Archibald Cronin - The Stars Look Down

“They’re in the study then, as I said.”

“May I go up?”

She shrugged her shoulders without answering. He was conscious of her dark eyes upon his, then she spun upon her heel and was gone. He stood for a moment collecting himself before ascending the stairs. Then he knocked and went into the study.

The room was brightly lit and warm; a good fire blazed on the hearth. Barras was seated at the desk, while Arthur stood beside the fireplace, in front of him. As David entered Arthur smiled in his usual friendly manner, but Barras’s welcome was much less cordial. He swung round his padded leather chair and stared at David with a blank inquiry.

“Well?” he said abruptly, “what is it?”

David looked from one to the other. He compressed his lips firmly.

“I wanted to have a word with you,” he said to Barras.

Richard Barras lay back in his chair. He was, actually, in an excellent humour. By the afternoon post he had received a letter from the Lord Mayor of Tynecastle asking him to accept the convenership of the organisation committee in connection with the building of the new wing for the City Royal Hospital. Barras was already on the Bench, three years president of the local education committee, and now this. He was pleased, sniffing the prospect of a knighthood like a well-fed mastiff the chances of a meaty bone. In his own exquisitely precise handwriting — no such machine as a typewriter existed at the Law — he was framing a suitable acceptance. As he sat there he embodied an almost sensual satisfaction that life should be so gratifying an affair.

“What is it you have to say?” he exclaimed; and observing David’s glance towards Arthur he added impatiently: “Go on, man. If it’s about Arthur he’d better hear it.”

David took a quick determined breath. Under the almost judicial force of Barras’s personality what he was going to say suddenly seemed presumptuous and absurd. But he had resolved to speak to Barras; nothing would shake him.

“It’s about the new workings in the Paradise,” he rushed on before Barras could interpose. “I daresay I’ve no right to talk, I’m out of the Neptune now, but my father’s there and my two brothers. You know my father, Mr. Barras, he’s been thirty years in the pit, he’s not an alarmist. But ever since you got the new contract and started stripping off the barrier he’s been worried to death you’ll have an inrush.”

Silence in the room. Barras continued to measure David with a coldly inquiring eye.

“If your father doesn’t like the Paradise he can leave it. He had this same insane notion seven years ago. He’s always been a trouble maker.”

David felt his blood rise; but he made himself speak calmly.

“It isn’t just my father. Quite a number of the men don’t like it. They say you’re travelling too near the old waste, the workings of Old Neptune which must be chock full of water.”

“They know what to do then,” Barras said icily. “They can get out.”

“But they can’t. They’ve got their living to think of. Almost every one of them has a wife and children to support.”

Barras’s features hardened imperceptibly.

“Let them go to that Hebbon fellow then. That’s what he’s there for, isn’t it? They pay him to exploit their grievances. The matter has nothing to do with you.”

A sudden tension gathered in the air and Arthur gazed from David to his father with growing uneasiness. Arthur hated trouble, anything approaching a scene caused him acute distress. David kept his eyes on Barras. He had turned pale but his expression remained determined and controlled.

“All I’m asking is that you should give a fair hearing to what these men have got to say.”

Barras laughed shortly.

“Indeed,” he answered cuttingly. “So you expect me to sit here and let my workmen teach me my business.”

“You’ll do nothing?”

“Emphatically, no!”

David clenched his teeth, restrained the turmoil of indignation within him. In a low voice he said:

“Very well, Mr. Barras. If you will take up my meaning wrongly, I can’t say any more. No doubt it was quite out of place for me to say anything at all.” He stood for a moment as though hoping Barras might speak, then he turned and quietly left the room.

Arthur did not immediately follow. The silence lengthened; then diffidently, with his eyes on the floor, Arthur said:

“I don’t think he meant any harm, father. He’s a good chap, David Fenwick.”

Barras did not answer.

Arthur flushed. Although he had taken a great many cold baths and knew his series of little red books almost by heart he still flushed abominably. But he continued with a sort of desperation:

“You don’t think he has any justification then? It sticks in my mind — what he said. As a matter of fact a queer thing happened in the Paradise to-day, father. The Scupper pump was overcome in the afternoon shift.”

“Well?”

“There was quite an accumulation of water in Swelly.”

“Indeed!” Barras picked up his pen and inspected the nib.

Arthur paused: the information seemed to mean nothing to his father. He still sat enthroned, judicial and half abstracted. Lamely, Arthur went on:

“It appeared to me there was quite a come of water in Scupper Flats. In fact it looked as if a block of undercut coal was forced off the Dyke as if there was pressure behind it. I thought you might like to know, father.”

“Like to know,” Barras repeated almost as though he recollected himself. “Oh yes!” Then his sardonic pleasantry: “I am obliged to you, of course, Arthur. I have no doubt you have anticipated Armstrong by a good sixteen hours, it’s very gratifying.”

Arthur looked downcast and hurt, his eyes travelled over the pattern of the carpet.

“If only we had the plans of the Old Neptune workings, father. We should know then for certain. It’s the most maddening thing to me, father, that they didn’t keep plans in those old days, father.”

The motionless quality of justice had never left Barras’s figure. He could not sneer. His voice held merely a cold rebuke:

“You are a little late with your condemnation, Arthur. If you had been born eighty years ago, I have no doubt you would have completely revolutionised the industry.”

There was another silence. Barras gazed at the half-finished letter on the desk before him. He picked it up and seemed to study it with a certain stem admiration for its phrasing. He thought out a fresh turn to the final sentence, lifted his pen. Then he rediscovered Arthur still standing by the door. He studied Arthur deliberately, as he had studied the letter, and gradually the severity went out of his face. He looked as near amusement as he could ever get. He said:

“Your interest in the Neptune is very satisfactory, Arthur. And I’m glad to see you have ideas on its management. In a few years’ time I have no doubt you will be running the mine — and me!” Had Barras been capable of real laughter he must certainly have laughed now: “In the meantime I suggest you confine yourself to the elementary things and leave the complicated business alone. Go and find that Fenwick fellow and get some trigonometry into your foolish head.”

When Arthur had gone, apologetic and vaguely ashamed, Barras returned to his letter of acceptance. Where had he got to again? What was that phrase again? Oh yes, he remembered. In his precise, resolute handwriting he continued: “For myself…”

The months passed quickly, summer to autumn, autumn to winter, and David’s recollection of his interview with Barras became less painful. Yet often, when he thought of it, he winced. He had been a fool, a presumptuous fool. Work still proceeded in Scupper Flats, the contract would be completed by the New Year. His visits to the Law had ceased. Arthur had taken his certificate with honours; and at the same time Dan Teasdale had obtained his ticket.