Mrs Lawson seemed at last to get some employment. She had been seeking for it long—to judge by her frequent absences from home, and the weary look of disappointment she wore when she returned. But at last the opening was found, and she set to work in earnest. She used to go out early in the morning, and not return until late in the evening, and then she looked pale and tired, as one whose energies had been overtasked all the day; but she had found no gold-mine. The scanty meals were even scantier than before, and her shabby mourning was getting shabbier and duller. She was evidently hard-worked for very little pay; and their condition was not improved, only sustained by her exertions. Things seemed to be very bad with them altogether, and with little hope of amendment; for poor Mrs Lawson had been 'brought up as a lady,' and so was doubly incapable—by education as well as by temperament—of gaining her own living. She was now employed as daily governess in the family of a city tradesman—people, who though they were kindly-natured enough, had as much as they could do in keeping their own fortunes afloat without giving any substantial aid to others, and who had therefore engaged her at the lowest possible salary, such as was barely sufficient to keep her and her son from absolute want.
The boy had long been very busy. He used to sit by the window all the day, earnestly employed with paper and scissors; and I wondered what fascinating occupation he had found to chain him for so many hours by those chinks and draughts; for he was usually enveloped in shawls, and blankets were hung about his chair, and every tender precaution taken that he should not increase his sickness by exposure even to the ordinary changes in the temperature of a dwelling-room. But now, in spite of his terrible cough, in spite of his hurried breathing, he used to sit for hours on hours by the dusky window, cutting and cutting at that eternal paper, as if his very life depended on his task. But he used to gather up the cuttings carefully, and hide all out of sight before his mother came home—sometimes nearly caught before quite prepared, when he used to shew as much trepidation as if committing a crime.
This went on for some time, and at last he went out. It was fortunately a fine day—a clear, cold, January day; but he had no sooner breathed the brisk frosty air than a terrible fit of coughing seemed to threaten his frail existence. He did not turn back though; and I watched him slowly pass down the street, holding on by the rails, and every now and then stopping to take breath. I saw a policeman speak to him in a grave, compassionating way, as if—seeing that he was so young and feeble, and so much a stranger that he was asking his way to Oxford Street, while going in a totally contrary direction—he was advising him to go home, and to let some one else do his business—his father perhaps; but the boy only smiled, and shook his head in a hopeful way; and so he went from my sight, though not from my thoughts.
This continued daily, sometimes Herbert bringing home a small quantity of money, sometimes only disappointment; and these were terrible trials! At last, the mother was made acquainted with her son's new mode of life, by the treasured 5s. which the poor boy thrust into her hand one evening, with a strange shy pride that brought all the blood into his face, while he kissed her with impetuosity to smother her reproaches. She asked him how he had got so much money—so much! and then he told her how, self-taught, he had learned to cut out figures—dogs and landscapes—in coloured paper, which he had taken to the bazaars and stationers' shops, and there disposed of—for a mere trifle truly. 'For this kind of thing is not fashionable, mother, though I think the Queen likes them,' he said; 'and of course, if not fashionable, I could not get very much for them.' So he contented himself, and consoled her, for the small payment of sixpence or a shilling, which perhaps was all he could earn by three or four days' work.
The mother gently blamed him for his imprudence in exposing himself as he had done to the wet and cold—and, alas! these had told sadly on his weakened frame; but Herbert was so happy to-night, that she could not damp his pleasure, even for maternal love; so she reserved the lecture which must be given until to-morrow. And then his out-door expeditions were peremptorily forbidden; and Miss Spong was called up to strengthen the prohibition—which she did effectually by offering, in her little, quick, nervous way, to take Herbert's cuttings to the shops herself, and thus to spare him the necessity of doing so. Poor Mrs Lawson went up to the little woman, and kissed her cheek like a sister, as she spoke; while Miss Spong, so utterly unused as she had been for years to the smallest demonstration of affection, looked at first bewildered and aghast, and finally sank down on the chair in a childish fit of crying. I cannot say how much the sight of that poor little old maid's tears affected me! They seemed to speak of such long years of heart-loneliness—such loving impulses strangled by the chill hand of solitude—such weary familiarity with that deadness of life wherein no sympathy is bestowed, no love awakened—that I felt as one witnessing a dead man recalled to life, after all that made life pleasant had fled. What a sorrowful house that Number Nineteen was! From the desolate servant-of-all-work at her first place from the Foundling, to the half-starved German in the attics, every inmate of the house seemed to have nothing but the bitter bread of affliction to eat—nothing but the salt waters of despair to drink.
