ZULEIME.
Among a jumbled heap of murky buildings.—KEATS.
Zuleime had been placed by Georgia under the care of a poor woman, the
wife of a carver and gilder, who had occasionally worked for her father.
And as long as the funds of the belle had held out, the trifling
expenses of such poor board and lodging had been regularly paid. But
when the syren was reduced to support her own extravagance entirely by
credit, founded upon the false reputation of wealth—her small
remittances to her protégé, or rather her victim, ceased. Zuleime was
afraid to seek her, afraid to write to her—there was nothing she feared
more than discovery, and the recognition of her hand-writing on the
superscription of a letter might have led to that. It was long after the
death of her father before she heard of it—nor then did she hear any of
the particulars of time, place or circumstance. The fact came to her
knowledge irregularly, through the report of the transcendant charms and
conquests of his beautiful young widow. A long and dangerous illness was
the result of this sudden news. It was some weeks after her recovery
before the poor people of the house, who had long despaired of getting
anything for her board, could find it in their kind hearts to ask her to
seek another home. And even then they sent a sigh after the desolate
young widow—the child who went forth carrying in her arms another child.
And how she lived during the interval between that and the period at
which I shall again introduce her to you, I cannot tell. Sometimes a
little fine needle-work came to her hands; sometimes a spell of want,
reaching almost to starvation; then a little assistance from neighbors;
and a little going in debt to shopkeepers. And then she always lodged
with the poor. And the poor seldom persecute the poor; remember that the
needy family who first sheltered her, had been for months at the sole
expense of her food, lodging, and long illness—and yet they had never
reproached or persecuted her for unpaid debts—though they scarcely
refrained from reproaching themselves for sending her away.
In a quiet, back street, mostly inhabited by very humble people, in the
middle of the square, and fronting immediately upon the battered
pavement, stood an old two-story brick house, occupied by a poor
cabinet-maker and old furniture dealer. The lower front room was used as
the ware-room, and crowded and piled up with every description of
miserably dilapidated household furniture, apparently good for nothing
else under the sun but kindling wood, and scarcely worth splitting up
for that. Old worm-eaten, carved mahogany bureaus and bedsteads; tables
without legs or leaves; chairs without backs; cradles without bottoms or
rockers; clocks wanting faces; beaufets wanting doors; sofas minus arms;
smoky pictures without frames; and tarnished frames without pictures;
worm-eaten cabinets, and mildewed looking-glasses; broken pots, pans and
kettles; and mismatched crockery-ware in any quantity.
Reader, I do not wish to give you an inventory of an old furniture-shop,
but merely some idea of the inextricable confusion in which this
heterogeneous mass of worn out, broken, worm-eaten, mildewed,
fly-stained, dust-clothed, cobweb-veiled items, were piled up from floor
to ceiling. It would make your heart and head ache with wondering what
sort of a living could be picked out from so much dirt, disorder and
decay—and who on earth could be the patrons of the establishment. You
would unconsciously gather close about you your most worthless dress in
passing through the shop, and look up in involuntary dread of a broken
head or limbs, by the fall of some of those dilapidated, ill-balanced,
old chairs and tables.
The family of the chair-maker consisted of himself, his wife, and two
daughters. They were Germans, with the usual talent of that race for
money-getting and money-keeping. And the man made at least a hundred per
cent. on every old, rickety, worm-eaten bureau or table that, mended and
varnished, left his shop. They added to their income, by letting the
rooms of their house, and occasionally by taking a profitable boarder.
It was in the early part of the same autumn which found her sister
Carolyn in Lisbon—and Mrs. Clifton and Catherine alone at Hardbargain,
that Zuleime became a tenant of the German cabinet-maker. She occupied
the back room, on the second floor; the two daughters of the family
using the front room as a sleeping apartment. She had the use of the
street passage door, and so reached her room without passing through the
shop or any part of the house occupied by the family or their boarders.
The refinement in which she had been born and bred, was not lost amid
her bitter poverty. It constrained her to seek privacy of life at least.
