"The Story of King Roy" (continued 2)

“No, no,” replied Faith, shaking her head. “I’ll stay and wait here. The ragged Sunday-school’s all about Jesus, and I don’t b’lieve in no Jesus now.”

Meg said nothing more; she smothered a faint sigh, and closing the door behind her ran down-stairs. She had more than a mile to walk to Sunday-school, and she was anxious to be in time; but as she walked along, the pained expression called up by Faith’s words had not left her face.

Meg was a wild, untaught, uncared-for Arab child, a true offshoot of the lowest of the people. With a touch of gipsy blood in her veins, with the most ungoverned, uncontrolled passions, she yet was capable of a devotion, of an affection self-absorbing, self-forgetful. Offered up at any other shrine, it would have been idolatry; offered at this, it was worship. Meg loved, something as Mary Magdalene, something as the women who followed to the sepulchre, must have loved our Lord.

All the love of a most loving nature had Meg given to Jesus. It was not alone gratitude which inspired this love. “It’s jest cause He’s so wonderful beautiful His own self,” she would say; and it was agony to her, greater even than it would be to a mother to hear her little child abused, to have a word breathed against Him.

Faith’s words had wrung her heart. She was very sorry for Faith, very sorry that she could have so spoken; but she was more sorry for the pain she feared the words must have caused Jesus.

“I ’ope as yer’ll soon let us find the little ’un, for she’s beginning to think real hard things of yer, and I can’t abear ’em, I can’t abear ’em,” said Meg, looking up at the sky, and comforting herself with this very direct little prayer.

As she was leaving the Sunday-school at the end of the morning’s lessons, it came into her head that perhaps while she and Faith were so earnestly seeking for little Roy, he might all this time be safely at home. How stupid of them both never to have thought of this before! She had heard all about Faith’s respectable home from the little girl herself. Yes; she would go there now and set her mind at rest on this point before returning to Faith.

She reached the house. There was a common staircase, and the hall door stood open. She met no one as she ran up-stairs, and her feet, innocent of shoes and stockings, made no sound. A door was a little open on the first landing, and Meg, peeping in, saw a man seated by a table. He was a tall and powerful man, and Meg knew at once that she was looking at Faith’s father.

There was profound silence in the house, and Meg heard the man, whose face was bowed over his hands, presently say:

“It’s a lie, it’s all a lie. There is no good God. If there were, He would never have torn my children away from me like this. And I have asked Him so often and so long to bring them back again. Yes; God does not hear prayer. It’s a lie, I say. There is no God, no Christ, no nothing.”

“How dare yer!” said Meg, rushing into the room like a little fury. The man’s words had stung her so hard that she lost both fear and self-control. She rushed at the man, and took his hands and shook them. “How dare yer, how dare yer!” she repeated. “Oh! yer a wicked, wicked man to say as there’s no Jesus Christ.”

Warden—for it was he—started, and stared at the furious little creature. He did not say a word, or attempt in his utter astonishment to oppose her. He only gazed hard, as one who was bereft of all reason.

“Oh! there is a Jesus Christ, and you sha’n’t dare say there ain’t,” repeated Meg; and then she suddenly flung herself on the floor at his feet, and gave way to the most violent, most passionate sobs he had ever heard proceeding from human breast.

He got up and locked the door; then he got water and gave it to Meg. He was kind rather than otherwise to the poor child. When she was better, he even brought her over to sit on the sofa where little Roy had slept his last sleep in that room.

“Now, why did you rush in and speak to me in that strange way?” he asked.

“’Cause yer drove me near mad. You had no call ter say so dreadful a thing as that my Jesus Christ worn’t there.”

“You believe in Him then?” said Warden.

“I believe in Jesus Christ our Lord,” said Meg. Her excitement was spent. She spoke quietly, raising her big, black eyes to heaven. There was something in her manner which must have impressed even the most utterly careless and indifferent with its absolute sincerity.

Warden was silent, gazing at her curiously, even with admiration.

“You must not only believe in Him, you must love Him very much,” he said.

“Ay, I love Him; I’d die fur Him most willin’,” said Meg, clasping her hard hands very tight together.

“But He hasn’t treated you as He has me,” said Warden. “You don’t know, you can’t even understand, what has happened to me. I was always a most respectable man. I tried to do my duty. I had two children. This day week I had two children, a son and a daughter. Now I have none. They did not die, but they ran away. The boy went first, then the girl. I may never see ’em again.”

