The year’s work had been most encouraging to Marsten. He had come to a cordial understanding with many of the Unions, not only at home, but in America and the colonies, and had formed an active alliance with several societies of workingmen in the United Kingdom. Times were good, business brisk, and comparatively few men were out of employment. All this inspired confidence in the success of a strike, for the demands of men are more certain to be listened to with attention when the market is rising than when it is falling. There would now be much difficulty in filling the shops with competent hands, as employment was more general throughout the country than had been the case for years before.
Marsten had been secretary of the Union for eighteen months before he made up his mind to begin the contest. He resolved to make a demand for a ten per cent increase of wages all round, and, if it were refused, to call out the men at once. The committee met in secret session and the demand was formulated. A gathering of the men was ordered for Saturday night, but the subject to be discussed was not stated. Marsten impressed on his committee the necessity for secrecy, although Gibbons, who was one of the members, said he failed to see the object of this, as their desire was to obtain the increase, and that desire could not be attained except openly. However, he added, Marsten was conducting the campaign, and it was but right he should be allowed to conduct it in his own way; therefore Gibbons merely stated his objection but did not insist upon it.
A deputation was appointed to seek an interview with the directors and make the demand on Saturday afternoon. After their conference they were to draw up a report to present to the meeting of the men.
On Friday Sartwell gathered his employees together and announced to them that, in view of the state of business, the company had voluntarily come to the conclusion that an increase of wages to the extent of ten per cent should be given, adding that he hoped the amicable relations between employers and employed at the works would long continue. This announcement was received with cheers, and the workers, who knew nothing of the meeting of the committee, dispersed well satisfied with the outlook.
It was too late to countermand the gathering ordered for Saturday night, and when it took place some inkling of what had happened was spread abroad; the general opinion being that in some way Marsten had been too clever by half, and had met with an unexpected check.
The young man, however, faced the meeting in good fettle, and congratulated them on the increase offered. The men were in jubilant humour, and they cheered everything that was said with the utmost impartiality. Marsten told them frankly why the meeting had been called, and he exulted in the fact that the recent unexpected turn of events had made any discussion unnecessary.
“I have heard it hinted,” he continued, “that I have been out-generalled by Mr. Sartwell, but we can stand a lot of beating on these lines. Mr. Sartwell is evidently afraid of the Unionnow. If the mere rumour that we were about to make a demand induces so stiff-necked a man as the manager to capitulate before a gun is fired, it goes to show the tremendous influence we can wield by all standing firmly together.”
It is said that the misplacing of a comma in an act of Parliament once cost the country a hundred thousand pounds. The one word “now,” spoken quite unthinkingly by Marsten, made Gibbons grind his teeth in helpless rage. He saw Marsten triumphant and his own administration discredited. He determined to make that small word of three letters cost Marsten dear, if an opportunity of upsetting the confident young man offered itself. However, Gibbons said nothing, and the meeting dispersed with cheers.
Sartwell had no delusion regarding the advance he had made the men. He knew he had merely postponed the fight, but he wanted to be in a position to show the directors that he had done everything possible to avoid a conflict. Six months later Sartwell called the directors together.
“I desire to place before you,” he said, “certain information I have received. There is reason to believe that a further demand of ten per cent will be made. If you are going to grant it, I would like to know; if we are going to make a stand, I would like to know. I will then arrange my plans accordingly.”
“If we grant it,” said Mr. Hope, “what do you think will be the result? Will it avert trouble, or will it be made the basis of fresh exactions? We cannot go on making concessions indefinitely.”
“Giving the increase will probably postpone the trouble for another six months. I am certain that Marsten wants to force on a fight; he has been preparing for more than two years. What I want to impress on you is that the struggle, when it comes, is going to be a severe one, and if you enter upon it, you must do so with your eyes open, resolved to fight it to the very end. You may go on conceding until wages are doubled, and every fresh concession will merely make an ultimate fight the more inevitable.”
“Then you think we had better make a stand now?”
“Yes; if, having made the stand, you refuse to capitulate on any terms.”
“But if we find, when the strike has lasted a few weeks, that we cannot hold out, it would be folly to continue.”
“Exactly. You know your own resources, and I know the resources of the men. You are therefore in as good a position to make up your minds now as two weeks hence, or a month, or a year. If we enter into a contest we must win, or I must resign.”
“It is a most perplexing situation,” sighed Mr. Hope.
“Oh, the situation is simple enough. You either give in or you don’t. Which is it?”
“What are the chances of filling the works with new men, should it prove impossible to come to terms with our present employees?”
“They are not so good as they were. We could do it gradually, but it would be some time before we were in full force again.”
“That would mean the refusal of new orders, and perhaps the cancelling of many now on hand.”
“Undoubtedly. That is the cost of war. We must face it if we fight. We might be crippled for six months to come.”
“That is very serious. Is no compromise possible? Could you not confer with Marsten and find out what he wants?”
“I know what he wants.”
“And you think compromise impossible?”
“Frankly, I do.”
“Have you the same objection to meeting Marsten that you had to meeting Gibbons?”
“As a matter of principle I object to discussing our business with any outsider. Marsten has never raised that point. When it was necessary to confer with me he always sent a deputation of our own men. He is a much more dangerous opponent than Gibbons was.”
“Would you be willing, then, in the interests of peace, to arrange a conference with Marsten, talk the matter over, and come to an understanding, if that be possible?”
“Yes. I will send for him at once; but I don’t think it will be of the slightest use, and it forms a bad precedent.”
It was unanimously agreed that such an action on Sartwell’s part would strengthen his hands, and that the fight, if it proved inevitable, could be gone into with greater spirit when all knew that everything possible had been done to avoid hostilities.
Sartwell invited Marsten to meet him at his office at seven o’clock in the evening. When the young man entered his first words were:
“You told me I was not to set foot in this office unless I was ordered to do so; I must apologize, therefore, for coming on a mere invitation.”
“Ah, you haven’t forgotten that yet!” said Sartwell, with a laugh. “But you do forget apparently that you were here on invitation before,—during the strike, you know.”
“Yes, so I was.”
