Hesba Stretton

“ When Jessica grew strong enough, many a cheerful walk had they together, in the early mornings, as they wended their way to the railway bridge, where the little girl took her place behind the stall and soon learned to serve the daily customers; and many a happy day was spent in helping to sweep and dust the chapel, into which she had crept so secretly at first, her great delight being to attend to the pulpit and the vestry, and the pew where the minister’s children sat, while Daniel and the woman he employed cleaned the rest of the building. ”

“ Some of the chief men belonging to the chapel urged the congregation to disperse and return to their homes; but they were too much excited to leave before it was known what had befallen the minister.
Jessica pushed her way—being small and nimble, and used to crowds—to the very door of the vestry, where Daniel stood to guard it from being invaded by too many strangers; and she waited there beside him until the door was opened by a hand-breadth, and a physician whispered from within, “It is not death, but a stroke.” ”

“ For several years the crowd of work-people8 had paused by the coffee-stall under the railway-arch, when one morning, in a partial lull of his business, the owner became suddenly aware of a pair of very bright dark eyes being fastened upon him and the slices of bread and butter on his board, with a gaze as hungry as that of a mouse which has been driven by famine into a trap. ”

“ Daniel had a good way to go, for the minister’s house was in an opposite direction to his own from the chapel. The November fogs still hung about London, and the lamps gave only a dim light through the gloom. Those who were yet walking about the streets marched quickly, as if anxious to reach whatever shelter they called their own. ”

“ Sometimes I’m afraid I love my money too much yet, but, Lord, if it’s that, or anything else that’s hard in my heart, so as to hinder me from doing what the Saviour, Jesus Christ, would do if he was in my place, I pray thee to take it away, and make me see clearly what my Christian duty is. Dear Lord, I beseech thee, keep both me and Jessica from evil.”
Daniel rose from his knees a good deal relieved and lightened in spirit. ”

“ Daniel see me?” asked Jessica.
“Nobody but papa is in the vestry,” answered Jane, “and he’ll tell us all, you and us, what we ought to do. You’ll not be afraid of him, will you?”
“No,” said Jessica cheerfully, following the minister’s children as they led her along the side of the chapel towards the vestry.
“He is not such a terrible personage,” said Winny, looking round encouragingly, as Jane tapped softly at the door, and they heard a voice saying, “Come in.” ”

“ The minister was the first to speak.
48 “Jessica,” he said, “there is a place close under my pulpit where you shall sit, and where I can see you all the time. Be a good girl, and listen, and you will hear something about God. Standring, put this little one in front of the pews by the pulpit steps.”
Before she could believe it, for very gladness, Jessica found herself inside the chapel, facing the glittering organ, from which a sweet strain of music was sounding. Not far from her Jane and Winny were peeping over the front of their pew with friendly smiles and glances. ”

“ You’re a very good man, aren’t you, Mr. Dan’el?”
“I don’t know,” he answered uneasily; “I’m afraid I’m not.”
“Oh, but you are, you know,” continued Jess. “You make good coffee; prime! And buns too! And I’ve been watching you hundreds of times afore you saw me, and the police leaves you alone, and never tells you to move on.18 Oh, yes! you must be a very good man.”
Daniel sighed, and fidgeted about his crockery with a grave and occupied air, as if he were pondering over the child’s notion of goodness. He made good coffee, and the police left him alone! ”

“ Why, Jessica, I love you more than my money, don’t I? God knows I love you better. I’d rather lose all my money, ay, and my place as chapel-keeper, than lose you.”
“You aren’t going to lose me,” said Jessica, with the same patient but sorrowful light in her eyes, “I’m only going away for a little while with my mother. She’s my mother, and I want to tell her all I know—that she may go to heaven as well as us. I’ll come back to-morrow.”
“She shall stay here,” said Daniel, hesitatingly.
51 “No, no,” answered Jessica, “that ’ud never do. She’ll be for stopping always if you give in once. ”

“ Daniel appeared again, arrayed in a long gown of black serge; and as she stood spell-bound gazing at the strange appearance of her patron, his eyes fell upon her, and he also was struck speechless for a minute, with an air of amazement and dismay upon his grave face.
“Come, now,” he exclaimed, harshly, as soon as he could recover his presence of mind, “you must take yourself out of this. ”

