He slapped his chest with Ascott"s merry laugh of old. It cheered Elizabeth for a long while afterward.
By-and-by she had to take little Henry to Brighton, and lost sight of "John Smith" for some time longer.
It was on a snowy February day, when, having brought the child home quite strong, and received unlimited grat.i.tude and guineas from the delighted father, Master Henry"s faithful nurse stood in her usual place at the dining-room door, waiting for the interminable grace of "only five minutes more" to be over, and her boy carried ignominiously but contentedly to bed.
The footman knocked at the door. "A young man wanting to speak to master on particular business.
"Let him send in his name."
"He says you wouldn"t know it, Sir."
"Show him in, then. Probably a case of charity, as usual. Oh!"
And Mr. Ascott"s opinion was confirmed by the appearance of the shabby young man with the long beard, whom Elizabeth did not wonder he never recognized in the least. She ought to have retired, and yet she could not. She hid herself partly behind the door, afraid of pa.s.sing Ascott; dreading alike to wound him by recognition or non-recognition. But he took no notice. He seemed excessively agitated.
"Come a-begging, young man, I suppose? Wants a situation, as hundreds do, and think that I have half the clerkships in the city at my disposal, and that I am made of money besides. But it"s no good, I tell you, Sir; I never give nothing to strangers, except--Here, Henry, my son, take that person there this half crown."
And the little boy, in his pretty purple velvet frock and his prettier face, trotted across the room and put the money into poor Ascott"s hand. He took it; and then to the astonishment of Master Henry, and the still greater astonishment of his father, lifted up the child and kissed him.
"Young man, young fellow--"
"I see you don"t know me, Mr. Ascott, and it"s not surprising. But I have come to repay you this--" he laid a fifty pound note down on the table. "Also, to thank you earnestly for not prosecuting me, and to say--"
"Good G.o.d!"--the sole expletive Peter Ascott had been heard to use for long. "Ascott Leaf, is that you? I thought you were in Australia, or dead, or something."
"No, I"m alive and here, more"s the pity perhaps. Except that I have lived to pay you back what I cheated you out of. What you generously gave me I can"t pay, though I may sometime. Meantime, I have brought you this. It"s honestly earned. Yes." observing the keen doubtful look, "though I have hardly a coat to my back, I a.s.sure you it"s honestly earned."
Mr. Ascott made no reply. He stooped over the bank-note, examined it, folded it, and put it into his pocket-book; then, after another puzzled investigation of Ascott, cleared his throat.
"Mrs. Hand, you had better take Master Henry up stairs."
An hour after, when little Henry had long been sound asleep, and she was sitting at her usual evening sewing in her solitary nursery, Elizabeth learned that the "shabby young man" was still in the dining-room with Mr. Ascott, who had rung for tea, and some cold meat with it. And the footman stated, with undisguised amazement, that the shabby young man was actually sitting at the same table with master!
Elizabeth smiled to herself and held her tongue. Now, as ever, she always kept the secrets of the family.
About ten o"clock she was summoned to the dining-room.
There stood Peter Ascott, pompous as ever, but with a certain kindly good-humor lightening up his heavy face, looking condescendingly around him, and occasionally rubbing his hands slowly together, as if he were exceedingly well pleased with himself. There stood Ascott Leaf, looking bright and handsome, in spite of his shabbiness, and quite at his ease--which small peculiarity was never likely to be knocked out of him under the most depressing circ.u.mstances.
He shook hands with Elizabeth warmly.
"I wanted to ask you if you have any message for Liverpool. I go there to-morrow on business for Mr. Ascott, and afterward I shall probably go and see my aunts." He faltered a moment, but quickly shook the emotion off. "Of course, I shall tell them all about you, Elizabeth. Any special message, eh?"
"Only my duty, Sir, and Master Henry is quite well again," said Elizabeth, formally, and dropping her old-fashioned courtesy; after which, as quickly as she could, she slipped out of the dining-room.
But, long, long after, when all the house was gone to bed, she stood at the nurser window, looking down upon the trees of the square, that stretched their motionless arms up into the moonlight sky--just such a moonlight as it was once, more than three years ago, the night little Henry was born. And she recalled all the past, from the day when Miss Hilary hung up her bonnet for her in the house-place at s...o...b..ry; the dreary life at No. 15; the Sunday nights when she and Tom Cliffe used to go wandering round and round the square.
"Poor Tom," said she to herself, thinking of Ascott Leaf, and how happy he had looked, and how happy his aunts would be to-morrow.
"Well, Tom would be glad too, if he knew all."
But, happy as every body was, there was nothing so close to Elizabeth"s heart as the one grave over which the snow was now lying, white and peaceful, out at Kensal Green.
Elizabeth is still living--which is a great blessing, for n.o.body could well do without her. She will probably attain a good old age; being healthy and strong, very equable in temper now, and very cheerful too, in her quiet way.
Doubtless, she will yet have Master Henry"s children climbing her knees, and calling her "Mammy Lizzie."
But she will never marry--She never loved any body but Tom.
THE END.