Transcriber's note: Unusual and inconsistent spelling is as printed.
[Illustration: Millie looked in the direction to which he pointed.]
WON OVER:
THE STORY OF A BOY'S LIFE.
BY
_NELLIE HELLIS_
AUTHOR OF "ROVING ROBIN," "MARTIN DRAYTON'S SIN," ETC., ETC.
LONDON:
T. WOOLMER, 2, CASTLE STREET, CITY ROAD, E.C.,
AND 66, PATERNOSTER ROW, E.C.
1885.
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To my Father,
IN GRATEFUL RECOGNITION OF HIS
LOVING HELP AND SYMPATHY.
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CONTENTS.
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CHAP.
I.—BIGAROONS AND BITTERNESS
II.—HOW PHIL AND MILLIE CAME TO LIVE IN LONDON
III.—WATERLOO BRIDGE BY MOONLIGHT
IV.—MILLIE GOES OUT TO TEA
V.—MISS CRAWFORD'S PROPOSAL
VI.—PHIL BREAKS HIS WORD
VII.—IN THE HOSPITAL
VIII.—MILLIE'S REAL FAIRY
IX.—STRONGER THAN DEATH
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WON OVER:
THE STORY OF A BOY'S LIFE.
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CHAPTER I.
BIGAROONS AND BITTERNESS.
IT was a hot day in July, and twelve o'clock was striking from a
neighbouring church as a little girl came from one of the narrow
streets that open into Drury Lane, and walked rapidly in the direction
of Oxford Street. Her face, generally very pale, was now flushed with
pleasure and excitement, while her eyes sparkled with delight. She had
gone some little distance before she perceived the person whom she had
come to meet. It was her brother, and breaking into a run she was soon
at his side.
"O! Phil," she gasped, completely out of breath, "what do you think?
Miss Crawford has been to see me."
"You should not run in such hot weather, Millie," said her brother.
"You'll be ill again, if you do. Here, sit down a minute on this
door-step, and get cool. Who has been, did you say?"
"Miss Crawford. Why, Phil, you can't have forgotten her."
"No, I remember," he answered shortly; and his face grew sorrowful,
almost stern, at the recollections the name recalled.
"She said she had been trying to find us everywhere," Millie went on
eagerly, "but nobody at Camberwell seemed to know where we had gone.
Then one day last week she happened to meet Ned Roberts, and he told
her that he thought uncle had moved to Swift Street."
"Yes, more's the pity," muttered Phil. "Didn't she tell you the
wretched hole would half kill you?"
"No, of course not. You know she's not the one to make the worst of
anything, Phil. She's too good for that. But, indeed, it's not so bad,
after all. Why, our street is quite fresh and pleasant compared to Back
Court," said Millie, mentioning one of the most wretched of the many
thickly-populated alleys near Drury Lane.
"You're like her there; you always make the best of everything. I wish
I could, but I can't," said Phil despondently. "Never mind, Millie,"
he added cheerfully after a moment's pause, "I shall soon be able to
earn enough to keep us both. I shall be fourteen, you know, next month.
Won't we have a pretty cottage in the country some day, that's all?"
"But we couldn't leave uncle, Phil," said Millie, earnestly.
"Why not? He has done nothing to make us very grateful to him, and
he's no such pleasant company either," answered Phil in a rough, harsh
tone. "See how he treats me! I did not tell you before, but, Millie—"
he lowered his voice as he said it—"he struck me the other night; yes,
struck me a blow that sent me reeling half across the room."
"O! Phil, when?" Millie exclaimed anxiously, forgetting Miss Crawford
and everything else in the alarm caused by her brother's words. "Where
was I? How was it that I didn't know anything about it?"
"You were asleep, dear. You had a headache and had gone to bed, and I
took care not to make a noise, for I didn't want to wake you. I only
looked at uncle; and, coward that he is, he slunk off to his room
without speaking. He had been drinking, of course," said Phil; "but if
he should dare to do it again, or touch you, I'll—" He did not finish
his sentence, but he drew himself up, and shook back the hair from his
forehead with such an expression of hatred and revenge on his face that
Millie shuddered.
"Phil, don't look so," she said. "You need not fear that he will ever
strike me. He loves me too dearly for that. You know I can do almost
anything with him."
"Except make him give up his bad companions and bad habits; and unless
you can do that, I don't see of what use your influence is, Millie,"
returned Phil with a short, bitter laugh. "For my part," he added, "I
think it's a mercy poor aunt died when she did. He'd have broken her
heart before now."
Millie thought it wiser to say nothing, though she could not suppress
the weary sigh that came from the very bottom of her heart, as rising
from the door-step she began walking slowly back to the place they now
called home. Phil kept pace with her, looking miserable and gloomy.
Very soon, however, Millie's face broke into a smile again, and she
cheerfully started a new subject of conversation.
"Dinner is all ready for you, Phil. Aren't you hungry?"
"No, it's too hot to be hungry. Besides, who could eat in this vile
atmosphere?"
"But I've got a lovely lettuce for you, and vinegar. Vinegar is always
so refreshing, I think, in hot weather. Then there's plenty of cheese,
and a bit of beef we had over from yesterday. And—But guess what there
is besides."
"Is uncle coming home to dinner?" inquired Phil.
Millie thought that he was ungraciously ignoring her request, and
replied in rather a hurt voice—
"No, he said he should not be in till night."
Her brother's next words, however, told her that she had wronged him.
"Well, then, there will be you, and to have you all to myself for half
an hour will be as good as twenty dinners, Millie."
