There was something so truly comic in the expression of the knight’s countenance, as he said this, that even the saturnine Mr. Parsons could not help laughing.
“If the born devils don’t sing your praises through the country, sir,” said he, as soon as he had recovered his gravity, “why we must find some other way to go to work with them.”
“Now then be off, Parsons, and contrive some clever scheme or Other to throw the unhappy family into a quandary.”
“I understand, sir,” said Parsons, nodding his head, and so parted the master and the man.
CHAPTER IV.
A LITTLE COTTAGE GOSSIP — A VISIT OF CHARITY — PRACTICAL BENEVOLENCE.
THE promptitude of the measures taken by Mr. Joseph Parsons, to bring to effect the wishes of his master, showed him to be deserving the post of confidence he held, as principal superintendent of Sir Matthew Dowling’s factory. He lost not a moment in obtaining a short interview with one of the parish-officers, who was his particular friend, and then made his way to Hoxley-lane, with the intention of questioning the widowed mother of the two Armstrongs, as to the situation of her affairs, and the particular species of misery from which she might, at that precise moment, be suffering the most.
The statement pronounced in Sir Matthew’s kitchen respecting the general eligibility of Hoxley-lane as a place of residence, was perfectly correct. It was the most deplorable hole in the parish — a narrow, deep-rutted parish-road (too hopelessly bad to be indicted), led from the turnpike down a steep hill to the town of Ashleigh. Exactly at the bottom of the hill, just at the point where every summer storm and winter torrent deposited their gatherings, there to remain and be absorbed as they might, began a long, closely-packed double row of miserable dwellings, crowded to excess by the population drawn together by the neighbouring factories. There was a squalid, untrimmed look about them all, that spoke fully as much of want of care, as of want of cash in the unthrifty tribe who dwelt there. It was like the moral delinquencies of a corporate body, of which no man is ashamed, because no man can be pointed at as the guilty ONE. It was not the business of No. I to look after the filth accumulated in front of No. 2; and the inhabitants of No. 3, saw no use in mending the gate that swung on one hinge, because No. 4 had no gate at all; and the dogs and the pigs who made good their entry there, of course found their way easy enough through the make-believe hedge, which throughout the row divided one tenement from another. The very vilest rags were hanging before most of the doors, as demonstration that washing of garments was occasionally resorted to within. Crawling infants, half-starved cats, mangy curs, and fowls that looked as if each particular feather had been used as a scavenger’s broom, shared the dust and the sunshine between them, while an odour, which seemed compounded of a multitude of villanous smells, all reeking together into one, floated over them, driving the pure untainted air of heaven aloft, far beyond the reach of any human lungs abiding in Hoxley-lane.
“Where does widow Armstrong live?” demanded Mr. Parsons of a woman who was whipping a child for tumbling in the dunghill before No. 5.
“In the back kitchen of No. 12, please your honour,” replied the woman, making a low reverence to the well-known superintendent.
“No. 12! — why that’s Sykes’s tenement — and they’re on the ground-floor themselves.”
“Yes, please your honour; but since the rents have been raised by Sir Matthew, the Sykes’s have been obliged to let off the back-kitchen, and live in the front one.”
“Why there’s a matter of a dozen of ’em, isn’t there?”
“Yes, your honour, they lies terrible close.”
“Obstinate dolt-heads! — That’s just because they pretend to fancy that it is not good for the small children to work — I know, for certain, that they have got two above five years, that they won’t send to the factory; and then they have the outdaciousness to complain that the rents are raised — as if because they are above choosing to earn money in an honest way, Sir Matthew was not to make what he could of his own. ’Tis disgusting to see such airs, where people ought to be thankful and happy to get work.”
“That’s quite true, no doubt, sir,” answered the woman, continuing to shake, and occasionally to slap the grub of a child she had taken off the dunghill. “But Robert Sykes’s children are very weakly; and them as your honour talks of, is almost too small — though ’tisn’t to be doubted that it is the bounden duty of us all to send ’em, sooner than see ’em starve.”
