“I could raise yer screw, say to ten bob a week,” said the man, slipping his arms round her waist and trying to kiss her on the lips. If one of the dirty rags had been thrust into her mouth she could not have experienced a more nauseous feeling of horror than that which took possession of her at that moment. She freed herself violently from the grasp of the man, seized her shawl and hurried upstairs, leaving him alone in the cellar. In the office she had a misty impression of a grinning clerk looking at her and passing some meaningless remark. When she got back to her room she told Meg of all that had happened.
“Ye’re a lucky lass, a gie lucky lass,” said the old woman enviously. “Just play yer cards well and ye’ll soon hae a pund a week in the store. I heard to-day about the bowdy girl that left us a month gone. The master had a fancy for her but a mistake happened and she was in straw. But it’s now all right and she’s gettin’ a pund a week. Just ye play yer cards well, Norah Ryan, and ye’ll have a gey guid time,” she added.
“Meg Morraws!”
“Ha, ha!” cried the old woman, laughing and showing her yellow stumps of teeth, worn to the gums. “That’s the way to act. Carry on like that with him and he’ll do onything ye ask, for ye’re a comely lass; a gey comely one! Often I wondered why ye stayed so long workin’ in the rag-store. Life could be made muckle easier by a girl wi’ a winnin’ face like yours, Norah Ryan. God! to think that a girl like ye are warkin’ in that dirty hole when ye could make ten times as muckle siller by doin’ somethin’ else!”
IV
NORAH did not go back to the rag-store. She took her child from Twopenny Helen and looked for other work. The boy with his round chubby legs and wonderful pink toes, which she never tired of counting, was a wonder and delight to her. Everything was so fresh about him, the radiant eyes, the red cheeks that made the mother so much long to bite them, the little soft lips and the white sharp teeth that were already piercing through the gums. The child was dressed poorly, but, as befitted a sanctuary before which one human being prostrated herself with all the unselfish devotion of a pure heart, with the best taste of the worshipper.
The cold which the child caught months before had never entirely gone away; whenever the cough that accompanied it seized him he curled up in his mother’s lap in agony, while she feared that the little treasure that she loved so much was going to be taken away. The thought of the boy dying occurred to her many times and almost shattered the springs of action within her. If he died! She shuddered in terror; her fear was somewhat akin to the fear which possesses a man who hangs over a precipice and waits for the overstrained rope to break. If the child was gone she would have nothing more to live for.
Her funds were very low; when she left the rag-store she had only the sum of nineteen shillings in her possession. This would pay rent for a few weeks, but meanwhile food, fuel, and clothing were needed. What was she to do?
Then followed weary days searching for work. Norah went from house to house in the better parts of the city, offering herself for employment. She left the child lying on a bed on the floor and locked the place up. She no longer sent it out to Twopenny Helen; Norah could not now spare twopence a day.
Again she got work, this time finishing dongaree jackets, and made tenpence a day. She had now to work on Sunday as well as Saturday, and she usually spent eighteen hours a day at her task. Winter came and there was no coal. The child, whose cold got no better, was placed in bed while the mother worked. The dry and hacking cough shook the mother’s frame at intervals and she sweated at night when asleep. She ate very little; her breasts were sore when she suckled her child, and by and by milk refused to come. Her eyes became sore; she now did part of her work under the lamp on the landing and by the light from the window across the courtyard. Old Meg, when she was drunk, had pence to spare for the child.