She supported herself and child, just now, by doing fine needle-work for
some ladies on a transient visit to the city. But the work was
precarious, and the supply might be cut off at any moment. Her expenses
were small, however, and her economy wonderful. Her neat, but poorly
furnished room, cost her but ten shillings a month; a bushel of meal and
a pint of salt, five shillings; milk for the child, two shillings; fuel,
eight shillings; washing, three shillings; candle-light, two shillings;
and the attendance of a boy to bring water and cut wood, three
shillings—making the sum total of her monthly expenses only one pound,
fourteen shillings, or little more than six dollars. Her only food was
mush or corn-cakes prepared from the meal. She could not have kept up
very long under this regimen; indeed, although she knew it not, she was
slowly dying of a disease as common as lingering, and as universally
ignored as that of a broken heart—namely, innutrition or slow
starvation. Her German hostess, kind-hearted, notwithstanding her money
grasping propensities, often sent her a bowl of “noodle soup,” with a
little plate of “sour-krout,” and a tumbler of schnapps, or some such
combination of German luxuries. But Zuleime, who managed to exist upon
coarse food, could not endure gross food, and she would turn away from
such, scarcely able to conceal the sickness the very odor so appetizing
to a Dutch stomach, excited in hers. Still her refusal of the viands was
couched in words so gentle and grateful, as never to offend her
landlady. Some of my readers may wonder why Zuleime did not do her
washing, water-drawing, etc., with her own hands, and take the money
paid for having those things done, and buy better food? Because, for one
reason, she had not the requisite physical strength or skill—and
besides, perhaps, she shrank from the exposure necessarily incurred in
these labors. She had not in these two years, forgotten the delicacy and
refinement in which she had been nurtured. On the contrary, everything
in her appearance and manners, betrayed the gentle-woman. She had but
one dress in the world—all the others had been cut up to make clothes
for her little girl. Her sole gown was black bombazine, which she had
worn daily for nearly two years—yet so good was its original quality,
and so well had it been preserved, that it was now neither rusty nor
threadbare. It was shaken out and hung up every night, and well brushed
and sponged every week. This dress, with the little inside ‘kerchief of
linen, was always neat and lady-like. Zuleime’s fine needle-work gave
out—as she knew it would—and she found herself without employment, or
funds. It was then that Bertha and Wilhelmina Erhmientraut, the
daughters of her landlord, told her of a German clothier on Main street,
who had advertised for a number of needle-women to make vests. Zuleime
confessed her total ignorance of that branch of needle-work. But the
kind German girls promised that if she would procure the work, they
would give her some instructions how it should be done. Zuleime
gratefully accepted their offer, and prepared to set out on her long
walk by donning the little black bonnet and shawl, as neat and as well
preserved as her dress had been. She could not further tax the kindness
of her landlord’s family by leaving her child in their care, she had
been obliged to put the little one to sleep, and lock it up in her room,
only leaving her key with her landlady—“in case anything should happen”
while she was gone. It was a long, weary tramp to Main street, where the
clothier’s store was situated. When she entered the show-shop and made
her business known, she was directed into a back room, where a man,
behind a long table, was engaged in cutting out garments—and many
bundles of cut out but unmade clothes, tied around with skeins of
thread, lay piled up at one end. Zuleime walked up to this table. The
foreman, as he appeared to be, laid down his shears and looked up,
saying deferentially—
“What did you wish to look at, madam? Mr. Schneider, attend this lady.”
“You are in error. I do not wish to look at your wares. You advertised
work to give out; can I have some?”
The tailor looked at her again. He saw, from her gentle manners and
appearance, that she was a lady, guessed from her dress that she was a
widow, and knew by her errand that she was self-dependent, unprotected;
so there existed no earthly reason why a coarse-minded, craven-hearted
man, who spent his whole days in smirking, cringing, deprecating and
deferring to others, should not refresh his soul by a little
impertinence and insolence to so safe a subject as a _poor lady_.
“And you ever make vests?” he asked, in a short, curt, insolent manner.
“No,” answered Zuleime, “but I sew very neatly—unusually neatly, my
patrons say—and as you cut and baste the work, very little instruction
would enable me to make them very nicely.”
“I shan’t trust you! I have had quite enough in my time of giving out
work to people who know nothing about the business.”
It was not the words so much as the insulting manner of the man that
shocked the gentle-hearted woman, and she turned and left the shop,
ready to sink, not so much under disappointment, though she knew not
where to turn for work or money or food—but under the deeply humiliating
sense of the rudeness and vulgarity to which she was forced to expose
herself in this bitter struggle through the world. She walked slowly,
thoughtfully, sadly away from the shop, till the sudden thought of her
child’s awakening, electrified her, and she hurried on until she reached
home. She obtained her key from the landlady, in the basement, and
entered the passage. It was then that she heard a very sweet, gentle
voice, apparently near her room door, saying—
“Don’t cry, baby! _poor_ baby, don’t cry! mother will come by-and-by!
