"I suppose I was stupid to think it could be anything but a hoax. But the letter seemed so kind, not as if it were written by a horrid person who would want to play a practical joke."
Christina, having climbed the stairs to her room with weary, dragging footsteps, sat down on her one chair, feeling tired, depressed, and indignant. The dire necessity of saving her every penny, drove her to walk from Bayswater to her far-off lodgings in the S.W. district, and as a fine rain had begun to fall long before she was half-way across the park, she was not only worn out and miserable, but very wet as well. In their best days her serge coat and skirt had not been thick; much wear and tear had reduced them to a threadbare condition quite incapable of resistance to weather. The drizzling rain had penetrated her inadequate coat and thin blouse; her skirt hung limply about her legs; she felt, what she actually was, wet to the skin, and too tired even to exert herself to make some tea over her spirit-lamp.
"I expect it is true what Mrs. Jones says," she reflected; "she says men are all brutes, and you can't trust one of them. I used to think she only said it because Mr. Jones drank himself to death, and drank away her earnings first, and beat her. But, now, I don't know." With cold fingers she drew the hatpins from her sodden hat, threw off the wet coat that clung so chillily to her shivering form, and took from her pocket a letter addressed in a bold, masculine hand.
"C.M., c/o Mrs. Cole, Newsagent,"10, Cartney Street, S.W."
"It looks like the handwriting of a gentleman," the poor little girl's reflections ran on; "I shouldn't have thought a man who wrote like that could be a brute, and his letter isn't a brute's letter either," she added pathetically, drawing the letter from its envelope and reading the words, which were already engraved upon her mind.
"DEAR MADAM,
"I think perhaps I may be able to be of some use to you if you could make it convenient to call at 100, Barford Road, Bayswater, at five o'clock to-morrow (Wednesday). We might have a little talk. My friend to whom the house belongs, will be very glad to see you.
"Yours faithfully,"R. MERNSIDE."
"And then I find the house shut up," Christina said shakily, and aloud, "and an old charwoman tells me she never heard of Mr. Mernside; and I suppose it was just all a mean practical joke." Two tears, tears of sheer fatigue and of bitter disappointment, welled up in the girl's eyes, and dropped slowly down her cheeks. She was so tired—so tired and cold and miserable—and she had built more hopes than she quite knew upon the answer to her timid little letter. The entire absence of any allusion to matrimonial prospects in Mr. Mernside's note had quieted her fears, and many hopes had mingled with the nervous doubts that had filled her soul as she set out that afternoon on her strange expedition. Some faint idea that this unknown Mr. Mernside might be instrumental in helping her to find work, sustained her through the long walk to Barford Road; she had been so sure, so very sure, that the writer of the terse, kindly letter, was a gentleman, and a good man to boot, that the sight of the shut-up house came to her with the force of an actual blow, whilst the caretaker's unfeigned ignorance of anybody of the name of Mernside, made Christina's theory of a hoax seem more than probable.
"And not one answer to all the letters I wrote about situations," she exclaimed wearily, pulling herself up from her chair, and taking the spirit-lamp from its place in the cupboard. "I wonder whether there are lots of other girls as poor as I am, and without any relations or friends. In another week, I shan't have enough money to pay my rent; and Mrs. Jones won't let it run; she's said so over and over again." Another shiver ran through her, and this time dread apprehension of the future was more responsible for the shiver than even the damp chilliness of her condition. "I don't know what I shall do when the money is all gone. Oh! I don't know what I shall do," and a little sob broke from her, as she took from the cupboard the materials for her tea. It was a meagre enough meal that her cold shaking fingers spread on the old deal table, and she was repeatedly forced to brush away the tears from her face, so fast did they run down it now that exhaustion and misery were at last finding an outlet. Her lunch had consisted of a glass of milk and a bun, bought at a neighbouring shop; since lunch-time she had walked some miles, had incidentally become wet through during the process, and her walk had been crowned by a cruel disappointment. It was not wonderful that the girl, plucky little soul though she was, should feel now as if the end were reached, and she could hope no more.
To add to her misery, everything seemed to go awry. The matches were only found after a prolonged hunt for them; for many minutes the lamp refused to light; and when, at last, a flame shot up, Christina thought that the water in the kettle boiled more slowly than water had ever boiled before. Dry bread had never tasted more unappetising; and milkless tea (though it was certainly warm, and in that respect carried a certain amount of comfort with it), tasted bitter and nauseating.
The girl longed, with an almost childish longing, for something more to eat and drink. Visions rose before her of the Donaldsons' cosy nursery, of a plate piled high with hot buttered toast, of a big home-made seed cake, that could be eaten as quickly as the nursery folks liked, without any dread of future want, and she pushed away her plate, and laid her head down upon the table, sobbing as though her heart would break. Hot buttered toast and seed cake are unromantic sounding things enough, no doubt, but when one is very hungry, and very heartsick, and only twenty into the bargain, the thoughts of past plenty make present poverty seem well nigh intolerable.
