Louisa looked, in part incredulous, in part frightened, in part overcome with quick sympathy, when this man of so much selfcommand, who had been so plain and steady through the late interview, lost his composure in a moment, and now stood with his hand before his face. She stretched out hers, as if she would have touched him; then checked herself, and remained still.
“Not e'en Rachael,” said Stephen, when he stood again with his face uncovered, “could mak sitch a kind offerin, by onny words, kinder. T” show that I'm not a man wi'out reason and gratitude, I'll tak two pound. I'll borrow “t for t” pay “t back. “Twill be the sweetest work as ever I ha done, that puts it in my power t” acknowledge once more my lastin thankfulness for this present action.”
She was fain to take up the note again, and to substitute the much smaller sum he had named. He was neither courtly, nor handsome, nor picturesque, in any respect; and yet his manner of accepting it, and of expressing his thanks without more words, had a grace in it that Lord Chesterfield could not have taught his son in a century.
Tom had sat upon the bed, swinging one leg and sucking his walkingstick with sufficient unconcern, until the visit had attained this stage. Seeing his sister ready to depart, he got up, rather hurriedly, and put in a word.
“Just wait a moment, Loo! Before we go, I should like to speak to him a moment. Something comes into my head. If you'll step out on the stairs, Blackpool , I'll mention it. Never mind a light, man!” Tom was remarkably impatient of his moving towards the cupboard, to get one. “It don't want a light.”
Stephen followed him out, and Tom closed the room door, and held the lock in his hand.
“I say!” he whispered. “I think I can do you a good turn. Don't ask me what it is, because it may not come to anything. But there's no harm in my trying.”
His breath fell like a flame of fire on Stephen's ear, it was so hot.
“That was our light porter at the Bank,” said Tom, “who brought you the message to-night. I call him our light porter, because I belong to the Bank too.”
Stephen thought, “What a hurry he is in!” He spoke so confusedly.
“Well!” said Tom. “Now look here! When are you off?”
“T” day's Monday,” replied Stephen, considering. “Why, sir, Friday or Saturday, nigh “bout.”
“Friday or Saturday,” said Tom. “Now look here! I am not sure that I can do you the good turn I want to do you—that's my sister, you know, in your room—but I may be able to, and if I should not be able to, there's no harm done. So I tell you what. You'll know our light porter again?”
“Yes, sure,” said Stephen.
“Very well,” returned Tom. “When you leave work of a night, between this and your going away, just hang about the Bank an hour or so, will you? Don't take on, as if you meant anything, if he should see you hanging about there; because I shan't put him up to speak to you, unless I find I can do you the service I want to do you. In that case he'll have a note or a message for you, but not else. Now look here! You are sure you understand.”
He had wormed a finger, in the darkness, through a button-hole of Stephen's coat, and was screwing that corner of the garment tight up round and round, in an extraordinary manner.
“I understand, sir,” said Stephen.
“Now look here!” repeated Tom. “Be sure you don't make any mistake then, and don't forget. I shall tell my sister as we go home, what I have in view, and she'll approve, I know. Now look here! You're all right, are you? You understand all about it? Very well then. Come along, Loo!”
He pushed the door open as he called to her, but did not return into the room, or wait to be lighted down the narrow stairs. He was at the bottom when she began to descend, and was in the street before she could take his arm.
Mrs. Pegler remained in her corner until the brother and sister were gone, and until Stephen came back with the candle in his hand. She was in a state of inexpressible admiration of Mrs. Bounderby, and, like an unaccountable old woman, wept, “because she was such a pretty dear.” Yet Mrs. Pegler was so flurried lest the object of her admiration should return by chance, or anybody else should come, that her cheerfulness was ended for that night. It was late too, to people who rose early and worked hard; therefore the party broke up; and Stephen and Rachael escorted their mysterious acquaintance to the door of the Travellers” Coffee House, where they parted from her.
They walked back together to the corner of the street where Rachael lived, and as they drew nearer and nearer to it, silence crept upon them. When they came to the dark corner where their unfrequent meetings always ended, they stopped, still silent, as if both were afraid to speak.
“I shall strive t” see thee agen, Rachael, afore I go, but if not—”
“Thou wilt not, Stephen, I know. “Tis better that we make up our minds to be open wi” one another.”
“Thou'rt awlus right. “Tis bolder and better. I ha been thinkin then, Rachael, that as “tis but a day or two that remains, “twere better for thee, my dear, not t” be seen wi” me. “T might bring thee into trouble, fur no good.”
“'Tis not for that, Stephen, that I mind. But thou know'st our old agreement. “Tis for that.”
“Well, well,” said he. “Tis better, onnyways.”
“Thou'lt write to me, and tell me all that happens, Stephen?”
“Yes. What can I say now, but Heaven be wi” thee, Heaven bless thee, Heaven thank thee and reward thee!”
“May it bless thee, Stephen, too, in all thy wanderings, and send thee peace and rest at last!”
“I towd thee, my dear,” said Stephen Blackpool—'that night—that I would never see or think o” onnything that angered me, but thou, so much better than me, should'st be beside it. Thou'rt beside it now. Thou mak'st me see it wi” a better eye. Bless thee. Good night. Good-bye!”
It was but a hurried parting in a common street, yet it was a sacred remembrance to these two common people. Utilitarian economists, skeletons of schoolmasters, Commissioners of Fact, genteel and used-up infidels, gabblers of many little dog's-eared creeds, the poor you will have always with you. Cultivate in them, while there is yet time, the utmost graces of the fancies and affections, to adorn their lives so much in need of ornament; or, in the day of your triumph, when romance is utterly driven out of their souls, and they and a bare existence stand face to face, Reality will take a wolfish turn, and make an end of you.
Stephen worked the next day, and the next, uncheered by a word from any one, and shunned in all his comings and goings as before. At the end of the second day, he saw land; at the end of the third, his loom stood empty.
He had overstayed his hour in the street outside the Bank, on each of the two first evenings; and nothing had happened there, good or bad. That he might not be remiss in his part of the engagement, he resolved to wait full two hours, on this third and last night.
There was the lady who had once kept Mr. Bounderby's house, sitting at the first-floor window as he had seen her before; and there was the light porter, sometimes talking with her there, and sometimes looking over the blind below which had BANK upon it, and sometimes coming to the door and standing on the steps for a breath of air. When he first came out, Stephen thought he might be looking for him, and passed near; but the light porter only cast his winking eyes upon him slightly, and said nothing.
Two hours were a long stretch of lounging about, after a long day's labour. Stephen sat upon the step of a door, leaned against a wall under an archway, strolled up and down, listened for the church clock, stopped and watched children playing in the street. Some purpose or other is so natural to every one, that a mere loiterer always looks and feels remarkable. When the first hour was out, Stephen even began to have an uncomfortable sensation upon him of being for the time a disreputable character.
Then came the lamplighter, and two lengthening lines of light all down the long perspective of the street, until they were blended and lost in the distance. Mrs. Sparsit closed the first-floor window, drew down the blind, and went up-stairs. Presently, a light went up-stairs after her, passing first the fanlight of the door, and afterwards the two staircase windows, on its way up. By and by, one corner of the second-floor blind was disturbed, as if Mrs. Sparsit's eye were there; also the other corner, as if the light porter's eye were on that side. Still, no communication was made to Stephen. Much relieved when the two hours were at last accomplished, he went away at a quick pace, as a recompense for so much loitering.