The Guinea Stamp Part 2

Gladys gave a violent start. The word was hideous; how hideous, she had never realised till it fell from her uncle's lips. But she controlled herself; nothing was to be gained by exhibitions of feeling in his presence.

'No, they will come, I think, to-morrow, quite early. I did not wish it done sooner,' she answered quietly. 'If you come now, I can show you the door.' She took the lamp from the table, and, with a gesture of dignity, motioned him to follow her. At the door of the little room where the artist had suffered and died she gave him the lamp, and herself disappeared into the studio. Not to sit down and helplessly weep. That must be over now; there were things to be thought of, things to do, on the threshold of her new life, and she was ready for action. She found the matches, struck a light, and began at once to gather together the few things she must now sacredly cherish as mementoes of her father.

First she took up with tender hand the little canvas from the easel, looked at it a moment, and then touched the face with her lips. It was her mother's face, which she remembered not, but had been taught to love by her father, who cherished its memory with a most pa.s.sionate devotion.

She wrapped it in an old silk handkerchief, and then began a trifle dreamily to gather together the old brushes with which John Graham had done so much good, if unappreciated, work. Meanwhile the old man was alone in the chamber of death. He had no nerves, no fine sensibilities, and little natural affection to make the moment trying to him. He entered the room in a perfectly matter-of-fact manner, set the lamp on the washhand-stand, and approached the bed. As he stood there, looking on the face, calm, restful, beautiful in its last sleep, a wave of memory, unbidden and unwelcome, swept over his selfish and hardened heart. The years rolled back, and he saw two boys kneeling together in childish love at their mother's knee, lisping their evening prayer, unconscious of the bitter years to come. Almost the white, still outline of the dead face seemed to reproach him; he could have antic.i.p.ated the sudden lifting of the folded eyelids. He shivered slightly, took an impatient step back to the table for the lamp, and made haste from the room.

[Ill.u.s.tration]

CHAPTER III

THE NEW HOME.

Next day at noon that strangely-a.s.sorted pair, the sordid old man and the gentle child, set out in a peasant's waggon, which he had hired for a few pence, to ride across the meadows to Boston. The morning was very fair. In the night the mist had flown, and now the sun shone out warm and cheerful, giving the necessary brightness to the scene. It lay tenderly on the quaint fen village, and the little gilt vane on the church steeple glittered proudly, almost as if it were real gold.

Gladys sat with her back to the old horse, quite silent, never allowing her eyes for a moment to wander from that picture until distance made it dim. She had no tears, though she was leaving behind all that love had hallowed. She wondered vaguely once or twice whether it would be her last farewell, or whether, in other and happier years, she might come again to kneel by that nameless grave. Abel Graham paid small attention to her. He tried to engage in a conversation with the peasant who sat on the front of the waggon, holding the reins loosely in his sunburnt hands; but that individual was stolid, and when he did vouchsafe a remark, Abel did not understand him, not being familiar with fen vernacular. They reached Boston in ample time for the train, even leaving half an hour to spare. This half hour the old man improved by hunting up the dealer in whose hands were two of his brother's pictures, leaving Gladys at the station to watch their meagre luggage. He drove a much better bargain than the artist himself could have done, and returned to the station inwardly elated, with four pounds in his pocket; but he carefully concealed from his niece the success of his transaction--not that it would have greatly concerned her, she was too listless to take interest in anything. At one o'clock the dreary railway journey began, and after many stoppages and changes, late at night Gladys was informed that their destination was reached. She stepped from the carriage in a half-dazed manner, and perceived that they were in a large, brilliantly-lighted, but deserted, city station. All her worldly goods were in one large, shabby portmanteau, which the old man weighed, first in one hand and then in the other.

'I think we can manage it between us. It isn't far, and if I leave it, it will cost tuppence, besides taking Wat Hepburn from his work to-morrow to fetch it.'

'Can't we have a cab?' asked Gladys innocently.

'No, we can't; you ought to know, if you don't, that a cab is double fare after midnight,' said the old man severely. Just look in the carriage to make sure nothing is left.'

