Volume Three—Chapter Sixteen.
Worn Out.
A heavy step upon the stairs, a heavy knock upon the door, and a heavy-eyed, heavy-countenanced man asking for Septimus Hardon.
“And he wants you, too, Miss,” said the man. “O dear, O dear! he was the only friend I ever had, and he came back the night afore last, after you’d been to ask for him. Not seen him, we hadn’t, for long enough; and then to come back like this!” and the great fellow sat down unasked upon a chair, and sobbed like a child.
“He wants to see you, sir,” he said again, “and we’ve done all we could,” he cried pitifully; “but you see he’s old, sir, and there ain’t nothing of him as’ll hold together, and he knows it, sir; and he only laughed and said, he says, ‘Ikey, old man,’ he says, ‘it must be all new stuff,’ he says, ‘for the stitches won’t hold no longer;’ and he was the only friend I ever had. ‘Go and tell them,’ he says, ‘as old Matt’s taken his last copy, and would like to see ’em afore he takes the wages he’s earned.’ You’ll come and see him, won’t you, sir? though it’s no sort of a place to come to; and the missus is breaking her heart about him.”
Half-an-hour after, Septimus Hardon and Lucy were in Lower Series-place, where, in the dingy back-room, close to the waste-paper, lay poor old Matt, with Mrs Gross upon her knees beside his bed, crying bitterly, as the poor old man lay calm and apparently sleeping; but he started when Lucy knelt down and took his hand, to let a tear-fall upon it.
“God bless you!” he whispered earnestly, as his dim eyes recognised the face bending over him. “Come like an angel to a dying man. God bless you, sir, I’m glad you’ve come; I was in mortal fear that you would be too late. Tell her—but no, I will.—Mother Slagg, you and Ikey go for a bit, please.”
The weeping woman put her apron to her eyes, and went out with her husband. It was a heavy afternoon, and the fog was settling down fast over the City. The light struggled feebly through the window, half-covered as it was with boots; but the great landlord returned directly with a thick, strong-smelling candle, stuck upon a block of wood between three nails.
As soon as the door was once more closed—a rare position for it, and one which it resented for some time, until Ikey had poked the corners clean with an awl, and oiled the lock—old Matt said huskily:
“Put your hand, sir, under my pillow. That’s it, that there little Bible. Know it, sir?” he said, for Septimus Hardon had changed colour, and his hands were trembling. “That took me a long time to get, sir,” and then he slowly and painfully told what he said he would have spared Miss Lucy if he could, but it was not to be; how he had seen Agnes Hardon lying dead, she whom he knew now to have been Agnes Hardon; how he had attended the inquest, and then tried to get a Bible that had been there mentioned, seeking for it day after day, night after night, ready to drop always, but feeling that he should succeed in spite of all. He searched the streets, he said, but all in vain; and at last he began to fear that the poor girl to whom Agnes gave the Bible had emulated her fate, when he recalled the address of the juryman, found to his delight she had been there, and through the stranger’s influence obtained the prize he sought.
“And now,” said Matt, “I’m happy. I can feel, sir, that I’ve done one little bit of good in my life, and I can go easy. Now, sir that book.”
Septimus, wondering and surprised, turned from Matt to Lucy, sobbing and horror-stricken at the old man’s recital, for much of what he heard now had yet to be explained to him; but the old man was intent upon the little Bible, one that Septimus remembered to have seen at home in his father’s desk.
“Now!” exclaimed the old man, with hands trembling, and eyes appealing, lest his hearers should lose anything of what he disclosed; “now look, look, look!” he cried, “I fastened it down again, as it was before. A knife, quick! Now look here,” he said huskily, and he tried to insert the blade of the penknife given to him beneath the fly-leaf, groaning bitterly at his inability, when, with hands trembling nearly as much, Septimus took Bible and knife, loosened the paper round, and laid it open, when the first thing that met his eyes, in his father’s clear handwriting, was the date of the marriage, and eighteen months after appeared the entry of his birth, while upon the opposite side, in a delicate woman’s hand, were the words—
“Agnes Hardon.
The gift of Uncle Octavius.”
“There, there, there, sir! That’s it, isn’t it, sir?” cried the old man excitedly. “I wouldn’t rest till I’d got it, and ’twas hard work, for the poor girl clung to it as the gift of someone she loved; but the more she hung back, the more I was set upon having it. I knew enough of binding to see that the end-leaf was gummed down, and under that leaf I knew there was what I wanted. Here; breath!” he gasped; “open the window.”
