Page:Gaskell - North and South, vol. II, 1855.djvu/50

 double diligence, "but I believe what she says is the truth. I like him for it."

"Well, sir, this strike has been a weary piece o' business to me; and yo'll not wonder if I'm a bit put out wi' seeing it fail, just for a few men who would na suffer in silence, and hou'd out, brave and firm."

"You forget!" said Margaret. "I don't know much of Boucher; but the only time I saw him it was not his own sufferings he spoke of, but those of his sick wife—his little children."

"True! but he were not made of iron himsel'. He'd ha' cried out for his own sorrows, next. He were not one to bear."

"How came he into the Union?" asked Margaret innocently. "You don't seem to have much respect for him; nor gained much good from having him in."

Higgins's brow clouded. He was silent for a minute or two. Then he said, shortly enough:

"It's not for me to speak o' th' Union. What they does, they does. Them that is of a trade mun hang together; and if they're not willing to take their chance along wi' th' rest, th' Union has ways and means."

Mr. Hale saw that Higgins was vexed at the turn the converation had taken, and was silent. Not so Margaret, though she saw Higgins's feeling as clearly as he did. By instinct she felt, that if he could but be brought to express himself in plain words, something clear would be gained on which to argue for the right and the just.

"And what are the Union's ways and means?"