Yet although Bissett grumbled she set about her duties once she saw that my mother was determined, and with Sukey’s assistance a mattress and bedclothes were conveyed into the kitchen and arranged in front of the fire. Then Sukey was given the money for the postage and set off home muffled up against the snow and carrying the letter.
Something woke me in the middle of the night. Unsure whether it was my dream or a noise from outside, I lay awake straining to catch any sounds but hearing nothing. Then I remembered our visiters and, wondering if they were all right, I got up and, cold as it was in my night-shirt, went along the passage groping my way in the dark since I had no light. When I reached the door to my mother’s room, which was ajar, I heard her breathing in her sleep. I smelt burning as if a taper had been recently extinguished there, and at that moment I thought I heard a faint noise from below. I crept down the stairs, still in complete darkness, and looked round the kitchen door. In the dim reddish glow of the fire I saw the large form of the woman stretched out on a palliasse before the hearth. But the mattress beside her was empty! I felt my way towards the front of the house and as I entered the hall I saw a faint glow from the open door of the parlour. Very cautiously I advanced towards it and looked round the edge of the door.
The light came from a rush that the boy was holding. He was standing by my mother’s escritoire and appeared to be running his free hand over the lid and around its sides.
“What are you doing?”
He jumped and as I entered the room presented to me a face of horror: “I wasn’t doin’ nothin’! I was jist lookin’.”
“I could see that. But why?”
“ ’Cause I ain’t nivver seen sich prime stuff. Look at this wood. It’s rare.”
I felt proud to own such things and think nothing of it. “But why did you go into my mother’s room?”
“I nivver done. I haven’t been upstairs.”
“That’s strange, for I smelled a rush on the landing.”
“Well, now that I rec’lleck, I did go jist a little way up them stairs. But I didn’t go into no room.”
“You are silly to come in here in the dark, you know. I could have shewn you everything in the morning.”
He looked at me oddly for a moment and then said: “I nivver thought of that. See, I meant no harm. Don’t tell nobody, will you?”
“Of course not. What is there to tell?”
So, rather puzzled, I returned to my bed while Joey went back to the kitchen.
CHAPTER 19
The next morning I was awoken by Bissett’s brisk: “Good morning, Master Johnnie.”
“Good morning, Bissett,” I said sleepily. “How are they?”
“They’re in the kitchen and eating as big a breakfast as if there’d nivver been nothin’ amiss with them,” she replied dourly as she drew back the curtains. There was thick hoar-ice on the windows that had made frost-flowers, and the light that streamed in had a peculiarly pale brilliance. “Ah,” she said, “just look at that.”
I jumped out of bed and ran over to the window. The light was reflected from the surface of the silent, snow-encumbered landscape. In the distance I heard the sounds of horns that boys always blew on Christmas morning.
“Oh isn’t that lovely!” I exclaimed.
“Well,” said Bissett with a kind of grim pleasure, “there’ll not be much visiting this Christmas for them as likes to go gadding about upon the Lord’s holy day.”
After breakfast my mother and I went into the kitchen where we found the woman and the boy seated in front of the fire and drinking from big mugs of tea. By the efforts of my mother and with the assistance (unwilling, I believe) of Bissett, a complete new wardrobe had been found for both of them. Several of my clothes had been given to the boy, including a pair of stout walking-shoes. Now rested and in their new clothes they presented a much rosier picture than on the day before. A little colour had returned to their faces though they were still pale and hollow-cheeked. Since the boy was so much slighter than I, my clothes hung somewhat loosely on him, though as they were mainly garments I had outgrown, the fit was not too bad. He looked as gloomy as before although his pallor was better.
“Will you tell me your story?” my mother asked.
“Are you sartin you wants to hear it, ma’am?” she said and glanced towards myself.
“I am very curious to do so.”