Septimus Hardon sat gazing dreamily at the entry in his hand; it was indisputable, though he could hardly believe in its truth, while the few words he heard coming from the weeping girl seemed only to add to the confused state of his mind; but it appeared to him now that the old man’s condition was the first thing to consider, and placing the book in his pocket, he begged that he might try and have him removed to his own lodgings.
“No,” said Matt feebly, “no; I won’t leave here, for somehow these people love me after their way, and I seem to think that the end should be much what the life has been; and as to doctor, sir, why I’ve got one here,” he said, gazing fondly up in Lucy’s weeping face, “and if she’ll stop here, and let me hold her hand, God bless her! I can go easy, for it will seem to keep ill away. No other doctor’s any use, sir. I’m worn out, sir, worn out!”
But Septimus would not be satisfied, and leaving Lucy by the old man’s side, he fetched assistance to his old friend.
“No hope at all?” he said, as the doctor and he walked together afterwards through the dingy shop.
“Not the slightest,” said the surgeon once more, as he stood upon the doorstep. “He has never thoroughly recovered from the effects of the operations he suffered, and besides, it’s the old tale with the poor fellow—sorrow, misery, starvation, on the one hand; dissipation, drink, late hours on the other. The poor old fellow speaks the truth; he is worn out.”
Night came, and Lucy and Septimus still waited by the old man’s dying bed. He had slept for some little time, during which interval Lucy had replied to her stepfather’s many queries—replied as she thought of the despair that must have prompted the awful plunge into futurity. Then the old man woke, and talked eagerly for awhile of the future prospects of the family. But soon a change came over his face, his head tossed wearily from side to side of his dirty pillow, while often he would raise it and stare wildly from face to face, but recognising none, sink back again with a pitiful moan.
“Lost life, lost life! Worn out, worn out!” he kept on muttering as he tossed restlessly from side to side, frequently starting and looking round as if not knowing where he was. Then he seemed to sleep peacefully for awhile, to open his eyes once more, and smile feebly at his visitors, beckoning them to come nearer.
“God bless you both!” he muttered; “it’s all over.”
Septimus half-rose and would have fetched the doctor again, but Matt whispered “No.”
“Don’t go,” he said. “He can do no good now, nor anyone else; I’m past all that. It’s been coming for days past, and I’ve fought it out; kept on till my work was done. I’ve never been much good, sir; but now I’m worn out. P’r’aps I might have been different, if I’d had other chances; but I was always weak, sir; weak.”
He paused again; and Lucy’s sobs were the only sounds that broke the silence.
“Ah!” said Matt again, feebly; “I’ve justified many a line, sir; line by line—‘line upon line,’ don’t it say somewhere? but I can’t justify myself. Dropping out of the old forme, sir; fast—fast now. But there, sir, hold up; for I’m happy enough. You did me a good turn once, and I’ve tried to pay it back; and since I’ve known you, and you’ve been ready to be my friends, I’ve seemed to get proud, and wouldn’t do anything that should disgrace Miss Lucy here. But I began too late, and I never deserved such friends as I’ve found; for I’ve been a poor, weak, helpless drinking old galley-slave. But there, sir,” he said with a smile, “my case is foul; the sorts are out; and I’m putting away my stick for good.”
“May I fetch Mr Sterne?” whispered Septimus.
“No, no, no,” said the old man wearily; “we were never friends; and I can’t play the hypocrite, sir. It’s too late, sir; too late! What I’ve done, I’ve done. Let me die in peace, here, with your loving faces by me; and fetch poor old Ike in, by and by, for he loves me in his way. No, sir; it would be the act of a hypocrite, I fancy, for me to send for a clergyman now. No, Mr Hardon, sir; stay with me to the last; and let me hold tightly by this little white hand, and I can go from you hopeful and in peace. For if the great God who sent me here, struggling on through a life of care, has made hearts so gentle, and true, and loving, that they can weep and sorrow over my poor old battered case, can’t I hope that He who knows all, and has seen all my helpless weakness, will be merciful? I know, sir, I know. I might have done better: but it’s been a life of drive and struggle—money to-day, starve to-morrow, and drink always, to hold up and do the work. I’m sorry, sir, sorry; but the sorrow came too late. I’ve had a hard life, sir; the wish for better things came too late, when I was worn, and shattered, and used up; when the day was too far spent, sir; and now the night’s coming on faster and faster. Hold my hands tight,” he whispered, “for it’s growing dark and darker; and I’m losing my way.”
And now once more there was a long silence, when the old man looked eagerly round.
