CHAPTER XII
In happy ignorance of the changes caused by his sudden and tragic end, Captain Flower sat at the open window of his shabby Walworth lodging, smoking an after-breakfast pipe, and gazing idly into the dismal, littered yard beneath. Time—owing to his injured foot, which, neatly bandaged at a local dispensary, rested upon a second chair—hung rather heavily upon his hands as he sat thinking of ways and means of spending the next six months profitably and pleasantly. He had looked at the oleographs on the walls until he was tired, and even the marvels of the wax fruit under a cracked glass shade began to pall upon him.
“I’ll go and stay in the country a bit,” he muttered; “I shall choke here.”
He took a slice of bread from the tray, and breaking it into small pieces, began to give breakfast to three hens which passed a precarious existence in the yard below.
“They get quite to know you now,” said the small but shrewd daughter of the house, who had come in to clear the breakfast things away. “How’d you like your egg?”
“Very good,” said Flower.
“It was new laid,” said the small girl.
She came up to the window and critically inspected the birds. “She laid it,” she said, indicating one of the three.
“She’s not much to look at,” said Flower, regarding the weirdest-looking of the three with some interest.
“She’s a wonderful layer,” said Miss Chiffers, “and as sharp as you make ‘em. When she’s in the dust-bin the others ‘ave to stay outside. They can go in when she’s ‘ad all she wants.”
“I don’t think I’ll have any more eggs,” said Flower, casually. “I’m eating too much. Bacon’ll do by itself.”
“Please yourself,” said Miss Chiffers, turning from the window. “How’s your foot?”
“Better,” said Flower.
“It’s swelled more than it was yesterday,” she said, with ill-concealed satisfaction.
“It feels better,” said the captain.
“That’s ‘cos it’s goin’ dead,” said the damsel; “then it’ll go black all up your leg, and then you’ll ‘ave to ‘ave it orf.”
Flower grinned comfortably.
“You may larf,” said the small girl, severely; “but you won’t larf when you lose it, an’ all becos you won’t poultice it with tea leaves.”
She collected the things together on a tea tray of enormous size, and holding it tightly pressed to her small waist, watched with anxious eyes as the heavy articles slowly tobogganed to the other end. A knife fell outside the door, and the loaf, after a moment’s hesitation which nearly upset the tray, jumped over the edge and bounded downstairs.
Flower knocked the ashes out of his pipe, and slowly refilling it, began to peruse the morning paper, looking in vain, as he had looked each morning, for an account of his death.
His reading was interrupted by a loud knock at the street door, and he threw down the paper to be ready to receive the faithful Fraser. He heard the door open, and then the violent rushing upstairs of Miss Chiffers to announce his visitor.
“Somebody to see you, Mr. Norton,” she panted, bursting into the room.
“Well, show him up,” said Flower.
“All of ‘em?” demanded Miss Chiffers.
“Is there more than one?” enquired Flower in a startled voice.
“Three,” said Miss Chiffers, nodding; “two gentlemen and a lady.”
“Did they say what their names were?” enquired the other, turning very pale.
Miss Chiffers shook her head, and then stooped to pick up a hairpin. “One of ‘em’s called Dick,” she said, replacing the pin.
“Tell them I’m not at home,” said Flower, hastily, “but that I shall be back at twelve o’clock, See?”
He produced a shilling, and the small girl, with an appreciative nod, left the room, and closed the door behind her. Flower, suffering severely from nervous excitement, heard a discussion in the passage below, and then sounds of a great multitude coming upstairs and opening various doors on its way, in spite of the indignant opposition afforded by the daughter of the house.
“What’s in here?” enquired a well-known voice, as a hand was placed on his door handle.
“Nothing,” said Miss Chiffers; “‘ere, you go away, that’s my bedroom. Go away, d’you ‘ear?”
There was the sound of a diminutive scuffle outside, then the door opened and a smartly-dressed young man, regardless of the fair form of Miss Chiffers, which was coiled round his leg, entered the room.
“Why, Dick,” said the skipper, rising, “Dick! Thank goodness it’s you.”
“I’ve no doubt you’re delighted,” said Mr. Tipping, coldly. “What are you doing with that knife?”
“I thought it was somebody else,” said Flower, putting it down. “I thought it was another attempt on my life.”
Mr. Tipping coughed behind his hand and murmured something inaudibly as his sister entered the room, followed by the third member of the party.
