Philip’s Mother
The winter that Dash came to the cottage where Philip lived with his
mother and grandfather was a very long and hard one. A great political
crisis had, in some mysterious way, affected the price of coal; there
were long weeks when only half the usual number of men were employed
in the mines, and this meant that many little children in the miners’
cottages went often supperless to bed, while the men would gather in
groups in the street and talk gloomily of the hard times, which seemed
to offer little hope of improvement. There was much illness in the
town, too; a season of unusual rain and fog, less fire than usual to
keep the chill out of the houses, and constitutions weakened by anxiety
and lack of food made ready a fertile soil for the fever which attacked
and carried off many scores of victims, especially among the little
children and the aged; the good village doctor was kept busy day and
night, and his old-fashioned hooded phaeton, with its patient old gray
horse which all the children in the village knew and petted, might be
seen constantly going back and forth from house to house, sometimes
until quite late into the night.
Mag was one of the few who had steady work, but her wages had been
reduced one-half, and with all her clever management it was sometimes
difficult to keep the little household warmed and fed. Philip’s
earnings had ceased altogether, and although he had more time
above-ground, yet he would gladly have exchanged this unaccustomed
freedom for the toil which would have brought a few extra comforts
into their little home. It made his tender heart ache, too, to see
the lines of anxiety grow each day deeper on the faces of Mag and his
grandfather; often when he was playing with Dash he would find his
mother’s eyes fastened upon them both, with a sad intensity which would
sometimes lead him to run to her and put his little arms close about
her neck, whispering:
“Don’t worry, mother dear; God will take care of us.” And on these
occasions Dash would always join the group, thrusting his cold nose
into their faces, and making it so evident that he shared their
distress that they would laugh in spite of themselves at his awkward
efforts to express his affection and sympathy.
Dearly as he loved her, Philip stood in awe of his silent mother,
and he used sometimes to wonder in his childish way why it was that
even when work had been plenty and wages high she was still so sad and
grave, so unlike her noisy, gossipy neighbors, who he noticed used
sometimes to shake their heads as though in kindly pity when she passed
their doors on her way to work. Philip had heard the miners, too, say
as they looked after her retreating figure:
“Poor lass! Poor Maggie!”
But whatever the sorrow that had darkened her life, she never allowed
it to blind her to the troubles of others, and her neighbors seemed to
understand this, for if ever sickness or accident befell any of them,
who so quick as Mag to help or befriend? Many a blessing followed her
that winter as, her work for the day finished, she would hurry from
house to house on countless errands of mercy, often going quietly
without her supper, that some little delicacy prepared by her own hands
might find its way to an ailing neighbor. Philip noticed that when
his mother returned from these kind errands she always seemed more
contented than usual, and the happiest time in the whole day was when,
her bonnet removed and her shawl neatly folded and laid away, she would
light the evening lamp and sit quietly down to her sewing, while her
father dozed contentedly in his chair before the fire (sometimes, alas!
a feeble enough blaze) and Philip and Dash played happily together on
the hearth.
Philip never remembered but one occasion when his mother had spoken to
him other than very gently, but that once he never forgot. It was an
evening when, tired of romping with Dash, the little boy had curled up
before the fire with a picture-book which had been loaned to him by
the overseer’s child. It was a rare treat, and Philip soon became quite
absorbed in this new object of interest. But Dash was determined not to
be cheated out of his usual half hour of play with his young master,
and after waiting as long as he thought that even the best-behaved dog
could be expected to do, he began to pull at Philip’s sleeve as though
to say: “Come, old fellow. Time’s up, you know!”
But as Philip paid no attention to this, he began to bark and frisk
about him in such a lively and disturbing manner that Philip pushed
him away several times, saying, “Down, Dash,” in a vexed and impatient
voice; but the little dog persisted in teasing and annoying him all the
more for being rebuffed, and at last Philip grew angry, and struck and
kicked the dog several times. Dash was so astonished at this unusual
behavior that for a moment he stood looking at his master in silent
reproach, and then he turned sadly away, and ran, yelping and whining,
to Mag. She turned and caught her little son by the arm, holding him
so tightly that he cried out in surprise and pain. His mother’s great
sorrowful eyes were fixed upon him with an expression so unusual that
he remembered it long afterward. She was very pale as she cried:
“Shame on ye, Philip lad, to hurt the brute that loves ye an’ canna’
strike back! Oh, Philip, Philip, ye must keep down that temper, my
little lad, or it will bring you to the woe that’s wearing me out.”
