THE CAPTAIN ARRIVES.
If you were asked to come into Fairyland, you would expect to see
wonders, and you would consider it the height of presumption to be
conducted to a small room, nearly at the top of a house, in which a
child lies sleeping and a woman sits working. The roses on the wall
are sham ones; but there are two real roses in the centre of a bunch
of buttercups and daisies, which stands in a jug with a broken handle
near to the bed on which the child lies sleeping. It is eleven o'clock
at night, and the woman is working by the light of one candle. If ever
woman was happy, this woman is as she plies her needle and looks at
her child, and hums a few bars of a song softly to herself. The roses
on the child's face rival the real and artificial ones in the room. It
is a beautiful face to gaze at, and the brown eyelashes, and the curly
brown hair, and the lips deliciously parted, make a delightful
picture, which, were I a painter, I should love to paint. As it is, I
stoop in fancy and kiss the pure fresh lips of this innocent happy
child. What work is the woman doing? If this be Fairyland, is she busy
with the wings of grasshoppers making a cover for Queen Mab's chariot,
or collars of the moonshine's watery beams for the teams of little
atomies that gallop "athwart men's noses as they lie asleep?" No; she
is busy on some things very different indeed from these. And she is
doing good work--woman's work: darning stockings.
And this is Fairyland! you say. And darning stockings is good work and
woman's work! you say. Can I detect a scornful ring in your protest?
But what are we to do, I humbly submit, if women will not darn the
stockings? Of course I mean poor women. Rich women, thanks to those
metaphorical silver spoons which are in their mouths when they are
born, do not need to darn. But poor women cannot afford to buy new
stockings every week; and they have to sit down to turn old lamps into
new ones, which they almost always do with infinite content, and with
a cheerful readiness which is not worthy of a better cause, for the
cause is a good one enough as it is. I declare it always gives me a
pleasurable sensation to see a good housewife--the true household
fairy--sit down of an evening at her fireside, and make preparations
to attack the contents of a basket where woolen stockings and cotton
stockings shake hands--no, I mean feet--together, and lie down side by
side in amicable confusion. What a homily might be preached upon the
contents of some of these baskets, which tell of many mouths to fill,
and of many little legs and feet to keep warm! What diversity is there
to be seen! and how suggestive is the contemplation of the thick
woollen stocking of the father and the dainty tiny Sunday sock of the
three-year-old darling! Yet have I not seen somewhere in print
articles and letters which give me the impression that women are at
length awaking from a hideous dream of centuries of slavery, and that
they consider it derogatory to their intelligence to darn stockings?
But if women will not darn stockings, who will? Or is darning as an
institution to be abolished?
Say that in this woman and the work she is singing over there are no
graceful suggestions which, in their worth and purity and tenderness,
deserves to be ranked with imaginings and mental creations of
exceeding beauty--say, as some hard critics, aver, that she and her
occupation are the prosiest of prosy themes, and that the sentiment
which animates her and makes her contented and happy belongs of
necessity to the dullest of dull clay; tear from her and her
surroundings every vestige of ideality: divest her of everything but
what is coarse and common, and make the room in which she sits a place
to moan over the hard realities of life--still in this very room
Fairyland dwells. The little head that lies so peacefully upon the
pillow teems with wonders; imagination is bringing to the child
fantastic creations and scenes of exquisite loveliness and grace.
Though the strangest of contrasts are presented to her, there is
harmony in everything. The light, the fresh air, the brighter clouds
than those she sees in the narrow streets, play their parts in her
dreams in a thousand happy shapes and forms. She walks with Felix in a
field, gathering flowers more beautiful than she has ever yet seen;
there are silver leaves and golden leaves, and all the colours of the
rainbow hide themselves in flower-bells, and then peep out to gladden
her. There are lilies, and roses, and wallflowers, and daisies, with
the fresh dew glistening on their leaves and stems. She and Felix
wander and wander until they are tired, and sit down to rest amidst
the flowers, which grow and arch until they are buried in them, and
the light of day is shut out. Then they sink and sink through the
flowers, which dissolve and melt away, as it seems, and she and Felix
are walking among the stars. It is night, and the stars are all around
them. Suddenly, in the clouds which float in solemn splendour beneath
them, a valley of light appears, and she looks through wondrous depths
into a shining sea, with the only ship her world contains sailing on
it. When she and Felix are walking at the bottom of the sea--as they
do presently--the stars are still with them, and the Captain and the
Doll play their parts in her beautiful dreams. Happiest of the happy
is Pollypod.