“Oh, Fred!” she said, wildly, “I wonder you can look me in the face. Where have you been all this time? Where have you been?”
“Give the man time to think,” said her brother, exchanging a glance with the other man.
“I’ve been everywhere,” said Flower, facing them defiantly. “I’ve been hunted all over the country.”
“But where did you go when you left me that day?” enquired Miss Tipping.
“It’s a long story,” said Flower, slowly. “But you got the letter I wrote you?”
Miss Tipping shook her head.
“You didn’t get it?” said Flower, in surprise. “I can’t think what you must have thought of me.”
“I’ll tell you what I thought of you, if you’d like to know,” interrupted Mr. Tipping, eagerly.
“I wrote to you to explain,” said Flower, glibly “I went abroad suddenly, called away at a moment’s notice.”
“Special trains and all that sort o’ thing, I s’pose,” said Mr. Tipping, with interest.
“Dick,” said Miss Tipping, fiercely.
“Well,” said Dick, gruffly.
“Hold your tongue.”
“I’ve not had any real sleep since,” said Flower, pathetically, “what with the danger and thinking of you.”
“Why didn’t you write again?” enquired Miss Tipping.
“I asked you to write to a certain address in that letter I sent you,” said Flower, “and when I came back to England and found there was no letter, I concluded that you couldn’t forgive me.”
Miss Tipping looked at him reproachfully, but Mr. Tipping, raising his eyes, gasped for air.
“But who are these enemies?” asked Miss Tipping, tenderly drawing closer to Flower.
“A man in the Government service–” began the captain.
He broke off disdainfully until such time as Mr. Tipping should have conquered a somewhat refractory cough.
“In the secret service,” continued Flower, firmly, “has got enemies all round him.”
“You’ll have to get something else to do when we are married, Fred,” said Miss Tipping, tearfully.
“You’ve forgiven me, then?” said Flower, hoping that he had concealed a nervous start.
“I’d forgive you anything, Fred,” said Miss Tipping, tenderly; “you’ll have to give up this job at once.”
Captain Flower shook his head and smiled mournfully, thereby intimating that his services were of too valuable a nature for any Government to lightly dispense with.
“May I come round and see you to-morrow?” he enquired, putting his arm about the lady’s waist.
“Come round to-morrow?” repeated Miss Tipping, in surprise; “why, you don’t think I’m going to leave you here surrounded by dangers? You’re coming home with us now.”
“No, to-morrow,” said the unhappy mariner, in a winning voice.
“You don’t go out of my sight again,” said Miss Tipping, firmly. “Dick, you and Fred shake hands.”
The two gentlemen complied. Both were somewhat proud of their grip, and a bystander might have mistaken their amiable efforts to crush each other’s fingers for the outward and visible signs of true affection.
“You’d better settle up here now, Fred,” said Miss Tipping.
Flower, putting the best face he could upon it, assented with a tender smile, and, following them downstairs, held a long argument with Mrs. Chiffers as to the amount due, that lady having ideas upon the subject which did more credit to her imagination than her arithmetic.
The bill was settled at last, and the little party standing on the steps waited for the return of Miss Chiffers, who had been dispatched for a four-wheeler.
“Oh, what about your luggage, Fred?” enquired Miss Tipping, suddenly.
“Haven’t got any,” said Flower, quickly. “I managed to get away with what I stand up in, and glad to do that.”
Miss Tipping squeezed his arm and leaned heavily upon his shoulder.
“I was very lucky to get off as I did,” continued the veracious mariner. “I wasn’t touched except for a rap over my foot with the butt-end of a revolver. I was just over the wall in time.”
“Poor fellow,” said Miss Tipping, softly, as she shivered and looked up into his face. “What are you grinning at, Dick?”
“I s’pose a fellow may grin if he likes,” said Mr. Tipping, suddenly becoming serious.
“This is the first bit of happiness I’ve had since I saw you last,” murmured Flower.
Miss Tipping squeezed his arm again.
“It seems almost too good to be true,” he continued. “I’m almost afraid I shall wake up and find it all a dream.”
“Oh, you’re wide-awake enough,” said Mr. Tipping.
“Wide-awake ain’t the word for it,” said the other gentleman, shaking his head.
“Uncle,” said Miss Tipping, sharply.
“Yes, my dear,” said the other, uneasily.
“Keep your remarks for those that like them,” said his dutiful niece, “or else get out and walk.”
