Chapter 3 Jill: A Flower Girl by L. T. Meade
About four o’clock on the following morning Mrs Robinson stirred, opened her eyes and looked around her.
The light was streaming full into the little bedroom. It was clean and fresh, for Jill would permit nothing else. There were no cobwebs to be seen on the walls, and the floor was white with constant scrubbing. The glass in the one small window was washed until it shone, and the little blind, which was neatly pinned across was fresh, and in perfect order.
Poll Robinson lay in bed and gazed around her. The scene of the night before bed passed completely from her memory and her mind now was altogether absorbed in wondering how she could outstrip Jill and smuggle some stale flowers, which she had hidden the night before under her bed, into her basket Jill never held with these doings, but Poll thought them perfectly justifiable. The way to do a thriving business was to mix the stale goods discriminately with the fresh, and to sell one with the other. Jill would not hear of it, and Poll had to own that Jill by her honesty and method, and by her own bright and spruce appearance, had gained a very tidy connection.
But though Poll liked the money which now flowed in regularly, she sighed more than once for the good old days when she need not scrub her sitting-room nor polish her windows, nor worry herself about her unsold flowers.
The flowers did very well thrust under the bed in the old times, and they sold very well, too, mixed up with fresh bunches the next day.
The neighbouring clock struck a quarter past four, and Mrs Robinson, with a profound sigh, raised herself on her elbow, and looked at her sleeping daughter.
There was a good deal of resemblance between the mother and child. Both were dark, and had big, brilliant eyes, and masses of raven hair.
The face of the older woman looked young enough this morning. The lines of care, pain, and dissipation had vanished with her last night’s sleep. A high colour, partly caused by an inward fever and ache, which scarcely ever left her, gave a false beauty to Poll Robinson’s face.
She stooped, kissed Jill on her forehead, and getting out of bed began to dress. She saw that the girl looked tired, and she determined to go to Covent Garden for the fresh flowers herself.
She hastily put on her clothes, and slipping her flowers from under the bed, went out into the kitchen. The boys were snoring loudly in their press bedstead. Poll went across the room, and shook Tom vigorously.
“Look yere,” she said, “you tell Jill that I’m fetching the flowers this morning. Tell her to lie easy, and take her sleep out. Do you hear me, you good-for-naught? Do you hear what I’m saying? or are ye too sleepy to take it all in?”
“I hear right enough, mother,” replied Tom, rubbing his sleepy eyes. “Are you better this morning, mother?”
“Yes, to be sure; why shouldn’t I be?”
Tom looked down at Bob, who was asleep. Then he glanced towards the open door of the bedroom. He was not at all afraid of his mother; but he had a wholesome dread of Jill.
“Look yere,” he said: “is it true what Hastie says?”
“What did Hastie say?”
Mrs Robinson placed her arms akimbo.
“He said as you were real bad last night, – real bad – and out in the street, you mind.”
“Well, and what ef I wor?”
“Only, Jill says it’s a lie. She said she’ll smack Hastie for saying it.”
Mrs Robinson’s face underwent a quick, queer change.
“Bless Jill,” she said. “You lie down and go to sleep, Tom, and don’t bother me.”
The boy slipped at once under the bed-clothes. He pretended to sleep, but he watched his mother furtively. Seen now in her fresh trim morning dress she was a presentable, and even handsome woman. She put on a coloured apron of the same pattern and design as Jill’s, twisted a turban round her head, and taking up her basket prepared to go out.
First of all, however, she went to an old bureau, and pulled open one of the small top drawers. In this drawer she and Jill kept their loose pence and silver. She was looking now for the money to buy the flowers with which she must stock her basket.
She knew that this time yesterday there were three shillings in pence and silver in the drawer. Now when she opened it, nothing whatever in the shape of money was to be seen. A piece of gay print, with which she intended to make an apron for herself, had also vanished.
Poll stood before the empty drawer with astonishment and confusion. Where had the money gone?
She thrust her hand into her pocket. Had she by any chance put it there when she went out to buy drink? If so, it was gone. Her pocket was quite destitute of the smallest coin. Could she have left the door open when she went out? No, she was quite confident on that point. She had a vivid recollection of locking the door, and taking the key with her.
The money was gone, and she could in no way account for its disappearance. What was she to do? She had not a halfpenny in the world to buy flowers with. Should she wake Jill, and tell her of her loss? No, she did not want to do that. The girl was looking sadly tired, and Poll did not want to confess that through her weakness and want of self-control some of their valuable little earnings had vanished.
She stood for a moment considering. Then she determined to go to the market, and trust to one of the flower merchants giving her sufficient flowers to stock her basket and Jill’s on credit. She must start at once, for the morning was passing, and the best and cheapest flowers would be sold.
