That Stick

C >> Charlotte M. Yonge >> That Stick

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'I don't wonder!'

'And--and I never would listen to you and Mary about poor Ida. I let her
idle and dress, and read all those novels, and it is out of them she got
that monstrous notion. You little know what I have gone through with
that girl, Frank, so different from the other two. Oh! if I could only
begin over again!'

'Perhaps,' said Frank, full of pity, 'this terrible shock may open her
eyes, and by God's blessing be the beginning of better things.'

'Oh, Frank, you are a perfect angel ever to bear the sight of us again!'
cried the poor woman, ever violent in her feelings and demonstrations.
'Hark! What's that?--I can't see any one.'

'Please, ma'am, it's Miss Rollstone, with a letter for his Lordship.'

CHAPTER XXXVIII
THE CLUE

'BEST OF ROSES,--

'I don't know where my uncle is, so please send him this. I got to
Toronto all right, and had not much trouble in finding out the
steady-going Jones, who is rather a swell, chief mate on board the
_British Empress_. He was a good deal taken aback by my story, and
said that his brother had come out with his wife, but no child. It
was quite plain that he was a good deal disappointed in the Rattler,
and not at all prepared for Mrs. Louisa, whom neither he nor his wife
admired at all, at all. He had got his brother a berth on a summer
steamer that had just been set up on Lake Winnipeg--being no doubt
glad to get rid of such an encumbrance as the wife, and he looked
very blue when he heard that I was quite certain that she had taken
the kid away with her, and been paid for it. There was nothing for
it but to go after them, and find out from them what they had done
with poor little Mite. He is a right good fellow, and would have
gone with me, but that he is bound to his boat, and a stunner she is;
but he gave me a letter to Sam, so I had to get on the Canadian
Pacific Railway, so that I should have been nonplussed but for your
loan. Splendid places it goes through, you never saw such trees, nor
such game.

'As good luck would have it, I was in the same car with an
Englishman--a gentleman, one could see with half an eye, and we
fraternised, so that I told him what I was come about. He was
awfully good-natured, and told me he lived a mile or two out of
Winnipeg, and had a share in the steam company, and if I found any
difficulty I was to come to him, Mr. Forman, at Northmoor. I stared
at the name, as you may guess! There was a fine horse and buggy
waiting for him at the station, and off he went. I put up at the
hotel--there's sure to be that whatever there is not--and went after
the Joneses next. I got at the woman first, she looked ill and
fagged, as if she didn't find life with Rattler very jolly. She
cried bucketsful, and said she didn't know anything, since she put
the poor little Mite to sleep after supper in a public-house at
Liverpool. She was dead tired, and when she woke he was gone, and
her husband swore at her, and never would tell her what he had done
with the boy, except that he had not hurt him. Then I interviewed
Sam Rattler himself. He cut up rough, as he said my Lord had done
him an ill turn, and he had the game in his hands now, and was not
going to let him know what was become of his child, without he came
down handsome enough to make up for what he had done him out of. So
then I had to go off to Mr. Forman. He has such a place, a house
such as any one might be delighted to have--pine trees behind, a
garden in front, no end of barns and stables, with houses and cows,
fine wheat fields spreading all round, such as would do your heart
good. That is what Mr. Forman and his brother-in-law, Captain Alder,
have made, and there's a sweet little lady as ever you saw, Alder's
sister. The Captain was greatly puzzled to hear it was Lord
Northmoor's son I was looking for. He is not up in the peerage like
your father, you see, and I had to make him understand. He thought
Lord N. must be either the old man, or Lady Adela's little boy. He
said some of his happiest days had been at Northmoor, and he asked
after Lady Adela, and if Miss Morton was married. He came with me,
and soon made Mr. Rattler change his note, by showing him that it
would be easy to give him the sack, even if he was not laid hold of
by the law on my information for stealing the child. They are both
magistrates and could do it. So at last the fellow growled out that
he wasn't going to be troubled with another man's brat, and just
before embarking, he had laid it down asleep at the door of Liverpool
Workhouse! So no doubt poor little Michael is there! I would have
telegraphed at once; but I don't know where my uncle is, or whether
he knows about it, but you can find out and send him this letter at
once. I have asked him to pay your advance out of my quarter; and as
to the rest of it, it is all owing to you that the poor little kid is
not to grow up a pauper.