Mr. Porson, being thus heckled, subsided into defiant mutterings, intended for Dick Tipping’s ear alone, and the remainder of the drive to Chelsea passed almost in silence. Arrived at the Blue Posts, Flower got out with well-simulated alacrity, and going into the bar, shook hands heartily with Mrs. Tipping before she quite knew what he was doing.
“You’ve got him, then,” she said, turning to her daughter, “and now I hope you’re satisfied. Don’t stand in the bar; I can’t say what I want to say here—come in the parlour and shut the door.”
They followed the masterful lady obediently into the room indicated.
“And now, Mr. Robinson,” she said, with her hands on her hips, “now for your explanation.”
“I have explained to Matilda,” said Flower, waving his hand.
“That’s quite right, mar,” said Miss Tipping, nodding briskly.
“He’s had a dreadful time, poor feller,” said Dick Tipping, unctuously. “He’s been hunted all over England by—who was it, Mister Robinson?”
“The parties I’m working against,” said Flower, repressing his choler by a strong effort.
“The parties he’s working against,” repeated Mr. Tipping.
“Somebody ought to talk to them parties,” said Mr. Porson, speaking with much deliberation, “that is, if they can find ‘em.”
“They want looking after, that’s what they want,” said Dick Tipping, with a leer.
“It’s all very well for you to make fun of it,” said Mrs. Tipping, raising her voice. “I like plain, straightforward dealing folk myself. I don’t under-stand nothing about your secret services and Governments and all that sort of thing. Mr. Robinson, have you come back prepared to marry my daughter? Because, if you ain’t, we want to know why not.”
“Of course I have,” said Flower, hotly. “It’s the dearest wish of my life. I should have come before, only I thought when she didn’t answer my letter that she had given me up.”
“Where ‘ave you been, and what’s it all about?” demanded Mrs. Tipping.
“At present,” said Flower, with an appearance of great firmness, “I can’t tell you. I shall tell Matilda the day after we’re married—if she’ll still trust me and marry me—and you shall all know as soon as we think it’s safe.”
“You needn’t say another word, mar,” said Miss Tipping, warningly.
“I’m sure,” said the elder lady, bridling. “Perhaps your uncle would like to try and reason with you.”
Mr. Porson smiled in a sickly fashion, and cleared his throat.
“You see, my dear—” he began.
“Your tie’s all shifted to one side,” said his niece, sternly, “and the stud’s out of your buttonhole. I wish you’d be a little tidier when you come here, uncle; it looks bad for the house.”
“I came away in a hurry to oblige you,” said Mr. Porson. “I don’t think this is a time to talk about button-holes.”
“I thought you were going to say something,” retorted Miss Tipping, scathingly, “and you might as well talk about that as anything else.”
“It ain’t right,” said Mrs. Tipping, breaking in, “that you should marry a man you don’t know anything about; that’s what I mean. That’s only reasonable, I think.”
“It’s quite fair,” said Flower, trying hard to speak reluctantly. “Of course, if Matilda wishes, I’m quite prepared to go away now. I don’t wish her to tie herself up to a man who at present, at any rate, has to go about wrapped in a mystery.”
“All the same,” said Mrs. Tipping, with a gleam in her eyes, “I’m not going to have anybody playing fast and loose with my daughter. She’s got your ring on her finger. You’re engaged to be married to her, and you mustn’t break it off by running away or anything of that kind. If she likes to break it off, that’s a different matter.”
“I’m not going to break it off,” said Miss Tipping, fiercely; “I’ve made all the arrangements in my own mind. We shall get married as soon as we can, and I shall put Dick in here as manager, and take a nice little inn down in the country somewhere.”
“Mark my words,” said Mrs. Tipping, solemnly, “you’ll lose him again.”
“If I lose him again,” said Miss Tipping, dramatically, “if he’s spirited away by these people, or anything happens to him, Dick won’t be manager here. Uncle Porson will have as much drink and as many cigars as he pays for, and Charlie will find another berth.”
“Nobody shall hurt a hair of his head,” said Mr. Tipping, with inimitable pathos.
“He must be protected against hisself,” said Mr. Porson, spitefully; “that’s the ‘ardest part. He’s a man what if ‘e thinks it’s his dooty ‘ll go away just as ‘e did before.”
