"Father, have pity!"
"You have thwarted the scheme of my life. But what was my strongest wish when it clashed with your girlish fancy? Listen. Do you know what I have suffered in this colony? I have suffered privation, hunger, misery, raging thirst, over and over again. I have walked, with blistered feet, hundreds and hundreds of miles; I have laboured with my axe till I was faint with fatigue; I have hidden from Blacks in fear of my life; I have been left for dead upon the burning plains; I have been lost in the bush until my whole being was one great despair! Was this a pleasant life to lead, and did I deserve no recompense? Was life so sweet to me, with those burdens, that I should enjoy it in the then present? I had a child--a daughter. But for her I might have grown into a wild man of the bush, and growled at the world and at humanity. I had provocation enough, for I was poor. Men who knew me when I first came to the colony, and when I had money, knew me not when I lost it. I lost my wife, too; and I had but my daughter and my poverty left. Then, when men turned their backs to me, and I felt the bitterness of it--(I know now that they were right; poverty should be shunned)--I bent all my mind and soul to the one desire--to make money. A slice of good fortune fell to my share. I resolved to grow rich, and to make my daughter rich. I toiled, I slaved, I schemed for her. I had an object, and life was less bitter than before. I said, My daughter shall be the envy of those who knew me when I was poor; she shall marry riches, and grow into fashion and into power from the force of her father's and her husband's money. She shall be called the rich squatter's daughter, and her children shall be educated to rule the State. I knew well then, and know well now, the power of gold; it could do all this for me, and more. There is no aristocracy in this colony but the aristocracy of wealth; money is the god all worship here! It ennobles the mean, it dignifies the vulgar. It is all powerful. See what it does for me. What fascinations, what graces, what virtues, do I possess, that people should cringe to me and adulate me? And as they idolize me, a man of money, for my wealth, so I idolize my wealth for what it brings me."
As he spoke from the vile selfishness of his heart, did the wailing wind, sighing mournfully around him, suggest to his mind no more precious thing in the world than gold? Did the pale stars and the restless waves teach no lesson that such an egotist might learn, and be the better for the learning? Did they tell no story from which he might have learned a noble creed, had he but listened to their teaching? No! he felt not their influence. He lived only in himself. What was Nature to him? She gave him nothing that he should be grateful for; what he received, all others received. And so he beheld the swelling waves, and heard the wailing wind, and looked up to the glimmering stars with indifference. What was the glory of the heavens to him or to his life? A handful of gold and a sightful of stars! Was not the gold which bought him human worship, more precious to him than all?
"Oh, father!" murmured Alice: "money is not everything."
"Money is everything," he replied; "everything to me. Can you undo, with a word, the study of my life? It was but little I asked in return for the future I was working out for you. The man I selected for you had wealth, position. Even if you had failed (as youhavefailed, but in a different manner) in the duty you owed to me, I could not have forced the man upon you; even although you knew it was the only reward I coveted for my life's labour, and refused at the last moment to give it to me, you might still have been the daughter of my heart, as you are of my blood. But to fly from me tohim--a penniless adventurer, a shallow, brainless coxcomb!" The thought seemed to cool his passion, and exclaiming, "Why do I waste my time here?" he made a movement towards the house.
"Stop, for pity's sake," Alice cried, stretching forth her arms; "stop and hear me."
"Speak on," he said, between his clenched teeth. There was no hope in his voice; it was hard and bitter.
"I came to-night, sir," Alice said, humbly bowing her head, and forcing back her tears, "to appeal to you for the last time. You may send me away, unhappy and broken-hearted--indeed, I am that already--but oh, sir! reflect before you do so, and let your better feelings guide you. Ah, sir! are all your thoughts about yourself and your money, and have you no thought of me? I do not know a parent's feelings, but soon"--and here her voice faltered--"soon I may become a mother--forgive me, sir, these tears--I try to conquer them, but they are too strong for me." She paused a few moments, and then continued: "What sympathy, sir, could you expect me, a simple girl, to have with your aspirations? I knew them not, and if you had confided them to me, I should not have understood them--"
"Have you come to tutor me, girl?" he asked, coldly.
"No, sir. If my distress and my misery have no weight with you, what can my poor words do? My husband--forgive me--I must speak of him."
"Go on."
"My husband, to whose fate and lot I am linked for ever--for ever," she repeated firmly, "is willing to work for me, is contented to keep me, poor and friendless as I am. But he needs help. Give it him; give it me, and I will trouble you no more. I will be content, so that you assist us to live."
"Your husband is a man; he can work like other men. Let him do so. He shall not live upon my bounty. No man need starve in this land of plenty. Let him work, if he be not too proud."
"He is not too proud, sir. He has tried to get work, but failed. Help him in his endeavor--you can do so. You have power, influence. And think, sir, that even if I would, I cannot undo the past."
"Would you, if you could?"
"For pity's sake, sir, do not ask me."
"Would you, if you could?" he repeated, relentlessly.
"Then, sir, as you insist," she returned, "I reply, as is my duty, No. He is my husband, and my future life is linked with his."
"Have you done?"
"I have but little more to say, sir. I feel from your voice that there is scant hope for me! But oh, sir, before you turn from me, think of what my future may be if you remain inexorable. You, who have undergone privations in your early life, know what a stern master is necessity. As yet, my husband is saved from crime--"
"Is this your last argument?" he interrupted. "It has no weight with me. You cannot more disgrace me than you have already done. Here let this end. Iaminexorable."
His voice, stern and unforgiving, carried conviction with it.
"Heaven help me!" she exclaimed sadly. "Then we must trust to chance." And she turned from him, weeping.
There was a pause, and then he said, "I will not leave you entirely unsatisfied. It is money, I suppose, you want. Here are fifty pounds. It is the last you will ever receive from me while he and you are together. Good night."
She raised her arms imploringly, but he was making towards the house. He saw not the entreating action, nor did he hear the low wailing sobs which broke from her as he walked away. A sad contrast was her drooping figure upon the lonely sands to the glad life that moved in the merchant's house! A sad accompaniment were her sobs to the strains of music and the sounds of light laughter with which they mingled! The guests within were joyous, while she, who should have been his one joy, stood desolate on the shore. But despite her misery there was hope deep within her heart--hope of a happy future yet with the man with whose lot hers was linked. Her father had cast her off; but love remained--love strong and abiding. How great the contrast! A good woman's love and a hard man's greed of gold!
Hunger has many phases; but in every phase except its physical one it is comparative. Thus, a person may be eagerly desirous, hungry, for something which his neighbour has, but which his neighbour, possessing, does not value and thinks of no regard. What is wanted is a moral, equable dispensation; yet if by any possibility such could be arranged, false weights would be sure to be introduced, and things would be unequal as before. And so the world goes on hungering, and one hungry class groans for that with which the belly of another hungry class is filled. Every step in the ladder of life is thronged with climbers ready to reach the next, and although some be twenty rounds above others, they are as restlessly unhappy in their high position, and as restlessly desirous of getting a foot higher, as those who are so far beneath them. It is the way of the world. The heaven is always above us, and we climb, and climb, and climb, and never reach our hopes.
