The Iron Master

by Jean Stubbs

  An hour later, peeping round the door to ask if she fancied anything else, Polly found her fallen against the pillows, looking steadfastly into the heavenly mansion prepared for her.

  Charlotte had borne up until the second funeral was over, and then cast aside all pretence of heading her household, and mourned its losses in the abandon which follows a period of intense strain. So the kitchen staff heard the door knocker, that Saturday afternoon, with a hint of temper.

  ‘Set of old pussy-cats!’ said Sally. ‘They come spying round when a body’s dead that they wouldn’t give the time of day to alive!’

  ‘I’d forget to hear it,’ said Polly, ‘except that Mrs Longe’d be vexed with me!’

  ‘I believe it is Mr Awkright,’ said Ambrose, recognising the peremptory sound.

  ‘Well, he can turn tail. She won’t see nobody, today!’ said Sally.

  ‘I should let him in,’ Ambrose advised. ‘He may annoy her thoroughly, and then she will not cry so hard.’

  ‘You’re too sharp for your own good!’ said Polly, and ran down the hall before Jack Ackroyd could assault their ears again.

  ‘And you know what happened to Sharp, don’t you, Master Ambrose?’ said Sally, warning him.

  ‘He cut himself!’ the two children chorused, and smiled covertly at one another.

  They heard the parlour door close behind their visitor. ‘How is Mr Awkright behaving himself, Polly?’ Ambrose asked, as she returned.

  ‘He ain’t put his foot in it so far. But give him five minutes!’

  He stood uncertainly, arms held stiffly by his sides, the pockets of his good dark suit stuffed with papers, his clean cravat awry.

  ‘I beg your pardon for this intrusion, Mrs Longe. Polly explained that you were low in spirits. I would not have come in, but she thought I might cheer you, ma’am.’

  He took two or three steps towards the bowed figure, and paused.

  ‘Though I am the poorest person imaginable on such occasions,’ he added, ‘I have never seemed to master the art of conveying what I feel.’

  Charlotte said with difficulty, ‘Polly had no right to place such a burden upon you, sir. Will you not sit down?’

  ‘I thank you. She said she would bring us some tea, and make a toast.’

  He sat upon the edge of Grandfather Wilde’s chair and spread his hands towards the glowing fire, glancing sideways at her. Charlotte dried her eyes and smoothed her hair, drew herself upright and avoided his gaze.

  ‘I had not realised that your good servant’s funeral took place yesterday,’ he explained. ‘I tend to overlook domestic matters. Mrs Longe, I have been endeavouring to compose a handbill, and your opinion and advice would be most acceptable. If you could bring yourself to glance at it for a moment.’

  He attempted to withdraw a paper from his pocket, whereat the rest fell all about the carpet.

  ‘God damn my carelessness!’ he muttered in self-disgust, stooping to pick them up.

  A slight smile hovered involuntarily on Charlotte’s mouth. Then her eyes welled tears again, and she whipped her handkerchief from her sleeve.

  ‘Mind you, Mrs Longe,’ said Jack, in kindly admonition, ‘the best medicine for grief is hard work!’ He peered about him for stray documents, and drew a moral from this statement. ‘I have suffered a deal of trouble in my life, but was never one to sit feeling sorry for myself when there was work to be done. I might say that by thinking of others I have forgotten myself, madam.’

  Charlotte stopped on a sob, and stared at him in disbelief.

  ‘Your want of tact is quite prodigious, sir!’ she cried, and wiped her eyes as though to dry them for good.

  He stood holding his papers, nonplussed by her reaction.

  ‘You misunderstand my meaning, madam,’ he protested.

  ‘Then you should speak plainer, sir!’

  Polly, entering, heard the intonation and registered her mistress’s annoyance, but set down her tray as though she were deaf.

  You may leave the bread, Polly,’ said Charlotte. ‘I shall toast it myself. I might ask you to do so, Mr Ackroyd’ — as the door closed — ‘but that you would be sure to burn it!’

  ‘Upon my soul, you are too provoking, madam!’

  ‘You should consider, sir, that I have been provoked in my turn!’

