Chapter X: Michael Finds a Friend

WHEN Michael came out of the house, the girl he had before observed was still leaning against the palings. She was bending forward, her face resting on her hands, which were wrapped in her shawl; but she raised her head as she heard the door close behind Michael, and glancing at her, he saw to his surprise that her eyes were wet with tears. The next moment she sprang to his side, saying imploringly, "Do tell me how she is, sir. You have been in, and you must know the latest."

"She is no better, poor little dear," said Michael, a lump rising in his throat as he spoke. "They fear the worst; but I'm going to fetch a doctor that I hope will cure her. Can you tell me where I can find a cab?"

"Yes, yes," she answered eagerly; "there's a stand just round the corner. I'll show you. Why, I declare if you ain't Michael Betts."

Michael looked at her in wonder. He had a dim idea that he had seen the girl before, but where or how he could not determine.

"That is my name, certainly," he said. "Who are you, I wonder, that you know me so well?"

"P'raps my name is Betts too," she said, giving him a quick glance of her bright, dark eyes.

"Don't be impertinent," he said sternly, "and don't tell me lies, please."

"You needn't fear," she said in a subdued tone. "I haven't the spirit to be impertinent. My heart is like to break thinking of that little angel lying there in such pain."

"Is she in great pain?" asked Michael sadly.

"To be sure. You never had diphtheria, I suppose? Well, I've had it, and I can tell you it's awful. I had it years ago in the hospital, and I'll never forget it, never."

"But the doctors saved your life," said Michael. "Why shouldn't they save hers?"

"Ah! Why not? See, there are the cabs. Oh, Mr. Betts, I wish you would let me come with you!"

"So you shall if you like," said Michael, touched by the grief the girl displayed, and feeling drawn to her by a bond of sympathy.

The girl signalled to a cabman, and when the vehicle drew up by the kerb, she helped Michael to get into it. She was struck by the feebleness of his movements.

"Have you been ill, Mr. Betts?" she asked. "I really hardly knew you when first I looked at you. You've altered sadly since I last saw you."

"When was that?" he asked. "I can't remember where I've seen you before, yet I seem to know your face."

"Oh, I'm about sometimes in the neighbourhood of your shop," she answered vaguely.

"And how did you come to know Mrs. Lavers and her little girl?"

"Oh, I belongs to a girls' club, and Mrs. Lavers is one of the ladies who comes there. But there ain't another like her; no, we all says that. She's an angel of a woman, that's what she is. Sometimes she would bring her little girl with her to the club. She's the prettiest, daintiest little creature you ever could see."

"I know," said Michael, the choking sensation rising again in his throat.

"She'd talk away to us girls, that wee mite,—my! You never heard anything like it. The veriest little chatterbox, yet with such wisdom in her words too. Oh, it would be terrible if she should die! It would just break her mother's heart."

"Ay, it would," said Michael, thinking sorrowfully how heavy a burden of guilt and remorse would rest on his conscience if the little one were taken. "She's a gentle-hearted lady, is Mrs. Lavers."

"She's the dearest lady in the world!" cried the girl fervently. "Ah, I can never tell you what she has been to me. Do you know what it is to have a friend that helps you to be good, a friend who you know would do anything for you, and for whom you'd do anything, even die, if need be? Well, she's such a friend to me."

Michael could only listen in wonder. He had never had such a friend; he had never felt such warm, passionate love as the girl's words expressed.

"Have you no one belonging to you?" he asked. "No mother or father?"

"Ay, I've a father," she said; "but he's a poor creature, my father, always weak and ailing. It's me has to take care of him, and not he, of me. I've took care of him ever since my mother died, eight years ago. It seems sometimes almost as if I were the parent, and he the child. Men are helpless creatures, you know. But here we are in the square. Now, which is the doctor's house?"

Happily the doctor was at home when Michael arrived at the house. After waiting some minutes, Michael was able to see him, but, to his despair, the busy physician was not to be persuaded to come with him at once. He had engagements which prevented his doing so, he said; but he listened patiently to all Michael could tell him about the little child, and promised that he would see her during the afternoon. Michael went away with his hopes somewhat dashed.

The girl drove back with him to his house. She sprang out there and helped him to alight, stood by his side as he settled with the driver, and then saw him safely down the stone steps to the door of the shop. She did it with a careful, almost motherly air, which seemed strange for so young a girl. Evidently she was used to taking care of others. Michael invited her to enter his house, but she declined resolutely.

"No, thank you," she said; "it's high time I went home to look after father. He'll be wondering what has become of me. If you like, I'll come round and tell you how she is this evening, after that doctor has seen her, you know. You ought not to go out again to-day, Mr. Betts; it's a bitter cold wind."

