BESSIE TAKES RODNEY FROM THE GIN-PALACE.
"I can't be any worse," moaned the drunkard.
"Not much, may be," said Bessie, frankly; "you went and stole Nelly's doll for drink, and now you've stole the vi'lets. But you might be dead, and that's worse. And every day you're only getting nearer it, and if you go on drinking, you're sure to die pretty soon. Perhaps, if you go on as you are, you'll be dead in a very little while."
"I wish I was dead," he groaned.
"Why!" exclaimed Bessie, in a tone of astonishment. "And then you could never undo the harm you've done to poor little Nelly, that you love so, I know, spite of all. If you'd only think of Nelly, and think of God—I don't know much about God, you used to know more than me; but I've a feeling as if He really does care for us all, every one of us, and you, when you're drunk even. If you'd only think of Him and little Nelly, you wouldn't get drunk again, I'm sure."
"I never will again, Bessie; I never will again," he repeated fervently. And he continued saying it over and over again, till they reached the gallery at the top of the staircase.
Bessie drew him aside as he was about to turn into his own room.
"No," she said, "you couldn't bear to stay in there alone all night; it 'ud be too much for you. Mrs. Simpson, as is taking care of Nelly 'll let you sit up by her fire; and I'll go and stay in your house. I'm not afeard at all. She loved us all so—you, and Nelly, and me. We're going to bury her in the morning, and I'd like to sit up with her the last night of all."
Before long Rodney was seated by his neighbour's fire, in a silent and very sorrowful mood, with Nelly leaning against him, her arm round his neck, and her cheek pressed against his. He was quite sober now; and his spirit was filled with bitter grief, and a sense of intolerable degradation. He loathed and abhorred himself, cursed his own sin, and the greed of the people who lived upon it. If the owners of these places of temptation—members of Christian churches, some of them—could hear the deep, unutterable curses breathed against them, their souls would be ready to die within them for their own sin, and the terrible shame of it.
CHAPTER VII.
HALF MEASURES.
AS soon as Mrs. Rodney was buried, Bessie entered upon her charge of Rodney and Nelly. She was little more than a child herself in years, but her life in the streets had given her a keen, shrewd knowledge of human nature. She set about at once to make Rodney's home more attractive than it had been during his wife's illness. And every evening, as soon as her own necessary livelihood was earned, she hastened to spend all the time she could with him and Nelly. She could sing and talk well; and Rodney, whose good resolutions were deeper than usual, was often induced to stay at home, or pay only a brief visit to some public-house, for the sake of society, accompanied by both Bessie and Nelly, who waited for him outside the door, now and then sending in a message, till he was ashamed of keeping them longer.
There was a little change for the better. Nelly's rags were covered by a gay pink cotton frock, trimmed with a number of small flounces, which Bessie picked up cheap at a clothes-shop, and which she washed until the colour was faded. Rodney often promised to buy his little daughter the other clothes she so greatly needed; but work was slack, very slack for unsteady hands like him; and he could earn but little, more than half of which still went for drink. But he had no violent outbreak, and often when he was tempted to greater excesses, there rose before his mind the image of his dead wife, with the violets in her folded hands. This memory, with Bessie's influence and Nelly's love, had a salutary effect upon him in part; and in his heart, he had determined to be altogether a changed and reformed man some day.
By degrees Rodney recovered confidence in himself and his own power of moderation. Three months had passed since his wife's death, and he had never been so drunk as to be incapable. Bessie, with the sanguine delight of a girl, believed in his reformation, and rejoiced in it openly; while Nelly praised and fondled him every day. The slavery of the habit seemed over; he was master of it, or at least he was no more than a hired servant, who could cast off the yoke at any moment, and be altogether free. He drank still, drank deeply; but he could come out of the gin-palace with money in his pocket; a feat impossible a few months ago. The abject drunkards, who could not tear themselves away from the neighbourhood of the spirit-vaults, became objects of contempt and disgust to him. He was pursuing the rational and manly course of breaking off the habit by slow but sure degrees.
Yet there was not after all much to be proud of. The poor place at home was still bare and comfortless, in spite of Bessie's efforts; Nelly was pining for better food, and he himself was shabby and out-at-elbow. No person passing him in the street would have distinguished him from the drunken objects he despised. He was feeble and tremulous still; his eyes were red and dim, and his head was hot. The only point gained was that the vice, which still had possession of him, held him with a somewhat slighter grasp.
But when the next autumn came, and heavy fogs from the river filled the town, Bessie caught cold after cold till her spirits failed her, and she could do little more than call in at Rodney's house upon her way home to her lodgings, where she longed to lie down to rest. There was nobody to wile away the listless time at home, and if he stayed longer than usual at the beer-shop or gin-palace, there was no one waiting for him outside, for he took care to lock Nelly up safely before he left her. By little and little the old slavery established itself again in all its tyranny. He had built his house upon the sand, and the storm came and beat upon it, and it fell; and great was the fall thereof.
