Full text of "Zoe"
by the author of
/
Miss Toosey s Mission" an
^
v U ui
ZOE.
BY THE AUTHOR OF Miss TQOSEY S MISSION.
Olorks bg ti)c Same <3utbor.
MISS TOOSEY S MISSION, AND
LADDIE.
i6mo. Cloth. 50 cents.
TIP-CAT.
i6mo. Cloth. $1.00.
OUR LITTLE ANN.
6mo. Cloth. $1.00.
PEN.
i6mo. Cloth. $1.00.
LIL.
i6mo. Cloth. $1.00.
ZOE.
6mo. Cloth. 60 cents.
ROBERTS BROTHERS, PUBLISHERS,
BOSTON.
O.R,
BY THE AUTHOR OP
**-, Lt- *- T-V ^rt^Ji-^L (ce^it
MISS TOOSEY S MISSION^IADDIE, TIP-CAT, OUR LITTLE
ANN, PEN, AND LIL.
BOSTON:
ROBERTS BROTHERS.
1890.
Snfbrrsitn $rrss:
JOHN WILSON AND SON, CAMBRIDGE.
ZOE.
CHAPTER I.
" HATH this child been already bap
tized, or no ? "
"No, she aint; leastwise we don t
know as how she ve been or no, so
we thought as we d best have her
done."
The clergyman who was taking Mr.
Clifford s duty at Downside for that
Sunday thought that this might be
the usual undecided way of answer
ing among the natives, and proceeded
with the service. There were two
961691
6 ZOE.
71* *~* * / * r
Other ; bat>iee .also-, brought that after
noon, one of which was crying lus
tily, so that it was not easy to hear
what the sponsors answered ; and,
moreover, the officiating clergyman
was a young man, and the prospect
of holding that screaming, red-faced,
little object made him too nervous
and anxious to get done with it to
stop and make further inquiries.
The woman who returned this un
decided answer was an elderly woman,
with a kind, sunburnt, honest face,
very much heated just now, and em
barrassed too ; for the baby in her
arms prevented her getting at her
pocket handkerchief to wipe the per
spiration from her brow and pulling
ZOE. 7
her bonnet on to its proper position
on her head. The man beside her
was also greatly embarrassed, and
kept shuffling his large hob-nailed
shoes together, and turning his hat
round and round in his fingers. I
think that really that hat was the
chief cause of his discomfort, for he
was so accustomed to have it on his
head that he could not feel quite
himself without it ; and, indeed, his
wife could hardly recognize him, as
she had been accustomed to see him
wearing it indoors and out during
the twenty years of their married
life, pushed back for meals or smok
ing, but always on his head, except
in bed ; and even there, report says,
8 ZOE.
on cold winter nights, he had re
course to it to keep off the draught
from that cracked pane in the win
dow. His face, like his wife s, was
weather-beaten, and of the same broad,
flat type as hers, with small, surprised,
dazzled-looking, pale blue eyes, and
a tangle of grizzled light hair under
his chin. He was noticeable for the
green smock-frock he wore, a gar
ment which is so rapidly disappear
ing before the march of civilization,
and giving place to the ill-cut, ill-
made coat of shoddy cloth, which
is fondly thought to resemble the
squire s.
The christening party was com
pleted by a hobbledehoy lad of about
ZOE. y
sixteen, who tried to cover his invin
cible shyness by a grin, and to keep
his foolish eyes from the row of farm
boys in the aisle, whose critical glances
he felt in every pore. He was so like
both father and mother, that there
was no mistaking his parentage ; but
when Mrs. Gray took off the shep-
herd s-plaid shawl in which the baby
was wrapped, such a little dark head
and swarthy face were exposed to
view as might have made intelligent
spectators (if there were any in Down
side church that afternoon, which I
doubt) reflect on the laws of heredity
and reversion to original types.
" Name this child ! "
The clergyman had got successfully
10 ZOE.
through his business with the roaring
George Augustus and the whimper
ing Alberta Florence, and had now
the little, quiet, brown-faced baby in
his arms. Even a young and unmar
ried man was fain to confess that it
was an unusually pretty little face that
lay against his surplice, with a pointed
chin, and more eyebrows and lashes
than most young babies possess, and
with dark eyes that looked up at
him with a certain intelligence, , re
cognizable even to an unprejudiced
observer.
" Name this child ! "
Mrs. Gray had taken advantage of
this opportunity to mop her forehead
with her blue and white pocket hand-
ZOE. 11
kerchief, and wrestle with her bon
net s unconquerable tendency to slip
off behind, and the clergyman passed
the question on to her husband,
who fixed his eye on a bluebottle
buzzing in one of the windows,
and jerked out what sounded like
"Joe."
" I thought it was a girl," whis
pered the clergyman. " Joe, did you
say ? "
" No, it aint that zactly. Here,
Liza, can t you tell the gentleman ?
You knows best what it be."
The next attempt sounded like
" Sue," and the clergyman suggested
Susan as the name, but that would
not do.
12 ZOE.
\
" Zola " seemed to him, though not
a reader of French novels, unsuit
able, and " Zero/ too, he could not
quite appreciate.
" Dashun ! if I can make it out, an
outlandish sorter name ! " said Gray,
with a terrible inclination to put on
his hat in the excitement of the mo
ment, only checked by a timely
nudge from his wife s elbow ; " here,
aint you got it wrote down some-
wheres ? Can t you show it up ? "
And after a lengthened rummage
in a voluminous pocket, and the pro
duction of several articles irrelevant
to the occasion, a thimble, a bit of
ginger, and part of a tract, Mrs.
Gray brought to light a piece of
ZOE. 13
paper, on which was written the
name " Zoe."
" Zoe, I baptize thee "
A sudden crash on the organ-
pedals followed these words. Mr.
Robins, the organist, had, perhaps,
been asleep and let his foot slip on
to the pedals, or, perhaps, he had
thought there was no wind in the
instrument and that he could put
his foot down with impunity. He
was plainly very much ashamed of
himself for what had happened, and
it was only right, that he should be,
for of course it made all the school
children giggle and a good many of
their elders too, who should have
known better.
14 ZOE.
The boy \vlio blew the organ de
clared that he turned quite red and
bent his head over the keys as if he
were examining something on them,
and he was evidently nervous and
upset, for he made ever so many mis
takes in the concluding parts of the
service, and to the great surprise and
to the satisfaction of the blower, cut
the voluntary at the end unusually
short, ending it in an abrupt and
discordant way, which, I am sorry to
say, the blower described as "a owl/*
though any shock that the boy s mus
ical taste sustained was compensated
for by the feeling that he would be
at home at least ten minutes earlier
than usual to tea.
ZOE. 15
Now it so happened that Mr. Robins
was in the vestry when the christen
ing party came in to give the partic
ulars about the babies to be entered
in the register. He had come to
fetch a music-book, which, however,
it appeared after all had been left at
home ; but the clergyman was glad
of his help in making out the story
of the little Zoe who had just been
baptized.
I have spoken before of intelligent
observers noticing and drawing argu
ments from the entire want of likeness
between Zoe and her parents; but all
the observers on this occasion whether
intelligent or not, with the exception
of the officiating clergyman, were
16 ZOE.
quite aware that Zoe was not the Grays
baby, but was a foundling child picked
up one night by Gray in his garden.
Of her antecedents nothing was
known, and, of course, any sensible
people would have sent her to the
workhouse, everyone agreed on this
point and told the Grays so ; and yet,
I think, half the women who were so
positive and severe on Mrs. Gray s
folly would have done just the same.
We do not half of us know how
kind-hearted we are till we are tried,
or perhaps it is our foolishness that
we do not realize.
Gray was only a laborer with twelve
shillings a week and a couple of
pounds more at harvest, and, of course,
ZOE. 17
in bad weather there was no work and
no wages, which is the rule among the
agricultural laborers about Downside,
as in many other parts, so did not
present itself as a grievance to Gray s
mind, though, to be sure, in winter or
wet seasons it was a hard matter to
get along. But it was neighbors fare,
and none of them felt hardly used, for
Farmer Benson, what with bad sea
sons and cattle plague, was not much
better off than they were, and the men
knew it.
But out of these wages it was hardly
to be expected of the most provident
of people that anything could be laid
by for old age or a rainy day ; indeed,
there seemed so many rainy days in
2
18 ZOE.
the present that it was not easy to
give much thought to those in the
future. Of course too the local provi
dent club had come to utter and hope
less grief. Is there any country place
where this has not been the case?
Gray had paid into it regularly for
years and had gone every Whitmon-
day to its dinner, his one voluntary
holiday during the year, on which
occasion he took too much beer as a
sort of solemn duty connected with his
membership. When it collapsed he
was too old to join another club, and
so was left stranded. He bore it very
philosophically ; indeed, I think it was
only on Whitmonday that he felt it at
all, as it seemed strange and unnatural
ZOE. 19
to go to bed quite sober on that day
as he did on all other days of the year.
On all other occasions he was a
thoroughly sober man, perhaps, how
ever, more from necessity than choice,
as the beer supplied by Farmer Ben
son in the hayfield was of a quality on
which as the men said you got " no
forrarder " if you drank a hogshead,
and Gray had no money to spare from
the necessaries of life to spend on
luxury, even the luxury of getting
drunk.
He was in one way better off than
his neighbors from a worldly point of
view, in that he had not a large family,
as most of them were blessed with ;
for children are a blessing, a gift and
20 ZOE.
heritage that coineth of the Lord, even
when they cluster round a cold hearth
and a scanty board. But Gray had
only two sons, the elder of whom,
Tom, we have seen at Zoe s christen
ing, and who had been at work four
years, having managed at twelve to
scramble into the fifth standard, and
at once left school triumphantly, and
now can neither read nor write,
having clean forgotten everything
drummed into his head, but earns
three shillings and sixpence a week
going along with Farmer Benson s
horses, from five o clock in the
morning till six in the evening, the
long w r et furrows and heavy ploughed
land having made havoc of his
ZOE. 21
legs, as such work does with most
plough-boys.
The younger boy, Bill, is six years
younger and still at school, and having
been a delicate child, or as his mother
puts it. " enjoying bad health," is not
promising for farm-work ; and, being
fond of his book and a favorite at
school, his mother cherishes hopes
of his becoming a school-teacher in
days to come.
But such is the perversity of human
nature that though many a Downside
mother with a family of little steps
envied Mrs. Gray her compact family
and the small amount of washing at
tached to it, that ungrateful woman
yearned after an occupant for the old
22 ZOE.
wooden cradle, and treasured up the
bits of baby things that had belonged
to Tom and Bill, and nursed up any
young thing that came to hand and
wanted care, bringing up a mother
less blind kitten with assiduous care
and patience, as if the supply of that
commodity was not always largely in
excess of the demand, and lavishing
more care on a sick lamb or a super
fluous young pig than most of the
neighbors* babies received.
So when one evening in May Gray
came in holding a bundle in his arms
and poked it into her lap as she sat
darning the holes in Tom s stockings
(she was not good at needlework, but
she managed, as she said, to* " goblify "
ZOE. 23
the holes), he knew pretty well that
it was into no unwilling arms that he
gave the baby.
" And a mercy it was as the darning-
needle didn t run right into the little
angel," Mrs. Gray always said in re
counting the story.
lie had been down to the village
to fetch some tobacco, for the Grays
cottage was right away from the vil
lage, up a lane leading on to the hill
side, and there were no other cottages
near. Tom was in bed, though it was
not eight yet, but he was generally
ready for bed when he had had his
tea; and Bill was up on the hill, a
favorite resort of his, and especially
when it was growing dark and the
24
ZOE.
great indigo sky spread over him, with
the glory of* the stars coming out.
" He never were like other lads," his
mother used to say with a mixture of
pride and irritation ; " always moon
ing about by himself on them old
hills."
The cottage door stood open as it
always did, and Mrs. Gray sat there,
plainly to be seen from the lane, with
Tom s gray stocking and her eyes and
the tallow candle as near together as
possible. She did not hear a sound,
though she was listening for Bill s
return, and even though Tom s snores
penetrated the numerous crevices in
the floor above, they were hardly
enough to drown other sounds.
ZOE. 25
So there was no knowing when the
bundle was laid just inside the cottage
gate, not quite in the middle of the
brick path, but on one side against
the box edging-, where a clump of
daffodils nodded their graceful heads
over the dark velvet polyanthus in
the border. Gray nearly stepped
upon the bundle, having large feet
and the way of walking which cov
ers a good deal of ground to right
and left, a way which plough driv
ing teaches.
Mrs. Gray heard an exclamation.
" Dashun! " was, I think, Gray s fav
orite ejaculation, which I am afraid is
an imprecation, but of a mild order,
and may perhaps be allowed to pass,
26 ZOE.
as expletives of some kind seem a
necessity to human nature.
