Put Yourself in His Place [25]
About 11 o'clock, that same day, the postman brought him a letter, so vilely addressed, that it had been taken to two or three places, on speculation, before it reached its destination.
Little saw at once it was another anonymous communication. But he was getting callous to these missives, and he even took it with a certain degree of satisfaction. "Well done, Bramah! Obliged to send their venom by post now." This was the feeling uppermost in his mind. In short, he opened the letter with as much contempt as anger.
But he had no sooner read the foul scrawl, than his heart died within him.
"Thou's sharp but not sharp enow. We know where thou goes courting up hill. Window is all glass and ripe for a Peter shall blow the house tatums. There's the stuff in Hillsbro and the men that have done others so, and will do her job as wells thine. Powders a good servant but a bad master.
"ONE WHO MEANS DOING WHAT HE SAYS."
At this diabolical threat, young Little leaned sick and broken over the handle of his bellows.
Then he got up, and went to Mr. Cheetham, and said, patiently, "Sir, I am sorry to say I must leave you this very day."
"Don't say that, Little, don't say that."
"Oh it is with a heavy heart, sir; and I shall always remember your kindness. But a man knows when he is beat. And I'm beat now." He hung his head in silence awhile. Then he said, in a faint voice, "This is what has done it, sir," and handed him the letter.
Mr. Cheetham examined it, and said, "I am not surprised at your being taken aback by this. But it's nothing new to us; we have all been threatened in this form. Why, the very last time I fought the trades, my wife was threatened I should be brought home on a shutter, with my intestines sweeping the ground. That was the purport, only it was put vernacular and stronger. And they reminded me that the old gal's clothes (that is Mrs. Cheetham: she is only twenty-six, and the prettiest lass in Coventry, and has a row of ivories that would do your heart good: now these Hillsborough hags haven't got a set of front teeth among 'em, young or old). Well, they told me the old gal's clothes could easily be spoiled, and her doll's face and all, with a penn'orth of vitriol."
"The monsters!"
"But it was all brag. These things are threatened fifty times, for once they are done."
"I shall not risk it. My own skin, if you like. But not hers: never, Mr. Cheetham: oh, never; never!"
"Well, but," said Mr. Cheetham, "she is in no danger so long as you keep away from her. They might fling one of their petards in at the window, if you were there; but otherwise, never, in this world. No, no, Little, they are not so bad as that. They have blown up a whole household, to get at the obnoxious party; but they always make sure he is there first."
Bayne was appealed to, and confirmed this; and, with great difficulty, they prevailed on Little to remain with them, until the Unions should decide; and to discontinue his visits to the house on the hill in the meantime. I need hardly say they had no idea the house on the hill was "Woodbine Villa."
He left them, and, sick at heart, turned away from Heath Hill, and strolled out of the lower part of the town, and wandered almost at random, and sad as death.
He soon left the main road, and crossed a stile; it took him by the side of a babbling brook, and at the edge of a picturesque wood. Ever and anon he came to a water-wheel, and above the water-wheel a dam made originally by art, but now looking like a sweet little lake. They were beautiful places; the wheels and their attendant works were old and rugged, but picturesque and countrified; and the little lakes behind, fringed by the master-grinder's garden, were strangely peaceful and pretty. Here the vulgar labor of the grindstone was made beautiful and incredibly poetic.
"Ah!" thought poor Little, "how happy a workman must be that plies his trade here in the fresh air. And how unfortunate I am to be tied to a power-wheel, in that filthy town, instead of being here, where