THE very next day after that, while I was singing baby to sleep, sitting all alone by the fire, there was a soft knock at the door. I said, “Come in!” thinking it was Mrs. Saltoun, when there suddenly appeared before me a figure as different as possible from the nice little cosy figure of our good old landlady. This was an overgrown girl, fourteen or thereabouts, in the strangest scanty dress. A printed cotton frock, very washed out and dingy, so short as to leave a large piece of legs, clothed in blue-grey stockings, uncomfortably visible; very red arms that somewhat looked as if they were all elbow and fingers; a great checked blue and white pinafore, much washed out like the frock, into the breast of which the hands wore thrust now and then by way of relief to the awkwardness of their owner; hair disposed to be red, and superabundant in quantity, thrust back as far as was practicable under the shade of a queer big bonnet, not only a full-sized woman’s bonnet, but one ten years old, and made in the dimensions common at that distant period. She stood at the door looking at me in a perfect agony of innocent awkwardness, shuffling one foot over the other, twisting her red fingers, holding down her bashful head, but all the time staring with wistful eyes at baby and myself, and so sincere a look of awe and admiration that of course I was touched by it. She did not say a word, but dropped a foolish curtsey, and grew violently red standing at the door. I could not think what such a strange apparition wanted with me.
“What do you want, my good girl?” said I at last.
“The mistress said I might come,” with another curtsey. Then, after a violent effort, “They said you was wanting a lass.”
A lass! Here she was then, the first applicant for the new situation of baby’s personal attendant! Oh dear, what a spectre! I had to pause a little before I could answer her. Really, though I was not much disposed to laughter, the idea was too ludicrous to be treated gravely.
“Yes, I want a lass;’ but not one so young as you,” said I. “I want somebody who can take care of my baby. Who sent you to me?”
“The mistress said I might come,” answered the apparition; “I can keep wee babies fine.”
“You can keep wee babies fine! How old are you?” cried I.
“I’m just fourteen since I was born, but some folk count different. I’m awfu’ auld other ways,” said my extraordinary visitor, with a kind of grotesque sigh.
The creature roused my interest with her odd answers and wistful round eyes. “Shut the door and come here,” said I. “Do you know me? and what tempted you to think you could do for my servant? Were you ever in a place before?”
“No; but I’ve seen you gaun by, the Captain and you, and I would be awfu’ glad if you would let me come. There’s plenty things I can do if I could get leave to try,” cried the girl with a wonderful commotion in her voice. “I’ve nursed bairns since ever I was a bairn myself, and I can wash, and I can sew. Oh, leddy, tak me! I’ll no eat very much, and I dinna want no wage; and I’ll learn everything you tell me, for the mistress says I’m awfu’ quick at learning; and I’ll serve you hand and foot, nicht and day!”
“But, my poor girl,” said I, quite amazed by this burst of eloquence, “why do you want so much to come to me?”
Upon this another extraordinary change came upon my would-be maid. She fidgeted about, she blushed fiery red, she thrust her red hands into the bosom of her pinafore, she stood upon one heavy foot, making all sorts of wonderful twists and contortions with the other. At last in gulps, and with every demonstration of the most extreme confusion and shame-facedness, burst forth the following avowal. “Oh! because you’re rael bonnie; and you smile—and oh, I would like to come!”
It was an extraordinary kind of flattery, certainly; but I felt my cheeks flush up, and I cannot deny my heart was touched. I remember too, when I was a little girl, taking fancies to people; I believe I might have fallen in love with a lady and gone and offered myself to be her servant, as likely as not if I could have done it. The uncouth creature no more meant to flatter me than to offend me. She was deeply ashamed of having made her confession. Her shame, and her admiration, and her passionate childish feeling quite went to my heart.
“You are a very strange girl,” said I. “What is your name, and where do you live? and do your parents know what you want with me?”
“They ca’ me Leczie Bayne. My father died six months since,” said the girl, falling into a kind of vacant tone after her excitement, as if this account of herself was something necessary to go through, but not otherwise interesting. “I never had any mother, only a stepmother, and lots of little bairns. She’s gaun back to her ain place, among her friends, and I’m to be left, for I’ve naebody belonging to me. We live down the road, and I used ay to see you gaun by. Whiles you used to smile at me, no thinking; but I ay minded. And the folk said you we’re awfu’ happy with the Captain, and had a kind look for everybody,—and oh, leddy, I’ve naebody belonging to me!”
I could have cried for her as she stood there, awkward, before the little fire, with great blobs of tears dropping off her cheeks, rubbing them away with her poor red hands. I knew no more how to resist her, in that appeal she made to my happiness, than if I had been a child like a baby in my lap. The tears came into my eyes, in spite of myself. In the impulse of the moment I had nearly broken forth and confided to her my terror and grief about Harry, and this dreadful war that was beginning. She took possession of me, like the soldier’s wife, with a nearer fellow feeling than sympathy. Poor, forlorn, uncouth creature, she stood before me like my old self, strangely transmogrified, but never to be denied. I could not answer her—for what could I say? Could I cast her off, poor child, led by the instincts of her heart to me of all people? And oh dear, dear, what a ridiculous contrast to all the passionate, elevated feeling of her story, could I take her all in her checked pinafore and blue stockings, a pathetic grotesque apparition, to be baby’s nurse and my little maid?