“Very well,” she said thoughtfully. And so when my mother and I had made ourselves comfortable in two of the other chairs, and the strangers’ mugs of tea had been replenished, she began: “Well, it’s long tale, ma’am, but one that’s little like to interest you to hear minced too fine, for it is a common enough one, pity only knows. Our name is Digweed and we live in Cox’s-square, Spitalfields. My George, the father of that boy, is a time-sarved mason by trade. And a skilled j’iner, too. And don’t hardly take a drop when he’s working. Seen the damage of it in his own dad, he says. And then there’s the young ’uns: Joey here and then his sister, Polly, who is a wonderful child for all she’s only going on ten. Many’s the time she’s saved us from starvation, or the work’us, or nussed us through sickness. Then there’s the other boy, Billy, who’s only seven and a fine lad. And there’s Sally, too, the eldest.” I noticed that her right hand clasped and unclasped as she spoke these words. Then she went on quickly: “Well, until three or four years back we’d been making a dacent living for my George was a paid-up member of his S’iety and respected by his fellows and trusted by the little masters who gived him a deal o’ work. Then the slack time started and George didn’t get no more work. We were all right at fust, though we saw trouble coming to others. At fust, he worked in the dishonourable part of the trade — though he nivver gived short measure. But he was working under the book-price and somehow the S’iety larned this and struck him off. Arter that the only work he could get was for that new gas-company in Horseferry-road. He was doing the brick-lining and it was very hot and none too safe, and the wages was mortal low. Why, bless you, we was poor as rats. Well, we was just about making do when our fortins took a turn for the worse. There was some trouble at work and my George was hurt. His arms and leg and his face. He was in the ’Spital for four months and then couldn’t work for another year. Things wasn’t good for the gas wouldn’t do nothin’ for us at fust but then at last they gived us some money as a set-off. But then on account of his arm, George couldn’t get work of no kind at all. It was about this time — Christmas three year ago — that … a sartin indiwiddle come to us.” Her face darkened. “Well, he was wery friendly. I reckon he’d heard that George had that money. Mind, I don’t say he meant to do us harm. Mebbe the worst thing he done was he took that boy to live with him to save us another mouth to feed. Joey ain’t nivver been the same boy since, though he wouldn’t nivver tell his dad nor me nothin’ about that time.”
I glanced curiously at Joey who hung down his head guiltily.
“Anyways, what this person done was, he purwailed upon George to set up as a small master himself since the S’iety wouldn’t let him work no more for the honourable masters and to come in with him on a contract to take a lease and build a house in the marsh-lands out beyond Westminster. (That’s the reg’lar way of doing things.) For with the set-off from the gas, we had just enough to do it. Some of the other small masters took on two or three houses but George and his partner only took on one between the two on ’em, though it was a big ’un for they were meant to be fine houses for the gentry. So they had to pay the plaisterers and other j’iners themselves. And all the money went into that. And more, for this indiwiddle didn’t have no blunt at all. We had to feed ourselves and, worst of all, to buy all the building-stuff. And George wouldn’t use nothin’ but the best stock brick, and he had noises with his partner over that. And also on account of how this indiwiddle didn’t do none of the work as he’d promised, but spent all his time drinking with other tradesmen and trying to purwail upon ’em to take up contracts, too. Well, next thing is, arter about si
x months he says he wants to pull out. And so George bought out his share — oh, it was a fair price but it was more money than we’d bargained for at the start. And so as time went on we pawned almost everything we owned — our few sticks, clothes, bedding, cups and plates — everything save a few clothes and the tools he needed. But we had to raise more money somehow. Well, the pawnbrokers what we’d pledged everything to was willing to lend us money, but at a terrible rate of interest. You wouldn’t know nothin’ about it, ma’am, but there are wicked men in Town what feeds on poor people like us.”
My mother shook her head slowly at this as if, to my surprise, she understood the allusion.
