"My sister is very careful," said Jenny, sententiously. The matron looked sharply at her and said—

"Now come along with me—I'm going to fetch your sister's money. I can't leave you here—you'd get quarrelling with my patients."

"No, missis, indeed I won't say nothing to her."

"Do as I tell you. Come along with me."

So with a passing scowl Jenny expressed her contempt for the woman who had come "a-interfering in 'er business," and went after the matron, watching her every movement. When they came back Jenny's eyes were fixed on the matron's fat hand as if she could see the yellow metal through the fingers.

"Here is your money," said the matron; "four pounds five. You can give your sister what you like."

Esther held the four sovereigns and the two half-crowns in her hand for a moment, then she said—

"Here, Jenny, are the two pounds you want to take you to Australia. I 'ope they'll bring you good luck, and that you'll think of me sometimes."

"Indeed I will, Esther. You've been a good sister to me, indeed you 'ave; I shall never forget you, and will write to you.... It is very 'ard parting."

"Come, come, never mind those tears. You have got your money; say good-bye to your sister and run along."

"Don't be so 'eartless," cried Jenny, whose susceptibilities were now on the move. "'Ave yer no feeling; don't yer know what it is to bid good-bye to yer sister, and perhaps for ever?" Jenny flung herself into Esther's arms crying bitterly. "Oh, Esther, I do love you; yer 'ave been that kind to me I shall never forget it. I shall be very lonely without you. Write to me sometimes; it will be a comfort to hear how you are getting on. If I marry I'll send for you, and you'll bring the baby."

"Do you think I'd leave him behind? Kiss 'im before you go."

"Good-bye, Esther; take care of yourself."

Esther was now alone in the world, and she remembered the night she walked home from the hospital and how cruel the city had seemed. She was now alone in that great wilderness with her child, for whom she would have to work for many, many years. How would it all end? Would she be able to live through it? Had she done right in letting Jenny have the money—her boy's money? She should not have given it; but she hardly knew what she was doing, she was so weak, and the news of her mother's death had overcome her. She should not have given Jenny her boy's money.... But perhaps it might turn out all right after all. If the matron got her a situation as wet-nurse she'd be able to pull through. "So they would separate us," she whispered, bending over the sleeping child. "There is no help for it, my poor darling. There's no help for it, no help for it."

Next day Esther was taken out of bed. She spent part of the afternoon sitting in an easy-chair, and Mrs. Jones came to see her. The little old woman seemed like one whom she had known always, and Esther told her about her mother's death and the departure of her family for Australia. Perhaps a week lay between her and the beginning of the struggle which she dreaded. She had been told that they did not usually keep anyone in the hospital more than a fortnight. Three days after Mrs. Jones' visit the matron came into their room hurriedly.

"I'm very sorry," she said, "but a number of new patients are expected; there's nothing for it but to get rid of you. It is a pity, for I can see you are both very weak."

"What, me too?" said the woman in the other bed. "I can hardly stand; I tried just now to get across the room."

"I'm very sorry, but we've new patients coming, and there's all our spring cleaning. Have you any place to go to?"

"No place except a lodging," said Esther; "and I have only two pounds five now."

"What's the use in taking us at all if you fling us out on the street when we can hardly walk?" said the other woman. "I wish I had gone and drowned myself. I was very near doing it. If I had it would be all over now for me and the poor baby."

"I'm used to all this ingratitude," said the matron. "You have got through your confinement very comfortably, and your baby is quite healthy; I hope you'll try and keep it so. Have you any money?"

"Only four-and-sixpence."

"Have you got any friends to whom you can go?"

"No."

"Then you'll have to apply for admission to the workhouse."

The woman made no answer, and at that moment two sisters came and forcibly began to dress her. She fell back from time to time in their arms, almost fainting.

"Lord, what a job!" said one sister; "she's just like so much lead in one's arms. But if we listened to them we should have them loafing here over a month more." Esther did not require much assistance, and the sister said, "Oh, you are as strong as they make 'em; you might have gone two days ago."

"You're no better than brutes," Esther muttered. Then, turning to the matron, she said, "You promised to get me a situation as wet-nurse."

"Yes, so I did, but the lady who I intended to recommend you to wrote this morning to say that she had suited herself."

"But do you think you could get me a situation as wet-nurse?" said the other woman; "it would save me from going to the workhouse."

"I really don't know what to do with you all; you all want to stop in the hospital at least a month, eating and drinking the best of everything, and then you want situations as wet-nurses at a pound a week."

"But," said Esther, indignantly, "I never should have given my sister two pounds if you had not told me you could get me the situation."

"I'm sorry," said the matron, "to have to send you away. I should like to have kept you, but really there is no help for it. As for the situation, I'll do the best I can. It is true that place I intended for you is filled up, but there will be another shortly, and you shall have the first. Give me your address. I shall not keep you long waiting, you can depend upon me. You are still very weak, I can see that. Would you like to have one of the nurses to walk round with you? You had better—you might fall and hurt the baby. My word, he is a fine boy."

"Yes, he is a beautiful boy; it will break my heart to part with him."

Some eight or nine poor girls stood outside, dressed alike in dingy garments. They were like half-dead flies trying to crawl through an October afternoon; and with their babies and a keen wind blowing, they found it difficult to hold on their hats.

"It do catch you a bit rough, coming out of them 'ot rooms," said a woman standing by her. "I'm that weak I can 'ardly carry my baby. I dunno 'ow I shall get as far as the Edgware Road. I take my 'bus there. Are you going that way?"

"No, I'm going close by, round the corner."



XVIII

Her hair hung about her, her hands and wrists were shrunken, her flesh was soft and flabby, and she had dark shadows in her face. Nursing her child seemed to draw all strength from her, and her nervous depression increased; she was too weary and ill to think of the future, and for a whole week her physical condition held her, to the exclusion of every other thought. Mrs. Jones was very kind, and only charged her ten shillings a week for her board and lodging, but this was a great deal when only two pounds five shillings remained between her and the workhouse, and this fact was brought home to her when Mrs. Jones came to her for the first week's money. Ten shillings gone; only one pound fifteen shillings left, and still she was so weak that she could hardly get up and down stairs. But if she were twice as weak, if she had to crawl along the street on her hands and knees, she must go to the hospital and implore the matron to get her a situation as wet-nurse. It was raining heavily, and Mrs. Jones said it was madness for her to go out in such weather, but go she must; and though it was distant only a few hundred yards, she often thought she would like to lie down and die. And at the hospital only disappointment. Why hadn't she called yesterday? Yesterday two ladies of title had come and taken two girls away. Such a chance might not occur for some time. "For some time," thought Esther; "very soon I shall have to apply for admission at the workhouse." She reminded the matron of her promise, and returned home more dead than alive. Mrs. Jones helped her to change her clothes, and bade her be of good heart. Esther looked at her hopelessly, and sitting down on the edge of her bed she put the baby to her breast.

Another week passed. She had been to the hospital every day, but no one had been to inquire for a wet-nurse. Her money was reduced to a few shillings, and she tried to reconcile herself to the idea that she might do worse than to accept the harsh shelter of the workhouse. Her nature revolted against it; but she must do what was best for the child. She often asked herself how it would all end, and the more she thought, the more terrible did the future seem. Her miserable meditations were interrupted by a footstep on the stairs. It was Mrs. Jones, coming to tell her that a lady who wanted a wet-nurse had come from the hospital; and a lady entered dressed in a beautiful brown silk, and looked around the humble room, clearly shocked at its poverty. Esther, who was sitting on the bed, rose to meet the fine lady, a thin woman, with narrow temples, aquiline features, bright eyes, and a disagreeable voice.

"You are the young person who wants a situation as wet-nurse?"

"Yes, ma'am."

"Are you married?"

"No, ma'am."

"Is that your first child?"

"Yes, ma'am."

"Ah, that's a pity. But it doesn't matter much, so long as you and your baby are healthy. Will you show it to me?"

"He is asleep now, ma'am," Esther said, raising the bed-clothes; "there never was a healthier child."

"Yes, he seems healthy enough. You have a good supply of milk?"

"Yes, ma'am."

"Fifteen shillings, and all found. Does that suit you?"

"I had expected a pound a week."

"It is only your first baby. Fifteen shillings is quite enough. Of course I only engage you subject to the doctor's approval. I'll ask him to call."

"Very well, ma'am; I shall be glad of the place."

"Then it is settled. You can come at once?"

"I must arrange to put my baby out to nurse, ma'am."

The lady's face clouded. But following up another train of thought, she said—

"Of course you must arrange about your baby, and I hope you'll make proper arrangements. Tell the woman in whose charge you leave it that I shall want to see it every three weeks. It will be better so," she added under her breath, "for two have died already."

"This is my card," said the lady—"Mrs. Rivers, Curzon Street, Mayfair—and I shall expect you to-morrow afternoon—that is to say, if the doctor approves of you. Here is one-and-sixpence for your cab fare."

"Thank you, ma'am."

"I shall expect you not later than four o'clock. I hope you won't disappoint me; remember my child is waiting."