“Well if he gets away from Charlie,” said Mr. Tipping, “he’ll be cute. There’s one thing, Mr. Robinson: if you try to get away from those who love you and are looking after you, there’ll be a fight first, then there’ll be a police court fuss, and then we shall find out what the Government mean by it.”
Captain Flower sat down in an easy posture as though he intended a long stay, and in a voice broken with emotion murmured something about home, and rest, and freedom from danger.
“That’s just it,” said Mrs. Tipping, “here you are, and here you’ll stay. After you’re married, it’ll be Matilda’s affair; and now let’s have some tea.”
“First of all, mar, kiss Fred,” said Miss Tipping, who had been eyeing her parent closely.
Mrs. Tipping hesitated, but the gallant captain, putting a good face on it, sprang up and, passing his arm about her substantial waist, saluted her, after which, as a sort of set-off, he kissed Miss Tipping.
“I can only say,” he said truthfully, “that this kindness hurts me. The day I’m married I’ll tell you all.”
CHAPTER XIII
In happy ignorance that the late master of the Foam had secured a suite of rooms at the Blue Posts Hotel, the late mate returned to London by train with a view of getting into communication with him as soon as possible. The delay occasioned by his visit to Bittlesea was not regretted, Mr. Fraser senior having at considerable trouble and expense arranged for him to take over the Swallow at the end of the week.
Owing to this rise in his fortune he was in fairly good spirits, despite the slur upon his character, as he made his way down to the wharf. The hands had knocked off work for the day, and the crew of the schooner, having finished their tea, were sprawling in the bows smoking in such attitudes of unstudied grace as best suited the contours of their figures. Joe looked up as he approached, and removing his pipe murmured something inaudible to his comrades.
“The mate’s down below, sir,” said Mr. William Green in reply to Fraser. “I shall be pleased to fetch him.”
He walked aft and returned shortly, followed by Ben, who, standing stiffly before his predecessor, listened calmly to his eager enquiry about his letter.
“No, there’s been nothing for you,” he said, slowly. He had dropped the letter overboard as the simplest way of avoiding unpleasantness. “Was you expecting one?”
Fraser, gazing blankly at him, made no reply, being indeed staggered by the thoroughness with which he imagined the wily Flower was playing his part.
“He’s going to be lost his full six months, that’s evident,” he thought, in consternation. “He must have seen the way I should be affected; it would serve him right to tell the whole thing right away to Captain Barber.”
“If anything does come I’ll send it on to you,” said Ben, who had been watching him closely.
“Thanks,” said Fraser, pondering, and walked away with his eyes on the ground. He called in at the office as he passed it; the staff had gone, but the letter-rack which stood on the dusty, littered mantel-piece was empty, and he went into the street again.
His programme for the evening thus suddenly arrested, he walked slowly up Tower Hill into the Minories, wondering what to do with himself. Something masquerading as a conscience told him severely that he ought to keep his promise to the errant Flower and go and visit Poppy; conscience without any masquerading at all told him he was a humbug, and disclaimed the responsibility. In the meantime, he walked slowly in the direction of Poplar, and having at length made up a mind which had been indulging in civil war all the way, turned up Liston Street and knocked at the Wheelers’ door.
A murmur of voices’ from the sitting-room stopped instantly. A double knock was a rare occurrence on that door, and was usually the prelude to the sudden disappearance of the fairer portion of the family, while a small boy was told off to answer it, under dire penalties if he officiated too soon.
This evening, however, the ladies had made their toilet, and the door was opened after a delay merely sufficient to enable them to try and guess the identity of the guest before the revelation. Poppy Tyrell opened it, and turned upon him eyes which showed the faintest trace of surprise.
“Good evening,” said Fraser, holding out his hand.
“Good evening,” said the girl.
“Fine weather we’re having,” said the embarrassed ex-mate, “for June,” he added, in justification of the remark.
Miss Tyrell assented gravely, and stood there waiting.
It is probable that two members at least of the family would have been gratified by the disappearance of the caller then and there, but that Mr. Wheeler, a man of great density and no tact whatever, came bustling out into the passage, and having shaken hands in a hearty fashion, told him to put his hat on a nail and come in.
“No news of the cap’n, I suppose?” he asked, solemnly, after Fraser was comfortably seated.
“Not a word,” was the reply.
The dock-foreman sighed and shook his head as he reflected on the instability of human affairs. “There’s no certainty about anything,” he said, slowly. “Only yesterday I was walking down the Commercial Road, and I slipped orf the curb into the road before you could say Jack Robinson.”
