learning that I was not house-seeking but a visitor, I was soon sitting
chatting to them, and found that they were only too willing to
communicate their affairs to me, though the old lady was suffering from
a touch of pleurisy, and she was very quiet.
That visit was one of several, and during one of them the old man told
me how he had been a bookseller, but had failed. Then he had gone into
the second-hand book trade, and done pretty well for a time, but at last
he had failed over that.
"He used to give too good prices for the old books," said the old lady,
smiling.
"Well, yes, I was a bit too easy," he said. "It was very pleasant
though, and I liked it, and some of the happiest days of my life were
spent in my dusty shop."
"Yes," said the old lady with a sigh, "we were happy enough there, but
you used to give too much for the old books."
"Ah! perhaps so," said the old man, "but look at the advantages we
enjoyed of a constantly changing, ebbing and flowing library, filled
with works of all dates, from the shabby, fingered copy of a year old,
right back to black-letter times, and even beautifully clear illuminated
manuscript works, perfect marvels of neatness and labour.
"Then, too, we had a wonderful chance of studying human nature--not only
from the buying side like your new booksellers, but from the selling
side; and let me tell you that the purchasers of our books were not your
light, flippant people who buy a volume for its gilt back and showy
binding, but those who want books for their contents. Why it's a study
alone to sit watching the books outside, so as to be on the alert for
those bibliomaniacs who take copies off the outer stall and forget to
replace them. It's a perfect study, I assure you, to see people stop
and take up first one and then another volume, till they happen on
something which takes their interest, and then to see the play of their
countenances, as forgetful of the lapse of time, they read on and on
till the book is either laid down with a sigh, or purchased--more often
the former than the latter.
"But it is from the selling side that we see most, or else I have always
paid more heed to this class; and a strange one it is too, for we buy of
some curious customers at times. Now by chance one buys a whole library
belonging to some one deceased--now a lot of a broker who has purchased
the whole effects of some one in trouble, or about to move a great
distance; but more often we get our stock in trade from people who bring
little lots of half-a-dozen or a dozen books at a time, and are glad
enough to take anything for them. For they know well enough that old
books possess a very different value to the same works at the
publishers. Of course there are some which are always valuable; but the
generality of your light frothy works come down so that I could get any
number of three-volume, guinea-and-a-half sets of novels at from
ninepence to eighteenpence the set.
"Most of your selling customers are reckless, and dab down a score of
old books with a `What'll you give me for these?' But sometimes we had
people come who had seen better days; and then it becomes painful, and I
hated to offer them the current value of the works they had brought
themselves to part with most unwillingly. They were generally books
they had bought in happier days, or had presented to them; and perhaps
after making some calculation at home as to the amount they can raise
upon these works, the look of stony despair that came over their faces
was something pitiful; for, you see, trade is trade, and when things
have a current value in the market, however well one may feel disposed
towards those in trouble, one is obliged to be hard-hearted, and to
think of the business part alone.
"But I couldn't always do it; there are times when things go home to
your feelings, and a case occurred to me once when I was sorely put out.
You see, one day I was sitting in my old shabby dusty coat amongst my
books, taking a peep here, and a dip there, just as it was my custom to
do, when a tall, pale girl, dressed in shabby black, entered the shop
with a large moreen bag containing four great quarto volumes. These she
placed upon the counter, with the request that I would give her as much
for them as they were worth.
"I looked at the books, then at my visitor, then at the books again, and
I felt in a manner that I would much rather they had been taken
elsewhere. I was not romantic--all the romance was rubbed off my
character like so much silver plating sixty years ago, to leave only the
copper quite bare; but I knew well enough that my first words would give
a lady who was in distress great pain, and, therefore, I dreaded to
speak; for it was all plain enough written in that poor girl's face--
beaten-down pride, struggle with poverty, the desire to keep up
appearances, and all compelled to give way to the hunger which would
take no denial.
"But business was business; she had come in obedience to urgent need,
and I knew it was cruelty to keep her in suspense.
"`How much do you ask for these, ma'am?' I said.