And then Gray came in, and, as
1 have said, did his best to impale the
bundle, baby and all, on the top of his
wife s darning-needle.
CHAPTER II.
THE organist of Downside, Mr.
Robins, lived in a little house close
to the church.
Mr. Clifford the vicar was accounted
very lucky by the neighboring clergy
for having such a man, and not being
exposed to all the vagaries of a young
schoolmaster, or, perhaps still worse,
schoolmistress, with all the latest mus
ical fancies of the training colleges.
Neither had he to grapple with the
tyranny of the leading bass nor the
conceit and touchiness that seems in
separable from the tenor voice, since
28
ZOE.
Mr. Robins kept a firm and sensible
hand on the reins, and drove that gen
erally unmanageable team, a village
choir, with the greatest discretion.
But when Mr. Clifford was compli
mented by his friends on the posses
sion of such a treasure, he accepted
their remarks a little doubtfully, be
ing sometimes inclined to think that
he would almost rather have had a
less excellent choir and have had some
slight voice in the matter himself.
Mr. Robins imported a certain sol
emnity into the musical matters of
Downside, which of course was very
desirable as far as the church services
were concerned ; but when it came to
penny-readings and village concerts,
ZOE. 29
Mr. Clifford and some of the parish
ioners were disposed to envy the
pleasant ease of such festivities in
other parishes, where, though the
music was very inferior, the enjoy
ment of both performers and audi
ence was far greater.
Mr. Robins, for one thing, set his
face steadily against comic songs; and
Mr. Clifford in his inmost heart had
an ungratified ambition to sing a cer
tain song, called " The Three Little
Pigs," with which Mr. Wilson in the
next parish simply brought down the
house on several occasions ; though
Mr. Clifford felt he by no means did
full justice to it, especially in the
part where the old mother "waddled
30
about, saying Urn ph! Umph! Umph!
while the little ones said wee! wee! *
To be sure Mr. Wilson suffered for
months after these performances from
outbursts of grunting among his youth
ful parishioners at sight of him, and
even at the Sunday-school one auda
cious boy had given vent on one
occasion to an " Umph ! " very true
indeed to nature, but not conducive
to good behavior in his class. But Mr.
Clifford did not know the after effects
of Mr. Wilson s vocal success.
Likewise Mr. Robins selected very
simple music, and yet exacted an
amount of practising unheard of at
Bilton or Stokeley, where, after one
or two attempts, they felt competent
ZOE. 31
to face a crowded school-room, and
yell or growl out such choruses as
"The Heavens are telling" or "The
Hallelujah Chorus/ with a lofty in
difference to tune or time, and with
their respective schoolmasters banging
away at the accompaniment within a
bar or two of the singers, all feeling
quite satisfied if they finished up all
together on the concluding chord or
thereabouts, flushed and triumphant,
with perspiration standing on their
foreheads, and an expression of hon
est pride on their faces, as much as
to say, " There s for you. What do
you think of that ? "
If success is to be measured by
applause, there is no doubt these per-
32 ZOE.
formances were most successful, far
more so than the accurately rendered
" Hardy Norseman " or " Men of Har-
lech" at Downside, in which lights
and shades, pianos and fortes were
carefully observed, and any attempt
on any one s part, even the tenors,
to distinguish themselves above the
others was instantly suppressed. The
result, from a musical point of view,
was no doubt satisfactory ; but the
applause was of a very moderate
character, and never accompanied by
those vociferous " angcores " which are
so truly gratifying to the soul of mus
ical artistes.
Mr. Robins was a middle-aged man,
looking older than he really was, as
ZOE.
33
his hair was quite white. He had
some small independent means of his
own, which he supplemented hy his
small salary as organist, and by giv
ing a few music lessons in the neigh
borhood. He had been in his earlier
years a vicar-choral at one of the
cathedrals, and had come to Down
side twenty years ago, after the death
of his wife, bringing with him his
little girl, in whom he was entirely
wrapt up.
He spoilt her so persistently, and
his housekeeper, Mrs. Sands, was so
gentle and meek-spirited, that the
effect on a naturally self-willed child
can easily be imagined ; and as she
grew up, she became more and more
3
34 ZOE.
uncontrollable. She was a pretty,
gypsy-looking girl, inheriting her
sweet looks from her mother and
her voice and musical taste from her
father. There was more than one
young farmer in the neighborhood
who cast admiring glances towards
the corner of the church near the
organ where the organist s pretty
daughter sat, and slackened the pace
of his horse as he passed the clipped
yew-hedge by the church, to catch
a glimpse of her in the bright little
patch of garden, or to hear her clear
sweet voice singing over her work.
But people said Mr. Eobins thought
no one good enough for her, and
though he himself had come of hum-
ZOE. 35
ble parentage, and in no way re
garded himself nor expected to be
regarded as a gentleman, it was gen
erally understood that no suitor ex
cept a gentleman would be acceptable
for Edith.
And so it took every one by sur
prise, and no one more so than her
father, when the girl took up with
Martin Blake, the son of the black
smith in the next village, who might
be seen most days with a smutty face
and leathern apron hammering away
at the glowing red metal on the an
vil. It would have been well for him
if he had only been seen thus, with
the marks of honest toil about him ;
but Martin Blake was too often to
36 ZOE.
be seen at the " Crown/ and often in
a state that any one who loved him
would have grieved to see ; and he was
always to be found at any race meet
ing s and steeplechases and fairs in the
neighborhood, and report said was by
no means choice in his company.
To be sure he was good-looking and
pleasant-mannered, and had a sort of
rollicking, light-hearted way with him
which was very attractive ; but still it
seemed little short of infatuation on the
part of Edith Robins to take up with
a man whose character was so well-
known, and who was in every way her
inferior in position and education.
No doubt Mr. Robins was very in
judicious in his treatment of her when
ZOE. 37
he found out what was going on, and
as this was the first time in her life
that Edith s wishes had been crossed,
it was not likely that she would yield
without a struggle. The mere fact
of opposition seemed to deepen what
was at first merely an ordinary liking
into an absorbing passion. It was
perfectly useless to reason with her ;
she disbelieved all the stories to his
discredit, which were abundant, and
treated those who repeated them as
prejudiced and ill-natured.
It was in vain that Mr. Kobins by
turns entreated and commanded her
to give him up, her father s distress
or anger alike seemed indifferent to
her ; and when he forbade Martin to
38 ZOE.
come near the place and kept her as
much as possible under his eye to
prevent meetings between them, it
only roused in her a more obstinate
determination to have her own way
in spite of him. She was missing
one morning from the little bedroom
which Mrs. Sands loved to keep as
dainty and pretty as a lady s, and
from the garden where the roses and
geraniums did such credit to her
care, and from her place in the little
church where her prayer-book still
lay on the desk as she had left it
the day before.
She had gone off with Martin Blake
to London, without a word of sorrow
or farewell to the father who had been
ZOE. 39
so foolishly fond of her, or to the
home where her happy petted child
hood had passed. It nearly broke her
father s heart ; it made an old man of
him and turned his hair white, and it
seemed to freeze or petrify all his
kindliness and human sympathy.
He was a proud, reserved man, and
could not bear the pity that every one
felt for him, or endure the well-meant
but injudicious condolences, mixed
with " I told you so," and " I ve thought
for a long time," which the neighbors
were so liberal with. Even Mr. Clif
ford s attempts at consolation he could
hardly bring himself to listen to cour
teously, and Jane Sands tearful eyes
and quivering voice irritated him be-
40 ZOE.
yond all endurance. If there had
been any one to whom he could have
talked unrestrainedly and let out
all the pent-up disappointment and
wounded love and tortured pride that
surged and boiled within him, he
might have got through it better, or
rather it might have raised him, as
rightly borne troubles do, above his
poor, little, pitiful self, and nearer to
God ; but this was just what he could
not do.
He came nearest it sometimes in
those long evenings of organ playing,
of the length of which poor little Jack
Davis, the blower, so bitterly com
plained, when the long sad notes
wailed and sobbed through the little
ZOE. 41
church like the voice of a weary, sick
soul making its complaint. But even
so he could not tell it all to God,
though he had been given that power
of expression in music which must
make it easier to those so gifted to cry
unto the Lord.
But the music wailed itself into
silence, and Jack in his corner by the
bellows waited terror-struck at the
" unked " sounds and the darkening
church, till he ventured at last to ask :
" Be I to blow, Mister ? I m kinder
skeered like."
So the organist s trouble turned him
bitter and hard, and changed his love
for his daughter into cold resentment ;
he would not have her name men-
42 ZOE.
tioned in his presence, and he refused
to open a letter she sent him a few
weeks after her marriage, and bid
Jane Sands send it back if she knew
the address of the person who sent it.
On her side, Edith was quite as
obstinate and resentful. She had no
idea of humbling herself and asking
pardon. She thought she had quite a
right to do as she liked, and she be
lieved her father would be too un
happy without her to bear the separa
tion long. She very soon found out
the mistake she had made, indeed,
even in the midst of her infatuation
about Martin Blake, I think there
lurked a certain distrust of him, and
they had not been married many weeks
ZOE. 43
I might almost say days before
this distrust was more than realized.
His feelings towards her, too, had
been more flattered vanity at being
preferred by such a superior sort of
girl than any deeper feeling, and
vanity is not a sufficiently lasting
foundation for married happiness, es
pecially when the cold winds of poverty
blow on the edifice, and when the
superior sort of girl has not been
brought up to anything useful, and
cannot cook the dinner, or iron a shirt,
or keep the house tidy.
When his father, the old blacksmith
at Bilton, died six months after they
were married, Martin wished to come
back and take up the work there, more
44 ZOE.
especially as work was hard to get in
London and living dear; but Edith
would not hear of it, and opposed it so
violently that she got her way, though
Martin afterwards maintained that this
decision was the ruin of him, occasion
ally dating his ruin six months earlier,
from his wedding. Perhaps he was
right, and he might have settled down
steadily in the old home and among
the old neighbors in spite of his fine-
lady wife ; but when he said so, Edith
was quick to remember and cast up at
him the stories which she had disbe
lieved and ignored before, to prove in
their constant wranglings that place
and neighborhood had nothing to do
with his idleness and unsteadiness.
ZOE. 45
No one ever heard much of these five
years in London, for Edith wrote no
more after that letter was returned.
Those five years made little differ
ence at Downside, except in Mr.
Robins white hair and set, lined face ;
the little house behind the yew-hedge
looked just the same, and Jane Sands
kind, placid face was still as kind and
placid. Some of the girls had left
school and gone to service ; some of
the lads had developed into hobblede
hoys and came to church with walking-
sticks and well-oiled hair ; one or two
of the old folks had died ; one or
two more white-headed babies crawled
about the cottage floors ; but other
wise Downside was just the same as it
46 ZOE.
had been five years before, when, one
June morning, a self-willed girl had
softly opened the door under the
honeysuckle porch and stepped out
into the dewy garden, where the birds
were calling such a glad good-morning
as she passed to join her lover in the
lane.
But the flame of life burns quicker
and fiercer in London than at Down
side, for that same girl, coming back
after only five years in London, was so
changed and aged and altered that
though, to be sure, she came in the
dusk and was muffled up in a big
shawl no one recognized her, or
thought for a moment of pretty, co
quettish, well-dressed Edith Robins,
ZOE. 47
when the weary, shabby-looking
woman passed them by. She had
lingered a minute or two by the
churchyard gate, though tramps, for
such her worn-out boots and muddy
skirts proclaimed her, do not as a rule
care for such music as sounded out
from the church-door, where Mr.
Kobins was consoling himself for the
irritation of choir-practice by ten
minutes playing. It was soon over,
and Jack Davis, still blower, and not
much taller than he was five years
before, charged out in the rebound
from the tension of long blowing, and
nearly knocked over the woman stand
ing by the churchyard gate in the
shadow of the yew-tree, and made the
48 ZOE.
baby she held in her arms give a
feeble cry.
" Now then, put of the way ! " he
shouted in that unnecessarily loud
voice boys assume after church, per
haps to try if their lungs are still
capable of producing such a noise
after enforced silence.
The woman made no answer, but
after the boy had run off, went in and
waited in the porch till the sound of
turning keys announced that the or
ganist was closing the organ and
church for the night. But as his foot
steps drew near on the stone pavement
she started and trembled as if she had
been afraid, and when he came out
into the porch she shrank away into
ZOE. 49
the shadow as if she wished to be un
observed. He might easily have
passed her, for it was nearly dark from
the yew-tree and the row of elms that
shut out the western sky, where the
sunset was just dying away. His
mind, too, was occupied with other
things, and he was humming over the
verse of a hymn the boys had been
singing, " Far from my heavenly
home." There was no drilling into
them the proper rendering of the last
pathetic words
" O guide me through the desert here,
And bring me home at last."