Good stuff must have gone to the making of little Christina, and whoever those ancestors on her mother's side had been, they had passed on to her a goodly heritage of courage and endurance. Her storm of sobs was of very brief duration. Giving herself a little shake both actually and metaphorically, she raised her head from the table, resolutely dried her eyes, choked back her sobs and forced herself to finish eating the dry morsels of bread, and drinking the nauseous draught of tea. Either the food itself, or the effort she had made to eat it, sent a tingling of new strength along her limbs, and she broke into a faint laugh over her own despair.
"You perfect goose," she said firmly, rising to wash up her tea things; "crying won't make anything better. Mr. Donaldson used to say, 'Don't look for your bridges before you come to them,' and so I won't look at the bridge. Mrs. Jones will put up for me about the rent, until I am really going to step right on to it. And before I give up every bit of hope, I ought—perhaps I ought to try and pawn the pendant, only I can't bear doing it. I can't bear it."
Mrs. Jones was not at all the pleasant and kindly landlady of fiction, who succours and helps her tenants, and plays the part of mother to them. The only part Mrs. Jones understood playing was that of the cruel stepmother of fairy legend, and Christina did not err in thinking that to allow rent to remain unpaid, was no part of her landlady's methods. Mrs. Jones's own life had been a hard one. Grinding work in her early girlhood, a brutal husband, and much grinding poverty during her married life, and in her widowhood an unending struggle to make two ends meet; these made up the sum of the landlady's existence, and she treated the world as she found herself treated by the world. She expected nothing from others, and she gave them nothing. She asked for no help from her fellow beings, and she most assuredly bestowed none.
She was lighting the gas jet in the hall, a hard-featured, tight-lipped woman, when, half an hour later, Christina went out again, a small brown paper parcel in her hand; and Mrs. Jones's thin lips tightened more than ever as her sharp eyes fell upon the parcel.
"Goin' out to pop somethin'," was her grim thought, and the thought was displeasing to her. Not that she particularly pitied her lodger. Pity was a virtue not cultivated by Mrs. Jones. But she instinctively dreaded the moment when her lodgers began to slip out stealthily with parcels under their arms, or in their hands. The significance of those parcels was well known to her, and she was fully aware that lodgers who once began to pawn their goods passed by easy stages to backwardness in paying their rent, and then followed eviction and new tenants. No; Mrs. Jones mistrusted brown paper parcels, just as much as she mistrusted the look, half-shy, half-frightened, which Christina cast at her in passing, and the flood of colour that dyed the girl's face, when she met the landlady's glance.
Some of her smarter clothes Christina had long ago sold to an old clothes' shop round the corner, but this was the first time she had visited a real pawnbroker, and her heart beat like a sledge-hammer, as she stood outside the window of a jeweller's shop, over which the three balls were displayed. She had shrunk from going into the establishment of Mr. Moss, the recognised pawnbroker of that squalid neighbourhood, and had gone further afield, thinking that from a jeweller, even though he engaged in pawnbroking as well, she would meet with more consideration, and perhaps receive a larger sum of money. But, looking through the glass doors at the two men who lounged behind the counter, her spirits sank to zero, and she allowed ten minutes to slip by before, taking her courage into her hands, she finally entered the shop.
Coming in out of the damp of the November evening, the pleasant warmth was grateful to her, but the brilliant gaslight dazzled her eyes, and sheer nervousness made her stumble hopelessly over the sentence she had been committing to memory, ever since she had left her lodgings.
"I called to ask whether this pendant was of any value," she had intended to say. But instead of that, she found herself stammering breathlessly, "I—I came—would you please tell me—if you can give me something on this," and she thrust her parcel into the hand indolently stretched out for it, by one of the young men behind the counter.
His eyes looked her up and down with an insolent stare that sent the blood flying over her face, and his smile gave her an impotent longing to strike his fat, sleek countenance.
"How much do you want for it, my dear, that's the question?" the man said jauntily, his eyes never leaving the girl's flushed face; "we are always pleased to accommodate a pretty young lady like you, eh, Tom?" with an odious leer he nudged the elbow of his companion, who emitted a hoarse guffaw, and winked facetiously, as Christina turned a distressed glance in his direction. Unfortunately for her, the master of the shop was absent, and she was at the mercy of two of those underbred, mean-spirited curs, who regard any defenceless woman as lawful prey, and take the same delight in baiting her, as their ignoble ancestors took in baiting an equally defenceless dumb animal.
"You tell us what you want, miss," the man called Tom struck in, leaning across the counter, and tapping the girl's hand; "anything you ask in reason we shall be pleased to oblige you with. Now, what's this thing, and this thing, and this very pretty thing?" he ended facetiously, whilst his fellow shopman unfastened Christina's parcel, and opened the cardboard box it contained.
