rose a man, his voice shaking with emotion. "It's not true, Mr. Crouch, sure—ly!"
"It is, Vincent. Wilson and King are going to wind up. It will be announced next week."
"Mercy help us! There'll be forty more hands throwed out! What's to become of us all?"
A dead silence fell on the room. Vincent broke it. Hope is strong in the human heart. "Mr. Crouch, I don't think it can be true. Our wages was all paid up to-night. And we have not heard a breath on't."
"I know all that," said Stephen Crouch. "I know where the money came from to pay them. It came from Mr. Ashley."
The assertion astonished the room. "From Mr. Ashley! Did he tell it abroad?"
"He tell it!" indignantly returned Stephen Crouch. "Mr. Ashley is an honourable man. No. Wilson and King have a tattler too near to them; that's how it came out. Not but what it would have been known all over Helstonleigh on Monday, all particulars. Every sixpence, pretty near, that Wilson and King have, is locked up in their stock. They expected remittances by the London mail this morning, and they did not come. They went to the bank. The bank was shy, and would not make advances; and they had nothing in hand for wages. They went to Mr. Ashley and told him their perplexity, and he drew a cheque. The bank cashed that, with a bow. And if it had not been for Mr. Ashley, Ned Vincent, you and the rest of their hands would have gone home to-night with empty pockets."
"Will Mr. Ashley lose the money?"
"Not he. He knew there was no danger of that, when he lent it. Nobody will lose by Wilson and King. They have more than enough to pay everybody in full; only their money's locked up."
"Why are they giving up?"
"Because they can't keep on. They have been losing a long while. What do you ask—what will they do? They must do as others have done before them, who have been unable to keep on. If Wilson and King had given up ten years ago, they had then each a nice little bit of property to retire upon. But it has been sunk since. There are too many others in this city in the same ease."
"And what's to become of us hands that's throwed out?" asked Vincent, returning to his own personal grievance.
"You must try and get taken on somewhere else, Vincent," observed Stephen Crouch.
"There ain't a better cutter than Ned Vincent going," cried another voice. "He won't wait long."
"I don't know about that," returned Vincent gloomily. "The masters is overdone with hands."
"Of all the bad luck as ever fell upon a town, the opening of the ports to them foreign French was the worst for Helstonleigh," broke in the intemperate voice of Fisher.
"Hold th' tongue, Fisher!" exclaimed a sensible voice. "We won't get into them discussions again. Didn't we go over 'em, night after night, and year after year, till we were heart-sick?—and what did they ever bring us but ill-feeling? It's done, and it can't be undone. The ports be open, and they'll never be closed again."
"Did the opening of 'em ruin the trade of Helstonleigh, or didn't it? Answer me that," said Fisher.
"It did. We know it to our cost," was the sad answer. "But there's no help for it."
"Oh," returned Fisher ironically. "I thought you were going to hold out that the opening of 'em was a boon to the place, and the keeping 'em open a blessing. That 'ud be a new dodge. Why do they keep 'em open?"
"Just hark at Fisher!" said Mr. Buffle in a mincing tone. "He wants to know why Government keeps open the British ports. Don't every dozen of gloves that comes into the country pay a heavy duty? Is it likely Government would give up that, Fisher?"
"What did they do afore they had it?" roared Fisher. "If they did without the duty then, they could do without it now."
"I have heered of some gents as never tasted sugar," returned Mr. Buffle; "but I never heered of one, who had the liking for it, as was willing to forego the use of it. It's a case in pint; the Government have tasted the sweets of the glove-duty, and they stick to it."
"Avaricious wolves!" growled Fisher. "But you are a fool, dandy, for all that. What's a bit of paltry duty, alongside of our wants? If a few of them great Government lords had to go on empty stomachs for a month, they'd know what the opening of ports means."
"In all political changes, such as this, certain localities must suffer," broke in the quiet voice of Stephen Crouch. "It will be the means of increasing commerce wonderfully; and we, that the measure crushed, must be content to suffer for the general good. The effects to us can never be undone. I know what you say, Fisher," he continued, silencing Fisher by a gesture. "I know that the ports might be re-closed to-morrow, if Government so willed it. But it could not undo for us what has been done. It could not repair the ruin that was wrought on Helstonleigh. It could not reinstate firms in business; or refund to the masters their wasted capital; or collect the hands it scattered over the country, to find a bit of work, to beg, or to starve; or bring the dead back to life. It could not do any of this. Neither would it restore a flourishing trade to those of us who are left."
"What's that last, Crouch?"
"It never would," emphatically repeated Stephen Crouch. "A shattered trade cannot be brought together again. It is like a shattered glass: you may mourn over the pieces, but you cannot put them together. Believe me, or not, as you please, my friends, but the only thing remaining is, to make the best of what is left to us. There are other trades a deal worse off than we are."
"I have talked to ye about that there move—a strike," resumed Fisher, after a pause. "We shall get no good till we try it–"
"Fisher, don't you be a fool and show it," was the imperative interruption of Stephen Crouch. "I have explained to you till I am tired, what would be the effects of a strike. It would just finish you bad workmen up, and send you and your children into the nearest dry ditch for a floor, with the open skies above you for a roof."
"We have never tried a strike in Helstonleigh," answered Fisher, holding to his own opinion.
"And I trust we never shall," returned the intelligent foreman. "Other trades may have their strikes if they choose, and it's not our business to find fault with them for it; but the glove trade has hitherto kept itself aloof from strikes, and it's to be hoped it always will. You cannot understand how a strike works, Joe Fisher, or you'd not let your head be running on it."
"Others' heads be running on it as well as mine, Master Crouch," said Fisher, nodding significantly.
"It is not improbable," was the equable rejoinder of Stephen Crouch. "Go and strike next week, half a dozen of you. I mean the operatives of half a dozen firms."
"Every firm in the place must strike," interrupted Fisher hastily. "A few on us doing it would only make bad worse."
Stephen Crouch smiled. "Exactly. But the difficulty, Fisher, will be, that all the firms won't strike. Ask the men in our firm to strike; ask those in Ashley's; ask others that we could name—and what would their answer be? Why, that they know when they are well off. Suppose, for argument's sake, that we did all strike; suppose all the hands in Helstonleigh struck next Monday morning, and the manufactories had to be closed? Who would have the worst of it?—we or the masters?"
"The masters," returned Fisher in an obstinate tone.
"No. The masters have good houses over their heads, and their bankers' books to supply their wants while they are waiting—and their orders are not so great that they need fear much pressure on that score. The London houses would dispatch a few extra orders to Paris and Grenoble, and the masters here might enjoy a nice little trip to the sea-side while our senses were coming back to us. But where should we be? Out at elbows, out at pocket, out at heart; some starving, some in the workhouse. If you want to avoid those contingencies, Joe Fisher, you'll keep from strikes."
Fisher answered by an ironical cheer. "Here, missis," said he to the landlady, who was then passing him, "let's have another pint, after that."
"That'll make nine pints you owe for since Monday night, Joe Fisher," responded the landlady.
"What if I do?" grunted Fisher irascibly. "I am able to pay. I ain't out of work."
CHAPTER