I
When, in the October of 1896, Louie Causton left Mortlake Road, with half the nurses of the home waving their handkerchiefs after her, she went to a house near the Parson's Green end of Wandsworth Bridge Road. As she left that house before Christmas, going to another one near the Walham Green Town Hall, there is no need to describe it. Neither need the Walham Green house be described, since from there she went, in February 1897, to yet another house, in a street off the Bishops Road, Fulham. These and other removals did not necessitate the use of a pantechnicon; a four-wheeler sufficed on each occasion. Louie, the boy and the nurse went inside; the top was quite big enough for her belongings. She stuck to the south-western district; at no time did she move farther east than when she took two rooms in Cheyne Walk, over a bicycle shop near the Chelsea suspension bridge—which rooms, by the way, she was forced to leave at an hour's notice, her landlord, a man of straw, being himself ejected and involving his sub-tenant in his own catastrophe. She kept to this district because of its nearness to Kingston and the Molyneux Arms. By the time the boy was nine months old she was living in Tadema Road, not far from where the Chelsea power-station now stands.
The nurse whom she had engaged was a link—save for Chaff the only one—with Trant. She was, indeed, her own old French governess, once Céleste Martin, now Céleste Farnier and a widow. She was a Provençale, from Arles. On the death of her husband, which had taken place while Louie had been still at the home in Mortlake Road, she had sought out Chaff with a sheaf of testimonials, and by-and-by Louie had engaged her. She paid her ten shillings a week, on the distinct understanding that she must not hesitate to accept the first decent post that offered. It was already plain that, even if Céleste could have brought herself to leave the little girl to whom she had taught the order of the personal pronouns in French, her affection for Master Jim would have haled her back again.
Louie changed her abode so frequently for one reason and another. In perhaps a third of the cases the landladies to whom she offered herself as a lodger found reasons for asking her to leave when they saw that her letters were addressed to "Miss Causton." Then, to save cab fares, Louie began to make her position plain at the outset. Sometimes this made a difference, sometimes none. On the whole, London S.W. showed itself charitable or merely indifferent. By May 1897 she was at another house in Wandsworth Bridge Road.
She had not refused to accept, easily and as a loan, a sum of money from Buck; but thrice she had well-nigh quarrelled with Buck because she would accept it only as a loan. Twice, for the same reason, she had had tussles with Chaff. But money, until she should find something settled to do, she must have. No doubt Richenda Earle would have shaken her head and have pointed out that now Louie not only had the Scarisbricks behind her, but a prosperous publican also; but Louie, though she lived as frugally as if she had to earn every penny, did not see why her boy should go short while there was money to be had. She took the sensible view of the matter, and borrowed, while walking her shoes out and answering advertisements for this, that and the other.
Up to the summer of '97 her occupations had been almost as various as her addresses. She very soon discovered that her Holborn training was of little use to her, and she could not (as also she discovered) play the piano well enough to give lessons. What she dreamed of, of course, was a comfortable private secretaryship; no young woman is so ill-trained or so incompetent but she fancies herself good enough for a private secretaryship. Perhaps Uncle Augustus might have helped her to one, but she would have nothing to do with Uncle Augustus; and Chaff was unable to beat up anything of the kind. Buck's proposal, that she should keep his books, had been the cause of their second altercation. Common-sense in the matter of borrowing she was prepared to be; beyond that point she remembered her pride and Richenda's words. So for the present she was spared the worst of the pinch.
So, in the early part of that year, she was in an A.B.C. cash-desk, traveller for a History, and saleswoman at an Earls Court chocolate-stall. Then, in June, she obtained, actually in the face of considerable competition, a place in the showrooms of a Bond Street photographer. Perhaps her dresses, of which several still remained, helped her to this place. She wrote letters, arranged appointments, answered press and other calls on the telephone, and received sitters. No doubt some of these knew Uncle Augustus. Robson, of the Board of Trade (who came one day), would probably know him; so would George Hastie, Robson's friend and colleague, and perhaps Sir Peregrine Campbell and others. Some of them, the more sporting sort, might even know Buck too, for Buck was still a tradition; in short, Louie's own position amused her immensely. By taking her letters home with her and leaving a younger assistant in charge, she was frequently able to leave the showrooms by half-past four and to spend the evenings with Céleste and her boy. Incidentally, Louie improved her French a good deal, for Céleste crooned over the boy in French and English indifferently.... "The darleeng—the lo-ove—the précieux—oh, oh, oh, mais il existe—il manifeste, le petiot——"; and she would break off to sing, in a cracked voice, "Le Pont d'Avignon," or some lullaby of Frédéric Mistral. She idolised the infant; when he was put to bed she did not delay long to follow him, for Louie, who had her work to do during the day, must not be roused at night; and so Louie frequently sat alone, writing her letters or wrapped in her own musings. She received thirty-five shillings a week. Her job had the appearance of a "permanency." In July she got a "rise" of three shillings a week. She also got ten days' holiday, the greater part of which she spent in the company of her father. She was beginning to know what holidays meant now.
On one of those days she had an unexpected little meeting in Richmond Park. Céleste and the boy had gone on by train, and she was walking. The meeting was with a girl called Myrtle Morris, who, when Louie had kept the confectionery stall at Earls Court, had sold cigarettes at the stall adjoining. Miss Morris was accompanied by a tall young man; she stopped to greet Louie, and the young man walked slowly on. Myrtle asked Louie what she was doing now. Louie told her. "And you?" she said.
"Oh, I've gone back to my old trade," the girl said, nodding towards her retreating companion. "Artists' model. That's my present employer—Izzard."
"Who?" said Louie. The name seemed familiar.