A London Baby: The Story of King Roy

by L. T. Meade

That very same Sunday evening, while Warden remained upon his knees, and the Recording Angel, looking down at him, could declare for the first time, “Behold, he prayeth,” Hannah Searles was very miserable. There was no longer any doubt, even to so untrained and ignorant a woman as she was, that little Roy was very ill. During the greater part of the past week he had been taking more or less of the fatal drops. A few in the day, more at night, had Hannah given him. They always seemed to her inexperience to have a most beneficial effect on him. His fretfulness ceased, his blue eyes closed, and he slept; but though sleep was always supposed to be so very good for children, Hannah could never discover that little Roy awoke refreshed or the better for his sleep. More fretful each time was the little voice, more dull and clouded the eyes. On Sunday he absolutely refused all food; but he was already intelligent enough to see that the bottle which held the drops gave him present relief, and he pointed to it and asked for more repeatedly. On Sunday, however, Hannah only gave him one small dose, for even to her obtuse mind the thought had occurred that it might not be doing him so much good as she had hoped.

After this dose he lay in her arms for long hours in heavy slumber. It was a foggy day, and very little light came into the cellar; but what fitful rays did penetrate the gloom fell upon a very white and sunken little face. Yes; there was no doubt at last, no doubt at all, that Roy looked as bad as Davie had looked; nay, more, that he looked worse than Davie had ever looked, except— Oh! good God! was Roy going to die too? Hannah felt herself trembling all over as this thought occurred to her. Was she a second time to lose her all; was a second time her one heart’s treasure to be torn from her arms and from her love?

“And I promised God as I’d try hard to be good ef He’d leave me this yere young ’un as I found lost in the street,” she said. In her sore despair she felt angry against God. What right had He not to take her at her word, and allow her to be good in her own way? It had never yet entered into her poor, untaught mind that in keeping little Roy she was keeping what was not her own. The other folks to whom God had first entrusted him had been careless of so great and precious a trust, so he had been sent to her. She regarded him as absolutely her own, and no idea of returning him to his people entered once into her head. Of course they might by great cleverness trace him until they found him, and then they would tear him from her arms; but never, until this happened, would she relinquish him. What! never! ah! she was not so sure of that. Some one else, even before his own people, might come to take little Roy away—some one who once already had visited this cellar. Before his call there was no resistance possible. With one magic touch, this great, awful, and mysterious some one would close the blue eyes and still the baby heart and—yes—yes—yes—break her heart for ever. A few big, heavy tears fell from her eyes at the terrible thought, but she wiped them away, dreading to disturb the sleeping child.

It was evening when little Roy awoke, and Hannah perceived with fresh terror that there was another change in him. He looked at her without a shade or gleam of recognition; he no longer called her red face pretty; he screamed at the sight of it, and cried often and wildly for Faith, who Hannah hoped he had forgotten.

“Fate, Fate, come to ’Oy. ’Oy want ’oo vevy much, vevy much.”

Hannah was at her wit’s end. She no longer feared discovery. She laid the child on the bed, and, pulling out the box which was hidden underneath, she took out again his little blue frock, his pretty shoes, and white pinafore. These she dressed him in, and he was pleased for the minute, and stroked the white pinafore, and called it “Pitty, pitty.”

There came a knock at the door as she fastened the button into the last little shoe.

“Dat’s Fate knocking,” said little Roy, raising his eyes solemnly to her face.

Hannah felt it might be, but she had become indifferent. She got up, and, with the child in her arms, went to open the door. It was not Faith, however, but the woman from over the way—the woman from whom she had received the drops.

“I can’t stay a minute, neighbour,” she said; “but I thought it but right to tell yer as them drops they ha’ done fur my babby—least way I’m feared as they ha’ done fur her. She wor tuk wid convulsions last evening, and when the doctor come he said it wor the drops. He smelled to ’em and tasted ’em, and he said as there wor poison in ’em; and he threw ’em, bottle and h’all, out of winder. He said as it wor well the ’ooman as sold ’em had made off to ’Mericy, fur she had done wot might transport her. He may save my babby, but he ain’t sure. I jest come h’over to ask yer to go and tell the other mother.”