Will of the Mill Part 11

"Speaking of you! No. But my father says that he often feels irritated by him."

"Ah!" said the artist, reflectively. "He never shows them to me when we have a pipe together at night. He is a very interesting character, Will. Of course, as somebody said, 'manners makyth man--'"

"Oh," said Will, "I thought Manners made pictures."

"No wonder you lost that fish," said the artist, dryly, "if you waste your time making bad jokes."

CHAPTER NINE.

A QUEER CHARACTER.

"Old Boil O's in a regular rage," said Josh, laughing.

"Well, but he hasn't been talking to you about it, has he?" replied Will.

"Yes; said your father must be getting off his head to go and buy up such a miserable ramshackle piece of rubbish. It was only fit to knock to pieces and sell for old copper."

"Old Drinkwater had better keep his tongue quiet," said Will, shortly, "or he'll make my father so much off his head that he will give him what he calls the sack."

"Nonsense! Your father would not turn away such an old servant as that."

"He wouldn't like to, of course," said Will, loftily; "but Boil O has grown so precious b.u.mptious, and he doesn't care to do this, and he doesn't care to do that. I believe he thinks he's master of the whole place."

"Well, he always was so ever since I can remember; but--tchah!--your father would not turn him away. My father says he is the most useful man he ever knew. Why, he's just like what we say when we count the rye-gra.s.s: soldier, sailor, tinker, tailor--you know."

"Oh, yes, I know," said Will, "and he isn't soldier nor thief; but he can do pretty well everything, from making a box, plastering and painting, to mending a lock or shoeing a horse. But such impudence! My father mad, indeed! I think it was a very wise thing for him to do, to buy that engine so cheaply. The old mill's nearly all wood. Suppose it were to catch fire?"

"Bother!" said Josh. "Why hasn't it caught fire all these two hundred years since it was built?"

"Because everybody's been so careful," said Will. "But it might catch fire any day."

"Pigs might fly," said Josh. "Well, suppose it did. Haven't you got plenty of water to put it out?"

"Yes, but how are you going to throw it up to the top? Why, with that engine hose and branch, now old Boil O's put the pump suckers right, you could throw the water all over the place a hundred feet, I daresay, in a regular shower. Ha, ha, ha! I say, Josh, what a game!"

"What's a game?"

"Shouldn't I like to have the old thing out, backed up to the dam, with some of the men ready to pump--a shower, you know."

"Well, I suppose you mean something, but I don't understand."

"A shower--umbrella."

"Well, everybody puts up an umbrella in a shower."

"Yah! What an old thick-head you are!--old Manners sitting under his umbrella, and we made it rain."

Josh's face expanded very gradually into the broadest of grins, wrinkling up so much that it was at the expense of his eyes, which gradually closed until they were quite tightly shut.

"Oh, no," he said at last. "It would be a game, but,"--he began to rub himself gently with both hands--"the very thought of it makes me feel as if my ribs were sore. He was such a weight."

"Yes, we mustn't play any more tricks; he's such a good chap. But about old Boil O--I don't like his turning so queer. He went on at me like a madman--I felt half frightened--said all sorts of things."

"What sort of things?"

"Oh, that father imposed upon him because he was a poor man, and set him to do all kinds of dirty jobs about the place because he was willing.

Said he'd repent it some day. When you know father picks out those jobs for him because he's such a clever old chap and does the things better than the clumsy workmen from the town. But as for imposing upon him,"

said the boy, proudly, "father would not impose upon anybody."

"No, that he wouldn't. My father says he's the most n.o.ble-hearted, generous man he ever knew; he's always ready to put his hand in his pocket for the poor."

"So he is," cried Will. "Impose! Why, do you know what he pays old Boil O every week?"

"No."

"Then I shan't tell you, because that's all private; but just twice as much as he pays any of the other men."

"And he has that cottage rent-free, hasn't he?"

"Yes, and Mrs Drinkwater makes a lot every year by letting her rooms to the artists who come down. She charges just what she likes, and the people are glad to pay it, because it's such a nice place, and Mrs Waters makes them so comfortable. Why, look at old Bad Manners--this is the third year he's been down to stay a couple of months. Now what has old Boil O got to grumble about."

"Nothing," said Josh; "only against himself. My father says that he was born in a bad temper. Why, he won't even say 'Good-morning' sometimes, only gives you a surly scowl or a snap as if he were going to bite."

"'Let dogs delight to bark and bite, for 'tis their nature to'--that's poetry. Hollo! What's the matter now?"

The two lads looked sharply round in the direction of the mill-yard, from whence a loud, strident voice was heard, saying something in angry tones, which rose at last to a pa.s.sionate outburst, drowning the deep voice of someone responding, and echoing strangely from the high, cliff-like walls above the picturesque old mill.

"It's old Drink in one of his fits," said Josh. "Come on; let's see what's the matter."

Will had already started off at a dog trot, and the boys ran side by side towards the mill-yard, where quite a little group of the silk-weavers and their wives and daughters were hurrying out to ascertain the cause of the trouble.

"Why, there's father there," said Josh.

"What is the matter now?" cried Will.

The next minute they knew, for, as they readied the spot where grave-looking John Willows stood looking like a patriarch amongst his people, beside his friend the gray-headed Vicar, a short, almost dwarfed, thick-set, large-headed man, with a s.h.i.+ny bald head fringed by grisly, harsh-looking hair,--and whose dark, wrinkled face was made almost repellent by the s.h.a.ggy brows that overhung his fierce, piercing, black eyes--took a step forward menacingly, and holding out his left hand, palm upwards, began beating it with his right fist, fiercely shouting in threatening tones--

"It's been so from the first, John Willows, ever since I came to this mill as a boy. You've been a tyrant and a curse to all the poor, struggling people who spent their days under you, not as your servants, but as your slaves."

"Oh! Oh! Oh! No! No! No!" rose from the hearers, in a murmured chorus of protest.

"Silence there!" yelled the man, furiously.

"You cowardly fools! You worms who daren't speak for yourselves!

Silence, I say, and let one who dares speak for you."

The Vicar stepped forward and laid his hand on the speaker's shoulder.