Trading Part 42

"What's the matter, Sarah?" said Matilda in a distressed whisper.

"This is Mrs. Binn's boy, Miss Matilda, that you came to see."

"_That?_ Why does he--why do they put him there?"

"Mrs. Binn's room is so small and so hot. It's there, Miss Matilda; you'll see it. When she's doing her washing and ironing, the place is so full of steam and so hot; and there ain't no room for the bed neither; and so she put Josh here."

Sarah led the way to Mrs. Binn's room, and Matilda followed her in a bewildered state of mind. She saw as soon as the door was opened the truth of Sarah's statements. The attic room was so small that Mrs.

Binn's operations must have been carried on with the greatest difficulty; impossible Matilda would have thought them, but there were the facts. One dormer window in the roof was effectually shut up and hindered from its office of admitting air, by the pipe of the stove which pa.s.sed out through the sash. As it was the end of the week, no washing enc.u.mbered the six feet clear of s.p.a.ce; but the stove was fired up and Mrs. Binn was ironing and some clothes were hung up to air. It was neither desirable nor very practicable to go in; only Matilda edged a little way within the door, and David and Sarah stood at the opening.

"What's all to do?" said Mrs. Binn at this unlooked-for interruption, stopping iron in hand and peering at them between shirts and overalls hanging on the cords stretched across the room. She was a red-faced woman; no wonder! a small, incapable-looking, worn-out-seeming woman besides.

"This lady has come to see Josh, Mrs. Binn."

"What does she want of him?"

"Nothing," said Matilda gently; "Sarah told us how he had been sick a long while; and we came to see how he was and what he wanted."

"He won't want anything soon, but a coffin and a grave," said his mother. Matilda wondered how she could speak so; she did not know yet how long misery makes people seem hard. "How he'll get them, I don't know," Mrs. Binn went on; "but I s'pose--"

Her voice choked; she stopped there.

"Have you no place to put him but where he is lying?" Matilda asked, by way of leading on to something else.

"No, miss; no place," said the woman, feeling of her iron and taking up another one from the stove. "He'd perish in here, if he wouldn't be under my feet. An' I must stand, to live."

"Where do you dry the clothes you wash?"

"Here. I haven't an inch besides."

"I don't see how you can."

"Rich folks don't see a sight o' things," said poor Mrs. Binn; "don't like to, I guess."

"Is there not another room in the house that you could have for the sick boy, or that you could do your washing in and give him this?"

"Room in this house?" repeated the woman. "I'll tell you. There's nigh upon three hundred people living in it; do you think there'd be a room to spare?"

"Three hundred people in _this_ house?" repeated Matilda.

"Nigh upon that. O it's close livin', and all sorts, and all ways o'

livin', too. I like my room, cause it's so high and atop o' everything; but I hear thunder below me sometimes. I wouldn't care, only for the child," she said in a tone a little subdued.

"David, what can we do?" said Matilda, in a half despairing whisper.

David edged himself a little forward and put his question.

"What does the doctor say about him?"

"Doctor!" echoed Mrs. Binn. "Did you say doctor? There's no doctor has seen him. Is it likely one would walk up to this chimbley top to see a poor boy like that? No, no; doctors has to be paid, and I can't do that."

"What do you give him to eat? what does he like?"

"What does he like!" the woman repeated. "He don't like nothin' he has, and he don't eat nothin'. 'Tain't 'what we like,' young sir, that lives in these places. Some days he can't swaller dry bread, and he don't care for mush; he'll take a sup o' milk now and then, when I can get it; but it's poor thin stuff; somethin' you call milk, and that's all."

"Good bye," said David. "I'll bring him something he will like, perhaps. I hope we haven't hindered you."

"I don't have so many visits I need quarrel with this one," said the woman, coming to her door to shew them so much civility; "Sarah wouldn't bring anybody to make a spectacle of me."

They cast looks on the poor little brown heap in the corner of the entry, and groped their way down stairs again. But when they got out into the street and drew breaths of fresh air, David and Matilda stood still and looked at each other.

"I never knew what good air meant before," said the latter.

"And even this is not _good_," replied David.

"How does he live, that poor little creature, with not one breath of it?"

"He doesn't live; he is dying slowly," said David.

"Oh David, what can we do?"

"We'll think, Tilly. I'll carry him some grapes presently. I fancy he wants nothing but food and air. We will contrive something."

"I wonder if there are any other sick children in that house, Sarah?"

Matilda asked.

"I can't say, Miss Matilda; I don't know n.o.body there but Mrs. Binn; and we used to know her before she moved there. Do you want to know of anybody else in trouble?"

"Do you think of somebody else?"

"Not a child," said Sarah; "she's an old woman, or kind of old."

"Well; who is she?"

"She's Mrs. Kitteredge; her husband's a brick mason. Mother used to know her long ago, and she was a smart woman; but she's had a deal o'

pulling down."

"What does she want now, Sarah?"

"It's too bad to tell you, Miss Matilda; you've done so much for us already."

"Never mind," said David; "go on; let us hear."

"Well"--Sarah hesitated.

"Is she sick too?"

"No, she ain't sick; she has been."