Complete Works of Wilkie Collins (1044 page)

Amelius carried the box into the bedroom. “Be as quick as you can, Sally,” he said — and left her alone, to enjoy the full rapture of discovering the new clothes.

When she opened the door and showed herself, the change was so wonderful that Amelius was literally unable to speak to her. Joy flushed her pale cheeks, and diffused its tender radiance over her pure blue eyes. A more charming little creature, in that momentary transfiguration of pride and delight, no man’s eyes ever looked on. She ran across the room to Amelius, and threw her arms round his neck. “Let me be your servant!” she cried; “I want to live with you all my life. Jump me up! I’m wild — I want to fly through the window.” She caught sight of herself in the looking-glass, and suddenly became composed and serious. “Oh,” she said, with the quaintest mixture of awe and astonishment, “was there ever such another bonnet as this? Do look at it — do please look at it!”

Amelius good-naturedly approached to look at it. At the same moment the sitting-room door was opened, without any preliminary ceremony of knocking — and Rufus walked into the room. “It’s half after ten,” he said, “and the breakfast is spoiling as fast as it can.”

Before Amelius could make his excuses for having completely forgotten his engagement, Rufus discovered Sally. No woman, young or old, high in rank or low in rank, ever found the New Englander unprepared with his own characteristic acknowledgment of the debt of courtesy which he owed to the sex. With his customary vast strides, he marched up to Sally and insisted on shaking hands with her. “How do you find yourself, miss? I take pleasure in making your acquaintance.” The girl turned to Amelius with wide-eyed wonder and doubt. “Go into the next room, Sally, for a minute or two,” he said. “This gentleman is a friend of mine, and I have something to say to him.”

“That’s an
active
little girl,” said Rufus, looking after her as she ran to the friendly shelter of the bedroom. “Reminds me of one of our girls at Coolspring — she does. Well, now, and who may Sally be?”

Amelius answered the question, as usual, without the slightest reserve. Rufus waited in impenetrable silence until he had completed his narrative — then took him gently by the arm, and led him to the window. With his hands in his pockets and his long legs planted wide apart on his big feet, the American carefully studied the face of his young friend under the strongest light that could fall on it.

“No,” said Rufus, speaking quietly to himself, “the boy is not raving mad, so far as I can see. He has every appearance on him of meaning what he says. And this is what comes of the Community of Tadmor, is it? Well, civil and religious liberty is dearly purchased sometimes in the United States — and that’s a fact.”

Amelius turned away to pack his portmanteau. “I don’t understand you,” he said.

“I don’t suppose you do,” Rufus remarked. “I am at a similar loss myself to understand
you.
My store of sensible remarks is copious on most occasions — but I’m darned if I ain’t dried up in the face of this! Might I venture to ask what that venerable Chief Christian at Tadmor would say to the predicament in which I find my young Socialist this morning?”

“What would he say?” Amelius repeated. “Just what he said when Mellicent first came among us. ‘Ah, dear me! Another of the Fallen Leaves!’ I wish I had the dear old man here to help me.
He
would know how to restore that poor starved, outraged, beaten creature to the happy place on God’s earth which God intended her to fill!”

Rufus abruptly took him by the hand. “You mean that?” he said.

“What else could I mean?” Amelius rejoined sharply.

“Bring her right away to breakfast at the hotel!” cried Rufus, with every appearance of feeling infinitely relieved. “I don’t say I can supply you with the venerable Chief Christian — but I can find a woman to fix you, who is as nigh to being an angel, barring the wings, as any she-creature since the time of mother Eve.” He knocked at the bedroom door, turning a deaf ear to every appeal for further information which Amelius could address to him. “Breakfast is waiting, miss!” he called out; “and I’m bound to tell you that the temper of the cook at our hotel is a long way on the wrong side of uncertain. Well, Amelius, this is the age of exhibition. If there’s ever an exhibition of ignorance in the business of packing a portmanteau, you run for the Gold Medal — and a unanimous jury will vote it, I reckon, to a young man from Tadmor. Clear out, will you, and leave it to me.”

