Essential Novelists - Elizabeth Gaskell. Elizabeth Gaskell
yo've enough for th' childer and th' missus. So dunnot turn faint-heart, and go to th' tyrants a-seeking work.'
The man turned round at these words,—turned round a face so white, and gaunt, and tear-furrowed, and hopeless, that its very calm forced Margaret to weep. 'Yo' know well, that a worser tyrant than e'er th' masters were says "Clem to death, and see 'em a' clem to death, ere yo' dare go again th' Union." Yo' know it well, Nicholas, for a' yo're one on 'em. Yo' may be kind hearts, each separate; but once banded together, yo've no more pity for a man than a wild hunger-maddened wolf.'
Nicholas had his hand on the lock of the door—he stopped and turned round on Boucher, close following:
'So help me God! man alive—if I think not I'm doing best for thee, and for all on us. If I'm going wrong when I think I'm going right, it's their sin, who ha' left me where I am, in my ignorance. I ha' thought till my brains ached,—Beli' me, John, I have. An' I say again, there's no help for us but having faith i' th' Union. They'll win the day, see if they dunnot!'
Not one word had Margaret or Bessy spoken. They had hardly uttered the sighing, that the eyes of each called to the other to bring up from the depths of her heart. At last Bessy said,
'I never thought to hear father call on God again. But yo' heard him say, "So help me God!"'
'Yes!' said Margaret. 'Let me bring you what money I can spare,—let me bring you a little food for that poor man's children. Don't let them know it comes from any one but your father. It will be but little.'
Bessy lay back without taking any notice of what Margaret said. She did not cry—she only quivered up her breath,
'My heart's drained dry o' tears,' she said. 'Boucher's been in these days past, a telling me of his fears and his troubles. He's but a weak kind o' chap, I know, but he's a man for a' that; and tho' I've been angry, many a time afore now, wi' him an' his wife, as knew no more nor him how to manage, yet, yo' see, all folks isn't wise, yet God lets 'em live—ay, an' gives 'em some one to love, and be loved by, just as good as Solomon. An', if sorrow comes to them they love, it hurts 'em as sore as e'er it did Solomon. I can't make it out. Perhaps it's as well such a one as Boucher has th' Union to see after him. But I'd just like for to see th' mean as make th' Union, and put 'em one by one face to face wi' Boucher. I reckon, if they heard him, they'd tell him (if I cotched 'em one by one), he might go back and get what he could for his work, even if it weren't so much as they ordered.'
Margaret sat utterly silent. How was she ever to go away into comfort and forget that man's voice, with the tone of unutterable agony, telling more by far than his words of what he had to suffer? She took out her purse; she had not much in it of what she could call her own, but what she had she put into Bessy's hand without speaking.
'Thank yo'. There's many on 'em gets no more, and is not so bad off,—leastways does not show it as he does. But father won't let 'em want, now he knows. Yo' see, Boucher's been pulled down wi' his childer,—and her being so cranky, and a' they could pawn has gone this last twelvemonth. Yo're not to think we'd ha' letten 'em clem, for all we're a bit pressed oursel'; if neighbours doesn't see after neighbours, I dunno who will.' Bessy seemed almost afraid lest Margaret should think they had not the will, and, to a certain degree, the power of helping one whom she evidently regarded as having a claim upon them. 'Besides,' she went on, 'father is sure and positive the masters must give in within these next few days,—that they canna hould on much longer. But I thank yo' all the same,—I thank yo' for mysel', as much as for Boucher, for it just makes my heart warm to yo' more and more.'
Bessy seemed much quieter to-day, but fearfully languid and exhausted. As she finished speaking, she looked so faint and weary that Margaret became alarmed.
'It's nout,' said Bessy. 'It's not death yet. I had a fearfu' night wi' dreams—or somewhat like dreams, for I were wide awake—and I'm all in a swounding daze to-day,—only yon poor chap made me alive again. No! it's not death yet, but death is not far off. Ay! Cover me up, and I'll may be sleep, if th' cough will let me. Good night—good afternoon, m'appen I should say—but th' light is dim an' misty to-day.'
Chapter XX
Men And Gentlemen
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'OLD AND YOUNG, BOY, let 'em all eat, I have it;
Let 'em have ten tire of teeth a-piece, I care not.'
ROLLO, DUKE OF NORMANDY.
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MARGARET WENT HOME so painfully occupied with what she had heard and seen that she hardly knew how to rouse herself up to the duties which awaited her; the necessity for keeping up a constant flow of cheerful conversation for her mother, who, now that she was unable to go out, always looked to Margaret's return from the shortest walk as bringing in some news.
'And can your factory friend come on Thursday to see you dressed?'
'She was so ill I never thought of asking her,' said Margaret, dolefully.
'Dear! Everybody is ill now, I think,' said Mrs. Hale, with a little of the jealousy which one invalid is apt to feel of another. 'But it must be very sad to be ill in one of those little back streets.' (Her kindly nature prevailing, and the old Helstone habits of thought returning.) 'It's bad enough here. What could you do for her, Margaret? Mr. Thornton has sent me some of his old port wine since you went out. Would a bottle of that do her good, think you?'
'No, mamma! I don't believe they are very poor,—at least, they don't speak as if they were; and, at any rate, Bessy's illness is consumption—she won't want wine. Perhaps, I might take her a little preserve, made of our dear Helstone fruit. No! there's another family to whom I should like to give—Oh mamma, mamma! how am I to dress up in my finery, and go off and away to smart parties, after the sorrow I have seen to-day?' exclaimed Margaret, bursting the bounds she had preordained for herself before she came in, and telling her mother of what she had seen and heard at Higgins's cottage.
It distressed Mrs. Hale excessively. It made her restlessly irritated till she could do something. She directed Margaret to pack up a basket in the very drawing-room, to be sent there and then to the family; and was almost angry with her for saying, that it would not signify if it did not go till morning, as she knew Higgins had provided for their immediate wants, and she herself had left money with Bessy. Mrs. Hale called her unfeeling for saying this; and never gave herself breathing-time till the basket was sent out of the house. Then she said:
'After all, we may have been doing wrong. It was only the last time Mr. Thornton was here that he said, those were no true friends who helped to prolong the struggle by assisting the turn outs. And this Boucher-man was a turn-out, was he not?'
The question was referred to Mr. Hale by his wife, when he came up-stairs, fresh from giving a lesson to Mr. Thornton, which had ended in conversation, as was their wont. Margaret did not care if their gifts had prolonged the strike; she did not think far enough for that, in her present excited state.
Mr. Hale listened, and tried to be as calm as a judge; he recalled all that had seemed so clear not half-an-hour before, as it came out of Mr. Thornton's lips; and then he made an unsatisfactory compromise. His wife and daughter had not only done quite right in this instance, but he did not see for a moment how they could have done otherwise. Nevertheless, as a general rule, it was very true what Mr. Thornton said, that as the strike, if prolonged, must end in the masters' bringing hands from a distance (if, indeed, the final result were not, as it had often been before, the invention of some machine which would diminish the need of hands at all), why, it was clear enough that the kindest thing was to refuse all help which might bolster them up in their folly. But, as to this Boucher, he would go and see him the first thing in the morning, and try and find out what could be done for him.
Mr.