Chapter XII · IN LONDON.

The space, the crowd and the bustle in and around the terminus of the Great Northern Railway, scared poor Mary, and literally took her breath away. Wearily, and with a haggard and almost despairing eye, the girl threw up her black veil and looked about her. The train had disgorged its hundreds on the spacious platform; all seemed to have some decided object or path to pursue—some home or hotel to go to; nearly all seemed to have friends to greet them, were able to select their own luggage, and depart on their way in confidence and security.

"Now then, young lady—move on, please," said a policeman, and she moved on accordingly, but mechanically and forgetting all about the little trunk which contained all her worldly goods, till she suddenly saw it on a barrow, with many others, when she claimed it, and was instantly surrounded by clamorous porters, and even cabmen seeking her as a fare, and using strange slang terms of which she was totally ignorant.

"Where was she to be driven to?" some one asked her.

She could not say, but stood helpless and burst into tears. At that moment the guard of the train by which she had travelled—a ruddy complexioned, brown-whiskered, and jolly looking man—remembered that she was the young lady to whom the showily-liveried footman had brought the bouquet and fruit at Willowdean. He came forward and, touching his cap, politely said—

"Can I do anything for you, ma'am—'seem a stranger in London—'been here before?"

"Never."

"Where do your friends live?"

"I have none in London."

"Then where would you like a cab to take you?" he continued.

"That I cannot tell you—I am so utterly a stranger."

The guard began to look puzzled, and a policeman who was standing by, and had hitherto been gazing stolidly over his glazed leather stock, now seemed to take an interest in the conversation and to look suspicious, while one or two men of shabby appearance whispered together and drew near, till his eye fell on them, and then they slunk away.

"Do you know Lady Wetherall's house in Piccadilly?" asked Mary, timidly.

"I knows Piccadilly pretty well, ma'am—but can't say as I knows Lady Wetherall. Are you going there?"

"To-morrow—meantime I must rest for to-day and to-night; I am quite exhausted."

After a pause, the guard said,

"I daresay my missus wouldn't object to taking you in for a night till you could look about you, and do it cheap too. She prefers Scotch folks—queer, but every one to their taste. If you choose to cab it, I'll go along with you myself."

"Is she your wife of whom you talk, my good man?" asked Mary, feeling the necessity of rousing herself to action, for the eyes of many loiterers were now upon her.

"Wife—no, my landlady—poor woman she has seen better days, has Mrs. Long Primer."

"Of course—who ever knowed a landlady that hadn't?" said the policeman, laughing.

"She's a respectable woman—a printer's widow, ma'am; and though her name be Long, she's little enough."

"Well, Tom," resumed the policeman, "I think you'd better take the young woman away with you; she may get into trouble else, being, I see, quite a stranger—a jolly green one sure as my name is Finnis."

This style of dialogue was Mary's first taste of a new kind of humiliation. The distribution of two or three three-penny pieces procured the cab, on the box of which her trunk was hoisted; she stepped in, and the guard, Tom Gubbs, in his railway livery, followed her. As they drove through the streets the double lines of vehicles of all kinds, laden carts, drays and waggons, the multitude of sounds that mingled and united into a species of dull roar; the vast and ceaseless human tide that surged along the pavements, at first appalled Mary, and then seemed to lull her senses into a kind of stupor, from which the voice of her new companion roused her at times, as he kindly named the thoroughfares through which they were passing, or drew her attention to some great church or other public edifice.

At last, after traversing what seemed to be an enormous wilderness of streets, the cab turned to the left from the crowded Strand, down a quiet and narrow alley, where all was still and nearly noiseless, and at the foot of which a glimpse could be had of the Thames, with its shipping, and the crowded steamers gliding past. And now the vehicle stopped at the green-painted door of a large house, where people were lodged on the various floors, according to what they could afford to pay. Then the guard, Mr. Tom Gubbs, after a chaffing wrangle with the cabby, who insisted that his fare should be five, instead of two shillings, informed her that this was "Norfolk Street, Strand."

