CHAPTER II.
TWO YEARS LATER.
Two years had elapsed, and to superficial observers Meg might haveappeared to have changed only by some inches added to her length oflimb. She still haunted the corner overlooking the stairs on the topmostlobby, but it was not to watch the come and go of the shabby socialeddies breaking down below. She read much to herself. Her choice ofliterature was a queer _melange_ of odds and ends. She was up to all thefires, the accidents, the pageants of a world into which she had neverset foot. She knew to what corner of a London daily paper and provincialweekly she was to look to find descriptions of these sensationalincidents, and the style in which they were recorded stirred in her anadmiration worthy of being lavished on Homeric epics. She knew also anumber of ballads by heart that she would recite with an amount ofnative dramatic vividness.
If the shifting scenes going on downstairs no longer attracted her asin the past, she was intent and absorbed in watching one life. Thefriendship between her and Mr. Standish had become a tie that drew outpeculiarities of the child's nature. There had been quarrels,coolnesses, reconciliations, but Meg's usual attitude toward thejournalist was one of mingled proprietorship and watchfulness. It was amixture of motherly solicitude and dog-like faithfulness. Shecross-questioned, admonished, and kept vigilant guard over hisinterests.
Once, having discovered that Mrs. Browne had cheated him of sixpence inthe weekly bill, she drew the landlady's notice to the overcharge; butMrs. Browne refused to acknowledge or set it right, and Meg criedherself to sleep. Loyalty to the landlady was discarded, and withbrimming eyes and quivering lips she told Mr. Standish next day of thatfraudulent sixpence. To her dismay he laughed, and vowed that Mrs.Browne's name ought to be handed down to posterity as an honest landladyif sixpence covered the amount of a week's cheating. Meg would not becomforted; to her the landlady seemed remorseless.
A mother could not have detected with quicker apprehension a shade ofweariness or pallor on the young man's face. Her invariable question onsuch an occasion would be, "What have you had for dinner?" Sometimes hetried to deceive her. He would roll out a dazzling _menu_--turtle soup,turbot, plum-pudding.
She would stop him at once with pathetic and angry remonstrance. "It isnot true; you know it is not true. Why do you say it?"
Her earnestness always moved him; he was ashamed of deceiving her.
Their last quarrel had been caused by Mr. Standish's confession that hehad dined off fish.
"Fish!" cried Meg with scorn, tossing her head. "Can you work after abit of fish? What fish--turbot, salmon, fried soles?" The ladies whooccupied the drawing-room floor gave occasional dinner-parties, wheresuch delicacies figured.
As Mr. Standish kept shaking his head, the smile in his eyes growingmore amused and tender, a terrible idea dawned upon Meg. She grew pale.
"Herring!" she faltered.
"Herrings," he repeated in a voice of rich appreciation. "Two herrings,fat as lord mayors!"
Meg walked about the room, her eyes bright with angry misery, her lipstrembling. "It's downright wicked! You want to kill yourself, that'swhat you want to do." She flicked a tear away. "A workman in the streetdown there has a better dinner than that."
"Now, Meg, be reasonable," the young man pleaded in a voice of protest."Don't you see," he went on, striking his left palm with two fingers ofthe right hand, "there is a day called 'pay-day' that rules my bill offare, as I explained to you the other day the moon rules the tides. Onpay-day and its immediate followers I live in abundance. Then come daysof lesser luxuries, then abstinence. I have reached this period. Soonplenty will reign again."
"It is a foolish way of managing money," said Meg, abrupt in hertrouble, and only half-comforted.
"Can you tell me, Meg, how to manage money without reference topay-day?" he asked.
"Will you do as I tell you?" she said, stopping short in her restlessperegrinations.
He nodded.
"Take your money, all your money, and divide it into little parcels, asmany parcels as there are days it must last, and every day spend justwhat is inside one of the little parcels, and not a bit more," said Megwith elucidating gestures.
Mr. Standish vowed she spoke like a chancellor of the exchequer; thatthe more he heard her the more he was determined on coming into thecolossal fortune he was to enjoy some day, to appoint her his almoner,housekeeper, the dispenser of his bounties, the orderer of his dinners.This project to be his housekeeper was one dear to Meg's heart, thepacifier of her wrath. By what means Mr. Standish was to come intopossession of this fabulous wealth remained vague. Sometimes he wouldannounce his intention of getting it by marrying an heiress, a projectalways chillingly received by Meg. Sometimes she would suggestspitefully that the heiress would not marry him; but Mr. Standishoverrode all objections, and would depict days of indolent delight forhimself and his bride, while Meg managed the household. When thedaydream reached this point it generally abruptly terminated by Megplunging out of the room, and banging the door after her with anemphatic "Shan't!"
On the evening of the fish dinner Mr. Standish left the heiress out ofthe question, and Meg was softened.
