Chapter 6. "Do Let Me Come"

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_ CHAPTER SIX. "DO LET ME COME"

The rest of the week soon slipped by, and my uncles took possession of the works, but not peaceably.

The agent who had had the letting went down to meet my uncles and give them formal possession.

When he got there he was attacked by the work-people, with words first, and then with stones and pails of water.

The consequence was that he went home with a cut head and his clothes soaked.

"But what's to be done?" said Uncle Dick to him. "We want the place according to the agreement."

The agent looked up, holding one hand to his head, and looking white and scared.

"Call themselves men!" he said, "I call them wild beasts."

"Call them what you like," said Uncle Dick; "wild beasts if you will, but get them out."

"But I can't," groaned the man dismally. "See what a state I'm in! They've spoiled my second best suit."

"Very tiresome," said Uncle Dick, who was growing impatient; "but are you going to get these people out? We've two truck-loads of machinery waiting to be delivered."

"Don't I tell you I can't," said the agent angrily. "Take possession yourself. There, I give you leave."

"Very well," said Uncle Dick. "You assure me that these men have no legal right to be there."

"Not the slightest. They were only allowed to be there till the place was let."

"That's right; then we take possession at once, sir."

"And good luck to you!" said the agent as we went out.

"What are you going to do?" asked Uncle Bob.

"Take possession."

"When?"

"To-night. Will you come?"

"Will I come?" said Uncle Bob with a half laugh. "You might as well ask Jack."

"It may mean trouble to-morrow."

"There's nothing done without trouble," said Uncle Bob coolly. "I like ease better, but I'll take my share."

I was wildly excited, and began thinking that we should all be armed with swords and guns, so that I was terribly disappointed when that evening I found Uncle Dick enter the room with a brown-paper parcel in his hand that looked like a book, and followed by Uncle Jack looking as peaceable as could be.

"Where's Uncle Bob?" I said.

"Waiting for us outside."

"Why doesn't he come in?"

"He's busy."

I wondered what Uncle Bob was busy about; but I noticed that my uncles were preparing for the expedition, putting some tools and a small lantern in a travelling-bag. After this Uncle Jack took it open downstairs ready for starting.

"Look here, Cob," said Uncle Dick; "we are going down to the works."

"What! To-night?"

"Yes, my lad, to-night."

"But you can't get in. The men have the key."

"I have the agent's keys. There are two sets, and I am going down now. Look here; take a book and amuse yourself, and go to bed in good time. Perhaps we shall be late."

"Why, you are going to stop all night," I cried, "so as to be there before the men?"

"I confess," he said, laughing in my excited face.

"And I sha'n't see any of the fun," I cried.

"There will not be any fun, Cob."

"Oh, yes, there will, uncle," I said. "I say, do let me come."

He shook his head, and as I could make no impression on him I gave up, and slipped down to Uncle Jack, who was watching Mrs Stephenson cut some huge sandwiches for provender during the night.

"I say, uncle," I whispered, "I know what you are going to do. Take me."

"No, no," he said. "It will be no work for boys."

He was so quiet and stern that I felt it was of no use to press him, so I left the kitchen and went to the front door to try Uncle Bob for my last resource.

I opened the door gently, and started back, for there was a savage growl, and I just made out the dark form of a big-headed dog tugging at a string.

"Down, Piter!" said Uncle Bob. "Who is it? You, Cob? Here, Piter, make friends with him. Come out."

I went out rather slowly, for the dog was growling ominously; but at a word from Uncle Bob he ceased, and began to smell me all round the legs, stopping longest about my calves, as if he thought that would be the best place for a bite.

"Pat him, Cob, and pull his ears."

I stooped down rather unwillingly, and began patting the ugliest head I ever saw in my life. For Piter--otherwise Jupiter--was a brindled bull-dog with an enormous head, protruding lower jaw, pinched-in nose, and grinning teeth. The sides of his head seemed swollen, and his chest broad, his body lank and lean, ending in a shabby little thin tail.

"Why, he has no ears," I said.

"They are cut pretty short, poor fellow. But isn't he a beauty, Cob?"

"Beauty!" I said, laughing. "But where did you get him?"

