The Hired Baby

But after Christmas had come and gone, and the melancholy days, the last beating of the failing pulse of the Old Year, throbbed slowly and heavily away, the baby took upon its wan visage a strange expression—the solemn expression of worn-out and suffering age. Its blue eyes grew more solemnly speculative and dreamy, and after a while it seemed to lose all taste for the petty things of this world and the low desires of mere humanity. It lay very quiet in Liz's arms; it never cried, and was no longer fretful, and it seemed to listen with a sort of mild approval to the tones of her voice as they rang out in the dreary streets, through which, by day and night, she patiently wandered. By-and-by the worsted bird, too, fell out of favour; it jumped and glittered in vain; the baby surveyed it with an unmoved air of superior wisdom, just as if it had suddenly found out what real birds were like, and was not to be deceived into accepting so poor an imitation of nature. Liz grew uneasy, but she had no one in whom to confide her fears. She had been very regular in her payments to Mother Mawks, and that irate lady, kept in order by her bull-dog of a husband, had been of late very contented to let her have the child without further interference. Liz knew well enough that no one in the miserable alley where she dwelt would care whether the baby were ill or not. They would tell her, "The more sickly the better for your trade." Besides, she was jealous; she could not endure the idea of any one tending it or touching it but herself. Children were often ailing, she thought, and if left to themselves without doctor's stuff they recovered sometimes more quickly than they had sickened. Thus soothing her inward tremors as best she might, she took more care than ever of her frail charge, stinting herself than she might nourish it, though the baby seemed to care less and less for mundane necessities, and only submitted to be fed, as it were, under patient and silent protest.

And so the sands in Time's hour-glass ran slowly but surely away, and it was New-Year's eve. Liz had wandered about all day, singing her little repertoire of ballads in the teeth of a cruel, snow-laden wind—so cruel that people otherwise charitably disposed had shut close their doors and windows, and had not even heard her voice. Thus the last span of the Old Year had proved most unprofitable and dreary; she had gained no more than sixpence; how could she return with only that humble amount to face Mother Mawks and her vituperative fury? Her throat ached; she was very tired, and, as the night darkened from pale to deep and starless shadows, she strolled mechanically from the Strand to the Embankment, and after walking some little distance she sat down in a corner close to Cleopatra's Needle—that mocking obelisk that has looked upon the decay of empires, itself impassive, and that still appears to say, "Pass on, ye puny generations! I, a mere carven block of stone, shall outlive you all!" For the first time in all her experience the child in her arms seemed a heavy burden. She put aside her shawl and surveyed it tenderly; it was fast asleep, a small, peaceful smile on its thin, quiet face. Thoroughly worn out herself, she leaned her head against the damp stone wall behind her, and clasping the infant tightly to her breast, she also slept—the heavy, dreamless sleep of utter fatigue and physical exhaustion. The solemn night moved on, a night of black vapours; the pageant of the Old Year's deathbed was unbrightened by so much as a single star. None of the hurrying passers-by perceived the weary woman where she slept in that obscure corner, and for a long while she rested there undisturbed. Suddenly a vivid glare of light dazzled her eyes; she started to her feet half asleep, but still instinctively retaining the infant in her close embrace. A dark form, buttoned to the throat and holding a brilliant bull's-eye lantern, stood before her.

"Come now," said this personage, "this won't do! Move on!"

Liz smiled faintly and apologetically.

"All right!" she answered, striving to speak cheerfully, and raising her eyes to the policeman's good-natured countenance. "I didn't mean to fall asleep here. I don't know how I came to do it. I must go home, of course."

"Of course," said the policeman, somewhat mollified by her evident humility, and touched in spite of himself by the pathos of her eyes. Then turning his lamp more fully upon her, he continued, "Is that a baby you've got there?"

"Yes," said Liz, half proudly, half tenderly. "Poor little dear! it's been ailing sadly—but I think it's better now than it was."

