i had been quite prepared to find polly a willing convert to my charitable schemes, but i had not expected to find in cousin helen so strong an ally as she proved. but our ideas were no novelty to her, as we soon discovered. in truth, at nine years old, she was a bit of an enthusiast. she read with avidity religious biographies furnished by miss blomfield. she was delicate in health, but reticent and resolute in character. she was ready for any amount of self-sacrifice. she contributed liberally to our box; and i fancy that she and polly continued it after i had gone back to dacrefield.
my new ideas were not laid aside on my return home. to the best of my ability i had given nurse bundle an epitome of the sermon on alms—deeds which had so taken my fancy, and i have reason to believe that she was very proud of my precocious benevolence. whilst the subject was under discussion betwixt us, she related many anecdotes of the good deeds of the "young gentlemen and ladies" in a certain clergyman's family where she had lived as nursemaid in her younger days; and my imagination was fired by dreams of soup-cans, coal-clubs, linsey petticoats comforting the rheumatic limbs of aged women, opportune blankets in winter, sunday-school classes, etc., etc.[62]
"my dear!" said nurse bundle, almost with tears in her eyes, "you're for all the world your dear mamma over again. keep them notions, my dear, when you're a grown gentleman, and there'll be a blessing on all you do. for in all reason it's you that'll have to look to your pa's property and tenants some time."
my father, though not himself an adept in the details of what is commonly called "parish work," was both liberal and kind-hearted. he liked my knowing the names of his tenants, and taking an interest in their families. he was well pleased to respond by substantial help when nurse bundle and i pleaded for this sick woman or that unshod child, as my mother had pleaded in old days. as for nurse bundle, she had a code of virtues for "young ladies and gentlemen," as such, and charity to the poor was among them. though i confess that i think she regarded it more in the light of a grace adorning a certain station, than as a duty incumbent upon all men.
so i came to know most of the villagers; and being a quaint child, with a lively and amusing curiosity, which some little refinement and good-breeding stayed from degenerating into impertinence, i was, i believe, very popular.
one afternoon, during the spring that followed our return from london, i had strolled out with rubens, and was bowling my hoop towards one of the lodges when a poor woman passed by on the drive (which was a public road through the park), her apron to her face, weeping bitterly. i stopped her, and asked what was the matter, and finally made out that she had been to some sale at a farmhouse near, where a certain large blanket had "gone for" five shillings. that she had scraped[63] five shillings together, and had intended to bid for it, but had (with eminent stupidity) managed just to be out of the way when the blanket was sold; and that it had gone for the very sum she could have afforded, to another woman who would only part with it for six and sixpence—eighteenpence more than the price she had paid for it.
the poor woman wept, and said she had had hard work to "raise" the five shillings, and could not possibly find one and sixpence more. and yet she did want the blanket badly, for she had a boy sick in bed, and his throat was so bad—he suffered a deal from the cold, and there wasn't a decent "rag of a blanket" in her house. i did not quite follow her long story, but i gathered that one and sixpence would put an end to her troubles, and at once offered to fetch her the money.
"where do you live?" i asked.
"the white cottage just beyond the gate, love," she answered.
"i will bring you the money," said i. for to say the truth, i was rather pompous and important about my charitable deeds, and did not dislike playing the part of sir bountiful in the cottages. in this case, too, it was a kindness not to take the woman back to the hall, for she had left the sick child alone; and when i arrived at the cottage with the money he complained bitterly at the idea of her leaving him again to get the blanket.
"let me go a minute, love, and i'll fetch mrs. taylor to sit with thee till i get the blanket."
"i don't want a blanket," fretted the child; "i be too hot as 'tis. i don't want to be 'lone."
"if you'll only be a minute, i'll stop with him," said i; and there was some kindness in the offer, for i was really afraid of the boy with his heavy[64] angry eyes and fever petulance. the woman gladly accepted it, and hurried off, despite the child's fretful tears, and his refusing to see in "the young gentleman's" condescension the honour which his mother pointed out. no doubt she only meant to be "a minute," and mrs. taylor's dwelling was, to my knowledge, near; but i suppose she had to tell, and her friends to hear, the whole history of the sale, her disappointment and subsequent relief, as a preliminary measure. after which it is probable that mrs. taylor had to look at her pie in the oven, or attend to some similar and pressing domestic duty before she could leave her house; and so it was nearly half an hour before they came to my relief. and all this time the sick boy tossed and moaned, and cried for water. i gave him some from a mug on the table, not so much from any precocious gift for sick nursing (for i was simply "frightened out of my wits"), but because the imperative tone of his demand forced me involuntarily into doing what he wanted. he grumbled, when between us we spilt the water on his clothes, and then, soothed for a few seconds, he lay down, till the fever, like a possessing demon, tossed him about once more, and his throat became as parched as ever, and again he moaned for "a drink," and we repeated the process. this time the mug was emptied, and when he called a third time i could only say, "the mug's empty."
"there's a pot behind the door," he muttered, impatiently; "look sharp!"
now food, and drink, and all other necessaries of life came to me without effort or seeking, and i was as little accustomed as any other rich man's son to forage for supplies; but on this occasion circumstances forced out of me a helpfulness which[65] necessity early teaches to the poor. i became dimly cognizant of the fact that water does not spring spontaneously in carafes, nor take a delicate colour and flavour in toast-and-water jugs of itself. i found the water-pot, replenished the mug, and went back to my patient. by the time his mother returned i had become quite clever in checking the spasmodic clutches which spilt the cold water into his neck.
from what mrs. taylor said to her friend, it was evident that she disapproved in some way of my presence, and the boy's mother replied to her whispered remonstrances, "i was that put out, i never thought;" which i have no doubt was strictly true.
as i afterwards learnt, she got the blanket, and never ceased to laud my generosity.
i was rather proud of it myself, and it was not without complacency that i recounted to nurse bundle my first essay in "visiting the sick."
but complacency was the last feeling my narrative awoke in mrs. bundle. she was alarmed out of all presence of mind; and her indignation with the woman who had requited my kindness by allowing me to go into a house infected with fever knew no bounds. she had no pity to spare for her when the news reached us that the child was dead.
nothing further came of it for some time. days passed, and it was almost forgotten, only i became decidedly ill-tempered. a captious irritability possessed me, alternating with fits of unaccountable fatigue. at that time i was always either tired or cross, and sometimes both. i must have made nurse bundle very uncomfortable. i was so little happy, for my own share, that when after a day's headache i was put to bed as an invalid, it was a[66] delicious relief to be acknowledged to be ill, to throw off clothes and occupation, and shut my eyes and be nursed.
this happiness lasted for about half an hour. then i began to shiver, and, through no lack of blankets my teeth were soon chattering and the bed shaking under me, as it had been with the village boy. but when this was succeeded by burning heat, and intolerable, consuming restlessness, i would have been glad to shiver again. and then my mind wandered with a restlessness more intolerable than the tossing of my body; and all boundaries of time, and place, and person became confused and indefinitely extended, and hot hours were like ages, and i thought i was that other boy, and that myself would not wait upon him; and the only sensible words i spoke were cries for drink; and so the fever got me fairly into its clutches.