“Now, Marsten, to begin with, have you any personal ill feeling against me for your summary dismissal?”
“Not the slightest. I should probably have acted as you did under the same circumstances.”
“It is generous of you to say that, but I doubt if you would. However, not attempting to excuse myself at all, I may say that the event did not quite turn out as I expected. I hoped that you would call on me, and that we would—well, arrange an armistice, as it were.”
“I thought you knew me better than that.”
“I didn’t, you see. But let the dead past bury its dead. Let us give our attention to the present and to the future, and I shall begin by asking if you have any suspicion that you are a fool?”
“A most diplomatic and soothing beginning, Mr. Sartwell. However, I suppose we are all more or less tinged with folly, so we won’t quarrel about terms; but we seem to see the defects of others rather clearer than we see our own.”
“That is undoubtedly true. It strikes me, then, that you are wasting your life, and I would like to convince you of that before it is too late.”
“Yes?”
“Yes. I want an assistant manager. He must be a man of ability and a man I can trust. I am getting on in years, and will soon stand aside. My assistant, if he has the right stuff in him, will take my place, and the future will belong to him. I offer you the position.”
“I cannot accept it.”
“Why?”
“Because I have devoted my life to the men.”
“But you will have an opportunity of doing more for the men in that position than you can possibly do for them in your present office, where they grudgingly pay you barely enough to keep body and soul together.”
“I don’t mean the men in these works, but all workingmen everywhere.”
“Rather a large order, Marsten.”
“I know it is, but I feel equal to filling it.”
“I don’t suppose you imagine I make you this offer because I am afraid of you as secretary of the Union.”
“Oh, no. I am well aware that you want to avoid a fight, and I know you are afraid of nothing except that your directors will not back you through to a finish.”
“Do you imagine that your own backers are as adamant?”
“No. My weakness is Gibbons and his gang. Yours is the board of directors. One neutralizes the other, so it will be an interesting fight.”
“Make no mistake, my boy; a capitalist will back his man ten times as long as a worker will his.”
“I haven’t your intense admiration for the capitalist. Mr. Hope promised me, almost with tears in his eyes, to look after my future when he found I was working to settle the other strike which so terrorized him. I and my friends succeeded in breaking up the strike, yet you discharged me a week after, and I doubt if Mr. Hope ever gave a thought to his promise from that day to this. Your capitalist is notoriously timid and thoroughly selfish. The workingman has his faults, of course, and he is himself the greatest sufferer from them; but in generosity he is miles ahead of any capitalist that ever lived.”
“Then you are determined to fight, Marsten?”
“Oh, no! Not if you give in.”
“How often shall we have to give in?”
“Until such time as the compensation given to the workers is at least equal to the amount taken out by the so-called proprietors of the business.”
“Ah, that is Utopian, which is simply another word for nonsense. Now, why not be perfectly frank and say you are resolved to fight us?”
“My position is this, Mr. Sartwell: I don’t want to fight for a fight’s sake, and I have no revengeful desire to humiliate you or to defeat the firm for the mere glory of victory; but I am convinced the men will not get the fair share of what they make until there is a fight and a decisive victory. A few years ago the very right to combine was Utopian and nonsensical in the mind of the capitalist, yet that right is one of the undisputed facts of to-day. The capitalist won’t concede anything until he is forced to do so. Therefore there must be a struggle, and I am bound to choose my own time and my own battle-ground. We are ready to fight now, we are going to fight, and I believe we are going to win.”
“Exactly. That is what I wanted to know. As to winning, we shall see. I quite agree with you that there is nothing so satisfactory in the long run as a square, stand-up fight, and let the best man win. The combatants have a mutual respect for each other afterwards. The trouble is that the contest is rarely free from the side issues that affect the final result. In this case you are not sure of your backers; neither am I. If I were the owner of this establishment I would bring on the war instantly, carry it through with the relentlessness of a Barbary pirate, win it, of course, and have the most contented men in England in my employ ever after. As it is, the trouble is not going to be decided by either your generalship or mine, but by the relative constancy of our backers. If the men round on you before my directors get a trifle more frightened than they are now, then you will be defeated. If the directors get panic-stricken first, then I shall go under. It will be a hollow victory either way, and will not be decided on the merits of the case at all. It is a toss-up, and, if we were sensible men, we two would settle it now by twirling a penny in the air; besides, if you do win, it will be a barren triumph, for you will lose everything you gain the moment there is a pinch in trade. The only reason you have a show of winning is because business is brisk, and the directors naturally wish to make hay while the sun shines. They don’t wish to be crippled and have a fuss on while their trade rivals are reaping the benefit of their embarrassment. The moment trade becomes dull again, down will go the wages, and no power on earth can prevent the fall. It is all a question of supply and demand. On the other hand, I give you fair warning that, if I win, not another Union man will ever set foot in these works again. So if you really have the interests of the men at heart, Marsten, you will reflect a bit before you bring on the fight.”
“Do you doubt that I have the interests of the men at heart?”
“No, I don’t. I believe you are thoroughly unselfish, but I also believe you are needlessly sacrificing yourself. You see it is difficult for us to come to an agreement, for we look out on the world from entirely different standpoints. You are at the foot of the hill, and the mists of the valley of youth are around you, distorting your vision, and destroying correct proportion. I am up towards the top of the mountain, where the air is clearer. You see men heroic and noble; I see them small and mean. You believe in the workingman; I do not. The chances are that neither of us sees with absolute accuracy, and the truth lies between the two extremes. Nevertheless, I think the day of chivalrous, unselfish action is past, and it is every man for himself in these times.”
“I can’t understand why you talk like that, Mr. Sartwell. I have seen heroic things done even in my short life. I saw a man come out of these works alone and unprotected, when he knew the mob outside was howling for his blood, yet there was no trace of either fear or bravado about him. The same man nearly lost his life in saving others when the factory burned, and Braunt, an unlearned workingman, did unselfishly and chivalrously go to his death in the same cause.”
