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diff --git a/old/hslet10.txt b/old/hslet10.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..81d92ee --- /dev/null +++ b/old/hslet10.txt @@ -0,0 +1,4249 @@ +Project Gutenberg Etext of A House to Let, by Dickens and Others +#53 in our series by Charles Dickens and Others + + +Copyright laws are changing all over the world, be sure to check +the copyright laws for your country before posting these files!! + +Please take a look at the important information in this header. +We encourage you to keep this file on your own disk, keeping an +electronic path open for the next readers. Do not remove this. + + +**Welcome To The World of Free Plain Vanilla Electronic Texts** + +**Etexts Readable By Both Humans and By Computers, Since 1971** + +*These Etexts Prepared By Hundreds of Volunteers and Donations* + +Information on contacting Project Gutenberg to get Etexts, and +further information is included below. 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All, however, is not as it seems and she is drawn into +the mystery which surrounds the house. Originally published in 1858 in +the Christmas edition of "House Worlds Magazine", Dickens and his fellow +contributors wrote a chapter each and Dickens edited the whole. + +We have already released Dicken's chapter which was "Going into Society". +However, its good to have the whole book too so that people know how the +story starts and ends. + + + + +A HOUSE TO LET + + + + +Contents: + +Over the Way +The Manchester Marriage +Going into Society +Three Evenings in the House +Trottle's Report +Let at Last + + + +OVER THE WAY + + + +I had been living at Tunbridge Wells and nowhere else, going on for +ten years, when my medical man--very clever in his profession, and +the prettiest player I ever saw in my life of a hand at Long Whist, +which was a noble and a princely game before Short was heard of-- +said to me, one day, as he sat feeling my pulse on the actual sofa +which my poor dear sister Jane worked before her spine came on, and +laid her on a board for fifteen months at a stretch--the most +upright woman that ever lived--said to me, "What we want, ma'am, is +a fillip." + +"Good gracious, goodness gracious, Doctor Towers!" says I, quite +startled at the man, for he was so christened himself: "don't talk +as if you were alluding to people's names; but say what you mean." + +"I mean, my dear ma'am, that we want a little change of air and +scene." + +"Bless the man!" said I; "does he mean we or me!" + +"I mean you, ma'am." + +"Then Lard forgive you, Doctor Towers," I said; "why don't you get +into a habit of expressing yourself in a straightforward manner, +like a loyal subject of our gracious Queen Victoria, and a member of +the Church of England?" + +Towers laughed, as he generally does when he has fidgetted me into +any of my impatient ways--one of my states, as I call them--and then +he began, - + +"Tone, ma'am, Tone, is all you require!" He appealed to Trottle, +who just then came in with the coal-scuttle, looking, in his nice +black suit, like an amiable man putting on coals from motives of +benevolence. + +Trottle (whom I always call my right hand) has been in my service +two-and-thirty years. He entered my service, far away from England. +He is the best of creatures, and the most respectable of men; but, +opinionated. + +"What you want, ma'am," says Trottle, making up the fire in his +quiet and skilful way, "is Tone." + +"Lard forgive you both!" says I, bursting out a-laughing; "I see you +are in a conspiracy against me, so I suppose you must do what you +like with me, and take me to London for a change." + +For some weeks Towers had hinted at London, and consequently I was +prepared for him. When we had got to this point, we got on so +expeditiously, that Trottle was packed off to London next day but +one, to find some sort of place for me to lay my troublesome old +head in. + +Trottle came back to me at the Wells after two days' absence, with +accounts of a charming place that could be taken for six months +certain, with liberty to renew on the same terms for another six, +and which really did afford every accommodation that I wanted. + +"Could you really find no fault at all in the rooms, Trottle?" I +asked him. + +"Not a single one, ma'am. They are exactly suitable to you. There +is not a fault in them. There is but one fault outside of them." + +"And what's that?" + +"They are opposite a House to Let." + +"O!" I said, considering of it. "But is that such a very great +objection?" + +"I think it my duty to mention it, ma'am. It is a dull object to +look at. Otherwise, I was so greatly pleased with the lodging that +I should have closed with the terms at once, as I had your authority +to do." + +Trottle thinking so highly of the place, in my interest, I wished +not to disappoint him. Consequently I said: + +"The empty House may let, perhaps." + +"O, dear no, ma'am," said Trottle, shaking his head with decision; +"it won't let. It never does let, ma'am." + +"Mercy me! Why not?" + +"Nobody knows, ma'am. All I have to mention is, ma'am, that the +House won't let!" + +"How long has this unfortunate House been to let, in the name of +Fortune?" said I. + +"Ever so long," said Trottle. "Years." + +"Is it in ruins?" + +"It's a good deal out of repair, ma'am, but it's not in ruins." + +The long and the short of this business was, that next day I had a +pair of post-horses put to my chariot--for, I never travel by +railway: not that I have anything to say against railways, except +that they came in when I was too old to take to them; and that they +made ducks and drakes of a few turnpike-bonds I had--and so I went +up myself, with Trottle in the rumble, to look at the inside of this +same lodging, and at the outside of this same House. + +As I say, I went and saw for myself. The lodging was perfect. +That, I was sure it would be; because Trottle is the best judge of +comfort I know. The empty house was an eyesore; and that I was sure +it would be too, for the same reason. However, setting the one +thing against the other, the good against the bad, the lodging very +soon got the victory over the House. My lawyer, Mr. Squares, of +Crown Office Row; Temple, drew up an agreement; which his young man +jabbered over so dreadfully when he read it to me, that I didn't +understand one word of it except my own name; and hardly that, and I +signed it, and the other party signed it, and, in three weeks' time, +I moved my old bones, bag and baggage, up to London. + +For the first month or so, I arranged to leave Trottle at the Wells. +I made this arrangement, not only because there was a good deal to +take care of in the way of my school-children and pensioners, and +also of a new stove in the hall to air the house in my absence, +which appeared to me calculated to blow up and burst; but, likewise +because I suspect Trottle (though the steadiest of men, and a +widower between sixty and seventy) to be what I call rather a +Philanderer. I mean, that when any friend comes down to see me and +brings a maid, Trottle is always remarkably ready to show that maid +the Wells of an evening; and that I have more than once noticed the +shadow of his arm, outside the room door nearly opposite my chair, +encircling that maid's waist on the landing, like a table-cloth +brush. + +Therefore, I thought it just as well, before any London Philandering +took place, that I should have a little time to look round me, and +to see what girls were in and about the place. So, nobody stayed +with me in my new lodging at first after Trottle had established me +there safe and sound, but Peggy Flobbins, my maid; a most +affectionate and attached woman, who never was an object of +Philandering since I have known her, and is not likely to begin to +become so after nine-and-twenty years next March. + +It was the fifth of November when I first breakfasted in my new +rooms. The Guys were going about in the brown fog, like magnified +monsters of insects in table-beer, and there was a Guy resting on +the door-steps of the House to Let. I put on my glasses, partly to +see how the boys were pleased with what I sent them out by Peggy, +and partly to make sure that she didn't approach too near the +ridiculous object, which of course was full of sky-rockets, and +might go off into bangs at any moment. In this way it happened that +the first time I ever looked at the House to Let, after I became its +opposite neighbour, I had my glasses on. And this might not have +happened once in fifty times, for my sight is uncommonly good for my +time of life; and I wear glasses as little as I can, for fear of +spoiling it. + +I knew already that it was a ten-roomed house, very dirty, and much +dilapidated; that the area-rails were rusty and peeling away, and +that two or three of them were wanting, or half-wanting; that there +were broken panes of glass in the windows, and blotches of mud on +other panes, which the boys had thrown at them; that there was quite +a collection of stones in the area, also proceeding from those Young +Mischiefs; that there were games chalked on the pavement before the +house, and likenesses of ghosts chalked on the street-door; that the +windows were all darkened by rotting old blinds, or shutters, or +both; that the bills "To Let," had curled up, as if the damp air of +the place had given them cramps; or had dropped down into corners, +as if they were no more. I had seen all this on my first visit, and +I had remarked to Trottle, that the lower part of the black board +about terms was split away; that the rest had become illegible, and +that the very stone of the door-steps was broken across. +Notwithstanding, I sat at my breakfast table on that Please to +Remember the fifth of November morning, staring at the House through +my glasses, as if I had never looked at it before. + +All at once--in the first-floor window on my right--down in a low +corner, at a hole in a blind or a shutter--I found that I was +looking at a secret Eye. The reflection of my fire may have touched +it and made it shine; but, I saw it shine and vanish. + +The eye might have seen me, or it might not have seen me, sitting +there in the glow of my fire--you can take which probability you +prefer, without offence--but something struck through my frame, as +if the sparkle of this eye had been electric, and had flashed +straight at me. It had such an effect upon me, that I could not +remain by myself, and I rang for Flobbins, and invented some little +jobs for her, to keep her in the room. After my breakfast was +cleared away, I sat in the same place with my glasses on, moving my +head, now so, and now so, trying whether, with the shining of my +fire and the flaws in the window-glass, I could reproduce any +sparkle seeming to be up there, that was like the sparkle of an eye. +But no; I could make nothing like it. I could make ripples and +crooked lines in the front of the House to Let, and I could even +twist one window up and loop it into another; but, I could make no +eye, nor anything like an eye. So I convinced myself that I really +had seen an eye. + +Well, to be sure I could not get rid of the impression of this eye, +and it troubled me and troubled me, until it was almost a torment. +I don't think I was previously inclined to concern my head much +about the opposite House; but, after this eye, my head was full of +the house; and I thought of little else than the house, and I +watched the house, and I talked about the house, and I dreamed of +the house. In all this, I fully believe now, there was a good +Providence. But, you will judge for yourself about that, bye-and- +bye. + +My landlord was a butler, who had married a cook, and set up +housekeeping. They had not kept house longer than a couple of +years, and they knew no more about the House to Let than I did. +Neither could I find out anything concerning it among the trades- +people or otherwise; further than what Trottle had told me at first. +It had been empty, some said six years, some said eight, some said +ten. It never did let, they all agreed, and it never would let. + +I soon felt convinced that I should work myself into one of my +states about the House; and I soon did. I lived for a whole month +in a flurry, that was always getting worse. Towers's prescriptions, +which I had brought to London with me, were of no more use than +nothing. In the cold winter sunlight, in the thick winter fog, in +the black winter rain, in the white winter snow, the House was +equally on my mind. I have heard, as everybody else has, of a +spirit's haunting a house; but I have had my own personal experience +of a house's haunting a spirit; for that House haunted mine. + +In all that month's time, I never saw anyone go into the House nor +come out of the House. I supposed that such a thing must take place +sometimes, in the dead of the night, or the glimmer of the morning; +but, I never saw it done. I got no relief from having my curtains +drawn when it came on dark, and shutting out the House. The Eye +then began to shine in my fire. + +I am a single old woman. I should say at once, without being at all +afraid of the name, I am an old maid; only that I am older than the +phrase would express. The time was when I had my love-trouble, but, +it is long and long ago. He was killed at sea (Dear Heaven rest his +blessed head!) when I was twenty-five. I have all my life, since +ever I can remember, been deeply fond of children. I have always +felt such a love for them, that I have had my sorrowful and sinful +times when I have fancied something must have gone wrong in my life- +-something must have been turned aside from its original intention I +mean--or I should have been the proud and happy mother of many +children, and a fond old grandmother this day. I have soon known +better in the cheerfulness and contentment that God has blessed me +with and given me abundant reason for; and yet I have had to dry my +eyes even then, when I have thought of my dear, brave, hopeful, +handsome, bright-eyed Charley, and the trust meant to cheer me with. +Charley was my youngest brother, and he went to India. He married +there, and sent his gentle little wife home to me to be confined, +and she was to go back to him, and the baby was to be left with me, +and I was to bring it up. It never belonged to this life. It took +its silent place among the other incidents in my story that might +have been, but never were. I had hardly time to whisper to her +"Dead my own!" or she to answer, "Ashes to ashes, dust to dust! O +lay it on my breast and comfort Charley!" when she had gone to seek +her baby at Our Saviour's feet. I went to Charley, and I told him +there was nothing left but me, poor me; and I lived with Charley, +out there, several years. He was a man of fifty, when he fell +asleep in my arms. His face had changed to be almost old and a +little stern; but, it softened, and softened when I laid it down +that I might cry and pray beside it; and, when I looked at it for +the last time, it was my dear, untroubled, handsome, youthful +Charley of long ago. + +- I was going on to tell that the loneliness of the House to Let +brought back all these recollections, and that they had quite +pierced my heart one evening, when Flobbins, opening the door, and +looking very much as if she wanted to laugh but thought better of +it, said: + +"Mr. Jabez Jarber, ma'am!" + +Upon which Mr. Jarber ambled in, in his usual absurd way, saying: + +"Sophonisba!" + +Which I am obliged to confess is my name. A pretty one and proper +one enough when it was given to me: but, a good many years out of +date now, and always sounding particularly high-flown and comical +from his lips. So I said, sharply: + +"Though it is Sophonisba, Jarber, you are not obliged to mention it, +that _I_ see." + +In reply to this observation, the ridiculous man put the tips of my +five right-hand fingers to his lips, and said again, with an +aggravating accent on the third syllable: + +"SophonISba!" + +I don't burn lamps, because I can't abide the smell of oil, and wax +candles belonged to my day. I hope the convenient situation of one +of my tall old candlesticks on the table at my elbow will be my +excuse for saying, that if he did that again, I would chop his toes +with it. (I am sorry to add that when I told him so, I knew his toes +to be tender.) But, really, at my time of life and at Jarber's, it +is too much of a good thing. There is an orchestra still standing +in the open air at the Wells, before which, in the presence of a +throng of fine company, I have walked a minuet with Jarber. But, +there is a house still standing, in which I have worn a pinafore, +and had a tooth drawn by fastening a thread to the tooth and the +door-handle, and toddling away from the door. And how should I look +now, at my years, in a pinafore, or having a door for my dentist? + +Besides, Jarber always was more or less an absurd man. He was +sweetly dressed, and beautifully perfumed, and many girls of my day +would have given their ears for him; though I am bound to add that +he never cared a fig for them, or their advances either, and that he +was very constant to me. For, he not only proposed to me before my +love-happiness ended in sorrow, but afterwards too: not once, nor +yet twice: nor will we say how many times. However many they were, +or however few they were, the last time he paid me that compliment +was immediately after he had presented me with a digestive dinner- +pill stuck on the point of a pin. And I said on that occasion, +laughing heartily, "Now, Jarber, if you don't know that two people +whose united ages would make about a hundred and fifty, have got to +be old, I do; and I beg to swallow this nonsense in the form of this +pill" (which I took on the spot), "and I request to, hear no more of +it." + +After that, he conducted himself pretty well. He was always a +little squeezed man, was Jarber, in little sprigged waistcoats; and +he had always little legs and a little smile, and a little voice, +and little round-about ways. As long as I can remember him he was +always going little errands for people, and carrying little gossip. +At this present time when he called me "Sophonisba!" he had a little +old-fashioned lodging in that new neighbourhood of mine. I had not +seen him for two or three years, but I had heard that he still went +out with a little perspective-glass and stood on door-steps in Saint +James's Street, to see the nobility go to Court; and went in his +little cloak and goloshes outside Willis's rooms to see them go to +Almack's; and caught the frightfullest colds, and got himself +trodden upon by coachmen and linkmen, until he went home to his +landlady a mass of bruises, and had to be nursed for a month. + +Jarber took off his little fur-collared cloak, and sat down opposite +me, with his little cane and hat in his hand. + +"Let us have no more Sophonisbaing, if YOU please, Jarber," I said. +"Call me Sarah. How do you do? I hope you are pretty well." + +"Thank you. And you?" said Jarber. + +"I am as well as an old woman can expect to be." + +Jarber was beginning: + +"Say, not old, Sophon- " but I looked at the candlestick, and he +left off; pretending not to have said anything. + +"I am infirm, of course," I said, "and so are you. Let us both be +thankful it's no worse." + +"Is it possible that you look worried?" said Jarber. + +"It is very possible. I have no doubt it is the fact." + +"And what has worried my Soph-, soft-hearted friend," said Jarber. + +"Something not easy, I suppose, to comprehend. I am worried to +death by a House to Let, over the way." + +Jarber went with his little tip-toe step to the window-curtains, +peeped out, and looked round at me. + +"Yes," said I, in answer: "that house." + +After peeping out again, Jarber came back to his chair with a tender +air, and asked: "How does it worry you, S-arah?" + +"It is a mystery to me," said I. "Of course every house IS a +mystery, more or less; but, something that I don't care to mention" +(for truly the Eye was so slight a thing to mention that I was more +than half ashamed of it), "has made that House so mysterious to me, +and has so fixed it in my mind, that I have had no peace for a +month. I foresee that I shall have no peace, either, until Trottle +comes to me, next Monday." + +I might have mentioned before, that there is a lone-standing +jealousy between Trottle and Jarber; and that there is never any +love lost between those two. + +"TROTTLE," petulantly repeated Jarber, with a little flourish of his +cane; "how is TROTTLE to restore the lost peace of Sarah?" + +"He will exert himself to find out something about the House. I +have fallen into that state about it, that I really must discover by +some means or other, good or bad, fair or foul, how and why it is +that that House remains To Let." + +"And why Trottle? Why not," putting his little hat to his heart; +"why not, Jarber? + +"To tell you the truth, I have never thought of Jarber in the +matter. And now I do think of Jarber, through your having the +kindness to suggest him--for which I am really and truly obliged to +you--I don't think he could do it." + +"Sarah!" + +"I think it would be too much for you, Jarber." + +"Sarah!" + +"There would be coming and going, and fetching and carrying, Jarber, +and you might catch cold." + +"Sarah! What can be done by Trottle, can be done by me. I am on +terms of acquaintance with every person of responsibility in this +parish. I am intimate at the Circulating Library. I converse daily +with the Assessed Taxes. I lodge with the Water Rate. I know the +Medical Man. I lounge habitually at the House Agent's. I dine with +the Churchwardens. I move to the Guardians. Trottle! A person in +the sphere of a domestic, and totally unknown to society!" + +"Don't be warm, Jarber. In mentioning Trottle, I have naturally +relied on my Right-Hand, who would take any trouble to gratify even +a whim of his old mistress's. But, if you can find out anything to +help to unravel the mystery of this House to Let, I shall be fully +as much obliged to you as if there was never a Trottle in the land." + +Jarber rose and put on his little cloak. A couple of fierce brass +lions held it tight round his little throat; but a couple of the +mildest Hares might have done that, I am sure. "Sarah," he said, "I +go. Expect me on Monday evening, the Sixth, when perhaps you will +give me a cup of tea;--may I ask for no Green? Adieu!" + +This was on a Thursday, the second of December. When I reflected +that Trottle would come back on Monday, too, I had My misgivings as +to the difficulty of keeping the two powers from open warfare, and +indeed I was more uneasy than I quite like to confess. However, the +empty House swallowed up that thought next morning, as it swallowed +up most other thoughts now, and the House quite preyed upon me all +that day, and all the Saturday. + +It was a very wet Sunday: raining and blowing from morning to +night. When the bells rang for afternoon church, they seemed to +ring in the commotion of the puddles as well as in the wind, and +they sounded very loud and dismal indeed, and the street looked very +dismal indeed, and the House looked dismallest of all. + +I was reading my prayers near the light, and my fire was growing in +the darkening window-glass, when, looking up, as I prayed for the +fatherless children and widows and all who were desolate and +oppressed,--I saw the Eye again. It passed in a moment, as it had +done before; but, this time, I was inwardly more convinced that I +had seen it. + +Well to be sure, I HAD a night that night! Whenever I closed my own +eyes, it was to see eyes. Next morning, at an unreasonably, and I +should have said (but for that railroad) an impossibly early hour, +comes Trottle. As soon as he had told me all about the Wells, I +told him all about the House. He listened with as great interest +and attention as I could possibly wish, until I came to Jabez +Jarber, when he cooled in an instant, and became opinionated. + +"Now, Trottle," I said, pretending not to notice, "when Mr. Jarber +comes back this evening, we must all lay our heads together." + +"I should hardly think that would be wanted, ma'am; Mr. Jarber's +head is surely equal to anything." + +Being determined not to notice, I said again, that we must all lay +our heads together. + +"Whatever you order, ma'am, shall be obeyed. Still, it cannot be +doubted, I should think, that Mr. Jarber's head is equal, if not +superior, to any pressure that can be brought to bear upon it." + +This was provoking; and his way, when he came in and out all through +the day, of pretending not to see the House to Let, was more +provoking still. However, being quite resolved not to notice, I +gave no sign whatever that I did notice. But, when evening came, +and he showed in Jarber, and, when Jarber wouldn't be helped off +with his cloak, and poked his cane into cane chair-backs and china +ornaments and his own eye, in trying to unclasp his brazen lions of +himself (which he couldn't do, after all), I could have shaken them +both. + +As it was, I only shook the tea-pot, and made the tea. Jarber had +brought from under his cloak, a roll of paper, with which he had +triumphantly pointed over the way, like the Ghost of Hamlet's Father +appearing to the late Mr. Kemble, and which he had laid on the +table. + +"A discovery?" said I, pointing to it, when he was seated, and had +got his tea-cup.