The Continental Monthly, Vol. 2, No 3, September, 1862

'It was very good of you. How has she obtained food?'

'The little boy sells papers and ballads about the streets. The newsman round the corner trusts him for 'em, and he's managed to make twenty-five cents or more most every day.'

'Can't you give her another room? She should not die where she is.'

'I know she shouldn't, sir, but I hain't got another—all of 'em is taken up; and besides, sir,' and she hesitated a moment, 'the noise up here would disturb her.'

I had not thought of that; and expressing myself gratified with her kindness, I passed down again to the basement. The sick girl smiled as I opened the door, and held out her hand again to me. Taking it in mine, I asked:

'Do you feel better?'

'Much better,' she said, in a voice stronger than before. 'I have not felt so well for a long time. I owe it to you, sir! I am very grateful.'

'Don't speak of it, madam. Won't you have more of the broth?'

'No more, thank you. I won't trouble you any more, sir—I shan't trouble any one long;' and her eyes filled, and her voice quivered; 'but, O sir! my child! my little boy! What will become of him when I'm gone?' and she burst into a hysterical fit of weeping.

'Don't weep so, madam. Calm yourself; such excitement will kill you. God will provide for your child. I will try to help him, madam.'

She looked at me with those deep, intense eyes. A new light seemed to come into them; it overspread her face, and lit up her thin, wan features with a strange glow.

'It must be so,' she said, 'else why were you led here? God must have sent you to me for that!'

'No doubt he did, madam. Let it comfort you to think so.'

'It does, oh! it does. And, O my Father!' and she looked up to Him as she spoke: 'I thank thee! Thy poor, sinful, dying child thanks thee; and, oh! bless him, forever bless him, for it!'

I turned away to hide the emotion I could not repress. A moment after, not seeing the little boy, I asked:

'Where is your son?'

'Here, sir.' And turning down the bed-clothing, she showed him sleeping quietly by her side, all unconscious of the misery and the sin around him, and of the mighty crisis through which his young life was passing.

Saying I would return on the following day, I shortly afterward bade her 'good-night,' and left the house.

CHAPTER III

It was noon on the following day when I again visited the house in Anthony street. As I opened the door of the sick woman's room, I was startled by her altered appearance. Her eye had a strange, wild light, and her face already wore the pallid hue of death. She was bolstered up in bed, and the little boy was standing by her side, weeping, his arms about her neck. I took her hand in mine, and in a voice which plainly spoke my fears, said:

'You are worse!'

In broken gasps, and in a low, a very low tone, her lips scarcely moving, she answered:

'No! I am—better—much—better. I knew you—were coming. She told me so.'

'Who told you so?' I asked, very kindly, for I saw that her mind was wandering.

'My mother—she has been with me—all the day—and I have been so—so happy, so—very happy! I am going now—going with her—I've only waited—for you!'

'Say no more now, madam, say no more; you are too weak to talk.'

'But I must talk. I am—dying, and I must tell—you all before—I go!'

'I would gladly hear you, but you have not strength for it now. Let me get something to revive you.'

She nodded assent, and looking at her son, said:

'Take Franky.'

The little boy kissed her, and followed me from the room. When we had reached the upper-landing, I summoned the woman of the house, and said to him:

'Now, Franky, I want you to stay a little while with this good lady; your mother would talk with me.'

'But mother says she's dying, sir,' cried the little fellow, clinging closely to me; 'I don't want her to die, sir. Oh! I want to be with her, sir!'

'You shall be, very soon, my boy; your mother wants you to stay with this lady now.'

He released his hold on my coat, and sobbing violently, went with the red-faced woman. I hurried back from the apothecary's, and seating myself on the one rickety chair by her bedside, gave the sick woman the restorative. She soon revived, and then, in broken sentences, and in a low, weak voice, pausing every now and then to rest or to weep, she told me her story. Weaving into it some details which I gathered from others after her death, I give it to the reader as she outlined it to me.

