LITTLE PROVIDENCES
Never--never to their dying day--did Christian and Rose enjoy anything
so much as their comfortable seat by the carpenter's fire, and the hot,
strong tea which the carpenter's mother gave them. She informed them
that her name was Morris, that her son was called John Morris, and that
they were both thoroughly respectable.
"You have had such a queer adventure that maybe you won't know just for
a bit who is respectable and who is not; but me and John is. Aren't we,
John?"
"Strikes me you are about right, mother," said John Morris; and then he
sat down and stared at the two children.
"It is too wonderful," he kept saying; and when he said this he began
to ruffle up his thick hair and to rub his forehead.
"What is wonderful?" said Christian at last. "Do you greatly mind, Mrs.
Morris? but if your son wouldn't stare so very hard, Rosy and I would
like it better."
"Oh, 'taint at you he's looking," said Mrs. Morris. "Don't you fash
yourself, my dear."
"But he is looking first at Rose and then at me," said Christian.
"Aren't you, Morris?" she added, turning to the tall young man.
"Well, I be and I been't," was his reply. "I'm looking through you,
miss, and that's the fact."
"Oh, dear!" said Christian; "I think that makes matters a little
worse."
"Would you like to hear a bit of a story, my deary?" said Mrs. Morris,
drawing her straw arm-chair close to the fire as she spoke. "You don't
mind the children hearing it, do you, John, my son?"
"No, mother," was his answer. "You tell 'em just as much as you think
fit."
"Well, loveys," said Mrs. Morris, "it was just like this. John and me,
we owed a bit of money--exactly seven pounds ten--and we didn't know
how on the wide earth to get it, and the man to whom we owed it was
about to sell us up. He was going to put the brokers into this little
bit of a house, my darlings."
"Who are they?" asked Christian.
"Men, lovey--cruel men. They come and take possession of your house,
and you can't call even the bed you sleep on your own, to say nothing
of your little frying-pan and china-lined saucepan. And when a day or
two has gone by they sell everything and take away the money, and you
are left without stick or stone belonging to you."
"That must be very awful. I never heard of anything quite so awful,"
said Christian; "and only for seven pounds ten."
"I've heard of it," said Rosy. "There's one thing about poor folks:
they do hear of that sort of thing. It's very bad, Mrs. Morris," she
continued.
"I think it is about the most cruel thing I ever heard of," said
Christian. "Oh! if only my seven pounds weren't stolen you should have
them all."
"Aint they dear children, both of 'em?" said Mrs. Morris, looking at
her son, and the tears filled her eyes. "But, my darlings, maybe you'll
be the means of giving us the money after all; for a reward is offered
by your friends, loves, and if anybody earns that reward now it is my
son John."
"If the little ladies are ready, perhaps we'd best be going," said John
Morris.
"Oh, yes, we're quite ready," said Christian. "Hadn't we better have a
cab? I feel rather tired," she added.
"We can't have it," said the man; "there aint any money to pay for it."
"But it can be paid for when we get home," said Christian.
"We won't risk it," said the man. "They may have left the house;
there's no saying what might have happened. We've got to walk, misses."
"I'm so tired," said Christian again; but Rosy nudged her and said:
"Keep up your heart. You can rest as long as ever you like when you get
home."
So they bade good-by to Mrs. Morris, and thanked her for her tea;
and she kissed them and called them "little providences" and "little
hostages to fortune," and smiled at them as they went out of the door,
and looked so happy that it almost broke Christian's heart to see her.
"To be happy--oh, so happy!--in such a tiny, tiny house, and then to
want just seven pounds ten, and because of the lack of so little, to
have the terrible fear of her furniture being sold! Indeed it shall not
be!" thought Christian; "I'll see to that."
But as she walked through the dirty, sloppy streets by John Morris's
side she could not help wondering if she had any right to ask anything
at all. For the thought of what she had done and the misery she had
caused kept cropping up ever and ever before her mind, and with each
thought her sin seemed to grow blacker, and her ingratitude to her
parents greater.
"And they're not even at home," thought the young girl. "Oh, who will
give the poor carpenter seven pounds ten?"
From the part of London where the children had been found to Russell
Square was a long way, and soon Christian was so weary that she could
scarcely drag herself along.
"There's no help for it," said the carpenter; "I'm a strong man and can
carry you for a bit, missy. Come," he added; "put your arms round my
neck. Now then."
Christian felt heartily ashamed of herself. A great girl to be carried
through the streets of London! But oh, how weary she was! Her feet felt
quite blistered, and the carpenter's arms were very strong, and he had
such a kind face.