--"Don't go, Trottle." + +"The first of a series of discoveries," answered Jarber. "Account +of a former tenant, compiled from the Water Rate, and Medical Man." + +"Don't go, Trottle," I repeated. For, I saw him making +imperceptibly to the door. + +"Begging your pardon, ma'am, I might be in Mr. Jarber's way?" + +Jarber looked that he decidedly thought he might be. I relieved +myself with a good angry croak, and said--always determined not to +notice: + +"Have the goodness to sit down, if you please, Trottle. I wish you +to hear this." + +Trottle bowed in the stiffest manner, and took the remotest chair he +could find. Even that, he moved close to the draught from the +keyhole of the door. + +"Firstly," Jarber began, after sipping his tea, "would my Sophon- " + +"Begin again, Jarber," said I. + +"Would you be much surprised, if this House to Let should turn out +to be the property of a relation of your own?" + +"I should indeed be very much surprised." + +"Then it belongs to your first cousin (I learn, by the way, that he +is ill at this time) George Forley." + +"Then that is a bad beginning. I cannot deny that George Forley +stands in the relation of first cousin to me; but I hold no +communication with him. George Forley has been a hard, bitter, +stony father to a child now dead. George Forley was most implacable +and unrelenting to one of his two daughters who made a poor +marriage. George Forley brought all the weight of his band to bear +as heavily against that crushed thing, as he brought it to bear +lightly, favouringly, and advantageously upon her sister, who made a +rich marriage. I hope that, with the measure George Forley meted, +it may not be measured out to him again. I will give George Forley +no worse wish." + +I was strong upon the subject, and I could not keep the tears out of +my eyes; for, that young girl's was a cruel story, and I had dropped +many a tear over it before. + +"The house being George Forley's," said I, "is almost enough to +account for there being a Fate upon it, if Fate there is. Is there +anything about George Forley in those sheets of paper?" + +"Not a word." + +"I am glad to hear it. Please to read on. Trottle, why don't you +come nearer? Why do you sit mortifying yourself in those arctic +regions? Come nearer." + +"Thank you, ma'am; I am quite near enough to Mr. Jarber." + +Jarber rounded his chair, to get his back full to my opinionated +friend and servant, and, beginning to read, tossed the words at him +over his (Jabez Jarber's) own ear and shoulder. + +He read what follows: + + + +THE MANCHESTER MARRIAGE + + + +Mr. and Mrs. Openshaw came from Manchester to London and took the +House To Let. He had been, what is called in Lancashire, a Salesman +for a large manufacturing firm, who were extending their business, +and opening a warehouse in London; where Mr. Openshaw was now to +superintend the business. He rather enjoyed the change of +residence; having a kind of curiosity about London, which he had +never yet been able to gratify in his brief visits to the +metropolis. At the same time he had an odd, shrewd, contempt for +the inhabitants; whom he had always pictured to himself as fine, +lazy people; caring nothing but for fashion and aristocracy, and +lounging away their days in Bond Street, and such places; ruining +good English, and ready in their turn to despise him as a +provincial. The hours that the men of business kept in the city +scandalised him too; accustomed as he was to the early dinners of +Manchester folk, and the consequently far longer evenings. Still, +he was pleased to go to London; though he would not for the world +have confessed it, even to himself, and always spoke of the step to +his friends as one demanded of him by the interests of his +employers, and sweetened to him by a considerable increase of +salary. His salary indeed was so liberal that he might have been +justified in taking a much larger House than this one, had he not +thought himself bound to set an example to Londoners of how little a +Manchester man of business cared for show. Inside, however, he +furnished the House with an unusual degree of comfort, and, in the +winter time, he insisted on keeping up as large fires as the grates +would allow, in every room where the temperature was in the least +chilly. Moreover, his northern sense of hospitality was such, that, +if he were at home, he could hardly suffer a visitor to leave the +house without forcing meat and drink upon him. Every servant in the +house was well warmed, well fed, and kindly treated; for their +master scorned all petty saving in aught that conduced to comfort; +while he amused himself by following out all his accustomed habits +and individual ways in defiance of what any of his new neighbours +might think. + +His wife was a pretty, gentle woman, of suitable age and character. +He was forty-two, she thirty-five. He was loud and decided; she +soft and yielding. They had two children or rather, I should say, +she had two; for the elder, a girl of eleven, was Mrs. Openshaw's +child by Frank Wilson her first husband. The younger was a little +boy, Edwin, who could just prattle, and to whom his father delighted +to speak in the broadest and most unintelligible Lancashire dialect, +in order to keep up what he called the true Saxon accent. + +Mrs. Openshaw's Christian-name was Alice, and her first husband had +been her own cousin. She was the orphan niece of a sea-captain in +Liverpool: a quiet, grave little creature, of great personal +attraction when she was fifteen or sixteen, with regular features +and a blooming complexion. But she was very shy, and believed +herself to be very stupid and awkward; and was frequently scolded by +her aunt, her own uncle's second wife. So when her cousin, Frank +Wilson, came home from a long absence at sea, and first was kind and +protective to her; secondly, attentive and thirdly, desperately in +love with her, she hardly knew how to be grateful enough to him. It +is true she would have preferred his remaining in the first or +second stages of behaviour; for his violent love puzzled and +frightened her. Her uncle neither helped nor hindered the love +affair though it was going on under his own eyes. Frank's step- +mother had such a variable temper, that there was no knowing whether +what she liked one day she would like the next, or not. At length +she went to such extremes of crossness, that Alice was only too glad +to shut her eyes and rush blindly at the chance of escape from +domestic tyranny offered her by a marriage with her cousin; and, +liking him better than any one in the world except her uncle (who +was at this time at sea) she went off one morning and was married to +him; her only bridesmaid being the housemaid at her aunt's. The +consequence was, that Frank and his wife went into lodgings, and +Mrs. Wilson refused to see them, and turned away Norah, the warm- +hearted housemaid; whom they accordingly took into their service. +When Captain Wilson returned from his voyage, he was very cordial +with the young couple, and spent many an evening at their lodgings; +smoking his pipe, and sipping his grog; but he told them that, for +quietness' sake, he could not ask them to his own house; for his +wife was bitter against them. They were not very unhappy about +this. + +The seed of future unhappiness lay rather in Frank's vehement, +passionate disposition; which led him to resent his wife's shyness +and want of demonstration as failures in conjugal duty. He was +already tormenting himself, and her too, in a slighter degree, by +apprehensions and imaginations of what might befall her during his +approaching absence at sea. At last he went to his father and urged +him to insist upon Alice's being once more received under his roof; +the more especially as there was now a prospect of her confinement +while her husband was away on his voyage. Captain Wilson was, as he +himself expressed it, "breaking up," and unwilling to undergo the +excitement of a scene; yet he felt that what his son said was true. +So he went to his wife. And before Frank went to sea, he had the +comfort of seeing his wife installed in her old little garret in his +father's house. To have placed her in the one best spare room was a +step beyond Mrs. Wilson's powers of submission or generosity. The +worst part about it, however, was that the faithful Norah had to be +dismissed. Her place as housemaid had been filled up; and, even had +it not, she had forfeited Mrs. Wilson's good opinion for ever. She +comforted her young master and mistress by pleasant prophecies of +the time when they would have a household of their own; of which, in +whatever service she might be in the meantime, she should be sure to +form part. Almost the last action Frank Wilson did, before setting +sail, was going with Alice to see Norah once more at her mother's +house. And then he went away. + +Alice's father-in-law grew more and more feeble as winter advanced. +She was of great use to her step-mother in nursing and amusing him; +and, although there was anxiety enough in the household, there was +perhaps more of peace than there had been for years; for Mrs. Wilson +had not a bad heart, and was softened by the visible approach of +death to one whom she loved, and touched by the lonely condition of +the young creature, expecting her first confinement in her husband's +absence. To this relenting mood Norah owed the permission to come +and nurse Alice when her baby was born, and to remain to attend on +Captain Wilson. + +Before one letter had been received from Frank (who had sailed for +the East Indies and China), his father died. Alice was always glad +to remember that he had held her baby in his arms, and kissed and +blessed it before his death. After that, and the consequent +examination into the state of his affairs, it was found that he had +left far less property than people had been led by his style of +living to imagine; and, what money there was, was all settled upon +his wife, and at her disposal after her death. This did not signify +much to Alice, as Frank was now first mate of his ship, and, in +another voyage or two, would be captain. Meanwhile he had left her +some hundreds (all his savings) in the bank. + +It became time for Alice to hear from her husband. One letter from +the Cape she had already received. The next was to announce his +arrival in India. As week after week passed over, and no +intelligence of the ship's arrival reached the office of the owners, +and the Captain's wife was in the same state of ignorant suspense as +Alice herself, her fears grew most oppressive. At length the day +came when, in reply to her inquiry at the Shipping Office, they told +her that the owners had given up Hope of ever hearing more of the +Betsy-Jane, and had sent in their claim upon the underwriters. Now +that he was gone for ever, she first felt a yearning, longing love +for the kind cousin, the dear friend, the sympathising protector, +whom she should never see again,--first felt a passionate desire to +show him his child, whom she had hitherto rather craved to have all +to herself--her own sole possession. Her grief was, however, +noiseless, and quiet--rather to the scandal of Mrs. Wilson; who +bewailed her step-son as if he and she had always lived together in +perfect harmony, and who evidently thought it her duty to burst into +fresh tears at every strange face she saw; dwelling on his poor +young widow's desolate state, and the helplessness of the fatherless +child, with an unction, as if she liked the excitement of the +sorrowful story. + +So passed away the first days of Alice's widowhood. Bye-and-bye +things subsided into their natural and tranquil course. But, as if +this young creature was always to be in some heavy trouble, her ewe- +lamb began to be ailing, pining and sickly. The child's mysterious +illness turned out to be some affection of the spine likely to +affect health; but not to shorten life--at least so the doctors +said. But the long dreary suffering of one whom a mother loves as +Alice loved her only child, is hard to look forward to. Only Norah +guessed what Alice suffered; no one but God knew. + +And so it fell out, that when Mrs. Wilson, the elder, came to her +one day in violent distress, occasioned by a very material +diminution in the value the property that her husband had left her,- +-a diminution which made her income barely enough to support +herself, much less Alice--the latter could hardly understand how +anything which did not touch health or life could cause such grief; +and she received the intelligence with irritating composure. But +when, that afternoon, the little sick child was brought in, and the +grandmother--who after all loved it well--began a fresh moan over +her losses to its unconscious ears--saying how she had planned to +consult this or that doctor, and to give it this or that comfort or +luxury in after yearn but that now all chance of this had passed +away--Alice's heart was touched, and she drew near to Mrs. Wilson +with unwonted caresses, and, in a spirit not unlike to that of, +Ruth, entreated, that come what would, they might remain together. +After much discussion in succeeding days, it was arranged that Mrs. +Wilson should take a house in Manchester, furnishing it partly with +what furniture she had, and providing the rest with Alice's +remaining two hundred pounds. Mrs. Wilson was herself a Manchester +woman, and naturally longed to return to her native town. Some +connections of her own at that time required lodgings, for which +they were willing to pay pretty handsomely. Alice undertook the +active superintendence and superior work of the household. Norah, +willing faithful Norah, offered to cook, scour, do anything in +short, so that, she might but remain with them. + +The plan succeeded. For some years their first lodgers remained +with them, and all went smoothly,--with the one sad exception of the +little girl's increasing deformity. How that mother loved that +child, is not for words to tell! + +Then came a break of misfortune. Their lodgers left, and no one +succeeded to them. After some months they had to remove to a +smaller house; and Alice's tender conscience was torn by the idea +that she ought not to be a burden to her mother-in-law, but ought to +go out and seek her own maintenance. And leave her child! The +thought came like the sweeping boom of a funeral bell over her +heart. + +Bye-and-bye, Mr. Openshaw came to lodge with them. He had started +in life as the errand-boy and sweeper-out of a warehouse; had +struggled up through all the grades of employment in the place, +fighting his way through the hard striving Manchester life with +strong pushing energy of character. Every spare moment of time had +been sternly given up to self-teaching. He was a capital +accountant, a good French and German scholar, a keen, far-seeing +tradesman; understanding markets, and the bearing of events, both +near and distant, on trade: and yet, with such vivid attention to +present details, that I do not think he ever saw a group of flowers +in the fields without thinking whether their colours would, or would +not, form harmonious contrasts in the coming spring muslins and +prints. He went to debating societies, and threw himself with all +his heart and soul into politics; esteeming, it must be owned, every +man a fool or a knave who differed from him, and overthrowing his +opponents rather by the loud strength of his language than the calm +strength if his logic. There was something of the Yankee in all +this. Indeed his theory ran parallel to the famous Yankee motto-- +"England flogs creation, and Manchester flogs England." Such a man, +as may be fancied, had had no time for falling in love, or any such +nonsense. At the age when most young men go through their courting +and matrimony, he had not the means of keeping a wife, and was far +too practical to think of having one. And now that he was in easy +circumstances, a rising man, he considered women almost as +incumbrances to the world, with whom a man had better have as little +to do as possible. His first impression of Alice was indistinct, +and he did not care enough about her to make it distinct. "A pretty +yea-nay kind of woman," would have been his description of her, if +he had been pushed into a corner. He was rather afraid, in the +beginning, that her quiet ways arose from a listlessness and +laziness of character which would have been exceedingly discordant +to his active energetic nature. But, when he found out the +punctuality with which his wishes were attended to, and her work was +done; when he was called in the morning at the very stroke of the +clock, his shaving-water scalding hot, his fire bright, his coffee +made exactly as his peculiar fancy dictated, (for he was a man who +had his theory about everything, based upon what he knew of science, +and often perfectly original)--then he began to think: not that +Alice had any peculiar merit; but that he had got into remarkably +good lodgings: his restlessness wore away, and he began to consider +himself as almost settled for life in them. + +Mr. Openshaw had been too busy, all his life, to be introspective. +He did not know that he had any tenderness in his nature; and if he +had become conscious of its abstract existence, he would have +considered it as a manifestation of disease in some part of his +nature. But he was decoyed into pity unawares; and pity led on to +tenderness. That little helpless child--always carried about by one +of the three busy women of the house, or else patiently threading +coloured beads in the chair from which, by no effort of its own, +could it ever move; the great grave blue eyes, full of serious, not +uncheerful, expression, giving to the small delicate face a look +beyond its years; the soft plaintive voice dropping out but few +words, so unlike the continual prattle of a child--caught Mr. +Openshaw's attention in spite of himself. One day--he half scorned +himself for doing so--he cut short his dinner-hour to go in search +of some toy which should take the place of those eternal beads. I +forget what he bought; but, when he gave the present (which he took +care to do in a short abrupt manner, and when no one was by to see +him) he was almost thrilled by the flash of delight that came over +that child's face, and could not help all through that afternoon +going over and over again the picture left on his memory, by the +bright effect of unexpected joy on the little girl's face. When he +returned home, he found his slippers placed by his sitting-room +fire; and even more careful attention paid to his fancies than was +habitual in those model lodgings. When Alice had taken the last of +his tea-things away--she had been silent as usual till then--she +stood for an instant with the door in her hand. Mr. Openshaw looked +as if he were deep in his book, though in fact he did not see a +line; but was heartily wishing the woman would be gone, and not make +any palaver of gratitude. But she only said: + +"I am very much obliged to you, sir. Thank you very much," and was +gone, even before he could send her away with a "There, my good +woman, that's enough!" + +For some time longer he took no apparent notice of the child. He +even hardened his heart into disregarding her sudden flush of +colour, and little timid smile of recognition, when he saw her by +chance. But, after all, this could not last for ever; and, having a +second time given way to tenderness, there was no relapse. The +insidious enemy having thus entered his heart, in the guise of +compassion to the child, soon assumed the more dangerous form of +interest in the mother. He was aware of this change of feeling, +despised himself for it, struggled with it nay, internally yielded +to it and cherished it, long before he suffered the slightest +expression of it, by word, action, or look, to escape him. He +watched Alice's docile obedient ways to her stepmother; the love +which she had inspired in the rough Norah (roughened by the wear and +tear of sorrow and years); but above all, he saw the wild, deep, +passionate affection existing between her and her child. They spoke +little to any one else, or when any one else was by; but, when alone +together, they talked, and murmured, and cooed, and chattered so +continually, that Mr. Openshaw first wondered what they could find +to say to each other, and next became irritated because they were +always so grave and silent with him. All this time, he was +perpetually devising small new pleasures for the child. His +thoughts ran, in a pertinacious way, upon the desolate life before +her; and often he came back from his day's work loaded with the very +thing Alice had been longing for, but had not been able to procure. +One time it was a little chair for drawing the little sufferer along +the streets, and many an evening that ensuing summer Mr. Openshaw +drew her along himself, regardless of the remarks of his +acquaintances. One day in autumn he put down his newspaper, as +Alice came in with the breakfast, and said, in as indifferent a +voice as he could assume: + +"Mrs. Frank, is there any reason why we two should not put up our +horses together?" + +Alice stood still in perplexed wonder. What did he mean? He had +resumed the reading of his newspaper, as if he did not expect any +answer; so she found silence her safest course, and went on quietly +arranging his breakfast without another word passing between them. +Just as he was leaving the house, to go to the warehouse as usual, +he turned back and put his head into the bright, neat, tidy kitchen, +where all the women breakfasted in the morning: + +"You'll think