Chapter XII: "lame Dogs Over Stiles."

We cannot kindle when we will
The fire which in the heart resides;
The spirit bloweth and is still,
In mystery our soul abides.
But tasks in hours of insight will'd
Can be through hours of gloom fulfill'd.

With aching hands and bleeding feet
We dig and heap, lay stone on stone;
We bear the burden and the heat
Of the long day, and wish 't were done.
Not till the hours of light return,
All we have built do we discern.
MATTHEW ARNOLD.

"There's been a scrap of a child here asking for you," said the old captain to Donovan, as they returned to their rooms one evening after dining at a restaurant. "I couldn't make out what she wanted, but she's been here twice to see if you weren't come home."

"What sort of child?"

"Oh! a shabby-looking little lass. She wouldn't tell me what she wanted with you, only she must see Mr. Farrant, and when would he be in."

"She'll turn up again, I suppose," said Donovan. "I'm pretty free this evening; shall we do those slides?"

Old Rouge had lately developed a most satisfactory love for the microscope, and whenever it was possible Donovan asked his help over it, or awakened his interest in some new specimen to be seen. There were now actually three things in the world besides himself and his toddy which the old captain cared for--Donovan, Sweepstakes, and the microscope. He loved them all exceedingly in his odd way, and, on the whole, the year which he had spent in York Road was almost the happiest year of his life.

They were hard at work with their slides, specimens, and Canada balsam when the doorbell rang and the mysterious "child" was announced.

"Show her in here," said Donovan to the landlady.

"Indeed, sir, she ain't fit," returned the woman. "It's a-pouring with rain, and she be that wet and dirty."

Donovan frowned the frown of a Republican, deposited his section of the brain of a gorilla in a safe place, and went out into the passage. The smallest little white-faced child imaginable stood on the mat; the rain had soaked her, the water dripped down from her dark hair, from her ragged shawl, from her indescribably-draggled skirt; she looked the picture of misery.

"Come in and dry yourself by the fire," said Donovan, and the small elf, too frightened to refuse, followed him into the sitting-room. The old captain bowed to her as gallantly as if she had been a princess, Waif sniffed at her wet frock and yielded up his place in front of the fender, Donovan drew a stool for her on to the hearthrug, and the elf sat down and instinctively spread out her frozen fingers to the blaze.

"You wanted to see me?" asked Donovan. "What was it about?"

"Please it was father, sir."

"What is your father's name?"

"Smith, sir, and please he's very ill with something in his inside, and he wants to see you."

"But I'm not a doctor; he must get the parish doctor."

"Oh! please, it isn't for his inside he wants you," said the elf, looking frightened.

"What does he want?"

"Please I don't know, but he said I was to ask Mr. Farrant to come."

"But I don't know your father; he's not been at St. Thomas's, has he?"

"No, sir, but please do come, for he'll be dreadful vexed if you don't," and her eyes filled with tears.

"Don't cry," said Donovan, "I'll come with you. Is it far? You must show me the way."

They set off together, Donovan taking the elf under his umbrella to her unspeakable pride and delight, and Waif soberly trotting at their heels.

"And how did your father know where I lived, do you think?" he asked, as they crossed Westminster Bridge.

"Please he had it all wrote down on a card, and he can read very well indeed, father can."

Big Ben struck nine, and therewith a recollection awoke in Donovan's mind, a fierce struggle which he had once had just on that spot, a sight of Stephen passing by, a hurried pursuit to a well-known billiard-saloon, and a strange recognition of a Cornish face. He had written his address on a card, of course! He remembered it perfectly well now. This must be a message from Trevethan's son.

The elf did not speak again, but led him down Horseferry Road into one of the most horrible of the Westminster slums. He took the precaution of picking up Waif and carrying him under his arm; he was his only valuable. They were unmolested, however, and the child, turning into a forlorn-looking house, led the way up a steep and dirty staircase, and turning a door-handle showed Donovan into a perfectly dark room redolent of tobacco.

"Here's the gentleman, father; give us a light," she said, groping her way in.

