“And must you pass the night here out in the cold?” said Aubrey.
“It isn’t not to call a cold night, sir,” said the woman, meekly, “and they’ve got plenty on to keep them warm.”
“I’ll try and get them to open the waiting-room for you,” said Aubrey.
“Oh, no, sir; thank you kindly, but don’t take the trouble--the rooms are that stuffy. It’s better for them in the open air, and they’ll go to sleep in a little while. Baby will be quite warm on my lap, and Johnny’s lying against me.”
“And what is to become of you in this arrangement?” said Aubrey, looking pitifully, with eyes that had known the experiences both of husband and father, upon this little plump human bed, which was to stand in the place of down pillows for the children.
“Oh, I’ll do very well, sir, when they go to sleep,” she said, looking up at him with a smile.
“Not till six in the morning,” she replied; “but perhaps that’s all the better, for I’ll be able to get them some bread and milk, and a good wash before we start.”
Well, it was not much of an indulgence for a man who was well off. He might have thrown it away on any trifle, and nobody would have wasted a thought on the subject. He got hold of one of the wandering ghosts of porters, and got him, with a douceur, to change the poor woman’s cheap ticket for her into one for the express, and commissioned him, if possible, to get her a place in a sleeping carriage, where, I fear, she was not likely to be at all a warmly welcomed addition to the luxurious young men or delicate ladies in these conveyances. He saw that there was one found for her which was almost empty when the train came up. He scarcely knew if she were young or old--though indeed, as a matter of fact, the poor little mother, bewildered by her sudden elevation among the gentlefolks, and not quite sure that she would not have preferred to remain where she was and pick up in the morning her natural third-class train, was both young and pretty, a fact that was remarked by the one young lady in the carriage, who saw the young man through the window at her side, and recognised him in a flash of the guard’s lantern, with deep astonishment to see him handing in such a woman and such children to the privileged places. He disappeared himself into the dark, and indeed took his place in the corner of a smoking carriage, where his cigar was a faint soother of pain. In his human short-sightedness, poor Aubrey also was consoled a little, I think, by the thought that this poor fellow-passenger was comfortable--she and her children--and that instead of slumbering uneasily on a bench, she was able to lay the little things in a bed. It seemed to him a good omen, a little relaxation of the bonds of fate, and he went away cheered a little and encouraged by this simple incident and by the warmth of the kindness that was in his heart.