MESSRS. BLACK AND PARKER.
Joan slept well that night, and woke to find the sunlight streaming in at her
window. Coming down to the sitting-room at a quarter past seven, she saw that,
early as it was, it had been swept and garnished and the breakfast laid.
“Good morning, my dear!” said Mrs. Bird: “I am glad to see
that you are an early riser. I suppose it is a habit which you bring with you
from the country. It was not so with the late accountant, who would never
breakfast till nine if he could help it, and on Sundays not till ten; but I
think that an affection of the liver from which he suffered made him sleepy.
And now I am going to have prayers. Maria, come to prayers.”
Maria shuffled in, obedient, and diving into the back room reappeared wheeling
her master before her, who, as he came, smiled sweetly and waved his hand in
greeting to Joan. Presently Sally arrived, and the ceremony began. First Mrs.
Bird handed two Bibles to her husband and her daughter, pointing out the
passage which was to be read with her finger, then she gave them each a manual
of prayer. These preparations finished, she began to read the chapter of the
Bible aloud; and it was curious and touching to see the attention with which
her deaf-and-dumb audience followed the words they could not hear, glancing
from time to time at the motions of her lips to make sure that they were
keeping pace with her. When the reading was finished she shut the Bible and
knelt down an example that Mr. Bird could not follow, for his limbs were
paralysed. Sally, however, placed herself near Joan, making it clear to her by
signs that she was to indicate by pointing each sentence as it passed her
mother’s lips.
Prayers being over—and surely family worship was never carried on under
greater difficulties—breakfast followed, and then the business of the day
began. Mr. Bird carved while Mrs. Bird and her daughter sewed at gowns that
they were making. For a time Joan looked on helplessly; then, wearying of
idleness, asked if she could not do something.
“Can you sew, my dear?” said Mrs. Bird.
“Pretty well,” she answered; “but not like you.”
“That is scarcely wonderful, considering that I have done nothing else
for more than twenty years; but here are some seams to be run up, if you have
nothing better to do.”
Joan took the seams and began to run them; indeed, she “ran” until
her back ached with stooping.
“You are getting tired, my dear,” said Mrs. Bird, “as I
expected you would, not being accustomed to the work,” and she peered at
her kindly through her spectacles. “Now you had better rest awhile and
talk. What part of England do you come from?”
“From the Eastern counties,” answered Joan.
“Dear me! that is strange—quite a coincidence, I declare. I come
from the East coast myself. I was born at Yarmouth, though it is many and many
a year since I have seen a herring boat. You see, my story is a very simple
one. I was an orphan girl, for my dear father was drowned in an October gale
when fishing at sea, and I came to London with a family as nursemaid. They did
not treat me kindly—even now I cannot say that they did, although I wish
to be charitable—for they discharged me because I was not strong enough
to do the work, and if I had not been taken in out of pity by a widow woman, a
dressmaker and my predecessor in this very house, I do not know what would have
become of me. My husband was her only child, and it was part of my duty, and
indeed of my pleasure, to look after him in his affliction so far as I was
able. Then when his mother died I married him, for I could not make up my mind
to leave him alone, and this of course I must have done unless I became his
wife. So you see, my dear, I took him on and the business with him, and we have
been very happy ever since—so happy that sometimes I wonder why God is so
good to me, who am full of faults. One sorrow we have had, it is true, though
now even that seems to have become a joy: it was after Sally was born. She was
a beautiful baby, and when for the first time I grew sure that she would be
deaf and dumb also, I cried till I thought my heart would break, and wished
that she might die. Now I see how wicked this was, and every night I thank
Heaven that I was not taken at my word, for then my heart would have broken
indeed.” And the dear little woman’s eyes filled with tears as,
putting her arm round the child’s waist, she kissed her tenderly.
There was something so beautiful in the scene that Joan almost cried in
sympathy, and even Jim, who seemed to understand everything, for one moment
ceased to smile, and having wiped away a tear from his round blue eye,
stretched out his great arms and swept both the mother and the daughter into a
confused embrace.
“You say that you are full of faults,” said Joan, turning her head
until the three of them had recovered their composure, “but I think you
are an angel.”