To Mary's ear this conveyed no particular idea, but to her eye the houses looked gloomy, dingy, and strange, and she could not determine whether they had been built yesterday, or two hundred years ago; though with their quaintly corniced doors, old fashioned brass knockers, and general aspect, they looked like mansions at which Johnson and Garrick might have visited, near which Savage might have wandered in his hunger and misery, and where crown bowls of punch had been drunk over the defeat of "The Rebels" at Culloden, and the fall of Quebec,—for the quarter seemed decidedly London of the Hanoverian times.

Mary's introducteur, whose apartment was at the top of the house, vouched to the landlady for the respectability of her "new wisitor," whom he said "had come from Scotland by the night-train, and was going to Lady Wetherall's in Piccadilly—to service of some kind, as he thought—to-morrow; but that she wished a few hours' rest, being well nigh wore out."

Indeed Mary looked as if about to sink, and when Mrs. Long Primer, a plump and motherly looking little woman in a huge white cap, asked her "on which floor she wished an apartment," she replied that it was a matter of total indifference to her; so the landlady solved the difficulty by conducting her at once to a little room, one window of which faced the gloomy street; but the other afforded a narrow glimpse of the shining river with all its bustle.

A little breakfast was prepared for her, and now Mary with a swelling and thankful heart, shook hands with Gubbs the guard (who, on the morrow, she knew, would be speeding past the Lammermuirs, with the down train), and the worthy fellow blushed scarlet, for it had not been often his lot to have in his a hand so white and beautiful as that of Mary Lennox.

A reference to the London Directory assured Mrs. Primer that there was a Lady Wetherall in Piccadilly. The weight and appearance of Mary's trunk, as it stood in the passage, suggested respectability, and it was filled with genuine wearing apparel. Her courier bag too, with all its little appurtenances, seemed faultless. Mrs. Long Primer studied all these things acutely, for she had been deluded, "taken in," more than once during her career as a landlady; but in the course of conversation with Mary, she soon learned her circumstances, her object in coming to London, and all her wishes; and the good woman felt her mother's heart stirred within her, as she surveyed the sad, weary eyes, the pale little face and the black dress of a creature so young and attractive cast on the world alone; and more sadly perhaps would she have surveyed her, had she known how very few pounds the poor girl had in her pocket.

Unslept though she had been all the previous night, Mary felt unnaturally wakeful all day. The street was still and quiet, though close to the roar of the mighty Strand. No sound came to her ears there, save an occasional street cry, the paddling of a steamer shooting past with its human freight, or the bell of St. Clement's church, as the clock struck the slowly passing hours. She prayed in her heart and felt hopeful, for she had made her first essay in life and met with kindness.

She studied the advertisements in the Times, and the number of situations vacant filled her with wonder. Could people ever be found to supply them all! On the other hand, the number of applicants, their talents, qualifications, and recommendations rather scared her, and made her happy to rest all her hopes upon Lady Wetherall. Yet she could not resist turning again and again, nervously, to the monstrous lists in the Times.

There were, "Wanted, a young lady for a millinery department—salary for the first year 50l." "Wanted, a young person of strictly Christian principles, as governess to five little girls; solid English education, French, Italian, music, drawing, and the use of the globes necessary, salary 10l. per annum; and the share of a comfortable home." "Widow, wanted as housekeeper to a single gentleman, not over forty" (which was to be "not over forty," the advertisement did not say). "Wanted, a cook"—the cooks seemed decidedly to have the best of it, so far as salaries went; but Mary's heart sank as she read on, and then she cast the paper aside.

Quitting the rickety little calico-covered sofa, she frequently rose to look from the window into the street without. The architecture, material, and construction of the houses seemed novel to her eye, while the window panes being almost flush with the external walls, suggested alarming ideas of insecurity. The voices of the passers, and the names on the signboards, like the sound of the church bells, all spoke to her of being in a strange place, and of being utterly among strangers.

