Thomas Leigh

“ Leigh, obstinately. “Thomas, bear in mind that you are not a business man. You don't understand that money is never to be had merely for the asking. Your problem is to get the money as quickly as possible.”
Mr. Leigh was frowning, full of a feverish impatience that alarmed Tommy. To him his father had always been a slave of routine and method, almost an automaton. Evidently the old man's nerves were overwrought, and there was no telling the reason. But his desire to help his son was prompted by love and loyalty to the living and the dead. ”

“ Leigh, looking with clear and scornful eyes at his work, gave him to feel that at least one man knew him to the bottom of his scoundrelly soul. For a while it appeared as though Mr. Leigh would be irretrievably ruined and McSheen and his friends and secret backers like Canter would secure easy possession of the properties his power of organization had built up; but suddenly an unlooked-for ally with abundant resources had come to Mr. Leigh's assistance in the person of an old friend, and the ripened fruit of their labors had been plucked from their hands outstretched to grasp it. ”

“ Genest calls it a 'good ballad farce,' Chetwood gives in his short life of Leigh a ballad written by him to the tune of 'Thomas, I cannot,' concerning some brother actors, which for the time was a capital specimen of humour and versification. Leigh died in 1726. A man of education with an excellent figure and pleasing address, distinguished from his namesakes as Handsome Leigh, he was received with favour, but did not maintain his position. ”

“ Leigh's voice was now steady, almost cold—“I shall be quite satisfied, Thomas.”
“I'll do my best, father,” said Tommy, fully as firmly. “I'll write you regularly and keep you informed of my progress. My work is of a peculiar character, and I can't always be sure I'm making good. As a matter of fact,” he added, in a burst of frankness, “I'm merely getting paid for being one of Thompson's Experiments, as they call us at the works.”
“He is an unusual man. If his experiments should prove successful—” The old man paused to look sternly at his only son. ”

“ He married Mary, daughter of John Wrightington of Wrightington, Lancashire, and left issue. His will is quoted in the ‘Derby Household Books’ published by the Chetham Society.
Leigh wrote the following: 1. ‘The Souls Solace against Sorrow,’ a funeral sermon on Katharine Brettargh [q. v.] , published with another sermon by William Harrison of Huyton, 1602, 1605; 5th edit. 1617, 8vo. 2. ‘The Christians Watch ... preached at Prestbury Church in Cheshire at the funerals of ... Thomas Leigh of Adlington,’ 1605, 8vo. 3. ”

“ And Tommy was one of Thompson's business Experiments.
“I'll show them!” he said aloud. And in his determination there was quite as much loyalty to Thompson as resolve to demonstrate the worth of Thomas F. Leigh.
Having definitely made up his mind to succeed, he began once more at the beginning. He must get RIvington and his other friends to arrange for Meetings with their fathers. The speeches would say themselves when the time came. It all depended upon what manner of men the fathers were. And then he began to think of his own father.
The human mind works curiously. ”

“ Ere morning came one of the children had passed away; but the mother and the other children survived; and Eleanor Leigh knew that John Marvel, now on his knees, now leaning over the bed administering stimulants, had saved them.
As Eleanor Leigh stepped out into the morning light, she looked on a new earth, as fair as if it had just been created, and it was a new Eleanor Leigh who gazed upon it. The tinsel of frivolity had shrivelled and perished in the fire of that night. Sham had laid bare its shallow face and fled away. Life had taken on reality. ”

“ Leigh was issued, and the next morning after that not a wheel turned on his lines or in his factories. It was imagined and reported as only a question of wages between an employer and his men. But deep down underneath lay the secret motives of McSheen and Canter and their set who had been plotting in secret, weaving their webs in the dark—gambling in the lives of men and sad-eyed women and hungry children. The effect on the population of that section of the city was curious. Of all sad things on earth a strike is the saddest. ”

