Bennett's-rents still upon that day--a bright breezy day--when for a
whole hour the god that kisseth carrion shone down into the court to
lick up every trace of green damp and moisture from the foul, broken
pavement. There was a pump in Bennett's-rents, and a channel ran down
the centre of the paving, whose broken slabs rose and fell in wet
weather to the passing step, spurting out little founts of dirty water,
while the channel itself was choked, from being turned into a receptacle
for the superfluous odds and ends of the inhabitants--to wit: potato,
turnip, and carrot peelings; the shells of whelks, periwinkles, mussels,
and crabs; egg-shells were at times seen there, as also the nacreous
covering of the oyster, but not as the debris of banquets, since these
latter were only brought in by the grotto-building children, and the
former thrown out by the jobbing bookbinder's-finisher when robbed of
their albumen for purposes of trade. Heads, tails, and the vertebra of
plaice, or the real Yarmouth bloater, were common objects of the shore.
Babies had been seen in that channel, which possessed a certain charm
from its safety, since the child that rolled in rolled no farther. It
was the favourite resort of the small fry of the neighbourhood,--a
neighbourhood that rejoiced in small children, and big babies of an
elastic nature, which prevented falls and contusions from stopping their
growth,--for the refuse in that channel could be raked about and poked
at with bits of stick to the formation of dams, where walnut cock-boats
could be sailed, or mussel-prows launched; and occasional visitants from
as far off as Lower Series-place had been known to perch there and peck,
for the channel was famed for its ample supply of impromptu playthings
for the little savages of the place. A large lobster-claw found therein
had formed the coral of Dredge minor, whose father worked at
Covent-garden Market, and never slept at home by night. Little Jenny
Perkins wore a necklace composed of periwinkle-shells; while
whelk-shells, stuck at the end of thick pieces of firewood, and
previously filled with peas, formed rattles that were indestructible.
Like Lower Series-place, Bennett's-rents was famous for its prolific
inhabitants. Long as daylight lasted, there was a dense small
population of half-dressed aborigines, hooting, racing about, playing,
and quarrelling, aided in their efforts by levies from others of the
rags of Lincoln's-inn. Why called Bennett's-rents was not obvious,
though it might have been from the hideous cracks and seams in the
frowzy old houses, whose windows looked as if they had been in a
brown-paper-and-rag war, in which glass had suffered a terrible defeat,
and submitted now, with an ill grace, to the presence of the new
settlers.
But the children did not have the channel all up themselves, for at
early dawn the pigeons from the housetops paid it visits, and, in spite
of broken, dissipated-looking chimney-pots, falling-out mortar, and
shattered, soot-covered tiles, there were many soft-eyed, iridescent--
hued birds dwelling upon the roofs of the houses in Bennett's-rents;
and, more especially upon Sunday mornings, an observer from some high
edifice might have seen dirty-faced men, in hairy caps, rising out of
trap-doors in roofs, like "Mr F's aunt" through the factory-floor, and,
when half-way out, and forming prominent objects among little
wildernesses of sooty, lath-made cages and traps, amusing themselves by
waving red-cotton handkerchiefs tied to the end of sticks, for the
purpose of keeping their flights of pigeons high in air.
A rumour had spread through the court that something was to be seen in
the neighbouring street, when out trooped the children from the narrow
entrance, and comparative silence reigned, till place and echoes were
alike mocked by a man with his cry of "Rag--bone!" but his was labour in
vain: he took nothing further from the Rents to glut the shop of Mrs
Slagg, and, reaching the end of the place, he departed with his bag
still light, and the court knew him no more that day, though there were
rags enough in every house to have filled his sack again and again, and
drawn down the index of his portable weighing-machine to the furthest
limit. Still there was another sound to be heard, for Mr William
Jarker, of the heavy jaw, flattened nose, and general bull-dog aspect,
was above his attic, whistling to his pigeons, as the Reverend Arthur
Sterne stood by the reeking channel, gazing up into the strip of blue
sky above his head, and following the circling flight of the birds as he
muttered sadly to himself, "O, that I had wings like a dove; for then
would I fly away and be at rest!" but the next instant he smiled sadly,
as he recalled work undone, duties to perform, and then thought of the
rest and fate of these birds, wondering, too, how it came that they
should form the "fancy" of the roughest of the rough. Then he paused
with his foot upon the threshold of the house where Septimus Hardon
lodged, for there, in the hot, close London court, came gushing down in
tones of purest liquid melody, the wild, heaven-gate trill of a lark:
"Tsweet-tsweet-tsweet-tsweet!" every trill an intoxicating, magic
draught, drunk in by the ear, and--a very opium--bearing the hearer far,
far away to green fields, shady woodlands, golden hill-sides, and
sparkling brooks; louder, louder and more rapturous, thrilling the air
around; rising and falling, echoing from far and near, but ever sweet
and pure, even joyous at times; and praise the song of the wild bird as
you may, there is that in the trill of its caged brother in some close
London alley that shall sound the sweeter in the sadness engendered by
the surroundings, for it whispers of brighter scenes and purer homes,
bearing you with it far, far away from the misery where you stay.
