Walter Besant
All Sorts and Conditions of Men: An Impossible Story
CHAPTER XXXV.
THEN WE'LL KEEP COMPANY
After the celebrated debate on the abolition of the Lords, Dick Coppin found that he took for the moment a greatly diminished interest in burning political questions. He lost, in fact, confidence in himself, and went about with hanging head. The Sunday evening meetings were held as usual, but the fiery voice of Dick the Radical was silent, and people wondered. This was the effect of his cousin's address upon him. As for the people, it had made them laugh, just as Dick's had made them angry. They came to the Hall to get these little emotions, and not for any personal or critical interest in the matter discussed; and this was about all the effect produced by them.
One evening the old Chartist who had taken the chair met Dick at the club.
"Come out," he said, "come out and have a crack while the boys wrangle."
They walked from Redman's Lane, where the club stands, to the quiet side pavement of Stepney Green, deserted now because the respectable people were all in church, and it was too cold for the lounging of the more numerous class of those who cannot call themselves respectable. The ex-Chartist belonged, like Daniel Fagg, to the shoemaking trade in its humbler lines. The connection between leather and Socialism, Chartism, Radicalism, Atheism, and other things detrimental to old institutions, has frequently been pointed out, and need not be repeated. It is a reflecting trade, and the results of meditation are mainly influenced by the amount of knowledge the meditation brings with it. In this respect the Chartist of thirty years ago had a great advantage over his successors of the present day, for he had read. He knew the works of Owen, of Holyoke, and of Cobbett. He understood something of what he wanted, and why he wanted it. The proof of which is that they have got all they wanted, and we still survive.
When next the people make up their minds that they want another set of things they will probably get them, too.
"Let us talk," he said. "I've been thinking a bit about that chap's speech the other night – I wanted an answer to it."
"Have you got one?"
"It's all true what he said – first of all, it's true. The pinch is just the same. Whether the Liberals are in or the Tories, Government don't help us. Why should we help them?"
"Is that all your answer?"
"Wait a bit, lad – don't hurry a man. The chap was right. We ought to co-operate and get all he said, and a deal more; and once we do begin, mind you, there'll be astonishment – because you see, Dick, my lad, there's work before us. But we must be educated; we must all be got to see what we can do if we like. That chap's clever now, though he looks like a swell."
"He's got plenty in him. But he'll never be one of us."
"If we can use him, what matter whether he is one of us or not? Come to that – who is 'us'? You don't pretend before me that you call yourself one of the common workmen, do you? That does for the club; but, between ourselves, why, man! you and me, we're leaders. We've got to think for 'em. What I think is – make that chap draw up a plan, if he can, for getting the people to work together – for we've got all the power at last, Dick. We've got all the power. Don't forget when we old 'uns are dead and gone, who done it for you."
He was silent for a moment. Then he went on:
"We've got what we wanted – that's true; and we seem to be no better off – that's true, too. But we are better off, because we feel that every man has his share in the rule of the nation. That's a grand thing. We are not kept out of our vote – we don't see, as we used to see, our money spent for us without having a say. That's a very grand thing, which he doesn't understand, nor you neither, because you are too young. Everything we get, which makes us feel our power more, is good for us. The chap was right; but he was wrong as well. Don't give up politics, lad."
"What's the good if nothing comes?"
"There's a chance now for the working-man, such as he has never had before in history. You are the lad to take that chance. I've watched you, Dick, since you first began to come to the club – there's life in you. Lord! I watch the young fellows one after the other. They stamp and froth, but it comes to nothing. You're different – you want to be something better than a bellows; though your speech the other night came pretty nigh to the bellows kind."
"Well, what is the chance?"
"The House, Dick. The working-men will send you there, if you can show them that you've got something in you. It isn't froth they want – it's a practical man, with knowledge. You go on reading, go on speaking, go on debating. Keep it up. Get your name known; don't demean yourself. Get reported; and learn all that there is to learn. Once in the House, Dick, if you are not afraid – "
"I shall not be afraid."
