“What a lucky chance to have passed you!” cried Irene; “will you do something real kind for me?”
“Anything in the world. I suppose I’m to fetch a doctor,” he replied, with an eye on her new protégée.
“No. I’ll send Jane, if necessary. Go round to this little creature’s home and tell them she is ill and that I’ll take care of her for to-day, and if they like I’ll find a decent place for her. She lives with an uncle and aunt, who beat her. Fancy sending out a child, with nothing on, to sell violets on a day like this!”
“Where do they live?”
“At 24 George Street—in the slums at the back of the station. Their name is Jackson. Come back and tell me. I’ll give you some lunch.”
Hugh nodded, stepped back, gave the word to the driver and the cab started off. He trudged along in its wake, amused and touched by the little scene. He could imagine Irene first catching sight of the child, her indignant whipping off of her sealskin, putting the child into the cab, arranging everything off-hand, in her undoubting, imperial fashion. He smiled, too, at her unhesitating anticipation of his immediate acceptance of his mission. It was well that there was a woman like Irene in the world. As he passed by the house, he saw her figure flit quickly across an upper window. He pictured her stirring up the maids, getting a hot bath ready, and kneeling before the fire with a roll of flannel in her hands—the light playing in her fair hair and illuminating her face. He dwelt upon the picture until he had reached his destination.
He found Mrs. Jackson. Her husband was not in. If one judged from his home, he was certainly at that moment hugging the lee-side of a public-house doorway, waiting for opening time. The room was filthy. Mrs. Jackson, if possible, filthier. Her habitual speech, as Hugh shortly discovered, was filthy in the superlative degree. She was also perceptibly drunk. There was an apology for a bed in the room; but in a corner lay some sacking and a bundle of rags, evidently the child’s sleeping place. Hugh explained his mission; to his surprise, met with instant success. Mrs. Jackson did not see why she should support a child that was nothing to her. She was expecting a sanguinary one of her own shortly. If anyone else cared to support her, they were welcome.
For all she cared, they could take her to a much warmer place than Irene’s fireside.
“It’s all right,” he said to Irene, when she came down to the hall to meet him.
“Good,” she said. “Come upstairs for a moment.”