CHAPTER I. EVENING AT HOME.

MADGE, do leave those horrid old stockings, and let’s all have a game at ‘Beggar my neighbour.’ It would keep Jem and Jack from quarrelling.”

“I can’t, unless you’ll darn them for me. There are eight pairs, and they ought to be done to-night ready for the morning.”

“Well, take your chair and sit between them, to keep them apart.”

“What’s the use of that? If Jack were here and Jem in Australia, they’d quarrel somehow. How industrious you are to-night, Edie!”

[6]“I am tired.”

“Well, as you’re the only person that’s tired, of course it’s quite fair that you should do nothing.”

“Madge, if you’d asked me civilly to help you, I’d have done so in a minute, but sneering won’t make me, you may be quite sure of that. Why don’t you ask Bessie to do some work?”

“Because she’s younger, and it doesn’t matter so much about her.”

“Madge, get me that little oil-can that your mother uses for the sewing-machine.”

“Yes, father.... Here it is.”

“Madge, there’s baby crying. Run up and rock him to sleep again.”

“Yes, mother.”

The little sitting-room at 15 Buxton Street, Denham Green, seemed a great deal too small to hold such a family party as were now squeezed into it, the above being a few of the remarks flying about there at eight o’clock in the evening. Those gathered in this small space were all members of the Kayll family. There was Mr. Kayll, a little,[7] fair, bald, pleasant-looking man, who was seated at the table with a newspaper before him, on which were spread out tiny wheels, screws, nuts, and cogs of yellowish metal. He had taken the clock to pieces, as it would not go, and was cleaning its works, not seeming to take more notice of the hubbub than if he were stone deaf.

Then there was Mrs. Kayll, a thin, worried-looking woman, who was engaged in putting a patch on the knee of a small and shabby pair of tweed trousers. There was Madge, too, a minute before, but she had gone to baby, and the quiet, regular, “thump, thump” of the cradle rockers could be heard in the room overhead.

The others were so mixed up that it was difficult to distinguish one from another.

That boy with the dark curly hair and mischievous eyes was Jack, aged fourteen, who earned five shillings a week by the labour of his own hands. Beyond him, with his elbows on the table, and his eyes intent on the works of the clock over which his father was busy, was Bob, his elder brother—but[8] no one is likely to remember all these children without a list to look at now and then. Here are their names, ages, and occupations.

Madge, aged sixteen, “mother’s help.”

Bob, aged fifteen, father’s help.

Jack, aged fourteen, a printer’s boy.

Jem, aged thirteen, errand-boy to a chemist.

Edie, aged twelve, school-girl.

Bessie, aged ten, school-girl.

Baby, aged five months. No occupation.

Now, having arrived at a clear understanding, we can get on with the story, and there will be no excuse for anyone mixing up Jack with Jem, Edie with Bessie, or Madge with the baby.

This was the conversation going on between Jack and Jem.

“I do more work for four shillings than you do for five.”

“That you don’t. I work twice as hard as you do any day.”

“Oh, I say! I like that! And you told me yesterday that you’d found time to read Robinson Crusoe all through.”

“I didn’t.”

[9]“Yes, you did.”

“No, I didn’t.”

“Well, perhaps you’ll be good enough to tell me what you did say, then.”

“I said I’d skimmed it.”

“I don’t think you did; but any way, whether you skimmed it, or whether you read it properly, you wouldn’t have done so when anyone was looking, I know.”

“Now, look here, Jem, if you’re going to lecture me, I shall just sew up your coat-sleeves after you’re gone to sleep to-night, and get ready some more little surprises for you. I won’t be lectured by my youngers.”

“Do be quiet and not quarrel, you two boys,” interrupted their mother in a plaintive tone, as she held up her needle between herself and the lamp, the better to see its eye. “It does worry me so. You’ve given me quite a headache.”

Jack was silent at once. Not so Jem.

“Have we, mother?” he said quickly. “I’m so sorry. But I can’t help quarrelling with Jack. He doesn’t give me any peace. Now this morning I went all the way to the[10] shop with a ticket pinned on the back of my jacket, with ‘This side up, with care’ on it, and Jack says that’s to teach me to brush it before I put it on. And yesterday all my pockets were sewn up, to teach me to keep my hands out of them. It doesn’t. It makes me put them in all the more.”

