'It 'ud be kind of you if you would, Mr. Dabbs. I'm afraid she'll tell me she can't afford to lose the day.'

He consulted his watch, then again reflected, still drumming on the table.

'All right, we'll go,' he said, rising from his chair.

His coat was hanging on a peg behind the door. He drew it on, and went to tell the barmaid that he should be absent exactly twenty minutes.

It was Daniel's policy to lead his underlings to expect that he might return at any moment, though he would probably be away a couple of hours.

The sisters were now living in a street crossing the angle between Goswell Road and the City Road. Daniel was not, as a rule, lavish in his expenditure, but he did not care to walk any distance, and there was no line of omnibuses available. He took a hansom.

It generally fell to Emma's share to put her sister's children to bed, for Mrs. Clay was seldom at home in the evening. But for Emma, indeed, the little ones would have been sadly off for motherly care. Kate had now and then a fit of maternal zeal, but it usually ended in impatience and slappings; for the most part she regarded her offspring as enc.u.mbrance, and only drew attention to them when she wished to impress people with the hardships of her lot. The natural result was that the boy and girl only knew her as mother by name; they feared her, and would shrink to Emma's side when Kate began to speak crossly.

All dwelt together in one room, for life was harder than ever. Emma's illness had been the beginning of a dark and miserable time. Whilst she was in the hospital her sister took the first steps on the path which leads to destruction; with scanty employment, much time to kill, never a sufficiency of food, companions only too like herself in their distaste for home duties and in the misery of their existence, poor Kate got into the habit of straying aimlessly about the streets, and, the inevitable consequence, of seeking warmth and company in the public-house. Her children lived as the children of such mothers do: they played on the stairs or on the pavements, had accidents, were always dirty, cried themselves to sleep in hunger and pain. When Emma returned, still only fit for a convalescent home, she had to walk about day after day in search of work, conciliating the employers whom Mrs. Clay had neglected or disgusted, undertaking jobs to which her strength was inadequate, and, not least, striving her hardest to restore order in the wretched home. It was agreed that Kate should use the machine at home, whilst Emma got regular employment in a workroom.

Emma never heard of that letter which her sister wrote to Mutimer's wife. Kate had no expectation that help would come of it; she hoped that it had done Mutimer harm, and the hope had to satisfy her. She durst not let Emma suspect that she had done such a thing.

Emma heard, however, of the loan from Daniel Dabbs, and afterwards thanked him for his kindness, but she resolutely set her face against the repet.i.tion of such favours, though Daniel would have willingly helped when she came out of the hospital. Kate, of course, was for accepting anything that was offered; she lost her temper, and accused Emma of wishing to starve the children. But she was still greatly under her sister's influence, and when Emma declared that there must be a parting between them if she discovered that anything was secretly accepted from Mr. Dabbs, Kate sullenly yielded the point.

Daniel was aware of all this, and it made an impression upon him.

To-night Emma was as usual left alone with the children. After tea, when Kate left the house, she sat down to the machine and worked for a couple of hours; for her there was small difference between Sunday and week day. Whilst working she told the children stories; it was a way of beguiling them from their desire to go and play in the street. They were strange stories, half recollected from a childhood which, had promised better things than a maidenhood of garret misery, half Emma's own invention. They had a grace, a spontaneity, occasionally an imaginative brightness, which would have made them, if they had been taken down from the lips, models of tale-telling for children. Emma had two cla.s.ses of story: the one concerned itself with rich children, the other with poor; the one highly fanciful, the other full of a touching actuality, the very essence of a life such as that led by the listeners themselves.

Unlike the novel which commends itself to the world's grown children, these narratives had by no means necessarily a happy ending; for one thing Emma saw too deeply into the facts of life, and was herself too sad, to cease her music on a merry chord; and, moreover, it was half a matter of principle with her to make the little ones thoughtful and sympathetic; she believed that they would grow up kinder and more self-reliant if they were in the habit of thinking that we are ever dependent on each other for solace and strengthening under the burden of life. The most elaborate of her stories, one wholly of her own invention, was called 'Blanche and Janey.' It was a double biography.

Blanche and Janey were born on the same day, they lived ten years, and then died on the same day. But Blanche was, the child of wealthy parents; Janey was born, in a garret. Their lives were recounted in parallel, almost year by year, and, there was sadness in the contrast.

Emma had chosen the name of the poor child in memory of her own sister, her ever dear Jane, whose life had been a life of sorrow.

The story ended thus:

'Yes, they died on the same day, and they were buried, on the same day.

But not in the same cemetery, oh no! Blanche's grave is far away over there'--she pointed to the west--'among tombstones covered with flowers, and her father and mother go every Sunday to read her name, and think and talk of her. Janey was buried far away over yonder'--she pointed to the east--'but there is no stone on her grave, and no one knows the exact place where she lies, and no one, no one ever goes to think and talk of her.'

The sweetness of the story lay in the fact that the children were both good, and both deserved to be happy; it never occurred to Emma to teach her hearers to hate little Blanche just because hers was the easier lot.

Whatever might be her secret suffering, with the little ones Emma was invariably patient and tender. However dirty they had made, themselves during the day, however much they cried when hunger made them irritable, they went to their aunt's side with the a.s.surance of finding gentleness in reproof and sympathy with their troubles. Yet once she was really angry. Bertie told her a deliberate untruth, and she at once discovered it. She stood silent for a few moments, looking as Bertie had never seen her look. Then she said:

'Do you know, Bertie, that it is wrong to try and deceive?'

