Chapter XVIII: The Two Old Women

In one of those narrow streets that open from the vicinity of Chatham Square, stood a small, two-story house built of brick, but with wooden steps that descended on the side-walk, and gable windows looking down from the roof. Two old women occupied this house; beside them and a large, gray cat, there was not a living creature beneath its roof; for the old ladies performed their own household duties, and lived out their isolated lives in silent companionship. The elder of the two, a little, withered-up creature approaching ninety, possessed some means of support beside the house she lived in; and the other was her dependent in all things.

This dependent old woman had turned seventy, and, on account of her comparative youth, was looked upon by her associate as a sprightly young thing, whose movements required especial vigilance, and whose limbs were capable of any amount of household exercise.

It is difficult for two women to be real heart companions, if cast on the same hearth-stone when the gray shadows are creeping over them. While old Mrs. Frost felt that she was doing wonders of charity in giving Mrs. Nicholson a home, she—poor, old gentlewoman—felt this dependence to the core of her weary heart, and took on herself the toil of a servant without in the slightest degree softening the impressions of benevolence with which the elder female solaced her self-love.

These old women were sitting over their unsocial dinner, composed of a little hashed fish, the section of a mince-pie, and a scant portion of green tea, from which Mrs. Frost drained off one good, strong cup, and diluted the rest with warm water, observing, as she lifted the lid of the tea-pot for this purpose, that, for young persons like Mrs. Nicholson, strong tea was very unwholesome and apt to render them nervous, if not hysterical. This speech had been so often repeated that Mrs. Nicholson took it as a matter of course, while she meekly invigorated the weak tea with a little bluish milk, and helped herself sparingly to a spoonful of the fish, very much as the gray cat would have done had she found a chance to steal her portion of food from the table.

The old women sipped their tea in silence, tasting lightly of the fish; while now and then a kindly murmur and a fragment of food went down to the cat, who rubbed herself against one old woman’s ankle, then marched off to beg of the other with a mute appeal of the eyes.

“I wonder,” said old Mrs. Frost, “what has become of Michael Hurst. It is a long time since he was here; Jube has grown from a fair-sized kitten since then. The boy seems to forget his old friends: or maybe he’s gone out of town on business.”

“I think not. Yesterday he passed me in the street, when I was going to the grocery after those watercresses,” said Mrs. Nicholson. “He didn’t speak, but I’m sure it was him.”

“Met him on your way to the grocery,” cried Mrs. Frost, and her head began to vibrate like a pendulum; “so near my house, and not call? Why, Mary Nicholson, this comes of something you have done to offend him; your thoughtless, flighty ways will be the ruin of you yet. What have you been saying to the boy?”

“I haven’t spoken to him in more than two months,” said Mrs. Nicholson, coloring through her wrinkles at this charge of youthful indiscretion; “indeed I never do speak with him—he don’t care to talk with me, I’m sure.”

“But then what keeps him away?”

“I don’t know. Wasn’t it then he asked for something, that you didn’t want to give him? I thought so.”

“Mrs. Nicholson, you must have been listening. I’m astonished.”

“But I was in the room and could not help it. If people will talk before me what can I do?”

The old woman of ninety shook her head in a dissatisfied way, and muttered, “Poor thing! poor, weak thing! She hasn’t got the experience which brings discretion. It’s no use scolding her.”

So, with a philosophic wave of the little, withered hand, she proceeded to cut the section of pie in two equal parts, measuring each to a fraction with the flat of her knife; then she scraped the fragments of fish together for Jube, and, leaning back in her Boston rocking-chair, left Mrs. Nicholson to wash the dishes, while she prepared herself for a long nap.

But just as her eyes began to dose, and her little hands were falling apart from their clasp on her chest, a knock at the street door carried Mrs. Nicholson into the hall. She turned the latch, and found upon the door-step the very young man whom they had been talking about.

“Mr. Hurst, is it you?” she said, happy to see any human being in that unsocial house. “Step light, please; Mrs. Frost is in her first sleep.”

“But I came to see Mrs. Frost, aunty, and can’t possibly wait till she drones herself awake again, so just give her a nudge—tell her I’m here, and—ha! you look frightened, and shake that poor, little cap dismally. Daren’t do it, ha! Well, I’ll rouse her myself.”

That instant an old, withered head appeared through the sitting-room door, shaking like a cluster of dry leaves, but with an attempt at welcome, which, though grim enough, was all the cordiality that infirm woman could muster out of her worn old age.

“Michael, is it you?”

“Grandmother! Well, you are awake, and glad to have me back again a little while, I hope.”

“Glad?” said the old lady, and a smile displaced the wrinkles about her mouth; “you’ve been a long time waiting to see if I would be glad or not. But come in, Mike. Dear me what a dashing young fellow you’ve grown! Mary Nicholson! Mary Nicholson! just pour some boiling water into the tea-pot, and put in an even spoonful of Young Hyson. I dare say Michael would like a good, old-fashioned cup of tea. We’d just done dinner, but that’s of no consequence. Mary Nicholson! run around the corner for another pie.”

