That lass o lowries, p.7
That Lass o' Lowrie's, page 7
“I’ll be keerful, owd lass,” chuckled Sammy, taking his stick. “I’ll be keerful for th’ sake o’ th’ town.”
He made his way toward the village ale-house in the best of humors. Arriving at The Crown, he found a discussion in progress. Discussions were always being carried on there in fact, but this time it was not Craddock’s particular friends who were busy. There were grades even among the visitors at The Crown, and there were several grades below Sammy’s. The lowest was composed of the most disreputable of the colliers—men who with Lowrie at their head were generally in some mischief. It was these men who were talking together loudly this evening, and as usual, Lowrie was the loudest in the party. They did not seem to be quarrelling. Three or four sat round a table listening to Lowrie with black looks, and toward them Sammy glanced as he came in.
“What’s up in them fellys?” he asked of a friend.
“Summat’s wrong at th’ pit,” was the answer. “I canna mak’ out what mysen. Summat about one o’ th’ mesters as they’re out wi’. What’ll tha tak’, owdlad?”
“A pint o’ sixpenny.” And then with another sidelong glance at the debaters:
“They’re an ill set, that lot, an’ up to summat ill too, I’ll warrant. He’s not the reet soart, that Lowrie.”
Lowrie was a burly fellow with a surly, sometimes ferocious, expression. Drink made a madman of him, and among his companions he ruled supreme through sheer physical superiority. The man who quarrelled with him might be sure of broken bones, if not of something worse. He leaned over the table now, scowling as he spoke.
“I’ll ha’ no lads meddlin’ an’settin’ th’ mesters agen me,” Craddock heard him say. “Them on yo’ as loikes to tak’ cheek mun tak’ it, I’m too owd a bird fur that soart o’ feed. It sticks i’ my crop. Look thee out o’ that theer window, Jock, and watch who passes. I’ll punse that lad into th’ middle o’ next week, as sure as he goes by.”
“Well,” commented one of his companions, “aw I’ve gotten to say is, as tha’ll be loike to ha’ a punse on it, fur he’s a strappin’ youngster, an’ noan so easy feart.”
“Da’st ta mean to say as I conna do it?” demanded Lowrie fiercely.
“Nay—nay, mon,” was the pacific and rather hasty reply. “Nowt o’ th’ soart. I on’y meant as it was na ivvery mon as could.”
“Aye, to be sure!” said Sammy testily to his friend. “That’s th’ game is it? Theer’s a feight on hond. That’s reet, my lads, lay in thy beer, an’ mak’ dom’d fools o’ thysens, an’ tha’lt get a chance to sleep on th’ soft side o’ a paving-stone i’ th’ lock-ups.”
He had been a fighting man himself in his young days, and had prided himself particularly upon “showing his muscle,” in Riggan parlance, but he had never been such a man as Lowrie. His comparatively gentlemanly encounters with personal friends had always been fair and square, and in many cases had laid the foundation for future toleration, even amiability. He had never hesitated to “tak’ a punse” at an offending individual, but he had always been equally ready to shake hands when all was over, and in some cases, when having temporarily closed a companion’s eyes in the heat of an argument, he had been known to lead him to the counter of “th’ Public,” and bestow nectar upon him in the form of “sixpenny.” But of Lowrie, even the fighting community, which was the community predominating in Riggan, could not speak so well. He was “ill-farrant,” and revengeful,—ready to fight, but not ready to forgive. He had been known to bear a grudge, and remember it, when it had been forgotten by other people. His record was not a clean one, and accordingly he was not a favorite of Sammy Craddock’s.
A short time afterward somebody passed the window facing the street, and Lowrie started up with an oath.
“Theer he is!” he exclaimed. “ Now fur it. I thowt he’d go this road. I’ll see what tha’s getten to say fur thysen, my lad.”
He was out in the street almost before Craddock and his companion had time to reach the open window, and he had stopped the passer-by, who paused to confront him haughtily.
“Why!” cried Sammy, slapping his knee, “I’m dom’d if it is na th’ Lunnon engineer chap.”
