The seed she sowed : $b A tale of the great dock strike.Leslie, Emma
General
The seed she sowed : $b A tale of the great dock strike.
Leslie, Emma
Docks -- England -- London -- Juvenile fiction; London (England) -- Juvenile fiction; Strikes and lockouts -- Juvenile fiction
"We must get away from here to-morrow," said Rutter when they went
upstairs. "I've bought a house a little way out, and we'll get into
it at once. I shall send to say I am ill and can't go to work in the
morning, and we'll be away before those fellows get back at night."
"But the woman's coming to wash in the morning," said Mrs. Rutter in
some dismay, for she did not like being taken from all her friends.
"If the woman's coming, she can help you pack up. But you need not let
her know where we are going, for these rough fellows are not easy to
manage when they are in a rage, and I don't want them to find out where
I am going."
So when Mrs. Chaplin came the next morning, she heard to her dismay
that her work for the future would be lessened, for it was scarcely
likely that she would be able to get another day's washing in the
neighbourhood.
Another thing, she had known Mrs. Rutter a long time. They used to
be friends when they first came to the neighbourhood. She had felt
inclined to envy her friend's good fortune when the improvement in
their circumstances first took place, but she soon began to see that
somehow riches did not bring happiness or content to the Rutters, and
she often pitied the poor woman more now than when they were both
struggling to make ends meet, as they did sometimes in those old days.
Since then they had been getting steadily poorer and the Rutters
richer, but the more anxious and unhappy as it seemed to Mrs. Chaplin.
She helped with the packing all day and saw the furniture put into the
van, but as Mrs. Rutter was not allowed to know where they were going,
she could not tell her friend, much as she might wish to do so.
When she got home, another piece of news awaited her.
Annie Brown, who insisted upon coming in to see Winny sometimes, burst
into the room just after she got back, exclaiming: "I say Mrs. Chaplin,
Rutter has bought this house and is going to raise all the rents!"
"Nonsense!" replied Mrs. Chaplin. "I should have heard about that, if
it had been true, for I have been working there to-day."
She would not say a word about the moving, for fear Annie should find
out which way they had gone and follow them. She would be quite capable
of doing this, and telling those who had made the disturbance last
night that they might repeat it.
"You'll find out that what I say is true enough; and what we shall do,
I don't know, for father's foot is bad, and there's nobody but me to
earn a penny now."
The girl worked at a match factory near, and though the work was
regular, the wages were small, and only sufficient for her own
maintenance, so that it was impossible for them to make up the rent
until her father was able to go to work again. This matter was
discussed by the Chaplins after she had gone, for they felt very sorry
for her.
"I wish she went to Sunday-school," said Winny, "for I can't help
liking her though she is rough and rude sometimes."
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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