_Dear pretty_ baby, don’t cry! I’ll bring you all my playthings, and a
little dog, when I can get in.”
And then, in the pause of the child’s wails and broken talk, and baby
plaints, she ran up stairs at once, and there, kneeling before her door,
and talking through the key-hole, was a sweet little dark haired girl of
about five years old, and dressed in deep mourning. Her hat of the
finest Leghorn straw, the richness of the black ribbon that bound it—the
fineness of the black bombazine frock and the linen cambric tucker, the
delicate shoes and stockings—the gentle, refined manner, all bespoke a
child of a different rank from those seen in that neighborhood, and
especially in that house. The child got up and stood aside when she saw
the lady come with the key to unlock the door. When Zuleime had entered
her room, and lifted the babe to her lap, she called the little girl up
to her side. She was a lovely child indeed, with fair skin and delicate
features—jet black hair, eyebrows and eyelashes, and large, mournful,
dark gray eyes.
“You are a dear little girl. What is your name? asked Zuleime, pulling
her around her waist caressingly.
“Ida ——; see what a nice new black dress I’ve got. They gave it to me
when father died. Mother wears one, too. You’ve got a black dress on,
too! Is your father dead?”
“Yes, darling,” said Zuleime, with her eyes suffused.
“Don’t cry, please! Mother cries so much. I do wish she wouldn’t! Is the
baby’s father dead, too?”
“Yes—yes, love—the baby’s father is dead, too!”
“Well—_please_ don’t cry so! Mother says we have all got a father in
Heaven! _Oh! please_ don’t cry so! It gives me such a—such an ache in
the breast to see anybody cry so,” said the child, and her mournful, but
most beautiful eyes assumed a pleading, painful, almost _querulous_
look.
“Who _is_ your mother, sweet Ida?” asked Zuleime, to change the subject
of her own and her little companion’s thoughts.
“Mrs. Knight, you know, the leading lady. Did they put the baby’s father
in a long red box, and send him away?”
“Yes, yes, Ida. Where does your mother live?”
“She lives here, in the back room, down stairs. We came to-day. She is
going to play to-night, and then I’ll be by myself. Did they hold the
baby up to kiss her father like they did me? And did he put his hand on
her head and call her his fawn-eyed darling? That was when he was on the
bed. And afterwards he went to sleep. And they said he was dead. Was
that the way with the baby’s father?”
“I don’t want to talk about it, dear Ida. Tell me of your mother. What
does she play on—the organ?”
“No! I don’t know. Yes I do, too!—the stage. Look at my nice new hat. It
used to have a wreath of red roses round it. But when father died,
mother took it off and put this black ribbon there. Mother wears roses
on her head, though. At night, I mean. All day long she wears black, and
looks so pale and weeps. But at night, she puts beautiful flowers in her
hair, and sometimes gold and fine feathers—and she has such sweet long
curls and rosy cheeks—and such beautiful dresses. And father used to
wear beautiful clothes at night, red and gold, and feathers. I do want
to see father so much. I wish they’d bring him back. Do you think it
will be long before I see him?” asked the child, as the large tears
rolled down her cheeks.
“Perhaps not, my love. Is your mother an actress, then?”
“Yes, that is what she is. Don’t cry, now! It gives me a pain in my
bosom. _Please_ don’t cry; if _you_ don’t, _I_ won’t,” said the child,
wiping her eyes. Then suddenly she exclaimed, “Oh! I forgot, I promised
to bring the baby my playthings and my curly dog”; and so saying, the
child ran away and scampered down stairs.
Zuleime looked in vain for her return, and finally concluded that her
mother had detained her. But if the child did not come, somebody else
did. Wilhelmina entered, and kindly inquired after her lodger’s success
in seeking work. When she learned her failure, she begged Zuleime not to
be troubled, for that there was work in the house for her if she would
take it. That the new boarder, Mrs. Knight, the leading lady of the
Richmond Theatre, wanted assistance in making up some dresses, that were
to be ready in a few days. That she, Wilhelmina, had recommended their
lodger, and if the young lady pleased, she would conduct her down and
introduce her to Mrs. Knight. Zuleime thanked the kind-hearted girl, and
prepared to accompany her—sensible amid all her other emotions of a
rustic’s curiosity to see a really living actress, for she had never in
her life seen one off the boards. She followed Wilhelmina down the
stairs into the passage. Near the foot of the stairs was a door leading
into the first floor back room. At this door Wilhelmina rapped. It was
opened by Ida, who, as soon as she saw Zuleime, exclaimed—
“Oh! it’s you! Come in. Mother! here is the baby’s mother!”