When Mrs. Rivers left, Esther consulted with Mrs. Jones. The difficulty was now where she should put the child out at nurse. It was now just after two o'clock. The baby was fast asleep, and would want nothing for three or four hours. It would be well for Esther to put on her hat and jacket and go off at once. Mrs. Jones gave her the address of a respectable woman who used to take charge of children. But this woman was nursing twins, and could not possibly undertake the charge of another baby. And Esther visited many streets, always failing for one reason or another. At last she found herself in Wandsworth, in a battered tumble-down little street, no thoroughfare, only four houses and a coal-shed. Broken wooden palings stood in front of the small area into which descent was made by means of a few wooden steps. The wall opposite seemed to be the back of some stables, and in the area of No. 3 three little mites were playing. The baby was tied in a chair, and a short fat woman came out of the kitchen at Esther's call, her dirty apron sloping over her high stomach, and her pale brown hair twisted into a knot at the top of her head.

"Well, what is it?"

"I came about putting a child out to nurse. You are Mrs. Spires, ain't yer?"

"Yes, that's my name. May I ask who sent you?"

Esther told her, and then Mrs. Spires asked her to step down into the kitchen.

"Them 'ere children you saw in the area I looks after while their mothers are out washing or charing. They takes them 'ome in the evening. I only charges them four-pence a-day, and it is a loss at that, for they does take a lot of minding. What age is yours?"

"Mine is only a month old. I've a chance to go out as wet-nurse if I can find a place to put him out at nurse. Will you look after my baby?"

"How much do you think of paying for him?"

"Five shillings a week."

"And you a-going out as wet-nurse at a pound a week; you can afford more than that."

"I'm only getting fifteen shillings a week."

"Well, you can afford to pay six. I tell you the responsibility I of looking after a hinfant is that awful nowadays that I don't care to undertake it for less."

Esther hesitated; she did not like this woman.

"I suppose," said the woman, altering her tone to one of mild interrogation, "you would like your baby to have the best of everything, and not the drainings of any bottle that's handy?"

"I should like my child to be well looked after, and I must see the child every three weeks."

"Do you expect me to bring up the child to wherever the lady lives, and pay my 'bus fare, all out of five shillings a week? It can't be done!" Esther did not answer. "You ain't married, of course?" Mrs. Spires said suddenly.

"No, I ain't; what about that?"

"Oh, nothing; there is so many of you, that's all. You can't lay yer 'and on the father and get a bit out of 'im?"

The conversation paused. Esther felt strangely undecided. She looked round suspiciously, and noticing the look the woman said—

"Your baby will be well looked after 'ere; a nice warm kitchen, and I've no other babies for the moment; them children don't give no trouble, they plays in the area. You had better let me have the child; you won't do better than 'ere."

Esther promised to think it over and let her know to-morrow. It took her many omnibuses to get home, and it was quite dark when she pushed the door to. The first thing that caught her ear was her child crying. "What is the matter?" she cried, hurrying down the passage.

"Oh, is that you? You have been away a time. The poor child is that hungry he has been crying this hour or more. If I'd 'ad a bottle I'd 'ave given him a little milk."

"Hungry, is he? Then he shall have plenty soon. It is nearly the last time I shall nurse the poor darling." Then she told Mrs. Jones about Mrs. Spires, and both women tried to arrive at a decision.

"Since you have to put the child out to nurse, you might as well put him there as elsewhere; the woman will look after him as well as she can—she'll do that, if it is for the sake of the six shillings a week."

"Yes, yes, I know; but I've always heard that children die that are put out to nurse. If mine died I never should forgive myself."

She could not sleep; she lay with her arms about her baby, distracted at the thought of parting from him. What had she done that her baby should be separated from her? What had the poor little darling done? He at least was innocent; why should he be deprived of his mother? At midnight she got up and lighted a candle, looked at him, took him in her arms, squeezed him to her bosom till he cried, and the thought came that it would be sweeter to kill him with her own hands than to be parted from him.

The thought of murder went with the night, and she enjoyed the journey to Wandsworth. Her baby laughed and cooed, and was much admired in the omnibus, and the little street where Mrs. Spires lived seemed different. A cart of hay was being unloaded, and this gave the place a pleasant rural air. Mrs. Spires, too, was cleaner, tidier; Esther no longer disliked her; she had a nice little cot ready for the baby, and he seemed so comfortable in it that Esther did not feel the pangs at parting which she had expected to feel. She would see him in a few weeks, and in those weeks she would be richer. It seemed quite wonderful to earn so much money in so short a time. She had had a great deal of bad luck, but her luck seemed to have turned at last. So engrossed was she in the consideration of her good fortune that she nearly forgot to get out of her 'bus at Charing Cross, and had it not been for the attention of the conductor might have gone on, she did not know where—perhaps to Clerkenwell, or may be to Islington. When the second 'bus turned into Oxford Street she got out, not wishing to spend more money than was necessary. Mrs. Jones approved of all she had done, helped her to pack up her box, and sent her away with many kind wishes to Curzon Street in a cab.

Esther was full of the adventure and the golden prospect before her. She wondered if the house she was going to was as grand as Woodview, and she was struck by the appearance of the maidservant who opened the door to her.

"Oh, here you are," Mrs. Rivers said. "I have been anxiously expecting you; my baby is not at all well. Come up to the nursery at once. I don't know your name," she said, turning to Esther.

"Waters, ma'am."

"Emily, you'll see that Waters' box is taken to her room."

"I'll see to it, ma'am."

"Then come up at once, Waters. I hope you'll succeed better than the others."

A tall, handsome gentleman stood at the door of a room full of beautiful things, and as they went past him Mrs. Rivers said, "This is the new nurse, dear." Higher up, Esther saw a bedroom of soft hangings and bright porcelain. Then another staircase, and the little wail of a child caught on the ear, and Mrs. Rivers said, "The poor little thing; it never ceases crying. Take it, Waters, take it."

Esther sat down, and soon the little thing ceased crying.

"It seems to take to you," said the anxious mother.

"So it seems," said Esther; "it is a wee thing, not half the size of my boy."

"I hope the milk will suit it, and that it won't bring up what it takes. This is our last chance."

"I daresay it will come round, ma'am. I suppose you weren't strong enough to nurse it yourself, and yet you looks healthy."

"I? No, I could not undertake to nurse it." Then, glancing suspiciously at Esther, whose breast was like a little cup, Mrs. Rivers said, "I hope you have plenty of milk?"

"Oh, yes, ma'am; they said at the hospital I could bring up twins."

"Your supper will be ready at nine. But that will be a long time for you to wait. I told them to cut you some sandwiches, and you'll have a glass of porter. Or perhaps you'd prefer to wait till supper? You can have your supper, you know, at eight, if you like?"

Esther took a sandwich and Mrs. Rivers poured out a glass of porter. And later in the evening Mrs. Rivers came down from her drawing-room to see that Esther's supper was all right, and not satisfied with the handsome fare that had been laid before her child's nurse, she went into the kitchen and gave strict orders that the meat for the future was not to be quite so much cooked.

Henceforth it seemed to Esther that she was eating all day. The food was doubtless necessary after the great trial of the flesh she had been through, likewise pleasant after her long abstinences. She grew happy in the tide of new blood flowing in her veins, and might easily have abandoned herself in the seduction of these carnal influences. But her moral nature was of tough fibre, and made mute revolt. Such constant mealing did not seem natural, and the obtuse brain of this lowly servant-girl was perplexed. Her self-respect was wounded; she hated her position in this house, and sought consolation in the thought that she was earning good money for her baby. She noticed, too, that she never was allowed out alone, and that her walks were limited to just sufficient exercise to keep her in health.

A fortnight passed, and one afternoon, after having put baby to sleep, she said to Mrs. Rivers, "I hope, ma'am, you'll be able to spare me for a couple of hours; baby won't want me before then. I'm very anxious about my little one."

"Oh, nurse, I couldn't possibly hear of it; such a thing is never allowed. You can write to the woman, if you like."

"I do not know how to write, ma'am."

"Then you can get some one to write for you. But your baby is no doubt all right."

"But, ma'am, you are uneasy about your baby; you are up in the nursery twenty times a day; it is only natural I should be uneasy about mine."

"But, nurse, I've no one to send with you."

"There is no reason why any one should go with me, ma'am; I can take care of myself."

"What! let you go off all the way to—where did you say you had left it—Wandsworth?—by yourself! I really couldn't think of it. I don't want to be unnecessarily hard—but I really couldn't—no mother could. I must consider the interests of my child. But I don't want you to agitate yourself, and if you like I'll write myself to the woman who has charge of your baby. I cannot do more, and I hope you'll be satisfied."

By what right, by what law, was she separated from her child? She was tired of hearing Mrs. Rivers speak of "my child, my child, my child," and of seeing this fine lady turn up her nose when she spoke of her own beautiful boy. When Mrs. Rivers came to engage her she had said that it would be better for the baby to be brought to see her every three or four weeks, for two had died already. At the time Esther had not understood. She had supposed vaguely, in a passing way, that Mrs. Rivers had already lost two children. But yesterday the housemaid had told her that that little thing in the cradle had had two wet-nurses before Esther, and that both babies had died. It was then a life for a life. It was more. The children of two poor girls had been sacrificed so that this rich woman's child might be saved. Even that was not enough, the life of her beautiful boy was called for. Then other memories swept into Esther's frenzied brain. She remembered vague hints, allusions that Mrs. Spires had thrown out; and as if in the obtuseness of a nightmare, it seemed to this ignorant girl that she was the victim of a dark and far-reaching conspiracy; she experienced the sensation of the captured animal, and she scanned the doors and windows, thinking of some means of escape.