And yet some of our desires are very small. Ambition is various; large-souled aspirations and the meanest of cravings come within its scope. Casually, we admire the aspirations of a noble mind which looks above and beyond the grovelling littleness of humanity, and strives to reach a goal where dwell the nobler virtues, studded with the jewels of their worth and goodness. Casually, we pass by, as scarcely worthy of contempt, certainly not worthy of notice, the paltry desires for common things which fill some creatures' souls. Nevertheless, the aspiration which stretches itself towards the nobler virtues may be no finer than the paltry desire which pines for common things. 'Tis ten to one that the latter is more human; and what is human must be good, notwithstanding what some preachers say about the corruption of flesh, and the vanity of desire.
Ask Grif. How paltry, how mean is his ambition! Ask him, in such language as he can understand, what it is he most desires, what it is he most craves for? He will answer, in his own way, Sufficient of the commonest food to eat in the day, and a shelter and blanket to cover him in the night. Is it his fault that he strives no higher? His hungry body cries out to him, and he responds to its prompting. He does not openly rebel against his fate. He knows thatit is, and, without any concerted action of the mind to assist him to that conclusion, he feels that he cannot alter it. He does not repine; he only wonders sometimes that things are so. Of course, when he is hungry he suffers; that he cannot help. But he suffers in silence, and thereby shows that he has within him the qualities that would make a hero. But still the fact remains that he aspires no higher; still the fact remains that he is dead to the conscious exercise of the nobler virtues. Spread them before him, if such were possible, and he would not even wonder. But his eyes would light up, and all his intellectual forces would be gratified, at the sight of a bone with a little meat upon it. Such is Grif, a human waif living in the midst of a grand and mighty civilisation.
Is it possible that this same civilisation, of which we comfortable ones prate and vaunt, depraves as well as ennobles? The thought is pertinent to the subject. For here is Grif (unquestionably depraved and debased in the eyes of that civilisation which does nothing for him, which absolutely turns its back upon him), a piece of raw material out of which much good might be wrought, suffering much unmerited suffering, and surrounded by an atmosphere of actively-conscious vice. The law looks unkindly upon him; policemen push him aside as if he were an interloper in the world; and well-dressed people shrink from contact with him as he slouches by. Civilisation presses upon him unkindly. He does not deserve it. There is a better nature within him than he is called upon to exercise in his intercourse with his enemy, the world. The chord of that better nature has been touched by Alice, so kindly, so commiseratingly, that every nerve in his frame quivers with a passionate longing to serve her. He can reckon on the fingers of one hand the objects for which he has any human affection. Alice he loves far beyond the others, for he feels that she is different to them. He has seen that she is unselfish and self-sacrificing; and he knows (though he could not express it in so many words) that she is good from principle, and that she is pure because it is her nature to be pure. He has heard her renounce ease and comfort, and choose poverty and suffering, so that she might play the good angel to the man whom she loves. And at the goodness of that renunciation, at the holiness of it, Grif fell down and worshipped her with all his soul. Then there was Milly: his love for her had no adoration in it, but was born of pity, tenderness, and gratitude. He would do much to serve Milly, for she had been very kind to him. Then came Little Peter. Grif loved that other little waif because he was so helpless, and because it was so sweet to have some one to cherish and take care of. His love for Little Peter had in it something of the love of a mother. He asked for no reward in the shape of gratitude. It was sufficient for him that Peter was dependent upon him--was his to protect. It is truly more blessed to give than to receive!
Counting, then, upon one hand the objects of his love, Grif could mention Alice, Milly, and Little Peter, and still leave a finger unprovided for. A short time since--only two days ago--the dog Rough would have closed the list; but Rough was dead, and the finger might be regarded as widowed. Yes, Rough was dead. Grif's faithful follower, his dumb companion, his honest servant, was gone--poisoned, murdered, meanly killed! Tears, born of rage and desolation, came into Grif's eyes as he thought of the death and the manner of it. But the murderer! Revengeful justice found strong expression when Grif swore and swore again that he would be even with the villain who had murdered his dog.
It was the second night after the burial, and Grif and Little Peter were sitting upon the ground near the grave. Grif was mourning for his lost friend; if Rough had been his brother he could not have mourned with more genuine grief. The night was chilly, and the wind whistled sharply about the rags in which the boys were clothed. But they were too much engrossed in special cares and griefs to pay more attention to the remorseless wind than was expressed by a cold shiver now and then, and an involuntary huddling together of their limbs. "I wouldn't care if Rough was alive," mused Grif. "If he'd only come when I whistle!" And the next moment he absolutely whistled the old familiar call, and looked down, almost expecting to feel Rough's cold nose rubbing against his hand. Disappointed in this, he looked to Little Peter for sympathy.
He got none. Little Peter's nature was not sympathetic, and Grif obtained no response from Little Peter's eyes or tongue as he placed his hand against the lad's cheek. How thin and pale was that poor little face of poor Little Peter's! What weariness of the trouble of living was expressed in the attitude of his body and in every line of his features! As he sat, drooping, trembling, hollow-cheeked, wistful-eyed, he looked like a shrunken old child-man with every drop of healthful life-blood squeezed clean out of him.
Gazing at the drooping figure, Grif forgot his own grief, and saying "Poor Little Peter!" in a tone of much pity, drew closer to the lad, and sat motionless for many minutes. Then he rose.
"Come along, Peter," he said, "it's time we was off."
But Little Peter did not move.
"Asleep, Peter?" asked Grif.
A slight quivering of Little Peter's body was the only reply.
"Wake up, Peter!" persisted Grif, shaking him gently by the shoulder.
Still Little Peter made no response, but sat quiet, with head drooping to his knees.
Grif knelt quickly upon the ground, and raised Peter's head. The large eyes opened slowly and gazed vacantly at Grif, and a strong trembling took possession of Peter. His limbs relaxed, and he would have fallen upon his face to the earth had not Grif caught him in his arms. Where he lay, trembling and shivering.
"He's took ill!" cried Grif, with a sudden apprehension. "They won't take him in at the horspital! What shall I do?"
Grif, aware of the necessity of immediate action, lifted Little Peter upon his shoulder. As he did so, and as Little Peter's head sank forward upon Grif s breast, a small stone heart, hanging from a piece of common string, fell from the little fellow's neck. Grif caught it in his hand and held it. Ever since he had known Peter this little stone heart had been round the boy's neck. He would have lost it long ago, had it been of any value; but its worthlessness was its security. So with the stone heart in his hand and Peter upon his shoulder, Grif walked slowly back to the city. Now and then a wayfarer stopped and looked after ragged Grif and his ragged burden. But Grif walked steadily on, taking no notice of curiosity mongers. Once he was stopped by a policeman, who questioned him.
"He's my brother," said Grif, telling the lie without the smallest compunction, "and he's took ill. I'm carryin' of him home."
Carrying of him home! The words caused Grif to reflect and ask himself where heshouldcarry Little Peter. The barrel? Clearly, that was not a fit place for the sick lad. He knew what he would do. He would take Peter to Milly's house. Grif's instincts were nearly always right.
Soon he was in the city, and choosing the quietest streets, he made his way to the quarter where Milly lived. There was a light in her room. He walked slowly up the stairs, and knocked at the door. No answer came. He knocked again, and listened. A sound of soft singing reached his ears, and opening the door, he entered the room and stood still.
Milly was at the further end of the room, kneeling by the side of a bed on which lay a baby asleep. Her hands were clasped, and she was smiling, and singing softly to herself, and looking at the face of her baby, the while she gently swayed her body to and fro. He stood wondering. "I never knowed she had a baby," he muttered inly, under his breath.
