LIZ SPEAKS HER MIND.
'Wat,' said Liz Hepburn to her brother next time he came home, 'what
kind o' a lassie is thon?'
It was a question difficult for Walter to answer, and, Scotch-like, he
solved it by putting another.
'What do you think of her?'
'I dinna ken; she's no' like ither folk.'
'But you liked her, Liz?' said Walter, with quite evident anxiety.
'Oh ay; but she's queer. How does she get on wi' Skinny?'
'Well enough. I believe he likes her, Liz, if he would let on.'
Liz made a grimace.
'I daursay, if he can like onything. I telt her my mind on the business
plain, an' offered to get her into our mill.'
'Oh, Liz, you might have had more sense! Her work in a mill!' cried
Walter, with more energy than elegance.
'An' what for no'?' queried Liz sharply. 'I suppose she's the same flesh
and bluid as me.'
'Shut up, you twa,' said a querulous, peevish voice from the ingle-neuk,
where the mother, dull-eyed, depressed, and untidy, sat with her elbows
on her knees. She was in a poor state of health, and had not recovered
from the last week's outburst. It was Saturday night, but there was no
pay forthcoming from the head of the house, who was still in Duke Street
Prison. Walter looked at his mother fixedly for a moment, and the shadow
deepened on his face. She was certainly an unlovely object in her dirty,
unkempt gown, her hair half hanging on her neck, her heavy face looking
as if it had not seen soap and water for long, her dull eyes unlit by
any gleam of intelligence. Of late, since they had grown more dissipated
in their habits, Walter had fallen on the plan of keeping back his wages
till the beginning of the week--the only way in which to ensure them
food. Seldom, indeed, was anything left after Saturday and Sunday's
carousal.
'Is there anything the matter the day, mother?' he asked quite kindly
and gently, being moved by a sudden feeling of compassion for her.
'No, naething; but I'm clean dune. Wad ye no' bring in a drap, Wat?' she
said coaxingly, and her eye momentarily brightened with anticipation.
'It won't do you any good, mother, ye ken that,' he said, striving still
to speak gently, though repulsion now mingled with his pity. 'A good
dinner or supper would do ye more good. I'll bring in a bit steak, if
ye'll cook it.'
'I've nae stammick for meat,' she said, relapsing into her dull state.
'I'm no' lang for this world, an' my wee drap's the only comfort I hae.
Ye'll maybe wish ye hadna been as ill to me by an' by.'
'I'm comin' alang some nicht, Wat,' said Liz, who invariably treated
such remarks with the most profound contempt, ignoring them entirely.
'D'ye think Skinny'll let me in?'
'I daresay,' answered Walter abruptly, and, sitting down on the
window-box, he looked through the blindless window upon the masses of
roofs and the twinkling lights of the great city. His heart was heavy,
his soul sick within him. His home--so poor a home for him, and for all
who called it by that sweet name--had never appeared a more miserable
and homeless place. It was not the smallness nor the poverty of its
furnishing which concerned him, but the human beings it sheltered, who
lay a burden upon his heart. Liz was out of bed, crouching over the
fire, with an old red shawl wrapped round her--a striking-looking figure
in spite of her general _deshabille_, a girl at whom all men and many
women would look twice. He wished she were less striking, that her
appearance had matched the only destiny she could look for--grey,
meagre, commonplace, hopeless as a dull November day.
'Your pecker's no' up, Wat?' she said, looking at him rather keenly.
'What are ye sae doon i' the mooth for?'
Walter made no reply. Truth to tell, he would have found it difficult to
give expression to his thoughts.
'He's aye doon i' the mooth when he comes here, Liz,' said the mother,
with a passing touch of spirit. 'We're ower puir folk for my lord noo
that he's gettin' among the gentry.'
'The gentry of Argyle Street an' the Sautmarket, mother?' asked Walter
dryly. 'They'll no' do much for ye.'
'Is Skinny no' gaun to raise yer screw, Wat?' asked Liz. 'It's high time
he was thinkin' on't.'
'I'll ask him one o' these days, but he might as well keep the money as
me. This is a bottomless pit,' he said, with bitterness. 'It could
swallow a pound as quick as five shillings, an' never be kent.'
'Ye're richt, Wat; but I wad advise ye to stick in to Skinny. He has
siller, they say, an' maybe ye'll finger it some day.'
One night not long after, Liz presented herself at the house in
Colquhoun Street, to return the visit of Gladys. As it happened, Walter
was not in, having heard of a night school where the fees were so small
as to be within the range of his means. Gladys looked genuinely pleased
to see her visitor, though she hardly recognised in the
fashionably-dressed young lady the melancholy-looking girl she had seen
lying on the kitchen bed in the house of the Hepburns.
'Daur I come in? Would he no' be mad?' asked Liz, when they shook hands
at the outer door.
'Do you mean my uncle?' asked Gladys. 'He will be quite pleased to see
you. Come in; it is so cold here.'
'For you, ay; but I'm as warm's a pie, see, wi' my new fur cape--four
an' elevenpence three-farthings at the Polytechnic. Isn't it a beauty,
an' dirt cheap?'
Thus talking glibly about what was more interesting to her than anything
else in the world, Liz followed Gladys into the kitchen, where the old
man sat, as usual, in his arm-chair by the fireside, looking very old
and wizened and frail in the flickering glow of fire and candle light.
'This is Walter's sister, Uncle Abel,' Gladys said, with that
unconscious dignity which singled her out at once, and gave her a touch
of individuality which Liz felt, though she did not in the least
understand it.