At that moment a knock was heard and the housemaid came in.

"The woman who has charge of your baby has come to see you."

Esther started up from her chair, and fat little Mrs. Spires waddled into the room, the ends of her shawl touching the ground.

"Where is my baby?" said Esther. "Why haven't you brought him?"

"Why, you see, my dear, the sweet little thing didn't seem as well as usual this afternoon, and I did not care to bring him out, it being a long way and a trifle cold.... It is nice and warm in here. May I sit down?"

"Yes, there's a chair; but tell me what is the matter with him?"

"A little cold, dear—nothing to speak of. You must not excite yourself, it isn't worth while; besides, it's bad for you and the little darling in the cradle. May I have a look?... A little girl, isn't it?"

"Yes, it is a girl."

"And a beautiful little girl too. 'Ow 'ealthy she do look! I'll be bound you have made a difference in her. I suppose you are beginning to like her just as if she was your own?"

Esther did not answer.

"Yer know, all you girls are dreadful taken with their babies at first. But they is a awful drag on a girl who gets her living in service. For my part I do think it providential-like that rich folk don't nurse their own. If they did, I dunno what would become of all you poor girls. The situation of wet-nurse is just what you wants at the time, and it is good money. I hope yer did what I told you and stuck out for a pound a week. Rich folk like these here would think nothing of a pound a week, nor yet two, when they sees their child is suited."

"Never mind about my money, that's my affair. Tell me what's the matter with my baby?"

"'Ow yer do 'arp on it! I've told yer that 'e's all right; nothing to signify, only a little poorly, but knowing you was that anxious I thought it better to come up. I didn't know but what you might like to 'ave in the doctor."

"Does he require the doctor? I thought you said it was nothing to signify."

"That depends on 'ow yer looks at it. Some likes to 'ave in the doctor, however little the ailing; then others won't 'ave anything to do with doctors—don't believe in them. So I thought I'd come up and see what you thought about it. I would 'ave sent for the doctor this morning—I'm one of those who 'as faith in doctors—but being a bit short of money I thought I'd come up and ask you for a trifle."

At that moment Mrs. Rivers came into the nursery and her first look went in the direction of the cradle, then she turned to consider curtseying Mrs. Spires.

"This is Mrs. Spires, the lady who is looking after my baby, ma'am," said Esther; "she has come with bad news—my baby is ill."

"Oh, I'm sorry. But I daresay it is nothing."

"But Mrs. Spires says, ma'am——"

"Yes, ma'am, the little thing seemed a bit poorly, and I being short of money, ma'am, I had to come and see nurse. I knows right well that they must not be disturbed, and of course your child's 'ealth is everything; but if I may make so bold I'd like to say that the little dear do look beautiful. Nurse is bringing her up that well that yer must have every satisfaction in 'er."

"Yes, she seems to suit the child; that's the reason I don't want her upset."

"It won't occur again, ma'am, I promise you."

Esther did not answer, and her white, sullen face remained unchanged. She had a great deal on her mind, and would have spoken if the words did not seem to betray her when she attempted to speak.

"When the baby is well, and the doctor is satisfied there is no danger of infection, you can bring it here—once a month will be sufficient. Is there anything more?"

"Mrs. Spires thinks my baby ought to see the doctor."

"Well, let her send for the doctor."

"Being a bit short of money——"

"How much is it?" said Esther.

"Well, what we pays is five shillings to the doctor, but then there's the medicine he will order, and I was going to speak to you about a piece of flannel; if yer could let me have ten shillings to go on with."

"But I haven't so much left. I must see my baby," and Esther moved towards the door.

"No, no, nurse, I cannot hear of it; I'd sooner pay the money myself. Now, how much do you want, Mrs. Spires?"

"Ten shillings will do for the present, ma'am."

"Here they are; let the child have every attendance, and remember you are not to come troubling my nurse. Above all, you are not to come up to the nursery. I don't know how it happened, it was a mistake on the part of the new housemaid. You must have my permission before you see my nurse." And while talking rapidly and imperatively Mrs. Rivers, as it were, drove Mrs. Spires out of the nursery. Esther could hear them talking on the staircase, and she listened, all the while striving to collect her thoughts. Mrs. Rivers said when she returned, "I really cannot allow her to come here upsetting you." Then, as if impressed by the sombre look on Esther's face, she added: "Upsetting you about nothing. I assure you it will be all right; only a little indisposition."

"I must see my baby," Esther replied.

"Come, nurse, you shall see your baby the moment the doctor says it is fit to come here. You can't expect me to do more than that." Esther did not move, and thinking that it would not be well to argue with her, Mrs. Rivers went over to the cradle. "See, nurse, the little darling has just woke up; come and take her, I'm sure she wants you."

Esther did not answer her. She stood looking into space, and it seemed to Mrs. Rivers that it would be better not to provoke a scene. She went towards the door slowly, but a little cry from the cradle stopped her, and she said—

"Come, nurse, what is it? Come, the baby is waiting for you."

Then, like one waking from a dream, Esther said: "If my baby is all right, ma'am, I'll come back, but if he wants me, I'll have to look after him first."

"You forget that I'm paying you fifteen shillings a week. I pay you for nursing my baby; you take my money, that's sufficient."

"Yes, I do take your money, ma'am. But the housemaid has told me that you had two wet-nurses before me, and that both their babies died, so I cannot stop here now that mine's ill. Everyone for her own; you can't blame me. I'm sorry for yours—poor little thing, she was getting on nicely too."

"But, Waters, you won't leave my baby. It's cruel of you. If I could nurse it myself——"

"Why couldn't you, ma'am? You look fairly strong and healthy."

Esther spoke in her quiet, stolid way, finding her words unconsciously.

"You don't know what you're saying, nurse; you can't.... You've forgotten yourself. Next time I engage a nurse I'll try to get one who has lost her baby, and then there'll be no bother."

"It is a life for a life—more than that, ma'am—two lives for a life; and now the life of my boy is asked for."

A strange look passed over Mrs. Rivers' face. She knew, of course, that she stood well within the law, that she was doing no more than a hundred other fashionable women were doing at the same moment; but this plain girl had a plain way of putting things, and she did not care for it to be publicly known that the life of her child had been bought with the lives of two poor children. But her temper was getting the better of her.

"He'll only be a drag on you. You'll never be able to bring him up, poor little bastard child."

"It is wicked of you to speak like that, ma'am, though it is I who am saying it. It is none of the child's fault if he hasn't got a father, nor is it right that he should be deserted for that... and it is not for you to tell me to do such a thing. If you had made sacrifice of yourself in the beginning and nursed your own child such thoughts would not have come to you. But when you hire a poor girl such as me to give the milk that belongs to another to your child, you think nothing of the poor deserted one. He is but a bastard, you say, and had better be dead and done with. I see it all now; I have been thinking it out. It is all so hidden up that the meaning is not clear at first, but what it comes to is this, that fine folks like you pays the money, and Mrs. Spires and her like gets rid of the poor little things. Change the milk a few times, a little neglect, and the poor servant girl is spared the trouble of bringing up her baby and can make a handsome child of the rich woman's little starveling."

At that moment the baby began to cry; both women looked in the direction of the cradle.

"Nurse, you have utterly forgotten yourself, you have talked a great deal of nonsense, you have said a great deal that is untrue. You accused me of wishing your baby were dead, indeed I hardly know what wild remarks you did not indulge in. Of course, I cannot put up with such conduct—to-morrow you will come to me and apologise. In the meantime the baby wants you, are you not going to her?"

"I'm going to my own child."

"That means that you refuse to nurse my baby?"

"Yes, I'm going straight to look after my own."

"If you leave my house you shall never enter it again."

"I don't want to enter it again."

"I shall not pay you one shilling if you leave my baby. You have no money."

"I shall try to manage without. I shall go with my baby to the workhouse. However bad the living may be there, he'll be with his mother."

"If you go to-night my baby will die. She cannot be brought up on the bottle."

"Oh, I hope not, ma'am. I should be sorry, indeed I should."

"Then stay, nurse."

"I must go to my baby, ma'am."

"Then you shall go at once—this very instant."

"I'm going this very instant, as soon as I've put on my hat and jacket."

"You had better take your box with you. If you don't I'll shall have it thrown into the street."

"I daresay you're cruel enough to do that if the law allows you, only be careful that it do."