He quite started when a hand
was laid upon his arm, and a voice,
4
50 ZOE.
changed indeed and weak, but still
the voice that in old days not
so very old either was the one
voice for him in all the world, said,
"Father!"
I think just for one minute his im
pulse was to take her in his arms and
forget the ingratitude and desertion
and deceit, like the father in the para
ble whose heart went out to the poor
prodigal while he was yet a long way
off; but the next moment the cold,
bitter, resentful feelings quenched the
gentler impulse, and he drew away
his arm from her detaining hold, and
passed on along the flagged path as if
he were unconscious of her presence,
and this on the very threshold of
ZOE. 51
His house who so pitifully forgives
the debts of His servants, forasmuch
as they have not to pay.
But he had not reached the church
yard gate before she was at his side
again.
" Stop/ she said ; " you must hear
me. It s not for my own sake, it s
the child. It s a little girl ; the
others were boys, and I didn t mind
so much ; if they d grown up, they
might have got on somehow, but
there ! they re safe anyhow both
of them in one week," wailed the
mother s voice, protesting against her
own words that she did not mind
about them. " But this is a girl, and
not a bit like him. She s like me,
52 ZOE.
and you used to say I was like mother.
She s like mother, I in sure she is.
There, just look at her. It s so dark,
but you can see even by this light that
she s not like the Blakes." She was
fumbling to draw back the shawl from
the baby s head with her disengaged
hand, while with the other she still
held a grip on his arm that was almost
painful in its pressure ; but he stood
doggedly with his head turned away,
and gave no sign of hearing what she
said.
" He left me six months ago," she
went on, " and I ve struggled along
somehow. I don t want ever to see
him again. They say he s gone to
America, but I don t care. I don t
ZOE. 53
mind starving myself, but it s the
little girl. Oh ! I ve not come to ask
you to take me in, though it would n t
be for long," and a wretched, hollow
cough that had interrupted her words
once or twice before broke in now as
if to confirm what she said ; " if you d
just take the child. She s a dear lit
tle thing, and not old enough at two
months to have learnt any harm, and
Jane Sands would be good to her, I
know she would, for the sake of old
times. And I 11 go away and never
come near to trouble you again I 11
promise it. Oh ! just look at her ! If
it was n t so dark you d see she was
like mother. Why, you can feel the
likeness if you just put your hand on
54 ZOE.
her little face; often in the night I ve
felt it, and I never did with the boys.
She s very good, and she s too little
to fret after me, bless her ! and
she 11 never know anything about me,
and need n t even know she has a
father, and he s not ever likely to
trouble himself about her."
Her voice grew more and more
pleading and entreating as she went
on, for there was not the slightest re
sponse or movement in the still figure
before her, less movement even than
in the old yew-tree behind, whose
smaller branches, black against the
sky where the orange of the sunset
was darkening into dull crimson,
stirred a little in the evening air.
ZOE. 55
" Oh ! you can t refuse to take her !
See, I 11 carry her as far as the door so
that Jane can take her, and then I 11
go clear away, and never come near
her again. You 11 have her chris
tened, won t you ? I ve been think
ing all the weary way what she
should be called, and I thought, un
less you had a fancy for any other
name " (a little stifled sigh at the
thought of how dear one name used
to be to him), " I should like her to
be Zoe. Just when she was born,
and I was thinking, thinking of you
and home and everything, that song
of yours kept ringing in my head,
Maid of Athens/ and the last line
of every verse beginning with Zoe.
56 ZOE.
I can t remember the other words,
but I know you said they meant
* My life, I love you ; and Zoe was
life, and I thought when I m gone
my little girl would live my life over
again, my happy old life with you,
and make up to you for all the
trouble her mother s been to you."
She stopped for want of breath and
for the cough that shook her from
head to foot, and at last he turned ;
but even in that dim light she could
see his face plainly enough to know
that there was no favorable answer
coining from those hard-set lips and
from those cold, steady eyes, and her
hand dropped from his arm even be
fore he spoke.
ZOE. 57
" You should have thought of this
five years ago," he said. " I do not
see that I am called upon to support
Martin Blake s family. I must trouble
you to let me pass/
She fell back against the trunk of
the yew-tree as if he had struck her,
and the movement caused the baby
to wake and cry, and the sound of
its little wailing voice followed him
as he walked down the path and out
into the road ; and he could hear it
still when he reached his own garden-
gate, where through the open door
the light shone out from the lamp
that Jane Sands was just carrying
into his room, where his supper was
spread and his arm-chair and slippers
awaited him.
58 ZOE.
In after days, remembering that
evening, he fancied he had heard
" Father " once more mingling with
the baby s cry ; but he went in and
shut the door and drew the bolt,
and went into the cheerful, pleasant
room, leaving outside the night and
the child s cry and the black shadow
of the church and the yew-tree.
It w r as only the beginning of the
annoyance, he told himself; he must
expect a continued course of persecu
tion, and he listened, while he made
a pretence of eating his supper, for
the steps outside and the knock at
the door which would surely renew
the unwarrantable attempt to saddle
him with the charge of the child.
He listened, too, as he sat after sup-
ZOE. 59
per, holding up the newspaper in
front of his unobservant eyes; and
he listened most of the night as he
tossed on his sleepless pillow lis
tened to the wind that had risen and
moaned and sobbed round the house
like a living thing in pain, listened to
the pitiless rain that followed, pelt
ing down on the ivy outside and on
the tiles above his head as if bent
on finding its way into the warm,
comfortable bed where he lay.
CHAPTER
BUT the annoyance for which Mr.
Robins had been preparing himself
was not repeated ; the persecution,
if such had been intended, was not
continued. As the days passed by
he began to leave off listening and
lying awake ; he came out from his
house or from the church without
furtive glances of expectation to the
right and left ; he lost that constant
feeling of apprehension and the ne
cessity to nerve himself for resistance.
He had never been one to gossip or
concern himself with other people s
ZOE. 61
matters, and Jane Sands had never
brought the news of the place to
amuse her master as many in her
place would have done, so now he
had no way of knowing if his daugh
ter s return had been known in the
place or what comments the neigh
bors passed on it.
He fancied that Jane looked a little
more anxious than usual ; but then
her sister was lying ill at Stokeley
and she was often there with her, so
that accounted for her anxiety. It
accounted, too, for her being away
one evening a fortnight later, when
Mr. Robins, coming in in the dusk,
found something laid on his doorstep.
His thoughts had been otherwise oc-
62 ZOE.
cupied, but the moment his eyes fell
on the shepherd s-plaid shawl wrap
ping the bundle at his feet, he knew
what it was, and recognized a renewed
attempt to coerce him into doing what
he had vowed he would not. He saw
it all in a minute, and understood
that now Jane Sands was in the plot
against him, and she had devised this
way of putting the child in his path
because she was afraid to come to
him openly and say what she wanted.
Perhaps even now she was watching,
expecting to see him fall into the
trap they had set for him; but they
should find they were very much
mistaken.
His first resolution was to fetch the
ZOE. 63
police constable and get him to take
the child right off to the workhouse,
but on second thoughts he altered his
purpose. Such a step would set all
the tongues in the place wagging, and
little as he cared for public opinion,
it would not be pleasant for every one
to be telling how he had sent his
grandchild to the workhouse. Grand
child ? pshaw ! it was Martin Blake s
brat.
The child was sleeping soundly,
everything was quiet, the dusk was
gathering thick and fast. Why should
he not put the child outside some
other cottage, and throw the respon
sibility of disposing of it on some one
else, and be clear of it himself alto-
64 ZOE.
gether? The idea shaped itself with
lightning rapidity in his brain, and
he passed quickly in review the dif
ferent cottages in the place and their
inmates, and, in spite of his indiffer
ence to Martin Blake s brat, he se
lected one where he knew a kindly
reception, at any rate for the night,
\vould be given. He knew more about
the Grays than of most of the village
people. Bill was a favorite of his,
and had been with him that after
noon after school to fetch a book Mr.
Robins had promised to lend him.
He was a bright, intelligent boy and
had a sweet voice, and the organist
found him a more apt pupil than any
of the others, and had taken some
ZOE. 65
pains with him, and when he was ill
the winter before had been to see
him, and so had come to know his
mother and her liking for anything
young and weak and tender.
Their cottage was at some distance,
to be sure, and Mr. Robins had not had
much to do with babies of late years
and was a little distrustful of his ability
to carry one so far without rousing it
and so proclaiming its presence ; but
there was a path across the fields but
little frequented, by which he could
convey the child without much risk
of being met and observed.
And now the great thing to aim at
was to carry out his plan as quickly as
possible, before any one was aware of
5
66 ZOE.
the child being at his house, and he
gathered up the little warm bundle as
gingerly as he knew how, and was on
his way to the gate when the sound of
approaching steps along the road made
him draw back, and unlocking the
door, carry the child in. The steps
stopped at the gate and turned in,
and one of the choirmen came to
the door.
There were little movements and
soft grumblings inside the shawl in the
organist s arms, and he turned quite
cold with apprehension.
" Any one at home ? " sounded Mil
let s jovial voice at the open door.
" Evening, Mr. Robins are you
there? All in the dark, eh? I
ZOE. G7
wanted a couple of words with you
about that song."
"I ll come directly," sounded the
organist s voice, with a curious jogging
effect in it, such as Millet was used to
sometimes in his conversations with
his wife at the children s bed-time.
And then Millet heard him go upstairs,
and it was some minutes before he
came down again, and then in such a
queer absent condition that if it had
been any other man in the parish than
Mr. Robins, whose sobriety was unim
peachable, Millet would have said that
he had had a drop too much.
He did not ask him in or strike a
light, but stood at the door answering
quite at haphazard, and showing such
68 ZOE.
indifference on the vital question of
a certain song suiting Millet s voice
that that usually good-natured man
was almost offended.
" Well, I 11 wish you good-evening,"
he said at last (it seemed to Robins
that he had been hours at the door) ;
" perhaps you 11 just think it over and
let me know. Hullo ! is that a cat
you have up there ? I thought I
heard something squeal out just then."
Mr. Robins was not generally given
to shaking hands, indeed, some of
the choir thought he was too much
stuck up to do so ; but just then he
seized Millet s hand and shook it quite
boisterously, at the same time advanc
ing with the apparent intention of
ZOE. 69
accompanying him in a friendly man
ner to the gate, a movement which
compelled Millet to back in the same
direction, and cut short his farewell
remarks, which frequently lasted for
ten minutes or more. And all the
way to the gate Eobins was talking
much quicker and louder than was his
usual custom, and he ended by almost
pushing Millet out at the gate, all the
time expressing great pleasure at hav
ing seen him and pressing him to
come in again any evening he could
spare the time and have a pipe and a
bit of supper with him, such unheard-
of hospitality that Millet went home
quite persuaded that the old man was,
as he expressed it to his wife, "going
70 ZOE.
off his chump ; " so that it was quite
a relief to meet him two days later
at the choir practice as formal and
distant in his manners as ever.
Meanwhile Mr. Robins had hastened
back to his bedroom where the baby
lay asleep on his bed, for it had been
really Jane Sands cat whose voice
Millet heard and not, as Mr. Robins
believed, the waking child s.
It was quite dark up there, and he
could only feel the warm, little heap
on his bed, but he struck a match to
look at it. The shawl had fallen
away, showing its little dark head
and round sleeping face, with one lit
tle fist doubled up against its cheek
and half-open mouth and the other
ZOE. 71
arm thrown back, the tiny hand lying
with the little moist, creased palm
turned up,
" She s like mother, I m sure she
is." He remembered the words and
scanned the small sleeping face. Well,
perhaps there was a likeness, the eye
lashes and the gypsy tint of the com
plexion ; but just then the match went
out and the organist remembered there
was no time to be wasted in trying to
see likenesses in Martin Blake s brat.
But just as he was lifting the baby
cautiously from his bed, a sudden
thought struck him. Zoe was to be
her name ; well, it should be so,
though he had no concern in her
name or anything else ; so he groped
72
ZOE.
about for pencil and paper and wrote
the name in big printing letters to
disguise his hand and make it as dis
tinct as possible, though even so, as
we have seen already, the name
caused considerable perplexity to the
sponsors. And then he pinned the
paper on to the shawl, and taking
the child in his arms set out across
the field path to the Grays cottage.
There was a cold air, though it was
a May night, but the child lay warm
against him, and he remembered how
its mother had said she could feel the
likeness even in the dark, and he
could not resist laying his cold finger
on the warm little cheek under the
shawl; and then, angry with himself
ZOE. 73
for the throb that the touch sent to
his heart, hastened his steps, and had
soon reached the Grays cottage and
deposited his burden just inside the
gate, where a few minutes after Gray
found it.