Love and devotion were expressed in every curve of the girl's body. The outline of her face, her hair hanging loosely down, the graceful undulations of her figure, were beautiful to look at. She was singing some simple words which might have been sung to her when she was a sinless child, and the good influence of sweet remembrance was upon her, and robed her with tenderness.
"Milly!" whispered Grif.
She turned quickly at the sound, and seeing Grif, cautioned him by signs not to make a noise; and then, after placing her cheek caressingly against her baby's, came towards him.
"What do you want, Grif?" she asked. "Who have you got there?"
"It's Little Peter," said Grif, placing the boy on the ground; "he's took ill, and I don't know what to do."
Milly raised Peter's head to her lap, and bent over him.
"Poor Little Peter!" she said. "How white he is, and how thin! Perhaps he's hungry."
"No," said Grif. "I know what's the matter with him. He caught cold t'other night, when I took him with me to bury my dawg. It was rainin' hard, and we both got soppin' wet. It didn't matter for me, but he was always a pore little chap. I ought to have knowed better."
"To bury your dog!" repeated Milly. "Why, I saw him with you the night before last."
"Yes, Milly, that was when you gave me that shillin'. Rough was all right then. But he was pizened that night."
"Poisoned!"
"Yes," very mournfully.
"Who poisoned him?"
"The Tenderhearted Oysterman."
"The mean hound!"
"He heerd me say somethin' agin him when I was speakin' to you, Milly, so he took it out of me by pizenin' the dawg. But I'll be even with him!"
By this time Milly had undressed Little Peter, and placed him in the bed by the side of her baby.
"There!" she said. "He'll be all right to-morrow. I'll make him some gruel presently. He's got a bad cold, and wants keeping warm."
"You're a good sort, Milly," said Grif, gratefully. "I'd have carried him to the horspital, but I didn't think they'd take him in."
"No; they wouldn't take him there without a ticket, and where could you have gotthatfrom?"
"Blest if I know!" exclaimed Grif. "Nobody would givemea ticket, I shouldn't think!" This remark was made by Grif in a tone sufficiently indicative of his sense of his abasement.
"But I say, Milly," he continued, "I didn't know you had a baby. May I look at him?"
"It's a little girl," said Milly, smiling, leading Grif towards the bed, and turning down the coverlid so that he might get a peep of baby's face. "Isn't she a beauty?"
Grif bent over the bed, and timidly put his hand upon baby's. The little creature involuntarily grasped one of Grit's dirty fingers in her dimpled fist, and held it fast.
"It's like a bit of wax," said Grif, contemplating with much admiration the difference between baby's pretty hand and his own coarse fingers. "Will she always be as nice, Milly?"
"You were like that once, Grif," Milly remarked.
"Was I, though?" he replied, reflectively; "I shouldn't have thought it. How did I come like this I wonder?"
Here the baby opened her eyes--which had a very wide-awake look in them, as if she had been shamming sleep--and stared at Grif, seriously, as at some object really worth studying. To divert her attention from a study so unworthy, Grif smiled at the baby, who, thus encouraged, reflected back his smile with interest, and crowed into the bargain. Whereat Milly caught her in her arms, and pressing her to her breast, covered her face with kisses.
"How old is she, Milly?" asked Grif, regarding this proceeding with honest pleasure.
"Ten weeks the day after to-morrow," replied Milly, who, as is usual with young mothers, reckoned forward. "And now, Grif, if you will hold her, I will make some gruel for Little Peter. Be careful. No; you mustn't take her like that! Sit down, and I will put her in your lap."
So Grif squatted upon the ground, and Milly placed the child in his lap. He experienced a strange feeling of pleasure at his novel position. It was a new revelation to him, this child of Milly's. Milly herself was so different. He had never seen her in so good a light as now. Hitherto he had in his thoughts drawn a wide line between her and Alice; a gulf that seemed impassable had divided them. Now the gulf was bridged with human love and human tenderness. Alice was all good; but was Milly all bad?
He looked at her as she was making the gruel. Tender thoughts beautify; a mother's love refines. She was kneeling before the fire, pausing in her occupation now and then to bestow a smile upon her child. Once she rested her face in baby's neck, caressingly. Her hair hung upon Grif's hand, and he touched it and marvelled at the contrast between Milly of yesterday and Milly of to-day. Then he fell to wondering more about Milly than he had ever wondered before. Had she a father, like Alice, who was unkind to her? What was it that she saw in Jim Pizey that made her cling to him? Why was it that everything seemed to be wrong with those persons whom he loved? Rough had been poisoned, Little Peter was ill, Milly was attached to a bad man, and Alice--well, it was a puzzle, the whole of it! While he thus thought, Milly had been giving Little Peter the gruel.
"Milly," Grif said, when she returned from the bed, "have you got a mother and father?"
The girl turned a startled look upon him, and was about to make some passionate reply, but suddenly checked herself.
"Don't ask me, Grif," she said, in a hard voice. "How is your lady?"
Her old spirit was coming upon her. Grif knew that she meant Alice by "your lady," and he was hurt by the scornful ring of her voice. Seeing that he was grieved, Milly said:
"Don't mind me, Grif; now I'm soft, and now I'm hard. I've got the devil in me sometimes, and I can't keep him down. But I mustn't think--I mustn't think--I mustn't think. Of course, I've got a mother and father, and my mother and father's got a daughter they might be proud of. Everybody used to tell me so. I had a pretty face, pretty hands, pretty feet, pretty hair. I'm a pretty daughter altogether! Why wasn't I ugly? Then I might have been good!"
She took the baby from Grif s arms, and pressed it to her bosom.
"If I knew how to be good," she said, in a softened voice, "I think I would be. But I don't know how. If I was to go out of this house to-night, I shouldn't know which way to turn to be good. I'd be sure to turn wrong. I don't care!" And then she sang, recklessly, "I'm happy, I'm careless, I'm good-natured and free; and I don't care a single pin what the world thinks of me!"
"Don't, Milly! don't!" pleaded Grif, placing his hand upon hers, and looking earnestly at her.
She took his hand convulsively, and put it to her baby's lips.
"That won't do baby any harm," she said, after a pause. "I wonder if baby will grow up pretty, like me. Oh, I hope not, I hope not!"
"She's got eyes like your'n," said Grif, wishing to change her humour.
"Prettier than mine," Milly replied. "But if it wasn't that I should go mad if I was to lose her, I wish she would die! It would be better for her, but I think it would be worse for me. What's that in your hand?"
It was Little Peter's stone heart, which Grif had held all the while.
"It's Little Peter's heart," he said.
"Of course it is; I remember it now. It belonged to his mother."
"Where is she?" asked Grif, eagerly, for this was the first time he had heard of Little Peter's mother.
"She died two years ago in the hospital."
"Did you know her, Milly?"
"I went with a friend to see her when she was dying. She was a Welsh woman. She put the heart round Little Peter's neck when we took him to wish her good-bye, for the doctor said she would die before night."
"What did she die of, Milly?" The subject was full of interest to Grif.
"Broken heart. Somebody played her false, as usual. I shan't die of a broken heart--not I! Drink will be my death--the sooner the better! Hush! There's Jim. Who else? The Tenderhearted Oysterman."
Grif jumped to his feet, trembling with passion.
