CHAPTER XXVI.
MRS. GINNISS HAS A VISITOR.
HEAVILY went the days in the lowly home of Mrs. Ginniss and her son. Teddy sought early and late for employment, disdaining nothing, however humble, whereby he might earn a few cents, and working as diligently at street-sweeping, dust-gathering, errand-running, or horse-holding, as he had ever done in the way of gaining an education under the kind tuition of his late master.
Every night he brought home some small sum, and silently placed it in his mother's hand; nor, though she urged it, would he retain a penny for himself, or indulge in any of the small luxuries he had in former days enjoyed so much.
"Go buy a wather-million, honey, or get an ice-crame; sure it's nothin' at all ye're atin'," the fond mother would say: but Teddy always shook his head, or, if the matter were urged, took his cap and went out, always with the weary step that had become habitual to him, and returned no more until bedtime.
"It's frettin' himsilf to his grave the crather is," said poor Mrs. Ginniss, and tried in many a motherly way to make home pleasant to her boy, and to re-awaken the ambition that seemed quite dead in his heart. No more reading aloud now, of which he had been so fond; no more recitals of interesting or humorous scenes in office or street; no more wise opinions upon public events: all the boy's boyish conceit and self-esteem, germs in a strong character of worthy self— respect, seemed crushed out of him. Patient, humble, silent, one could hardly recognize in this Teddy Ginniss that other Teddy, whose cheery voice, frequent laugh, positive opinions and wishes, and good-humored self-satisfaction, had been the leading features of his modest home.
Poor Mrs. Ginniss longed to be contradicted or instructed or laughed at once more, and fought against her son's submissive respect as another mother might have done against disobedience or insolence.
"Can't ye be mad nor yet be merry at nothin', Teddy?" asked she impatiently one day.
"I'm thinking I'll never be merry again, mother," said Teddy sadly, as he left the room.
It was in the afternoon of the same day, that Mrs. Ginniss, sitting at her sewing in melancholy mood enough, heard a little tap at her door, and, opening it, found upon the threshold a lady, elegant in her simple dress of gray, who asked,—
"Are you Mrs. Ginniss?"
"Yes, ma'am; I'm that same," said the laundress, staring strangely at the lovely face framed in a shower of feathery golden ringlets, and lighted by large violet eyes as sad as they were sweet.
"Will ye be plazed to walk in, ma'am?" continued she. "It's but a poor place for the likes uv yees."
The lady made no reply, but, gliding into the room, stood for a moment looking about it, and then turning to the Irish woman, who still regarded her in the same awestruck manner, said piteously,—
"I am her mother!"
"Sure an' I knowed it the minute I sot eyes on ye; for it's the same swate face, an' eyes that's worse nor cryin, ye've got; an' the same way of a born lady, so quite an' so grand. Och! it wor a purty darlint, it wor; an' it's me own heart that's sore for her the day, forbye your'n that's her borned mother; and, if it wor my own life that 'ud fetch her back to yees"—
But here the long breath on which Mrs. Ginniss had started came to an end, and with it the impulse of consolation and self-defence that had so far sustained her; and with a wild cry of "Wurra, wurra! och the black day that's in it!" she sank upon a chair, and buried her head in her apron, sobbing loudly.
The visitor, hardly regarding her, still stood in the centre of the little room, her sad eyes wandering over its humble furniture and adornments as if each one were a relic.
"Are there some little things of hers, clothes or playthings or books,—any thing she touched or loved?" asked she presently in a hushed voice.
Mrs. Ginniss, still crying, rose, and opened a drawer in the pine bureau, which, with a looking-glass and some vases of blue china upon it, stood as the ornamental piece of furniture of the place.
"Here they bees, ivery one uv 'em, and poor enough for her, an' yit the bist we could git," said she.
