 | CHAPTER VIII.
A TROUBLESOME CHARACTER. The silent partner |  |
8. CHAPTER VIII.
A TROUBLESOME CHARACTER.
OLD Bijah Mudge stepped painfully over a
tub of yellow ochre and crossed the print-room
at the overseer's beck. There had been an
order of some kind, but he was growing deaf, and
the heavy engines were on. The overseer repeated
it.
“Sir?”
“I said your notice, did n't I? I say your
notice, don't I? You 'll work your notice, you
will.”
“A-a-ah!” said Bijah, drawing a long breath.
He stood and knotted his lean fingers together,
watching the yellow dye drop off.
“Is there a reason given, sir?”
“No reason.”
“Folks my age ain't often ordered on notice
without reason,” said the old man, feebly.
“Folks your age should be more particular
significantly.
“I 've known o' cases as where a boss has
guessed at a reason, on his own hook, you know,
Jim.”
Prish Jim was in the print-rooms at Hayle and
Kelso at that time. Some said the new partner
had a finger in getting him out of the weaving-room.
It was a sharp fellow, and belonged somewhere.
Here he would be brutal to old men and
little boys; but there were no girls in the print-room.
“On his own hook and at a guess,” said the
“boss,” “a man might ask who testified to Boston
on a recent little hour-bill as we know of.”
“I testified,” cried the old man, shrilly, “before
a committee of the Legislature of the State
of Massachusetts. I 'd do it ag'in, Jim! In the
face of my notice, I 'd do it ag'in! At the risk
o' the poor-us, I 'd do it ag'in! I call Hayle and
Kelso to witness as I 'd do it ag'in! In the name
of the State of Massachusetts, I 'd do it ag'in!”
“Do it again!” said Jim, with a brutal oath.
“Who hinders you?”
“But there were no reasons!” added the overseer,
that 's all; there 's no reasons.”
“I am an old man to be turned out o' work
sudden, sir.” The thin defiance in Bijah's voice
broke. He made an obsequious little bow to
the Irishman, wringing his dyed hands dry, and
lifting them weakly by turns to his mouth.
“It 's not always easy for an old man to get
work, sir.”
But Jim was at the other end of the print-room,
having some trouble with the crippled
tender, who always spilled the violet dye. The
boy had cut himself upon a “doctor,” it seemed,
to-day. Bijah saw blood about, and felt faint,
and slunk away.
“Can I have work?”
“What can you do?”
“Anything.”
“Where from?”
“Five Falls.”
“Hayle and Kelso?”
“Yes, sir.”
“You talk like a man with a toothache.”
“Ay? Folks has told me that before. An
old habit, sir.”
“You have been printing?”
“Yes, sir.”
“For three months?”
“Just about, sir.”
“There 's yellow ochre on your clothes, I
see.”
“I 've none better, sir. I — I 'd not have travelled
in my working-close if I 'd had better; I 'd
not have done it once. But I 'm an old man, and
out of work.”
“Your name is Bijah Mudge?”
“I 'd not told you my name, sir.”
“No, you 'd not told your name; but you 're
Bijah Mudge. We 've got no work for you.”
“I am an old man, sir.”
“You 're a troublesome character, sir.”
“I 'm quite out of work, sir.”
“You 'll stay quite out as far as we 're concerned.
We 've got no place for you, I say, on
this corporation.”
“Very well, sir,” bowing with grim courtesy.
“Good evening, sir. I can try elsewhere.”
“O yes,” with a slight laugh, “you can try
elsewhere.”
“It 's a free country, sir!” cried the troublesome
defiance.
“O yes; it 's a free country, without doubt;
quite right. You 'll see the door at your left, there.
— Patrick! the door. Show the man the door.”
“And this is the end on 't.”
The old man said that to Perley Kelso three
weeks later. He said it in bed in the old men's
ward of the almshouse at Five Falls. There was
a chair beside the bed.
The room was full of beds with chairs beside
them. These beds and chairs ran in a line along
the wall, numbered nicely. In general, when you
had taken possession of your bed, your chair, and
your number, and sat or lay with folded, thin
hands and gazed about with weak, bleared eyes,
and so sat or lay gazing till you died; you commanded
such variety and excitement as consist
in being bounded on both sides by another bed,
another chair, another pair of folded hands, and
another set of gazing eyes. Old Bijah's bed and
chair stood the last in the line. So he lay and
looked at the wall, when he said, “This is the
end on 't.”