“May be you worn’t a werry good father to ’em,” said Meg. “May be Jesus let ’em run away so as to show yer how to be a better father to ’em. There is some as beats their children, and some as neglec’s ’em. I dunno wot is best. May be Jesus seen as you neglec’ed yer little children.”

Warden felt the lines tightening round his mouth at these words. It was broad daylight, it was true, and Meg was only a poor, ragged child, but her face was so solemn, and her big eyes shone with so intense a light, and she was so absolutely fearless before him, that he felt impressed, even just a trifle afraid—something as he would have felt had he been looking at an accusing angel.

“You may have neglec’ed yer little children,” she repeated.

When she did so, Warden nodded his head.

“It is true,” he said. “It is very true, God forgive me; but I never meant it. I fear I was a very hard man.”

“Then you jest tell Jesus that,” said Meg, rising. “You tell Him as you believes in Him, as you loves Him, as yer real sorry you spoke so dreffle bitter. It wor awful the way as you did speak; but wot’s so wonderful beautiful in Him is how He furgives. You tell Him as yer determined to neglec’ yer children never no more, and I’m sure as He’ll let yer have ’m back again.”

“Little girl,” said Warden, “tell me the truth as you profess to love God. Do you know anything, anything at all, of my little son, my little, lost son, Roy?”

“No,” answered Meg. “I wishes as I did, I don’t know nothink; but I means to pray to Jesus, and Jesus ull help me to find him. I feel as he’ll be found, fur Jesus do love him so werry much.”

Meg went away, and Warden, unlocking the door, saw her ragged figure disappearing down the stairs. He sighed when he saw the last of her. Then, relocking his door, he returned to his seat by the table. As he seated himself he remembered that he had neither asked her name nor where she lived. It would be impossible, then, for him if he wanted her again to find her.

He sat on perfectly motionless, recalling every word of the strange and passionate scene just enacted before him. At last his thoughts centred round one sentence, which began to burn into his heart like fire.

“May be Jesus seen as you neglec’ed yer little children.”

He thought and thought, and more and more intolerable each moment became his feelings. At last he found that there was only one position in which he could bear them. He slid down from the chair to his knees. There he remained for some hours.

Chapter Thirteen.

That very same Sunday evening, while Warden remained upon his knees, and the Recording Angel, looking down at him, could declare for the first time, “Behold, he prayeth,” Hannah Searles was very miserable. There was no longer any doubt, even to so untrained and ignorant a woman as she was, that little Roy was very ill. During the greater part of the past week he had been taking more or less of the fatal drops. A few in the day, more at night, had Hannah given him. They always seemed to her inexperience to have a most beneficial effect on him. His fretfulness ceased, his blue eyes closed, and he slept; but though sleep was always supposed to be so very good for children, Hannah could never discover that little Roy awoke refreshed or the better for his sleep. More fretful each time was the little voice, more dull and clouded the eyes. On Sunday he absolutely refused all food; but he was already intelligent enough to see that the bottle which held the drops gave him present relief, and he pointed to it and asked for more repeatedly. On Sunday, however, Hannah only gave him one small dose, for even to her obtuse mind the thought had occurred that it might not be doing him so much good as she had hoped.

After this dose he lay in her arms for long hours in heavy slumber. It was a foggy day, and very little light came into the cellar; but what fitful rays did penetrate the gloom fell upon a very white and sunken little face. Yes; there was no doubt at last, no doubt at all, that Roy looked as bad as Davie had looked; nay, more, that he looked worse than Davie had ever looked, except— Oh! good God! was Roy going to die too? Hannah felt herself trembling all over as this thought occurred to her. Was she a second time to lose her all; was a second time her one heart’s treasure to be torn from her arms and from her love?

“And I promised God as I’d try hard to be good ef He’d leave me this yere young ’un as I found lost in the street,” she said. In her sore despair she felt angry against God. What right had He not to take her at her word, and allow her to be good in her own way? It had never yet entered into her poor, untaught mind that in keeping little Roy she was keeping what was not her own. The other folks to whom God had first entrusted him had been careless of so great and precious a trust, so he had been sent to her. She regarded him as absolutely her own, and no idea of returning him to his people entered once into her head. Of course they might by great cleverness trace him until they found him, and then they would tear him from her arms; but never, until this happened, would she relinquish him. What! never! ah! she was not so sure of that. Some one else, even before his own people, might come to take little Roy away—some one who once already had visited this cellar. Before his call there was no resistance possible. With one magic touch, this great, awful, and mysterious some one would close the blue eyes and still the baby heart and—yes—yes—yes—break her heart for ever. A few big, heavy tears fell from her eyes at the terrible thought, but she wiped them away, dreading to disturb the sleeping child.