XIX

The moment Esther got out of the house in Curzon Street she felt in her pocket for her money. She had only a few pence; enough for her 'bus fare, however, and her thoughts did not go further. She was absorbed by one desire, how to save her child—how to save him from Mrs. Spires, whom she vaguely suspected; from the world, which called him a bastard and denied to him the right to live. And she sat as if petrified in the corner of the 'bus, seeing nothing but a little street of four houses, facing some haylofts, the low-pitched kitchen, the fat woman, the cradle in the corner. The intensity and the oneness of her desire seemed to annihilate time, and when she got out of the omnibus she walked with a sort of animal-like instinct straight for the house. There was a light in the kitchen just as she expected, and as she descended the four wooden steps into the area she looked to see if Mrs. Spires was there. She was there, and Esther pushed open the door.

"Where's my baby?"

"Lord, 'ow yer did frighten me!" said Mrs. Spires, turning from the range and leaning against the table, which was laid for supper. "Coming like that into other folk's places without a word of warning—without as much as knocking at the door."

"I beg your pardon, but I was that anxious about my baby."

"Was you indeed? It is easy to see it is the first one. There it is in the cradle there."

"Have you sent for the doctor?"

"Sent for the doctor! I've to get my husband's supper."

Esther took her baby out of the cradle. It woke up crying, and Esther said, "You don't mind my sitting down a moment. The poor little thing wants its mother."

"If Mrs. Rivers saw you now a-nursing of yer baby?"

"I shouldn't care if she did. He's thinner than when I left him; ten days 'ave made a difference in him."

"Well, yer don't expect a child to do as well without its mother as with her. But tell me, how did yer get out? You must have come away shortly after me."

"I wasn't going to stop there and my child ill."

"Yer don't mean to tell me that yer 'ave gone and thrown hup the situation?"

"She told me if I went out, I should never enter her door again."

"And what did you say?"

"Told her I didn't want to."

"And what, may I ask, are yer thinking of doing? I 'eard yer say yer 'ad no money."

"I don't know."

"Take my advice, and go straight back and ask 'er to overlook it, this once."

"Oh, no, she'd never take me back."

"Yes, she will; you suits the child, and that's all they think of."

"I don't know what will become of me and my baby."

"No more don't I. Yer can't stop always in the work'us, and a baby'll be a 'eavy drag on you. Can't you lay 'ands on 'is father, some'ow?"

Esther shook her head, and Mrs. Spires noticed that she was crying.

"I'm all alone," she said; "I don't know 'ow I'm ever to pull through."

"Not with that child yer won't—it ain't possible.... You girls is all alike, yer thinks of nothing but yer babies for the first few weeks, then yer tires of them, the drag on yer is that 'eavy—I knows yer—and then yer begins to wish they 'ad never been born, or yer wishes they had died afore they knew they was alive. I don't say I'm not often sorry for them, poor little dears, but they takes less notice than you'd think for, and they is better out of the way; they really is, it saves a lot of trouble hereafter. I often do think that to neglect them, to let them go off quiet, that I be their best friend; not wilful neglect, yer know, but what is a woman to do with ten or a dozen, and I often 'as as many? I am sure they'd thank me for it."

Esther did not answer, but judging by her face that she had lost all hope, Mrs. Spires was tempted to continue.

"There's that other baby in the far corner, that was brought 'ere since you was 'ere by a servant-girl like yerself. She's out a'nursing of a lady's child, getting a pound a week, just as you was; well, now I asks 'ow she can 'ope to bring up that 'ere child—a weakly little thing that wants the doctor and all sorts of looking after. If that child was to live it would be the ruin of that girl's life. Don't yer 'ear what I'm saying?"

"Yes, I hear," said Esther, speaking like one in a dream; "don't she care for her baby, then?"

"She used to care for them, but if they had all lived I should like to know where she'd be. There 'as been five of them—that's the fifth—so, instead of them a-costing 'er money, they brings 'er money. She 'as never failed yet to suit 'erself in a situation as wet-nurse."

"And they all died?"

"Yes, they all died; and this little one don't look as if it was long for the world, do it?" said Mrs. Spires, who had taken the infant from the cradle to show Esther. Esther looked at the poor wizened features, twitched with pain, and the far-off cry of doom, a tiny tinkle from the verge, shivered in the ear with a strange pathos.

"It goes to my 'eart," said Mrs. Spires, "it do indeed, but, Lord, it is the best that could 'appen to 'em; who's to care for 'em? and there is 'undreds and 'undreds of them—ay, thousands and thousands every year—and they all dies like the early shoots. It is 'ard, very 'ard, poor little dears, but they is best out of the way—they is only an expense and a disgrace."

Mrs. Spires talked on in a rapid, soothing, soporific voice. She had just finished pouring some milk in the baby's bottle and had taken down a jug of water from the dresser.

"But that's cold water," said Esther, waking from the stupor of her despair; "it will give the baby gripes for certain."

"I've no 'ot water ready; I'll let the bottle stand afore the fire, that'll do as well." Watching Esther all the while, Mrs. Spires held the bottle a few moments before the fire, and then gave it to the child to suck. Very soon after a cry of pain came from the cradle.

"The little dear never was well; it wouldn't surprise me a bit if it died—went off before morning. It do look that poorly. One can't 'elp being sorry for them, though one knows there is no 'ouse for them 'ere. Poor little angels, and not even baptised. There's them that thinks a lot of getting that over. But who's to baptise the little angels?"

"Baptise them?" Esther repeated. "Oh, sprinkle them, you mean. That's not the way with the Lord's people;" and to escape from a too overpowering reality she continued to repeat the half-forgotten patter of the Brethren, "You must wait until it is a symbol of living faith in the Lord!" And taking the baby in her hands for a moment, the wonder crossed her mind whether he would ever grow up and find salvation and testify to the Lord as an adult in voluntary baptism.

All the while Mrs. Spires was getting on with her cooking. Several times she looked as if she were going to speak, and several times she checked herself. In truth, she didn't know what to make of Esther. Was her love of her child such love as would enable her to put up with all hardships for its sake, or was it the fleeting affection of the ordinary young mother, which, though ardent at first, gives way under difficulties? Mrs. Spires had heard many mothers talk as Esther talked, but when the real strain of life was put upon them they had yielded to the temptation of ridding themselves of their burdens. So Mrs. Spires could not believe that Esther was really different from the others, and if carefully handled she would do what the others had done. Still, there was something in Esther which kept Mrs. Spires from making any distinct proposal. But it were a pity to let the girl slip through her fingers—five pounds were not picked up every day. There were three five-pound notes in the cradles. If Esther would listen to reason there would be twenty pounds, and the money was wanted badly. Once more greed set Mrs. Spires' tongue flowing, and, representing herself as a sort of guardian angel, she spoke again about the mother of the dying child, pressing Esther to think what the girl's circumstances would have been if they had all lived.

"And they all died?" said Esther.

"Yes, and a good job, too," said Mrs. Spires, whose temper for the moment outsped her discretion. Was this penniless drab doing it on purpose to annoy her? A nice one indeed to high-and-mighty it over her. She would show her in mighty quick time she had come to the wrong shop. Just as Mrs. Spires was about to speak out she noticed that Esther was in tears. Mrs. Spires always looked upon tears as a good sign, so she resolved to give her one more chance. "What are you crying about?" she said.

"Oh," said Esther, "I don't even know where I shall sleep tonight. I have only threepence, and not a friend in the world."

"Now look 'ere, if you'll listen to reason I'll talk to you. Yer mustn't look upon me as a henemy. I've been a good friend to many a poor girl like you afore now, and I'll be one to you if you're sensible. I'll do for you what I'm doing for the other girl. Give me five pounds—"

"Five pounds! I've only a few pence."

"'Ear me out. Go back to yer situation—she'll take you back, yer suits the child, that's all she cares about; ask 'er for an advance of five pounds; she'll give it when she 'ears it is to get rid of yer child—they 'ates their nurses to be a-'ankering after their own, they likes them to be forgotten like; they asks if the child is dead very often, and won't engage them if it isn't, so believe me she'll give yer the money when yer tells 'er that it is to give the child to someone who wants to adopt it. That's what you 'as to say."

"And you'll take the child off my hands for ever for five pounds?"

"Yes; and if you likes to go out again as wet-nurse, I'll take the second off yer 'ands too, and at the same price."

"You wicked woman; oh, this is awful!"

"Come, come.... What do you mean by talking to me like that? And because I offered to find someone who would adopt your child."

"You did nothing of the kind; ever since I've been in your house you have been trying to get me to give you up my child to murder as you are murdering those poor innocents in the cradles."

"It is a lie, but I don't want no hargument with yer; pay me what you owe me and take yerself hoff. I want no more of yer, do you 'ear?"

Esther did not shrink before her as Mrs. Spires expected. Clasping her baby more tightly, she said: "I've paid you what I owe you, you've had more than your due. Mrs. Rivers gave you ten shillings for a doctor which you didn't send for. Let me go."

"Yes, when yer pays me."

"What's all this row about?" said a tall, red-bearded man who had just come in; "no one takes their babies out of this 'ere 'ouse before they pays. Come now, come now, who are yer getting at? If yer thinks yer can come here insulting of my wife yer mistaken; yer've come to the wrong shop."

"I've paid all I owe," said Esther. "You're no better than murderers, but yer shan't have my poor babe to murder for a five-pound note."

"Take back them words, or else I'll do for yer; take them back," he said, raising his fist.

