A Rough Shaking Part 37

"I suppose not, ma'am! I used to feel very angry when people wouldn't believe me, but now I see they are not to blame. And now I've got used to it, and it don't hurt so much.--But," he added with a sigh, "the worst of it is, they won't give me any work!"

"Do you always tell people you've come out of prison?"

"Yes, ma'am, when I think of it."

"Then you can't wonder they won't give you work!"

"I don't, ma'am--not now. It seems a law of the universe!"

"Not of the universe, I think--but of this world--perhaps!" said the old lady thoughtfully.

"But there's one thing I do wonder at," said Clare. "When I say I've been in prison, they believe me; but when I say I haven't done anything wrong, then they mock me, and seem quite amused at being expected to believe that. I can't get at it!"

"I daresay! But people will always believe you against yourself.--What are you going to do, then, if n.o.body will give you work? You can't starve!"

"Indeed I _can_, ma'am! It's just the one thing I've got to do. We've been pretty near the last of it sometimes--me and Abdiel! Haven't we, Abby?"

The dog wagged his tail, and the old lady turned aside to control her feelings.

"Don't cry, ma'am," said Clare; "I don't mind it--not _much_. I'm too glad I didn't _do_ anything, to mind it much! Why should I! Ought I to mind it much, ma'am? Jesus Christ hadn't done anything, and they killed _him_! I don't fancy it's so very bad to die of only hunger!

But we'll soon see!--Sha'n't we, Abby?"

Again the dog wagged his tail.

"If you didn't do anything wrong, what _did_ you do?" said the old lady, almost at her wits' end.

"I don't like telling things that are not going to be believed. It's like washing your face with ink!"

"I will _try_ to believe you."

"Then I will tell you; for you speak the truth, ma'am, and so, perhaps, will be able to believe the truth!"

"How do you know I speak the truth?"

"Because you didn't say, 'I will believe you.' n.o.body can be sure of doing that. But you can be sure of _trying_; and you said, 'I will _try_ to believe you.'"

"Tell me all about it then."

"I will, ma'am.--The policeman came in the middle of the night when we were asleep, and took us all away, because we were in a house that was not ours."

"Whose was it then?"

"n.o.body knew. It was what they call in chancery. There was n.o.body in it but moths and flies and spiders and rats;--though I think the rats only came to eat baby."

"Baby! Then the whole family of you, father, mother, and all, were taken to prison!"

"No, ma'am; my fathers and my mothers were taken up into the dome of the angels."--What with hunger and sleepiness, Clare was talking like a child.--"I haven't any father and mother in this world. I have two fathers and two mothers up there, and one mother in this world. She's the mother of the wild beasts."

The old lady began to doubt the boy's sanity, but she went on questioning him.

"How did you have a baby with you, then?"

"The baby was my own, ma'am. I took her out of the water-b.u.t.t."

Once more Clare had to tell his story--from the time, that is, when his adoptive father and mother died. He told it in such a simple matter-of-fact way, yet with such quaint remarks, from their very simplicity difficult to understand, that, if the old lady, for all her trying, was not able quite to believe his tale, it was because she doubted whether the boy was not one of G.o.d's innocents, with an angel-haunted brain.

"And what's become of Tommy?" she asked.

"He's in the same workhouse with baby. I'm very glad; for what I should have done with Tommy, and nothing to give him to eat, I can't think. He would have been sure to steal! I couldn't have kept him from it!"

"You must be more careful of your company."

"Please, ma'am, I was very careful of Tommy. He had the best company I could give him: I did try to be better for Tommy's sake. But my trying wasn't much use to Tommy, so long as he wouldn't try! He was a little better, though, I think; and if I had him now, and could give him plenty to eat, and had baby as well as Abdiel to help me, we might make something of Tommy, I think.--_You_ think so--don't you, Abdiel?"

The dog, who had stood looking in his master's face all the time he spoke, wagged his tail faster.

"What a name to give a dog! Where did you find it?"

"In Paradise Lost, ma'am. Abdiel was the one angel, you remember, ma'am, who, when he saw what Satan was up to, left him, and went back to his duty."

"And what was his duty?"

"Why of course to do what G.o.d told him. I love Abdiel, and because I love the little dog and he took care of baby, I call him Abdiel too. Heaven is so far off that it makes no confusion to have the same name."

"But how dare you give the name of an angel to a dog?"

"To a _good_ dog, ma'am! A good dog is good enough to go with any angel--at his heels of course! If he had been a bad dog, it would have been wicked to name him after a good angel. If the dog had been Tommy--I mean if Tommy had been the dog, I should have had to call him Moloch, or Belzebub! G.o.d made the angels and the dogs; and if the dogs are good, G.o.d loves them.--Don't he, Abdiel?"

Abdiel a.s.sented after his usual fashion. The lady said nothing. Clare went on.

"Abdiel won't mind--the angel Abdiel, I mean, ma'am--he won't mind lending his name to my friend. The dog will have a name of his own, perhaps, some day--like the rest of us!"

"What is _your_ name?"

"The name I have now is, like the dog's, a borrowed one. I shall get my own one day--not here--but there--when--when--I'm hungry enough to go and find it."

Clare had grown very white. He sat down, and lay back on the gra.s.s. He had talked more in those few minutes than for weeks, and want had made him weak. He felt very faint. The dog jumped up, and fell to licking his face.

"What a wicked old woman I am!" said the lady to herself, and ran across the road like some little long-legged bird, and climbed the bank swiftly.

She disappeared within the gate, but to return presently with a tumbler of milk and a huge piece of bread.

"Here, boy!" she cried; "here is medicine for you! Make haste and take it."

Clare sat up feebly, and stared at the tumbler for a moment. Either he could hardly believe his eyes, or was too sick to take it at once. When he had it in his hand, he held it out to the dog.

"Here, Abdiel, have a little," he said.