It was evening when little Roy awoke, and Hannah perceived with fresh terror that there was another change in him. He looked at her without a shade or gleam of recognition; he no longer called her red face pretty; he screamed at the sight of it, and cried often and wildly for Faith, who Hannah hoped he had forgotten.

“Fate, Fate, come to ’Oy. ’Oy want ’oo vevy much, vevy much.”

Hannah was at her wit’s end. She no longer feared discovery. She laid the child on the bed, and, pulling out the box which was hidden underneath, she took out again his little blue frock, his pretty shoes, and white pinafore. These she dressed him in, and he was pleased for the minute, and stroked the white pinafore, and called it “Pitty, pitty.”

There came a knock at the door as she fastened the button into the last little shoe.

“Dat’s Fate knocking,” said little Roy, raising his eyes solemnly to her face.

Hannah felt it might be, but she had become indifferent. She got up, and, with the child in her arms, went to open the door. It was not Faith, however, but the woman from over the way—the woman from whom she had received the drops.

“I can’t stay a minute, neighbour,” she said; “but I thought it but right to tell yer as them drops they ha’ done fur my babby—least way I’m feared as they ha’ done fur her. She wor tuk wid convulsions last evening, and when the doctor come he said it wor the drops. He smelled to ’em and tasted ’em, and he said as there wor poison in ’em; and he threw ’em, bottle and h’all, out of winder. He said as it wor well the ’ooman as sold ’em had made off to ’Mericy, fur she had done wot might transport her. He may save my babby, but he ain’t sure. I jest come h’over to ask yer to go and tell the other mother.”

“This yere’s the other mother, and this yere’s the child,” said Hannah, pushing Roy forward where what light there was might fall upon his white face. “So you ere the one as ha’ killed my lad. Ay, but I’ll be even wid yer, see ef I ain’t.”

“I meant no harm indeed, neighbour. I did it fur the best,” said the poor woman, shrinking from Hannah’s wild and angry eyes. “I’m main sorry fur yer. I never guessed as you had a child of yer h’own. I thought you had only that wee Davie wot died last spring. But, howsomedever, that ere young ’un don’t look so bad as mine. Take him to a doctor at once. I’m real, real sorry as I did him an injury.”

“Wot doctor?” said Hannah eagerly. “I’ll furgive yer, neighbour, ef yer’ll help me to save him. Wot’s the name o’ the doctor?”

“The doctor wot is saving mine is called Slade, he lives in Tummill Street, half a mile away; go to him at once, he may be to home now.”

The woman went away, and Hannah lost not an instant in acting on the advice given to her. She wrapped her old shawl round little Roy, and forgetting even to close her cellar door, went out. The fog was less thick, and the gas made the place far brighter than it had been by day. Hannah walked briskly, for little Roy had laid his heavy head on her shoulder, and he felt cold in her arms. But she walked with hope going before and by her side. If the neighbour’s baby, who was so much worse than Roy, might yet recover, why surely he might. Her heart danced at the thought. Yes, God was not going to snatch this second treasure away. How very good she would be in future for such a loving mercy as this! She reached the doctor’s door, saw the name on the plate, and pulled the bell. In a moment a little maid opened it. But alas! the doctor was not at home, he was out at church, and so was the missis; he would be back in about an hour; would the woman call again in an hour? Hannah’s heart sank within her; the night had turned very chilly, and little Roy, sleeping heavily in her arms, seemed to grow colder and colder; dare she keep him in the winter streets for a whole hour?

“Look yere, my lass,” she said suddenly, “ef I may come in and rest anywhere in the house wid this little sickly young ’un, I don’t mind how long it be. He’s werry sick I’m feared, and I’m main terrified to have him out in this east wind. May we wait inside, my little maid?”

The little servant-girl had to refuse, however, though she did so with tears in her eyes. She was left in sole charge of the house. It was more than her place was worth to let any one in while master and missis were at church!