"`I would much rather you made me an offer,' was the timid reply--one
that I half dreaded to hear; for I knew that any offer I could make must
pain her terribly; so I backed out, telling her it was not the custom,
and so on, when, after much hesitation, she asked me to give her a pound
for them, which I could have declared was only about half what she hoped
to obtain, yet dared not ask. And yet the sum was more than double what
I ought to give for such a work, though most likely it was published at
seven or eight pounds--seven pounds ten, I am nearly sure, was the
published price."
"He always would give too much for the books," said the old lady.
"What was I to do? I felt sorry for the poor girl; but then I couldn't
afford to feel sorry, and to sympathise in a solid fashion with
everybody who came to me to sell books on account of being in distress;
and at last of all I let business win the day, declaring that I could
not afford such a price, and telling myself that I was giving
half-a-crown too much in offering ten shillings.
"She said nothing, merely passed the books over towards me, and as I
took four half-crowns out of my till and placed them on the counter, I
saw the little fingers, all sore and worn with needlework, trembled as
they picked the money up, and a half-suppressed sigh the poor girl gave
seemed to go right to my heart.
"The next moment she had glided from the shop, leaving me fighting with
feelings that were rather strange to me, till I was obliged to give in,
and confess that I was wanting in sympathy and humanity towards one sore
in distress.
"`You ought to have given what she asked,' whispered Conscience, `and
you would not have felt the loss.'
"`But business--trade--current prices,' I muttered in defence.
"`Go and take her the other ten shillings,' said Conscience; and,
without another word of defence, I took the money from the till, locked
it, and hurried out of the shop, leaving no one to mind it, for my wife
was out, and ran down the street, looked up this turning, along that, in
every direction I could think of; but in vain; the poor girl was gone.
"I felt more disappointed than I could have thought possible as I turned
back; but I consoled myself with the thought that she would come again;
for when people of a decent class once began to sell me books, they came
again and again, many times over; and I have remarked that they mostly
began with a few shabby old worthless volumes, and gradually got on to
those which were more valuable, though this was not the case here.
"I hurried back to the shop, when, as a matter of course, there was some
one there; for though you may often wait all day for a customer, most
likely if you get out of the way for five minutes, somebody comes. In
this case it was an old clergyman, who had taken up one of the four
quarto volumes, and just giving me a nod, he stood there reading for, I
should think, quite a quarter of an hour, and then asked the price of
the books.
"`Two pounds,' I said, for I seemed to fancy that he would try to beat
me down to half. But no; he pulled out his old net purse, shook out a
couple of sovereigns, put two volumes under one arm and two under the
other, and marched out of the shop.
"`This is a curious sort of day,' I thought to myself; and somehow or
other I felt so put out, that when my boy came back from an errand,
after being not more than twice as long gone as he should have been, I
boxed his ears--both of them--with the first and second volumes of an
abridged Froissart, and then threw a pocket Nugent at him for snuffling
and muttering in the corner.
"For I was really put out and hurt and annoyed; and I know I once called
myself a wretched old miser.
"Well, a week passed, during which I had a fight with myself as to how
much of these two pounds I ought to give to that poor girl if she called
again. Business said I should be very generous if I gave her ten
shillings; but my heart seemed to say, would it not be better to give it
all? However, I could not settle it either one way or the other, even
though I turned it over and over in bed at night, and let it half rob me
of my rest; and when one day I was dipping into an old copy of Chaucer I
had just bought, in came my fair young customer to find me as undecided
as ever.
"`Let me see,' I said, turning red as a found out schoolboy, `I don't
think, ma'am, we made a correct settlement over those last books, which
I have just sold;' and in a clumsy, awkward fashion I laid down a
sovereign and a half, in a way, in fact, that looked so like offering
charity, that my visitor's pale face became suffused in an instant, and
she replied coldly--
"`You paid me the price you offered for the books, sir, and are
evidently labouring under some mistake.'
"I felt more like one found out than ever; and I believe that if my boy
had been within reach I should have kicked him severely, as I blundered,
and asked, in a confused, stupid way, what were her commands, when she
laid half a dozen volumes before me.