Night after night Rodney came home late, raving more furiously than ever, while Nelly crouched in the darkest corner of the little room in an agony of terror, not daring to stir lest she should draw his attention to her. Sometimes, as she grew better, Bessie would make her way through the chilly evenings to the house to exert her old influence, but she found that it was all gone before this new outbreak. Once he struck her brutally, and thrust her out into the rain, bidding her begone, and come back no more; but the faithful girl would not forsake him and little Nelly. She was hoping against hope.
CHAPTER VIII.
A SORROWFUL FACT.
IT was not long before the time came when Rodney was never really sober. When he could not stagger along the narrow streets to the spirit-vaults, he sent Nelly, as scores and hundreds of little children are sent in our Christian country; and he drank himself dead drunk in the room where his wife had died. At last there was neither shame, nor sorrow, nor a consciousness of sin in his soul; only the one absorbing, insatiable craving for drink. A seven-fold possession had taken fast hold of him, and Bessie lost all hope.
It was quite dark one evening, and Rodney was lying prostrate, unable to stir, upon the low bed, with a bottle near him which he had lately drained, but without power to fumble with his nerveless fingers for any more pence which might possibly remain in his possession. His eyes were open, and in a state of drunken lethargy he was watching Nelly going softly to and fro about the room, casting terrified glances at him from time to time. He saw her bent almost double under the weight of the old iron-kettle, which she was lifting with both her little arms on to the fire; and lying there, powerless and speechless, he saw the thin, ragged frock, with its torn and faded flounces, catch the flame between the bars, and kindle rapidly into a blazing light about her.
An extreme agony came upon him. With all the might of his will, he struggled to raise himself up to save her; but he could not move. He had no more power over his own limbs than the mother's corpse would have had, if it had been lying there. For a moment, his little girl stretched out her arms to him with a scream for help; and then she sprang past him to the door, and he heard the street ring and echo with her cries, and the shrieks of frightened women and children. But still he could not stir. He lay there like a log, while great drops of terror and anguish gathered on his face.
How long it was he did not know—it might have been years of torment—before the door was flung open, and a woman's face looked in upon him, white and haggard with fear.
"She's burned to death!" she cried, "and you'll have to answer for it. I'm not sorry; I'm glad. She'll be better off now; and I hope they 'll hang you for it. You'll have to answer for the child's death."
She drew the door to again sharply, and left him in his miserable and helpless loneliness. Nelly was dead then; burned to death through his sin! The intolerable agony of his spirit gave him a little strength, and he crawled upon his hands and knees to the door, and succeeded in opening it. Down in the street below the people were talking of it, the women calling to one another to tell the horrible news; he could hear many of the words they said, with his name sometimes, and sometimes Nelly's. Dead! Was it possible that his little Nelly could be dead? Why did they not bring her home? But then a great shuddering of horror fell upon him. He could not bear to see her again, his dead child; burned to death with him lying by, too drunk to save her.
By and by his limbs gathered more power, and with pain and toil he raised himself to his feet. The tumult in the streets was subsiding, and the people were retiring to their houses. Some of them, who lived on the same flat, kicked at his door with loud and angry curses; but he had locked it as soon as his fingers could turn the key, and he kept a silence like the grave. All was quiet after a while, and the clocks of the town struck eleven. If he could only steal away now, there would be no one to stop him and ask him what he was about to do, or whither he was going. The streets were almost deserted, except about the gin-palaces. He cursed them bitterly as he went by. There was now only one purpose, one idea in his tormented brain: if his miserable feet would but carry him to the river, all should soon be ended for him. Nothing in the world to come could be worse than the hell of his own sin. The only plea Bessie herself could urge—that he should live to make amends to Nelly—had no longer an existence.
It was slow and weary work, creeping, creeping down to the river side. He saw it long before he reached it, with the lights glimmering across it from the opposite shore. He was obliged to lean often against the walls and the lamp-posts to gain breath and power to take a few more footsteps towards his grave. He was drunk no longer. His mind was terribly clear. He knew distinctly what had happened, and what was about to happen to him if his strength would only take him down to the edge of yonder black water. His conscience raised no voice against his purpose. There was a certain feeling, almost of satisfaction, that in a little while the tide would be carrying him out to sea.
He had almost gained a spot where a single effort would plunge him into the cooling waters; there were but few persons about, and they at some distance away, far enough not to hear the splash as he fell into the basin, when his unsteady foot caught upon the curb-stone, and he fell forward, dashing his head violently upon the pavement. Before many minutes had passed, a policeman was conveying him in a cab to the infirmary; and he was laid, unconscious and delirious, upon a bed in one of the wards there.
CHAPTER IX.
FOUND DROWNED.
THREE days after Rodney's disappearance, Bessie was sitting at an apple-stall in her old place by the landing-stages, when the news ran along the line of basket-women that the body of a drowned man had just been brought ashore at one of the wharves near at hand. Bessie's heart sank within her. There had been no tidings of Rodney since the evening she had first missed him, though she had sought everywhere for him; and she recollected too well the threat he had often made of putting an end to his life. She felt sick and giddy at the mere thought of recognizing him in this drowned man, yet she left her basket and stall in charge of a neighbour, and ran in search of the crowd which would be sure to gather about the ghastly object.
