“Gave it to ’em straight,” Mr. Weavel assented, “and what I propose is a meeting at Sheffield—­say this day month—­and an appeal to the ironfounders.  It’s all very well, Borden,” he went on, a little angrily, “but my people are looking for something from me, in return for their cash.  What with these strikes here and strikes there, and a bit out of it for everybody, why, it’s time Sheffield spoke.”

“There’s a question I should like to ask,” Graveling intervened, plunging into the discussion, “and that is, why are you so cocksure, Mr. Maraton, of Government support in favour of the men?  You said in your speech to-night, so far as I remember, that if the masters wouldn’t give in without, Government must force them to see the rights of the matter.  And not only that, but Government should compel them to recognise the Union and to deal with it.  Now you’ve only been in this country a few days, and it seemed to me you were talking on a pretty tall order.”

“Not at all,” Maraton replied.  “I have a scheme of my own, scarcely developed as yet, a scheme which I wasn’t sure, when I came here, that I should ever make use of, which justified me in saying what I did.”

They looked at him jealously.

“Is it an arrangement with Mr. Foley that you’re speaking of?” Peter Dale enquired.

“Perhaps so,” Maraton assented.

There was a dead silence.  Maraton was leaning slightly against a table.  Julia was talking to the wife of one of the delegates, a little way off.  The others were all spread around, smoking and helping themselves to drinks which had just been brought in.  Graveling’s face was dark and angry.

“Are we to gather,” he demanded, “that there’s some sort of an understanding between you and Mr. Foley?”

“If there is,” Maraton asked easily, “to whom am I responsible?”

There was a silence, brief but intense.  Julia had turned her head; the others, too, were listening.  Peter Dale was blowing tobacco smoke from his mouth, Borden was breathing heavily.  Graveling’s small eyes were bright with anger and distrust.  They were all of them realising the presence of a new force which had come amongst them, and already, with the immeasurable selfishness of their class, they were speculating as to its personal effect upon themselves.  Peter Dale, with his hands in his trousers pockets, and his pipe between his teeth, elbowed his way to Maraton’s side.

“Young man,” he began solemnly, “we’d best have an understanding.  Ask any of these others and they’ll tell you I’m the leader of the Labour Party.  Are you one of us or aren’t you?”

“One of you, in a sense, I hope, Mr. Dale,” Maraton answered simply.  “Only you must put me down as an Independent.  I don’t understand conditions over here yet.  Where my own way seems best, I am used to following it.”

Peter Dale removed his pipe from his mouth and spoke with added distinctness.