He could see Mrs. Gray plainly as
she sat at her work, a pleasant,
motherly face ; but he did not linger
to look at it, but turned away and re
traced his steps along the field path
home. He found himself shivering as
he went ; the air seemed to have
grown more chilly and penetrating
without that warm burden against his
heart, and the unaccustomed weight
had made his arms tremble.
Somehow the house looked dull and
74 ZOE.
uncomfortable, though Jane Sands had
come in and lighted the lamp, and was
laying his supper. Upstairs there was
a hollow on his bed where something
had lain, and by the side of the bed he
found a baby s woollen shoe, which
might have betrayed him to Jane if
she had gone upstairs. But though
he put it out of sight directly, he felt
sure that the whole matter was no
secret from Jane, and that she had
been an accomplice in the trick that
had been played on him, and he
smiled to himself at the thought of
how he had outwitted her, and of how
puzzled she must be to know what
had become of the baby.
He did his best to appear as tran-
ZOE. 75
quil and composed as usual, as if
nothing had happened to disturb the
ordinary current of his life, and he
forced himself to make a few remarks
on indifferent subjects when she came
into the room.
She had evidently been crying, and
was altogether in a nervous and upset
condition. She forgot half the things
he wanted at supper, and her hand
trembled so that she nearly overturned
the lamp. More than once she
stopped and looked at him as if she
were nerving herself to speak, and he
knew quite well the .question that was
trembling on her lips. " Where is the
child? Master, where is the child?"
But he would not help her in any way,
76 ZOE.
and he quite ignored the agitation
that was only too evident ; and even
when he went into the kitchen to
fetch his pipe, and found her with her
face buried in her arms on the kitchen
table, shaking with irrepressible sobs,
he retreated softly into the passage
and called to her to bring the pipe,
and when after a long delay she
brought it in, he was apparently ab
sorbed in his paper, and took no notice
of her tear-stained face and quivering
lips.
He heard her stirring far into the
night, and once she went into the
little room next his that used to be
his daughter s and which no one had
used since she left, and in the silence
ZOE. 77
of the night again he could hear heart
breaking sobs half-stifled.
" Poor soul ! poor soul ! " he said to
himself. " She s a good creature is
Jane, and no doubt she s bitterly dis
appointed. I 11 make it up to her
somehow. She s a faithful, good
soul ! "
He was restless and uncomfortable
himself, and he told himself he had
taken cold and was a bit feverish.
It was feverish fancy, no doubt, that
made him think the hollow where
the child s light weight had rested
was still perceptible, but this fancy
outlasted the fever of that night and
the cold that caused it, for there was
hardly a night afterwards when Mr.
78 ZOE.
Robins did not detect its presence,
even with all Jane Sands thorough
shaking of the feather-bed and care
ful spreading of sheets and blankets.
If he dropped asleep for a minute
that night the child was in his arms
again, heavy as lead, weighing him
down, down, down, into some un
fathomable gulf, or he was feeling
for it in the dark, and its face was
cold as death ; and more than once
he woke with a start, feeling certain
that a child s cry had sounded close
to his bed.
CHAPTER IV.
THERE is certainly a penalty paid
by people who keep entirely clear of
gossip, though it is not by any means
in proportion to the advantages they
gain. The penalty is that when they
particularly want to hear any piece of
news, they are not likely to hear it
naturally like other people, but must
go out of their way to make inquiries
and evince a curiosity which at once
makes them remarkable.
Now every one in the village except
Mr. Robins heard of the baby found
in the Grays garden, and discussed
80 ZOE.
how it came there, hut it was only
by overhearing a casual word here
and there that the organist gathered
even so much as that the Grays had
resolved to keep the child, and were
not going- to send it to the work
house. Even Bill Gray knew the
organist s ways too well to trouble
him with the story, though he was
too full of it himself to give his usual
attention at the next choir practice,
and at every available pause between
chant and hymn his head and that
of the boy next him were close to
gether in deep discourse.
It had occurred to Mr. Robins mind,
in the waking moments of that rest
less night, that there might have been,
ZOE. 81
nay, most probably was, some mark
on the child s clothes which would
lead to its identification, and for the
next few days, every glance in his
direction, or for the matter of that,
in any other direction, was interpreted
by him as having some covert allu
sion to this foundling grandchild of
his ; but the conversation of some
men outside his yew-hedge, which he
accidentally overheard one day, set
his anxiety at rest.
From this he gathered that it was
generally supposed to be a child be
longing to a gypsy caravan that had
passed through the village that day.
" And I says," said one of the men
with that slow, emphatic delivery in
82 ZOE.
which the most ordinary sentiments
are given forth as if they were wis
dom unheard and undreamt of be
fore ; "and I don t mind who hears
me, as Gray did oughter set the per-
lice on to un to find the heartless
jade as did un."
"Ay, sure! so he did oughter;
but he aint no gumption, Gray
aint; never had neither, as have
known him man and boy these fifty
year."
" My missus says," went on the
first speaker, " as she seed a gypsy
gal with just such a brat as this on
her arm. She come round to par
son s back door my Liza s kitchen
gal there and telled her mother. She
ZOE. 83
were one of them dressed-up baggages
with long earrings and a yeller hand-
kercher round her head, a-telling for
tunes ; coming round the poor, silly
gals with her long tongue and sly
ways. She went in here, too." Mr.
Robins guessed, though he could not
see, the jerk of the thumb in his direc
tion. " Mrs. Sands told me so her
self;" the organist s listening was
quickened to yet sharper attention
" she says she had quite a job to get
rid of her, and thought she were after
the spoons belike. But she says as
she d know the gal again anywheres,
and my missus says she d pretty near
take her davy to the child, though as
I says, one brat s pretty much like an-
84 ZOE.
other haw, haw! though the women
don t think it."
And the two men parted, laughing
over this excellent joke.
It was most curious how that little
out-of-the-way house of the Grays and
its unremarkable inmates had suddenly
become conspicuous; the very cottage
was visible from all directions, from
the churchyard gate, from the organ
ist s garden, from various points along
the Stokeley road ; but perhaps this
may have been because Mr. Robins had
never cared to identify one thatched
roof from another hitherto. As for
the Grays, they seemed to be every
where; that man hoeing in the turnip-
field was Gray ; that boy at the head
ZOE. 85
of the team in the big, yellow wagon
was Torn, and Bill seemed to be all
over the place, whistling along the
road or running round the corner, or
waiting to change his book at the
organist s gate. If Mr. Clifford spoke
to Mr. Kobins it was about something
to do with the Grays, and even Mr.
Wilson of Stokeley stopped him in
the road to ask if some people called
Gray lived at Downside. It was most
extraordinary how these people, so in
significant a week ago, were now
brought into prominence.
Even before Mr. Robins had over
heard that conversation he had had
a fidgety sort of wish to go up to the
Grays cottage, and now he made a
86 ZOE.
pretext of asking for a book he had
lent Bill, but went before the school
came out, so that only Mrs. Gray was
at home as he opened the gate and
went up the path.
It was a beautiful, sunny afternoon,
and Mrs. Gray was sitting outside the
door, making, plain as she was, a
pretty picture with the shadows of the
young vine-leaves over the door dap
pling her print gown and apron and
the baby s little dark head and pink
pinafore, a garment that had once
been Bill s, who had been of a more
robust build than this baby, and more
over had worn the pinafore at a more
advanced age, so that the fit left a
good deal to be desired, and the color
ZOE. 87
had suffered in constant visits to the
wash-tub, and was not so bright as it
had been originally.
But altogether the faded pinafore
and the vine-leaf shadows, and the
love in the woman s face, made a har
monious whole, and the song she was
singing, without a note of sweetness
or tune in it, did not jar on the organ
ist s ear, as you might have supposed,
knowing his critical and refined taste.
" Good afternoon, Mrs. Gray," he
said ; " I came for the book I lent
your son the other day. Why, is this
your baby ? " he added, with unneces
sarily elaborate dissimulation. " I did
not know you had any so young."
" Mine ? Lor bless you, no. Aint
88 ZOE.
you heard? Why, I thought it was
all over the place. Gray, he found it
in the garden just there where you be
standing, a week ago come to-morrow.
Aint she a pretty dear, bless her ! and
takes such notice too, as is wonderful.
Why, she s looking at }^ou now as if
she d aknown you all her life. Just
look at her ! if she aint smiling at
you, a little puss! "
" Where did she come from ? "
" Well, sure, who s to know ? There
was some gypsy folks through the
place, and there Ve been a lot of
tramps about along of Milton Fair,
and there was one of em, they say,
a week or two ago with just such a
baby as this un. My master he Ve
ZOE. 89
made a few enquirements ; but there !
for my part I don t care if we don t
hear no more of her folks, and Gray s
much of the same mind, having took a
terrible fancy to the child. And it s
plain as she aint got no mother worth
the name, as would leave her like that,
and neglected, too, shameful. As there
aint no excuse, to my way of thinking
for a baby being dirty, let folks be as
poor as they may."
Somewhere deep down in Mr.
Robins mind, unacknowledged to
himself, there was a twinge of resent
ment at this reflection on the mother s
treatment of the baby.
" She s as sweet as a blossom now,"
went on Mrs. Gray, tossing the baby
90 ZOE.
up, who laughed and crowed and
stretched its arms. Yes, he could see
the likeness, he was sure of it ; and it
brought back to his mind with sudden
vividness a young mother s look of
pride and love as she held up her lit
tle girl for the father s admiration.
Mother and child had then been won
derfully alike, and in this baby he
could trace a likeness to both.
Mrs. Gray went maundering on, as
her manner was, interspersing her
narrative with baby nonsense and en
dearments, and Mr. Robins forgot his
errand, which was after all only a
pretext, and stood half-listening and
more than half back in the old days of
memory ; and once he so far forgot
ZOE. 91
himself as to snap his fingers at the
child, and touch one of its warm, little
hands, which immediately closed round
his finger with a baby s soft, tenacious
grasp, from which it required a certain
gentle effort to escape.
" A pleasant, chatty sort of man the
organist," Mrs. Gray said, having
talked nearly all the time herself, with
only a word or two from him now and
then as reply ; " and not a bit of pride
about him, let folks say what they
like. Why, he stopped ever so long
and had a deal to say ; and there, Bill,
you just run down with the book, as
he went off after all without it."
Mr. Robins went home slowly across
the fields in a curiously softened frame
92 ZOE.
of mind. Perhaps it was the soft west
wind, fragrant with sweet spring
scents of cowslips and cherry blossom,
or the full glad sunshine on all the
varied green of tree and hedge, a
thousand tints of that " shower of
greennesses " poured down so lavishly
by the Giver of all good things ; per
haps it was the larks springing up
from the clover in such an ecstasy of
song ; or perhaps it was the clasp of a
baby s hand on his finger. He noticed
the spring beauty round him as he
had not noticed such things for many
a day, stooping to pick a big, tasselled,
gold-freckled cowslip, and stopping to
let a newly-fledged, awkward young
bird hop clumsily out of the way,
ZOE. 93
with a sort of tenderness and consid
eration for young things unusual to
him.
His mind was more at rest than it
had been for the last three weeks.
The baby s crowing laughter seemed
to drive out of his memory the wail
ing cry and the hollow cough and the
sad, beseeching- voice saying " Father,"
and then the pitiless beating rain,
which had been haunting him for the
last three weeks. The sight of the
baby, loved and cared for, had taken
away a misgiving, which he had
hardly been conscious of himself.
After all, he had not done badly by
the child. Mrs. Gray was a kind,
motherly sort of body, and used to
94 ZOE.
babies, which Jane Sands was not, and
she would do well by the child, and
he himself could see, without any one
being the wiser, that the child did not
want for anything, though he would
not be held responsible in any way
for it.
CHAPTER V.
THERE was one thing that puzzled Mr.
Robins extremely, and this was Jane
Sands behavior. He was convinced
that she had been a party to the
trick that had been played off on
him, and she was evidently full of
some secret trouble and anxiety, for
which he could only account by at
tributing it to her disappointment
about the baby, and perhaps distrust
of the care that would be taken of
it by others.
Mr. Robins often discovered her in
tears, and she was constantly going
96 ZOE.
out for hours at a time, having al
ways hitherto been almost too much
of a stay-at-home. He suspected that
these lengthened absences meant visits
to the Grays cottage and that baby-
worship that women find so delight
ful ; but he found out accidentally
that she had never been near the
cottage since the baby s arrival, and
when he made an excuse of sending
a book by her to Bill to get her to
go there, she met the boy at the
bottom of the lane and did not go
on to the cottage.
As to what he had overheard the
men saying about the gypsy girl, he
felt sure that Jane had only said this
to put people on the wrong scent.