of what I said, Mrs. Frank" (this was her name with +the lodgers), "and let me have your opinion upon it to-night." + +Alice was thankful that her mother and Norah were too busy talking +together to attend much to this speech. She determined not to think +about it at all through the day; and, of course, the effort not to +think made her think all the more. At night she sent up Norah with +his tea. But Mr. Openshaw almost knocked Norah down as she was +going out at the door, by pushing past her and calling out "Mrs. +Frank!" in an impatient voice, at the top of the stairs. + +Alice went up, rather than seem to have affixed too much meaning to +his words. + +"Well, Mrs. Frank," he said, "what answer? Don't make it too long; +for I have lots of office-work to get through to-night." + +"I hardly know what you meant, sir," said truthful Alice. + +"Well! I should have thought you might have guessed. You're not +new at this sort of work, and I am. However, I'll make it plain +this time. Will you have me to be thy wedded husband, and serve me, +and love me, and honour me, and all that sort of thing? Because if +you will, I will do as much by you, and be a father to your child-- +and that's more than is put in the prayer-book. Now, I'm a man of +my word; and what I say, I feel; and what I promise, I'll do. Now, +for your answer!" + +Alice was silent. He began to make the tea, as if her reply was a +matter of perfect indifference to him; but, as soon as that was +done, he became impatient. + +"Well?" said he. + +"How long, sir, may I have to think over it?" + +"Three minutes!" (looking at his watch). "You've had two already-- +that makes five. Be a sensible woman, say Yes, and sit down to tea +with me, and we'll talk it over together; for, after tea, I shall be +busy; say No" (he hesitated a moment to try and keep his voice in +the same tone), "and I shan't say another word about it, but pay up +a year's rent for my rooms to-morrow, and be off. Time's up! Yes +or no?" + +"If you please, sir,--you have been so good to little Ailsie--" + +"There, sit down comfortably by me on the sofa, and let us have our +tea together. I am glad to find you are as good and sensible as I +took for." + +And this was Alice Wilson's second wooing. + +Mr. Openshaw's will was too strong, and his circumstances too good, +for him not to carry all before him. He settled Mrs. Wilson in a +comfortable house of her own, and made her quite independent of +lodgers. The little that Alice said with regard to future plans was +in Norah's behalf. + +"No," said Mr. Openshaw. "Norah shall take care of the old lady as +long as she lives; and, after that, she shall either come and live +with us, or, if she likes it better, she shall have a provision for +life--for your sake, missus. No one who has been good to you or the +child shall go unrewarded. But even the little one will be better +for some fresh stuff about her. Get her a bright, sensible girl as +a nurse: one who won't go rubbing her with calf's-foot jelly as +Norah does; wasting good stuff outside that ought to go in, but will +follow doctors' directions; which, as you must see pretty clearly by +this time, Norah won't; because they give the poor little wench +pain. Now, I'm not above being nesh for other folks myself. I can +stand a good blow, and never change colour; but, set me in the +operating-room in the infirmary, and I turn as sick as a girl. Yet, +if need were, I would hold the little wench on my knees while she +screeched with pain, if it were to do her poor back good. Nay, nay, +wench! keep your white looks for the time when it comes--I don't say +it ever will. But this I know, Norah will spare the child and cheat +the doctor if she can. Now, I say, give the bairn a year or two's +chance, and then, when the pack of doctors have done their best-- +and, maybe, the old lady has gone--we'll have Norah back, or do +better for her." + +The pack of doctors could do no good to little Ailsie. She was +beyond their power. But her father (for so he insisted on being +called, and also on Alice's no longer retaining the appellation of +Mama, but becoming henceforward Mother), by his healthy cheerfulness +of manner, his clear decision of purpose, his odd turns and quirks +of humour, added to his real strong love for the helpless little +girl, infused a new element of brightness and confidence into her +life; and, though her back remained the same, her general health was +strengthened, and Alice--never going beyond a smile herself--had the +pleasure of seeing her child taught to laugh. + +As for Alice's own life, it was happier than it had ever been. Mr. +Openshaw required no demonstration, no expressions of affection from +her. Indeed, these would rather have disgusted him. Alice could +love deeply, but could not talk about it. The perpetual requirement +of loving words, looks, and caresses, and misconstruing their +absence into absence of love, had been the great trial of her former +married life. Now, all went on clear and straight, under the +guidance of her husband's strong sense, warm heart, and powerful +will. Year by year their worldly prosperity increased. At Mrs. +Wilson's death, Norah came back to them, as nurse to the newly-born +little Edwin; into which post she was not installed without a pretty +strong oration on the part of the proud and happy father; who +declared that if he found out that Norah ever tried to screen the +boy by a falsehood, or to make him nesh either in body or mind, she +should go that very day. Norah and Mr. Openshaw were not on the +most thoroughly cordial terms; neither of them fully recognising or +appreciating the other's best qualities. + +This was the previous history of the Lancashire family who had now +removed to London, and had come to occupy the House. + +They had been there about a year, when Mr. Openshaw suddenly +informed his wife that he had determined to heal long-standing +feuds, and had asked his uncle and aunt Chadwick to come and pay +them a visit and see London. Mrs. Openshaw had never seen this +uncle and aunt of her husband's. Years before she had married him, +there had been a quarrel. All she knew was, that Mr. Chadwick was a +small manufacturer in a country town in South Lancashire. She was +extremely pleased that the breach was to be healed, and began making +preparations to render their visit pleasant. + +They arrived at last. Going to see London was such an event to +them, that Mrs. Chadwick had made all new linen fresh for the +occasion-from night-caps downwards; and, as for gowns, ribbons, and +collars, she might have been going into the wilds of Canada where +never a shop is, so large was her stock. A fortnight before the day +of her departure for London, she had formally called to take leave +of all her acquaintance; saying she should need all the intermediate +time for packing up. It was like a second wedding in her +imagination; and, to complete the resemblance which an entirely new +wardrobe made between the two events, her husband brought her back +from Manchester, on the last market-day before they set off, a +gorgeous pearl and amethyst brooch, saying, "Lunnon should see that +Lancashire folks knew a handsome thing when they saw it." + +For some time after Mr. and Mrs. Chadwick arrived at the Openshaws', +there was no opportunity for wearing this brooch; but at length they +obtained an order to see Buckingham Palace, and the spirit of +loyalty demanded that Mrs. Chadwick should wear her best clothes in +visiting the abode of her sovereign. On her return, she hastily +changed her dress; for Mr. Openshaw had planned that they should go +to Richmond, drink tea and return by moonlight. Accordingly, about +five o'clock, Mr. and Mrs. Openshaw and Mr. and Mrs. Chadwick set +off. + +The housemaid and cook sate below, Norah hardly knew where. She was +always engrossed in the nursery, in tending her two children, and in +sitting by the restless, excitable Ailsie till she fell asleep. +Bye-and-bye, the housemaid Bessy tapped gently at the door. Norah +went to her, and they spoke in whispers. + +"Nurse! there's some one down-stairs wants you." + +"Wants me! Who is it?" + +"A gentleman--" + +"A gentleman? Nonsense!" + +"Well! a man, then, and he asks for you, and he rung at the front +door bell, and has walked into the dining-room." + +"You should never have let him," exclaimed Norah, "master and missus +out--" + +"I did not want him to come in; but when he heard you lived here, he +walked past me, and sat down on the first chair, and said, 'Tell her +to come and speak to me.' There is no gas lighted in the room, and +supper is all set out." + +"He'll be off with the spoons!" exclaimed Norah, putting the +housemaid's fear into words, and preparing to leave the room, first, +however, giving a look to Ailsie, sleeping soundly and calmly. + +Down-stairs she went, uneasy fears stirring in her bosom. Before +she entered the dining-room she provided herself with a candle, and, +with it in her hand, she went in, looking round her in the darkness +for her visitor. + +He was standing up, holding by the table. Norah and he looked at +each other; gradual recognition coming into their eyes. + +"Norah?" at length he asked. + +"Who are you?" asked Norah, with the sharp tones of alarm and +incredulity. "I don't know you:" trying, by futile words of +disbelief, to do away with the terrible fact before her. + +"Am I so changed?" he said, pathetically. "I daresay I am. But, +Norah, tell me!" he breathed hard, "where is my wife? Is she--is +she alive?" + +He came nearer to Norah, and would have taken her hand; but she +backed away from him; looking at him all the time with staring eyes, +as if he were some horrible object. Yet he was a handsome, bronzed, +good-looking fellow, with beard and moustache, giving him a foreign- +looking aspect; but his eyes! there was no mistaking those eager, +beautiful eyes--the very same that Norah had watched not half-an- +hour ago, till sleep stole softly over them. + +"Tell me, Norah--I can bear it--I have feared it so often. Is she +dead ?" Norah still kept silence. "She is dead!" He hung on +Norah's words and looks, as if for confirmation or contradiction. + +"What shall I do?" groaned Norah. "O, sir! why did you come? how +did you find me out? where have you been? We thought you dead, we +did, indeed!" She poured out words and questions to gain time, as +if time would help her. + +"Norah! answer me this question, straight, by yes or no--Is my wife +dead?" + +"No, she is not!" said Norah, slowly and heavily. + +"O what a relief! Did she receive my letters? But perhaps you +don't know. Why did you leave her? Where is she? O Norah, tell me +all quickly!" + +"Mr. Frank!" said Norah at last, almost driven to bay by her terror +lest her mistress should return at any moment, and find him there-- +unable to consider what was best to be done or said-rushing at +something decisive, because she could not endure her present state: +"Mr. Frank! we never heard a line from you, and the shipowners said +you had gone down, you and every one else. We thought you were +dead, if ever man was, and poor Miss Alice and her little sick, +helpless child! O, sir, you must guess it," cried the poor creature +at last, bursting out into a passionate fit of crying, "for indeed I +cannot tell it. But it was no one's fault. God help us all this +night!" + +Norah had sate down. She trembled too much to stand. He took her +hands in his. He squeezed them hard, as if by physical pressure, +the truth could be wrung out. + +"Norah!" This time his tone was calm, stagnant as despair. "She +has married again!" + +Norah shook her head sadly. The grasp slowly relaxed. The man had +fainted. + +There was brandy in the room. Norah forced some drops into Mr. +Frank's mouth, chafed his hands, and--when mere animal life +returned, before the mind poured in its flood of memories and +thoughts--she lifted him up, and rested his head against her knees. +Then she put a few crumbs of bread taken from the supper-table, +soaked in brandy into his mouth. Suddenly he sprang to his feet. + +"Where is she? Tell me this instant." He looked so wild, so mad, +so desperate, that Norah felt herself to be in bodily danger; but +her time of dread had gone by. She had been afraid to tell him the +truth, and then she had been a coward. Now, her wits were sharpened +by the sense of his desperate state. He must leave the house. She +would pity him afterwards; but now she must rather command and +upbraid; for he must leave the house before her mistress came home. +That one necessity stood clear before her. + +"She is not here; that is enough for you to know. Nor can I say +exactly where she is" (which was true to the letter if not to the +spirit). "Go away, and tell me where to find you to-morrow, and I +will tell you all. My master and mistress may come back at any +minute, and then what would become of me with a strange man in the +house?" + +Such an argument was too petty to touch his excited mind. + +"I don't care for your master and mistress. If your master is a +man, he must feel for me poor shipwrecked sailor that I am--kept for +years a prisoner amongst savages, always, always, always thinking of +my wife and my home--dreaming of her by night, talking to her, +though she could not hear, by day. I loved her more than all heaven +and earth put together. Tell me where she is, this instant, you +wretched woman, who salved over her wickedness to her, as you do to +me." + +The clock struck ten. Desperate positions require desperate +measures. + +"If you will leave the house now, I will come to you to-morrow and +tell you all. What is more, you shall see your child now. She lies +sleeping up-stairs. O, sir, you have a child, you do not know that +as yet--a little weakly girl--with just a heart and soul beyond her +years. We have reared her up with such care: We watched her, for +we thought for many a year she might die any day, and we tended her, +and no hard thing has come near her, and no rough word has ever been +said to her. And now you, come and will take her life into your +hand, and will crush it. Strangers to her have been kind to her; +but her own father--Mr. Frank, I am her nurse, and I love her, and I +tend her, and I would do anything for her that I could. Her +mother's heart beats as hers beats; and, if she suffers a pain, her +mother trembles all over. If she is happy, it is her mother that +smiles and is glad. If she is growing stronger, her mother is +healthy: if she dwindles, her mother languishes. If she dies-- +well, I don't know: it is not every one can lie down and die when +they wish it. Come up-stairs, Mr. Frank, and see your child. +Seeing her will do good to your poor heart. Then go away, in God's +name, just this one night-to-morrow, if need be, you can do +anything--kill us all if you will, or show yourself--a great grand +man, whom God will bless for ever and ever. Come, Mr. Frank, the +look of a sleeping child is sure to give peace." + +She led him up-stairs; at first almost helping his steps, till they +came near the nursery door. She had almost forgotten the existence +of little Edwin. It struck upon her with affright as the shaded +light fell upon the other cot; but she skilfully threw that corner +of the room into darkness, and let the light fall on the sleeping +Ailsie. The child had thrown down the coverings, and her deformity, +as she lay with her back to them, was plainly visible through her +slight night-gown. Her little face, deprived of the lustre of her +eyes, looked wan and pinched, and had a pathetic expression in it, +even as she slept. The poor father looked and looked with hungry, +wistful eyes, into which the big tears came swelling up slowly, and +dropped heavily down, as he stood trembling and shaking all over. +Norah was angry with herself for growing impatient of the length of +time that long lingering gaze lasted. She thought that she waited +for full half-an-hour before Frank stirred. And then--instead of +going away--he sank down on his knees by the bedside, and buried his +face in the clothes. Little Ailsie stirred uneasily. Norah pulled +him up in terror. She could afford no more time even for prayer in +her extremity of fear; for surely the next moment would bring her +mistress home. She took him forcibly by the arm; but, as he was +going, his eye lighted on the other bed: he stopped. Intelligence +came back into his face. His hands clenched. + +"His child?" he asked. + +"Her child," replied Norah. "God watches over him," said she +instinctively; for Frank's looks excited her fears, and she needed +to remind herself of the Protector of the helpless. + +"God has not watched over me," he said, in despair; his thoughts +apparently recoiling on his own desolate, deserted state. But Norah +had no time for pity. To-morrow she would be as compassionate as +her heart prompted. At length she guided him downstairs and shut +the outer door and bolted it--as if by bolts to keep out facts. + +Then she went back into the dining-room and effaced all traces of +his presence as far as she could. She went upstairs to the nursery +and sate there, her head on her hand, thinking what was to come of +all this misery. It seemed to her very long before they did return; +yet it was hardly eleven o'clock. She so heard the loud, hearty +Lancashire voices on the stairs; and, for the first time, she +understood the contrast of the desolation of the poor man who had so +lately gone forth in lonely despair. + +It almost put her out of patience to see Mrs. Openshaw come in, +calmly smiling, handsomely dressed, happy, easy, to inquire after +her children. + +"Did Ailsie go to sleep comfortably?" she whispered to Norah. + +"Yes." + +Her mother bent over her, looking at her slumbers with the soft eyes +of love. How little she dreamed who had looked on her last! Then +she went to Edwin, with perhaps less wistful anxiety in her +countenance, but more of pride. She took off her things, to go down +to supper. Norah saw her no more that night. + +Beside the door into the passage, the sleeping-nursery opened out of +Mr. and Mrs. Openshaw's room, in order that they might have the +children more immediately under their own eyes. Early the next +summer morning Mrs. Openshaw was awakened by Ailsie's startled call +of "Mother! mother!" She sprang up, put on her dressing-gown, and +went to her child. Ailsie was only half awake, and in a not +uncommon state of terror. + +"Who was he, mother? Tell me!" + +"Who, my darling? No one is here. You have been dreaming love. +Waken up quite. See, it is broad daylight." + +"Yes," said Ailsie, looking round her; then clinging to her mother, +said, "but a man was here in the night, mother." + +"Nonsense, little goose. No man has ever come near you!" + +"Yes, he did. He stood there. Just by Norah. A man with hair and +a beard. And he knelt down and said his prayers. Norah knows he +was here, mother" (half angrily, as Mrs. Openshaw shook her head in +smiling incredulity). + +"Well! we will ask Norah when she comes," said Mrs. Openshaw, +soothingly. "But we won't talk any more about him now. It is not +five o'clock; it is too early for you to get up. Shall I fetch you +a book and read to you?" + +"Don't leave me, mother," said the child, clinging to her. So Mrs. +Openshaw sate on the bedside talking to Ailsie, and telling her of +what they had done at Richmond the evening before, until the little +girl's eyes slowly closed and she once more fell asleep. + +"What was the matter?" asked Mr. Openshaw, as his wife returned to +bed. "Ailsie wakened up in a fright, with some story of a man +having been in the room to say his prayers,--a dream, I suppose." +And no more was said at the time. + +Mrs. Openshaw had almost forgotten the whole affair when she got up +about seven o'clock. But, bye-and-bye, she heard a sharp +altercation going on in the nursery. Norah speaking angrily to +Ailsie, a most unusual thing. Both Mr. and Mrs. Openshaw listened +in astonishment. + +"Hold your tongue, Ailsie I let me hear none of your dreams; never +let me hear you tell that story again!" Ailsie began to cry. + +Mr. Openshaw opened the door of communication before his wife could +say a word. + +"Norah, come here!" + +The nurse stood at the door, defiant. She perceived she had been +heard, but she was desperate. + +"Don't let me hear you speak in that manner to Ailsie again," he +said sternly, and shut the door. + +Norah was infinitely relieved; for she had dreaded some questioning; +and a little blame for sharp speaking was what she could well bear, +if cross-examination was let alone. + +Down-stairs they went, Mr. Openshaw carrying Ailsie; the sturdy +Edwin coming step by step, right foot foremost, always holding his +mother's hand. Each child was placed in a chair by the breakfast- +table, and then Mr. and Mrs. Openshaw stood together at the window, +awaiting their visitors' appearance and making plans for the day. +There was a pause. Suddenly Mr. Openshaw turned to Ailsie, and +said: + +"What a little goosy somebody is with her dreams, waking up poor, +tired mother in the middle of the night with a story of a man being +in the room." + +"Father! I'm sure I saw him," said Ailsie, half crying. "I don't +want to make Norah angry; but I was not asleep, for all she says I +was. I had been asleep,--and I awakened up quite wide awake though +I was so frightened. I kept my eyes nearly shut, and I saw the man +quite plain. A great brown man with a beard. He said his prayers. +And then he looked at Edwin. And then Norah took him by the arm and +led him away, after they had whispered a bit together." + +"Now, my little woman must be reasonable," said Mr. Openshaw, who +was always patient with Ailsie. "There was no man in the house last +night at all. No man comes into the house as you know, if you +think; much less goes up into the nursery. But sometimes we dream +something has happened, and the dream is so like reality, that you +are not the first person, little woman, who has stood out that the +thing has really happened." + +"But, indeed it was not a dream!" said Ailsie, beginning to cry. + +Just then Mr. and Mrs. Chadwick came down, looking grave and +discomposed. All during breakfast time they were silent and +uncomfortable. As soon as the breakfast things were taken away, and +the children had been carried up-stairs, Mr. Chadwick began in an +evidently preconcerted manner to inquire if his nephew was certain +that all his servants were honest; for, that Mrs. Chadwick had that +morning missed a very valuable brooch, which she had worn the day +before. She remembered taking it off when she came home from +Buckingham Palace. Mr. Openshaw's face contracted into hard lines: +grew like what it was before he had known his wife and her child. +He rang the bell even before his uncle had done speaking. It was +answered by the housemaid. + +"Mary, was any one here last night while we were away?" + +"A man, sir, came to speak to Norah." + +"To speak to Norah! Who was he? How long did he stay?" + +"I'm sure I can't tell, sir. He came--perhaps about nine. I went +up to tell Norah in the nursery, and she came down to speak to him. +She let him out, sir. She will know who he was, and how long he +stayed." + +She waited a moment to be asked any more questions, but she was not, +so she went away. + +A minute afterwards Openshaw made as though he were going out of the +room; but his wife laid her hand on his arm: + +"Do not speak to her before the children," she said, in her low, +quiet voice. "I will go up and question her." + +"No! I must