"Help, help, murder!" Esther screamed. Before the brute could seize her she had slipped past, but before she could scream again he had laid hold of her. Esther thought her last moment had come.

"Let 'er go, let 'er go," cried Mrs. Spires, clinging on her husband's arm. "We don't want the perlice in 'ere."

"Perlice! What do I care about the perlice? Let 'er pay what she owes."

"Never mind, Tom; it is only a trifle. Let her go. Now then, take yer hook," she said, turning to Esther; "we don't want nothing to do with such as you."

With a growl the man loosed his hold, and feeling herself free Esther rushed through the open doorway. Her feet flew up the wooden steps and she ran out of the street. So shaken were her nerves that the sight of some men drinking in a public-house frightened her. She ran on again. There was a cab-stand in the next street, and to avoid the cabmen and the loafers she hastily crossed to the other side. Her heart beat violently, her thoughts were in disorder, and she walked a long while before she realised that she did not know where she was going. She stopped to ask the way, and then remembered there was no place where she might go.

She would have to spend the night in the workhouse, and then?

She did not know.... All sorts of thoughts came upon her unsolicited, and she walked on and on. At last she rested her burden on the parapet of a bridge, and saw the London night, blue and gold, vast water rolling, and the spectacle of the stars like a dream from which she could not disentangle her individuality. Was she to die in the star-lit city, she and her child; and why should such cruelty happen to her more than to the next one? Steadying her thoughts with an effort, she said, "Why not go to the workhouse, only for the night?... She did not mind for herself, only she did not wish her boy to go there. But if God willed it...."

She drew her shawl about her baby and tried once more to persuade herself into accepting the shelter of the workhouse. It seemed strange even to her that a pale, glassy moon should float high up in the sky, and that she should suffer; and then she looked at the lights that fell like golden daggers from the Surrey shore into the river. What had she done to deserve the workhouse? Above all, what had the poor, innocent child done to deserve it? She felt that if she once entered the workhouse she would remain there. She and her child paupers for ever. "But what can I do?" she asked herself crazily, and sat down on one of the seats.

A young man coming home from an evening party looked at her as he passed. She asked herself if she should run after him and tell him her story. Why should he not assist her? He could so easily spare it. Would he? But before she could decide to appeal to him he had called a passing hansom and was soon far away. Then looking at the windows of the great hotels, she thought of the folk there who could so easily save her from the workhouse if they knew. There must be many a kind heart behind those windows who would help her if she could only make known her trouble. But that was the difficulty. She could not make known her trouble; she could not tell the misery she was enduring. She was so ignorant; she could not make herself understood. She would be mistaken for a common beggar. Nowhere would she find anyone to listen to her. Was this punishment for her wrong-doing? An idea of the blind cruelty of fate maddened her, and in the delirium of her misery she asked herself if it would not have been better, perhaps, if she had left him with Mrs. Spires. What indeed had the poor little fellow to live for? A young man in evening dress came towards her, looking so happy and easy in life, walking with long, swinging strides. He stopped and asked her if she was out for a walk.

"No, sir; I'm out because I've no place to go."

"How's that?"

She told him the story of the baby-farmer and he listened kindly, and she thought the necessary miracle was about to happen. But he only complimented her on her pluck and got up to go. Then she understood that he did not care to listen to sad stories, and a vagrant came and sat down.

"The 'copper,'" he said, "will be moving us on presently. It don't much matter; it's too cold to get to sleep, and I think it will rain. My cough is that bad."

She might beg a night's lodging of Mrs. Jones. It was far away; she did not think she could walk so far. Mrs. Jones might have left, then what would she do? The workhouse up there was much the same as the workhouse down here. Mrs. Jones couldn't keep her for nothing, and there was no use trying for another situation as wet-nurse; the hospital would not recommend her again.... She must go to the workhouse. Then her thoughts wandered. She thought of her father, brothers, and sisters, who had gone to Australia. She wondered if they had yet arrived, if they ever thought of her, if—She and her baby were on their way to the workhouse. They were going to become paupers. She looked at the vagrant—he had fallen asleep. He knew all about the workhouse—should she ask him what it was like? He, too, was friendless. If he had a friend he would not be sleeping on the Embankment. Should she ask him? Poor chap, he was asleep. People were happy when they were asleep.

A full moon floated high up in the sky, and the city was no more than a faint shadow on the glassy stillness of the night; and she longed to float away with the moon and the river, to be borne away out of sight of this world.

Her baby grew heavy in her arms, and the vagrant, a bundle of rags thrown forward in a heap, slept at the other end of the bench. But she could not sleep, and the moon whirled on her miserable way. Then the glassy stillness was broken by the measured tramp of the policeman going his rounds. He directed her to Lambeth Workhouse, and as she walked towards Westminster she heard him rousing the vagrant and bidding him move onward.



XX

Those who came to the workhouse for servants never offered more than fourteen pounds a year, and these wages would not pay for her baby's keep out at nurse. Her friend the matron did all she could, but it was always fourteen pounds. "We cannot afford more." At last an offer of sixteen pounds a year came from a tradesman in Chelsea; and the matron introduced Esther to Mrs. Lewis, a lonely widowed woman, who for five shillings a week would undertake to look after the child. This would leave Esther three pounds a year for dress; three pounds a year for herself.

What luck!

The shop was advantageously placed at a street corner. Twelve feet of fronting on the King's Road, and more than half that amount on the side street, exposed to every view wall papers and stained glass designs. The dwelling-house was over the shop; the shop entrance faced the kerb in the King's Road.

The Bingleys were Dissenters. They were ugly, and exacted the uttermost farthing from their customers and their workpeople. Mrs. Bingley was a tall, gaunt woman, with little grey ringlets on either side of her face. She spoke in a sour, resolute voice, when she came down in a wrapper to superintend the cooking. On Sundays she wore a black satin, fastened with a cameo brooch, and round her neck a long gold chain. Then her manners were lofty, and when her husband called "Mother," she answered testily, "Don't keep on mothering me." She frequently stopped him to settle his necktie or collar. All the week he wore the same short jacket; on Sundays he appeared in an ill-fitting frock-coat. His long upper lip was clean shaven, but under his chin there grew a ring of discoloured hair, neither brown nor red, but the neutral tint that hair which does not turn grey acquires. When he spoke he opened his mouth wide, and seemed quite unashamed of the empty spaces and the three or four yellow fangs that remained.

John, the elder of the two brothers, was a silent youth whose one passion seemed to be eavesdropping. He hung round doors in the hopes of overhearing his sisters' conversation and if he heard Esther and the little girl who helped Esther in her work talking in the kitchen, he would steal cautiously halfway down the stairs. Esther often thought that his young woman must be sadly in want of a sweetheart to take on with one such as he. "Come along, Amy," he would cry, passing out before her; and not even at the end of a long walk did he offer her his arm; and they came strolling home just like boy and girl.

Hubert, John's younger brother, was quite different. He had escaped the family temperament, as he had escaped the family upper lip. He was the one spot of colour in a somewhat sombre household, and Esther liked to hear him call back to his mother, "All right, mother, I've got the key; no one need wait up for me. I'll make the door fast."

"Oh, Hubert, don't be later than eleven. You are not going out dancing again, are you? Your father will have the electric bell put on the door, so that he may know when you come in."

The four girls were all ruddy-complexioned and long upper-lipped. The eldest was the plainest; she kept her father's books, and made the pastry. The second and third entertained vague hopes of marriage. The youngest was subject to hysterics, fits of some kind.

The Bingleys' own house was representative of their ideas, and the taste they had imposed upon the neighbourhood. The staircase was covered with white drugget, and the white enamelled walls had to be kept scrupulously clean. There were no flowers in the windows, but the springs of the blinds were always in perfect order. The drawing-room was furnished with substantial tables, cabinets and chairs, and antimacassars, long and wide, and china ornaments and glass vases. There was a piano, and on this instrument, every Sunday evening, hymns were played by one of the young ladies, and the entire family sang in the chorus.

It was into this house that Esther entered as general servant, with wages fixed at sixteen pounds a year. And for seventeen long hours every day, for two hundred and thirty hours every fortnight, she washed, she scrubbed, she cooked, she ran errands, with never a moment that she might call her own. Every second Sunday she was allowed out for four, perhaps for four and a half hours; the time fixed was from three to nine, but she was expected to be back in time to get the supper ready, and if it were many minutes later than nine there were complaints.

She had no money. Her quarter's wages would not be due for another fortnight, and as they did not coincide with her Sunday out, she would not see her baby for another three weeks. She had not seen him for a month, and a great longing was in her heart to clasp him in her arms again, to feel his soft cheek against hers, to take his chubby legs and warm, fat feet in her hands. The four lovely hours of liberty would slip by, she would enter on another long fortnight of slavery. But no matter, only to get them, however quickly they sped from her. She resigned herself to her fate, her soul rose in revolt, and it grew hourly more difficult for her to renounce this pleasure. She must pawn her dress—the only decent dress she had left. No matter, she must see the child. She would be able to get the dress out of pawn when she was paid her wages. Then she would have to buy herself a pair of boots; and she owed Mrs. Lewis a good deal of money. Five shillings a week came to thirteen pound a year, leaving her three pound a year for boots and clothes, journeys back and forward, and everything the baby might want. Oh, it was not to be done—she never would be able to pull through. She dare not pawn her dress; if she did she'd never be able to get it out again. At that moment something bright lying on the floor, under the basin-stand, caught her eye. It was half-a-crown. She looked at it, and as the temptation came into her heart to steal, she raised her eyes and looked round the room.