He pulled off his coat, and conquered the difficulties of packing in a hurry, as if he had done nothing else all his life. The landlady herself, appearing with pitiless punctuality exactly at the expiration of the hour, “smoothed her horrid front” in the polite and placable presence of Rufus. He insisted on shaking hands with her; he took pleasure in making her acquaintance; she reminded him, he did assure her, of the lady of the captain-general of the Coolspring Branch of the St. Vitus Commandery; and he would take the liberty to inquire whether they were related or not. Under cover of this fashionable conversation, Simple Sally was taken out of the room by Amelius without attracting notice. She insisted on carrying her threadbare old clothes away with her in the box which had contained the new dress. “I want to look at them sometimes,” she said, “and think how much better off I am now.” Rufus was the last to take his departure; he persisted in talking to the landlady all the way down the stairs and out to the street door.

While Amelius was waiting for his friend on the house-steps, a young man driving by in a cab leaned out and looked at him. The young man was Jervy, on his way from Mr. Ronald’s tombstone to Doctors’ Commons.

CHAPTER 3

With a rapid succession of events the morning had begun. With a rapid succession of events the day went on.

The breakfast being over, rooms at the hotel were engaged by Rufus for his “two young friends.” After this, the next thing to be done was to provide Simple Sally with certain necessary, but invisible, articles of clothing, which Amelius had never thought of. A note to the nearest shop produced the speedy arrival of a smart lady, accompanied by a boy and a large basket. There was some difficulty in persuading Sally to trust herself alone in her room with the stranger. She was afraid, poor soul, of everybody but Amelius. Even the good American failed to win her confidence. The distrust implanted in her feeble mind by the terrible life that she had led, was the instinctive distrust of a wild animal. “Why must I go among other people?” she whispered piteously to Amelius. “I only want to be with You!” It was as completely useless to reason with her as it would have been to explain the advantages of a comfortable cage to a newly caught bird. There was but one way of inducing her to submit to the most gently exerted interference. Amelius had only to say, “Do it, Sally, to please me.” And Sally sighed, and did it.

In her absence Amelius reiterated his inquiries, in relation to that unknown friend whom Rufus had not scrupled to describe as “an angel — barring the wings.”

The lady in question, the American briefly explained, was an Englishwoman — the wife of one of his countrymen, established in London as a merchant. He had known them both intimately before their departure from the United States; and the old friendship had been cordially renewed on his arrival in England. Associated with many other charitable institutions, Mrs. Payson was one of the managing committee of a “Home for Friendless Women,” especially adapted to receive poor girls in Sally’s melancholy position. Rufus offered to write a note to Mrs. Payson; inquiring at what hour she could receive his friend and himself, and obtain permission for them to see the “Home.” Amelius, after some hesitation, accepted the proposal. The messenger had not been long despatched with the note before the smart person from the shop made her appearance once more, reporting that “the young lady’s outfit had been perfectly arranged,” and presenting the inevitable result in the shape of a bill. The last farthing of ready money in the possession of Amelius proved to be insufficient to discharge the debt. He accepted a loan from Rufus, until he could give his bankers the necessary order to sell out some of his money invested in the Funds. His answer, when Rufus protested against this course, was characteristic of the teaching which he owed to the Community. “My dear fellow, I am bound to return the money you have lent to me — in the interests of our poor brethren. The next friend who borrows of you may not have the means of paying you back.”

After waiting for the return of Simple Sally, and waiting in vain, Amelius sent a chambermaid to her room, with a message to her. Rufus disapproved of this hasty proceeding. “Why disturb the girl at her looking-glass?” asked the old bachelor, with his quaintly humorous smile.

Sally came in with no bright pleasure in her eyes this time; the girl looked worn and haggard. She drew Amelius away into a corner, and whispered to him. “I get a pain sometimes where the bruise is,” she said; “and I’ve got it bad, now.” She glanced, with an odd furtive jealousy, at Rufus. “I kept away from you,” she explained, “because I didn’t want
him
to know.” She stopped, and put her hand on her bosom, and clenched her teeth fast. “Never mind,” she said cheerfully, as the pang passed away again; “I can bear it.”

Amelius, acting on impulse, as usual, instantly ordered the most comfortable carriage that the hotel possessed. He had heard terrible stories of the possible result of an injury to a woman’s bosom. “I shall take her to the best doctor in London,” he announced. Sally whispered to him again — still with her eye on Rufus. “Is
he
going with us?” she asked. “No,” said Amelius; “one of us must stay here to receive a message.” Rufus looked after them very gravely, as the two left the room together.

Applying for information to the mistress of the hotel, Amelius obtained the address of a consulting surgeon of great celebrity, while Sally was getting ready to go out.