Even Bill Jarker ceased waving his handkerchief, took his short, black
pipe from his mouth, and listened; the curate thought of days when, with
a soft white hand in his, he had wandered over the downs, listening to
those ever-sweet English notes; while from the window above was
stretched forth the fair, shapely head of Lucy Grey, her eyes sparkling,
and lips apart, as if to command silence; and then, as the curate looked
up, there was a slight start, a faint flush of colour in the girl's pale
cheeks, and her head was quickly withdrawn.
A tall, slight, careworn man was the curate of Saint Magdalen's; hair
sprinkled with grey, deep lines crossing his brow, and yet there was a
smile of ineffable sweetness lingering about his mouth--a smile which,
far from telling of weakness, whispered of sorrow, tenderness, patience,
and charity.
The few minutes of tranquillity had passed. The door of the house stood
open--as, in fact, did that of every other house in the
thickly-inhabited court; the children began to troop back, Bill Jarker
took to his pipe and pigeon-flying, and with thoughts trembling between
the ideal and the real, the curate entered the door before him.
It was not a Saturday, or he would have found the ascent of the stairs
troublesome; but he well knew the manners and customs of the natives,
and abstained from making his visits on that day of the week, for on
Saturdays there was a rule carried out (one set in force by the
landlady), that the attics cleaned down to the second-floor, the
second-floor to the first, the first-floor to the passage, which last
portion fell to the lot of the occupants of the parlours, front and
back--two families who took it in turns to make the dirt upon the said
passage wet, and then to smear it from side to side with a flannel, so
that the boards always wore the aspect of having been newly hearthstoned
with a lump of brown clay, if the simile will stand. Consequently, upon
this seventh day of the week, when the lodgers were busy, and Mrs Sims
could be heard sniffing as she "did Hardons' bit," the journey upwards
was dangerous, for if the traveller avoided the snares and pitfalls
formed by divers pails and brown pans, or even, maybe, a half-gallon can
from the public at the corner if the pail was engaged; if he saved
himself from slipping on the sloping, wet boards, and fell over no
kneeling scrubber in a dark corner, he most certainly heard low-muttered
abuse heaped upon his head for "trapesing" over the newly-cleaned
stairs--abuse direct or indirect, according to the quality of the
traveller.
Not, then, being a Saturday, Mr Sterne entered the house known as
Number 7--by tradition only, for the brass number, after being spun
round by one pin for some months, suddenly disappeared--passed along to
the worn stairs, two flights of which he ascended, creaking and cracking
the while beneath his weight, and every one sloping, so that it seemed
hanging to the wall to save itself from falling. He paused for an
instant upon the landing opposite Septimus Hardon's rooms, and listened
to the rapid beating "click-click" of Lucy's sewing-machine; then up two
more flights; and again, without pause, up two more, which groaned with
weakness and old age; while sunken door-frames, doors that would not
shut, and various other indications, told of the insecure condition of
the house. And now once more he paused upon the top landing, where some
domestic spider had spun a web of string, stretching it from rusty nail
to rusty nail, for the purpose of drying clothes--garments now,
fortunately for the visitor, absent.
Here fell upon the ear the twitterings of many birds, and the curate's
face again lighted up as the song of the lark once more rang out loud
and clear, apparently from outside the window of the attic before whose
door he stood. But his reverie was interrupted by a sharp shrill voice,
which he could hear at intervals giving orders in a quick angry tone.
Then followed the lashing of a whip, a loud yelp, or the occasional
rapid beat of a dog's tail upon the floor. At last, turning the handle
of the rickety door, the visitor entered.