“Jack,” said Mrs. Kayll severely, “don’t do that sort of thing any more. I forbid it. Jokes of that kind may be very funny to you, but they often lead to serious consequences. And it’s not for you to teach Jem what he ought to do, except by setting him a good example.”

Still Jack was silent. He loved teasing and playing tricks, especially on Jem, and was continually getting into grief by this means.

“I sha’n’t stop at Graves’s long,” said the younger boy soon after in a low tone to his brother.

“It’s very stupid of you, then. You don’t know when you’ve got a good place.”

“I know when I’ve got a bad one, though.”

“The fact is,” said Jack, who had an uncomfortable[11] habit of telling people the exact truth to their faces, “you are jealous of me because I get five shillings a week, and you only get four.”

Jem turned of an indignant scarlet.

“I’m not! I wouldn’t be in your shoes for a pound a week, if I knew it; so now, then!”

“Then you would be very selfish, for a pound a week would make you able to help mother ever so much—buy your own clothes and all sorts of things.”

“Oh, you boys! you boys!” sighed Mrs. Kayll. “Father, did you ever hear anything like them?”

“Like them! Oh, dear, yes, lots of times,” he answered in a preoccupied tone, without looking up from his work. “My brother Tom and I were just as bad at their age. I recollect, though,” he added, glancing at his boys for a minute with a twinkle in one eye, “that my father used to cane us both soundly, and send us to our bed-rooms till we apologized.”

“Oh, but we’ll apologize without that,”[12] cried Jack laughing. “Jem, old chap, shake hands, and never mind my fun.”

Jem was quite ready, and there was peace between them for perhaps half an hour.

But though the boys were quiet, the girls were not. Edith and Bessie were at this moment engaged in a playful and good-tempered struggle for the possession of a worn-out doll, which means that the one who had it in her hand was running round the room, jumping over chairs, or scrambling under the table, with the other catching at her frock or pinafore amid deafening shrieks of laughter.

“Hush, children! Play quietly,” said Mrs. Kayll, and the noise stopped for a minute, only to go on again a little later.

At this point Madge walked in again with the baby in its night-dress on her arm, wide awake, and in the best of spirits.

“He wouldn’t go to sleep, mother, and no wonder, so I’ve brought him down, the sweet darling pet. And did he want to come down-stairs and see all the fun? He should, then, that he should, a chickums,[13] and sissy will nurse him while she darns the stockings.”

And she sat down in her old place, and tried to mend the great holes worn by the boys in the heels of their hose, with the little one on her lap jumping, kicking, writhing, and running great risk of being pricked by Madge’s long needle.

Upon this Bessie, a rather pale, fragile-looking little creature, with great thoughtful gray eyes, left the rough play of which she was already growing tired, and set herself to interest and amuse her baby brother, talking nonsense to him, building up houses of cotton-reels on the table, and letting him knock them over, tickling him, kissing his fat cheeks, until he laughed aloud, and made remarks in his own language, such as “Boo, google, coo-coo,” which singular words little Bessie seemed perfectly to understand.

Meanwhile Edie had drawn a chair to the table, and was quite absorbed in a book which she had read at least six times before, and Jack was behind her, secretly pinning her dress to the legs of the chair, in which[14] feat he completely succeeded without arousing suspicion. He then strolled round looking for some fresh diversion, which was easily found. A couple of metal buttons were lying near Mrs. Kayll’s elbow, ready for placing on the garment she was mending. Jack possessed himself of these, and in two seconds they had gone down Jem’s back, and the culprit had to escape from the room to get away from his brother’s vengeance. Jem dashed after, and the scuffle was soon heard going on overhead.

They were a noisy, merry, poor and unlucky family. Loving one another dearly at the bottom of their hearts, but hiding their love as though it were a crime, quarrelling a good deal, and causing much anxiety to Mrs. Kayll, who used to think sometimes that no woman ever had children so hard to manage and so little time for managing them. For Mr. Kayll, though he was the best of husbands and kindest of fathers, and worked hard all his life, had not the gift of “getting on in the world.”

They were all startled into looking up[15] from their various employments by a loud imperative knock at the door.

Madge and the baby went to answer it, and voices were at once heard that sounded more energetic than polite. Before many minutes had passed the girl came back, rather red in the face, and with a paper in her disengaged hand.

“It’s the baker,” she said in an undertone, so as not to be heard in the passage. “He has brought his bill, and he’s so rude, and says he won’t bring us any more bread unless he’s paid to-night.”