“ It might suit for the millennium, but not for a society in which every man was competing with every other man. In fact, however, the principal reason for Mr. Leigh's silence was the growing differences between himself and Mrs. Argand. The struggle had grown until it involved the very existence of his house. He knew that if his daughter ever realized the truth, that her aunt's interest had been thrown against him and in favor of men whose methods he reprobated, it would mean the end of all between them, and he was unwilling that a breach should come between his daughter and her mother's sister. ”

“ Leigh, "but I will deal with you," he turned to the other men. "I will not discharge the man you speak of. He is an exceptionally good man. I happen to know this of my own personal knowledge, and I know the reason he is not a Union man. It is because you kept him out of the Union, hoping to destroy him as you have destroyed other honest men who have opposed you." He turned back to the leader.
Wringman started to speak, but Mr. Leigh cut him short.
"Not a word from you. I am dealing now with my own men. I know you. I know who your employer is and what you have been paid. ”

“ A man named Ring—something—a walking-delegate whom he used to know back in the East, got down on him, and followed him up, and when he was about to get in the Union, he turned him down. And, Dad, you've just got to give him a place."
"Wringman, possibly," said Mr. Leigh. "There's a man of that name in the city who seems to be something of a leader. He's a henchman of Coll McSheen and does his dirty work for him. He has been trying to make trouble for us for some time. Send your man around to Butts to-morrow, and I'll see what we can do for him." ”

“ LEIGH, RICHARD (fl. 1675) , poet, born in 1649, was younger son of Edward Leigh of Rushall, Staffordshire. He entered Queen's College, Oxford, in Lent term 1666, and proceeded B.A. on 19 June 1669. He afterwards went to London and became an actor in the company of the Duke of York, where other actors bearing the same surname [see Leigh, Anthony and John] , from whom he is to be carefully distinguished, were engaged at the same time. ”

“ Leigh, with the light of affection warming up his rather cold face. "Surely no one, even the anarchistic writers of the anarchistic press, could imagine anything to say against you."
"Yes, of me, too, though not by name, perhaps; but I was there and I was in a way the cause of the trouble, because the car was sent after me and Aunt Sophia, and I feel terribly guilty about it."
"Guilty of what, my dear?" smiled her father. "Of simply using your own property in a way satisfactory to you?"
"That is just it, father; that is the point which the writer raises. Is it our own property?" ”

“ Leigh's losses and reported embarrassment, I expressed myself hotly. If they struck again they deserved all they got—they deserved to fail for following such leaders as Wringman and refusing to listen to their friends.
"Oh, no, they are just ignorant, that is all—they don't know. Give them time—give them time."
"Well, I am tired of it all."
"Tired! Oh! don't get tired. That's not the way to work. Stand fast. Go and see John Marvel and get new inspiration from him. See how he works."
"Wolffert, I am in love," I said, suddenly. ”

“ Leigh appeared an interested auditor, though he did not help me out much. At the end, he said:
"Mr. Glave, I have some confidence in my daughter, sufficient—I may say—to have decided for some time back to allow her to manage her own affairs, and unless there were some insuperable objection in any given case, I should not interfere. This is one of the vital affairs in life in which a man has to fight his own battle. I refer you to my daughter. If there were an insuperable objection, of course I should interfere." I wondered if he knew of Canter, and took some hope from his words. ”

“ James Canter was possibly the most attentive of all the beaux Miss Leigh had, and they were more numerous than I at that time had any idea of. He was prospectively among the wealthiest young men in the city, for his father, who idolized him, was one of the largest capitalists in the State. ”

“ Everybody knows her." I did not, but I did not care; I knew all I wanted to know—I knew who Miss Leigh was. I reflected with some concern that this was the name of the vice-president of the Railway whom I had attacked through Kalender and of the man to whom Mr. Poole's perfunctory letter was addressed. I went back to my office in better spirits, and, having no brief to work on, even wrote a poem about the violets—about her leaving a track of violets behind her.
I was drawn to that street a number of times afterward, but I saw her no more.
I don't believe that love often comes at first sight ”

