"Never," was the prompt answer; "unless," added the "mistress," with a smile that half belied the severity of her speech—"unless you knew how to make a better use of it than to get together over rum and tea if you are women, or over beer and pipes if you are men, and talk scandal at your neighbours' expense. Come, friends," she added, changing at once from bluntness to courtesy, "oblige me by taking your cans and going home. I expect several persons to call to-day, and it will be inconvenient to have the avenues to the house crowded."
Yorkshire people are as yielding to persuasion as they are stubborn against compulsion. The yard was clear in five minutes.
"Thank you, and good-bye to you, friends," said Shirley, as she closed the gates on a quiet court.
Now, let me hear the most refined of cockneys presume to find fault with Yorkshire manners. Taken as they ought to be, the majority of the lads and lasses of the West Riding are gentlemen and ladies, every inch of them. It is only against the weak affectation and futile pomposity of a would-be aristocrat they turn mutinous.
Entering by the back way, the young ladies passed through the kitchen (or house, as the inner kitchen is called) to the hall. Mrs. Pryor came running down the oak staircase to meet them. She was all unnerved; her naturally sanguine complexion was pale; her usually placid, though timid, blue eye was wandering, unsettled, alarmed. She did not, however, break out into any exclamations, or hurried narrative of what had happened. Her predominant feeling had been in the course of the night, and was now this morning, a sense of dissatisfaction with herself that she could not feel firmer, cooler, more equal to the demands of the occasion.
"You are aware," she began with a trembling voice, and yet the most conscientious anxiety to avoid exaggeration in what she was about to say, "that a body of rioters has attacked Mr. Moore's mill to-night. We heard the firing and confusion very plainly here; we none of us slept. It was a sad night. The house has been in great bustle all the morning with people coming and going. The servants have applied to me for orders and directions, which I really did not feel warranted in giving. Mr. Moore has, I believe, sent up for refreshments for the soldiers and others engaged in the defence, for some conveniences also for the wounded. I could not undertake the responsibility of giving orders or taking measures. I fear delay may have been injurious in some instances; but this is not my house. You were absent, my dear Miss Keeldar. What could I do?"
"Were no refreshments sent?" asked Shirley, while her countenance, hitherto so clear, propitious, and quiet, even while she was rating the milk-fetchers, suddenly turned dark and warm.
"I think not, my dear."
"And nothing for the wounded—no linen, no wine, no bedding?"
"I think not. I cannot tell what Mrs. Gill did; but it seemed impossible to me, at the moment, to venture to dispose of your property by sending supplies to soldiers. Provisions for a company of soldiers sounds formidable. How many there are I did not ask; but I could not think of allowing them to pillage the house, as it were. I intended to do what was right, yet I did not see the case quite clearly, I own."