Up the stairs stumbles a tired-out man, with a dog close at his heels.
Mrs. Podmore jumps from her chair at the sound of his steps, and
almost in the twinkling of an eye the table is made ready for supper.
"Well, old woman," says Jim, with a great sigh of relief at being home
at last.
He speaks in gasps as usual, as if, after his day's hard labour, he
finds talking an effort. Mrs. Podmore takes a blue-cotton handkerchief
containing an empty basin from him--Jim's favourite dinner is a
meat-pudding, in the making of which his wife would not yield the palm
to the Queen's cook. Snap, the faithful dog, greets Mrs. Podmore with
sniffs at the hem of her gown, and when this duty is performed, leaps
upon the bed and licks Pollypod's face.
"Did you enjoy yourself--old woman?" asks Jim Podmore.
"That we did. We've had such a beautiful day, Jim!"
Jim nods, and his hand wanders to Pollypod's neck, and caresses it.
"What a colour--she's got--mother!"
"Bless her little heart!" is the reply. "It's done her a power o'
good."
He sees the flowers, and takes them in his hand.
"They're for you, Jim," said Mrs. Podmore; "Polly's present for
father. She tried to keep awake to give them to you; but she could not
keep her little eyes open."
He turns the flowers about tenderly, and a troubled look that was in
his eyes when he came home vanishes as he lays his great dirty face
and bushy head on the pillow. But when he sits down to his supper,
with the flowers before him to give an additional zest to his food,
the troubled look returns. Mrs. Podmore says quietly,
"You're bothering your head about something, Jim;" and draws her chair
a little nearer to him.
He does not answer her immediately, but makes a pretence of eating,
and presently lays his knife and fork on his plate, and pushes them
away.
"Did you hear--the newspaper boys--a-calling out anything?" he asks.
"No, Jim."
"Nothing about--a accident?"
"No, Jim. Has there been one?"
"There's been--another smash-up--on our line. A lot o'
people--hurt--badly. I saw some of 'em. It made me sick."
He takes the fork, and plays with it nervously. A look of apprehension
flashes into Mrs. Podmore's eyes as she notices his agitation, and she
asks, with white lips,
"It wasn't your doing, Jim, was it? Don't say it was your doing!"
"No, it wasn't my doing," he answers; but he evidently takes it to
heart almost as much as if he had been to blame.
"It's bad enough, Jim," said Mrs. Podmore, relieved of her fear; "but
it would ha' been worse if you was to blame. It ain't your fault?"
"It ain't my fault--no; but it might ha' been--it might ha' been. It
warn't his fault, either."
"Whose, then, Jim?"
"Whose?" he exclaims. "When a lot o' directors--works a feller--till
he's--dead beat--till blue lights--and green lights--and red
lights--dances afore his eyes--and he don't know what is real--and
what is fancy--is he to be made--accountable? Dick Hart--him as had
the accident--wouldn't lift his finger--agin man or child--and now
he's killed--two or three--and 'll be made--accountable. I never
saw--such a face--as his'n--to-night--when the people that was
hurt--was brought in. It was as white--as a bit o' chalk. He was hurt
as much as them. There was a child among 'em--a little girl"--(his
voice breaks here, and his eyes wander to Pollypod)--"they didn't know
what--was the matter with her. She breathed--and that was all. Dick
Hart--(he's got a little girl hisself, mother--and he wouldn't lift
his finger--agin any man)--Dick Hart--he trembles--and cries--when he
sees the little thing--a-laying so still--and he whispers to a
mate--as how he wishes--some one--'d come and strike him dead--where
he stands. As he says this--the little thing's mother--runs in
wild-like--and cries, 'Where's the man--as killed my child?' And Dick
Hart runs away--on the platform--and jumps on to the rails--scared
and mad--and if he hadn't been stopped--would ha' made away--with
hisself--somehow. But they stopped him--in time--and brought him back.
Another minute--and he'd ha' been cut to pieces--by a train--that was
coming in. They had to keep--tight hold on him; for when he was in the
room agin--and saw the little girl's--mother--on her knees by the
child--he fell a-trembling--and looked more like a animal--than a
man."
"What will they do to him, Jim?"
"The Lord knows! The law's pretty sharp--on us--for don't you see, old
woman, the public's got to be protected. Lord save us! As if it was
our fault! As if it was us!--the public's got to be--protected from!
It's a pretty how-do-you-do--altogether, that's what it is."
"I pity his wife as much as him," says Mrs. Podmore, with all a
woman's sympathy.