"It is a pendant," Christina faltered, afraid to show the indignation she felt, lest the men should refuse to give her what she needed; "it has been a long time in my family—and—I know it is very valuable."
"Oh! you know it is very valuable, do you?" queried the first man, mocking her trembling accents; "now, it is for us to tell you its value; not for you to tell us, you know. Hum! old-fashioned thing," he ejaculated, holding up to the light the piece of jewellery he had drawn from its box; "this sort of antique article may have suited our grandmothers, but it doesn't go down nowadays!"
"That is not at all the case," Christina answered boldly; "everybody likes antique things now; and that pendant is worth a great deal, as you know."
Anger was beginning to conquer her nervous tremors, and the odious smile with which her remark was received by both young men, made her draw herself up proudly.
"Hoity, toity!" said the man called Tom; "as we know, indeed. If Mr. Franks, my excellent friend and colleague," he made an exaggerated bow to his companion, "considers the bauble old-fashioned and worthless, it certainly is worthless and old-fashioned."
"It is certainly nothing of the kind," Christina cried, anger driving away the last semblance of nervousness. "I should be much obliged if you would tell me at once how much you can advance me upon it. If you are unable to give me anything, I can take it elsewhere." As she spoke, she looked straight into the smiling, insolent faces before her, her own grown rigid and proud; and in spite of her shabby clothing and obvious poverty, she suddenly assumed a look of imperial dignity, which had an instantaneous effect upon her tormentors.
"Come, come, miss; don't talk like that," the man called Franks said sheepishly; "we were just having a bit of fun over it, that's all. And I'm sure we'll give you the best we can for the pendant."
Christina's threat of taking the jewel elsewhere, had brought the shopmen sharply to their senses, for it had needed no more than a cursory glance, to show them both that the jewel the girl had brought them was of no small value, and they were uncomfortably aware that the vials of their master's wrath would be emptied upon their heads, if they allowed such an article to be disposed of in another establishment.
"It is a very pretty piece of work," the first man said, taking the pendant in his hand, and looking over it with a fine assumption of carelessness; "family initials, I suppose, in this twisted monogram?"
"I suppose so. I cannot give you any history of the pendant; I don't know its history myself. It came to me from my mother." Christina gave this piece of gratuitous information, feeling uneasily that it might be supposed she had stolen the beautiful piece of jewellery; and, with the thought, all the old associations that were interwoven with it swept into her mind, and almost choked further utterance.
"A.V.C.," the young man said slowly, deciphering the monogram, which, in exquisitely-chased gold, surmounted the pendant itself. This latter consisted of an emerald, remarkably vivid in colour, and set in the same finely-chased gold as that which formed the monogram. "A.V.C. would have been some ancestor of yours, no doubt?" he asked jocularly, and with another wink at his companion.
"I don't know," Christina repeated; "as I tell you, I know nothing of the jewel's history. I believe it to be a genuine emerald, and I am sure it is very valuable."
Both men simultaneously shrugged their shoulders and laughed, odious, deprecating laughs.
"My dear young lady," said Franks, who seemed to occupy a position superior to the other, "someone has been, as we say, 'getting at' you, if they told you this was agenuineemerald. Why! if it was an emerald, arealemerald, mind you, it would be worth"—and he raised his eyes to the ceiling, and lifted up his hands, as if to demonstrate the magnitude of a sum he could not mention in spoken language.
"Itisa real emerald, and it is worth a great deal," Christina said firmly, "but if you do not care to advance me what it is worth, I will take it away," and she put out her hand for the pendant, from which the gleams of light flashed brilliantly.
"Now look here," said Mr. Franks persuasively, "you believe me, missy; this is no more an emerald than I am, but it is a nice little bit of paste, and the gold is well worked. I'm taking a good bit upon myself in making the suggestion, and goodness knows what the boss will say to me when he comes home. But I'll take it off your hands for five pounds. There!" he ended triumphantly, as though convinced that the generosity must be a delicious surprise for his hearer.
"Five—pounds!"—Christina's voice rang with indignation—"five pounds for what you know as well as I do is worth twenty times that amount."
Franks laughed contemptuously, and began putting the ornament back into its box with elaborate care.
"You have an exaggerated idea of the thing's value," he said. "I couldn't undertake to offer you more than five pounds for it, and if you take my advice," he added darkly, with a swift glance at his colleague, and back at the girl, "you'll accept the offer, and let us have the thing altogether. You see," he coughed significantly, "awkward questions might be asked about a thing like this, with initials. If I did my business properly, I ought to ask you where you got it."
The colour ebbed out of Christina's face; the possibility that had confronted her a few minutes ago, had all at once taken definite form. This man was hinting—nay, more than hinting—that the pendant had come into her hands by unlawful means, and she had nothing but her word to prove her own statement.
"I have told you—that it belonged to my mother," she said tremblingly; "it is an old family ornament, and—I cannot part with it altogether."