"Humph! Well, we shall see. Well, there's your chance. A working-man's candidate – one of ourselves. That's a card for you to play; but not so ignorant as your mates. Eh? Able (if you want) to use the swell's sneerin' talk – so's to call a man a liar, without sayin' the words. To make him feel like a fool and a whipped cur, with just showing your white teeth! Learn them ways, Dick – they'll be useful."
"But if," said the young man doubtfully, "if I am to keep on debating, what subjects shall we take up at the club?"
"I should go in for practical subjects. Say that the club is ready to vote for the abolition of the Lords and the Church, and reform of the land laws when the time comes. You haven't got the choice of subjects that we had. Lord! what with rotten boroughs and the black Book of Pensions, and younger sons, and favoritism in the service, why, our hands were full."
"What practical subjects?"
"Why, them as your cousin talked about. There's the wages of the girls – there's food and fish and drink. There's high rent – there's a world of subjects. You go, and find out all about them. Give up the rest for a spell, and make yourself master of all these questions. If you do, Dick, I believe your fortune is made."
Dick looked doubtful – it seemed disheartening to be sent back to the paltry matter of wages, prices, and so on, when he was burning to lead in something great. Yet the advice was sound.
"Sometimes I think, Dick," the old man went on, "that the working-man's best friend would be the swells, if they could be got hold of. They've got nothing to make out of the artisan. They don't run factories, nor keep shops. They don't care, bless you, how high his wages are. Why should they? They've got their farmers to pay the rent; and their houses, and their money in the funds. What does it matter to them? They're well brought up, most of them – civil in their manner, and disposed to be friendly if you're neither standoffish nor familiar; but know yourself, and talk accordin'."
"If the swells were to come to us, we ought to go to them – remember that, Dick. Very soon there will be no more questions of Tory and Liberal; but only what is the best thing for us. You play your game by the newest rules. As for the old ones, they've seen their day."
Dick left him; but he did not return to the club. He communed beneath the stars, turning over these and other matters in his mind.
"Yes, the old man was right. The old indignation times were over. The long list of crimes which the political agitator could bring against King, Church, Lords, and Commons thirty, forty, fifty years ago, are useless now. They only serve to amuse an audience not too critical."
He was ashamed of what he had himself said about the Lords. Such charges are like the oratory of an ex-minister on the stump – finding no accusation too reckless to be hurled against his enemies.
He was profoundly ambitious. To some men, situated like himself, it might have been a legitimate and sufficient ambition to recover by slow degrees and thrift, and in some trading way, the place in the middle class from which the Coppins had fallen. Not so to Dick Coppin – he cared very little about the former greatness of the Coppins, and the position once occupied by Coppin the builder (his father), before he went bankrupt. He meant secretly something very much greater for himself. He would be a member of Parliament – he would be a working-man's member. There have already been half a dozen working-men's members in the House. Their success has not hitherto been marked, probably because none of them have shown that they know what they want – if, indeed, they want anything. Up to the last few days Dick simply desired in the abstract to be one of them; only, of course, a red-hot Radical – an Irreconcilable.
Now, however, he desired more. His cousin's words and the Chartist's words fell on fruitful soil. He perceived that to become a power in the House one must be able to inform the House on the wants – the programme of his constituents – what they desire, and mean to have. Dick always mentally added that clause, because it belongs to the class of speech in which he had been brought up – "and we mean to have it." You accompany the words with a flourish of the left hand, which is found to be more effective than the right for such purposes. They don't really mean to have it, whatever it may be. But with their audiences it is necessary to put on the appearance of strength before there arises any confidence in strength. Disestablishers of all kinds invariably mean to have it, and the phrase is, perhaps, getting played out.
Dick went home to his lodgings and sat among his books, thinking. He was a man who read. For the sake of being independent, he became a teetotaler – so that, getting good wages, he was rich. He would not marry, because he did not want to be encumbered. He bought such books as he thought would be useful to him, and read them, but no others. He was a man of energy and tenacity, whose chief fault was the entire absence as yet of sympathy and imagination – if these could be supplied in any way, Dick Coppin's course would be assured. For with them would come play of fancy, repartee, wit, illustration, and the graces as well as the strength of oratory.
He went on Monday evening to see Miss Kennedy. He would find out from her, as a beginning, all that she could tell him about the wages of women.
