A Humble Enterprise Part 7

Jenny was quite aware that she was being talked of, and presently she approached them, flushed, bright-eyed, vividly charming, as she had never been in the days before Mr. Anthony appeared. He rose at once, and stood while she asked him whether he had been properly attended to.

"Yes, thank you," he replied; and Sarah noticed his change of tone. "I have been taking the liberty of making myself acquainted with your sister."

Jenny laid a hand on Sarah's shoulder. "You are very kind," she said.

"I'm afraid she is a bit dull and lonely in this corner by herself all day."

"The kindness has been the other way," said he, but was grateful that she otherwise regarded it, perceiving a future advantage to himself therein. "I fear you are tired, Miss Liddon."

"Not a bit," she said--and said truly--for his presence had filled body and soul with life. "And if I am, it's a pleasant way of getting tired."

"You must not over-exert yourself," he urged, with a serious solicitude that thrilled her. "What profiteth it to gain custom and lose your health?"

"That's what I am always telling her," said Sarah.

"My health is excellent," Jenny said, smiling happily. "And we are taking our landlady into the firm, you see, with a view to contingencies."

"Yes, I was so glad to see that. It would take twenty of her to do what you do, but still it's something; and she'll get more alert in time, I hope. If necessary, you must take in still more helpers, Miss Liddon--_anything_, rather than overstrain yourself and break down. You must see to that"--turning to Sarah; "you must make her take care of herself. And if she won't, report her to me, and I'll bring my father to bear upon her. He looks on her as his special charge, I know."

As they were standing apart from the tea-drinkers, and as it were in private life, he held out his hand in farewell, bending his tall head in a most courteous bow. He could not sit down again, after getting up, his own tea and scone being disposed of, and thought it wise to resist his strong desire to linger.

Being still afraid of taking liberties, he kept away from the tea-room for a day or two, taking his pleasures in other walks of life. Then the spirit moved him to return thither, and he chose the morning for his visit, when Jenny might be finding time to sit down to sew. Busy little bee! What a contrast to the girls who courted him at Maude's tennis and theatre parties--girls who appeared to have no motive or purpose in the world beyond stalking husbands, and bringing them down, if possible, by fair means or foul--women whose brains and hands seemed never to be n.o.bly exercised. He found himself continually drawing comparisons, to their disadvantage.

Since it was obviously impossible that a man could want tea and scones in the morning, he had to invent another excuse for going to see Miss Liddon at that time of day, and the happy thought occurred to him of taking some flowers to Sarah. He selected from Paton's beautiful window a wisp of moss and ferns and lilies of the valley, which was the choicest thing he could see there, hid it in his hansom as he went through the street, and carried it with some shamefacedness to the table of the money-changer, where the two sisters were sitting together, awaiting customers.

"Good morning, Miss Liddon. Don't get up. I have not come for tea this time. It just struck me that it would refresh Miss Sarah, sitting here all day, if she had a flower to look at." And he presented his bouquet to the crippled girl, pretending that Jenny had nothing to do with it.

"Oh!" she breathed deeply. "How good! How lovely!" And, "Oh, oh--h!"

cried Sarah simultaneously. They smelt the flowers in ecstasy, and Jenny ran to draw a tumbler of water from her big filter.

"It's only rubbish," he mumbled disparagingly, "but it's sweet. I'm awfully fond of the smell of lilies of the valley myself."

"So am I," said Sarah. "And I don't know how to thank you."

"Oh, it's nothing! I just thought you might like it, don't you know. It seemed a weary thing for you to sit here for hours, with nothing but the money-boxes to look at."

He opened and shut his watch. Jenny was standing beside him, visible palpitating, touching the white bells with the tips of her fingers, saying nothing. There was a sound of footsteps and rustlings on the stairs. It was impossible to prolong the interview.

"Well, good-bye," he said suddenly, extending his hand. "I must go back to work."

As he plunged down the dark stairs into the narrow street his heart was beating in quite a new style, and he was distinctly aware of it. "Little bit of a hand!" he said to himself, opening and shutting his own broad palm, that had just swallowed it as if it had been a baby's. "Little mite of a creature! I could crush her between my finger and thumb--and she's got the pluck of a whole army of men like me. I used to think there were no such women in the world nowadays; but there are--there are, after all. Little wisp of a thing! I could take her up in my arms and carry her on my shoulder as easily as I do the children. I wish to Heaven I _could_ carry her--out of that beastly place, which will kill her when the summer comes. Hullo! If I don't look out, I shall be falling in love before I know where I am. And with a restaurant-keeper, of all people! A pretty kettle of fish that would be!"

