"Stop work on new garden at once; pay outside labourers week"s wages and dismiss them."
Colonel Eldridge"s eyes, resting upon the paper, remained there longer than it required to take in its meaning. Coming immediately upon the thoughts with which his mind had been full, they gave him an unpleasant shock, the effect of which he could not entirely hide from the man who had administered it to him.
"There"s a mistake," he said shortly. "I never intended that the work should be stopped."
Coombe did not take this up. "I"ve come to ask, sir," he said, "if anything can be done about the men I got in to help with the work. I had a good deal of difficulty in finding them, and I told them it was likely to be at least a two months" job. Sir William said I could count it as that. They"re mostly men who"ve been in the army--unemployed.
There"s dissatisfaction among them, and I--"
Colonel Eldridge had allowed him to go on because he wanted time to collect himself; but he now interrupted brusquely: "There"s no need to make trouble at all. You can tell them there"s been a mistake, and they can go on."
Coombe"s eyes dropped. He was a youngish man, with a self-confident air, but with something secretive in his appearance and demeanour which seemed to contradict his quiet respectful manner. "I"ve given them notice, sir, on that telegram," he said. "I couldn"t do anything else."
"You ought to have come and seen me first. It seems to me that you"ve been glad of the opportunity to make trouble."
It was a relief to him to speak like this. He disliked the man who stood before him with his sleek, respectful air, which he suspected to hide hostility that would show itself in insolence if it dared.
"I didn"t come to see you about that, sir. My instructions are plain enough from that telegram, and I"d only got to carry them out."
"Then why do you come to me at all?"
"Because I thought you might be able to do something to keep these men from making trouble, sir, as Sir William isn"t here. Only two of them belong to Hayslope--Jackson and Pegg. The others are lodging here. I"ve paid them their wages, as instructed, and with no work to do they"re likely to get drinking and--"
"Oh, it"s out of consideration for the good behaviour of the village you"ve come to me, is it?"
"Yes, sir. And because Sir William isn"t here to deal with it."
Colonel Eldridge was getting more and more annoyed with him. But his training prevented his showing more annoyance with men of this cla.s.s than he could make effectual. "Sir William is your master," he said, "and you are quite right to take your orders from him. But you know perfectly well that it"s for me as a magistrate to deal with anything of that sort, whether he is here or not."
"Yes, sir, that"s why I have come to you. I only meant that as the men are upset-like at Sir William"s turning them off, he might have done something to quiet them."
There was no offence apparent in this. Colonel Eldridge thought for a moment. "The best thing to do is to tell them that there has been a mistake," he said. "They can go back to their work. You can tell them that on my authority, and I"ll make it right with Sir William."
Coombe hesitated, and then came plump out with a refusal. "I can"t do that, sir, without instructions from Sir William himself."
There was a moment"s pause. Coombe kept his eyes on the ground, but his face became a shade paler. Colonel Eldridge looked at him as if he would have annihilated him, and then turned away, and said quietly: "Very well, then. You can go."
Coombe threw a glance at him, seemed as if he were going to say something further, but went out without a word.
CHAPTER XI
A QUESTION OF LABOUR
So that was how William had taken his protest! No word to him, but this--it seemed like ill-tempered--order to put an end to the work. His anger was hot against Coombe, whom he accused in his mind of putting him in a hole for the sake of doing so, and then coming to see how he would take it. But towards William his feeling was more one of sorrow.
He had been giving him credit for generosity and kindly feeling. Surely it was unworthy of him to behave in that way, even if he had allowed himself to be unduly annoyed over the tone of the protest made to him.
What must have been his att.i.tude when he sent that telegram to his servant, and sent no word to his brother? He must have known that to dismiss his labourers in that way at a moment"s notice would make trouble--trouble that would affect his brother who was on the spot. Yet he had left him to find out the high-handed action he had taken for himself. Why couldn"t he have given him an opportunity of withdrawing, if he really thought that he had vetoed the undertaking, which had been in hand for a week? He _couldn"t_ have thought that; the letter written to him was not a prohibition.
What was to be done now? If that confounded fellow Coombe had come to him before dismissing the men, he would have wired to William and put it all right. Yes, he would have done that, pocketing the hurt to his dignity; for he did recognize that he had given some cause for offence, though William had been in the wrong to take it in the way he had.