The next day the young man supped at home. His tray, as usual on theseoccasions, was brought in by Meg. A burly German sausage and a pot ofScotch marmalade graced the board. Meg's answers were evasive concerningthe source from which these dainties came. It struck Mr. Standish thatMeg had bought them with the store of half-pence he had taught her toput away in a moneybox he had himself presented to her, with a view toinculcating economical instincts. Her fierce refusal to answer convincedhim that he had guessed right.
The refusal to touch these dainties died on his lips. He could not hurtthe child. He ate the supper she had provided with loud laudations ofits excellence. Before it was finished an arrangement had been enteredinto between them. On pay-day Meg would henceforth receive a sum to bekept for him against the days of privation. The contract had beenfulfilled. Meg had proved a stern treasurer, resisting the young man'sentreaties to dole out portions of the money before the appointed time.
If the child had gained much by intercourse with an educated mind, ifher English had grown by it more refined and correct, her mind storedwith more definite and varied knowledge; if, above all, there had cometo her by this affection a precocious womanliness, taming and sweeteningher lonely life, Mr. Standish had gained as much by the tie betweenthem. A sort of wonder, half-amused, half-tender, sometimes awoke in hisheart at the thought of the child's devotion. His occupation led him tosee rough sides of life, and as he became familiar with degradation, thegoodness, the innocence of the child was ever before him. He felt it wastouching to be loved by a child of ten. Her advanced wisdom struck him.If it stirred his sense of humor and inclined him to laugh, still itmade him thoughtful.
During those two years he had enlarged his connections. He was earningmore money. Individuals, somewhat of unkempt appearance, whom Megdisapproved of thoroughly, often made their way up the stairs to theyoung man's rooms. The peals of laughter, the loud talk emerging fromthe sanctum, confirmed Meg in judging these visitors foolish company forher hero. The child grew hot with angry apprehension when the bell rangshortly after their coming, and Jessie would answer it with tumblers ofwhisky and lemons. On letting out these friends Meg thought that Mr.Standish usually looked excited, his eyes brighter, his manner moreexpansive. The child grew restless, alert, suspicious. She did notdisguise her feelings to Mr. Standish. Why did these rough men comedrinking his whisky? She would break into fierce denunciations againstdrink.
"Madam"--Mrs. Browne--"always said she was poor. Why was she poor?Because she was always a-sipping and drinking. He'd keep being poortoo."
Often Meg's tones, staccato with prophetic denunciation, would falter atthe picture she evoked.
Mr. Standish listened sometimes with an amused and indulgent good humorthat exasperated Meg; sometimes an uneasy qualm was perceptible in hisvoice as he admitted that Meg was wise; sometimes he assumed a supe
riortone of disapproval that silenced her for the time, but left her morethan ever under the shadow of a vague and sorrowful apprehension.
One Sunday afternoon Mr. Standish emerged from his room ready to sallyforth. Meg appeared out of her shadowy corner.
"Going out?" she asked shortly.
He nodded, smiling down with benign amusement. He seemed enveloped in aholiday brightness.
"Going with those horrid men?" she resumed, throwing her words out withsorrowful brevity.
He nodded, and drew out his watch. He was apparently in a mood to beentertained.
"Come, Meg, there are five minutes for a sermon. I will listen to itrespectfully, as if it were the Archbishop of Canterbury preaching."
But Meg was too much absorbed to mind a joke. She followed him into hissitting-room, and began restlessly walking about.
Mr. Standish sat down, and as he stroked his hat with his sleeve hewatched the little figure's perambulations. Meg wore her Sunday gown, arusty black velveteen, foldless and clinging, buttoned from throat tohem. She had outgrown its scanty proportions. Her feet, incased in blackfelt slippers, looked large under the trim ankles.
"Well, Meg, I am waiting," said Mr. Standish.
"Don't go," said the child, stopping short and facing him abruptly. Thequaint austerity of the skimpy garment brought out the lines of thechildish figure as she stood erect and animated before him.
"Why not, Meg?"
"Because they're bad; because I hate them; because they'll bring you tomisery," said the child, with an upward flash of one little brownwell-formed hand, and with a piteous emphasis on the last word.
"Nonsense, Meg!" said Mr. Standish, impatient because more impressedthan he cared to be. "You keep comparing my friends with Mrs. Browne--Idon't mean any disrespect--an uneducated tippling old woman. My friends,my dear Meg, are gentlemen, educated men, who, I admit, are fond of ajoke, fond of a glass or two glasses of grog, but who respectthemselves."
"Education has nothing to do with it," snapped Meg, with concise energy."There was a man downstairs, he was educated. I think he was the devil.He'd leave his wife and little child for days, and come back drunk." Meggave a fierce little shudder. "There'd be scenes. One day he went andnever came back--never, and the wife and baby boy went off one snowy dayto the workhouse."
"Poor child, you should not see those things!" said Mr. Standish with atroubled look.
"Why not? You would not let these men up there take your money if yousaw them."
