Speaking in a large printing-office, amongst twenty or thirty men, there was soon a market for the jumping frog; and then the old man drew out a scrap of something soft and flabby, and held it up.
“You wouldn’t tell what that is in a hurry,” said Matt. “All to encourage industry, you know; that’s a big indy-rubber balloon, that is, only I couldn’t pocket it, so I made it collapse first; so that’s no good to nobody—pitch it away. Here we have—ah, this is an out-and-out toy, this is, only I’ve broke the stick, and it wants a bit of glue—who’ll have a climbing monkey?”
And so the old man would pull out perhaps twenty toys, balls, dolls, gelatine cards, to the infinite amusement of his companions, who laughed on, but without discomposing Matt in the least, who practised his humble philanthropy as long as he had money, and often, in consequence, went without a meal; for saving was an utter impossibility with the old man—a feat, he said, he had often tried to accomplish; but how, he said, could a man keep money in his pocket when he saw others wanting? “It is done,” said Matt; “but old as I am, I can’t quite see it.”
But there had been no toy distributions lately, for old Matt had found times very hard, and even if they had been better, there would have been no more such amusements for the denizens of the offices he worked at, for there was another way for Matt’s philanthropical purchases to go, namely, to Carey-street, to Septimus Hardon’s little boy, for whose special benefit the old man had made several purchases on credit, which was freely accorded by those to whom he was known; but as to work at Septimus Hardon’s printing-office, there was none for him, further than that of disposing of type and materials at one or another of the brokers’, which duties he performed without recompense, grumbling sorely the while at the wretched sums he obtained for the goods.
“You ought to find fault then, sir,” he would say to Septimus; “I can’t help it; but I’m ashamed, that I am, to think that people will give such a beggarly price. It grieves me, sir, to see the stuff go like that.”
But Septimus did not find fault, only smiled feebly; for in this time of his sore distress he had so aged, and grown so helpless and wanting in reliance, that he trusted to the old compositor in almost everything.
“Might rob him right and left, sir,” said old Matt to a favourite lamp-post in Carey-street. “He’s no business up here at all. I could quarrel with him sometimes for being so simple, if it wasn’t that he’s such a thorough good sort at bottom. What’s to become of them when the things are all gone, goodness knows; for he’ll never do what I’ve done, sir—lived two days upon a large dose of sleep, a penn’orth of snuff, and three back numbers of the London Journal.”
For troubles now came thickly crowding on Septimus Hardon’s horizon. His wife’s health failed fast, and the means were wanting to procure her the necessary comforts. But there is always light behind the darkest cloud; and now it was that Lucy, young in years, but a woman in self-reliance, proved a stay to the family. Ever busily plying her needle, ever cheerful, she was a ray of sunshine in their sad home, shedding her brightness in the darkest hours. And though Septimus Hardon querulously complained of his standing so friendless in the world, there was another who watched anxiously the failing fortunes of the family, and was always ready with counsel and aid—the Reverend Arthur Sterne, who became more constant in his visits as the affairs of Septimus grew darker. Old Matt and he, too, often met, but somehow not without feelings of distrust on either side—distrust perhaps excusable on the side of the clergyman; for the ways of Matthew Space shed no softening lustre upon his outer man.
One day old Matt went into Carey-street to find the broker in possession; for Septimus was far behind with his heavy rent, and the landlord was alarmed at seeing his tenant’s worldly possessions shrinking at so rapid a rate; while, when the old man made his way into the sitting-room, he found weary-looking Septimus waiting with aching heart for a reply to the appealing letter he had sent to his father.
Old Matt went again, day after day, asking himself how he could be such an old idiot as to care for other people’s affairs to the neglect of his own; but there was always the same weary shake of the head, and the same answer—“No letter, Matt.”