“What time is it?” he asked; and Septimus told him, then, turning towards Lucy, the old man whispered—
“Put your hand to my lips, that I may kiss it once before I go;” but she leaned over and tenderly kissed him, when he smiled, and some words passed, but they were too faint to be heard. Then he was restless for a while; but soon started again, to stare wildly round. “What’s that?” he asked.
“Nothing but the wind moaning round the houses,” whispered Lucy.
“No,” he said with a smile, “nothing but the wind—nothing but the wind waiting to scatter the dust.”
And now he lay so still and peaceful, that, in answer to Lucy’s inquiring look, Septimus bent over him again and again; but as he looked in that sorrow-ploughed face he could see that the old man still slept, while, with the light strong upon her face as she knelt, Lucy seemed no mean representative of the angel watching by the old man’s side.
“An angel, sir, an angel, sir!” he had mattered again; and then he seemed to doze off, muttering the words to himself.
“Worn out!” said Septimus Hardon, as he listened time after time to the faintly-borne chimes of Saint Clement’s; and then he thought of the present revelation, which seemed almost dearly bought in the old man’s death; of the past; the office in Carey-street, and its sorrows; the bitter struggle for mere life; the lodging in Bennett’s-rents; and the shabby old compositor in his frayed suit, pinching himself that he might supply their wants; the watchful care and jealousy with which he had tended Lucy to and from the warehouse; the secret they had shared, and the old man’s chivalrous endurance in tracing out the information; spite of all blurs or blots upon his character, ever the same tender, true-hearted man, devoted to his friends’ interests, and ready with his offering, even though it were humble as the cup of cold water that should not be without its reward; and now worn out—the poor old setting battered and worthless, but the heart true and bright to the last.
The quarters chimed again. Isaac had been to set up a fresh candle, and then retired to his weeping partner; while, now seated upon an old work-bench, Septimus Hardon still let his thoughts wander, pausing long upon the poverty of the crowded streets of the great City; the prosperity crushing down the misery; the swiftly-hurrying stream of life, and the striving of the throng to keep afloat, as others pressed upon them, climbed upon their shoulders, or, in the madness of despair, clung to their legs and dragged them down to the muddy ooze at the bottom. He thought too once more of his own misery, and that of this waif, after its long encounter with the storms of life, cast up torn, weary, and breathless upon the shore.
Mournfully moaned the wind down the court and at the back of the house, making cowls creak and spin, and rattling worn old windows; for it was no bright starry night, the clouds gathered black overhead, and sent down a pitiless rain to empty the streets, and be caught by the wind and dashed against the panes. By the feeble light in the front shop, Isaac could be seen with his head against the wall sleeping heavily; and, worn out with watching, his wife had returned to the next house. Now faintly heard in the lulls of the wind came the striking of Saint Clement’s clock and its laboured chiming, which sounded wild and strange upon the night air.
Suddenly Lucy and her stepfather started, for the old man was sitting up in bed with one hand raised as if to command silence, and loud, clear, and strange, his voice seemed to thrill through the silence as the tones of the bells came louder upon the wind.
“Hush!” cried the old man, “the bells! I set it once, and I’ve never forgotten it— ‘Ring out the false, ring in the true’—never forgotten it,” he muttered, as he sank heavily back and spoke in a whisper—“‘Ring out the false, ring in the true.’ Hands—hands—once again; they’re ringing out a false and coward heart, and ringing in the true.” Then he began to mutter from time to time words connected with his trade—wild incoherent words, but strangely fitted to his past life and present state; while at times he spoke with such wild bitterness that his hearers shuddered, and Isaac came trembling in, leading with him Mr Sterne, anxious at their protracted absence.
And so an hour passed, when the dying man had been for some time silent, but another kneeling figure had offered a prayer at the bedside; then once more the old man began to mutter, at first in a low tone, then slowly and aloud.
“Gold, sir, cold; bitter cold for an old man like me—dreary streets, sir, and the lamps out—dark, dark—the dull courts and the foggy alleys—misery—beggary—starvation. Bright fields—light and darkness. No hypocrite, sir—humbly, with an angel’s kiss upon my old lips—a seal—purity. Hark! Copy and proof—copy and proof—blurred and blotted—foul—foul—spelling—outs and doubles—corrections—too late—too late. Wages on Friday night, air; wages, sir—wages of sin—wages—death—death—poor girl!—Bleeping—found drowned—the Bible—Agnes Hardon—wages—wages—darker and darker—but no hypocrite, sir—with an angel’s kiss—an angel’s—forgive—forgive—for ever and ever—and ev—”
Silence in the room, and the watchers stealing away.