There was a grotesque sweetness in Meg's appearance as she stood therein her skimpy dress, her short dusky hair falling in masses about herneck and over her forehead. There came to the young journalist aremembrance of those wingless angels that the pre-Raphaelite masterspainted, gracious, grave, workaday beings, with unearthly wise faces.But it was not as a picture that he contemplated Meg; the thought of thegoodness, the purity, the holiness of the child, who knew so much andunderstood so little of life, overcame him. Her innocence almostfrightened him. He felt the sacredness of a vow taken to her; it wouldbe more binding than one taken before a court of justice.
"What is it that you want me to promise, Meg?" he asked.
"Not to let them take your money from you, not to let them give youdrink," she replied with her accustomed unhesitancy, but her voicefaltering with harbored longing.
"Not drink at all?" he asked.
"I wish not at all; I wish not at all," she replied with unconsciousrepetition.
"Look here, Meg; I'll promise you this--I'll not waste my money, andI'll not tipple like Mrs. Browne downstairs. Will that satisfy you?"
"You promise!" said Meg vehemently, with another upward flash of thewell-formed little brown hand, and holding him with her eyes.
"I promise," said Mr. Standish gravely, disguising an inclination tolaugh.
The young man was busy in the intervals of journalistic work composing apolitical squib. He had not so much time to devote to Meg as in theless-employed days, but he allowed her to sit near him when he wrote,reading the story-books and ballads he gave her. In his leisure, as hesmoked his pipe, he watched with half-closed eyes the quaint littlefigure, and drew the child out to talk. He explained the difficultpassages in the books she read, and gave her lessons in recitation.Better than anything to Meg, he sometimes imparted to her the last _bonmot_ he had put into the mouth of "Sultan Will" to his sufferingsubjects--a confidence that invariably produced abnormal gravity inMeg.
The child had no reason to think the young man was not fulfilling thepromise he had given. His alert carriage and concentrated expressioncontradicted any suspicion of faltering. Yet she was restless; hisfriends came often to see him.
"Why did they come, disturbing him at his work?" she asked spitefully.
Mr. Standish called her a hard little taskmaster, and received hisfriends cordially. A formless fear was at the child's heart. She hauntedthe threshold of his door when they were in his room; she lay awake ofnights when she knew that he had gone out with them. She magnified toherself the number of times that he had gone out earlier and come homelater than he used. If she dropped asleep her slumbers were broken untilshe heard the sound of his footsteps on the stairs.
One evening Mr. Standish went off in company with two journalisticcomrades to a public dinner, given to members of the press by thedirectors of a new railway company. Meg would not retract theunfavorable verdict she pronounced upon his appearance in the new dresssuit he had ordered specially for the occasion. She was not to bemollified by the promise of an orange from the directors' table. "Shedid not want an orange; she did not see what a dinner had to do with arailway," she averred.
That night she could not sleep. The formless fear at her heart lay heavyupon it; it seemed to her that the fulfillment of that nameless dreadwas approaching. As the hour came and passed Mr. Standish had fixed forhis return, visions began to group about her bed and pass before herwide-open eyes. All the sorrowful stories of accidents Mr. Standish hadrelated to her enacted themselves before her, in which he appeared thecentral figure. The night plodded slowly on; the clock in the hallstruck the hours at intervals. When the clock struck three Meg got upand paced about the room, a wan little ghost.
When another hour struck the four peals sounded like a hammer-stroke ona coffin. Meg began to dress. She did not know why she did so, or whatshe would do after, but a vague sense of being needed impelled her. Shefumbled her way to the staircase and sat on the topmost step.
She waited in the darkness and silence. A faint whiteness began to stealthrough the sides of the blinds drawn over the window on the lobby. Thebanisters, the flight of stairs, showed shadowily, gradually growingmore distinct.
Suddenly she sprang to her feet. There was the scrape of a key in thelatch. A step sounded in the hall, made its way up the stairs. It wasMr. Standish. When he reached the topmost flight of steps he perceivedthe little gray figure standing waiting in the gray dawn, erect,immobile. He steadied himself against the banisters and began to laugh.He looked pale, his eyes dark; his hat was thrown back, his hairdisordered.
"Why, Meg, you little detective, are you there? Such a jolly night!splendid dinner! No humbug this time, Meg--real turtle, tuns ofchampagne!" He came up a few steps. "Tuns of champagne, Meg! Speeches,Meg! Such nonsense! Everybody complimented everybody else. I did notforget you, Meg. Look here, I stole an orange and sweetmeats!" He beganfumbling in his pockets.
"You've broken your promise," said the child in a low and tremblingvoice.
"Not a bit of it, Meg. Now you think I am tipsy," he replied, speakinghuskily. "Not a bit of it. You'll see if I can't walk straight as a lamppost to that door."
As he went up he staggered--she had not seen him stumble before--caughthimself by the balustrade, then plunged forward with uneven steps.
Instinctively Meg put out her hand, but he did not see it. Catching atthe wall he fell into a fit of laughing; then making his way to his roomhe let the door slam behind him.
Meg was petrified. All that she h
ad dreaded seemed to have happened. Shesat down, her throat burning, her body cold, as if a shroud enfoldedher. She remained huddled and moveless until signs of life began to beheard in the house. Then she got up and crept into her attic.