Part II Chapter 7 The Children's Pilgrimage by L. T. Meade
SUSIE
Cecile had never anything more to say to the Salvation Army. What lay behind the scenes, what must shock a more refined taste, never came to her knowledge. To her that fervent, passionate meeting seemed always like the very gate of heaven. To her the Jesus she had long been seeking had at last come, come close, and entered into her heart of hearts. She no longer regretted not seeing Him in the flesh; nay, a wonderful spiritual sight and faith seemed born in her, and she felt that this spiritual Christ was more suited to her need. She got up gravely the next morning; her journey was before her, and the Guide was there. There was no longer the least reason for delay, and it was much better that she, Maurice, and Toby should start for France, while they had a little money that they could lawfully spend. When she had got up and dressed herself, she resolved to try the new powerful weapon she had got in her hand. This weapon was prayer; the Guide who was so near needed no darkness to enable Him to listen to her. She did not kneel, she sat on the side of her tiny bed, and, while Maurice still slept, began to speak aloud her earnest need:
"Jesus, I think it is hotter that me, and Maurice, and Toby should go to France while we have a little money left. Please, Jesus, if there is a man called Jography, will you help us to find him to-day, please?" Then she paused, and added slowly, being prompted by her new and great love, "But it must be just as you like, Jesus." After this prayer, Cecile resolved to wait in all day, for if there was a man called Jography, he would be sure to knock at the door during the day, and come in and say to Cecile that Jesus had sent him, and that he was ready to show her the way to France. Maurice, therefore, and Toby, went out together with Mrs. Moseley, and Cecile stayed at home and watched, but though she, watched all day long, and her heart beat quickly many times, there was never any sound coming up the funny stairs; the rope was never pulled, nor the boards lifted, to let in any one of the name of Jography. Cecile, instead of having her faith shaken by this, came to the wise resolution that Jography was not a man at all. She now felt that she must apply to Mrs. Moseley, and wondered how far she dare trust her with her secret.
"You know, perhaps, ma'am," she began that evening, when Moseley had started on his night duty, and Maurice being sound asleep in bed, she found herself quite alone with the little woman, "You know, perhaps, ma'am, that we two little children and our dog have got to go on a very long journey—a very, very long journey indeed."
"No, I don't know nothink about it, Cecile," said Mrs. Moseley in her cheerful voice. "What we knows, my man and me, is, that you two little mites has got to stay yere until we finds some good orphan school to send you to, and you has no call to trouble about payment, deary, for we're only too glad and thankful to put any children into our dead child's place and into Susie's place."
"But we can't stay," said Cecile; "we can't stay, though we'd like to ever so. I'm only a little girl. But there's a great deal put on me—a great, great care. I don't mind it now, 'cause of Jesus. But I mustn't neglect it, must I?"
"No, darling: Only tell Mammie Moseley what it is."
"Oh! May I call you that?"
"Yes; for sure, love. Now tell me what's yer care, Cecile, honey."
"I can't, Mammie, I can't, though I'd like to. I had to tell Jane Parsons. I had to tell her, and she was faithful. But I think I'd better not tell even you again. Only 'tis a great care, and it means a long journey, and going south. It means all that much for me, and Maurice, and Toby."
"Going south? You mean to Devonshire, I suppose, child?"
"I don't know. Is there a place called Devonshire there, ma'am? But we has to go to France—away down to the south of France—to the Pyrenees."
"Law, child! Why, you don't never mean as you're going to cross the seas?"
"Is that the way to France, Mammie Moseley? Oh! Do you really know the way?"
"There's no other way that I ever hear tell on, Cecile. Oh, my dear, you must not do that!"
"But it's just there I've got to go, ma'am; and me and Maurice are a little French boy and girl. We'll be sure to feel all right in France; and when we get to the Pyrenees we'll feel at home. 'Tis there our father lived, and our own mother died, and me and Maurice were born there. I don't see how we can help being at home in the Pyrenees."
