Crying for the Light Volume I Part 3

'Yes, I tell you it is, and we must save it.'

The actress led the way to the bundle of rags. They were the only clothes of a little lad who, hatless and shoeless and s.h.i.+rtless, was lying on the ground-to be trampled on by horses or men, it seemed to matter little to him. To him approached the awfulness of respectability as embodied in the persons of the Mayor and the Vicar, but he never moved; he was too tired, too weak, too ill to rise. Half awake and half asleep there he lay, quite unconscious, as they looked in his face-thin with want, grimy with dirt, shaded with brown curling hair. Presently the lad got upon his legs with a view to running away-that's the invariable etiquette on the part of ragged boys in such cases-but it was too late. Already the enemy were on him. Holding his right hand across his brow so as to shade his eyes, he plucked up his courage and prepared for the encounter.

'Hulloa, you little ragam.u.f.fin, what are you up to here?' said the Mayor, in a tone which frightened the poor boy at once.

'Pray don't speak so, Mr. Mayor,' said the actress; 'you'll frighten the poor boy.'

'Dear madam,' said the august official, 'what are we to do?'

'Save the child.'

'Ah! that's easier said than done. Besides, what is the use of saving one? There are hundreds of such lads in Sloville, and we can't save 'em all.'

'Quite true,' said the Vicar, professionally shaking his head.

'What's the matter, my poor boy?' said the actress, as, heedless of the remarks of her companions, she stooped down to kindly pat the head of the little waif, who was at first too frightened to reply.

Slowly and reluctantly he opened his big blue eyes and stared, then he screwed up his mouth and began to cry.

'Come, my little man,' continued the actress, in her gentlest tone, 'tell us what is the matter with you.'

'Yes, tell the good lady what's the matter with you!' said the Vicar, who thought it was now high time for him to say something.

Even then the boy sulked. He was of a cla.s.s apparently for whom respectability has few kind words or looks, who, in this wicked world, get more kicks than half-pence. Respectability has quite enough to do to look after her own children, especially now that taxes and butchers'

bills and School Board rates, to say nothing of coals, run up to such formidable items, to give herself much trouble about the children of other people. I have myself little pity for the heartless vagabonds who bring children into existence merely that they may rot and die. Of the devilish cruelty of such fathers and mothers no tongue can give an adequate idea; hanging is too good for them. It is to them we owe the pauperism which, apparently, it is beyond the power of the State to cure.

I am sick of the cant ever uttered of population _versus_ property; one is born of self-denial, industry, foresight, all the qualities which we as a nation require, while population is too often the result of unspeakable vice or consummate folly, qualities against which it becomes the nation to set its face.

But I must not forget the actress. More tenderly and coaxingly she repeated the question. To the charm of that voice and manner resistance was impossible.

Swallowing the rising tear with a great effort, slowly opening his eyes and mouth at the same time, and looking terribly frightened all the while, the poor lad replied:

'Oh, ma'am, I've got such a pain in my head.'

'Of course you've got a headache, lying like that in the sun. Why don't you get away and run home?'

'I ain't got a home.'

'Then, what are you doing here?' said the Mayor.

'Nothin',' said the boy.

'So it seems,' said the Vicar.

'Where's your father?' asked the actress,

'I ain't got one.'

'Then, where's your mother?'

'Gone off with a tramp, and she took brother with her.'

'But why did not she take you as well?'

''Cause she said I was big enough to earn my own wittles and drink. But I must be off; here comes a bobby,' said the boy, frightened at the appearance of one of the town police. Alas! he was too weak to run; he had had no food all day, and his only bed by night had been under some old waggon or in some old barn or loft, and, barefooted, he fell an easy prey to the representative of law and order.

'Now, you young rascal,' said the policeman, as he gave the lad a good shaking, apparently in order to test the strength of his ragged clothes, and, if possible, to make matters worse, 'get out of this, and be off,'

an order which the poor lad would have obeyed had not the actress held his hand.

'You know him,' said she to the policeman.

'Know him! of course I do. It was only last week I had him up before the magistrate.'

'What for?'

'For sleeping in the open air, and now here he is again. 'Tis very aggrawatin'. What's the use of trying to do one's duty if this sort of thing goes on?'

'Is it a crime to sleep in the open air?' asked the actress.

'Well, you see, ma'am, it ain't allowed by the magistrates; leastwise, not inside the borough.'

'Poor little fellow!' said the actress as she looked at the lad; 'I'll take him myself to the workhouse. There he would be out of harm's way, and washed and fed, and made clean and comfortable.'

'I beg your pardon, ma'am, that ain't no use; you ain't got a horder, and it is as much as the porter's place is worth to take anyone in without a horder.'

'Then, what's to be done with the poor boy?'

'Ah, that's the question,' said the policeman, and he was right there.

What's to be done with our boys, rich or poor, good or bad, is a question some of us find increasingly hard to answer.

'Then you can't help me?' said the actress.

'Oh no, mum; we've plenty of such boys about.'

'What's to be done?' said the lady she still looked at the poor boy. 'Is it right to leave him thus?' There was a tear in her voice as she spoke.

All seemed so hard and unmoved, and the urgency was so pressing.

'Dear madam,' said the Mayor, who felt himself bound to say something, 'the case is a hard one, but there's no help for it. We can't encourage such hoys as that. If we did, the town would be overrun with them. They are always begging.'

'I wasn't beggin',' said the boy, who now began to feel interested in the discussion. 'I don't want to go beggin'. I want a job.'

'Ah, all the boys say that,' said the Vicar, 'the young rascals! If I had my way, I would give them a good whipping all round.'

'Yes, and if we listened to all these stories the bench would have to sit all day long,' said the Town Clerk, giving the boy a copper and ordering him off.

'Off,' said the actress-'where to?'

'To Parker's Buildings,' said the Mayor. 'That's where these young rascals live. There is not a worse place in the whole town.'