"He mustn't see you. He'll do you a mischief. Perhaps he won't stop long. Get under the bed-clothes, and pretend to be asleep. Quick! For God's sake!"
She thrust him hurriedly into the bed, and had barely time to conceal him and resume her position, before Jim and his companion entered.
Milly smiled at Jim, but neither he nor his companion took heed of her. They seated themselves near the fire, and Milly sat upon the bed, which was in the shadow of the room.
"We must have him," said the Tenderhearted Oysterman, apparently in continuance of a conversation. "The old bloke always keeps a heap of money in his safe at Highlay Station; and Dick Handfield knows every nook and cranny of the place. I've heard him say so. He knows all the secret drawers, too, I'll be bound, and where the keys are to be found, and where the hiding places are. We must have him, Jim."
At the mention of Highlay Station, Grif pricked up his ears. That was the Station which Alice had spoken of in their conversation a couple of nights ago. But when, the next instant, the Tenderhearted Oysterman uttered Richard Handfield's name, he started, and caught Milly's hand excitedly. Milly pressed him down with quiet, warning action, and, recalled to the necessity of being cautious, Grif lay still and listened. Milly paid but little attention to the conversation. She did not know anything of Highlay Station, nor that Alice was Richard Handfield's wife, and it was no novelty to her to hear schemes of robbery discussed by Jim and his associates.
"You talk," said Jim Pizey. "But I like to do."
"What do you mean by that?" asked the other.
"Not that you're not cool enough," continued Jim, "you're as good a pal as I ever want to have, if you'd only stop that damned cant of not hurting people." (The Tenderhearted Oysterman gave a quiet chuckle.) "I know well enough that you don't mean it."
"Now Jim," expostulated the Oysterman, and yet evidently regarding his comrade's words as a compliment. "It's a good job there's no one by to hear you take away my character."
"But others don't know you as well as I do, and there's plenty of them would think you were chicken-hearted."
"Do I look like it?" asked the Tenderhearted Oysterman in a tone of villanous humility.
"No, you don't. But you'd make believe that you was. If I didn't know you for one who would stick at nothing--nothing, not even short of--"
"Never mind what," interrupted the Oysterman, looking at Milly, who was employed nursing her baby, and did not appear to be taking heed of what was said.
"If I didn't know you for that, then, I'd have nothing to do with you, for your infernal cant sickens me."
There was a pause in the conversation. Grif still held Milly's hand hard. He felt there was something coming which would affect Alice, and every word that was being uttered stamped itself upon his mind.
"Dick Handfield we must have, and Dick Handfield we will have," resumed Jim. "If we can't have him one way, we will another. I've got a hook in him already, and if he hangs on and off as he's been doing, the white-livered skunk! the last two weeks, he'll get a dose that'll pretty well settle him."
"What sort of a dose, Jim?"
"I bought a watch of him this morning--here it is. I gave him five pounds for it. It's a pretty little thing. Just the thing for Milly! Milly."
"Yes, Jim," answered Milly, disengaging her hand from Grif's grasp, and walking towards Jim, for fear he should come to the bed, and discover Grif.
"Here's a watch I've bought for you. It belonged to a lady."
"Oh, what a beauty!" cried Milly, her eyes sparkling with eager delight as she looked at the pretty bauble.
"Well, it's yours now, my girl. I promised you should have one when the young 'un came."
"Thank you, Jim," said Milly, returning to the bed, with the present in her hand.
"He's just like me, Milly," said the Tenderhearted Oysterman; "he's as soft as a piece of putty. But I can't see how that watch is a dose, Jim."
"I gave Dick Handfield five pounds for that watch," said Jim, "and I paid him for it with a forged note."
At these words, Milly, who had been looking at the watch, and examining it with the pleasure of a child when it receives a new toy, dropped it upon the bed, with a heavy sigh.
"Then I took him to Old Flick's, and Old Flick gave him five sovereigns for the note. There was a man in the store when Dick Handfield changed the note, and Old Flick, who knew all about the lay, asked Dick Handfield all sorts of questions and regularly confused him. That's a pretty good dose for him, I think. I shall ask him to-morrow for the last time to join us. If he refuses, Old Flick shall give him in charge for passing a forged note, and the man who was in the store at the time will be the witness. Handfield will be glad enough to join us when he finds he's in the web. He'd sooner go up the country with us than go to quod--if it was only for the sake of that woman of his, that white-faced piece of virtue he calls his wife."
"Alice her name is," said the Tenderhearted Oysterman, sneeringly. "She's as much his wife as I am."
"It's a lie, Milly, a lie!" whispered Grif, in an agony of rage and despair at what he had heard. "Sheishis wife!" Oh, if he could get away from the room to tell Alice of the danger which surrounded her husband! He dug his nails in his hand, and his faithful heart beat furiously.
Milly placed her hand upon his lips.
"You're a liar, Oysterman!" she said, quietly. "The girlishis wife."
Grif took Milly's hand, and kissed it again and again for the vindication.
The Tenderhearted Oysterman turned sharply upon Milly, and was about to answer her when Jim Pizey said,--
"Milly's right. The girl is his wife. You don't know everything, Oysterman. But now I'll tell you that that girl is the daughter of Old Nuttall, the rich squatter of Highlay Station. Dick Handfield was living on the Station for a goodish time--that's how he came to know all about it. The girl fell in love with him, and they ran away and got married."
"And a pretty nice thing she made of it!" sneered the Oysterman. "I hate these milk-sop women!"
"I wonder what sort of a woman you'd ever be fond of, Oysterman!" said Milly, with bitter sarcasm. "I wonder ifyou'dever get a woman to love you, and think you a model of anything but what's mean!"
"Serve you right, Oysterman," said Jim, laughing. "Never you speak against women when a woman is by."
The Tenderhearted Oysterman had turned white in the face when Milly spoke.
"You're a nice sort of woman,youare," he exclaimed, with a snarl. "I'd never wantyouto love me and think me a model."
"A good job for you," she exclaimed. "I pity the woman you'd take a fancy to, or the man either, for that matter. If I was Jim, I'd pitch you downstairs."
"Come, come, Milly," said Jim, "we've had enough of that."
"No, we haven't," cried Milly, who was thoroughly roused. "You're a man, you are. You're bad enough, God knows! but thereissomething of a man in you. But that cur!" She placed her baby on the bed, and advanced a step towards the men, and pointed to the Oysterman. "That cur!" she repeated in a tone of such contempt that the Oysterman's blood boiled with fury. "That kicker of women and poisoner of dogs! What do you think he did, the night before last, Jim? He crawled to where poor little Grif was sleeping, and gave a piece of poisoned meat to Grif's dog. He did, the mean hound! That was a nice manly thing to do, wasn't it!"
"Come along, Oysterman," said Jim Pizey, half angry and half amused, taking his comrade by the arm. "It's no use answering her. She talks to me sometimes like that. Come along, and have a drink."
And by sheer strength he forced the Oysterman out of the room.
"That's done me good," said Milly, when the men were gone, taking her baby to the fire.
Grif started to his feet.
"Thank you, Milly," he said. "I'll tell Ally how you stood up for her."
"Don't you do anything of the sort," said Milly, who, now her passion was over, was crying. "It isn't fit that my name should be mentioned to her. She's a good woman."
"And so are you, Milly," said Grif, inwardly struggling with his doubts.