"That may be, child; and it may be right to send a letter to yer people, and if they wants you two, and will treat you well, to let you go back to them. But to have little orphans like you wandering about in France all alone, ain't to be thought on, ain't to be thought on, Cecile."
"But whether my people write for me and Maurice or not, ma'am, I must go," said Cecile in a low, firm voice. "I must, because I promised—I promised one that is dead."
"Well, my darling, how can I help you if you won't conwide in me? Oh, Cecile! you're for all the world just like what Susie was; only I hopes as you won't treat us as bad."
"Susie was the girl who slept in our little bedroom," said Cecile. "Was she older than me, ma'am? and was she yer daughter, ma'am?"
"No, Cecile. Susie was nothink to me in the flesh, though, God knows, I loved her like a child of my own. God never gave me a bonnie girl to love and care for, Cecile. I had one boy. Oh! I did worship him, and when Jesus tuk him away and made an angel of him, I thought I'd go near wild. Well, we won't talk on it. He died at five years old. But I don't mind telling you of Susie."
"Oh! please, Mammie!"
"It was a year or more after my little Charlie wor tuk away," said Mrs. Moseley. "My heart wor still sore and strange. I guessed as I'd never have another baby, and I wor so bad I could not bear to look at children. As I wor walking over Blackfriars Bridge late one evening I heard a girl crying. I knew by her cry as she was a very young girl, nearly a child; and, God forgive me! for a moment I thought as I'd hurry on, and not notice her, for I did dread seeing children. However, her cry was very bitter, and what do you think it was?
"'Oh, Mammie, Mammie, Mammie!'
"I couldn't stand that; it went through me as clean as a knife. I ran up to her and said: 'What's yer trouble, honey?'
"She turned at once and threw her arms round me, and clung to me, nearly in convulsions with weeping.
"'Oh! take me to my mother,' she sobbed. 'I want my mother.'
"'Yes, deary, tell me where she lives,' I said.
"But the bonnie dear could only shake her head and say she did not know; and she seemed so exhausted and spent that I just brought her home and made her up a bed in your little closet without more ado. She seemed quite comforted that I should take to her, and left off crying for her mother. I asked her the next day a lot of questions, but to everything she said she did not know. She did not know where her mother lived now. She would rather not see her mother, now she was not so lonely. She would rather not tell her real name. I might call her Susie. She had been in France, but she did not like it, and she had got back to England. She had wandered back, and she was very desolate, and she had wanted her mother dreadfully, but not now. Her mother had been bad to her, and she did not wish for her now that I was so good. To hear her talk you'd think as she was hard, but at night John and I 'ud hear her sobbing often and often in her little bed, and naming of her mammie. Never did I come across a more willful bit of flesh and blood. But she had that about her as jest took everyone by storm. My husband and I couldn't make enough on her, and we both jest made her welcome to be a child of our own. She was nothing really but a child, a big, fair English child. She said as she wor twelve years old. She was lovely, fair as a lily, and with long, yellow hair."
"Fair, and with yellow hair?" said Cecile, suddenly springing to her feet. "Yes, and with little teeth like pearls, and eyes as blue as the sky."
"Why, Cecile, did you know her?" said Mrs. Moseley. "Yes, yes, that's jest her. I never did see bluer eyes."
"And was her name Lovedy—Lovedy Joy?" asked Cecile.
"I don't know, child; she wouldn't tell her real name; she was only jest Susie to us."
"Oh, ma'am! Dear Mrs. Moseley, ma'am, where's Susie now?"
"Ah, child! that's wot I can't tell you; I wishes as I could. One day Susie went out and never come back again. She used to talk o' France, same as you talk o' France, so perhaps she went there; anyhow, she never come back to us who loved her. We fretted sore, and we hadvertised in the papers, but we never, never heard another word of Susie, and that's seven years or more gone by."