speak to her. You must know," said he, turning to his +uncle and aunt, "my missus has an old servant, as faithful as ever +woman was, I do believe, as far as love goes,--but, at the same +time, who does not always speak truth, as even the missus must +allow. Now, my notion is, that this Norah of ours has been come +over by some good-for-nothin chap (for she's at the time o' life +when they say women pray for husbands--'any, good Lord, any,') and +has let him into our house, and the chap has made off with your +brooch, and m'appen many another thing beside. It's only saying +that Norah is soft-hearted, and does not stick at a white lie-- +that's all, missus." + +It was curious to notice how his tone, his eyes, his whole face +changed as he spoke to his wife; but he was the resolute man through +all. She knew better than to oppose him; so she went up-stairs, and +told Norah her master wanted to speak to her, and that she would +take care of the children in the meanwhile. + +Norah rose to go without a word. Her thoughts were these: + +"If they tear me to pieces they shall never know through me. He may +come,--and then just Lord have mercy upon us all: for some of us +are dead folk to a certainty. But he shall do it; not me." + +You may fancy, now, her look of determination as she faced her +master alone in the dining-room; Mr. and Mrs. Chadwick having left +the affair in their nephew's hands, seeing that he took it up with +such vehemence. + +"Norah! Who was that man that came to my house last night?" + +"Man, sir!" As if infinitely; surprised but it was only to gain +time. + +"Yes; the man whom Mary let in; whom she went up-stairs to the +nursery to tell you about; whom you came down to speak to; the same +chap, I make no doubt, whom you took into the nursery to have your +talk out with; whom Ailsie saw, and afterwards dreamed about; +thinking, poor wench! she saw him say his prayers, when nothing, +I'll be bound, was farther from his thoughts; who took Mrs. +Chadwick's brooch, value ten pounds. Now, Norah! Don't go off! I +am as sure as that my name's Thomas Openshaw, that you knew nothing +of this robbery. But I do think you've been imposed on, and that's +the truth. Some good-for-nothing chap has been making up to you, +and you've been just like all other women, and have turned a soft +place in your heart to him; and he came last night a-lovyering, and +you had him up in the nursery, and he made use of his opportunities, +and made off with a few things on his way down! Come, now, Norah: +it's no blame to you, only you must not be such a fool again. Tell +us," he continued, "what name he gave you, Norah? I'll be bound it +was not the right one; but it will be a clue for the police." + +Norah drew herself up. "You may ask that question, and taunt me +with my being single, and with my credulity, as you will, Master +Openshaw. You'll get no answer from me. As for the brooch, and the +story of theft and burglary; if any friend ever came to see me +(which I defy you to prove, and deny), he'd be just as much above +doing such a thing as you yourself, Mr. Openshaw, and more so, too; +for I'm not at all sure as everything you have is rightly come by, +or would be yours long, if every man had his own." She meant, of +course, his wife; but he understood her to refer to his property in +goods and chattels. + +"Now, my good woman," said he, "I'll just tell you truly, I never +trusted you out and out; but my wife liked you, and I thought you +had many a good point about you. If you once begin to sauce me, +I'll have the police to you, and get out the truth in a court of +justice, if you'll not tell it me quietly and civilly here. Now the +best thing you can do is quietly to tell me who the fellow is. Look +here! a man comes to my house; asks for you; you take him up-stairs, +a valuable brooch is missing next day; we know that you, and Mary, +and cook, are honest; but you refuse to tell us who the man is. +Indeed you've told one lie already about him, saying no one was here +last night. Now I just put it to you, what do you think a policeman +would say to this, or a magistrate? A magistrate would soon make +you tell the truth, my good woman." + +"There's never the creature born that should get it out of me," said +Norah. "Not unless I choose to tell." + +"I've a great mind to see," said Mr. Openshaw, growing angry at the +defiance. Then, checking himself, he thought before he spoke again: + +"Norah, for your missus's sake I don't want to go to extremities. +Be a sensible woman, if you can. It's no great disgrace, after all, +to have been taken in. I ask you once more--as a friend--who was +this man whom you let into my house last night?" + +No answer. He repeated the question in an impatient tone. Still no +answer. Norah's lips were set in determination not to speak. + +"Then there is but one thing to be done. I shall send for a +policeman." + +"You will not," said Norah, starting forwards. "You shall not, sir! +No policeman shall touch me. I know nothing of the brooch, but I +know this: ever since I was four-and-twenty I have thought more of +your wife than of myself: ever since I saw her, a poor motherless +girl put upon in her uncle's house, I have thought more of serving +her than of serving myself! I have cared for her and her child, as +nobody ever cared for me. I don't cast blame on you, sir, but I say +it's ill giving up one's life to any one; for, at the end, they will +turn round upon you, and forsake you. Why does not my missus come +herself to suspect me? Maybe she is gone for the police? But I +don't stay here, either for police, or magistrate, or master. +You're an unlucky lot. I believe there's a curse on you. I'll +leave you this very day. Yes! I leave that poor Ailsie, too. I +will! No good will ever come to you!" + +Mr. Openshaw was utterly astonished at this speech; most of which +was completely unintelligible to him, as may easily be supposed. +Before he could make up his mind what to say, or what to do, Norah +had left the room. I do not think he had ever really intended to +send for the police to this old servant of his wife's; for he had +never for a moment doubted her perfect honesty. But he had intended +to compel her to tell him who the man was, and in this he was +baffled. He was, consequently, much irritated. He returned to his +uncle and aunt in a state of great annoyance and perplexity, and +told them he could get nothing out of the woman; that some man had +been in the house the night before; but that she refused to tell who +he was. At this moment his wife came in, greatly agitated, and +asked what had happened to Norah; for that she had put on her things +in passionate haste, and had left the house. + +"This looks suspicious," said Mr. Chadwick. "It is not the way in +which an honest person would have acted." + +Mr. Openshaw kept silence. He was sorely perplexed. But Mrs. +Openshaw turned round on Mr. Chadwick with a sudden fierceness no +one ever saw in her before. + +"You don't know Norah, uncle! She is gone because she is deeply +hurt at being suspected. O, I wish I had seen her--that I had +spoken to her myself. She would have told me anything." Alice +wrung her hands. + +"I must confess," continued Mr. Chadwick to his nephew, in a lower +voice, "I can't make you out. You used to be a word and a blow, and +oftenest the blow first; and now, when there is every cause for +suspicion, you just do nought. Your missus is a very good woman, I +grant; but she may have been put upon as well as other folk, I +suppose. If you don't send for the police, I shall." + +"Very well," replied Mr. Openshaw, surlily. "I can't clear Norah. +She won't clear herself, as I believe she might if she would. Only +I wash my hands of it; for I am sure the woman herself is honest, +and she's lived a long time with my wife, and I don't like her to +come to shame." + +"But she will then be forced to clear herself. That, at any rate, +will be a good thing." + +"Very well, very well! I am heart-sick of the whole business. +Come, Alice, come up to the babies they'll be in a sore way. I tell +you, uncle!" he said, turning round once more to Mr. Chadwick, +suddenly and sharply, after his eye had fallen on Alice's wan, +tearful, anxious face; "I'll have none sending for the police after +all. I'll buy my aunt twice as handsome a brooch this very day; but +I'll not have Norah suspected, and my missus plagued. There's for +you." + +He and his wife left the room. Mr. Chadwick quietly waited till he +was out of hearing, and then aid to his wife; "For all Tom's +heroics, I'm just quietly going for a detective, wench. Thou +need'st know nought about it." + +He went to the police-station, and made a statement of the case. He +was gratified by the impression which the evidence against Norah +seemed to make. The men all agreed in his opinion, and steps were +to be immediately taken to find out where she was. Most probably, +as they suggested, she had gone at once to the man, who, to all +appearance, was her lover. When Mr. Chadwick asked how they would +find her out? they smiled, shook their heads, and spoke of +mysterious but infallible ways and means. He returned to his +nephew's house with a very comfortable opinion of his own sagacity. +He was met by his wife with a penitent face: + +"O master, I've found my brooch! It was just sticking by its pin in +the flounce of my brown silk, that I wore yesterday. I took it off +in a hurry, and it must have caught in it; and I hung up my gown in +the closet. Just now, when I was going to fold it up, there was the +brooch! I'm very vexed, but I never dreamt but what it was lost!" + +Her husband muttering something very like "Confound thee and thy +brooch too! I wish I'd never given it thee," snatched up his hat, +and rushed back to the station; hoping to be in time to stop the +police from searching for Norah. But a detective was already gone +off on the errand. + +Where was Norah? Half mad with the strain of the fearful secret, +she had hardly slept through the night for thinking what must be +done. Upon this terrible state of mind had come Ailsie's questions, +showing that she had seen the Man, as the unconscious child called +her father. Lastly came the suspicion of her honesty. She was +little less than crazy as she ran up-stairs and dashed on her bonnet +and shawl; leaving all else, even her purse, behind her. In that +house she would not stay. That was all she knew or was clear about. +She would not even see the children again, for fear it should weaken +her. She feared above everything Mr. Frank's return to claim his +wife. She could not tell what remedy there was for a sorrow so +tremendous, for her to stay to witness. The desire of escaping from +the coming event was a stronger motive for her departure than her +soreness about the suspicions directed against her; although this +last had been the final goad to the course she took. She walked +away almost at headlong speed; sobbing as she went, as she had not +dared to do during the past night for fear of exciting wonder in +those who might hear her. Then she stopped. An idea came into her +mind that she would leave London altogether, and betake herself to +her native town of Liverpool. She felt in her pocket for her purse, +as she drew near the Euston Square station with this intention. She +had left it at home. Her poor head aching, her eyes swollen with +crying, she had to stand still, and think, as well as she could, +where next she should bend her steps. Suddenly the thought flashed +into her mind that she would go and find out poor Mr. Frank. She +had been hardly kind to him the night before, though her heart had +bled for him ever since. She remembered his telling her as she +inquired for his address, almost as she had pushed him out of the +door, of some hotel in a street not far distant from Euston Square. +Thither she went: with what intention she hardly knew, but to +assuage her conscience by telling him how much she pitied him. In +her present state she felt herself unfit to counsel, or restrain, or +assist, or do ought else but sympathise and weep. The people of the +inn said such a person had been there; had arrived only the day +before; had gone out soon after his arrival, leaving his luggage in +their care; but had never come back. Norah asked for leave to sit +down, and await the gentleman's return. The landlady--pretty secure +in the deposit of luggage against any probable injury--showed her +into a room, and quietly locked the door on the outside. Norah was +utterly worn out, and fell asleep--a shivering, starting, uneasy +slumber, which lasted for hours. + +The detective, meanwhile, had come up with her some time before she +entered the hotel, into which he followed her. Asking the landlady +to detain her for an hour or so, without giving any reason beyond +showing his authority (which made the landlady applaud herself a +good deal for having locked her in), he went back to the police- +station to report his proceedings. He could have taken her +directly; but his object was, if possible, to trace out the man who +was supposed to have committed the robbery. Then he heard of the +discovery of the brooch; and consequently did not care to return. + +Norah slept till even the summer evening began to close in. Then +up. Some one was at the door. It would be Mr. Frank; and she +dizzily pushed back her ruffled grey hair, which had fallen over her +eyes, and stood looking to see him. Instead, there came in Mr. +Openshaw and a policeman. + +"This is Norah Kennedy," said Mr. Openshaw. + +"O, sir," said Norah, "I did not touch the brooch; indeed I did not. +O, sir, I cannot live to be thought so badly of;" and very sick and +faint, she suddenly sank down on the ground. To her surprise, Mr. +Openshaw raised her up very tenderly. Even the policeman helped to +lay her on the sofa; and, at Mr. Openshaw's desire, he went for some +wine and sandwiches; for the poor gaunt woman lay there almost as if +dead with weariness and exhaustion. + +"Norah!" said Mr. Openshaw, in his kindest voice, "the brooch is +found. It was hanging to Mrs. Chadwick's gown. I beg your pardon. +Most truly I beg your pardon, for having troubled you about it. My +wife is almost broken-hearted. Eat, Norah,--or, stay, first drink +this glass of wine," said he, lifting her head, pouring a little +down her throat. + +As she drank, she remembered where she was, and who she was waiting +for. She suddenly pushed Mr. Openshaw away, saying, "O, sir, you +must go. You must not stop a minute. If he comes back he will kill +you." + +"Alas, Norah! I do not know who 'he' is. But some one is gone away +who will never come back: someone who knew you, and whom I am +afraid you cared for." + +"I don't understand you, sir," said Norah, her master's kind and +sorrowful manner bewildering her yet more than his words. The +policeman had left the room at Mr. Openshaw's desire, and they two +were alone. + +"You know what I mean, when I say some one is gone who will never +come back. I mean that he is dead!" + +"Who?" said Norah, trembling all over. + +"A poor man has been found in the Thames this morning, drowned." + +"Did he drown himself?" asked Norah, solemnly. + +"God only knows," replied Mr. Openshaw, in the same tone. "Your +name and address at our house, were found in his pocket: that, and +his purse, were the only things, that were found upon him. I am +sorry to say it, my poor Norah; but you are required to go and +identify him." + +"To what?" asked Norah. + +"To say who it is. It is always done, in order that some reason may +be discovered for the suicide--if suicide it was. I make no doubt +he was the man who came to see you at our house last night. It is +very sad, I know." He made pauses between each little clause, in +order to try and bring back her senses; which he feared were +wandering--so wild and sad was her look. + +"Master Openshaw," said she, at last, "I've a dreadful secret to +tell you--only you must never breathe it to any one, and you and I +must hide it away for ever. I thought to have done it all by +myself, but I see I cannot. Yon poor man--yes! the dead, drowned +creature is, I fear, Mr. Frank, my mistress's first husband!" + +Mr. Openshaw sate down, as if shot. He did not speak; but, after a +while, he signed to Norah to go on. + +"He came to me the other night--when--God be thanked--you were all +away at Richmond. He asked me if his wife was dead or alive. I was +a brute, and thought more of our all coming home than of his sore +trial: spoke out sharp, and said she was married again, and very +content and happy: I all but turned him away: and now he lies dead +and cold!" + +"God forgive me!" said Mr. Openshaw. + +"God forgive us all!" said Norah. "Yon poor man needs forgiveness +perhaps less than any one among us. He had been among the savages-- +shipwrecked--I know not what--and he had written letters which had +never reached my poor missus." + +"He saw his child!" + +"He saw her--yes! I took him up, to give his thoughts another +start; for I believed he was going mad on my hands. I came to seek +him here, as I more than half promised. My mind misgave me when I +heard he had never come in. O, sir I it must be him!" + +Mr. Openshaw rang the bell. Norah was almost too much stunned to +wonder at what he did. He asked for writing materials, wrote a +letter, and then said to Norah: + +"I am writing to Alice, to say I shall be unavoidably absent for a +few days; that I have found you; that you are well, and send her +your love, and will come home to-morrow. You must go with me to the +Police Court; you must identify the body: I will pay high to keep +name; and details out of the papers. + +"But where are you going, sir?" + +He did not answer her directly. Then he said: + +"Norah! I must go with you, and look on the face of the man whom I +have so injured,--unwittingly, it is true; but it seems to me as if +I had killed him. I will lay his head in the grave, as if he were +my only brother: and how he must have hated me! I cannot go home +to my wife till all that I can do for him is done. Then I go with a +dreadful secret on my mind. I shall never speak of it again, after +these days are over. I know you will not, either." He shook hands +with her: and they never named the subject again, the one to the +other. + +Norah went home to Alice the next day. Not a word was said on the +cause of her abrupt departure a day or two before. Alice had been +charged by her husband in his letter not to allude to the supposed +theft of the brooch; so she, implicitly obedient to those whom she +loved both by nature and habit, was entirely silent on the subject, +only treated Norah with the most tender respect, as if to make up +for unjust suspicion. + +Nor did Alice inquire into the reason why Mr. Openshaw had been +absent during his uncle and aunt's visit, after he had once said +that it was unavoidable. He came back, grave and quiet; and, from +that time forth, was curiously changed. More thoughtful, and +perhaps less active; quite as decided in conduct, but with new and +different rules for the guidance of that conduct. Towards Alice he +could hardly be more kind than he had always been; but he now seemed +to look upon her as some one sacred and to be treated with +reverence, as well as tenderness. He throve in business, and made a +large fortune, one half of which was settled upon her. + + +Long years after these events,--a few months after her mother died, +Ailsie and her "father" (as she always called Mr. Openshaw) drove to +a cemetery a little way out of town, and she was carried to a +certain mound by her maid, who was then sent back to the carriage. +There was a head-stone, with F. W. and a date. That was all. +Sitting by the grave, Mr. Openshaw told her the story; and for the +sad fate of that poor father whom she had never seen, he shed the +only tears she ever saw fall from his eyes. + +* * * + +"A most interesting story, all through," I said, as Jarber folded up +the first of his series of discoveries in triumph. "A story that +goes straight to the heart--especially at the end. But"--I stopped, +and looked at Trottle. + +Trottle entered his protest directly in the shape of a cough. + +"Well!" I said, beginning to lose my patience. "Don't you see that +I want you to speak, and that I don't want you to cough?" + +"Quite so, ma'am," said Trottle, in a state of respectful obstinacy +which would have upset the temper of a saint. "Relative, I presume, +to this story, ma'am?" + +"Yes, Yes!" said Jarber. "By all means let us hear what this good +man has to say." + +"Well, sir," answered Trottle, "I want to know why the House over +the way doesn't let, and I don't exactly see how your story answers +the question. That's all I have to say, sir." + +I should have liked to contradict my opinionated servant, at that +moment. But, excellent as the story was in itself, I felt that he +had hit on the weak point, so far as Jarber's particular purpose in +reading it was concerned. + +"And that is what you have to say, is it?" repeated Jarber. "I +enter this room announcing that I have a series of discoveries, and +you jump instantly to the conclusion that the first of the series +exhausts my resources. Have I your permission, dear lady, to +enlighten this obtuse person, if possible, by reading Number Two?" + +"My work is behindhand, ma'am," said Trottle, moving to the door, +the moment I gave Jarber leave to go on. + +"Stop where you are," I said, in my most peremptory manner, "and +give Mr. Jarber his fair opportunity of answering your objection now +you have made it. + +Trottle sat down with the look of a martyr, and Jarber began to read +with his back turned on the enemy more decidedly than ever. + + + +GOING INTO SOCIETY + + + +At one period of its reverses, the House fell into the occupation of +a Showman. He was found registered as its occupier, on the parish +books of the time when he rented the House, and there was therefore +no need of any clue to his name. But, he himself was less easy to +be found; for, he had led a wandering life, and settled people had +lost sight of him, and people who plumed themselves on being +respectable were shy of admitting that they had ever known anything +of him. At last, among the marsh lands near the river's level, that +lie about Deptford and the neighbouring market-gardens, a Grizzled +Personage in velveteen, with a face so cut up by varieties of +weather that he looked as if he had been tattooed, was found smoking +a pipe at the door of a wooden house on wheels. The wooden house +was laid up in ordinary for the winter, near the mouth of a muddy +creek; and everything near it, the foggy river, the misty marshes, +and the steaming market-gardens, smoked in company with the grizzled +man. In the midst of this smoking party, the funnel-chimney of the +wooden house on wheels was not remiss, but took its pipe with the +rest in a companionable manner. + +On being asked if it were he who had once rented the House to Let, +Grizzled Velveteen looked surprised, and said yes. Then his name +was Magsman? That was it, Toby Magsman--which lawfully christened +Robert; but called in the line, from a infant, Toby. There was +nothing agin Toby Magsman, he believed? If there was suspicion of +such--mention it! + +There was no suspicion of such, he might rest assured. But, some +inquiries were making about that House, and would he object to say +why he left it? + +Not at all; why should he? He left it, along of a Dwarf. + +Along of a Dwarf? + +Mr. Magsman repeated, deliberately and emphatically, Along