“Nearly run over?” queried Fraser.
Mr. Wheeler shook his head. “No,” he said, quietly.
“Well, what of it?” enquired his son.
“It might just as well have been the edge of the dock as the curb; that’s what I mean,” said Mr. Wheeler, with a gravity befitting his narrow escape.
“I’m alwis telling you not to walk on the edge, father,” said his wife, uneasily.
The dock-foreman smiled faintly. “Dooty must be done,” he said, in a firm voice. “I’m quite prepared, my life’s insured, and I’m on the club, and some o’ the children are getting big now, that’s a comfort.”
A feeling of depression settled on all present, and Augustus Wheeler, aged eight, having gleaned from the conversation that his sire had received instructions, which he intended promptly to obey, to fall into the dock forthwith, suddenly opened his mouth and gave vent to his affection and despair in a howl so terrible that the ornaments on the mantelpiece shook with it.
“Don’t scold ‘im,” said the dock-foreman, tenderly, as Mrs. Wheeler’s thin, shrill voice entered into angry competition with the howl; “never mind, Gussie, my boy, never mind.”
This gentleness had no effect, Gussie continuing to roar with much ardour, but watching out of the corner of one tear-suffused eye the efforts of his eldest sister to find her pocket.
“Hold your noise and I’ll give you a ha’penny,” she said, tartly.
Gussie caught his breath with a sob, but kept steam up, having on some similar occasions been treated with more diplomacy than honesty. But to-day he got the half-penny, together with a penny from the visitor, and, having sold his concern in his father for three halfpence, gloated triumphantly in a corner over his envious peers.
“Death,” said Mr. Wheeler, slowly, after silence had been restored, “is always sudden. The most sudden death I knew ‘appened to a man who’d been dying for seven years. Nobody seemed to be able to believe he’d gone at last.”
“It’s a good job he wasn’t married,” said Mrs. Wheeler, raising herself on her elbow; “sailors ‘ave no right to marry at all. If I thought that one ‘o my gals was goin’ to marry a sailor, I don’t know what I shouldn’t do. Something steady on shore is the thing.”
“I don’t know,” said the tactless Mr. Wheeler. “I think if I was a gal I should like to marry a sailor; there’s something romantic about them. I often wish I’d been a sailor.”
“Then you wouldn’t ‘ave ‘ad me,” said the lady from the sofa, grimly.
Mr. Wheeler sighed, but whether at the thought of what he might have lost or what he had gained, cannot be safely determined. Still in a morbid mood, he relapsed into silence, leaving Fraser to glance anxiously to where Poppy, pale and pretty, sat listening to the clumsy overtures of Mr. Bob Wheeler.
“I might ‘ave ‘ad two or three sailors if I’d liked,” continued Mrs. Wheeler, musingly, “but I wouldn’t.”
Fraser murmured his admiration at her firmness.
“There was Tom Rogers, ‘e was the first,” said Mrs. Wheeler; “you remember ‘im, father?”
“Chap with bow legs and a squint, wasn’t he?” said the dock-foreman, anxious to please.
“I never saw ‘im squint,” said his wife, sharply. “Then there was Robert Moore—he was number two, I think.”
“‘Ad a wife a’ready,” said Mr. Wheeler, turning to the visitor; “‘e was a bright lot, ‘e was.”
“I don’t know what they saw in me, I’m sure,” said Mrs. Wheeler, with a little modest laugh; “it wasn’t my good looks, I’m sure.”
“You ‘ad something better than good looks, my dear,” said the dock-foreman, affectionately, “something what’s wore better.”
Mrs. Wheeler turned on the sofa, and detecting Gussie in the act of using his mouth as a moneybox, upbraided him shrilly and sent him into a corner. She then brought sundry charges of omission and commission against the other children, until the air was thick with denials and explanations, in the midst of which Fraser turned towards Poppy.
“I want to have a few minutes’ talk with you, Miss Tyrell,” he said, nervously.
The girl looked up at him. “Yes,” she said, gravely.
“I mean alone,” continued the other, marvelling at his hardihood; “it’s private.”
He lowered his voice from a shout to its normal tone as Emma Wheeler in self-defence opened the door and drove the small fry out.
“I’ve not got my rooms now,” said the girl, quietly.
“Well, my dear—” began the dock-foreman.