She was the only daughter of a well-to-do farmer in the town of B–, New-Hampshire. Her mother died when she was a child, and left her to the care of a paternal aunt, who became her father's housekeeper. This aunt, like her father, was of a cold, hard nature, and had no love for children. She was, however, an exemplary, pious woman. She denied herself every luxury, and would sit up late of nights to braid straw and knit socks, that she might send tracts and hymn-books to the poor heathen; but she never gave a word of sympathy, or a look of love to the young being that was growing up by her side. The little girl needed kindness and affection, as much as plants need the sun; but the good aunt had not these to give her. When the child was six years old, she was sent to the district-school. There she met a little boy not quite five years her senior, and they soon became warm friends. He was a brave, manly lad, and she thought no one was ever so good, or so handsome as he. Her young heart found in him what it craved for—some one to lean on and to love, and she loved him with all the strength of her child-nature. He was very kind to her. Though his home was a mile away, he came every morning to take her to school, and in the long summer vacations he almost lived at her father's house. And thus four years flew away—flew as fast as years that are winged with youth and love always fly—and though her father was harsh, and her aunt cold and stern, she did not know a grief, or shed a tear in all that time.

One day, late in summer, toward the close of those four years, John—that was his name—came to her, his face beaming all over with joy, and said:

'O Fanny! I am going—going to Boston. Father [he was a richer man than her father] has got me into a great store there—a great store, and I'm to stay till I'm twenty-one—they won't pay me hardly any thing—only fifty dollars the first year, and twenty-five more every other year—but father says it's a great store, and it'll be the making of me.' And he danced and sung for joy, but she wept in bitter grief.

Well, five more years rolled away—this time they were not winged as before—and John came home to spend his two weeks of summer vacation. He had come every year, but then he said to her what he had never said before—that which a woman never forgets. He told her that the old Quaker gentleman, the head of the great house he was with, had taken a fancy to him, and was going to send him to Europe, in the place of the junior partner, who was sick, and might never get well. That he should stay away a year, but when he came back, he was sure the old fellow would make him a partner, and then—and he strained her to his heart as he said it—'then I will make you my little wife, Fanny, and take you to Boston, and you shall be a fine lady—as fine a lady as Kate Russell, the old man's daughter.' And again he danced and sung, and again she wept, but this time it was for joy.

He staid away a little more than a year, and when he returned he did not come at once to her, but he wrote that he would very soon. In a few days he sent her a newspaper, in which was a marked notice, which read somewhat as follows:

'The co-partnership heretofore existing under the name and style of Russell, Rollins & Co., has been dissolved by the death of David Gray, Jr.

'The outstanding affairs will be settled, and the business continued, by the surviving partners, who have this day admitted Mr. John Hallet to an interest in their firm.'

The truth had been gradually dawning upon me, yet when she mentioned his name, I sprang involuntarily to my feet, exclaiming:

'John Hallet! and were you betrothed to him?'

The sick woman had paused from exhaustion, but when I said that, she made a feeble effort to raise herself, and said in a stronger voice than before:

'Do you know him—sir?'

'Know him! Yes, madam;' and I paused and spoke in a lower tone, for I saw that my manner was unduly exciting her; 'I know him well.'

I did know him well, and it was on the evening of the day that notice was written, and just one month after David had followed his only son to the grave, that I, a boy of sixteen, with my hat in my hand, entered the inner office of the old counting-room to which I have already introduced the reader. Mr. Russell, a genial, gentle, good old man, was seated at his desk, writing; and Mr. Rollins sat at his, poring over some long accounts.

'Mr. Russell and Mr. Rollins,' I said very respectfully, 'I have come to bid you good-by. I am going to leave you.'

'Thee going to leave!' exclaimed Mr. Russell, laying down his spectacles; 'what does thee mean, Edmund?'

'I mean, I don't want to stay any longer, sir,' I replied, my voice trembling with emotion.

'But you must stay, Edmund,' said Mr. Rollins, in his harsh, imperative way. 'Your uncle indentured you to us till you are twenty-one, and you can't go.'

'I shall go, sir,' I replied, with less respect than he deserved. 'My uncle indentured me to the old firm; I am not bound to stay with the new.'

Mr. Russell looked grieved, but in the same mild tone as before, he said:

'I am sorry, Edmund, very sorry, to hear thee say that. Thee can go if thee likes; but it grieves me to hear thee quibble so. Thee will not prosper, my son, if thee follows this course in life.' And the moisture came into the old man's eyes as he spoke. It filled mine, and rolled in large drops down my cheeks, as I replied:

'Forgive me, sir, for speaking so. I do not want to do wrong, but I can't stay with John Hallet.'

