Gutter-alley was certainly a gloomy home, but somehow time glided on as
swiftly there as in more favoured spots. A year soon sped. The
attentions of the young men had been incessant, but they had made no
progress in their suits, for the love of Jenny continued to be centred
in her grandfather, and if she had any to spare it was devoted to the
row of flowers in her window, sickly plants which, sheltered though they
were from the cold weather without, grew long of stalk and leaf as they
strained and struggled to reach the light. But Jenny's patience was
vain; the flowers always ended by drooping, turning yellow, and slowly
withering away, even as drooped the wretched birds, supposed to be
fowls, which pecked about in the alley, dropping a feather here and a
feather there in their perpetual moult and raggedness, but about which
fowls there was a legend known to every child in the court, in which it
was related that the feathery scarecrow known as "the hen" had once laid
an egg--a real genuine egg like those labelled at the cheesemonger's as
"Sixteen a shilling," though no one had ever been found, from the owner
of the fowls to the youngest inhabitant, who could conscientiously
declare that he or she had seen that egg in its new-laid form.
For, as has been before hinted at, Gutter-alley had an atmosphere of its
own, where not only flowers had their life dried out of them, but human
beings grew more sickly day by day. The children became pale and
stunted of growth; their elders unwholesome of mien and habit. It was
one of Death's London strongholds, and the visits of parish surgeon and
undertaker were frequent here. The close crowded court was one of the
spots where typhus lived till it was tired, surfeited with the ill it
had done, when for a time it slept.
It was summer, and there was much meeting of women in the court, where
they would stand together after their fashion, with apron-wrapped arms,
to gossip and compare notes. Now there was a funeral, and that had to
be discussed, being considered a decent berryin, wherein all took deep
interest, for most likely the majority had subscribed their mites to
assist the neighbour in trouble. No matter how poor the sufferers, a
decent funeral must be had; and it was no uncommon thing for the
undertaker to be called upon to take off the bare, wretched,
poverty-stricken aspect of the parish shell by decking it with a few
rows of black nails, and a breast-plate and set of handles.
Now the doctor had been seen to go into Number 8. Where would he go
next? How was Mrs Rose? Was Banks's child better? Would Widow
Robinson and the five little ones have to go to the workhouse? Plenty
of such questions were discussed in those days; and it happened that as
four of the women were watching for the return of the doctor from one
house, that, laden as usual, Harry Smith came up the road, set down his
basket, and then, taking out almost an armful of moss roses, he was
about to enter the door of Number 5, when one of the women partly
covered her face with her apron, and then whispered something to the
young man, which made him hesitate for a moment. Directly after he
smiled, shook his head, and entered the house, to return in a few
minutes without the roses.
The next morning he found that there was still a discussion going on in
the court, and on approaching the door of Number 5 it was shut, and
entrance was denied.
He could not see any one, a parish nurse said, for the fever was very
bad in the house, as at many more in the court; and the young man sighed
as he went away to encounter John Wilson at the end of the alley,
glancing down it for a moment before passing on again.
For the fever was bad indeed, and once and twice a day shabby funeral
processions left the place. Now that the trouble had come, parish
meetings were held, and timid men made some little paltry attempts at
battling and staying the progress of the distemper. But in spite of all
they could do, the fever still raged; and at last, when he came one
morning, Harry Smith learned from the women of the court that Jenny
Blossom lay a-dying.
No one now saw the blooming girl, basket in hand, go out to sell her
fragrant flowers, and Number 5 was shunned as the blackest plague spot
in the court.
But still, day by day, came Harry Smith to the door, where he was never
admitted. Not laden now with heavy bunches of flowers, but bearing a
few sweet buds, to send by the hands of the nurse to the sick girl's
room. Twice over though had Hany to stop shuddering, to let the bearers
of something pass. Shuddering from no selfish fear, but lest _some one_
might have been suddenly snatched away. For in those times he knew that
it was not long before the cold harshly-shaped coffin was called into
requisition, and his dread was great until the woman at the house set
him at rest.
Then came Harry's turn: one morning he tried to rise for his market
trip, but only to find that he had been stricken down by the enemy, and
he was soon fighting hard with the fever that had fastened on him.
It was a long hard fight that, but Harry was young and hopeful, he had
much to live for, and he won the victory, but only to be left weak as a
little child, and unable to stir from his humble bed.
As soon as he could crawl about, by the help of a stick, Harry's steps
were directed to Gutter-alley, where, after a long and painful walk, he
stood leaning against a wall for support, feeling deadly faint, for
there was another funeral at Number 5.
"From which room?" he asked huskily, for there was one of the court
women at his side.
"Second floor front," was the reply, and the young man groaned, impotent
to ask further questions.
"Is it--is it?" he could say no more; but the woman divined his
thoughts.
"No, no!" she answered eagerly, "the poor darling has been spared. It
is the old man who is gone to his long home. Jenny has been about this
fortnight now, and nursed the old man through it all."
"Was it fever?" asked Harry, more for the sake of speaking than from
curiosity, for he wanted to conceal his weakness as far as he could.
"Some say it was; but I don't think so," she replied. "But you ought to
be at home, with the rain falling like this. Why, you look fit to be in
your bed and nowhere else."
"Yes, yes," said Harry, "I'll go soon."
"He was very old," said the woman; "I knew him years ago, when I lived
over there, before he broke his leg. I've been to see Jenny, God bless
her! She's half brokenhearted, and has now no one to look up to."
Harry Smith, in spite of the inclement, wintry weather, stopped by the
mouth of the court awaiting the coming of the funeral, and a faint flush
came into his hollow cheeks as he thought of the woman's last words, and
wondered whether Jenny would now choose a protector, and whether that
protector would be John Wilson.
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