ZOE. 97
though, certainly, deception of any
sort was very unlike her. Once he
found her sitting up late at night at
work on some small frocks and pina
fores, and he thought that at last
the subject was coming to the sur
face, and especially as she colored
up and tried to hide the work when
he came in.
" Busy ? " he said. " You seem very
hard at work. Who are you working
/ o
for ? "
" A baby," she stammered, " a
baby that my sister s taking care
of."
She was so red and confused that
he felt sure she was saving what was
./ o
not true, but he forgave her for the
7
98 ZOE.
sake of the baby for whom he firmly
believed the work was being done,
and who, to be sure, when he saw it
in Mrs. Gray s arms, looked badly in
want of clothes more fitted to its size
than Bill s old pinafores.
He stood for a minute fingering
the pink, spotted print of infantile
simplicity of pattern, and listening to
the quick click, click, of her needle
as it flew in and out ; but it was not
till he had turned away and was half
out of the kitchen that she began a
request that had been on the tip of
her tongue all the time, but which
she had not ventured to bring out
while he stood at the table.
" I was going to ask, if you d no
ZOE. 99
objection, seeing that they re no good
to any one "
Now it was coming out, and he
turned with an encouraging smile.
" Well, what is it ? "
" There are some old baby-clothes
put away in a drawer upstairs.
They re rough dried, and I ve kept
an eye on them, and took them out
now and then to see as the moth
didn t get in them "
u Yes ? "
" Well, sir, this baby that I ? rn work
ing for is terrible short of clothes, and
I thought I might take a few of them
f or her"
She did not look at him once as
she spoke, or she might have been
100 ZOE.
encouraged by the look on his face,
which softened into a very benignant,
kindly expression.
" To be sure ! to be sure ! " he
said. " 1 ve no objection to your
taking some of them for the baby
at your sister s." He spoke the last
words with some meaning, and she
looked quickly up at him and dropped
her work as if tumultuous words were
pressing to be spoken, but stopped
them with an effort and went on with
her work, only with heightened color
and trembling fingers.
o o
She was not slow to avail herself
of his permission, for that very night
before she went to bed he heard her
in the next room turning out the
ZOE. 101
drawer where the old
had been stored away :: eve J f ,3hie J it-:
tie Edith had discarded them for
clothes of a larger size. And next
morning she was up betimes, starch
ing and ironing and goffering dainty
little frills with such a look of love
and satisfaction on her face, that he
had not the heart to hint that she
had availed herself somewhat liber
ally of his permission, and that less
dainty care and crispness might do
equally well for the baby, bundled
up in Mrs. Gray s kind but crump
ling arms, to take the place of Bill s
faded pinafore.
That afternoon he purposely took
his way home over the hillside and
102 ZOE.
down- the lane by the Grays cottage,
witlt\a.,epn,v.ictioi i that he should see
the baby tricked out in some of those
frilled and tucked little garments over
which Jane Sands had lavished so much
time and attention that morning. But
to his surprise he saw her in much the
same costume as before, only the pina
fore this time was washed-out laven
der instead of pink, and as she was in
Bill s arms, and he, as the youngest
of the family, being inexperienced in
nursing, a more crumpled effect was
produced than his mother had done.
He could only conclude that Jane
had not found time yet to take the
things, or that Mrs. Gray was reserv
ing them for a more showy occasion.
ZOE. 103
But he found Jane just returning
as he came up to his house, and she
looked far more hot and dusty than
the short walk up the lane to the
Grays accounted for, but with a beam
ing look on her kind face that had
not been there for many a day.
" Well," he said, " Jane, have you
been to Stokeley ? "
"Yes," she said; " and I took the
things you were good enough to say
the baby might have. They were
pleased."
She, too, spoke with a curious
meaning in her voice and manner
which somehow faded when she saw
the want of response in his face. In
deed there was a very distinct feel-
104 ZOE.
ing of disappointment and irritation
in his feelings. For after all those
clothes had actually gone to some
other baby. Well ! well ! it is a self
ish world after all, and each of us
has his own interests which take him
up and engross him. No doubt this
little common child at Stokeley was
all in all to Jane Sands, and she was
glad enough of a chance to pick all
the best out of those baby-clothes up
stairs that he remembered his young
wife preparing so lovingly for her
baby and his. It gave him quite a
pang to think of some little Sands
or Jenkins adorned with these tucks
he had seen run so carefully and
frills sewn so daintily. He had evi-
ZOE. 105
dently given Jane credit for a great
deal more unselfishness and devotion
to him and his than she really felt,
for she had all the time been busy
working and providing for her own
people when he had thought she was
full of consideration for Edith s child.
Pshaw ! he had to pull himself to
gether and take himself to task; for
even in these few days he had grown
to think of that little brown-faced,
dark-eyed baby as his grandchild, in
stead of Martin Blake s brat. Insen
sibly and naturally, too, the child had
brought back the memory of its mother,
first as baby, then as sweet and win
some little child; then as bright, wil
ful, coaxing girl, and, lastly, unless he
106 ZOE.
kept his thoughts well in check, there
followed on these brighter memories
the shadow of a white, worn woman
under the yew-tree in the churchyard,
and of a voice that said " Father."
That uninteresting child at Stokeley
apparently required a great supply of
clothes, for Jane Sands was hard at
work again that evening, and when
he came in from the choir practice,
he heard her singing over her work
as she used to do in old days, and
when he went in for his pipe she
looked up with a smile that seemed
to expect a sympathetic response, and
made no effort to conceal the work as
she had done the day before.
He stood morosely by the fireplace
XOE. 107
for a minute, shaking the ashes out of
his pipe.
" You re very much taken up with
that baby," he said crossly ; and she
looked up quickly, thinking that per
haps he had a hole in his stocking or
a button off his shirt to complain of,
as a consequence of her being en
grossed in other work. But he went
on without looking at her, and appar
ently deeply absorbed in getting an
obstinate bit of ash out of the pipe
bowl.
" There s a child at Mrs. Gray s
they say is very short of clothes.
That baby, you know "
" That baby that was found in the
garden/ Jane said, in such a curiously
108 ZOE.
uninterested tone of voice that he
could not resist glancing round at her ;
but she was just then engaged in that
mysterious process of " stroking the
gathers," which the intelligent femi
nine reader will understand requires a
certain attention. If this indifference
were assumed, Jane Sands was a much
better actor and a more deceptive char
acter than he had believed possible ;
if she were too entirely absorbed in
her own people to give even a thought
to her young mistress s baby, she was
not the Jane Sands he thought he had
known for the last twenty years. The
only alternative was that she knew
nothing about the baby having been
left on his door-step, nor of the meet-
ZOE. 109
ing with his daughter in the church
yard which had preceded it.
What followed convinced him that
this was the case, though it also a lit
tle favored the other hypothesis of her
selfish absorption in her own people.
"Perhaps," he said, "you could
look out some of those baby things
upstairs if there are any left."
" What ? I beg your pardon, sir.
What did you say ? "
" Those baby -clothes upstairs that
you gave to your sister s baby."
" Those ! " she said, with a strange
light of indignation in her eyes, more
even than you would have expected
in the most grasping and greedy per
son on a proposal that something
HO . ZOE.
should be snatched from her hungry
maw and given to another. " Those !
Little Miss Edith s things! that her
own mother made and that I ve kept
so careful all these years in case Miss
Edith s own should need them ! "
You see she forgot in the excite
ment of the moment that these were
the very things she had been giving
away so freely to that common little
child at Stokeley; but women are so
inconsistent.
"Well?" he said, as her breath
failed her in this unusual torrent of
remonstrance. " Why not ? "
" For a little gypsy child ! a found
ling that nobody knows anything
about! Don t do it, master, don t!
ZOE. Ill
I could n t abear to see it. Here, let
me get a bit of print and flannel and
run together a few things for the
child. I d rather do it a hundred
times than that those things should be
given away, and just now too ! "
It was very plain to Mr. Robins
that she did not know; but all the
same he was half inclined to point out
that it was not a much more outrage
ous thing to bestow these cherished
garments on a foundling than on her
sister s baby ; but she was evidently so
unconscious of her inconsistency in
the matter that he did not know how
to suggest it to her.
" I m going into Stokeley to
morrow," she went on, " and if you
112 ZOE.
liked I could get some print and make
it a few frocks. I saw some very neat
at fourpence three-farthings that would
wash beautiful, and a good stout flan
nel at elevenpence. Oh ! not like
that," she said, as he laid a finger on
some soft Saxony flannel with a pink
edge which lay on the table ; " some
thing more serviceable for a poor
person s child."
Well, perhaps it was better that
Jane should not know who the baby
was of whom she spoke so contemptu
ously. A baby was none the better or
healthier for being dressed up in frills
and lace ; and Mrs. Gray was a
thoroughly clean, motherly woman,
and would do well by the child.
ZOE. 113
All the same, when Jane came back
from Stokeley next day and unfolded
the parcel she had brought from the
draper s there, he could not help feel
ing that that somewhat dingy laven
der, though it might wash like a rag,
was, to say the least, uninteresting,
and the texture of the flannel, even to
his uncliscriminating eye, was a trifle
rough and coarse for baby limbs.
He knew nothing (how should he ? )
of the cut and make of baby-clothes,
but somehow, these, under Jane s
scissors and needle, did not take such
attractive proportions as those she had
prepared for the other baby; nor did
the stitches appear so careful and
minute, though Jane s worst enemy, if
8
114 ZOE.
she had any, could not have accused
her of putting bad work even into the
hem of a duster, let alone a baby s
frock. He also noticed that, industri
ously as she worked at the lavender
print, her ardor was not sufficient to
last beyond bedtime, and that when
the clock struck ten, her work was
put away without any apparent re
luctance, even when, to all appear
ances, it was so near completion that
any one would have given the requis
ite ten minutes just from the mere
lust of finishing.
That Sunday afternoon when the
curious name Zoe, sounding across the
church in the strange clergyman s
voice, startled the organist, who had
ZOE. 115
not expected the christening to take
place that day, one of the distracting
thoughts which made him make so
many mistakes in the music was won
dering what Jane Sands would think
of the name, and whether it would
rouse any suspicion in her mind and
enlighten her a little as to who the
baby at Mrs. Gray s really was. The
name was full of memories and associ
ations to him ; surely it must be also a
little to Jane Sands.
But of all Sunday afternoons in the
year, she had chosen this to go over
to Stokeley church. Why, parson and
clerk were hardly more regular in
their attendance than Jane Sands as a
rule ; it was almost an unheard-of
116 ZOE.
thing for her seat to be empty. But
to-day it was so, and the row of little
boys whom her gentle presence gener
ally awed into tolerable behavior in-
/
dulged unchecked in all the ingenious
naughtiness that infant mind and
body are capable of in church.
She came in rather late with his
tea, apologizing for having kept him
waiting.
"It was christening Sunday," she
said, and then she looked at him
rather wistfully.
Perhaps she has heard, he thought ;
perhaps the neighbors have told her
the name, and she is beginning to
guess.
" And the baby has been called -
ZOE. 117
she hesitated and glanced timidly at
him.
" Well ? " he said encouragingly?
" what is the name ? "
"Edith/* she answered, "was one
name.
Pshaw ! it was the baby at her
sister s she was talking of all the time !
He turned irritably away.
" He can t bear to hear the name,
even now ; or, perhaps, he s cross at
being kept waiting for tea," thought
Jane Sands.
CHAPTER VI.
As spring glided into summer, and
June s long, bright, hay-scented days
passed by, followed by July, with its
hot sun pouring down on the ripen
ing wheat and shaven hay fields, and
on the trees, which had settled down
into the monotonous green of sum
mer, the little, brown-faced baby at
the Grays throve and flourished, and
entwined itself round the hearts of the
kindly people in whose care Provi
dence, by the hands of the organist,
had placed it. It grew close to them
like the branches of the Virginia
ZOE. 119
creeper against a battered, ugly, old
wall, putting out those dainty little
hands and fingers that cling so close
not even the roughest wind or driv
ing rain can tear them apart. Gray,
coming in dirty and tired in the eve
ning, after a long day s work in the
hayfield or carting manure, was never
too tired, nor for the matter of that
too dirty, to take the baby, and let
it dab its fat hands on his face, or claw
at his grizzled whiskers, or slobber
open-mouthed kisses on his cheeks.
Tom who had bought a blue tie
and begun taking Mary Jane, dairy
maid at the farm, out walking on a
Sunday evening, for at the age of
sixteen, and on three-and-sixpence a
120
ZOE.
week, it is natural and usual to think
of matrimony - - Tom, I say, let Zoe
keep him from his siren and scrabble
at that vivid neckjtie, and pull the bit
of southernwood out of his button
hole and rumple his well-oiled locks
out of all symmetry ; while Bill ex
pended boundless ingenuity and time
in cutting whistles and fashioning
whirligigs, which were summarily dis
posed of directly they got into the
baby s hands.