Hannah did not abuse her, but she turned away, with a feeling as though her feet were weighted with lead. What should she do with little Roy? she dare not keep him for a whole hour in the cold, cold street. Ah! there was one refuge, and it was close—a public-house shed its cheerful light upon the scene. There, in a place so warm and snug both she and the child might wait in shelter, in warmth and safety, and she had sixpence in her pocket, and she might spend twopence in gin. If little Roy were spared to her she meant never to drink again, but to-night she must have one little dram, for her heart was very low.

Chapter Fourteen.

Meg, after her interview with Warden, went straight bade to what home she possessed. Her violent anger, her passion of tears, had left behind them a kind of calm—nay more, a very deep calm; it was as though a thundercloud had rolled across a very blue sky, leaving it when past bluer and brighter than before. Meg, though tired in body and a little faint, for she had eaten no food that day, felt as though she was being carried home in the arms of Jesus. She looked up at the sky and behind all its London gloom and fog she seemed to see the smile of Jesus shining through directly upon her. She ran down the ladder to her cellar with almost gay steps, and she found Faith there, still very depressed and miserable. She told her of her interview with her father, by no means relating the whole scene, but simply that part which concerned little Roy. Faith listened and shook her head more dismally than ever.

“I seen mother in a dream last night,” she said; “she come close to me and axed me what I had done wid Roy. I ought never to have left my little Roy wot mother give me to mind when she was dying; it’s all my fault as little Roy is lost.”

“Why that’s som’ut like wot yer father said,” answered Meg. “He said as he wor a hard man, and it wor his fault. It seems to me that wot you ought both to do is to get down on yer bended knees and pray most bitter hard to Jesus to furgive yer; when He ha’ furgiven yer He’ll let you have little Roy back again.”

Faith stared very hard at Meg but made no reply, and Meg having devoured a small piece of dry crust, which remained over from the little which she had put carefully by for Faith to eat while she was out, lay down on the bed and dropped asleep. She awoke in the dusk of the evening to find Faith kneeling by her bed. Faith had lit a little bit of fire, and its cheerful rays revealed a change in her thin face, her eyes had lost their hardness and were full of tears.

“Meg, Meg!” she said, “near h’all the time you ha’ bin asleep I ha’ bin praying, and I think, I do think as Jesus has quite forgiven me.”

“Ah! ’tis jest wonderful how willin’ He is to forgive,” said Meg, “and wot cuts me h’up so is when folks know that, why they’re allus a fretting of Him.”

“Well, I’ll try not to fret Him no more,” said Faith.

“Faith,” said Meg lying still, and gazing hard at Faith out of her big black eyes, “how long ’ud you say as gals like me, under-fed, under-clothed gals, ’ud be like to live?”

“I dunno,” answered Faith in some surprise; “I suppose same as other folks.”

“No they don’t though,” replied Meg; “it comforts me a deal to think on it, fur they most sartin don’t. Ef they’re wot’s called lucky and don’t catch no ’fection, and don’t meet no h’accident, why then they may pull through; they lives then to be werry, werry skinny and ugly. Ugh! I shivers when I sees ’em; I says to myself, that’s me when I’m old. But, Faith, the chances ere h’all agen gals like me living to be old; let the least bit o’ ’fection come to a gal like me, or the werry smallest h’accident, so as I’d have ter be tuk to ’orspital, and then where am I? why, no where. You never, never seen a gal like me come h’out of ’orspital, Faithy.”

“But, Meg,” said little Faith, “why do you say it comforts you to think that?”

“Well, and so it do! Why, Faith, I’m no use down yere; no one wants me, and I h’an’t never a chance as far as this world goes, besides, besides,” and here Meg pressed her hand upon her beating heart, “besides, I ha’ a real hankering to see Him. Oh! to see wid my h’own, h’own eyes the lovely, lovely face o’ Jesus! and then perhaps arter a time He’d take a bit o’ notice of me and say, ‘Is that you, Meg? I know as you love me, Meg.’”

Faith was silent, too puzzled, too unlike Meg in her own frame of mind to make any reply, and after a time the two little girls went out. As they went down the street which led from the court to the more open thoroughfares, Meg said something which comforted her little companion greatly.

“I think, Faith,” she said, “as we’ll werry, werry soon now see little Roy; I think may be as we’ll find him to-night.”

“Oh Meg! oh! where?” asked Faith.

“I dunno, only I feel it. Jest you wait and see.”

