“Who’s us?” I asked.
“Tha’ll know soon enough. They’re waitin’ for us i’ th’ room upstairs—but come into th’ snug an’ have a glass o’ ale. Tha looks breathed and flustered, an’ as if tha’d seen a boggart on th’ road. There’s a chap inside aw want thee to know—he’s a rare ’un. He’s a better scholard nor other thee nor me, Ben, and aw’se warrant tha’ll like him, when tha knows him.”
“Who is it, George?”
“They call him Booth, John Booth, th’ parson’s son at Lowmoor.”
“Is he one on yo’?” I asked.
“As close as th’ heft to th’ blade,” replied George. And I breathed more freely, for John Booth I had seen many a time at Mr. Wright’s, the saddler’s, in Huddersfield; and I, though I had had no speech with him, had heard much of his great learning and sweet temper. He was not one to harm a fly. His father was, I knew, the Vicar at Lowmoor Church, and a master cropper to boot. Surely the son of a parson and of a finisher was engaged in no enterprise that need daunt my father’s son.
He was sat in the snug, a pot of ale before him, scarce tasted; a youth not more than twenty–one or two years old, with pale face, long lank dark hair that fell on either side a high and narrow brow. His eye was dark and melancholy, his lip’s somewhat thin. His face was bare of beard, of an oval shape, and womanish. He had a low, soft voice, and spoke more town like than I was used to. But he had a sweet smile and a winning, caressing way that partly irritated me because I thought it out of place in a man. But it was very hard to stand against all the same.
“I am glad to see you, Mr. Bamforth,” he said, placing a hand that, despite his trade, was small and white, in my own big, brawny fist. He looked very slim by the side of me as we stood hand in hand, for I am six feet and more and big built, and thanks be to God hard as nails and little bent even yet. But it is mind, my children, not matter, that rules the world.See how he tickled me at the very start,—“Mr. Bamforth”—there was a whole page of delicate flattery in the very words and way of breathing on it. It meant I was a man. It meant I was of some place and power in his reckoning of me. I felt myself flush, and I grew bigger to myself. Why, I do not think anyone had ever called me “Mr. Bamforth” before. Even ’Siah, our teamer, called me “Ben.” The Vicar at the Church called me “Ben,” and ruffled me not a little by the patronizing way he had. Mr. Webster, at the Powle, called me “Ben;” but that I did not mind, for he said it as though he loved me.
“I am glad to see you. Any friend of George Mellor’s is welcome, but your father’s son is thrice welcome. George, do you go in and prepare our friends to receive a new member. Set all things in order, and I will talk meanwhile with your cousin.”
“And so, Mr. Bamforth,” he continued.