"Look here, miss"—the man's voice became rough and harsh—"it's no use your coming old family ornaments over me. People with old family ornaments don't come to places like this pawning them. What price your 'old family,' eh?" He ended his coarse speech with a coarser laugh, at the sound of which Christina shrank and shivered.
"I will take back my pendant, please," she said, trying to regain her courageous tone. "I do not wish to sell it outright, and if you will not advance me anything on it, there is nothing more to be said."
"Not so fast, not so fast," the man called Tom exclaimed, pushing back the hand she once more extended towards the box. "What Mr. Franks says is very true—how do we know where you got this pendant? The more you go on making difficulties over letting it go, the more doubtful the whole affair looks. Now if you're really so badly in want of cash," he went on brutally, "you take what we offer—five pounds down. If you don't, we may feel ourselves obliged to send for the police—and——"
Quite unable, in her innocence, to understand that the two cowards were bullying her to the top of their bent;—already worn-out by the events of the day, and by many days of fatigue and under-feeding, a panic terror seized upon her. Before the astonished men were aware of her intention, she had reached over the counter, snatched the box from Franks's hand, and fled out of the shop and down the street, her heart beating to suffocation, her eyes wide with terror.
Never once looking back, she threaded her way along the pavement, oblivious of the expostulations of passers-by, against whom she brushed; almost unconscious of their very existence, in her frantic desire speedily to put as great a distance as possible between herself and the objectionable jewellers.
Heedless of the traffic, she dashed headlong over the crossings, and plunging into a network of by-streets, ran on still at full speed, possessed by the horrible fear that those men with the dreadful smiles, might already have put the police upon her track.
"I can't prove the pendant is mine," she panted breathlessly. "I have no proof that I didn't steal it. What can I say if they take me up as a thief?" The bare thought made her redouble her pace, although she was already on the verge of exhaustion, and her breath was coming in great gasps. Beads of perspiration stood on her forehead, and when at last she reached her own room, she was powerless to do more than sink upon a chair, shaking in every limb.
For many minutes she could only lean back, with closed eyes and ashen face, drawing long painful breaths, each one of which was a sob; but as a sense of safety grew upon her, she roused herself to light her lamp, and to draw off her damp clothing, preparatory to going to bed. Even with the slender supply of blankets Mrs. Jones allowed her lodgers, it would be warmer than sitting up without a fire; and she dared not allow herself the luxury of a fire, especially now that her last hope of raising money had been snatched from her.
"For I shall never dare take the pendant to show to anybody again," she thought, with a shudder. "The next person I went to might send for the police then and there. And perhaps it was horrible of me to think of pawning mother's pendant at all—only—I don't believe she would have minded, if she had known how dreadfully, dreadfully poor her little girl was going to be—and how hard it is for a girl even to get bread enough to keep from starvation. And I know this is worth—oh! a lot of money," she exclaimed pathetically, once more taking the ornament from its box, and holding it before her in the light of the lamp. As the green gleam of the stones flashed out before her eyes, the dreary room in which she sat, her squalid surroundings, even her own misery faded from her mind; she was back in the past—back in her mother's bedroom in the dear Devonshire home—her mother's dying voice sounding in her ears. Through the open window had drifted the song of the sea, mingling with the hum of bees amongst the roses that climbed to the very sill, and made the room fragrant with their sweetness. And a bird had sung—ah! how it had sung, on that last night of her mother's life, when Christina felt that her life too was going down into the dark for ever.
"My little girl"—how faint the gentle voice had been!—"I—can't stay—now father has gone; he—and I—could not ever be apart. He is my world—-all my world." The dim resentment which Christina, the child, had sometimes experienced, because those two beings she loved best had seemed so remote from her, so perfectly able to live their lives without her, had smitten the girl Christina afresh as she listened to her mother's words. Her father and mother had been so wrapped up in one another, always so wholly sufficient for each other's needs, that their child had played a very secondary part in their lives. And the child had dimly resented it.
Through all the sorrow that filled her heart as she stood beside her mother's deathbed, that smouldering resentment would not be wholly stilled. Her mother could barely spare a thought for the girl she was leaving to face the world alone, because her husband filled her whole soul; she could remember only that he had gone before her into the silent land, and that she must hasten to join him again.
"You are so young," the dying voice had murmured on, whilst the fast dimming eyes looked, not at her little daughter, but at the blue sky outside the window, "somebody will want you some day—as—Ronald—wanted me—as—he wants me still."
Christina did not answer, only her eyes followed her mother's glance out to the deep blue sky framed by the nodding roses round the window; and she wondered dully whether anybody would really care for her some day, or whether there was something inherently unlovable in her, seeing that her own father and mother had seemed to find her so little worthy of love.
The bitter thought passed. She bent over her mother, and gently stroked back the damp hair from her forehead.
