Chapter VI: Will She Conquer?

AFTER Elfie and Susie had been kept some hours in the dull, gloomy prison cell, a policeman came and took them into another part of the building, where a magistrate was sitting, and the policeman stated why Elfie had been taken up. He had not seen her take the boots himself, however, and the man to whom they belonged said he did not wish to send the child to prison; and so the magistrate, warning her that if ever she was taken up again, she would not get off so easily, let her go. Against Susie there was no charge, and so the two were allowed to leave together, the policeman telling them never to steal any more, or they would be sent to prison for a month.

"Susie never did steal," said Elfie, indignantly turning round upon the man as she spoke.

"Hush, Elfie, never mind," whispered Susie, who was anxious to get away now.

"But I shall mind. You never did steal in your life, and it's a shame to say you did," retorted Elfie.

"But don't you see I was with you, and so I mustn't mind what they say," replied Susie.

Elfie looked at her in silence for a minute or two, and when they had got out into the street, she burst into tears. "O Susie, you don't deserve to be called a thief," she sobbed.

Susie tried to soothe her, but explained that she was afraid people would think her one, if they remained together, and she did not alter.

"Oh, I will, I will," said Elfie; "I can't bear to think of you loving me, and God loving me, and being so wicked all the while. Susie, ask him to forgive me, and let me say 'our Father' when we go home," she added.

As soon as they reached their room, they went in and shut the door, and kneeled down and said the Lord's Prayer together; and then Susie prayed in simple words that God would forgive Elfie for the sake of Jesus Christ, and help her by his Holy Spirit to lead a new life—to be honest and truthful, and make them both love each other, and be patient, and gentle, and kind.

Elfie was still crying when Susie got up from her knees, and she did not lift her head for some time—not until the fire was blazing under the tea-kettle and Susie had begun to get the tea ready.

"Shall we go to school to-night?" asked Susie a little timidly, when Elfie drew near the table.

"To-night ain't Sunday," said Elfie.

"No; but they have school to-night, and it would help us both to learn a little more," said Susie in the same gentle tone.

"I don't know nothing," said Elfie with a sigh. Only a day or two before, she had told Susie she did not want to learn any more, and would not go to school.

"You'd like to learn to read, wouldn't you, Elfie?" said Susie; "and it'll be nice to go to school of a night, I think."

"Yes, I'll go," said Elfie; "they'll know me there, but you won't let 'em turn you agin' me, will you?" she added.

"They won't try, Elfie, when they know you're wanting to be a different girl," said Susie. "Come and have some tea now," she added, "and I'll tell you how I came to be in the street where you was took up."

Elfie had forgotten to ask about this in the fright and excitement. "How did you get there?" she asked now.

Susie thought for a minute or two, and then she said, "I think God sent me, Elfie."

"Perhaps he did," said Elfie, with drooping head, "for I'd made up my mind never to come back to you any more when the policeman took me. I thought it was all up then, and I might as well forget all you'd told me, for it only made me feel bad and miserable."

"Then God sent me to bring you home, Elfie; and I've got a place too, I think," said Susie joyfully.

"Got a place!" repeated Elfie.

"Yes; I'm to go every morning, and do all sorts of work, and learn to be a proper servant," said Susie.

"But you'll come back every night?" said Elfie.

"Oh yes, I shall come back every night," replied Susie. "I shouldn't like to leave you now."

"No, don't leave me," whispered Elfie. "I do want to love God, but I shall forget all about him if you go away, Susie."

"But you could go to school and learn about him there," said her companion.

"Yes, they'd teach about him, and be kind, I know, but it ain't like loving you," said Elfie. "I can believe about God's love now a little because of yours, but I never had any love before, and I don't want you to go away."

"And I don't want to go away," said Susie. "I mean to earn a lot of money. I shall get eighteen-pence for going out every morning; and then of an afternoon I can clean steps, and knives, and forks, at the other places."

"And I'll get some steps to do, and mind the baskets again," said Elfie.

"Oh yes, do; God will help you, I know," said Susie.

And her heart beat high with hope as she showed Elfie how to wash cups and saucers; for of this necessary accomplishment, Elfie was quite ignorant.