As for Mrs. Gray, it is unnecessary
to say that she was the most complete
slave of all Zoe s abject subjects, and
the neighbors all agreed that she was
downright silly like over that little,
brown-faced brat as was no better
ZOE. 121
no, nor nothing to hold a candle to
my Johnnie, or Dolly, or Bobby, as
the case might be.
An unprejudiced observer might
have thought that Mrs. Gray had
some reason for her high opinion of
Zoe, for she was certainly a very
much prettier baby than the majority
in Downside, who were generally of
the dumpling type, with two currants
for eyes. And she was also a very
good baby. " And easy enough too
for any one to be good ! " would be
the comment of any listening Down
side mother, " when they always gets
their own way ; " which, however,
is not so obvious a truth as regards
babies under a year as it is of older
122 ZOE.
people. Certainly to be put to bed
awake and smiling at seven o clock,
and thereupon to go to sleep and
sleep soundly till seven o clock next
morning, shows an amount of virtue
in a baby which is unhappily rare,
though captious readers may attri
bute it rather to good health and
digestion, which may also be cred
ited, perhaps, with much virtue in
older people.
"And I do say," Mrs. Gray was
never tired of repeating to any one
who had patience to listen, " as noth
ing would n t upset that blessed little
angel, as it makes me quite uneasy
thinking as how she s too good to live,
as is only natural to mortal babies to
ZOE. 123
have the tantrums now and then, if
it s only from stomach-ache."
The only person who seemed to
sympathize in the Grays admiration
for the baby was the organist. It
was really wonderful, Mrs. Gray said,
the fancy he had taken to the child.
" Ay, and the child to him, too,
perking up and looking quite peart
like, as soon as ever his step come
along the path." The wonder was
mostly in the baby taking to him,
in Mrs. Gray s opinion, as there was
nothing to be surprised at in any one
taking to the baby ; but " he, with
no chick nor child of his own, and
with that quiet kind of way with
him as aint general what children
124 XOE.
like, though don t never go for to
tell me as Mr. Robins is proud and
stuck up, as I knows better."
There was a sort of fascination about
the child to the organist, and when
he found that no one seemed to have
the slightest suspicion as to who the
baby really was, or why he should be
interested in it, he gave way more
and more to the inclination to go to
the Grays cottage, and watch the lit
tle thing, and trace the likeness that
seemed every day to grow more and
more strong to his dead wife and to
her baby girl.
Perhaps any one sharper and less
simple than Mrs. Gray might have
grown suspicious of some other reason
ZOE. 125
than pure, disinterested admiration for
little Zoe as the cause which brought
the organist so often to her house ;
and perhaps if the cottage had stood
in the village street, it might have
occasioned remarks among the neigh
bors ; but he had always, of late
years, been so reserved and solitary
a man that no notice was taken of
his coinings and goings, and if his
way took him frequently over the
hillside and down the lane w r hy !
it was a very nice walk, and there
was nothing to be surprised at.
The only person who might have
noticed where he went, and how long
he sometimes lingered, was Jane Sands,
and I cannot help thinking that in old
126 ZOE.
days she would have done so ; but
then, as we have seen, she was not
quite the same Jane Sands she used
to be, or at any rate not quite what
we used to fancy her, devoted above
all things to her master and his in
terests, but much absorbed in her
own matters and in those Stokeley
friends of hers. She had asked for a
rise in her wages, too, which Mr.
Robins assented to, but without that
cordiality he might have done a few
months before; and he strongly sus
pected that when quarter-day came
the wages went the same w r ay as
those baby-clothes, for there was cer
tainly no outlay on her own attire,
which, though always scrupulously
ZOE. 127
neat, seemed to him more plain and
a shade more shabby than it used
to be.
As the summer waxed and waned,
the love for little Zoe grew and
strengthened in the organist s heart.
It seemed a kind of possession, as if
a spell had been cast on him ; in old
times it might have been set down
to witchcraft ; and, indeed, it seemed
something of the sort to himself, as if
a power he could not resist compelled
him to seek out the child, to think
of it, to dream of it, to have it so
constantly in his mind and thoughts
that from there it found its way into
his heart. To us who know his
secret, it may be explained as the tie
128 ZOE.
of blood, the drawing of a man, in
spite of himself, towards his own kith
and kin. Blood is thicker than water,
and the organist could not reject this
baby grandchild from his natural feel
ings, though he might from his house.
And beyond and above this explana
tion, we may account for it, as we
may for most otherwise unaccount
able things, as being the leading of
a wise Providence working out a
divine purpose.
Perhaps the punishment that was to
come to the organist by the hands of
little Zoe those faf, dimpled, brown
hands, that flourished about in the air
so joyously when he whistled a tune
to her began from the very first,
ZOE. 129
for it was impossible to think of the
child without thinking of the mother,
for to look at Zoe without seeing the
likeness that his fond fancy made far
plainer than it really was; and to
think of the mother and to see her
likeness was to remember that meet
ing in the churchyard and the sad,
pleading voice and hollow cough, and
the cold denial he had given, and the
beating rain and howling wind of that
O o
dreary night. He grew by degrees
to excuse himself to himself and to
plead that he was taken unawares,
and that, if she had not taken his
answer as final, but had followed him
to the house, he should certainly have
relented.
130 ZOE.
And then he went a step further.
I think it was one July day, when the
baby had been more than usually gra
cious to him, and he had ventured, in
Mrs. Gray s absence, to lift her out of
the cradle and carry her down the
garden path, finding her a heavier
weight than when he had first taken
her to the Grays cottage. She had
clapped her hands at a great, velvet-
bodied humble bee, she had nestled
her curly head into his neck, and with
the feeling of her soft breath on his
cheek he had said to himself: " If
Edith were to cotne back now I would
forgive her for the baby s sake, for
Zoe s sake." He forgot that he had
need to be forgiven too. " She will
ZOE. 131
come back/ he told himself, " she will
come back to see the child. She
could not be content to hear nothing
more of her baby and never to see
her, in spite of what she said. And
when she comes it shall be different,
for Zoe s sake."
He wondered if Jane Sands knew
where Edith was, or ever heard from
her. He sometimes fancied that she
did, and yet, if she knew nothing of
the baby, it was hardly likely that she
had any correspondence with the
mother. He was puzzled, and more
than once he felt inclined to let
her into the secret, or at least drop
some hint that might lead to its
discovery.
132 ZOE.
It pleased him to imagine her de
light over Edith s child, her pride in
and devotion to it ; she would never
rest till she had it under her care, and
ousted Mrs. Gray from all share in lit
tle Zoe. And yet, whenever he had
got so far in his inclination to tell
Jane, some proof of her absorption in
that baby at Stokeley, for whom he
had a sort of jealous dislike, threw
him back upon himself and made him
doubt her affection for her young mis
tress and resolve to keep the secret to
himself, at any rate for the present.
He came the nearest telling her one
day in August, when, as he was water
ing his flowers in the evening, Mrs.
Gray passed the gate with that very
ZOE. 133
little Zoe, who was so constantly in
his thoughts.
She had a little white sun bonnet
on, which Jane Sands had actually be
stowed upon her, rather grudgingly,
it is true, and only because there was
some defect about it which made it
unworthy of the pampered child at
Stokeley. Zoe saw the organist, or
at least Mrs. Gray imagined that she
did, for the cry she gave might equally
well have been intended as a greeting
to a pig down in the ditch.
" Well a-never, who d a thought i
she see you ever so far off, bless her !
and give such a jump as pretty near
took her out of my arms. Why, there !
Mr. Robins don t want you, Miss
134 ZOE.
Saucy, no one don t want such rub-
biclge ; a naughty, tiresome gal ! as
won t go to sleep, but keeps jumping
and kicking and looking about till my
arm s fit to drop with aching."
Jane Sands was sitting at work just
outside the kitchen door at the side of
the house. He had seen her there
a minute ago when he filled the
watering-can at the pump, and a sud
den impulse came into his mind to
show her the child.
He did not quite decide what he
should say, or what he should do,
when the recognition, which he felt
sure was unavoidable, followed the
sight of the child ; but he just yielded
to the impulse and took the child from
ZOE. 135
Mrs. Gray s arms and carried her
round to the back door. The recog
nition was even more instantaneous
than he had expected. As he came
round the corner of the house with
the little white-bonneted girl in his
arms, Jane sprang up with a cry of
glad surprise and delight, such as
swept away in a moment all his doubt
of her loyalty to him and his, and all
his remembrance of her absorption in
that little common child at Stokeley.
She made a step forward and then
stood perfectly still, and the light and
gladness faded out of her face, and
her hands, that had been stretched
out in delighted greeting, fell dull and
lifeless to her sides.
136 ZOE.
He said nothing, but held the child
towards her; it was only natural that
she should doubt, being so unprepared,
but a second glance would convince
her.
"I thought," she said, looking the
baby over, with what in a less kind,
gentle face might have been quite a
hard, critical manner, " I thought for
a minute "
" Well ? "
" I was mistaken," she said ; " of
course I was mistaken." And then
she added to herself more than to
him, "It is not a bit like-
" Look again," he said, " look again,
don t you see a likeness? "
" Likeness ? Oh, I suppose it s the
ZOE. 137
gypsy child up at Mrs. Gray s, and
you mean the likeness to the woman
who came here that day she was left ;
but I don t remember enough of her
to say. It s plain the child s a gypsy.
What a swarthy skin, to be sure ! "
Why, where were her eyes ? To
Mr. Robins it was little Edith over
again. He wondered that all the vil
lage did not see it and cry out on him.
Bat it was not likely that after this
his confidence should go further, and
just then the child began a little
grumble, and he took her back hastily
to Mrs. Gray with a disappointed,
crest-fallen feeling.
Jane Sands was conscious that her
reception of the baby had not been
138 ZOE.
satisfactory, and she tried to make
amends by little complimentary re
marks, which annoyed him more than
her indifference.
" A fine, strong child, and does Mrs.
Gray great credit."
" It s a nice, bright little thing, and
I dare say will improve as it grows
older."
She could not imagine why the or
ganist grunted in such a surly way in
reply to these remarks, for what on
earth could it matter to him what any
one thought of a foundling, gypsy
child?
CHAPTER VII.
IT was near the end of September
that John Gray broke his leg. They
were thrashing out a wheat-rick at
Farmer Benson s, and somehow he
tumbled from the top of the rick and
fell with his leg bent under him, and
found that he could not stand when
he tried to struggle up to his feet.
They ran to tell " his missus/ who
came straight off from the wash tub
with the soapsuds still about her
skinny, red elbows, catching up Zoe
from the cradle as she passed, at
sight of whom Gray, in spite of the
140 ZOE.
pain and the deadly faintness that
was dimming his eyes and clutching
his breath, made an effort to chirrup
and snap his fingers at the little
one.
" It s his innerds as is hurted,"
explained one of the bystanders, with
that wonderful openness and way of
making the worst of everything that
is found in that class.
" The spine of his back most like,"
said another, " like poor Johnson over
to Stokeley, as never walked another
step arter his fall."
" Ay, he do look mortal bad ! Tis
a terrible bad job ! "
u Cut off like a flower ! " sighed one
of the women. " There, bear up, my
ZOE. 141
dear, 5 to Mrs. Gray, with whom she
had not been on speaking terms for
some weeks, owing to a few words
about her cat s thieving propensities.
" Don t ee take on ! I knows well
enough what you feels, as is only
three weeks since Father was took
with his fit."
" Don t be skeered, old gal," sounded
Gray s voice, odd and unnatural to the
ears of the hearers, and far away and
independent to himself, " I aint so
bad as that comes to "
And then mercifully he became un
conscious, for to go six miles with a
broken leg in a cart without springs
on the way to the hospital is not a
joke, and the neighbors kindly at-
142 ZOE.
tempts to bring him round were hap
pily unsuccessful. The worst part of
that drive fell to the share of his
wife, who sat holding his head on
her lap as they jolted along, trying
to keep the jars and bumps from
jerking his leg, though all the time
she firmly believed he was dead, and
was already in her dulled mind mak
ing pitiful little arrangements about
mourning and the funeral, and con
templating, with dreary equanimity,
a widowed existence with three-and-
sixpence a week for her and Tom and
Bill and Zoe to live upon. She never
left Zoe out of the calculation, even
when it became most difficult to ad
just the number of mouths to be fed
ZOE. 143
with the amount of food to be put
into them, and over this dark future
fell the darker shadow of the work
house, which closes the vista of life
to most of the poor. No wonder
they live entirely in the present, and
shut their eyes persistently to the
future !
There was not much going back
into the past when she was a girl
and the " master a lad, and they
went courting of a Sunday afternoon
along the green lanes. Life had been
too matter-of-fact and full of hard
work to leave much sentiment even
in memory.