"I'm not, nor ever shall be. That watch" (pointing to it) "was hers, I suppose."
"I s'pose so. I never sor it."
Milly took it in her hand and opened the case.
"Here's her name," she said. "Alice Handfield. And here's a motto: Hope, Faith, and Love. And she gave it back to her husband, because they were hard up, perhaps, and Jim bought it of him with a forged note. Oh, my God! What a web of wickedness and goodness!"
"I must go" cried Grif, "I must go and tell them--I must go and put Ally up to it."
"Up to what?" exclaimed Milly, a light breaking upon her. "Up to the forged note! You'll go and tell her that you heard Jim say he paid for the watch with a forged note? And her husband 'll have Jim took up, and you'll be witness against him!" She glided swiftly to the door, and turning the key, put it in her pocket.
"What do you do that for?" asked Grif. "Imustgo, Milly. I'll break open the door."
"No, you won't," said Milly, taking fast hold of him. "You shan't get Jim into trouble. He's been kind to me, though he is a bad man, and you shan't peach upon him."
"Let me go, Milly," cried Grif, gently struggling.
"You don't go till Jim comes in," she said, still retaining her hold of him, "and then--good God!" she cried, in a voice of despair and horror. "Then, he'll kill you!"
The conflict of thought was too much for her. She relaxed her hold, and Grif flew to the door, and broke the frail lock. Then he looked back. Milly had fallen to the floor, and was sobbing convulsively. Her baby was lying by her side.
Grif went to her and raised her.
"Milly," he said, "don't take on so. I won't hurt you or Jim. But I must be true to Ally. If I couldn't I'd go and drown myself. I couldn't live, and not be true to her. She said I was her only friend, and I swore that I'd be so till I die! And I will be, till I die--and I'd like to die for her, for she's a good woman, Milly!"
"She is--she is," groaned Milly; "and I'm a bad and wicked one."
"You're not, Milly, you're not," said Grif, emphatically. "You're good, but another sort of good! See what you've done for Little Peter to-night," and he kissed her hand; "see what you've done for me many and many a time; and see how you stood up for Ally jist now, although every word you said was agin yourself!" he kissed her hand again. "You can't be bad and wicked! And I won't hurt you, and I won't hurt Jim, because of you. I won't, you may believe me! I'll tell Ally that her husband must go away to-night. He was agoin' away--I heerd him say so--and perhaps he's gone already. I won't tell her about the forged note. I'll say that I heerd a plot, and I won't tell her what it is. She'll believe me, I know she will. And so I shall do her good, and I shan't do you any harm!"
Grif spoke earnestly, for as his words brought to his mind the remembrance of Milly' s unselfish kindness, the conviction that it would be wicked to harm her or wound her feelings, grew stronger and stronger.
"God bless you!" said Milly.
Truly, Grif was not entirely unhappy or forsaken. The blessing, even from Milly, fell upon his heart like dew upon a parched field.
"Ah, if you sor Ally!" Grif continued. "If you knew her! You wouldn't wonder at me then for sayin' I'd like to die for her! Why, do you know what I've heerd her do? I've heerd her refuse to go where she'd have everything she could set her heart upon. I've heerd her refuse it because it wouldn't be right, although lots of women would think it was, and because she means to keep good if she dies for it! She'd make you good, Milly!"
Milly looked at him and laughed hysterically.
"Make me good!" she exclaimed, half-defiantly. "She couldn't, she couldn't! It's too late for that?" Then, as Grif rose to go, she said, "You won't say anything about the forged note?"
"No, Milly. Take care of poor Little Peter. If ever I can do you a good turn, I'll do it--you mind if I don't!"
He went to the bed where little Peter was sleeping. The lad was lying on his side, hot and flushed, with his lips partly open, as if thought were struggling to find expression there. Grif placed his hand tenderly upon Peter's cheek, and then went out of the house.
When he arrived at Alice's lodging he crept up the stairs, and with a settled purpose, which gave intensity to his face, opened the door. Husband and wife were standing, looking into each other's eyes. Tender words had evidently been exchanged, for they stood hand in hand, he with the dawn of a good and strong purpose upon his face, she encouraging him with hopeful, loving speech. A blanket, rolled up, gold-digger fashion, was upon the ground. Grif walked swiftly towards them and asked abruptly--
"Are you goin' away to-night?"
There was so much earnestness in his manner, that, with startled looks, they asked for his meaning.
"I can't tell you," he said, in a rapid, sharp tone; "I'm under a promise not to tell. But you must go away to-night."
"We were thinking just now, Grif," said Alice, "whether it would not be better for him to go in the morning."
"Make up your mind at once," said Grif, looking round as if he were fearful of being overheard, "that it won't do to wait here any longer. I've overheerd somethin', Ally, and I'm bound down not to tell. If you stop till to-morrow, somethin' dreadful 'll happen."
"Richard, you must go," said Alice, with gathering alarm, for Grif's impressiveness was filling her with fearful forebodings. "You must go, and at once."
"But why?" asked Richard, fretfully, and regarding Grif as if he were anything but a friend. "Why must I go? Why can't he tell what he knows? What difference will a few hours make?"
"All the difference," said Grif; "in a few hours perhaps you won't be able to go at all, unless--"
"Unless--" repeated Alice, eagerly.
"Unless it's in company with Jim Pizey and the Tenderhearted Oysterman. They've set a trap for you that you won't be able to get out of, if you refuse to join 'em. Don't ask me again to tell you what I've overheerd, for I can't I mustn't I darn't! I've run all the way here to tell you that there's more and more danger every minute you stop. It'll be all the better for you to go away in the dark."
Weak natures like Richard Handfield's are easily impressed, and more easily impressed with fear, which springs from selfishness, than with any other feeling. Almost without knowing what he was doing, Richard proceeded to sling the blanket round his shoulders. Alice's eager fingers assisted him.
"Grif is right, dearest," she said; "I'm sure he is. His looks are against him, but he is a faithful friend." Grif nodded his head, and his eyes brightened. "After all, it is but a few hours more. They would soon be past. Bless you, darling I bless you, Richard!" She kissed him again and again, and clung to him, and broke away from him, choosing rather to endure the pain springing from repressed tenderness, than do aught, in word or deed, to weaken him in his purpose.
"Yes, I will go," he said, in a decided tone, and having made up his mind, he took Alice in his arms and held her to him. While thus they clung together, she whispered,--
"Be strong and firm, Richard dear!"
"I will, dearest and best," he said, as with a passionate love-clinging he held the good and faithful woman to his breast.
"If the thought that I am true to you, darling--that I am yours in life, and afterwards--that I would share a crust with you and be happy if you were so--if that thought will strengthen and comfort you, Richard, take it with you, keep it in your mind, for, oh! it is true, my darling, it is true!"
"I know it, Alice, I know it."
"I shall bless you and pray for you every day. Until we are together again, my eyes can never close without thinking of you. See, Richard, I am not crying." She put his hand to her eyes, which were hot but tearless. "I can send you away with gladness, for it is the beginning of a better time. Though I feel that it is hard to part with you, I can say cheerfully, Go, my dear, for I know that your going is for the good of both of us. Write to me often, and tell me how and where to write to you. Good bye, good bye--Heaven bless and preserve you!"