"I shall—be able—to take care of myself," she said bravely, "and——"
"Be good, my little girl," the murmuring voice broke in, "be good—and come to us some day—Ronald and I will be there—together. I want—to tell you—the pendant—the emerald pendant"—a look of excitement flashed into her eyes; she made a great effort to raise herself in the bed, but such effort was far beyond her feeble strength—"I can't tell—you—now," she gasped; "later—after—sleep—the pendant—take—the—emerald; tell Arthur"—and at that word her strength suddenly failed, her eyes closed, she slipped down among her pillows, in an unconsciousness from which she never again awoke.
All through the fragrant summer night following that sunshiny afternoon, Christina had watched beside her, hoping against hope that some faint knowledge of outward things would return to her, that the strange unfinished sentence might be ended.
"I want to tell you," her mother had said. What was it she wished to tell her daughter? What was the meaning of those strange words that seemed so incoherent and without sense?
"The pendant—take—the—emerald—tell Arthur——"
But no glimmer of consciousness crossed the still white face; the eyes that had last looked at the sunny sky of June, and the nodding roses, opened no more upon this world's sunshine and flowers, the faltering voice was silenced for ever; and in the grey dawn of morning Christina's mother had passed to the land where she and the man she loved would part no more.
The vision faded. Christina was back again in the present—the dull light of the oil lamp shining on the jewel she held—in the clammy cold of a November evening, that was as far removed from the sunny sweetness of June, as her sordid room was removed from the rose-scented fragrance of her old home.
"I wonder what she wanted to tell me," the girl mused again; as she had mused countless times before; "what could she have meant when she said those words:
"The pendant—take—the—emerald—tell Arthur——"
"I wonder who Arthur could have been."
"Will the lady who on Monday morning brought Baba home out of the fog, kindly call at 100, Eaton Square, any time between eleven and one o'clock?"
The words seemed to start from the printed page before Christina's eyes, and she read them over and over again with growing wonder. It was Friday morning, two days after her two disastrous visits—one to the shut-up house in Bayswater, the other to the insolent jewellers—and with difficulty she had managed to crawl round to the Free Library, feeling that she dared leave no stone unturned in a fresh search for work. The day before she had perforce spent in bed, for her day of fatigue, emotion, and exposure to the weather, had been followed by a night of fever and aching limbs; and on the Thursday morning she could scarcely lift her head from the pillow. But on Friday, realising affrightedly that each day brought her nearer to absolute destitution, she made a herculean effort, got up and dressed, and, feeling more dead than alive, dragged herself to the library, to study the monotonous advertisement columns of the newspapers. And having wearily glanced down the familiarly-worded lines, in which nursery governesses and companions were asked for, at wages that would not satisfy the average kitchen-maid, she turned to the front page of theMorning Post, and found herself confronted with the advertisement that now held her astonished eyes:
"Will the lady who on Monday morning brought Baba home out of the fog, kindly call at 100, Eaton Square, any time between eleven and one o'clock."
Unless there were two Babas in the world, and two ladies who had taken them home out of the fog, she herself was clearly the person indicated by the advertisement; and as the square in which the bewitching baby had been taken from her by an excited footman, was certainly Eaton Square, she had little doubt but that the advertiser wished to thank, and perhaps to reward, her. A hot flush came into her white cheeks as the word "reward" entered her mind; all her instincts revolted against the notion of being rewarded for doing what had been a most obvious duty. But with the instinct of revolt came also a little rush of hope. To the tired girl the advertisement seemed like a friendly hand outstretched towards her; and though pride whispered to her to pay no heed to it, and to ignore it altogether, the sense that kindliness towards a total stranger had prompted the advertisement, fought hard with pride. After all, if she went to 100, Eaton Square, she need accept nothing at the hands of the inmates: that they should wish to thank her for the safe return of their little one was only natural, and it would be churlish of her to refuse to be thanked.
In her excitement, she omitted to take down any addresses of employers; for the first time since she had begun to haunt the Free Library, she went out of its doors without a list of names to which letters must be written, setting forth her own qualifications for tending children, or amusing the elderly. She had actually forgotten to draw from her pocket the sheet of notepaper she never failed to bring with her on her morning quest, so full was her mind of the coming visit to Eaton Square. Her weary limbs still refused to hurry, and she walked slowly back to her lodgings, "to make herself tidy," as she put it, before venturing into what was to her an actually new world. Her heart was beating very fast as she rang the bell of the great Eaton Square mansion, and, thanks partly to nervousness, partly to fatigue, her legs were trembling so much, that she was obliged to clutch at the wall for support, to prevent herself from falling. A footman flung open the door—a tall, rather supercilious footman, whose face was not the good-natured, foolish face of the James who had lifted the red-cloaked baby from her arms. This man looked the visitor up and down with a comprehensive stare, which held in it both enquiry and contempt, and had the effect of banishing Christina's small remnant of courage.
"Could I—see—the lady of the house?" she asked.
"What might you want with her?" the servant demanded with a sniff.
