IN WHICH MANIWEL DRAKE MAKES A SUGGESTION
THE cottage had its full complement of occupants when Jagger entered,
and the noise of his “bass” as he dropped it on the stone floor and
pushed it noisily with his foot alongside an old-fashioned chest of
drawers that stood against the wall, caused each of them to look up.
Hannah, his sister and the family housekeeper, turned again at once to
the grid-iron on which something was grilling for the evening meal; but
the father’s eyes fixed themselves on the young man’s face.
“That’s right, lad,” he said, as he let the weekly paper he had been
reading fall to his knees; “take it out of t’ bass! It’s as meek as
Moses and’ll say naught. Who’s been treading on your corns this time?”
“T’ bass may lie there while I find another job,” said Jagger surlily,
untying his apron as he spoke. “I’m paid off. Baldwin’s stalled, and so
am I.”
Hannah said nothing, but an exclamation came from the other side of the
hearth where Grannie Drake was busy with her darning needles—a wordless
exclamation produced by the tip of the tongue and the roof of the mouth
in conjunction; and the old woman rested her hands on her lap whilst she
turned her spectacled eyes on her grandson.
“Stalled of each other, are you?” It was the father who spoke and there
was humour in his voice and in the eyes that scrutinised the other’s
face. “Well, bad news’ll keep. Get you washed and we’ll have our tea;
and then if you think you’ve got to make all our coffins ’cause
Baldwin’s sacked you I’ll help you to take t’ measures.”
Jagger’s face clouded more heavily and Hannah stole a glance at it as
her brother opened the scullery door; but he avoided her gaze; and she
wheeled round and looked into her father’s eyes with a smile on her lips
that was both question and comment. Maniwel had picked up his paper
again and was apparently engaged with its contents but the smile reached
his consciousness and he glanced up and met his daughter’s eyes.
“You two ought to have changed places,” he said with grim pleasantry,
“Jagger’d have made a good lass.”
“And me a fine lad!” she commented. “It can’t be helped; we’re as we
are.”
She turned the kidneys on to a hot dish and the good smell filled the
room. “I could almost wish it was Baldwin I had on t’ bars,” she
remarked and her father laughed.
“According to t’ Book, lass, t’ best way would be to heap t’ fire on his
head and try to melt his heart. Your grannie turns her nose up. You
think they’re getting t’ grid-iron ready for him in t’ hot place, eh
mother? Well, maybe they are; but that’s devil’s work, anyway.”
He tossed the newspaper into the window bottom as he spoke and drew his
chair up to the table. The sleeve of his right arm was pinned to his
coat, but if the defect were overlooked, he was a fine figure of a
man—tall, erect, broad-shouldered and well-proportioned. His hair and
beard were thick and only faintly streaked with grey, and the firm lips
and deep chin and straight nose, together with the placidly-playful
brown eyes, indexed a character that was at the same time virile and
sympathetic. In some respects the son was like him; but the mouth was
sulkier, the chin weaker, and the eyes lacked humour—you had to turn to
the daughter to find the father’s features reproduced more successfully,
though not his frame.
“It’ll blow over, softhead,” said Hannah, with sisterly candour as
Jagger made slow headway, staring moodily at his plate instead of
eating. “Get on with your tea before it goes cold. I wouldn’t miss a
good meal for t’ best man living; much less for one o’ t’ worst.”
“It isn’t going to blow over,” the young man burst out hotly. “If it
does there’ll be another storm before t’ week’s out and we shall have it
all to go through again. I’ve got just about to t’ far end, father, and
I may as well chuck it now as next week or next month.”
Maniwel raised his eyes for a moment and regarded his son steadily, but
all he said was:
“Get on with your tea as Hannah tells you. If you’ve got to fight
trouble never do it on an empty belly. Them kidneys are wasted on you.”
He himself was eating with evident enjoyment and making good progress in
spite of his handicap; and it was grannie who continued the
conversation.