"`If you won't take it one way, you shall another,' I muttered, as I
seemed to recover myself a bit; for I could see that she looked more
pinched and haggard than at the last visit. So I took up the books,
turned them over, examined the binding, the title-pages, the _finis_,
put them down and took a pinch of snuff--every moment growing more
confident, and chuckling to myself as I thought of what I meant to do.
I shook my head at one volume, as I began to go over them again; screwed
up my mouth at another; made a wry face at a third; and pitched a fourth
contemptuously aside, watching her out of the corner of my eye the
while; and I could see her face working, and a tear drop down upon her
dress.
"`Weak, poor soul,' I muttered; and I went on turning the books over,
and keeping her on the rack, expecting every moment that she would
speak. Then I muttered something about the date and edition, laid them
all together, and held them up to examine the backs; and once more laid
them on the counter, and took snuff, with my under lip thrust out,
shaking my head the while.
"`Perhaps I could bring you some other books that would be more
saleable,' she said, at last; and I could hardly keep up my acting as I
listened to the poor child's trembling voice, and watched her quivering
lips.
"`They're saleable enough,' I said, `at a price, though--at a price;'
and I stared at her very hard.
"`I only want what you consider to be the value of them,' she answered
sadly, `I--'
"She stopped short, having evidently been about to say something of
which she repented.
"`Well,' I said coolly, `I'm afraid that I can't give you more than a
couple of pounds for them,' and I pushed them across the counter, as if
expecting her to snatch them away and hurry out of the shop.
"`Two--two pounds,' she stammered, and then her eyes rested upon me so
pitifully, that if I had not had spectacles on, I could not have kept up
my character. But I kept on looking her full in the face, seeing her
flush a little as if resenting what I said, then turn paler than before,
as she seemed to be unable to comprehend whether I was in earnest, or
merely seeking an excuse for helping her. In a few moments she appeared
to decide that the latter was the case, and drawing herself up proudly,
she took the books, but only to clutch the next moment at the counter,
as the place swam before her eyes, and I had hardly time to open the
flap and catch her in my arms before she had fainted dead away.
"I carried her into my little back room and laid her upon the sofa
there, with bookshelves all around, and my wife bathed her poor pale
face, and chafed her hands till she gave two or three sighs, and her
eyes began slowly to open, and she gazed up at the ceiling in a strange
vacant way, till her gaze fell upon our withered old faces, when
catching my hands in hers, she kissed them and began to sob bitterly.
"There was no pride now; she had seen plainly enough my motive, and I
could keep it up no longer, for being a weak, childish old fellow, whose
thoughts would go back to some one who, had she lived, might have been
just such a tall, graceful girl, my spectacles got so that I could not
see through them, and when I spoke and tried to soothe her, it was in a
cracked choking voice that I did not know for mine.
"She left us at last, taking the money I had obtained for the first four
volumes, and leaving me the others to sell for her--that was how we
settled it was to be; and I'm afraid there was a little deceit about
those last books when she came again. And that time I went home with
her to the one room she occupied with her mother, and I wanted no
telling, it was all plain enough what they had suffered, and that when
the poor girl came to me she was weak and faint for want of food.
"Her mother was lying upon a sort of sofa-bed when I went, and it had
been arranged that I was to have come about some books; for the old
lady, though she lay there in pain, worn to a shadow, and was busily
sewing together little scraps of skins for the furriers, was that proud
that she would have resented anything she could have called charity; so
I was very respectful and quiet, and went away again with a couple of
books, after asking leave to call again for more.
"Sometimes I think the poor lady must have seen through it all; but she
made no sign, but kept it up till one day, surprised that I had not seen
the daughter for a week, I called to find her kneeling by the side of
the couch; for the furriers had lost one of their assistants, and the
poor lady had gone to a happier home.
"This all seems as if I were talking about how I did this, and how I did
that; but being so mixed up with it as I was, I can't tell it all and
leave myself out. The poor lady was laid to her rest, and after a deal
of persuasion, her daughter consented to come and stay with us--to help
make up a catalogue of my books, for until I thought of that, she would
not hear of it. And in the long winter evenings I got to know a good
deal about her and her family; for the father had been a pensioned
officer of the Indian army, who had died three years before, leaving his
widow and child to exist on the sale of their furniture, and such money
as they could earn by their needles.