'Why can't thee stay with John?'

'He don't like me, sir. We are not friends.'

'Why are you not friends?'

'Because I know him, sir.'

'What do you know of him?' asked Mr. Rollins, in the same harsh, abrupt tone. I had never liked Mr. Rollins, and his words just then stung me to the quick, I forgot myself, for I replied:

'I know him to be a lying, deceitful, hypocritical scoundrel, sir.'

Some two years before, Hallet had joined the church in which Mr. Rollins was a deacon, and was universally regarded as a pious, devout young man. The opinion I expressed was, therefore, rank heterodoxy. To my surprise, Mr. Rollins turned to Mr. Russell and said:

'I believe the boy is right, Ephraim; John professes too much to be entirely sincere; I've told you so before.'

'I can't think so, Thomas; but it's too late to alter things now. We shall see. Time will prove him.'

I soon left, but not till they had shaken me warmly by the hand, wished me well, and tendered me their aid whenever I required it. In after-years they kept their word.

Yes, I did know John Hallet. The old gentleman never knew him, but time proved him, and those whom that good old man loved with all the love of his large, noble heart, suffered because he did not know him as I did.

After I had given her some of the cordial, and she had rested awhile, the sick girl resumed her story.

In about a month Hallet came. He pictured to her his new position; the wealth and standing it would give him, and he told her that he was preparing a little home for her, and would soon return and take her with him forever.

[When he said that, he had been for over a year affianced to another—a rich man's only child—a woman older than he, whose shriveled, jaundiced face, weak, scrawny body, and puny, sickly soul, would have been repulsive even to him, had not money been his god.]

The simple, trusting girl believed him. He importuned her—she loved him—and she fell!

About a month afterward, taking up a Boston paper, she read the marriage of Mr. John Hallet, merchant, to Miss –. 'Some other person has his name,' she thought. 'It can not be he, yet it is strange!' It was strange, but it was true, for there, in another column, she saw that: 'Mr. John Hallet, of the house of Russell, Rollins & Co., and his accomplished lady, were passengers by the steamer Cambria, which sailed from this port yesterday for Liverpool.'

The blow crushed her. But why need I tell of her grief, her agony, her despair? For months she did not leave her room; and when at last she crawled into the open air, the nearest neighbors scarcely recognized her.

It was long, however, before she knew all the wrong that Hallet had done her. Her aunt noticed her altered appearance, and questioned her. She told her all. At first, the cold, hard woman blamed her, and spoke harshly to her; but, though cold and harsh, she had a woman's heart, and she forgave her. She undertook to tell the story to her brother. He had his sister's nature; was a strict, pious, devout man; prayed every morning and evening in his family, and, rain or shine, went every Sunday to hear two dull, cast-iron sermons at the old meeting-house, but he had not her woman's heart. He stormed and raved for a time, and then he cursed his only child, and drove her from his house. The aunt had forty dollars—the proceeds of sock-knitting and straw-braiding not yet invested in hymn-books, and with one sigh for the poor heathen, she gave it to her. With that, and a small satchel of clothes, and with two little hearts beating under her bosom, she went out into the world. Where could she go? She knew not, but she wandered on till she reached the village. The stage was standing before the tavern-door, and the driver was mounting the box to start. She thought for a moment. She could not stay there. It would anger her father, if she did—no one would take her in—and besides, she could not meet, in her misery and her shame, those who had known her since childhood. She spoke to the driver; he dismounted, opened the door, and she took a seat in the coach to go—she did not know whither, she did not care where.

They rode all night, and in the morning reached Concord. As she stepped from the stage, the red-faced landlord asked her if she was going further. She said, 'I do not know, sir;' but then a thought struck her. It was five months since Hallet had started for Europe, and perhaps he had returned. She would go to him. Though he could not undo the wrong he had done, he still could aid and pity her. She asked the route to Boston, and after a light meal, was on the way thither.

