Mrs. Harker's Christmas and other Tales, etc

Front matter

JHDrs. Ijarfepp's fj^risf mas^ AND OTHER TALES. Sffirx. Jjapfepp's (Jljrisfmes, AND OTHER TALES. FOR MOTHERS' MEETINGS, VILLAGE READINGS, SCHOOL PRIZES, ETC. BY LUCY MASSEY, Autlior 0/ " The Inner Life," "Light at Eventide," " The Cottage on the Shore," etc. WonUn : W. SKEFFINGTON & SON, 163, PICCADILLY. 1879- CONTENTS. Mrs. Harker's Christmas ... ... ... 3 Chapter I. — The Face in the Fire. „ II. — A Cold Welcome. ,, III. — The Beds toe lie on. ,, IV. — The Christmas Carol. V. — Poor Lyddy. VI — Words and Ways. No. Ill Ward, or " Mother told me." 68 Better Days 103 A Cup of Cold Water JUDrs. Ijarfepr's (Jljrisfmas

Chapter I

. " T SHALL sit alone, and think about John at sea, X and my poor dead Lizzie." That is what I said to myself one Christmas Eve years ago, as I closed my cottage door, after going outside to put up the shutters. It, was quite hard work to shut that door, for the wind was high, and my strength not what it had been ; but I latched it at last, and then I drew the bolt, for I said, " No one won't think of looking in on me, so I'll make fast for the night now, and it will be all one trouble." Then it was, that when I sat down alone by the silent hearth that used to be so bright and gladsome, I said half aloud, " Christmas-tide is nothing to me now, I'll just spend it at home, thinking about John at sea, and my poor dead Lizzie." I must have begun to cry a little, I fancy ; pitying myself in a poor selfish sort of way as I sat there alone ; and I remember how the log that I had laid on the fire burnt slowly into ashes, and the room grew darker and more gloomy.

I know I started and cried out in a sort of fear when, all at once, I heard a tap low down on my door. At the very same minute too, and before I could stir to open it, fingers were fumbling at the latch, cold fingers I felt sure they were, for they seemed as if they could hardly lift it. I was in no hurry to move, for I didn't feel pleased to have anyone coming just then, when I had made up my mind that nobody thought about me ; so I crossed the kitchen but slowly, and the tap sounded once more, only louder this time, while a shrill little voice cried through the keyhole, " Mrs. Harker' I can't get in." I knew the voice well enough, my visitor was James Bowlett, ' lame Jim ' as all the village called him, and I took shame to myself to think that I was keeping the cripple out there in the cold.

I had the door open in a minute, and in came the little fellow, looking smaller and more pinched than ever, I thought, for he was making shift to carry a bi» bough of Christmas, twice as tall as himself. " Bless the boy, what's that for ? " said I stooping down to give him a kiss, but getting scratched about the hands instead, through forgetting the holly. " We've been helping to put up the green boughs in the Church, Mrs. Harker ;" cried Jim, " when we had done there was lots of Christmas over, and the parson said we might each take some. So I brought •mine here, for I didn't think you had got any, and please may I help you put it up." By this time I had a fresh log on the fire, and & candle lit, and when the little fellow had got well warmed through, sitting on the stool that he always called his in the chimney corner, we set to work and stuck the shining leaves all about the room.

There was some over the picture of my poor husband, done in oils, with a pink in his mouth, as like as life, that hung above the fireplace ; and there was a bough fixed over the drawing of John's ship, " The Nelson;" and another above " The Sailor's Farewell," that he had brought me the last time as ever he came home ; and we even made my mother's old clock seem as if it was looking out of a bower of green. Last of all what must the boy do but whip out a sprig of misseltoe, that he had kept slily hidden under his little jacket all this time, and climbing on Iiis stool, tie it to the great yellow pumpkin that was hanging from the ceiling. It was all done in a minute, and almost before I knew what Jim was about, he had pulled me along under it ; to be sure I stooped down with right good will, and let the lit tle fellow catch me round the neck, and give me a good kiss.

