Roland Yorke / A Sequel to "The Channings"

by Mrs. Henry Wood

Oh, it was true. Many and many a little luxury (Gerald would have called it a necessary) that Hamish required in his failing health--for it had begun to fail--did he debar himself of for the sake of Gerald Yorke's wife and children. His heart ached for them. He took not the smallest pleasure, he often walked where he ought to have rode, he would eat breed and cheese for his lunch, or a dry roll where he should have had a chop, that he might give the saved money to Mrs. Yorke. In those golden dreams of fame and fortune, when his book was approaching completion, and the realization of its returns had apparently been drawing very near (months ago now, it seemed to be, since they were dreamt out), Hamish had cherished a little delightful plot: of setting Gerald on his legs again anonymously--of putting him straight with the world, and perhaps something over, that he might see his way at least a little clearer towards a more satisfactory state of household matters for himself and Winny jointly. This had been frustrated through the book's being written down, as already partially told of, and a corner of the grief in Hamish Manning's weary heart was sighing itself out for Gerald's sake. Hamish said not a word of the disappointment to a living soul--we are speaking now in regard to Gerald--Ellen had been his sole confidant, and he did not allude to it even to her. To Hamish, it seemed that there was only the more necessity for helping Gerald, in administering to the necessities of his forsaken wife.

And Gerald's wife had invented a pleasant fable. As the weeks went on after Winny came to London, it was not possible but that Gerald should see someone must help her with money. Put to it for an excuse, one day that Gerald asked the question point blank, and not daring to say it was Hamish or Ellen Channing, Winny declared it was her mother. Gerald stared a little. Mrs. Eales lived somewhere down in Wales, and existed on an annuity of sixty pounds a-year. But though he wondered how the good old mère contrived to help Winny so much, or in fact at all, he inquired no farther. She might be reducing herself to a crust and a glass of water a day; might be, for aught he knew, forestalling her income wholesale; Gerald was complacently content to let it be so.

And thus matters had been going on: Winny in want always, and Hamish taxing himself and his needs to help her. In September, the office he served offered him a fortnight's holiday, thinking he looked as if he required it. Hamish thanked them, but declined. He had no spirits for taking holiday, and the helping of Gerald's family left him no funds for it.

And when Winny burst into Mrs. Channing's one afternoon, with this last confession, that she was utterly penniless, save for the half-sovereign the man threw back, and should be so until Gerald came home, weeks hence, telling it in the hearing of her three little girls, her face woe-begone, her tears and sobs fit to choke her, Ellen Channing felt annoyed and vexed. Mixed with her compassion for Gerald's wife, there was a feeling that they had already done more for her than they were justified in doing. Ellen would have liked the fortnight's holiday very much indeed on her own score. A suspicion had begun to dawn upon her that her husband was not so strong as he might be, and one morning she spoke to him. It was only the London heat that made him feel weak, Hamish answered, perhaps really thinking so. Very well, argued Ellen, then there was all the more necessity for getting out of it to the seaside for a change. And he would have been glad enough to take the change had funds allowed it. Considering that the small amounts of help incessantly applied to the need of Mrs. Gerald Yorke would have taken them to the seaside ever so many times over, Mrs. Channing had felt it. And to have this fresh demand made, when she had supposed Winny was safe for some weeks to come, to hear the avowal that she wanted money for everything--food and lodging and washing and sundries, did strike Mrs. Channing as being a little too much.

Ellen Channing had been, as Ellen Huntley, reared to liberality. She was large-hearted by nature, open-handed by habit. To refuse to continue to aid Mrs. Yorke in her helpless need, would have gone against her inclination, but to continue to supply her at any cost was almost equally so. What to do, and what Winny would do, she could not think. The first thing was, to take Winny's things off and comfort her for the rest of the day; the next was to send the children to Miss Nelly in the nursery; the third to wait till Hamish came in.

He arrived at the usual hour, his face a little brighter than it had been of late. However James Channing might strive to conceal the curious pain--not physical yet, only mental--always gnawing at his heart-strings, and to put on a brave smile before his wife and the world, she detected that all was not right with him. Leaving Winny, on the plea that she would see whether the children were at tea yet, Mrs. Channing followed her husband into his dressing-room.

He had just dried his hands when she entered, and was turning to the glass to brush his hair. She stood by while telling him of Winny's piteous state, and the impossibility, as it seemed, that they could do much for her.

"Yes we can, Ellen," he said, turning to her with his bright smile when the recital was over. "I have had a slice of luck today."

"A slice of luck!"

"Even so. You remember Martin Pope, poor fellow, who somehow got down in the world at Helstonleigh, and borrowed a little money from me to get him up in it again?"