The old man gave a little grunt, and bade her sit down; but, though not
talkative, he keenly observed the two, and saw that they were cast in a
different mould. Liz looked well, flushed with her walk, the dark warm
fur setting off the brilliance of her complexion, her clothes fitting
her with a certain flaunting style, her manner free from the least touch
of embarrassment or restraint. Liz Hepburn feared nothing under the sun.
'And are you quite better, Liz?' asked Gladys gently, with a look of
real interest and sympathy in her face.
'Oh ay, I'm fine. Wat's no' in?' she said, glancing inquiringly round
the place.
'No; he has heard of a teacher who takes evening pupils for book-keeping
and these things, and has gone to make arrangements with him.'
Never had the nicety of her speech and her sweet, refined accent been
more marked by Abel Graham. He looked at her as she stood by the table,
a slender, pale figure, with a strange touch of both child and maiden
about her, and he felt glad that she was not like Liz. Not that he
thought ill of Liz, or did not see her beauty, such as it was, only he
felt that the maiden whom circumstances had cast into his care and
keeping was of a higher type than the red-cheeked, bright-eyed damsel
whom so many admired.
'An' when hae ye been oot, micht I ask?' inquired Liz calmly. 'Ye're a
jimpy-looking thing.'
'Not since Sunday.'
'Sunday! Mercy me! an' this is Friday. She'll sune be in her grave, Mr.
Graham. Folk maun hae fresh air. What way d'ye no' set her oot every
day?'
'She is welcome to go if she likes, miss. I don't keep her in,' answered
the old man tartly.
'Maybe no', but likely she has that muckle adae she canna get,' replied
Liz fearlessly. 'It's a fine nicht--suppose ye tak' a walk wi' me? The
shops is no' shut yet.'
'Shall I go, uncle?' asked Gladys.
'If ye want, certainly; but come in in time of night. Don't be later
than nine.'
'Very well,' answered Gladys, and retired into her own room to make
ready for her walk.
Then Liz, turning round squarely on her seat, fixed the old man
fearlessly with her eyes, and gave him a piece of her mind.
'I saw ye lookin' at her a meenit ago, Maister Graham, an' maybe ye was
thinkin' the same as me, that she's no' lang for this world. Is't no' a
sin an' a shame for a cratur like that to work in a place like this? but
it's waur, if it be true, as folk say, that there's nae need for it.'
So astonished was Abel Graham by this plain speaking on the part of a
girl he had never seen in his life, that he could only stare.
'It's true,' added Liz significantly; 'she's yin o' the kind they mak'
angels o', and that's no' my kind nor yours. If I were you, I'd see
aboot it, or it'll be the waur for ye, maybe, after.'
Happily, just then Gladys returned for her boots, and in her mild
excitement over having a companion to walk with, she did not observe the
very curious look on her uncle's face. But Liz did, and gave an inward
chuckle.
'How's your father and mother?' he asked, making the commonplace
question a cover for the start he had got.
'Oh, they're as well as they can expect to be,' Liz replied. 'He cam'
oot on Monday. I spiered if they had gi'en him a return ticket available
for a week.'
The hard little laugh which accompanied these apparently heartless words
did not in the least deceive Gladys, and, looking up from the lacing of
her boots, she flashed a glance of quick sympathy upon the girl's face,
which expressed more than any words.
'They're surely very ill-kinded,' was Abel Graham's comment, in rather a
surprised tone. Liz had given him more information about her people in
five minutes than Walter had done in the two years he had been with him.
The difference between the two was, that while sharing the bitterness of
their home sorrows, the one found a certain relief in telling the worst,
the other shut it in his heart, a grief to be brooded over, till all
life seemed tinged and poisoned by its degradation.
'Oh, it's drink,' she said carelessly,--'the same auld story. Everything
sooms awa' in whisky; they'll soom awa' theirsel's some day wi'd, that's
wan comfort. I'm sure that's wan thing Wat an' me's no' likely to meddle
wi'. We've seen ower muckle o' the misery o' drink. It'll never be my
ruin, onyway. Are ye ready, Gladys?'
'In a minute, just my hat and gloves,' Gladys answered, and again
retired.
'I say, sir, d'ye no' think ye should raise Wat's wages? I had twa
things to say to ye the nicht, an' I've said them. Ye needna fash to
flyte; I'm no' feared. If ye are a rich man, as they say, ye're waur
than oor auld yin, for he haunds oot the siller as lang as it lasts.'
'You are a very impudent young woman,' said Abel Graham, 'and not a fit
companion for my niece. I can't let her go out with you.'
'Oh, she's gaun the nicht, whether you let her or no',' was the calm
answer. 'And as to being impident, some folk ca's the truth impidence,
because they're no' accustomed to it. But aboot Wat, ye ken as weel as
me, ye micht seek east an' west through Glesca an' no' get sic anither.
He's ower honest. You raise his wages, or he'll quit, if I should seek a
place for him mysel'.'
The calm self-assertion of Liz, which had something almost queenly in
it, compelled the respect of the old man, and he even smiled a little
across the table to the chair where she sat quite at her ease,
delivering herself of these remarkably plain statements. In his inmost
soul he even enjoyed them, and felt a trifle sorry when Gladys appeared,
ready to go. Liz sprang up at once, and favoured the old miser with a
gracious nod by way of farewell.
'Guid-nicht to ye, then, an' mind what I've said. I was in deid earnest,
an' I'm richt, as ye'll maybe live to prove. An' mind that there's ower
wee a pickle angels in Glesca for the ither kind, and we'd better tak'
care o' what we hae.'
[Illustration]