“Disadvantages!” the same voice called.
“—Comforts and conveniences of civilisation are goin’ to mean to the women and children of this Godforsaken hole,” M’Ginnis cried furiously. “If I had a wife and kids, d’ye think I’d have any time for this highfalutin’ flap-doodle of yours about bread and fat? Not much. The best in the country wouldn’t be too good for them—and it’s not good enough for the women and children of Fallen Star. That’s what I’ve got to say—and that’s what any decent man would say if he could see straight. I’m an ordinary, plain, practical man myself … and I ask you chaps who’ve been lettin’ your legs be pulled pretty freely—and starvin’ to be masters of your own dumps—to look at this business like ordinary, plain, practical men, who’ve got their heads screwed on the right way, and not throw away the chance of a lifetime to make Fallen Star the sort of township it ought to be. If there’s some men here want to starve to be masters of their own dumps, let ’em, I say: it’s a free country. But there’s no need for the rest of us to starve with ’em.”
He sat down, and again it seemed that the pendulum had swung in favour of Armitage and his scheme.
“What’s Michael got to say about it?” a man from the Three Mile asked. And several voices called: “Yes; what’s Michael got to say?”
For a moment there was silence—a silence of apprehension. George Woods and the men who knew, or had been disturbed by the stories they had heard of a secret treaty between Michael and John Armitage, recognised in that moment the power of Michael’s influence; that what Michael was going to say would sway the men of the Ridge as it had always done, either for or against the standing order of life on the Ridge on which they had staked so much. His mates could not doubt Michael, and yet there was fear in the waiting silence.
Those who had heard Michael was not the man they thought he was, waited anxiously for his movement, the sound of his voice. Charley Heathfield waited, crouched in a corner near the platform, where everyone could see him, Rouminof beside him. They were standing there together as if there was not room for them in the body of the hall, and their eyes were fixed on the place where Michael sat—Charley’s eager and cruel as a cat’s on its victim, Rouminof’s alight with the fires of his consuming excitement.
Then Michael got up from his seat, took off his hat; and his glance, those deep-set eyes of his, travelled the hall, skimming the heads and faces of the men in it, with their faint, whimsical smile.
“All I’ve got to say,” he said, “George Woods has said. There’s nothing in Mr. Armitage’s scheme for Fallen Star. … It looks all right, but it isn’t; it’s all wrong. The thing this place has stood for is ownership of the mines by the men who work them. Mr. Armitage’ll give us anything but that—he offers us every inducement but that … and you know how the thing worked out on the Cliffs. If the mines are worth so much to him, they’re worth as much, or more, to us.
“Boiled down, all the scheme amounts to is an offer to buy up the mines—at a ‘fair valuation’—put us on wages and an eight-hour day. All the rest, about making a flourishing and, up-to-date town of Fallen Star, might or mightn’t come true. P’raps it would. I can’t say. All I say is, it’s being used to gild the pill we’re asked to swallow—buyin’ up of the mines. There’s nothing sure about all this talk of electricity and water laid on; it’s just gilding. And supposing the new conditions did put more money about—did bring the comforts and conveniences of civilisation to Fallen Star—like M’Ginnis says—what good would they be to the people, women and children, too, if the men sold themselves like a team of bullocks to work the mines? It wouldn’t matter to them any more whether they brought up knobbies or mullock; they’d have their wages—like bullocks have their hay. It’s because our work’s had interest; it’s because we’ve been our own bosses, life’s been as good as it has on Fallen Star all these years. If a man hasn’t got interest in his work he’s got to get it somewhere. How did we get it on the Cliffs when the mines were bought up? Drinking and gambling … and how did that work out for the women and children? But it was stone silly of M’Ginnis to talk of women and children here. We know that old hitting-below-the-belt gag of sweating employers too well to be taken in by it. By and by, if you took on the Armitage scheme, and there was a strike in the mines, he’d be saying that to you: ‘Remember the women and children.’ ”
Colour flamed in Michael’s face, and he continued with more heat than there had yet been in his voice.
“The time’s coming when the man who talks ‘women and children’ to defeat their own interests will be treated like the skunk—the low-down, thieving swine he is. Do we say anything’s too good for our women and children? Not much. But we want to give them real things—the real things of life and happiness—not only flashy clothes and fixings. If we give our women and children the mines as we’ve held them, and the record of a clean fight for them, we’ll be giving them something very much bigger than anything Mr. Armitage can offer us in exchange for them. The things we’ve stood for are better than anything
