University of Virginia Library

3. CHAPTER III.
SUSPECTED QUARTERS.

When Ellen awoke on the following day, she perceived a
dull, leaden light coming in through the only window which
the apartment contained, and which barely served to make
the gloom of the place visible. At first she had to tax her
recollection to comprehend where she was, and how she
came to be there, and then she looked eagerly around for
the occupants of the night previous. To her surprise and
alarm, she discovered that she was alone. The door was
shut, the fire was out, and the room had a deserted,
cold, and dismal appearance. Crawling from the bed, she
hurried to the door, and found it locked on the outside;
this increased her alarm, and caused a shudder of undefined
terror to pass through her thin frame; and not knowing
better what to do, she hastened back to the bed, and covered
herself from the cold air.

While lying there, trembling, and wondering what could
be the meaning of this strange desertion of her benefactors,
she heard a noise at the door outside; and immediately
after, it was thrown open, and the woman Margaret entered,
stamping the snow from her feet. Ellen recognized
her with an exclamation of joy.

“Have you been alarmed?” asked Margaret, kindly.

“Oh! very much!” answered little Ellen. “I woke up,
and finding everybody gone, I didn't know what to make
of it.”

“I have been to the grocery,” said the other, by way of
explanation, as she closed the door, and placed a small basket,
containing some articles, on the table. “Did you sleep
well last night?” she continued, approaching the bed.

“Oh! yes, ma'am—thank you—I never slept better in
my life.”

“Did you hear any noise in the night?”

“No, ma'am—none at all.”

As Ellen spoke, she noticed, for the first time, that Margaret
had a black eye, and she was about to make a remark
concerning it; but thinking it might give offence, she
checked the words as they rose to her lips. Margaret,
catching the expression, and divining her thoughts, said:

“You see I hurt myself last night. I accidentally
stumbled over a stool, and struck my head against the
corner of the chest yonder.”

“Oh! ma'am, I'm so sorry!”

“I don't care for the hurt,” continued the woman;
“only some people might think I'd been fighting.”

“Nobody would think that of one so good and kind as
you are, I'm sure,” returned Ellen.”

“Alas!” sighed the other—“I'm not so good and kind
as you think—I sometimes wish I were. But, come! you
must get up and put on these clothes, which are better than
yours, and which I altered for you last night from some
old ones of my own.”

Ellen, acting from the impulse of pure gratitude, seized
and kissed the hand of her benefactress, and, with tears in
her eyes, exclaimed:

“Oh! ma'am, you are good and kind—don't say you
are not! How shall I ever repay you?”

Margaret turned away her face, to hide her own emotion;
and going to the basket, she returned with a pair of stockings
and second-hand shoes, adding:

“And these, which I purchased this morning, will keep
the frost from your little feet; take all as a Christmas present,
from one who has little in this world to love, and
may you live to see many more and happier ones than I
have!”

The poor, friendless little orphan could not find words to
express the swelling gratitude of her heart; and so she
threw her arms around Margaret, and burst into tears; and
the latter, in spite of herself, wept too; and, for a short
time, felt a happiness which she had not known for many a
long year. Degraded in vice, criminal in the eyes of the
law, a very wretch and outcast whom the world despised,
Margaret now felt that she was clasped by innocent hands,
and that from one innocent heart, a grateful and perhaps
acceptable prayer was ascending for her to the Throne of
Grace, and that moment became a green oasis in the desert
of misery. A light, as if from Heaven, for a moment shone
on her darkened path, and in guileless little Ellen she felt
the presence of an angel. By that one good deed, simple
in itself, she felt that a weight of sin was lifted from her
guilty soul, virtue seemed to stand before her in a new
light, and she wept to think it had so long been a stranger
to her heart. Had there been a Mentor by, to seize upon
that moment of repentance, and pour words of holy consolation
into her vice-bound soul, she might have been
snatched, as a “brand from the burning,” and been reclaimed;
but, alas! left to herself and guilty associations,
she looked upon escape from the course she was pursuing
as a something impossible, and regarded herself as a being
doomed beyond the mercy of God and man.

While Ellen put on her new garments, Margaret made a

fire, and soon prepared a frugal repast. To this they sat
down by themselves—Margaret merely observing, that Mr.
Mulwrack had been called away on business, which might
detain him for a day or two.

Scarcely was the meal over, when there was heard the
sound of feet descending the steps outside, and immediately
there followed a heavy knocking on the door. Margaret
started, and turned somewhat pale—but said, in a low
tone:

“Go, Ellen, and see who's there?”

As Ellen opened the door, two rough-looking men, well
bundled up in overcoats, entered rather unceremoniously,
and looked eagerly around.

“I believe,” said one, in a gruff tone, addressing Margaret,
“this here's the crib of Jim Mulwrack—alias Red
Head Jim—alias Peter Dodge—alias what you—please!”

“What do you want?” demanded Margaret, in a severe
tone, with a look of indignant scorn.

“We wants him—you know well enough what we wants,”
replied the man, coarsely. “I say, Spike, (to his companion,)
tumble round that there bed, and don't leave a
hole unwestigated as you can stick your finger in—for
Peter Dodge, you know, is a prince of a dodger;” and he
ended with a broad laugh at his own joke.