of a +Dwarf. + +Might it be compatible with Mr. Magsman's inclination and +convenience to enter, as a favour, into a few particulars? + +Mr. Magsman entered into the following particulars. + +It was a long time ago, to begin with;--afore lotteries and a deal +more was done away with. Mr. Magsman was looking about for a good +pitch, and he see that house, and he says to himself, "I'll have +you, if you're to be had. If money'll get you, I'll have you." + +The neighbours cut up rough, and made complaints; but Mr. Magsman +don't know what they WOULD have had. It was a lovely thing. First +of all, there was the canvass, representin the picter of the Giant, +in Spanish trunks and a ruff, who was himself half the heighth of +the house, and was run up with a line and pulley to a pole on the +roof, so that his Ed was coeval with the parapet. Then, there was +the canvass, representin the picter of the Albina lady, showing her +white air to the Army and Navy in correct uniform. Then, there was +the canvass, representin the picter of the Wild Indian a scalpin a +member of some foreign nation. Then, there was the canvass, +representin the picter of a child of a British Planter, seized by +two Boa Constrictors--not that WE never had no child, nor no +Constrictors neither. Similarly, there was the canvass, representin +the picter of the Wild Ass of the Prairies--not that WE never had no +wild asses, nor wouldn't have had 'em at a gift. Last, there was +the canvass, representin the picter of the Dwarf, and like him too +(considerin), with George the Fourth in such a state of astonishment +at him as His Majesty couldn't with his utmost politeness and +stoutness express. The front of the House was so covered with +canvasses, that there wasn't a spark of daylight ever visible on +that side. "MAGSMAN'S AMUSEMENTS," fifteen foot long by two foot +high, ran over the front door and parlour winders. The passage was +a Arbour of green baize and gardenstuff. A barrel-organ performed +there unceasing. And as to respectability,--if threepence ain't +respectable, what is? + +But, the Dwarf is the principal article at present, and he was worth +the money. He was wrote up as MAJOR TPSCHOFFKI, OF THE IMPERIAL +BULGRADERIAN BRIGADE. Nobody couldn't pronounce the name, and it +never was intended anybody should. The public always turned it, as +a regular rule, into Chopski. In the line he was called Chops; +partly on that account, and partly because his real name, if he ever +had any real name (which was very dubious), was Stakes. + +He was a un-common small man, he really was. Certainly not so small +as he was made out to be, but where IS your Dwarf as is? He was a +most uncommon small man, with a most uncommon large Ed; and what he +had inside that Ed, nobody ever knowed but himself: even supposin +himself to have ever took stock of it, which it would have been a +stiff job for even him to do. + +The kindest little man as never growed! Spirited, but not proud. +When he travelled with the Spotted Baby--though he knowed himself to +be a nat'ral Dwarf, and knowed the Baby's spots to be put upon him +artificial, he nursed that Baby like a mother. You never heerd him +give a ill-name to a Giant. He DID allow himself to break out into +strong language respectin the Fat Lady from Norfolk; but that was an +affair of the 'art; and when a man's 'art has been trifled with by a +lady, and the preference giv to a Indian, he ain't master of his +actions. + +He was always in love, of course; every human nat'ral phenomenon is. +And he was always in love with a large woman; I never knowed the +Dwarf as could be got to love a small one. Which helps to keep 'em +the Curiosities they are. + +One sing'ler idea he had in that Ed of his, which must have meant +something, or it wouldn't have been there. It was always his +opinion that he was entitled to property. He never would put his +name to anything. He had been taught to write, by the young man +without arms, who got his living with his toes (quite a writing +master HE was, and taught scores in the line), but Chops would have +starved to death, afore he'd have gained a bit of bread by putting +his hand to a paper. This is the more curious to bear in mind, +because HE had no property, nor hope of property, except his house +and a sarser. When I say his house, I mean the box, painted and got +up outside like a reg'lar six-roomer, that he used to creep into, +with a diamond ring (or quite as good to look at) on his forefinger, +and ring a little bell out of what the Public believed to be the +Drawing-room winder. And when I say a sarser, I mean a Chaney +sarser in which he made a collection for himself at the end of every +Entertainment. His cue for that, he took from me: "Ladies and +gentlemen, the little man will now walk three times round the +Cairawan, and retire behind the curtain." When he said anything +important, in private life, he mostly wound it up with this form of +words, and they was generally the last thing he said to me at night +afore he went to bed. + +He had what I consider a fine mind--a poetic mind. His ideas +respectin his property never come upon him so strong as when he sat +upon a barrel-organ and had the handle turned. Arter the wibration +had run through him a little time, he would screech out, "Toby, I +feel my property coming--grind away! I'm counting my guineas by +thousands, Toby--grind away! Toby, I shall be a man of fortun! I +feel the Mint a jingling in me, Toby, and I'm swelling out into the +Bank of England!" Such is the influence of music on a poetic mind. +Not that he was partial to any other music but a barrel-organ; on +the contrary, hated it. + +He had a kind of a everlasting grudge agin the Public: which is a +thing you may notice in many phenomenons that get their living out +of it. What riled him most in the nater of his occupation was, that +it kep him out of Society. He was continiwally saying, "Toby, my +ambition is, to go into Society. The curse of my position towards +the Public is, that it keeps me hout of Society. This don't signify +to a low beast of a Indian; he an't formed for Society. This don't +signify to a Spotted Baby; HE an't formed for Society.--I am." + +Nobody never could make out what Chops done with his money. He had +a good salary, down on the drum every Saturday as the day came +round, besides having the run of his teeth--and he was a Woodpecker +to eat--but all Dwarfs are. The sarser was a little income, +bringing him in so many halfpence that he'd carry 'em for a week +together, tied up in a pocket-handkercher. And yet he never had +money. And it couldn't be the Fat Lady from Norfolk, as was once +supposed; because it stands to reason that when you have a animosity +towards a Indian, which makes you grind your teeth at him to his +face, and which can hardly hold you from Goosing him audible when +he's going through his War-Dance--it stands to reason you wouldn't +under them circumstances deprive yourself, to support that Indian in +the lap of luxury. + +Most unexpected, the mystery come out one day at Egham Races. The +Public was shy of bein pulled in, and Chops was ringin his little +bell out of his drawing-room winder, and was snarlin to me over his +shoulder as he kneeled down with his legs out at the back-door--for +he couldn't be shoved into his house without kneeling down, and the +premises wouldn't accommodate his legs--was snarlin, "Here's a +precious Public for you; why the Devil don't they tumble up?" when a +man in the crowd holds up a carrier-pigeon, and cries out, "If +there's any person here as has got a ticket, the Lottery's just +drawed, and the number as has come up for the great prize is three, +seven, forty-two! Three, seven, forty-two!" I was givin the man to +the Furies myself, for calling off the Public's attention--for the +Public will turn away, at any time, to look at anything in +preference to the thing showed 'em; and if you doubt it, get 'em +together for any indiwidual purpose on the face of the earth, and +send only two people in late, and see if the whole company an't far +more interested in takin particular notice of them two than of you-- +I say, I wasn't best pleased with the man for callin out, and wasn't +blessin him in my own mind, when I see Chops's little bell fly out +of winder at a old lady, and he gets up and kicks his box over, +exposin the whole secret, and he catches hold of the calves of my +legs and he says to me, "Carry me into the wan, Toby, and throw a +pail of water over me or I'm a dead man, for I've come into my +property!" + +Twelve thousand odd hundred pound, was Chops's winnins. He had +bought a half-ticket for the twenty-five thousand prize, and it had +come up. The first use he made of his property, was, to offer to +fight the Wild Indian for five hundred pound a side, him with a +poisoned darnin-needle and the Indian with a club; but the Indian +being in want of backers to that amount, it went no further. + +Arter he had been mad for a week--in a state of mind, in short, in +which, if I had let him sit on the organ for only two minutes, I +believe he would have bust--but we kep the organ from him--Mr. Chops +come round, and behaved liberal and beautiful to all. He then sent +for a young man he knowed, as had a wery genteel appearance and was +a Bonnet at a gaming-booth (most respectable brought up, father +havin been imminent in the livery stable line but unfort'nate in a +commercial crisis, through paintin a old gray, ginger-bay, and +sellin him with a Pedigree), and Mr. Chops said to this Bonnet, who +said his name was Normandy, which it wasn't: + +"Normandy, I'm a goin into Society. Will you go with me?" + +Says Normandy: "Do I understand you, Mr. Chops, to hintimate that +the 'ole of the expenses of that move will be borne by yourself?" + +"Correct," says Mr. Chops. "And you shall have a Princely allowance +too." + +The Bonnet lifted Mr. Chops upon a chair, to shake hands with him, +and replied in poetry, with his eyes seemingly full of tears: + + +"My boat is on the shore, +And my bark is on the sea, +And I do not ask for more, +But I'll Go:- along with thee." + + +They went into Society, in a chay and four grays with silk jackets. +They took lodgings in Pall Mall, London, and they blazed away. + +In consequence of a note that was brought to Bartlemy Fair in the +autumn of next year by a servant, most wonderful got up in milk- +white cords and tops, I cleaned myself and went to Pall Mall, one +evening appinted. The gentlemen was at their wine arter dinner, and +Mr. Chops's eyes was more fixed in that Ed of his than I thought +good for him. There was three of 'em (in company, I mean), and I +knowed the third well. When last met, he had on a white Roman +shirt, and a bishop's mitre covered with leopard-skin, and played +the clarionet all wrong, in a band at a Wild Beast Show. + +This gent took on not to know me, and Mr. Chops said: "Gentlemen, +this is a old friend of former days:" and Normandy looked at me +through a eye-glass, and said, "Magsman, glad to see you!"--which +I'll take my oath he wasn't. Mr. Chops, to git him convenient to +the table, had his chair on a throne (much of the form of George the +Fourth's in the canvass), but he hardly appeared to me to be King +there in any other pint of view, for his two gentlemen ordered about +like Emperors. They was all dressed like May-Day--gorgeous!--And as +to Wine, they swam in all sorts. + +I made the round of the bottles, first separate (to say I had done +it), and then mixed 'em all together (to say I had done it), and +then tried two of 'em as half-and-half, and then t'other two. +Altogether, I passed a pleasin evenin, but with a tendency to feel +muddled, until I considered it good manners to get up and say, "Mr. +Chops, the best of friends must part, I thank you for the wariety of +foreign drains you have stood so 'ansome, I looks towards you in red +wine, and I takes my leave." Mr. Chops replied, "If you'll just +hitch me out of this over your right arm, Magsman, and carry me +down-stairs, I'll see you out." I said I couldn't think of such a +thing, but he would have it, so I lifted him off his throne. He +smelt strong of Maideary, and I couldn't help thinking as I carried +him down that it was like carrying a large bottle full of wine, with +a rayther ugly stopper, a good deal out of proportion. + +When I set him on the door-mat in the hall, he kep me close to him +by holding on to my coat-collar, and he whispers: + +"I ain't 'appy, Magsman." + +"What's on your mind, Mr. Chops?" + +"They don't use me well. They an't grateful to me. They puts me on +the mantel-piece when I won't have in more Champagne-wine, and they +locks me in the sideboard when I won't give up my property." + +"Get rid of 'em, Mr. Chops." + +"I can't. We're in Society together, and what would Society say?" + +"Come out of Society!" says I. + +"I can't. You don't know what you're talking about. When you have +once gone into Society, you mustn't come out of it." + +"Then if you'll excuse the freedom, Mr. Chops," were my remark, +shaking my head grave, "I think it's a pity you ever went in." + +Mr. Chops shook that deep Ed of his, to a surprisin extent, and +slapped it half a dozen times with his hand, and with more Wice than +I thought were in him. Then, he says, "You're a good fellow, but +you don't understand. Good-night, go along. Magsman, the little +man will now walk three times round the Cairawan, and retire behind +the curtain." The last I see of him on that occasion was his tryin, +on the extremest werge of insensibility, to climb up the stairs, one +by one, with his hands and knees. They'd have been much too steep +for him, if he had been sober; but he wouldn't be helped. + +It warn't long after that, that I read in the newspaper of Mr. +Chops's being presented at court. It was printed, "It will be +recollected"--and I've noticed in my life, that it is sure to be +printed that it WILL be recollected, whenever it won't--"that Mr. +Chops is the individual of small stature, whose brilliant success in +the last State Lottery attracted so much attention." Well, I says +to myself, Such is Life! He has been and done it in earnest at +last. He has astonished George the Fourth! + +(On account of which, I had that canvass new-painted, him with a bag +of money in his hand, a presentin it to George the Fourth, and a +lady in Ostrich Feathers fallin in love with him in a bag-wig, +sword, and buckles correct.) + +I took the House as is the subject of present inquiries--though not +the honour of bein acquainted--and I run Magsman's Amusements in it +thirteen months--sometimes one thing, sometimes another, sometimes +nothin particular, but always all the canvasses outside. One night, +when we had played the last company out, which was a shy company, +through its raining Heavens hard, I was takin a pipe in the one pair +back along with the young man with the toes, which I had taken on +for a month (though he never drawed--except on paper), and I heard a +kickin at the street door. "Halloa!" I says to the young man, +"what's up!" He rubs his eyebrows with his toes, and he says, "I +can't imagine, Mr. Magsman"--which he never could imagine nothin, +and was monotonous company. + +The noise not leavin off, I laid down my pipe, and I took up a +candle, and I went down and opened the door. I looked out into the +street; but nothin could I see, and nothin was I aware of, until I +turned round quick, because some creetur run between my legs into +the passage. There was Mr. Chops! + +"Magsman," he says, "take me, on the old terms, and you've got me; +if it's done, say done!" + +I was all of a maze, but I said, "Done, sir." + +"Done to your done, and double done!" says he. "Have you got a bit +of supper in the house?" + +Bearin in mind them sparklin warieties of foreign drains as we'd +guzzled away at in Pall Mall, I was ashamed to offer him cold +sassages and gin-and-water; but he took 'em both and took 'em free; +havin a chair for his table, and sittin down at it on a stool, like +hold times. I, all of a maze all the while. + +It was arter he had made a clean sweep of the sassages (beef, and to +the best of my calculations two pound and a quarter), that the +wisdom as was in that little man began to come out of him like +prespiration. + +"Magsman," he says, "look upon me! You see afore you, One as has +both gone into Society and come out." + +"O! You ARE out of it, Mr. Chops? How did you get out, sir?" + +"SOLD OUT!" says he. You never saw the like of the wisdom as his Ed +expressed, when he made use of them two words. + +"My friend Magsman, I'll impart to you a discovery I've made. It's +wallable; it's cost twelve thousand five hundred pound; it may do +you good in life--The secret of this matter is, that it ain't so +much that a person goes into Society, as that Society goes into a +person." + +Not exactly keepin up with his meanin, I shook my head, put on a +deep look, and said, "You're right there, Mr. Chops." + +"Magsman," he says, twitchin me by the leg, "Society has gone into +me, to the tune of every penny of my property." + +I felt that I went pale, and though nat'rally a bold speaker, I +couldn't hardly say, "Where's Normandy?" + +"Bolted. With the plate," said Mr. Chops. + +"And t'other one?" meaning him as formerly wore the bishop's mitre. + +"Bolted. With the jewels," said Mr. Chops. + +I sat down and looked at him, and he stood up and looked at me. + +"Magsman," he says, and he seemed to myself to get wiser as he got +hoarser; "Society, taken in the lump, is all dwarfs. At the court +of St. James's, they was all a doing my old business--all a goin +three times round the Cairawan, in the hold court-suits and +properties. Elsewheres, they was most of 'em ringin their little +bells out of make-believes. Everywheres, the sarser was a goin +round. Magsman, the sarser is the uniwersal Institution!" + +I perceived, you understand, that he was soured by his misfortunes, +and I felt for Mr. Chops. + +"As to Fat Ladies," he says, giving his head a tremendious one agin +the wall, "there's lots of THEM in Society, and worse than the +original. HERS was a outrage upon Taste--simply a outrage upon +Taste--awakenin contempt--carryin its own punishment in the form of +a Indian." Here he giv himself another tremendious one. "But +THEIRS, Magsman, THEIRS is mercenary outrages. Lay in Cashmeer +shawls, buy bracelets, strew 'em and a lot of 'andsome fans and +things about your rooms, let it be known that you give away like +water to all as come to admire, and the Fat Ladies that don't +exhibit for so much down upon the drum, will come from all the pints +of the compass to flock about you, whatever you are. They'll drill +holes in your 'art, Magsman, like a Cullender. And when you've no +more left to give, they'll laugh at you to your face, and leave you +to have your bones picked dry by Wulturs, like the dead Wild Ass of +the Prairies that you deserve to be!" Here he giv himself the most +tremendious one of all, and dropped. + +I thought he was gone. His Ed was so heavy, and he knocked it so +hard, and he fell so stoney, and the sassagerial disturbance in him +must have been so immense, that I thought he was gone. But, he soon +come round with care, and he sat up on the floor, and he said to me, +with wisdom comin out of his eyes, if ever it come: + +"Magsman! The most material difference between the two states of +existence through which your unhappy friend has passed;" he reached +out his poor little hand, and his tears dropped down on the +moustachio which it was a credit to him to have done his best to +grow, but it is not in mortals to command success,--"the difference +this. When I was out of Society, I was paid light for being seen. +When I went into Society, I paid heavy for being seen. I prefer the +former, even if I wasn't forced upon it. Give me out through the +trumpet, in the hold way, to-morrow." + +Arter that, he slid into the line again as easy as if he had been +iled all over. But the organ was kep from him, and no allusions was +ever made, when a company was in, to his property. He got wiser +every day; his views of Society and the Public was luminous, +bewilderin, awful; and his Ed got bigger and bigger as his Wisdom +expanded it. + +He took well, and pulled 'em in most excellent for nine weeks. At +the expiration of that period, when his Ed was a sight, he expressed +one evenin, the last Company havin been turned out, and the door +shut, a wish to have a little music. + +"Mr. Chops," I said (I never dropped the "Mr." with him; the world +might do it, but not me); "Mr. Chops, are you sure as you are in a +state of mind and body to sit upon the organ?" + +His answer was this: "Toby, when next met with on the tramp, I +forgive her and the Indian. And I am." + +It was with fear and trembling that I began to turn the handle; but +he sat like a lamb. I will be my belief to my dying day, that I see +his Ed expand as he sat; you may therefore judge how great his +thoughts was. He sat out all the changes, and then he come off. + +"Toby," he says, with a quiet smile, "the little man will now walk +three times round the Cairawan, and retire behind the curtain." + +When we called him in the morning, we found him gone into a much +better Society than mine or Pall Mall's. I giv Mr. Chops as +comfortable a funeral as lay in my power, followed myself as Chief, +and had the George the Fourth canvass carried first, in the form of +a banner. But, the House was so dismal arterwards, that I giv it +up, and took to the Wan again. + + +"I don't triumph," said Jarber, folding up the second manuscript, +and looking hard at Trottle. "I don't triumph over this worthy +creature. I merely ask him if he is satisfied now?" + +"How can he be anything else?" I said, answering for Trottle, who +sat obstinately silent. "This time, Jarber, you have not only read +us a delightfully amusing story, but you have also answered the +question about the House. Of course it stands empty now. Who would +think of taking it after it had been turned into a caravan?" I +looked at Trottle, as I said those last words, and Jarber waved his +hand indulgently in the same direction. + +"Let this excellent person speak," said Jarber. "You were about to +say, my good man?" - + +"I only wished to ask, sir," said Trottle doggedly, "if you could +kindly oblige me with a date or two in connection with that last +story?" + +"A date!" repeated Jarber. "What does the man want with dates!" + +"I should be glad to know, with great respect," persisted Trottle, +"if the person named Magsman was the last tenant who lived in the +House. It's my opinion--if I may be excused for giving it--that he +most decidedly was not." + +With those words, Trottle made a low bow, and quietly left the room. + +There is no denying that Jarber, when we were left together, looked +sadly discomposed. He had evidently forgotten to inquire about +dates; and, in spite of his magnificent talk about his series of +discoveries, it was quite as plain that the two stories he had just +read, had really and truly exhausted his present stock. I thought +myself bound, in common gratitude, to help him out of his +embarrassment by a timely suggestion. So I proposed that he should +come to tea again, on the next Monday evening, the thirteenth, and +should make such inquiries in the meantime, as might enable him to +dispose triumphantly of Trottle's objection. + +He gallantly kissed my hand, made a neat little speech of +acknowledgment, and took his leave. For the rest of the week I +would not encourage Trottle