"She _is_ to be pitied. She's near her confinement, too--poor
creature!--and Dick, he's out of a billet now--and hasn't got
anything--put by. I tell you what it is, old woman--it's hard
lines--that's what it is--hard lines!"
"But the Company'll see to her, Jim, surely!"
"Will they!" exclaims Jim bitterly. "The Company'll pay you--pretty
regular--while you work--and 'll work you--pretty hard--while they pay
you;--that's what the Company'll do. You'd think--knowing, as they
know--that Dick Hart's got a wife as is near her confinement--and
knowing, as they know--that Dick Hart's wages is just enough to keep
him and her--and his little girl--and that it's next to impossible--he
could lay anything by--for a rainy day--you'd think, old woman--that
now Dick's in trouble--the Company'd pay him his wages--till he got
out of it! Catch 'em at it! That's not the Company's game. Their
game is--when an accident occurs--to make out--that they're not
accountable--and responsible--and that they're the victims--not us, or
the public. The Company'll see to--Dick's wife--will they, old woman!
Where's my pipe?"
He has it in his hand, but is so engrossed in his theme that he does
not know it, and Mrs. Podmore quietly takes it from him, and fills it.
In truth there is another cause for Jim's agitation--a cause which he
dare not speak of, which he scarcely dare think of, as he puffs away
at his pipe. But it comes upon him, despite his reluctance to
entertain it, and fills him with terrible fear. This very night he
himself had a narrow escape from an accident. He was very tired, and
even as he stood waiting to shift the points for an expected train, he
fell into a dose. For how long he did not know--a second, a minute, or
many--but he was suddenly aroused by a furious whirl of sound. It was
the train approaching. In a very agony of fear, he rushed and adjusted
the points. Just in time, thank God! Half a dozen seconds more, and it
would have been too late. No one but he knew of the narrow escape of
the passengers, yet the anguish of that one almost fatal moment will
remain with him for many a year.
It is with him now, as he smokes, and it remains with him during the
night, as he holds his darling Pollypod in his arms, and thinks what
would become of her if one night, when he was dead-beat, he should
fall asleep again on his watch, and not wake up until it was too late.
Then the fancy comes upon him that the little girl who was hurt in the
accident, and who lay like dead, was something like Pollypod; and he
shivers at the thought, and holds his darling closer to his breast.
Pollypod is awake very early in the morning, and while her mother is
lighting the fire, and preparing breakfast for Jim, who has to be at
his post at half-past five, she tells her father all about the
adventures of the previous day. He listens in delight, and when she
comes to the part where Felix gave her the flowers, he says, "Felix is
a gentleman;" but Pollypod whispers, "No, he is a wizard;" and tells
of the ship and the Doll and the Captain, and speaks in such good
faith, that Jim is troubled in his mind, and thinks, "That all comes
along of my stupidity about my ship coming home! Polly'll break her
heart if she doesn't get the Doll." Jim cannot afford to buy one; he
is in the same boat as Dick Hart, and has not been able to put
anything by for a rainy day. He thinks that the very happiest thing
that could occur to him would be to pick up a sovereign as he goes to
his work. "If some swell'd only drop one now," he thinks absurdly,
"and I was to drop across it as I walk along!"
When he is dressed and has had his breakfast, and stands by the
bedside kissing Pollypod before he goes, she makes him put some
flowers in the button-hole of his greasy old fustian jacket.
"Now you look like Felix," she says,
As Jim walks to his work, with the bright sun shining on him, he looks
anxiously along the pavements of the quiet streets in the ridiculous
hope that some swell had dropped a sovereign, and that it might be his
luck to come across it. But no such good fortune is his, and he wishes
with all his heart that he had not put the notion of the ship in
Pollypod's head.
This ship that is coming home is always a poor man's ship, and many a
pretty conceit is woven out of it to gratify the poor man's child. It
is always sailing over the seas, freighted with precious treasure, but
it rarely reaches port. When it does, earth contains no greater
happiness and delight.
The faithful dog, Snap, does not accompany his master on this morning.
Pollypod had said to her father, "Leave Snap at home, father. I want
to tell him something."
So Snap is left behind, unconscious of the precious secret that is
about to be intrusted to him. Pollypod waits until mother is out of
the room, and then, kneeling upon her bed in her night-dress, she sets
Snap before her, and bids him listen. Snap, sitting gravely on his
haunches, but with some difficulty, for the bed is all tumbled about,
looks Pollypod straight in the face, with a serious demeanour worthy
of the occasion. He receives the intelligence that Pollypod imparts to
him with no other expressions of feeling than are contained in short
barks, and blinks, and rollings backward when he loses his balance;
but Pollypod finds this perfectly satisfactory, and tells him that he
is to be sure to be fond of the Doll, and not to growl at her or be
jealous of her. "For I'll love you all the same, Snap." Whereat Snap
licks her face, and by that act vows fealty to the Doll.