"Mr Tomplin has lent him to us."

"But what for?"

"Garrison for the fort," my boy. "I think we can trust him."

I commenced my attack then.

"I should so like to go!" I said. "It isn't as if I was a nuisance. I wasn't so bad when we were out all night by Dome Tor."

"Well, there, I'll talk them over," he said. "Here, you stop and hold the dog, while I go in."

"What, hold him?"

"Yes, to be sure. I won't be long."

"But, uncle," I said, "he looks such a brute, as if he'd eat a fellow."

"My dear Cob, I sha'n't be above a quarter of an hour. He couldn't get through more than one leg by that time."

"Now you're laughing at me," I said.

"Hold the dog, then, you young coward!"

"I'm not," I said in an injured tone; and I caught at the leather thong, for if it had been a lion I should have held on then.

I wanted to say, "Don't be long," but I was ashamed, and I looked rather wistfully over my shoulder as he went in, leaving me with the dog.

Piter uttered a low whine as the door closed, and then growled angrily and gave a short deep-toned bark.

This done, he growled at me, smelled me all round, making my legs seem to curdle as his blunt nose touched them, and then after winding the thong round me twice he stood up on his hind-legs, placing his paws against my chest and his ugly muzzle between them.

My heart was beating fast, but the act was so friendly that I patted the great head; and the end of it was, that I sat down on the door-step, and when Uncle Bob came out again Piter and I had fraternised, and he had been showing me as hard as he could that he was my born slave, that he was ready for a bit of fun at any time, and also to defend me against any enemy who should attack.

Piter's ways were simple. To show the first he licked my hand. For the second, he turned over on his back, patted at me with his paws, and mumbled my legs, took a hold of my trousers and dragged at them, and butted at me with his bullet head. For the last, he suddenly sprang to his feet as a step was heard, crouched by me ready for a spring, and made some thunder inside him somewhere.

This done, he tried to show me what fun it was to tie himself up in a knot with the leathern thong, and strangle himself till his eyes stood out of his head.

"Why, you have made friends," said Uncle Bob, coming out. "Good dog, then."

"May I go?" I said eagerly.

"Yes. They've given in. I had a hard fight, sir, so you must do me credit."

Half an hour after, we four were on our way to our own works, just as if we were stealing through the dark to commit a burglary, and I noticed that though there were no swords and guns, each of my uncles carried a very stout heavy stick, that seemed to me like a yard of bad headache, cut very thick.

The streets looked very miserable as we advanced, leaving behind us the noise and roar and glow of the panting machinery which every now and then whistled and screamed as if rejoicing over the metal it was cutting and forming and working into endless shapes. There behind us was the red cloud against which the light from a thousand furnaces was glowing, while every now and then came a deafening roar as if some explosion had taken place.

I glanced down at Piter expecting to see him startled, but he was Arrowfield born, and paid not the slightest heed to noise, passing through a bright flash of light that shot from an open door as if it were the usual thing, and he did not even twitch his tail as we walked on by a wall that seemed to quiver and shake as some great piece of machinery worked away, throbbing and thudding inside.

"Here we are at last," said Uncle Dick, as we reached the corner of our place, where a lamp shed a ghastly kind of glow upon the dark triangular shaped dam.

The big stone building looked silent and ghostly in the gloom, while the great chimney stood up like a giant sentry watching over it, and placed there by the men whom it was our misfortune to have to dislodge.

We had a perfect right to be there, but one and all spoke in whispers as we looked round at the buildings about, to see in one of a row of houses that there were lights, and in a big stone building similar to ours the faint glow of a fire left to smoulder till the morning. But look which way we would, there was not a soul about, and all was still.

As we drew closer I could hear the dripping of the water as it ran in by the wheel where it was not securely stopped; and every now and then there was an echoing plash from the great shut-in cave, but no light in any of the windows.

"Come and hold the bag, Jack," whispered Uncle Dick; and then laughingly as we grouped about the gate with the dog sniffing at the bottom: "If you see a policeman coming, give me fair warning. I hope that dog will not bark. I feel just like a burglar."