“Well, so we borrowed forty pound, and that meant we had to pay back eighty at the end of six months. At the beginning of last year George had about finished work on the house and then we larned some bad news: a man come round from the main-contractor and told all the small masters that on account of some kind of difficulties that I nivver understood, the people what owned the land had the right to seize it back on account of they hadn’t been paid no rent or something. It was nothin’ to do with us, but it seemed we could lose everything without no set-off: all the money we’d paid for the lease and all the work and the bricks and the wood and all what we’d put into the house and paid others to do. It didn’t seem right.”
Here my mother looked at me in dismay.
“This man said to all the small masters as how they should sell out to the main-contractor who, in course, couldn’t offer them nothin’ like a fair price for the work they’d put in on account of the difficulties he was in himself. He would offer them a hundred pound for each house, take it or leave it. And if they left it, they might lose everything. Well they’d done about three hundred pound worth of work on each house. Some of ’em said they wouldn’t sell at that price and sure enough the freeholder went to law and seized their houses without paying nothin’ at all. And then the contractor dropped his price even lower on account of that. So then the rest on ’em sold and George did too and got no more nor forty pound for the house. But the strange thing is, ma’am, that the main-contractor what now owned nearly all the half-built houses was able to finish and sell ’em, for the freeholder nivver did seize any more on ’em. I nivver understood that and thought there was something wrong there.”
“What was the company called?” I asked.
“It was the West London Building Company.”
My mother and I glanced at each other in relief.
“Since then things have been worse than before on account of the badness of the times. They say the harvest failed in Ireland this summer and sartin it is there’s been many more poor Irishers in Town than ever before to bring down the price of work and raise the rents.”
“So how have you lived since then?” my mother asked.
Mrs Digweed glanced nervously in my direction before replying: “My George has had to take to the shores, ma’am. And with that and my washing we’ve jist about managed to keep body and soul together. But then last winter he took sick with the damp on his chest — and worse than that! — off the work he was doing. We nigh on starved then, for the pawnbroker what I told you about was taking four shillin’ a week off of us for what we owed. And because we couldn’t pay it back fast enough, we was getting deeper and deeper into debt all the time. Well then in the Spring, this same indiwiddle as I told you of come to see us again. It was a long time since we’d seen him, and to tell the truth, I was none too glad when I set eyes on him. But he seemed to be bringing us some good news this time. He said he’d heard that there was some work to do at the great house up at Hougham.”
“The great house?” my mother repeated. “You must mean Mompesson-park?”
“I believe the name was something like that, ma’am.”
“But the house has been empty for years!” my mother exclaimed.
“Seemingly the fambly’s coming back there, ma’am, if it’s the same house. Well, my George went to see the steward in Town and got took on. So we talked it over and agreed to leave the young ’uns in Town. George was from here as a boy but it was the fust time that I’d ever gone beyond the lamps. Then, like I told you last night, Joey and me had to go on to Stoniton. And that’s where we were until we heerd the tidings from Town. Well, that’s all there is to say. And now we have to get on home.”
She rose from her chair as she spoke.
“Gracious Heavens!” cried my mother. “You surely cannot propose to continue your journey today!”
“We have rested and we have ate, and thanks to your goodness we have got warm clothes and good stout shoes that will take us up to Town easy.”
“But not on foot,” my mother persevered, seeing that she was determined. “At the very least, I insist upon giving you the money to pay for your fare by stage-coach. You can pick it up at noon on the turnpike where it passes the turning to the village.”
A troubled expression appeared on the woman’s face: “I don’t like to take money, thank you kindly, ma’am. We’re so deep in debt already, we dare not take on no more.”
“But if you take the coach you can be with your family by early tomorrow instead of three or four days from now. And Joey looks much too tired to go on today by foot. And I don’t mean it as a loan but as a gift.”
The woman’s weary face as she looked at her little boy was a battle-ground of conflicting emotions. At last she spoke: “We’d pay you back, ma’am, Joey’s dad and me. He would say that as sartin as me if he were here now. We’d not like to be beholden.” Then she added timidly: “How much would the fare be for the two of us?”