"But I have told you," she said, "I told you all the first night you came here – have you forgotten? Then, I suppose, I must tell you again."
The first time he was only bored with the story, because he did not see how he could use it for his own purposes – therefore he had forgotten the details.
She told him the sad story of woman's wrongs, which go unredressed while their sisters clamor for female suffrage and make school boards intolerable by their squabbles. The women do but copy the men; therefore, while the men neglect the things that lie ready to their hand and hope for things impossible, under new forms of government, what wonder if the women do the like?
This time Dick listened, because he now understood that a practical use might be made out of the information. He was not a man of highly sensitive organization, nor did he feel any indignation at the things Angela told him, seeing that he had grown up among these things all his life, and regarded the inequalities of wages and work as part of the bad luck of being born a woman. But he took note of all, and asked shrewd questions and made suggestions.
"If," he said, "there's a hundred women asking for ten places, of course the governor'll give them to the cheapest."
"That," replied Angela, "is a matter of course as things now are. But there is another way of considering the question. If we had a Woman's Trade Union, as we shall have before long, where there are ten places only ten women should be allowed to apply, and just wages be demanded."
"How is that to be done?"
"My friend, you have yet a great deal to learn."
Dick reddened and replied rudely, that if he had, he did not expect to learn it from a woman.
"A great deal to learn," she repeated gently. "Above all, you have got to learn the lesson which your cousin began to teach you the other night, the great lesson of finding out what you want and then getting it for yourselves. Governments are nothing; you must help yourselves; you must combine."
He was silent. The girl made him angry, yet he was afraid of her because no other woman he had ever met spoke as she did or knew so much.
"Combine," she repeated. "Preach the doctrine of combination; and teach us the purposes for which we ought to combine."
The advice was just what the cobbler had given.
"Oh, Mr. Coppin" – her voice was as winning as her eyes were kind and full of interest – "you are clever; you are persevering; you are brave; you have so splendid a voice; you have such a natural gift of oratory, that you ought to become – you must become – one of the leaders of the people."
Pride fell prone, like Dagon – before these words. Dick succumbed to the gracious influence of a charming woman.
"Tell me," he said, reddening, because it is humiliating to seek help of a girl, "tell me what I am to do."
"You are ambitious, are you not?"
"Yes," he replied coldly, "I am ambitious. I don't tell them outside," he jerked his thumb over his shoulder to indicate the Advanced Club, "but I mean to get into the 'Ouse – I mean the House." One of his little troubles was the correction of certain peculiarities of speech common among his class. It was his cousin who first directed his attention to this point.
"Yes: there is no reason why you should not get into the House," said Angela. "But it would be a thousand pities if you should get in yet."
"Why should I wait, if they will elect me?"
"Because, Mr. Coppin, you must not try to lead the people till you know whither you would lead them: because you must not pretend to represent the people till you have learned their condition and their wants; because you must not presume to offer yourself till you are prepared with a programme."
"Yet plenty of others do."
"They do; but what else have they done?"
"Only tell me – then – tell me what to do. Am I to read?"
"No; you have read enough for the present. Rest your eyes from books; open them to the world; see things as they are. Look out of this window. What do you see?"
"Nothing; a row of houses; a street; a road."
"I see, besides, that the houses are mean, dirty, and void of beauty: but I see more. I see an organ player; on the curbstone the little girls are dancing; in the road the ragged boys are playing. Look at the freedom of the girls' limbs; look at the careless grace of the children. Do you know how clever they are? Some of them, who sleep where they can and live as they can, can pick pockets at three, go shop-lifting at four, plot and make conspiracies at five; see how they run and jump and climb."
"I see them. They are everywhere. How can we help that?"