He liked to talk, they said; talked a great deal;
talked to the doctor, the paupers, the cat; talked
to the chair and the wall; talked to Miss Kelso
now, because she came between the chair and the
wall; had talked since he was brought struggling
in and put to bed with nobody knew what
exactly the matter with him. He was dead beat
out, he said.
He must have talked a great deal upon his
journey; especially in its later days, since
the earnings of the last “Lord's day” were
gone; since he had travelled afoot and gone
without his, dinner; since he had taken to
sleeping in barns and under fences, and in
meadow-places undisturbed and wet with ebbing
floods; since he had traversed the State, and
ventured into New Hampshire, and come back
into the State, and lost heart and gained it, and
lost it again and never gained it again, and so
begged his way back to his old shanty up the
river, and been found there by Stephen Garrick,
in a driving storm, dozing on the floor in a little
pool of water, and with the door blown down
upon him by the gale.
He had talked to the fences, the sky, the
it, the dam at Lawrence, and the Lowell bells,
and the wind that sprang up in an afternoon, and
gray clouds, and red sunsets, and the cattle on
the road, especially, he said, to trees; but always
rather to these things than to a human hearer.
“They listened to me,” he said, turning shrewd
eyes and a foolish smile upon his visitor. “They
always listen to me. It 's a free country and I 'm
a troublesome character, but they listen — they
listen. It 's a free country and there 's room for
them and me. I 'm an old man to be turned out
o' work. One night I sat down on Lawrence
Bridge and said so. It was coming dark, and all
the little trees were green. No, marm, I 'm not
out o' my head. I 'm only a troublesome character
out of work in a free country. The mill-gals
they went by, but I 'd rather tell the little
trees. I had n't eat no dinner nor no supper. It
was dark ag'in the water and ag'in the sky; all
the lights in the mills was blazin', and the streets
was full; if I 'd been a younger man I 'd not have
took it quite so hard, mebbe. A younger man
might set his hand to this and that; but I 've
worked to factories fifty-six years, and I was very
years old.
“`We know you,' says they to me, `we don't
want you!' says they. Here and there, up to
New Hampshyre and back ag'in, this place and
that and t'other, `We know you,' says they.
“So I set on Lawrence Bridge; there was cars
and ingines come screechin' by; `We know you,'
says they; and the little trees held up like as
it was their hands to listen. `They know me,'
says I, `I 'm a troublesome character out o' work!'
There was a little Irish gal come by that night
and took me home to supper. She lived in one
o' them new little houses adown the road.
“There, there, there! Well, well, it 's oncommon
strange how much more cheery-like it is a
talkin' to women-folks than it is to trees. And
clearin' to the head. But you 'd never guess,
unless you was a troublesome character and out
o' work, how them trees would listen —
“I like the looks of you setting up ag'in the
chair; it makes a variety about the wall. You 'd
never know, onless you 'd come to the end on 't,
how little of what you may call variety there is
about that wall.
“Now I remember what I had to say; I remember
clear. I think I 've had a fever-turn about
me, and a man gets muddled now and then from
talking to so many trees and furrests. There 's
a sameness about it. They 're good listeners,
but there 's a sameness about 'em; and a lonesomeness.
“Now this is what I had to say; in the name of
the State of Massachusetts, this is what I 've got
to say: I 've worked to factories fifty-six years.
I have n't got drunk not since I was fifteen year
old. I 've been about as healthy, take it off and
on, as most folks, and I guess about as smart.
I 'm a moral man, and I used to be a Methodist
class-leader. I 've worked to factories fifty-six
years steady, and I 'm sixty-six year old, and in
the poor-us.
“I don't know what the boys would say if they
see me in the poor-us.
“I 've married a wife and buried her. I 've
brought up six children and buried 'em all. Me
and the bed and the chair and the wall are the
end on 't.
“It kind o' bothers me, off and on, wonderin'
what the boys would say.
“There was three as had the scarlet fever, and
two as I lost in the war (three and two is five;
and one —) there 's one other, but I don't rightly
remember what she died on. It was a gal, and
kinder dropped away.
“I 've worked fifty-six years, and I 've earned
my bread and butter and my shoes and hats, and
I give the boys a trade, and I give 'em harnsome
coffins; and now I 'm sixty-six year old and in
the poor-us.