A match was struck, and Donovan could see by the fitful light a comfortless-looking room, and in the corner a man propped up in bed with a short pipe in his hand. The elf produced a tallow candle, Donovan drew near to the bed, and at once recognised the billiard-marker.

"I thought the message was from you; I'm glad you've sent for me at last," he said.

"I thought it was too late," said the man, "and then when the child found you out, I thought it was that you wouldn't come. Sit down;" he pointed to a chair, then went on speaking in the most absolutely free and easy tone. "I'm dying, or next door to it, so I thought I'd like to hear of the old man down at Porthkerran. He asked you to look out for me, did he?"

"It was his greatest wish to find you," said Donovan. "And after you sent him that five-pound note he told me about you, said he thought you must be in London, and having very little idea of the sort of place London is, he asked me to look for you. You are like him; I recognised you at once that night."

"No flattery to the poor old man to say I'm like him," said Trevethan, with a laugh. "This one is like him, though; come here, little one, are you wet? it rains, don't it?"

He drew the child towards him, touching her ragged dress with his thin white hands.

"The gentleman made me dry it by the fire, and he held his umbrella over me as we comed back," said the elf.

"Thank you, sir," said Trevethan, a softened expression playing about his cynical mouth. "She's a bit of the real Cornish in her, though London smoke has nearly spoilt it. There, run away and get your supper, Gladys."

Donovan started and coloured.

"Yes, 'tis a queer name for the likes of her," observed Trevethan, scanning Donovan's face curiously with his keen blue eyes. "But I made up my mind the little one should have at least one good honest name, though may be Miss Gladys wouldn't be best pleased to have her name given to such a poor little brat."

"Oh! yes, she would be very glad to see that you remembered Porthkerran and still cared for it," said Donovan. "But it's a pity to let the poor child grow up here when your father would be only too glad to have her."

"That's what I wanted you for," said Trevethan. "Would he be kind to her? is he too strait-laced to take in my poor little lass? Some of those religionists are hard as nails, and I want my little lass to be happy."

"He would be very good to her," said Donovan, without hesitation. "Your father is one of the best men I know."

"Odd that he should have such a son, isn't it?" said Trevethan, trying to laugh.

"Happily the least deserving of us do often have good fathers," said Donovan, rather huskily.

Then he listened to the history of the blacksmith's son, a very sad history, which need not be written here. The man was now evidently very ill, not at all fit to be left alone with no better nurse than his child, but he had fought against the idea of being moved to a hospital because he could not endure the thought of leaving little Gladys alone, or of having her sent to the workhouse. Donovan offered to pay her expenses down to Porthkerran, but even that seemed intolerable to the poor man, as long as he lived he could not make up his mind to part with her. Nor would he let Donovan write to his father.

"Not now. Don't write now," he urged, "it would only make the old man miserable, wait till I'm either dead or better. Do you think there's a chance of my getting better? I should like to make a fresh start."

"There would be a very good chance for you if you would go to a hospital, you cannot be properly nursed here. Think over it, and I will see whether I can't find some one in London who would look after your child."

"If she could come to see me," said Trevethan, wistfully.

So Donovan left, promising to look in again the next evening and talk things over.

There was evidently no time to be lost, he thought the matter over as he walked home, and suddenly arriving at a possible solution of the difficulty, he turned into the station instead of going on to York Road, took a ticket to Gower Street, and was soon making his way to the Osmonds.

Charles Osmond was at church, but Brian and Mrs. Osmond wore at home, and were quite ready to hear the story of the sick man.

"Another _protégé_ for you," said Brian, laughing, "and of course a ne'er-do-weel."

"Birds of a feather flock together," said Donovan, smiling. "We've a natural affinity, you see. The great difficulty is about the child, I don't know what's to be done with her."

"We might get her into some home," said Mrs. Osmond. "I know one or two where she would be happy."

"But she wouldn't be allowed to go and see her father," said Donovan. "And it would never do to separate them, the child is the great hope for him."