I laughed as much as he did, though I knew he had tumbled my cap, and the great collar that had been my mother's, and that I had put on only the day before. " There, Mrs. Harker," said the child clapping his hands, and all red in the face through having nearly tumbled off the stool, " I've kissed you under the misseltoe ; a happy Christmas, oh don't you like Christmas best of all?" Now I felt better and more cheery by this time, but I wasn't quite come to saying that I liked Christ mas best of all, so I made pretence to be busy with my collar, and then set Jim down on his stool again, and pretended to shake him well, and be very angry at his impertinence. By and by, when he had drunk a cup of hot tea, to bring a little colour into his thin white cheeks, he said he must go, for they had to practise the carols that the boys always sung about the place on Christ mas morning early.

When I had shut the door after him, I sat down on my chair, just as I was before, and yet somehow I felt quite different. Whether it was the holly blinking and shining at me from the wall wherever I looked, or whether it was the feel of the warm little arms round my neck, and the child's kiss on my old faded cheek, or the words that seemed to sound over and over again in my ears, " I like Christmas best of all, don't you ? " I can't say ; but I know I felt right down ashamed of my ungrateful murmuring, and yet not unhappy, but rather as if something pleasant were going to happen. And then this thought came into my mind, what if someone else were feeling about Christmas much as I had done an hour before, what if I could cheer up someone else as little Jim had cheered me. I don't know how it was, I can't explain it at all, but as I turned the matter over in my mind, and looked at the fire where the log had now burnt into white ashes, I seemed to see a face there in the glow ; and strangest of all it was a face that I knew well enough, but had never cared really to think about before, the face of a poor old woman who lived a mile away in the lanes. ' Old Kezia Betts ' we always called her when we spoke of her, but that was not often, for she was no favourite, and neighboured with none of us.

There was a young Mrs. Betts in the village, her daughter in-law, and the only one of the family that was thought well of, or looked on at all, but old Kezia had no one's good word. Well, as I say, it seemed to me as if I saw her faded pinched old face, in the dirty bonnet she always wore, just looking at me out of the fire ; and there was something about her rather sad and strange, I thought, so as to set me wondering had I heard anything said of late about the old woman, to put her face so plain in my sight. I had to chase the thought a long way backward and forward before I caught it, but at last I did remember howyesterday was a week Stephen Wright, the chapman, said, while he was warming himself at my fire, that old Kezia was in worse trouble than ever. He had not much chance of hearing what it was, he said, for she shut the door augry-like in his face when he began to ask questions, but he knew her man was bad and a-bed, and postman was sure there was ill-news in the letter he carried there on Friday.

I hadn't given it a thought when Stephen spoke about it, because I was taken up with reckoning how much lace I should want for my Sunday cap, and with watching that the man didn't cheat me in the length ; but now that face in the fire seemed to bring it all back, or was it perhaps that talk which made me see the face in the fire ! It was too much for me to make it out, it would take a clever man to do that, let alone an old woman, whose schooling was not much to speak of, I being the eldest of thirteen. However, come as it might, it seemed in no hurry to go away. I stirred the fire to get rid of it, and the log fell all about the hearth, but still Kezia's face seemed looking at me out of the ashes that were left, until at last I said to myself, that it must be there for a purpose, and perhaps the old woman was the very one who wanted me that Christmas Eve.

I didn't come to the thought quickly you may be sure, it had to knock a long time at the door of my heart before I would let it in, for though lame Jim had, so to speak, taken down the shutters, yet the bolt was still drawn, and the thought of helping Kezia Betts was not one I was in haste to welcome. I had always held myself a bit above the rest ; taking pride in the thought of my old man, who was parish clerk for forty years, and the best shoe maker for miles round, and the best husband and father too, as the squire and parson themselves allowed. I had never evened myself with such as Kezia, and when my John that was now away at sea, took to loitering about on the Sunday after noons to get a word with her Lydia, I up and told him that I was nowise willing. " She ain't fitting for the like of you, with your bringings up," said I ; " and as for her good looks, she thinks so much of them herself, that 'tis no wonder if others don't take them quite at her value ; have a bit of pride," I told him, " and don't go hankering after a girl as lets every idle lad in the village make up to her."

