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THE NEW LODGER.
"SO you like your new lodger, Sally Dent?"
"Ay, he's a gentleman, he is."
"A gentleman! That means that he pays you reg'lar, I s'pose?"
"It means a good sight more than that, though it's true he give me a fortnight's rent in advance, and said I shouldn't never be a loser by he, for he'd take 'isself off when he'd no money to pay me. I tell you, he's a real gentleman."
"That's a good 'un!" laughed a man, who stood mending a fence near enough to the women to hear what they said. "Do you think him so, because he came home as drunk as a lord last night? A pretty gentleman! But maybe you wasn't aware of that fact."
"Wasn't I? There ain't much 'appens in my 'ouse that I ain't aware on. But if he was drunk, he be'aved 'isself like a gentleman, and didn't make no noise. We've all our little weaknesses, and I 'opes I knows how to make allowance."
Sally Dent's appearance accorded with her tolerant tone. She was a tall, fine woman, who might have been comely had she taken more care of her person. She had an abundance of light wavy hair, but its rough, dishevelled condition robbed it of all beauty. The expression of her round fat face was too easy by far, and its ruddy hue suggested that she too might have her "little weakness," and that a fellow-feeling made her so "wondrous kind" towards her lodger's infirmity. Her dirty, torn gown, the grimy doorstep on which she stood, the blackened passage beyond, the state of the child clutching at her gown as he poised himself on his unsteady feet, all bore witness to a life that was a careless drifting on the currents of inclination.
"He's got a boy, ain't he?" asked her neighbour, a gaunt, angular female, who looked to have a temper, and altogether more character than the indolent Sally.
"Yon's the boy," returned Sally, pointing across the road.
Mrs. Minn glanced in the direction indicated. The houses of Lavender Terrace—why Lavender Terrace it would be hard to say; the purity and fragrance which we associate with the name of the old-fashioned country flower were not characteristics of the foul, narrow lane—faced a line of railway, and trains were continually passing on the other side of the high, tarred fence. At one spot a heap of refuse—broken earthenware, battered kettles, and such old shoes as even the dwellers in Lavender Terrace were forced to discard—was banked against the fence.
On the top of this heap, attaining a still greater elevation by balancing himself by one foot upon an upturned flower-pot, stood the boy, absorbed in watching the passing trains. He was a small, slight boy, looking only eight, though two years older. His face was turned from the women, and the fact concerning him most evident to the eye of the observer was the very dilapidated state of his garments. So ragged were they, that it was a matter of wonder how they held together.
As Sally's neighbour eyed the little lad, she gave a short laugh.
"He looks like a gentleman's son, don't he now? He has no mother, I s'pose?"
"She's dead, I believe. Ay, you may laugh, Mrs. Minn; but there's gentlefolks as come down in the world, and, if I'm not mistaken, this lodger of mine comes of gentlefolk. You should see the Bible he has in his room, one with gilt edges and lined with silk, like the gentry use. I ought to know, for I've lived in good service and seen what's what. And I can tell you he's a scholard, for one day I wanted a letter wrote to my old mistress, and I made so bold as to ask him to do it for me, and you may believe me, he wrote such a letter as a gentleman might 'a'wrote. She noticed it, she did, and asked me who'd wrote it."
"The more shame to him to have fallen so low," said the carpenter, hammering vigorously. "There's some excuse for us poor chaps, who have had a hard struggle all our days, if we take a drop too much to cheer us sometimes; but a man who has had eddication, and all the advantages money can give, ought to be ashamed of hisself if he can't behave as he should. I know if I had had such chances—"
But what he would have done under more fortunate circumstances remained untold, for at that moment Mrs. Dent's lodger made his appearance. He came round the sharp bend by which the lane turned from the main road, a man above the middle height, but with stooping shoulders and feeble frame. His clothes were deplorably shabby, but they looked the shabbier for their cut and style, which revealed the skill of a high-class tailor. His face was sharp and wan, but it had a refinement of feature which was not due merely to the wasting of disease. The deep-seated anguish that looked out of his eyes, the settled bitterness expressed by the drooping corners of the delicate mouth, would have struck pain to the heart of a sensitive observer.
Mrs. Minn was hardly such a one, but she felt a novel sensation of pity, as with instinctive courtesy he stepped from the path to make room for her. In spite of his depressed, crushed air, he walked and bore himself in a different fashion from any other man living at Lavender Terrace. It was the first time he had been seen abroad in daylight since he came to Mrs. Dent's, and the neighbours observed him curiously.
