Ragged Trousered Philanthropists by Robert Tressell (read novel full TXT) 📖
- Author: Robert Tressell
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injure or be injured. It is the system that deserves to be blamed.
What those who wish to perpetuate the system deserve is another
question.
`When do you think you’ll have the drawings ready?’ inquired Rushton.
`Can you get them done tonight?’
`I’m afraid not,’ replied Owen, feeling inclined to laugh at the
absurdity of the question. `It will need a little thinking about.’
`When can you have them ready then? This is Monday. Wednesday
morning?’
Owen hesitated.
`We don’t want to keep ‘im waiting too long, you know, or ‘e may give
up the idear altogether.’
`Well, sat Friday morning, then,’ said Owen, resolving that he would
stay up all night if necessary to get it done.
Rushton shook his head.
`Can’t you get it done before that? I’m afraid that if we keeps ‘im
waiting all that time we may lose the job altogether.’
`I can’t get them done any quicker in my spare time,’ returned Owen,
flushing. `If you like to let me stay home tomorrow and charge the
time the same as if I had gone to work at the house, I could go to my
ordinary work on Wednesday and let you have the drawings on Thursday
morning.’
`Oh, all right,’ said Rushton as he returned to the perusal of his
letters.
That night, long after his wife and Frankie were asleep, Owen worked
in the sitting-room, searching through old numbers of the Decorators’
Journal and through the illustrations in other books of designs for
examples of Moorish work, and making rough sketches in pencil.
He did not attempt to finish anything yet: it was necessary to think
first; but he roughed out the general plan, and when at last he did go
to bed he could not sleep for a long time. He almost fancied he was
in the drawing-room at the `Cave’. First of all it would be necessary
to take down the ugly plaster centre flower with its crevices all
filled up with old whitewash. The cornice was all right; it was
fortunately a very simple one, with a deep cove and without many
enrichments. Then, when the walls and the ceiling had been properly
prepared, the ornamentation would be proceeded with. The walls,
divided into panels and arches containing painted designs and
lattice-work; the panels of the door decorated in a similar manner.
The mouldings of the door and window frames picked out with colours
and gold so as to be in character with the other work; the cove of the
cornice, a dull yellow with a bold ornament in colour - gold was not
advisable in the hollow because of the unequal distribution of the
light, but some of the smaller mouldings of the cornice should be
gold. On the ceiling there would be one large panel covered with an
appropriate design in gold and colours and surrounded by a wide margin
or border. To separate this margin from the centre panel there would
be a narrow border, and another border - but wider - round the outer
edge of the margin, where the ceiling met the cornice. Both these
borders and the margin would be covered with ornamentation in colour
and gold. Great care would be necessary when deciding what parts were
to be gilded because - whilst large masses of gilding are apt to look
garish and in bad taste - a lot of fine gold lines are ineffective,
especially on a flat surface, where they do not always catch the
light. Process by process he traced the work, and saw it advancing
stage by stage until, finally, the large apartment was transformed and
glorified. And then in the midst of the pleasure he experienced in
the planning of the work there came the fear that perhaps they would
not have it done at all.
The question, what personal advantage would he gain never once
occurred to Owen. He simply wanted to do the work; and he saw so
fully occupied with thinking and planning how it was to be done that
the question of profit was crowded out.
But although this question of what profit could be made out of the
work never occurred to Owen, it would in due course by fully
considered by Mr Rushton. In fact, it was the only thing about the
work that Mr Rushton would think of at all: how much money could be
made out of it. This is what is meant by the oft-quoted saying, `The
men work with their hands - the master works with his brains.’
The Letting of the Room
It will be remembered that when the men separated, Owen going to the
office to see Rushton, and the others on their several ways, Easton
and Slyme went together.
During the day Easton had found an opportunity of speaking to him
about the bedroom. Slyme was about to leave the place where he was at
present lodging, and he told Easton that although he had almost
decided on another place he would take a look at the room. At Easton’s
suggestion they arranged that Slyme was to accompany him home that
night. As the former remarked, Slyme could come to see the place, and
if he didn’t like it as well as the other he was thinking of taking,
there was no harm done.
Ruth had contrived to furnish the room. Some of the things she had
obtained on credit from a second-hand furniture dealer. Exactly how
she had managed, Easton did not know, but it was done.
`This is the house,’ said Easton. As they passed through, the gate
creaked loudly on its hinges and then closed of itself rather noisily.
Ruth had just been putting the child to sleep and she stood up as they
came in, hastily fastening the bodice of her dress as she did so.