Piter uttered a low growl, but remained silent, while Uncle Dick opened the gate and we entered.

As soon as we were inside the yard the bag was put under requisition again, a great screw-driver taken out, the lantern lit, and with all the skill and expedition of one accustomed to the use of tools, Uncle Dick unscrewed and took off the lock, laid it aside, and fitted on, very ingeniously, so that the old key-hole should do again, one of the new patent locks he had brought with him in the brown-paper parcel I had seen.

This took some little time, but it was effected at last, and Uncle Dick said:

"That is something towards making the place our own. Their key will not be worth much now."

Securing the gate by turning the key of the new lock, we went next to the door leading into the works, which was also locked, but the key the agent had supplied opened it directly, and this time Uncle Dick held box and lantern while Uncle Jack took off the old and fitted on the second new lock that we had brought.

It was a curious scene in the darkness of that great stone-floored echoing place, where an observer who watched would have seen a round glass eye shedding a bright light on a particular part of the big dirty door, and in the golden ring the bull's-eye made, a pair of large white hands busy at work fixing, turning a gimlet, putting in and fastening screws, while only now and then could a face be seen in the ring of light.

"There," said Uncle Jack at last, as he turned the well-oiled key and made the bolt of the lock play in and out of its socket, "now I think we can call the place our own."

"I say, Uncle Bob," I whispered--I don't know why, unless it was the darkness that made me speak low--"I should like to see those fellows' faces when they come to the gate to-morrow morning."

"Especially Old Squintum's," said Uncle Bob laughing. "Pleasant countenance that man has, Cob. If ever he is modelled I should like to have a copy. Now, boys, what next?"

"Next!" said Uncle Dick; "we'll just have a look round this place and see what there is belonging to the men, and we'll put all together so as to be able to give it up when they come."

"The small grindstones are theirs, are they not?" said Uncle Bob.

"No; the agent says that everything belongs to the works and will be found in the inventory. All we have to turn out will be the blades they are grinding."

Uncle Dick went forward from grindstone to grindstone, but only in one place was anything waiting to be ground, and that was a bundle of black-looking, newly-forged scythe blades, neatly tied up with bands of wire.

He went on from end to end, making the light play on grindstone, trough, and the rusty sand that lay about; but nothing else was to be seen, and after reaching the door leading into the great chamber where the water-wheel revolved, he turned back the light, looking like some dancing will-o'-the-wisp as he directed it here and there, greatly to the puzzlement of Piter, to whom it was something new.

He tugged at the stout leathern thong once or twice, but I held on and he ceased, contenting himself with a low uneasy whine now and then, and looking up to me with his great protruding eyes, as if for an explanation.

"Now let's have a look round upwards," said Uncle Dick. "I'm glad the men have left so few of their traps here. Cob, my lad, you need not hold that dog. Take the swivel off his collar and let him go. He can't get away."

"Besides," said Uncle Bob, "this is to be his home."

I stooped down and unhooked the spring swivel, to Piter's great delight, which he displayed by scuffling about our feet, trying to get himself trodden upon by all in turn, and ending by making a rush at the bull's-eye lantern, and knocking his head against the round glass.

"Pretty little creature!" said Uncle Bob. "Well, I should have given him credit for more sense than a moth."

Piter growled as if he were dissatisfied with the result, and then his hideous little crinkled black nose was seen as he smelt the lantern all round, and, apparently gratified by the odour of the oil, he licked his black lips.

"Now then, upstairs," said Uncle Dick, leading the way with the lantern. But as soon as the light fell upon the flight of stone stairs Piter went to the front with a rush, his claws pattered on the stones, and he was up at the top waiting for us, after giving a scratch at a rough door, his ugly countenance looking down curiously out of the darkness.

"Good dog!" said Uncle Dick as he reached the landing and unlatched the door.

Piter squeezed himself through almost before the door was six inches open, and the next moment he burst into a furious deep-mouthed bay.

"Someone there!" cried Uncle Dick, and he rushed in, lantern in hand, to make the light play round, while my uncles changed the hold of their stout sticks, holding them cudgel fashion ready for action.