"There was an advertisement in to-day'sMorning Post," the girl answered, her voice shaking with nervous weariness; "it said, 'call between eleven and one'—and I came to——"
"Come after the place, have you?"—the footman's tone changed to one of huge condescension. "Oh! well, step in, and I'll see if her ladyship can see you."
"The place!—her ladyship!" Christina looked at the man with bewildered eyes, and said faintly—"I don't know anything about a place. I have not come for that. Only the advertisement said, 'call between eleven and one o'clock.'"
"Step inside," came the short order, whilst Henry, the first footman, inwardly remarked that he wished her ladyship wouldn't go putting in advertisements, and not mentioning them to the establishment. "Take a seat there, and I'll ascertain whether her ladyship is disengaged."
Had Christina been in her normal health, the man's grandiloquent manner and language would have amused her. With her nerves at high tension, her limbs trembling, and her whole frame exhausted and weary, she felt only a great inclination either to flee out of the front door, or to sit down and cry. The hall, softly-carpeted and warm, fragrant with the flowers massed in great pots at the foot of the staircase, and quiet with the stillness of a well-ordered house, oppressed her. The solemn voice of a grandfather clock in the corner, had only the effect of making the prevailing silence more noticeable, and Christina experienced a wild longing to scream, or to burst into uncontrollable laughter, just to break the stillness which weighed upon her like a nightmare.
"Will you come this way, please?"
She started violently as the footman's voice sounded close to her. His footstep on the thick pile of the stair carpet had been quite inaudible, and she was surprised to see him once more beside her. At his bidding she rose mechanically, and followed him up the wide staircase, whose soft carpet was a bewildering novelty to the girl accustomed to the simplest surroundings, across a landing, fragrant, like the hall, with growing roses and exotic plants, into a small boudoir, in which she found herself alone. In all her twenty years of life she had never before been in a room like this room, and, standing in the centre of it, just where her guide had left her, she looked round her timidly, and drew a long breath of admiration and amazement.
The murkiness of the November day that darkened the world outside, did not appear to enter into this lovely apartment, which gave Christina a sense of summer and sunshine.
"It is just like a pink rose," she said to herself, her eyes wandering from the walls, delicately tinted a soft rose colour, to the sofa and chairs upholstered in a deeper shade of the same colour, and the carpet, whose darker tint of rose harmonised with the paler hues. Every table seemed to the girl to overflow with books and magazines; bowls of flowers, vases of flowers, pots of flowers, stood on every available shelf, and in every possible corner. The windows were draped with rose-coloured silk curtains, that made even the grey sky beyond them look less grey, and the pictures on the walls drew a gasp of delight from Christina's lips. They were mainly landscapes, and in almost every case they represented wide spaces, open tracts of country, that gave one a sense of life and freshness. Here was an expanse of sea, blue and smiling as the sky that stooped to meet it; there, long green rollers swept up a sandy beach, whilst clouds lit up by a rift of sunshine, lay on the horizon. On this side was a moorland, purple with heather, bathed in the glory of the setting sun; on that side, a plain, far-reaching as the sea itself, soft and green and misty, bounded by mountains, whose snow-crowned summits stood out in serried stateliness against the faint blue sky. In a looking-glass hanging on the wall, Christina caught sight of her own reflection, and a shamed consciousness of her white face and shabby clothes, gave her a sense of the incongruousness between her own appearance, and the loveliness around her. But this uneasy sense of discrepancy had barely entered her mind, when the door opened, and there entered a tiny personage, whose daintiness made Christina all at once feel huge, awkward, and ungainly.
"It was sweet of you to come," the little lady exclaimed, holding out to the girl a white hand flashing with diamonds, "you are the kind lady who brought my Baba home? Henry was very incoherent; he always is, in a grand, long-winded way of his own. But I gathered from his meandering remarks, that you had come in answer to my advertisement."
"Yes," Christina answered; "I saw it—the advertisement—in theMorning Postto-day. I thought it was so kind of you to advertise, that I came. But, of course, when I brought the darling baby home, I only did what everybody else would have done," she added, rather breathlessly.
"A lady—and very proud," the thought ran through her listener's brain; but aloud the little lady only said:
"I can't put into words how grateful I am to you, all the same. You see, my little girlie is my ewe lamb—my only child—and she is very precious. If anything had happened to her, I—oh! but we mustn't talk about dreadful things that might happen, when I hope they never will. Baba was a naughty monkey to run out alone. But she is rather a sweet monkey, isn't she?"
"She is one of the dearest babies I ever saw," Christina answered simply, sitting down in the chair her hostess pushed forward for her, and feeling some of her awkwardness slipping from her, in presence of this kindly, dainty little lady. With girlish enthusiasm her eyes drank in the loveliness of the other's fair face, its delicate colouring, its crown of bright hair; the perfection of the tiny form, the gracefulness of the dead black gown, that fell in exactly the right folds, and was hung as no dress of poor little Christina's had ever been persuaded to hang.