Bessie pushed through the circle of bystanders, and looked down on the dripping form lying upon the stones. The face was livid and disfigured, and the scanty hair was smooth and dark; yet it was like him, so like him that Bessie fell upon her knees beside him, sobbing passionately.
"Oh! I know him!" she cried. "He saved me from being drowned once, and now he's gone and drowned himself. Oh! I wish he could be brought to life again! Is he quite dead? Are you sure he's quite dead?"
"He's been in the water two or three days," said one of the lookers-on, speaking to another who stood near.
"Oh! Then, it must be him!" sobbed Bessie. "It must be him. It's three days since little Nelly set herself on fire while he was drunk; and he went and drowned himself. He used to say he'd do it, and I hindered him. Why wasn't I there to hinder him again?"
"Are you his daughter?" asked a policeman.
"No, I was nothing to him," answered Bessie, "only he saved me from being drowned when I was a little girl. He ought never to have come to this; he oughtn't. He was a good man, and as kind as kind could be when he was himself. Oh! Why wasn't I here, Mr. Rodney, when you came to drown yourself?"
"Do you know where his family lives?" asked the policeman again.
"He hasn't got any family now," said Bessie, with fresh tears; "his wife died at Easter, and little Nelly is dying in the hospital. They say they think she'll die to-day, but I'm to go again this evening. He's got nobody but a mother down in the country thirty miles away; and as soon as I can walk it, I was going to tell her about Nelly; and now there 'll be this to tell her as well. And he was such a good man once."
"You must tell me where you live," said the policeman; "we shall want you on the inquest, you know."
"Oh, yes," she answered, "but I haven't got any more to tell. Only I was very fond of him and Nelly, I was."
She rose from her knees and wiped her eyes, watching them earnestly as they carried the corpse into a small public-house near at hand, where it was not unwelcome, as it brought custom to the bar. The next morning she gave her evidence at the inquest, and the corpse was buried as that of John Rodney. Bessie gave up the key of the house, which she had kept in her possession; and the few poor articles of furniture in it were sold by the landlord to pay the rent that was due to him.
In the meantime, and for several weeks after, Rodney lay on the verge of death, crazy and delirious with brain-fever. His wretched life hung upon a thread, and only the marvellous skill and patience of those about him could have saved it. Nothing was known of him, and when the delirium was over, his mind and memory were at first too weak for him to give any account of himself.
As recollection returned and conscience awoke, he kept silence, brooding over the terrible history of the past. There were time and opportunity now, during the long hours, day and night, while he lay enfeebled, but sober, calling up one by one all the memories of his sad life. He knew that he should be compelled to live now, and compelled to enter upon the desolate future, with its sore burden of remorse and shame. He vowed to himself that if ever he went out into the streets again, where temptations beset him on every hand, nothing should induce him to fall again into sin.
When the time came for him to leave, he was asked where his home was, and what he intended to do. Rodney's white and sunken face flushed a little as he answered, "I've no home now," he said. "I had one once as good as a man could wish for. I earned good wages, and I'd a dear wife and little children to meet me when I came in from my day's work. But I threw it all away for drink. All my children are dead—the last that died was little Nelly. And my poor wife is dead, thank God! I've nobody in the world belonging to me, save my old mother, and I've broken her heart. I think I'll go home to her; I know she'll take me in."
With half-a-crown to pay his fare down to his mother's house in the country, Rodney left the infirmary, and found himself once more in the familiar streets, with their common, everyday sounds and sights, and their gin-palaces thrusting themselves upon his notice at every other minute of his progress through them.
CHAPTER X.
DEEPER STILL.
WITH bowed head and despair tugging at his heart, Rodney passed through the noise and business of the streets. He was bent upon seeing over again the poor place where his wife had died and Nelly been killed. It was the middle of the morning as he approached it, and as he shrank from being the object of notice to his former neighbours, he slunk down the side-alleys and passages, which brought him almost opposite the building where his home had been. Again he climbed the worn steps and gave a low knock at his own door, which was quickly answered by a voice calling, "Come in."
Yes, his home was gone, quite gone. Here was another family on the same road to ruin as himself, dwelling within the old walls. Upon the hearth was a woman sitting on a low stool and nursing a wailing baby, with a bottle in reach of her hand, while the scent of gin, which made every nerve in him creep and tingle, filled the place.
She looked up with blood-shot eyes: and asked him what his business might be.
"I'd a friend who lived here once," he said, leaning against the door-post, for he felt faint and giddy, "John Rodney by name. I suppose he's gone?"
"Oh! He's dead," answered the woman, "drowned himself: and a good thing too. Everybody was glad to hear the news. His little girl set herself afire, and him lying there, the brute, too drunk to stir; couldn't lift hand or foot to help her. Mrs. Simpson, as lived next door, said how she see him crawl away after, down them steps and up the street, and three days after his body was found in the river."