There was one noble trait in Phil's character, at any rate, his intense
love for his sister. It shone out now from his innermost soul, as
looking fondly at her, he tucked her hand under his arm.
"No, but do guess what it is," Millie went on eagerly. "It's something
so nice—something you will enjoy. Miss Crawford brought it."
"Then it's sure to be something good. Tell me, I'm a bad hand at
guessing."
"A dish of cherries. Such beauties! There was a basket full of them,
and at the top she had spread some flowers. I thought it was all
flowers at first. Isn't she kind, Phil? And O! She said—But there,"
exclaimed Millie, suddenly interrupting herself, "we'll have dinner
now, and I'll tell you what she said presently."
So saying, Millie entered the house in Swift Street in which the
brother and sister and their uncle lodged. Their rooms were on the
top floor, and the little girl climbed wearily up the long steep
staircase. Phil walked behind, taking good care not to hurry her. On
every landing there were children playing,—poor, dirty, uncared-for
little things who, for the most part, were shoeless and ragged. Some
were quarrelling, while some, happier than the rest, were ravenously
devouring the slices of bread, thinly spread with jam, that constituted
their midday meal. On the second landing, a girl, older than Millie,
with a coarse, bold face, called out sneeringly:
"Well, you two stuck-ups! Just arrived from your mornin' walk? Ain't
you proud of your uncle? He's such an ornament to the family, that you
ought to be."
"You'd better be careful what you say before my sister, Nora Dickson,"
returned Phil haughtily. "I won't have her insulted by such a girl as
you, I can tell you."
Nora answered him with a mocking laugh, but she wisely refrained from
further comment, and went on cobbling—it could not be called sewing—the
ragged little frock which she held in her hand.
As Millie had said, the dinner did look inviting. Yet it was only owing
to the nice arrangement of the dishes, the cleanliness of the cloth,
and the polish upon the knives and forks, that it had that appearance,
for the food itself was small in quantity, and second-rate in quality.
There was an air of neatness and refinement about the room too, which
was evidently the result of Millie's care and taste; Millie, the
child-woman, who in the twelve years of her short life had seen so many
changes, and experienced so many of this world's sorrows and troubles.
"Well," said Phil, cutting up his lettuce and beginning to eat with
a relish that told of a good healthy appetite. "Well, what did Miss
Crawford say?"
"Why," replied Millie, the glad, happy look coming back again into her
eyes, "she said I was to go to her house and have tea with her. She
did, Phil. Aren't you glad?"
"Jolly glad, little woman. It will just do you good to have a change,
and plenty of something nice to eat for once in the way. When are you
going?"
"Not till next week, because Miss Crawford's brother is ill, and she
has to nurse him. But he is getting better now, she says, and as soon
as ever she is at leisure, she will fix a day for me to go."
"She lives in Kennington Road, doesn't she?" Phil asked.
"Yes, Baverstock House, Kennington Road. I remember it, because I saw
aunt direct a letter to her once." Then, with a change in her voice,
Millie continued, "Phil, I think that before aunt died she must have
asked Miss Crawford to look after me a bit, for she told me this
morning that whenever I was in trouble, and wanted a friend, I was
always to let her know, and she would help me in any way she could. She
was so grieved about uncle too. She said she wished she could find me
a more comfortable home than this. But when I told her that I wouldn't
leave you nor uncle, she smiled, and said that I was right, and that so
long as uncle was willing to have me, it was best for me to stay."
"But it's not good for you to be here. I know that well enough," Phil
returned bitterly. "I wish I could take you away; but we shall have to
wait for that."
"I shouldn't leave uncle under any circumstances," said Millie
earnestly and resolutely. "I promised aunt that, however bad he might
be, I would always care for him and attend to him, just as she would
have done if she had lived."
"You're a good girl," said Phil, "but flesh and blood can't stand too
much. However," he added more cheerfully, "we won't talk about our
troubles any more. Get out your cherries. I must be back at one; so I
have no time to spare."
Even Phil's gloomy face brightened as Millie took from the cupboard a
plate of beautiful "bigaroons." He ate a dozen or so with considerable
gusto, then stopped short.
"Why, Millie, you're eating none," he said. "Mind, I shan't have a
single cherry more than you, so please make haste. They won't keep this
weather, you know."
"But—but uncle would like some," said Millie timidly.
"There it is again," exclaimed Phil angrily, breaking out into one
of his sudden outbursts of passion. "It's always uncle, uncle, from
morning to night. I'm sick of the sound of the word. I am nobody and
nothing, I suppose."
"O Phil, dear Phil, don't," said Millie, laying her head upon his
shoulder and bursting into tears. "I do love you. You know I do. I have
nobody in the world but you. If I hadn't you, I should just like to lie
down and die. Don't say such unkind things."
"There, there," said Phil tenderly, his anger all melting at sight of
his sister's tears. "I didn't mean to vex you. Why, Millie," as her
sobs increased, "don't be such a baby. You are a woman now, as you said
the other day." And he kissed her, and lovingly stroked back the damp
curls from her hot forehead.
"Somebody must love uncle, Phil. It's the only thing that will save
him. Aunt felt that, I know. And besides, you can't deny that when he's
sober, he'll do anything for 'the little lass.'" And Millie smiled
bravely, "just to please Phil," as she said to herself.
"Well, I'm off," he said when he saw that her tears had ceased. "Don't
expect me home till late to-night. There's a lot of extra work to be
done, and I must stay overtime. Good-bye, dear."
He turned to go, but Millie held out a handful of cherries and looked
so pleadingly at him, that against his will, he took them. Then,
calling out a last good-bye from the door, Phil tramped downstairs, and
Millie saw no more of him till dusk.
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