The Duchess of Rosemary Lane: A NovelFarjeon, B. L. (Benjamin Leopold)
General
The Duchess of Rosemary Lane: A Novel
Farjeon, B. L. (Benjamin Leopold)
English fiction -- 19th century
Sally, walking about the streets the next morning, with her baby in
her arms, was aware that a critical change in her prospects was
impending, which threatened to separate her and the child who was now
part of her life; and as far as such a mite as she can be said to
determine, she resolved that such a separation should never take
place. She would run away into the wide, wide world.
She set off at as good a pace as her little legs could achieve, but
the child she carried was no light weight for one of her tender years,
and before she had extricated herself from the labyrinth of courts,
alleys, and narrow streets which intersected Rosemary Lane, she was
exhausted. Leaning against the wall, she looked up to the sky with a
sad and weary face. She had never forgotten the beautiful dream she
had dreamt on the night of her brother's return, and it now recurred
to her, bringing with it a dim hope that something wondrous might
happen to aid her in her difficulty. If she had been acquainted with
the history of Jack and his Beanstalk, she would have audibly wished
for a tree--up which she could climb into a kinder land than Rosemary
Lane. But although no miracle brought light to Sally's troubled soul,
something happened which seemed to her very wonderful.
She had halted immediately before a cobbler's stall, and the face she
saw as she looked down to earth was that of Seth Dumbrick the
cobbler--no other, indeed, than the cobbler who in Sally's dream had
appeared to her in the clouds, mending boots and shoes for the angels.
Here was the realisation of Sally's dim hope. Fancies of grand
processions and magic trees and angels in the clouds thronged her
mind, revolving around two central figures--the sweet figure of her
beautiful child, and the strange one of this queer-looking cobbler
whose chin had not met razor's edge for a week.
Seth Dumbrick, observing Sally's agitation, and also attracted by the
children, paused in his work, and spoke to Sally. She did not hear the
words, but the voice of the man was kind, and that was sufficient to
give colour to her hope.
"O Mr. Dumbrick," she exclaimed, pressing her hands to her breast, and
gazing upon the cobbler with eyes open to their fullest extent. "It
was you I dreamt of--it was you!"
"Ah, Sally," was Seth Dumbrick's calm comment, "it was me you dreamt
of, eh? What sort of a dream?"
"Oh," cried Sally, "so good--so beautiful!"
"Tell me the dream," said Seth.
Sally gave him a practical reply. "I am _so_ tired, and _so_ hungry!
And so's my baby."
Seth's eyes wandered to the baby, who was staring at him solemnly.
"Yours?" he gravely asked of Sally.
"Mine," as gravely answered Sally, with an emphatic nod.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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