“If to tend and care for those whom one loves is to be an angel, _I_
think that we shall most of us get to heaven,” she answered, shaking her
head; then added, “Oh! you wretched Jim, you have broken my
spectacles—the new ones.”
Jim, watching his wife’s lip and the damaged glasses, looked so comically
distressed that Joan burst out laughing, while Sally, seeing what was the
matter, ran to the back room to fetch another pair.
“And now, my dear,” Mrs. Bird said presently, “you say that
you have come to London to get work, though why you should want work if you
have plenty of money I do not quite understand. What kind of employment do you
wish to take? For my part I cannot think, for, to be frank with you, my dear,
you seem too much of a lady for most things.”
“I thought,” said Joan diffidently, “that I might perhaps get
a situation as one of those girls in shops whom they use to hang cloaks on for
the approval of customers. You see, I am—tall, and I am not clever enough
to teach, so I know nothing else for which I should be fit.”
Mrs. Bird shook her head. “I dare say that you might come by such
employment, my dear, but I tell you at once that I do not approve of it. I know
something of the wickedness of London, and I think that this sort of occupation
puts too many temptations in the way of a young lady like you, who are so
beautiful, and do not seem to have any home ties to keep your thoughts from
them. We are most of us weak, remember; and flattery, and promises, and grand
presents, all of which would be offered to you, are very nice things.”
“I am not afraid of such temptations, Mrs. Bird,” Joan answered,
with a sad confidence that at once attracted the quick little woman’s
attention.
“Now, when a person tells me that she is not afraid of a thing,”
she said, glancing at her, “I conclude that she is either totally without
experience and foolhardy, or that, having won the experience and passed through
the fire, she no longer fears a danger which she has overcome,
or——” and she stopped.
This vein of speculative reflection did not seem to recommend itself to Joan:
at any rate she changed the subject.
“You have twice called me a lady, Mrs. Bird,” she said, “but
I must tell you that I am nothing of the sort. Who my father was I don’t
even know, though I believe him to have been a gentleman, and my mother was the
daughter of a yeoman farmer.”
“Married?” asked Mrs. Bird interrogatively.
Joan shook her head.
“Ah! I understand,” said Mrs. Bird.
“I—That is partly why I left home,” explained Joan.
“Meaning Bradmouth? Don’t look surprised, my dear. I saw the name
on the clergyman’s testimonial, and also on your box.”
“Yes, Bradmouth. I lived there with an aunt, and everybody looked down
upon me because of my position.”
“That was very wicked of them. But did they begin to look down upon you
all at once, or had you, perhaps, some other reason for coming away? I suppose
your aunt knew that you were coming?”
“No, she did not know. We do not get on together, and I thought it best
not to tell her. Also, she wanted me to marry somebody whom I dislike.”
“Because there is somebody else whom you do like, I suppose, my dear.
Well, it is no affair of mine. But if you will not think me impertinent, where
then do you get your money from?”
“A gentleman——”
“A gentleman!” exclaimed Mrs. Bird, dropping her work in horror.
“Oh! no, not that,” said Joan, blushing; “he is a kind of
guardian, a friend of my father’s, I believe. At any rate he has paid for
me all these years, and says that he will allow me five pounds a month though I
would rather earn my own living if possible.”
“A friend of your father’s? What a strange story! I suppose that
_he_ is not your father, my dear?”
“My father!” said Joan, opening her eyes wide in amazement,—
“Mr. Levinger my father! Of course not. Why, if he were, would he have
treated me like a stranger all my life?”
“It is possible,” said Mrs. Bird drily; “I have heard of such
things.”
“Oh no, he is not bad enough for that; in fact, he is very good and kind.
He knew that I was coming away, and gave me five-and-twenty pounds to start on,
and he told me himself that he was left my trustee by my father, who is dead,
but whose name he was bound not to reveal.”
“Indeed,” answered Mrs. Bird, pursing up her lips. “And now I
must go and see about the dinner. As it happens, I do work for some of the big
shops; and I will inquire if there is any situation vacant that might suit you.
Look: Jim wants you to turn your head a little, so that he can see your nose.
