Lady Good-for-Nothing: A Man's Portrait of a Woman

  Chapter V.

  RUTH.

  "Hey, what is it?" the Collector demanded, slewing himself to thehalf-about in his chair.

  The girl stepped forward into the candle-light. Over her shoulders shewore a faded plaid, the ends of which her left hand clutched and heldtogether at her bosom.

  "Your Honour's pardon for troubling," she said, and laying a gold coinon the table, drew back with a slight curtsy. "But I think you gaveme this by mistake; and now is my only chance to give it back.I am going home in a few minutes."

  The Collector glanced at the coin, and from that to the girl's face, onwhich his eyes lingered.

  "Gad, I recollect!" he said. "You were the wench that pulled off myboots?"

  "Yes, sir."

  "Well, upon my honour, I forget at this moment if I gave it by mistakeor because of your face. No, hang me!" he went on, while she flushed,not angrily, but as though the words hurt her, "it must have been bymistake. I couldn't have forgot so much better a reason."

  To this she answered nothing, but put forward her hand as if to push thecoin nearer.

  "Certainly not," said he, still with eyes on her face. "I wish you totake it. By the way, I heard the landlady's voice just now, lettingloose upon somebody. Was it on you?"

  "Yes."

  "And you are going home to-night, you say. Has she turned you out?"

  "Yes." The girl's hand moved as if gathering the plaid closer over herbosom. Her voice held no resentment. Her eyes were fixed upon thecoin, which, however, she made no further motion to touch; and thisdownward glance showed at its best the lovely droop of her longeyelashes.

  The Collector continued to take stock of her, and with a growing wonder.

  The lower half of the face's oval was perhaps Unduly gaunt and a trifleoverweighted by the broad brow. The whole body stood a thought too highfor its breadth, with a hint of coltishness in the thin arms and thickelbow-joints. So judged the Collector, as he would have appraised aslave or any young female animal; while as a connoisseur he knew thatthese were faults pointing towards ultimate perfection, and at thisstage even necessary to it.

  For assurance he asked her, "How old are you?"

  "Sixteen."

  "That's as I guessed," said he, and added to himself, "My God, this isgoing to be one of the loveliest things in creation!" Still, as shebent her eyes to the coin on the table, he ran his appraising glanceover her neck and shoulders, judging--so far as the ugly shawlpermitted--the head's poise, the set of the coral ear, the delicate waveof hair on the neck's nape.

  "Why is she turning you out?"

  "A window curtain took fire. She said it was my fault."

  "But it was not your fault at all!" cried Dicky. "Papa, the curtaintook fire in my room, and she beat it out. The whole house might havebeen burnt down but for her. She beat it out, and made nothing of it,though it hurt her horribly. Look at her hands, papa!"

  "Hold out your hands," his father commanded.

  She stretched them out. The ointment, as she turned them palms upward,shone under the candle rays.

  "Turn them the other way," he commanded, after a long look at them.The words might mean that the sight afflicted him, but his tone scarcelysuggested this. She turned her hands, and he scrutinised the backs ofthem very deliberately. "It's a shame," said he at length.

  "Of course it's a shame!" the boy agreed hotly. "Papa, won't you ringfor the landlady and tell her so, and then she won't be sent away."

  "My dear Dicky," his father answered, "you mistake. I was thinking thatit was a shame to coarsen such hands with housework." He eyed the girlagain, and she met him with a straight face--flushed a little andplainly perturbed, but not shrinking, although her bosom heaved--for hisadmiration was entirely cool and critical. "What is your name?" heasked.

  "Ruth Josselin."

  He appeared to consider this for a moment, and then, reaching out a handfor the decanter, to dismiss the subject. "Well, pick up your guinea,"he said. "No doubt the woman outside has treated you badly; but I can'tintercede for you, to keep you a drudge here among the saucepans; no,upon my conscience, I can't. The fact is, Ruth Josselin, you have themakings of a beauty, and I'll be no party to spoiling 'em. What ismore, it seems you have spirit, and no woman with beauty and spirit needfail to win her game in this world. That's my creed." He sipped hiswine.

  "If your Honour pleases," said the girl quietly, picking up the coin,"the woman called me bad names, and I was not wanting you at all tospeak for me."

  "Oho!" The Collector set down his glass and laughed. "So that's theway of it--'_Nobody asked you, sir, she said._' Dicky, we sit rebuked."

  "But--" she hesitated, and then went on rapidly in the lowest of lowtones--"if your Honour wouldn't mind giving me silver instead of gold?They won't change gold for me in the town; they'll think I have stolenit. Most Sundays I'm allowed to take home broken meats to mother andgrandfather, and to-night I shan't be given any, now that I'm sent away.They'll be expecting me, and indeed, sir, I can't bear to face them--orI wouldn't ask you. I beg your Honour's pardon for saying so much."