It was an old story now, for John had been at sea this three years, and Lydia Betts had gone long ago to service in London. She might be there now, or she might not ; folks will talk, and they did say that she had never written once to her father or mother, and that no one knew what had become of her. I think it was almost on purpose that I went over it all in my mind, trying to rouse all the old feelings about Kezia, so as to put it out of the question that I should turn out that cold night to go to her cottage. But after all it worked just the other way, for the more I thought the more uneasy I grew, till at last nothing would serve me, but I must put on my warm cloak and my old bonnet, light my lantern, aud away up Workhouse Lane to old Betts' cottage. " They'll think I'm nigh crazed," I said, vexed with myself all the while I was tying my strings, and yet casting about for something to take with me, that would give me a kind of excuse for going.

There was the pudding for to-morrow ; it had been boiling most of the afternoon in the iron pot, and was now hung in its cloth over the dresser. But I couldn't cut that, nor yet the bit of roasting pork, for it was the very Christmas dinner I had always got ready for my old man and the children, and I felt as if I couldn't bear to break the old custom, though there were none of them to eat it with me. But, thank God, I had many a kind friend to remember me at Christmas time, for the sake of them that were gone, and so it was that by the side of the pork there was a bit of neck of mutton hang ing, and two mince pies on a plate that Miss Grace had brought me. Should it be the mutton or the pies ! It ended in my putting both into my great basket, with a bit of berried holly on the top of all. Then when I had pinned up my gown, got out my pattens, and lit up my husband's great lantern, I was ready.

Chapter II. As

I turned the key of my door, and put it in my pocket, I almost laughed out loud at myself, to think that I was going on such an errand, and all without any reason except that face in the fire. However, I had soon enough to do to keep my footing, for pattens are awkward things where the snow is trodden, and half-melted, and frozen again, as it was under the tall hedges along the road that night. In the middle of the road the ruts were full of water, shining a little where the circle of light from my lantern fell on them. I splashed and slipped along as best I might, wishing it wasn't quite so lonesome, and rather dreading the dark lane which led up to the Betts' cottage. But after a time a thought came into my mind which seemed to drive such fancies away. I say it came into my mind ; but I suppose what I really mean is that God sent it.

I believe we often mean this when we talk of a thought as if it came of itself; only we are shy of saying it, and so after a time we, perhaps, even for get to meau it. At least, my husband used to say something very like this, I know ; and he was a fine scholar, and saw into the nature of things. Well, the thought which I believe God sent to help me over the rough road that dark night was this : " Ain't I going on an errand for God, and won't He make it all plain, and right, and safe for me. If He wishes me to go to old Betts' cottage, then I shall get there safe, and find something to do for Him at the end of the journey." I was so occupied with turuing this over in my mind, that I forgot to listen to the little sounds round me, that, when I first set out, had disturbed me so much ; the snapping of the dried branches, or the far-off whine of some house dog.

But I did hear footsteps coming up behind me, heavy foot steps, and a sound as if tools were striking together in the mau's basket as he walked. " It's Mark Gaudern going home," I said to myself, and I was pleased to think I should have his company nigh as far as I was going, for Mark Gaudern, the joiner, lived but a stone's throw from old Betts' house. " Hallo, mother," he shouted as he came up behind, and then he looked curiously at me to make out who it was on the road on such a night. " Why if it isn't Mrs. Harker, where are you bound for ? Here hand us your basket, 'tis light enough for such a big one ;" and he was going to put it over his shoulder along with his tools, but 1 begged of of him to carry it straight on account of the pies. " 'Tis a coldish night," he began again, when he had hung the basket on his arm, " and scarce fitting for you, at your years, to be abroad carrying pies ; I don't think much of it myself, and 'tis well I don't, for I shall have to turn out again, to take my part with the singers.

"It makes me think of my John, Master Gaudern," said I, " to hear you talk of the carols, he used to count finely on going round with the rest ; but it will be long before I hear his voice singing with you all again, I reckon." But Mark wasn't to be put off that way. "Anybody sick?" he asked presently, without answering what I said about my John, " but there, I can guess, you are going to old Betts'." When I heard that it seemed as if my heart came right into my mouth, for it was plain enough that something was wrong at Betts' cottage, or Master Gaudern wouldn't have named them. " What's the matter there, then ?" I asked, as soon as I could get my words together. " Nay, mother," said Mark, " if you don't know I can't tell you, for the old man and his missis, they neighbour with none of us ; but he's bad sure enough, though whether 'tis drink or whether 'tis trouble I don't know ; like enough 'tis drink, it wouldn't be the first time, nor the second," and Mark swung his basket so that I thought the saw would fall out.

