Happy Pollyooly Part 14

"Yes. If Mr. Ruffin would let you stay for a week or two, I could teach you a lot," said Pollyooly hopefully.

For the rest of the way to the Temple they discussed in detail Millicent's accomplishments. They were few and limited; but to her willingness to work there were no bounds.

As soon as they reached the Temple they set about getting dinner.

Fortunately Pollyooly had in her larder half a cold chicken; for, as was his practice, the Honourable John Ruffin had three days before ordered a cold chicken from the kitchen of the Inner Temple, had made a pretence of eating some of it at his breakfast, and then had bidden her never let him see it again. This was one of his ways of making sure that she and the Lump were properly fed, without weakening her independence by sapping her belief that she really supported the two of them.

Accordingly Millicent made an excellent meal; and it restored her strength and her spirits. She was surprised by the fact that the Lump had a whole mugful of milk with his dinner, for she was unused to this lavishness with that luxury in a child's diet. Pollyooly explained that it had been an article of faith with her Aunt Hannah that a young child needed a pint of milk a day; therefore the Lump always had one.

Millicent was deeply impressed: this was indeed affluence.

She helped Pollyooly wash up after their dinner; and then Pollyooly suggested that it would be well for her to look very clean indeed when she was presented to Mr. Ruffin.

"He's so particular about children being clean. Mr. Gedge-Tomkins isn't nearly so particular," she said apologetically. "I work for him, too, you know. He lives across the landing."

Millicent accepted the suggestion readily enough, for her mother had been cleaner than her cla.s.s. Pollyooly helped her wash and dry and brush out her ma.s.s of silken hair, and lent her a clean frock of her own. Presently, after the good meal on the top of her fast, Millicent turned very sleepy, and Pollyooly let her sleep. She was still sleeping when the Honourable John Ruffin returned home.

Pollyooly did not at once hurry to him with her news. She cut his bread and b.u.t.ter very thin and nice, and followed his instructions about the making of tea with scrupulous exactness. She carried the tray into his sitting-room and set it beside him. Then she hesitated, looking at him.

He looked up from the evening paper he was scanning, smiled his usual smile of appreciation at her angel face, and said amiably:

"Well, Mrs. Bride: what is it?"

When he did not call her Pollyooly he called her "Mrs." Bride, because they had decided that "Miss" Bride did not sound sufficiently dignified a name for a housekeeper.

"Please, sir: I've got a little girl here," said Pollyooly in a somewhat anxious, deprecating tone.

"A little girl?" said the Honourable John Ruffin in a natural surprise.

"Yes, sir. Her mother's dead; and they wanted to send her to the workhouse; but she ran away," said Pollyooly quickly.

"Curious that England's little ones should fly from the home she offers them," said the Honourable John Ruffin in his most amiable tone.

"Yes, sir. And she hadn't had anything to eat and she was very hungry, so I brought her home to dinner," said Pollyooly still quickly.

"A very proper thing to do," said the Honourable John Ruffin.

"And I thought I'd ask you if she could stop here, sir--with me and the Lump--till she gets some work to do. There'd be lots of room for her, sir; and she wouldn't bother you at all," said Pollyooly in a tone of anxious pleading.

"To get work might take a long time," said the Honourable John Ruffin gravely.

"Yes, sir; it might," said Pollyooly no less gravely, for she knew well the difficulty of getting work in London.

"And do you propose to keep her till she finds work?" said the Honourable John Ruffin in the tone of one who finds it difficult to believe his ears.

"Oh, yes, sir. She wouldn't eat much," said Pollyooly in a tone of cheerful serenity.

"Out of the exiguous wages Mr. Gedge-Tomkins and I pay you?"

"Yes, sir. I can do it quite well," said Pollyooly confidently; and then she added hopefully: "And perhaps it wouldn't be for long."

"On the other hand it may be for years and it may be forever," said the Honourable John Ruffin in a despondent tone.

"Oh, no, sir: I'm sure it wouldn't be as long as that," said Pollyooly confidently.

The Honourable John Ruffin looked at her earnest, anxious pleading face for half a minute. Then he said:

"Let's get it quite exact: you want to saddle yourself with the maintenance of a little girl for weeks, or it may be months, or even years, just to save her from the chief of England's representative inst.i.tutions?"

Pollyooly's anxious frown grew deeper as she said:

"From the workhouse? Yes, sir."

"Where shall the watchful sun, England, my England, Match the master-work you've done, England my own?"

quoted the Honourable John Ruffin with deep feeling. Then he added sententiously: "Well, we must by no means check the generous impulses of the young. But before I decide I should like to see your protegee.

I take it that she does not rise to those heights of cleanliness at which you maintain yourself and the Lump; but does she display sufficient of our chief English virtue?"

"Oh, yes, sir: I couldn't have her about with the Lump if she wasn't,"

said Pollyooly firmly. "But I'll fetch her, sir." She paused, hesitatingly, and added: "She isn't in mourning, sir. The funeral took all the money."

"Then it can not be helped," said the Honourable John Ruffin sadly.

Pollyooly hurried up-stairs to Millicent, awoke her, and helped her tidy her hair. She bade her be sure and curtsey nicely to the Honourable John Ruffin, brought her into the sitting-room, and presented her to him. Millicent's big eyes were s.h.i.+ning brightly from her sleep; her silken hair was prettily waved by its so recent was.h.i.+ng; and the excitement of this fateful meeting had flushed delicately her pale cheeks. She appealed alike to the Honourable John Ruffin's aesthetic and protective instinct. Only her strong London accent distressed him: he feared lest it might corrupt the speech of Pollyooly and the Lump, which, owing to the care of their Aunt Hannah, who had for many years been housekeeper for Lady Constantia Deeping, was that of gentle-folk.

However, he talked kindly and sympathetically to Millicent, questioned her about her acquirements, and gave her leave to stay.

CHAPTER VIII

THE QUESTION OF A HOME

Millicent left his presence almost dazed with relief and joy. Not only was the imminent workhouse removed to a distance; but she herself was transported to a sphere of astonis.h.i.+ng luxury. She settled down in a quiet content, only broken at rare intervals by a fit of weeping for her dead mother. She helped Pollyooly with the work of the two sets of chambers, displaying a considerable lack of knowledge and efficiency, and played untiringly with the Lump.

Between their dinner and the Honourable John Ruffin's tea she and Pollyooly hunted for work for her. Mr. Hilary Vance would have been an ideal, unexacting employer for her; but he was on the point of going to Paris for six months. They consulted all Pollyooly's friends; and all of them promised to look out for work for her; but it seemed likely to be hard to find.

The Honourable John Ruffin seeing Millicent often, watched and studied her carefully in the hope that his mind would produce a happy thought in the way of work for her. He perceived that she needed some well paid sinecure.

Then one morning when Pollyooly was clearing away his breakfast, he said:

"I have been considering Millicent, and I should be charmed to let her stay here. You and she are such admirable foils to one another's fairness and darkness that no cultivated eye can rest on you together without great pleasure. But I don't think that you are doing the right thing in trying to find her a job like your own. She couldn't keep it.

She is not a stern red Deeping like you. She is the clinging kind of orphan, not made to stand alone."

"But perhaps I should be able to go on helping her if she got work, sir," said Pollyooly, gazing at him with puckered brow. "I'm sure anybody would find her very willing."

"I'm sure they would. So many people are willing. Even the Government says it's willing. But I don't think that she is fitted to support herself by her own efforts yet. She has had no training; and evidently she hasn't been properly fed, and she isn't strong. What I think is that she's the kind of orphan for whom homes for orphans were created,"

he said with the air of one who has weighed the matter very carefully.