Fergus Derrick stood before his enemy with anything but a propitiatory air. That this brutal fellow who had caused him trouble enough already, should interfere with his very progress in the street, was too much for his high spirit to bear.
“I comn out here,” said Lowrie, “to see if tha had owt to say to me.”
“Then,” replied Fergus, “you may go in again, for I have nothing.”
Lowrie drew a step nearer to him.
“Art tha sure o’ that?” he demanded. “Tha wert so ready wi’ thy gab about th’ Davys this mornin’ I thowt happen tha’d loike to say summat more if a mon ud gi’ yo’ a chance. But happen agen yo’re one o’ th’ soart as sticks to gab an’ goes no further.”
Derrick’s eyes blazed, he flung out his open hand in a contemptuous gesture.
“Out of the way,” he said, in a suppressed voice, “and let me pass.”
But Lowrie only came nearer.
“Nay, but I wunnot,” he said, “until I’ve said my say. Tha wert goin’ to mak’ me obey th’ rules or let th’ mesters hear on it, wert tha? Tha wert goin’ to keep thy eye on me, an’ report when th’ toime come, wert tha? Well, th’ toime has na come yet, and now I’m goin’ to gi’ thee a thrashin’.”
He sprang upon him with a ferocity which would have flung to the earth any man who had not possessed the thews and sinews of a lion. Derrick managed to preserve his equilibrium. After the first blow, he could not control himself. Naturally, he had longed to thrash this fellow soundly often enough, and now that he had been attacked by him, he felt forbearance to be no virtue. Brute force could best conquer brute nature. He felt that he would rather die a thousand deaths than be conquered himself. He put forth all his strength in an effort that awakened the crowd—which had speedily surrounded them, Owd Sammy among the number—to wild admiration.
“Get thee unto it, lad,” cried the old sinner in an ecstasy of approbation, “Get thee unto it! Tha’rt shapin’ reet I see. Why, I’m dom’d,” slapping his knee as usual—“I’m dom’d if he is na goin’ to mill Dan Lowrie!”
To the amazement of the by-standers, it became evident in a very short time, that Lowrie had met his match. Finding it necessary to defend himself, Derrick was going to do something more. The result was that the breathless struggle for the mastery ended in a crash, and Lowrie lay upon the pavement, Fergus Derrick standing above him pale, fierce and panting.
“Look to him,” he said to the men about him, in a white heat, “and remember that the fellow provoked me to it. If he tries it again, I will try again too.” And he turned on his heel and walked away.
He had been far more tolerant, even in his wrath, than most men would have been, but he had disposed of his enemy effectually. The fellow lay stunned upon the ground. In his fall, he had cut his head upon the curbstone, and the blood streamed from the wound when his companions crowded near, and raised him. Owd Sammy Craddock offered no assistance; he leaned upon his stick, and looked on with grim satisfaction.
“Tha’s getten what tha deserved, owd lad,” he said in an undertone. “An’ tha’st getten no more. I’st owe th’ Lunnon chap one fro’ this on. He’s done a bit o’ work as I’d ha’ takken i’ hond mysen long ago, if I’d ha’ been thirty years younger, an’ a bit less stiff i’ th’ hinges.”
Fergus had not escaped without hurt himself, and the first angry excitement over, he began to feel so sharp an ache in his wrist, that he made up his mind to rest for a few minutes at Grace’s lodgings before going home. It would be wise to know the extent of his injury.
Accordingly, he made his appearance in the parlor, somewhat startling his friend, who was at supper.
“My dear Fergus!” exclaimed Paul. “How excited you look!”
Derrick flung himself into a chair, feeling rather dubious about his strength, all at once.
“Do I?” he said, with a faint smile. “Don’t be alarmed, Grace, I have no doubt I look as I feel. I have been having a brush with that scoundrel Lowrie, and I believe something has happened to my wrist.”
He made an effort to raise his left hand and failed, succumbing to a pain so intense that it forced an exclamation from him.
“I thought it was a sprain,” he said, when he recovered himself, “but it is a job for a surgeon. It is broken.”