"What did you say about the little girl?" he asked, sick at heart.
"Why! She set herself afire at this very grate, and him lying as it might be there, and she ran out, all in a flame, down them steps, and was burned to death. Bless you! I'd lots of folks to see the place, specially ladies; but they're forgetting it now. I couldn't bear it at first myself, but I bore up. This 'll help you bear up against anything."
She laid her hand on the bottle, smiling drearily, and Rodney shivered and shuddered throughout all his frame. He knew well what it would do for him: what a warmth, what a genial glow would run through all his veins, till some, at least, of this deadly sickness of heart would pass away. In the hospital he had had wine given to him at stated intervals, and his burden had always seemed lighter after he drank it. Here, within the narrow compass of these bare walls was the scene of his most terrible remembrance; but here also the temptation beset him with awful and renewed strength. He gazed with greedy eyes at the bottle in the woman's hand.
THE VISIT TO THE OLD HOME.
"It's all gone," she said, "or I'd have given you a drop."
Rodney turned away without a word, his brain on fire with the old hellish craving for drink. Some words were running through his mind with monotonous repetition,—
"Cool my tongue, for I am tormented in this flame."
Half-way down the narrow street lay a man in the gutter, the butt for any passer-by to kick at. The children had strewn ashes upon his head and face, from the dust-heaps which lay before each door, without disturbing the profound slumber of the drunkard. Rodney stood still and gazed at him, with a mingled feeling of wonder and envy to think of what, deep draughts he must have taken, and what utter forgetfulness had come over him. At length, he passed onwards to the more public thoroughfares. There was the old frequented gin-palace, with its easily swinging doors, and its attractive appliances to help the temptation to conquer him. He could resist no longer; and he did not turn away from the counter till the whole of the money, given to him to carry him to his mother's home, was gone.
It was some hours before Rodney came to himself; being hastened to it by a shove from the foot of the proprietor, who had allowed him to lie asleep in a corner of the place during the slack hours of the daytime. It was time for him now to make room for others who had money to spend. He gathered himself up and stood on his feet, looking drearily into the man's face.
"Where am I to go to?" he asked. "I've spent my last penny with you. I haven't got a hole to put my head in, nor a farthing in my pocket. Where am I to go to?"
"Where you were last night," said the man angrily.
"I came out of the infirmary this morning," he answered, in a bewildered tone; "where am I to go to to-night?"
"To the workhouse then," said the man; "only out of this anyhow."
He opened the door, and pushed him out.
Rodney tottered to a doorway, and sat down, gazing at the stream of people constantly passing by, with a rigid and stony face of despair. It was still twilight, and a crimson flush was tinging the sky westward, while a fresh invigorating breeze played about his burning forehead.
"Oh God! Oh God!" he cried within himself. "I meant to have kept that vow. Where can I hide myself from these places that entrap me? Would to God they'd take me into some madhouse, and put a strait-waistcoat on me! I am mad, or the devil is in me. If I could but crawl to some place where they'd lock me up and keep me from it, if I died for thirst! Oh! If there were only such a place for a madman like me!"
But there was no place for him, even to shelter him for the night. He was homeless, without a penny or a friend in the great and busy town. Or rather, there was one refuge for him—the workhouse. The thought of going there came dimly to him at first; but by and by he began to see that it was not merely the only place for him, but it was a place where he could not be assailed by the sight and smell of the poison which took away his senses. As long as he could keep to the resolution of remaining within its walls, he would be preserved from the temptation of the numberless gin-palaces which met him at every turn. It might be that after a time, the spell would be broken; the devil's witchcraft which had cost him so much.
It was a painful pilgrimage, with his heavy feet and despairing spirit, to make his way to the workhouse. He could only be admitted to the casual ward for the night; but the next morning he entered, as an inmate, this last and only refuge.
"God help me," he said to himself, "God help me to keep inside these walls. I daren't trust myself in the streets. If there's any chance for me, it's here."
CHAPTER XI.
THE ONLY REFUGE.
FOR a season Rodney's mind was clouded and bewildered. It is probable that if he had been in ordinary health and strength, he could not have held to his resolution to keep within the walls, which were his only defence from overpowering temptation. But though his craving often amounted to intense agony, the weakness which was the result of his long and dangerous illness made him incapable of much exertion, and the little labour he was put to completely exhausted his powers. Day after day passed by, the hours dragging along heavily. In the midst of the miserable poor who peopled the place, he lived alone, in a kind of dreary lethargy of body and soul, which rendered him almost unconscious of what was going on around him.
Gradually, however, the cloud which drunkenness had brought across his mind melted away, and his thoughts and memories grew clear. All his past life lay behind him, mapped out plainly and distinctly; his early manhood, his strength of muscle and nerve, his marriage, his children, and last of all his little Nelly,—all sacrificed, all destroyed, all lost, by his fatal obedience to the sin which had possessed him. It had come to this, that he who should have been a happy and useful man, respected and beloved, was a pauper, eating the begrudged bread of a workhouse table. He had been acting out the story told centuries ago by the Lord of truth and wisdom. He had left the Father's house and wandered into a far country, where a sore famine had arisen; and behold! he was eating the husks which the swine did eat, and no man gave unto him. That was his condition.