“Why don’t you like my good friend upstairs?” he said to the girl as they drove away from the house. The answer came swift and straight from the heart of the daughter of Eve. “Because
you
like him!” Amelius changed the subject: he asked if she was still in pain. She shook her head impatiently. Pain or no pain, the uppermost idea in her mind was still that idea of being his servant, which had already found expression in words before they left the lodgings. “Will you let me keep my beautiful new dress for going out on Sundays?” she asked. “The shabby old things will do when I am your servant. I can black your boots, and brush your clothes, and keep your room tidy — and I will try hard to learn, if you will have me taught to cook.” Amelius attempted to change the subject again. He might as well have talked to her in an unknown tongue. The glorious prospect of being his servant absorbed the whole of her attention. “I’m little and I’m stupid,” she went on; “but I do think I could learn to cook, if I knew I was doing it for
You.”
She paused, and looked at him anxiously. “Do let me try!” she pleaded; “I haven’t had much pleasure in my life — and I should like it so!” It was impossible to resist this. “You shall be as happy as I can make you, Sally,” Amelius answered; “God knows it isn’t much you ask for!”

Something in those compassionate words set her thinking in another direction. It was sad to see how slowly and painfully she realized the idea that had been suggested to her.

“I wonder whether you
can
make me happy?” she said. “I suppose I have been happy before this — but I don’t know when. I don’t remember a time when I was not hungry or cold. Wait a bit. I do think I
was
happy once. It was a long while ago, and it took me a weary time to do it — but I did learn at last to play a tune on the fiddle. The old man and his wife took it in turns to teach me. Somebody gave me to the old man and his wife; I don’t know who it was, and I don’t remember their names. They were musicians. In the fine streets they sang hymns, and in the poor streets they sang comic songs. It was cold, to be sure, standing barefoot on the pavement — but I got plenty of halfpence. The people said I was so little it was a shame to send me out, and so I got halfpence. I had bread and apples for supper, and a nice little corner under the staircase, to sleep in. Do you know, I do think I did enjoy myself at that time,” she concluded, still a little doubtful whether those faint and far-off remembrances were really to be relied on.

Amelius tried to lead her to other recollections. He asked her how old she was when she played the fiddle.

“I don’t know,” she answered; “I don’t know how old I am now. I don’t remember anything before the fiddle. I can’t call to mind how long it was first — but there came a time when the old man and his wife got into trouble. They went to prison, and I never saw them afterwards. I ran away with the fiddle; to get the halfpence, you know, all to myself. I think I should have got a deal of money, if it hadn’t been for the boys. They’re so cruel, the boys are. They broke my fiddle. I tried selling pencils after that; but people didn’t seem to want pencils. They found me out begging. I got took up, and brought before the what-do-you-call-him — the gentleman who sits in a high place, you know, behind a desk. Oh, but I was frightened, when they took me before the gentleman! He looked very much puzzled. He says, ‘Bring her up here; she’s so small I can hardly see her.’ He says, ‘Good God! what am I to do with this unfortunate child?’ There was plenty of people about. One of them says, ‘The workhouse ought to take her.’ And a lady came in, and she says, ‘I’ll take her, sir, if you’ll let me.’ And he knew her, and he let her. She took me to a place they called a Refuge — for wandering children, you know. It was very strict at the Refuge. They did give us plenty to eat, to be sure, and they taught us lessons. They told us about Our Father up in Heaven. I said a wrong thing — I said, ‘I don’t want him up in Heaven; I want him down here.’ They were very much ashamed of me when I said that. I was a bad girl; I turned ungrateful. After a time, I ran away. You see, it was so strict, and I was so used to the streets. I met with a Scotchman in the streets. He wore a kilt, and played the pipes; he taught me to dance, and dressed me up like a Scotch girl. He had a curious wife, a sort of half-black woman. She used to dance too — on a bit of carpet, you know, so as not to spoil her fine shoes. They taught me songs; he taught me a Scotch song. And one day his wife said
she
was English (I don’t know how that was, being a half-black woman), and I should learn an English song. And they quarrelled about it. And she had her way. She taught me ‘Sally in our Alley’. That’s how I come to be called Sally. I hadn’t any name of my own — I always had nicknames. Sally was the last of them, and Sally has stuck to me. I hope it isn’t too common a name to please you? Oh, what a fine house! Are we really going in? Will they let
me
in? How stupid I am! I forgot my beautiful clothes. You won’t tell them, will you, if they take me for a lady?”