After these had been put away, and their faces washed, they set off for school; Elfie feeling rather shy at going there again, and Susie quite exultant at the thought of taking her.

"Elfleda! Have you come back again?" said the teacher in some surprise, when Elfie paused before the desk.

It was the first time Susie had ever heard Elfie's proper name, and she hardly knew who was addressed, until she heard her companion say, "Please, I'd like to come back, if you'll let me come with Susie."

The teacher glanced at Susie, wondering whether she would be as troublesome.

"Have you been here to school before?" she asked.

"Not on a week-day, ma'am, but I come on Sundays," said Susie.

"Well, you must try to come regularly, on week-day as well as on Sunday," said the teacher, looking at Susie. It was quite useless to speak to Elfie, she thought; she had tried her so many times before, and she did not expect she would come to school above once a week.

It was a little disappointment to Elfie that Susie was placed in a different class; but Susie whispered that she would soon be able to read, if she only tried to learn, and then they could be together. And with this hope in view, Elfie began that very evening, bending all her energies to master the difficulties of the alphabet—a task she had never even tried to conquer before, although she had had the book before her a good many times.

No one who had known Elfie, and the disturbance she made in the school a short time back, could fail to notice the difference in her now. And a few of her companions teased her about it, calling her a "little saint," and various other names, which Elfie did not take very quietly at first, and which would have led to a fight as soon as they got outside again, if Susie had not interfered. Poor Elfie had a great deal to learn. She could not understand at all, that getting into a passion was almost as bad as being dishonest; and she was half inclined to be cross with Susie for interfering.

But by degrees she grew more calm, as she listened to the story of Jesus' life of patient suffering; and before she went to sleep that night she said, "O Susie, I wish I could be like Jesus!"

"We must try to be like him," said Susie; "it's hard work sometimes, and we don't seem to get on a bit, but mother said we must never give up trying."

"You're trying, I know," said Elfie; "and I'll try too. I'll begin to-morrow."

"I think you have begun, Elfie," said Susie, kissing her; "and we'll help each other to keep on trying."

The next morning both girls were up early—Elfie to go to the market in search of any odd job she could get; and Susie to the grocer's, to know when she should begin her work there, for she made sure she should go.

She had not given a thought to the possibility of the man seeing her with Elfie and the policeman, and thinking them both alike dishonest. She had not seen him, and had forgotten all about going there in the excitement caused by Elfie's arrest; and so she started off without the least fear in her mind, but that she should be taken on trial at least.

When she reached the shop, the man said, "What do you want?" And did not seem to recognize her at first.

But when he lifted his head and saw who it was, he added, "You've come to see what you can pick up, I suppose."

"No, sir," answered Susie meekly; "the lady said I was to come to-day about the place."

"And do you think we'd have you?" asked the grocer in astonishment. "Well, you must have a good stock of impudence, girl, to ask such a thing, and I saw you only yesterday as I did."

"Please, sir, I hadn't been stealing," said Susie with the tears in her eyes.

"And the other girl had not either, I suppose you'll tell me," said the grocer.

"Yes, sir, Elfie had," admitted Susie with a heightened colour; "but she's very sorry now, and won't do it again."

"She won't have the chance, I suppose, for some time," said the man; "they'll keep her in prison, I hope."

"She isn't in prison, sir," said Susie; "she's going to try and get some work in the market, for she wants to be honest."

"Well, there, you can go; I don't want to listen to your tales about a young thief," said the man.

"Oh, sir, won't you let me come and try to be your servant?" asked Susie anxiously.

"Well, if ever I heard such impudence as that!" exclaimed the grocer. "Do you think I'd have a thief to live in my house? Be off, or I'll send for the police to you and have you locked up, and you shan't get off so easily as the girl did yesterday."

Susie turned and went out of the shop with an almost breaking heart, and sitting down on a door-step near, she burst into tears. Her disappointment was the more keen and bitter because she had felt so sure of success; and when at last, chilled and benumbed with the cold, she turned back towards the main road, she had no heart to inquire anywhere else. Everybody would look upon her as a thief now, because she had been seen with Elfie and the policeman; and full of this thought, she turned into Fisher's Lane and went home.