“Ah, Braunt was one of a thousand! Well, perhaps there is something worth preserving left in human nature after all, and may be I am merely growing old and pessimistic. Anyway, the main point at present is that there must be a trial of strength; so I suppose there is nothing for us to do but shake hands like a pair of prize-fighters before the performance begins. I think you are foolish, you know, not to take the sub-managership.”
The two men shook hands, and Marsten departed into the night. Sartwell sat in his office for some minutes thinking over the situation.
The second strike was as clean-cut as the first: that is to say, no laggards remained behind in the works; there was apparent unanimity among the men, and apparent determination on the part of the masters. To all outward seeming it was to be a straightforward, brutal trial of strength between Capital and the Union. Marsten cared little for public sympathy, which Gibbons had considered of great importance; and Sartwell cared for it nothing at all. The public took small interest either way. It was known that the company had voluntarily advanced the wages of the men a short time before, and employers generally said that this showed the folly of sentimentality in business; that no master should advance wages until he was forced to do so. There was no gratitude on the part of the workingman, they averred, and some of the newspapers took the same tone. But even those journals favourable to labour had qualms about the wisdom of the strike under the circumstances, although they hoped it would succeed.
Marsten, however, paid small heed to the comments of friend or foe; he knew that success or failure did not lie in what the papers said, but in perfect organization and in hitting hard. He knew that, if he won, most of the praise would go to the determination of the men and the opportuneness of the strike; while, if he lost, he would have to shoulder all the censure that had to be bestowed. He picketed the works in the usual way, choosing for that duty the staunchest of his friends among the men. He asked the remainder of the employees to keep away from the gates and leave the conduct of the fight entirely to him and those he had chosen as his lieutenants.
Once the fight was on, Sartwell determined to give no quarter. He resolved to fill up the works, if possible, with men from outside, and to take back none of the old employees who did not sign a paper promising to abandon the Union. In the former strike he had been anxious to get his men back in a body, and had made no real attempt to fill their places. He knew in the beginning of the second struggle that he was fighting for his life, and that if he suffered defeat he would resign, and the place that had known him for years would know him no more. He had no fear that the company would discharge him if he lost the battle,—in fact he knew they would use every effort to induce him to remain; but it was his own stubborn pride, as his wife called it, that he felt he could not overcome even if he had wished to do so. Sartwell, like certain swords of finely-tempered steel, would break, but would not bend. Years of unflinching determination in what he thought was right had made him a man over whom he himself had but slight control; and he sometimes recognized with grim humour that while he could persuade all hisconfrèresto take a devious but safe course upon any given problem, he could not induce himself to follow anything but the straight line. He worked night and day at the task of filling the factory with new men. He scoured the country for them, and his telegraph bills alone were enormous; but men were scarce—good men are always scarce, and now even indifferent workers were hard to find. Gibbons had once said that the workingman of modern times suffers from the fact that he is merely a cog in a big wheel, but this truism tells also against the employer who is trying to fill his shops. If a cog is useless by itself it must not be forgotten that the wheel is also useless until the cog is replaced. It is easy for an employer to supply the place of a single cog; but when the whole wheel is cogless, ninety-nine cogs are of no avail if the hundredth necessary to complete the circle cannot be found.
It was here that Sartwell had the first touch of his opponent’s quality, and his anger was lost in admiration for the young man’s shrewdness and knowledge of the business. The fight had been conducted so quietly that no one in the neighbourhood would have known, from any sign of disturbance, that war was in progress. Marsten made no attempt to buy off the new men, who came and went from the works unmolested by the pickets. Marsten sometimes talked with the strangers, telling them of the strike, and asking where they came from; advising them to get work elsewhere, but never making any attempt either to coerce or to bribe them. Sartwell wondered at this, and hoped Marsten would continue such a mild and harmless warfare; nevertheless its very mildness made him anxious, and he cautioned his new employees to give no information to the strikers, though he was well aware of the uselessness of trying to inculcate secrecy—for men will talk. In fact Marsten kept himself well informed of what was going on inside the works, and saw that the manager was quite shrewdly concentrating his attention to one branch of a department, instead of trying to fill the whole factory at one time. He was gradually collecting his hundred cogs from all points of the compass, and by and by would have one big wheel and pinion, out of the many wheels and pinions, revolving. One day at noon, when the men came out, Marsten, rapidly running his eye over them, saw a new man, and at once he recognized that here at last was the hundredth cog.
“You’re a new-comer?” he said, accosting him.
“Yes,” answered the man; “I came this morning.”
“I’d like to have a word with you,” said Marsten, keeping step with him.
“It’s no use. I know there’s a strike. I’m here to work, and I don’t give a hang for the Union!”
“Well, it will do no harm to talk the matter over.”
“It’ll do no good. I didn’t come out to talk; I came out for my dinner.”
“Of course. I’m on the same lay myself; come with me. We can talk and eat.”
“I can pay for my own dinner.”
“Certainly; I’m not offering to pay for it. I don’t suppose I get a tenth part of the wages you do; I can see by the look of you that you are a good workman. I’m secretary of the Union, and I get but a few shillings a week. I would tell you how few, but you probably wouldn’t believe me, for I could get much more at my trade.”
“The more fool you, then, for working for less.”
“Perhaps. I want to raise the wages of men all over the kingdom, so I’m content to work for little if I can do that. Where do you come from?”
“I’m a Bolton man.”
“Is your family here?”
“No.”
“Why?”
“What’s that to you, I’d like to know?”
“It’s a good deal to all of us, because it shows that you are not sure of your situation.”
“It shows nothing of the kind. I am guaranteed my situation.”
“Guaranteed! What does a master’s guarantee amount to? We’re going to win this strike, and then where will you new-comers be? You know what happens when the men go back. Not one of you will be left in the shops. Suppose you do get good wages for a few weeks, what will be the benefit in the end? A permanent situation at even lower wages would be better.”
“Who says it wouldn’t? But I haven’t the permanent situation, you see.”
“Now you are talking sense. Are you a member of the Union?”
“I was. I had a row with the foreman, and he gave me the sack.”
“In whose shop was that?”
“At Smighden’s.”
“I don’t know it. What wages were you getting there?”
