We are now in for a thoroughly comfortable and intimate conversation. The cat is fast asleep. The spinster's mantelpiece, which is decorated with pictorial advertisements of such highly inappropriate commodities as baby's food and tobacco, wears an aspect which I am content to regard as social. And the cupboard beside the fireplace, although the bottom floor is used as a coal-cellar, suggests, with its crowded shelves of dishes, egg-cups, plates, biscuit-boxes, and paper bags, that we are in for a little friendly banquet, which, if not good enough for his Grace of Canterbury, might yet have inspired him of Assisi to ask a blessing.
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"Well, you must know," says Miss Stipp, looking at the fire, and nodding her head as she speaks, "that I am one of ten, that I was born in Blackfriars—born in Blackfriars, I was—and that all the boys died, and that only me, who was born a cripple—born a cripple, I was—and my two sisters ever grew up to be a comfort to my poor mother. What father was, if ever he was anythin' at all, I don't know; and if I ever did know I think it was somethin' connected in some roundabout fashion, it was, with drains. But he died early, and that was an end of him. My poor mother, she was a laundress—a beautiful laundress she was, a very beautiful laundress—and she used to do for a gentleman who was a dissentin' minister—a dissentin' minister he was—and most particular about his linen, and lived in the big square just by the church at the corner, number five; and I've knowed my poor mother fret herself almost to death, she would, if one of them little blisters ever come up on the gentleman's shirt-fronts. And I used to help my poor mother, I did, by carryin' the gentleman's linen to number five in the big square, and that was the fust job I ever did for my poor mother, and proud she was, and proud I was, too, that I could be sich a help to her.
"We was poorer than 'most anybody in Blackfriars, where we lived, and a terribly poor neighbourhood it were—terribly poor; and so one of my sisters got married, she did, and a wonderfully big family she had, but most of 'em died sharp, so that was all right, excep' that the berryin' cost a tidy bit of money, it did. Then my other sister went out to service in Brixton. I useter go there one day a week—Toosday it was—to clean the silver and the soup tureens, and they give me a shillin', they did, I useter help sister in the kitchen—not a cook I wasn't, you must understand, but I useter help with the vegetables and the dishin'-up, and they give me a shillin'. It was a very nice house; a nice house, and no mistake about it. The lady had married a gardener—a gentleman's gardener, he was; and there was a carpet all over the dining-room floor—a nice carpet, a Brussels carpet, an ol' Brussels carpet; and she kep' a parrot—oh, a nasty, spiteful parrot, it was—I useter hate it, I did, the nasty, squawlin' beast; and it was more to her than any baby; and I useter clean the silver and the soup tureens, and do the vegetables and dish-up, Toosdays it was; and they give me a shillin'.
"All by meself I useter go, there and back, and one night"—she lifts her claws and gurgles at the memory, with a slow smile creepin' gradually through all the wrinkles on her face—"Oh, didn't I give my poor mother a fright, and no mistake about it! It was one of them nasty, stinkin' cold, freezin' nights; the streets like ice, they was, and the 'bus horses couldn't get along nohow, for all they was roughed; and it was past eleven o'clock, it was—yes, past eleven o'clock, it was—before ever I got home; and there was my poor mother standing at the door of the alms-house where we was livin' in Blackfriars—my poor mother and me—and cryin' and wringin' her hands and makin' a to-do, she was, thinking as how she had lost me altogether.
* * * * *
"Then my poor mother died," says Miss Stipp sadly, drawing her hand across the end of her nose. "I forgit the year, but it was the fust year that ever there come a August Bank Holiday. And she died on that day, my poor mother did. Yuss, she died on that day. She didn't seem like dyin' at all that there mornin,' she didn't. She eat a beautiful dinner, a bit of boiled meat—I forgit whether it was beef or mutton—mutton, I think it was, but anyway boiled meat; and she eat a beautiful dinner, my poor mother did—boiled meat, greens, and pertaters; and she eat a nice tea—well, nothin' partickler in the way of a tea, but a comfortable tea; and when I came home, 'Oh Emma Jane,' she says, 'I wish I hadn't never let you go to church this day; for this here,' she says, 'is my very last day on earth,' she says, 'and I'm goin',' she says, 'to your father in heaven, to take care of him, and I shall have to leave you all alone,' she says, 'to look after yourself; and I'm most afeard,' my poor mother said, 'what'll become of you,' she says; 'and don't forgit,' she says, 'to say your prayers, and go reggeler to the Communion, and always be good and obedient, and don't git doin' no vile sin, and please God we'll all meet in heaven,' she says, 'and be more happy,' she says, 'nor what we have ever been here in Blackfriars.' And it was August Bank Holiday, the first August Bank Holiday that ever was; and it was a beautiful day, lovely weather it was, and my poor mother had a fit, and never was quite the same; and she died."
Miss Stipp fetches a sigh, and shakes her head at the fire. She has been living in the past, watching with the mind's eye her poor mother fade slowly into eternity on that beautiful August day—the little almshouse bedroom flooded, let us hope, with golden light, for all it was in Blackfriars. She comes to herself with a little jerk, turns her head slowly round to us, and smiles one of her poor, pathetic, half-entreating smiles which make her seem like another Maggie.
And, strange to relate, Miss Stipp was confirmed in St. George's Church, on whose muddied steps Little Dorrit, Little Mother, sat in far-off days with the big head of poor Maggie on her lap. "It was beautiful, beautiful it was, that there Confirmation," says Miss Stipp. "The bishop, he put his hands on my head, just there he did, put 'em on, and I was kneelin' at his feet, and he said the words, whatever they was, and I felt his hands pressin' on my hair; of course, I had done it werry nice for the occasion; and I was quite a public character; yuss! and many's the time I've been up to St. George's Church since those days and fancied to myself that I was actin' the part again."
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