by allowing him to refer to the House at +all. I suspected he was making his own inquiries about dates, but I +put no questions to him. + +On Monday evening, the thirteenth, that dear unfortunate Jarber +came, punctual to the appointed time. He looked so terribly +harassed, that he was really quite a spectacle of feebleness and +fatigue. I saw, at a glance, that the question of dates had gone +against him, that Mr. Magsman had not been the last tenant of the +House, and that the reason of its emptiness was still to seek. + +"What I have gone through," said Jarber, "words are not eloquent +enough to tell. O Sophonisba, I have begun another series of +discoveries! Accept the last two as stories laid on your shrine; +and wait to blame me for leaving your curiosity unappeased, until +you have heard Number Three." + +Number Three looked like a very short manuscript, and I said as +much. Jarber explained to me that we were to have some poetry this +time. In the course of his investigations he had stepped into the +Circulating Library, to seek for information on the one important +subject. All the Library-people knew about the House was, that a +female relative of the last tenant, as they believed, had, just +after that tenant left, sent a little manuscript poem to them which +she described as referring to events that had actually passed in the +House; and which she wanted the proprietor of the Library to +publish. She had written no address on her letter; and the +proprietor had kept the manuscript ready to be given back to her +(the publishing of poems not being in his line) when she might call +for it. She had never called for it; and the poem had been lent to +Jarber, at his express request, to read to me. + +Before he began, I rang the bell for Trottle; being determined to +have him present at the new reading, as a wholesome check on his +obstinacy. To my surprise Peggy answered the bell, and told me, +that Trottle had stepped out without saying where. I instantly felt +the strongest possible conviction that he was at his old tricks: +and that his stepping out in the evening, without leave, meant-- +Philandering. + +Controlling myself on my visitor's account, I dismissed Peggy, +stifled my indignation, and prepared, as politely as might be, to +listen to Jarber. + + + +THREE EVENINGS IN THE HOUSE + + + +NUMBER ONE. + +I. + +Yes, it look'd dark and dreary +That long and narrow street: +Only the sound of the rain, +And the tramp of passing feet, +The duller glow of the fire, +And gathering mists of night +To mark how slow and weary +The long day's cheerless flight! + +II. + +Watching the sullen fire, +Hearing the dreary rain, +Drop after drop, run down +On the darkening window-pane; +Chill was the heart of Bertha, +Chill as that winter day, - +For the star of her life had risen +Only to fade away. + +III. + +The voice that had been so strong +To bid the snare depart, +The true and earnest will, +And the calm and steadfast heart, +Were now weigh'd down by sorrow, +Were quivering now with pain; +The clear path now seem'd clouded, +And all her grief in vain. + +IV. + +Duty, Right, Truth, who promised +To help and save their own, +Seem'd spreading wide their pinions +To leave her there alone. +So, turning from the Present +To well-known days of yore, +She call'd on them to strengthen +And guard her soul once more. + +V. + +She thought how in her girlhood +Her life was given away, +The solemn promise spoken +She kept so well to-day; +How to her brother Herbert +She had been help and guide, +And how his artist-nature +On her calm strength relied. + +VI. + +How through life's fret and turmoil +The passion and fire of art +In him was soothed and quicken'd +By her true sister heart; +How future hopes had always +Been for his sake alone; +And now, what strange new feeling +Possess'd her as its own? + +VII. + +Her home; each flower that breathed there; +The wind's sigh, soft and low; +Each trembling spray of ivy; +The river's murmuring flow; +The shadow of the forest; +Sunset, or twilight dim; +Dear as they were, were dearer +By leaving them for him. + +VIII. + +And each year as it found her +In the dull, feverish town, +Saw self still more forgotten, +And selfish care kept down +By the calm joy of evening +That brought him to her side, +To warn him with wise counsel, +Or praise with tender pride. + +IX. + +Her heart, her life, her future, +Her genius, only meant +Another thing to give him, +And be therewith content. +To-day, what words had stirr'd her, +Her soul could not forget? +What dream had fill'd her spirit +With strange and wild regret? + +X. + +To leave him for another: +Could it indeed be so? +Could it have cost such anguish +To bid this vision go? +Was this her faith? Was Herbert +The second in her heart? +Did it need all this struggle +To bid a dream depart? + +XI. + +And yet, within her spirit +A far-off land was seen; +A home, which might have held her; +A love, which might have been; +And Life: not the mere being +Of daily ebb and flow, +But Life itself had claim'd her, +And she had let it go! + +XII. + +Within her heart there echo'd +Again the well-known tune +That promised this bright future, +And ask'd her for its own: +Then words of sorrow, broken +By half-reproachful pain; +And then a farewell, spoken +In words of cold disdain. + +XIII. + +Where now was the stern purpose +That nerved her soul so long? +Whence came the words she utter'd, +So hard, so cold, so strong? +What right had she to banish +A hope that God had given? +Why must she choose earth's portion, +And turn aside from Heaven? + +XIV. + +To-day! Was it this morning? +If this long, fearful strife +Was but the work of hours, +What would be years of life? +Why did a cruel Heaven +For such great suffering call? +And why--O, still more cruel! - +Must her own words do all? + +XV. + +Did she repent? O Sorrow! +Why do we linger still +To take thy loving message, +And do thy gentle will? +See, her tears fall more slowly; +The passionate murmurs cease, +And back upon her spirit +Flow strength, and love, and peace. + +XVI. + +The fire burns more brightly, +The rain has passed away, +Herbert will see no shadow +Upon his home to-day; +Only that Bertha greets him +With doubly tender care, +Kissing a fonder blessing +Down on his golden hair. + + +NUMBER TWO. + + +I. + +The studio is deserted, +Palette and brush laid by, +The sketch rests on the easel, +The paint is scarcely dry; +And Silence--who seems always +Within her depths to bear +The next sound that will utter - +Now holds a dumb despair. + +II. + +So Bertha feels it: listening +With breathless, stony fear, +Waiting the dreadful summons +Each minute brings more near: +When the young life, now ebbing, +Shall fail, and pass away +Into that mighty shadow +Who shrouds the house to-day. + +III. + +But why--when the sick chamber +Is on the upper floor - +Why dares not Bertha enter +Within the close-shut door? +If he--her all--her Brother, +Lies dying in that gloom, +What strange mysterious power +Has sent her from the room? + +IV. + +It is not one week's anguish +That can have changed her so; +Joy has not died here lately, +Struck down by one quick blow; +But cruel months have needed +Their long relentless chain, +To teach that shrinking manner +Of helpless, hopeless pain. + +V. + +The struggle was scarce over +Last Christmas Eve had brought: +The fibres still were quivering +Of the one wounded thought, +When Herbert--who, unconscious, +Had guessed no inward strife - +Bade her, in pride and pleasure, +Welcome his fair young wife. + +VI. + +Bade her rejoice, and smiling, +Although his eyes were dim, +Thank'd God he thus could pay her +The care she gave to him. +This fresh bright life would bring her +A new and joyous fate - +O Bertha, check the murmur +That cries, Too late! too late! + +VII. + +Too late! Could she have known it +A few short weeks before, +That his life was completed, +And needing hers no more, +She might-- O sad repining! +What "might have been," forget; +"It was not," should suffice us +To stifle vain regret. + +VIII. + +He needed her no longer, +Each day it grew more plain; +First with a startled wonder, +Then with a wondering pain. +Love: why, his wife best gave it; +Comfort: durst Bertha speak? +Counsel: when quick resentment +Flush'd on the young wife's cheek. + +IX. + +No more long talks by firelight +Of childish times long past, +And dreams of future greatness +Which he must reach at last; +Dreams, where her purer instinct +With truth unerring told +Where was the worthless gilding, +And where refined gold. + +X. + +Slowly, but surely ever, +Dora's poor jealous pride, +Which she call'd love for Herbert, +Drove Bertha from his side; +And, spite of nervous effort +To share their alter'd life, +She felt a check to Herbert, +A burden to his wife. + +XI. + +This was the least; for Bertha +Fear'd, dreaded, KNEW at length, +How much his nature owed her +Of truth, and power, and strength; +And watch'd the daily failing +Of all his nobler part: +Low aims, weak purpose, telling +In lower, weaker art. + +XII. + +And now, when he is dying, +The last words she could hear +Must not be hers, but given +The bride of one short year. +The last care is another's; +The last prayer must not be +The one they learnt together +Beside their mother's knee. + +XIII. + +Summon'd at last: she kisses +The clay-cold stiffening hand; +And, reading pleading efforts +To make her understand, +Answers, with solemn promise, +In clear but trembling tone, +To Dora's life henceforward +She will devote her own. + +XIV. + +Now all is over. Bertha +Dares not remain to weep, +But soothes the frightened Dora +Into a sobbing sleep. +The poor weak child will need her: +O, who can dare complain, +When God sends a new Duty +To comfort each new Pain! + + +NUMBER THREE. + + +I. + +The House is all deserted +In the dim evening gloom, +Only one figure passes +Slowly from room to room; +And, pausing at each doorway, +Seems gathering up again +Within her heart the relics +Of bygone joy and pain. + +II. + +There is an earnest longing +In those who onward gaze, +Looking with weary patience +Towards the coming days. +There is a deeper longing, +More sad, more strong, more keen: +Those know it who look backward, +And yearn for what has been. + +III. + +At every hearth she pauses, +Touches each well-known chair; +Gazes from every window, +Lingers on every stair. +What have these months brought Bertha +Now one more year is past? +This Christmas Eve shall tell us, +The third one and the last. + +IV. + +The wilful, wayward Dora, +In those first weeks of grief, +Could seek and find in Bertha +Strength, soothing, and relief. +And Bertha--last sad comfort +True woman-heart can take - +Had something still to suffer +And do for Herbert's sake. + +V. + +Spring, with her western breezes, +From Indian islands bore +To Bertha news that Leonard +Would seek his home once more. +What was it--joy, or sorrow? +What were they--hopes, or fears? +That flush'd her cheeks with crimson, +And fill'd her eyes with tears? + +VI. + +He came. And who so kindly +Could ask and hear her tell +Herbert's last hours; for Leonard +Had known and loved him well. +Daily he came; and Bertha, +Poor wear heart, at length, +Weigh'd down by other's weakness, +Could rest upon his strength. + +VII. + +Yet not the voice of Leonard +Could her true care beguile, +That turn'd to watch, rejoicing, +Dora's reviving smile. +So, from that little household +The worst gloom pass'd away, +The one bright hour of evening +Lit up the livelong day. + +VIII. + +Days passed. The golden summer +In sudden heat bore down +Its blue, bright, glowing sweetness +Upon the scorching town. +And sights and sounds of country +Came in the warm soft tune +Sung by the honey'd breezes +Borne on the wings of June. + +IX. + +One twilight hour, but earlier +Than usual, Bertha thought +She knew the fresh sweet fragrance +Of flowers that Leonard brought; +Through open'd doors and windows +It stole up through the gloom, +And with appealing sweetness +Drew Bertha from her room. + +X. + +Yes, he was there; and pausing +Just near the open'd door, +To check her heart's quick beating, +She heard--and paused still more - +His low voice Dora's answers - +His pleading--Yes, she knew +The tone--the words--the accents: +She once had heard them too. + +XI. + +"Would Bertha blame her?" Leonard's +Low, tender answer came: +"Bertha was far too noble +To think or dream of blame." +"And was he sure he loved her?" +"Yes, with the one love given +Once in a lifetime only, +With one soul and one heaven!" + +XII. + +Then came a plaintive murmur, - +"Dora had once been told +That he and Bertha--" "Dearest, +Bertha is far too cold +To love; and I, my Dora, +If once I fancied so, +It was a brief delusion, +And over,--long ago." + +XIII. + +Between the Past and Present, +On that bleak moment's height, +She stood. As some lost traveller +By a quick flash of light +Seeing a gulf before him, +With dizzy, sick despair, +Reels to clutch backward, but to find +A deeper chasm there. + +XIV. + +The twilight grew still darker, +The fragrant flowers more sweet, +The stars shone out in heaven, +The lamps gleam'd down the street; +And hours pass'd in dreaming +Over their new-found fate, +Ere they could think of wondering +Why Bertha was so late. + +XV. + +She came, and calmly listen'd; +In vain they strove to trace +If Herbert's memory shadow'd +In grief upon her face. +No blame, no wonder show'd there, +No feeling could be told; +Her voice was not less steady, +Her manner not more cold. + +XVI. + +They could not hear the anguish +That broke in words of pain +Through that calm summer midnight, - +"My Herbert--mine again!" +Yes, they have once been parted, +But this day shall restore +The long lost one: she claims him: +"My Herbert--mine once more!" + +XVII. + +Now Christmas Eve returning, +Saw Bertha stand beside +The altar, greeting Dora, +Again a smiling bride; +And now the gloomy evening +Sees Bertha pale and worn, +Leaving the house for ever, +To wander out forlorn. + +XVIII. + +Forlorn--nay, not so. Anguish +Shall do its work at length; +Her soul, pass'd through the fire, +Shall gain still purer strength. +Somewhere there waits for Bertha +An earnest noble part; +And, meanwhile, God is with her, - +God, and her own true heart! + + +I could warmly and sincerely praise the little poem, when Jarber had +done reading it; but I could not say that it tended in any degree +towards clearing up the mystery of the empty House. + +Whether it was the absence of the irritating influence of Trottle, +or whether it was simply fatigue, I cannot say, but Jarber did not +strike me, that evening, as being in his usual spirits. And though +he declared that he was not in the least daunted by his want of +success thus far, and that he was resolutely determined to make more +discoveries, he spoke in a languid absent manner, and shortly +afterwards took his leave at rather an early hour. + +When Trottle came back, and when I indignantly taxed him with +Philandering, he not only denied the imputation, but asserted that +he had been employed on my service, and, in consideration of that, +boldly asked for leave of absence for two days, and for a morning to +himself afterwards, to complete the business, in which he solemnly +declared that I was interested. In remembrance of his long and +faithful service to me, I did violence to myself, and granted his +request. And he, on his side, engaged to explain himself to my +satisfaction, in a week's time, on Monday evening the twentieth. + +A day or two before, I sent to Jarber's lodgings to ask him to drop +in to tea. His landlady sent back an apology for him that made my +hair stand on end. His feet were in hot water; his head was in a +flannel petticoat; a green shade was over his eyes; the rheumatism +was in his legs; and a mustard-poultice was on his chest. He was +also a little feverish, and rather distracted in his mind about +Manchester Marriages, a Dwarf, and Three Evenings, or Evening +Parties--his landlady was not sure which--in an empty House, with +the Water Rate unpaid. + +Under these distressing circumstances, I was necessarily left alone +with Trottle. His promised explanation began, like Jarber's +discoveries, with the reading of a written paper. The only +difference was that Trottle introduced his manuscript under the name +of a Report. + + + +TROTTLE'S REPORT + + + +The curious events related in these pages would, many of them, most +likely never have happened, if a person named Trottle had not +presumed, contrary to his usual custom, to think for himself. + +The subject on which the person in question had ventured, for the +first time in his life, to form an opinion purely and entirely his +own, was one which had already excited the interest of his respected +mistress in a very extraordinary degree. Or, to put it in plainer +terms still, the subject was no other than the mystery of the empty +House. + +Feeling no sort of objection to set a success of his own, if +possible, side by side with a failure of Mr. Jarber's, Trottle made +up his mind, one Monday evening, to try what he could do, on his own +account, towards clearing up the mystery of the empty House. +Carefully dismissing from his mind all nonsensical notions of former +tenants and their histories, and keeping the one point in view +steadily before him, he started to reach it in the shortest way, by +walking straight up to the House, and bringing himself face to face +with the first person in it who opened the door to him. + +It was getting towards dark, on Monday evening, the thirteenth of +the month, when Trottle first set foot on the steps of the House. +When he knocked at the door, he knew nothing of the matter which he +was about to investigate, except that the landlord was an elderly +widower of good fortune, and that his name was Forley. A small +beginning enough for a man to start from, certainly! + +On dropping the knocker, his first proceeding was to look down +cautiously out of the corner of his right eye, for any results which +might show themselves at the kitchen-window. There appeared at it +immediately the figure of a woman, who looked up inquisitively at +the stranger on the steps, left the window in a hurry, and came back +to it with an open letter in her hand, which she held up to the +fading light. After looking over the letter hastily for a moment or +so, the woman disappeared once more. + +Trottle next heard footsteps shuffling and scraping along the bare +hall of the house. On a sudden they ceased, and the sound of two +voices--a shrill persuading voice and a gruff resisting voice-- +confusedly reached his ears. After a while, the voices left off +speaking--a chain was undone, a bolt drawn back--the door opened-- +and Trottle stood face to face with two persons, a woman in advance, +and a man behind her, leaning back flat against the wall. + +"Wish you good evening, sir," says the woman, in such a sudden way, +and in such a cracked voice, that it was quite startling to hear +her. "Chilly weather, ain't it, sir? Please to walk in. You come +from good Mr. Forley, don't you, sir?" + +"Don't you, sir?" chimes in the man hoarsely, making a sort of gruff +echo of himself, and chuckling after it, as if he thought he had +made a joke. + +If Trottle had said, "No," the door would have been probably closed +in his face. Therefore, he took circumstances as he found them, and +boldly ran all the risk, whatever it might be, of saying, "Yes." + +"Quite right sir," says the woman. "Good Mr. Forley's letter told +us his particular friend would be here to represent him, at dusk, on +Monday the thirteenth--or, if not on Monday the thirteenth, then on +Monday the twentieth, at the same time, without fail. And here you +are on Monday the thirteenth, ain't you, sir? Mr. Forley's +particular friend, and dressed all in black--quite right, sir! +Please to step into the dining-room--it's always kep scoured and +clean against Mr. Forley comes here--and I'll fetch a candle in half +a minute. It gets so dark in the evenings, now, you hardly know +where you are, do you, sir? And how is good Mr. Forley in his +health? We trust he is better, Benjamin, don't we? We are so sorry +not to see him as usual, Benjamin, ain't we? In half a minute, sir, +if you don't mind waiting, I'll be back with the candle. Come +along, Benjamin." + +"Come along, Benjamin," chimes in the echo, and chuckles again as if +he thought he had made another joke. + +Left alone in the empty front-parlour, Trottle wondered what was +coming next, as he heard the shuffling, scraping footsteps go slowly +down the kitchen-stairs. The front-door had been carefully chained +up and bolted behind him on his entrance; and there was not the +least chance of his being able to open it to effect his escape, +without betraying himself by making a noise. + +Not being of the Jarber sort, luckily for himself, he took his +situation quietly, as he found it, and turned his time, while alone, +to account, by summing up in his own mind the few particulars which +he had discovered thus far. He had found out, first, that Mr. +Forley was in the habit of visiting the house regularly. Second, +that Mr. Forley being prevented by illness from seeing the people +put in charge as usual, had appointed a friend to represent him; and +had written to say so. Third, that the friend had a choice of two +Mondays, at a particular time in the evening, for doing his errand; +and that Trottle had accidentally hit on this time, and on the first +of the Mondays, for beginning his own investigations. Fourth, that +the similarity between Trottle's black dress, as servant out of +livery, and the dress of the messenger (whoever he might be), had +helped the error by which Trottle was profiting. So far, so good. +But what was the messenger's errand? and what chance was there that +he might not come up and knock at the door himself, from minute to +minute, on that very evening? + +While Trottle was turning over this last consideration in his mind, +he heard the shuffling footsteps come up the stairs again, with a +flash of candle-light going before them. He waited for the woman's +coming in with some little anxiety; for the twilight had been too +dim on his getting into the house to allow him to see either her +face or the man's face at all clearly. + +The woman came in first, with the man she called Benjamin at her +heels, and set the candle on the mantel-piece. Trottle takes leave +to describe her as an offensively-cheerful old woman, awfully lean +and wiry, and sharp all over, at eyes, nose, and chin--devilishly +brisk, smiling, and restless, with a dirty false front and a dirty +black cap, and short fidgetty arms, and long hooked finger-nails--an +unnaturally lusty old woman, who walked with a spring in her wicked +old feet, and spoke with a smirk on her wicked old face--the sort of +old woman (as Trottle thinks) who ought to have lived in the dark +ages, and been ducked in a horse-pond, instead of flourishing in the +nineteenth century, and taking charge of a Christian house. + +"You'll please to excuse my son, Benjamin, won't you, sir?" says +this witch without a broomstick, pointing to the man behind her, +propped against the bare wall of the dining-room, exactly as he had +been propped against the bare wall of the passage. "He's got his +inside dreadful bad again, has my son Benjamin. And he won't go to +bed, and he will follow me about the house, up-stairs and +downstairs, and in my lady's chamber, as the song says, you know. +It's his indisgestion, poor dear, that sours his temper and