It was a long time before Rodney went any farther than that. Broken-hearted and cast down in spirit, he thought he must resign himself to abide in his miserable condition. An importunate remorse was gnawing in his conscience, and he said to himself, it was only just that he should be left without hope, and without God, in a world where he had brought all his misery upon himself. At this time, little Nelly was always in his thoughts, the puny, pale little child, puny and pale through his vice, hungry often, crying often, seldom merry and light-hearted as other children are, yet always patient and fond of him, always ready to be glad if he only smiled upon her. Oh! What a wretch he had been!
How often, too—his memory was vivid in recalling it—how often, when he had received any money, had he resolved to hasten home with it that Nelly's wants might be supplied, and those accursed gin-palaces had been strewn so thickly in his path that when he had reached home, it had been penniless, but raging mad with drink, striking the quiet, patient little creature if she only came in his way!
But one morning, so early that it was still an hour or two before the paupers left their pauper beds, a whisper seemed to come to his troubled conscience, partly, as it were, in a dream, which said to his awakening ears,—
"I will arise, and go to my Father."
He repeated the words over and over again. Had that poor prodigal son, living amongst swine, and eating of their husks, still a right to call any good and great being his Father? Still, it was he who had said it, without hesitation, as it seemed, in saying the word, Father: Christ, the Son of God, who knew all things, and could make no mistake, was He who had told the story. The miserable prodigal, who had spent every penny in riotous living, just as he had done, when he came to himself, had said, "I will arise, and go to my Father." Was it possible he could do the same?
Day after day Rodney pondered this question over in his heart. Long ago he had known that Jesus Christ had come to seek and to save those who were lost; and now, if he would only suffer himself to be found by Him, if he would only receive Christ and His love, He would give, even to him, the power to become one of the sons of God. Oh! If Christ would but find him! down there in his deep degradation and despair! Had He never known a drunkard like him! If He had not when He was a man on earth, He knew them now, by hundreds and thousands, in the streets of Christian cities; His pure eyes beheld them in all their vileness, in their desecrated homes, and in the gin-palaces thickly studding the streets.
The day dawn that was breaking upon his soul grew stronger and stronger, until the shadows fled away. There was neither drink nor the temptation to drink to make it dim, or to quench it. He could think now. He could repent, pray, and believe. Reason and faith could work within him, and there was no subtle foe to steal away his senses. The hour came at last, when from his inmost soul, drunkard though he had been, though his wife and little Nelly had perished through his sin, he could look up to God, and cry, "Father!"
CHAPTER XII.
TRUE TO A PROMISE.
IT was not many days after this that Rodney came to the conclusion that he ought not to stay any longer within the sheltering walls of the workhouse, to be a burden upon the poor-rates. He was strong enough now to earn his own living, though he could never regain the vigour he had thrown away. Weakness of body, and a sorrowful spirit within him, must be his portion in this life, though his sin was forgiven, and his heart could call God his Father. He knew also that outside the gates, within sight of them, a vehement temptation would assail him. Even there, within the refuge, if the thought of drink came across him, he could only find help against it in earnest prayer. Would the demon take him captive again if he ventured out to confront the peril?
With a trembling heart, and in an agony of prayer, Rodney left his shelter and found himself once more free and unrestrained in the streets. He was compelled to pass the places of his temptation, not once or twice only, but scores of times, with the fumes of the liquors poisoning the atmosphere about them. He could not help but breathe it, could not choose but see the gaudy and bright interiors, as his feet carried him from one fierce assault to another. Sometimes he felt as if he should be lost if he did not flee back to the shelter he had left, and end his days there shamefully. But he continued his course down to the docks, where he hoped he might happen on work to supply his wants for that day and night, for if he failed, he must return to the casual ward for a lodging.
He had earned a few pence, and was about to seek lodgings for the night, when he saw a number of decent working-men crowding into a schoolroom, which was well lit up. He stopped one of them to ask what was going on inside.
"It's a lecture," he answered, "on temperance, by Mr. Radford. He's always plenty to say, and says it out like a man. Come in, and hear him."
"Ay, I'll come in," said Rodney eagerly, forgetting both his hunger and fatigue.
The lecture had just begun, and the speaker, whose face was earnest and hearty, and who had a pleasant voice, had gained the fixed attention of his hearers.
"I'll tell you what a promise once did," he said, towards the close of his lecture: "We had a meeting of our Band of Hope some years ago, and I saw amongst the children a rough, barefoot little girl staring about her with large, eager eyes, as if she could not make out what we were about. I asked her her name, and told her to come to my house; and I wrote down my address for her. But I said to her, 'Will you promise me not to taste anything that will make you drunk till you see me again?' And she promised me."
"That's Bessie Dingle!" cried Rodney, half aloud.