The light rested directly on the face and chest of a man sitting up between a couple of rusty lathes, where a quantity of straw had been thrown down, and at the first glimpse it was evident that the dog had just aroused him from a heavy sleep.

His eyes were half-closed, bits of oat straw were sticking in his short dark hair, and glistened like fragments of pale gold in the light cast by the bull's-eye, while two blackened and roughened hands were applied to his eyes as if he were trying to rub them bright.

Piter's was an ugly face; but the countenance of an ugly animal is pleasanter to look upon than that of an ugly degraded human being, and as I saw the rough stubbly jaws open, displaying some yellow and blackened teeth that glistened in the light as their owner yawned widely, I began to think our dog handsome by comparison.

The man growled as if not yet awake, and rubbed away at his eyes with his big fists, as if they, too, required a great deal of polishing to make them bright enough to see.

At last he dropped his fists and stared straight before him--no, that's a mistake, he stared with the range of his eyes crossing, and then seemed to have some confused idea that there was a light before him, and a dog making a noise, for he growled out:

"Lie down!"

Then, bending forward, he swept an arm round, as if in search of something, which he caught hold of at last, and we understood why he was so confused. For it was a large stone bottle he had taken up. From this he removed the cork with a dull _Fop_! Raised the bottle with both hands, took a long draught, and corked the bottle again with a sigh, set it down beside him, and after yawning loudly shouted once more at the dog, "Get out! Lie down!"

Then he settled himself as if about to do what he had bidden the dog, but a gleam of intelligence appeared to have come now into his brain.

There was no mistaking the man: it was the squinting ruffian who had attacked us when we came first, and there was no doubt that he had been staying there to keep watch and hold the place against us, for a candle was stuck in a ginger-beer bottle on the frame of the lathe beyond him, and this candle had guttered down and gone out.

We none of us spoke, but stood in the black shadow invisible to the man, who could only see the bright light of the bull's-eye staring him full in the face.

"Lie down, will yer!" he growled savagely. "Makin' shut a row! Lie down or--"

He shouted this last in such a fierce tone of menace that it would have scared some dogs.

It had a different effect on Piter, who growled angrily.

"Don't, then," shouted the man; "howl and bark--make a row, but if yer touch me I'll take yer down and drownd yer in the wheel-pit. D'yer hear? In the wheel-pit!"

This was said in a low drowsy tone and as if the fellow were nearly asleep, and as the light played upon his half-closed dreamy eyes he muttered and stared at it as if completely overcome by sleep.

It was perfectly ridiculous, and yet horrible, to see that rough head and hideous face nodding and blinking at the light as the fellow supported himself on both his hands in an ape-like attitude that was more animal than human.

All this was a matter of a minute or so, and then the ugly cross eyes closed, opened sharply, and were brought to bear upon the light one after the other by movements of the head, just as a magpie looks at a young bird before he kills it with a stroke of his bill.

Then a glimpse of intelligence seemed to shoot from them, and the man sat up sharply.

"What's that light?" he said roughly. "Police! What do you want?"

"What are you doing here?" said Uncle Jack in his deep voice.

"Doing, p'liceman! Keeping wetch. Set o' Lonnoners trying to get howd o' wucks, and me and my mates wean't hev 'em. Just keeping wetch. Good-night!"

He sat up, staring harder at the light, and then tried to see behind it.

"Well," he cried, "why don't you go, mate? Shut door efter you."

"Hold the dog, Cob," said Uncle Jack. "Bob, you take the lantern and open the door and the gate. Lay hold of one side, Dick, I'll take the other, and we'll put him out."

But the man was wide-awake now; and as I darted at Piter and got my hands in his collar and held him back, the fellow made a dash at something lying on the lathe, and as the lantern was changed from hand to hand I caught sight of the barrel of an old horse-pistol.

"Take care!" I shouted, as I dragged Piter back. "Pistol."

"Yes, pistol, do yer hear?" roared the fellow starting up. "Pistol! And I'll shute the first as comes anigh me."

There was a click here, and all was in darkness, for Uncle Bob turned the shade of the lantern and hid it within his coat.

"Put that pistol down, my man, and no harm shall come to you; but you must get out of this place directly."