makes +him so agravating--and indisgestion is a wearing thing to the best +of us, ain't it, sir?" + +"Ain't it, sir?" chimes in agravating Benjamin, winking at the +candle-light like an owl at the sunshine. + +Trottle examined the man curiously, while his horrid old mother was +speaking of him. He found "My son Benjamin" to be little and lean, +and buttoned-up slovenly in a frowsy old great-coat that fell down +to his ragged carpet-slippers. His eyes were very watery, his +cheeks very pale, and his lips very red. His breathing was so +uncommonly loud, that it sounded almost like a snore. His head +rolled helplessly in the monstrous big collar of his great-coat; and +his limp, lazy hands pottered about the wall on either side of him, +as if they were groping for a imaginary bottle. In plain English, +the complaint of "My son Benjamin" was drunkenness, of the stupid, +pig-headed, sottish kind. Drawing this conclusion easily enough, +after a moment's observation of the man, Trottle found himself, +nevertheless, keeping his eyes fixed much longer than was necessary +on the ugly drunken face rolling about in the monstrous big coat +collar, and looking at it with a curiosity that he could hardly +account for at first. Was there something familiar to him in the +man's features? He turned away from them for an instant, and then +turned back to him again. After that second look, the notion forced +itself into his mind, that he had certainly seen a face somewhere, +of which that sot's face appeared like a kind of slovenly copy. +"Where?" thinks he to himself, "where did I last see the man whom +this agravating Benjamin, here, so very strongly reminds me of?" + +It was no time, just then--with the cheerful old woman's eye +searching him all over, and the cheerful old woman's tongue talking +at him, nineteen to the dozen--for Trottle to be ransacking his +memory for small matters that had got into wrong corners of it. He +put by in his mind that very curious circumstance respecting +Benjamin's face, to be taken up again when a fit opportunity offered +itself; and kept his wits about him in prime order for present +necessities. + +"You wouldn't like to go down into the kitchen, would you?" says the +witch without the broomstick, as familiar as if she had been +Trottle's mother, instead of Benjamin's. "There's a bit of fire in +the grate, and the sink in the back kitchen don't smell to matter +much to-day, and it's uncommon chilly up here when a person's flesh +don't hardly cover a person's bones. But you don't look cold, sir, +do you? And then, why, Lord bless my soul, our little bit of +business is so very, very little, it's hardly worth while to go +downstairs about it, after all. Quite a game at business, ain't it, +sir? Give-and-take that's what I call it--give-and-take!" + +With that, her wicked old eyes settled hungrily on the region round +about Trottle's waistcoat-pocket, and she began to chuckle like her +son, holding out one of her skinny hands, and tapping cheerfully in +the palm with the knuckles of the other. Agravating Benjamin, +seeing what she was about, roused up a little, chuckled and tapped +in imitation of her, got an idea of his own into his muddled head +all of a sudden, and bolted it out charitably for the benefit of +Trottle. + +"I say!" says Benjamin, settling himself against the wall and +nodding his head viciously at his cheerful old mother. "I say! +Look out. She'll skin you!" + +Assisted by these signs and warnings, Trottle found no difficulty in +understanding that the business referred to was the giving and +taking of money, and that he was expected to be the giver. It was +at this stage of the proceedings that he first felt decidedly +uncomfortable, and more than half inclined to wish he was on the +street-side of the house-door again. + +He was still cudgelling his brains for an excuse to save his pocket, +when the silence was suddenly interrupted by a sound in the upper +part of the house. + +It was not at all loud--it was a quiet, still, scraping sound--so +faint that it could hardly have reached the quickest ears, except in +an empty house. + +"Do you hear that, Benjamin?" says the old woman. "He's at it +again, even in the dark, ain't he? P'raps you'd like to see him, +sir!" says she, turning on Trottle, and poking her grinning face +close to him. "Only name it; only say if you'd like to see him +before we do our little bit of business--and I'll show good Forley's +friend up-stairs, just as if he was good Mr. Forley himself. MY +legs are all right, whatever Benjamin's may be. I get younger and +younger, and stronger and stronger, and jollier and jollier, every +day--that's what I do! Don't mind the stairs on my account, sir, if +you'd like to see him." + +"Him?" Trottle wondered whether "him" meant a man, or a boy, or a +domestic animal of the male species. Whatever it meant, here was a +chance of putting off that uncomfortable give-and-take-business, +and, better still, a chance perhaps of finding out one of the +secrets of the mysterious House. Trottle's spirits began to rise +again and he said "Yes," directly, with the confidence of a man who +knew all about it. + +Benjamin's mother took the candle at once, and lighted Trottle +briskly to the stairs; and Benjamin himself tried to follow as +usual. But getting up several flights of stairs, even helped by the +bannisters, was more, with his particular complaint, than he seemed +to feel himself inclined to venture on. He sat down obstinately on +the lowest step, with his head against the wall, and the tails of +his big great-coat spreading out magnificently on the stairs behind +him and above him, like a dirty imitation of a court lady's train. + +"Don't sit there, dear," says his affectionate mother, stopping to +snuff the candle on the first landing. + +"I shall sit here," says Benjamin, agravating to the last, "till the +milk comes in the morning." + +The cheerful old woman went on nimbly up the stairs to the first +floor, and Trottle followed, with his eyes and ears wide open. He +had seen nothing out of the common in the front-parlour, or up the +staircase, so far. The House was dirty and dreary and close- +smelling--but there was nothing about it to excite the least +curiosity, except the faint scraping sound, which was now beginning +to get a little clearer--though still not at all loud--as Trottle +followed his leader up the stairs to the second floor. + +Nothing on the second-floor landing, but cobwebs above and bits of +broken plaster below, cracked off from the ceiling. Benjamin's +mother was not a bit out of breath, and looked all ready to go to +the top of the monument if necessary. The faint scraping sound had +got a little clearer still; but Trottle was no nearer to guessing +what it might be, than when he first heard it in the parlour +downstairs. + +On the third, and last, floor, there were two doors; one, which was +shut, leading into the front garret; and one, which was ajar, +leading into the back garret. There was a loft in the ceiling above +the landing; but the cobwebs all over it vouched sufficiently for +its not having been opened for some little time. The scraping +noise, plainer than ever here, sounded on the other side of the back +garret door; and, to Trottle's great relief, that was precisely the +door which the cheerful old woman now pushed open. + +Trottle followed her in; and, for once in his life, at any rate, was +struck dumb with amazement, at the sight which the inside of the +room revealed to him. + +The garret was absolutely empty of everything in the shape of +furniture. It must have been used at one time or other, by somebody +engaged in a profession or a trade which required for the practice +of it a great deal of light; for the one window in the room, which +looked out on a wide open space at the back of the house, was three +or four times as large, every way, as a garret-window usually is. +Close under this window, kneeling on the bare boards with his face +to the door, there appeared, of all the creatures in the world to +see alone at such a place and at such a time, a mere mite of a +child--a little, lonely, wizen, strangely-clad boy, who could not at +the most, have been more than five years old. He had a greasy old +blue shawl crossed over his breast, and rolled up, to keep the ends +from the ground, into a great big lump on his back. A strip of +something which looked like the remains of a woman's flannel +petticoat, showed itself under the shawl, and, below that again, a +pair of rusty black stockings, worlds too large for him, covered his +legs and his shoeless feet. A pair of old clumsy muffetees, which +had worked themselves up on his little frail red arms to the elbows, +and a big cotton nightcap that had dropped down to his very +eyebrows, finished off the strange dress which the poor little man +seemed not half big enough to fill out, and not near strong enough +to walk about in. + +But there was something to see even more extraordinary than the +clothes the child was swaddled up in, and that was the game which he +was playing at, all by himself; and which, moreover, explained in +the most unexpected manner the faint scraping noise that had found +its way down-stairs, through the half-opened door, in the silence of +the empty house. + +It has been mentioned that the child was on his knees in the garret, +when Trottle first saw him. He was not saying his prayers, and not +crouching down in terror at being alone in the dark. He was, odd +and unaccountable as it may appear, doing nothing more or less than +playing at a charwoman's or housemaid's business of scouring the +floor. Both his little hands had tight hold of a mangy old +blacking-brush, with hardly any bristles left in it, which he was +rubbing backwards and forwards on the boards, as gravely and +steadily as if he had been at scouring-work for years, and had got a +large family to keep by it. The coming-in of Trottle and the old +woman did not startle or disturb him in the least. He just looked +up for a minute at the candle, with a pair of very bright, sharp +eyes, and then went on with his work again, as if nothing had +happened. On one side of him was a battered pint saucepan without a +handle, which was his make-believe pail; and on the other a morsel +of slate-coloured cotton rag, which stood for his flannel to wipe up +with. After scrubbing bravely for a minute or two, he took the bit +of rag, and mopped up, and then squeezed make-believe water out into +his make-believe pail, as grave as any judge that ever sat on a +Bench. By the time he thought he had got the floor pretty dry, he +raised himself upright on his knees, and blew out a good long +breath, and set his little red arms akimbo, and nodded at Trottle. + +"There!" says the child, knitting his little downy eyebrows into a +frown. "Drat the dirt! I've cleaned up. Where's my beer?" + +Benjamin's mother chuckled till Trottle thought she would have +choked herself. + +"Lord ha' mercy on us!" says she, "just hear the imp. You would +never think he was only five years old, would you, sir? Please to +tell good Mr. Forley you saw him going on as nicely as ever, playing +at being me scouring the parlour floor, and calling for my beer +afterwards. That's his regular game, morning, noon, and night--he's +never tired of it. Only look how snug we've been and dressed him. +That's my shawl a keepin his precious little body warm, and +Benjamin's nightcap a keepin his precious little head warm, and +Benjamin's stockings, drawed over his trowsers, a keepin his +precious little legs warm. He's snug and happy if ever a imp was +yet. 'Where's my beer!'--say it again, little dear, say it again!" + +If Trottle had seen the boy, with a light and a fire in the room, +clothed like other children, and playing naturally with a top, or a +box of soldiers, or a bouncing big India-rubber ball, he might have +been as cheerful under the circumstances as Benjamin's mother +herself. But seeing the child reduced (as he could not help +suspecting) for want of proper toys and proper child's company, to +take up with the mocking of an old woman at her scouring-work, for +something to stand in the place of a game, Trottle, though not a +family man, nevertheless felt the sight before him to be, in its +way, one of the saddest and the most pitiable that he had ever +witnessed. + +"Why, my man," says he, "you're the boldest little chap in all +England. You don't seem a bit afraid of being up here all by +yourself in the dark." + +"The big winder," says the child, pointing up to it, "sees in the +dark; and I see with the big winder." He stops a bit, and gets up +on his legs, and looks hard at Benjamin's mother. "I'm a good 'un," +says he, "ain't I? I save candle." + +Trottle wondered what else the forlorn little creature had been +brought up to do without, besides candle-light; and risked putting a +question as to whether he ever got a run in the open air to cheer +him up a bit. O, yes, he had a run now and then, out of doors (to +say nothing of his runs about the house), the lively little cricket- +-a run according to good Mr. Forley's instructions, which were +followed out carefully, as good Mr. Forley's friend would be glad to +hear, to the very letter. + +As Trottle could only have made one reply to this, namely, that good +Mr. Forley's instructions were, in his opinion, the instructions of +an infernal scamp; and as he felt that such an answer would +naturally prove the death-blow to all further discoveries on his +part, he gulped down his feelings before they got too many for him, +and held his tongue, and looked round towards the window again to +see what the forlorn little boy was going to amuse himself with +next. + +The child had gathered up his blacking-brush and bit of rag, and had +put them into the old tin saucepan; and was now working his way, as +well as his clothes would let him, with his make-believe pail hugged +up in his arms, towards a door of communication which led from the +back to the front garret. + +"I say," says he, looking round sharply over his shoulder, "what are +you two stopping here for? I'm going to bed now--and so I tell +you!" + +With that, he opened the door, and walked into the front room. +Seeing Trottle take a step or two to follow him, Benjamin's mother +opened her wicked old eyes in a state of great astonishment. + +"Mercy on us!" says she, "haven't you seen enough of him yet?" + +"No," says Trottle. "I should like to see him go to bed." + +Benjamin's mother burst into such a fit of chuckling that the loose +extinguisher in the candlestick clattered again with the shaking of +her hand. To think of good Mr. Forley's friend taking ten times +more trouble about the imp than good Mr. Forley himself! Such a +joke as that, Benjamin's mother had not often met with in the course +of her life, and she begged to be excused if she took the liberty of +having a laugh at it. + +Leaving her to laugh as much as she pleased, and coming to a pretty +positive conclusion, after what he had just heard, that Mr. Forley's +interest in the child was not of the fondest possible kind, Trottle +walked into the front room, and Benjamin's mother, enjoying herself +immensely, followed with the candle. + +There were two pieces of furniture in the front garret. One, an old +stool of the sort that is used to stand a cask of beer on; and the +other a great big ricketty straddling old truckle bedstead. In the +middle of this bedstead, surrounded by a dim brown waste of sacking, +was a kind of little island of poor bedding--an old bolster, with +nearly all the feathers out of it, doubled in three for a pillow; a +mere shred of patchwork counter-pane, and a blanket; and under that, +and peeping out a little on either side beyond the loose clothes, +two faded chair cushions of horsehair, laid along together for a +sort of makeshift mattress. When Trottle got into the room, the +lonely little boy had scrambled up on the bedstead with the help of +the beer-stool, and was kneeling on the outer rim of sacking with +the shred of counterpane in his hands, just making ready to tuck it +in for himself under the chair cushions. + +"I'll tuck you up, my man," says Trottle. "Jump into bed, and let +me try." + +"I mean to tuck myself up," says the poor forlorn child, "and I +don't mean to jump. I mean to crawl, I do--and so I tell you!" + +With that, he set to work, tucking in the clothes tight all down the +sides of the cushions, but leaving them open at the foot. Then, +getting up on his knees, and looking hard at Trottle as much as to +say, "What do you mean by offering to help such a handy little chap +as me?" he began to untie the big shawl for himself, and did it, +too, in less than half a minute. Then, doubling the shawl up loose +over the foot of the bed, he says, "I say, look here," and ducks +under the clothes, head first, worming his way up and up softly, +under the blanket and counterpane, till Trottle saw the top of the +large nightcap slowly peep out on the bolster. This over-sized +head-gear of the child's had so shoved itself down in the course of +his journey to the pillow, under the clothes, that when he got his +face fairly out on the bolster, he was all nightcap down to his +mouth. He soon freed himself, however, from this slight encumbrance +by turning the ends of the cap up gravely to their old place over +his eyebrows--looked at Trottle--said, "Snug, ain't it? Good-bye!"- +-popped his face under the clothes again--and left nothing to be +seen of him but the empty peak of the big nightcap standing up +sturdily on end in the middle of the bolster. + +"What a young limb it is, ain't it?" says Benjamin's mother, giving +Trottle a cheerful dig with her elbow. "Come on! you won't see no +more of him to-night!" + +"And so I tell you!" sings out a shrill, little voice under the +bedclothes, chiming in with a playful finish to the old woman's last +words. + +If Trottle had not been, by this time, positively resolved to follow +the wicked secret which accident had mixed him up with, through all +its turnings and windings, right on to the end, he would have +probably snatched the boy up then and there, and carried him off +from his garret prison, bed-clothes and all. As it was, he put a +strong check on himself, kept his eye on future possibilities, and +allowed Benjamin's mother to lead him down-stairs again. + +"Mind them top bannisters," says she, as Trottle laid his hand on +them. "They are as rotten as medlars every one of 'em." + +"When people come to see the premises," says Trottle, trying to feel +his way a little farther into the mystery of the House, "you don't +bring many of them up here, do you?" + +"Bless your heart alive!" says she, "nobody ever comes now. The +outside of the house is quite enough to warn them off. Mores the +pity, as I say. It used to keep me in spirits, staggering 'em all, +one after another, with the frightful high rent--specially the +women, drat 'em. 'What's the rent of this house?'--'Hundred and +twenty pound a-year!'--'Hundred and twenty? why, there ain't a house +in the street as lets for more than eighty!'--Likely enough, ma'am; +other landlords may lower their rents if they please; but this here +landlord sticks to his rights, and means to have as much for his +house as his father had before him!'--'But the neighbourhood's gone +off since then!'--'Hundred and twenty pound, ma'am.'--'The landlord +must be mad!'--'Hundred and twenty pound, ma'am.'--'Open the door +you impertinent woman!' Lord! what a happiness it was to see 'em +bounce out, with that awful rent a-ringing in their ears all down +the street!" + +She stopped on the second-floor landing to treat herself to another +chuckle, while Trottle privately posted up in his memory what he had +just heard. "Two points made out," he thought to himself: "the +house is kept empty on purpose, and the way it's done is to ask a +rent that nobody will pay." + +"Ah, deary me!" says Benjamin's mother, changing the subject on a +sudden, and twisting back with a horrid, greedy quickness to those +awkward money-matters which she had broached down in the parlour. +"What we've done, one way and another for Mr. Forley, it isn't in +words to tell! That nice little bit of business of ours ought to be +a bigger bit of business, considering the trouble we take, Benjamin +and me, to make the imp upstairs as happy as the day is long. If +good Mr. Forley would only please to think a little more of what a +deal he owes to Benjamin and me--" + +"That's just it," says Trottle, catching her up short in +desperation, and seeing his way, by the help of those last words of +hers, to slipping cleverly through her fingers. "What should you +say, if I told you that Mr. Forley was nothing like so far from +thinking about that little matter as you fancy? You would be +disappointed, now, if I told you that I had come to-day without the +money?"--(her lank old jaw fell, and her villainous old eyes glared, +in a perfect state of panic, at that!)