“A bad lot is Baldwin Briggs, and the son and grandson of bad ’uns;
black-hearted as t’ bog and hard as t’ rock on Gordel; all for
theirselves, and ne’er troubling to put a fair face on i’ front o’ their
neighbours; and that mean they’d let crows pick their bones to save a
burying——”
They were strong words for such a thin, weak voice; and they conveyed
the impression of a strong will. The deeply seamed shrivelled face, in
which the sunken eyes were dim as unclean lanterns and the receding
mouth gave away the secret of tenantless gums, was that of a woman who
had ruled her household in her day, and with a firm hand. Her eyes were
fixed on her grandson and the jaw continued to move long after her son
interrupted her.
“Now come, mother,” said he, “let’s give Baldwin a rest. A bad ’un he
may be, but if badness was passed on from his grandfather same as t’
twist of his mouth and them nose-whiskers of his, he’s more to be pitied
than blamed. But trouble’s as you make it, and a poor seasoning for meat
at any time. Jagger’ll none burst if he bottles his for a while, so
we’ll just keep t’ cork in and enjoy what’s set before us, if you
please.”
Jagger made an impatient gesture; but catching the warning look in
Hannah’s eye restrained himself, and went on with his meal. Grannie,
however, ate little and was not to be silenced; indeed she was
apparently unconscious of the prohibition. The half-sightless eyes
stared into space as if she saw there the ghosts of the dead whom memory
had summoned.
“There was never but one son born to any Briggses. There mud be as many
as half a dozen lasses, and Keturah’s great-aunt, I bethink me, had
nine; but there was never more nor one lad in any o’ their families, and
he was always a Baldwin and always a bad ’un, and came to a bad end.”
Maniwel’s fist came down upon the table with a force that set all the
pots a-dancing.
“That’ll do, mother,” said he. “Give a dog a bad name and it’ll live up
to it. Baldwin isn’t dead yet, and there’s room for him to mend. Pour
your grannie out a cup more tea, Hannah, and keep her busy, or we shall
be having all t’ Briggses’ corpses for generations back laid aside o’ t’
table before we’ve finished.”
He began roughly but ended on a note of humour and the meal was
completed without further incident.
Then as grannie returned to her seat and Hannah cleared the table
Maniwel bade his son draw up to the hearth.
“Now,” he said, “let’s hear what’s been amiss between you and Baldwin.”
The look of strain and annoyance had never left the young man’s face,
and he scowled heavily, goaded by his father’s half bantering tone. His
long legs were thrust out on to the hearth, his hands were buried in his
trousers pockets, and his temper, like his limbs, was at full stretch.
“You think it’s same as it has been before,” he said sullenly—“we’ve
fallen out and we shall fall in again; but if he comes on his bended
knees I’ve finished with him. I’d sooner beg my bread or starve than
I’d——”
“Aye, aye,” interrupted his father. “You can cut out all t’
high-and-mighty, lad, and get down to bed-rock. What’s he sacked you
for?”
“For asking for a rise,” Jagger answered hotly. “I work hours and hours
overtime as you know well without as much as a ‘Thank-ye’ for my labour;
and t’ harder I work t’ less he thinks of me. I told him he was fond
enough of putting his claim in when he was man instead of master, and he
laughed in my face. He said he was for himself then and he’s for himself
now, and for once in his life he spoke t’ truth. But it didn’t end
there. He says I rob him because I won’t scamp my work and diddle his
customers; and that filled t’ cup up, and I brought my bass home. You
have it all there; he isn’t a man, he’s a devil.”
“Maybe he is,” the father replied coolly, “or if he isn’t he keeps a
lodging-house in his inside for them o’ that breed, same as most of us;
and they’re like as they’ve got t’ upper hand o’ t’ Briggses, as your
grannie says. However, we’ll keep to bed-rock—Baldwin’ll none come on
his bended knees; but if you were to bend your stiff neck and go to
him——.”
“I’ll see him hanged first!”
“Well, he keeps inside o’ t’ law, does Baldwin, and I doubt if they’ve
started making t’ rope ’at’ll hang him, so we’ll move on a step; what
are you thinking of doing?”
