Amos went to the door.
‘So there you are, you Methody twister,’ Matt said at once. ‘We’re come to hear how you account for writing yourself into twenty acres while the rest of us get nowt.’
‘Ah’ and ‘Thass right’ said the crowd.
‘I can’t account for it,’ Amos said, bringing his mind back to mundane matters. ‘No, there’s no accounting for that, so far as I can see.’ No accounting for anything in a world where it could happen that one day, a man received enough wealth to ensure that the chapel would be roofed, and on the next news that the chapel was burned down. ‘I can’t account for it at all,’ Amos said again.
No impartial observer could have failed to see that, so far from being elated by his unaccountable award, Amos looked ill and sick at heart; all the harsh lines in his face were graved deeper, a patchy pallor lay around his mouth and eyes, and his lids were red with sleeplessness. But there was no impartial observer in that crowd, and all anyone saw was the man who had, not very willingly, drawn up the paper from which they had gained nothing and he twenty acres for which he now said he could not account.
‘You was the one said let Seizer hev what was Seizer’s,
ain’t you?’ Matt said accusingly. ‘And beyond doubt thass
what you wrote, you––! And got all us bloody iggerunt
lot to sign it. They give you twenty acres for your services,
you crooked sod, you! I see it all as clear as––day I’ He
believed that he did. He’d taken no solid food during his two-day drinking bout and now, half light-headed with fasting, was in a state to believe anything.
When he had left his hovel, carrying the gun, he had no intention of using it; he meant to frighten Amos, to scare him thoroughly and force some kind of explanation from him. Now he had found his own explanation, and there stood the rogue, entirely unrepentant, not attempting any explanation and not looking in the least scared. ‘If you reckon you’re gonna gloat over your ill-got gains, Amos Greenway, while the rest of us starve on the parish, you’re mistook. I’m gonna shoot you for the damned treacherous swine you are!’
Even then he might not have done it had not Amos stood there so exasperatingly calm. As it was, he swung the old gun into position and pulled the trigger. There was a flash, a muffled kind of explosion, a strong smell of gunpowder and a cloud of blue smoke which hovered for a moment between the two men and then drifted outwards over the heads of the crowd and inwards, across the workroom, to the kitchen door from which Julie, her tea forgotten, was fearfully peeping. As the smoke cleared Amos could see Matt again, standing there holding out his scorched and bleeding hands, and the twisted broken thing which had been his gun lying at his feet.
‘You’d best come inside,’ Amos said, reaching out an arm. ‘You, Bert, take his other side; the rest of you go home.’
They helped Matt on to the bench by the work-table and Amos called Julie to bring water and something for a bandage. Matt then showed his mettle. White-lipped, he said:
‘We don’t want no water, Amos; gunpowder’s the best cleaner. I’ve put a pinch and sparked it off on many a wound afore now. Jest you tie me up. And you, Bert, get
out and find me a drink of some sort, somewhere, for the love of God.’
‘Julie’ll make you a cup of tea,’ Amos said. Julie did; she also, remembering Matts several kindnesses to her in the past, produced the big black bottle of the medicine which was so effective for easing her pains, and gave him, since he was a man, a double dose, which soon did its merciful work. Then the four drank tea together, even Amos drinking the strong, heavily sugared beverage gladly; and presently Bert took Matt home. It was generally agreed that nothing but a miracle had saved Amos and Matt and those nearest to them from death, mutilation or blindness, and the jubilation was in no way mitigated by thoughts about quick death being preferable to slow death by starvation, which seemed to be the fate in store for many Waste-dwellers just then.
CHAPTER TWELVE
As soon as his hands were partially healed and he felt capable of carrying on the campaign Matt attempted to talk to the Squire again; but Richard, wary perhaps of such attempts, stayed in London the whole of that spring. So Matt drove into Baildon again and was again kindly received and listened to by Mr Turnbull, who said, yes, he had received the papers and, yes, he had noted what they said, and then mentioned that he had taken on himself to advise Sir Richard and the commissioners to make some allotment, however small, to the Waste-dwellers.
‘I could only advise, you know, because all that side of the business was nothing at all to do with me; and because, except for the two who had papers, none of you had even the shadow of a legal claim. But I think I explained that before.’
‘Seem to me they took your advice, sir, and made some allotment—twenty acres; but all to one man, Amos Green way, the cobbler. Now why should that be? Twenty acres divided out among us all would hev done us well and satisfied everybody. Why all to one and nowt for the rest of us?’
‘That is a question quite beyond my power to answer. Greenway has no claim that I know of, and the land granted him came from Sir Richard’s personal allotment of the Waste. Sir Richard may have had some private reason—I understand that Greenway is a very industrious workman.’
‘So are we all in our way; and we are dependent on the Waste, which Amos ain’t. He could cobble shoes anywhere.’
‘Yes, I admit that it seems very hard. But I have to tell you frankly that you have no redress, no hope of redress. The distribution was done legally and justly, and you would be best advised to accept it and to look out for some means of making a livelihood when the Waste is fenced, as it will be very soon.’
A more discouraging interview could hardly be imagined, and Matt had to stiffen his courage to attempt the next one. He braced himself and early one evening walked up to the Manor again and asked, this time, to speak to Lady Shelmadine. He’d seen her about and rather admired her looks—her hair was pretty; and it was well known that she had been more than ordinarily kind to the bailiff when he had his accident. A pretty woman, thought Matt—knowing nothing of the circumstances—might well have some influence on her husband, and a kind woman might be disposed to use that influence in the cause of right and justice. He was astonished at himself for not having thought of it before.
Linda received him kindly and listened to his story, which was more succinct and less full of rancour than she had expected when he began and she realised the reason for his visit. When he had finished she began gently, ‘I will, of course, speak to Sir Richard about you and the rest of them—I promise you that; and if I thought any persuasions of mine could have any effect …’ She broke off, imagining exactly what the result of such pleadings would be. ‘It’s Sir Richard’s land,’ she said, ‘and if he has decided not to make any allotments, as it seems he has, I’m afraid that nothing I could say would change his mind.’
‘But you will try, my lady? Afore thass too late, if you don’t mind my saying so.’
‘I’ll write to him tomorrow. Ill put the case just as you have put it to me. But… I do beg of you, don’t pin your faith on my efforts.’
Seen close to she was even prettier than he had thought, because her eyes were so soft and gentle-looking—in fact not unlike old Ripper’s; and when she smiled, as she did when bidding him good night, she was very sweet-looking indeed. It was funny—Matt thought—that she should have so little faith in her powers of persuasion; he knew several lumpish women with faces like the hindquarters of a carthorse who got their own way with their menfolk every time. And it wasn’t because ‘the gentry’ were different; everybody knew that Lady Fennel ruled Ockley, and not by sweet smiles and saying ‘please’. Them that smiled and said please—like poor old Julie Greenway—most often didn’t get much, Matt reflected; and that brought him back to the hopeful-hopelessness which had led him to go to the Manor. If this failed, what else could they do? What’d become of them when their front doors opened on the highroad and their back doors on the fenced-in Waste? What’d become of Shad’s new donkey and his own old horse? You could pay for beasts to be pastured, of course; but then to turn that necessary extra penny you’d have to work the poor beasts to death—and yourself too. My God, Matt thought, we are all in a mucky mess, and that’s the truth.