And, encouraged by his friendly tone, she opened the folds of her shawl to show him her one treasure. The bulls-eye came into still closer requisition as the kindly guardian of the peace peered inquiringly at the tiny bundle. He had scarcely looked when he started back with an exclamation:

"God bless my soul!" he cried, "it's dead!"

"Dead!" shrieked Liz; "oh, no, no! Not dead! Don't say so, oh, don't, don't say so! Oh, you can't mean it! Oh, for God's love, say you didn't mean it! It can't be dead, not really dead!—no, no, indeed! Oh, baby, baby! You are not dead, my pet my angel, not dead, oh no!"

And breathless, frantic with fear, she felt the little thing's hands and feet and face, kissed it wildly, and called it by a thousand endearing names, in vain—in vain! Its tiny body was already stiff and rigid; it had been a corpse more than two hours.

The policeman coughed, and brushed his thick gauntlet glove across his eyes. He was an emissary of the law, but he had a heart. He thought of his bright-eyed wife at home, and of the soft-cheeked, cuddling little creature that clung to her bosom and crowed with rapture whenever he came near.

"Look here," he said, very gently, laying one hand on the woman's shoulder as she crouched shivering against the wall, and staring piteously at the motionless waxen form in her arms; "it's no use fretting about it." He paused; there was an uncomfortable lump in his throat, and he had to cough again to get it down. "The poor little creature's gone—there's no help for it. The next world's a better place than this, you know! There, there, don't take on so about it"—this as Liz shuddered and sighed; a sigh of such complete despair that it went straight to his honest soul, and showed him how futile were his efforts at consolation. But he had his duty to attend to, and he went on in firmer tones: "Now, like a good woman, you just move off from here and go home. If I leave you here by yourself a bit, will you promise me to go straight home? I mustn't find you here when I come back on this beat, d' ye understand?" Liz nodded. "That's right!" he resumed, cheerily. "I'll give you just ten minutes; you just go straight home."

And with a "Good-night," uttered in accents meant to be comforting, he turned away and paced on, his measured tread echoing on the silence at first loudly, then fainter and fainter, till it altogether died away, as his bulky figure disappeared in the distance. Left to herself, Liz rose from her crouching posture; rocking the dead child in her arms, she smiled.

"Go straight home!" she murmured, half aloud. "Home, sweet home! Yes, baby; yes, my darling, we will go home together!"

And creeping cautiously along in the shadows, she reached a flight of the broad stone steps leading down to the river. She descended them, one by one; the black water lapped against them heavily, heavily; the tide was full up. She paused; a sonorous, deep-toned iron voice rang through the air with reverberating, solemn melody. It was the great bell of St. Paul's tolling midnight—the Old Year was dead.

"Straight home!" she repeated, with a beautiful, expectant look in her wild, weary eyes. "My little darling! Yes, we are both tired; we will go home! Home, sweet home! We will go!"

Kissing the cold face of the baby corpse she held, she threw herself forward; there followed a sullen, deep splash—a slight struggle—and all was over! The water lapped against the steps heavily, heavily, as before; the policeman passed once more, and saw to his satisfaction that the coast was clear; through the dark veil of the sky one star looked out and twinkled for a brief instant, then disappeared again. A clash and clamour of bells startled the brooding night, here and there a window was opened, and figures appeared in balconies to listen. They were ringing in the New Year—the festival of hope, the birthday of the world! But what were New Years to her, who, with white, upturned face, and arms that embraced an infant in the tenacious grip of death, went drifting, drifting solemnly down the dark river, unseen, unpitied by all those who awoke to new hopes and aspirations on that first morning of another life-probation! Liz had gone; gone to make her peace with God—perhaps through the aid of her "hired" baby, the little sinless soul she had so fondly cherished; gone to that sweetest "home" we dream of and pray for, where the lost and bewildered wanderers of this earth shall find true welcome and rest from grief and exile; gone to that fair, far glory-world where reigns the divine Master, whose words still ring above the tumult of ages: "See that ye despise not one of these little ones; for I say unto you, that their angels do always behold the face of My Father who is in heaven."

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