“Once when I broke my leg, and the gal was
sick, and the boys was in the tin-shop, and their
mother she lay abed with that baby that kep'
her down so long, I struck for higher wages, and
they turned me off. There was other times as I
struck for wages, I forget what for, and they
turned me off. But I was a young man then,
and so I sawed wood and waited my chances, and
name of the State of Massachusetts.
“Now I 've testified afore the Legislature, and
I 've got my notice; and away up in New Hampshyre
they knew the yellow ochre on my close,
and I could n't get the toothache out o' my voice,
and I would n't disown my honest name, — in
n't beg for honest work, unless I got it in my
honest name, — and so I am sixty-six year old,
and in the poor-us.
“Tell Hayle and Kelso, — will you? — that
I 'm sixty-six year old, and an honest man, and
dead beat out and in the poor-us! Curse 'em!
“All the leaves o' the trees o' the State of Massachusetts
knows it. All the fields and the rivers
and the little clouds and the winds o' dark nights
and the grasses knows it. I told 'em, I told 'em!
And you' d never know how they listened —
See here, marm. I 'm no fool, except for the fever
on me. I knew when I set out what I 'd got
to say. I 'm no fool, and I never asked no
favors from the State of Massachusetts. See
here! A workingman, as is only a workingman,
and as lives and dies a workingman, he 'll earn
enough to get him vittels, and to get him close,
and to get him a roof above his head, and he
genrilly won't earn much more; and I never
asked it of the State of Massachusetts as he
should. But now, look here! When I was to
Boston on my journey, I picked up a newspaper
to the depot, and I read as how a man paid forty
his house. Now, look here! I say there 's something
out o' kilter in that Commonwealth, and in
that country, and in that lot of human creeturs,
and in them ways of rulin', and in them ways of
thinkin', and in God's world itself, when a man
ken spend forty thousand dollars on the plate-glass
winders of his house, and I ken work
industrious and honest all my life and be beholden
to the State of Massachusetts for my
poor-us vittels when I 'm sixty-six year old!
“Not but what I 've had money in the bank in
my day, a many times. I had forty-six dollars
laid by to once. I went into the dye-rooms that
year, and my rubber boots was wore out. We
stand about in dye, and it 's very sloppy work,
you know. I 'd been off work and out o' cash,
and so I tried to get along without; so I wet my
feet and wet my feet, standing round in the stuff.
So there was lung fever and doctors' bills enough
to eat that bank account out as close as famine.
“Why was n't I far-seein' enough to get my
boots to the first place and save my fever? Now
that 's jest sech a question as I 'd look to get
from them as is them of property. That 's jest a
seems to be a layin' atween property and poverty,
atween capital and labor, atween you settin' thar
with yer soft ways and yer soft dress ag'in you,
and me, and the bed, and the chair, and the wall,
and the end on 't.
“How was I a goin' to get into that thar bank
account forty mile away in East Boston? Say!
You 'd never thought on 't, would you? No,
nor none the rest of you as has yer thousands,
and the trust as thousands brings, and as would
make no more of buyin' a pair o' rubber boots
than ye would o' the breath ye draws. I was a
stranger to town then, and it 's not for the likes
of me to get a pair of rubber boots on trust. So
I 'd had my lung fever and lost my bank account
afore I could lay finger on it.
“So with this and that and t'other, I 've come
into my old age without a dollar, and I 'm a
troublesome character, and my boys are dead,
and I 'm in the poor-us, and I 'm sixty-six years
old.
“I won't say but there's those of us that lays up
more than I did; but I will say that there 's not
a man of us that ever I knew to spend his life in
him in his old age. If there 's any such man, I 'd
like to see him.
“I tell you, marm, there 's a many men and women
in Hayle and Kelso, and there 's a many men
and women in a many factories of this here free
country, as don't dare to testify afore a Legislature.
When their testimony tells ag'in the interest
of their employers, they don't dare. There 's
them as won't do it not for nobody. There 's
them as does it on the sly, a holdin' back their
names onto the confidence o' the committee, out
o' dread and fear. We 're poor folks. We can't
help ourselves, ye see. We 're jest clutched up
into the claws o' capital tight, and capital knows
it, jest as well as we do. Capital says to us,
`Hold your tongue, or take your notice.' It
ain't a many poor men as can afford to say, `I 'll
take my notice, thankee!' I done it! And
I 'd do it ag'in! I 'd do it ag'in! In the name o'
the State of Massachusetts, I 'd do it ag'in!”