Is he not making a beautiful likeness?” And, nodding affectionately at
her husband, she left the room.
Once outside the door, Mrs. Bird stood still and reflected. “There is a
mystery about that girl,” she thought, “and she has not told me all
her story: she has left out the love affair—I could see it in her face.
Now, if I were wise, I should send her about her business without more words;
but, somehow, I cannot find the heart to do it. I suppose it is because she is
so beautiful, and seems so sad and friendless; and after all it is one’s
duty to help those who are placed thus—yes, even if they have not been
quite respectable, though of course I have no right to suppose that she has
not. No, I cannot turn her away. To do so might be to bring her to ruin, and
that would be a dreadful thing to have upon one’s mind. But I do not
think much of that guardian of hers, Mr. Levinger she called him, who can send
such a lovely girl to take her chance in London without providing her with a
proper home. It looks almost as if he wished to be rid of her: altogether it is
a very strange story. I must say that it interests me; but then curiosity
always was one of my sins, and I have not conquered it yet.” And again
shaking her head, this time at the thought of her own depravity, Mrs. Bird made
her way to the kitchen.
After dinner was over she announced to Joan that they were all going out for a
walk in the Park, and asked her if she would like to accompany them. Joan, of
course, was delighted, for already she began to feel a want of the fresh air to
which she was accustomed; but as she accepted she looked inquiringly at Mr.
Bird.
“Ah, my dear,” said his wife, “you are wondering how he can
come out walking when his legs are crippled. Well, presently you shall see. Now
go and put on your hat.”
By the time that Joan was ready she found that a long wheel-chair, which she
had noticed standing in the passage, had been run into the sitting-room, and
into this chair Mr. Bird shifted himself with marvellous agility by the help of
his muscular arms, nodding and smiling at Joan the while.
“How on earth will they get it down the steps?” she wondered. Soon
the mystery was solved, for, the front door having been opened, Sally appeared
with three grooved boards which reached from the lintel to the pavement. The
three wheels of the chair having been set in the grooves, Mr. Bird grasped the
iron railings on either side of the steps, and, smiling triumphantly, launched
himself with much dignity into the street.
“There, my dear!” said Mrs. Bird, while Sally replaced the boards
in the passage and shut the door, “necessity is the mother of invention.
Quite clever, isn’t it? But we have other contrivances that are even
cleverer.”
Then they started, Mr. Bird guiding himself, while Sally and Mrs. Bird who was
arrayed in a prim little bonnet and mantle, pushed behind. Joan offered to
assist, but was not allowed this honour because of her inexperience of the
streets, at any rate until they reached the Park. So she walked by the side of
the chair, wondering at the shops and the noise and bustle of the Edgware Road.
Presently they came to the corner opposite the Marble Arch, where, as usual,
the wide roadway was blocked with traffic. “How ever will they get across
there?” thought Joan: “it frightens me to look at it.”
But it did not frighten Mrs. Bird and her family, who, without a moment’s
hesitation, plunged into the thick of it, calling to Joan to keep close to
them. It was really wonderful to see the skill with which the transit was
accomplished; cabs, omnibuses and carriages bore down upon them from all
directions, but the Bird family were not dismayed. Here and there the chair
headed, now passing under the nose of a horse and now grazing the wheel of a
cab, till at length it arrived safely at the farther pavement. Joan was not so
fortunate, however; about half-way across she lost her head, and, having been
nearly knocked down by the pole of an omnibus, stood bewildered till a
policeman seized her by the arm and dragged her into safety.
“You see, my dear,” said Mrs. Bird, “although you are so
strong, you are not quite competent to wheel Jim at present. First you must
learn to look after yourself.”
Then they went for their walk in the Park, which Joan enjoyed, for it was all
new to her, especially when she was allowed to push the precious chair; and
returned to Kent Street in time for tea.
The rest of the afternoon and evening passed like those of the previous day,
and the morrow was as the yesterday had been. Indeed, there was little variety
in the routine of the Bird ménage—so little that Joan soon began
to wonder how they distinguished one month or one year from another. Few
customers came to the house, for most of the dressmaking was put out to Mrs.