"What child is the great hope, and for whom?" said Charles Osmond, coming into the room with his peculiarly soft slow step. "Do I actually hear you, Donovan, discussing such things as men and children, I thought you were up to the eyes in work for the exam?"

Donovan told his story.

"You see," he added, at the close. "From any school or home she would never be allowed to come out and go to the hospital."

"What's the child's name?"

"Gladys." Then as Brian looked greatly surprised and Charles Osmond made an exclamation, he continued,--"Trevethan comes from Porthkerran, and Miss Tremain is worshipped down there; she is the tutelary saint of the place--and he called his child after her."

"Well, I think Gladys had better come to this home," said Charles Osmond. "What do you say, mother--will Mrs. Maloney make the kitchen too hot to hold her?"

"Oh, no, she is much too good-natured."

"But you don't realise, I'm afraid," said Donovan. "She's the most neglected-looking little thing altogether, dirty and unkempt, and too young to be of any use to you."

"She must be an odd child if we don't find her of use," said Charles Osmond, with a strange smile in his eyes. "Why, I thought, Donovan, you were one who believed in the influence of children."

"For those who want it, yes," said Donovan. "But----"

"But we don't want it, and are to be left to ourselves--is that it?"

"She's scarcely fit to come here," said Donovan; "she's ragged and dirty to a degree."

"Oh, you soul of cleanliness!" said Charles Osmond, laughing. "Is there not water in the land of Bloomsbury?--can we not scrub this blackamoor white? And as to raggedness, it will be odd if with four women in the house--all of them longing to be Dorcases--we can't clothe one poor little elf. Can you get your man admitted to St. Thomas's?"

"I think so."

"Very well, then, as soon as he is moved we will be ready to have the little girl."

Donovan went home with the words ringing in his ears, "A stranger and ye took me in." And instinctively his thoughts travelled back to a certain summer day years ago, when, with muddy, travel-stained clothes, he too had been taken into a home, ill and penniless and utterly ignorant of that strange love which had been revealed to him. He feared it was against the rules of political economy, and quite against all worldly wisdom; but however that might be, such living Christianity had a strange power of touching his heart.

It seemed to touch Trevethan's heart too; evidently kindness to the child was the way to get hold of him. For attention to himself he was not particularly grateful, grumbled at the prospect of losing his pipe at the hospital, swore fearfully if, in helping him to move, Donovan caused him any pain, and was so surly and off-hand in manner that, had his attendant been a believer in class and caste, he could hardly have borne it patiently.

Every evening for the next week he went to that, dismal room in Westminster; it was thankless work, and yet Trevethan was very fond of him, and would hardly have dragged through the wretched days without the hope of those nightly visits. He was far too sullen and miserable and ashamed to let this appear, however, and made it seem rather a favour to admit his visitor. At the end of the week he was able to be moved to St. Thomas's, and on the afternoon of the same day Donovan took little Gladys to the Osmonds.

When he got back to his rooms he found, to his intense surprise, that instead of old Rouge's well-known figure sitting over the fire, there was a lady in the arm-chair, well-dressed, quite at her ease, apparently engrossed in a newspaper. He made a sort of inarticulate exclamation, upon which she turned hastily round.

It was Adela.

"My dear Augustus Cæsar, how delightful to see you again!" she exclaimed, holding out both her hands. "Were you very much astonished to see an unknown female in possession of your fire-side?"

"How good of you to come and look me up!" said Donovan, really pleased to see her, for she was the first of his family whom he had met for years.

"Good!" exclaimed Adela, in her old bantering tone--"why, I've been longing to come over since I knew your whereabouts--ever since that good Cornishman came and enlightened me at Oakdene. But there's been a conspiracy among the fates against me! if you'll believe it, I've hardly been in town since that time. I've been half over the world since I saw you last--Italy, Austria, Greece, Switzerland--in fact, the grand tour; but as to getting a day in town unmolested by friends or dressmakers, in which to visit you, I assure you it's been as unattainable as the moon."

Donovan, a good deal amused by this thoroughly characteristic speech, brought a foot-stool for his cousin, poked the fire, rang the bell for tea, and finally settled himself on the opposite side of the fireplace.

