A Life's Secret: A Novel

by Mrs. Henry Wood

'Don't take on so,' whispered a neighbour, who knew his thoughts. 'If you had gone back to work as soon as the yards were open, you'd only have been set upon and half-killed, as Baxendale was.'

'Then it would not, in that case, have been my fault if he had starved,' returned Darby, with compressed lips. 'His poor hungry face 'll lie upon my mind for ever.'

The shades of evening were on Daffodil's Delight when the attendants of the funeral returned, and Mr. Cox, the pawnbroker, was busily transacting the business that the dusk hour always brought him. Even the ladies and gentlemen of Daffodil's Delight, though they were common sufferers, and all, or nearly all, required to pay visits to Mr. Cox, imitated their betters in observing that peculiar reticence of manner which custom has thrown around these delicate negotiations. The character of their offerings had changed. In the first instance they had chiefly consisted of ornaments, whether of the house or person, or of superfluous articles of attire and of furniture. Then had come necessaries: bedding, and heavier things; and then trifles—irons, saucepans, frying-pans, gowns, coats, tools—anything; anything by which a shilling could be obtained. And now had arrived the climax when there was nothing more to take—nothing, at least, that Mr. Cox would speculate upon.

A woman went banging into the shop, and Mr. Cox recognised her for the most troublesome of his customers—Mrs. Dunn. Of all the miserable households in Daffodil's Delight, that of the Dunns' was about the worst: but Mrs. Dunn's manners and temper were fiercer than ever. The non-realization of her fond hope of good cheer and silk dresses was looked upon as a private injury, and resented as such. See her as she turns into the shop: her head, a mass of torn black cap and entangled hair; her gown, a black stuff once, dirty now, hanging in jags, and clinging round her with that peculiar cling which indicates that few, if any, petticoats are underneath; her feet scuffling along in shoes tied round the instep with white rag, to keep them on! As she was entering, she encountered a poor woman named Jones, the wife of a carpenter, as badly reduced as she was. Mrs. Jones held out a small blanket for her inspection, and spoke with the tears running down her cheeks. Apparently, her errand to Mr. Cox had been unsuccessful.

'We have kept it till the last. We said we could not lie on the sack of straw this awful weather, without the blanket to cover us. But to-day we haven't got a crumb in the house, or a ember in the grate; and Jones said, says he, "There ain't no help for it, you must pledge it."'

'And Cox won't take it in?' shrilly responded Mrs. Dunn. The woman shook her head, and the tears fell fast on her thin cotton shawl, as she walked away. 'He says the moths has got into it.'

'A pity but the moths had got into him! his eyes is sharper than they need be,' shrieked Mrs. Dunn. 'Here, Cox,' dashing up to the counter, and flinging on it a pair of boots, 'I want three shillings on them.'

Mr. Cox took up the offered pledge—a thin pair of woman's boots, black cloth, with leather tips; new, they had probably cost five shillings, but they were now considerably the worse for wear. 'What is the use of bringing these old things?' remonstrated Mr. Cox. 'They are worth nothing.'

'Everything's worth nothing, according to you,' retorted Mrs. Dunn. 'Come! I want three shillings on them.'

'I wouldn't lend you eighteen-pence. They'd not fetch it at an auction.'