'I am staying on at Northmoor--it sounds natural; they want another
hand for their harvesting, so I am working out my board, as is the
way here, at any rate till I hear from my uncle, and I shall ask him
to let me stay here for good as a farming-pupil. It would suit me
ever so much better than the militia, even if I could get into it,
which I suppose I haven't done. It is a splendid country, big enough
to stretch oneself in, and I shall never stand being cramped up in an
island after it; besides that I don't want to see Ida again in a
hurry, though there is some one I should like no end to see again.
There, I must not say any more, but send this on to my uncle. I wish
I could see his face. I did look to bring Mite back to him, but that
can't be, as I have not tin enough to carry me home. I hope your
loan has not got you into a scrape.

'Yours ever (I mean it),
'H. MORTON.'

The letter to Lord Northmoor, which the servant put into his hand, was
shorter, and began with the more important sentence--'The rascal dropped
Michael at Liverpool Workhouse.'

The father read it with an ejaculation of 'Thank God,' the aunt answered
with a cry of horror, so that he thought for a moment she had supposed he
said 'dropped him into the sea,' and repeated 'Liverpool Workhouse.'

'Oh, yes, yes; but that is so dreadful. The Honourable Michael Morton in
a workhouse!'

'He is safe and well taken care of there, no doubt,' said Frank. 'I have
no fears now. There are much worse places than the nurseries of those
great unions.' Then, as he read on, 'There, Emma, your boy has acted
nobly. He has fully retrieved what his sister has done. Be happy over
that, dear sister, and be thankful with me. My Mary, my Mary, will the
joy be too much? Oh, my boy! How soon can I reach Liverpool? There,
you will like to read it. I must go and thank that good girl who found
him the means.'

He was gone, and found Rose in the act of reading her letter aloud (all
but certain bits, that made her falter as if the writing was bad) to her
parents and Mr. Deyncourt. And there, in full assembly, he found himself
at a loss for words. No one was so much master of the situation as Mr.
Rollstone.

'My Lord, I have the honour to congratulate your Lordship,' he said, with
a magnificence only marred by his difficulty in rising.

'I--I,' stammered his Lordship, with an unexpected choke in his throat,
'have to congratulate you, Mr. Rollstone, on having such a daughter.'
Then, grasping Rose's hand as in a vice, 'Miss Rollstone, what we owe to
you--is past expression.'

'I am sure she is very happy, my Lord, to have been of service,' said her
mother, with a simper.

Mr. Deyncourt, to relieve the tension of feeling, said, 'Miss Rollstone
was reading the letter about Mr. Morton's adventures. Would you not like
her to begin again?'

And while Rose obeyed, Lord Northmoor was able to extract his cheque-book
from his pocket-book, and as Rose paused, to say--

'I have a debt of which my nephew reminds me. Miss Rollstone furnished
the means for his journey. Will you let me fill this up? This can be
repaid,' he added, with a smile, 'the rest, never.'

Mr. Rollstone might have been distressed at the venture on which his
daughter's savings had gone; but he was perfectly happy and triumphant
now, except that, even more than Mrs. Morton, he suffered from the idea
of the Honourable Michael being exposed to the contamination of a
workhouse, and was shocked at his Lordship's thinking it would have been
worse for him to be with the Rattler. Then, hastily looking at his
watch, Lord Northmoor asked when the post went out, and hearing there was
but half an hour to spare, begged Mr. Deyncourt to let him lose no time
by giving him the wherewithal to write to his wife.

'She would miss a note and be uneasy,' he said. 'Yet I hardly know what
I dare tell her. Only not mourning paper!' he added, with an exultant
smile.

In the curate's room he wrote--

'DEAREST WIFE,--

'I have been out all day, and have only a moment to say that I am
quite well, and trust to have some most thankworthy news for you.
Don't be uneasy if you do not hear to-morrow.--Your own

'FRANK.'

There was still time to scribble--

'DEAR LADY ADELA,--

'I trust to you to prepare Mary for well-nigh incredible joy, but do
not agitate her too soon. I cannot come till Friday afternoon.

'Yours gratefully,
'NORTHMOOR.'

Having sent this off, his next search was for a time-table. He would
fain have gone by the mail train that very night, but Mr. Deyncourt and
Mrs. Morton united in persuading him that his strength was not yet equal
to such a pull upon it, and he yielded. They hardly knew the man,
usually so equable and quiet as to be almost stolid.