My mother glanced at me: “Two outsides would be about twenty-four shillings,” I said.
Mrs Digweed’s eyes widened in horror. “I don’t know how long it would be a-fore we could pay back that much,” she murmured. “We couldn’t put aside more than that in a quarter even when my husband was working in the honourable trade.”
“Please don’t worry about that,” said my mother.
“Since it’s Christmas-day,” Sukey put in, “the coach that passes the village at noon will be nigh on empty.”
“Sukey will go with you to show you the way to the cross-roads.”
“Then I will take your money, and thank you ma’am, thank you,” the woman said. “Bless you, you have a workin’ heart for the poor.”
My mother smiled and said to me: “Johnnie, will you come into the parlour for a moment?” When we were alone she asked: “Do you think this can be the same enterprise? The name of the company was different.”
“It seems to be the same scheme. And there are several companies involved.”
“If so, it seems a strange coincidence. And what that woman said has made me uneasy. I wish I hadn’t sent that letter last night. Do you think I should write to Mr Sancious to say that I have changed my mind about putting more money into it?”
“Very well, if it will make you easier, though I don’t really see why you should be worried.”
“Then Sukey can take the letter to the post-office on the way to the cross-roads.”
“It’s Christmas-day, Mamma, the office will be closed.”
“Well if it is then Mrs Digweed can take it to London.”
“Do you think we should entrust so important a letter to her?”
“Whyever not?” my mother cried as she sat down and began to compose it.
I begged her to allow me to accompany Sukey and the Digweeds to the turnpike and, seeing how disappointed I would be to miss this chance of seeing the coach stop to take up passengers, she agreed. While she wrote the letter I went up to my room to make ready, and also to act surreptitiously on a resolution I had formed as I listened to Mrs Digweed’s story.
The leave-taking and the formalities which accompanied the handing-over of the money and the letter were taking place when I returned to the hall. Mrs Digweed insisted on my mother’s writing down her name and the direction of our house.
Eventually the four of us set off t
hrough the quiet village, peaceful under its blanket of snow and the only signs of life the chimneys from which the smoke was ascending straight up into the cloudless sky. The two women walked on ahead, leaving Joey and me to follow.
“Do you think the guard will blow his horn when he stops the coach?” I asked Joey.
“I don’t care,” he said. “I’ve travelled on a coach many and many a time.”
“Have you? Where?”
“With my uncle. In Town and thereabouts.”
“How old are you?” I asked.
His answer surprised me: despite his slighter stature (and I myself was small) he was only about six months younger than myself. I was relieved to know that he was not very much younger, as I had believed, since that would have made the fact that he had done and seen so much all the more galling.
The little general shop that served as a post-office was indeed barred and shuttered and so Sukey handed the letter to Mrs Digweed with another tuppence for the postage in London.
“Of course everything’s locked up today, just as I said it would be,” I pointed out.
“Everythin’ save the buryin’-ground,” Joey remarked for we were just passing it as I made this remark.
“Don’t be silly, graveyards are never locked up.”
He looked at me with a very irritating air of superiority: “They are in Lunnun. ’Less there’s a mort-safe.”
“Oh be quiet about London,” I cried and pushed him, determined not to ask what that word meant.
He pushed me back much harder so I seized him by the arm, but he managed to wriggle free and hit me on the chest. At this moment Sukey and Mrs Digweed pulled us apart and we walked the rest of the way separated by them.
We reached the cross-roads in good time and had some minutes to wait before the coach came in sight along the snow-covered road. I began waving my arms as soon as I saw it, and to my delight the guard did indeed blow a long blast on his horn as it slowed down and drew to a steaming, jangling, stamping halt abreast of us. The guard confirmed that there were places outside, the money was handed over, and the two new passengers helped up as I watched enviously.