“ The two or three young girls of the company had left at the same time with Miss Leigh, and the ladies who remained were, for the most part, married women of that indefinite age which follows youth after a longer or shorter interval. They had all travelled and seen a good deal of the world, and they knew a good deal of it ”

“ I hunted for Dix all day, but without success, and was so busy about it that I did not have time to begin my search for Jeams. That evening, as it was raining hard, I treated myself to the unwonted luxury of a ride home on a street-car. The streets were greasy with a thick, black paste of mud, and the smoke was down on our heads in a dark slop. Like Petrarch, my thoughts were on Laura, and I was repining at the rain mainly because it prevented the possibility of a glimpse of Miss Leigh on the street: a chance I was ever on the watch for. ”

“ Leigh, to whom Peck had given a rather sad account of me. My kinsman had asked him to ascertain how I lived.
I called on my new friend, Langton, earlier than he had expected. In my distress about Dix I consulted him the very next day and he undertook to get him back. I told him I had not a cent to pay him with at present, but some day I should have it and then——
"You'll never owe me a cent as long as you live," he said. "Besides, I'd like to find that dog. I remember him. He's a good one. You say you used the back stairway at times, opening on the alley near Mick Raffity's?" ”

“ The sodden face took on suddenly a resolution that gave the rough a look of power, the broad shoulders were those of an athlete, and the steady eye was that of a man to be reckoned with—and such was "Red Talman" when aroused.
"Speak her soft, Galley."
The name he had given was repeated over the throng by many, doubtless, who had not heard of her, but there were others who knew, and told of the work that Eleanor Leigh had been doing in quarters where any other woman of her class and kind had never showed her face; of help here and there; a hand lent to lift a fallen girl ”

“ A number of men boldly stood forth to declare for the half-a-loaf-better-than-no-bread theory, and against much hooting they stood their ground. The question of a resolution of thanks for Miss Leigh's baskets aroused a little opposition, but the majority were manifestly for it, and many pleasant things were said about her and her father as well, his liberal policy being strongly contrasted with the niggard policy of the other roads. Then there appeared the real leader of the occasion, to hear whom the meeting had been called: Wringman. ”

“ But though he made it appear easy enough to him, Eleanor Leigh's practical little head saw the difficulties and the flaws much more readily than the perfect result which he appeared to find so certain.
"You cannot reconstruct human nature," she protested, "and when you shall have gotten your system thoroughly under way, those who have gotten in positions of power will use their advantage for their own benefit, and then you will still have to begin all over again." But Wolffert was certain of the result and pointed out the work of his friend John Marvel as a proof of his theory. ”

“ We can't very well afford to have two rooms; but this is too small for us to live in comfortably and we have to keep it because it has a stationary wash-stand with hot water, which enables us to do our laundering."
"Yes, I see," murmured Miss Leigh softly.
"You see, we earn our living by making underclothes for—for a firm——"
"I see, and what nice work you do." She was handling a garment softly.
"Yes, my sister does beautiful work; and I used to do pretty well, too; but I am troubled a little with my eyes lately. The light isn't very good at night—and the gas is so expensive. ”

“ Leigh, a fact he mentioned somewhat irrelevantly. He was present during the trial and on its conclusion came up and congratulated me on my success against what he termed "the most powerful combination for evil in the city. They bid fair," he said, "to control not only the city, but the State, and are the more dangerous because they are entrenched behind the support of ignorant honesty. But you must look out for McSheen." As he stood near Coll McSheen, I caught the latter's eye fixed on us with that curious malevolent expression which cast a sort of mask over his face. ”

“ He was interested in a part of the street-car system of the city, that part in which "the Argand estate" held the controlling interest, and which was, to some extent, the rival system of that known as the "West Line," in which Mr. Leigh held a large interest. I mention these facts because, detached as they appear, they have a strong bearing on my subsequent relation to McSheen, and a certain bearing on my whole future. But, on occasion he was as ready for his own purposes to attack these interests secretly as those opposed to them. He always played his own hand. ”