" Why should it be trouble, Mark ; do you know of anything amiss ?" " Haven't you heard ?" and he looked at me a bit curious ; " Well, I can't tell you the rights of it, but my missis picked it up somewhere ; women will be talking, you know, and they mostly had a spite against Lydia. I tell them 'twas for nought but because she was better looking than the common." " Lydia ain't dead for sure, Master Gaudern," I asked ; not that I thought his words pointed that way, but because I wanted him to speak plain what was in his mind. " No, poor lass," he answered — he had daughters of his own, had Mark, — " but, maybe, it would be better to hear that of her than such news as they have had, if the neighbours tell true ; but, after all, no one saw the letter that came, and like enough the whole story is only gossip and a bit of spite ; I am glad you are going there, Mrs. Harker ; maybe the poor soul won't shut the door in your face, as she did to my missus yesterday."

" Who's there ?" cried a shrill voice from the upstairs room as I knocked at the door. It was no use answering, for Kezia was hard of hearing, so I rapped again, louder than before. No one moved within, no one seemed to take any notice, and I began to feel impatient that I should have to stand there so long in the cold, till presently I remembered how cross I felt myself but a little time before, when lame Jim had wanted me to let him in. I think I must have knocked four times, and shaken the latch, too, as loudly as I could, when at last I heard the click of the window just over my head, and one of the casements swung open. I looked up as well as I could, and made out that the curtain was blowing this way and that in the gusty wind, and that someone inside the room wanted the window shut again at once.

" Lie you still," I heard Kezia say, " there's some one knocking at the door fit to break it in, and I'm not a going down those stairs till I know who it is." She hadn't spoken to me, but I answered her, speaking in as loud a voice as I could, and making a sort of trumpet with my hand, as John tells me they do aboard ship. " It's me, my dear, it's Mrs. Harker, may I come in ?" I heard her coming down now ; clump, clump, on each of the old shaky stairs, and then across the kitchen to the door. She was talking to herself as she came, and being deaf she spoke loud. " Bless me," she muttered, " what should bring old mother Harker here, wants something of me I'll be bound, but she won't get it ; I've nothing to give, not I, nor my old man neither." I was more disposed to turn back now than I had been even when the wind was at the worst along the road ; but my pattens were chancy and awkward, and before my feet were in them again Kezia had the door open.

" Well, I never, who would have thought of seeing you !" was all she said. " I heard your man was bad," I answered, as I made my way, almost uninvited, into the kitchen ; and set my lantern down on the table amongst the plates and cups. " Bad, you may say so, and weak, he's no better than a child, and who's to wait on him up and down those stairs, I should like to know. Says doctor, ' don't let him want for nought, give him plenty of E support' ; but when I ask will he give me a bit of paper for some beef, he says guardians wouldn't allow it." I had my basket open by this time, and the mince pies on the table, and then I held the bit of mutton up for her to see ; " I hoped you wouldn't be against taking from a neighbour, Mrs. Betts," I told her, " so I made free to bring it." Kezia looked at the mutton, and she looked at me.

" What's the meaning of it, Mrs. Harker ?" she caid, after a minute, "you never brought me such a present before, not all the years I've lived in Kings thorpe." " The meaning is, Mrs. Betts," said I getting hold of her hand, " that it's Christmas Eve, and I wish you a happy Christmas, and Betts too, and many of them." If you believe it, she began to cry, fairly to cry, so that her old black bonnet shook backward and forward, aud I was so taken aback I couldn't think of anything to say or do to comfort her. " Don't take on so, my poor soul," I made shift to get out at last, " is he so very bad ?" " He'll be pleased to see you, Mrs. Harker," she answered as she went towards the foot of the stairs, " he were taking it hard that no one came in, folks were more neighbour-like when he was young, he says."