Gladys did so, then the melancholy pair trudged off out from the station into the quiet streets. Happily the night was fine, though cold, with a clear, star-begemmed sky, and a winter moon on the wane above the roofs and spires. A great city it seemed to Gladys, with miles and miles of streets; tall, heavy houses set in monotonous rows, but no green thing--nothing to remind her of heaven but the stars. She had the soul of the poet-artist, therefore her destiny was doubly hard. But the time came when she recognised its uses, and thanked G.o.d for it all, even for its moments of despair, its bitterest tears, because through it alone she touched the great suffering heart of humanity which beats in the dark places of the earth. In the streets after midnight there is always life--the life which dare not show itself by day, because it stalks in the image of sin. Gladys was surprised, as they slowly wended their way along a wide and handsome thoroughfare, past the closed windows of great shops, to meet many ladies finely dressed, some of them beautiful, with a strange, wild beauty, which half-fascinated, half-terrified her.

'Who are these ladies, Uncle Abel?' she asked at length. 'Why are so many people in the streets so late? I thought everybody would be in bed but us.'

'They are the night-birds, child. Don't ask any more questions, but shut your eyes and hold fast by me. We'll be home in no time,' said the old man harshly, because his conscience smote him for what he was doing.

Gladys again became silent, but she could not shut her eyes. Soon they turned into another street, in which were even more people, though evidently of a different order. The women were less showily dressed, and many of them had their heads bare, and wore little shawls about their shoulders. As they walked, the crowd became greater, and the din increased. Some children Gladys also saw, poorly clad and with hungry faces, running barefoot on the stony street. But she kept silence still, though growing every moment more frightened and more sad.

'Surely this is a terrible place, Uncle Abel,' she said at last. 'I have never seen anything like it in my life.'

'It isn't savoury, I admit; but I warned you. This is Argyle Street on a Sat.u.r.day night; other nights it is quieter, of course. Oh, he won't harm you.' A lumbering carter in a wild state of intoxication had pushed himself against the frightened girl, and looked down into her face with an idiotic leer.

Gladys gave a faint scream, and clung to her uncle's arm; but the next moment the man was taken in charge by the policeman, and went to swell the number of the drunkards at Monday's court.

'Here we are. This is Craig's Wynd, or The Wynd, as they say. We have only to go through here, and then we are in Colquhoun Street, where I live. It isn't far.'

In the Wynd it was, of course, rather quieter, but in the dark doorways strange figures were huddled, and sometimes the feeble wail of a child, or a smothered oath, reminded one that more was hidden behind the scenes. Gladys was now in a state of extreme mental excitement. She had never been in a town larger than Boston, and there only on bright days with her father. It seemed to her that this resembled the place of which the Bible speaks, where there is weeping and wailing and gnashing of teeth. To the child, country born and gently reared, whom no unclean or wicked thing had ever touched, it was a revelation which took away from her childhood for ever. She never forgot it. When years had pa.s.sed, and these dark days seemed almost like a shadow, that one memory remained vivid and most painful, like a troubled dream.

'Now, here we are. We must let ourselves in. Wat Hepburn will be away long ago. He goes home on Sat.u.r.day night,' said the old man, groping in his pocket for a key. It was some minutes before he found it, and Gladys had time to look about her, which she did with fearful, wondering eyes.

It was a very narrow street, with tall houses on each side, which seemed almost to touch the sky. Gladys wondered, not knowing that they were all warehouses, how people lived and breathed in such places. She did not know yet that this place, in comparison with others not many streets removed, was paradise. It was quiet--quite deserted; but through the Wynd came the faint echo of the tide of life still rolling on through the early hours of the Sabbath day.

'Here now. Perhaps you had better stay here till I bring a light,' said the old man at length.

'Oh no, I can't; I am terrified. I will come in, cried Gladys, in affright.

'Very well. But there's a stair; you must stand there a moment. I know where the matches are.'

Gladys stood still, holding in to the wall in silent terror. The atmosphere of the place depressed her--it smelt close and heavy, of some disagreeable oily odour. She felt glad to turn her face to the door, where the cool night air--a trifle fresher--could touch her face. Her uncle's footsteps grew fainter and fainter, then became louder again as he began to return. Presently the gleam of a candle appeared at the farther end of a long pa.s.sage, and he came back to the door, which he carefully closed and locked. Then Gladys saw that a straight, steep stair led to the upper floor, but the place Abel Graham called his home was on the ground floor, at the far end of a long wide pa.s.sage, on either side of which bales of goods were piled. He led the way, and soon Gladys found herself in a large, low-ceiled room, quite cheerless, and poorly furnished like a kitchen, though a bed stood in one corner. The fireplace was very old and quaint, having a little grate set quite unattached into the open s.p.a.ce, leaving room enough for a stool on either side. It was, however, choked with dead ashes, and presented a melancholy spectacle.