"What! Get out! Yes, out you go, whoever you are," roared the fellow. "I can see you, and I'll bring down the first as stirs. This here's a good owd pistol, and she hits hard. Now then open that light and let's see you go down. This here's my place and my mates', and we don't want none else here. Now then."

I was struggling in the dark with Piter, and only held him back, there was such strength in his small body, by lifting him by his collar and holding him against me standing on his hind-legs.

But, engaged as I was, I had an excited ear for what was going on, and I trembled, as I expected to see the flash of the pistol and feel its bullet strike me or the dog.

As the man uttered his threats I heard a sharp whispering and a quick movement or two in the dark, and then all at once I saw the light open, and after a flash here and there shine full upon the fellow, who immediately turned the pistol on the holder of the lantern.

"Now then," he cried, "yer give in, don't yer? Yes or no 'fore I fires. Yah!"

He turned sharply round in my direction as I struggled with Piter, whom the sight of the black-looking ruffian had made furious.

But the man had not turned upon me.

He had caught sight of Uncle Jack springing at him, the light showing him as he advanced.

There was a flash, a loud report, and almost preceding it, if not quite, the sound of a sharp rap given with a stick upon flesh and bone.

The next instant there was a hoarse yell and the noise made by the pistol falling upon the floor.

"Hurt, Jack?" cried Uncle Dick, as my heart seemed to stand still.

"Scratched, that's all," was the reply. "Here, come and tie this wild beast's hands. I think I can hold him now."

It almost sounded like a rash assertion, as the light played upon the desperate struggle that was going on. I could see Uncle Jack and the man, now down, now up, and at last, after wrestling here and there, the man, in spite of Uncle Jack's great strength, seeming to have the mastery. There was a loud panting and a crushing fall, both going down, and Uncle Jack rising up to kneel upon his adversary's chest.

"Like fighting a bull," panted Uncle Jack. "What arms the fellow has! Got the rope?"

"Yes," said Uncle Dick, rattling the things in the bag. "Can you turn him over?"

No sooner said than done. The man heard the order, and prepared to resist being turned on one side. Uncle Jack noted this and attacked the other side so quickly that the man was over upon his face before he could change his tactics.

"Keep that dog back, Cob, or he'll eat him," said Uncle Bob, making the lantern play on the prostrate man, whose arms were dexterously dragged behind him and tightly tied.

"There," said Uncle Jack. "Now you can get up and go. Ah, would you, coward!"

This was in answer to a furious kick the fellow tried to deliver as soon as he had regained his feet.

"If he attempts to kick again, loose the dog at him, Cob," cried Uncle Dick sharply.

Then in an undertone to me:

"No: don't! But let him think you will."

"You'll hev it for this," cried the man furiously.

"Right," said Uncle Jack. "Now, then, have you anything here belonging to you? No! Down you come then."

He collared his prisoner, who turned to kick at him; but a savage snarl from Piter, as I half let him go, checked the fellow, and he suffered himself to be marched to the door, where he stopped.

"Ma beer," he growled, looking back at the stone bottle.

"Beer! No, you've had enough of that," said Uncle Dick. "Go on down."

The man walked quietly down the stairs; but when he found that he was to be thrust out into the lane he began to struggle again, and shout, but a fierce hand at his throat stopped that and he was led down to the gate in the wall, where it became my task now to hold the lantern while Uncles Dick and Bob grasped our prisoner's arms and left Uncle Jack free to untie the cord.

"Be ready to unlock the gate, Cob," whispered Uncle Jack, as he held his prisoner by one twist of the rope round his arms like a leash. "Now, then, ready! Back, dog, back!"

Piter shrank away, and then at a concerted moment the gate was thrown open, the three brothers loosed their hold of the prisoner at the same moment, and just as he was turning to try and re-enter, a sharp thrust of the foot sent him flying forward, the gate was banged to, and locked, and we were congratulating ourselves upon having ridded ourselves of an ugly customer, when the gate shook from the effect of a tremendous blow that sounded as if it had been dealt with a paving-stone. _

Read next: Chapter 7. A Useful Ally

Read previous: Chapter 5. A Night Of Anxiety

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