Again to the crowded metropolis my story shifts, and to a part of the
grand city where dwell those of the humbler walks in life.
Here are no brown-stone fronts, no elegant homes, but the imprint of
poverty is upon all.
Long years before the place was a fashionable locality; but the rapid
growth of the city forced the wealthy residents up town, and into their
homes, not then as now, superb structures, palatial in their fittings,
the poorer classes moved, to again give place to those of a still lower
strata of the society that goes to make up the world to be found in
metropolitan life.
In a tenement-flat, on the fourth floor of a dingy-looking building, a
woman sat alone, a piece of embroidery in her hands.
The flat consisted of four rooms, one large one in the front, with a
hall-room adjoining, and the same in the rear.
Those in the front were used as sitting-room and bed-room; those in the
rear, the larger one for a kitchen and dining-room combined, the smaller
for a sleeping-chamber, for there was a cot in it.
The furniture was very scant, and cheap-looking, there being nothing
more than was actually necessary for use.
But an air of cleanliness was upon all, and the woman who sat alone in
the front room had the appearance of one reared in refinement, one who
had seen better days ere she had come to feel the pinching of poverty.
She was neatly clad in a black cashmere dress that was a trifle seedy,
and which appeared to have been often brushed.
Her form was slender, very graceful, and her face was beautiful yet sad,
while her large eyes were sunken and inflamed as though from weeping.
The work she was engaged upon ill accorded with the rooms and
surroundings, for she was embroidering a silk scarf of a rare and costly
pattern, and she kept it folded closely in a clean towel, excepting the
part upon which her slender, skilful fingers worked.
An easel stood near her with a box of paints and brushes, and a
half-finished painting was before her, a landscape scene, with a cosy
country house, an old mill, a brook, and a valley stretching away in the
distance.
Suddenly her eyes were raised from her work, and rested upon the canvas.
"Dear, dear old Brookside! how I long to see you once again, and yet I
dare not go, even though I should have to beg my bread.
"Not one word in all these long, weary, wretched years have I heard from
those whom I love so dearly, and deserted to become the wife of--_a
scoundrel_!
"Heaven forgive me that rash act; and forgive me for bringing sorrow
upon my parents and poor Kent; but I was fascinated by that wretch--yes,
fascinated, as though by a snake, for it was not love I felt, as now I
hate him--no, no, I should not say that of the dead, of the father of my
children," and she dropped her face in her hands and burst into tears.
Thirteen years have passed away since the reader last beheld her who
sits there sobbing like a child, and the once beautiful girl of
eighteen, pretty Ruby Raymond, the miller's daughter, has sadly changed
in all that time.
Almost from the moment that she left her lovely, happy home, deserting
her parents, and flying from the love of honest, brave Kent Lomax, her
miseries had begun; and, too proud to return to dear old Brookside,
though deserted by her husband, whom she afterward had heard was dead,
she struggled on to support herself and her two children.
Not a word had she heard from her parents, and she would not write to
them, fearing a rebuff.
Not a word had she heard from Kent Lomax, and, after all that she had
done to break his heart, she would not seek his aid in her distress.
She had sewed, embroidered, and then taken up painting as a means of
support; but her income was small, and she had to live very humbly.
Her children she sent to the public school, and she clothed them as well
as she could.
"Oh! if I could only get a little money saved up, that, in disguise, I
could go down to Brookside and see them all there, though they know me
not!
"I could leave my children with good hearted Mrs. Lucas, next door, and
be gone but a few days, for I only wish to see the dear old home, to
gaze upon the faces of my parents, to see Kent, and then come back to my
wretchedness and toil; but I feel I could work the better if I could go.
"Still, I cannot, for it would take nearly fifty dollars to go and
return, and I have but ten saved up, and it would not be right, if I had
the money to spend it thus, for what if I should be taken sick, what
would my little ones do?"
Again she buried her face in her hands and wept, to start suddenly,
hastily drying her eyes, and, as a second knock came at the door, to
call out:
"Come in!"
The door opened and a man entered.
He was a most unprepossessing looking person, one to dread, for he
looked like a tramp in dress, and a scoundrel in his face.
The woman arose quickly, and asked as firmly as she could:
"Well, sir, what do you wish here?"
"I've come on business, missus, so don't go to squealin', fer I doesn't
mean ter harm yer ef yer puts up ther chink as I tells you," was the
reply in a sullen voice.
The woman saw that she was in the man's power, for to scream would bring
no aid, as it would scarcely be heard above the din of the city.
Her children were at school, and there was no one to call upon.
The face of the man showed his evil heart, and in dread she said:
"I have but a few dollars in the world, and would you take _that_?"
"I would, you bet! fer I needs money, and I'll git it, ef I has ter make
trouble, so out with it."
The poor woman stepped to a little half-desk, half-table, the place
where she kept the few souvenirs of the past, and took therefrom a silk
purse.
Out of this she took the money, eleven dollars in all.
"Let me keep one dollar," she pleaded, adding:
"I need it so much."
"Not a copper cent, missus, so hand it over."
"Here it is, eleven dollars."
"It is not enough, for I need more."
"It is all I have."
"You've got jewellery."
"I've a little, souvenirs of my girlhood."
"Durn yer girlhood! Yer should forgit it; so hand it over."
"I will _not_!" she said firmly.
"Then I chokes that neck o' yours ontil yer can't preach, and takes
all."
"Mercy you can have all," and she handed out a small box containing a
few trinklets of little intrinsic value, but which she prized most
highly.
"You've got some rings there."
"My wedding ring, and one other."
"They are worth somethin'."
"They are worth a great deal to me, for one tells me of a happy past,
the other of only sorrow."
"One was given by a lover, I guesses, and t'other by your husband."
"You are right."
"Well, I wants 'em."
"No! no! no! You would not take these."
"Come, I hain't no time to lose, for I'm wanted by the perlice, and to
pertect mysel', I'll jist tie you up, and put a bandage on that
music-box o' yourn, so you sha'n't shout when I gets out."
As he spoke he advanced toward her, and with a spring he grasped her
arm, stifling a cry with his huge right hand.
At the same moment he fell like a log upon the floor, struck down by an
iron poker held in the hand of a boy of twelve, who unseen by the robber
or his victim, had glided into the room from the back chamber, closely
followed by a little girl of ten.
With a bound the woman sprang away from the man as he fell, while she
cried in a voice of anguish:
"Oh, Will, my son, you have killed him!"
"I have but protected you, mother," was the reply of the brave boy, who
stood over the prostrate form, the iron, which he had used as a weapon,
still grasped in his hand.