Chapter III. Deab

"how close the room was, when you did get up the stairs, which were more like a ladder than anything else. There lay old Betts, with a counterpane — a patchwork one, the worse for wear — twisted about him, this way and that, so that I could see the bare sacking at the side of the bed. He did look ill to be sure ; but then his face was all rough with hair, and not over clean. "Thank you for coming," he says in a husky sort of voice, " 'tis neighbour-like to have some one dropping in chance time, and rises the spirits, if 'tis only to say ' how do you find yourself?' " " But it isn't only to say ' how do you find yourself,' " cried his wife, " she has brought you some mutton, and some fine pies ; you'll have a chance now of knowing that it is Christmas to-morrow." " 'Twas uncommon cold work, I reckon, turning out at this time of night," answered old Betts, after a pause, " and 'tis not very warm lying here ; did you ever see such a roof for Christians to lie under, the thatch is all rotted and dropping about ; but 'tis everyone for himself now-a-days, no neighbouring, and no kindness to the poor : it were different when I were young."

I thought to myself that mostly we make the beds we lie on, and perhaps it wasn't anyone's fault but his own that old Betts was obliged to sleep on sacking ; but I didn't answer him, it was his wife that said, " Mrs. Harker is a good neighbour at any rate, and parson have sent us up some new milk not an hour since." " Then Mr. Osborne has been to see you," I said. " Ay," answered Betts, " he have ; 'twas this morning he were here, and he said a prayer to me, and told me good words. Very comfortable it was to hear him, but I can't keep hold of it, and I'm getting afeard again, for I've been a bad liver, Mrs. Harker, as most hereabouts knows of, and I feel as if I were like to die." Whether he were like to die or not I couldn't tell, he looked bad enough as he lay there, and Mrs. Betts, poor soul, put her apron to her eyes, and began to sob again.

" I'll tell you what my husband used to say — " I began, but Betts took me up on a sudden. " Har ker was a good-living man," he said, " and kept his Church ; he'd no call to feel afraid, I wish I'd my time to come over again, I'd be like him, I would." "Yes," I answered, " he was all that and more, but that wasn't enough to make him easy when he thought of standing before God to be judged." " But he had never done much amiss, I reckon," muttered the poor man, more to himself than to me ; " unless it were a hasty word now and then, or maybe bearing a bit too hard on a neighbour who wasn't quite so steady as himself." " If he lived a better life than the common, and thank God he did," I said, answering him, though I wasn't sure that he knew he had spoken aloud, "he wasn't one to forget how it came about.

Many a time he has said to me ' 'Tis my Blessed Saviour that has been with me all the way through, and He won't fail me now, when I'm like to want Him the most." That's what he said ; and you know, neighbour, He is your Saviour too." "That sounds like what parson told over to me, but I don't take much comfort, for I've gone against Him all my life." " There, there, give over talking and fretting, else you will make yourself worse," broke in his wife, "and don't keep Mrs. Harker standing here all night in the cold ; we'll go below, and I'll put on a bit of dry kindling and boil you a few broth, they will help to keep your heart up." I didn't like to leave the poor man to his trouble ; but then again I thought that being so ignorant as I was, I was more likely to say the wrong thing than the right, and that I had better leave parson's words to work in.

I went down the steep stairs carefully ; thinking rather anxiously about the cold lonely walk home, and wondering a little whether it really had been worth while to come so far on a dark night. " It would have done in the morning," I caught myself saying, as I set my last foot safely on the kitchen floor. It is as well I was down safely, or else I might have slipped at the surprise of hearing Mrs. Betts give a great cry, and of seeing her begin to wring her hands as if she were wild. Then she hurried to where I stood staring at her, and she shut to the door at the foot of the stairs ; " Hush," she said, " he mustn't hear it yet." I was too much taken by surprise to speak, I half feared the poor thing was wrong in the head. " He knows naught about the child," she went on. " The child, what child ?" but before I could ask her meaning, it seemed to me that I heard a baby crying somewhere close by.

There was only a dip on the table, and it had burnt nearly blind while we were upstairs, but Mrs. Betts snuffed it, and held it towards the great cushioned chair by the fire ; Betts' chair when he was about. In the chair lay a child asleep ; a pretty little one enough it seemed, with soft rings of gold hair, and dark lashes on the little rosy cheeks, that made me think of my Effie, lying long years since in Kingsthorpe churchyard. But how the child could have come there without our knowing, or who it could be, and why Mrs. Betts took on so about it, was all more than I could guess. She was stooping over it now, looking at it as if she had forgot everything but the little face, and yet I couldn't rightly tell whether she were fond of it, and fain to see it, or whether she was taken up, as I was, with the wonder and strangeness of finding it there.