“I fancy so, indeed,” replied Mr. Parsons; adding, with a finger pointed at the squalling child, who still continued under the cleansing process above described, “And isn’t it a comfort now, Mrs. Miller, to get rid of the plague of ’em?”
The woman ceased to shake her little boy, and looking for a moment at the clear blue eyes that, notwithstanding her rough discipline, were very lovingly turned up to her face — something like a shudder passed over her.
“Get along in with you, Bill,” said she, as if afraid that the blighting glance of the superintendent should rest upon him; and then added, “as long as they be so very small, your honour, they can’t do no good if they be sent.”
“Stuff and nonsense! there’s ways to teach ’em. But don’t fancy that I want you to send your brats — confound ’em! They’re the greatest plagues in natur; and nothing on God’s earth but good-heartedness and love of his country would ever make Sir Matthew, for one, trouble himself or his men with any of the creturs. — No. 12, is it, where I shall find the widow Armstrong?”
“Yes, please your honour — you’ll be sure to find her. She’s a cripple pour soul, and can’t stir.”
“She’s made up her mind to go into the workhouse, hasn’t she?” demanded the manager.
“Have she indeed poor thing?” responded the woman, in an accent of compassion.
“I heard so, as I come along, and that’s the reason I’m going to her. Our good Sir Matthew, who to be sure is the kindest-hearted man in the whole world, has taken a fancy to her boy, and he’ll be a father to him, I’ll be bound to say he will; and that’s why I think he’d like me to give her a call, just to tell her not to fret herself about the workhouse. If she don’t like going there, she needn’t, I dare say, with such a good friend as she’s got.”
The woman stared at him with an air of such genuine astonishment, that the superintendent felt disconcerted, and turning abruptly away, continued his progress down the lane.
By the time he had reached No. 12, however, he had begun to doubt whether his sudden appearance at the bedside of the widow Armstrong might not produce an effect unfavourable to the object he had in view.
“As sure as steam’s steam,” thought he, “she’ll be more inclined to fancy that I am come scolding about the boys for something, than to take her part, or do her pleasure; so I’ll just say a civil word to the Sykeses, and then stroll away on, till such time as the parish officers have been after her. I’ll engage for it, that Sam Butchel won’t let no grass grow under his feet after what I said to him; and if I turn in when he’s there, as if to see what was going on, it would certainly be more natural-like, and believable.”
In accordance with this improved projet de charité, Mr. Joseph Parsons walked on; but he had not proceeded far ere, on turning his head round to reconnoitre, he perceived, not the tall and burly Sam Butchel, the overseer of the parish, but the lean and lathy person of little Michael, advancing with an eager and rapid step towards his mother’s dwelling.
“Soh!” ejaculated the sagacious Parsons, “here comes the charity job! It would be worth a week’s wages to hear him tell his own story.”
Mr. Joseph Parsons had a Napoleon-like promptitude of action, which the unlearned operatives described by calling him “a word-and-a-blow man,” but which in reality often deserved the higher epithet above bestowed.
Scarcely had the thought of overhearing little Michael’s tale suggested itself, ere a sidelong movement ensconced him for a moment behind a favouring pig-sty, fro
m whence, unseen, he watched the boy enter the door of No. 12.
Again Napoleon-like, he remembered all he had heard from her neighbour, concerning the position of the widow’s dwelling-place; and rightly judging that Sykes’s back-kitchen must, in some way or other, be in a condition to favour the emission of sound, he troubled not the household by making his approaches through the principal entrance, but striding over the inefficient fence of the tiny cabbage-plot behind, obtained a station as favourable to his purpose, as he could possibly desire. This was a nook between a protuberance intended for an oven, and the window close beside, the widow Armstrong’s bed, from whence prophetic fate, favouring the yet latent purpose of the manager, had caused three panes to be extracted by a volley of pebbles, intended for mother Sykes’s cat, at least two months before.
To this safe and commodious crouching-place, he made his way just in time to hear the widow say, “Understand one word of Edward’s story, Mike; so sit down dear boy, and tell me all.”