“Thirty shillings a week.”
“Do you know Markham, Sarbury & Company, of Bolton?”
“Yes.”
“Would you be satisfied with thirty shillings a week there?”
“Yes; if I could be sure of getting it.”
“You can be sure of it. I will telegraph to the foreman this minute, and we’ll have an answer before we finish eating. He has promised to find me places for three men, and I haven’t sent him one yet. But don’t say a word to any one here, for I want to keep the other two places for Bolton men if they come.”
“I’ll not go back to this shop at all if I can be sure of a place in Bolton.”
And so it came about that Sartwell lost his hundredth cog, and the cog never thought it worth his while to give his late master even a word of explanation. He left on the first train for Manchester.
This kind of thing happened several times before Sartwell fully realized the method in Marsten’s action. He thought at first that Marsten had been merely lucky in buying off a man at the very time when such a purchase would block all progress. It was like pulling the linchpin from one of the axles of a wagon. The manager wrote to his fellow-managers in different parts of the country, and warned them that their foremen were giving places to employees from the works of Monkton & Hope, and he received answers saying they would do all they could to prevent such transplanting; but, as it was difficult to trace where a man went, when so few of them were deported, the warning came to nothing. If a wholesale exodus had been attempted, Sartwell, with the aid of his fellow-managers, might have done something to prevent its success; but the very homoeopathic nature of Marsten’s remedy made it difficult to cope with. By this time the feeling that he was a beaten man came over Sartwell, and, although he said nothing and sought sympathy from no one, it aged him more than years of toil had done. His daughter, now home from school, saw with helpless grief the deep lines care was ploughing in his rugged face.
Curiously enough, Marsten’s quiet but effective methods, which convinced so far-seeing a man as Sartwell that they were ultimately to be successful, had the very opposite effect on the strikers themselves. They did not understand the game, and they saw with increasing uneasiness that the works were apparently filling up while nothing was being done to prevent it. Marsten did not call meetings and enthusiastically show his hand with an outburst of eloquence, as had been the habit with Gibbons. The men thought he was doing nothing merely because he was saying nothing, and even Marsten’s own friends began to feel dubious about the result. There was no sign of giving in on the part of the masters, and they saw every day an increased number of men come out of the gates. In spite of Marsten’s prohibition the strikers began to gather about the gates, hooting the new employees when they came out; for hoots and groans seemed to accomplish something, and were at least a relief to the pent-up feelings of the idle men. Marsten saw these signs of revolt with uneasiness; but he thought, as the men this time were not starving, and as they all knew the Union was still in ample funds, he could keep the strikers in hand until a decisive blow would show Monkton & Hope the futility of further resistance. He had quietly prepared such a blow, and he expected that when it fell the strike would triumphantly end.
A deputation of the strikers, headed by Gibbons, waited on him, and demanded that public meetings should be held—as had always been done before—so that the men might be kept informed of the progress of a struggle that vitally affected their interests. Gibbons spoke strongly and feelingly on the subject, as one who speaks from the heart, and the deputation was correspondingly impressed. It was not right, Gibbons held, that they should grope longer in the dark; they wanted to know where they were, and what measures were being taken to bring Sartwell to terms.
“But, don’t you see,” protested Marsten, “that any information I give publicly to my friends at once becomes known to the enemy? I never knew anything to be accomplished by talk. There is generally too much of it in a contest of this kind.”
“I quite agree with you,” said the glib Gibbons; “but in the absence of talk we would like to have some evidence of action. This sort of thing cannot be kept up for ever. Sartwell is gradually filling the factory, and we are all getting a little restive. We must know what is going on, for it will be no consolation to be told in a week—or two—or three—that you find you have no chance of succeeding, and that we must make the best terms we can. You must remember that, although you lose no situation, we do. Will you call a meeting and explain to the men what the chances of success are?”
“I will do nothing of the sort. A general does not call his army together and explain to them what he intends to do next. I am leader of this strike, and I am going to lead it my own way or not at all. You say the factory is filling up, but I tell you that not a stroke of work has been done since the strike began. All I will promise to do is to let you know two weeks before we come to the end of our funds; then, if you do not think we will succeed, you will have time to make what arrangements you please, and depose me.”
“Oh, that kind of high-handed business does not do in this age. You are not an autocrat, remember. The men have every right to demand an account of what you are doing with them and their money.”
“When you were leader, Gibbons, they were at the end of their funds before you let them know anything about it. There was talk enough in those days, and precious little information went with it. I won’t conduct a strike with my mouth, and I won’t stand any interference.”
“You are our servant, I beg you to remember, and it is no interference when we simply ask to know what is being done and what you intend to do. Now you will either call a meeting of the men at the Salvation Hall or we will. Which is it to be?”
“I shall not call a meeting. If you call one, then you take the responsibility of meddling in a matter you don’t understand. It is quite possible that you may be able to embarrass, or perhaps defeat me; but if you do, the time will come when the men will curse you for your intervention. I tell you we are bound to win this strike if you keep your hands off. Calling a meeting will merely show Sartwell that we are getting anxious, and his whole hope is centered in a division among us. He was frank enough to tell me so himself.”
“When did he tell you that?”
“Before the strike began.”
Gibbons looked significantly at the deputation, and one or two of the members nodded sadly, as much as to say they wouldn’t have believed it; but it was now only too evident, from their secretary’s own admission, that he had secret communications with the enemy.
“I think,” said Gibbons, solemnly, “that, after what you have said, there is all the more reason why you should call the men together, and explain to them how you came to be discussing with Sartwell the probable failure of the strike even before it began. You knew that was a tender point with us long since; and if Sartwell is your enemy, as you said he was, I can’t see for the life of me why——”
“Oh, there is no need of any secrecy about it, Gibbons. In fact there is little mystery about anything we do, and that is one reason I don’t want to call a public meeting. Things are bad enough as they are. I have found that Sartwell generally knows what we are about to do before many of us know it ourselves. I went to Sartwell because he asked me to go. He knew this strike was coming on, although I had imagined it had only been discussed between myself and some of the others. He offered me the assistant managership of the works if I would resign my position as secretary. I refused, and he told me this strike was bound to fail because the men would not be true to me. You can give the men the whole particulars of my talk with Sartwell, but there is no need of calling a meeting to discuss it.”
