But he saw not the Nemesis that was following his footsteps, born of a base action he had committed without ruth or remorse. He thought it was dead and buried, and that a woman he had wronged--not the only one--was happily lost to him, if not to the world. Neither did he bestow a thought upon Robert Grantham, nor upon the double deceit he had practiced upon husband and wife. In fancied security he paced a secluded path, meditating upon the new lie which would bring Mrs. Grantham to her knees, for the sake of the child she loved so well.
[CHAPTER XI.]
Little Prue.
Who Roxy was, what was his occupation, and whether he lived in a bygone age or was living at the present day, are matters which are not pertinent to our story, the course of which brings us, in a remote and indirect manner, to the knowledge that such a being once existed, or exists now. That he was responsible for the miserable dozen tenements known as "Roxy's Rents" may be accepted, as may be also the undoubted reason for his giving them the eccentric name they bore; the rents of the hovels he erected being lawfully his, if he could find tenants to occupy them.
A stranger to the wretched ways of life of thousands upon thousands of poor people in such a city as London might reasonably have doubted the wisdom of spending money in the erection of such hovels; but Roxy knew what he was about when he went into the speculation. A comprehensive knowledge of humanity's outcasts had taught him that the more dismal and wretched the habitations, the more likely it was that there would be numerous applicants for the shelter they afforded; and his wisdom was proved by the result, not a room in Roxy's Rents ever being empty longer than a day or two. The narrow blind alley lined by the hovels, half a dozen on each side, may be found to-day in all its desolation or wretchedness in the south of London, by any person with a leaning to such explorations. It is well known to the police, who seldom have occasion to go there, because, strangely enough, it is chiefly tenanted by people who work hard for a living, often without obtaining it.
Roxy himself, or his agent, who collects the rents regularly every Saturday night from eight o'clock till past midnight, is very particular in his choice of tenants, which he is able to be by reason of the delectable tenements being in demand. There are numbers of landlords in more favored localities who would like to stand in Roxy's shoes in this respect. The alley is some eight feet wide, and its one architectural embellishment is a kind of hood at its entrance, the only use of which is to deepen its darkness by day and night. There is no public lamp in Roxy's Rents, nor near it in the street, very little wider than the alley, in which it forms a slit; therefore the darkness is very decided in its character on foggy days and moonless nights. This has never been a subject of complaint on the part of the residents or the parish authorities--officers who, as a rule, have an objection to stir up muddy waters: by which inaction they show their respect for an ancient proverb, the vulgar version of which is, "Let sleeping dogs lie." To one of the hovels in Roxy's Rents the course of our story takes us.
The room is on the ground floor, the time is night, the persons in it are a woman and her child. The woman's name is Flower; the name of her child, a girl of eight or nine, is Prue, generally called "Little Prue." The apartment is used for every kind of living purpose--working, cooking, eating, and sleeping, It is furnished with an ordinary stove, one bed on the floor in a corner (a bedstead being a luxury beyond the means of the family), two wooden chairs, a child's low chair, the seat of which once was cane but now is hollow, a deal table, a few kitchen utensils, and very little else. On the mantelshelf are two or three cracked cups and saucers, a penny, and a much-faded photograph of two young women, with, their arms round each other's waists. There is a family likeness in their faces, and one bears a faint resemblance to Mrs. Flower. The paper on the walls hangs loose, and the walls themselves reek with moisture; the plaster on the ceiling has dropped in places, and bare rafters are visible. Not a palatial abode, but the Flowers have lived there for years, and it forms their Home--a mocking parody on a time-honored song. Mrs. Flower is standing at the table, ironing clothes. She takes in washing when she can get it to do, having but few garments of her own to wash.
Mrs. Flower was working with a will, putting her whole soul into the iron. The apartment was chiefly in shadow, the only light being that from one tallow dip, twelve to the pound. The candle was on the table, being necessary for the woman's work, and its rays did not reach Little Prue, who sat in the low hollow-seated chair by the bed. Mrs. Flower enlivened her toil by singing, or rather humming with bated breath, a most lugubrious air for which she was famous in her maiden days, but then it used to be given forth with more spirit than she put into it now. Occasionally she turned to her child, who was sitting quite still with her eyes closed. There was a faint sickly smell of scorching in the room, proceeding from a wisp of carpet on the floor before the fire, upon which Mrs. Flower tested her hot irons. It had served this purpose so long that it was scorched almost to tinder. Presently the woman broke off in her melancholy singing, and called softly:
"Prue!" No answer coming, she called again, "Prue!"
"Yes, mother," said the child, opening her eyes. Her voice was weak, as might have been expected from a child with a face so pale and limbs so thin.