"You would leave these poor children to the Government and the police. Yet I think a better way to redeem these little ones is for the working-men to resolve together that they shall be taken care of, taught, and apprenticed. Spelling, which your cousin says constitutes most of the School Board education, does not so much matter. Take them off the streets and train them to a trade. Do you ever walk about the streets at night? Be your own police and make your streets clean. Do you ever go into the courts and places where the dock laborers sleep? Have a committee for every one such street or court, and make them decent. When a gang of roughs make the pavement intolerable, you decent men step off and leave them to the policeman, if he dares interfere. Put down the roughs yourselves with a strong hand. Clear out the thieves' dens, and the drinking shops; make roughs and vagabonds go elsewhere. I am always about among the people; they are full of sufferings which need not be; there are a great many workers – ladies, priests, clergymen – among them trying to remove some of the suffering. But why do you not do this for yourselves? Be your own almoners. I find everywhere, too, courage and honesty, and a desire for better things. Show them how their lot may be alleviated."
"But I don't know how," he replied, humbly.
"You must find out, if you would be their leader. And you must have sympathy. Never was there yet a leader of the people who did not feel with them as they feel."
This saying was too hard for the young man, who had, he knew, felt hitherto only for himself.
"You say what Harry says. I sometimes think – " he stopped short, as if an idea had suddenly occurred to him. "Look here, is it true that you and Harry are keeping company?"
"No, we are not," Angela replied with a blush.
"Oh! I thought you were. Is it off, then?"
"It never was – more – on – than it is at present, Mr. Coppin."
"Oh!" he looked doubtful. "Well," he said, "I suppose there is no reason why a girl should tell a lie about such a simple thing." He certainly was a remarkably rude young man. "Either you are, or you ain't. That's it, isn't it? And you ain't?"
"We are not," said Angela, with a little blush, for the facts of the case were, from one point of view, against her.
"Then if you are not – I don't care – though it's against my rules, and I did say I would never be bothered with a woman… Look here – you and me will."
"Will what?"
"Will keep company," he replied firmly. "Oh! I know it's a great chance for you – but then, you see, you ain't like the rest of 'em, and you know things, somehow, that may be useful – though how you learned 'em, nor where you came from, nor what's your character – there – I don't care, we'll keep company!"
"Oh!"
"Yes; we'll begin next Sunday. You'll be useful to me, so that the bargain is not all one side." It was not till afterward that Angela felt the full force of this remark. "As for getting married, there's no hurry; we'll talk about that when I'm member. Of course it would be silly to get married now."
"Of course," said Angela.
"Let's get well up the tree first. Lord help you! how could I climb, to say nothing o' you, with a round half-dozen o' babies at my heels?"
"But, Mr. Coppin," she said, putting aside these possibilities, "I am sorry to say that I cannot possibly keep company with you. There is a reason – I cannot tell you what it is – but you must put that out of your thoughts."
"Oh!" his face fell, "if you won't, you won't. Most girls jump at a man who's in good wages and a temperance man, and sought after, like me. But – there – if you won't, there's an end. I'm not going to waste my time cryin' after any girl."
"We will remain friends, Mr. Coppin?" She held out her hand.
"Friends? what's that? We might ha' been pals – I mean partners."
"But I can tell you all I think; I can advise you in my poor way still, whenever you please to ask my advice, even if I do not share your greatness. And believe me, Mr. Coppin, that I most earnestly desire to see you not only in the House, but a real leader of the people, such a leader as the world has never yet beheld. To begin with, you will be a man of the very people."
"Ay!" he said, "one of themselves!"
"A man not to be led out of his way by flatterers."
"No," he said with a superior smile, "no one, man or woman, can flatter me."
"A man who knows the restless unsatisfied yearnings of the people, and what they mean, and has found out how they may be satisfied."
"Ye – yes!" he replied, doubtfully, "certainly."
"A man who will lead the people to get what is good for themselves and by themselves, without the help of Government."
And no thunders in the Commons? No ringing denunciation of the Hereditary House? Nothing at all that he had looked to do and to say? Call this a leadership? But he thought of the Chartist and his new methods. By different roads, said Montaigne, we arrive at the same end.
CHAPTER XXXVI.
WHAT WILL BE THE END?
The end of the year drew near – the end of that last year of '81, which, whatever its shortcomings, its burning heat of July and its wretched rain of August, went out in sweet and gracious sunshine, and a December like unto the April of a poet.