Young Michael laughed.

“No, no, grandmother; I’m not hungry, and never drink tea now.”

“Never drink tea? Why, Mike, what has come over you? Never drink tea?”

“Not at this time of day. But never mind, I’ll take a cup now, and a piece of pie too, if aunty will bring it for me.”

Mrs. Frost nodded her head half a dozen times, for when she once began it was difficult to stop, and Mrs. Nicholson went patiently out in search of a pie at the next bakery. When she was gone, Hurst took the old lady’s hand and kissed it with some show of real affection.

“I am glad she is gone,” he said, “for I want a little private talk with you, grandmother.”

“Grandmother!” muttered the old woman. “Why, Mike, you are getting too old for that I never had a child in my life, as Mary Nicholson, the giddy thing, says: and to have a tall, handsome young fellow calling me grandmother is enough to take away one’s reputation. I really thought that was very sensible, very sensible indeed, for Mary Nicholson, considering her want of experience. Still it does sound pleasant when you call me grandmother, so I’ll run the risk.”

Here the old lady sat down in her rocking-chair, with an increased vibration of the head, and a sparkle of pleasure in her dim eyes. Hurst knelt down by her side, as he had done a thousand times when a boy, with a glow of real affection, which rendered his manner irresistible to the lonely soul he addressed.

“But grandmother, tell me, and oh! tell me truly, have I no right to claim some relationship to you? I cannot remember when you first took an interest in my life—when you first gave me a home. If I am related to you, legally or illegally, nearly or remotely, oh! tell me now. I shall not love you more or less for the knowledge: but it is very important that I know all about myself. Grandmother, dear grandmother, tell me every thing!”

The old lady began to vibrate in her chair—body, head and all. She tried to lift her hand in deprecation of farther questions, but it fell gently on the young man’s shoulder, and a tear trembled into her dim eyes.

“Michael, I can tell you nothing, because, of a certainty, I know nothing myself; what I suspect is not evidence, and may mislead.”

“But you know how I came under your care.”

“Yes, so far as that, I can tell you all I know myself.”

“Do, oh, do tell me all you know!”

“That is little—nothing in fact.”

“Still, let me have it, dear grandmother.”

“My husband, you can just remember him, Michael, and know that he was minister of a little Baptist society, which was not rich enough in those days to have a meeting-house to itself, but worshipped in a room around the corner, and was built up gradually, by the goodness of God and my husband’s labor, into a powerful church. He did not live to see it, but his teachings have brought forth fruit a thousand fold.”

“I know, I know; you have told me this again and again, dear grandmother; but what of myself?”

The young egotist had no sympathy with the dear memories which made the old lady dwell so lovingly on her husband’s good works, and cut them short with this burst of selfish impatience.

She drew back, nervous and bewildered; then answered, with touching meekness:

“Yes, I dare say that I have told you about him a great many times, till you are tired of it; but about yourself—well, that, too, was one of his good works, for he was not among the servants of God that confine their labors to one society, or to a single line of duty. He went forth into the highways and the hedges and forced sinners to come in. He was so charitable, too, without a sin of his own, that I could ever discover; he had no end of patience and forbearance for the sins of others.”

“Yes, yes; I know all this!” cried the young man, impatiently; “but of myself?”

“Well, this is a part of what I was saying: so be more patient, or I will not speak another word!” cried the old lady, with the stubbornness of extreme years. “To speak of you, a poor, helpless orphan baby, is to exalt his goodness. My husband not only cared for the souls of his parishioners in the next world, but he helped them forward in this. The poor were his children.”

“Well, and I was one of those poor orphan babies?” cried the youth, impatiently.

“You might have been two or three years old when he brought you home. Yes, it was just two years after my nieces, Sarah and Hetty Hart, come to visit me, and a few months after Sarah got married to that rich Mr. Bentley.”

“Mr. Bentley—did a niece of yours marry a man by that name?”

“And didn’t you know that? Why, yes, our Sarah married one of the most splendid and wealthy men in New York. His cousin, who was killed, used to be here a good deal, when the girls stayed with us, and the two young fellows often came together. The rich man was poor then; but after his cousin died the property all came to him, and he married Sarah.”

“And what became of her? Is she living now? Has she any children?”

“She died years ago, beyond sea, and left a little girl, her very picture.”

“What was her name?”

“A curious name for a girl—‘Gillian.’ I never knew where they picked it up. It has a heathenish sound to me.”

“Gillian, ah, and Miss Hetty Hart your niece, Daniel Hart and his daughter: are these the connections of Mrs. Bentley?”

“Yes, that is the family. You were up in Rockland once—did they never tell you about the Bentleys?”

“Never a word.”

“Well, it was no secret. I wonder Hetty never told you about them, for it was considered a great match for our Sarah. Hetty was here, I remember, just after Mr. Frost brought you home; and now I remember Sarah came too every day till she went beyond seas: they took a good deal of interest in you, and cried over you more than once. I caught them at it—but then they were tender-hearted girls always: the sight of a bird astray from its nest would set them a-crying always, especially Sarah.”