"Gus, I want you," he called to his son, halting for a moment ere he turned into the house. The voice was weak and hoarse; but it had some quality other than weakness or hoarseness, which gave it an unusual sound to the ears of the listeners.
The boy sprang down from the rubbish heap and hastened after his father. Perhaps the sight of the parcel wrapped in newspaper which his father carried under his arm quickened his steps. Gus was pale, and his face showed a faint reflex of the melancholy expression stamped upon his father's; but it had the brightness which comes of a liberal application of soap and water. If he was one of the most ragged boys in the lane, he was also one of the cleanest. He looked up into Mrs. Minn's face as he passed her. His clear, frank blue eyes, his sweet, gentle expression affected her strangely.
"God bless him! He's a pretty boy," she said, though she was not wont to pray God to bless her own children.
Sally Dent ventured on no familiar greeting as her lodger entered the house. There was something about the silent, melancholy man that held her in awe.
"So that's your lodger," said Mrs. Minn, lowering her voice. "But how ill he looks! I never saw any one so ghastly. You mark my words, Sally Dent, he won't be your lodger long."
GUS followed his father into the small back room which was their home. It was a comfortless room, with an unmade bed in one corner and a small table in the middle, on which was a penny bottle of ink, a couple of quill pens, and a dingy remnant of blotting-paper. It also contained two rickety chairs and a large, old-fashioned trunk, on the top of which lay about a score of books, most of them in a more or less shabby condition. The few poor articles of furniture were the property of Sally Dent; only the trunk, the books, and the writing materials belonged to her lodger.
The room was small, but it was not close. The window, grey with dust, was open at top and bottom, letting in the fresh, soft air of the fair May day. Lavender Terrace was not shut in from the winds of heaven. Before it ran the railway, and behind lay stretch of waste ground, around which new houses were rising. It was neither in London nor in the country, but one of those dreary new neighbourhoods to be found on the skirts of the metropolis which have lost their rural charm ere yet they have gained the advantages and respectability of a suburban locality. There were fields still at Glensford, and through one of them a stream made its way; but its banks were littered with rubbish, and its waters choked and befouled by the refuse cast into them. There were generally gipsy carts to be seen in these fields, and gipsy children with bare feet and tangled locks disporting themselves by the stream.
Gus watched his father silently, but with eager eyes, as he unrolled the paper parcel, and brought to view a loaf of bread and some slices of cooked ham. Then, without words, the boy went to a small cupboard by the fireplace, brought out the remnant of linen which did service as a tablecloth, with plates, knives and forks, and as rapidly as possible made the few simple preparations for their meal. The last of these was to place before his father a tall black bottle and a tumbler.
It was now two o'clock, and this was the first meal of the day; yet ere he attacked the food, for which he had so keen an appetite, the boy bent his head and repeated a brief grace. It was the habit in which he had been reared, and its omission would have drawn on him a reprimand from his father.
The boy ate hungrily, but a few mouthfuls seemed to content his father. He laid down his knife and fork, mixed himself a tumblerful of spirit and water, and sat slowly sipping it, and watching his boy the while with his hopeless, melancholy eyes.
"Gus," he said suddenly, "what is your name?"
"Gus Rew," answered the boy, with a smile. His spirits were rising as he took the sorely needed food, and he fancied that his father's mood was also waxing cheerful.
"No, that is not your name," was the unexpected reply.
Gus looked at his father with a shrewd, discerning glance. He was taking but a moderate draught; he never drank deeply so early in the day. Had it been night, Gus would have wondered at no strange, inexplicable words that might fall from his lips; but he did wonder now.
"What do you mean, father?" he asked.
"The name by which the people here know us is not our real name. I called myself Devereux once when we lived in another part, but people soon cut it down to Rew, and I let it be so. Shall I tell you your right name, Gus?"
"Yes," said the boy, forgetting to eat in his astonishment.
"Augustus Devereux Carruthers."
"My!" exclaimed Gus, his eyes opening wide in astonishment. "That's a good long one."
"It is your name, however. Can you remember it?"
"I don't know as I can," replied Gus.
"Then I'll write it down for you. It may be of importance to you some day that you should know your right name. But mind, boy, you are to keep it to yourself. Not a word to any one about it unless I give you leave."
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