  But she was feeling a little better, and began composedly to toast the bread while the tea brewed. While he, who was no sort of fool, pondered on the possible shrewdness behind Polly’s simple facade. The woman who had crouched in her misery before him was now sitting upright, thinking of other matters. He had, after all, cheered her, however unwittingly.

  ‘I hesitate to suggest any comfort, Mrs Longe,’ he said, somewhat forlornly, ‘but the two friends you have recently buried were both aged. They led lives which might have been richer, perhaps, but were at any rate useful and comfortable. And, forgive me if my view seems too forthright for your present mood, they were dependants who sapped your time and energy. Mourn them by all means, for the affection you bore them, for the kindnesses they did you, for what they were to you — but do not mourn for yourself, madam. You have been given a freedom you did not possess before. Think, rather, what you shall do with it.’

  Then he sat watching her, with the firelight on her face. Even in two and a quarter years of a friendship which had scarcely stirred the gossips in Millbridge — for they all thought him a poor catch, and paid far more attention to the visits of Hamish Standish, Nicodemus Hurst and the Quaker Caleb Scholes — even in this long time he had not learned to gauge her moods. He saw, with relief, that she was rational once more. He rubbed his hands softly, thoughtfully, and extended them to the friendly heat.

  ‘Mr Ackroyd,’ said Charlotte kindly, ‘if you would be so good as to attend to the toast I will look at your handbill!’

  And smiled on him.

  He buttered three slices of bread, stuck them together on the fork, and held them before the red coals.

  ‘I assure you, Mrs Longe, that I shall be no King Alfred, but mind my business,’ he said in earnest, and applied himself to the toasting.

  But she was back in Lock-yard again, studying the information before her, judging how best to present it, dealing with fearful facts in cool objectivity.

  ‘This is something greater in scope than you have attempted before!’ she observed, in passing. ‘No sporadic risings, but a concerted effort, and yet in a peaceable fashion. You seek, in short, to organise the whole of the valley?’ He inclined his head. ‘Then, Mr Ackroyd, you are no longer speaking to the artisans, who have some education, but to the mass of men who will be illiterate. This handbill will, of necessity, be read out to them. So they want a simple explanation and a few facts, which they can grasp on the instant. Remember the truth and simplicity of the parables! You need, therefore, to make your matter colourful, to draw pictures rather than morals — for the moral should be drawn from the tale. No need, no use for rhetoric. Speak to them, address them, directly, forcibly. Tell them what is to be done now — do not wax poetical on future worlds. The man who is hungry would rather have a crust of bread than the finest sentiment! Tell them what you want of them. Let today act, and tomorrow shall take care of itself. And Latin quotations, sir, are persona non grata’ — here her lips twitched, and she added — ‘except between us, of course, Mr Ackroyd!’

  ‘I am obliged to you, madam,’ he said generously. ‘Forgive me if I do not look at you as I speak, but I must watch the toast lest it burn. So I have far to go before I become a pamphleteer worthy of The Northern ?Correspondent?’

  ‘Oh, sir,’ said Charlotte, ‘you speak to my condition, as the Quakers would say. Forgive me, I beg. I do but seek to couch your words more surely. But I believe I know what you wish to do, and therefore I speak as I have done.’

  At this juncture she poured the tea, and he proffered the toast in homage. He took the other documents from his pockets, brooding on them.

  ‘Oh, Mrs Longe,’ he said fervently, ‘I n
eed your help. I should be loath to put you to any risk, both for your children’s sake and your own. But though London may have twenty political pamphleteers to the square mile for aught I know, there is but one in this entire valley and her talents are lying unused!’

  As he spoke he gained confidence, ceased to fumble with his sheaf of papers, shook them neatly together and laid them upon a table by her. His whole body was bent upon the discourse. He leaned forward, hands planted on his knees, eyes eloquent, and held her with fire and conviction.

  ‘Madam, I confess myself to be a follower of William Godwin rather than Tom Paine. For ever since I read Godwin’s excellent book Political Justice I knew that evil could not be patched up but must be eradicated. The French were right, madam! Oh, I am not advocating their methods, nor condoning their bestial excesses. It would avail, no one if we were to hang Pitt, shoot the King, take over St James’s Palace and rob the Royal Mint! These are the dreams of ignorance and malice. But our present system must go, madam, for as long as a handful of rich men own the country we shall continue to subjugate and sweat a majority of poor wretches.