Mr. Robins heard of the accident
in the evening, and went up to the
144 ZOE.
cottage, where he found Bill taking
care of Zoe, who was having a fine
time of it, having soon discovered
that she had only to cry for any
thing that evening to get it, and that
it was an occasion for displaying a
will of her own in the matter of go
ing to bed and being preternatnrnlly
wide awake and inclined for a game,
when on other nights she was quite
content to be laid down in the wooden
cradle, which was rapidly becoming
too small for her increasing size.
Poor Bill had been at school when
the accident happened, and of course
the neighbors had made the very worst
of the matter, so the poor boy hardly
knew what part of his father had not
ZOE. 145
been crushed or injured, or if he had
been killed on the spot, or had been
taken barely alive to the hospital.
The baby had been pushed into his
arms, so that he could not go up to
the farm, nor find Tom to learn the
rights of the matter, so that when
Mr. Robins came into the cottage he
found both Bill and the baby crying
together, the fire out, and the kettle
upset into the fender.
" Give me the child," the organist
said. And Bill obeyed, as he did at
the choir practice when he was told
to pass a hymn-book, too miserable
to wonder much at this new aspect
of his master, and at seeing him
take the baby as if he knew all
10
146 ZOE.
about it, and sit down in Father s
arm-chair.
" See if you can t make the fire
burn up," he went on; "the child s
cold."
Zoe seemed well content with her
new nurse and left off crying, and
sat blinking gravely at the fire, which
Bill, much relieved at having some
thing definite to do, soon roused up
to a sparkling, crackling blaze with
some dry sticks, while Mr. Robins
warmed her small, pink feet.
Bill would certainly have been sur
prised if he could have seen what was
passing in the organist s mind, a pro
posal ripening into a firm resolve that
he would take the child home that
ZOE. 147
very night and tell Jane who she was.
Let the village talk as it might, he
did not mind; let them say what they
pleased.
He knew enough of village reports
to guess that Gray was not as badly
hurt as every one declared ; but still,
even a trifling accident meant, at any
rate, a week or two of very short
commons at the cottage, perhaps less
milk for the baby or economy over
fuel, and the September days were
growing cold and raw, and there had
been more than one frost in the morn
ings, and the babv s little toes were
O t/
cold to his warm hand. Mrs. Gray,
too, would be occupied and taken up
with her husband, and little Zoe would
148 ZOE.
be pushed about from one to another ;
and he had heard that there was scar
latina about, and the relieving officer
had been telling him that very morn-
ing how careless the people were about
infection.
The cottage looked quite different
in the blazing firelight, and Bill, en
couraged by the organist s presence,
tidied up the place, where the wash-
tub stood just as Mrs. Gray had left
it ; and he set the kettle on to boil,
so that when Mrs. Gray and Tom
came in it presented quite a comfort
able appearance. Mrs. Gray came in
tired and tearful, but decidedly hope
ful, having left Gray comfortably in
bed with his leg set, and having re-
ZOE. 149
ceived reassuring opinions from nurse
and doctor ; and the first alarm and
apprehension being removed, there
was a certain feeling of importance
in her position as wife of the injured
man, and excitement at a visit to the
country town, both ways in a cart,
which does not happen often in a
lifetime.
The baby, thanks to the warmth
and Mr. Robins nursing, had fallen
asleep in his arms. Mrs. Gray was
so much confused and bewildered by
the events of the day that she would
hardly have been surprised to see the
Queen with the crown on her head
sitting there in the master s arm
chair, quite at home like, and hold-
150 ZOE.
ing the baby on one arm and the
sceptre on the other; and Tom was
of too phlegmatic a disposition to be
surprised at anything. So they made
no remark, and Mr. Robins laid the
baby, still asleep, in Bill s arms, and
went away.
Such a beautiful, quiet September
night, with great soft stars overhead,
and the scent of fallen leaves in the
air ! the path beneath his feet was soft
with them, and as he passed under the
elms which by daylight were a blaze
of sunny gold, some leaves dropped
gently on his head.
" To-morrow," he said, " I will bring
little Zoe home, and I will let her
mother, I will let Edith know that the
ZOE. 151
child is with me, and that if she
likes- "It needed but a word he
felt sure to bring the mother to the
baby, the daughter to her father.
He stood for a moment by the
churchyard gate, close to the spot
where that bitter, cruel parting had
been, and fancied what the meeting
would be. After all, what was his
feeling for little Zoe and his imagina
tion of what his little grandchild
would be to him in the future to the
delight of having Edith s arms round
his neck and holding her to his heart
once more ?
" Edith," he whispered softly, as he
turned away ; " Edith, come home ! "
" I wonder," he said to Jane Sands
152
ZOE.
that night ; " I wonder if you could
find out an address for me ? "
She was folding up the tablecloth,
and she stopped with a puzzled look.
"An address? Whose?"
" Well," he said, without looking at
her, " I fancy there are still some of
the Blakes " (the word came out with a
certain effort) " living at Bilton, and
perhaps you could find out from them
the address I want; or, perhaps," he
added quickly, for she understood
now, and eager words were on her
lips, perhaps you know. There !
never mind now ; if you know, you can
tell me to-morrow."
CHAPTER VIII.
MORNING very often brings other
counsels, but this was not the case
with Mr. Robins, for when he got up
next day he was more than ever re
solved to carry out his intention of
bringing little Zoe home, and letting
her mother know that a welcome
awaited her in her old home.
He had not slept very much during
the night, for his mind had been too
full of the change that was coming in
his life, and of the difference that the
presence of Edith and little Zoe would
make in the dull, old house. Sad and
154 ZOE.
worn and altered was she ! Ah ! that
would soon pass away with kindness
and care and happiness, and the cough
that had sounded so hollow and omin
ous should be nursed away, and Edith
should be a girl again, a girl as
she ought to be yet by right of her
years ; and those five years of suf
fering and estrangement should be
altogether forgotten as if they had
never been.
He went into the bedroom next his,
that had been Edith s, that was to
be Edith s again, and looking round
it, noticed with satisfaction that Jane
had kept it just as it had been in the
old days ; and he pushed the bed a
little to one side to make room for
ZOE. 155
a cot to stand beside it, a cot which
he remembered in the night as having
stood for years in the lumber-room up
in the roof, and which he now with
much difficulty dragged out from be
hind some heavy boxes, and fitted
together, wishing there had been time
to give it a coat of paint, and yet glad
with a tremulous sort of gladness that
there was not, seeing that it would be
wanted that very night.
And just then Jane Sands came up
to call him to breakfast, and stood
looking from the cot to her master s
dusty coat, with such a look of de
lighted comprehension on her face
that the organist felt that no words
were needed to prepare her for what
was going to happen.
156 ZOE.
"I thought," he said, "it had
better be brought down."
" Where shall it go ? " she asked.
" In Miss in the room next mine,"
he said, " and it will want a good
airing."
"Shall I make up the bed too?"
she asked.
" Yes, you may as well."
" Oh, master," she said, the tears
shaking- in her voice and shining in
her eyes ; " will they be wanted
soon? Will they, maybe, be wanted
to-night ? "
His own voice felt suspiciously
shaky ; his own eyes could not see the
old cot, nor Jane s beaming face quite
plainly, so he only gave a gruff assent
and turned away.
ZOE. 157
" What a good, kind creature she
is," he thought. " What a welcome
she will give Edith and Edith s little
Zoe ! "
During the morning he heard her
up in the room sweeping and scrub
bing, as if for these five years it had
been left a prey to dust and dirt,
and when he went out after dinner
to give a lesson at Bilton, she was
still at it with an energy worthy of a
woman half her age.
That stupid little girl at Bilton, who
generally found her music-lesson such
an intolerable weariness to the flesh,
and was conscious that it was no less
so to her teacher, found the half-hour
to-day quite pleasant. Mr. Robins
158 ZOE.
had never been so kind and cheerful,
quite amusing, laughing at her mis
takes, and allowing her to play just
the things she knew best, and to get
up in the middle of the lesson to go to
the window and see a long procession
of gypsy vans going by to Smithurst
Fair.
It was such a very beautiful day ;
perhaps it was this that produced such
a good effect on the organist s temper.
There had been a frost that morning,
but it was not enough to strip the
trees, but only to turn the elms a
richer gold and the beeches a warmer
red and the oaks a ruddier brown,
while in the hedges the purple dog
wood and hawthorn and bramble
ZOE. 159
leaves made a wonderful variety of
rich tints in the full bright sunshine,
which set the birds twittering with a
momentary delusion that it might
be spring.
He did not come back over the
hill, and past the Grays cottage, for
he was going to fetch the child that
evening ; but he came home by the
road, meeting many more of those
gypsy vans which had distracted his
pupil s attention, and looking with
kindliness on the swarthy men and
bronze dark-eyed women, for the sake
of little Zoe, who had been so often
called the gypsy baby.
When he reached home he found
the room prepared with all the care
160 ZOE.
Jane Sands could lavish. He had
thought when he went in that morn
ing that it was just as Edith had left
it, and all in the most perfect order;
but now the room was a bower of
daintiness and cleanliness, and all
Edith s old treasures had been set out
in the very order she used to arrange
them. Why ! even her brush and
comb were laid ready on the dressing
table and a pair of slippers by the
bedside, and a small bunch of autumn
anemones and Czar violets was placed
in a little glass beside her books. He
smiled, but with tears in his eyes, as
he saw all these loving preparations.
" Edith can hardly be here to
night," he said to himself; " but Zoe
ZOE. 161
will," and he smoothed the pillow of
the cot close to the bedside, and drew
the curtain more closely over its
head.
He found his tea set ready for him
when he came down, but Jane Sands
had gone out, and he was rather glad
of it, as she had watched him that
morning with an eager, expectant eye,
and he did not know what to say to
her. It would be easier when he
brought the baby and actually put it
into her arms.
The sun had set when he had
finished tea, a blaze of splendor set
tling down into dull purple and dead
orange, leaving a stripe of pale-green
sky over the horizon, flecked with a
11
162 ZOE.
few soft brown clouds tinged with
red.
But envious night hastened to cover
lip and deaden the colors of the sky
and the almost equally gorgeous tints
of tree and hedge ; and by the time
Mr. Robins reached the Grays cot
tage, darkness had settled down as
deep as on that evening four months
ago, when he carried the baby and
left it there.
Now, as then, the cottage door was
open, and Mrs. Gray sat at work with
the candle close to her elbow, every
now and then giving a long sniff or a
sigh, that made the tallow candle
flicker and tremble. He had almost
forgotten her husband s accident in
ZOE. 163
his absorption in the baby ; but these
sniffs recalled it to his mind, and he
thought he would give them a helping
hand while Gray was in the hospital.
" She has been kind to my little
Zoe," he thought, " and I will not for
get it in a hurry. She shall come and
see the child whenever she likes ; and
Edith will be good to her, for she has
been like a mother to the baby all
these months."
Close by where Mrs. Gray sat he
could see the foot of the old cradle
and the rocker within reach of the
woman s foot ; but Zoe must be asleep,
for there was no rocking necessary,
and Mrs. Gray did not turn from her
work to look at the child, though she
1G4 ZOE.
stopped from time to time to wipe her
eyes on her apron.
" She is taken up with her hus
band," he said to himself; " it is as well
that I am going to take the child
away, as she will have no thought to
give her now."
And then he went into the cottage,
with a tap on the open door to
announce his presence.
" Good evening, Mrs. Gray," he
said in a subdued voice, so as not to
wake the baby. But he might have
spared himself this precaution, for the
next glance showed him that the
cradle was empty.
" Lord bless you, Mr. Robins," the
woman said, " you give me quite a
ZOE. 165
start, coming in so quiet like. But,
there ! I m all of a tremble ; the
leastest thing do terrify me. You
might knock me down with a feather.
First one thing and then another!
The master yesterday and the baby
to-day ! "
"What!" he said, so sharp and
sudden, that it stopped the flow of
words for a moment. " What do you
mean ! Is the baby in bed upstairs ?
What s the matter? It s not the
scarlatina? Not "
" Bless you ! " she said, " why I
thought you d a-knowed. It aint the
scarlatina; the baby was as well and
bonny as ever when she went.
She ve agone, her mother come and
1GG ZOE.
fetch her this very day, and took her
right off. Ay ! but she were pleased
to see how the little thing had got on,
and she said as she d never forget my
kindness, and how she d bring her to
see me whenever she come this way.
But, there ! I do miss her terrible.
Why, it s most worse than the master
himself."
The organist hardly listened to
what she was saying, after the fact of
the mother having come and fetched
her away. Edith had come for her
baby ! How had she known ? Why
had she done it to-day ? Could Jane
have let her know ; and had she
come so quickly to take the child her
self to her old home? His first im-
ZOE. 167
pulse was to turn and hasten home ;
perhaps Edith and Zoe were there
already and would find him absent.