“That may all be true, but I confess it sounds rather fishy. I doubt if Sartwell is so much afraid of you as that comes to. Anyhow, there is no harm in finding out just where we stand. I will do my best to calm the apprehensions of the men, but I give you warning that if nothing more encouraging than we have had lately turns up within a week, there will be trouble. The men will call a meeting themselves if you don’t.”
“If nothing happens within a week, I will call a meeting and give them an account of what has been done so far; but I don’t approve of meetings, and I shall call one practically under compulsion. You are forcing my hand, Gibbons, and you promised me fair play.”
“It seems to me you have had a good run for your money, and I think we are very patient in consenting to wait a week when we are being led we don’t know where.”
The deputation then withdrew, and Marsten paced up and down the room, wondering if the directors were giving Sartwell as uneasy a time as the men were giving him. As was the case during the former strike, the Salvation Hall had been placed at the disposal of the men. Marsten had called no meetings except the one that had ushered in the strike. He made his headquarters, however, in a room that opened upon the platform, and which also communicated with a narrow lane that led along the outside of the hall to the street. Here his pickets reported to him, and here the work made necessary by the strike—the bookkeeping and the correspondence—was done. Here also letters and telegrams were received. It was a bare room with only two or three chairs and a rough table as its furnishing. Several religious and moral mottoes were tacked on the boards that formed the walls. “Love one another” was the sentence that met Mars-ten’s eye whenever he looked up from his seat at the table. He sometimes smiled sadly as he gazed at it. Marsten paused in his walk, and sat down at the table on hearing a knock at the outside door. A telegraph messenger entered and handed him an envelope. Marsten tore it open, and read the single word “Stopped.” The word had come from the other side of the earth, travelling from Sydney, New South Wales, to London. A gleam of savage joy lit up the eyes of the young man, and, to the amazement of the messenger, he brought his fist down heavily on the deal table.
“There is no answer,” he said to the waiting boy, suddenly recollecting that he was not alone; “and,” he added to himself, “there will be no answer but one from Monkton & Hope.”
Once more he paced the room up and down, his frame quivering with the delight of battle and the fore-knowledge of victory. The motto, “Love one another,” shone peacefully, but unnoticed, on the wall.
When the two years’ educational course at Eastbourne was finished, Edna Sartwell returned to Wimbledon, and again took up her position in her father’s house. As time went on, Sartwell was quietly pleased to see that there was an absence of that friction between his women-folk which had been his ostensible reason for sending Edna away. He had had but faint hope that the interval of two years would soften his wife’s only partially concealed dislike for the girl; but, now that peace reigned over the household, he did not inquire too closely into the cause of the welcome change. He did not know his daughter now bore uncomplainingly what she had before rebelled against. Mrs. Sartwell’s attitude towards education in general was one calculated to discourage the friends of learning. She looked upon a course in school as a sinful waste of time and money. The Apostles, she held, had never even gone to a Board school, and who among present-day people were to be compared with the Apostles? Education was merely a pamperer of that deplorable pride which was already too great a characteristic of this conceited nation. She had many texts at her command which went to prove that too much learning was a dangerous thing, and these quotations she frequently presented to Edna, in the hope that many repetitions of them would mitigate, in some measure, the evil that was sure to follow a period spent at a fashionable and expensive school. Overweening pride was Mrs. Sartwell’s especial bugbear; it, more than anything else, was driving modern nations rapidly to perdition. She told Edna, sorrowfully, that she noticed an unwelcome change in her manner since her return from Eastbourne. The pride which aped humility was ever the most baneful variety of that detestable fault, and Edna’s silence in the face of good counsel showed that her pride had assumed the sullen type which is so difficult for a good woman to deal with. It was only when Mrs. Sartwell—offended by absence of retort and cheated out of her just due of argument by the silence of her adversary—threatened to lay before her husband the appalling results of over-education upon an already haughty nature, that some glimmer of the old rebellion flashed out between them; yet the rebelliousness, like the hauteur, had been changed by the two years’ residence at Eastbourne. That Edna was angry at this proposed appeal to her father, was evident; still there was a reserve and restraint in her indignation which Mrs. Sartwell could not fathom. The girl stood for a moment looking at her, then said very quietly:
“My father has enough to worry him without being bothered by our small affairs. He thinks my two years’ absence has made you like me better than you did before I went away, and I wish him to continue thinking so.”
“Like you better? My poor child, it is the love I have for you that causes me to endeavour, in my humble way,—praying that my efforts may be blessed by a Higher Power,—to correct those faults that will be your undoing some day.”
“I am speaking of what my father thinks. The moment he finds things are just as bad as they ever were, then all your hold over me is gone. I am now trying to bear patiently and uncomplainingly all I have to put up with in this house, and I do so for no other reason than to save my father unnecessary trouble. You say I am proud, resentful, stubborn, and all that. I am far worse than even you have any idea of. It makes me shudder to think of the kind of woman I shall become if I am much longer under your sway. I feel like a hypocrite when I remain silent under your taunts, for I think such things that if I were to put them in words——well, we won’t talk of that. If you imagine that I have learned meekness because I have lived in a really Christian family for two years, you are very much mistaken; but I have learned that true Christianity does not consist in nagging, with a text at the end of every exasperating sentence. Now, being a woman, I understand you very much better than my father does. You said once that, if he chose me to be mistress of this house, you would lay down your keys and depart without a murmur. You would do nothing of the kind. You would fight for your place. Therefore I want you to understand thoroughly what you may expect if you appeal to my father. The moment you complain of me in any way, or lead him to think there is the least friction, I shall go to him and say that I must be mistress here. What will happen then?—you know as well as I do. So long as he is not troubled with our affairs, I shall say nothing, and will try to be as dutiful and obedient as if I were your own daughter.”