And she broke from him, and then, meeting his eyes, a look of electric love brought them together again, and once more their arms were twined about each other's neck. Then she glided from his embrace, and sank upon the stool. Richard walked slowly out of the room, his heart filled with love and tenderness, his eyes seeking the ground. It was bitter to part. Even in the agony of separation he found time to murmur at the hardness of his lot which tore him away from the woman who was to him as a saint. As he walked down the stairs, his foot kicked against something. He stooped and picked it up. A stone heart! Indeed, Little Peter's stone heart which Grif had dropped without knowing it. Richard's nature was superstitious. The shape of the stone was comforting to him. A heart! It was a good omen. He put it carefully in his pocket, and was about to close the street door when an uncontrollable impulse urged him to look again upon Alice's face. He ran up the stairs into the room. Alice was still sitting upon the stool, her head and arms were resting upon the table; and she was convulsed with outward evidences of a grief she had no longer any motive to conceal.
He spake no word, but kneeling before her, bowed his head in her lap, as a child might have done. She looked at him through her tears, and placed her hands upon his head: in that action were blended the tenderness of a mother to her child and a wife to her husband. He raised his lips to hers; they kissed once more, solemnly, and he went out of the house with her tears upon his face. As he walked along the streets towards the country where was hidden the gold which had tempted thousands to break up happy homes and sever fond ties of affection, the picture of Alice mourning for him, and Grif quiet and sad in the background, was very vivid to his mind. No forewarning of the manner of their next meeting was upon him; if it had been, he would have taken Grif's hand, and kissed it humbly, penitently, instead of parting from him without a farewell nod.
Left alone with Alice, Grif, with a delicacy of feeling in keeping with his general character, was about to retire, when Alice, in a voice broken by emotion, said,--
"Do not go for a minute or two, Grif. I want to speak to you."
Grif gave a nod of acquiescence, and sat upon the floor, patiently.
Presently Alice dried her eyes and beckoned him to come closer to her.
"Grif," she said, in a sweet voice. "Why are you not honest?"
Now, Grif knew perfectly well the meaning of honesty--that is to say, he knew the meaning of the word literally. To be honest, one must not take what belongs to other people. Well, he was not honest; he had often taken what did not belong to him. But he was not a systematic thief; what he had stolen he had stolen from necessity. And he had never stolen anything but food, and then only when hunger sharply pressed him. The thought flew swiftly to his mind that if he had not taken food when he wanted it, he must have starved. Was that right? No, he was sure it was not. Little as he knew about it, he was sure he was not sent into the world to starve. But he must have starved if he had not taken what belonged to other people! Clearly, then, it was not wrong to steal. Grif's mind was essentially logical, as may be seen from the process of thought which occupied it directly after Alice asked him the question. And yet if he were right, Alice was wrong. Could she be wrong? Could the woman who was to him the perfection of women, the embodiment of all that was pure and noble--could she be wrong? Here came the doubt whether it would not have been the proper thing to have starved, and not stolen. "There'd have been an end of it, at all events," he muttered to himself, when his musings reached this point. After which he grew perplexed, and the logical sequence of his thoughts became entangled. He did not blame Alice for asking the question; but, for all that, he bit his lip and looked imploringly at her.
"You have been so good a friend to me and Richard," she said, "that it pains me to see you as you are. I would like to see you better, for your sake and for mine, Grif."
"I never know'd how to be honest, Ally," he said. Then he thought of Milly's words to him that night. "If I knew how to be good," she had said, "I think I would be. But I don't know how." That was just the case with him. He did not know how to be honest. And yet he had told Milly that Alice could make her good. Perhaps Alice could make him honest. Not that he cared particularly about being honest, but he would like to please Alice. "I don't want not to be honest," he said; "all I wants is my grub and a blanket."
"And those, Grif," she said, gently, yet firmly, "you can earn if you like."
"Can I? I'd like to know how, Ally?"
"You must work for them."
"Yes, that's all right. I'm willin' enough to work. I'd go out this minute to work, if I had it to do. But I couldn't get no work--a pore beggar like me! I don't know nothin', that's one thing. And then, if I get a 'orse to mind, the peelers take it from me and tell me to cut off. I tried to git papers to sell, and I did one day; but some of the other boys told the paper man I was a thief, and when I went for more papers the next mornin' he wouldn't give 'em to me. I've got a precious bad character, Ally, there's no mistake about that; and I've been to quod a good many times. I can't look a peeler in the face, upon my soul I can't!"
Grif did not make this last remark in a humorous manner; he made it reflectively. It really was a fact, and he stated it seriously.
But Alice was not convinced.
"You're willing to work," she said.
"Yes, I'm willin' enough."
"Every one can get work if he likes, and if he tries."
Grif looked dubious. His knowledge of the world was superior to hers. He had battled with it and fought with it since he was a baby. "She don't know what a bad lot we are," he thought. But he was sincerely desirous to please her.
"What do you want me to do, Ally?"
"I want you to give me a promise to be honest, Grif," she said, earnestly.
"I'll do it," he replied, without a moment's hesitation. And then he added seriously, for he felt he was undertaking a great responsibility, "I'll be honest, Ally, whatever comes of it."
"And if ever you want anything to eat and can't earn it, Grif, you will come to me."
"Yes, I'll come to you, Ally," he said, almost crying, for he knew how poor she was.
"Suppose now, to-morrow morning you go into all the shops and ask if they want an errand boy. That does not require any learning, Grif."
"No, I could do that all right; I can run fast, too. But you'll see, Ally; it'll be no go."
"You'll try, Grif, will you not?"
"I'll try, Ally."
"This is the last night I shall be here. I am going to other lodgings to-morrow, and shall remain there until my husband writes for me. Perhaps he will write for me to join him on the diggings; if he does, and you fail in getting work, you shall come with me, Grif."
He stood before her, mute and grateful. She wrote an address on a piece of paper. "This is where I am going to live," she said, giving it to him. He took it, and seeing that she was weary, bade her good night.
"Good night, Grif, my good boy. I am very grateful for the service you have done us this night."
"You've got no call to be grateful to me, Ally," said Grif. "Only let me be your friend, as you said I was, and I don't want no more."
Outside the door, Grif considered where he should sleep. He did not care to go to the barrel, for it would be so lonely there without Little Peter. It had been Grif's chronic condition, before he took possession of the barrel, never to know in the morning where he was going to sleep at night. It all depended upon where he found himself when he made up his mind to retire to rest. Knowing there was a cellar to the house, he groped his way down to it.
"I wish I had a match," he muttered, when he was at the bottom of the stairs. "There was a empty packin'-case somewhere about; I remember seein' it. Oh, here it is; it's hardly long enough, but I can double myself up;" thus soliloquising, he crept into it. "Now then," he said, as he lifted the cover of the packing-case on the top, popping his head down quickly to avoid a bump; "that's warm and comfortable, that is. It'd be warmer, though, if I had Rough here, or Little Peter. Wouldn't it be jolly! I'm honest now," he thought, recurring to his promise, as he closed his eyes. "I'm honest now, that's what I am. I ain't a-goin' to crib no more pies or trotters. It's a rum go, and no mistake!"
And Grif fell asleep, and dreamt that all the pies and trotters he had pilfered were transformed into little hobgoblins, and were holding a jubilee because he had turned honest!