She arrived after dark, and was driven to the Marlboro Hotel—that Eastern Eden for lone women and tobacco-eschewing men—and there she passed the night. Though weak from recent illness, and worn and wearied with the long journey, she could not rest or sleep. The great sorrow that had fallen on her had driven rest from her heart, and quiet sleep from her eye-lids forever. In the morning she inquired the way to Russell, Rollins & Co.'s, and after a long search found the grim, old warehouse. She started to go up the rickety old stairs, but her heart failed her. She turned away and wandered off through the narrow, crooked streets—she did not know for how long. She met the busy crowd hurrying to and fro, but no one noticed or cared for her. She looked at the neat, cheerful homes smiling around her, and she thought how every one had shelter and friends but her. She gazed up at the cold, gray sky, and oh! how she longed that it might fall down and bury her forever. And still she wandered till her limbs grew weary and her heart grew faint. At last she sank down exhausted, and wept—wept as only the lost and the utterly forsaken can weep. Some little boys were playing near, and after a time they left their sports, and came to her. They spoke kindly to her, and it gave her strength. She rose and walked on again. A livery-carriage passed her, and she spoke to the coachman. After a long hour she stood once more before the old warehouse. It was late in the afternoon, and she had eaten nothing all day, and was very faint and tired. As she turned to go up the old stairway, her heart again failed her, but summoning all her strength, she at last entered the old counting-room.

A tall, spare, pleasant-faced man, was standing at the desk, and she asked him if Mr. John Hallet was there.

'No, madam, he's in Europe.'

'When will he come back, sir?'

'Not for a year, madam;' and David raised his glasses and looked at her. He had not done it before.

Her last hope had failed, and with a heavy, crushing pain in her heart, and a dull, dizzy feeling in her head, she turned to go. As she staggered away a hand was gently placed on her arm, and a mild voice said:

'You are ill, madam; sit down.'

She took the proffered seat, and an old gentleman came out of the inner office.

'What! what's this, David?' he asked. 'What ails the young woman?'

(She was then not quite seventeen.)

'She's ill, sir,' said David.

'Only a little tired, sir; I shall be better soon.'

'But thee is ill, my child; thee looks so. Come here, Kate!' and the old gentleman raised his voice as if speaking to some one in the inner room. The sick girl lifted her eyes, and saw a blue-eyed, golden-haired young woman, not so old as she was.

'She seems very sick, father. Please, David, get me some water;' and the young lady undid the poor girl's bonnet, and bathed her temples with the cool, grateful fluid. After a while the old gentleman asked:

'What brought thee here, young woman?'

'I came to see John—Mr. Hallet, I mean, sir.'

'Thee knows John, then?'

'Oh! yes, sir.'

'Where does thee live?'

She was about to say that she had no home, but checking herself, for it would seem strange that a young girl who knew John Hallet, should be homeless, she answered:

'In New-Hampshire. I live near old Mr. Hallet's, sir. I came to see John because I've known him ever since I was a child.'

She drank of the water, and after a little time rose to go. As she turned toward the door, the thought of going out alone, with her great sorrow, into the wide, desolate world, crossed her mind, the heavy, crushing pain came again into her heart, the dull, dizzy feeling into her head, the room reeled, and she fell to the floor.

It was after dark when she came to herself. She was lying on a bed in a large, splendidly furnished room, and the same old gentleman and the same young woman were with her. Another old gentleman was there, and as she opened her eyes, he said:

'She will be better soon; her nervous system has had a severe shock; the difficulty is there. If you could get her to confide in you, 'twould relieve her; it is hidden grief that kills people. She needs rest, now. Come, my child, take this,' and he held a fluid to her lips. She drank it, and in a few moments sank into a deep slumber.

It was late on the following morning when she awoke, and found the same young woman at her bedside.

'You are better, now, my sister. A few days of quiet rest will make you well,' said the young lady.

The kind, loving words, almost the first she had ever heard from woman, went to her heart, and she wept bitterly as she replied:

'Oh! no, there is no rest, no more rest for me!'

'Why so? What is it that grieves you? Tell me; it will ease your pain to let me share it with you.'

She told her, but she withheld his name. Once it rose to her lips, but she thought how those good people would despise him, how Mr. Russell would cast him off, how his prospects would be blasted, and she kept it back.

'And that is the reason you went to John? You knew what a good, Christian young man he is, and you thought he would aid you?'

'Yes!' said the sick girl.

Thus she punished him for the great wrong he had done her; thus she recompensed him for robbing her of home, of honor, and of peace!

