"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.
Margaret went home so painfully occupied with what she had heard andseen that she hardly knew how to rouse herself up to the duties whichawaited her; the necessity for keeping up a constant flow of cheerfulconversation for her mother, who, now that she was unable to go out,always looked to Margaret"s return from the shortest walk as bringing insome 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 thejealousy which one invalid is apt to feel of another. "But it must be verysad to be ill in one of those little back streets." (Her kindly natureprevailing, and the old Helstone habits of thought returning.) "It"s badenough here. What could you do for her, Margaret? Mr. Thornton hassent me some of his old port wine since you went out. Would a bottle ofthat do her good, think you?"
"No, mamma! I don"t believe they are very poor,--at least, they don"tspeak as if they were; and, at any rate, Bessy"s illness is consumption-shewon"t want wine. Perhaps, I might take her a little preserve, made ofour dear Helstone fruit. No! there"s another family to whom I shouldlike 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 today?"
exclaimed Margaret, bursting the bounds she had preordained forherself before she came in, and telling her mother of what she had seenand heard at Higgins"s cottage.
It distressed Mrs. Hale excessively. It made her restlessly irritated tillshe could do something. She directed Margaret to pack up a basket inthe very drawing-room, to be sent there and then to the family; and wasalmost angry with her for saying, that it would not signify if it did notgo till morning, as she knew Higgins had provided for their immediatewants, and she herself had left money with Bessy. Mrs. Hale called herunfeeling for saying this; and never gave herself breathing-time till thebasket 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 helpedto prolong the struggle by assisting the turn outs. And this Boucher-manwas a turn-out, was he not?"
The question was referred to Mr. Hale by his wife, when he came upstairs,fresh from giving a lesson to Mr. Thornton, which had ended inconversation, as was their wont. Margaret did not care if their gifts hadprolonged the strike; she did not think far enough for that, in her presentexcited state.
Mr. Hale listened, and tried to be as calm as a judge; he recalled all thathad seemed so clear not half-an-hour before, as it came out of Mr.
Thornton"s lips; and then he made an unsatisfactory compromise. Hiswife and daughter had not only done quite right in this instance, but hedid 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 handsfrom a distance (if, indeed, the final result were not, as it had often beenbefore, the invention of some machine which would diminish the needof hands at all), why, it was clear enough that the kindest thing was torefuse all help which might bolster them up in their folly. But, as to thisBoucher, he would go and see him the first thing in the morning, and tryand find out what could be done for him.
Mr. Hale went the next morning, as he proposed. He did not findBoucher at home, but he had a long talk with his wife; promised to askfor an Infirmary order for her; and, seeing the plenty provided by Mrs.
Hale, and somewhat lavishly used by the children, who were mastersdown-stairs in their father"s absence, he came back with a moreconsoling and cheerful account than Margaret had dared to hope for;indeed, what she had said the night before had prepared her father for somuch worse a state of things that, by a reaction of his imagination, hedescribed all as better than it really was.
"But I will go again, and see the man himself," said Mr. Hale. "I hardlyknow as yet how to compare one of these houses with our Helstonecottages. I see furniture here which our labourers would never havethought of buying, and food commonly used which they would considerluxuries; yet for these very families there seems no other resource, nowthat their weekly wages are stopped, but the pawn-shop. One had needto learn a different language, and measure by a different standard, uphere in Milton."
Bessy, too, was rather better this day. Still she was so weak that sheseemed to have entirely forgotten her wish to see Margaret dressed--if,indeed, that had not been the feverish desire of a half-delirious state.
Margaret could not help comparing this strange dressing of hers, to gowhere she did not care to be--her heart heavy with various anxieties-withthe old, merry, girlish toilettes that she and Edith had performedscarcely more than a year ago. Her only pleasure now in decking herselfout was in thinking that her mother would take delight in seeing herdressed. She blushed when Dixon, throwing the drawing-room dooropen, made an appeal for admiration.
"Miss Hale looks well, ma"am,--doesn"t she? Mrs. Shaw"s coral couldn"thave come in better. It just gives the right touch of colour, ma"am.
Otherwise, Miss Margaret, you would have been too pale."
Margaret"s black hair was too thick to be plaited; it needed rather to betwisted round and round, and have its fine silkiness compressed intomassive coils, that encircled her head like a crown, and then weregathered into a large spiral knot behind. She kept its weight together bytwo large coral pins, like small arrows for length. Her white silk sleeveswere looped up with strings of the same material, and on her neck, justbelow the base of her curved and milk-white throat, there lay heavycoral beads.
"Oh, Margaret! how I should like to be going with you to one of the oldBarrington assemblies,--taking you as Lady Beresford used to take me."