CHAPTER VIII

ANOTHER POINT OF VIEW

He turned into Collins Street, and made his way back to his office, still musing in this dangerous fashion: "What a housekeeper she would make! What a mother! What a pride she'd take in her home! Those other girls, once they'd got a house, would let it take care of itself, and their husbands too, while they ruffled about, like peac.o.c.ks in the sun, and entertained themselves with Platonic love affairs. As long as there was a useful person to pay the bills they wouldn't bother their heads about the butcher and baker. Oh, I know them! But _she's_ not that sort.

She wouldn't take our money, honest money as it was--she wouldn't be beholden to anybody--brave little thing! And such a ridiculous mite as it is, to go and do battle with the world for independence!"

Pa.s.sing through a small army of busy clerks, his eye lit on Joey, who was regarding him with the veneration due from a mortal to an Olympian G.o.d.

"Oh, Liddon--you are Liddon, aren't you?--how are you getting on?" he demanded suddenly.

"Very well, sir, thank you. I believe I am giving every satisfaction,"

said Joey, with his young complacency.

Anthony regarded him for a moment in deep thought, and then asked him how long he had been in the firm's employ.

"About two years," said Joey.

"And what's your salary?"

"A hundred and thirty, sir."

"Oh, well, I must make inquiries, and see if it isn't getting time to be thinking of a rise." n.o.body had thought of a rise for poor Liddon, senior, who had been worth a dozen of this boy. "And how is your mother getting on with the--the little business she has entered into?"

"I hardly know," said Joey, with a blush and a stammer. "I don't see very much of them now."

"Why not?"

"I'm sure I don't know, sir. Somehow I can't take to the tea-room scheme. I can't bear to see my mother and sisters doing that sort of thing, when our family has never been connected with trade in any way."

"Don't despise trade, young man. You are connected with it yourself--and not at all to your disadvantage, it strikes me--as your father was before you."

"Yes, sir; but this is a very different sort of thing, and my father, as you may have heard, sir, was an Eton boy."

"I have heard so. Well, you follow in your father's steps, my lad, and do your duty as well as he did. And your first duty is to look after your womenkind, and save them in every way you can. Out of office hours you could do a great deal for them, couldn't you?"

"I'm sure," complained Joey aggrievedly, "I'm ready to do anything--only Jenny won't let me. She will manage and control things, as if she were the head of the family. She would go into this low tea-room business in spite of all I could say. However"--drawing himself up--"I hope it won't be very long before she is in a different position."

A stinging thought flashed into Mr. Churchill's mind, and changed his amused smile into an anxious frown. "Do you mean by marriage?" he asked; saying to himself that she was just the woman to take up with a loafing vagabond, who would live upon her at his ease, while she worked to support him.

"No, sir. But my father's uncle, who is a great age, is rich, and we expect to come in for some of his property when he dies."

"Oh!" in an accent of relief. "I wouldn't advise you to count on any contingencies of that sort. Just stick to business, and depend on your own exertions--as your sister does. Take pattern by her, and you won't go far wrong."

Joey looked at his young chief with a new expression.

"Do you know my sister?" he inquired.

"I know _of_ her," said Anthony warily. "My father and Mrs. Churchill, and my sister, Mrs. Oxenham, have taken a great interest in the tea-room ever since it was first opened; I have heard from them of her n.o.ble efforts to help her family."

This was a new view of the case to Joey, who decided to go and see his mother and sisters in the evening.

Just before Anthony pa.s.sed out of the tea-room, after giving his flowers to Sarah, two stout countrywomen with children came in; people who had arrived by train, with the dust of travel in their throats, and to whom a cup of tea never came amiss at any time. Jenny made them comfortable in soft chairs, and gave them a pot and a pile of scones; then she came back to Sarah's table, and, kneeling down, encircled the lilies of the valley with her arms. She inhaled deep breaths of perfume, and gave them forth in long sighs, with her eyes shut. Sarah watched her.