"Baba—we call her Baba, because her own name, Veronica, is so big for such a baby—has managed to get rather out of hand since her nurse left. We do try not to spoil her, but we don't always succeed very well. I think you must be very fond of children—aren't you? You made a great impression on Baba."
"I love little children," Christina answered, with the simplicity and sincerity which characterised her; "since I have had to earn my own living, I have been a nursery governess."
"It is very absurd, but I don't even know your name, and I daresay you are equally ignorant of mine?" the little lady in the armchair exclaimed, with a gay laugh. "Rupert did not put any name in the advertisement; he said it was wiser not—but I am Lady Cicely Redesdale, and Baba, as I say, is my only child, and—very precious." Lady Cicely's blue eyes looked thoughtfully at Christina, her last words were spoken absently.
"I did not even know into which house the small girl was carried on Monday," Christina replied, laughing also; "the footman ran along the pavement when he saw us, and until I read your advertisement to-day, I had no idea which number in the square was the one he had come from. My name is Moore—Christina Moore—and I live in Maremont Street."
"In Maremont Street? But—isn't that rather a—wretched neighbourhood for you? Do your people live there?"
"I have no people," the girl answered, an unconscious wistfulness in her eyes that appealed to Lady Cicely's kind heart. "I lost my father and mother three years ago, and since then I have been living with some friends, and taking care of their children. But now they have gone to Canada and I am alone in the world." It was said without anyarrière pensée; no thought of exploiting her loneliness crossed Christina's mind. The sympathetic glance of the blue eyes watching her, led her on to frankness of speech, and to speak to an educated lady again was a delight, to which for the past few months she had been an entire stranger.
"And you—are obliged to work for yourself?" Lady Cicely put the question with hesitating kindliness.
"Oh, yes"—a faint smile crossed Christina's face—"and just now it is rather hard to get. Nobody seems to want the sort of work that I can do. You see, I have had very little education—not enough to teach big children—and I have no certificates or diplomas, or anything. I don't think my father ever dreamt that I should have to earn my own living, or he would have had me trained to do it."
"But you have taken care of little children?" again Lady Cicely's eyes searched the girl's face earnestly—"and you are very fond of them?"
"I love them," Christina said, for the third time, "and I am never tired of being with them, and taking care of them. But there are such lots of other girls like me, with very few qualifications, and so, though I answer ever so many advertisements, I can't get a place."
"Do you mind waiting here just a moment?" Lady Cicely asked abruptly. "I—I should like you to see Baba before you go; perhaps we might find—we might think——" and with this vague sentence, the small lady went out of the room, leaving Christina puzzled and wondering.
Lady Cicely meanwhile hurried downstairs to the library, where a man sat looking over a mass of legal papers.
"Rupert," she exclaimed impetuously, "it is the girl who brought Baba back, and my brain is teeming with plans for helping her."
"Is she a young person?"
"No, no—a lady. Very shabby, very tired-looking, very poor, I should guess; but unmistakably a lady. And—I'm so sorry for her, Rupert; she is just a slip of a girl, who looks as if she wanted mothering."
"Now, Cicely, do you wish to embark on the mother's rôle? As one of your trustees, let me warn you I shan't allow any quixotism."
"Leave those tiresome old papers for five minutes, and come and see this girl. I don't want to be quixotic, and I am ready to abide by your judgment, but come and look at Miss Moore."
"The tiresome old papers are fairly important deeds connected with your estate, and the future inheritance of your daughter, Miss Veronica Joan Redesdale," her cousin answered with a laugh; "but I suppose your ladyship's whims must take precedence of your property. Where is Miss Moore?"
"In my boudoir, and very shy. I am sure she was afraid at first that I meant to offer her money, there was a sort of proud shrinking in her eyes—and she has very pretty eyes, too. Of course, my ideahadbeen to offer her money, because I imagined she would be of the shop-girl type, but I should as soon think of offering you money, as of suggesting giving it to Miss Moore."
"Come along, then; let us get the inspection over. But, if you can't give her money, what do you propose to do with her?"
"I—thought"—Lady Cicely paused, glanced into her cousin's grave face, and glanced away again—"I fancied, perhaps, I might help her to get work. She is horribly poor, and she looks half-fed, and so tired. I—well—I—really and truly, Rupert, I wondered whether she could come here as nurse to Baba."
A low whistle was Rupert's response, then he said slowly—
"You didn't suggest this to her, did you? You are so kind, so impulsive, but, remember this girl is a perfect stranger. She may be—anything. As you yourself told me two days ago, you must have unimpeachable references with anyone who takes charge of Baba."
"Of course I said nothing to her. Now, Rupert, I know I am impulsive, but I am not entirely devoid of all common sense. Come and give me your opinion, and I promise—yes, I absolutelypromise—to be guided by you."