She opened the door, and closed it softly behind her. Then she ran with a quick, light step down-stairs. No one would have recognised this trim and active woman for the disreputable-looking creature whom Jill had rescued the night before.
She quickly passed the buildings where their little flat was, and entered the low neighbourhood of Drury Lane. Drury Lane was a great haunt for flower girls. Poll had lived there herself for years. A memory of the old free life came back to her as she walked, and she could not help breathing a hearty sigh. The old life seemed attractive to her this morning; she forgot the blows her cruel husband had given her; she forgot the dirt, and the sickness, and the misery. She only remembered the absolute freedom from restraint, the jolly, never-may-care sort of existence. Everything was altered now; for Jill had taken the reins into her own hands. She and her mother belonged to the respectable class of flower girls. They bought good flowers straight from the market, and sold them to regular customers, and had their own acknowledged corner where they could show their wares in tempting and picturesque array. They were clean, decent sort of people now. Poll knew this, but she could not take pride in the fact this morning.
She walked quickly along, with her usual swinging, free sort of motion. Some of her old cronies nodded and smiled to her. Poll was so good-tempered and good-natured that the flower girls who were still low down, very low down in the world, could not look on her with envy. She would have shared her last crust with the worst of them.
Jill was not nearly so popular as her mother, far Jill was proud, and did not want to know the girls who had been the friends of Mrs Robinson’s youth.
A red-eyed woman, with a bent figure, a white face, and a constant cough, came up and joined Poll as she approached the neighbourhood of the great market.
“And how are you, Betsy?” asked Poll. “Does your cough hack you as bad as ever?”
“No, it’s better,” replied the poor creature. “I bought some of them cough-no-mores, and they seem to still it wonderful. I’m glad I met you, Poll; I think it wor the good Lord sent you in my way this morning.” The woman gasped painfully as she spoke.
“Here, lean on me, Betsy Peters,” said Poll, stopping, and offering her strong arm. “Don’t press me, like a good soul, for my side aches orful. Now then, wot is it, Betsy?”
“It certain sure wor the good Lord let me meet yer,” repeated Mrs Peters. “I cried to Him for near an hour last night, and yere’s the answer. It’s wonderful, that it is.”
“Only me and Jill we don’t believe in the pious sort,” answered Poll. “Not that it matters, ef I can help you, Betsy.”
“Yes, but it do matter,” replied Mrs Peters. “It seems a pity, for that sort of belief is a real comfort to poor folk. My word, ain’t I held on to it many and many a time? It wor only last night, and I were praying fit to burst my heart, and at larst it seemed to me as ef I see’d Him, His face wondrous pitiful-like, and his smile that encouraging. And I seemed to hear Him a-saying, ‘You hold on, Betsy Peters, for you’re a’most in Paradise now. You give a good grip o’ Me, and I’ll land you safe.’ My word! it did comfort me. It seemed to lift me out o’ myself. It’s a pity as you don’t hold on to that sort of thing, neighbour.”
Poll gave a quick, impulsive sort of sigh.
“Well, I’m glad as you finds the comfort o’ it, Betsy,” she said. “But what can I do for you? We’re most at the market now.”
“Ef you could lend me a shilling to buy flowers, neighbour? My man came in drunk last night, and he carried away every penny as I put by in the tin box. There’s little Jeanie, she is low and wake, and I’ve nothing for her breakfast but some tea-leaves that I’ve watered twice afore. Ef you lend me a shilling, Poll, jest to see me over to-day, I’ll pay you back sure and faithful to-morrow morning, so I will.”
Poll’s handsome face grew dark.
“In course I’d lend it to you, you poor critter,” she said, “but I han’t got it. You’ll scarce believe me when I say that I come out without a penny piece in my pocket. Jill and me, we are well-to-do, as flower girls go, but yesterday some villain of a thief came in and stole our bits of savings. I ha’ come out now to ask Dan Murphy to give me flowers on tick. I can’t help you, neighbour, however willin’ I am.”
Mrs Peters’s face turned deadly pale. She pulled her feeble arm away from Poll’s and looked at her with trembling lips and eyes that shone through a dim veil of tears.
“Oh, it seems orful,” she gasped. “And I made so positive as the Lord wor there, and that He heard me, and sent you as a hanswer. It seems – it seems as ef – ”
“As ef there weren’t no Lord,” repeated Poll.
“No, no; ef I thought that – ” Mrs Peters turned ghastly, and pressed her hand to her heaving heart.
“And you shan’t, neighbour,” exclaimed Poll, a great wave of crimson spreading over her face. “You shan’t lose your last drop of comfort, not ef I know why. You go and stand round there, neighbour, and I’ll come and share my flowers with you, see ef I don’t. I’ll go on tick for enough for us both. You stand there, Betsy, and wait, I’ll be safe to come back to you.”