--"But what should you say, if +I told you that Mr. Forley was only waiting for my report, to send +me here next Monday, at dusk, with a bigger bit of business for us +two to do together than ever you think for? What should you say to +that?" + +The old wretch came so near to Trottle, before she answered, and +jammed him up confidentially so close into the corner of the +landing, that his throat, in a manner, rose at her. + +"Can you count it off, do you think, on more than that?" says she, +holding up her four skinny fingers and her long crooked thumb, all +of a tremble, right before his face. + +"What do you say to two hands, instead of one?" says he, pushing +past her, and getting down-stairs as fast as he could. + +What she said Trottle thinks it best not to report, seeing that the +old hypocrite, getting next door to light-headed at the golden +prospect before her, took such liberties with unearthly names and +persons which ought never to have approached her lips, and rained +down such an awful shower of blessings on Trottle's head, that his +hair almost stood on end to hear her. He went on down-stairs as +fast as his feet would carry him, till he was brought up all +standing, as the sailors say, on the last flight, by agravating +Benjamin, lying right across the stair, and fallen off, as might +have been expected, into a heavy drunken sleep. + +The sight of him instantly reminded Trottle of the curious half +likeness which he had already detected between the face of Benjamin +and the face of another man, whom he had seen at a past time in very +different circumstances. He determined, before leaving the House, +to have one more look at the wretched muddled creature; and +accordingly shook him up smartly, and propped him against the +staircase wall, before his mother could interfere. + +"Leave him to me; I'll freshen him up," says Trottle to the old +woman, looking hard in Benjamin's face, while he spoke. + +The fright and surprise of being suddenly woke up, seemed, for about +a quarter of a minute, to sober the creature. When he first opened +his eyes, there was a new look in them for a moment, which struck +home to Trottle's memory as quick and as clear as a flash of light. +The old maudlin sleepy expression came back again in another +instant, and blurred out all further signs and tokens of the past. +But Trottle had seen enough in the moment before it came; and he +troubled Benjamin's face with no more inquiries. + +"Next Monday, at dusk," says he, cutting short some more of the old +woman's palaver about Benjamin's indisgestion. "I've got no more +time to spare, ma'am, to-night: please to let me out." + +With a few last blessings, a few last dutiful messages to good Mr. +Forley, and a few last friendly hints not to forget next Monday at +dusk, Trottle contrived to struggle through the sickening business +of leave-taking; to get the door opened; and to find himself, to his +own indescribable relief, once more on the outer side of the House +To Let. + + + +LET AT LAST + + + +"There, ma'am!" said Trottle, folding up the manuscript from which +he had been reading, and setting it down with a smart tap of triumph +on the table. "May I venture to ask what you think of that plain +statement, as a guess on my part (and not on Mr. Jarber's) at the +riddle of the empty House?" + +For a minute or two I was unable to say a word. When I recovered a +little, my first question referred to the poor forlorn little boy. + +"To-day is Monday the twentieth," I said. "Surely you have not let +a whole week go by without trying to find out something more?" + +"Except at bed-time, and meals, ma'am," answered Trottle, "I have +not let an hour go by. Please to understand that I have only come +to an end of what I have written, and not to an end of what I have +done. I wrote down those first particulars, ma'am, because they are +of great importance, and also because I was determined to come +forward with my written documents, seeing that Mr. Jarber chose to +come forward, in the first instance, with his. I am now ready to go +on with the second part of my story as shortly and plainly as +possible, by word of mouth. The first thing I must clear up, if you +please, is the matter of Mr. Forley's family affairs. I have heard +you speak of them, ma'am, at various times; and I have understood +that Mr. Forley had two children only by his deceased wife, both +daughters. The eldest daughter married, to her father's entire +satisfaction, one Mr. Bayne, a rich man, holding a high government +situation in Canada. She is now living there with her husband, and +her only child, a little girl of eight or nine years old. Right so +far, I think, ma'am?" + +"Quite right," I said. + +"The second daughter," Trottle went on, "and Mr. Forley's favourite, +set her father's wishes and the opinions of the world at flat +defiance, by running away with a man of low origin--a mate of a +merchant-vessel, named Kirkland. Mr. Forley not only never forgave +that marriage, but vowed that he would visit the scandal of it +heavily in the future on husband and wife. Both escaped his +vengeance, whatever he meant it to be. The husband was drowned on +his first voyage after his marriage, and the wife died in child-bed. +Right again, I believe, ma'am?" + +"Again quite right." + +"Having got the family matter all right, we will now go back, ma'am, +to me and my doings. Last Monday, I asked you for leave of absence +for two days; I employed the time in clearing up the matter of +Benjamin's face. Last Saturday I was out of the way when you wanted +me. I played truant, ma'am, on that occasion, in company with a +friend of mine, who is managing clerk in a lawyer's office; and we +both spent the morning at Doctors' Commons, over the last will and +testament of Mr. Forley's father. Leaving the will-business for a +moment, please to follow me first, if you have no objection, into +the ugly subject of Benjamin's face. About six or seven years ago +(thanks to your kindness) I had a week's holiday with some friends +of mine who live in the town of Pendlebury. One of those friends +(the only one now left in the place) kept a chemist's shop, and in +that shop I was made acquainted with one of the two doctors in the +town, named Barsham. This Barsham was a first-rate surgeon, and +might have got to the top of his profession, if he had not been a +first-rate blackguard. As it was, he both drank and gambled; nobody +would have anything to do with him in Pendlebury; and, at the time +when I was made known to him in the chemist's shop, the other +doctor, Mr. Dix, who was not to be compared with him for surgical +skill, but who was a respectable man, had got all the practice; and +Barsham and his old mother were living together in such a condition +of utter poverty, that it was a marvel to everybody how they kept +out of the parish workhouse." + +"Benjamin and Benjamin's mother!" + +"Exactly, ma'am. Last Thursday morning (thanks to your kindness, +again) I went to Pendlebury to my friend the chemist, to ask a few +questions about Barsham and his mother. I was told that they had +both left the town about five years since. When I inquired into the +circumstances, some strange particulars came out in the course of +the chemist's answer. You know I have no doubt, ma'am, that poor +Mrs. Kirkland was confined while her husband was at sea, in lodgings +at a village called Flatfield, and that she died and was buried +there. But what you may not know is, that Flatfield is only three +miles from Pendlebury; that the doctor who attended on Mrs. Kirkland +was Barsham; that the nurse who took care of her was Barsham's +mother; and that the person who called them both in, was Mr. Forley. +Whether his daughter wrote to him, or whether he heard of it in some +other way, I don't know; but he was with her (though he had sworn +never to see her again when she married) a month or more before her +confinement, and was backwards and forwards a good deal between +Flatfield and Pendlebury. How he managed matters with the Barshams +cannot at present be discovered; but it is a fact that he contrived +to keep the drunken doctor sober, to everybody's amazement. It is a +fact that Barsham went to the poor woman with all his wits about +him. It is a fact that he and his mother came back from Flatfield +after Mrs. Kirkland's death, packed up what few things they had, and +left the town mysteriously by night. And, lastly, it is also a fact +that the other doctor, Mr. Dix, was not called in to help, till a +week after the birth AND BURIAL of the child, when the mother was +sinking from exhaustion--exhaustion (to give the vagabond, Barsham, +his due) not produced, in Mr. Dix's opinion, by improper medical +treatment, but by the bodily weakness of the poor woman herself--" + +"Burial of the child?" I interrupted, trembling all over. "Trottle! +you spoke that word 'burial' in a very strange way--you are fixing +your eyes on me now with a very strange look--" + +Trottle leaned over close to me, and pointed through the window to +the empty house. + +"The child's death is registered, at Pendlebury," he said, "on +Barsham's certificate, under the head of Male Infant, Still-Born. +The child's coffin lies in the mother's grave, in Flatfield +churchyard. The child himself--as surely as I live and breathe, is +living and breathing now--a castaway and a prisoner in that +villainous house!" + +I sank back in my chair. + +"It's guess-work, so far, but it is borne in on my mind, for all +that, as truth. Rouse yourself, ma'am, and think a little. The +last I hear of Barsham, he is attending Mr. Forley's disobedient +daughter. The next I see of Barsham, he is in Mr. Forley's house, +trusted with a secret. He and his mother leave Pendlebury suddenly +and suspiciously five years back; and he and his mother have got a +child of five years old, hidden away in the house. Wait! please to +wait--I have not done yet. The will left by Mr. Forley's father, +strengthens the suspicion. The friend I took with me to Doctors' +Commons, made himself master of the contents of that will; and when +he had done so, I put these two questions to him. 'Can Mr. Forley +leave his money at his own discretion to anybody he pleases?' 'No,' +my friend says, 'his father has left him with only a life interest +in it.' 'Suppose one of Mr. Forley's married daughters has a girl, +and the other a boy, how would the money go?' 'It would all go,' my +friend says, 'to the boy, and it would be charged with the payment +of a certain annual income to his female cousin. After her death, +it would go back to the male descendant, and to his heirs.' +Consider that, ma'am! The child of the daughter whom Mr. Forley +hates, whose husband has been snatched away from his vengeance by +death, takes his whole property in defiance of him; and the child of +the daughter whom he loves, is left a pensioner on her low-born boy- +cousin for life! There was good--too good reason--why that child of +Mrs. Kirkland's should be registered stillborn. And if, as I +believe, the register is founded on a false certificate, there is +better, still better reason, why the existence of the child should +be hidden, and all trace of his parentage blotted out, in the garret +of that empty house." + +He stopped, and pointed for the second time to the dim, dust-covered +garret-windows opposite. As he did so, I was startled--a very +slight matter sufficed to frighten me now--by a knock at the door of +the room in which we were sitting. + +My maid came in, with a letter in her hand. I took it from her. +The mourning card, which was all the envelope enclosed, dropped from +my hands. + +George Forley was no more. He had departed this life three days +since, on the evening of Friday. + +"Did our last chance of discovering the truth," I asked, "rest with +HIM? Has it died with HIS death?" + +"Courage, ma'am! I think not. Our chance rests on our power to +make Barsham and his mother confess; and Mr. Forley's death, by +leaving them helpless, seems to put that power into our hands. With +your permission, I will not wait till dusk to-day, as I at first +intended, but will make sure of those two people at once. With a +policeman in plain clothes to watch the house, in case they try to +leave it; with this card to vouch for the fact of Mr. Forley's +death; and with a bold acknowledgment on my part of having got +possession of their secret, and of being ready to use it against +them in case of need, I think there is little doubt of bringing +Barsham and his mother to terms. In case I find it impossible to +get back here before dusk, please to sit near the window, ma'am, and +watch the house, a little before they light the street-lamps. If +you see the front-door open and close again, will you be good enough +to put on your bonnet, and come across to me immediately? Mr. +Forley's death may, or may not, prevent his messenger from coming as +arranged. But, if the person does come, it is of importance that +you, as a relative of Mr. Forley's should be present to see him, and +to have that proper influence over him which I cannot pretend to +exercise." + +The only words I could say to Trottle as he opened the door and left +me, were words charging him to take care that no harm happened to +the poor forlorn little boy. + +Left alone, I drew my chair to the window; and looked out with a +beating heart at the guilty house. I waited and waited through what +appeared to me to be an endless time, until I heard the wheels of a +cab stop at the end of the street. I looked in that direction, and +saw Trottle get out of the cab alone, walk up to the house, and +knock at the door. He was let in by Barsham's mother. A minute or +two later, a decently-dressed man sauntered past the house, looked +up at it for a moment, and sauntered on to the corner of the street +close by. Here he leant against the post, and lighted a cigar, and +stopped there smoking in an idle way, but keeping his face always +turned in the direction of the house-door. + +I waited and waited still. I waited and waited, with my eyes +riveted to the door of the house. At last I thought I saw it open +in the dusk, and then felt sure I heard it shut again softly. +Though I tried hard to compose myself, I trembled so that I was +obliged to call for Peggy to help me on with my bonnet and cloak, +and was forced to take her arm to lean on, in crossing the street. + +Trottle opened the door to us, before we could knock. Peggy went +back, and I went in. He had a lighted candle in his hand. + +"It has happened, ma'am, as I thought it would," he whispered, +leading me into the bare, comfortless, empty parlour. "Barsham and +his mother have consulted their own interests, and have come to +terms. My guess-work is guess-work no longer. It is now what I +felt it was--Truth!" + +Something strange to me--something which women who are mothers must +often know--trembled suddenly in my heart, and brought the warm +tears of my youthful days thronging back into my eyes. I took my +faithful old servant by the hand, and asked him to let me see Mrs. +Kirkland's child, for his mother's sake. + +"If you desire it, ma'am," said Trottle, with a gentleness of manner +that I had never noticed in him before. "But pray don't think me +wanting in duty and right feeling, if I beg you to try and wait a +little. You are agitated already, and a first meeting with the +child will not help to make you so calm, as you would wish to be, if +Mr. Forley's messenger comes. The little boy is safe up-stairs. +Pray think first of trying to compose yourself for a meeting with a +stranger; and believe me you shall not leave the house afterwards +without the child." + +I felt that Trottle was right, and sat down as patiently as I could +in a chair he had thoughtfully placed ready for me. I was so +horrified at the discovery of my own relation's wickedness that when +Trottle proposed to make me acquainted with the confession wrung +from Barsham and his mother, I begged him to spare me all details, +and only to tell me what was necessary about George Forley. + +"All that can be said for Mr. Forley, ma'am, is, that he was just +scrupulous enough to hide the child's existence and blot out its +parentage here, instead of consenting, at the first, to its death, +or afterwards, when the boy grew up, to turning him adrift, +absolutely helpless in the world. The fraud has been managed, +ma'am, with the cunning of Satan himself. Mr. Forley had the hold +over the Barshams, that they had helped him in his villany, and that +they were dependent on him for the bread they eat. He brought them +up to London to keep them securely under his own eye. He put them +into this empty house (taking it out of the agent's hands +previously, on pretence that he meant to manage the letting of it +himself); and by keeping the house empty, made it the surest of all +hiding places for the child. Here, Mr. Forley could come, whenever +he pleased, to see that the poor lonely child was not absolutely +starved; sure that his visits would only appear like looking after +his own property. Here the child was to have been trained to +believe himself Barsham's child, till he should be old enough to be +provided for in some situation, as low and as poor as Mr. Forley's +uneasy conscience would let him pick out. He may have thought of +atonement on his death-bed; but not before--I am only too certain of +it--not before!" + +A low, double knock startled us. + +"The messenger!" said Trottle, under his breath. He went out +instantly to answer the knock; and returned, leading in a +respectable-looking elderly man, dressed like Trottle, all in black, +with a white cravat, but otherwise not at all resembling him. + +"I am afraid I have made some mistake," said the stranger. + +Trottle, considerately taking the office of explanation into his own +hands, assured the gentleman that there was no mistake; mentioned to +him who I was; and asked him if he had not come on business +connected with the late Mr. Forley. Looking greatly astonished, the +gentleman answered, "Yes." There was an awkward moment of silence, +after that. The stranger seemed to be not only startled and amazed, +but rather distrustful and fearful of committing himself as well. +Noticing this, I thought it best to request Trottle to put an end to +further embarrassment, by stating all particulars truthfully, as he +had stated them to me; and I begged the gentleman to listen +patiently for the late Mr. Forley's sake. He bowed to me very +respectfully, and said he was prepared to listen with the greatest +interest. + +It was evident to me--and, I could see, to Trottle also--that we +were not dealing, to say the least, with a dishonest man. + +"Before I offer any opinion on what I have heard," he said, +earnestly and anxiously, after Trottle had done, "I must be allowed, +in justice to myself, to explain my own apparent connection with +this very strange and very shocking business. I was the +confidential legal adviser of the late Mr. Forley, and I am left his +executor. Rather more than a fortnight back, when Mr. Forley was +confined to his room by illness, he sent for me, and charged me to +call and pay a certain sum of money here, to a man and woman whom I +should find taking charge of the house. He said he had reasons for +wishing the affair to be kept a secret. He begged me so to arrange +my engagements that I could call at this place either on Monday +last, or to-day, at dusk; and he mentioned that he would write to +warn the people of my coming, without mentioning my name (Dalcott is +my name), as he did not wish to expose me to any future +importunities on the part of the man and woman. I need hardly tell +you that this commission struck me as being a strange one; but, in +my position with Mr. Forley, I had no resource but to accept it +without asking questions, or to break off my long and friendly +connection with my client. I chose the first alternative. Business +prevented me from doing my errand on Monday last--and if I am here +to-day, notwithstanding Mr. Forley's unexpected death, it is +emphatically because I understood nothing of the matter, on knocking +at this door; and therefore felt myself bound, as executor, to clear +it up. That, on my word of honour, is the whole truth, so far as I +am personally concerned." + +"I feel quite sure of it, sir," I answered. + +"You mentioned Mr. Forley's death, just now, as unexpected. May I +inquire if you were present, and if he has left any last +instructions?" + +"Three hours before Mr. Forley's death," said Mr. Dalcott, "his +medical attendant left him apparently in a fair way of recovery. +The change for the worse took place so suddenly, and was accompanied +by such severe suffering, to prevent him from communicating his last +wishes to any one. When I reached his house, he was insensible. I +have since examined his papers. Not one of them refers to the +present time or to the serious matter which now occupies us. In the +absence of instructions I must act cautiously on what you have told +me; but I will be rigidly fair and just at the same time. The first +thing to be done," he continued, addressing himself to Trottle, "is +to hear what the man and woman, down-stairs, have to say. If you +can supply me with writing-materials, I will take their declarations +separately on the spot, in your presence, and in the presence of the +policeman who is watching the house. To-morrow I will send copies +of those declarations, accompanied by a full statement of the case, +to Mr. and Mrs. Bayne in Canada (both of whom know me well as the +late Mr. Forley's legal adviser); and I will suspend all +proceedings, on my part, until I hear from them, or from their +solicitor in London. In the present posture of affairs this is all +I can safely do." + +We could do no less than agree with him, and thank him for his frank +and honest manner of meeting us. It was arranged that I should send +over the writing-materials from my lodgings; and, to my unutterable +joy and relief, it was also readily acknowledged that the poor +little orphan boy could find no fitter refuge than my old arms were +longing to offer him, and no safer protection for the night than my +roof could give. Trottle hastened away up-stairs, as actively as if +he had been a young man, to fetch the child down. + +And he brought him down to me without another moment of delay, and I +went on my knees before the poor little Mite, and embraced him, and +asked him if he would go with me to where I lived? He held me away +for a moment, and his wan, shrewd little eyes looked sharp at me. +Then he clung close to me all at once, and said: + +"I'm a-going along with you, I am--and so I tell you!" + +For inspiring the poor neglected child with this trust in my old +self, I thanked Heaven, then, with all my heart and soul, and I +thank it now! + +I bundled the poor darling up in my own cloak, and I carried him in +my own arms across the road. Peggy was lost in speechless amazement +to behold me trudging out of breath up-stairs, with a strange pair +of poor little legs under my arm; but, she began to cry over the +child the moment she saw him, like a sensible woman as she always +was, and she still cried her eyes out over him in a comfortable +manner, when he at last lay fast asleep, tucked up by my hands in +Trottle's bed. + +"And Trottle, bless you, my dear man," said I, kissing his hand, as +he looked on: "the forlorn baby came to this refuge through you, +and he will help you on your way to Heaven." + +Trottle answered that I was his dear mistress, and immediately went +and put his head out at an open window on the landing, and looked +into the back street for a quarter of an hour. + +That very night, as I sat thinking of the poor child, and of another +poor child who is never to be thought about enough at Christmas- +time, the idea came into my mind which I have lived to execute, and +in the realisation of which I am the happiest of women this day. + +"The executor will sell that House, Trottle?" said I. + +"Not a doubt of it, ma'am, if he can find a purchaser." + +"I'll buy it." + +I have often seen Trottle pleased; but, I never saw him so perfectly +enchanted as he was when I confided to him, which I did, then and +there, the purpose that I had in view. + +To make short of a long story--and what story would not be long, +coming from the lips of an old woman like me, unless it was made +short by main force!--I bought the House. Mrs. Bayne had her +father's blood in her; she evaded the opportunity of forgiving and +generous reparation that was offered her, and disowned the child; +but, I was prepared for that, and loved him all the more for having +no one in the world to look to, but me. + +I am getting into a flurry by being over-pleased, and I dare say I +am as incoherent as need be. I bought the House, and I altered it +from the basement to the roof, and I turned it into a Hospital for +Sick Children. + +Never mind by what degrees my little adopted boy came to the +knowledge of all the sights and sounds in the streets, so familiar +to other children and so strange to him; never mind by what degrees +he came to be pretty, and childish, and winning, and companionable, +and to have pictures and toys about him, and suitable playmates. As +I write, I look across the road to my Hospital, and there is the +darling (who has gone over to play) nodding at me out of one of the +once lonely windows, with his dear chubby face backed up by +Trottle's waistcoat as he lifts my pet for "Grandma" to see. + +Many an Eye I see in that House now, but it is never in solitude, +never in neglect. Many an Eye I see in that House now, that is more +and more radiant every day with the light of returning health. As +my precious darling has changed beyond description for the brighter +and the better, so do the not less precious darlings of poor women +change in that House every day in the year. For which I humbly +thank that Gracious Being whom the restorer of the Widow's son and +of the Ruler's daughter, instructed all mankind to call their +Father. + + + + + +End of Project Gutenberg Etext of A House to Let, by Dickens and Others + |