Grif, although but a poor and humble member of the human family, was as gregariously inclined as the rest of his species, and loved, when opportunity offered, to associate with his fellows. The circumstance of birth had placed him upon the lowest rang of the social ladder, and, being grovelling by nature, he had no thought of striving upwards, and was always prowling about, like a hungry dog searching for a bone. Being gregariously inclined, he was to be depended upon as an item in a mob. The object of a gathering of people was not a thing to be considered--politics, religion, amusement, were all one to him. If he but chanced to come across a throng, he added one more to the number, from sheer force of habit. Thus he was a passive auditor of street preachers of every denomination, and being in the habit of standing quite still, with his mouth open and his hands in his pockets, or where his pockets ought to be, he grew to be looked upon as a godsend by the orators, who spoke at him, and scoffed at him, and humbled him, and hurled anathemas at his head, as representing a class entirely devoid of godliness. They twisted his moral nature, and picked at it, and pulled it to pieces, and grew eloquent upon it. They said--Look at his rags, look at his dirt, look at the ignorance written on his countenance. They told him to repent if he wished to be saved from damnation; and they prayed for him and wept for him so earnestly that sometimes he experienced a dull wonder that the earth did not open and swallow him, he felt so utterly and thoroughly bad. To the political orators who were in the habit of "stumping-it" in the Market-square he was not of so much importance. "The People" in the aggregate was what the stump politicians gnashed their teeth at and wept over; and it was remarkable to observe with what complacency the People listened to these bemoanings. At the period during which Grif played his insignificant part in the history of the gold-colony, working-men-politicians were in great force, and night after night the Market-square would be thronged with an auditory not unwilling to be amused by listening to the outpourings of half-crazy or wholly-knavish demagogues, who had either gone mad over "the people's wrongs," or were working to get into the parliament, where they could make "pickings" for themselves. Many a red-hot radical who could not get an audience in Great Britain, and who had emigrated to what he thought was to be the "people's paradise" here was listened to, and laughed at, and applauded, and--did no harm after all. Grif did not understand what it all meant. He heard a great deal about the ground-down people, the crushed people, the poor starving people, upon whose substance the oligarchs were fattening; but all he could make out was that things were wrong altogether, a conclusion which precisely tallied with his own experience. But he, for one, bore his lot uncomplainingly, and with an unconscious exercise of philosophy, walked in the gutters (not feeling himself good enough to indulge in the pavement) without a murmur. Grif did not object to gutters; he had formed their acquaintance in his earliest infancy, and time and association had almost endeared them to him. Everything in the world is comparative. Pleasure, pain, success, disappointment, act in different ways upon different people: the effect depends upon constitution and education. So, dirt and cleanliness are differently regarded by different classes of society. To a well-regulated mind the spectacle of Grif walking in a narrow street, and picking his steps carefully along the gutter, would have caused a sensation of wondering disgust; and a pair of well-polished Wellington boots might naturally have objected to come into contact with the dirty broken bluchers in which Grif's feet slip-slopped constantly. But, in the eyes of Grif, dirty boots were no disgrace; he felt not the shame of them. From the moment he came into possession of a second-hand pair (he had never known the respectable bliss of a new tight-fitting boot, pressing on corn or bunion), they were dragged down to his own level, and forfeited their position in society. They may have been occasionally scraped, but they were never polished; and so they lost their respectability, and became depraved and degraded, and their seams and soles were eaten into with mud and dirt, until they gave up the ghost in the boot world, and trod the earth no more.
It might be gathered from Grif's mutterings, as he walked along the streets the day after he had given Alice the promise to be honest, that his mind was disturbed. "She's right, o' course she is," he said, "I know that well enough; but what was I to do? I know it'll be no go my tryin'. He must be a precious green cove who'd have anythin' to do with me!" and he looked down upon his boots, not with disgust, but with distrust, and stepped out of the gutter on to the pavement. "I never wanted to steal; I only wanted my grub and a blanket. If any swell'd have given 'em to me, it'd have been all right. But they ain't a bit of use to any one, ain't the swells. I've got to try to got a billet as a errand boy. All right. It ain't a bit of good, I know. Every one on 'em knows what sort of a cove I am. But I'll try, at all events. I promised her I would, and I ain't agoin' to deceive her!"
And thus it fell out that Grif had issued from his last night's bed, the packing-case, with the intention, for the first time in his life, of endeavouring to obtain an honest livelihood.
But Grif did not seem destined to be successful. He walked into scores of shops and places of business with the timid yet half defiant inquiry, "Do you want a errand boy?" and was sometimes roughly, often ignominiously, turned out. Scarcely from one of the storekeepers did he obtain a kind word, and it was not in his favour that many of them knew him, and had been in the habit of seeing him prowl about the Melbourne streets. He was not a savoury-looking boy, and did not bear upon his outward appearance any recommendation to the situation he was soliciting. His boots were muddy, his clothes were ragged, his skin was dirty, his hair was matted. He did not add another word to the query, "Do you want a errand boy?" and he did not at all take it in bad part that he was treated with contumely. Indeed, if such a state of mind can be conceived, he was in a sort of measure exultant at each rebuff. "I told her so," he muttered to himself, triumphantly; "who'd have anything to do with a beggar like me? But I promised her I'd try, and I ain't agoin' to deceive her." Two or three times he was surlily spoken to by the policemen, and on each occasion he slunk off without a murmur, not without a dim consciousness that he was absolutely compromising his character by attempting to obtain an honest livelihood. Readers who are not acquainted with colonial life, must not suppose that the police, or that other "institutions," differ in any essential in the colonies from those of the older countries. The colonies are certainly new, but they do not commence their career at the year One, but at the year Eighteen Hundred and Odd. There is just about the same comparative amount of vice and virtue, goodness and wickedness, ruffianism and kind-heartedness, as is to be met with in any other part of the world. Those who say otherwise, and cause others to think otherwise, are in the wrong. There are in the colonies, just as much average unkindness and uncharitableness, just as much charity and benevolence, just as much ignorance, just as noble-mindedness, as can be found amongst of human creatures anywhere. It is true that men get into false positions oftener than in older countries, but that is scarcely to be wondered at in new colonies where people of all classes are thrown indiscriminately together, and have not had time to settle into their proper positions. Those readers will therefore please not to wonder that Grif should be looked upon in precisely the some light as he would be looked upon if he were prowling about London streets. To the Melbourne constable, he was just what a ragged pilfering boy would be to London constable. It did not much affect him. He was accustomed to be buffeted, and cuffed, and maltreated. The world had given him nothing but hard knocks since his birth, and he took them without murmuring. He looked upon it quite as a matter of course when the conservators of public peace spoke harshly to him. But he had a promise to perform; and he resolved to perform it conscientiously. So it happened that he stood at the door of the great place of business of Mr. Zachariah Blemish, with the intention of asking for the situation of an errand boy. The green baize folding doors somewhat daunted him; but hesitating for one moment only, he pushed them open and entered. It chanced that, exactly upon his entrance, Zachariah Blemish came out of his own particular private room for the purpose of putting a question to one of his clerks, and that the great Blemish and the small Grif stood face to face. It was a marvellous contrast! The great Blemish, sleek and shining; the small Grif, rough and muddy: the great Blemish clean and polished, smooth-shaved and glossy; the small Grif, dirty and ragged, with the incipient stubble of manhood upon his chin and cheeks. For nature is impartial in her supply of beard and whiskers. Money will not buy them, nor will grease produce them, though it be puffed and perfumed.