Poll vanished almost as she spoke into the crowd of people who were already pressing towards the flower merchants and vendors of vegetables, roots, seeds, fruit, and the other articles sold in the market.
The scene was an intensely busy and lively one. The farmers, who had come up from the country in the quiet hours of the night, had unpacked their wares, and spread them out to the best advantage.
The costermongers and flower girls were eagerly buying, wrangling, chaffering, nudging, and jostling one another. Now and then a high coarse laugh rose on the air, now and then an oath; sometimes a cry of anger or disappointment.
Poll, threading her way through the thickest of the crowd, approached a stall which belonged to a flower merchant from whom she and Jill constantly bought their goods. She had little doubt that he would allow her to replenish her own basket and Jill’s, and to get a bunch of flowers over and above the quantity she required, for poor Mrs Peters.
Poll came up confidently.
“Is Dan Murphy here?” she asked of a small boy who stood by the stall, and who looked around him.
“Dan Murphy? Don’t yer know?” he exclaimed.
“Don’t I know what, you little beggar? Get out of my way, and I’ll speak to him myself.”
The boy responded to this sally by standing on his head. Then resuming his former upright position, he stuck his tongue in his cheek and winked at Poll.
She raised one vigorous arm to give him a blow across his face, but he dodged her, and vanished.
Her coast was now clear, however. She went up to the stall, which was well stocked with both fruit and flowers, and repeated her question.
“Is Dan Murphy here? I wish to speak to him.” When she asked her question a man with a Jewish type of face stepped forward and replied civilly:
“Can I serve you, ma’am?”
Poll bestowed a withering glance upon this individual.
“No, lad, you can’t serve me,” she replied. “I want the owner of this stall, Dan Murphy. He’s an old crony o’ mine.”
“You haven’t heard then, ma’am, that Murphy has sold his business to me. This stall is mine now.”
“My word, but that’s a blow.” Poll was turning away.
“Can’t I serve you, ma’am?” called the new owner of the stall after her.
“No, lad, no; that you can’t.”
She walked across the market, stepping daintily between long rows of flowering plants and great piles of strawberries, currants, raspberries, and other summer fruits. The air was redolent with the sweet, fresh smell of fruit and flowers; the hawkers were pressing their wares, and customers were rapidly filling their baskets.
Poll thrust her hands deep into the big pockets of her gay apron, and gazed around her.
A vendor with whom she often dealt held up some bunches of pink and white peonies for her inspection. She knew how Jill’s face would darken and glow with pleasure over the peonies. What a sight her basket would look filled with these exquisite flowers.
The man had poppies of various colours, too, and any amount of green for decoration.
“Come, missis,” he called to Poll. “You won’t see flowers like these yere in a hurry, and they’re cheap – dirt cheap. You see these poppies; ain’t they prime?”
Poll shook her head.
“Don’t tempt me,” she said. “I ain’t got a cent with me, and the only man as ’ud give me flowers on tick has just gone and sold his business. I do call it ’ard.”
“So do I,” said the owner of the poppies. He was a good-humoured, rosy-faced young farmer.
“You look a tidy sort,” he said; “not like any o’ they – ” He pointed with his thumb in a certain direction where a group of slatternly flower girls of the true Drury Lane type were standing. “You don’t belong to ’em,” he said.
“No, that I don’t. Worse luck for me. They ha’ got flowers to sell, and I han’t any.”
“I wouldn’t trust the likes o’ them with even a penn’orth of flowers on tick,” said the farmer.
“And right you are, young man. You keep what you has got and trust no one with goods until you gets money for ’em. Good morning to you.”
“But, I say, look you here, missis.”
“What is it?”
“You look a tidy sort. Maybe I’ll give you some of these poppies. You’re safe to sell ’em, and you can pay me to-morrow. Here’s a shilling’s worth – these pink ones, and some white, and a bunch of green. You bring me the money to-morrow, won’t you?”
The young fellow picked up a great bunch of the flowers, thrust them into Poll’s hands, and turned to attend to another customer.
She stood still for a moment too surprised to move. Then, with a fierce colour in her cheeks, strode across the market to the corner where she had asked Betsy Peters to wait for her.
“Yere, Betsy,” she said, thrusting all the flowers into the woman’s basket, “ef there is a thing as sells, it’s a white or a pink poppy. Seems as if the very of the stingiest of the ladies couldn’t stan’ up agin’ a pink poppy. You’ll owe me a shilling for these, Betsy, and you’ll pay me when yer can. Good morning to yer; I’m off back to Jill.”