CHAPTER III.
A FELLOW-SUFFERER.
One night, a few minutes after nine, Douglas was returning home along one of the badly-lit little thoroughfares in the Borough, when he saw the figure of a woman slowly subside on to the pavement in front of him. She did not fall; she trembled on to her knees as it were, and then lay prone—near a doorstep. Well, he had grown familiar with the sights of London streets; but even if the woman were drunk, as he imagined, he would lift her up, until some policeman came along.
He went forward. It was not a woman, but a young girl of about seventeen or so, who did not seem a drunken person.
'My lass, what is the matter with ye?' he said, kneeling down to get hold of her.
'Oh, I am so ill—I am so ill!' the girl moaned, apparently to herself.
He tried to raise her. She was quite white, and almost insensible. Then she seemed to come to; she struggled up a bit, and sought to support herself by the handle of the door.
'I shall be all right,' she gasped. 'I am quite well. Don't tell them. I am quite well—it was my knees that gave way——'
'Where do ye live, my lass?' said he, taking hold of her arm to support her; for he thought she was going to sink to the ground again.
'Number twelve.'
'In this street?'
She did not answer,
'Come, I will help ye home, then.'
'No, no!' she said, in the same gasping way; 'I will sit down here a few minutes. I shall be all right. I—I am quite well——'
'Ye are not going to sit down on a doorstep on a night like this,' he said, severely. 'Come, pull yourself together, my lass. If it is number twelve, you have only a few yards.'
He half-dragged and half-carried her along. He knocked loudly at the door. There came to it a tall, black-a-vised woman, who, the moment she saw the girl, cried out—
'Oh, Mary Ann, are you took bad again?'
'No—don't tell them,' the girl said, as she staggered into the narrow passage. 'They'll turn me off. They said so the last time. I shall be all right. But my head—is so bad.'
They got her into the dingy little parlour, and laid her down on the horse-hair covered couch. Her hand was clasped to her head, and her whole frame was shivering violently, as if with cold.
John Douglas, living that recluse life up there in the north, had never before had to deal directly with sickness, and he was terribly anxious and alarmed. What was he to do? His first wild notion, observing the violent shivering, was to order hot whisky-and-water; then he thought it would be better to send for a doctor. But the tall, dark woman did not seem inclined to go or send for any doctor. She stood regarding the girl quite apathetically.
'Poor Mary Anne!' she said, watching her, as if she were a dog in a fit. 'She wasn't took as bad as this before. She's been starving herself, she has, to keep her mother and her young sisters; and she can't stand all day in the shop as she used to. I've seen it a-coming on.'
'God bless me, woman,' said Douglas, angrily, 'we must do something instead of standing and looking at the poor lass. Cannot you tell me where the nearest doctor is? Has one been attending her?'
'Poor Mary Ann,' the woman said, composedly; 'she'll come out of it; but it's worse this time. A doctor? She couldn't afford to have a doctor, she couldn't. A doctor would be bringing physic; she can't pay for physic, she can't. She owes me three weeks' rent, and I ain't ast for it once, not once. Thirteen hours a day standing behind a counter is too much for a slip of a girl like that. Poor Mary Anne! Is your head bad, my dear?'
Douglas made use of a phrase which is not to be found anywhere in the writings of Marcus Aurelius, and hurriedly left the house. He made for the nearest chemist's shop, and asked the youth there where he should find a doctor. The youth glanced towards the back room, and said Dr. Sweeney was at hand. Dr. Sweeney was summoned, and appeared: a hard-headed-looking youngish man, whom Douglas immediately bore away with him.
The young Irish doctor did not seem much concerned when he saw his patient. He seemed to be familiar with such cases. He said the girl must be put to bed at once. She was merely suffering from a feverish attack, on a system weakened by exhaustion and fatigue. Then he began to question the landlady.
The usual story. Girl in a draper's shop; mother and sisters in the country; sends them most of her earnings; probably does not take enough food; long hours; constant standing; drinking tea to stave off hunger; and so forth. Douglas listened in silence.
'And when she recovers from this attack, slight or severe,' he said at length, 'what would restore that young lass to a proper state of health?—can ye say that, doctor?'
'I can say it easily,' said the young Irishman, with a sarcastic smile. 'I can prescribe the remedies; and there are plenty of such cases; unfortunately the patients are not in a position to follow my prescriptions. I should prescribe good food, and fewer hours of work, and an occasional week in the country air. It is easy to talk of such things.'
'Ay, that is so,' said Douglas, absently.
He went home. He took from his pocket the biscuit, wrapped in a bit of newspaper, that he had meant for his supper; but he put it on the top of a little chest of drawers, thinking it would do for his breakfast in the morning, and he would save so much. Then he went to the little stock of money in his locked-up bag, and found there eight shillings and sixpence. He took seven shillings of it, and went out again into the cold night, and walked along to the house where the sick girl was.
'Mistress,' he said to the landlady, in his slow, staid way, 'I have brought ye a little money that ye may buy any small things the lass may want; it is all I can spare the now; I will call in the morning and see how she is.'
'You needn't do that,' said the tall woman. 'Poor Mary Anne—she'll be at the shop.'
'She shall not be at the shop!' he said, with a frown. 'Are ye a mad woman? The girl is ill.'
'She'll have to be at the shop, or lose her place,' said the landlady, with composure. 'There's too many young girls after situations now-a-days, and they won't be bothered with weakly ones.'