Londons Underworld | Page 5

which he apprenticed himself to french polishing. From apprentice to
journeyman, from journeyman to business on his own account, were
successive steps; he married, and that brought him among my many
acquaintances.
He had a nice home, and two beautiful children, and then that great
destroyer of home life, drink! had to be reckoned with. So he came to
consult me. She was a beautiful and cultured woman and full of
remorse.
The stained hands of the french polisher trembled as he signed a
document by which he agreed to pay L1 per week for his wife's
maintenance in an inebriate home for twelve months where she might
have her babe with her. Bravely he did his part, and at the end of the
year he brought her back to a new and better home, where the
neighbours knew nothing of her past.
For twelve months there was joy in the home, and then a new life came
into it; but with the babe came a relapse; the varnish- stained man was
again at his wits' end. Once more she entered a home, for another year
he worked and toiled to pay the charges, and again he provided a new
home. And she came back to a house that he had bought for her in a
new neighbourhood; they now lived close to me, and my house was
open to them. The story of the following years cannot be told, for she
almost ruined him. Night after night after putting the children to bed, he

searched the streets and public-houses for her; sometimes I went with
him. She pawned his clothes, the children's clothing, and even the boy's
fiddle. He cleaned the house, he cooked the food, he cared for the
children, he even washed and ironed their clothing on Saturday evening
for the coming Sunday. He marked all the clothing, he warned all the
pawnbrokers. At length he obtained a separation order, but tearing it up
he again took her home with him. She went from bad to worse; even
down to the deepest depths and thence to a rescue home. He fetched her
out, and they disappeared from my neighbourhood.
So I lost them and often wondered what the end had been. To-day he
was smiling; he had with him a youth of twenty, a scholarship boy, the
violinist. He said, "I am just going to pay for his passage to Canada; he
is going to be the pioneer, and perhaps we shall all join him, she will do
better in a new country!" On further inquiry I found that she was trying
hard, and doing better than when I lost them.
Thinking she needed greater interest in life, he had bought a small
business for her, but "Mr. Holmes, she broke down!"
Alas! I knew what "breaking down" meant to the poor fellow, the
heroic fellow I ought to have said. And so for her he will leave his
kindred, home and friends; he will forsake the business that he has so
slowly and laboriously built up, he will sacrifice anything in the hope
that the air of Canada "will do her good." let us hope that it may, for
her good is all he lives for, and her good is his religion.
Twenty years of heartbreaking misery have not killed his love or
withered his hope. Surely love like his cannot fail of its reward. And
maybe in the new world he will have the happiness that has been
denied him in the old world, and in the evening of his life he may have
the peaceful calm that has hitherto been denied him. For this he is
seeking a place in the new world where the partner of his life and the
desire of his eyes may not find it easy to yield to her besetting
temptation, where the air and his steadfast love will "do her good."
But all my acquaintances are not heroes, for I am sorry to say that my
old friend Downy has served his term of penal servitude, and is at

liberty once more to beg or steal. He is not ashamed to beg, but I know
that he prefers stealing, for he richly enjoys anything obtained "on the
cross," and cares little for the fruits of honest labour.
Downy therefore never crosses my doorstep, and when I hold
communication with him he stands on the doorstep where I bar his
entrance.
Yet I like the vagabond, for he is a humorous rascal, and though I know
that I ought to be severe with him, I fail dismally when I try to exhort
him. "Now, look here, old man," he will say, "stop preaching; what are
you going to do to help a fellow; do you think I live this life for