And the lecturer paused for an instant, looking down kindly but gravely upon his listeners.
"I expected her to come to me within a day or two, and I should have persuaded her to join our Band of Hope; but she never came. Nearly six years were gone, and one day last autumn, when I was on the landing-stage, I heard some one cry out, 'That's him again!' And a girl of seventeen or so, a bright, busy girl, came rushing towards me from an apple-stall.
"'I've kept my promise, sir!' she cried. 'I've never took a drop to make me drunk. I said I never would till I see you again.'
"The girl had been faithful to her promise. Yes, in her place, and according to her strength, she had kept her promise, as God keeps His."
Rodney scarcely heard the end of the lecture, so full was his mind of Bessie, whom he had scarcely thought of, but who was the only friend he had left in Liverpool. He could not go away without making some inquiry after her; and when the audience was dispersing, he made his way up to the lecturer's desk:—
"Sir," he said, "that girl was Bessie Dingle. Could you tell me where I could find her this very night?"
"She left Liverpool last autumn," he answered; "she is gone to live in the country with an old woman of the name of Rodney."
"Why! That must be my mother!" exclaimed Rodney, involuntarily.
"Who are you?" inquired Mr. Radford.
"My name's John Rodney," he answered; "Bessie knows all about me. Oh, sir! I was a dreadful drunkard; and one night I saw my little girl—she was the last of them, and my poor wife was dead as well, thank God!—and the child set herself on fire, and me lying by so drunk I could not move; I could not stir a limb no more than if I'd been dead. Oh God! Oh God! It was a horrible thing."
Rodney grasped the desk with both hands to keep himself from falling, and neither he nor the stranger could speak again for some moments.
"I understood you were drowned," said Mr. Radford at length; "Bessie believes so; she told me all about it."
"No," murmured Rodney, "I went off with the intention of putting an end to myself; but I slipped on the pavement, and they carried me to the infirmary. I was there a long time, and then I went home, and other folks had taken to my house, and I'd no place to sit down in, and the liquor-vaults were the only place open to such as me, and I went in and got dead drunk again."
"Again!" repeated Mr. Radford.
"Ay, again," he said, with a deep groan; "but it was the last time. I pray God it may be the last time. Then I knew there was no hope for me as long as I could see or smell drink, and I went into the workhouse to be out of the way partly, and partly because I'd no other place to go to. I only came out this morning."
"And where are you going to now?" asked his new friend.
"Anywhere," he answered; "but I'm afraid of going where they 'll be drinking. There seems to be drink everywhere. You don't know what it is down in the low parts of the town, sir."
"Yes, I do," said Mr. Radford; "but I'll speak to a friend of mine here, who will take you to his place for to-night. He was one of the first to join us here, and he was as great a slave to drink as you ever were before."
"Sir," said Rodney, earnestly, "I believe God has forgiven me, and I believe He will help me. He has helped me this day, or I should never have been here. If you will let me join myself to you, with a promise, I'll try to keep it as Bessie kept hers, God helping me."
"I believe from my heart it would be of great use to you," answered Mr. Radford, after a moment's thought. "Mark! I do not say it will save you, but it will help you. You can give it as a reason for not drinking to your old comrades; but the chief thing will be that it will bring you into acquaintance with new comrades of your own way of thinking, who will not tempt you to drink. Remember, too, if you should break it, that's no reason why you should not promise again; yes, and again and again, if you fall again and again. Most of us promise God very often to give up our favourite sin, and when we forget our promise, He does not forbid us to renew it."
With trembling fingers, and with deep, unspoken prayer in his heart, Rodney signed his name to a form by which he pledged himself to abstain from all intoxicating drinks; and then Mr. Radford committed him to the care of his friend, who was to take him home for the night.
"What are you going to do to-morrow?" asked Mr. Radford.
"I'll make my way down to my mother's," he answered. "I shall be safer out of the town, though I ought to be ashamed to go to her in these rags. But it's no more than I deserve, and she'll be overjoyed to see me."
"Go down by train," said Mr. Radford. "I will lend you the fare, and you can repay me when you are in work again. They all think you are dead down there."
"Yes," he answered, smiling sadly, "my mother will say, 'This my son was dead and is alive again; he was lost and is found.'"
With these words he went his way; and after a night's rest, more refreshing than any he had had for years, he started by the earliest train down into the country.
CHAPTER XIII.
DEAD AND ALIVE AGAIN.
IT was spring-time again—twelve months since his wife had died. The hedgerows were sweet with primroses and violets, whose fresh fragrance was full of sorrowful memories to Rodney. The years, which had changed him so much, had hardly touched the face of the country. Every step of the road was familiar and dear to him. Here were the nut-bushes, where he and his brothers had come nutting in the autumn, when he was a boy; they were fringed and tasselled with yellow catkins now. On the other side of the hedge lay the corn-fields, where they had all gone gleaning together in the harvest, as happy a time as any in the whole year.
