The Life of Thomas Wanless, Peasant

by A. J. Wilson

Thomas Wanless, however, was not a man to abandon himself long to useless grief. The more keen the pain the more certain was his nature to rise and fight for deliverance, and before long he had made up his mind that, while he had life, his child should not be abandoned. Cost what it would, he must follow her to that dreadful city whose horrors darkened his imagination. The lost one should be found, and, if God would but help him, saved. So he resolved, although as yet he knew not how his resolution could be carried out.

For a day or two he brooded over it, afraid almost to tell his wife. The fear was weak. No sooner did Mrs. Wanless know what her husband meant to do than she became almost cheerful, and brought her ready wit to bear on all possible plans for enabling him to go. Full of a true woman's self-sacrificing spirit, she at first proposed to go out charring, and so make a living, but the child made that impossible. The utmost she could do was to continue to take in washing, and even that would be a severe strain upon her, with a babe to tend. At best, too, it would afford her only a precarious living, and nothing possible could be left to help her husband in London.

Unable to decide on ways and means, but yet determined to carry out their one great plan, they ended by casting their trust on Providence, leaving the future to take care of itself. As a first step, Thomas went to Stratford, and withdrew the few pounds left in the bank there,—some £10 or £12. That done, he next went to consult his daughter Jane, as to what help she could give. Jane had little, and was saving that little to get married and to emigrate; but when the whole matter was laid before her, she, too, fell in with her father's plans, and offered him her money.

"No, no, I cannot take that," he answered. "I hope to get work in London, and cash enough to keep soul and body together. I only ask you to help your mother with it, should she be in need—to help her all you can, in fact."

Jane promised all the more cheerfully, perhaps, that her little all was not immediately to be taken from her to help in this hunt after Sarah.

Mrs. Wanless also wanted her husband to write to Tom, telling him the circumstances, and asking for help, but to this he would in nowise consent.

"Tom," he said, "needs all his money just now, and what he sends must come of his own goodwill. Besides we shall get Sally back again, and then the best thing will be to send her out to Tom. She wouldn't go if she thought Tom knew what had befallen her. Jacob does not yet know, Jane will keep silence, and there is no need for Tom to be enlightened."

This reasoning was unanswerable, and Mrs. Wanless had to acquiesce with what heart she could. Nay, more than that, sore against her will, she had to submit to see her husband start for London with only £5 in his pocket. The rest he insisted leaving with her, on the same grounds as he had refused Jane's savings. "I shall get work, my dear," he said; "never mind me," and she had to yield.

Possibly Thomas would have been less confident had he known what going to London, and work in London, meant; but in spite of his dread of the great city, his conceptions were so hazy, that in his heart, as he afterwards confessed, he never contemplated needing to work there at all. He hoped to find Sarah in a day or two, or at most within a week, and once found, was sure that she would come home. His wife, it turned out, formed a truer conception of the task before him, although she had never seen a bigger town than Leamington or Warwick. But her fears did not abate her husband's confidence. Without fixing dates, he told his master and all whom it concerned, that he expected to be back soon. Struck, perhaps, by the generous purpose of the man, Thomas's master thrust a couple of sovereigns into his hand as they parted, but Thomas would not accept them. In spite of all the farmer could say, Thomas stoutly maintained that he had enough. "My own means are sufficient," he said.

"Your own means sufficient," laughed the shrewd Scot. "Well, I like that! Man, how much hae ye got?"