"Are you sure--quite sure--carpenter," she said after a pause,
"that you will get that money? Are you certain that you will be
rewarded--that the people who advertised will give you as much for
finding us?"
"I guess that's about the sum," said Morris, and then he laughed.
What with one adventure and another, it was dark--quite dark--past six
o'clock--before the runaways reached the old family house in Russell
Square. Nurse and Miss Thompson had both returned. Judith, discomfited
and miserable, had gone back to her mother's house. A tall policeman
was standing in the hall, and Miss Neil, who had also come to the fore,
was talking to him very earnestly. He was suggesting this thing and
another, and as he suggested, and Miss Thompson's pale face looked up
at him, and Miss Neil's rather indignant one was fixed on his face, and
nurse wept in the background, there came a loud pealing ring at the
front-door.
"To save my life I couldn't go to answer it," thought nurse to herself.
"Something tells me as there is news, good or bad, and for the life of
me I can't stir a step to meet it."
But Judson, his pride a good deal ruffled, was not far away, and he
stalked to the front-door and flung it open.
Then there was a scream--which, on the part of Miss Neil, almost
reached a shriek--for in the arms of a tall man was a big, fair-haired
girl, and by his side stood a little, dark-haired girl, and the next
instant all three were in the hall. Christian, when she saw the
policeman, very nearly cried again; but the welcome the wanderers
received must soon have reassured them. Miss Neil was the only one who
even tried to look severe.
"Well, you have very nearly killed me," she said. "But there, there!
thank God in heaven you are back. Miss Thompson, see the poor children.
How frightfully tired they look! I have no doubt they have been in
horrid, dirty, smelly places, and have brought back the most horrible
complaints."
But Christian and Rose hardly heard the words, for the home feeling was
so comfortable, and nurse's kisses, given indiscriminately first to her
nursling and then to her great-niece, were too delicious for words.
It was Christian who first recovered herself. She heard someone talking
in the hall, and looking up, she saw Morris, looking very upright and
very respectable, on the mat. Now, no one had noticed Morris; and
perhaps, being not at all an aggressive sort of man, he might have gone
away from the house without any reward but for Christian. The look on
his face brought her quickly to herself.
"Miss Thompson," she said, "Miss Neil," she stood between the two in
the hall, "I don't pretend that I haven't been a very naughty girl.
I am sorry, although that doesn't mend matters; but neither Rosy
nor I would perhaps have ever got back home at all if it had not
been for this man. His name is Morris--John Morris--and he lives in
a timber-yard, a very nice place indeed. And he and his mother have
a little house there, and they're in great trouble because of seven
pounds ten. Please, I want him to have seven pounds ten at once for
finding us."
"You did mention, ma'am," said Morris, touching his forehead with great
punctiliousness, "or at least the parties who put up the advertisement
mentioned, that the reward for them as found the little ladies would be
substantial."
"It was I who put those words," said Miss Neil. "I regretted having to
do so, but there was no way out."
"My mother and me, we do want money," said Morris, "or I wouldn't make
so bold as to ask for it, for it's real happiness to have brought the
little ladies home."
"Very naughty children they are," said Miss Neil; "but of course we
must keep our word. How much, Miss Thompson, ought we to give this man?"
"Seven pounds ten at the very least," cried Christian.
"Hush, Christian! you certainly have no voice in the matter."
"We promised that bold girl, Judith Ford, ten pounds," said Miss
Thompson.
"That is quite true; and this man----"
"Oh, he was so kind!" said Christian. "He carried me when I nearly
fainted from tiredness; and he and his mother gave us such delicious
tea. Didn't they, Rosy?"
"That they did," said Rosy. "I haven't never took such a fancy to
anything as I did to that hot buttered toast," she added.
Morris smiled and his dark eyes twinkled.
"You must come another day, missy, and see my mother," was his answer.
"But now let us consider the reward," said Miss Thompson.
"It certainly can't be less than ten pounds; and I should say,"
remarked Miss Neil suddenly, "that seeing everything, and also having
an eye to the fact that we were about to offer a very much larger sum,
we ought to give this good man fifteen pounds."
"Miss Neil!" almost screamed Christian. "Oh, I'll never think you hard
or old-maidish again!"
She ran forward and caught Miss Neil by the arm.
"At present, my dear," said that good lady, eyeing her with marked
disapproval, "we will have done with heroics. We will attend to
business. Perhaps, sir, you will step into the study. Judson, show this
man into the study; we will go there and give him the money."