Old Bijah lies for a while, with this, blankly
gazing at the wall and at the visitor with the
“soft dress ag'in her,” and at the paupers, and at
the cat. Now and then he shrewdly nods, and
the rows of beds and chairs file into hickory-trees,
he says, and lift up their leaves in the name of
the State of Massachusetts, and listen — And
now he sees the visitor again, and turns sharply
on her, and the hickory-trees file off and wring
their hands in going.
“I heerd the t'other day of a man as give
thirty thousand dollars for a fancy mare!”
All the trees of the State of Massachusetts are
filing out of the old men's ward of the almshouse
at Five Falls now, and all in going wring
their hands and listen —
“Thirty thousand dollars for a mare! Jest fur
the fancy of the fancy creetur. Thirty thousand
dollars for a mare!”
He lies quite still once more, till the last
hickory hands have passed, wringing, out of the
almshouse, and some one has shut the door upon
them, and the visitor softly stirs in going after
them. He notices that the visitor does not wring
her hands, but holds them folded closely down
before her as she stirs.
He cries out that he wonders what the boys
would say, and that he give 'em harnsome coffins,
as he 's sixty-six year old, and out o' work, and in
the poor-us; and when she opens the door in
passing out, half the forests of New England jostle
over her and jostle in, and fill the room, and stand
and listen —
The visitor unclasps her hands on stepping
into the heart of the southern storm; it may be
fancy, or it may be that she slightly wrings them,
as if she had mistaken herself for a hickory-tree.
“They are cold!” exclaims Stephen Garrick,
who waits for her with an umbrella and an enigmatical
face. He takes one of the hands upon
his arm, and folds the other for her in her cloak.
Apparently, neither the man nor the umbrella
nor the action attracts her attention pointedly, till
the man says: “It is a furious storm, and you
will get very wet. What have you been about?”
“Feeling my way.”
“I am afraid that is all you will ever do.”
“I presume that is all I can ever do.”
“But that is something.”
“Something.”
“You are not expected to cut and carve a
advantage of not being responsible for the
quarry.”
“Who can hold you responsible for a case like
this? You are one of three, and, as you say,
tied by the hands.”
“That old man will hold me responsible to his
dying day. Half our operatives will hold me
responsible. Miss Kelso, I am one of those
people of whom you will always find a few in
the world, adjusted by fate or nature to a position
of unavoidable and intolerable mistake and
pain.”
His face, through the gray of the growing
storm, wears a peculiar and a patient smile which
Perley notes; there being always something noteworthy
about Stephen Garrick's smile.
“A position,” he repeats slowly, “in which a
man must appear, from force of circumstances, to
pass the — the wounded part of the world by
upon the other side. And I believe, before God,
that I would begin over again in East Street to-morrow,
if I could help to bind it up, and set it
healthily upon its way!”
Perley believes he would, and says so, solemnly.
think it to be true that a man who holds to such
a purpose, and who holds it with — she falters —
with such a smile, can permanently and inevitably
be misunderstood and pained. She cannot
think it.
Stephen Garrick shakes his head.
“I suspect there always are and always will
be a few rich men, Miss Kelso, who just because
they are rich men will be forever mistranslated
by the suffering poor, and I suspect that I am
one of them. I do not know that it matters.
Let us talk of something else.”
“Of something else than suffering and poverty?
Mr. Garrick,” — Perley turns her young face
against the west, where the sultry storm is
crouching and springing, — “why, Mr. Garrick!
sometimes I do not see — in God's name I do not
see — what else there can be to talk about in
such a world as this! I 've stepped into it, as we
have stepped out into this storm. It has wrapped
me in, — it has wrapped me in!”
The sultry rain wraps them in, as they beat
against it, heavily. It is not until a little lurid
tongue of light eats its way through and over the
clovers that brush against their feet, that Perley
breaks a silence into which they fall, to say, in a
changed tone, “It is not an uncommon case, this
old man's?” and that Mr. Garrick tells her, “Not
an uncommon case”; and that she leaves him,
nodding, at the corner of the road, and climbs the
hill alone; and that he stands in the breaking
storm for a moment there to watch her, brushing
gilded wet clovers down about her as she climbs.
| CHAPTER VIII.
A TROUBLESOME CHARACTER. The silent partner | |