And now began another epoch in the Lawson history, which shed a sad but most beautiful light over the fading day of that young life.
A girl of about fourteen—she might have been a year or so younger—was once sent from one of the stationer's shops to conclude some bargain with the sick paper-cutter. I saw her slender figure bound up the desolate steps with the light tread of youth, as if she had been a divine being entering the home of human sorrow. She was one of those saintly children who are sometimes seen blooming like white roses, unstained by time or by contact. Her hair hung down her neck in long, loose curls, among which the sunlight seemed to have fairly lost itself, they were so golden bright; her eyes were large, and of that deep, dark gray which is so much more beautiful, because so much more intellectual, than any other colour eyes can take; her lips were fresh and youthful; and her figure had all that girlish grace of fourteen which combines the unconscious innocence of the child with the exquisite modesty of the maiden. She soon became the daily visitor of the Lawsons—pupil to Herbert.
The paper-cutting was not wholly laid aside though; in the early morning, and in the evening, and often late into the night, the thin, wan fingers were busy about their task; but the middle of the day was snatched like an hour of sleep in the midst of pain—garnered up like a fountain of sweet waters in the wilderness; for then it was that little Jessie came for her Latin lesson, which she used to learn so well, and take such pleasure in, and be doubly diligent about, because poor Herbert Lawson was ill, and vexation would do him harm. Does it seem strange that a stationer's daughter should be so lovely, and should learn Latin? And there those two children used to sit for three dear hours of the day; she, leaning over her book, her sweet young face bent on her task with a look of earnest intellectuality in it, that made her like some sainted maid of olden time; and he watching her every movement, and listening to every syllable, with a rapt interest such as only very early youth can feel. How happy he used to look! How his face would lighten up, as if an angel's wing had swept over it, when the two gentle taps at the door heralded young Jessie! How his boyish reverence, mixed with boyish care, gave his wasted features an expression almost unearthly, as he hung over her so protectingly, so tenderly, so adoringly! It was so different from a man's love! There was something so exquisitely pure and spiritual in it—something so reverential and so chivalrous—it would have been almost a sin to have had that love grow out into a man's strong passion! The flowers she brought him—and seldom did a day pass without a fresh supply of violets, and, when the weather was warmer, of primroses and cowslips, from her gentle hand—all these were cherished more than gold would have been cherished; the books she lent him were never from his side; if she touched one of the paltry ornaments on the chimney-piece, that ornament was transferred to his own private table; and the chair she used was always kept apart, and sacred to her return.
It was very beautiful to watch all these manifestations: for I did watch them, first from my own window, then in the house, in the midst of the lonely family, comforting when I could not aid, and sharing in the griefs I could not lessen. Under the new influence, the boy gained such loveliness and spiritualism, that his face had an angelic character, which, though it made young Jessie feel a strange kind of loving awe for the sick boy, betokened to me, and to his mother, that his end was not far off.
He was now too weak to sit up, excepting for a small part of the day; and I feared that he would soon become too weak to teach, even in his gentle way, and with such a gentle pupil. But the Latin exercises still held their place; the books lying on the sofa instead of on the table, and Jessie sitting by him on a stool, where he could overlook her as she read: this was all the change; unless, indeed, that Jessie read aloud more than formerly, and not always out of a Latin book. Sometimes it was poetry, and sometimes it was the Bible that she read to him; and then he used to stop her, and pour forth such eloquent, such rapturous remarks on what he heard, that Jessie used to sit and watch him like a young angel holding converse with a spirit. She was beginning to love him very deeply in her innocent, girlish, unconscious way; and I used to see her bounding step grow sad and heavy as, day by day, her brother-like tutor seemed to be sinking from earth so fast.