Kate told her father the story, and the good old man gave her a room in one of his tenement houses, and there, a few months later, she gave birth to a little boy and girl. She was very sick, but Kate attended to her wants, procured her a nurse, and a physician, and gave her what she needed more than all else—kindness and sympathy.

Previous to her sickness she had earned a support by her needle, and when she was sufficiently recovered, again had recourse to it. Her earnings were scanty, for she was not yet strong, but they were eked out by an occasional remittance from her aunt, which good lady still adhered to her sock-knitting, straw-braiding habits, but had turned her back resolutely on her benighted brethren and sisters of the Feejee Islands.

Thus nearly a year wore away, when her little girl sickened and died. She felt a mother's pang at first, but she shed no tears, for she knew it was 'well with the child;' that it had gone where it would never know a fate like hers.

The watching with it, added to her other labors, again undermined her health. The remittance from her aunt did not come as usual, and though she paid no rent, she soon found herself unable to earn a support. The Russells had been so good, so kind, had done so much for her, that she could not ask them for more. What, then, should she do? One day, while she was in this strait, Kate called to see her, and casually mentioned that John Hallet had returned. She struggled with her pride for a time, but at last made up her mind to apply to him. She wrote to him; told him of her struggles, of her illness, of her many sufferings, of her little boy—his image, his child—then playing at her feet, and she besought him by the love he bore her in their childhood, not to let his once affianced wife, and his poor, innocent child STARVE!

Long weeks went by, but no answer came; and again she wrote him.

One day, not long after sending this last letter, as she was crossing the Common to her attic in Charles street, she met him. He was alone, and saw her, but attempted to pass her without recognition. She stood squarely in his way, and told him she would be heard. He admitted having received her letters, but said he could do nothing for her; that the brat was not his; that she must not attempt to fasten on him the fruit of her debaucheries; that no one would believe her if she did; and he added, as he turned away, that he was a married man, and a Christian, and could not be seen talking with a lewd woman like her.

She was stunned. She sank down on one of the benches on the Common, and tried to weep; but the tears would not come. For the first time since he so deeply, basely wronged her, she felt a bitter feeling rising in her heart. She rose, and turned her steps up Beacon Hill toward Mr. Russell's, fully determined to tell Kate all. She was admitted, and shown to Miss Russell's room. She told her that she had met her seducer, and how he had cast her off.

'Who is he?' asked Kate. 'Tell me, and father shall publish him from one end of the universe to the other! He does not deserve to live.'

His name trembled on her tongue. A moment more, and John Hallet would have been a ruined man, branded with a mark that would have followed him through the world. But she paused; the vision of his happy wife, of the innocent child just born to him, rose before her, and the words melted away from her lips unspoken.

Kate spoke kindly and encouragingly to her, but she heeded her not. One only thought had taken possession of her: how could she throw off the mighty load that was pressing on her soul?

After a time, she rose and left the house. As she walked down Beacon street, the sun was just sinking in the West, and its red glow mounted midway up the heavens. As she looked at it, the sky seemed one great molten sea, with its hot, lurid waves surging all around her. She thought it came nearer; that it set on fire the green Common and the great houses, and shot fierce, hot flames through her brain and into her very soul. For a moment, she was paralyzed and sank to the ground; then springing to her feet, she flew to her child. She bounded down the long hill, and up the steep stairways, and burst into the room of the good woman who was tending him, shouting:

'Fire! fire! The world is on fire! Run! run! the world is on fire!'

She caught up her babe and darted away. With him in her arms, she flew down Charles street, across the Common, and through the crowded thoroughfares, till she reached India Wharf, all the while muttering, 'Water, water;' water to quench the fire in her blood, in her brain, in her very soul.

She paused on the pier, and gazed for a moment at the dark, slimy flood; then she plunged down, down, where all is forgetfulness!

She had a dim recollection of a storm at sea; of a vessel thrown violently on its beam-ends; of a great tumult, and of voices louder than she ever heard before—voices that rose above the howling of the tempest and the surging of the great waves—calling out: 'All hands to clear away the foremast!' But she knew nothing certain. All was chaos.

The next thing she remembered was waking one morning in a little room about twelve feet square, with a small grated opening in the door. The sun had just risen, and by its light she saw she was lying on a low, narrow bed, whose clothing was spotlessly white and clean. Her little boy was sleeping by her side. His little cheeks had a rosier, healthier hue than they ever wore before; and as she turned down the sheet, she saw he had grown wonderfully. She could hardly credit her senses. Could that be her child?