He smiled, and declared he could neither eat nor sleep, but he actually
did both, sleeping, indeed, better and longer than he had done since his
illness, and coming down in the morning a new man, as he called himself,
but the old one still in his kindness to Mrs. Morton. He promised to
telegraph to her as soon as he knew all was well, assured her that he
would do his best to keep the scandal out of the papers, that he would
never forget his obligations to Herbert's generosity, and that if she
made up her mind to leave Westhaven he would facilitate her so doing.

Ida was not up. She had had a very bad night, and indeed she had
confessed that she had been miserable under dreams worse than waking,
ever since the child was carried off. Her mother had observed her
restlessness and nervousness, but had set a good deal down to love, and
perhaps had not been entirely wrong. At any rate, she was now really
ill, and could not bear the thought of seeing her uncle, though he sent a
message to her that now he did not find it nearly so hard to forgive her,
and that he felt for her with all his heart.

It was this gentleness that touched Mrs. Morton above all. Years had
softened her; perhaps, too, his patience, and the higher tone of Mr.
Deyncourt's ministry, and she was, in many respects, a different woman
from her who had so loudly protested against his marrying Mary Marshall.

CHAPTER XXXIX
THE HONOURABLE PAUPER

Lord Northmoor's card was given to the porter with an urgent request for
an interview with the Master of the workhouse.

He steadied his voice with difficulty when, on entering the office, he
said that he had come to make inquiry after his son, a child of three and
a half years old, who had been supposed to be drowned, but he had now
discovered had been stolen by a former nurse, and left at the gate of the
workhouse, and as the Master paused with an interrogative 'Yes, my Lord?'
he added--'On the night between the Wednesday and Thursday of Whitsun
week, May the--'

'Children are so often left,' said the Master. 'I will ascertain from
the books as to the date.'

After an interval really of scarcely a minute, but which might have been
hours to the father's feeling, he read--

'May 18th.--Boy, of apparently four years old, left on the steps, asleep,
apparently drugged.'

'Ah!'

'Calls himself Mitel Tent--name probably Michael Trenton.'

'Michael Kenton Morton.' Then he reflected, 'No doubt he thought he was
to say his catechism.'

'Does not seem to know parents' name nor residence. Dress--man's old
rough coat over a brown holland pinafore--no mark--feet bare; talks as if
carefully brought up. May I ask you to describe him.'

'Brown eyes, light hair, a good deal of colour, sturdy, large child,'
said Lord Northmoor, much agitated. 'There,' holding out a photograph.

'Ah!' said the Master, in assent.

'And where--is he here?'

'He is at the Children's Home at Fulwood Lodge. Perhaps I had better ask
one of the Guardians, who lives near at hand, to accompany you.'

This was done, the Guardian came, much interested in the guest, and a cab
was called. Lord Northmoor learnt on the way that the routine in such
cases, which were only too common, was the child was taken by the police
to the bellman's office till night and there taken care of, in case he
should be a little truant of the place, but being unclaimed, he spent a
few days at the Union, and then was taken to the Children's Home at
Fulwood. Inquiries had been made, but the little fellow had been still
under the influence of the drug that had evidently been administered to
him at first, and then was too much bewildered to give a clear account of
himself. He was in confusion between his real home and Westhaven, and
the difference between his appellation and that of his parents was
likewise perplexing, nor could he make himself clear, even as to what he
knew perfectly well, when interrogated by official strangers who alarmed
him.

Lord Northmoor was himself a Poor Law Guardian, and had no vague
superstitions to alarm him as to the usage of children in workhouses; but
he was surprised at the pleasant aspect of the nursery of the Liverpool
Union, a former gentleman's house and grounds, with free air and
beautiful views.

The Matron, on being summoned, said that she had from the first been
sure, in spite of his clothes, that little Mike was a well-born,
tenderly-nurtured child, with good manners and refined habits, and she
had tried in vain to understand what he said of himself, though night and
morning, he had said his prayers for papa and mamma, and at first added
that 'papa might be well,' and he might go home; but where home was there
was no discovering, except that there had been journeys by puff puff; and
Louey, and Aunt Emma, and Nurse, and sea, and North something, and 'nasty
man,' were in an inextricable confusion.

She took them therewith into a large airy room, where the elder children,
whole rows of little beings in red frocks, were busied under the
direction of a lively young nurse, in building up coloured cubes, 'gifts'
in Kindergarten parlance.

