"Your wife is ill?" said Sybil.
"Very!" replied Warner's wife. "Our daughter has behaved
infamously to us. She has quitted us without saying by your
leave or with your leave. And her wages were almost the only
thing left to us; for Philip is not like Walter Gerard you
see: he cannot earn two pounds a-week, though why he cannot I
never could understand."
"Hush, hush, wife!" said Warner. "I speak I apprehend to
Gerard's daughter?"
"Just so."
"Ah! this is good and kind; this is like old times, for Walter
Gerard was my friend, when I was not exactly as I am now."
"He tells me so: he sent a messenger to me last night to visit
you this morning. Your letter reached him only yesterday."
"Harriet was to give it to Caroline," said the wife. "That's
the girl who has done all the mischief and inveigled her away. And she has left Trafford's works, has she? Then I will be bound she and Harriet are keeping house together."
"You suffer?" said Sybil, moving to the bed-side of the woman; "give me your hand," she added in a soft sweet tone. "'Tis hot."
"I feel very cold," said the woman. "Warner would have the
window open, till the rain came in."
"And you, I fear, are wet," said Warner, addressing Sybil, and
interrupting his wife.
"Very slightly. And you have no fire. Ah! I have brought
some things for you, but not fuel."
"If he would only ask the person down stairs," said his wife, "for a block of coal; I tell him, neighbours could hardly refuse; but he never will do anything; he says he has asked too often."
"I will ask," said Sybil. "But first, I have a companion
without," she added, "who bears a basket for you. Come in, Harold."
The baby began to cry the moment a large dog entered the room; a young bloodhound of the ancient breed, such as are now found but in a few old halls and granges in the north of England. Sybil untied the basket, and gave a piece of sugar to the screaming infant. Her glance was sweeter even than her remedy; the infant stared at her with his large blue eyes; for an instant astonished, and then he smiled.
"Oh! beautiful child!" exclaimed Sybil; and she took the babe
up from the mattress and embraced it.
"You are an angel from heaven," exclaimed the mother, "and you
may well say beautiful. And only to think of that infamous
girl, Harriet, to desert us all in this way."
Sybil drew forth the contents of the convent basket, and
called Warner's attention to them. "Now," she said, "arrange
all this as I tell you, and I will go down stairs and speak to
them below as you wish, Harold rest there;" and the dog laid
himself down in the remotest corner.
"And is that Gerard's daughter?" said the weaver's wife. "Only think what it is to gain two pounds a-week, and bring up your daughters in that way—instead of such shameless husseys as our Harriet! But with such wages one can do anything. What have you there, Warner? Is that tea? Oh! I should like some tea. I do think tea would do me some good. I have quite a longing for it. Run down, Warner, and ask them to let us have a kettle of hot water. It is better than all the fire in the world. Amelia, my dear, do you see what they have sent us. Plenty to eat. Tell Maria all about it. You are good girls; you will never be like that infamous Harriet. When you earn wages you will give them to your poor mother and baby, won't you?"
"Yes, mother," said Amelia.
"And father, too," said Maria.
"And father, too," said the wife. "He has been a very good
father to you all; and I never can understand why one who
works so hard should earn so little; but I believe it is the
fault of those machines. The police ought to put them down, and then every body would be comfortable."
Sybil and Warner re-entered; the fire was lit, the tea made, the meal partaken. An air of comfort, even of enjoyment, was diffused over this chamber, but a few minutes back so desolate and unhappy.
"Well," said the wife, raising herself a little up in her bed, "I feel as if that dish of tea had saved my life. Amelia, have you had any tea? And Maria? You see what it is to be good girls; the Lord will never desert you. The day is fast coming when that Harriet will know what the want of a dish of tea is, with all her fine wages. And I am sure," she added, addressing Sybil, "what we all owe to you is not to be told. Your father well deserves his good fortune, with such a daughter."