Some one shouted as a correction, 'Into gold.'
'Yes,' said Beamish; 'you have coined the sweat of your men into heavy gold, and have left the men to hunger, and toil, and nakedness; to cramp, and ague, and fever. They have their rights as well as you. They have borne their wrongs long enough. Now they have risen to demand what in equity is theirs—some share of the profits, some just proportion out of your gains, so that they may live in comfort, and not barely live.'
'Shut your mouth!' roared one of the crowd; 'we want no preaching now. We knows our rights, and we'll maintain them with our fists, and not with your tongue. Pip thinks he'll convert Tiger Ki, he does! Words won't do that. Send a shot at him, Tansley. That's the only argument for him.'
Tansley, the man addressed, thrust Beamish back with the butt-end of his fowling-piece, and laid his barrel on the front board.
'Listen, Master Drownlands,' shouted Beamish, again making an effort to shoulder his way to the front of the waggon. 'What we ask of you is twenty pounds for the cause of the United Fen Labourers. Give us twenty pounds, and swear to the conditions—a fair wage and cheap corn. Then we will do you no harm whatever. We will take your money, and move along our way. We are bound for Ely.'
'I pay you twenty pounds?' yelled Drownlands. 'I have a gun as well as you have, and will contribute lead to the cause—lead only.'
He ran to the corner of the room and took down his gun from the rack.
'I'll shoot,' threatened Tansley.
'Ay—and so will I,' said Drownlands, 'and let us see who can take the best aim. I think my eye is pretty well known to be sharp and my hand steady. By the Lord, I'll not spare you!' He paused and put on a hat. 'I can see finely with all those wisps of fire. Hold up your torches, boys, higher, that I may send my bullet into Tansley's heart. He will leap, and then down he goes.'
Fallen pieces of ignited straw had kindled the half-kneaded straw on the ground, and there ran flames and half-flames to and fro on the soil. The cart-horses in the waggon started and shifted position to escape these flashes and flickers.