“You can search as much as you like,” rejoined Margaret,
sullenly; “but you'll find nobody here but us.”

“Thank you—we'll take the liberty of looking round,
since you gin us leave,” returned the spokesman, with a
grin, throwing himself in a careless attitude upon the chest
near. As he did so, his eye encountered little Ellen, who,
very pale, and evidently alarmed, was standing in the middle
of the apartment, looking alternately at the new-comers
and Margaret. “Who are you? where did you turn up?”
continued the spokesman, eyeing her sharply.

“My name is Ellen Norbury, sir,” replied the child,
timidly.

“Oh! 'tis, hey! Well, what is you doing here?—taking
lessons in stealing, I 'spect.”

“I don't know what you mean, sir, by saying that,” replied
Ellen. “I hadn't any home, and this kind lady says
I can live with her.”

“Oh! wery innocent you is—ha! ha! ha!” was the
coarse rejoinder. “I say, Spike—here's a innocent as
don't know what stealing is.”

“Well, she don't, o' course,” replied the other, with a
coarse chuckle. “Hadn't we better take and larn her,
Grubbins?”

“No doubt you could,” sneered Margaret; “for you
look as if you might be masters of the trade.”

“Come! none o' your imperdence!” said Grubbins,
savagely; “or we'll just fetch you over the coals, for interfering
with ossifers as is doing their dooties.”

“Brave men! to come here to insult an unprotected
female!” rejoined Margaret, nothing daunted, her black
eyes flashing defiance.

“I'd just like to know how to go to work for to insult
the likes of you, anyhow,” chuckled Grubbins. “Eh!
Spike! what say you?”

“Well, I would, Grub—I would. But the—scamp
ain't here, that's sartain,” he added, advancing to his companion.

“May be there's some of the spile here,” was the answer;
“let's sarch for that. I'll begin with this here chest, and
you take that there bed; and look sharp—that's the
word.”

The two constables—for such they were by virtue of
election, though more fit for dog-catchers than catchers of
human beings—now began a vigilant search of the apartment,

for stolen property—peering into every nook and
cranny, overhauling every thing they could find, and strewing
the clothing over the damp ground, as if they really
took a delight in making themselves as disagreeable as possible.
When they had completed this part of their business,
which gave them no reward for their trouble, Grubbins
took Margaret, and Spike Ellen, and handled them roughly,
under pretence of searching their persons.

“Well, Spike,” said Grubbins, when he had finished,
“we'll make nothing here.”

“Not a—thing,” returned Spike.

“Then I'll tell you what you can make,” said Margaret,
scornfully.

“What, my beauty?”

“Why, make yourselves scarce.”

“Take that for your imperdence!” said this worthy
specimen of an officer; and with the back of his hand, he
struck Margaret across the mouth.

Margaret uttered a cry of rage, and looked eagerly
around for some weapon with which to revenge the blow;
but seeing nothing that she thought would serve her purpose—for
she meditated killing the man on the spot—she
threw herself upon a seat, and, covering her eyes with her
hands, burst into tears.

“Let that larn ye better than to insult us perlice!”
muttered Grubbins; and with his companion he deliberately
walked out, ascended the steps, and disappeared.

As soon as they were gone, Ellen ran to Margaret, threw
her arms around her neck, and tried, by gentle and loving
words, to calm her irritated and revengeful spirit.

“You're an angel!” said Margaret, at length, returning
the child's embrace; “but for one angel there seem to be
a thousand devils.” And then she muttered to herself:

“If I wanted to be good, I couldn't, so what's the use of
trying?”

She got up, and going to the chest, took out a black
bottle, put it to her lips, and poured down a large quantity
of the fiery poison that was killing her. She then sat down
and gazed sullenly at the fire, taking no further notice of
Ellen, who, for fear of being thought intrusive, did nothing
to break her reverie. A few minutes passed away thus,
and then Margaret had recourse to the bottle again. The
third time she drained it; and then the effect of the liquor
began to be apparent to the eyes of little Ellen, who looked
on in sorrow, not unmingled with alarm.

“Here!” said Margaret, harshly, glaring round at her
protege, and holding out the bottle with an unsteady hand;
“take this, and get it filled with brandy!”

“Where shall I get it, ma'am?” inquired Ellen, timidly.

“I don't care where, so you get it,” replied Margaret,
crossly; “and be quick about it—for I'm bound to get
drunk, to get out of my misery.”

“Oh! ma'am, let me advise you,” began Ellen—but the
other interrupted:

“Keep your advice for whoever wants it. Come! be off,
I say, and get the brandy!”

“Will any body trust me, ma'am?”

“Trust you?” sneered Margaret; “are you a fool? Do
tigers trust their prey to other tigers?”

“But I have no money.”

“Well, you little dunce, I have;” and Margaret drew out
her purse, and from it took a coin of the value of twelve
and a half cents. “There,” she continued, tossing it to
Ellen, “get a pint of the best brandy: mind, now, the best!”

Ellen, without reply, hurried on her hood and shawl, and,
with the bottle in one hand and the money in the other,
went out, with a sorrowful heart.