Little Miss Joy Part 15

"I have had many troubles. Oh! Mr. Boyd, can you forgive me? When my darling child was a baby, I wanted bread. My husband died just when she was eighteen months old; I had not a s.h.i.+lling in the world; there was only the workhouse before me, and I could not--no, I could not take my precious child there. So I walked here from Ipswich. I remembered you had a kind heart--so I laid her here on your door-step and stood watching till you came and took her up, and I knew you would be good to her; but I dared not face my mother. I wandered alone all that night; and early in the morning, before any one was stirring, I came to look up at this house. As I stood listening, I heard my baby's little cough. Some one was crooning over her and playing with her."

"That was Susan. Hi, Sue! come this way," exclaimed Mr. Boyd.

Susan came blundering down the stairs, asking--

"What do you want? I was just giving the precious child her breakfast.

She seems a bit brighter this morning."

"What is the matter with her?" Maggie Chanter asked. "Is she ill? is she ill?"

"She was knocked down by a runaway horse last June, and hurt her back.

What do you know about the child?"

"I am her mother?" was the answer. "Oh! I thank you all for being kind to her." And then a burst of pa.s.sionate tears choked the poor mother.

Patience Harrison's kind arms were round her in a moment.

"My dear," she said, "G.o.d is very good to us. Do not fret; you trusted this little one to His care, and He has not forgotten you. Little Miss Joy is loved by every one; she is the sweetest and best of little darlings."

"Ah! I am so afraid she may not love me," the poor mother said. "She may think I was cruel to desert her; but what could I do? I knew Mr.

Boyd had a kind heart; but many, oh! many a time I have repented of what I did. As I wandered back to the quay that morning I saw a new registry office I had never seen before. I waited till it was open, and went in. A man-servant was waiting with me, and he went into the manager's room first. Presently the manager came out.

"'What place do you want?' she asked,

"'Any place,' I replied. 'A maid----'

"'I think she'll do,' the man said.

"Then he told me his young mistress was married a month before, and was to sail from London Docks that night for India. The maid who was to have attended her was sickening of scarlet fever; the lady was at her wits' end; she was staying at Lord Simon's, near Yarmouth. 'Come out,'

he said, 'and see her at once.'

"I went, and I was instantly engaged. I told my story in a few words, and the lady believed me. Strange to say, she had a photograph taken by my husband, with the name Ralph Chanter on the back. She remembered him and the time when he was taking portraits here. Well, I served her till she died, dear lady, and never returned to England till last week.

She has left me a legacy, which will enable me to set up a business, and make a home for my child. You'll give her back to me, Mr. Boyd?"

Uncle Bobo's face was a study as he listened to this story, told brokenly, and interrupted by many tears.

"It will be kind of hard," he said at last. "Yes, it will be _kind of hard_," with desperate emphasis. "But," he said, heavily slapping his leg, "I'll do what is just and right."

"I know you will, I know you will," Patience Harrison said; "but, oh! I am so sorry for you, dear Uncle Bobo."

"Let me see my child," Maggie Chanter said. "Let me see her; and yet, oh, how I dread it! Who will take me to her? Will you take me? Will you tell the story, Mr. Boyd?"

"No, no, my dear, don't ask me; let Patience Harrison do it; let her.

I can't, and that's the truth."

Then Patience Harrison mounted the narrow stairs, and pausing at the door said, "We must be careful, she is very weak."

Maggie bowed her head in a.s.sent, and then followed Patience into the room.

"Oh, Goody, I am _so_ glad you are come!" and the smile on Joy's face was indeed like a sunbeam. "Bet has not come yet. I don't like to vex her, but she does blunder so. Susan calls her Blunder-buss; isn't that funny of Susan?"

Then Joy turned her head, and caught sight of the figure on the threshold.

"Why doesn't she come in?" Joy said; "she looks very kind; and see what flowers and plums the girls have brought me as they went to school!"

"Joy, darling Joy," Patience said, "you have often said you wished you had known your mother."

"Have I? You are like my mother now."

"But what if I were to tell you your very own mother is come, Joy?"

And then, pointing to Maggie, she said, "There she is!"

The excitement and agitation was all on one side. The mother tried in vain to conceal her deep emotion. Joy, on the contrary, was quite calm, and said, looking at Patience--

"Is it true? _is_ this my mother?"

"Yes, yes; your poor unhappy mother. Can you love her, little Joy?

Can you forgive her for leaving you to Mr. Boyd?"

"Why, yes," Joy said brightly, "of course I can; he has been ever so good to me, and I do love him so."

Then Patience Harrison slipped away, and left the mother and the child together.

"The meeting is well over," she said as she returned to the shop.

"But the parting isn't over," was poor Uncle Bobo's lament; "and I tell you what, when it comes it will break my heart. I shan't have nothing left to live for; and the sooner I cut my cable the better."

Patience Harrison felt that it was useless to offer comfort just then, and she remembered Bet had not arrived as usual, and turned out of the row. Towards the market-place, on the way to Mrs. Skinner's cottage, she met George Paterson. His face brightened, as it always did, when they met.

"Well," he said, "have the bride and bride-groom come home?"

"Yes," she replied, "and I have given notice to quit."

"You have!" he said joyfully; "then you will come to me?"

"No, George, no--not yet."

"Not _yet_! When, then?" he asked quickly. "I was reading in the paper the other day, that when a man is not heard of for seven years it is lawful to marry another. It is getting on for twice seven years since you were left desolate."

"My dear kind friend," Patience said, "I have waited so long and prayed so often to be shown the right path, that I feel sure G.o.d will not leave me without an answer; and till I am certain that my husband is taken away by death, I could not be the wife of another man."

"Then you may wait till you are a hundred," George said impatiently.

"How _can_ you ever know?"

"Dear George, be patient with me. Do not be angry with me. I have asked G.o.d for guidance, and He will give it in His own time."

"I am wrong to be hard on you, I know," was the reply; "but to see you drifting alone, and with no home, is enough to madden any man when a home is ready for you."