NELLY, A WEST-END MILLINER'S APPRENTICE.
What Polly had heard, listening silently, with "Wemock's Orlando" held
close in her small arms, was quite true. Nelly Sanderson had determined
to be a lady, and though uncertain as yet as to how it was to be brought
about, felt that it must come. This she had made up her mind to when not
much older than Polly, and the desire had grown with her. It was
perfectly plain from the difference between her and Jim that Nature had
meant her for something better than to stitch shirt-bodies endlessly. At
twelve she had begun to do this, portions of two or three previous years
having been spent in a Board School. Then her time for work and
contribution to the family support had come. She was only a "feller,"
and took her weekly bundle of work from a woman, who, in turn, had it
from another woman, who took it from a master-sweater, who dealt
directly with the great city houses; and between them all, Nelly's wage
was kept at the lowest point. But she did her work well, and was quick
to a marvel; and her hope for the future carried her on through the
monotonous days, broken only by her mother's scolding and Jim's
insolence.
Jim was the typical East End loafer,--a bullet head, closely cropped;
dull round eyes, and fat nose, also rounded; a thick neck, and fat
cheeks, in which were plainly to be seen the overdoses of beer and
spirits he had drunk since he was ten or twelve years old.
His mother had tried to keep him respectable. She had been a lady's
maid; but that portion of her life was buried in mystery. It was only
known she had come to Norwood Street when Nelly was a baby, and that
very shortly Judkins, a young omnibus conductor, had fallen in love with
her; and they had married, and taken rooms, and lived very comfortably
till Jim was three or four years old. But the taste for liquor was too
strong; and long days in fog and rain, chilled to the marrow under the
swollen gray clouds of the London winter, were some excuse for the rush
to the "public" at the end of each trip. The day's wages at last were
all swallowed, and the wife, like a good proportion of workmen's wives,
found herself chief bread-winner, and tried first one trade and then
another, till Nelly's quick fingers grew serviceable.
Nelly was pretty,--more than pretty. Even Jim had moments of admiration;
and the Buildings, in which several of her admirers lived, had seen
unending fights as to who had the best right to take her out on Sundays.
Her waving red-brown hair, her great eyes matching it in tint to a
shade, her long black lashes and delicate brows, the low white forehead
and clear pale cheeks,--anybody could see that these were far and away
beyond any girl in the Buildings. The lips were too full, and the nose
no particular shape; but the quick-moving, slender figure, like her
mother's, and the delicate hands, which Nelly hated to soil, and kept as
carefully as possible,--all these were indications over which the women,
in conclave over tea and shrimps, shook their heads.
"'Er father was a gentleman, that's plain to see. She'll go the same
way her mother did. I'd not 'ave one of my hown boys take up with her,
not for no money."
This seemed the general verdict in the Buildings; and though Nelly sewed
steadily all day and every day, the women still held to it, the men
hotly contesting it, and family quarrels over the subject confirming the
impression. Nelly worked on, however, unmoved by criticism or approval,
spending all that could be saved from the housekeeping on the most
stylish clothes to be found in Petticoat Lane market, and denying
herself even in these for the sake of a little hoard, which accumulated,
oh! so slowly since it had been broken into, once for a new feather for
her little hat, once for a day's pleasuring at Greenwich; and Nelly
resolved firmly it should never happen again.
One ambition filled her. This hateful East End must be left somehow.
Somehow she must get to be the lady which she felt sure she ought to be.
There were hints of this sometimes in her mother's talk; but it was
plain that there was nobody to help her to this but herself. Already
Jim drank more than his share. He was going the way of his father, dead
years before in a drunken frolic; and the income made from the little
shop her mother had opened, to teach him how to make a living, covered
expenses, and not much more. Whatever was done for Nelly must be done by
herself.
The way had opened, or begun to open, at Greenwich. A tall, delicate
girl, who proved to be a milliner's apprentice, had taken a fancy to
her, and given her her first real knowledge of the delights of West End
life. She had nearly ended her apprenticeship, and would soon be a
regular hand; and Nelly listened entranced to the description of
marvellous hats and bonnets, and the people who tried them on, and
looked disgustingly at her own.
"You've got a touch, I know," the new friend said approvingly. "You'd
get on. Isn't there anybody to pay the premium for you?"
Nelly shook her head sorrowfully. "They couldn't do without me," she
said. "There's mother and Jim, that won't try to earn anything, and I
stitch now twelve hours a day. I'm off shirts, and on trousers. Trousers
pay better. I've made eighteen shillings a week sometimes, but you must
keep at it steady ahead for that."
"It's a pity," her companion said reflectively. "You'd learn quick. In
three months you'd be an improver, and begin to earn, and then there's
no knowing where you'd stop. You might get to be owner."
Nelly turned suddenly. She had felt for some time that some one was
listening to them. They were on the boat, sitting on the central seat,
back to back with a row of merry-makers; but this was some one
different.
"I beg your pardon," he said; and Nelly flushed with pleasure at a tone
no one had ever used before. "I have heard a little you were saying. I
am interested in this question of wages, and very anxious to know more
about it. I wish you would tell me what you know about this stitching."
He had come round to their side--a tall blond man of thirty, dressed in
light gray, and a note-book in his hand. He was so serious and gentle
that it was impossible to take offence, and very soon Nelly was telling
him all she knew of prices in cheap clothing of every sort, and how the
workers lived. She hated it all,--the grime and sordidness, the drunken
men and screaming children; and her eyes flashed as she talked of it,
and a flush came to her cheeks.
"You ought to have something better," the young man said presently, his
eyes fixed upon her. "We must try to find something better."
Nelly's companion smiled significantly, but he did not notice it.