For six months Angela had been living among her girls. The place was become homelike to her. The workwomen were now her friends – her trusted friends. The voice of calumny about her antecedents was silent, unless it was the voice of Bunker. The Palace of Delight (whose meaning was as yet unknown and unsuspected,) was rising rapidly, and indeed was nearly complete – a shell which had to be filled with things beautiful and delightful, of which Angela did not trust herself to speak. She had a great deal to think of in those last days of the year '81. The dressmaking was nothing – that went on. There was some local custom, and more was promised. It seemed as if (on the soundest principles of economy) it would actually pay. There was a very large acquaintance made at odd times among the small streets and mean houses of Stepney. It was necessary to visit these people and to talk with them.
Angela had nothing to do with the ordinary channels of charity. She would help neither curate nor Sister of Mercy, nor Bible-woman. Why, she said, do not the people stand shoulder to shoulder and help themselves? To be sure, she had the great advantage over professional visitors that she was herself only a work-woman, and was not paid for any services; and, as if there was not already enough to make her anxious, there was that lover of hers.
Were she and Harry keeping company? Dick Coppin asked this question; and Angela (not altogether truthfully) said that they were not. What else were they doing, indeed? No word of love now. Had he not promised to abstain? Yet she knew his past – she knew what he had given up for her sake, believing her only a poor dressmaker; all for love of her, and she could not choose but let her heart go forth to so loyal and true a lover. Many ladies, in many tales of chivalry, have demanded strange services from their lovers: none so strange as that asked by Angela when she ordered her lover not only to pretend to be a cabinet-maker, and a joiner, but to work at his trade and to live by it. Partly in self-reproach – partly in admiration – she watched him going and coming to and from the Brewery, where he now earned (thanks to Lord Jocelyn's intervention) the sum of a whole shilling an hour. For there was nothing in his bearing or his talk to show that he repented his decision. He was always cheerful, always of good courage – more, he was always in attendance on her. It was he who thought for her; invented plans to make her evenings attractive; brought raw lads (recruits in the army of culture) from the Advanced Club and elsewhere, and set them an example of good manners; and was her prime minister, her aide-de-camp, her chief vizier.
And the end of it all – nay, the thing itself being so pleasant, why hasten the end? And, if there was to be an end, could it not be connected with the opening of the Palace? Yes. When the Palace was ready to open its gates then would Angela open her arms.
For the moment it was the sweet twilight of love – the half-hour before the dawn. The sweet uncertainty, when all was certainty. And, as yet, the palace was only just receiving its roof. The fittings and decorations, the organ and the statues, and all, had still to be put in. When everything was ready, then – then – Angela would somehow, perhaps, find words to bid her lover be happy, if she could make him happy.
There could be but one end.
Angela came to Whitechapel incognito – a princess disguised as a milkmaid; partly out of curiosity, partly to try her little experiment for the good of work-girls, with the gayety and light heart of youth – thinking that before long she would return to her old place, just as she had left it. But she could not. Her old views of life were changed, and a man had changed them. More than that – a man whose society, whose strength, whose counsel had become necessary to her.
"Who," she asked herself, "would have thought of the Palace except him? Could I, could any woman? I could have given away money – that is all. I could have been robbed and cheated; but such an idea – so grand, so simple; it is a man's, not a woman's. When the Palace is completed; when all is ready for the opening, then – " And the air became musical with the clang and clash of wedding bells – up the scale, down the scale; in thirds, in fifths; with triple bob-majors and the shouts of the people, and the triumphant strains of a wedding march.
How could there be any end but one? – seeing that not only did this young man present himself nearly every evening at the drawing-room, when he was recognized as the director of ceremonies or the leader of the cotillon or deviser of sports, from an acting proverb to a madrigal; but that later the custom was firmly established that he and Angela should spend their Sundays together. When it rained, they went to church together, and had readings in the drawing-room in the afternoon, with, perhaps, a little concert in the evening, of sacred music, to which some of the girls would come. If the day was sunny and bright, there were many places where they might go – for the East is richer than the West in pretty and accessible country places. They would take the tram along the Mile End Road, past the delightful old church of Bow, to Staring Stratford, with its fine town-hall and its round dozen of churches and chapels; a town of 50,000 people, and quite a genteel place, whose residents preserve the primitive custom of fetching the dinner-beer themselves from its native public-houses on Sunday, after church. At Stratford there are a good many ways open if you are a good walker, as Angela was.
