Reginald Cruden Part 49

"How much?" said he, when it was done.

"Ninepence, please," said the rosy-cheeked girl who waited.

Reginald tossed her the shilling.

"Keep the change for yourself," said he, and walked out of the shop.

He was free now with a vengeance! He might do what he liked, go where he liked, starve where he liked.

He wandered up and down the streets that winter evening recklessly indifferent to what became of him. The shops were gaily lighted and adorned with Christmas decorations. Boys and girls, men and women, thronged them, eager in their purchases and radiant in the prospect of the coming festival. There went a grave father, parading the pavement with a football under his arm for the boy at home; and here a lad, with his mother's arm in his, stood halted before an array of fur cloaks, and bade her choose the best among them. Bright-eyed school-girls brushed past him with their brothers, smiling and talking in holiday glee; and here a trio of school-chums, arm-in-arm, bore down upon him, laughing over some last-term joke. He watched them all.

Times were when his heart would warm and soften within him at the memories sights like these inspired; but they were nothing to him now; or if they were anything, they were part of a universal conspiracy to mock him. Let them mock him; what cared he?

The night drew on. One by one the gay lights in the shops went out, and the shutters hid the crowded windows. One by one the pa.s.sengers dispersed, some to besiege the railway-stations, some to invade the trams, others to walk in cheery parties by the frosty roads; all to go home.

Even the weary shopmen and shop-girls, released from the day's labours, hurried past him homeward, and the sleepy cabman whipped up his horse for his last fare before going home, and the tramps and beggars vanished down their alleys, and sought every man his home.

Home! The word had no meaning to-night for Reginald as he watched the streets empty, and found himself a solitary wayfarer in the deserted thoroughfares.

The hum of traffic ceased. One by one the bedroom lights went out, the clocks chimed midnight clearly in the frosty air, and still he wandered on.

He pa.s.sed a newspaper-office, where the thunder of machinery and the glare of the case-room reminded him of his own bitter apprenticeship at the _Rocket_. They might find him a job here if he applied. Faugh! who would take a gaol-bird, a "let-off" swindler, into their employ?

He strolled down to the docks. The great river lay asleep. The docks were, deserted; the dockyards silent. Only here and there a darting light, or the distant throb of an engine, broke the slumber of the scene.

A man came up to him as he stood on the jetty.

"Now then, sheer off; do you hear?" he said. "What do you want here?"

"Mayn't I watch the river?" said Reginald.

"Not here. We've had enough of your sort watching the river. Off you go," and he laid his hand on the boy's collar and marched him off the pier.

Of course! Who had not had enough of his sort? Who would not suspect him wherever he went? Cain went about with a mark on his forehead for every one to know him by. In what respect was he better off, when men seemed to know by instinct and in the dark that he was a character to mistrust and suspect?

The hours wore on. Even the printing-office when he pa.s.sed it again was going to rest. The compositors one by one were flitting home, and the engine was dropping asleep. He stood and watched the men come out, and wondered if any of them were like himself--whether among them was a young Gedge or a Durfy?

Then he wandered off back into the heart of the town. A wretched outcast woman, with a child in her arms, stood at the street corner and accosted him.

"Do, kind gentleman, give me a penny. The child's starving, and we're so cold and hungry."

"I'd give you one if I had one," said Reginald; "but I'm as poor as you are."

The woman sighed, and drew her rags round the infant.

Reginald watched her for a moment, and then, taking off his overcoat, said,--

"You'd better put this round you."

And he dropped it at her feet, and hurried away before she could pick up the gift, or bless the giver.

He gave himself no credit for the deed, and he wanted none. What did he care about a coat? he who had been frozen to the heart already. Would a coat revive his good name, or cover the disgrace of that magisterial caution?

The clocks struck four, and the long winter night grew bleaker and darker. It was eleven hours since he had taken that last defiant meal, and Nature began slowly to a.s.sert her own with the poor outcast. He was faint and tired out, and the breeze cut him through. Still the rebel spirit within him denied that he was in distress. No food or rest or shelter for him! All he craved was leave to lose himself and forget his own name.

Is it any use bidding him, as we bade him once before, turn round and face the evil genius that is pursuing him? or is there nothing for him now but to run? He has run all night, but he is no farther ahead than when he stood at the police-court door. On the contrary, it is running him down fast, and as he staggers forward into the darkest hour of that cruel night, it treads on his heels and begins to drag him back.

Is there no home? no voice of a friend? no helping hand to save him from that worst of all enemies--his evil self?

It was nearly five o'clock when, without knowing how he got there, he found himself on the familiar ground of Shy Street. In the dim lamplight he scarcely recognised it at first, but when he did it seemed like a final stroke of irony to bring him there, at such a time, in such a mood. What else could it be meant for but to remind him there was no escape, no hope of losing himself, no chance of forgetting?

That gaunt, empty window of Number 13, with the reflected glare of the lamp opposite upon it, seemed to leer down on him like a mocking ghost, claiming him as its own. What was the use of keeping up the struggle any longer? After all, was there not one way of escape?

What was it crouching at the door of Number 13, half hidden in the shade? A dog? a woman? a child?

He stood still a moment, with beating heart, straining his eyes through the gloom. Then he crossed. As he did so the figure sprang to its feet and rushed to meet him.

"I knowed it, gov'nor; I knowed you was a-comin'," cried a familiar boy's voice. "It's all right now. It's all right, gov'nor!"

Never did sweeter music fall on mortal ears than these broken, breathless words on the spirit of Reginald. It was the voice he had been waiting for to save him in his extremity--the voice of love to remind him he was not forsaken; the voice of trust to remind him some one believed in him still; the voice of hope to remind him all was not lost yet. It called him back to himself; it thawed the chill at his heart, and sent new life into his soul. It was like a key to liberate him from the dungeon of Giant Despair.

"Why, Love, is that you, my boy?" he cried, seizing the lad's hand.

"It is so, gov'nor," whimpered the boy, trembling with excitement, and clinging to his protector's hand. "I knowed you was a-comin', but I was a'most feared I wouldn't see you too."

"What made you think I would come?" said Reginald, looking down with tears in his eyes on the poor wizened upturned face.

"I knowed you was a-comin'," repeated the boy, as if he could not say it too often; "and I waited and waited, and there you are. It's all right, gov'nor."

"It _is_ all right, old fellow," said Reginald. "You don't know what you've saved me from."

"Go on," said the boy, recovering his composure in the great content of his discovery. "I ain't saved you from nothink. Leastways unless you was a-goin' to commit soosanside. If you was, you was a flat to come this way. That there railway-cutting's where I'd go, and then at the inkwidge they don't know if you did it a-purpose or was topped over by the train, and they gives you the benefit of the doubt, and says, 'Found dead.'"

"We won't talk about it," said Reginald, smiling, the first smile that had crossed his lips for a week. "Do you know, young 'un, I'm hungry; are you?"

"Got any browns?" said Love.

"Not a farthing."

"More ain't I, but I'll--" He paused, and a shade of doubt crossed his face as he went on. "Say, gov'nor, think they'd give us a brown for this 'ere _Robinson_?"

And he pulled out his _Robinson Crusoe_ bravely and held it up.

"I'm afraid not. It only cost threepence."

Another inward debate took place; then drawing out his beloved _Pilgrim's Progress_, he put the two books together, and said,--

"Suppose they'd give us one for them two?"