“How much?” asked her father, taking the account from her and looking at the amount. “As it happens, I can do it. Here, Madge, pay him, make him receipt it, get rid of him, and tell him he needn’t trouble to call again.”

Madge took the money and did as she was told. But she stood for a minute in the passage after he was gone, before she rejoined the others, and brushed something from her eyelashes.

“Oh, baby,” she whispered, pressing her[16] face to the cool little cheek. “It’s miserable to be poor. I think there’s nothing more wretched in the world.”

In that sentiment all her brothers and sisters would have agreed. They had had few other troubles, and therefore fancied there was nothing so bad as the want of money.

CHAPTER II. MONEY MATTERS.

“MOTHER,” said Madge, as she and Mrs. Kayll were making the beds on the next Monday morning, “I wish you would talk to Jem. He is determined to leave his place, and it does seem such a pity.”

“Leave!” cried Mrs. Kayll, stopping in the act of shaking up a pillow. “Why, I thought he liked it so much!”

“So he did at first, but he’s tired of it already, just as he always is, after a month or so.”

[17]Mrs. Kayll sighed wearily, and laid the pillow in its place, taking care that the hole in the much-patched cover should go underneath and out of sight.

“Tiresome boy! He is so unsettled. I’ll talk to him to-night; but it’s not much good when he has once taken a dislike to his work. He’ll never go on with it with any pleasure. I don’t know what would become of us if Jack were the same. Heigh-ho! You children are a constant anxiety to me. We really can’t afford to have Jem at home on our hands just now, when your father’s doing so badly—really I don’t think he ever did so badly before.”

“Yet,” said Madge thoughtfully, straightening the patchwork quilt, made long since by her own hands, “Jem is so good in his way, and seems much more fond of us all than either Bob or Jack, and plays with the children without teasing them like Jack does.”

“Yes, he’s a dear affectionate boy,” sighed her mother, “but I wish his affection made him consider us a little more and himself a little less.”

[18]At this point, as they had finished the bed they were making, Madge picked up the baby—who had been sitting in a corner all the time, contentedly sucking a knob which had come off a chest of drawers, and looking on at his mother and sister while they were busy—and conveyed him into the next room, where he had again to sit with his back to the wall and amuse himself as well as he could.

“Never mind. Don’t get unhappy about it, mother dear,” said Madge in her quiet philosophical way. “As long as we’re all well, that’s the chief thing, isn’t it? Being poor isn’t half so bad as being ill.”

From which it will be seen that, like most other people, Madge saw the world with quite different eyes when she was fresh and bright in the morning, from those with which she looked at it when she was tired and depressed at night.

“Ah, it’s all very well for you, child,” said her mother, who seemed to think poverty was quite bad enough, as she looked at the girl’s worn blue dress, and remembered how hard it had been to make the children look[19] anything like respectable for church yesterday—“It’s all very well for you, but when you come to my age you will wish you too had a little leisure, and need not grind, grind, slave and pinch from year’s end to year’s end. But there, Madgie, it’s of no use grumbling. I don’t really mind, only I get tired of it now and then.”

And she smiled, and then sighed as a few more disagreeable reflections came crowding into her mind. Her husband’s coat was very very shabby, and he ought to have another, just to keep up his character in his business. The coals were getting low, too, and the summer was drawing to its close; there was no saying how soon the days might turn cold. And there was very little food in the larder. She must really turn her thoughts to providing dinner.

“Madge,” she said suddenly, “your father has a sale to-day, and won’t be home to dinner, so we’ll not cook anything but some potatoes, because there’s a jar of nice beef dripping, and you all like potatoes and dripping.”

[20]“Yes, mother,” Madge answered, apparently scarcely giving the matter a thought.

It was well for Mrs. Kayll that her eldest daughter was so amiable and easy of disposition. Nothing came wrong to Madge. She took life quietly, with a kind of stolid good-temper, and was one of those people of whom everyone else expects a great deal, and gets it, without being surprised, or particularly grateful. She worked hard from morning to night, uncomplainingly, and it was not until she was very tired, and had more on her hands than she could do, that she was sometimes led into speaking a little sharply to her young brothers and sisters.