"We will be comfortable, and you shall talk just as you did in the old times," he said. "I declare it makes me feel quite inclined to turn misanthropical again for the sake of one of the old arguments."

"There, I was right, then. You have actually renounced it all and become a philanthropist! To tell you the truth, the immediate cause of my visit was this: I happened to be in the Underground this afternoon, and imagine my feelings when, on the platform at Gower Street, I caught sight of my misanthropical cousin pioneering a little City Arab through the crowd. My curiosity was so intense that I was really obliged to come and solve the problem at once. Besides, it was tantalising to see you so near, and to have my frantic signals disregarded. You are immensely altered, Donovan; I almost wonder now that I knew you."

She looked at him attentively for a minute, as if trying to find out in what the great change consisted.

"It is a long time since we met," said Donovan; "I should think it rather odd if I were not changed."

"You have had a hard life, I'm afraid," said Adela. "You know, of course, how vexed I am about Ellis's conduct; he ought to have made you a proper allowance. I said all I could to him, but that brother of mine is terribly like a mule; when once he has made up his mind to dislike a person, nothing will change his opinion."

"We won't discuss him," said Donovan, afraid that inadvertently he might reveal to Adela the real depth of her brother's treachery. "Tell me instead about my mother; it is more than a year since I had any news of her."

"She is well, I think," said Adela, in a doubtful voice; "but, to tell you the truth, I have been very little at Oakdene. Whether Ellis has any idea that I act as a medium between you and your mother, I don't know, but he makes it unbearably uncomfortable for me. I oughtn't to say it to you, I suppose, but I must confess that that marriage seems to me to have been a fearful mistake. Ellis is not half as jolly as in his poor bachelor days; he has all that heart can wish or money buy, and yet every time I go to stay with them he seems to me more depressed and irritable and dissatisfied with things."

"Does he manage the estate well?"

"Oh! he leaves it all to the bailiff; he knows nothing whatever about it, moons about all day with his cigar, scolding anyone who dares to interrupt him."

"Are they coming up for the season?"

"No, he has let the Connaught Square house till July; but they think of spending next winter either there or abroad, for your mother fancies the Manor damp, and she has certainly had a good deal of rheumatism lately. That is absolutely all I know about them. Now let us talk of something more cheerful; haven't you got some nice, wicked medical student stories for me? You are a dreadful lot, are you not? Now amuse me a little, there's a good boy, for, to tell you the truth, I'm dying of _ennui_ in this most prosaic of worlds."

"We are very prosaic here," said Donovan, smiling, "nothing, I fear, to re-vivify you except ponderous works on anatomy and medicine. Come, you shall be my first patient; in less than a year you will perhaps see the family name on a brass plate, not a useless brass in a church, but a most utilitarian plate on a surgery door."

"You dreadful boy, what made you take up such a trade?"

"Take care how you speak of my profession," said Donovan, laughing. "I'll prescribe the most horrible remedies for your _ennui_ if you are not respectful. I chose it because it's to my mind the only really satisfactory profession."

"If you had any interest in the medical world, and were likely to get a good West End practice; but otherwise, just think of the sort of people it will throw you among. You'll have to go among poverty and dirt and everything that's disagreeable. Besides, you will lose caste."

"You forget that I don't believe I have any to lose," said Donovan, smiling. "You should turn Republican, it saves so many small annoyances."

"What were you doing this afternoon with that beggar-child?"

"Taking her to some friends of mine who have promised to house her while her father is in the hospital."

Adela lifted up her hands in horror.

"Taking that child to a gentleman's house, my dear boy--what an odd set you must have got into! That sort of thing sounds very nice, but it's dreadfully extravagant and romantic."

"It has a way of seeming very practical to the one who is taken in," said Donovan, in a voice which revealed a good deal to Adela.

"You are thinking of your good Cornishman," she exclaimed. "But you were a more eligible subject than that little beggar-girl, more fit to be in a gentleman's house."