The week that passes after her mother's funeral is by no means an
unhappy one for Lily. A familiar voice and a familiar presence are
gone, and she grieves naturally. But she derives much comfort from
the restfulness and peacefulness of everything about her. The lodgers
in the house make as little noise as possible, and Jim Podmore, as he
goes down-stairs to his work in the early morning, treads as softly as
his heavy boots will allow him, so that he shall not disturb her. She
derives comfort also from Alfred's happier mood. The night after the
funeral he comes home with a bright look in his face, and greets her
with a kiss. With his arm round her waist, he draws her into her
bedroom, and tells her that she mustn't mind if he has not been so
affectionate to her lately as he ought to have been.
"I have had some troubles," he says, "and have been very unhappy,
Lily. But now things look brighter. I'm going to love you more than
ever. I'm going to do something grand by-and-by. You'll see! I'm not
going to let you work much longer."
"O, but I don't mind it, Alf," she replies, with her arm round his
neck.
"Ah, but it isn't right. I'm going to work for you. I know a way! You
let me alone for knowing a thing or two. We'll have a better place
than, this soon, and we'll go about a bit."
She listens to him with pleasure, in her innocence and trustfulness,
and kisses him softly. Alfred is proud of her--proud of her beauty,
proud of her gentleness and modesty--proud because she loves him and
thinks all the world of him.
"I have made," he continues, "the best friend that any man ever
had--the noblest-hearted fellow I had ever seen or heard of."
"O, I am glad of that, Alfred--I am glad of that! Who is it? He must
be my friend too. Do I know him?"
Her thoughts turn to Felix as she asks the question, and an innocent
joy warms her young heart.
"Do you know him!" he repeats gaily. "Do you know him, Puss! Why, of
course you do! You don't need me to tell you who it is. You can
guess--you do guess. There's only one--although he's only a new friend
after all, now I come to think of it. But he's a man every inch of
him. He gave a hundred and twenty pounds to a poor widow-woman who was
left penniless! The week before last he paid a poor man's debts--the
poor fellow had got into trouble somehow--and set him up in business
again, and made him comfortable--all because he had a wife and
children. What do you think of that, Lily?"
"A noble nature, indeed!" says Lily softly, sharing Alfred's
enthusiasm, and wondering whether she shall ever see Felix again.
"And he thinks himself so wise" (Alfred says this with a light laugh)
"that he's always being taken in."
"That's a pity, Alfred."
"O, but he don't mind; he can afford it, and likes it. If you knew
what a friend he is to me! And I shouldn't wonder if it was for
Somebody's sake----why, how you are trembling, Lily!"
"You speak so warmly of this good friend, Alfred, that I am filled
with joy--for your sake, my dear, that you have found such a friend.
And yet I wonder, and cannot understand it."
She almost whispers these last words. She has been carried away by
Alfred's enthusiasm. Certainly, Felix's kindness and gentle bearing
had made a great impression upon her, and her thoughts dwelt much upon
him. But it was only yesterday that she first saw him. It is all so
strange. Only yesterday! But it seems longer; it seems to her as if
she has known him for a long, long time.
"So now you can guess who it is, Lily, can't you?"
"I think I can, dear, and I am very, very glad! Glad to find he is as
good and noble as I believed him to be when I first saw him."
"And it isn't so long ago that we first knew him!"
"No, indeed, Alf dear--but yesterday!"
"It might be yesterday. Why, it was only last Saturday night--just
five days ago--that he saw you home from the Royal White Rose."
The little hand that was caressing his neck slowly withdraws itself,
and the flush of colour, that the excitement of the conversation had
brought to the cheeks, dies rapidly away. Her hands now lie idly in
her lap, her face is colourless, her eyes are drooping to the ground.
"You are speaking of"--she manages to say.
"Mr. Sheldrake, Puss! The noblest-hearted man in the world. You
guessed at once--I saw it. Ah, Lily, that's a wise little head of
yours!"
He takes the wise little head between his hands, and kisses her lips.
She kisses him thoughtfully, and gazes at him with a steady sad light
in her eyes.
"And he is such a good friend to you, Alf?"