Mrs. Sartwell sat down, buried her face in her hands, and wept softly, as one does whose tenderest feelings are wounded. It was hard that, after having a lifelong contest with one stubborn person, resulting in a most uncertain and unsatisfactory victory,—if it could be called a victory at all,—she should be called upon to face the same problem over again. She knew that if Edna appealed to her father anything might happen. He would be brute enough to take another house somewhere, and live in peace with his daughter. The man was capable of anything, in spite of all the precepts she had flung away upon him. However, there was still the consolation that she might save the girl by earnest and devoted persistence in well-doing, and she knew Edna would not protest so long as her father was unmolested: so Mrs. Sartwell agreed that her husband should not be made the referee between them, and Peace once more folded her white wings over the happy home.
Edna had developed into a beautiful woman; more beautiful, indeed, than she herself had any idea of. She was more sedate and reserved than when she had left home, and more prone to sit thoughtfully, chin in hand, and ponder, with her dreamy eyes trying to peer into the future. Resolutely as she had set herself to put Marsten forever out of her thoughts, she never succeeded, and his vibrant, deep-toned voice often came back to her. Although she had been brought up in a democratic way, and theoretically held that one person was technically as good as another, yet she lived in a country where a grocer’s daughter considers it quite beneath her dignity to be seen in company with a green-grocer’s daughter; while the daughter of a draper, from her serene social altitude, would have some difficulty in distinguishing the relative status of the other two, although she would be well aware that the adjective “green” carried comparative degradation with it. Edna was the daughter of a man who had been a workman; yet, when she thought over the proposal she had received in the school garden, she was slightly shocked to think that a workman should aspire to the hand of his master’s daughter. She had conversed with Marsten, and discussed the problems that had interested them both, yet never for a moment had the thought of equality between them entered her mind. He was merely a workman, and, when that was said, a gulf yawned. But love levels all ranks, as a distinguished man has sung, and, as the young woman meditated on the subject in all its bearings, the social barriers seemed to become less and less tangible. She remembered that no thought of social inequality had ever occurred to her while in his presence. She got no further in the understanding of her own feelings than the conclusion that she liked him very much indeed, and had a strong admiration for his manliness and his determination to succeed.
When the strike came on, and she knew that her father and her lover were opponents, her state of mind was one of great perplexity. It was hard that one or the other must be defeated, and she sighed when she thought of the relentlessness of fate in bringing into savage opposition the two men who were now dearer to her than all the world beside.
As the contest went on and she saw her father bending under the storm, ageing perceptibly day by day, becoming more and more silent, her strong affection for him grew stronger; she yearned towards him, wishing she could comfort him, yet knowing she was helpless. Sometimes a fierce resentment against Marsten would spring suddenly up in her heart. He had all the world to fight against, yet he must choose as his antagonist, out of the many millions, her father. It disconcerted her to perceive that this resentment never lasted long; that she found herself sympathizing too with the younger of the combatants, and making excuses for him. A partisan has an easy time of it in this world, compared with one who sees that all the good or all the bad rarely rests with one side solely, but is interwoven like the cotton and the wool in a piece of cloth. Sartwell and Marsten each believed he was fighting for the right; but Edna saw wrong on both sides and right on both sides, although—once the fight was started—she had not the courage to say this to her father.
But, as war goes on, the original right or wrong almost invariably sinks out of sight, and we choose our side from other considerations than those which appeal in times of peace to thinking beings. He who holds aloof is branded as a traitor: and yet man, with his marvellous capacity for self-esteem, flatters himself that he is a reasoning animal.
Sartwell generally came home late, sometimes returning by the last train. It had come to be recognized that it was Edna’s privilege to sit up for him, and, although he faintly protested once or twice when he found her there after midnight, it was quite evident that her presence was a comfort to him. She had a soothing, restful way with her, moving silently about the room, anticipating a tired man’s needs without unnecessary fuss, and with no irritating questions to ask; yet she was a sympathetic and receptive listener if there was anything to be told. In the wake of some women inanimate nature seems to clash: doors bang, plates fall, cups and saucers clatter, and chairs upset, jangling nerves sensitive to sound; but Edna could deftly set out a supper without so much as a chink of china. She knew the value of trivialities,—the setting of the arm-chair at just the right angle so that the light fell over the shoulder as it should, the placing of the slippers where the stockinged feet fell into them without effort; and, when her father was too much fatigued to care for the formality of sitting up to the festive board late at night, a small gipsy table, covered with spotless linen and some dainty that might tempt the appetite of a Lucullus, would appear at his right elbow as if they had come noiselessly up through the floor. All this came under the general head of “pampering” in Mrs. Sartwell’s vocabulary, and the good woman, finding that her example was of no effect in putting a stop to it, retired early to rest, so that she might not countenance such proceedings by her presence. There was a time to eat and a time to drink, and if a man presumed to be hungry at midnight, it was a sin that should be punished by dyspepsia in this world and goodness knows what in the next.
In spite of the compact between them, Sartwell told his daughter little about the progress of the strike; and she, seeing him indisposed to speak, forbore to question him, feeling that no suggestion she might have to offer could be of any value to him, contenting herself with protecting him from annoyance at home, and cheering him as much as possible whenever she had him to herself. But it wrung her heart to see him failing perceptibly day after day, his step, which she eagerly listened for, losing more and more its selfreliant tread.
One night she sat in his arm-chair waiting for him, thinking deeply. She looked suddenly up with a start, and saw her father standing beside the table gazing down at her. His face was white, gaunt, and haggard, and the gloom of his countenance was deepened rather than relieved by the sombre smile that parted his lips as he regarded her. He seemed like a man on the verge of a serious illness, and so startled was the girl, that for a moment she looked at him with wide-open eyes, fearing that an apparition stood before her.
“Father!” she cried at last, springing to her feet. “What has happened?”
“Nothing, my girl, except that you have been asleep in the chair when you should have been in bed long ago.”
“I don’t think I have been asleep, yet I didn’t hear you open the door. But you are ill.”
“I’m right enough. A little tired, that’s all. No, I won’t have anything to eat, thank you. It’s after closing hours, I know; but I’m a traveller, and I’ll have something to drink, if you don’t mind.”
