Chapter 6 A LODGER.

HAT do you think I'm going to try my hand at to-day?" said Meg the next morning at breakfast.

"I'm sure I can't tell, dear."

"I'm going to make some bread!"

"Oh, that's it, is it?" asked Jem; "if I didn't guess as much when I saw you carryin' home that little red pan."

"But if it's heavy," said Meg dubiously, not referring to the pan, but to the bread, "shall you ever trust me with your flour again?"

He only smiled at that, and said,

"But you used to make it at home, for I'm sure as you told me so once."

"So I used, but not for a long time now; and you know there are a great many things that have to be right, or your bread won't be right."

"Well," said Jem, "let's get 'em all right, and then we shan't have no mishaps."

Meg laughed merrily.

"Jem, I must have some German yeast, and some nice good flour."

"I'll buy those for you as I pass along to my work, and tell them to send 'em in."

"But they'll have to come early," said Meg, "or it will not be a bit of use."

Jem promised to see to that; and then Meg propounded the question which had been burning on her lips all yesterday, only she could not get courage to bring it out.

"Jem," she began.

"Well, little woman?"

"Jem-should you very much mind if I were to earn something?"

Jem looked astonished, and then a cloud came over the brightness of his face. Did his little woman already begin to miss some of the things she had been accustomed to at the Hall?

"Why, dear?" he asked soberly.

"Because-at least-Jem-your mother said-if I helped her she should pay me!"

"And you did not like that?" asked Jem, looking relieved, but puzzled.

"I suppose I did not. I think I should like to help her for nothing-out of love to you, Jem, and by-and-by out of love to her."

"Yes, dear, so should I; but I see what mother feels. If she has more work than she can do alone, she would have to pay some one else, and would a deal rather the money went into your pocket. She would not be right to earn money at your expense."

"Not if we gave my time willingly?"

"No; but, Meg, you needn't do it unless you like it, my dear."

"I thought you would be sure to tell me to help your mother all I can," said Meg, almost ready to cry.

"An' so I should, sweetheart, while we had breath in our bodies, if she were ill or needed it. But it's different as it is. Jenny don't serve her well, that she don't."

"Who is 'Jenny'?" asked Meg.

"Jenny lives on our first floor. She has an old blind father, but she's out a deal. I fancy they have some sort of little income, for she don't work steady enough to keep him, and pay rent for those two rooms."

"And does she iron for mother?"

"Yes; and wash too sometimes. But mother has a knack or two with the washing, and likes to do most of that herself; she says folks don't get the things clean."

"Then you would like me to earn something if I could, Jem?" she asked.

"Well, dear," he answered very kindly, "if you was to ask me what I'd like, I'd say as I should like you never to have a need to work all your life! But, Meg, I've looked at things a long time, and I've laid awake at night too thinkin' of them, and I've come to learn this. That our God don't mean us to be idle-none of us-and that it's whatsoever our hands find to do, that we are to do with our might."

Meg's eyes lost their troubled look, and brightened up into their own serene sweetness under his earnest gaze.

"And so," he pursued, "the matter seems to me to stand like this: 'Is this what your dear little hand finds to do, or ain't it?'"

Meg sat thoughtfully silent for a few moments, and Jem got his hat. Then he came over to bid her good-bye.

"I won't forget the flour, little woman."

"And I won't forget what you've said, Jem. I think my hand does find it to do."

He kissed her tenderly.

"If we bring everythin' as we're doubtful of to whether He would like it--"

Meg nodded; and then he was gone, and she stood alone.

But in a moment his step was heard coming up, and his bright face peeped in.

"How much yeast did you say?"

"Oh, a halfpenny worth-if they would sell it-half an ounce, Jem; that will make up five pounds of flour well."

"All right."

This time she heard his step go to the bottom, and then she turned round and began to think of her day's work.

"I'll run up and ask mother first," she said; and locking her door, which they were obliged to do in a house with so many lodgers, she ran up-stairs.

In answer to her knock a rather far-off voice called "Come in."

She pushed open the door and entered, but Mrs. Seymour was nowhere to be seen. The bed-room door adjoining was ajar, but Meg hesitated to knock there, as she was sure her mother had said she had a lodger.

But in another moment a voice from within said, "Come in here, please; I can't bear to speak loud."

To Meg's great surprise the speaker's voice came from the further of two beds, and a wan pale face, belonging to an elderly woman, raised itself a little from the pillow.

"Did you want me to come in?" asked Meg, hesitating with a fluttering heart.

"Yes. Mrs. Seymour's run down to find Jenny; she promised to be up early, and she ain't come. You're young Mrs. Seymour, I suppose?"

Meg blushed as she answered, "Yes." She had hardly ever heard herself called by her new name.

"She won't be but a minute. Sit down, will yer. You didn't 'spect to find some one here, by your looks?"

"No," answered Meg.

The invalid shook her head.

"Ah, to think now I should see you before I've been made straight for the day, after all!"

Meg did not reply; but thinking it might be unkind to go back, she sat down on the edge of a chair, and tried to think of something to say.

"I've heard of you before to-day," said her mother-in-law's lodger, with an attempt at a smile.

"Have you?" asked Meg.

"And what's more, I've done for you what I wouldn't ha' believed any one would ha' persuaded me to do. But it was all along of Jem's kindness, and Mrs. Seymour's kindness."