So Morris, hardly knowing whether he was standing on his head or his
heels, went home that night with fifteen pounds in his pocket.
"Mother," he said as, an hour later, he entered the very humble little
home, "it wasn't only that they were providences, those two dear little
ladies, but they have set us up for life. I can now get that machine
I have always been hankering after, and so add a lot to my weekly
earnings."
"And what a good thing you did find the poor little dears!" said Mrs.
Morris. "I am just going out now to get some sausages, for you haven't
had what may be called a meal for some little time, John."
So John and Mrs. Morris were helped, and as far as they were concerned,
Christian's mad adventure seemed to have borne good fruit.
To Christian herself, after Morris went, no one said a harsh word; but
Miss Neil sat down and began to write a long letter, which was to
reach the girl's parents in Bombay. Occasionally as she wrote she put
up her handkerchief to her eyes to wipe away some fast-falling tears;
for she was not all hard, as Christian had supposed, and she had really
suffered horribly for the last two days.
Rose, having been regaled with an excellent meal, was taken home by
nurse herself. Mrs. Latimer received her little girl with scant favor.
"A fine mess you have got into!" she said.
"Don't scold her, poor child!" said nurse. "I am going, if I possibly
can, to have her to live with me in the coming winter. She did what she
did because she's so took up with Miss Christian; and, bad as the whole
affair was, it was a blessed thing for Miss Christian that she had Rosy
with her."
"Then if you are going to look after Rose, aunt," said Mrs. Latimer,
"she needn't go on learning the dressmaking."
"No, that she needn't, for I'm going to train her to be a proper
lady's-maid. Miss Christian will want someone whom she can really trust
when she is grown up. You must remember, Mary, that our Miss Christian
is the daughter of very rich people, and very important people too, and
will be quite a great lady in her own way by and by."
So Rose's home-coming was not nearly so bad as she had feared, for her
mother was not going to be too cross with a little girl whom her aunt
was, to all practical purposes, going to adopt.
"Sit down, child," she said; "or, if you have had enough to eat, do for
goodness' sake take yourself off to bed. You look half-dazed."
"That's about true, mother," said Rosy.
In Christian's room a bright fire was blazing, and nurse herself, the
moment she came back, began to attend to her nursling.
"To think of where we slept last night," mused Christian.
But if her thoughts were back in that short and dreadful experience,
she could not bring herself to speak of it for to-night at least, and
nurse did not speak of it either. She went on just as though nothing
had happened. But when the young girl was warm and snug in bed, and the
dreadful past seemed wonderfully like a dream, nurse sank down by the
bedside, stretched out her arms over the coverlet, laid her head down
on them, and burst into tears.
"Miss Christian," she whispered, "for all the rest of my life I will
believe in God Almighty and in the power of prayer. For I did pray so
terribly hard; and now, see, God has answered me."
"Yes," said Christian; but she did not say any more.
That night she slept soundly. She did not guess that nurse had dragged
a little sofa-bed into the room and was lying down near her; she was
too weary to know anything.
In the morning she awoke, and the dream-feeling of the past grew
greater and greater. She got up slowly and went into the schoolroom.
How strange the house seemed! Just the old house, with all the old
furniture, and the same servants, and nurse there and all; and yet her
father and mother away, and she herself having no right to be there.
At about eleven o'clock Miss Neil bustled into the room.
"Christian," she said, "you have been, from what I hear, in a very
unhealthy and dangerous place, and you may have contracted some illness
while there. That being the case, Miss Peacock does not wish you to go
to school for at least ten days. During that time you will stay with
nurse and Miss Thompson, and the doctor, whom I have sent for, will
call to see you once or twice. When you are pronounced absolutely free
of all danger of infection I will take you to Penwerne. But for the
next ten days you will consider yourself free. You will have holidays,
and Miss Thompson will take you where she likes. Now, my dear, I am
off, and I can only say I am glad your mad escapade has not ended in
anything worse."
Christian tried to speak, but Miss Neil did not give her any time; she
whisked out of the room and went downstairs.
"I have told her, Miss Thompson," she said to the governess, who was
waiting for her in the hall. "I don't suppose she has caught anything,
but it will serve her right if she has. Anyhow, it is only fair to the
school that it should not be endangered by such a naughty girl."
"And we may do what we like for the next ten days?" said Miss Thompson.
"Anything; only don't bother me."
"We won't indeed."
"I will send in a doctor to see her. She looks perfectly well, only a
little pale. Yes, amuse her; do what you please. It is not my place to
punish her. Thank Heaven she is not my child!"