"But I learned, too, that there was some one expected home from
somewhere; and he came one day, to be almost angry, at first, to find
her in such condition; but only to make us uncomfortable afterwards with
his thanks for the little we had done.
"He took her away at last, and she came to see us again and again as his
bonny wife--God bless her! and then we went to see them many times, till
they went away, over the seas, thousands of miles from here; but I often
picture her pale fair face, and her gentle ways, and feel again the kiss
she gave me when she left; and those thoughts seem to brighten up the
present and make some of our dullest days a bit more cheery. And then
we sit and think about the sorrows of this life, and the goodness by
which they are assuaged; and wonder whether it may please God that we
should see her face again--a face that seems to us like that of a dear
child, for we should like to look upon it once again before we die."
But the old people never set eyes upon her again for at the end of a
couple of months the damp place and the cold paving had been too much
for the old bookseller, and he had died; while from the wife of a
policeman in charge of the next house I learned how prophetic had been
my thoughts respecting them at our first meeting. I recalled the simple
act that I had seen--how the poor old lady had laid her hand
affectionately upon her husband's arm--just, too, as at our last
meeting, when sick herself, she had listened quietly to her old
companion's words, and smilingly upbraided him for being too generous in
his trade.
"They found her kneeling down, ma'am," said the policeman's wife, "just
aside the bed, with her cheek upon his dead hand--she dead and cold too;
and no wonder neither--the place was damp enough to kill a horse."
CHAPTER TWENTY.
KATE'S ORDEAL.
I have mentioned Mary Sanders to you as the dear friend drawn to my side
by a trifling act of kindness during her illness. Some were good enough
to say that I risked my life in attending her; but I don't know: I fancy
the risk of catching a complaint is as great to those who take endless
care as to those who take scarcely any. Ninety-nine precautions are
taken, and the hundredth window is left open through which the disease
enters unawares.
Be that as it may, I tended her, and we became great friends.
I have in my memory a little incident in her life, which I will
endeavour to repeat almost in her own words as she told me one evening
as we sat together. It was a story of her childhood--of what she called
her baby days--before she had to go out into the world.
"`Ah, those were good old times,' she said, with a sigh, `when dear old
Sally, our maid, used to scold us so. Then it used to be--and I
remember one occasion well--the day Kate came down to us--There, you're
banging that door again, Miss Mary. I declare to goodness you children
would worrit the patience out of a saint.'
"`Oh, never mind, Sally,' I said, panting, after a race to get into the
house first--a race I had won, for Lil and Cissy were yards behind.
"`Never mind, indeed!' cried Sally, `and there's your fine cousin coming
down to-day from London. I wonder what she will say when she sees you
racing about the meadow like so many wild colts, and your arms all brown
and scratched, and the hooks off your dress. I never see such children,
never.'
"`But you like us, Sally,' I said, getting hold of her rough, fat, red
arm, and laying my cheek against it.
"`I don't, I declare I don't,' she cried impetuously; and to show her
dislike she threw her arms round me, and squeezed my nose nearly flat
against the piece of hard wood she used to wear inside her dress.
"Sally was our housemaid, parlour-maid, and nursemaid all in one; and it
used to seem to me that she spent all her leisure time in quarrelling
with the cook and snubbing us; but, for all that, one of my principal
recollections, during the fever I had so long, was waking at all times
to see Sally's red face watching by my bedside; and I know she did all
cook's work for six weeks as well as her own, when the poor thing had
such a sad accident and cut her hand.
"We three--Lil, Cissy, and I--had a long discussion about cousin Kate
and her visit; and we all felt what dreadful little ragamuffins we
should seem to her, for I'm afraid we had been running wild; though papa
only used to laugh about it, and would come into the school-room when
mamma was busy with us over our lessons, whenever it was a fine morning,
and cry, `Now then, girls, the sun shines and the birds are calling.
Out with you! Learn lessons when it rains.'
"I knew afterwards why this was. Papa had a horrible nervous dread of
our growing up weak and sickly, for his was a delicate family; and I had
heard that our cousins were often very ill.
