He caught Daisy in his arms, and kissed her twice before she could evade his grasp, and then ran off after Slee, who was steadily walking on, smiling, as he caressed his tender, bruised lip with his damp handkerchief.
Once he pressed his thumb down on his palm in a meaning way, and gave an ugly wink. Then he chuckled, but checked his smiles, for they hurt his swollen face.
“Not bad for one day, eh! That’s ointment for Mester Joe Banks’s sore place, and a bit o’ revenge at the same time. This wean’t have nowt to do wi’ the strike; this is all private. Here he comes,” he muttered, twitching his ears. “I thowt he would. Well, I mean to hev five pun’ to howd my tongue, and more when I want it. And mebbe,” he continued, with an ugly leer, “I can be a bit useful to him now and then.”
A minute later Richard Glaire had overtaken Sim Slee, and a short conversation ensued, in the course of which something was thrust into the schemer’s hand. Then they parted, and that night, in spite of his swollen lip, Sim Slee delivered a wonderful oration on the rights of the British workman at the meeting at the Bull, at which were present several of the men after Sim’s own heart; but the shrewd, sensible workmen were conspicuous by their absence, as they were having a quiet meeting of their own.
Volume One—Chapter Fifteen.
Daisy is Obstinate.
“A lungeing villain,” muttered Joe Banks to himself, “he knows nowt but nastiness. Strange thing that a man can’t make up to a pretty girl wi’out people putting all sorts o’ bad constructions on it. Why they’re all alike—Missis Glaire, the wife and all. My Daisy, too. To say such a word of her.”
He hastened home, filled his pipe, lit it, and went out and sat down in the garden, in front of his bees, to smoke and watch them, while he calmed himself down and went over what had gone by, before thinking over the future.