And so it proved under the examination of the nearest practitioner, and then Derrick remembered a wrench and shock which he had felt in Lowrie’s last desperate effort to recover himself. Some of the small bones had broken.
Grace called in the surgeon himself, and stood by during the strapping and bandaging with an anxious face, really suffering as much as Derrick, perhaps a trifle more. He would not hear of his going home that night, but insisted that he should remain where he was.
“I can sleep on the lounge myself,” he protested. “And though I shall be obliged to leave you for half an hour, I assure you I shall not be away a longer time.”
“Where are you going?” asked Derrick.
“To the Rectory. Mr. Barholm sent a message an hour ago, that he wished to see me upon business.”
Fergus agreed to remain. When Grace was on the point of leaving the room, he turned his head.
“You are going to the Rectory, you say?” he remarked.
“Yes.”
“Do you think you shall see Anice?”
“It is very probable,” confusedly.
“I merely thought I would ask you not to mention this affair to her,” said Derrick. The Curate’s face assumed an expression at that moment, which it was well that his friend did not see. A shadow of bewilderment and anxiety fell upon it and the color faded away.
“You think—” faltered he.
“Well, I thought that perhaps it would shock or alarm her,” answered Derrick. “She might fancy it to have been a more serious matter than it was.”
“Very well. I think you are right, perhaps.”
9. The News at the Rectory
If she did not hear of the incident from Grace, Anice heard of it from another quarter.
The day following, the village was ringing with the particulars of “th’ feight betwix’ th’ Lunnon chap an’ Dan Lowrie.”
Having occasion to go out in the morning, Mr. Barholm returned to luncheon in a state of great excitement.
“Dear me!” he began, almost as soon as he entered the room. “Bless my life! what ill-conditioned animals these colliers are!”
Anice and her mother regarded him questionably.
“What do you suppose I have just heard?” he went on. “Mr. Derrick has had a very unpleasant affair with one of the men who work under him—no other than that Lowrie—the young woman’s father. They are a bad lot it seems, and Lowrie had a spite against Derrick, and attacked him openly, and in the most brutal manner, as he was going through the village yesterday evening.”
“Are you sure?” cried Anice. “Oh! papa,” and she put her hand upon the table as if she needed support.
“There is not the slightest doubt,” was the answer, “everybody is talking about it. It appears that it is one of the strictest rules of the mine that the men shall keep their Davy lamps locked while they are in the pit—indeed they are directed to deliver up their keys before going down, and Derrick having strong suspicions that Lowrie had procured a false key, gave him a rather severe rating about it, and threatened to report him, and the end of the matter was the trouble of yesterday. The wonder is, that Derrick came off conqueror. They say he gave the fellow a sound thrashing. There is a good deal of force in that young man,” he said, rubbing his hands. “There is a good deal of—of pluck in him—as we used to say at Oxford.”
Anice shrank from her father’s evident enjoyment, feeling a mixture of discomfort and dread. Suppose the tables had turned the other way. Suppose it had been Lowrie who had conquered. She had heard of horrible things done by such men in their blind rage. Lowrie would not have paused where Derrick did. The newspapers told direful tales of such struggles ending in the conquered being stamped upon, maimed, beaten out of life.
“It is very strange,” she said, almost impatiently. “Mr. Grace must have known, and yet he said nothing. I wish he would come.”
As chance had it, the door opened just at that moment, and the Curate was announced. He was obliged to drop in at all sorts of unceremonious hours, and to-day some school business had brought him. The Rector turned to greet him with unwonted warmth. “The very man we want,” he exclaimed. “Anice was just wishing for you. We have been talking of this difficulty between Derrick and Lowrie, and we are anxious to hear what you know about it.”
Grace glanced at Anice uneasily.
“We wanted to know if Mr. Derrick was quite uninjured,” she said. “Papa did not hear that he was hurt at all, but you will be able to tell us.”
There was an expression in her upraised eyes the Curate had never seen there.
“He met with an injury,” he answered, “but it was not a severe one. He came to my rooms last night and remained with me. His wrist is fractured.”
