It being Sunday afternoon, visitors were admitted to the hospital in which Alice lay. Mutimer had allowed himself time to pass five minutes by his sister’s bedside on the way to Clerkenwell. Alice was still unconscious; she lay motionless, but her lips muttered unintelligible words. He bent over her and spoke, but she did not regard him. It was perhaps the keenest pain Mutimer had ever known to look into those eyes and meet no answering intelligence. By close listening he believed he heard her utter the name of her husband. It was useless to stay; he kissed her and left the ward.
On his arrival at Clerkenwell Green—a large triangular space which merits the name of Green as much as the Strand—he found a considerable gathering already assembled about the cart from which he was to speak. The inner circle consisted of his friends—some fifty who remained staunch in their faith. Prominent among them was the man Redgrave, he who had presented the address when Mutimer took leave of his New Wanley workpeople. He had come to London at the same time as his leader, and had done much to recommend Mutimer’s scheme in the East End. His muscular height made those about him look puny. He was red in the face with the excitement of abusing Mutimer’s enemies, and looked as if nothing would please him better than to second words with arguments more cogent. He and those about him hailed the agitator’s appearance with three ringing cheers. A little later came a supporter whom Richard had not expected to see—Mr. Westlake. Only this morning intelligence of what was going on had reached his ears. At once he had scouted the accusations as incredible; he deemed it a duty to present himself on Mutimer’s side. Outside this small cluster was an indefinable mob, a portion of it bitterly hostile, a part indifferent; among the latter a large element of mere drifting blackguardism, the raff of a city, anticipating with pleasure an uproar which would give them unwonted opportunities of violence and pillage. These gentle men would with equal zeal declare for Mutimer or his opponents, as the fortune of the day directed them.
The core of the hostile party consisted of those who followed the banner of Comrade Roodhouse, the ralliers to the ‘Tocsin.’ For them it was a great occasion. The previous evening had seen a clamorous assembly in the room behind the Hoxton coffee-shop. Comrade Roodhouse professed to have full details of the scandal which had just come to light. According to him, there was no doubt whatever that Mutimer had known from the first the character of the bogus Company, and had wittingly used the money of the East-Enders to aid in floating a concern which would benefit himself and a few others. Roodhouse disclosed the identity of Mr. Robert Delancey, and explained the relations existing between Rodman and Mutimer, ignoring the fact that a lawsuit had of late turned their friendship to mutual animosity. It was an opportunity not to be missed for paying back the hard things Mutimer had constantly said of the ‘Tocsin’ party. Comrade Roodhouse was busy in the crowd, sowing calumnies and fermenting wrath. In the crowd were our old acquaintances Messrs. Cowes and Cullen, each haranguing as many as could be got to form a circle and listen, indulging themselves in measureless vituperation, crying shame on traitors to the noble cause. Here, too, was Daniel Dabbs, mainly interested in the occasion as an admirable provocative of thirst. He was much disposed to believe Mutimer guilty, but understood that it was none of his business to openly take part with either side. He stood well on the limits of the throng; it was not impossible that the debate might end in the cracking of crowns, in which case Mr. Dabbs, as a respectable licensed victualler whose weekly profits had long since made him smile at the follies of his youth, would certainly incur no needless risk to his own valuable scalp.
The throng thickened; it was impossible that the speakers should be audible to the whole assembly. Hastily it was decided to arrange two centres. Whilst Mutimer was speaking at the lower end of the Green, Redgrave would lift up his voice in the opposite part, and make it understood that Mutimer would repeat his address there as soon as he had satisfied the hearers below. The meeting was announced for three o’clock, but it was half an hour later before Mutimer stood up on the cart and extended his hand in appeal for silence. It at first seemed as if he could not succeed in making his voice heard at all. A cluster of Roodhouse’s followers, under the pretence of demanding quiet, made incessant tumult. But ultimately the majority, those who were merely curious, and such of the angry East-Enders as really wanted to hear what Mutimer had to say for himself, imposed silence. Richard began his speech.
He had kept Adela’s warning in mind, and determined to be calmly dignified in his refutal of the charges brought against him. For five minutes he impressed his hearers. He had never spoken better. In the beginning he briefly referred to the facts of his life, spoke of the use he had made of wealth when he possessed it, demanded if it was likely that he should join with swindlers to rob the very class to which he himself was proud to belong, and for which he had toiled unceasingly. He spoke of Rodman, and denied that he had ever known of this man’s connection with the Company—a man who was his worst enemy. He it was, this Rodman, who doubtless had written the letter which first directed suspicion in the wrong quarter; it was an act such as Rodman would be capable of, for the sake of gratifying his enmity. And how had that enmity arisen? He told the story of the lawsuit; showed how, in that matter, he had stood up for common honesty, though at the time Rodman was his friend. Then he passed to the subject of his stewardship. Why had he put that trust money into a concern without sufficient investigation? He could make but one straightforward answer: he had believed that the Company was sound, and he bought shares because the dividends promised to be large, and it was his first desire to do the very best he could for those who had laid their hard-earned savings in his hands.
For some minutes he had had increasing difficulty in holding his voice above the noise of interruptions, hostile or friendly. It now became impossible for him to proceed. A man who was lifted on to the shoulders of two others began to make a counter-speech, roaring so that those around could not but attend to him. He declared himself one of those whom Mutimer had robbed; all his savings for seven months were gone; he was now out of work, and his family would soon be starving. Richard’s blood boiled as he heard these words.
‘You lie!’ he bellowed in return; ‘I know you. You are the fellow who said last night that I should run away, and never come at all to this meeting. I called you a blackguard then, and I call you a liar now. You have put in my hand six threepences, and no more. The money you might have saved you constantly got drunk upon. Your money is waiting for you: you have only to come and apply for it. And I say the same to all the rest. I am ready to pay all the money back, and pay it too with interest.’
‘Of course you are!’ vociferated the other. ‘You can’t steal it, so you offer to give it back. We know that game.’
It was the commencement of utter confusion. A hundred voices were trying to make themselves heard. The great crowd swayed this way and that. Mutimer looked on a tempest of savage faces—a sight which might have daunted any man in his position. Fists were shaken at him, curses were roared at him from every direction. It was clear that the feeling of the mob was hopelessly against him; his explanations were ridiculed. A second man was reared on others’ shoulders; but instead of speaking from the place where he was, he demanded to be borne forward and helped to a standing on the cart. This was effected after a brief struggle with Mutimer’s supporters. Then all at once there was a cessation of the hubbub that the new speaker might be heard.
‘Look at this man!’ he cried, pointing at Mutimer, who had drawn as far aside as the cart would let him. ‘He’s been a-tellin’ you what he did when somebody died an’ left him a fortune. There’s just one thing he’s forgot, an’ shall I tell you what that is? When he was a workin’ man like ourselves, mates, he was a-goin’ to marry a pore girl, a workin’ girl. When he gets his money, what does he do? Why, he pitches her over, if you please, an’ marries a fine lady, as took him because he was rich—that’s the way ladies always chooses their husbands, y’understand.’