Then she tried to, make him understand why falsehood was evil, and as she spoke to the child her voice quivered, her breast heaved. When the little fellow was overcome, and began to sob, Emma checked herself, recollecting that she had lost sight of the offender's age, and was using expressions which he could not understand. But the lesson was effectual. If ever the brother and sister were tempted to hide anything by a falsehood they remembered 'Aunt Emma's' face, and durst not incur the danger of her severity.

So she told her stories to the humming of the machine, and when it was nearly the children's bedtime she broke off to ask them if they would like some bread and b.u.t.ter. Among all the results of her poverty the bitterest to Emma was when she found herself _hoping that the children would not eat much_. If their appet.i.te was poor it made her anxious about their health, yet it happened sometimes that she feared to ask them if they were hungry lest the supply of bread should fail. It was so to-night. The week's earnings had been three shillings; the rent itself was four. But the children were as ready to eat as if they had had no tea. It went to her heart to give them each but one half-slice and tell them that they could have no more. Gladly she would have robbed herself of breakfast next morning on their account, but that she durst not do, for she had undertaken to scrub out an office in Goswell Road, and she knew that her strength would fail if she went from home fasting.

She put them to bed--they slept together on a small bedstead, which was a chair during the day--and then sat down to do some patching at a dress of Kate's. Her face when she communed with her own thoughts was profoundly sad, but far from the weakness of self-pity. Indeed she did her best not to think of herself; she knew that to do so cost her struggles with feelings she held to be evil, resentment and woe of pa.s.sion and despair. She tried to occupy herself solely with her sister and the children, planning how to make Kate more home-loving and how to find the little ones more food.

She had no companions. The girls whom she came to know in the workroom for the most part took life very easily; she could not share in their genuine merriment; she was often revolted by their way of thinking and speaking. They thought her dull; and paid no attention to her. She was glad to be relieved of the necessity of talking.

Her sister thought her hard. Kate believed that she was for ever brooding over her injury. This was not true, but a certain hardness in her character there certainly was. For her life, both of soul and body, was ascetic; she taught herself to expect, to hope for, nothing. When she was hungry she had a sort of pleasure in enduring; when weary she worked on as if by effort she could overcome the feeling. But Kate's chief complaint against her was her determination to receive no help save in the way of opportunity to earn money. This was something more than, ordinary pride. Emma suffered intensely in the recollection that she had lived at Mutimer's expense during the very months when he was seeking the love of another woman, and casting about for means of abandoning herself. When she thought of Alice coming with the proposal that she and her sister should still occupy the house in Wilton Square, and still receive money, the heat of shame and anger never failed to rise to her cheeks. She could never accept from anyone again a penny which she had not earned. She believed that Daniel Dabbs had been repaid, otherwise she could not have rested a moment.

It was her terrible misfortune to have feelings too refined for the position in which fate had placed her. Had she only been like those other girls in the workroom! But we are interesting in proportion to our capacity for suffering, and dignity comes of misery n.o.bly borne.

As she sat working on Kate's dress, she was surprised to hear a heavy step approaching. There came a knock at the door; she answered, admitting Daniel.

He looked about the room, partly from curiosity, partly through embarra.s.sment. Dusk was falling.

'Young 'uns in bed?' he said, lowering his voice.

'Yes, they are asleep,' Emma replied.

'You don't mind me coming up?'

'Oh no!'

He went to the window and looked at the houses opposite, then at the flushed sky.

'Bank holiday to-morrow. I thought I'd like to ask you whether you and Mrs. Clay and the children 'ud come with me to Epping Forest. If it's a day like this, it'll be a nice drive--do you good. You look as if you wanted a breath of fresh air, if you don't mind me sayin' it.'

'It's very kind of you, Mr. Dabbs,' Emma replied. 'I am very sorry I can't come myself, but my sister and the children perhaps--'

She could not refuse for them likewise, yet she was troubled to accept so far.

'But why can't _you_ come?' he asked good-naturedly, slapping his hat against his leg.

'I have some work that'll take me nearly all day.'

'But you've no business to work on a bank holiday. I'm not sure as it ain't breakin' the law.'

He laughed, and Emma did her best to show a smile. But she said nothing.

'But you _will_ come, now? You can lose just the one day? It'll do you a power o' good. You'll work all the better on Tuesday, now see if you don't. Why, it ain't worth livin', never to get a holiday.'

'I'm very sorry. It was very kind indeed of you to think of it, Mr.

Dabbs. I really can't come.'

He went again to the window, and thence to the children's bedside. He bent a little and watched them breathing.

'Bertie's growin' a fine little lad.'

'Yes, indeed, he is.'

'He'll have to go to school soon, I s'pose--I'm afraid he gives you a good deal of trouble, that is, I mean--you know how I mean it.'

'Oh, he is very good,' Emma said, looking at the sleeping face affectionately.

'Yes, yes.'

Daniel had meant something different; he saw that Emma would not understand him.

'We see changes in life,' he resumed, musingly. 'Now who'd a' thought I should end up with having more money than I. know how to use? The 'ouse has done well for eight years now, an' it's likely to do well for a good many years yet, as far as I can see.'

'I am glad to hear that,' Emma replied constrainedly.