“It is I, Mrs. Knight, with the person I spoke of. May we come in?”
inquired Wilhelmina.
“Assuredly. Do so,” replied the sweetest, deepest voice Zuleime thought
she had ever heard. And they entered the room. Wilhelmina introduced
Mrs. Fairfax, and withdrew. The apartment in which Zuleime found
herself, was the best furnished room in the house—decidedly—having a
good warm, hued carpet on the floor, crimson stuff curtains at the only
back window, a grate with a coal fire, a four-post bedstead, with
tester, net valance and a white counterpane, a bureau with tall
dressing-glass, and wash-stand, with china toilet service. But it was in
a state of confusion only less than that of the adjoining shop. Trunks,
boxes, and band boxes of all sizes, forms and colors, some corded and
piled up one above the other, and some open and boiling up and over with
all sorts of finery and tinsel, satins, silks and velvets, feathers,
flowers and fustian, which also trailed upon the carpet, and strewed the
chairs. An oil painting, in a large heavy gilt frame, leaned with its
face against the wall. On the bed, a black mantle and bonnet, with a
widow’s veil, lay side by side with a gorgeous scarlet velvet train,
embroidered with gold, an imitation ermine robe, a crown of gilt and
paste, a plume of feathers, and great bunches of sham pearls. On a low
trunk, in the midst of this sad chaos of poverty and glitter, mummery
and mourning, sat one who immediately drew and fixed Zuleime’s
attention. A tall, noble looking woman, of perhaps thirty years of age,
clothed in deep mourning, with her heavy black hair banded around her
forehead and temples, and shading a countenance dark and cavernous, with
its large hollow eyes and hollow cheeks, but majestic with power,
earnestness and truth, and beautiful with those grand, mournful eyes,
whose mesmeric spell was felt by Zuleime, on whom they were now brought
to bear.
“Take a seat, Mrs. Fairfax. You find me here in great confusion, because
I have but just arrived, and have had to unpack and look over all these
trunks, to select and prepare no less than four costumes for the
evening,” said the same rich, full, deep tones, as their owner cleared a
chair of spangled robes and plumes, and offered it to her visitor.
“Mother is going to wear _this_ dress this evening—isn’t it pretty?”
said Ida, climbing upon the foot of the bed.
Zuleime turned her eyes with childish interest towards the robes; and
Mrs. Knight, observing her look of curiosity, said—
“They form a portion of the Queen Katherine costume. They are going to
bring out Henry VIII., this evening.”
Zuleime glanced from the costume to the haggard, but noble looking
woman, and thought that she might represent the unhappy Queen very well,
as far as personal appearance would go, but instead of expressing this
opinion, she said—
“The young German girl told me that you wanted some assistance in
needle-work. I shall be glad to help you.”
The dark, mournful eyes rose slowly, and grew still, looking at the
young widow, in whom they now began to recognize that most piteous of
all beings—_a reduced lady_.
“Sit down—pray sit down,” she said, to Zuleime, who still remained
standing.
Zuleime took the vacant chair.
“Would you object, Mrs. Fairfax, to sitting with me while you sew? There
are alterations to be made in these four Queen Katherine dresses, in
which you would require my advice.”
Zuleime hesitated, and then answered—
“I should not like to leave my little child alone, madam.”
“Let me!—let me!—let me go up and stay with the baby!” eagerly
interrupted Ida, jumping down from the bed, and running up and seizing
the hand of her mother.
The dark eyes sank fondly on the little one, and the rich voice—richer
now with maternal love, replied—
“Certainly you may go, if the lady will permit you to do so.”
Zuleime hesitated again, then said—
“Thank you. I shall be very glad. Let me go up first, and make the fire
safe.” And she left the room, followed by Ida, who ran back first, to
throw her arms around her mother’s neck, and kiss her “good-bye.”