There was a few moments of pause, as all the pairs of eyes were raised to
meet the new-comers. With a little sense of disappointment, but more of
anxiety, Frank glanced over them, and encountered a rounded, somewhat
puzzled stare from two brown orbs in a rosy face. Then he ventured to
say 'Mite,' and there followed a kind of laughing yell, a leap over the
structure of cubes, and the warm, solid, rosy boy was in his arms, on his
breast, the head on his shoulder in indescribable ecstasy of content on
both sides, of thankfulness on that of the father.

'No doubt there!' said the Guardian and the Matron to one another,
between smiles and tears.

Mite asked no questions. Fate had been far beyond his comprehension for
the last five months, and it was quite enough for him to feel himself in
the familiar arms, and hear the voice he loved.

'Would he go to mamma?'

The boy raised his head, looked wonderingly over his father's face, and
said in a puzzled voice--

'Louey said she would take me home in the puff puff.'

'Come now with father, my boy. Only kiss this good lady first, who has
been so kind to you.

'Kiss Tommy too, and Fanny,' said Michael, struggling down, and beginning
a round of embraces that sufficiently proved that his nursery had been a
happy one, while his father could see with joy that he was as healthy and
fresh-looking as ever, perhaps a little less plump, but with the natural
growth of the fourth year, and he was much the biggest of the party, with
the healthfulness of country air and wholesome tendance, while most of
the others were more or less stunted or undergrown.

Lord Northmoor's longing was to take his recovered son at once to gladden
his mother's eyes; but Michael's little red frock would not exactly suit
with the manner of his travels.

So he accepted the Guardian's invitation to come to his house and let
Michael be fitted out there, an invitation all the more warmly given
because it would have been a pity to let wife and daughters miss the
interest of the sight of the lost child and his father. So, all
formalities being complied with and in true official spirit, the account
for the boy's maintenance having been asked for, a hearty and cordial
leave was taken of the Matron, and Michael Kenton Morton was discharged
from Liverpool Union.

The lady and her daughters were delighted to have him, and would have
made much of him, but the poor little fellow proved that his confidence
in womankind had been shaken, by clinging tight to his father, and
showing his first inclination to cry when it was proposed to take him
into another room to be dressed. Indeed, his father was as little
willing to endure a moment's separation as he could be, and looked on and
assisted to see him made into a little gentleman again in outward
costume.

After luncheon there was still time to reach Malvern by a reasonable hour
of the evening, and Frank felt as if every moment of sorrow were almost a
cruelty to his wife. The Guardian's wife owned that she ought not to
press him to sleep at her house, and forwarded his departure with strong
fellow-feeling for the mother's hungry bosom.

From the station Frank sent telegrams to Herbert, to Mrs. Morton, and to
Rose Rollstone; besides one to Lady Adela, containing only the reference,
Luke xv. 32.

People looked somewhat curiously at the thin, worn-looking, elderly man,
with the travelling bag in one hand, and the little boy holding tight by
the other, each with a countenance of radiant gladness; and again, to see
how, when seated, he allowed himself to be climbed over and clasped by
the sturdy being, who seemed almost overwhelming to one so slight.

When the September twilight darkened into night, Michael, who had been
asleep, awoke with a scream and flung both arms round his father's neck,
exclaiming--

'Oh, Louey, I'll not cry! Don't let him throw me out! Oh, the nasty
man!'

And even when convinced that no nasty man was present, and that it was
papa, not Louey, whom he was grappling, he still nestled as close as
possible, while he was only pacified in recurring frights by listening to
a story. Never good at story-telling, the only one that, for the nonce,
his father could put together was that of Joseph, and this elicited
various personal comparisons.

'Mine wasn't a coat of many colours, it was my blue frock! Did they dip
it in blood, papa?'

'Not quite, my darling, but it was the same thing.'

Then presently, 'It wasn't a camel, but a puff puff, and _he_ was so
cross!'

By and by, 'I didn't tell anybody's dreams, papa. They didn't make me
ride in a cha-rot, but nurse made me monitor, 'cause I knew all my
letters. I should like to have a brother Benjamin. Mayn't Tommy be my
brother? Wasn't Joseph's mamma very glad?'

Michael's Egypt had not been a very terrible house of bondage, and the
darker moments of his abduction did not dwell on his memory; but years
later, when first he tasted beer, he put down the glass with a shudder,
as the smell and taste brought back a sense of distress, confusion, and
horror in a gas-lit, crowded bar, full of loud-voiced, rough figures, and
resounding with strange language and fierce threats to make him swallow
the draught which, no doubt, had been drugged.

