Page:The Dial (Volume 68).djvu/270

'Flemin''s got the sack," said Slanty Joe.

"What for?" some one asked.

"Talkin'."——

It may seem strange that a man should lose his job as a docker for talking, but to the whole gang Slanty's words were quite explicable. You see, Fleming had been educated on a Hull trawler, so his habits were peculiar and his vocabulary, though limited, weird and arresting. Take his habits first—though one couldn't say that the fishing-ground was entirely responsible for them, they were mostly the gift of nature, and could be borne with some degree of fortitude. Some of them he did not indulge in much; those were the good ones, and they were very few. The others, the ones he cultivated most, we grouped under the general heading of "Fleming's monthly." They were all linked together by indissoluble bends— thus:

At the beginning of the month he signed the pledge. He was then agonizing through the aftermath of a very great drunk. For a week or so he would assiduously preach temperance and thrift, and, having no money, he would be consistent enough religiously to practise those much over-rated virtues. Then he became dull and low-spirited, and was awkwardly quarrelsome when interfered with. He would continue in this state until the end of the third week, by which time he had accumulated wealth—or what passed for wealth on the Dalby docks—say, two pounds.

Early in the last week of the month he was neither quarrelsome nor preachy; he was just—mellow. He believed in toleration and the Brotherhood of Man. He had views—and aired them—on The Inn as the Workers' Home, and shook hands with his mates about forty times a day, and forgot all old smouldering animosities.

The end of the month often found him in the police court on some charge or other. Once he was "up" for obstruction. Having carried a policeman to the middle of the bridge that spanned the river, he dropped his burden over the parapet, ran round to the bank, swam to the gasping struggler, and tried to haul him to safety in a given number of minutes. One of his prime diversions was juggling with policemen. He didn't believe in Law at all. It hurt him too much.