"Ah," he said, "I've left a little darlin' like this at 'ome. It's 'ard
on us old folks when we're one too many; but the little mouths must be
filled, and my son, 'e said 'e didn't see they could keep me on the
arf-crown, with another child on the way; so I'm tramping to N----, to
the House; but it's a 'ard pinch, leavin' the little ones."
I looked at him--a typical countryman, with white hair, mild blue eyes,
and a rosy, childish, unwrinkled face.
"I'm eighty-four," he went on, "and terrible bad with the rheumatics
and my chest. Maybe it'll not be long before the Lord remembers me."
The child crept close and put a sticky little hand confidingly into
the tired old palm. The two looked strangely alike, for the world seems
much the same to those who leave it behind as to those who have but
taken the first step on its circular pathway.
"'Ook at my kitty," she said, pointing to the small creature in her
lap. Then, as the old man touched it with trembling fingers she went
on--"'Oo isn't my grandad; he's away in the sky, but I'll kiss 'oo."
I worked on, hearing at intervals the old piping voice and the
child-treble, much of a note; and thinking of the blessings vouchsafed
to the simple old age which crowns a harmless working-life spent in
the fields. The two under the hedge had everything in common and were
boundlessly content together, the sting of the knowledge of good and
evil past for the one, and for the other still to come; while I stood
on the battlefield of the world, the flesh, and the devil, though,
thank God, with my face to the foe.
The old man sat resting: I had promised him a lift with my friend
the driver of the flour-cart, and he was almost due when the child's
grandmother came down the road.
When she saw my other visitor she stood amazed.
"What, Richard Hunton, that worked with my old man years ago up at
Ditton, whatever are you doin' all these miles from your own place?"
"Is it Eliza Jakes?"
He looked at her dazed, doubtful.
"An' who else should it be? Where's your memory gone, Richard Hunton,
and you not such a great age either? Where are you stayin'?"
Shame overcame him; his lips trembled, his mild blue eyes filled with
tears. I told the tale as I had heard it, and Mrs Jakes's indignation
was good to see.
"Not keep you on 'alf a crown! Send you to the House! May the Lord
forgive them! You wouldn't eat no more than a fair-sized cat, and not
long for this world either, that's plain to see. No, Richard Hunton,
you don't go to the House while I'm above ground; it'd make my good man
turn to think of it. You'll come 'ome with me and the little 'un there.
I've my washin', and a bit put by for a rainy day, and a bed to spare,
and the Lord and the parson will see I don't come to want."
She stopped breathless, her defensive motherhood in arms.
The old man said quaveringly, in the pathetic, grudging phrase of
the poor, which veils their gratitude while it testifies their
independence, "Maybe I might as well." He rose with difficulty, picked
up his bundle and stick, the small child replaced the kitten in its
basket, and thrust her hand in her new friend's.
"Then 'oo _is_ grandad tum back," she said.
Mrs Jakes had been fumbling in her pocket, and extracted a penny, which
she pressed on me.
"It's little enough, mister," she said.
Then, as I tried to return it: "Nay, I've enough, and yours is poor
paid work."
I hope I shall always be able to keep that penny; and as I watched the
three going down the dusty white road, with the child in the middle, I
thanked God for the Brotherhood of the Poor.