some extent free from the curse, this particular pile of building, of which the garden formed the apex, had a grog-shop, opening on another court, for its foundation-stone. From that sink of iniquity, literal and unmitigated—though not unadulterated—spirits of evil rose like horrid fumes from the pit, and maddened the human spirits overhead. These, descending to the foundation-den, soaked themselves in the material spirit and carried it up, until the whole tenement seemed to reek and reel under its malign influence.
But, strange to say, the riot did not rise as high as the garden on the roof—only the echoes reached that little paradise.
Now it is a curious almost unaccountable fact, which no one would ever guess, that a teapot was the cause of this—at least a secondary cause—for a teapot was the chief instrument in checking, if not turning, the tide of evil. Yes, chimney-pot Liz held her castle in the very midst of the enemy, almost single-handed, with no visible weapon of offence or defence but a teapot! We say visible, because Liz did indeed possess other and very powerful weapons which were not quite so obvious—such as, the Word of God in her memory, the love of God in her heart, and the Spirit of God in her soul.
To the outside world, however, the teapot was her weapon and shield.
We have read of such a weapon before, somewhere in the glorious annals of city missions, but just now we are concerned only with the teapot of our own Liz of chimney-pot notoriety.
Seated, as we have said, in a rustic chair, gazing through the foliage at the busy Thames, and plying her knitting needles briskly, while the sun seemed to lick up and clear away the fogs and smoke of the great city, chimney-pot Liz enjoyed her thoughts until a loud clatter announced that Susy had knocked over the watering-pot.
“Oh! granny” (thus she styled her), “I’m so sorry! So stupid of me! Luckily there’s no water in it.”
“Never mind, dear,” said the old woman in a soft voice, and with a smile which for a moment exposed the waste of gums in which the solitary fang stood, “I’ve got no nerves—never had any, and hope I never may have. By the way, that reminds me—Is the tea done, Susy?”
“Yes, not a particle left,” replied the girl, rising from her floral labours and thereby showing that her graceful figure matched well with her pretty young face. It was a fair face, with golden hair divided in the middle and laid smooth over her white brow, not sticking confusedly out from it like the tangled scrub on a neglected common, or the frontal locks of a Highland bull.
“That’s bad, Susy,” remarked old Liz, pushing the fang about with her tongue for a few seconds. “You see, I had made up my mind to go down to-night and have a chat with Mrs Rampy, and I wouldn’t like to visit her without my teapot. The dear old woman is so fond of a cup of tea, and she don’t often get it good, poor thing. No, I shouldn’t like to go without my teapot, it would disappoint her, you know—though I’ve no doubt she would be glad to see me even empty-handed.”
“I should just think she would!” said Susy with a laugh, as she stooped to arrange some of the fastenings of her garden, “I should just think she would. Indeed, I doubt if that dear old woman would be alive now but for you, granny.”
The girl emphasised the “dear” laughingly, for Mrs Rampy was one of those middle-aged females of the destitute class whose hearts have been so steeled against their kind by suffering and drink as to render them callous to most influences. The proverbial “soft spot” in Mrs Rampy’s heart was not reached until an assault had been made on it by chimney-pot Liz with her teapot. Even then it seemed as if the softness of the spot were only of the gutta-percha type.
“Perhaps not, perhaps not my dear,” returned old Liz, with that pleased little smile with which she was wont to recognise a philanthropic success a smile which always had the effect of subduing the tooth, and rendering the plain face almost beautiful.
Although bordering on the lowest state of destitution—and that is a remarkably low state in London!—old Liz had an air of refinement about her tones, words, and manner which was very different from that of the poor people around her. This was not altogether, though partly, due to her Christianity. The fact is, the old woman had “seen better days.” For fifty years she had been nurse in an amiable and wealthy family, the numerous children of which seemed to have been born to bloom for a few years in the rugged garden of this world, and then be transplanted to the better land. Only the youngest son survived. He entered the army and went to India—that deadly maelstrom which has swallowed up so much of British youth and blood and beauty! When the old couple became bankrupt and died, the old nurse found herself alone and almost destitute in the world.
It is not our purpose to detail here the sad steps by which she descended to the very bottom of the social ladder, taking along with her Susan, her adopted daughter and the child of a deceased fellow-servant. We merely tell thus much to account for her position and her partial refinement—both of which conditions she shared with Susan.
“Now then,” said the latter, “I must go, granny. Stickle and Screw are not the men to overlook faults. If I’m a single minute late I shall have to pay for it.”
“And quite right, Susy, quite right. Why should Stickle and Screw lose a minute of their people’s work? Their people would be angry enough if they were to be paid a penny short of their wages! Besides, the firm employs over two hundred hands, and if every one of these was to be late a minute there would be two hundred minutes gone—nigh four hours, isn’t it? You should be able to count that right off, Susy, havin’ been so long at the Board-school.”
“I don’t dispute it, granny,” said the girl with a light laugh, as she stood in front of a triangular bit of looking-glass tying on her poor but neatly made hat. “And I am usually three or four minutes before my time, but Stickle and Screw are hard on us in other ways, so different from Samson and Son, where Lily Hewat goes. Now, I’m off. I’ll be sure to be back by half-past nine or soon after.”
As the girl spoke, footsteps were heard ascending the creaky wooden stair. Another moment and Tommy Splint entering with a theatrical air, announced—
“A wisitor!”
He was closely followed by Sam Blake, who no sooner beheld Susy than he seemed to become paralysed, for he stood gazing at her as if in eager but helpless amazement.
Susy was a good deal surprised at this, but feeling that if she were to wait for the clearing up of the mystery she would infallibly be late in reaching the shop of the exacting Stickle and Screw, she swept lightly past the seaman with a short laugh, and ran down-stairs.
Without a word of explanation Sam sprang after her, but, although smart enough on the shrouds and ladders of shipboard, he failed to accommodate himself to the stairs of rookeries, and went down, as he afterwards expressed it, “by the run,” coming to an anchor at the bottom in a sitting posture. Of course the lithe and active Susy escaped him, and also escaped being too late by only half a minute.
“Never mind, she’ll be back again between nine and ten o’clock, unless they keep her late,” said old Liz, after Sam had explained who he was, and found that Susy was indeed his daughter, and chimney-pot Liz the nurse who had tended his wife to her dying day, and afterwards adopted his child.
“I never was took aback so in all my life,” said the seaman, sitting down beside the old woman, and drawing a sigh so long that it might have been likened to a moderate breeze. “She’s the born image o’ what her dear mother was when I first met her. My Susy! Well, it’s not every poor seaman as comes off a long voyage an’ finds that he’s fallen heir to a property like that!”
“You may well be proud of her,” said old Liz, “and you’ll be prouder yet when
