"I don't see my way clear to refusing things when they are brought to me, Mrs. Gass, ma'am. The women 'ould only go off to Whitborough and pledge 'em there."
"Then they should go--for me."
"Yes, ma'am," rejoined the man, not knowing what else to say.
"I'm not particular squeamish, Ducket; trade's trade; and a pawnbroker must live as well as other people. I don't say but what the money he lends does sometimes a world of good to them that has no other help to turn to--and, maybe, through no fault of their own, poor things. But when it comes to dismantling homes by the score, and leaving families as destitute as ever they were when they came into this blessed world, that's different. And I wouldn't like to have it on my conscience, Ducket, though I was ten pawnbrokers."
Mrs. Gass quitted the shop with the last words, leaving Ducket to digest them. In passing North Inlet, she saw a group of the disaffected collected together, and turned out of her way to speak to them. Mrs. Gass was quite at home, so to say, with every one of the men at the works; more so than a lady of better birth and breeding could ever have been. She found fault with them, and commented on their failings as familiarly as though she had been one of themselves. Of the whole body of workpeople, not more than three or four had consistently raised their voices against the strike. These few would willingly have gone to work again, and thought it a terrible hardship that they could not do so; but of course the refusal of the majority to return practically closed the gates to all. Richard North could not keep his business going with only half-a-dozen pairs of hands in it.
"Well," began Mrs. Gass, "what's the time o' day with you men?"
The men parted at the address, and touched their caps. The "time o' day" meant, as they knew, anything but the literal question.
"How much longer do you intend to lead the lives of gentlefolk?"
"It's what we was a-talking on, ma'am--how much longer Mr. Richard North 'll keep the gates closed again' us," returned one whose name was Webb, speaking boldly but respectfully.
"Don't you put the saddle on the wrong horse, Webb; I told you that the other day. Mr. Richard North didn't close the gates again' you: you closed 'em again' yourselves by walking out. He'd open them to you tomorrow, and be glad to do it."