Michael thanked her and went inside. "She's a good girl," he said to himself, as he walked through the shop, "a much nicer girl than any one looking at her would take her to be. A rough kind of girl, of course, but with good feelings."

Mrs. Wiggins had gone home, and Michael was sitting alone by his fire, feeling very weary and depressed, when a loud, impetuous knock on the street door resounded through the quiet house.

"There she is," said Michael, and he went out as quickly as he could to open the door.

"Come in," he said, as he opened it; "come in quickly and tell me."

"No, thank you," said the girl decidedly, "I won't come inside. I haven't much to tell. She's neither better nor worse; that's all they can say."

"No better! Oh dear!" said Michael. Then, as the cold air blew in upon him, he began to cough.

"Now do go in out of the cold," said the girl. "You'll be worse, if you don't take more care of yourself, Mr. Betts."

"But I want to hear what the doctor said. I want to know all about it," Michael protested. "If you won't come inside, I must stand here and catch cold."

"Oh, well, then," said the girl, yielding, "I don't want you to catch your death." And she stepped inside.

Michael led her into the inner room, and tried feebly to stir the dull fire into a blaze.

"Let me do that," said the girl eagerly. "I'm a rare hand at making a fire. But you did ought to keep a better fire than this, Mr. Betts. You don't know how to take care of yourself."

"Don't I?" said Michael. "Ah, and I've no daughter to take care of me, as your father has."

"Ah, poor father!" said the girl, her face clouding over.

"Is he worse?" asked Michael.

She nodded. "This cold wind is so bad for him," she said.

Observing the girl more closely, Michael saw that her face was wan and thin, with dark circles beneath the eyes.

"Set the kettle on the fire," he said, "and make yourself a cup of cocoa."

"No, thank you," she said. "I'll make a cup for you with pleasure; but none for me—thank you all the same."

"Well, put the kettle on," he said, thinking she might change her mind, "and then tell me all the doctor said."

"That's more than I can tell you," said the girl, with a smile; "but they say he is not without hope of pulling her through. He says the next twenty-four hours will decide it."

"Ah," said Michael, with a shiver.

"We must just hope for the best," said the girl, striving after cheerfulness; "hope and pray, that's what we've got to do. Did I tell you that Mrs. Lavers sent a message to us girls at the club, asking us all to pray for her?"

"No," said Michael, "you did not tell me that."

They sat in silence for a few minutes. Presently the water began to boil, and his new friend busied herself in making him a cup of cocoa. She did it deftly, and waited upon him in a kind and gentle way; but she was not to be persuaded to take any herself. Michael was hurt by the determined manner in which she refused his hospitality. He could not understand why she did so, for she really looked as if she needed nourishment.

"What work do you do?" he asked presently.

"I make matches when I can get taken on," she replied; "but just now is a slack time in the trade."

"Then you're badly off, I fear," he said.

"I haven't complained, have I?" she asked, turning upon him with an air of defiance. Then, with an evident desire to turn the conversation, she remarked, as she looked about her, "What a sight of books you have, Mr. Betts!"

"Do you like books?" he asked.

She nodded her head. "I'm awful fond of reading."

"Well," he said, with the kindest intention, "if there are any of my books that you would like to read, I'm willing to lend them to you."

"Oh no, thank you," she said hastily, colouring as she spoke, and giving a quick little movement of the head, as if the suggestion annoyed her. "I don't want to borrow your books, Mr. Betts."

He looked at her curiously. She was certainly a very strange girl. But he liked her. He was beginning to feel considerable confidence in her.

"I must go now," she said. "I don't like to leave father for long."

"Stay a moment," said Michael in a timid, hesitating way. "I wish you'd do something for me before you go."

"What is it?" she asked.

"Just kneel down and say a prayer for that poor little child. I want to pray, but I can't. My heart is so hard—and—and—it's years since I tried—but I'd like to hear you."

She looked startled and alarmed.

"Oh, I can't," she said; "I can't pray out loud like that."

"Say it in a whisper," he suggested.

She hesitated, her colour coming and going under the strain of excited emotion.

"I'll try," she said at last. "She says it don't matter what words we use, as long as they come from the heart. God can read our heart, and He will understand."

So she knelt down, and Michael bent beside her, whilst in broken, childish utterance, the very quaintness of which seemed to prove its sincerity, she asked the loving Father to spare the life of little Margery. And Michael prayed too, breathing forth what was perhaps the first true prayer of his life. The prayer seemed to bring the assurance of its answer. There were tears in the eyes of each as they rose; but God's comfort was in their hearts. The girl said not a word as Michael shook hands with her; but when she quitted the house and walked quickly homeward her heart was filled with a strange wonder not unmixed with joy.