Chapter Nine.
The woman who had seen Roy in the public-house, and who had been attracted by his pretty face, bore him quickly in her arms down the street. He was quite contented in this queer resting-place, and being absolutely confident in his little mind that the woman was carrying him home to Faith, he laid his curly head on her shoulder and dropped asleep. When she saw that he was asleep, and not before, the woman paused to wrap her own dirty shawl a little over him. She did this partly to shelter him, and partly to consider. Did the police see such a woman as she was, with so well-dressed a child as Roy in her arms, they might stop to question her. She did not want them to do that; she had by no means made up her mind how to act by this poor lost baby, but she had no desire just then that the police should rob her of him. Hiding him very effectually with her shawl, she brought him home—to such a home as she called her own. It was a cellar in a miserable back court, an ill-smelling, ill-drained place. From such a cellar as Hannah Searles’s stalked many times in the year the gaunt and grim spectre of fever. It had one advantage, however, over many around it, she lived in it alone; no other living creature shared it with her. She stumbled down the ladder which led to it, drew across the trap-door, and laying Roy, who still slept soundly, on the bed, she prepared a small fire in the grate. When it was kindled, making a little light and cheerfulness in the gloomy place, she removed her bonnet, and going over to the bed knelt down by it; in this position her hungry eyes could gaze long on the sleeping child. Yes, he was very fair; she had never seen any creature half so beautiful since her own child died; nay, she had even to acknowledge to herself that her own child, though he had yellow hair and fair skin, and though he was in very truth bone of her bone and flesh of her flesh, yet even he was not so lovely as this child. Yet there was a likeness; the lips pouted with something the same pretty fulness, the little hands were folded in somewhat a similar attitude, the bright hair curled in much the same rings. Then kneeling there in the flickering twilight made by the fire, a strange fancy came over Hannah Searles; perhaps this was in very truth her own little child come back again. True, she had with her own hands closed the coffin on the sweet golden head, she had herself seen him laid in the grave, but perhaps God, seeing what a lost, abandoned woman she was without him, might have sent her baby back to her again. He had been a whole year in Heaven now. During that year, while she had been leading as bad a life as a woman could lead, he had been growing beautiful in the air of heaven, and now God had sent him back to save her. Where had that child come from who stood on the threshold of the dreadful public-house? Was it not more than probable that he was indeed an angel, that he was her own angel given back to her once more? The fancy was very sweet to her; but Roy opening his eyes at the moment dispelled it. Roy’s eyes were blue, her baby’s brown; but having for an instant thought him her very own child, she began from that instant to love him.
“’Oy want Fate,” said the little child, raising his head and gazing about him.
“Wot’s yer name, my little dear; wot they calls ye to home, I mean?” asked Hannah.—Hannah with all her roughness had a soft voice, it attracted the child to her, he sat up on the dirty bed, regarded her with decided favour, and replied in a contented voice:
“Fate calls! ’Oy.”
“And I’d like to say Davie to yer, dear little man. May I call yer by the real beautiful name o’ Davie? I ’ad a Davie of my h’own once.”
“A Davie of ’oor own,” repeated little Roy, and now he came close and stroked the rough, red cheek.
“I’ll get yer some supper, my sweet little darlin’; you set still on the side o’ the pretty bed, and I’ll get a nice supper ready in a jiffy.”
The woman had no candle, but she heaped on coals with a lavish hand, and prepared a mess of bread and milk. Little Roy was very hungry; he found no fault with the tin mug, nor with the pewter spoon. He thought the woman’s rough red face rather nice, and her soft tones fell warm on his baby heart. The dreadful cellar, too, with the flickering firelight making fantastic shadows on its dirty, wet walls, became as a palace in his little mind; he clapped his dimpled hands and said, “Pitty, pitty.” He ceased to ask for Faith, and even twice before he had again dropped asleep, he had answered to the name of Davie.
That night Hannah Searles slept again with a child clasped to her bosom. Her sleep was very sweet to her, but the morning brought fresh cares. She had now quite resolved to keep little Roy. He was not her child, she knew that, but he had been sent to her. She shut her eyes resolutely to the fact of some other woman’s broken heart for the loss of him. No, if he had a mother living she must be strangely careless to allow so great a treasure to go away from her, and to be found in a public-house. But Hannah guessed that little Roy’s mother was dead. If she was alive he would have spoken of his mammie, but no, he only mentioned some mysterious fate: she was his real fate—she would be a mother to him, and make up to him by her love for the loss of his own.
But though his mother might be dead, yet Hannah knew that so nicely dressed a child must have relations who would miss him and take means to have him returned to them. They would put up rewards; the police would get directions to search for the child. She must therefore on no account put his nice, dainty clothes on him, she must fold them up and put them carefully out of sight. Another woman would have pawned the little things, but Hannah did not care to make money by this child who had come in the place of her own. She put the dainty blue frock, the white pinafore, the little shoes and socks, into a box which was well hidden away under the bed; then while Roy still slept she slipped out, and purchased at a pawnbroker’s for a shilling, a set of little garments such as her own child, were he alive, would wear.
When Roy awoke she dressed him in the dingy and ragged clothes. He did not like them and cried a little for his own “pitty fock,” and spoke again in a complaining voice of Faith. But Hannah drew out of her pocket a small many-coloured ball, and for the sake of the ball he forgave her the ragged and ugly garments; he chased the ball into all the dark corners of the dingy cellar, and his gay laugh filled Hannah’s heart with rejoicing.
That day the woman and child spent at home. She was very happy with Roy, but she was puzzled how to act; she dared not leave him alone at home, she dared not confide her secret to the neighbours, still less did she dare to take him with her into the streets, for by this time surely his description would be printed up by the police courts, and no rags could dim the beauty of his lovely little face. But for to-day she had money enough, so she spent her time cleaning the cellar and making it a more fit habitation for the young king who had made it his home.