"Don't let me come back again, that's all," she exclaimed; and if his
looks were a faithful index of Timothy Ruggles' mind, his heart
evidently just then whispered, "I wish to goodness I could take you at
your word."
Then the door was once more closed, the step heard again, the bang
down-stairs, and then there was silence in the room, broken only by the
half-suppressed sobs of little Pine, and the impatient, restless pecking
of the bird in the cage.
Five minutes passed, and still there was silence, when Tim softly took
up a yard-measure from the board, stole nimbly off on to his shoeless
feet, opened the door, and peered through the crack, and then, reaching
out one hand, he touched a bell with the yard-measure, making it ring
loudly twice over. Then he softly closed the door, replaced himself and
his measure upon the board, before leaping boldly and noisily off to
cross the room, open the door loudly, and trot down-stairs to answer the
bell, the child earnestly watching his motions the while.
Down the stairs trotted Tim, and along the passage to the front door, to
open it, look out, and peer up and down the street, when, apparently
satisfied, he closed the door once more, his face wearing an aspect of
full belief as he muttered, "A runaway ring."
Had Tim Ruggles made his descent a minute sooner, he would have seen the
graceful form of his lady some half-a-dozen doors lower down, as she
stood in conversation with a neighbour; but now, no one being in sight,
he hurried up-stairs again, climbed upon his board, placed his work
ready to hand, and then, and then only, he held out his arms to the
child, who was sobbing the next instant upon his breast.
"Don't--don't cry, my pet," he whispered, puzzling the while a couple of
real tears which had escaped from his eyes, and finding no friendly
handkerchief at hand, were dodging in and out amongst the main lines and
sidings and crossings and switches of the course of life as mapped out
in Tim's face, till one tear was shunted into his left ear, and the
other paused by the corner of his mouth.
"Don't cry, my pet," said Tim again, caressing the child with all a
woman's tenderness. "But come, I say, you must cheer up, for see what
I've been making for you. But there, don't cry, my darling;" and he
pressed his cool, soft, womanly hand upon weal and burning sore. "Now
look," he continued, and from under a heap of cloth patches he produced
a quaint-looking rag doll, evidently the work of many a stolen five
minutes. "Now, then!" he cried, in the tone people adopt towards
children, "what do you think of that?"
Then there was silence, while Tim eagerly watched the child, whose
little mind seemed to be struggling hard between the ideas natural to
its age, and those of a forced and premature character. First she
looked at the doll, then at its donor, and then, half laughing, half
crying, she looked pitifully in Tim's face, before once more throwing
herself, sobbing loudly, in his arms, where she clung tightly, as the
little man patted her head, and smoothed and caressed her.
"I thought she'd have liked it," muttered Tim, looking down upon the
little head in a disconcerted way, his face growing more and more
puckered as he rocked himself to and fro, humming the snatch of some old
ditty, treating the suffering little one as though she were a baby. By
slow degrees the sobs ceased, and Tim seemed more puzzled than ever,
when the child raised her head, and gazed in his face, her little wan
aspect seeming to make her years older as she kissed him, saying--
"Please put it away now."
Tim stared hard at the little thin face, as with one hand he reluctantly
placed the doll beneath the cloth shreds, holding her tightly with the
other, till, in a strange old-fashioned way, she kissed him again,
saying--
"It was very kind of you." And then she slipped out of his arms,
crossed the room to the glass, and smoothed her hair, wetted Tim's
sponge, and removed the tear marks from her face, placing too the cool
grateful water against the smarting weals upon her arms. Afterwards she
returned to her task and went on polishing the metal lid, a sob rising
at intervals to make Tim Ruggles flinch.
Tim's work was again in hand, but progressing very, very slowly as he
then sat musing, and wondering whose child the little one was; also
whether she would be fetched away, a proceeding which he dreaded, in
spite of the pain it gave him to see her suffer. "I've no spirit to
stop it," he muttered, "though it nips me horribly. I suppose it's from
stitching so much that I ain't like most men. It's all right though, I
s'pose; she knows best.--Here, I say, though, my wig and pickles, we
shall have the missus home directly," he cried, fiercely, "and no work
done. Now then, bustle; polish away;" and he set the example of
industry by snatching up the trousers in course of making, and sewing
more fiercely than ever.
Volume 1, Chapter X.