Was it too late to do it even now? It was he who had induced the word to be given that had stopped the work, and it was for him to give the word for it to go on. It was simply Coombe"s insolence that had refused to take it from him. Coombe would find that he had overstepped the bounds; for he had for the time made it impossible to take the course that his master must wish to have taken. If matters were to be put right, it could only be by sending a long telegram to William. He began to formulate it in his mind. He must say that his letter had not meant that he wished the work to be stopped; he must make it plain that he wanted it to go on; he must say that Coombe had already dismissed the outside labour before telling him of the orders he had received, and had refused to take orders from him to re-engage the men. It would be best to get William to wire to Coombe to act upon Colonel Eldridge"s authority until he came to Hayslope himself.
It would be a complete surrender on his part; but he was ready to make it. The mood in which he had entered the house still influenced him; if William chose to act in this way towards him, he would not accept it as an offence without giving him a chance to alter his att.i.tude. They could have it out together when they met; that would be better than writing letters, which were apt to be misunderstood.
He had sat down at his writing-table to compose his message, when the maid came in and said that some men had called to see him. Who were they? One was Jackson, from the Brookside cottages, and another was Pegg, from Crouch Lane. There were two more whom she didn"t know. She was told to show them in.
Jackson was an elderly man of good character well known to Colonel Eldridge, who had employed him himself for some years, until he had been obliged to reduce his labour bill. Pegg was a younger man, who had worked on various farms, and since the war, in which he had been wounded, had never remained long in one place, because his small pension, and the greatly increased wages for agricultural labour, had enabled him to indulge his taste for occasional spells of leisure. The other two men were younger still, and one of them wore a discoloured khaki tunic. Colonel Eldridge did not know either of them, but a shrewd glance told him that they were of the agricultural labourer cla.s.s, probably smartened up a bit by their military service. They stood before him, Jackson slightly in advance.
"Well, Jackson! Well, Pegg! Hope your leg hasn"t been giving you any more trouble. Who are these two?"
The man in the khaki tunic answered for himself, smartly. "Thomas Dell, Colonel, late of Second Battalion Downshire Regiment." The other followed suit. "Albert Chambers, Colonel, late of Army Service Corps."
He asked them a few questions about themselves. They had served their country; the soldier in him must pay tribute to that first of all. They could be seen expanding in modest pride, as they exercised the mode of address they had learnt in the orderly room, standing before their officers as they now stood before him. He approved of them. Men who had served unwillingly in the army and taken their discharge would not have answered him in that way.
"Well, what is it you want? Jackson!"
"We were took on at Mr. William"s, beg your pardon, Sir William"s, sir, and now we"re turned off. It don"t seem hardly fair, and we thought we"d come to you about it."
"How were you taken on? By the week?"
"Yes, sir. But--"
"Coombe has just been here, and told me that you"ve had a week"s wages instead of notice. So there"s nothing unfair in it."
"Well, sir, we were told that it would be a two month"s job. That"s what Coombe told us."
"Coombe took you on, I suppose; not Sir William?"
"Yes, sir. It was like this--"
"I"ve just heard all about it from Coombe. There has been a mistake.
When you came in, I was just about to telegraph to Sir William. What you"d better do is to wait till I get an answer, and I"ve no doubt that to-morrow you"ll be going on where you left off. You"ll have had a day"s holiday at full pay, and you won"t have anything to grumble at, eh?"
He said this with a smile. He liked old Jackson, and had often stopped to have a word with him, when he had been employed on estate work, mending a fence, clearing a drain, or whatever job it might be that had to do with the land on which he had worked since boyhood. He was full of homely wisdom; a true son of the soil, with few desires that were not connected with it. Such men appeal to the fatherly instinct that is born in the best type of landowner towards those dependent on him. Their simplicity must be respected; their reliance upon the justice of their "betters" must be met by the most careful consideration of their troubles.
Old Jackson hesitated. "Well, sir," he said, "begging your pardon, we"re not wishful to take on work again under Coombe. Sir William, he"d always treat us right, same as you would, if he wasn"t too occupied to look after things himself, as I"ve told these others who"ve been working along of us. Pegg"ll bear me out there."
Pegg bore him out, with a mumble of acquiescence, and Colonel Eldridge waited for him to go on.
"Coombe don"t come from these parts," said old Jackson, and came to a stop.
"That"s nothing against him, if he acts as he should. What"s the complaint against him?"
But Jackson had come to the end of his powers of expression. He could only repeat: "He don"t come from these parts."
Dell, in the khaki jacket, took up the tale. "He"s desirous of making mischief, sir. We were told, after you came down the other morning, that there"d be trouble about the work we were doing, and if we were turned off of a good job we"d better look to you for another one."