At dinner-time, Elfie came back from the market to know how she had got on. She was not so surprised as Susie thought she would be, when she heard what had happened; but she hung her head with a sense of shame she had never felt before, when Susie told her how it was they would not even give her a trial.

"It's my fault," said Elfie. "O Susie, what shall I do?" And then she burst into tears.

"There, don't cry; it ain't worth crying about," said Susie, trying to speak cheerfully. "I will go out again presently, and perhaps somebody else will give me a trial."

"But they'll think you're a thief because you go with me," said Elfie sadly.

"Never mind, as long as I am not one really. God knows we are trying to be honest, and other people will be sure to know it too by-and-by.—What have you been doing, Elfie?" she asked, by way of turning the conversation.

Elfie's face brightened. She had been very successful at the market this morning, and had earned sixpence, besides having a lapful of potatoes and turnips given to her. "I didn't take one of them, Susie," she said, "and I've promised the man I'll never touch his things again; and he says he'll give me a job now and then, if I keep honest."

"And you will, Elfie, even if the work don't come always?" said Susie, speaking very earnestly.

"I'll try, Susie; I will try," said Elfie.

"And pray too; you must not forget that. God will help you if you ask him," said Susie.

Two meals a day were all the girls could afford; and so it was arranged that the potatoes and turnips should be boiled for tea, to save buying bread. Susie knew how to cook them, for she had seen her mother do so many times, and she promised to have them all ready by the time Elfie came home; for she was going out again to try and get something else to do.

After she was gone, the tears came into Susie's eyes again. Somehow it seemed that she was bearing the punishment of Elfie's wrong-doing, while Elfie herself was more than successful in her feeble attempts to be honest. It was hardly fair, she thought, and for a few minutes her tears flowed fast; but gradually there came into her mind some words of her mother's, about the work God intended her to do in the world, and she thought that this was the way He intended her to help Elfie, perhaps; and that thought made her more calm.

At tea-time, when Elfie came in, cold, hungry, tired, and rather cross, Susie was as cheerful and gentle as ever. She had asked God to help her to love Elfie "through evil report," and be patient with her, and he had answered her prayer. And it was no seeming cheerfulness, but real and heartfelt love, that she met her with now, as she threw herself on the floor in front of the fire.

"We shall have a dinner-tea to-day," she said, as she turned the potatoes and turnips out into a dish. "Come along, Elfie, and let us eat it while it's hot, and then we'll go to school."

"I'm tired, I don't want to go to school to-night," said Elfie crossly.

Susie did not take any notice of this, and before their meal was over Elfie began to look better tempered; and by the time the things were washed and put away, she was ready to go to school.

The teacher looked surprised to see her again so soon, and whispered some words of encouragement when she saw how earnestly she was trying to learn. It was not lost upon Elfie. It seemed to give her renewed courage and hope; and the other girls, seeing she was in earnest in her efforts, thought they might as well try too, and the whole class was more orderly in trying to follow Elfie's example.

This evening school was really pleasant to the poor neglected little street girl, and she overcame her habitual restlessness so far as to sit quietly on the form as long as it was necessary; a thing more difficult to accomplish than many might imagine. Elfie herself thought that as she had managed to do this, the victory over all her bad habits was gained; but she found she had been mistaken before long.

The next day she did not earn a single penny at the market, and Susie only earned twopence, although she was walking about all day; and when they returned home late in the afternoon, tired, cold, and hungry, and Susie said they could only have a piece of dry bread before they went to school, Elfie felt herself rather ill-used. She might have helped herself to some turnips quite easily in the morning, and that would have furnished them with a nice hot meal; but she had resisted the temptation, believing that she should get some work and be able to buy some.

But the work had not come, and they could only spend a penny of what Susie had earned, for the other was needed to make up the rent. They had got a week or two behind, in spite of all their efforts to keep it paid; and the landlord had said they must leave, if some were not ready on Monday. The next day was Saturday, and they hoped to earn some more; but they could not be sure of this.

And so it was with a sad heart they went to school that evening, and Elfie had a hard battle to fight with herself before she could sit still and give her attention to what was being taught.