He tried to laugh a little over this attempted pleasantry, but his laugh sounded dismal, and it frightened the girl still more, instead of reassuring her, as was his intention. The neck of the decanter clattered against the glass like chattering teeth, which seemed to annoy Sartwell; for he muttered something, and shot a glance at his daughter to see if she had noticed his unusual nervousness. Then he grasped the vessel more firmly, pouring the liquor with a steadier hand, but the effort made him tighten his lips. He drank off the liquid and set down the empty glass. Edna stood opposite him; he looked up at her with a wan smile on his lips.
“Well, my girl,” he said, “the game’s up.”
“Has the strike ended, father?” she asked, her voice quavering.
“Actually, no; practically, yes. The firm will give in to-morrow, and I shall resign. Sorry?”
“I am sorry if you are, father,” said Edna, kneeling beside him. “I am not sorry that the tension has ended, for I think anything is better than the anxiety you have been undergoing for the past few weeks. And you look positively ill to-night.”
“Yes. A man hates to be beaten. Well, I’m fairly knocked out, and if there is any comfort in a decisive beating, I have it.”
“What has happened?”
“You see, Edna, in the pictures of a battle, we always have the horses galloping, the men firing, or being shot, or cutting down their enemies with the sword; but we rarely get a view of the background, and so people sometimes do not know that it exists: yet the picture shows merely the front of the fight, as it were, while battles are often won by perfect arrangements in the rear,—the supply of ammunition, the food and water carriers and all that sort of thing. Well, a strike is like a battle; there are other things to consider than the actual fighting, and these things often decide the day. The direct loss in a struggle of this kind is nothing to the indirect loss. We see trade slipping away from us and going to our bitterest rivals. Some of our customers may come back; others won’t. Then we are unable to fulfil contracts we have made, and, as a strike can hardly be called an act of God, we are liable to have damages awarded against us where no strike clause has been inserted in the agreement. All this I have had to fight as well as the strikers themselves. Then there is great difficulty in filling up the shops—much more than I expected. During the last week I have been slowly losing ground with the directors. They haven’t said very much, but I have felt it. It was in the air somehow that we were fighting a losing battle, and so things have been on the balance, and the only reason the directors did not give in a week ago was they knew I would resign if they did so. It only required a straw to turn the scales against me. Some time before the strike began, a steamer sailed for Sydney, New South Wales. It had a large quantity of our goods on board. To-day I received notice from the owners that the ship lay there and could not be unloaded because of our strike. They propose to hold us responsible for the delay, and that will mean an expensive lawsuit whichever way the verdict goes. This is serious enough in itself, but the fact that we have been struck from the remotest ends of the earth while being paralyzed in London will make the directors give in at once. So, my girl, I’m a beaten man.”
“But might you not have been beaten in any case?”
“No; another week would have seen the men back—I am sure of it. They are seething with discontent, and have called a meeting for to-morrow night, in spite of the protests of Marsten. There is sure to be a split, and all I need is a slight defection to set the works going again.”
“Why need you resign, father? You have done your best, and the directors know it.”
“Ah, my girl, you are sleepy; I can see that, or you wouldn’t ask such a question. But now you know all about it, so off you go.”
In the morning Edna walked with her father to the station.
“Is there to be a meeting of the directors to-day?” she asked.
“Yes. It is called for five o’clock this evening.”
“Do you think the strike would end if they gave you another week?”
“I feel morally certain it would. There is sure to be a split at to-night’s meeting of the men. You see it is called in direct opposition to Marsten’s wishes, and that shows he is losing whatever hold he ever had on the strikers.”
“Then wouldn’t you be justified in saying nothing about this communication from the shipowners until the next directors’ meeting? You would know by that time what the result of the strikers’ meeting was.”
“My dear Edna, you make proposals that take away a man’s breath. No, that wouldn’t do. The directors must have full information. I could not take the responsibility of holding back anything that bore on their interests, whatever might be the result to myself; but I can’t help wishing the message had gone astray for a day or two.”
“I am going to the office at six o’clock to-night, father.”
Sartwell laughed, but in a mirthless, despondent manner.
“Hadn’t you better come at five and give the directors your opinion of them? I’m sure it wouldn’t be very flattering.”
“You mustn’t make fun of me, father. The situation is very serious, and I couldn’t bear the suspense of waiting until you came home. I must know what happens, so please don’t forbid me. Besides, it may be your last night there, and I should like to bring you home with me.”
“Oh, it won’t be my last night. I shall not leave the old firm like that. I shall stay until the new manager is installed and everything running smoothly. Even though a man is defeated, Edna, he owes it to himself to retreat in good order, and sometimes a masterly retreat is as good a bit of generalship as a victory. As everything is perfectly quiet, you may come if you are anxious, as of course you are; or I could telegraph you, if you would rather. But it is a foregone conclusion, I am sure of that. Whenever they see this message, and learn there has been little progress made in filling up the works, they will succumb—and I don’t know that I can blame them. They have vast interests at stake, and they have backed me well up to the present, when, if it hadn’t been for me, they would have given in long ago. Then I shall look for you at six, my dear. Take a hansom from the station, and ask the man to wait in the yard of the works. Wait for me in my room if I happen to be absent when you come. I shall tell the commissionaire to look after you.”
The girl watched the train come in and leave; then, turning, she walked towards her home with a heavy heart. She went past the house and on to the Common, unconsciously imitating her father, who, when troubled in mind, sought its breezy expanse. Several times she paused, and thought of sending a telegram to Marsten, asking him to meet her in the old garden at Wimbledon at once. There she fancied herself appealing to him to put an end to the strike; but she feared the anger of her father should he discover what she had done, even though it had been done for his sake. It did not occur to her that perhaps the appeal might be in vain, for she knew she would do anything asked of her for one she loved, and she had little doubt that the young man had a true and lasting affection for her. What, she asked herself, if Marsten made conditions? Would she be willing to accept a great favour and grant nothing in return? What would he think if she telegraphed him to come? The answer was obvious, and, in searching her own heart, she for the first time admitted to herself that her reply would be different from what it had been at Eastbourne.
