RETURNING KINDNESS.
On this stormy Sunday--while Mr. Kayll in his solitude was wondering
how it fared with his wife and children, and never dreaming that it was
a happy thing for him that he did not know; and while Jack and his two
little sisters were walking homewards from church, after waiting in the
porch of an empty house until the rain was over, without a suspicion
of what was in store for them--three people at least were happier than
they had been for years.
These were Mrs. Coleson and her children. They were still in the same
lodgings, but their poverty was a thing of the past. Mr. Coleson’s
mother, the hard and cold woman who had never helped them while she was
alive, had at her death, a few days ago, left everything she possessed
to her son’s widow and her little grandchildren.
And now the rent was paid, and they were all full of plans for the
future. The youngest child, who was already better, lay on the bed with
one hand in her mother’s, and a smile lighting up her small pinched
face, as Amy drew a wonderful picture of the beautiful life that was
before them.
“We’ll have a dear little cottage in the country,” she was saying,
“with ivy and roses growing all over it, and a garden, full of fruit
and flowers and vegetables, and chickens--you must let us have
chickens, mother--and a cat and kittens, and a big dog, and then we
shall enjoy ourselves all day long. Won’t it be lovely, baby? And
you’ll learn to walk, and grow up straight and tall, and Kitty will get
the roses back into those white cheeks of hers, and mother will get
well and strong and happy.”
“It is sad, though,” said Mrs. Coleson, “to think how many poor things
we shall leave behind us in London, whose grandmothers have no money to
leave them, and who will live as we have been living until they die.”
The children were quiet for a little while; but they soon began to plan
how they would have some little girls and boys they knew to stay with
them in that new home, and they should enjoy themselves too.
Already Mrs. Coleson had some money to use, and she could have as much
more as she liked, while she made her arrangements for leaving Wingate
Row. But her first duty was to pay her debt to Mr. Kayll, whose visit
to her had, as she knew, resulted in a great trouble falling upon his
family.
“This afternoon, Amy,” she said, interrupting the children’s chatter,
“I think, if the rain and thunder are over, you and I might leave Kitty
and baby in Mrs. Smith’s care while we go over to Denham Green.”
Amy looked delighted.
“How lovely!” she cried. “You won’t mind being left, baby, will you?”
The child only laughed, for their old landlady was almost like another
mother to them all, and they were greatly attached to her.
And so it befell that the same day, towards evening, Mrs. Coleson and
Amy went over to Buxton Street, but not to No. 15, for that number had
ceased to exist.
It was now their turn to aid, comfort, and advise, although, indeed,
there were plenty of people willing to help the sufferers by the
accident as far as lay in their power. There were doors open to them,
meals for them to share, offers of assistance in saving what was left
of their belongings from the wreck. Poor Mrs. Kayll, however, sadly
needed someone to manage for her, for this last calamity had been such
a shock, that at first she seemed quite helpless and broken down.
“It’s of no use to make a fuss, though,” said Jack, who insisted on
looking on the bright side of it all. “We all knew the house would
come down some day, and if it hadn’t fallen now it would have been much
too wet to live in. And I don’t believe it was healthy before. As for
Jem, though he nearly got buried in the ruins, he didn’t quite, and
he’s all right now, and thinks Bob a hero, which he never did before.
Then, if father had been here, he couldn’t have prevented the flood,
or the house falling, and there’d have been another to find room for
somewhere, to-night. Things might have been ever so much worse.”
Madge entered into this cheerful view of the matter, and went with Mrs.
Coleson to find lodgings where they could all be taken in at once. For
though the neighbours were kind enough, and one would have taken two of
the children, another two more, for the night, they wanted to keep all
together if it could possibly be managed.
And so, before nightfall they were installed in three empty rooms in
a house in the next street, and some people lent them one thing, and
some another--old boxes for table and chairs, and the landlady of the
lodging spared what she could for them in the way of furniture, until
the boys and girls all declared it was the best fun in the world, and
that they liked it better than being at home.
It was not till the next morning that the water was sufficiently
drained away for anything to be done in the way of recovering their
property from the fallen building. All hands went to work, though,
as soon as it was light, and the boys, instead of being cast down at
the sight of so many things broken, bent, soaked or spoiled, shouted
with laughter as they recognized in a battered, shapeless, flat object
the metal tea-pot out of which they had had tea ever since they could
remember, or found an extraordinary black pulpy mass to be their
mother’s old feather-bed.
Every bit of crockery was broken. The clock would never go again. In
fact, very little that could be of any use except for firewood was
recovered. A blanket or two, so transformed that at first nobody knew
what they were, later on a few bent and rusty knives and forks, and a
coal-scuttle, almost made up the sum of available property when all was
done.
Mrs. Kayll had really to start house-keeping again from the very
beginning, poorer than when she and her husband began life together
seventeen years ago, with only two people to support instead of nine.
This morning Mrs. Coleson came back laden with several little additions
to their comfort, insisting on staying there and helping to the best of
her power. For this day or two her aid was very welcome, for Mrs. Kayll
and the elder children all felt that it was impossible to decide upon
anything, or form any plan, until next Tuesday should be over.