Yonder was the bank where the violets grew thickest, and where he had been used to seek the first-scented blossom for Ellen, before they were married. The wooden bridge over the shallow brook, whose water rippled round pebbles as bright as gems, where he had paddled barefoot when he was young—barefoot like little Nelly, only it had been sport to him; the willow-trees dipping down into the stream; the cottage-roofs; but above all, the thatched roof of his own cottage home; all seemed to him like another world, compared with the noisy, bustling, tempting streets of Liverpool, where, in those parts to which he had sunk, there were none but sordid sights and sounds of misery. Oh! If Nelly had only lived a young life like his own!
He reached the garden-gate, and leaned against it, looking down the long, straight, narrow walk which led to the door. It stood open, and the sun was shining brightly into the house, lighting up for him the old, polished oak dresser, with the shelves above it, well filled with plates and dishes. A lavender and rosemary bush grew close up to the door-sill, and the bees were humming busily about them. He could hear also the murmur of voices; the prattle of a child's voice talking gaily within, out of his sight.
Once he saw Bessie cross the kitchen to the little pantry, but she did not glance his way, through the open door. And he still lingered outside, scarcely knowing how he should make himself known to his mother, who believed he was dead.
She came to the door at last—a neat old woman, with a snow-white frill round her face, looking out through her horn spectacles upon her sunny garden; and Rodney, leaning over the gate, stretched out his hands towards her, unable to speak a word, except the low, murmured cry, "Mother! Mother!" which reached her ears, though they had grown dull of hearing years ago.
For a minute or two old Mrs. Rodney stood still, gazing intently at the motionless figure leaning over her wicket, and then, almost in a voice of terror, she called out loudly, "Bessie." And in an instant Bessie was at her side, in the doorway, with her quick, sharp eyes fastened upon him.
"Bessie!" cried Rodney, in a louder voice than before, "I was not drowned, as you thought I was. I've been almost dead in the infirmary, but didn't die. I've come home now, a changed man, if you and mother will take me in."
Would they take him in? They could hardly hasten to the wicket fast enough, the old woman with her short, unsteady steps, hanging on to Bessie's arm to prevent her from being the first to welcome her son. She threw her arms round his neck, and pressed many motherly kisses upon his haggard face, crying, "My boy! My boy!" While Bessie clasped his hand in both her own, fondling and kissing it as if it was impossible to express her great and unexpected gladness. It seemed to Rodney as if they were making too much of him, and forgiving him too freely. They ought at least to hang back a little from such a sinner as he.
THE PRODIGAL'S RETURN.
"Mother," he said sadly, "you know all about my poor little Nelly."
"Yes, yes, my son," she answered, "I know it all; but now you've come home safe and sound, after we thought you were dead, we cannot remember all that. Nelly forgot it long ago."
"Ah!" cried Rodney, with a heavy sigh.
"Nelly's happier than ever she was in her life," said Bessie, "and she'll be happier than all now. It was a good change for her to be took away from those dirty streets, where everybody about her was getting drunk. She was never so well off as now."
"I know it," answered Rodney.
"And though the pain was very bad," continued Bessie, soothingly, "she's forgotten it all by now. She's never in any pain, and she's singing as happy as an angel all day long. I wouldn't fret about that if I was you. We've forgot it; and now you're come home again, though I was sure and positive you were drowned. I said so before the coroner; and Mr. Rodney, please, I followed you to the grave."
Bessie burst into an hysterical fit of laughter and sobbing, which she could hardly conquer, and she ran back along the garden-path, leaving Rodney and his mother to follow more slowly. His mother was hanging fondly on his arm; and before he entered the cottage, he paused and lifted his old hat from his head.
"Please God," he said, earnestly, "I'll be a different man to what I've ever been; and may He at last bring me to where my poor wife and little Nelly are gone!"
"Father!" cried a sweet, childish voice inside the cottage, a voice he had never thought to hear again in this world. "Where is father, Bessie?"
How he crossed the threshold, and passed into sight of his child, he could never tell. But there was Nelly before his very eyes, her wan, small face unchanged, save for a faint tinge of colour in her cheeks, and a happy light in her eyes. She was lying on a little couch beneath the lattice-window, with a doll beside her, and a cup of violets on the window-sill; peaceful and happy, with a childish patience and sweetness in her face. Her arms were stretched out to him, and her features began to quiver with eagerness as he stood awe-stricken and motionless.
Bessie drew him to her side, and he fell down on his knees with his gray head upon the pillow, while she laid her arm about his neck. He had no voice to tell them what he had thought during these last terrible months, and with what a shock of rapture it came over him to find that his little Nelly was still living.
"Come," said Bessie, in a tone of comforting, "don't take on so, please, Mr. Rodney. We never thought as Nelly would pull through at all; and she's not in any pain; are you, darling?"
"No," answered Nelly, pressing her arm closer about him; "are you come home to stay, daddy?"
Still Rodney could not speak, for his throat seemed dried up and choked. The child's voice grew plaintive and wistful.