`I’ve brought a gentleman to see you,’ said Easton.
Although she knew that he was looking out for someone for the room,
Ruth had not expected him to bring anyone home in this sudden manner,
and she could not help wishing that he had told her beforehand of his
intention. It being Monday, she had been very busy all day and she
was conscious that she was rather untidy in her appearance. Her long
brown hair was twisted loosely into a coil behind her head. She
blushed in an embarrassed way as the young man stared at her.
Easton introduced Slyme by name and they shook hands; and then at
Ruth’s suggestion Easton took a light to show him the room, and while
they were gone Ruth hurriedly tidied her hair and dress.
When they came down again Slyme said he thought the room would suit
him very well. What were the terms?
Did he wish to take the room only - just to lodge? inquired Ruth, or
would he prefer to board as well?
Slyme intimated that he desired the latter arrangement.
In that case she thought twelve shillings a week would be fair. She
believed that was about the usual amount. Of course that would
include washing, and if his clothes needed a little mending she would
do it for him.
Slyme expressed himself satisfied with these terms, which were as Ruth
had said - about the usual ones. He would take the room, but he was
not leaving his present lodgings until Saturday. It was therefore
agreed that he was to bring his box on Saturday evening.
When he had gone, Easton and Ruth stood looking at each other in
silence. Ever since this plan of letting the room first occurred to
them they had been very anxious to accomplish it; and yet, now that it
was done, they felt dissatisfied and unhappy, as if they had suddenly
experienced some irreparable misfortune. In that moment they
remembered nothing of the darker side of their life together. The
hard times and the privations were far off and seemed insignificant
beside the fact that this stranger was for the future to share their
home. To Ruth especially it seemed that the happiness of the past
twelve months had suddenly come to an end. She shrank with
involuntary aversion and apprehension from the picture that rose
before her of the future in which this intruder appeared the most
prominent figure, dominating everything and interfering with every
detail of their home life. Of course they had known all this before,
but somehow it had never seemed so objectionable as it did now, and as
Easton thought of it he was filled an unreasonable resentment against
Slyme, as if the latter had forced himself upon them against their
will.
`Damn him!’ he thought. `I wish I’d never brought him here at all!’
Ruth did not appear to him to be very happy about it either.
`Well?’ he said at last. `What do you think of him?’
`Oh, he’ll be all right, I suppose.’
`For my part, I wish he wasn’t coming,’ Easton continued.
`That’s just what I was thinking,’ replied Ruth dejectedly. `I don’t
like him at all. I seemed to turn against him directly he came in the
door.’
`I’ve a good mind to back out of it, somehow, tomorrow,’ exclaimed
Easton after another silence. `I could tell him we’ve unexpectedly
got some friends coming to stay with us.’
`Yes,’ said Ruth eagerly. `It would be easy enough to make some
excuse or other.’
As this way of escape presented itself she felt as if a weight had
been lifted from her mind, but almost in the same instant she
remembered the reasons which had at first led them to think of letting
the room, and she added, disconsolately:
`It’s foolish for us to go on like this, dear. We must let the room
and it might just as well be him as anyone else. We must make the
best of it, that’s all.’
Easton stood with his back to the fire, staring gloomily at her.
`Yes, I suppose that’s the right way to look at it,’ he replied at
length. `If we can’t stand it, we’ll give up the house and take a
couple of rooms, or a small flat - if we can get one.’
Ruth agreed, although neither alternative was very inviting. The
unwelcome alteration in their circumstances was after all not
altogether without its compensations, because from the moment of
arriving at this decision their love for each other seemed to be
renewed and intensified. They remembered with acute regret that
hitherto they had not always fully appreciated the happiness of that
exclusive companionship of which there now remained to them but one
week more. For once the present was esteemed at its proper value,
being invested with some of the glamour which almost always envelops
the past.
Penal Servitude and Death
On Tuesday - the day after his interview with Rushton - Owen remained
at home working at the drawings. He did not get them finished, but
they were so far advanced that he thought he would be able to complete
them after tea on Wednesday evening. He did not go to work until
after breakfast on Wednesday and his continued absence served to
confirm the opinion of the other workmen that he had been discharged.
This belief was further strengthened by the fact that a new hand had
been sent to the house by Hunter, who came himself also at about a
quarter past seven and very nearly caught Philpot in the act of
smoking.
During breakfast, Philpot, addressing Crass and referring to Hunter,
inquired anxiously:
`‘Ow’s ‘is temper this mornin’, Bob?’
`As mild as milk,’ replied Crass. `You’d think butter
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