More as a bird, long restrained and suddenly set free, would dart toward the tree where nest and young awaited it, than in the ordinary mode of human movement, the mother, so long hungering for smallest tidings of her child, darted upon this sudden mine of wealth, and, bending low, seemed to caress each object with her eyes before touching it. Then tearing off her gloves, she laid her white fingers softly upon the coarse garments, the broken toys, the few worn books, and bits of paper covered with pencil-marks, the strip of gay patchwork with the needle still sticking in it, and the little brass thimble upon it.
At one end of the drawer stood a little pair of slippers, with some slightly soiled white stockings rolled up and laid within them. At sight of these, a low cry-it might have been of pain, it might have been of joy-crept from between the pale lips of the mother; and, reverently lifting the little shoes, she kissed them again and again, in an eager, longing fashion, as one might kiss the lips of a dying child whom human love may yet recall to human life.
"Thim's the little shlippers that Teddy saved his bit uv spinding-money till he could buy for her, bekase he said the fut uv her wor too purty to put in sich sthrong shoe's as I'd got; and thin it was mesilf that saved the white little shtockings out uv me tay an' sugar; an' it's like a little fairy (save me for spakin' the word) that she lucked in 'em."
Pressing the little shoes close to her bosom with both hands, the mother turned those mournful eyes upon the speaker, listening to every word, and, at the end, said eagerly,—
"Tell me some more! Tell me every thing she said and did! Oh! was she happy?"
The word had grown so strange upon her lips and in her heart, that, as she said it, all the tense chords, so long attuned to grief, thrilled with a sharp discord; and, turning yet paler than before, she sank upon a chair, and, leaning her forehead on the edge of the open drawer, wept such tears as, pray God, happy mothers, you and I may never weep.
"O my baby, my baby! O my little child!" moaned she again and again, until the tender heart of the Irish woman could endure no longer; and, coming to the side of her guest, she knelt beside her, and put her arms about the slender figure that shook with every sob, and drew the bright head to rest upon her own shoulder.
"O ye poor darlint! ye poor, young crather, that's got the black sorrer atin' inter yer heart, all the same as if ye wor owld an' mane an' oogly, like mesilf!-it's none but Him aboov as kin comfort yees. Blissid Vargin, as was a moother yersilf, an' knowed a moother's pains an' a moother's love, an' all the ins an' outs uv a moother's heart, luck down on this young moother an' help her, an' spake to thim as can help her betther nor yees, an' give back her child; bekase ye mind the time yer own Howly Child wor lost, an' ye sought him sorrerin'; an' ye mind the joy an' the comfort that wor in it whin he was foun'. Och Mother of Jasus! hear us this day, if niver again."
As the passionate prayer ended, the lady raised her head, and kissed the tear-stained cheek of the petitioner.
"Thank you," said she. "I know that you were good to her, and that she loved you; but, oh! did she forget me so soon?"
Alas poor human heart whose purest impulses are tinged with selfishness! You who have lost your nearest and dearest, can you say from your inmost soul that you would be content to know yourself and all of earth forgotten, or that it is sorrow to you to fancy that a lingering memory, a faint regret for the love you so lavished, stains the perfection of heavenly bliss?
Tact is not a matter of breeding; and Chesterfield or Machiavelli could have found no better answer than that of Mrs. Ginniss:—
"Sure, honey, it wor alluz she remembered yees, an' longed for yees; though the little crather wor that yoong, an' the faver had so poot her about, that she didn' know what it wor she wanted nor missed; but it wor 'mother' as wor writ in the blue eyes uv her as plain as prentin'."
"And was she very, very sick?" asked the sad voice again.
"The sickest crather that iver coom back from hivin's gate," replied the other; and then, seating herself beside her visitor, she began at the beginning, and gave a long detail of the circumstances attending Cherry's first appearance in the garret, and her subsequent illness and convalescence. Then came the story of her acquaintance with Giovanni; her passion for dancing and singing with him; and finally their flight, and the consternation and sorrow of her adopted mother.