  "Hullo!" exclaimed the Collector. "Why, yes, to be sure, you must begrandchild to the old man of the sea--him that I met on the beach thisafternoon, t'other side of the headland. Lives in a hovel with a woodpile beside it, and a daughter that looks out for wreckage?"

  "Your Honour spoke with them?" Into Ruth's face there mounted a deepertide of colour. But whereas the first flush had been dark withdistress, this second spread with a glow of affection. Her eyes seemedto take light from it, and shone.

  "I spoke with the old man. Since you have said so much, I may say more.I gave him food; he was starving."

  She bent her head. Her hands moved a little, with a gesture mostpitiful to see. "I was afraid," she muttered, "with these gales, and nogetting to the oyster beds."

  "He took some food, too, to his daughter, with a bottle of wine, as Iremember."

  A bright tear dropped. In the candle-light Dicky saw it splash on theback of her hand, by the wrist.

  "God bless your Honour!" Dicky could just hear the words.

  The door opened and Manasseh entered, bearing the coffee on a silvertray.

  "Manasseh," said his master, "take that guinea and bring me change forit. If you have no silver in the treasury get the landlady to change itfor you."

  Manasseh was affronted. His hand came near to shaking as he poured andhanded the coffee.

  "Yo' Hon'ah doan off'n use de metal," he answered. "Dat's sho'.But whiles an' again yo' Hon'ah condescends ter want it. Dat bein' so,I keep it by me--_an'_ polished. I doan fetch yo' Hon'ah w'at any lowtrash has handled."

  He withdrew, leaving this fine shaft to rankle, and by-and-by enteredwith a small velvet bag, from the neck of which he shook a small cascadeof silver coins, all exquisitely polished.

  "Count me out change for a guinea," commanded his master.

  Manasseh obeyed.

  "Now empty the bag, put into it what you have counted, and sweep up therest."

  Manasseh dropped in the coins one by one, and tied the neck of the bagwith its silken ribbon. The Collector took it from him and tossed it tothe girl.

  "Here--catch!" said he carelessly.

  But her burnt hands shrank from closing on if, and it fell to the floor.She stooped, recovered it, and slipped it within her bodice. As sherose erect again her eyes rested in wonder on the black servant who witha crumb-brush was sweeping the rest of the money off the table andcatching it upon the coffee-salver. The rain and clash of the coinsappeared to confuse her for a moment. Then with another curtsy and a"Thank your Honour," she moved to the door.

  "But wait," said the Collector sharply, on a sudden thought. "You arenot meaning to walk all the way home, surely?"

  "Yes."

  "At this hour?"

  "The wind has gone down. I do not mind the dark, and the distance isnothing. . . . Oh, I forgot: your Honour thinks that, with all thismoney, some
one will try to rob me?"

  The Collector smiled. "You would appear to be a very innocent youngwoman," he said. "I was not, as a fact, thinking of the money."

  "Nobody will guess that I am carrying so much," she said simply; "so itwill be quite safe."

  "Nevertheless this may help to give you confidence," said he.Feeling in the breast pocket of his laced satin waistcoat, he drew fortha diminutive pistol--a delicate toy, with a pattern of silver foliatedover the butt. "It is loaded," he explained, "and primed; though itcannot go off unless you pull back the trigger. At close quarters itcan be pretty deadly. Do you understand firearms?"

  "Grandfather has a fowling-piece," she answered; "and, now that hissight has failed, on Sundays I try to shoot sea-birds for him. He saysthat I have a good eye. But last week the birds had all flown inland,because of the gale."

  "Then take this. It is nothing to carry, and you may feel the safer forit."

  She put up a hand to decline. "Why should I need it?"

  "We'll hope you will not. But do as I bid you, girl. I shall bepassing back along the beach in two days' time, and will call for it."

  She resisted no longer.

  "I will take it," she said. "By that time I may have thought of wordsto thank your Honour."

  She curtsied again.

  "Manasseh!" Captain Vyell pointed to the door. The negro opened it andstood aside majestically as she passed out and was gone.

  Let moralists perpend. Ruth Josselin had knocked at that door after asharp struggle between conscience and crying want. The poverty known toRuth was of the extreme kind that gnaws the entrails with hunger.It had furthermore starved her childhood of religion, and her sole codeof honour came to her by instinct. Yet she had knocked at the door withno thought but that the Collector's guinea had come to her hand bymistake, and no expectancy but that the Collector would thank her andtake it back. She was shy, moreover. It had cost courage.

  "Honesty is the best policy." True enough, no doubt. Yet, when all issaid, but for some radical instinct of honesty, untaught, brave toconquer a more than selfish need, Ruth had never brought back herguinea. And, yet again, from that action all the rest of this storyflows. When we have told it, let the moralists decide.