There never was a harder dilemma: and imagination, you may be sure, did its very best to make things worse, by bringing up before me the pretty, tidy, fresh little maid I had been dreaming of, with a white apron and a little cap, and plump arms to hold my baby in. What could I do? and oh, if I could not resist my fate, what would Harry say to me? How he would shrug his shoulders and admire my good taste; how he would look at her in his curious way as if she were a strange animal; how he would laugh at me and my soft heart! I got quite restless as the creature stood there opposite to me, twisting her poor foot and clasping her hands hard as she thrust them into the bosom of her pinafore. I could not stand against her wistful eyes. I grew quite desperate looking at her. Could I ever trust my child in those long red arms that looked all elbow—and yet how could I send her away?
“Lizzie, my poor girl,” cried I, remonstrating, “don’t you see I am very, very sorry for you? But look here now: my baby is very young, not three months old, and I could never dare trust him to a young girl like you. You must see that very well, a girl with so much sense; and besides, I want somebody who knows how to do things. I don’t think I could teach you myself; and besides——”
Here I fairly broke down, stopped by the flood of arguments which rose one after another, not to be defeated, in Lizzie’s round anxious eyes.
“But I dinna need to learn,” she cried out whenever my voice faltered and gave her a chance. “I ken! I would keep that bonnie baby from morning to night far sooner than play; if practice learns folk, I’ve been learning and learning a’ my life; and I’m that careful I would rather break every joint in a’ my body than have a scratch on his little finger; and I can hem that you wouldna see the stitches; and I can sing to him when he’s wakin’, and redd up the house when he’s in his bed. I’m no telling lees; and I’ll serve you on my knees, and never have a thought but how to please you, oh, leddy, if you’ll let me come!”
Could I resist that? I do not believe Harry himself could if he had heard her. I gave in because I could not help myself. I did it in shame and desperation, but what could I do? She was too many for me.
“Go down stairs and ask Mrs. Saltoun to come up,” said I.
She went off in a moment, almost before I could look up, and vanished out of the room without any noise—I suppose because of the high excitement the poor child was in. Mrs. Saltoun came up rather flurried, casting very strange looks at Lizzie. When I saw the dear prim old lady beside that extraordinary creature, and saw the looks she cast at her, the ludicrous part of it seized hold upon me, and I was seized with such a fit of laughing that I could scarcely speak.
“Mrs. Saltoun,” said I, “I don’t know really what you will think of me. I am going to take her for my maid.”
Mrs. Saltoun looked at me and looked at Lizzie, who made her a curtsey. She thought I had gone out of my senses. “It’s to be hoped it’s for lady’s maid and not for bairn’s maid then,” she said, with dreadful sarcasm. If Mrs. Saltoun was so severe, what would Harry say.
“She is an orphan and all alone; and she says she understands about children,” said I, humbly, in self-defence.
“Oh, if you please, I can keep bairns fine,” said Lizzie; “if ye’ll ask the neebors they’ll a’ tell; and oh, if the leddy will try me, dinna turn her against me again! I’m no a lassie in mysel. I’m awfu’ auld in mysel. Afore harm would come to the baby I would die.”
“And, my lass, what good would it do the lady if ye were to die,” said Mrs. Saltoun entering the lists, “after maybe killin’ her bonnie bairn?”
“I would a’ fa’ in pieces first!” cried Lizzie. “I would let them burn spunks in my fingers, or crush my feet as they did langsyne; there’s no a creature in the world I wouldna fecht and fell afore harm came to the wean!”
Mrs. Saltoun was not prepared for such an address; nor for the true fire of enthusiasm and valour that burned through Lizzie’s tears; but she did not give in. I had the satisfaction to look on and listen while the old lady demonstrated in the clearest way that she would never do, without any particular regard for her feelings; and then quietly enjoyed the triumph when Lizzie burst forth upon Mrs. Saltoun, and in two minutes routed her, horse and foot. Half an hour after Mrs. Saltoun and I sat contriving what dress could be got up on the spur of the moment to make the creature presentable; and that very night, while Harry was at mess, she sat in the little kitchen downstairs helping to make up a fresh new printed dress for herself in a fashion which justified part of her assertions, and with a rapidity which I could explain only under the supposition that excitement had still forcible possession of her. I confess I was myself a little excited; though she was only a girl of fourteen and a servant, not to say the most grotesque and awkward-looking person imaginable, it is wonderful what an effect this sudden contact with so strange and characteristic a creature immediately had. My fears about the war faded off for the moment. I could not help being quite occupied with thoughts about the new-comer:—whether, after all, I ever would venture to trust baby with her,—what Harry would say when he saw that odd apparition;—whether I had only been very foolish;—whether I might have resisted. Lizzie Bayne had made herself the heroine of that night.