"For me?" echoed Meg.

"For you. When Jem told me he wanted me to move up here, out of my back room-yours, as is now-I flatly refused, that I did."

"Oh," said Meg, "was it you who did that for me?"

"Yes, I did, and I don't repent it. In fact, I'm mighty glad I did, for I'm a deal more comfortable up here than I was down there. Of course there's the smell of the washing, but if it's bad I holler out to them to shut the door; and most times I don't mind it, and where I lie I can see 'em in there, going about and ironing, and fussing; and it ain't half so quiet and dull as it was. And then of nights, when I want anything, I can just give a call, and Mrs. Seymour's up in a minute! Jem said as it would be so, but I wouldn't credit it before."

"And what made you decide?" asked Meg, wondering in this mixture of self-interest and helplessness what had been the reason that influenced her at the bottom.

"It was one night," said the invalid with a softened look, "I was took awful bad. I don't know what it was made me so bad; but I had told Jem that evening, flat, that nothing on earth should move me out of the room where I'd lain for ten years, and it was no use his asking me.

"Well, as I said, I was took awful bad in my chest, and I laid there groaning for a long time. At last I managed to knock the wall, and got Jem to come to the door.

"'Oh, I'm dying,' says I; 'come in and see what you can do for me, Jem.'

"He'd put on his things when he heard me first; and in he came and raised me up, and then he goes up-stairs and calls his mother. But as luck would have it, the neighbour on the ground floor was ill too, and Mrs. Seymour couldn't leave her for a moment just then.

"When Jem come up and told me that, I thought I should ha' died straight away. But he comes over to me as quiet and kind as any woman, and he says, 'Miss Hobson, don't you take on; I'll do all as I can for you, if you'll tell me what to do.'

"So I told him to prop me up, for I couldn't fetch my breath, you see; and he goes and gets some hot water from his mother's boiler, and puts a shawl over my head, and makes me breathe the steam; and when I was a little easier he gets me a cup of tea, as did me a world of good.

"Once or twice while he was bending over me when I was so very bad, he says to me sort of soft-like, 'Look to Jesus, Miss Hobson-there's nought but Jesus can save a dying soul.'

"But I heard him without taking much notice.

"When I was a bit better, and had done gasping so bad, he sits down by my side as kind as any nurse, and he says to me, 'Miss Hobson, I'm a deal more anxious for you to get the Breath of Life than ever I am for you to be able to breathe easy. I wish you would think of that!' he says.

"And I says to him, 'What do you mean by the Breath of Life?'

"And he says, 'It's coming to Jesus, and getting forgiveness of all our sins from Him. That's the Breath of Life!'

"'I don't know how to come,' says I.

"'Ask Him to draw you!' says he. 'He tells you, "Him that cometh unto Me I will in no wise cast out." If you'll come to Jesus, you'll have new life.'

"Well, I don't know how it was, but I thought as it 'ud be a fine thing to get new life. So I laid myself back on my pillow and thought it over. But before long I says to him, 'Jem, do you ever pray?'

"'Ever?' says he; 'you know I do.'

"'Then pray for me,' says I, closing my eyes.

"When the grey dawn of morning crept into my room there he was, sitting by me and watching me still.

"'Jem,' says I, 'I've come to Jesus. I'm awful bad, but He's said as He'll not cast me out. I've come.'

"At that he looked as glad as if I'd left him a fortune. And then he gets up and lights my fire, and warms some gruel his mother had brought for me, and while I was eating it, I says to him, 'Jem,' says I, 'you may have it!'

"'Have what?' says he.

"'My room,' says I. And that's how it was as I moved up here to make room for you!"

Meg had sat spell-bound, listening to the woman's words, her interest in her Jem swallowed up in her greater interest in this soul's struggle from death to life.

"Oh, thank you for telling me," she exclaimed at last.

But the invalid spoke again.

"I've been a selfish woman all my life, and now I've come near the end of it, I'm a selfish old woman still; but my Jesus is going to cure me of that. I tell Him about it every day, and He helps me every day to get the better of it, a little bit."

"Oh, Miss Hobson," said Meg, coming close to her, "I do want to get like Jesus too. Will you help me?"

"Me, my dear?"

"Yes; I'm sure if you want to so much, you can show me how."

"He teaches," she answered, "teaches every day."

Just as she said these words Mrs. Seymour pushed open the door, and not seeing Meg, said anxiously,

"There! Jenny's been and played truant again. Her old father says as her uncle has come and fetched her to spend the day over at Brixton."

Then she caught sight of Meg, who hastened to explain why she was there, and her mother-in-law said,

"Why, my dear, you've come in my time of need. Do you mean you will work for me as I proposed?"

"Yes," answered Meg, "if it would be a comfort to you."

Mrs. Seymour looked exceedingly relieved.

"Can you come at once?" she asked.

"When I have made some bread," answered Meg, "and tidied up a bit."

"Bread?" said Mrs. Seymour.

Meg smiled.

"I'm going to try; and if I succeed I'll bring you a loaf, mother! Please don't think I'm a new broom!"

"You're a nice broom!" said her mother-in-law, with rare enthusiasm, "and I'll come down to see you make it one of these days. Dear, dear, can you make bread, to be sure? I've often wished to see it done!"

* * *