When Zuleime reached her room, she placed the blower before the grate,
for safety—hid away all implements with which the children might harm
themselves, and leaving the little ones at play upon the rag carpet,
returned below stairs, and went to work. Her new occupation was indeed
of an odd and miscellaneous description—ripping off gold lace, and
sewing in its place imitation sable; trimming buskins, and lastly,
making up an ancient coiffure, all under the direction of the
shadowy-faced woman, who, all this time, sat upon the trunk, with a
tattered play-book on her knee, studying her part.
Zuleime spoke of Ida—her beauty, her charming manner.
“Is she? Do you find her so? I thought that might be only my partiality.
Poor little one! She is a great comfort and a great sorrow to me, if you
can understand such a paradox.”
“Yes, I can understand it,” said Zuleime.
“I have to leave her all the forenoon, for the purpose of attending the
rehearsals, and then, before it is time for her to go to bed, I have to
leave her, alone, and go to the theatre, and be absent till a late hour
of the night. And then the fear of fire, or of accident, while I am gone
from her, wears me out. Worse than that, all day and night, while away
from her, is the dread of her getting in the street, and into evil
company.” And the eyes of the woman assumed an anxious, haggard,
querulous look, as she dropped them upon her book.
“Give your little girl into my care. I am never absent from home except
early in the morning—as to-day—and at that hour you are here.”
The dark eyes flew up and fastened themselves upon the face of Zuleime,
and the deep voice inquired—
“Would you really take charge of her for me? Oh, it is too much for you,
and too good in you. I don’t understand it.”
“Indeed I shall be very glad to do so. The presence of a lovely child is
a great pleasure to me. Leave Ida with me this evening while you are
gone, and I will put her to bed when the time comes.”
“For this evening I will gratefully accept your kindness, but you may
find her more inconvenient than you anticipate,” said Mrs. Knight. And
then she dropped her eyes again upon her book, and Zuleime went on
silently with her sewing. About sunset the work was nearly completed,
and the costume, with the exception of the coiffure, upon which Zuleime
was still engaged, was packed in bandboxes, to be conveyed to the
theatre. Then Mrs. Knight rang a little hand bell, and when it was
answered by the entrance of Bertha Erhmientraut, she said,—“Please send
me a lad to carry these boxes for me, and ask your mother to make me a
very strong cup of coffee.”
Bertha disappeared, and Mrs. Knight put on her bonnet and shawl. And
soon a ragged boy appeared at the door, who agreed to carry the boxes
for a sixpence. Mrs. Knight loaded and dispatched him at the same moment
that Bertha re-appeared with a huge cup of strong coffee, which she took
and drank off, standing. Then, as she handed back the empty cup to the
German girl, and received from Zuleime the finished coiffure pinned up
in a paper, she said—
“That cup of coffee will give me strength to go through my heavy part
to-night, but will leave me at its close more exhausted than ever; thus
I discount future health and life for present bread.” And so she went
off, her eyes gleaming under the excitement of a stimulant narcotic, as
fatal, if not as disreputable, as opium or alcohol. Zuleime went up to
her own room, and prepared the frugal supper for herself and the two
children, that were still playing on the carpet. She got a double
portion of milk from the German people, on account of her little guest,
Ida declaring that she liked milk with corn cake crumbled in it better
than anything, it was so sweet. And then when the babe was undressed and
put to bed, the little girl’s eyes waxed heavy and dim, and Zuleime took
her down stairs into her mother’s room, and disrobed and washed and
prepared her for bed. And when the child was about to kiss her friend
and spring into bed, Zuleime said—
“Stop, Ida. Don’t you say your prayers?”
“No, ma’am.”
“But don’t you wish to?”
“Oh, yes, ma’am,” said the child, and running back, she kneeled down at
Zuleime’s knees, and placed her little hands together and looked up for
instruction.
Zuleime thought the shortest, simplest infant’s prayer she knew of was
the best, because readily understood and easily remembered. And so she
took the little one’s folded hands between her own, and bade her repeat
after her—
“Now I lay me down to sleep,
I pray the Lord my soul to keep.
If I should die before I wake,
I pray the Lord my soul to take.”
“That is a sweet little verse. What _is_ my soul?” asked the child.
Zuleime hesitated, puzzled for an answer; then she said for want of a
better—
“It is what you think with, and wonder with, and what you are sorry or
glad with, and what will live forever.”
“I love you with it then. Good-night, good, pretty lady.”
“Good-night, sweet child.” And Zuleime laid her in the bed, and kissed
her fair eyelids down to slumber.