Slowly passed the day, and after she had been some hours alone, she began to feel forlorn and nervous.

Oh, the gloom of that London lodging-house—she should never, never forget it! Her liberty, her being so unheeded and uncared for, almost terrified her. There were none to greet her, and none whom she could greet. She felt as if her existence was already being ignored. To add to the gloom of her thoughts, she had read in that day's Times of two cases of death from starvation—death amid the wealth and luxury of London. And in one instance the victim had been a governess, a lady of many accomplishments, but out of employment. Starvation! the idea filled her with horror; but, with God's help, such could never be her fate, for was there not Lady Wetherall, whom Lady Wedderburn felt assured would refuse her nothing?

The very opening and shutting of the house door, and the rat-tat of its knocker, suggested the idea of temporary lodgings, and not of home. Home! alas, she had none now, though even the dog's kennel or the half-ruined stable at Lonewoodlee, would have seemed as such to her then. Never more—never more, should she feel the sublime sense of security afforded by home and a father's roof!

She felt somewhat relieved, however, when gossipy little Mrs. Primer came to ask her to "join her at tea, with a chop, quite cheery in her own back parlour." The kind woman had hot muffins, shrimps and watercresses—even a little flask of Old Tom—provided as a relish; and she was very anxious to hear all about Scotland (the late Mr. Long Primer's mother having been a native of that country), her ideas of which were decidedly cloudy, and somewhat pre-railway, being chiefly deduced from a cheap edition of Miss Porter's "Scottish Chiefs," and "Rob Roy," as she had seen it performed at the Lyceum or Surrey Theatre.

"And if Miss Lennox would like to go to the play to-night, or any night," she added, "they could get a pit order from the first floor front, Miss Madalena de Montmorencie, who was leading lady at one establishment, or her third floor back, Mr. Algernon Sidney Spangles, who was the light comedy gent at another; or to see funny little Mr. Robson in 'Jones the Awenger,' when one didn't know whether to laugh or cry. and so did both at once; or to see Mr. Harley, as—begging your pardon, Miss—was Bottom at the Princess's." But Mary nervously declined all these kind offers of patronage, urging that she was in deep mourning, and had been face to face with sorrow too recently.

Even amid her intended civility and benevolence, Mrs. Primer came out at times with little remarks that jarred on Mary's, perhaps, overwrought sensibility.

"I think, my dear," said she, as she slowly stirred her tea and balanced the spoon from time to time on the edge of her cup, "you said it was a situation as governess you were a-looking after?"

"Yes."

"Oh, I quite forgot to ask—have you got a character?"

"A what—Mrs. Primer?" asked Mary, with genuine surprise, while the other began to fidget and cool her tea in the saucer.

"Testimonial of any kind from your last place?"

"No, I have never been in a situation, and consequently never thought such things were necessary."

"No character—no testimonials—not even a line from the rector or parish clergyman?"

"I have nothing of the kind."

"Oh lor, oh lor, you are simple as a new-born babby! Why, child, you'll not get a place even as a lady's maid, without some such papers."

"I have a letter of introduction, such as one lady may give to another," replied Mary, coldly and proudly, yet feeling crushed in heart and broken in spirit, for that such things should be said to her, plainly showed already how poor and dependent her position in life was becoming.

And Mary—she who, in her pride of heart, had shrunk from kissing Lady Wedderburn, while under the roof of her dead father's house—now in the utter loneliness of that heart, kissed with real affection the cheek of the plain little Englishwoman, as she left her for the night; for she felt gratefully conscious that Mrs. Long Primer had been kind and good to her.

But the word "character" continued to rankle in her memory; and at times, especially in the darkness and silence of her bedroom that night, ere she slept, there crept into her soul an intense longing to be laid at rest by her father's side, where she might never—too probably should never—lie, in the Lennox aisle at Willowdean.