He was not desirous of discussing the subject very freely, it was evident, even to Mr. Barholm, who was making an effort to draw him out. He seemed rather to avoid it, after he had made a brief statement of what he knew. In his secret heart, he shrank from it with a dread far more nervous than Anice’s. He had doubts of his own concerning Lowrie’s action in the future. Thus the Rector’s excellent spirits grated on him, and he said but little.
Anice was silent too. After luncheon, however, she went into a small conservatory adjoining the room, and before Grace took his departure, she called him to her.
“It is very strange that you did not tell us last night,” she said; “why did you not?”
“It was Derrick’s forethought for you,” he answered. “He was afraid that the story would alarm you, and as I agreed with him that it might, I remained silent. I might as well have spoken, it appears.”
“He thought it would frighten me?” she said.
“Yes.”
“Has this accident made him ill?”
“No, not ill, though the fracture is a very painful and inconvenient one.”
“I am very sorry; please tell him so. And, Mr. Grace, when he feels able to come here, I have something to say to him.”
Derrick marched into the Barholm parlor that very night with his arm in splints and bandages.
It was a specially pleasant and homelike evening to him; Mrs. Barholm’s gentle heart went out to the handsome invalid. She had never had a son of her own, though it must be confessed she had yearned for one, strong and deep as was her affection for her girl.
But it was not till Derrick bade Anice good-night, that he heard what she intended to say to him. When he was going, just as he stepped across the threshold of the entrance door, she stopped him.
“Wait a minute, if you will be so good,” she said, “I have something to ask of you.”
He paused, half smiling.
“I thought you had forgotten,” he returned.
“Oh! no, I had not forgotten,” she answered. “But it will only seem a very slight thing to you perhaps.” Then she began again, after a pause. “If you please, do not think I am a coward,” she said.
“A coward!” he repeated.
“You were afraid to let Mr. Grace tell me about your accident last night and though it was very kind of you, I did not like it. You must not think that because these things are new and shock me, I am not strong enough to trust in. I am stronger than I look.”
“My dear Miss Barholm,” he protested, “I am sure of that. I ought to have known better. Forgive me if—”
“Oh,” she interposed, “you must not blame yourself. But I wanted to ask you to be so kind as to think better of me than that. I want to be sure that if ever I can be of use to anybody, you will not stop to think of the danger or annoyance. Such a time may never come, but if it does—”
“I shall certainly remember what you have said,” Fergus ended for her.
10. On the Knoll Road
The moon was shining brightly when he stepped into the open road—so brightly that he could see every object far before him unless where the trees cast their black shadows, which seemed all the blacker for the light. “What a grave little creature she is!” he was saying to himself. But he stopped suddenly; under one of the trees by the roadside some one was standing motionless; as he approached, the figure stepped boldly out into the moonlight before him. It was a woman.
“Dunnot be afeard,” she said, in a low, hurried voice. “ It’s me, mester—it’s Joan Lowrie.”
“Joan Lowrie!” he said with surprise. “What has brought you out at this hour, and whom are you waiting for?”
“I’m waiting for yo’rsen,” she answered.
“For me?”
“Aye; I ha’ summat to say to you.”
She looked about her hurriedly.
“Yo’d better come into th’ shade o’ them trees,” she said, “I dunnot want to gi’ any one a chance to see me nor yo’ either.”
It was impossible that he should not hesitate a moment. If she had been forced into entrapping him!
She made a sharp gesture.
“I am na goin’ to do no harm,” she said. “Yo’ may trust me. It’s th’ other way about.”
“I ask pardon,” he said, feeling heartily ashamed of himself the next instant, “but you know—”
“Aye,” impatiently, as they passed into the shadow, “I know, or I should na be here now.”
A moonbeam, finding its way through a rift in the boughs and falling on her face, showed him that she was very pale.
“Yo’ wonder as I’m here at aw,” she said, not meeting his eyes as she spoke, “but yo’ did me a good turn onct, an’ I ha’ na had so many done me i’ my loife as I can forget one on ’em. I’m come here—fur I may as well mak’ as few words on’t as I con—I come here to tell yo’ to tak’ heed o’ Dan Lowrie.”