The frown on Jagger’s brow beetled the deep caverns of his eyes; but the
tone in which he replied that he supposed he must leave the village and
seek a job in the town, where jobs were plentiful and wages were
regulated by the unions, was not convincing.
“And what sort of a show would you make in a town?” Hannah’s voice broke
in. “You that has t’ moor in your blood! You’d choke! Ling doesn’t grow
on paved streets and it’s poor fishing you’ll get in a bath-room!”
“You can do without what you can’t get. Needs must when the devil
drives, as I told Baldwin. I shan’t be t’ first who’s left t’ village
and made his way in t’ town.”
“If you make your way in t’ town you’ll be t’ first i’ our family that
ever managed it,” said his father. “Not that I’m again’ you trying it,
mind you, if there isn’t a better way, though there is an old wife’s
tale that no Drake comes to any good that turns his back on t’ moor.”
“It’s true, Maniwel; God’s truth it is,” the old woman across the hearth
interposed sharply; “and no old wife’s tale, neither. Didn’t they bring
your Uncle Ben back with a stroke on him and all his money ’at he’d
piled up sunk like a rock i’ t’ Tarn; and him thankful for sup and bite
out o’ them he’d looked down on. And there was your great-uncle,
Rueben——”
“Aye, aye, mother,” her son broke in pleasantly; “and there was his
father before him, that they buried at t’ cross roads with a stake in
his inside and made a tale of. I know all t’ catalogue of shockers; but
I’m t’ wrong man to be frightened o’ boggards, and I could wish our
Jagger was. If t’ finger o’ duty pointed me to t’ town I’d follow it
same as Luther talked about if it rained boggards and I’d to wade
through ’em up to t’ waist, but I doubt if Jagger’s grit enough.”
“You’re over hard on him, father,” expostulated Hannah who was standing,
dish-cloth in hand, at the scullery-door; and her brother forced a
bitter laugh.
“What do I care how hard he is! I know he thinks I’m a milksop because I
haven’t his spirit, and don’t laugh when things go all wrong. But where
is there another thinks as he does ’at if you go straight all ’ll turn
out for t’ best? What has he to show for his belief but an empty
sleeve?”
A red flush surged over his neck and face as he completed the sentence;
and half-ashamed of his outburst he looked into his father’s face.
“Nay, lad, you’ve no ’casion to run t’ red flag up,” Maniwel replied;
but there was nothing bantering in his tone now, and his face had
sobered. “If we’d windows to our hearts you’d happen be capped to see
what there is inside o’ mine, both good and bad; but one thing you
_would_ find if you looked close—you’d find ’at my belief, as you call
it, had brought me a deal more than an empty sleeve, and you’d see
naught ’at I’m ashamed of in my thoughts of you.”
“You oughtn’t to have said that, Jagger,” said his sister reproachfully;
but her father waved the rebuke aside.
“I’d sooner a blain showed on his lip than fester under t’ skin, and
I’ve tried to learn you both to speak your minds. For twenty years I’ve
done my best to walk t’ street called Straight, and I’ve got it rooted
in my mind ’at there’s no better road. Baldwin favours t’ street called
Crook’d, as long as it isn’t _too_ crook’d, ’cause he thinks it’s a
short cut to t’ Land o’ Plenty. I think he’s mista’en; but whether he is
or no I should be sorry for any lad o’ mine to follow him; and that’s
why I’m glad ’at Jagger goes by t’ straight road even if he grumbles at
t’ ruts.”
There was just a hint of suspicion in the eyes Jagger turned on his
father’s face but what he saw there reassured him and his brow cleared a
little. His tone, however, was still gruff as he said:
“Crook’d ways seem to pay all right. They landed Baldwin’s feet in Mr.
Clegg’s shoes and put money in his purse; and t’ street called Straight
has done precious little for us. If it pays to do right, how is it that
you happened your accident and how is it I get sacked? I suppose it’ll
be made up to us i’ heaven!”
The suggestion was something less than a sneer, in that it conveyed a
want of understanding as honest as Job’s in similar, if more tragic,
circumstances, and the father read it as such.