"Much you know about it!" said Donovan, with a half smile, and again Adela realised that the five years which had passed so uneventfully with her, had brought to her cousin a knowledge both of evil and good quite beyond her understanding.

"I tried my misanthropical creed for some time," he continued after a minute's pause, "and found it a dead failure. And then I had the good fortune to come across some people who lived exactly on the opposite system."

"From extreme to extreme, of course," said Adela, "that is always the way. I suppose you've become a Wesleyan or a Methodist."

He could not help smiling a little at her tone, and at her fashionable horror of dissent, but his grave answer brought back to her the remembrance that even in the old days he never could endure to have matters of religious belief or unbelief lightly touched upon.

"I do not see my way to Christianity at all as yet."

"And you don't go to church?" said Adela, regretfully. It had always been the one great thing she had urged upon him.

"Not quite in the way you would approve of," replied Donovan, smiling, "but I do go in for the sermon now and then at my friend's church. I am afraid you would think his teaching of the 'extravagant and romantic' order, he has a habit of bringing Christianity to bear on every-day life in rather a difficult and inconvenient way."

Adela looked thoughtful.

"He is right, of course," she said, sadly; "but I don't think people know how hard it is when one is a great deal in society. I can't adopt beggar children or teach in Sunday schools, it's not in my line."

She spoke so much more seriously than usual that Donovan's heart went out to her.

"I sometimes think," he said, "that in its way Dot's life was about the most perfect one can fancy. It seemed such a matter of course that she should be the patient, loving little thing she was, that at the time it didn't strike one. But just think of it now, with everything to make her selfish she was always the first to think of other people, with scarcely a day of her life free from pain she was always the one bit of sunshine in the house. And yet she was as unconscious of it as if she had been a baby. Depend upon it it's not the teaching in Sunday schools or the adopting of children that makes the difference, the spirit of love can be brought into any kind of life. What had Dot to do with philanthropy and good works? Yet if it had not been for that little child's life I should have been a downright fiend long ago. I don't believe you women know how much you can do for us, not by your district-visitings and conventionalities, but by just being the pure beings you were meant to be."

Adela was silent. She knew she had talked a great deal of nonsense in her life, had flirted with innumerable men, had flattered dozens of foolish young fellows whom in her heart she had all the time despised. She felt truly enough that her influence must all have gone into the wrong scale, and that while meaning harmlessly to amuse herself, she had all the time been lowering that standard of womanhood of which Donovan seemed to think so much.

"And yet you know," she said, piteously, "if you subtracted the vein of fun and banter and chaff from me there would be nothing left but a dull old spinster beginning to turn grey, whom you would all wish to get rid of. I'm like poor little Miss Moucher, volatile I was born, and volatile I shall die."

"We can ill afford to lose any of the real fun in the world," said Donovan. "I hope you won't turn puritanical. I don't think I could like a person who had no sense of humour, so please don't talk of subtracting yours."

"I suppose the real fun, as you call it, is good," said Adela. "And the artificial nonsense is bad. At the same time it is hard to get up anything but forced fun when life is a long bit of _ennui_."

"But you have the secret for making life something very different," said Donovan.

"I believe you envy me!" said Adela; "but, oh! my dear Donovan, it is quite possible to have prescriptions, and medicines, and a doctor within reach, and yet to be very ill and miserable."

"It seems then that we are both in a bad way," said Donovan, smiling. "You know the remedies, but have not will enough to use them. I have the will to use them, but have not the remedies."

"Well, what is to help us?" said Adela.

"Go to some one better fitted to tell you," replied Donovan. "This is a good sort of working motto, though."

He opened Kingsley's life, which was lying on the table, and pointed to the following lines:

"Do the work that's nearest,
Though it's dull at whiles,
Helping, when you meet them,
Lame dogs over stiles."

"I'll be your 'lame dog' for this afternoon, and you shall grace this bachelor room and pour out tea for us. By-the-by, talking of bachelors, how is old Mr. Hayes? it is an age since I heard of him."

They drifted off into talk about Oakdene and Greyshot neighbours, feeling that they had touched upon deeper matters than they cared to discuss.