Evidently he was unlike most of the gentlemen she had seen in the West
End. Yet he certainly was a gentleman. He took them to a small
restaurant when Nelly had answered all his questions, and they dined
sumptuously, or so it seemed to them, and he sat by them and told
stories, and entertained them generally all the way home.
"I shall go down the river next Sunday," he said low to Nelly as they
landed. "Do you like to row? If you do, come to Chelsea to the Bridge,
and we will try it from there."
This was the beginning, and for many weeks it meant simply that he
pleased his æsthetic sense, as well as convinced himself that he was
doing a good and righteous deed in making life brighter for an East End
toiler. He had given her the premium, and Nelly, without any actual lie,
had convinced her mother that the West End milliner was willing to take
her for only two months of time given, and then begin wages. She brought
out her own little fund, swollen by several shillings taken from one of
the sovereigns given her, and proved that there was enough here to keep
them till she began to earn wages again; and Mrs. Judkins allowed
herself at last to be persuaded, feeling that a chance had come for the
girl which must not be allowed to pass.
So Nelly's apprenticeship began. There was less rose-color than she had
imagined. The hours were long, longer sometimes than her stitching had
been, and many of the girls looked at her jealously. But Maria, her
first friend, remained her friend. The two sat side by side, and Nelly
caught the knack by instinct almost, and even in the first week or two
caught a smile from Madame, who paused to consider the twist of a bow,
quite Parisian in its effect, and said to herself that here was a hand
who would prove valuable.
Nelly went home triumphant that night, and even her mother's sour face
relaxed. She had taken up trouser-stitching again, forcing Jim to mind
the shop, and saying to herself that the family fortunes were going to
mend, and that Nelly would do it. Sundays were always free. Nobody
questioned the girl. The young men in the Buildings and the street gave
up pursuit. Plainly Nelly was not for them, but had found her proper
place in the West End. They bowed sarcastically, and said, "'Ow's your
Royal 'Ighness?" when they met; but Nelly hardly heeded them. The long
wish had taken shape at last,--she was going to be a lady.
Summer ended. There was no more boating, but there were still long walks
and excursions. The apprenticeship was over, and Nelly was now a regular
hand, and farther advanced than many who had worked a year or two. She
made good wages, often a pound a week. Her dress was all that such a
shop demanded; her manner quieter every day.
"She's a lady, that's plain," Maria said; and Madame agreed with her,
and took the girl more and more into favor. Nelly had a little room of
her own now, next to Maria. She seldom went home, save to take money to
her mother, and she never stayed long.
"It's best not," Mrs. Judkins said. "You're bound for something better,
and you'll get it. This isn't your place. You're a bit pale, Nelly. It's
the hours and the close room, I suppose?"
"Yes; it's the hours," Nelly said. "When there's a press, we're often
kept on till nine or ten; but it's a good place."
She lingered to-day till Jim came in. Jim grew worse and worse, and she
hurried away as she saw him swaggering toward the door; but there were
tears in her eyes as she turned away. She passed her friend of the
summer in Regent Street, and looked back for a moment. He had nodded,
but was talking busily with a tall man, who eyed Nelly sharply. She had
found that he lived in Chelsea, and was a literary man of some
sort,--she hardly knew what,--and that his name was Stanley; beyond
this she knew nothing. Some day he would make her a lady,--but when?
There was need of haste. No one knew how great need.
Another month or two, the winter well upon them, and there came a day
when Madame, who, as Nelly entered the workroom, had stopped for a
moment and looked at her, first in surprise, then in furious anger,
burst out upon her in words that scorched the ears to hear. No girl like
that need sit down among decent girls. March, and never show her
shameful face again.
Nelly rose silently, and took down her hat and shawl, and as silently
went out, Madame's shrill voice still sounding. What should she do? The
end was near. She could not go home. She must find Herbert, and tell
him; but he would not be at home before night. She knew his number now,
and how to find him. He must make it all right. She went into Hyde Park
and walked about, and when she grew too cold, into a cocoa-room, and so
the day wore away; and at five she took a Chelsea omnibus, and leaned
back in the corner thinking what to say. The place was easily found,
and she knocked, with her heart beating heavily, and her voice trembling
as a maid opened the door and looked at her a moment.
"Come this way," she said, certain it must be a lady,--a visitor from
the country, perhaps; and Nelly followed her into a back drawing-room,
where a lady sat with a baby on her lap, and two or three children about
her. A little boy ran forward, then stood still, his frightened,
surprised eyes on Nelly's eyes, which were fixed upon him in terror.
"Whose is he?--whose?" she stammered.
"He is Herbert Stanley, junior," the lady said with a smile. "I'm Mrs.
Stanley. Good Heaven! what is it?"
Nelly had stood for a moment, her hands reaching out blindly, the card
with its name and number still in them.
"I must go," she said. "I must look for the real Herbert. This is
another." She fell as the words ended, still holding the card tight; and
when they had revived her, only shook her head as questions were asked.
The boy stood looking at her with his father's eyes. There could be no
doubt. Nelly rose and looked around; then, with no word to tell who she
might be, went out into the night. She crossed the street, and stood
hesitating; and as she stood a figure came swiftly down the street on
the other side, and ran up the steps of the house she had left. There
was no doubt any more; and with a long, bitter cry Nelly fled toward the
river. There was no pause. She knew the way well, and if she had not,
instinct would have led her, and did lead, through narrow alleys and
turnings till the embankment was reached. No stop, even then. A
policeman saw the flying figure, and a man who tried to hinder her heard
the words, "I shall never be a lady now," but that was all; and when he
saw her face again the river had done its work, and the story was plain,
though for its inner pages only the man who was her murderer has the
key.