She was in John's room—in the sneak's room. No one was about. She would have cut off one of her fingers for the coin. That half-crown meant pleasure and a happiness so tender and seductive that she closed her eyes for a moment. The half-crown she held between forefinger and thumb presented a ready solution of the besetting difficulty. She threw out the insidious temptation, but it came quickly upon her again. If she did not take the half-crown she would not be able to go Peckham on Sunday. She could replace the money where she found it when she was paid her wages. No one knew it was there; it had evidently rolled there, and having tumbled between the carpet and the wall had not been discovered. It had probably lain there for months, perhaps it was utterly forgotten. Besides, she need not take it now. It would be quite safe if she put it back in its place; on Sunday afternoon she would take it, and if she changed it at once—It was not marked. She examined it all over. No, it was not marked. Then the desire paused, and she wondered how she, an honest girl, who had never harboured a dishonest thought in her life before, could desire to steal; a bitter feeling of shame came upon her.

It was a case of flying from temptation, and she left the room so hurriedly that John, who was spying in the passage, had not time either to slip downstairs or to hide in his brother's room. They met face to face.

"Oh, I beg pardon, sir, but I found this half-crown in your room."

"Well, there's nothing wonderful in that. What are you so agitated about? I suppose you intended to return it to me?"

"Intended to return it! Of course."

An expression of hate and contempt leaped into her handsome grey eyes, and, like a dog's, the red lip turned down. She suddenly understood that this pasty-faced, despicable chap had placed the coin where it might have accidentally rolled, where she would be likely to find it. He had complained that morning that she did not keep his room sufficiently clean! It was a carefully-laid plan, he was watching her all the while, and no doubt thought that it was his own indiscretion that had prevented her from falling into the snare. Without a word Esther dropped the half-crown at his feet and returned to her work; and all the time she remained in her present situation she persistently refused to speak to him; she brought him what he asked for, but never answered him, even with a Yes or No.

It was during the few minutes' rest after dinner that the burden of the day pressed heaviest upon her; then a painful weariness grew into her limbs, and it seemed impossible to summon strength and will to beat carpets or sweep down the stairs. But if she were not moving about before the clock struck, Mrs. Bingley came down to the kitchen.

"Now, Esther, is there nothing for you to do?"

And again, about eight o'clock, she felt too tired to bear the weight of her own flesh. She had passed through fourteen hours of almost unintermittent toil, and it seemed to her that she would never be able to summon up sufficient courage to get through the last three hours. It was this last summit that taxed all her strength and all her will. Even the rest that awaited her at eleven o'clock was blighted by the knowledge of the day that was coming; and its cruel hours, long and lean and hollow-eyed, stared at her through the darkness. She was often too tired to rest, and rolled over and over in her miserable garret bed, her whole body aching. Toil crushed all that was human out of her; even her baby was growing indifferent to her. If it were to die! She did not desire her baby's death, but she could not forget what the baby-farmer had told her—the burden would not become lighter, it would become heavier and heavier. What would become of her? Was there no hope? She buried her face in her pillow, seeking to escape from the passion of her despair. She was an unfortunate girl, and had missed all her chances.

In the six months she had spent in the house in Chelsea her nature had been strained to the uttermost, and what we call chance now came to decide the course of her destiny. The fight between circumstances and character had gone till now in favour of character, but circumstances must call up no further forces against character. A hair would turn the scale either way. One morning she was startled out of her sleep by a loud knocking at the door. It was Mrs. Bingley, who had come to ask her if she knew what time it was. It was nearly seven o'clock. But Mrs. Bingley could not blame her much, having herself forgotten to put on the electric bell, and Esther hurried through her dressing. But in hurrying she happened to tread on her dress, tearing it right across. It was most unfortunate, and just when she was most in a hurry. She held up the torn skirt. It was a poor, frayed, worn-out rag that would hardly bear mending again. Her mistress was calling her; there was nothing for it but to run down and tell her what had happened.

"Haven't you got another dress that you can put on?"

"No, ma'am."

"Really, I can't have you going to the door in that thing. You don't do credit to my house; you must get yourself a new dress at once."

Esther muttered that she had no money to buy one.

"Then I don't know what you do with your money."

"What I do with my wages is my affair; I've plenty of use for my money."

"I cannot allow any servant of mine to speak to me like that."

Esther did not answer, and Mrs. Bingley continued—

"It is my duty to know what you do with your money, and to see that you do not spend it in any wrong way. I am responsible for your moral welfare."

"Then, ma'am, I think I had better leave you."

"Leave me, because I don't wish you to spend your money wrongfully, because I know the temptations that a young girl's life is beset with?"

"There ain't much chance of temptation for them who work seventeen hours a day."

"Esther, you seem to forget—"

"No, ma'am; but there's no use talking about what I do with my money—there are other reasons; the place is too hard a one. I've felt it so for some time, ma'am. My health ain't equal to it."

Once she had spoken, Esther showed no disposition to retract, and she steadily resisted all Mrs. Bingley's solicitations to remain with her. She knew the risk she was running in leaving her situation, and yet she felt she must yield to an instinct like that which impels the hunted animal to leave the cover and seek safety in the open country. Her whole body cried out for rest, she must have rest; that was the thing that must be. Mrs. Lewis would keep her and her baby for twelve shillings a week; the present was the Christmas quarter, and she was richer by five and twenty shillings than she had been before. Mrs. Bingley had given her ten shillings, Mr. Hubert five, and the other ten had been contributed by the four young ladies. Out of this money she hoped to be able to buy a dress and a pair of boots, as well as a fortnight's rest with Mrs. Lewis. She had determined on her plans some three weeks before her month's warning would expire, and henceforth the mountainous days of her servitude drew out interminably, seeming more than ever exhausting, and the longing in her heart to be free at times rose to her head, and her brain turned as if in delirium. Every time she sat down to a meal she remembered she was so many hours nearer to rest—a fortnight's rest—she could not afford more; but in her present slavery that fortnight seemed at once as a paradise and an eternity. Her only fear was that her health might give way, and that she would be laid up during the time she intended for rest—personal rest. Her baby was lost sight of. Even a mother demands something in return for her love, and in the last year Jackie had taken much and given nothing. But when she opened Mrs. Lewis's door he came running to her, calling her Mummie; and the immediate preference he showed for her, climbing on her knees instead of on Mrs. Lewis's, was a fresh sowing of love in the mother's heart.

They were in the midst of those few days of sunny weather which come in January, deluding us so with their brightness and warmth that we look round for roses and are astonished to see the earth bare of flowers. And these bright afternoons Esther spent entirely with Jackie. At the top of the hill their way led through a narrow passage between a brick wall and a high paling. She had always to carry him through this passage, for the ground there was sloppy and dirty, and the child wanted to stop to watch the pigs through the chinks in the boards. But when they came to the smooth, wide, high roads overlooking the valley, she put him down, and he would run on ahead, crying, "Turn for a walk, Mummie, turn along," and his little feet went so quickly beneath his frock that it seemed as if he were on wheels. She followed, often forced to break into a run, tremulous lest he should fall. They descended the hill into the ornamental park, and spent happy hours amid geometrically-designed flower-beds and curving walks. She ventured with him as far as the old Dulwich village, and they strolled through the long street. Behind the street were low-lying, shiftless fields, intersected with broken hedges. And when Jackie called to his mother to carry him, she rejoiced in the labour of his weight; and when he grew too heavy, she rested on the farm-gate, and looked into the vague lowlands. And when the chill of night awoke her from her dream she clasped Jackie to her bosom and turned towards home, very soon to lose herself again in another tide of happiness.

The evenings, too, were charming. When the candles were lighted, and tea was on the table, Esther sat with the dozing child on her knee, looking into the flickering fire, her mind a reverie, occasionally broken by the homely talk of her companion; and when the baby was laid in his cot she took up her sewing—she was making herself a new dress; or else the great kettle was steaming on the hob, and the women stood over the washing-tubs. On the following evening they worked on either side of the ironing-table, the candle burning brightly and their vague woman's chatter sounding pleasant in the hush of the little cottage. A little after nine they were in bed, and so the days went softly, like happy, trivial dreams. It was not till the end of the third week that Mrs. Lewis would hear of Esther looking out for another place. And then Esther was surprised at her good fortune. A friend of Mrs. Lewis's knew a servant who was leaving her situation in the West End of London. Esther got the address, and went next day after the place. She was fortunate enough to obtain it, and her mistress seemed well satisfied with her. But one day in the beginning of her second year of service she was told that her mistress wished to speak to her in the dining-room.

"I fancy," said the cook, "that it is about that baby of yours; they're very strict here."