“Why mother, ’tis like a story-book — and it’s very fine to be sure — but yet—” And the boy stopped short.
“But yet you don’t like it, Mike?” rejoined his mother. “That’s what you was going to say. Tell the truth, my child, and don’t go to keep nothing from me.”
“That was it,” said Mike.
“Ungrateful viper!” muttered the confidential superintendent between his closed teeth.
“Poor fellow! poor dear Michael!” exclaimed the woman, soothingly. “It was hard to go to sleep without kissing mother, wasn’t it?”
“Yes, I didn’t like that — nor I didn’t like being without Teddy neither — and I didn’t like the grumpy old lady as comed into the kitchen, and abused me; nor the gentlemen servants either, except the gardener, and he took hold of my hand, and led me along kind enough — and I like Molly too, that’s she as give me my supper and my bed, and my breakfast this morning, mother. Oh, mother! how I did long to bring away some of the milk and bread and butter home with me!”
“Never think of such a thing, for your life, boy!” exclaimed the mother eagerly. “It would be thieving, nothing else, Michael — nothing more nor less than thieving — never mention that again to me, dear, that’s a darling.”
“I won’t, mother; but I know I shall think of it every time I see them big pounds of butter, and jugs of milk, and minds how careful you be over your little scrimped bit in the broken saucer, and how you drinks your drop of tea without ever having any milk at all.”
“Never you mind that, darling. But what are they going to do with you, Mike? And what for do they want to have you up at the great house. ’Tis a mystery to me, and thankful as we ought to be for any help, I can’t say but I should be easier in my mind, if I understood something about it.”
“Impertinent hag!” growled the surly Parsons from his lair. “Does she think they are going to trap him like a rabbit, for the sake of his skin?”
“But, mother, I don’t understand any thing about it myself,” said Michael, rather dolefully.
To this avowal, no reply was made for some minutes; upon which the superintendent grew impatient, and stretching forward his neck a little, contrived athwart the sheltering branches of an elder-bush, to peep through the broken window.
To the agent of Sir Matthew Dowling’s benevolence the sight that presented itself was really revolting; though there may be others who would have been affected differently by it. Michael had flung himself across the bed; his arms were thrown round his mother, who was sitting upright with some piece of needlework in her hands, and his dark curls set off in strong contrast the extreme paleness of the face that looked down upon him. The widow Armstrong was still rather a young woman, and would still have been a very lovely one, had not sickness and poor living sharpened the delicate features, and destroyed the oval outline that nature had made perfect. Yet she had quite enough of beauty left to detain the eye; and such a history of patient suffering might be read in every line of her speaking countenance, that few ever looked upon her harshly. Spite of her extreme poverty too, she was clean — her cap was clean, the bedclothes were clean, and the pale hands too, looked so very white, that if Mr. Parsons from his hiding-place had ventured to speak any opinion concerning her, he would certainly have given utterance to a strong expression of indignation, at the abominable air of delicacy which her appearance displayed.
She looked as if she were struggling with some painful feeling, but did not weep, though her boy did, heartily.
For a little while she suffered his tears to flow without interruption or reproof, and then she kissed him once, twice, thrice.
“There now, Michael,” she said, looking at him fondly; “have you not played baby long enough? Stand up, darling, and listen to me. You don’t seem over-glad, Mike, of this great change, and if you did, perhaps I might have been over-sorry; but sorrow would be sin for either of us, when God has sent us help. ’Tis you that be the heartiest Mike, and ’tis you that want food the most, growing at the rate you do, and heart-sore have I been at mealtimes to see you so stinted. So never let us trouble ourselves any more about the reasons for your getting so into favour, but just thank God, and be contented.”
“But mother! How will you get on without me?” replied Michael, shaking his head; “I am sure that Teddy can’t make your bed as I do — he hasn’t the strength in his arms. And (who’s to fetch water? ‘Deed and ‘deed mother, you’d better thank Sir Matthew, and say no, unless he’ll just please to let Teddy go instead.”