CHAPTER XL
JOY WELL-NIGH INCREDIBLE

The midday letters were a riddle to the ladies at Malvern.

'Out all day,' said Mary, 'that is well. He will get strong out
boating.'

'I hope Herbert has come home to take him out,' said Constance.

'Or he may be yachting. I wonder he does not say who is taking him out.
I am glad that he can feel that sense of enjoyment.'

Yet that rejoicing seemed to be almost an effort to the poor mother who
craved for a longer letter, and perhaps almost felt as if her Frank were
getting out of sympathy with her grief--and what could be the good news?

'Herbert must have passed!' said Constance.

'I hope he has, but the expression is rather strong for that,' said Lady
Adela.

'Perhaps Ida is engaged to that Mr. Deyncourt? Was that his name?' said
Lady Northmoor languidly.

'Oh! that would be delicious,' cried Constance, 'and Ida has grown much
more thoughtful lately, so perhaps she would do for a clergyman's wife.'

'Is Ida better?' asked her aunt, who had been much drawn towards the girl
by hearing that her health had suffered from grief for Michael.

'Mamma does not mention her in her last letter, but poor Ida is really
much more delicate than one would think, though she looks so strong.
This would be delightful!'

'Yet, joy well-nigh incredible!' said her aunt, meditatively. 'Were not
those the words? It would not be like your uncle to put them in that way
unless it were something--even more wonderful, and besides, why should he
not write it to me?'

'Oh--h!' cried Constance, with a leap, rather than a start. 'It can be
only one thing.'

'Don't, don't, don't!' cried poor Mary; 'you must not, Constance, it
would kill me to have the thought put into my head only to be lost.'

Constance looked wistfully at Lady Adela; but the idea she had suggested
had created a restlessness, and her aunt presently left the room. Then
Constance said--

'Lady Adela, may I tell you something? You know that poor dear little
Mite was never found?'

'Oh! a boat must have picked him up,' cried Amice; 'and he is coming
back.'

'Gently, Amy; hush,' said the mother, 'Constance has more to tell.'

'Yes,' said Constance. 'My friend, Rose Rollstone, who lives just by our
house at Westhaven, and was going back to London the night that Mite was
lost, wrote to me that she was sure she had seen his face just then. She
thought, and I thought it was one of those strange things one hears of
sights at the moment of death. So I never told of it, but now I cannot
help fancying--'

'Oh! I am sure,' cried Amice.

Lady Adela thought the only safe way would be to turn the two young
creatures out to pour out their rapturous surmises to one another on the
winding paths of the Malvern hills, and very glad was she to have done
so, when by and by that other telegram was put into her hands.

Then, when Mary, unable to sit still, though with trembling limbs, came
back to the sitting-room, with a flush on her pale cheek, excited by the
sound at the door, Lady Adela pointed to the yellow paper, which she had
laid within the Gospel, open at the place.

Mary sank into a chair.

'It can't be a false hope,' she gasped.

'He would never have sent this, if it were not a certainty,' said Adela,
kneeling down by her, and holding her hands, while repeating what
Constance had said.

A few words were spent on wonder and censure on the girl's silence, more
unjust than they knew, but hardly wasted, since they relieved the
tension. Mary slid down on her knees beside her friend, and then came a
silence of intense heart-swelling, choking, and unformed, but none the
less true thanksgiving, and ending in a mutual embrace and an outcry of
Mary's--

'Oh, Adela! how good you are, you with no such hope'--and that great
blessed shower of tears that relieved her was ostensibly the burst of
sympathy for the bereaved mother with no such restoration in view. Then
came soothing words, and then the endeavour with dazed eyes and throbbing
hearts to look out the trains from Liverpool, whence, to their amazement,
they saw the telegram had started, undoubtedly from Lord Northmoor.
There was not too large a choice, and finally Lady Adela made the hope
seem real by proposing preparations for the child's supper and
bed--things of which Mary seemed no more to have dared to think than if
she had been expecting a little spirit; but which gave her hope
substance, and inspired her with fresh energy and a new strength, as she
ran up and downstairs, directing her maid, who cried for joy at the news,
and then going out to purchase those needments which had become such
tokens of exquisite hope and joy. After this had once begun, she seemed
really incapable of sitting still, for every moment she thought of
something her boy would want or would like, or hurried to see if all was
right.

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