LITERATURE.

Globe, Volume XX, Issue 1414, 27 August 1878, Page 3

LITERATURE.

44 AS COMPANION TO A LADY.” [“ Cassell’s Magazine.”! ‘ I’m very sorry, Miss, but I’m only a poor womrn myself, and if you can’t pay the rent of this room, I don’t see as you can afford the rent of the one upstairs.” Here my landlady rubbed her nose viciously upon her apron, and stared straight out of the very dirty window. As this was evidently a challenge for me to reply, I said, as firmly as I could, a few words which brought out the reason for the woman’s visit that morning. 4 Am I to understand, then, that you wish me to leave?’ 4 If you please, miss, at the end of the week, for there’s the gent on the first floor would like to have this bedroom.’ 4 Very well, Mrs Euddock,’ I said; I will find a room elsewhere,’ 4 Thanky, miss,’ she said sharply ; and giving her nose another vicious rub, she left mo to my thoughts —and my tears. For I was weak, faint, and heart sick, and the coins in my purse had dwindled down, so that if 1 did not succeed in obtaining an engagement in a very few days, I had no resource left but to creep back to the country and avow my failure. Just three months since, and we were all so happy in the little country vica-age ; and then, in visiting one of his people, my poor father caught a dangerous fever, while in tending him my dear mother was stricken with the same complaint, and ere three weeks had passed Minna and I sat in the little study alone, in deep black ; for the struggle had been brief, and those we loved lay together in the green churchyard, and we were only intruders now in the little vicarage that had been our homo. We were nearly penniless, too, but a brother clergyman of my father’s, quite as poor, came forward and offered us a temporary home till, as he said, some opening should occur for us. I gladly accepted it for Minna; but for myself, I was determined to try great London and, unaided, batt'e for myself. In two years John Murray was to come back from Australia to me for his wife, and till then I would be independent. So the day came at last when, with many tears, we two girls had to separate, and with aching heart I left the old Lincolnshire home, and reached the great dreary void of London early one a'ternoon. I was not long in finding a place where I could stay, in the shape of a second-floor front room in one of those heart-aching streets near the Foundling—streets that echo from morning to night with mournful crien uttered by vendors whose goods it is impossible to surmise, and with the dismal echoing tones of the various organs. So painful were these last to me, that often of an evening, when I have returned from a weary, disheartening search for an engagement, and sat alone and hungry, fearing to spend my money in anything beyond the tea and bread-and butter upon which I existed, these doleful strains —cheering maybe to some—have had such an effect up m me that I have sat and sobbed till, utterly worn out, I have fallen asleep, to wake perhaps hours after, to find it very late, and crawl shivering off to bed. As the weeks passed on, and my advertisements and feoi paid to the various registry offices had been without effect, I used to crawl back to my room, growing more and more disheartened. I was always a plain, sallow-looking girl, and now in my fastwearing black I began to feel that I was day by day growing more shabby and wearylook*ng, and that my feeble chances of obtaining a post were growing less and less. I used to sit and ask myself whether I had tried hard ; and I knew 1 had ; but it was always the same. Whether I advertised for a situation as governess, or went from a registry office to offer myself as companion to a lady, it was always the same: I noticed a look of disappointment as soon as I entered the room, for .1 was neither pretty nor brightlooking, and my mournful black helped to sadden my aspect. It was always the same —the lady did not think 1 should suit her ; and in blank disappointment I had to return. And now it had come to this : that my landlady had grown as tired of me as the people at the registry offices, where I had more than once been told rudely that I was not likely to get a place as governess or companion, but had better look lower. That afternoon, evidently suspicious of my ability to pay, and perhaps disgusted with my miserable way of living, and afraid that 1 should be left an invalid upon her hands, she had —rudely it seemed to me—requested me to leave. In my present circumstances I was utterly prostrated by the news, for I dared not take lodgings elsewhere ; and I could see nothing now but to sell a portion of my scanty wardrobe, and go back to bog for assistance from my father’s friend. What a change! and how soon had my hopes of independent action been blighted ? I was heartsore as I felt how that in that great city there was wealth being squandered and luxury around mo while I was literally starving; for my poor living was tel'ing upon n:e fas* 7 . What should I do ? What should I do ? _ It was with weary iteration I had said those words, and wept till tears came no more, and a dull stolid feeling of despair had come upon me. I had almost shrunk away in the streets from the bright-faced, happy girls I passed ; and at times I found myself asking what had been my sin that I should be thus punished. 1 lay awake that night for many hours, watching the light from the street lamp p aying upon my ceiling ; and at last towards morning, the remembrance of words 1 had often heard came tome with a calm sense of

repose, trust, and restfulness, and I believe I fell asleep at last with a smile upon my lips, repeating a portion of that comforting sentence ending, ‘ Are ye not much better than they ? ’ It was a bright, sunshiny morning when I awoke, to hear some one knocking at my door; and hurrying on a few things, I answered. ‘Ah ! I was just going to take’em down again,’ said my landlady harshly. * Some folks can afford to lie in bed all day; I can’t. Here’s two letters for you. And mind this, Miss Laurie: I never bargained to come tramping up to the top of the house with letters and messages for you.’ ‘ I’m very much obliged, Mrs Ruddock,’ I said gently, as I took the letters with trembling hands, while, muttering and complaining, their bearer went down-stairs. It seemed very hard then, but I believe it was the woman’s habit, and that she was not bad at heart, but warped and cankered by poverty, hard work, and ill-usage from a drunken husband, whom she entirely kept. One letter I saw at a glance was from Minna, the other was in a strange crabbed hand ; and f longed to read them ; but exercising my self-denial, I dressed, lit my fire, and prepared my very frugal breakfast before sitting down and devouring Minna’s news. What right had I to murmur as I did last night, I asked myself, when she was evidently so happy and contented ? and then I opened, with buttering hand, the other letter, and was puzzled by it at first; but at last I recalled the fact that three weeks before I had answered an advertisement in the ‘Times’ where a lady wanted a companion. The note was very brief and curt, and ran as follows; ‘ If Miss Laurie is not engaged, she can call upon Mrs Langton Porter, 47, Morton street, Park Village South, at eleven o’clock to-morrow—Thursday ’ ‘ At last!’ I said to myself joyfully ; and with beating heart I p-epared myself for my journey, for the appointment was for that morning. Just as I had pretty well timed myself for my walk, a sudden squall came on, the sky was darkened, snow fell heavily, and in place of a morning in spring, we seemed to have gone back into winter, for the snow lay thickly in a very short time, and the branches of the trees in the squares were whitened. Weak as I was, this disheartened me, but I fought my way bravely on, and just at eleven rang timidly at the door of an important looking house, and was superciliously shown, by a stout tall footman in drab livery, into a handsomely furnished room. Everything in the place I noticed was rich and good : hea v y curtains hung by window and door ; skins and Eastern rugs lay on the polished wood floor; and a tremendous fire b'azed in a great brass fire place, and the flames danced and were reflected from the encaustic tiles with which it was surrounded.

(To he continued.)