Mrs. Trubner was sitting on a low wicker chair by the fire. She was a large woman with eagle features. Her eyesight had been failing for some years, and her maid was reading to her. The maid closed the book and left the room.

"It has come to my knowledge, Waters, that you have a child. You're not a married woman, I believe?"

"I've been unfortunate; I've a child, but that don't make no difference so long as I gives satisfaction in my work. I don't think that the cook has complained, ma'am."

"No, the cook hasn't complained, but had I known this I don't think I should have engaged you. In the character which you showed me, Mrs. Barfield said that she believed you to be a thoroughly religious girl at heart."

"And I hope I am that, ma'am. I'm truly sorry for my fault. I've suffered a great deal."

"So you all say; but supposing it were to happen again, and in my house? Supposing——"

"Then don't you think, ma'am, there is repentance and forgiveness? Our Lord said——"

"You ought to have told me; and as for Mrs. Barfield, her conduct is most reprehensible."

"Then, ma'am, would you prevent every poor girl who has had a misfortune from earning her bread? If they was all like you there would be more girls who'd do away with themselves and their babies. You don't know how hard pressed we are. The baby-farmer says, 'Give me five pounds and I'll find a good woman who wants a little one, and you shall hear no more about it.' Them very words were said to me. I took him away and hoped to be able to rear him, but if I'm to lose my situations——"

"I should be sorry to prevent anyone from earning their bread——"

"You're a mother yourself, ma'am, and you know what it is."

"Really, it's quite different.... I don't know what you mean, Waters."

"I mean that if I am to lose my situations on account of my baby, I don't know what will become of me. If I give satisfaction—"

At that moment Mr. Trubner entered. He was a large, stout man, with his mother's aquiline features. He arrived with his glasses on his nose, and slightly out of breath.

"Oh, oh, I didn't know, mother," he blurted out, and was about to withdraw when Mrs. Trubner said—

"This is the new servant whom that lady in Sussex recommended."

Esther saw a look of instinctive repulsion come over his face.

"I'll leave you to settle with her, mother."

"I must speak to you, Harold—I must."

"I really can't; I know nothing of this matter."

He tried to leave the room, and when his mother stopped him he said testily, "Well, what is it? I am very busy just now, and—" Mrs. Trubner told Esther to wait in the passage.

"Well," said Mr. Trubner, "have you discharged her? I leave all these things to you."

"She has told me her story; she is trying to bring up her child on her wages.... She said if she was kept from earning her bread she didn't know what would become of her. Her position is a very terrible one."

"I know that.... But we can't have loose women about the place. They all can tell a fine story; the world is full of impostors."

"I don't think the girl is an impostor."

"Very likely not, but everyone has a right to protect themselves."

"Don't speak so loud, Harold," said Mrs. Trubner, lowering her voice. "Remember her child is dependent upon her; if we send her away we don't know what may happen. I'll pay her a month's wages if you like, but you must take the responsibility."

"I won't take any responsibility in the matter. If she had been here two years—she has only been here a year—not so much more—and had proved a satisfactory servant, I don't say that we'd be justified in sending her away.... There are plenty of good girls who want a situation as much as she. I don't see why we should harbour loose women when there are so many deserving cases."

"Then you want me to send her away?"

"I don't want to interfere; you ought to know how to act. Supposing the same thing were to happen again? My cousins, young men, coming to the house—"

"But she won't see them."

"Do as you like; it is your business, not mine. It doesn't matter to me, so long as I'm not interfered with; keep her if you like. You ought to have looked into her character more closely before you engaged her. I think that the lady who recommended her ought to be written to very sharply."

They had forgotten to close the door, and Esther stood in the passage burning and choking with shame.

"It is a strange thing that religion should make some people so unfeeling," Esther thought as she left Onslow Square.

It was necessary to keep her child secret, and in her next situation she shunned intimacy with her fellow-servants, and was so strict in her conduct that she exposed herself to their sneers. She dreaded the remark that she always went out alone, and often arrived at the cottage breathless with fear and expectation—at a cottage where a little boy stood by a stout middle-aged woman, turning over the pages of the illustrated papers that his mother had brought him; she had no money to buy him toys. Dropping the Illustrated London News, he cried, "Here is Mummie," and ran to her with outstretched arms. Ah, what an embrace! Mrs. Lewis continued her sewing, and for an hour or more Esther told about her fellow-servants, about the people she lived with, the conversation interrupted by the child calling his mother's attention to the pictures, or by the delicate intrusion of his little hand into hers.

Her clothes were her great difficulty, and she often thought that she would rather go back to the slavery of the house in Chelsea than bear the humiliation of going out any longer on Sunday in the old things that the servants had seen her in for eight or nine months or more. She was made to feel that she was the lowest of the low—the servant of servants. She had to accept everybody's sneer and everybody's bad language, and oftentimes gross familiarity, in order to avoid arguments and disputes which might endanger her situation. She had to shut her eyes to the thefts of cooks; she had to fetch them drink, and to do their work when they were unable to do it themselves. But there was no help for it. She could not pick and choose where she would live, and any wages above sixteen pound a year she must always accept, and put up with whatever inconvenience she might meet.

Hers is an heroic adventure if one considers it—a mother's fight for the life of her child against all the forces that civilisation arrays against the lowly and the illegitimate. She is in a situation to-day, but on what security does she hold it? She is strangely dependent on her own health, and still more upon the fortunes and the personal caprice of her employers; and she realised the perils of her life when an outcast mother at the corner of the street, stretching out of her rags a brown hand and arm, asked alms for the sake of the little children. Esther remembered then that three months out of a situation and she too would be on the street as a flower-seller, match-seller, or——

It did not seem, however, that any of these fears were to be realised. Her luck had mended; for nearly two years she had been living with some rich people in the West End; she liked her mistress and was on good terms with her fellow servants, and had it not been for an accident she could have kept this situation. The young gentlemen had come home for their summer holidays; she had stepped aside to let Master Harry pass on the stairs. But he did not go by, and there was a strange smile on his face.

"Look here, Esther, I'm awfully fond of you. You are the prettiest girl I've ever seen. Come out for a walk with me next Sunday."

"Master Harry, I'm surprised at you; will you let me go by at once?"

There was no one near, the house was silent, and the boy stood on the step above her. He tried to throw his arm round her waist, but she shook him off and went up to her room calm with indignation. A few days afterward she suddenly became aware that he was following her in the street. She turned sharply upon him.

"Master Harry, I know that this is only a little foolishness on your part, but if you don't leave off I shall lose my situation, and I'm sure you don't want to do me an injury."

Master Harry seemed sorry, and he promised not to follow her in the street again. And never thinking that it was he who had written the letter she received a few days after, she asked Annie, the upper housemaid, to read it. It contained reference to meetings and unalterable affection, and it concluded with a promise to marry her if she lost her situation through his fault. Esther listened like one stunned. A schoolboy's folly, the first silly sentimentality of a boy, a thing lighter than the lightest leaf that falls, had brought disaster upon her.

If Annie had not seen the letter she might have been able to get the boy to listen to reason; but Annie had seen the letter, and Annie could not be trusted. The story would be sure to come out, and then she would lose her character as well as her situation. It was a great pity. Her mistress had promised to have her taught cooking at South Kensington, and a cook's wages would secure her and her child against all ordinary accidents. She would never get such a chance again, and would remain a kitchen-maid to the end of her days. And acting on the impulse of the moment she went straight to the drawing-room. Her mistress was alone, and Esther handed her the letter. "I thought you had better see this at once, ma'am. I did not want you to think it was my fault. Of course the young gentleman means no harm."

"Has anyone seen this letter?"

"I showed it to Annie. I'm no scholar myself, and the writing was difficult."

"You have no reason for supposing——How often did Master Harry speak to you in this way?"

"Only twice, ma'am."

"Of course it is only a little foolishness. I needn't say that he doesn't mean what he says."

"I told him, ma'am, that if he continued I should lose my situation."

"I'm sorry to part with you, Esther, but I really think that the best way will be for you to leave. I am much obliged to you for showing me this letter. Master Harry, you see, says that he is going away to the country for a week. He left this morning. So I really think that a month's wages will settle matters nicely. You are an excellent servant, and I shall be glad to recommend you."

Then Esther heard her mistress mutter something about the danger of good-looking servants. And Esther was paid a month's wages, and left that afternoon.



XXI

It was the beginning of August, and London yawned in every street; the dust blew unslaked, and a little cloud curled and disappeared over the crest of the hill at Hyde Park Corner; the streets and St. George's Place looked out with blind, white eyes; and in the deserted Park the trees tossed their foliage restlessly, as if they wearied and missed the fashion of their season. And all through Park Lane and Mayfair, caretakers and gaunt cats were the traces that the caste on which Esther depended had left of its departed presence. She was coming from the Alexandra Hotel, where she had heard a kitchen-maid was wanted. Mrs. Lewis had urged her to wait until people began to come back to town. Good situations were rarely obtainable in the summer months; it would be bad policy to take a bad one, even if it were only for a while. Besides, she had saved a little money, and, feeling that she required a rest, had determined to take this advice. But as luck would have it Jackie fell ill before she had been at Dulwich a week. His illness made a big hole in her savings, and it had become evident that she would have to set to work and at once.