'Now,' said the old man, as he set the portmanteau down, 'here we are.

One o'clock in the morning--Sunday morning, too. Are you hungry?'

'No,' said Gladys, 'not very.'

'Or cold, no? That's impossible, we've walked so fast. Just take off your things, and I'll see if there's anything in the press. There should be a bit of bread and a morsel of cheese, if that rascal hasn't gobbled them up.'

Gladys sat down, and her eyes wandered over all the great wide room into its shadowy corners, and it was as if the frost of winter settled on her young heart. The old man hung up his coat and hat behind the door, and, opening the press, brought therefrom the half of a stale loaf, a plate on which reposed a microscopic portion of highly-coloured b.u.t.ter, and a sc.r.a.p of cheese wrapped in paper. These he laid on the bare table, where the dust lay white.

'Eat a mouthful, child, and then we'll get to bed,' he said. 'You'll need to sleep here in my bed to-night, and I'll go to the back room, where there's an old sofa. On Monday I'll get some things, and you can have that room for yourself. Tired, eh?'

Uncle Abel's spirits rose to find himself at home, and the child's sank lower at the prospect stretching out before her.

'No--that is, not very. It seems very long since morning.'

'Ay, it's been a longish day. Never mind; tomorrow's Sunday, and we needn't get up before ten or eleven.'

'Don't you go to church, Uncle Abel?'

'Sometimes in the afternoon, or at night. Oh, there are plenty of churches; they grow as thick as mushrooms, and do about as much good.

Won't you eat?'

The fare was not inviting; nevertheless, Gladys did her best to swallow a few morsels, because she really felt faint and weak. It did not occur to the miser that he might kindle a cheerful spark of fire to give her a welcome, and to make her a cup of tea. He was not less cold and hungry himself, it may be believed, but he had long inured himself to such privation, and bore it with an outward semblance of content.

When they had eaten, he busied himself getting an old rug and a pillow from the chest standing across one of the windows, and carried them into the other room, then he bade Gladys get quickly to bed, and not burn the candle too long. He went in the dark himself, and when Gladys heard his footsteps growing fainter in the long pa.s.sage a great terror took possession of her, the place was so strange, so cold, so unknown. For some time she was even afraid to move, but at last she rose and crossed the floor to the windows, to see whether from them anything friendly or familiar could be seen. But they looked into the street, and had thick iron bars across them, exactly like the windows of a gaol. It was the last straw added to the burden of the unhappy child. Her imagination did not lack in vividness, and a thousand unknown terrors rose up before her terrified eyes. If only from the window she might have looked up to the eyes of the pitying stars, she had been less desolate, less forlorn. A sharp sense of physical cold was the first thing to arouse her, and she took the candle and approached the bed. Now, though they had ever been poor, the artist and his child had kept their surroundings clean and wholesome. In her personal tastes Gladys was as fastidious as the highest lady in the land. She turned down the covering, and when she saw the hue of the linen her lip curled, and she hastily covered it up from sight. In the end, she laid herself down without undressing above the bed, spreading a clean handkerchief for her head to rest upon; and so, worn-out, she slept at last an untroubled and dreamless sleep, in which she forgot for many hours her forlorn and friendless state.

[Ill.u.s.tration]

CHAPTER IV.

A RAY OF LIGHT.

Sunday was a dreary day. It rained again, and the fog was so thick that it seemed dim twilight all day long in Gladys's new home. Her uncle did not go out at all, but dozed in the chimney-corner between the intervals of preparing the meagre meals. On Sunday Abel Graham attended to his own housekeeping, and took care to keep a shilling off Mrs. Macintyre's pittance for the same. Gladys, though unaccustomed to perform household duties except of the slightest kind, was glad to occupy herself with them to make the time pa.s.s. The old man from his corner watched with much approval the slender figure moving actively about the kitchen, the busy hands making order out of chaos, and adding the grace of her sweet young presence to that dreary place. On the morrow, he told himself, he should dismiss the expensive Mrs. Macintyre. Yes, he had made a good investment, and then the girl would always be there, a living creature, to whom he might talk when so disposed.

'It isn't at all a bad sort of place, my dear,' he said quite cheerfully. 'At the back, in the yard, there's a tree and a strip of gra.s.s. In spring, if you like, you might put in a pennyworth of seeds, and have a flower.'

This was a tremendous concession. Gladys felt grateful for the kindly thought which prompted it.

'One tree, growing all by itself. Poor thing, how lonely it must be!'

The old man looked at her curiously.