Rupert's grey eyes smiled down with brotherly affection into his little cousin's face, and he followed her obediently from the room, and upstairs, wondering vaguely why it was, that, much as he cared for and admired Cicely, she had never inspired him with any deeper affection. Like an elder brother to her from her earliest childhood, the brotherly relation had continued between them after Cicely's marriage, and it had been by her dead husband's most earnest wish, and specified instructions, that Mernside was one of her trustees and Baba's guardians, and Mr. Redesdale had bidden his wife consult Rupert about everything connected with the estate and its baby heiress.
On the landing at the head of the stairs a small figure with flying golden curls, and filmy white frock, flung herself upon her mother, shrieking delightedly.
"Baba's runned away from Jane. Now Baba come with mummy."
"Oh, Baba, you are not a good baby," Cicely exclaimed, with an attempt at severity, which only produced a chuckle from the small girl; "it is time mummy found a very stern nurse. Nevertheless her appearance is opportune," she said,sotto voce, to Rupert. "I told Miss Moore I would fetch Baba, and I don't want her to feel she is being inspected. Run on into mummy's boudoir, sweetheart," she added aloud to the child, "there's somebody there for Baba to see."
It was a pretty sight which greeted the two elders when, a moment later, they entered the rose-coloured room; and Rupert paused for an instant in the doorway, to look and smile. Baba, after one short glance at the stranger, who had risen from her chair, made a rush across the room towards her, clasped her round the knees, and cried fervently—
"Dat's Baba's lady, what found her in the ugly fog. Kiss Baba," and, at the moment of their entrance, Rupert and Cicely saw the girl stoop and lift the baby in her arms, with a tenderness that marked a true child lover, and an absence of self-consciousness induced by her ignorance that two pairs of eyes were fixed upon her.
"Baba loves you very much," the child babbled on, her soft fingers touching Christina's white face, "and thank you for bringing Baba home. Pretty lady," she added suddenly, "Baba like when the pinky colour goes all up and down your cheeks." For, at that moment, the girl had become aware of the presence, not only of Lady Cicely, but of a tall stranger with grave grey eyes, and a rosy flush swept over the whiteness of her face.
"Baba has not forgotten you," the former said, with her gay little laugh. "Rupert, this is Miss Moore, who so kindly brought naughty Baba home out of the fog. My cousin is Baba's guardian, Miss Moore, and he is as grateful to you as I am."
Christina, in her embarrassment, did not observe Lady Cicely's omission of the tall stranger's surname; Cicely herself was unconscious that she had not said it, and Rupert was only intent on setting the girl at her ease.
"Baba seems to be bestowing her own thanks in her own violent way," he said, as the child's dimpled arms were flung again round Christina's neck, and her soft face pressed against the girl's flushed one; "but we all owe you a debt of gratitude for having found, and brought her back. London streets are not the safest place for little babies of that age, with pearl necklaces round their necks."
"That was what I thought," Christina exclaimed impulsively; "at least—I mean," she stammered, "I couldn't help being glad that I was the first person to find her, and that it was not one of the dreadful people who do prowl about in fogs, who saw her first."
"We are most thankful for that, too," Rupert answered; and then, being a man of the world, he skilfully led the conversation to more general subjects, until Christina was soon talking quietly and naturally, with no more tremors or self-consciousness.
When, a few minutes later, she rose to go, Lady Cicely held her hands in a clasp that was very comforting to the weary girl, and said gently—
"I am not going to worry you with more thank-yous; but I want you to come and see me again in a day or two. I think, perhaps, I may be able to hear of some work that would suit you."
As Christina wended her way homewards, she felt, tired though she was, as if her feet trod on air. Hope was once more fully alive within her. Lady Cicely's lovely face and charming manner had bewitched the girl, and she was sure—quite, quite sure—that if the sweet little blue-eyed lady said she would do something for her, that something would infallibly be done. And—the tall cousin, with the grave grey eyes, and the mouth that seemed to Christina to be set in lines of pain? Those grey eyes and that firmly-set mouth, haunted her during the whole course of her walk, and through her mind there flashed unbidden the thought—
"I—wish I could comfort him. I am sure he is unhappy."
Her way led her past the newspaper shop kept by Mr. Coles, and the little man himself was standing at his door surveying the world.
"There is a letter in here for you, miss," he said good-naturedly; "it came yesterday morning, and the wife and I made sure you'd be in for it."
Christina started. The events of the day had obliterated from her mind all recollection of the matrimonial advertisement, and the letters that were to be addressed to Mr. Coles's shop. The memory of Wednesday's disappointment came back to her, and as Mr. Coles put into her hand a letter addressed "C.M." in the same bold, strong hand that had addressed the other letter, her momentary inclination was to return it to its writer unopened.
"Perhaps there is some explanation," was her next and saner reflection; and, walking along the street, she opened, and read the letter, feeling a certain compunction as she did so. The address was still that of the newspaper office, and the letter ran—