“All I know about heaven,” he said, “and all I want to know, is ’at t’
street called Straight runs through it as well as to it, and if it
doesn’t put money in your purse it keeps t’ fountain sweet in your soul,
and that’s something. But walking straight doesn’t take t’ bite out o’
t’ teeth of a circ’lar saw when you run your thumb again’ it, and it
doesn’t take trouble out o’ life. All t’ same if you’re frightened o’
trouble you’re as like to meet with it on t’ crook’d road as on t’
straight.”
“Now look you here, lad,” he continued as his son made no reply; “if
you’ll get out o’ t’ cradle and give up supping dill-water, but stand on
your feet like a man I’ll help you to plan something out. I’m none for
you going back to Baldwin, though I don’t doubt he expects it; and I’m
none for you leaving t’ village unless you’re forced. You’re a moorman,
and t’ moor’s in your blood as Hannah says, same as it’s i’ mine. It’ll
call you and rive at your heart strings if you put t’ sea between you
and it. You’d hear t’ pipit ‘peep-peeping’ over t’ heather and t’
jackdaws cawing on Gordel; and you’d see t’ trout leaping i’ t’ beck and
t’ dippers plunging their white breasts into t’ water below t’ Cove if
you were in t’ thick o’ London streets——”
“And it’s a bad end you’d come to, Jagger. Some can do it and be no
worse for’t, but there’s naught but ill follows them Drakes that leaves
t’ moor; don’t ee do it, my lad!” Grannie’s voice was pleading, and her
eyes were troubled.
“Let’s hear what father has in his mind,” said Hannah who had joined the
group and drawn a chair up to the hearth. Then she turned to her father.
“You oughtn’t to plague him with talking of ‘dill-water’ and such like.
If it was me it ’ud get my back up.”
“Aye, right enough,” said Maniwel with a significance that the girl
resented though it left Jagger unmoved; “but I’ll get to t’ point.
There’s been a notion i’ my head for some time back ’at we happen
couldn’t do better than start i’ business for ourselves. There’s room
for two i’ t’ village, if one’s a small ’un, and small we should have to
be ’cause all t’ brass we should have ’ud be that three hundred ’at’s
lying out at interest wi’ John Clegg. But if Jagger’s willing I’ll call
it in, and we’ll fix up a bit of a shop and get to work. It’ll be a poor
do if between us we can’t make a living; for if I’ve got shut of an arm
I’ve kept my head, and that’ll come in handy when Jagger loses his. T’
big jobs’ll have to go to Baldwin ’cause we shan’t have neither machines
nor capital; but there’ll be enough little ’uns to keep some meal i’ t’
barrel, I’ll warrant. What think you, lad?”
A complete change had come over Jagger whilst his father was speaking
and the face was now that of another man. The brow became unbent and the
eyes mild and pleasant. He withdrew his hands from his pockets and
rubbed them together slowly like one who anticipates a satisfaction near
at hand.
“By gen, it’s a trump card! I’d give a dollar to see Baldwin’s face when
he hears tell what we’re doing! Jobs? There’ll be no lack of ’em. I
mayn’t have your headpiece for scheming out ways and means, but Baldwin
hasn’t a man in his shop ’at can come near me at my job, and there’s
more than him knows it. It’ll serve the old lickpenny right, and teach
him not to rob widows. Where’ll we find a shop?”
Maniwel looked at him steadily for a moment or two, and Hannah watched
her father’s face, knowing what he was thinking.
“When folks are in a hurry to swallow they have to have their meat
minced for ’em. It ’ud suit me better, lad, if you’d get off spoon-food,
and begin to chew for yourself. You’ve jumped at this plan o’ mine same
as a bairn at a rattle. You’d better sleep on it, and then we’ll talk
about t’ shop. But if we do start for ourselves it shall be in t’ street
called Straight, anyway. Baldwin’s for himself all t’ way through; we’ll
be for ourselves and company.”
Hannah turned to look at her brother; but it was evident he had only
partly heard his father’s remarks, being engaged with his own thoughts;
and her brow bent into an expression of impatience.