No! no! no! I wanted my mother, and would be satisfied with nothing less. According to my father’s own statement, she was lying all alone, speared through and through with spikes, as was Joe Jenkins’s bullfinch, (or, if not, she was reduced to that deplorable condition, that whether they run spikes through or no would make no difference to her—which was much the same thing;) and what I insisted on, and would consent to leave off crying on no other terms, was that my father and I should go up-stairs and let mother out. He had the key of the door under his pillow, I reminded him; and begged and implored that he would go up and see what could be done for poor mother.
“No; I won’t do it. I can’t do it. I wouldn’t do it for a hundred good pounds told down,” replied he, emphatically; “and since you won’t be good for nothing less, why p’r’aps you’d better cry until you are tired, and then you’ll leave off.”
My father had a way of saying things he really meant in a way there was no misunderstanding. The answer above written was of this sort, and speedily led to our coming to terms. On condition that he got up and lit a candle immediately, and, further, that I should see mother the very first thing in the morning, I consented to kiss him and be a good boy.
I have no doubt but that my father congratulated himself on having achieved a victory on such easy conditions; but there were difficulties in the way of the carrying out of the terms of our treaty he had never dreamed of. He got out of bed, and then he made the discovery that old Jenkins had not left us any candle. Stumbling amongst young Joe’s wood and wirework, and feeling on the mantle-shelf and in the cupboard, he made the discovery; and it set him growling at a pretty rate. The handiest candle was the one outside the door, that the woman had brought down from the room where my mother was.
“Here’s a pretty go, Jim!” said my father, affecting to treat the matter pleasantly, as a lure, I suppose, for me to do the same. “I’m blessed if that old Jenkins hasn’t took the candle away. Well give him a talking to to-morrow morning, won’t we?”
“There’s a candle outside, and matches as well,” I replied. “I heard the woman who came down-stairs put them there.”
“Oh, you don’t want no candle, Jimmy!” said my father, coaxingly. “See what a man you are gettin’—going to have a bloater for your breakfast, too—a whole bloater! See here; I’ll pull aside the curtain, and let a bit more moon in—shall I? There you are! Why, it’s as light as artenoon a’most now—ain’t it?”
But instead of answering him, I began to cry again, and to call out loudly for my mother. He saw plainly that there was nothing to be done but keep to the terms of our contract; so, after a bit of a growl, he opened the door very softly, and reached in the matches and the candlestick, and lit the candle, and stood it on a shelf.
I was of course too young to think of such things at the time, but it has occurred to me frequently since,—how did my father feel, and what did he think about, as he lay watching that candle burning? In my eyes it was simply a bit of tallow candle; and my only reflection in reference to it was, that it would have been much better had it been somewhat longer, for there was not more than two inches of it, and it was all aslant and guttery. As he lay with his eyes fixed on it, however, it may have filled him with thoughts that were much more serious. It may have come into his mind that this was the candle that had burned all the night through in my mother’s room, and that it was gazing on its flame that her dying sight had failed her. Perhaps she had said, as dying people will, under such circumstances, “Bring back the candle; I cannot see; I am in the dark.” He may have been led to ponder on the uncertainty of life, and on what a useless thing a body bereft of its soul is. More useless than a scrap of candle, for the candle flame may be quenched, and the candle saved and rekindled; but the body never may until the day of the Great Rekindling comes.
If he got into a train of thought of this sort, goodness knows what else he may have been led to think about. Perhaps of the considerable share he had taken towards putting my mother’s life out, and how he would have to answer for it one day. I shouldn’t wonder if he did think of this. Certainly, as he lay regarding the candle-flame so intently thoughts of more than ordinary solemnity were busy within him, and I very sincerely trust that the guess I have made is correct, because never before or since do I recollect seeing him so bowed down and humble.
For my part, the bullfinch gave me enough to think of. By the dull light of the moon I had been able to make out little more than its mere shape. Now, however, it was plainly revealed from its head to its tail. My heart has been set against bullfinches from that time; and, as a gift even, I would not accept the best “piper” in London. I believe that most people would as soon entertain the idea of giving house-room to a human skeleton as I to a bird of this species; nor would it be, comparatively, more preposterous, since the bullfinch is, in my eyes, as perfect an emblem of death as could possibly be suggested. It was death itself, and so I regarded it. My eyes were drawn towards it, and would not be withdrawn. Its black, eyeless, bullet-shaped head; its wide-agape beak; its straddle legs; the crimson blurs and smirches that stained its body; the bright, sharp wires which trussed it in every direction, fascinated my gaze completely. Presently the dwindling candle began to sputter, and its flame to gasp for breath, as it were—rising and falling like a man that is drowning, and seeming to make the spitted bird rise and fall, and to wriggle and writhe to get free from the spikes in it. Then, with a struggle, I turned my face to the wall, and, falling asleep, never awoke until I heard the tinkle of the breakfast things in Jenkins’s room.
Chapter VI. In which, for the first time in my life, I see the inside of a church, also a pit-hole in the yard by the side of it.
Sympathizing friends
I discovered no particular reason for bewailing my mother’s death for some considerable time after it happened. On the contrary, indeed, I was decidedly a gainer by the melancholy event; for no sooner did it become generally known that I was an orphan, than every womanly heart in Fryingpan Alley yearned towards me. During the first two or three days, this universal sympathy and commiseration was rather embarrassing to a boy so utterly unused to it. My appearance at the door was the signal for a doleful chorus of “Here comes poor little Jimmy!” and I could scarcely walk as far as the water-butt without having my head patted half-a-dozen times, and more bread and treacle and bits of pudding thrust into my hands that I could have fairly eaten in a day.
Nor did the good-nature of the neighbours stop at presents of victuals. People whom I scarcely knew by sight even stopped me, and, after many tender inquiries of a sort calculated to make me pipe my eye, soothed and comforted me by gifts of halfpence and farthings. The pocket in my little breeches would scarcely hold my riches; and the value of money so depreciated in my eyes, that I was led into all sorts of extravagances. There was no delicacy in the sweetstuff-shop round the comer, from the top to the bottom shelf, with the flavour of which I did not make myself acquainted. My young acquaintances exerted themselves in my behalf to invent novel and curious means for investing my money. At their suggestion, I once bought a market bunch of young and juicy carrots. On the third day after my mother’s decease, I became so ill that they fetched the white-headed doctor to see me. I was going after my mother, everybody said; and quite a new start was given to the now slightly flagging interest in me.