But when it came to the point, she could not bring herself to the length of sending a message. She shrank from playing so dangerous a card; for, if it failed to win the trick, how could she face the after-humiliation? Something in the self-reliant ring of Marsten’s voice, something in the dogged determination of his manner, something in the compelling glance of his eye, warned her that not even to please the girl he loved would he be untrue to the flag under which he fought—and something in her own heart told her that she herself would think less of him if he did. Yet, if he refused, she could never speak to him again; she was certain of that. Having made an appeal in vain, she could never grant one of his own, or even listen to it. She thought of the pleasure it would be to her to have him plead his cause once more, and read his answer in her willing eyes before her lips could speak it; but if he refused her when she begged him to spare her father the impending humiliation of defeat, there could be no more friendship between them. Edna at last returned to her home, bewildered in mind and hesitating to act, and listened to a homily on the sinfulness of wasting one’s time, although she heard or understood but little of the admirable discourse.
As evening drew on the girl became more and more anxious, and impatiently awaited the hour that was to take her to London. She half expected a telegram from her father, but as none came she knew the situation had not changed for the better. Shortly after six o’clock her hansom drove into the yard of the works; the gatekeeper was evidently on the watch for her, and had the gates open, closing them after her. The silent, deserted air of the huge place had a most depressing influence on her as she mounted the stairs that led to her father’s office. He was standing at his desk as she entered, entirely alone, and looked round absent-mindedly when he heard the door open.
“Well, my girl,” he said, “you have come to help pack, after all.”
“If there must be packing, I am ready to help, father.”
“I’m afraid that’s all there’s left to do, dear. But we’re not going to show the white feather, are we? I’ve just been planning a lovely little tour on the Continent for you and me, where we shall forget, for a time, that there is such an ugly thing as a strike in the whole world. You’ll be a princess, and I’ll be the old dethroned king; they always went to the Continent, you know, after a defeat.”
Sartwell’s attempt at banter was a gloomy failure, and he avoided his daughter’s eye, pretending to be sorting out some papers. She saw how hard hit he was, and the tears came into her eyes.
“Is the directors’ meeting over?” she asked at last.
“No. They are in there yet, arranging the terms of surrender—or hardly that, for there are no terms. They simply give the men all they ask—which, of course, they might have done a month ago, and saved all this bother. I knew how it would be when they heard about the ship lying unloaded in Australia. There was not an ounce of fight left in them, and I felt sure a blow dealt so far away would appeal to what little imagination any of them has. It seems to them decisive, but of course it is nothing of the kind. It is merely a theatrical bit of by-play that should have no bearing on the result. But there is little use in kicking against fate. They are at this moment engaged in writing out their letter of capitulation—as if it made any difference how you worded an acknowledgment of defeat and a surrender of your interests to a lot of ignorant, beer-drinking boors who don’t——but what is the use of cursing? Another week of this indecision would have demoralized me; in fact, I think it has done so already, for I don’t generally growl.”
“Will you come home with me, father?”
“No, my dear. I shouldn’t have let you come all this distance merely to hear what we both knew this morning. Run along home, like a good little girl, and don’t sit up for me to-night. I’ll be late. Of course, in spite of my scolding, I’ll stay till the last dog’s hung. I’ll see the thing through, and wave the white flag myself. It wouldn’t be quite the thing, you know, to have all the fun of the fight and then funk the submission. I merely came into this room because you were due at six, and to rest my nerves a bit. I’m going back to the directors, and will write the letter of surrender myself; for they will never summon up courage enough to do even that if I am not at their elbows. I’m going down with the ship, my girl, pretending I like it; so off you go, Edna, and we’ll feel all right about it next week——perhaps.”
Haggard as he looked the night before, Edna now noticed, with a thrill of fear, that for the first time he seemed an old man. His usually well-set shoulders were bent, and even his neatly-fitting clothes hung loosely about him. The hesitation and the tone in which he said the last word, “perhaps,” showed her like an electric flash what was in his own mind, and what had never occurred to her before,—that when he was suddenly wrenched away from the task that had been his life’s work, he would break up in idleness like a useless hulk on the rocks.
“Father,” she cried, “don’t let them send that letter till to-morrow. A day more or less makes no difference, and they will keep it back if you ask them to.”
Sartwell shook his head.
“There is no use in delay,” he said. “It has always been my habit to do quickly what had to be done, and I am getting too old to change my habits. If you must walk the plank, walk it, and get it over.”
The girl did not urge him further, but kissed him and said, “Good-night.” He saw her into the hansom, and told the cabman to drive to Waterloo. At the first turning Edna pushed up the little trap-door in the roof of the cab.
“Do you know where the headquarters of the strikers are?” she asked.
“Yes, miss. At the Salvation Hall, miss.”
“Well, drive me there as quickly as you can.”
The cabby turned his horse and in a short time was making his way through the crowd of men who were gathering from all quarters to the meeting. He drew up at the kerb in front of the hall. Edna stepped out, flushing as she saw the men looking curiously at her. She said to one:
“Where can I find Mr. Marsten?”
“He’s in his room at the back of the ’all, ma’am. This wye, ma’am. I’ll show you the door.”
Edna followed the man down the long, narrow passage at the side of the hall.
“For God’s sake, mates, what’s the meaning of this?” cried Gibbons, in amazement, taking his pipe out of his mouth.
Some of the men laughed, but Gibbons looked serious, and they saw that there was more in the incident than appeared on the surface.
“Who is it she wants to see?” cried Gibbons, as the man appeared who had led the girl down the passage.
“She arsked for Marsten. She’s in with him now.”
“Look here, mates,” cried Gibbons. “What have I been telling you? We’re sold, or I’m a Dutchman! That girl is Sartwell’s daughter, and I’ll warrant she has come direct from him. I say, cabby, did you drive that young lady here from the works?”
“What’s that to you? You’re not paying my fare,” answered the cabman, with characteristic disregard of the threatening crowd.
“He came from the works; I saw him,” said one of the men.
“Let’s get inside, and call this meeting to order,” cried Gibbons, decisively.