John Raikes gave a cry to drown his words. “Whisht, whisht!” he shouted.
“Ay, I’ve touched ye, have I? That’s Cope. Don’t trust my eyes; come and see. Come and see the busiest man in Horwick. Ye’re going to bide what happens, are ye? See ye don’t bide too long. What Emmason’s going to do he must do quick, and James, that can talk his daft talk, must see to it. Don’t tell me I’ve troubles ye know nothing about; ye’ve heard my trouble.”
John Raikes was pale, and he was clenching and unclenching his hands. Eastwood’s crafty face was anxious and drawn into corrugations. Monjoy fiddled with his russet whiskers. Moon’s speech had set a load on their spirits. But soon Monjoy began to come round. He remembered the merchant’s habitual caution and lack of enterprise, his attachment to filing and clipping and sweating and such small matters, and quickly his own hazardous venture filled his mind again.—It was the obtaining of fuel that troubled him chiefly. Ore he had, and labour, and the security of the hills, but unless fuel was to be had near at hand ... but there must be coal still unworked ... there would be much to do before the furnaces were finished that did not need his immediate supervision, and he would see about the coal.... He was as thoughtful as the others, tapping his fingers on the table; but the merchant’s words were already out of his mind.
“Give me two months, if this weather holds,” he cried suddenly, “and Johnny Cope shall think we’ve coined the big blessed silver moon herself! By heaven! if we stick for fuel, the lads shall bring their loom-timbers for the first fire! We’ll weave a shalloon with a ring and music in it! What?—Then, some Horwick way, some Trawden, and we’ll run it, rund and bar, down the Pennine to Sheffield, and Nottingham, and Derby, where Charlie turned back.... An ilion-end for the Elector! What, lads?”
He was on his feet, his arms extended, and the three looked at his red radiant countenance as if it had suddenly become unfamiliar.—“What, lads?” he cried again; and Matthew Moon rose.
“I’ve said my say,” he said. “There’s no talking to Arthur; but you, John, keep in mind what I told you. I’ll stand by the Exec’tive as long as I’m on it, and now I’ll go and look after these things that doesn’t matter so much in Horwick. Good night.”
The door closed behind him, and his heavy tread was heard on the stairs. Soon the others were deep in the discussion of the details of Big Monjoy’s dangerous undertaking.
CHAPTER VII.
CICELY.
THE summer grew hot and rainless, and the Horwick mills stood for want of water. In Wadsworth you could no longer tell the day of the week by the knocking of the looms—the lazy throw of the shuttle that began the week from the frantic clatter of “felling” on the eve of the Thursday market—for the weavers worked only early in the mornings and late into the night, and dozed during the afternoons. Not a breath stirred the birches and mountain-ash of the Scout; and the blue-flowering teazel-thistles, that the fullers set in iron frames for the raising of a nap on their cloth, stretched up the steep hillside like a dusty, slaty, ethereal bloom.
Arthur Monjoy had taken a small house in Horwick, but every night he was over the moor, and, until he should cease his setting out at nightfall and returning at daybreak, Cicely remained in her father’s house. Eastwood Ellah, who for a week after the wedding had slept none knew where, had returned. He sat in his old place by the chimney corner, watching Cicely as before; and sometimes, when he went upstairs, the jarring of his loom would sound through the greater part of the night. Once or twice only had he gone forth with Monjoy; he now seemed to dislike the moor, and, indeed, open spaces generally; and when he was not in the chimney corner he was usually in bed sleeping the clock round.