You may take the Romford road, and presently turn to the left and find yourself in a grand old forest (only there is not much of it left) called Hainault Forest. When you have crossed the Forest you get to Chigwell; and then, if you are wise, you will take another six miles (as Angela and Harry generally did) and get to Epping, where the toothsome steak may be found, or haply the simple cold beef – not to be despised after a fifteen miles' walk – and so home by tram. Or you may take the Northern road at Stratford, and walk through Leytonstone and Woodford; and, leaving Epping Forest on the right, walk along the bank of the River Lea till you come to Waltham Abbey, where there is a church to be seen, and a cross and other marvels. Or you may go still further afield and take train all the way to Ware, and walk through country roads and pleasant lanes, if you have a map, to stately Hatfield, and on to St. Albans; but do not try to dine there, even if you are only one-and-twenty, and a girl.
All these walks and many more were taken by Angela with her companion on that blessed day, which should be spent for good of body as well as soul. They are walks which are beautiful in the winter as well as in the summer – though the trees are leafless, there is an underwood faintly colored with its winter tint of purple; and there are stretches of springy turf and bushes hung with catkins; and, above all, there was nobody in the Forest or on the roads except Angela and Harry. Sometimes night fell on them when they were three or four miles from Epping. Then, as they walked in the twilight, the trees on either hand silently glided past them like ghosts, and the mist rose and made things look shadowy and large; and the sense of an endless pilgrimage fell upon them – as if they would always go on like this, side by side. Then their hearts would glow within them, and they would talk; and the girl would think it no shame to reveal the secret thoughts of her heart, although the man with her was not her accepted lover.
As for her reputation, where was it? Not gone, indeed, because no one among her old friends knew of these walks and this companionship, but in grievous peril.
Or, when the day was cloudy, there was the city. I declare there is no place which contains more delightful walks for a cloudy Sunday forenoon, when the clang of the bells has finished, and the scanty worshippers are in their places, and the sleepy sextons have shut the doors, than the streets and lanes of the old city.
You must go as Harry did, provided with something of ancient lore, otherwise the most beautiful places will quite certainly be thrown away and lost for you. Take that riverside walk from Billingsgate to Blackfriars. Why, here were the quays, the ports, the whole commerce of the city in the good old days. Here was Cold Herbergh, that great many-gabled house, where Harry, Prince of Wales, "carried on" with Falstaff and his merry crew. Here was Queen Hithe – here Dowgate with Walbrook. Here Baynard's Castle, and close by the Tower of Montfichet; also, a little to the north, a thousand places dear to the antiquarian – even though they have pulled down so much. There is Tower Royal, where Richard the Second lodged his mother. There is the Church of Whittington, close by the place where his college stood. There are the precincts of Paul's, and the famous street of Chepe. Do people ever think what things have been done in Chepe? There is Austin Friars, with its grand old church now given to the Dutch, and its quiet city square, where only a few years ago lived Lettice Langton (of whom some of us have heard). There is Tower Hill, on which was the residence of Alderman Medlycott, guardian of Nelly Carellis; and west of Paul's there is the place where once stood the house of Dr. Gregory Shovel, who received the orphan Kitty Pleydell. But, indeed, there is no end to the histories and associations of the city; and a man may give his life profitably to the mastery and mystery of its winding streets.
Here they would wander in the quiet Sunday forenoon, while their footsteps echoed in the deserted street, and they would walk fearless in the middle of the road, while they talked of the great town, and its million dwellers, who come like the birds in the morning, and vanish like the birds in the evening.
Or they would cross the river and wander up and down the quaint old town of Rotherhithe, or visit Southwark, the town of hops and malt, and all kinds of strange things; or Deptford, the deserted, or even Greenwich; and if it was rainy they would go to church. There are a great many places of worship about Whitechapel, and many forms of creed, from the Baptist to the man with the biretta; and it would be difficult to select one which is more confident than another of possessing the real Philosopher's Stone – the thing for which we are always searching, the whole truth. And everywhere church and chapel filled with the well-to-do and the respectable, and a sprinkling of the very poor; but of the working-men – none.