"Haven't I told you!--and all, perhaps, for Somebody's----"
With a rapid motion, she places her fingers on his lips.
"And is really noble-hearted! And has done all these kind things!"
"All, and more, Lily. It is quite by accident I heard of these; for he
is a queer character, and nothing displeases him so much as for
people to speak to him about his kindness, or that they know it. He
tries to show himself in quite a different light."
Lily is silent and very thoughtful for a little time after this, but
she soon recovers, and her manner becomes brighter because Alfred's is
so. A great weight seems to have been lifted from his mind, and he is
more considerate of her than is usual with him. But she, in the
unselfishness of her affection, does not notice this; it is because he
is more cheerful that she is happier.
The next evening is Friday, and Pollypod and her mother have tea with
Lily and her grandfather. Pollypod, of course, is engrossed by one
subject. She has the fullest faith in Felix, but as the end of the
week is very near, she is very curious about the Captain. She wants to
know so much--what a Captain is like; how the Captain will find the
house; whether the Captain will know her, and know that the Doll is
for her. Every knock and ring at the street-door makes her heart beat
loud and fast, and during the last two days she has tired out her
little legs by running up and down-stairs to see if the Captain is at
the door. Mrs. Podmore is not so sanguine. She tries to prepare
Pollypod for disappointment, but nothing can shake the child's faith.
He was the nicest-spoken gentleman (said Mrs. Podmore to Lily, in
confidence) that she has ever set eyes on. But Lord love you! he only
told Pollypod the story out of the goodness of his heart. He was as
good as gold, that he was; the way he carried Pollypod upstairs was a
sight to see; but all he wanted to do was to amuse the child, bless
him! What did he know of dolls, a gentleman like him? But Mrs. Podmore
does not win Lily over to her view of the question, for Pollypod has
also made a confidante of Lily, and she in her heart of hearts
believes that Felix will make the child a present of a doll.
"Not such a handsome one as you say, Polly." says Lily to her; "but a
nice one, I daresay."
"You'll see--you'll see," is all that Pollypod says in reply. "I wish
it was to-morrow! I wish it was to-morrow!"
But although she wishes it were to-morrow, she looks out for the
Captain to-night, and listens to every footfall on the stairs. But the
night passes, and to-morrow comes, and still no Captain. As twilight
comes on, Pollypod's excitement is so great that Mrs. Podmore declares
she is afraid the child will work herself into a fever. So Lily
proposes that Pollypod shall come and sit with her and her
grandfather, and Mrs. Podmore consents, all the more willingly because
she wants to clean up for Sunday. Pollypod is glad to go down to the
first-floor, for she will be nearer to the street door. They sit at
the window, the three of them, Polly in Lily's lap, with all her heart
in her ear. Knocks come, and rings, but not one of them heralds the
Captain or the Doll. Lily believes in the Doll, but not in the
Captain; Pollypod believes in both.
"If he doesn't come, Polly," says old Wheels, "I'll make you a doll,
on wheels."
"He's sure to come! he's sure to come!" exclaims Pollypod.
But twilight deepens, and the hope grows fainter. Pollypod's face is
on Lily's neck, and Lily feels the tears welling from the child's
eyes. Lily begins to feel sorry, also; sorry for more reasons than
one. Mrs. Podmore is busy upstairs, scrubbing the room; Sunday is a
day of rare, enjoyment to her and her small family. Old Wheels is on
the point of suggesting that they shall light the lamp, when a knock
comes at the street-door--a strange knock. Not a single knock for the
first-floor, not two deliberate knocks for the second-floor, nor three
for the third; but a rat-tat-tat, with a flourish which might be
intended for some person in this humble house who has distinguished
friends in the upper circles of society. Some one--never mind
whom--opens the door and a step that none of them recognises is on the
stairs. Pollypod jumps from Lily's lap, but Lily retains her hand. The
man lingers on the first landing. It is dark, and he is evidently a
stranger.
"Does Mrs. Podmore live here?" he asks of Nobody, in a loud voice.
"Yes," answers Old Wheels, going to the door. "On the third-floor, but
she's busy cleaning. What do you want of her?"
"I have brought something for her little girl."
"O, O!" cries Pollypod, and in her excitement Lily rises, and
accompanies the child to the door. "Are you a Captain?"
"Yes."
"What ship?" inquires Old Wheels, merrily for the child's sake, and
nautically in honour of the visitor.
"The Fancy" replies the man in the dark.
"Come in," says Old Wheels; "the little girl you want is here."
And the Captain of the Fancy enters the room.