“ It’s such a long way, and Mr. Daniel has plenty of customers. No, he never would come to you for money.”
“Jessica,” he answered, “I will tell you what I will do. I will trust you with a shilling every Sunday, if you’ll promise to give it to your friend the very first time you see him. I shall be sure to know if you cheat me.” And the keen, piercing eyes of the minister looked down into Jessica’s, and once more the tender and pitying smile returned to his face. ”

“ Tell me, my child, do you understand what I preach about in my pulpit?”
“Oh, no, no!” answered Jessica, shaking her head deprecatingly, “only when you say God, and Jesus Christ, and10 heaven! I know what you mean by them.”
“Do you?” said the minister, with a very tender smile; “and do I say them often, Jessica?”
“Sometimes they come over and over again,” replied Jessica, “and then I feel very glad, because I know what you are preaching about. There is always God in your sermon, but sometimes there isn’t Jesus Christ and heaven.” ”

“ He looked at me, or the minister did, through and through, and he said, ‘Thou fool, this night thy soul shall be required78 of thee: then whose shall those things be which thou hast provided?’ And I could answer him nothing, Jess. He had come to a reckoning with me, and I could not say a word to him.”
“Aren’t you a good man, Mr. Daniel?” whispered Jessica.
“No; I’m a wicked sinner,” he cried, while the tears rolled down his solemn face. “I’ve been constant at God’s house, but only to get money; I’ve been steady and industrious, but only to get money ”

“ Every Sunday evening the barefooted and bareheaded child might be seen advancing confidently up to the chapel where rich and fashionable people worshipped God; but before taking her place she arrayed herself in a little cloak and bonnet which had once belonged to the minister’s elder daughter, and which was kept with Daniel’s serge gown, so that she presented a somewhat more respectable appearance in the eyes of the congregation. The minister had no listener more attentive, and he would have missed the pinched,70 earnest little face if it were not to be seen in the seat just under the pulpit. ”

“ But the Spirit of God has a gracious tyranny which requires more and more from the soul which begins to sacrifice itself. He had mastered his love of money for the sake of a child whom he loved; now he must conquer it to rescue a wretched woman whom he shrank from.
The struggle seemed to last long, but it was ended before Jessica came back to the fireside. Daniel’s prayer in the afternoon had been too sincere for him to be left in darkness to grope along a wrong path. His face wore a smile as Jessica took her sewing and sat down66 opposite to him ”

“ But when the minister advanced into the middle of the room Jessica’s white cheeks flushed into deep red.
“Oh, minister,” she cried, “God has given me every thing I wanted except paying Mr. Daniel for the coffee he used to give me!”
“Ah! but God has paid me over and over again,” said Daniel, rising to receive the minister. “He’s given me my own soul in exchange for it. Let me make bold to speak to you this once,86 sir. You’re a very learned man, and a great preacher, and many people flock to hear you till I’m hard put to it to find seats for them at times ”

“ The crowds who flocked to hear the minister were increasing every Sunday, and Daniel Standring had, with some reluctance, yielded to the necessity of sharing his office of pew-opener with a colleague; a man, however, of less dignity and solemnity of deportment than himself, and who was quite willing to look up to him as a superior. Moreover, the old members of the church, the “carriage people” especially, recognized him only as their chapel-keeper, and entrusted any message or any commission to him alone ”

“ Daniel finds me out he wont give me any more coffee.”
“Little girl,” said the elder child, in a composed and demure voice, “we don’t mean to be unkind to you; but what do you come here for, and why do you hide yourself behind the door?”
“I like to hear the music,” answered Jessica, “and I want to find out what pray is, and the minister, and God. I know it’s only for ladies and gentlemen, and fine children like you; but I’d like to go inside, just for once, and see what you do.”
“You shall come with us into our pew,” cried Winny, in an eager and impulsive tone ”

“ For they were old friends, having met many times a week for a dozen years in the same chapel; and since Jessica had drawn them closer together the learned and eloquent preacher had cared for Daniel’s illiterate soul, and the chapel-keeper had learned to pick up some crumbs of nourishment from the great feast which the minister prepared week after week for his intellectual congregation. He had not been, but Daniel was undisturbed, and so, patient and peaceful, with a smile upon his lips when he met Jessica’s wistful eyes, he waited for87 the last hour and the last moment to come. ”