“But this is no intelligence, grandmother—it does not inform me who I am, or who my parents were,” cried the youth. “Did your husband never tell you where I came from, or to whom I belonged?”

“No, he never did. His good acts were done in secret, and though he called me his right hand, I never knew what the left hand did, especially in his charities. If the sinful gave him their confidence, it was sacred between himself and the throne of God. Many a miserable girl has he snatched from under the cruel feet of the multitude, and saved from deeper sin. Many a child——”

“Don’t speak of that—do not couple me with such Christian charities,” cried the young man, wildly, while his face flushed scarlet, and his eyes filled with smouldering flame. “The mother who can leave this shameful orphanage on her child deserves to be trodden to the earth—crushed out of existence——”

He broke off suddenly, and stood still with his hand clutched in a firm grip, his features gradually becoming pale, and his eyes fixed on the door; for during his vehement speech it had opened, and Aunt Hetty Hart stood mute and still on the threshold.

She met that look of inflamed passion with a wild gaze and a lip of marble. His impetuosity seemed to terrify her into stone: she was so unused to violent feelings, poor thing, that their utterance abashed her to death. After a little while, she glided into the room and sat down, shivering and drawing her mantle tightly as if she were cold.

“Oh!” said the young man, with a forced and bitter laugh, “you have just come in time, Miss Hart. I am trying to persuade my old grandmother here to tell me who I really am; and she was kindly insinuating that I was little less than a pauper child, raked up from the gutter where a shameless mother had left me. You cannot wonder that intelligence like this sheds something besides rose-leaves on my temper, and that I was very near cursing myself and those to whom I owe life.”

Hetty looked at him steadily. Her large, sorrowful eyes dilated; her lips grew cold.

“Do not curse either your father or your mother, Michael. Leave them with God—leave them both to the great, just God, who allows no sin, open or hidden, to go unpunished.”

The words dropped solemnly and slowly from her lips; but even the touching sadness of that voice failed to influence the intemperate youth.

“No, it is useless cursing them; they cannot feel or know it,” he said, bitterly; “one might as well denounce the wind. But you had some knowledge of me when a child: Grandmother Frost has just told me so—you and your sister, the wife of that rich Mr. Bentley, whose house I saw you at a little while back. If you are human, tell me something by which I may guess who I am.”

Aunt Hetty shrunk away from him.

“I have no power. I cannot, if I would, give up a mother to the curses of her child.”

“And so all ends in this. With every effort to know something of my own history, I am thrown back to fight with shadows again.”

The young man flung himself away from Aunt Hetty as he spoke, and prepared to go; but some new thought struck him, and he turned back.

“One thing I wish to ask. There is a lady living on the Bloomingdale road, who has been a very kind and good friend to me for some years. Is she known to any of you? Her name is Ransom, and she is an author of high standing.”

The old ladies looked at each other, pondered a while; then each shook her head—they knew no such woman. Aunt Hetty had heard the name, and remembered that Gillian Bentley had brought one of Mrs. Ransom’s books into Rockland county; but of the author herself she knew nothing.

The timid woman said this in a frightened way, and seemed to shrink into herself when another sharp exclamation broke from the young man.

“Another mystery,” he said; “but I was a fool to inquire about her here,” and with angry clouds on his brow he started off, almost knocking the old woman down who was coming in with the pie she had been ordered to bring.

“I beg your pardon—I am really sorry,” he said, as the old creature reeled back against the wall. “I did not mean to hurt you; but that stubborn old thing will tell me nothing, and it drives me mad.”

The old woman, instead of being angry at his carelessness, was grateful for this half apology; and softly closing the door, said to him, in a hurried whisper—

“I only wish I could help you out of all this trouble. Tell me what it is about.”

He laughed a low and bitter laugh.

“I am a poor orphan in search of my father and mother,” he said, “and no one will tell me where to find them. I believe Mrs. Frost could help me if she pleased.”

“Did she know any thing?”

“Her husband did; but he is dead.”

The old woman pondered a moment, with a lean finger pressed to her lip.

“I don’t think she knows any thing about it; but if she does I’ll find it out for you. Come again before long. It’s pleasant to have company drop in now and then.”

“Find out what I want to know, and I’ll come to see you every day of my life,” he whispered, earnestly. “Miss Hart is in the sitting-room: take notice of what they talk about after I am gone.”

“I will—as sure as you live I will, and trust me for more than that. It’ll be something to think about, and that is a great deal to a woman who does not get a chance to speak sometimes for twenty-four hours together.”

“Well, well,” said the young man, “be my friend, as you always have been, and if I ever win good fortune, you shall share it. So, now, good-day, aunty; I hear a movement as if some one were coming.”

With these words he disappeared, just as the pale face of Aunt Hetty looked through the door.

She saw his shadow as he went, and called out faintly, but there was no strength in her feeble voice to summon him back or lead him from his desperate course.