Archie's Mistake Part 1

Archie's Mistake.

by G. E. Wyatt.

"Father, why do you have such a beggarly-looking hand at the mill as that young Bennett?" asked Archie Fairfax of the great mill-owner of Longcross.

"Why shouldn't I?" he replied. "He comes with an excellent character from the foreman he has been under at Morfield. He does his work very well, Munster says, and that's all I care for. I don't pay for his clothes."

Archie said no more, but he still felt aggrieved. As a rule, his father's work-people were a superior, tidy-looking set, but this new lad was literally in rags, and his worn, haggard face and great, hungry-looking eyes seemed, in Archie's mind, to bring discredit on the cotton-mill.

"He's no business here," he said to himself.--"I wish you'd send him away."

Archie had only lately had anything to do with the mill, as he had been at a large public school. But now he was eighteen, and had left school. He had come into his father's office as secretary, that he might learn a little about the business which was to be his some day.

Mr. Fairfax had some excuse for the pride he took in his manufactory, for a better looked after, better managed, or more prosperous one it would have been difficult to find, though of course there were _some_ rough people among the workers. Long experience had taught his work-people to respect and trust an employer who acted justly and honourably in every transaction; and it was Mr. Fairfax's boast that there had never yet been a "strike" among his men, nor any difficulty about work or wages which had not been settled at last in a friendly spirit.

But this very "superiority" was a snare to the mill-hands. For if they once took a dislike to any one who had been "taken on," they left him no peace until they got rid of him. It was looked on as a sort of privilege in Longcross to belong to the Fairfax mills, and the men chose to be very particular as to whom they would admit among themselves.

They all disapproved of poor Stephen Bennett from the first day of his coming.

As they walked away that evening they discussed his appearance with eager disapprobation.

"Who is he?" "Where does he come from?" "Where's he living?" "What's made the master take such a ragam.u.f.fin on?"

These were some of the questions asked, but no one was able to answer them.

"I'll get it all out of him to-morrow," said Simon Bond, a big savage-looking lad, with his hat on one side, and his pipe in his mouth.

"P'raps he won't be quite so ready to tell as you are to ask," said some one else.

"He'd better be, then, if he's got any care for his skin," answered the boy, and the others laughed.

So the next day Simon followed the stranger out of the mill, and began his questions in a rude, hectoring voice.

To his utter astonishment, Stephen refused to answer them. He made no reply while Simon poured out his questions, until the latter said,--

"Well, dunderhead, d'ye hear me speaking?"

"Yes, I hear you," responded Stephen, looking at him with a half-frightened, half-defiant expression.

"Then why don't you answer?" he inquired with an oath. He was getting angry. "If you cheek me, 'twill be the worse for you, I can tell you."

"I don't want to cheek you," said Stephen; "but I don't see as my affairs is your business, any more than your affairs is my business."

Simon could hardly believe his ears as he listened to this answer.

This little shrimp to defy him like that!

But his anger soon outweighed his amazement.

He seized Stephen by the collar, saying, as he gave him a shake,--

"Answer my questions this instant, or--"

His gestures completed the sentence.

Stephen turned very white, but he replied firmly,--

"I've told you I ain't going to, and I sticks to my words. If you threaten me like that, I'll go to the foreman and complain. There he comes."

Simon looked down the street, and saw Mr. Munster advancing just behind two other mill-hands. He was obliged to let Stephen go, but rage filled his heart.

"I'll pay you out," he muttered, "one of these days." Then he turned round a side street and disappeared.

And what did Stephen do?

He walked on till he came to a baker's shop, where he bought some bread; then to a grocer's, where he got sugar, tea, and a candle; and so on, till his arms and pockets were full of parcels. But the odd thing was that he bought so much. That was what struck a man--one of the mill-hands--who was in the shop.

Most of the work-people lived in one particular quarter of the big city--Fairfax Town it was called in consequence. But Stephen threaded his way to quite a different part--a much poorer one--and turned into an old tumble-down house, with all its windows broken and patched, which had stood empty and deserted until he came to it.

Weeks pa.s.sed on, and still, in spite of constant persecution, Stephen remained at the mill. Scarcely any one spoke a kind word to him except Mr. Fairfax, but he very seldom saw him. Even old Mr. Munster, the head foreman, addressed him sharply and contemptuously, which was not his usual custom. The lad did his work well enough, but he was such a miserable-looking fellow, and so untidy and shabby.

Mr. Munster said something of the sort to Archie one day, when he met him outside the office, just as Stephen was going away after receiving his week's wages.

"Yes," replied Archie eagerly; "did you ever see such a scarecrow? But he has good pay, hasn't he?"

"Yes, Mr. Archie; very good for such a young hand. He has fifteen s.h.i.+llings a week."

"He drinks--depend upon it he drinks spirits, and that's what gives him that hang-dog look," said Archie.

"You've never seen him the worse for drink, have you?" asked Mr.

Munster, not unwilling to have an excuse for getting rid of the ragged stranger.

"Well, I don't know," he answered. "He was leaning up against a wall the other day when I pa.s.sed, and when he saw me coming he tried to stand upright, and he regularly staggered. I could see it was as much as ever he could do."

"H'm!" said Mr. Munster thoughtfully; "I shall watch him, then. If I catch him like that at his work, I shall soon send him packing."

"And there's another thing," Archie went on. "What does he do with the things he buys? What do you think I saw him getting last week?"

"Couldn't say, sir, I'm sure."

"Why, three boys' fur caps, and a lot of serge, and a girl's cloak, and four pairs of cheap stockings, and other things besides. I was in Dutton's shop when he came in. He didn't see me because of a pile of blankets, and I heard him buy all those things, and carry them off. He paid for half, and the rest he said he'd pay for this week. He must have bought things there before, or they wouldn't have trusted him.

But, you know, they'd come to very nearly as much as his wages."

"Yes; I don't understand it," said Mr. Munster. "But, after all, it isn't our business if he does his duty at the mill."

"No, I know," said Archie; "but I believe there's something wrong about him, and I should like to know what it is."

"Well, 'give him enough rope and he'll hang himself,' as they say,"

rejoined Mr. Munster--"that is, if your ideas about him are true."