"_En avant! Halte la! Ah-h-h! bete_! O, 'tis monsieur," were the
words which greeted Mr Sterne as he entered the sloping-roofed attic,
one side of which was almost entirely window--old lead-framed lattice,
mended in every conceivable way with pasted paper and book-covers; and
there, in the middle of the worn floor, stood the thin, sharp-faced
woman of the cellar, holding in one hand a whip, in the other a hoop;
while two half-shaven French poodle-dogs crouched at her feet. Seated
by the open window surrounded by birdcages, conspicuous among which was
that of the lark whose notes enlivened the court, was a sallow,
dark-haired, dark-eyed youth, eager-looking and well-featured, but sadly
deformed, for his head seemed to rest upon his shoulders, and the leg
twisted round the crutch which leaned against his chair was miserably
attenuated.
"_Bon jour_! How are the pupils, Madame la Mere?" said the curate,
taking a broken chair and seating himself.
"_Bete, bete, bete_!" hissed the woman, making feigned cuts with her
little whip at the crouching dogs, which yelped miserably as they shrunk
closer to the boards. "Ah, what you deserve!" she said.
"And how are the birds, Jean?" continued the visitor, addressing the
young man, who was looking at him half-askance. "Your lark gives me the
heartache, and sets me longing for the bright country."
The curate had touched the right chord, for the youth's face brightened
into a pleasant smile directly.
"Does he not sing!" he said, with a slight French accent; and he leaned
towards the cage where the bird, with crest erect, was breasting the
wooden bars, and gazing with bright bead-like eyes up at the blue sky;
but as soon as the cripple's finger was inserted between the bars, the
bird pecked at it playfully, fluttered its wings, and then, with head on
one side, stood looking keenly at its master.
"O yes, he sings," hissed the woman; "but he is obstinate, is Jean; he
should sell his bird, and make money, and not let his poor _mere_ always
keep him."
"Pst, pst!" ejaculated Jean, frowning upon his mother; but she only
stamped one foot angrily, and continued:
"He is _bete_ and obstinate. The doll down-stairs with the
needle-machine loves the bird, and she would buy it, and it is worth
four shillings; but Jean will that his mother seek his bread for him in
de street, wis de stupid dogs; and they are _bete_, and will not learn
nosing at all. _Allez donc_!"
As the woman grew more voluble in her speech, she passed from tolerable
English to words with a broader and broader accent, till the command
given at last to the dogs, each word being accompanied by a sharp cut of
the whip, when the animals rose upon their hind-legs, drooped their
fore-paws, and then subsided once more into their natural posture, but
now to bend their fore-legs, as if kneeling. Then they rose again,
drooped, and afterwards meekly crossed, their paws, winking their eyes
dolefully the while, and, with an aspect of gravity made absurd, walked
slowly off to separate corners of the room, where they again went down
upon all-fours, and then sat wistfully winking at and watching their
task-mistress.
"See, then!" she exclaimed, in her harsh shrill voice. "They would not
do it, though I try thousand time; but now the task is ended they walk.
Ah-h-h!"
The cut in the air which accompanied the exclamation might have fallen
upon the dogs themselves, for the miserable little objects yelped as
they saw it fall, and, as if moved by one muscle, laid their heads
against the whitewashed wall till, seeing themselves unnoticed, they
curled up, but never for a moment took their blinking eyes off their
mistress.
Amidst much muttering, and with many frowns and short sharp shakes of
the head, while her lips were pressed closely together, the woman, after
much fumbling in her pocket, drew forth a partly-knitted stocking; when,
sitting down, she began furiously clicking her needles, watching the
while, with half-closed eyes, the curate and her son.
"So, then, you will not sell your lark, Jean?" said Mr Sterne.
The cripple knit his brow slightly, shook his head, and then drawing a
long, delicate, girlish finger over the bars of his favourite's cage,
the lark set up its crest, twittered, fluttered its wings, and again
pecked at the finger.
"No, no, no," he said softly; "why does she complain? I would work if I
could; but I sell and make money of these, though it seems cruel to keep
them shut up, and they beat themselves against their prison-bars to get
out into the free air and the green woods. And I'm sorry for them when
the little breasts grow bare, and the feathers lie in the bottom of the
cage; and she says--_ma mere_ there--that I am _bete_."
The woman seemed to compress every feature, as she shook her head
fiercely, and went on with her knitting.
"Look!" continued Jean softly, as he smiled and pointed rapidly from
cage to cage, "canaries, linnets, redpoles, goldfinches, and a
blackbird. The thrush broke his heart with singing, they said--the
birdcatchers--but it was not that: I know why. I have sold four birds
this week; but I keep the lark; he is a favourite."