“ Daniel,” she said, very sorrowfully, “when mother awoke this morning57 I told her everything about Jesus Christ, and God, and heaven; and she knew it all before! Before I was born, she said!”
“Ah!” ejaculated Daniel, but not in a tone of surprise; only because Jessica paused and looked mournfully into his face.
“Yes,” continued Jessica, shaking her head hopelessly, “she knew about it, and she never told me; never! She never spoke of God at all, only when she was cursing. I don’t know now anything that’ll make her a good woman. ”

“ Will she let you go?”
62 “No,” answered Jessica; “mother says she’ll never let me learn to read, or go to church; she says it would make me good for nothing. But please, sir, she doesn’t know any thing about your church, it’s such a long way off, and she hasn’t found me out yet. She always gets very drunk of a Sunday.”
The child spoke simply, and as if all she said was a matter of course; but the minister shuddered, and he looked through the broken window to the little patch of gloomy sky overhead. ”

“ If I took you to live in my house with my little daughters you would have to be washed and clothed in new clothing to make you fit for it. God wanted us to go and live at home with him in heaven, but we were so sinful that we could never have been fit for it. ”

“ She wished him to forget that she had ever been there, and by-and-by her wish was accomplished, and Daniel was no longer uneasy, while he was lighting the lamps, with the dread of seeing the child’s wild face starting up before him.
But the light evenings of summer-time were drawing near apace, and Jessica foresaw with dismay that her Sunday treats would soon be over. The38 risk of discovery increased every week, for the sun was later in setting, and there would be no chance of creeping in and out unseen in the broad daylight. ”

“ Tell me, and I’ll be off sharp.”
“They come here to pray,” whispered Daniel.
“What is pray?” asked Jessica.
“Bless the child!” cried Daniel, in perplexity. “Why, they kneel down in those pews; most of them sit, though; and the minister up in the pulpit tells God what they want.”
Jessica gazed into his face with such an air of bewilderment that a faint30 smile crept over the sedate features of the pew-opener.
“What is a minister and God?” she said; “and do ladies and gentlemen want any thing? I thought they’d every thing they wanted, Mr. Daniel.”
“Oh!” cried Daniel, “you must be off, you know. ”

“ So he sent his own Son to live among us, and die for us, to wash us from our sins, and to give us new clothing, and to make us ready to live in God’s house. When you ask God for any thing you must say, ‘For Jesus Christ’s sake.’ Jesus Christ is the Son of God.”
After these words the minister carefully67 descended the ladder, followed by Jessica’s bare and nimble feet, and she led him by the nearest way into one of the great thoroughfares of the city, where he said good-by to her, adding, “God bless you, my child,” in a tone which sank into Jessica’s heart. ”

“ In a screened and secluded corner of one of the many railway-bridges which span the streets of London there could be seen, a few years ago, from five o’clock every morning until half-past eight, a tidily set out coffee-stall, consisting of a trestle and board, upon which stood two large tin cans with a small fire of charcoal burning under each, so as to keep the coffee boiling during the early hours of the morning when the work-people were thronging into the city on their way to6 their daily toil. ”

“ It seemed as if he had never truly known God before; and though the sermon, by a student merely, was one which he would have criticised with contempt a week ago, now it was pleasant only to hear the names of his God and Saviour; just as one is pleased to hear even a stammering tongue speak the praises of those we love.
During the evening service Jessica went to stay with the minister’s children. Jane came down to her in the hall and71 told her they were to sit in their father’s room while the strange nurse and their own nurse were having tea together in an adjoining room. ”

“ More quickly than the words could be carried from lip to lip among the crowd Jessica glided through the midst to the pew where the minister’s children were17 kneeling, with arms about one another, sobbing out inarticulate prayers to God. She stood for a moment beside them, scarcely knowing what to say, and then she fell down on her knees by Winny, and put her lips close to her ear.
“Miss Winny,” she said with a trembling voice, “the doctor says it’s nothing but a stroke. He isn’t taken with death, Miss Jane; it’s only a stroke.” ”