As Meg said this the little girls turned a corner and came full upon the flaring light of one of the largest gin-palaces in the neighbourhood.

“Let’s cross over to it,” said Meg. “I allus do hanker fur light. Let’s get inter the brightness of it.”

She took Faith’s hand as she spoke and ran across, hastening her steps, for the sound of wheels approaching rapidly were heard.

At this very instant, just as the little girls set their feet on the opposite pavement, a woman carrying a child in her arms came out of the public-house; she walked unsteadily, and unheeding, probably not hearing, the rapidly approaching carriage-wheels, stepped into the street. As she did so her ragged shawl was caught by the wind and flung aside, revealing to view a little child’s blue frock, and showing for an instant a golden head pressed heavily on her bosom. Faith saw nothing, but Meg did. The woman was Hannah Searles; the child, little lost Roy—she recognised him by his blue frock and golden head. She uttered a joyful cry, and was about to touch Faith, when the sound on her lips was changed to a scream of horror. The carriage and prancing horses were on the woman, who was too tipsy either to see them or to save herself. In an instant she and little Roy must have been killed. Quick, quicker than thought brave Meg rushed to the rescue. She flew in the faces of the excited horses and caught their reins. They swerved in their course, swerved sufficiently to enable woman and child to pass by unhurt, but they knocked Meg down and the carriage-wheels went over her.

Many hours later on the same Sunday evening a group of persons were gathered round one of the white and narrow beds in a large London hospital. On this bed lay a bruised and dying girl. The girl was Meg; the people who stood so close were Roy’s father, holding Roy in his arms, Faith, and Hannah Searles. Faith and Hannah were sobbing, but Warden, with dry eyes, knelt close, and when Meg at last opened her eyes he placed the baby hand of his little son in hers.

“Meg—dear, dear, brave Meg,” said Warden, “let me thank you. You have saved the little chap’s life. Oh, Meg, if for no other deed of mercy, I must all the rest of my life believe in the Lord Jesus Christ.”

It was a public confession, wrung from a proud and hard man in the moment of his deep humiliation and thankfulness, and doubtless the angels in heaven recording it rejoiced. But the earthly ears for whom it was meant were deaf. Never again would Meg hear human voice of either love or kindness; there was no place for Meg down here, she was going to a place prepared for her long ago in heaven. Her eyes travelled past those who surrounded her, and fixed themselves joyfully on a Presence unseen to any but her dying eyes.

“’Tis you, Lord Jesus Christ,” she said, “’tis you. You ha’ come your werry own self. I ain’t to live to be old, I ain’t to be ragged nor hungry no more. You—ha’—come.”

She tried to stretch out her arms, but they fell to her side, the breath ceased, and Meg was in Paradise.

After all, brave Meg was the only one to die. For long before the daisies came into blossom on her grave in the country cemetery to which Warden had her carried, the roses had come back to the bonnie cheeks of sweet baby Roy, and the health and brightness to his eyes. He had been rescued in time to save his little life. In that re-united home a new order of things was established. Faith and Roy had never to complain of a cold or hard father again. The great tribulation of those terrible eight days had done their work on the man’s heart, and the death of Meg seemed to set the seal to it. Warden told Meg that he believed in Jesus Christ our Lord. It is enough to say of his future life, that he acted as only a man could act who carried that belief to its logical conclusion, and who very humbly and very prayerfully followed in the steps of the Master whom he loved. Faith and Roy were to grow up knowing the meaning of true fatherhood, both human and divine. And Hannah! God was very gracious to poor lost Hannah Searles. He gave her treasure back to his own, but He did not take him quite away from her. She still saw her baby boy, and as she grew steadier and more respectable day by day, and week by week, Warden gradually gave her more to do in his house, until finally she almost lived there.

“I said to the Lord that I’d be good ef He spared me the child,” she was often heard to say, “and I’m a trying. I’m a rare and wicked woman, God h’Almighty knows that werry, werry well, but I’m a trying hard to be good.”

The End.

|

Prologue

| |

Chapter 1

| |

Chapter 2

| |

Chapter 3

| |

Chapter 4

| |

Chapter 5

| |

Chapter 6

| |

Chapter 7

| |

Chapter 8

| |

Chapter 9

| |

Chapter 10

| |

Chapter 11

| |

Chapter 12

| |

Chapter 13

| |

Chapter 14

|