Bird by the managers of large shops, who had confidence in her, and were not
afraid to trust her with costly materials, which she made up, generally into
skirts, and took back in the evenings.
So it came about that all day long Mrs. Bird and Sally sewed, while Jim carved
endless walking-sticks, and Joan sat by giving such help as she could, now
listening to her hostess’s good-natured chatter and now to the shrill
song of the canary. At first, after all that she had gone through, this mode of
life was a rest to her. It was delightful to be obliged neither to think nor to
work unless she so wished; it was delightful to know that she was beyond the
reach of Samuel Rock, and could not be harried by the coarse tongue of Mrs.
Gillingwater or by the gossip of her neighbours. The atmosphere of goodness in
which she lived was very soothing also: it was a new thing for Joan to pass her
days where there was no hate, no passion, no jealousy, and no
violence—where, on the contrary, charity and loving-kindness reigned
supreme. Soon she grew very fond of little Mrs. Bird, as, indeed, anybody must
have done who had the good fortune to know her; and began to share her
adoration of the two “babies,” the great patient creature who faced
his infirmities with a perpetual smile, and the sweet child from whom love
seemed to radiate.
But after a while, as her body and mind shook off their weariness, these things
began to pall; she longed for work, for anything that would enable her to
escape from her own thoughts,—and as yet no work was forthcoming. At
times, tiring of Jim’s smile as he hewed out libellous likenesses of
herself upon his walking-sticks, and of the trilling of the canary, she would
seek refuge in her own sitting-room, where she read and re-read the books that
Henry had given her; and at times, longing for air, she would escape from the
stuffy little house to the Park, to walk up and down there till she grew
weary—an amusement which she found had its drawbacks. At last, when she
had been a fortnight in Kent Street, she asked Mrs. Bird if there was any
prospect of getting employment.
“My dear,” was the answer, “I have inquired everywhere, and
as yet without success. To-night I am taking this skirt back to Messrs. Black
and Parker, in Oxford Street, and I will ask their manager, who is quite a
friend of mine, if he has an opening. Failing this I think you had better
advertise, for I see that you are getting tired of doing nothing, and I do not
wonder at it,—though you should be most thankful that you can afford to
live without work, seeing that many people in your position would now be
reduced to starvation.”
That night Mrs. Bird returned from Messrs. Black and Parker’s with a
radiant countenance.
“My dear,” she said, “there is a coincidence, quite a
wonderful coincidence. The young woman at Messrs. Black and Parker’s
whose business it was to fit on the cloaks in the mantle department has
suddenly been called away to nurse a sick uncle in Cornwall from whom she has
expectations, and they are looking out for some one to take her place, for, as
it chances, there is no one suitable for the post in their employ. I told the
manager about you, and he said that I was to bring you there to-morrow morning.
If they engaged you your pay would be eighteen shillings a week to begin with;
which is not much, but better than nothing.”
Accordingly, on the following morning, having arrayed herself in her best
dress, and a pretty little bonnet that she had made with the help of Sally,
Joan set out for Messrs. Black and Parker’s in the company of Mrs. Bird.
Messrs. Black and Parker’s establishment was an enormous one, having many
departments.
“You see it is a first-class shop, my dear,” said Mrs. Bird,
glancing with veneration at the huge windows filled with
_chefs-d‘oeuvres_ of the milliner’s and other arts. “Now
follow me, and don’t be nervous.” And she led the way through
various divisions till she reached a large box built of mahogany and glass
labelled “Manager’s Office. No admittance except on business.”
At this moment the door of the box opened, and from it issued an oiled and
curled specimen of manhood, with very white hands and hair so wavy, that it
conveyed a suggestion of crimping tongs.
His eye fell upon Joan, and he bowed obsequiously.
“Can I do anything for you, madam?” he said. “We are so full
this morning that I fear you are not being attended to.”
“She is not a customer, Mr. Waters,” said Mrs. Bird, emerging from
behind Joan’s tall shape: “she is the young person about whom I
spoke to you, who wants a situation as show-woman.”