“Don’t interfere, father,” said Mrs. Wheeler somewhat sharply. “I’m sure Mr. Fraser needn’t mind saying anything before us. It’s nothing he’s ashamed of, I’m sure.”
“Certainly not,” said Fraser, sternly, “but it’s quite private for all that. Will you put your hat on and come out a little way, Miss Tyrell?”
“That I’m sure she won’t,” said the energetic Mrs. Wheeler. “She’s that particular she won’t even go out with Bob, and they’re like brother and sister almost. Will she, Bob?”
Mr. Bob Wheeler received the appeal somewhat sullenly, and in a low voice requested his parent not to talk so much. Fraser, watching Poppy closely, saw with some satisfaction a tinge of colour in her cheek, and what in any other person he would have considered a very obstinate appearance about her shapely chin.
“I’ll get my hat on, if you’ll wait a minute,” she said, quietly.
She rose and went upstairs, and Fraser with a cheerful glance at Mrs. Wheeler entered into conversation with her husband about overside work in the docks, until the door was pushed open a little to reveal Miss Tyrell ready for walking.
They walked on for some little time in silence. The sun had set, and even in the close streets of Poplar the evening air was cool and refreshing. When this fact had thoroughly impressed itself on Mr. Fraser’s mind he communicated it to Miss Tyrell.
“It’s very pleasant,” she answered, briefly. “What was it you wanted to talk to me about?”
“About a lot of things,” said Fraser. “What a tremendous lot of children there are about here.”
Miss Tyrell coldly admitted an obvious fact, and stepping out into the road to avoid spoiling a small maiden’s next move at “hop scotch,” returned to the pavement to listen to a somewhat lengthy dissertation upon the game in question.
“What did you want to say to me?” she asked at length, turning and regarding him.
“In the first place,” said Fraser, “I wanted to tell you that, though nothing has been heard of Captain Flower, I feel certain in my own mind that he has not been drowned.”
Miss Tyrell shook her head slowly.
“Then I ought to tell you that I have left the Foam” continued the other. “I think that there is some idea that I knocked Flower overboard to get his place.”
The girl turned quickly, and her face flushed. “How absurd,” she said, indignantly, and her manner softened.
“Thank you,” said Fraser. “If you don’t believe it, I don’t care what anybody else thinks.”
Miss Tyrell, looking straight in front of her, stole a glance at this easily satisfied young man from the corner of her eye. “I should never expect to hear of you doing anything wicked,” she said. Fraser thanked her again, warmly. “Or venturesome,” added Miss Tyrell, thoughtfully. “You’re not the kind.”
They walked on in silence; indignant silence on the part of the ex-mate.
“Then you are out of a berth?” said Poppy, not unkindly.
Fraser shook his head and explained. “And I told my father about you,” he added, nervously. “He knew Flower very well, and he told me to say that he would be very pleased and proud if you would come down and stay with him at Bittlesea for a time.”
“No, thank you,” said Miss Tyrell.
“The air would do you good,” persisted Fraser; “you could come down by train or come down with me on the Swallow next week.”
Miss Tyrell repeated her refusal. “I must stay in London and get something else to do,” she said, quietly.
“What do you think of doing?” enquired Fraser.
“Anything I can get,” was the reply.
“And in the meantime–” he began, nervously.
“In the meantime I’m living on the Wheelers,” said the girl, pressing her lips together; “that was what you were going to say, wasn’t it?”
“I was not going to say anything of the kind,” said Fraser, warmly. “I was not thinking of it.”
“Well, it’s true,” said Poppy, defiantly.
“It isn’t true,” said Fraser, “because you will pay them back.”
“Shall we turn back?” said the girl.
Fraser turned and walked beside her, and, glancing furtively at the pale, proud face, wondered how to proceed.
“I should be delighted if you would come to Bittlesea,” he said, earnestly, “and I’m sure if Flower should ever turn up again, he would say it was the best thing you could have done.”
“Thank you, but I prefer to stay here,” was the reply, “and I don’t wish to be ungrateful, but I wish that people would not trouble me with their charity.”
She walked on in silence, with her face averted, until they reached Liston Street, and, stopping at the door, turned to bid him good-bye. Her face softened as she shook hands, and in the depths of her dark eyes as they met his he fancied that he saw a little kindness. Then the door opened, and, before he could renew his invitation, closed behind her as rapidly as Mr. Bob Wheeler could perform the feat.