“I like you, Tarnley; we’ve had rough words, sometimes, but no ill blood, and I’ll do what I said. I never failed a friend, as you will see, if only you be my friend; and why or for whom should you not? Tut, we’re not fools!”
“The time is past for me to quarrel, being to the wrong side o’ sixty more than you’d suppose, and quiet all I wants—quiet, ma’am.”
“Yes, quiet and comfort, too, and both you shall have, Mildred Tarnley, if you don’t choose to quarrel with those who would be kind to you, if you’d let them. Yes, indeed, who would be kind, and very kind, if you’d only let them. No, leave your hand where it is, I can’t see you, and it’s sometimes dull work talking only to a voice. If I can’t see you I’ll feel you, and hold you, old girl—hold you fast till I know what terms we’re on.”
All this time she had Mildred Tarnley’s hand between hers, and was fondling and kneading it as a rustic lover in the agonies of the momentous question might have done fifty years ago.
“I don’t know what you want me to say, ma’am, no more than the plate there. Little good left in Mildred Tarnley now, and small power to help or hurt anyone, great or small, at these years.”
“I want you to be friendly with me, that’s all; I ask no more, and it ain’t a great deal, all things considered. Friendly talk, of course, ain’t all I mean, that’s civility, and civility’s very well, very pleasant, like a lady’s fan, or her lapdog, but nothing at a real pinch, nothing to fight a wolf with. Come, old Mildred, Mildred Tarnley, good Mildred, can I be sure of you, quite sure?”
“Sure and certain, ma’am, in all honest service.”
“Honest service! Yes, of course; what else could we think of? You used to like, I remember, Mildred, a nice ribbon in your bonnet. I have two pieces quite new. I brought them from London. Satin ribbon—purple one is—I know you’ll like it, and you’ll drink a glass of this to please me.”
“Thanks for the ribbons, ma’am, I’ll not refuse ’em; but I won’t drink nothing, ma’am, I thank you.”
“Well, please yourself in that. Pour out a little for me, there’s a glass, ain’t there?”
“Yes, ’m. How much will you have, ma’am?”
“Half a glass. There’s a dear. Stingy half glass,” she continued, putting her finger in to gauge the quantity. “Go on, go on, remember my long journey today. Do you smoke, Mildred?”
“Smoke, ’m? No, ’m! Dear me, there’s no smell o’ tobacco, is there?” said Mildred, who was always suspecting Tom of smoking slyly in his crib under the stairs.
“Smell, no; but I smoke a pinch of tobacco now and again myself, the doctor says I must, and a breath just of opium when I want it. You can have a pipe of tobacco if you like, child, and you needn’t be shy. Well?”
“Ho, Fau! No, ma’am, I thank ye.”
“Fau!” echoed the Dutchwoman, with a derisive, chilling laugh, which apprised old Mildred of her solecism. But the lady did not mean to quarrel.
“What sort of dress have you for Sundays, going to church, and all that?”
“An old dress it is now. I had the material, ye’ll mind, when ye was here, long ago; but it wasn’t made up till long after. It’s very genteel, the folk all says. Chocolate colour—British cashmere—’twas old Mrs. Hartlepool, the parson’s widow, made me a compliment o’t when she was goin’, and I kept it all the time, wi’ whole pepper and camphor, in my box, by my bed, and it looked as fresh when I took it out to give it to Miss Maddox to make up as if ’twas just put new on the counter. She did open her eyes, that’s nigh seven years gone, when I told her how old it was.”
“Heyday! Hi! I think I do remember that old chocolate thing. Why, it can’t be that, that’s twenty years old. Well, look in my box, here’s the key. You’ll see two books with green leather backs and gold. Can ye read? I’m going to make you a present.”
“I can read, ma’am; but I scarce have time to read my Bible.”
“The Bible’s a good book, but that’s a better,” said the lady, with one of her titters. “But it ain’t a book I’m going to give you. Look it out, green and gold, there are only two in the box. It is the one that has an I and a V on the back, four, the fourth volume. I have little else to amuse me. I have the news of the neighbours, but I don’t like ’em, who could? A bad lot, they hate one another; ’twouldn’t be a worse world if they were all hanged. They hate me because I’m a lady, so I don’t cry when baby takes the croup, nor break my heart when papa gets into the ‘Gazette.’ Have you found it? Why, it’s under your hand there. They would not cry their eyes out for me, so I can see the funny side of their adventures, bless them!”
“Is this it, ma’am?”
“There are but two books in the box. Has it an I and a V on the back?”
“V, O, L, I, V,” spelled out old Mildred, who was listening in a fever for the sounds of Charles Fairfield’s arrival.
“That’s it. That’s the book you should read. I take it in, and I hire all the others, and a French one, from the Hoxton library. I make Molly Jinks, the little, dirty, starving maid, read to me two hours a day. She’s got rather to like it. How are your eyes?”
“I can make out twelve or fourteen verses wi’ the glasses, but not more, at one bout.”
“Well, get on your glasses. This is the