“Oh! is she?” said Mr. Waters, with a complete change of manner;
“then why didn’t you say so at first? Well, she’s a pretty
girl anyway. Step in here, miss, and take off your jacket, please, so that I
can see what your figure is like.”
Joan did as she was told, although she felt a hate of this individual swelling
in her heart. Mr. Waters surveyed her critically for half a minute or more,
shutting first one eye and then the other, as though to bring her better into
focus.
“Any experience?” he said laconically. “I mean of
business.”
“No, sir, none,” Joan answered.
“Ah! I see: a lady, I suppose.”
“I am not a lady, sir,” replied Joan.
“Ain’t you?—then you imitate the article very well.”
“Just what I feared,” murmured Mrs. Bird, shaking her head.
“However,” he went on, “we can overlook that fault; but I
have another doubt about you. You’re too good-looking. Our customers like
to see their things tried on a fine figure, of course, but they don’t
like to see them tried on a girl who makes them look common dowds beside her.
Why, a three-guinea mantle would seem a better thing on your back than a
forty-pound cloak on most of them. You’d show off the goods, I dare say,
but I doubt that you would frighten away custom.”
“I thought that tall people were always wanted,” hesitated Joan.
“Tall people!” said Mr. Waters, with an admiring snigger;
“just you look at yourself in this pier glass, and I think that you will
see something else there beside height. Now, I’ll give you a bit of
advice: you drop this show and go on to the stage. You’ll draw there;
yes, even if you can’t sing or act a bit, there are hundreds who would
pay to come and look at you. By George! I’m not sure that I
wouldn’t myself.”
“I do not wish to go on the stage,” answered Joan stiffly; and Mrs.
Bird behind her murmured, “No! never!” in sympathetic tones.
“If you think that I shall not suit,” she added, “I will not
take up your time any longer.”
“I didn’t say that, miss. Here!”—and he put his head
out of the door and called to a shop-woman—“just give me that
velvet mantle, will you? Now, miss,” he said: “you fancy that Mrs.
Bird’s a customer, and let me see you try to sell her this cloak.”
Joan’s first impulse was to refuse, but presently a sense of the fun of
the situation prevailed, and she rose to it, mincing, smiling, and praising up
the garment, which she hung upon her own shoulders, bending her graceful shape
this way and that to show it in various lights and attitudes, till at length
Mrs. Bird exclaimed, “Well, I never!—you’re a born actress,
my dear. You might have been bred to the business. I should have bought that
cloak long ago, I should, though, saving your presence, Mr. Waters, I
don’t think it is worth the price asked.”
“You’ll do,” said the manager, rubbing his hands, “if
only you can forget that you are a lady, and have _nous_ enough to flatter
when you see that it is welcome, and that’s always where ladies and their
clothes are concerned. What’s your name?”
“Haste: Joan Haste.”
“Very well, Miss Haste. Let’s see: to-day is Saturday, so you may
as well begin on Monday. Hours nine to seven, dinner and tea provided, also
black silk dress, that you put on when you come and take off when you leave. I
should think that the last young lady’s would fit you pretty well with a
little alteration, unless you like to buy one yourself at cost price.”
“Thank you, I think that I will buy one for myself.”
“Indeed! Well, so much the better for us. It is usual to ask for
references as to character, and security, or a sum on deposit; but I understand
that Mrs. Bird guarantees all that, so we will say no more about it. The wages
will be eighteen shillings a week for the first six months, and after that a
pound if we are satisfied with you. Do you agree to these terms?”
“Yes.”
“Very well, then. Good morning.”
“There’s a smart girl,” reflected Mr. Waters to himself,
“and a real beauty too. But she’s a fool for all that; she ought to
go on the boards,—she’d have a future there. However, it’s
her affair, not mine.”
“Well, my dear,” said Mrs. Bird to Joan, “you got through
that capitally. At first I thought that he would never engage you, but he
seemed to take quite a liking to you before the end. What do you think of
him?”
“I think him odious,” said Joan.
“Odious, my dear! What a strong term! Free and easy, if you like, but not
odious. He is much better than most of them, I can tell you.”
“Then the rest must be very bad indeed,” said Joan, and continued
on her way in silence.