  ‘Now Paine would use our present social system, while giving every man his opportunity to work and eat according to his talent. On this I disagree in principle, but it may well be that we must make haste slowly. Paine first, and Godwin after. I am willing to go along with Tom Paine for a while! Tax the rich and give to the poor. Make each mill or shop or mine supply medical care for its employees, and a pension for the aged who can no longer toil. Let the workhouses provide work of a proper and dignified sort. And, since the human race depends upon propagation, dispense allowances: a sovereign when a poor couple marries, another sovereign to the mother when each child is born, and a payment to the parents for every child under the age of, say, fourteen years who is still at school. Subsidise education, so that everyone can at least read and write. Build schools everywhere, fill them with teachers of a proper sort — and may your Misses Whiteheads’ Academies and the old dames’ schools go hang! Fill their bellies, clothe their bodies, put a plain roof over their heads, teach them to think.

  ‘Madam, I confess that I have been at the back of most revolts in this valley. Since I was a young man I have helped and encouraged any little group who was oppressed. I led the weavers to burn down the first spinning-mill ever erected at Thornley, seventeen years ago. But I have never been able to organise the mass of workers. I labour for the day when I can see this valley as one great union, and hold their services in abeyance until they are paid fair wages. I look to the time when every man has a vote, and will elect a Parliament of Radicals. Then, madam, we shall see Reform!’

  Like most women, Charlotte had learned the trick of dividing her attention. So even as she turned over these ideas in her mind, she rang the bell for more hot water, sliced bread, and coals. While Jack Ackroyd strode the parlour impatiently, stopping to say Pshaw! at any ornament he especially despised. But she took her time, and supplied him with further refreshment before she spoke on the matter.

  ‘Sir, what you say reaches my heart and echoes my principles. In theory I am with you. It is the practice that falls down! Your organisation, sir, would be riddled with government spies in five minutes. And, upon all being discovered, no government would enquire into the purity of our motives, but despatch us both on the scaffold!’

  ‘Not both, madam. Me, certainly. Your name shall never be mentioned, nor your presence known. If you would be our pamphleteer even Ralph Fairbarrow shall know nothing of it!’

  She smiled in spite of herself at his ingenuousness.

  ‘My dear Mr Ackroyd, Mr Fairbarrow and many others — unless they have forgot me quite! — would recognise my style. And if I agree to work with you then I agree to the penalty for working. That would be only honest in me.’

  He struggled with a notion that was still new to him: the value of herself as an individual over the value of the cause itself.

  ‘Then,’ he said with infinite regret, ‘I withdraw my offer, Mrs Longe. I know a little more of you and of your children since we made up our quarrel of that other year, and I cannot allow you so to risk your safety. It does not matter about me. I belong to no one. None shall miss me.’

  In her astonishment Charlotte let the toast burn.

  ‘There, sir!’ she cried. ‘Look what I have done!’

  ‘It is not my fault, surely, madam?’ he protested, brought down from his heights.

  ‘No, sir, but I must scold someone for it!’ Smiling at her wilfulness and his amazement. Then, threading fresh slices on to the fork, ‘Mr Ackroyd, you have spoke of talents lying unused. What of your talent for teaching? Certainly, Millbridge regards you as an odd fish, sir. But they do not think you dangerous, and they are prepared to overlook a few eccentricities because of your ability as their headmaster. In the field of young minds you will plant a greater and more fertile crop of radical attitudes than by rousing an illiterate mob. For I must risk your displeasure, sir, by warning you that what you begin in this valley you will not end! Whereas in your grammar school the whole object is encompassed peaceably. Your pupils need you, sir, and they would miss you.’

  He was restored at once to his theme.

  ‘First, madam!’ Holding up his forefinger in reproof. ‘I know that he who sows the wind shall reap the whirlwind. I dislodge a clod of earth, and start a landslide. I know, I know. You speak of ideas. Ideas are very well, but they are not enough. It is by our actions we are judged, madam. I do not seek merely to educate some hundreds of benevolent young men. I wish to awaken the dormant spirit of thousands of oppressed human beings, to make them aware of their rights and their powers. Millbridge would find another headmaster but I doubt that such another weapon as myself has yet been forged in this valley. My predecessor and benefactor, Henry Tucker, used me as an educational experiment, madam. Oh, he was never unkind. He treated me fairly. I was not ill-used. But I was proof of the assumption that if you take an intelligent boy from a poor family, and instruct him well, he will prove as good or better than your educated gentleman.’