But he could not go without a word to
Mrs. Gray, who was wiping her eyes
in her apron and unconsciously rock
ing the empty cradle.
" You will often see her," he said
consolingly, " she will not be very far
away."
"Oh, I don t know about that;
them gypsies go all over the place, up
and down the country, and they don t
always come back for the fairs;
though she says as they don t often
miss Smithurst."
" Gypsies ? " he said puzzled.
"Ay, the mother s a gypsy sure
168 ZOE.
enough, and I ve said it all along, and
the child s the very image of her ;
there was n t no doubt when one saw
the two together as they was mother
and child."
"Are you sure she was a gypsy?"
He had often said in fun that Edith
was a regular little gypsy, but he
would never have thought that any
one could really mistake her for one ;
and besides, Mrs. Gray must have
known Edith well enough, at any
rate by sight, in the old days, and
changed as she was, it was not beyond
all recognition.
" Oh, there wasn t no mistaking,
and the van as she belonged to waited
just outside the village, for I went
ZOE. 169
down along with her and seed it,
painted yeller with red wheels. I
knowed Zoe was gypsy born, for she d
one of them charms round her neck as
I did n t meddle with, for they do say
as there s a deal of power in them
things, and that gypsies can t be
drovvnded or ketch fevers and things
as long as they keeps em."
Mr. Robins sat down in the chair
opposite Mrs. Gray. An odd, cold sort
of apprehension was stealing over him,
and the pleasant dream, of home and
Edith and Zoe, in which he had been
living through the day, was fading away
with every word the woman said.
" The funny part of it were that
she vowed and declared as she put
170 ZOE.
the child at your door, and never
came this way at all ; leastways, from
what she said it must a-been your
house, for she said it was hard by
the church and had a thick hedge,
and that there was a kind sorter
body as she see there in the morn
ing, as must a-been Mrs. Sands and
nobody else from her account. She
said she was in a heap of trouble
just then, her husband ill and a deal
more, and she was pretty nigh at
her wits end, and that without think
ing twice what she were about, she
wropt the baby up and laid it close
agin the door of the house where
she d seen the kind-looking body.
She would have it as it was there,
ZOE. 171
say what I would ; but maybe, poor
soul, she were mazed, and hardly
knew where she were. She went to
your house to-day, and Mrs. Sands
were quite put out with her, being
busy, too, and expecting company,
and thought it were just her impi-
dence ; but there ! I knows what
trouble is, and how it just mazes a
body, for 1 could no more tell where
I went nor what I did yesterday than
that table there. And another queer
thing is as she did n t know noth
ing about the name, and neither she
nor her husband can t read or write
noways, so she could n t have wrote
it down, and she d never heard tell
of such a name as Zoe, and did n t
172 ZOE.
like it neither. She d always a-meant
it to be Rachel, as had been her
mother s name before her and her
grandmother s too."
" Are you quite certain she was the
mother ? "
" Certain ? Why, you d only to see
the two together to be sure of it. I d
not have let her go, not were it ever
so, if it had n t been as clear as day
light ; and just now, too, when I
seems to want her for a bit of com
fort ; " and here Mrs. Gray relapsed
into her apron.
Mr. Robins sat for a minute look
ing at her in silence, and then got
up, and without a word w r ent out
into the dark night, mechanically tak-
ZOE. 173
ing the way to his house and then
turning on to the highroad to Smith-
urst, tramping along through the
mud and dead leaves with a dull,
heavy persistence.
Anything was better than going
back to the empty silence of his
house and Jane Sands expectant
face, and the pretty, white-curtained
room with the cot all ready for little
Zoe, who was already miles away
along that dark road before him,
sleeping, perhaps, in some dirty gypsy
van put up on some bit of waste
land by the roadside, or perhaps sur
rounded by the noise and glare of
the fair with its shows and round
abouts. His little Zoe! he could not
174 ZOE.
possibly have been so utterly de
ceived all through, the baby who
had lain on his bed, whose little face
he had felt as he carried her up to
the Grays cottage in the dark, whom
he had seen day after day and never
failed to notice the likeness, growing
stronger with the child s growth ! Was
it all a delusion ; all the foolish fancy
of a fond old man ? He tried hard
to believe that it was impossible that
he could have been so deceived, and
yet from the very first he felt that it
was so, and that the love that had
been growing in his heart all these
months had been lavished on a gypsy
baby whose face most likely he should
never see again.
ZOE. 175
And all his plans for the future,
his dreams of reparation, of tender re
conciliation with Edith, and of happy,
peaceful days that would obliterate
the memory of past trouble and alien
ation, they had all vanished with the
gypsy baby ; life was as empty as the
cradle by Mrs. Gray s side.
Where was he to find his daughter?
Where had she wandered that night
when the pitiless rain fell and the
sullen wind moaned ? Was that the
last he should ever see of her, with
the white, wan, pleading face under
the yew-tree ; and would that de
spairing voice saying " Father 1 " haunt
his ears till his dying day ; and would
the wailing cry that followed him as
176 ZOE.
he went to his house that night be
the only thing he should ever know
of his grandchild, the real little Zoe
whom he had rejected?
He was several miles away along the
Smithurst road when he first realized
what he was doing, brought to the
consciousness, perhaps, by the fact of
being weary and footsore and wet
through from a fine rain that had
begun falling soon after he left the
village. It must be getting late too ;
many of the cottages he passed showed
no light from the windows, the in
mates most likely being in bed.
Painfully and wearily he toiled back
to Downside; he seemed to have no
spirit left to contend against even
ZOE. 177
such trifling things as mud and in
equalities in the road, and when a
bramble straying from the hedge
caught his coat and tore it, he could
almost have cried in feeble vexation
of spirit. Downside street was all
dark and quiet, but from the organ
ist s house a light shone out from
the open door and down the garden
path, making a patch of light on the
wet road.
Some one stood peering out into
the darkness, and at the sound of
his dragging, stumbling footsteps, Jane
Sands ran down to the gate. The
long waiting had made her anxious,
for she was breathless and trembling
with excitement.
12
178 ZOE.
"Where have you been?" she said;
" we got so frightened. Why are you
so late ? Oh, dearie me ! " as she
caught sight of his face. " You re
ill ! Something has happened ! There,
come in, do ee, now ; you look fit to
drop ! "
He pushed by her almost roughly
into the house and dropped down
wearily into the arm-chair. He was
too worn out and exhausted to no
tice anything, even the warmth and
comfort of the bright fire and the sup
per ready on the table. He tossed his
soaked hat on the ground, and lean
ing his elbows on his knees and his
head on his hands, sat bowed down with
the feeling of utter wretchedness.
ZOE. 179
Day alter day, night after night,
till his life s end, plenty and comfort,
and neatness and respectability and
warmth in dull monotony ; while out
side somewhere in the cold and rain,
in poverty and want and wretched
ness, wandered Edith with the wail
ing baby in her arms !
" You can go to bed," he said
to Jane Sands ; " I don t want any
supper."
She drew back and went softly out
of the room; but some one else was
standing there looking down at the
bowed white head with eyes fuller
even of pity and tears than Jane s
had been, and then she too left the
room, and with a raised finger to
180 ZOE.
Jane, who was waiting in the passage,
she went upstairs, and as if the way
were well known to her, to the little
room which had been got ready so
uselessly for the organist s daughter.
There, sheltered by the bed-curtain,
was the cot where Zoe was to have
lain, and there, wonderful to relate, a
child s dark head might be seen deep
in the soft pillow, deeper in soft sleep.
And then this strangely presuming
intruder in the organist s house softly
took up the sleeping child, and wrap
ping a shawl round it, carried it, still
sleeping, downstairs, the dark lashes
resting on the round cheek flushed with
sleep and of a fairer tint than gypsy
Zoe s, and the rosy mouth half open.
ZOE. 181
The organist still sat with his head
in his hands and did not stir as she
entered, not even when she came and
knelt down on the hearth in front of
him.
Jane Sands was unusually tiresome
to-night, he thought; why could she
not leave him alone?
And then against his cold hands
clasped over his face was laid some
thing soft and warm and tender,
surely a little child s hand ! and a
voice a voice he had never thought
to hear again till maybe it sounded as
his accuser before the throne of grace
said : " Father, for Zoe s sake."
"The sparrow again waited until the child had almost reached him."
SPARROW THE TRAMP. ^ f
HOEFT. With illustrations by Jessie McDermott. Price, #1.25.
ROBERTS BROTHERS, PUBLISHERS, BOSTON
In .sf )!/<{/* Dark Country.
KIBBOO GANEY;
OR, THE LOST CHIEF OF THE COPPER MOUN
TAINS. A Story of travel and adventure in the heart oi
Africa. By WALTER WENTWORTH.
16mo. Cloth. Illustrated. Price, $1.25.
ROBERTS BROTHERS. BOSTON.
SUSAN COOLIDGi S POPULAR BOOKS.
CLOVER. A Sequel to the Katy Books. By SUSAN
COOLIDGE. With illustrations by Jessie McDermott. Square
i6mo. Cloth. Price, $1.25.
All the children will want to know more about " What Katy Did."
ROBERTS BROTHERS, PunusiiFRS. Boston
THE KINGDOM OF COINS.
a Salt for CJjtftittn of ail
BY JOHX BKADLEY GILMAN.
ILLUSTRATED BY F. T. MERRILL.
// is an ingenious story of a little boy who falls asleep while
clutching a penny, and dreams that he meets Mr. Midas, and by
him is conducted to the Kingdom of Coins, where he is taught, in
an object-lesson manner, the proverbs of the people in regard to
money. " Penny-wise and pound-foolish? " A penny saved is a
penny earned," and other saws are thus impressed upon him.
The book is readable and does not smack of the worn-out
fairy-tale. THE EPOCH.
Small 4to, illuminated board covers. Price, 60 cents.
ROBERTS BROTHERS, BOSTON.
PRINCE VANCE.
A Story of a Prince with a Court in His Box. By ELEANOR
PUTNAM and ARLO BATES. Illustrated by Frank Myrick.
" Prince Vance " is an Entertaining Fairy Story of tJu> -wildest and most
fantastic adventures and of amusing and original impossibilities, -which,
ho-wever, carry -with them a stern p^^ritan moral. This allegiance of un
fettered imagination and straightforward, -wholesome, moral teaching is
unusual , and gives the little book a special value.
Small 4to. Cloth gilt. Price, $1.50.
ROBERTS BROTHERS, BOSTON.
Messrs. Roberts Brothers Publication*.
MRS, DODGES POPULAR BOOK
A PORTRAIT OF DOROTHY AT SIXTEEN.
DONALD AND DOROTHY.
BY MARY MAPES DODGE.
Beautifully Illustrated and Bound. Price $1.50.
An honest tribute from an admiring friend.
" DEAR MRS. DODGB, I have just finished your book called Donald and
Dorothy for the third or fourth time, and would like very much to know
whether Dorothy is a real person, and if so, what is her name ? I am nearly
as old as Dorothy was at the close of the book, so am very much interested
m her. I would also HKC to know how old she is, and where she lives. If you
/.mild be kind enough to reply, yoj would preatly oblisre
" Your admiring friend,"
ROBERTS BROTHERS, PUBLISHERS, BOSTON
MRS. EYftNG S GIEL-BOOK,
SIX TO SIXTEEN. A Story for Girls. By Mrs.
EWING. Price, 50 cents.
ROBERTS BROTHERS, PUBLISHERS,
Boston.
MRS. EWING S LAST BOOK.
-J^^^r" "~~ ^^
j^r^ 7
JACKANAPES.
DADDY DARWIN S DOVECOT.
THE STORY OF A SHORT LIFE.
With a Sketch of Mrs. Ewicg s Life by her Sister, H. K, F, Gatty,
in one volume, with Illustrations by RANDOLPH CALDECOTT and GORDON
BROWNE. Price, 50 cents.
ROBERTS BROTHERS, BOSTON.
MRS. EICHARDS S STORY.
"The man taught him to beat the drum."
THE JOYOUS STORY OF TOTO.
BY LAURA E, RICHARDS.
With Illustrations by E. H. GARRETT. IGmo. Price,
$1,25.
ROBERTS BROTHERS, Publishers,
BOSTON.
ni tht- Author of JoUy Good Times."
THEIR CANOE TRIP.
By MARY P. W. SMITH,
AUTHOR OF THE "BROWNS."
A story founded on the actual experiences of two Koxbtiry boy s, during a
canoe trip on the Concord, Merrimac, Piscataquog, and other rivers.
16mo. Cloth. Price, $1.25.
ROBERTS BROTHERS. BOSTON.
rtfhitaker
961691
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