Ever since she left off going to school, Madge had been nurse, cook, needlewoman, and in part teacher, for in so large a family as this, where no servant could be kept, there was always more than enough employment for both her mother and herself, with keeping the house tidy, everyone’s clothes clean and in good repair, preparing meals and clearing them away, and taking care of the baby.

[21]The children who were at school came in for their simple dinner, and ran off again; the afternoon was passed in the same way as usual, with washing up, straightening, and making all comfortable and ready for tea.

To this meal Jack, Jem, and the three girls came home, but Mr. Kayll and Bob were not expected until nine or ten. So the mother poured out tea, and Madge cut bread and dripping for everybody with untiring patience.

Suddenly, in the middle of the meal, Jem remarked in a matter-of-fact tone:

“I’ve left.”

“What?” cried Jack.

“Oh, Jem, you don’t mean that!” exclaimed Mrs. Kayll.

“I do, though; but don’t you bother about it, mother, I’ll soon get something else to do.”

“Jem, you’re a—” began Jack hotly; but his mother touched his lips with her hand.

“Don’t call him names, whatever he’s done, Jack. That won’t do any good. But[22] oh, Jem, it is too bad if you have, when you know how poor we are, and how little your father has had to do lately.”

“But don’t you see, mother,” said Jem, with a rather superior smile, “I mean to get something better, so that I shall be more real help. I’m sure I ought to be making more than four shillings a week, and I believe I can if you leave me alone.”

“Oh, yes,” put in Edie, who always believed in Jem, and took his part against the whole world, “he’ll soon find a better place, where he’ll get on—won’t you, dear? And he has stayed in this one a month now—that’s longer than he was last time, and next time he’ll stay longer still.”

Jack gave a sort of grunt that seemed to express disapproval, and the matter dropped until Bob came in a couple of hours later, very tired and not in the best of tempers in consequence.

“Father’s coming directly, mother,” he said. “I won’t have anything till he comes in, and then we’ll have a bit of supper together.”

[23]He sat down, and Bessie, the smallest and palest of the girls, climbed on his knee, and slipped her arm under his and round his back.

“Well, monster,” he said, for this was his nickname for the slight little creature, “how have you been getting on? Any news?”

“No,” said Bessie, “except that Jem’s left his place.”

“Left? What, have they sent him off?”

“No. He left of his own accord. He was tired of it.”

“Then he’s a miserable, selfish, stupid, useless creature, and for two pins I’d give him a thorough thrashing,” cried Bob. “Do you hear that, Jem?”

Madge tried to check his anger, as her mother was not in the room, but he would not listen to her.

“No, Madgie,” he went on, “I shall let him hear the truth for once in his life, as father’s so easy with him. He doesn’t deserve to have a home to come to when he behaves as he does, caring more for whether he likes his work, or whether he doesn’t, than for seeing[24] mother slave till she’s ready to drop. Do you think she likes toiling from morning to night to keep us all respectable and comfortable, or that father likes shouting himself hoarse all day before he can make people buy things for half what they’re worth, or that Madge enjoys sweeping the stairs and washing up the sauce-pans, or even that Jack or I like our work? You’re the only one that doesn’t seem to think it’s possible to do what you ought, whether you like it or not. You seem to think you were put into the world to enjoy yourself, no matter how inconvenient that may be for other people.”

Jem looked very cast-down, for he was fond of Bob, and liked to have his good opinion. Edie put in a word for him.

“Don’t be too hard on him, Bob. He’s much younger than you, you know.”

“I don’t think it’s possible to be too hard,” he answered. “I’m thoroughly ashamed of him.”

At this point Mrs. Kayll re-entered the room, and directly after the head of the family arrived, Madge having only just[25] finished setting the bread and cheese and cold bacon in readiness. Mr. Kayll was evidently tired out after the day’s hard work, but he had a smile and a nod for each of the young people in turn, and a kiss for his wife, who went to the door to meet him.

While he and his eldest boy ate their supper, Madge put the baby off to sleep in his cradle, and the three little girls said good-night and went to bed, Edie whispering to Jem as she passed him:

“Never mind, old boy, so long as father isn’t angry.”

When they were gone Mr. Kayll took out his purse, which he handed to Jack, with:

“Give that to your mother, Jacky. That’ll set her up for a little while.”

Mrs. Kayll poured the contents into her hand and counted ten sovereigns.

“All for me?” she asked.

“Of course it is. Make much of it. There’s no saying when the next will come.”