  ‘So you were not unhappy with your family, sir?’

  A wound had been opened which he had long chosen to ignore. He left his fresh toast untouched. He became cold and awkward.

  ‘No, madam, they were kind to me, but kindness does not extend the intellect, and love can hamper it! I left them far behind me. With a wisdom which, as a child, I did not realise, Mr Ricker cut me off from my family. I was allowed no dealings with them. They, being equally wise, though so much humbler, agreed to the stipulation. A boy of six or seven, madam, finds such a situation harrowing. A man over forty sees its inevitability.’

  The line of his mouth was stoical. He coughed, folded his arms, crossed his legs, and stared fiercely at the fire-irons.

  ‘Such a weapon as yourself?’ Charlotte prompted, picking out the expression he had used so bitterly.

  He looked directly at her dark and hard and isolated.

  ‘Madam, Mr Tucker did not consider human nature in his pursuit of education. My feelings were for my family, my intellect was for him, and socially I belonged and now belong to nobody. When I entered this room today I believe I remarked on my inability to express emotion. It arises from the division in me. I am not a loving, trusting, believing person, madam. I am of no use to myself. Therefore, my affections are directed to the mass of people — since they do not demand of me an attention which I could not give. I belong to everyone, madam, and therefore to no one. So no one will miss me.’

  ‘Oh, Mr Ackroyd,’ said Charlotte compassionately, ‘I begin to understand you better. Pray eat your toast, sir’ — briskly endeavouring to put him at his ease again — ‘I should have thought we had gone to sufficient trouble not to leave it!’

  She had been making up her mind for a longer time than he would have thought possible: for well over three years, since his first visit. She spoke simply, frankly.

  ‘Sir, I know myself to be an excellent pamphleteer. And I
do not say this out of vanity, for my husband taught me, and what I am I owe to him and the need to earn my bread. And my principles are yours, sir. I shall be pleased to help you.’

  Now he was beset by so many emotions, rational and otherwise, that he could not deal with her or himself. He jumped up at once, spilling his toast, knocking the table in his flight, stuffing the papers pell-mell into his pockets.

  ‘I am no weathercock, madam,’ he cried, ‘to change direction with the wind. I had not thought about such matters as your style betraying you. I had thought I would take all upon myself, and so protect you from possible consequences. I see it cannot be. I beg your pardon if I have in any way offended you. And good-day to you, madam!’

  Whereupon he departed, forgetting his hat, cravat tails flying, banging the front door after him.

  ‘And how did Mr Awkright offend Mamma this time?’ Ambrose asked.

  ‘Now bless me if she ain’t forgot to tell me all her private business!’ Polly replied with tremendous sarcasm.

  ‘But has Mamma stopped crying, please, Polly?’ Cicely asked.

  ‘Oh, she ain’t grieving no more, love. Just a-setting by the parlour fire, a bit on the thoughtful side. Leave her be until bed-time. She’ll be right as rain tomorrow.’

  *

  Charlotte had picked up the toast and righted the table by the time Polly came in to see what all the noise was about.

  ‘Mr Ackroyd has forgotten his hat,’ she said. ‘If he comes back for it, Polly, do not trouble him to enter — unless he wishes to, of course — just give it to him. He has some problem on his mind.’

  The handbill had been forgotten. She sat with her feet on the fender, shoulders hunched forward, reading it. From time to time she smiled impishly, involuntarily, at some scholarly turn of phrase, some solemn passage, some flight of rhetoric which would have adorned an essay better than a tract. Then she brought writing materials to the table by the fire, and began to draft a new broadsheet. The children came to say goodnight and she kissed them fondly, promising they should spend the whole of tomorrow with her. Polly fetched her supper on a tray. Jack Ackroyd did not return. Their separate windows shone long into the winter night mute witnesses to separate thoughts. But whereas Charlotte mused philosophically, Jack Ackroyd struggled in rage and misery.