"`I can guess why cousin Kate's coming to stay with us,' said Lil.
"`I _know_ why she's coming,' I said.
"`It's because she's ill,' shouted Lil, for fear I should show my
knowledge first.
"`Sally will take her up new warm milk and an egg in it before she gets
out of bed in the morning,' said Cissy solemnly; `that will soon make
her well.'
"`She shall have all the eggs Speckle lays,' said Lil, `and Mary will
take her every morning to the old garden-seat under the trees. She's
sure to get well there.'
"And so we did, for cousin Kate came that afternoon--a tall, pale girl,
with a sad weary look in her face, as she gazed wistfully from one to
the other.
"We three girls stood back, quite in awe of the well-dressed,
fashionable-looking body, who was so different from what we had
expected, while mamma went up to welcome her, and took her in her arms
in a tender affectionate way, saying, `My dear child, we are so glad to
see you.'
"Cousin Kate threw her arms round mamma's neck and burst into a fit of
sobbing, hiding her face from our sight.
We girls did not see any more of our cousin Kate that day; but our young
interest was deeply excited, and somehow, perhaps, fostered by dark
hints dropped by Sally--who was a blighted flower, having been crossed
in a love affair with the horse-keeper at a neighbouring farm--we girls
got to think of our cousin's illness as a kind of mystery connected in
some way, how we did not know, with the heart.
"Our awe of the sweet gentle cousin fell off the very next day, when we
took possession of her, and led her round our dear old country home,
with its wilderness of an orchard, great garden, shrubberies, and
pleasant meadow.
"Her coming seemed to mark an epoch in our young lives, for, seeing how
weak and delicate she was, we used to vie one with the other in being
quiet and gentle, waiting upon her in the most unnecessary way, like
slaves, and always ready to rush off most willing messengers to
forestall any little wants she expressed.
"This came natural to us; but on my part it was increased by a few words
which I heard pass between mamma and papa, mamma saying that she did not
think poor Kate would ever grow strong again, but slowly wither away. I
gave a great gulp as I heard those words, and then burst out sobbing
violently.
"`You here, Mary!' said mamma. `Well, my dear, as you have heard what
we said, it must be your secret too. Never let your poor cousin know
what we think, and never behave to her as if you thought she could not
recover.'
"I promised readily, and at fourteen the possession of that secret
seemed to make me more womanly than my sisters, as I redoubled my
tenderness to the suffering girl.
"The invalid was twenty-one--a great age in our estimation--and I used
to look up to her with veneration, gazing in her soft sweet face and
wistful eyes, wondering why she was so ill, and what was the great
sorrow that had come upon her like a blight upon one of the roses round
our porch.
"Cousin Kate came to us in the spring, and the months flew by till it
was the height of summer; and many and many a night had I turned my face
to the wall, so that Lil should not know, and cried silently till my
pillow was wet. For I knew so well that Kate was weaker, much weaker
than when she came, a walk across the lawn to the old garden-seat in the
shade being as much now as she could bear.
"`Cousin Kate,' I said, one day when we were alone, Lil and Cissy having
rushed off to get some flowers, `couldn't any doctor make you well?'
"She looked at me with a wild strange gaze which almost startled me,
before she replied, and then in a way that made my heart beat she sobbed
out--
"`Only one--only one!' and then as if to herself, in a low whisper, she
added, `and before he can come I shall be dead--dead!'
"She did not know I heard her last words, and I sat chilled and
frightened, gazing at her till my sisters came back, when, as we
frequently did, we sat down about her; Lil got upon the seat, Cissy sat
on the grass with her head against one of Kate's hands, which hung
listlessly from the corner where she leaned, and I threw myself on the
grass at her feet, so as to look up in her gentle face, which had now
become calm with its old weary look.
"`Cousin Kate,' said Lil, `tell us another story.'
"`No, no,' I said, `don't ask; she isn't so well to-day.'
"`Yes,' she said quietly, raising her head and looking at me, `I am
better to-day.'
"`Tell us one, then,' cried Cissy eagerly,--`one you've never told us
before.'