She turned into the park. She was going north, to a registry office near Oxford Street, which Mrs. Lewis had recommended. Holborn Row was difficult to find, and she had to ask the way very often, but she suddenly knew that she was in the right street by the number of servant-girls going and coming from the office, and in company with five others Esther ascended a gloomy little staircase. The office was on the first floor. The doors were open, and they passed into a special odour of poverty, as it were, into an atmosphere of mean interests.

Benches covered with red plush were on either side, and these were occupied by fifteen or twenty poorly-dressed women. A little old woman, very white and pale, stood near the window recounting her misfortunes to no one in particular.

"I lived with her more than thirty years; I brought up all the children. I entered her service as nurse, and when the children grew up I was given the management of everything. For the last fifteen years my mistress was a confirmed invalid. She entrusted everything to me. Oftentimes she took my hand and said, 'You are a good creature, Holmes, you mustn't think of leaving me; how should I get on without you?' But when she died they had to part with me; they said they were very sorry, and wouldn't have thought of doing so, only they were afraid I was getting too old for the work. I daresay I was wrong to stop so long in one situation. I shouldn't have done so, but she always used to say, 'You mustn't leave us; we never shall be able to get on without you.'"

At that moment the secretary, an alert young woman with a decisive voice, came through the folding doors.

"I will not have all this talking," she said. Her quick eyes fell on the little old woman, and she came forward a few steps. "What, you here again, Miss Holmes? I've told you that when I hear of anything that will suit you I'll write."

"So you said, Miss, but my little savings are running short. I'm being pressed for my rent."

"I can't help that; when I hear of anything I'll write. But I can't have you coming here every third day wasting my time; now run along." And having made casual remarks about the absurdity of people of that age coming after situations, she called three or four women to her desk, of whom Esther was one. She examined them critically, and seemed especially satisfied with Esther's appearance.

"It will be difficult," she said, "to find you the situation you want before people begin to return to town. If you were only an inch or two taller I could get you a dozen places as housemaid; tall servants are all the fashion, and you are the right age—about five-and-twenty."

Esther left a dozen stamps with her, and soon after she began to receive letters containing the addresses of ladies who required servants. They were of all sorts, for the secretary seemed to exercise hardly any discrimination, and Esther was sent on long journeys from Brixton to Notting Hill to visit poor people who could hardly afford a maid-of-all-work. These useless journeys were very fatiguing. Sometimes she was asked to call at a house in Bayswater, and thence she had to go to High Street, Kensington, or Earl's Court; a third address might be in Chelsea. She could only guess which was the best chance, and while she was hesitating the situation might be given away. Very often the ladies were out, and she was asked to call later in the day. These casual hours she spent in the parks, mending Jackie's socks or hemming pocket handkerchiefs, so she was frequently delayed till evening; and in the mildness of the summer twilight, with some fresh disappointment lying heavy on her heart, she made her way from the Marble Arch round the barren Serpentine into Piccadilly, with its stream of light beginning in the sunset.

And standing at the kerb of Piccadilly Circus, waiting for a 'bus to take her to Ludgate Hill Station, the girl grew conscious of the moving multitude that filled the streets. The great restaurants rose up calm and violet in the evening sky, the Cafe Monico, with its air of French newspapers and Italian wines; and before the grey facade of the fashionable Criterion hansoms stopped and dinner parties walked across the pavement. The fine weather had brought the women up earlier than usual from the suburbs. They came up the long road from Fulham, with white dresses floating from their hips, and feather boas waving a few inches from the pavement. But through this elegant disguise Esther could pick out the servant-girls. Their stories were her story. They had been deserted, as she had been; and perhaps each had a child to support, only they had not been so lucky as she had been in finding situations.

But now luck seemed to have deserted her. It was the middle of September and she had not yet been able to find the situation she wanted; and it had become more and more distressing to her to refuse sixteen pound a year. She had calculated it all out, and nothing less than eighteen pound was of any use to her. With eighteen pound and a kind mistress who would give her an old dress occasionally she could do very well. But if she didn't find these two pounds she did not know what she should do. She might drag on for a time on sixteen pound, but such wages would drive her in the end into the workhouse. If it were not for the child! But she would never desert her darling boy, who loved her so dearly, come what might. A sudden imagination let her see him playing in the little street, waiting for her to come home, and her love for him went to her head like madness. She wondered at herself; it seemed almost unnatural to love anything as she did this child.

Then, in a shiver of fear, determined to save her 'bus fare, she made her way through Leicester Square. She was a good-looking girl, who hastened her steps when addressed by a passer-by or crossed the roadway in sullen indignation, and who looked in contempt on the silks and satins which turned into the Empire, and she seemed to lose heart utterly. She had been walking all day and had not tasted food since the morning, and the weakness of the flesh brought a sudden weakness of the spirit. She felt that she could struggle no more, that the whole world was against her—she felt that she must have food and drink and rest. All this London tempted her, and the cup was at her lips. A young man in evening clothes had spoken to her. His voice was soft, the look in his eyes seemed kindly.

Thinking of the circumstances ten minutes later it seemed to her that she had intended to answer him. But she was now at Charing Cross. There was a lightness, an emptiness in her head which she could not overcome, and the crowd appeared to her like a blurred, noisy dream. And then the dizziness left her, and she realised the temptation she had escaped. Here, as in Piccadilly, she could pick out the servant girls; but here their service was yesterday's lodging-house—poor and dissipated girls, dressed in vague clothes fixed with hazardous pins. Two young women strolled in front of her. They hung on each other's arms, talking lazily. They had just come out of an eating-house, and a happy digestion was in their eyes. The skirt on the outside was a soiled mauve, and the bodice that went with it was a soiled chocolate. A broken yellow plume hung out of a battered hat. The skirt on the inside was a dim green, and little was left of the cotton velvet jacket but the cotton. A girl of sixteen walking sturdily, like a little man, crossed the road, her left hand thrust deep into the pocket of her red cashmere dress. She wore on her shoulders a strip of beaded mantle; her hair was plaited and tied with a red ribbon. Corpulent women passed, their eyes liquid with invitation; and the huge bar-loafer, the man of fifty, the hooked nose and the waxed moustache, stood at the door of a restaurant, passing the women in review.

A true London of the water's edge—a London of theatres, music-halls, wine-shops, public-houses—the walls painted various colours, nailed over with huge gold lettering; the pale air woven with delicate wire, a gossamer web underneath which the crowd moved like lazy flies, one half watching the perforated spire of St. Mary's, and all the City spires behind it now growing cold in the east, the other half seeing the spire of St. Martin's above the chimney-pots aloft in a sky of cream pink. Stalwart policemen urged along groups of slattern boys and girls; and after vulgar remonstrance these took the hint and disappeared down strange passages. Suddenly Esther came face to face with a woman whom she recognised as Margaret Gale.

"What, is it you, Margaret?"

"Yes, it is me all right. What are you doing up here? Got tired of service? Come and have a drink, old gal."

"No, thank you; I'm glad to have seen you, Margaret, but I've a train to catch."

"That won't do," said Margaret, catching her by the arm; "we must have a drink and a talk over old times."

Esther felt that if she did not have something she would faint before she reached Ludgate Hill, and Margaret led the way through the public-house, opening all the varnished doors, seeking a quiet corner. "What's the matter?" she said, startled at the pallor of Esther's face.

"Only a little faintness; I've not had anything to eat all day."

"Quick, quick, four of brandy and some water," Margaret cried to the barman, and a moment after she was holding the glass to her friend's lips. "Not had anything to eat all day, dear? Then we'll have a bite and a sup together. I feel a bit peckish myself. Two sausages and two rolls and butter," she cried. Then the women had a long talk. Margaret told Esther the story of her misfortune.

The Barfields were all broken up. They had been very unlucky racing, and when the servants got the sack Margaret had come up to London. She had been in several situations. Eventually, one of her masters had got her into trouble, his wife had turned her out neck and crop, and what was she to do? Then Esther told how Master Harry had lost her her situation.

"And you left like that? Well I never! The better one behaves the worse one gets treated, and them that goes on with service find themselves in the end without as much as will buy them a Sunday dinner."

Margaret insisted on accompanying Esther, and they walked together as far as Wellington Street. "I can't go any further," and pointing to where London seemed to end in a piece of desolate sky, she said, "I live on the other side, in Stamford Street. You might come and see me. If you ever get tired of service you'll get decent rooms there."

Bad weather followed fine, and under a streaming umbrella Esther went from one address to another, her damp skirts clinging about her and her boots clogged with mud. She looked upon the change in the weather as unfortunate, for in getting a situation so much depended on personal appearance and cheerfulness of manner; and it is difficult to seem a right and tidy girl after two miles' walk through the rain.

One lady told Esther that she liked tall servants, another said she never engaged good-looking girls, and another place that would have suited her was lost through unconsciously answering that she was chapel. The lady would have nothing in her house but church. Then there were the disappointments occasioned by the letters which she received from people who she thought would have engaged her, saying they were sorry, but that they had seen some one whom they liked better.