The landlady mounted the narrow stairs slowly. They were dirty, as stairs in all such houses are; there were many gaps in the banisters, and many sad rents and signs of wear on the greasy carpets. I could have moralised, as I walked up the stairs behind the broad-backed landlady. I could have stored up materials for an excellent little essay on the shady side of lodging-house life. But my heart was too full just then to think of anything but the girl whom I was about to visit, the girl whom my brother had married without even giving her his rightful name.
Poor people are often the proudest, and we Lindleys had what is commonly called “honest pride.” That simply means that we were honest; we had no double dealings; we paid our way not only with coin of the realm, but with promises which were kept, with endeavours which terminated in results. It could not enter into our heads to cheat our brothers; we could do without luxuries, but we could not part with even a hair’s-breadth of honour.
The first scapegrace in a family like ours causes, therefore, those anguished blushes, those shrinkings of the soul which are about the worst forms of pain. I felt as if I were being roasted at a slow fire of public condemnation as I followed Mrs Ashton up-stairs. I was almost sorry at that moment that my conscience was so tender.
The landlady did not stop until she reached the attic floor; then she turned and pointed to the door of a room which was slightly open.
“Mrs Gray’s in there,” she said; “you can go in.”
She did not offer to come with me. On the contrary she turned her broad back and descended the stairs with many bumps and bangs. I walked softly into the small low attic which had been thrown open for my entrance.
My steps were light, and the room was almost entirely in shadow, for the fire had gone out, and one solitary candle was already dying in its socket.
Light as my footfall was, however, it was heard, for a high-pitched, querulous, weak voice said instantly:—
“Is that you, Jack? Is that really you at last?”
“No,” I replied to the voice, “I am not Jack, but I am the next best thing, I am Jack’s sister. I have brought you a great many messages from him. Now lie quite still, until I light a candle, and then I will tell you everything.”