"Bah!" ejaculated the mother softly; "but he is _bete_;" when, as the
curate turned, she was bending over her knitting, shaking her head and
frowning, while she stabbed fiercely again and again at the worsted ball
till it was transfixed by her needle, when she replaced the ball in her
pocket, where the first drag she gave at the thread drew the ball from
its place and it rolled on the floor. "Ah! good dog, _bon chien_!" she
cried, as one of the poodles ran forward, caught the errant ball, and
bore it to his mistress, returning immediately to his corner; but not to
be unrewarded, for the woman rose, and forcing up the sliding socket,
caused a little scrap of tallow-candle end to shoot out of a
tin-candlestick as from a gun, when, receiving permission, the dog
snatched it from the floor, and devoured the savoury morsel in its
corner.
"But he should sell the lark, monsieur," said the woman.
"Hush, _ma mere_," said the cripple angrily; "the bird is not to sell."
The mother shrugged her shoulders, and clicked her needles furiously.
"We all have our loves and likes, madame," said the curate quietly.
"O, yes, yes, you rich; but we poor? No. We must live, and eat and
drink, and have clothes; and Jean, there, has ruined me in medicine.
What do we want with favourites, we poor? But that they help to keep
us, I would sell the dogs. We are all slaves here, we poor; and we sell
ourselves, our work, our hands, our beauty, some of us,--is it not so?
and you rich buy,--or we starve. It is a bad world for us old and ugly.
I am not like the doll upon the floor down-stairs."
A sharp angry glance passed between mother and son, as the former rose
from her seat, and with a short quick step left the room, driving back
the dogs as they tried to follow; while it was evident that her words
jarred painfully upon the curate. "Our beauty, some of us," seemed to
ring in his ears again and again, and he could not help associating
these words with the latter part of her speech.
"How do you get your birds, Jean?" said the curate, making an effort,
and breaking the silence.
"From him," said the young man, nodding across the court to where Bill
Jarker sat half out of his trap-door, still keeping up his pigeons, for
a stray was in sight, and he was in hopes of an amalgamation, in spite
of the efforts being made by neighbouring flights. "From him: he goes
into the country with his nets--far off, where the green trees wave,
while I can only read of them. But the book; did you bring the book?"
Thinking of other birds breasting their prison-bars: now of the fair
bright face that he had seen at the window below, now of that of the
cripple before him, the curate produced a volume from his pocket, and
smiled as he watched the glittering eyes and eager aspect of the young
man, as, hastily grasping the volume, he gazed with avidity upon the
title.
"You love reading, then, Jean?" said the curate.
"Yes, yes," cried the cripple. "What could I do without it? Always
here; for I cannot walk much--only about the room. Ah, no! I could not
live without reading--and my birds. She is good and kind," he
continued, nodding towards the door; "but we are poor, and it makes her
angry and jealous."
The lark burst forth with one of its sweetest strains as it heard its
master's voice, and then, rising, the curate left the attic, closing the
door after him slowly, and peering through the narrowing slit to look
upon the cripple eagerly devouring a page of the work he had brought.
The Frenchwoman was upon the first landing, and saluted the curate with
a sinister meaning smile as he passed her and thoughtfully descended.
"But he is mean, I tell you," cried _ma mere_ angrily, as she once more
stood beside her son. "What does he give us but words--words which are
worth nothing? But what is that? My faith, a book he brought you? You
shall not read; it makes you silly, and to forget your mother, who does
so much for you. But I will!"
"Ah!" cried Jean, painfully starting from his seat, and snatching back
the volume, and just in time, for the next moment would have seen it
flying from the open window.
"Then I will sell the lark when you are asleep," cried the woman
spitefully.
The youth's eyes glittered, as, with an angry look, he hissed between
his teeth, "Then I will kill the dogs!" But the anger passed from his
countenance in a few moments, and smiling softly, he said, "No, no, _ma
mere_; you would not sell my poor bird, because I love it, and it would
hurt me;" and then, casting down her knitting, the woman sprang across
the room, throwing her arms round the cripple, and kissing him
passionately, calling him by every endearing name, as she parted the
hair from his broad forehead, and gazed in his bright dark eyes with all
a mother's fondness.
But the curate heard nothing of this--nothing but the loud song of the
lark, which rang through the house--as slowly and thoughtfully he
descended the worn and creaking stairs, while the woman's words seemed
to keep repeating themselves in a slow measured way, vibrating in his
ears, and troubling him sorely with their cutting meaning; and more than
once he found himself forming with his lips, "Our beauty, some of us."
Volume Two, Chapter VI.