Imágenes de páginas
PDF
EPUB

"He must be just."

Mr. Owen nodded, as much as to say that Lowland-street Academy contained the justest

of men.

[ocr errors]

Merciful, too, with his justice."

He nodded again, with emphasis.

"By the way, father, who was that I heard crying yesterday?"

"Candy Secundus," said her father, shortly. "Poor Candy Secundus! Poor little Sugar Candy! Do you know little Sugar Candy, Adie? The dearest little fellow, with blue eyes and curly hair, and always getting into scrapes. His mother keeps the baker's shop over the way. What did poor Sugar Candy do, father?"

"Justice comes before mercy," said Rhyl Owen. "Chastise thy son while there is hope, and let not thy soul spare for his crying." Candy Secundus brought a piece of chalk in his trousers pocket, and chalked upon my desk -my desk-these lines:

'Taffy is a Welshman;

Taffy keeps a cane;
When I get a big man

He shall have it back again.'

Candy Secundus will remember his verses for some time when he comes to sit down. I expect Candy's mother will come to-night to give notice."

Winifred looked graver. The withdrawal of one boy from the little school meant the loss of a pound a quarter, a sensible item in the modest household.

"I will go round and see her presently," she said. "Perhaps she will be reasonable."

As the light fell upon her, the low fire on the left and the gas just turned on overhead made pretty effects of colour in the twilight. You may see that she is not a beautiful girl-not beautiful in the sense that Adie, with her regular features and calm eyes in a perpetual repose, is beautiful. Look again: you see a face full of mirth and animation; a nose rather short and perhaps a little too broad; lips half open, showing the whitest teeth behind; and more still, cheeks as soft as peaches and set with a pair of dimples— petites fossettes d'amour. Her chin is strongly accentuated and rather pointed, for Winifred has a will of her own; the tiniest and daintiest little pink ears nestle beneath a cloud of rebel

lious locks of light brown, which escape from their assigned places, and float at their own sweet will; a face full of affection, enjoyment, and possible passion; and, to crown all, a pair of grey eyes which have caught the sunshine of June, and give it back through all the year-eyes always ready to laugh; eyes fearless and trusting; eyes that enjoy the world, and are aglow with the fire of her youthful blood, in which the lover-when the lover comes-will see "a fountain of gardens, a well of living waters, and streams from Lebanon." Her fingers, long and delicate, quiver when she speaks, as if she was working the telegraph still. As she sits, as she moves, as she speaks, you feel that you are with a girl whose nervous system is strung by nature to concert pitch, so that one note out of tune would set the whole ajar. The other girl, Adie Revel, beside her, is at present calmly and dispassionately happy. She has had enough to eat-that is sufficient for the time. Like the owner of the Splendid Shilling, she can say, "Fate cannot harm me; I have dined today." She has no more care for the next day than when we left her last, playing Badminton

with her brother. Like the soft-eyed deer, she lies in the sun and warmth, enjoys what the present has to give, and is a philosopher in this— that she leaves the gods the rest. "Heaven," we know, "which sees the future, keeps the issues in the darkness of the night; nor does it forgive the man who trembles before what is coming, more than is due to human uncertainty." Adie had never read Horace; but she agreed with so much of his philosophy as not to tremble at thinking of the future. Now Winifred thought perpetually of things that might be coming: she thought of Marion, who worked for the three; of Adie, who could not work, but sat at home and hoped for better things; and she thought—she thought too much-of Fred: Fred the handsome, Fred the indolent, Fred, whose very faults made him interesting, because they were not the faults of the class among whom she had been brought up. A young man of Lowland-street or Euphrates-row, if he departed from the paths of rectitude, which was not uncommon, was to be seen smoking pipes at public-house doors, reeling home at night, or even, in extreme cases of moral obliquity, marching handcuffed between

two men in blue, or escorted from the doors of Bow-street Police-office to the door of her Majesty's omnibus. The Lowland-street youth did not, like Mr. Frederick Revel, wear trousers and coat closely resembling those of Bond-street; they did not spend the day in the fashionable end of the town; they did not frequent West-end billiard rooms; nor did they despise the companionship of other young gentlemen in the street. Perhaps it was the contrast of Fred Revel with this other young man which made Winifred think so much about him.

The old schoolmaster, retreating from the table to his place in the window and his book, left the two girls to their talk.

"Poor dear!" said Winifred. "To think of your going without your dinner for two days! Why did you not tell us?"

Adie laughed.

"That is nothing, providing we don't have to go without our dinner to-morrow and the next day. But I dare say Marion will get some money; she always does find money somehow." "Perhaps your brother will get a proper place soon."

« AnteriorContinuar »