The rich, great Blemish, then, looked down upon the poor little Grif. For a moment, the great man's breath was taken away at the sight. In his counting-house, sanctified by the visits of Members of Parliament, of Ministers, and of merchants of the highest standing--in sight of his books, wherein were daily entered records of transactions amounting to thousands of pounds--the appearance of a ragged boy, and such a ragged boy, was, to speak of it in the mildest terms, an anomaly.
"What do you want here?" asked Blemish.
"Do you want a errand boy?" asked Grif, in return.
"A what?" inquired Blemish, sharply.
"A errand boy," replied Grif, calmly.
At this juncture, a policeman, who had watched Grif enter the office, and who was sycophantishly disposed to protect the interests of wealth and position, popped his head in at the door, and touching his hat, begged Mr. Blemish's pardon, but the boy was a thief, and he thought he was up to no good.
"Umph!" said Mr. Blemish. "He looks like it. But thank you, policeman," this with a stately affability, "I do not think you will be wanted."
Whereupon the policeman touched his hat again, and vanished, determining, however, to keep an eye upon Grif, and find out what he was up to.
"Come this way," said Mr. Blemish to Grif, who, considerably astonished that he had not been given into custody, followed the great man into his private room. There he found himself in the presence of two other gentlemen, Mr. Matthew Nuttall, and Mr. David Dibbs. Mr. Nuttall was sitting at a table, writing, and his face was hidden from Grif. "Now, then," said Mr. Blemish, when Grif had disposed himself before the great merchant like a criminal; "what do you mean by coming into my place of business?"
"I wants a sitiwation as a errand boy," immediately replied Grif.
"The policeman says you are a thief," interrogated Mr. Blemish; "what do you say to that?"
"Nothin'," replied Grif, shortly.
"Youarea thief, then?"
"No, I ain't," said Grif: "I'm honest, now," and he blushed with shame as he made the confession.
"Oh, you are honest now," Mr. Blemish observed, with a slight dash of sarcasm. "Since when has that occurred?"
"Since this mornin'; this is my first day at it."
Grif's candid statement appeared to perplex the great merchant. He paused a little before he said,--
"Youwerea thief, then?"
"When I couldn't get nothin' to eat for nothin', I took it," returned Grif, uncompromisingly; "I wasn't a-goin' to starve."
"Starve!" exclaimed Mr. Blemish, lifting up his hands in pious wonderment. "Starve! In this land of plenty!"
"It ain't a land of plenty to me; I wish it was."
"Really," observed Mr. Blemish, to surrounding space, "the unblushing manner in which such ragamuffins as this give the lie to political economists is positively frightful. Do you believe in statistics, boy?"
"Not as I knows on," said Grif.
"Did you expect a situation here?" inquired Mr. Blemish, looking down upon the lad, as if wondering what business he had in the world.
"No."
"Why did you come, then?"
"I promised her to try, though I told her it wasn't a bit o' good."
"Who is 'her'?" inquired Mr. Matthew Nuttall, turning suddenly round, and facing Grif.
Grif gave a great start, and threw a sudden sharp look at the questioner's face. He knew him at once. The likeness was unmistakeable. Even in his deep voice there was a ring of Alice's sweeter tones. If anything could have shaken Grif, it was the sight of that stern face, and the knowledge that the man before him could make Alice happy if he chose. Eager words rushed to Grif's lips, but he dared not give them utterance. What good could a ragamuffin like him do? He had best hold his tongue, or he would make matters worse.
"Who is 'her'?" repeated the gentleman.
"She's a lady, that's what she is," replied Grif, recovering his composure.
"A lady!" and Mr. Nuttall laughed.
"Ah, if you knew!" thought Grif, but he contented himself with saying, "Yes, she is, and so you'd say if you sor her."
"Upon my word," remarked Mr. Blemish, blandly, "I did not know that vagabonds like you associated with ladies. This boy is evidently an original."
"Don't you call no names," said Grif. "If you don't want a errand boy, say so, and send me away."
"Better and better," observed Mr. Blemish, composedly. "Now, this is something in my way, although I am not aware that I have met with such a character before to-day. Why did you start when this gentleman spoke to you?"
"I thort I knew his voice," returned Grif.
"And do you know it? Have you had the pleasure of this gentleman's acquaintance?" this said so pleasantly that both the gentlemen smiled.
"Never seed the gentleman afore, as I knows on," said Grif, to whom a lie was of the very smallest consequence.
"What do you do for a living?" asked Mr. Blemish.
"Nothin' partikeler."
"And you find it very hard work, I have no doubt," observed Mr. Blemish.
"Yes, I do; very hard," replied Grif, literally; and then, with sudden exasperation, he exclaimed, "What's the use of badgerin' me? You ain't agoin' to do nothin' for me. Why don't you let me go?"
"Come," said Mr. David Dibbs, who up to this time had taken no part in the dialogue, "I tell you what it is, young feller! You keep a civil tongue in your head, or I'll commit you on the spot. I'm a magistrate, that's what I am, and I'll give you a month, as sure as eggs is eggs, if you don't mind what you're up to!"
"I don't care," responded Grif. "I ain't a-goin' to be badgered."
"You don't care!" exclaimed Mr. David Dibbs, turning as red as a turkey-cock. "Send for the policeman, Blemish. I'll have him put in jail, and flogged. Is a magistrate to be sauced at in this here way?"
The small puffed-up soul of Mr. David Dibbs swelled with indignation. Things were come to a pretty pass, indeed, when the possessor of thirty thousand pounds a year, and a magistrate into the bargain, was thus openly defied by a ragged boy, probably without sixpence in his pockets! They glared at each other, did Grif and Mr. David Dibbs, and Mr. Dibbs did not have much the best of the situation.
"Nay, nay, Mr. Dibbs," said Mr. Blemish, soothingly; "you have every right to be angry, but let me deal with the boy, I beg.--Now, suppose," he said, addressing Grif, impressively, "suppose I were to take it into my head (I haven't any such idea, mind you) to give you a situation as errand boy, what remuneration would you require in return?"
"What what?"
"What remuneration--what salary--how much a week would you expect?"
"I don't expect nothin' a week," answered Grif; "I only wants my grub and a blanket. But if you ain't got no such idea, what's the good of keeping me here?"
"Of course you know nothing of religion?"
"I've been preached to," responded Grif, "till I'm sick of it."
"This boy interests me," remarked Mr. Blemish, speaking to society in general; "I should like to make an experiment with him. Who knows but that we might save his soul?"
"You can't do that," said Grif, moodily.
"Can't save your soul!"
"No; the preacher chap sed it'd go to morchel perdition; and I s'pose he knows."
Mr. Blemish raised his eyes to the ceiling, and an expression of sublime pity stole over his countenance. Grif edged closer to the door, as if anxious to be dismissed.
Mr. Blemish folded his hands with a sort of pious horror, and exclaimed--"I am amazed!"
"What are you amazed at?" inquired Mr. David Dibbs. "I've seen hundreds of boys like this here one--he ain't no different to the rest. They're a bad, vicious lot."
Grif assented to the last remark by a nod.
"But our duty is clear," said Mr. Blemish, as if in answer to a voice within him, perhaps the voice of morality. "Listen to me"--this to Grif, with a forefinger warningly held up; "I am about to give you a chance of reforming."
"All right; I'm agreeable," said Grif, in a tone that betokened utter indifference of the matter.