“That won’t do my dear child, in any way. Tis I must watch poor Edward. Little as I can do for him, I don’t think he’d like to part from me, as long as God is pleased to let me stay.”
“That’s true mother — that’s very true! Teddy would break his heart. No, no, ’tisn’t he shall be parted from you; I’ll show him how to make the bed, if I can’t come over myself; but perhaps they’ll let me, mother?”
“What’s the business that you’ll have to do, Michael?” inquired the widow.
“I haven’t been told of any business yet,” replied the boy.
“But you don’t expect that you’re going to be kept for nothing, dear?” said the mother, smiling.
“’Tisn’t for my work, mother; ’tis for the cow,” replied Michael, gravely.
“The cow, child? What is it you and Teddy have got into your heads about a cow? A poor starved beast, he says it was, that wouldn’t have frightened a mouse, and you made it turn round, Mike — that’s all I can make out. But he must be mistaken surely. What was it you did about the cow, darling?”
At this question, the boy burst into a hearty fit of laughter, which to say truth, offended the listening ears of Mr. Joseph Parsons, still more than his weeping had done.
“I’ll do his business for him, he may depend upon it,” thought he. “If master must have a charity job, he must; but it don’t follow that the cretur shan’t be made to know himself just as well as if he was in the factory. I’ll be your overlooker yet, master Mike.” Just as this prophetic sketching of the future had made itself distinctly visible to his mind’s eye, the bodily senses of the agent announced to him that the tranquil tête-à-tête within the widow’s chamber was disturbed by the entrance of persons, whose voice and step announced that they were men. Mr. Parsons was at no loss to guess their errand. “Here they come!” muttered he. “Now we’ll see how Master Butchel manages his job.
“We be commed to see,” said a gruff voice within the widow’s chamber, “whether or no you be commed to your senses, Mrs. Armstrong.”
“Sir?” said the trembling woman in return.
“You knows well enough what I means, without my going into it again; you knows well enough as I comes to talk to ye about the house again. We’ve had Larkips the baker, coming to inquire if there’s parish pay to look to, for your bill, Mrs. Armstrong — and I have told him, NO, not a farthing, not the quarter of a farthing, unless you’ll come into the house. The parish have gone on allowing you two sh
illing a week, week after week, God knows how long— ’tis a perfect shame and imposition, and the board says they won’t do it no longer. You and the boys too may come in if you will, that’s one thing; but living here, cramming ’em with as much wheaten bread as they’ll eat without paying for it, is another, and it’s what no honest parish don’t tolerate I’ll be bound to say now, as you have brought up the scamps without their ever knowing the taste of gruel? Tell the truth, did you ever take the trouble to make a drop of gruel for ’em?”
“As long as I had my legs to stand upon, sir, I never minded trouble; and, when my husband was living, we did a deal better, and I have done cooking for ’em then, such as a few potatoes and a cabbage, may be, with a scrap of bacon on a Sunday; but, from the hour he died, we have never had a pot upon the fire.”
“That’s what ’tis to be so obstinate. If you’d come into the house you’d see the pot upon the fire all day long, a’most.”
“But the children would be in one room, after they came from the factory, and I should be in another,” pleaded the widow, “and I’ve got a few of the decent things as I married with, when I came from service, and it would be a grief to me to see ’em all sold.”
“If the parish don’t sell ’em, Larkins the baker will, you may take my word for that, Mrs. Armstrong,” replied the overseer. “However, ’tis your business, not mine. Here’s a decent, respectable man, as is ready to take all you’ve got at a valiation, fair and honourable, but that’s just as you please. I only called, as in duty bound, to tell ye that the parish don’t mean to continy no such extravagance as paying you two shilling a week, no longer.”
“God help me!” answered the widow gently. “If ’tis his will that so it should be, it would be a sin for me to complain.”
“That’s vastly fine, beant it?” said the brutal Butchel, “and now let’s hear what you’ll be after saying to Master Larkins, for here he comes, as sure as eggs be eggs.”
Collected Works of Frances Trollope Page 168