She spoke to him. He opened his eyes and smiled, and put his little mouth up to hers, saying, 'Kiss, mamma, kiss Fanky.' She took him in her arms, and covered him with kisses. Then she rose to dress herself. A strange but neat and tidy gown was on the chair, and she put it on; it fitted exactly. Franky then rolled over to the front of the bed, and putting first one little foot out and then the other, let himself down to the floor. 'Can it be?' she thought, 'can he both walk and talk?' Soon she heard the bolt turning in the door. It opened, and a pleasant, elderly woman, with a large bundle of keys at her girdle, entered the room.

'And how do you do this morning, my daughter?' she asked.

'Very well, ma'am. Where am I, ma'am?'

'You ask where? Then you are well. You haven't been for a long, long time, my child.'

'And where am I, ma'am?'

'Why, you are here—at Bloomingdale.'

'How long have I been here?'

'Let me see; it must be near fifteen months, now.'

'And who brought me?'

'A vessel captain. He said that just as he was hauling out of the dock at Boston, you jumped into the water with your child. One of his men sprang overboard and saved you. The vessel couldn't put back, so he brought you here.'

'Merciful heaven! did I do that?'

'Yes. You must have been sorely troubled, my child. But never mind—it is all over now. But hasn't Franky grown? Isn't he a handsome boy? Come here to grandma, my baby.' And the good woman sat down on a chair, while the little fellow ran to her, put his small arms around her neck, and kissed her over and over again. Children are intuitive judges of character; no really bad man or woman ever had the love of a child.

'Yes, he has grown. You call him Franky, do you?'

'Yes; we didn't know his name. What had you named him?'

'John Hallet.'

As she spoke those words, a sharp pang shot through her heart. It was well that her child had another name!

She was soon sufficiently recovered to leave the asylum. By the kind offices of the matron, she got employment in a cap-factory, and a plain but comfortable boarding-place in the lower part of the city. She worked at the shop, and left Franky during the day with her landlady, a kind-hearted but poor woman. Her earnings were but three dollars a week, and their board was two and a quarter; but on the balance she contrived to furnish herself and her child with clothes. The only luxury she indulged in was an occasional walk, on Sunday to Bloomingdale, to see her good friend the kind-hearted matron.

Thus things went on for two years; and if not happy, she was at least comfortable. Her father never relented; but her aunt wrote her often, and there was comfort in the thought that, at least, one of her early friends had not cast her off. The good lady, too, sent her now and again small remittances, but they came few and far between; for as the pious woman grew older, her heart gradually returned to its first love—the poor heathen.

To Kate Russell Fanny wrote as soon she left the asylum, telling her of all that had happened as far as she knew, and thanking her for all her goodness and kindness to her. She waited some weeks, but no answer came; then she wrote again, but still no answer came, though that time she waited two or three months. Fearing then that something had befallen her, she mustered courage to write Mr. Russell. Still she got no reply, and she reluctantly concluded—though she had not asked them for aid—that they had ceased to feel interested in her.

'They had not, madam. Kate has often spoken very kindly of you. She wanted to come here to-day, but I did not know this, and I could not bring her here!'

She looked at me with a strange surprise. Her eyes lighted, and her face beamed, as she said: 'And you know her, too!'

'Know her! She is to be my wife very soon.'

She wept as she said: 'And you will tell her how much I love her—how grateful I am to her?'

'I will,' I replied. I did not tell the poor girl, as I might have done, that Hallet had at that time access to Mr. Russell's mails, and that, knowing her hand-writing, he had undoubtedly intercepted her letters.

After a long pause, she resumed her story.

At the end of those two years, a financial panic swept over the country, prostrating the great houses, and sending want and suffering into the attics—not homes, for they have none—of the poor sewing-women. The firm that employed her failed, and Fanny was thrown out of work. She went to her good friend the matron, who interested some 'benevolent' ladies in her behalf, and they procured her shirts to make at twenty-five cents apiece! She could hardly do enough of them to pay her board; but she could do the work at home with Franky, and that was a comfort, for he was growing to be a bright, intelligent, affectionate boy.