Blade-O'-Grass. Golden Grain. and Bread and Cheese and Kisses.Farjeon, B. L. (Benjamin Leopold)
General
Blade-O'-Grass. Golden Grain. and Bread and Cheese and Kisses.
Farjeon, B. L. (Benjamin Leopold)
Christmas stories; Fiction
'Only once!' I said sadly. 'That's all, sir; I never went agin. I
stood near the door while the bells was ringin'. I like to 'eer them
bells; they rest me like, and it was them as drawed me on. A lot o'
fine people was comin' along the streets all round, and goin' in
while I stood there. Some on 'em looked 'appy, 'specially the gals as
was about the same age as me; but some on 'em looked orfle glum,
as if they knowed they was bad uns, and was goin' to be preached
to!--beggin' your pardon, sir. Some of the ladies was dressed
beautiful, and more nor one on 'em 'eld their gownds away from me as
they parsed, for fear I should 'ave spoiled 'em by touchin' 'em. One
lady in lavender silk pulled 'er two little gals away because they was
close to me, and looked at me as much as to say that I'd got no
business to be there. No more I 'ad, sir, I know. I remember them
things, sir. All the people got in, and the bells stopped, and then I
thought 'ow I should like to go in too. It took a deal o' courage to
push open the door, and my 'eart was in my mouth when I did it; but
that was nothin' to what come arterwards. When I was inside, I thort I
should ha' dropped down with fright, a lot on 'em stared at me so
'ard-like; and what with that and the place bein' so grand, I turned
all over like a jelly. Then a big man comes up to me, lookin' very
stern and solemn. I thort he was a-goin' to give me in charge, and I
was goin' to cry out and beg 'im not to, when he clapped 'is 'and on
my mouth, and put me somewhere where I couldn't see nothink, and where
I could only 'eer a drummin' in my ears like a lot o' flies, except
when the people was a-singin'. But I was frightened all the while, and
when the doors was throwed open, I run out as fast as I could, for
fear somethin' 'd be done to me. I never went no more; it seemed to me
as if I'd no right to go.'
'Do you know where my church is, child?'
'No, sir.'
I wrote the address on a piece of paper, and gave it to her.
'I can't read, sir,' she said, with a flush in her cheeks.
I begged her pardon, and told her the name of the church, and the
street it was in. 'If you will come there, my dear, next Sabbath, I
shall be glad to see you. And don't think you have no right there! You
have as much right as the best-dressed lady in the church.'
She thanked me, and said she would come because I had been good to
her.
'And bring Tom,' I said.
She shook her head. 'I don't think Tom'll come, sir.'
'Not for your sake?' I asked.
'Tom'll do almost anythink for me,' she said, tears gathering in her
eyes.
'Do you know,' I said very gently, 'that living as you are living now
with Tom gives great pain to your friends?'
She bit her lips rebelliously, and put on her dogged look.
'And that it is wrong in the sight of God?'
There was no softening of the dogged look; it hardened rather.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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