She sank into a chair, covering her face with her trembling hands, and
rocking herself to and fro as she said softly, and as though speaking
to herself:
“Oh, Mag, ye have given your own wicked temper to the child, to be a
curse to him as it has been to yourself!”
She dropped her hands at her side and gazed at Philip with such
mournful eyes that although he could not understand the meaning of her
words, he was frightened and shrank into his corner, his face burning
with shame and remorse. Dash had stood looking from one to the other,
as though bewildered by such a strange scene, and presently he crept up
to Philip, thrusting his nose timidly into the boy’s hand, as much as
to say:
“Don’t feel so badly, Philip. I know you didn’t mean to hurt me, and it
was mean to tease you when I knew you wanted to read. Come, let bygones
be bygones--that’s my motto.”
And Philip patted his rough head, and the companions felt that they had
been mutually understood and forgiven. But with Mag it was different.
She took up her sewing again, to be sure, and went on with her work as
usual, but she paid no heed to Philip’s timid efforts to explain and
ask forgiveness. Indeed, she seemed not to see him, for her thoughts
had wandered apparently far away; and after a while Philip stole off to
bed, wondering sadly why his fit of ill-temper should have so strangely
moved his silent mother.
The next morning Mag seemed still constrained and unhappy, and went
about her work in an absent-minded way, scarcely heeding Philip’s timid
efforts at conversation; so shortly after breakfast he stole quietly
out of the house with Dash. They did not return until dinner-time, and
as they approached the house Philip perceived with a sinking of the
heart that the good doctor’s carriage was fastened to the gate-post in
front of their little cottage. He flew rather than ran the remainder of
the distance, and his mother met him at the door, a warning finger on
her lip.
“Hush!” she said; “your grandfather is ill. I saw he was not over-well
this week past, and this morning he could not eat; so when I saw the
doctor pass, I hailed him in. I fear--it may be--the fever.”
She spoke with a catch in her voice, but she tried to smile as she put
her arm around Philip with more than her usual tenderness and drew him
into the house. The doctor was coming out of the sick man’s room, and
he was looking rather grave; but he said little, only leaving some
powders, with directions as to food and other matters, promising to
call again later in the day. The old man grew no worse, however, and
indeed in a few days he persisted in leaving his bed and coming out to
his favorite seat beside the fire; but he seemed to have but little
strength, and to have grown much older in those few days of illness.
The first evening that he took his place again in the family circle was
a memorable one for Philip. The boy had always been a great favorite
with his grandfather, who delighted to ask him questions about what
he had seen during the day; there was never much to tell, but Philip
had a whimsical fashion of making a great deal of a small adventure in
relating it, and often some trifling remark would suggest past events
to the old man, and he would tell the boy strange stories of the past,
which though often repeated were always new and of absorbing interest
to his grandson and to Mag, who was ever an interested listener.
On this particular evening, however, she seemed listless and
distraught, and after a while she left her sewing and knelt in front of
the fire in a drooping attitude, which made Philip ask at last half
timidly (for since the episode with Dash he had not felt quite at ease
with his mother):
“Are ye cold, mother dear? Shall I put a few coals on the fire?” She
shook her head without replying, and after a moment Philip asked his
grandfather for a story; but, to the great surprise of both, Mag
suddenly spoke:
“Wait a moment,” she said, “both of ye; it is my turn to tell the story
to-night, an’ ye must listen patiently while I tell it, even though it
may seem over-long.”
She put her hand to her throat as though something there choked her,
and in the flickering firelight her eyes gleamed strangely. Philip was
so dumbfounded at the idea of his silent mother telling him a story
that he looked from her to his grandfather in amazement. The old man
shook his head.
“My poor lass!” he said softly. “Perhaps it will ease the poor troubled
mind of ye to tell it to the lad.”
And Mag began her story in a cold, hard voice, with her eyes still
fixed upon the fire and her position unchanged.