Mrs. Legrange listened to every thing with the most profound attention, asking now and then a question, or uttering an exclamation; even smiling faintly at mention of the child's graceful dancing and sweet voice in singing.
"Yes, she had an extraordinary ear for music," murmured she; "and to think of her remembering being called Cerito!"
Nor did the mother fail to notice how the whole coarse fabric of the Irish woman's story was embroidered with a golden thread of love and admiration, and even reverence, for the exquisite little creature she had cherished and cared for so tenderly.
"Yes, you loved her; and I love you for it, and will always be your friend. But Teddy?" asked she at last; for Mrs. Ginniss, through the whole story, had carefully avoided all mention of her son, except in the most casual and general fashion. Now, however, she boldly answered,—
"An' its mesilf loved the purty crather well; but my love kim no nearer the love the b'y had for her than the light of a taller candle does to the sun in hiven. He loved her that sthrong, that it med him do a mane thing in kapin' her whin he knowed who she wor; but sure it's betther ter sin fer love than ter sin fer sin's sake."
Mrs. Legrange smiled sadly. To her it had seemed, from the first, small matter of surprise, however great of regret, that Teddy should have found 'Toinette's attractions irresistible; or that, having once appropriated her as his little sister, he should have found it almost impossible to relinquish her.
She had not, therefore, shared at all in the indignation of her cousin and husband toward the boy, and had even solicited the former to retain him in his employ. But Mr. Burroughs, kind, generous, and forbearing as he was, cherished implacable ideas of integrity and honor, and never forgave an offence against either, whether in friend or servant; so that his cousin had finally withdrawn her request, asking, instead, that he should conduct her to Mrs. Ginniss's dwelling, and leave the rest to her. This the young man had consented to do; and, as Mrs. Legrange would not allow him to wait for her, he had privately instructed James to do so, and had not left the outer door until he saw that faithful servitor upon guard.
Just what were her own intentions with regard to Teddy, or his mother, Mrs. Legrange did not herself know; and, once arrived in the room where 'Toinette had lived out the weary months since her loss, all other ideas had faded and disappeared before the memories there confronting her. Now, however, the sweet and generous nature of the woman re-asserted itself, and she kindly said,—
"Yes: I see how great Teddy's temptation was, and I cannot wonder that he yielded to it. Any one would have found it hard to part with 'Toinette; and he, poor boy! could not know how I was suffering. It would have been different if you had known who she was."
"Indade an' it would. One moother can fale fer another; but these childhren hasn't the sinse till they gits the sorrer. Small fear that Teddy'll iver go asthray agin from light-heartedness."
"Does he feel very sorry, then?" asked Mrs. Legrange timidly.
"Sorry isn't the word, ma'am. It's his own heart as he consumes day an' night," said Mrs. Ginniss gloomily.
"Because she is lost, or because he kept her in the first place?" asked the lady.
"It's hard tellin', an' he niver spakin' whin he can help it; but I belave it's all together. He wor sich a bowld b'y, an' so sthrong for risin' in the world; an' wor alluz sayin' as he'd be a gintleman afore he died, an' readin' his bit books and writins, an' tillin' me about the way the counthry wor goin'; an', right or wrong, it's he wor ready to guide the whole of 'em. An', sure, it wor wondherful to see the sinse that wor in him when he get spakin' of thim things; an' one day, whin I said to him,—
"'Sure, Teddy, an', if it's one or tither of 'em is Prisident, what differ'll it make to us?' An' he says, says he, 'Whist, moother! fer one day, mabbe, it's I'll be the Prisident mesilf; an' what way 'ud that be fer me moother to be talkin'?'
"But now it's no sich talk ye'll git out uv him, an' niver a laugh nor a joke, nor the bit bowld ways he used to have wid him. An' och, honey! if ye've lost yer purty darlint, it's I've lost me b'y that wor as mooch to me; an' it's I'm the heavy-hearted woman, this' day an' alluz."