and try its edge, which was keen as that of a razor; and then, armed with this, and quite as much at home in the works as the foreman, he went about with lithe steps as cautious as a cat, and, cutting through the bands that connected the wheels of the lathes with the great shaft that set them in motion, he dragged them down and piled them together till he had collected a goodly heap.
This was not accomplished all at once, and with ease, for, setting aside the watchfulness with which the task had to be done, and the care to ensure silence, the bands were heavy, hard to cut, and they had to be borne some distance. Altogether it took Sim Slee a good hour’s arduous labour, and he perspired profusely. In fact, it was his habit to take more pains to achieve a bad end than would have sufficed to get a good living twice over.
“Phew! it’s hot,” he muttered in one of his pauses, during which he ran to the nearest door, and listened. “What a slave I am to the cause.”
Then he chuckled and laughed over the mischief he had done, and ended by laboriously dragging all the great leather bands and straps to the uncovered hole of a furnace, down which he dropped them, so that they fell far back from the mouth below, which opened on the stoke-hole; and he knew that the chances were ten to one that if the present heat did not destroy them, a fire would be lit by the careless stokers, and the bands consumed before they were missed, as, if business were resumed on the following day, the firemen would be there long before the ordinary workers.
“Theer,” said Sim, when he had finished, “I wonder what Joe Banks would say now if he knew o’ this?”
He resumed his coat, out of the pocket of which he took a piece of strong line, some fifteen feet long, and walked cautiously, listening the while, towards one of the windows which looked down on the lane, one side of which was formed by the works and the wall of the yard, and from which the little door before mentioned gave access to the proprietor’s private room in the counting-house.
Sim Slee had entered by this window, being a light, active man, and he was about to descend from it, and make his escape by hitching the strong light steel hook attached to the end of his rope to the sill, just as he had entered by throwing it up till it caught, it being so constructed that a sharp wave sent along the slackened rope would set it free. But before descending Sim stood, rope in hand, listening, watched by the cat at a respectable distance, that sage black animal being evidently impressed with the fact that the intruder in the works was wonderfully rat-like in his actions.
Tommy did not approach him, nor yet purr, but crouched there watching while Sim stood with one ear close to the window, then sharply turned his head and thrust it out into the night air, drew it back again as sharply, and then cautiously thrust it out once more, so that unseen he could see and listen to what went on below.
For there were two figures just below the opening, and as Sim listened, holding his breath, one of them exclaimed:
“I won’t, I won’t, Mr Richard, and you’ve no business to ask me.”
“Mr. Richard,” said the other, reproachfully; “I thought it was to be Dick – your own Dick.”
“Oh, don’t – don’t – don’t talk like that,” sobbed the other. “Oh, I wish I really, really knew whether you meant it all.”
“Meant it all, Daisy! how can you be so cruel, when you know how dearly I love you? But come into the counting-house, and we can sit there and talk.”
“I can’t – I won’t!” said Daisy; “and you know you oughtn’t to ask me, Mr Richard. What would father say if he were to hear of it?”
“Father would only be too pleased,” whispered the young man, “for he believes in me, if you don’t, Daisy. He’d like you to be my own beautiful darling little wife, that I should make a lady.”
“But, do you really, really mean it, Mr Richard?” said Daisy, with a hysterical sob.
“‘Really mean it! Mr Richard!’” said the young fellow, reproachfully. “Oh, Daisy, have you so mean an opinion of me? Do you take me for a contemptible liar?”
“Oh no, no, no,” sobbed the girl; “but they say – I always thought – I believed that you were engaged to Miss Eve.”
“A poor puny thing,” said Richard, in a contemptuous tone; “and besides, she’s my cousin.”
“But she thinks you love her,” said Daisy.
“Poor thing!” laughed Richard.
“And I believe you love her.”
“Indeed I don’t, nor anybody else but you, you beautiful little rosebud. Oh, Daisy, Daisy, how can you be so cruel!”
“I’m not, I’m not cruel,” sobbed poor Daisy; “but I want to do what’s right.”
“Of course,” whispered Richard. “But come along, let’s go in the counting-house – to my room – it’s safer there.”
“I won’t, I won’t,” cried Daisy, indignantly. “At such a time of night, too! You oughtn’t to ask me.”
“I only asked you for your own sake,” said Richard, “because people might talk if they saw you with me here.”
“Oh yes,” sobbed Daisy; “and they would. I must go.”
“Stop a moment,” said Richard, catching her wrist. “Perhaps, too, it was a little for my own sake, because the men are so furious against me.”
“Oh yes, I heard,” cried Daisy, with her voice shaking; “but they did not hurt you to-day?”
“Not hurt me!” said Richard. “Why, they nearly killed me.”
“No, no,” sobbed Daisy.
“But they did; and they would if I hadn’t been rescued.”
Daisy suppressed a hysterical cry, and Richard passed his arm round her little waist, and drew her to him.
“Then you do love me a little, Daisy?” he whispered.
“No, no, I don’t think I do,” sobbed the girl, without, however, trying to get away. “I believe you were going to meet Miss Eve this morning, and were disappointed because I was there.”
“Indeed I was not,” said Richard. “But I’m sure you were expecting to see that great hulking hound, Tom Podmore.”
“That I was not,” cried Daisy, impetuously; “and I won’t have you speak like that of poor Tom, for I’ve behaved very badly to him, and he’s a good – good, worthy fellow.”
“‘Poor Tom!’” said Richard, with a sigh. “Ah, Daisy, Daisy.”
“Don’t, Mr Richard, please,” sobbed Daisy, who was crying bitterly.
“‘Poor Tom – Mr Richard,’” said the young man, as if speaking to himself.
“Don’t, don’t, Mr Richard, please.”
“‘Mr Richard.’”
“Well, Dick, then. But there, I must go now.”
“Not just now, darling Daisy,” whispered Richard, passionately. “Come with me – here we are