"Oh! Father," she said, "you're not going to get drunk any more, and make Granny, and Bessie, and me all poor and miserable again? You've come back to be good, aren't you, father?"
"God help me!" sobbed Rodney.
"We're all so happy now," continued Nelly pleadingly; "Bessie goes out to work, and Granny and me are alone all day, and at nights we sing, and I'm learning to read, and so is Bessie. And if you'll only be good, it'll be nicer than ever. You didn't mean to hurt me, I know; never, did you?"
He could not lift up his head yet, or answer her in any way, except by his reiterated cry, "God help me!"
"See, I've got a doll again," said Nelly in a gayer tone, to cheer him; "it's all my own, and it keeps me company all day and night too. The doctor says I shall never walk and run about like other children, but I don't mind that. I don't mind anything, now you're come home, if you'll only be good, and never get drunk, and make us all poor and ragged again. I shouldn't like to see poor Granny like mother was. You'll never do that, will you, father?"
"Hush, Nelly!" said Bessie, as she saw Rodney shaking with his sobs. "Hush! Father's come home to work, and get money for you; and we shall all be happier than ever now. If God wasn't going to help him to be good, now he's trying himself, He'd have let him be drowned in the river, and not brought him back here to be a plague to us. There, Mr. Rodney, please get up, and sit down on this chair beside of little Nelly."
Rodney did as she told him, and sat still for a time, holding Nelly's small hand tightly in his own. Bessie bustled about getting dinner ready, for it was nearly mid-day, and in their simple country fashion they took their meals early, and lived in the day-light, from sunrise till not long after sunset. His mother was sitting opposite to him in her old three-cornered chair, from time to time wiping the glasses of her horn spectacles, while her white head trembled a little. He could scarcely believe that it was not all a dream.
In the long, sunny afternoon, with the bees humming at the door, and the scent of lavender and rosemary wafted in upon every breath of the fresh spring air, Rodney told them all that had happened to him, and the great change that had passed over him in the workhouse, and his interview with Mr. Radford the evening before. Then Bessie related to him the history of their lives.
"Mr. Rodney," she said, "when little Nelly came flying down them steps all in a flame, I met her just at the bottom, and I'd a big cloak on as was lent me by a woman I was friends with, and I wrapped it all round her, and quenched the fire.
"Then a woman as was in the crowd shouted, 'Take her to the Children's Hospital. They 'll do well by her, if she isn't dead.'
"And I cried out, 'Oh! She is dead!'
"And then me and some other women carried her to the hospital, and at first they said she was dead, and then they said she'd be sure to die. So I had to leave her there, and I came back to tell you, and you was gone, and Mrs. Simpson she said she'd seen you go creeping off in the dark, and it 'ud be a good riddance if you never came back. And it was three days after they found somebody in the river, and I was certain it was you, and I followed you to the churchyard, me and nobody else at all. And then I went to the hospital, and they said there was a little sparkle of hope, but if Nelly lived, she'd never be good for anything.
"And I said, 'Never you mind. You make her live, and I'll take care of her after.'
"And then I came down here, walked every foot of the way, and told Mrs. Rodney, and she said,—
"'Bessie, as soon as that dear child is well enough, her and you shall have a home with me.'
"So as soon as Nelly could come, we moved down to this place; and it's been like heaven to us—hasn't it, Nelly?"
"Yes," answered the child with a quiet smile.
"But now you're come home as well," continued Bessie, blithely, "it'll be better than ever. It was bad to think of you being drowned, and never been the good man you ought to have been. I'm glad you've seen Mr. Radford; and glad you've made him a promise like me. And oh! I'm so glad you're going to be good and kind again at last. I always knew you'd be that, if it hadn't been for drink."
Long after the others had gone to bed, and were sleeping soundly and peacefully under the thatched roof, Rodney sat up by the cottage fire, brooding over his past life and that which lay before him, with many earnest prayers for light, and strength, and help. One thing was certain: whatever other people might do who had never fallen captives to drunkenness, he must never touch the accursed thing again.
He trembled to think of the snares that would be laid to entrap, and with what wary and watchful steps he must tread among them. He could not walk down the village street, or greet any of his former friends, who had believed him dead, without being invited, urged, and tempted to drink. He could not seek work where he should meet with fellow-workmen who would not mock at the pledge he had taken. He could not even sit among some religious people who would not despise him somewhat for his weakness. Whatever he did, where-ever he went, in town or country, he would be forced into contact with drinking customs, which would assail him from without; while within there would ever be a treacherous foe ready to betray him. No other sin met with so constant a temptation.
Yet, on the other hand, here was his little child restored to him from the dead; here his mother, so long broken-spirited for him, and with so few days left which he could make happy; and here was Bessie, constant and faithful, true to the promises she made, his helper and example. Could he plunge them again into the depths from which God had delivered them? Rodney opened his mother's old Bible, with the large print which his own dim eyes needed now, and turning over page after page he found at last the promise he was searching for, and set an indelible mark against it to look at in after-years:
"My grace is sufficient for thee; for my strength is made perfect in
weakness."