Sturdy and Strong: or, How George Andrews Made His Way

"Will that do for you?" the man asked.

"Capitally," George said; "it could not be nicer;" while Bill was so taken aback by its comfort and luxury that he was speechless.

"Well, that's settled, then," the man said. "If you have got any things you can bring 'em in when you like."

"We have not got any to speak of," George said, flushing a little. "I came up from the country three months ago to look for work, and beyond odd jobs I have had nothing to do since, so that everything I had is pretty well gone; but I can pay a week's rent in advance," he said, putting his hand in his pocket.

"Oh, you needn't mind that!" the man said; "as you work in the shop it's safe enough. Now I must get my dinner, else I shall be late for work."

"Well, Bill, what do you think of that?" George asked as they left the house.

"My eye," Bill exclaimed in admiration; "aint it nice just! Why, yer couldn't get a room like that, not furnished, anywhere near the market, not at four bob a week. Aint it clean just; so help me if the house don't look as if it has been scrubbed down every day! What a woman that must be for washing!"

"Yes; we shall have to rub our feet well, Bill, and make as little mess as we can in going in and out."

"I should think so," Bill said. "It don't seem to me as if it could be true as we're to have such a room as that to ourselves, and to walk into a house bold without being afraid as somebody would have his eye on you, and chivey you; and eight bob a week for grub regular."

"Well, let's get some bread and cheese, Bill; pretty near half our time must be gone, and mind we must be very saving at first. There will be several things to get; a kettle and a teapot, and a coffeepot, and some cups and saucers, and we shall want a gridiron for frying rashers of bacon upon."

"My eye, won't it be prime!" Bill broke in.

"And we shall want some towels," George went on with his enumeration.

"Towels!" repeated Bill. "What are they like?"

"They are cloths for wiping your hands and face after you have washed."

"Well, if yer says we wants 'em, George, of course we must get 'em; but I've always found my hands dried quick enough by themselves, especially if I gived 'em a rub on my trousers."

"And then, Bill, you know," George went on, "I want to save every penny we can, so as to get some things to furnish two rooms by the time mother comes out."

"Yes, in course we must," Bill agreed warmly, though a slight shade passed over his face at the thought that they were not to be always alone together. "Well, yer know, George, I am game for anythink. I can hold on with a penn'orth of bread a day. I have done it over and over, and if yer says the word I am ready to do it again."

"No, Bill, we needn't do that," George laughed. "Still, we must live as cheap as we can. We will stick to bread for breakfast, and bread and cheese for dinner, and bread for supper, with sometimes a rasher as a great treat. At any rate we will try to live on six shillings a week."

"Oh! we can do that fine," Bill said confidently; "and then two shillings for rent, and that will leave us eight shillings a week to put by."

"Mother said that the doctor didn't think she would be able to come out 'til the spring. We are just at the beginning of November, so if she comes out the first of April, that's five months, say twenty-two weeks. Twenty-two weeks at eight shillings, let me see. That's eight pounds in twenty weeks, eight pounds sixteen altogether, that would furnish two rooms very well, I should think."

"My eye, I should think so!" Bill exclaimed, for to his mind eight pound sixteen was an almost unheard-of sum, and the fact that his companion had been able to calculate it increased if possible his admiration for him.

It needed but two or three days to reconcile Mrs. Grimstone to her new lodgers.

"I wouldn't have believed," she said at the end of the week to a neighbor, "as two boys could have been that quiet. They comes in after work as regular as the master. They rubs their feet on the mat, and you can scarce hear 'em go upstairs, and I don't hear no more of 'em till they goes out agin in the morning. They don't come back here to breakfast or dinner. Eats it, I suppose, standing like."

"But what do they do with themselves all the evening, Mrs. Grimstone?"

"One of 'em reads to the other. I think I can hear a voice going regular over the kitchen."

"And how's their room?"

"As clean and tidy as a new pin. They don't lock the door when they goes out, and I looked in yesterday, expecting to find it like a pigsty; but they had made the bed afore starting for work, and set everything in its place, and laid the fire like for when they come back."

Mrs. Grimstone was right. George had expended six pence in as many old books at a bookstall. One of them was a spelling-book, and he had at once set to work teaching Bill his letters. Bill had at first protested. "He had done very well without reading, and didn't see much good in it." However, as George insisted he gave way, as he would have done to any proposition whatever upon which his friend had set his mind. So for an hour every evening after they had finished tea Bill worked at his letters and spelling, and then George read aloud to him from one of the other books.

"You must get on as fast as you can this winter, Bill," he said; "because when the summer evenings come we shall want to go for long walks."

They found that they did very well upon the sum they agreed on. Tea and sugar cost less than George had expected. Mrs. Grimstone took in for them regularly a halfpenny-worth of milk, and for tea they were generally able to afford a bloater between them, or a very thin rasher of bacon. Their enjoyment of their meals was immense. Bill indeed frequently protested that they were spending too much money; but George said as long as they kept within the sum agreed upon, and paid their rent, coal, candles, and what little washing they required out of the eight shillings a week, they were doing very well.

They had by this time got accustomed to the din of the machinery, and were able to work in comfort. Mr. Penrose had several times come through the room, and had given them a nod. After they had been there a month he spoke to Grimstone.

"How do those boys do their work?"

"Wonderful well, sir; they are the two best boys we have ever had. No skylarking about, and I never have to wait a minute for a plank. They generally comes in a few minutes before time and gets the bench cleared up. They are first-rate boys. They lodge with me, and two quieter and better-behaved chaps in a house there never was."

"I am glad to hear it," Mr. Penrose said. "I am interested in them, and am pleased to hear so good an account."

That Saturday, to their surprise, when they went to get their money they received ten shillings apiece.

"That's two shillings too much," George said as the money was handed to them.

"That's all right," the foreman said. "The governor ordered you both to have a rise."

"My eye!" Bill said as they went out. "What do you think of that, George? Four bob a week more to put by regularly. How much more will that make by the time your mother comes?"

"We won't put it all by, Bill. I think the other will be enough. This four shillings a week we will put aside at present for clothes. We want two more shirts apiece, and some more stockings, and we shall want some shoes before long, and another suit of clothes each. We must keep ourselves decent, you know."

From the time when they began work the boys had gone regularly every Sunday morning to a small iron church near their lodging, and they also went to an evening service once a week. Their talk, too, at home was often on religion, for Bill was extremely anxious to learn, and although his questions and remarks often puzzled George to answer, he was always ready to explain things as far as he could.

February came, and to George's delight he heard, from his mother that she was so much better that the doctor thought that when she came out at the end of April she would be as strong as she had ever been. Her eyes had benefited greatly by her long rest, and she said that she was sure she should be able to do work as before. She had written several times since they had been at Limehouse, expressing her great pleasure at hearing that George was so well and comfortable. At Christmas, the works being closed for four days, George had gone down to see her, and they had a delightful talk together. Christmas had indeed been a memorable occasion to the boys, for on Christmas Eve the carrier had left a basket at Grimstone's directed "George Andrews." The boys had prepared their Christmas dinner, consisting of some fine rashers of bacon and sixpenny-worth of cold plum pudding from a cook-shop, and had already rather lamented this outlay, for Mrs. Grimstone had that afternoon invited them to dine downstairs. George was reading from a book which he bought for a penny that morning when there was a knock at the door, and Mrs. Grimstone said:

"Here is a hamper for you, George."

"A hamper for me!" George exclaimed in astonishment, opening the door. "Why, whoever could have sent a hamper for me! It must be a mistake."

"That's your name on the direction, anyhows," Mrs. Grimstone said.

"Yes, that's my name, sure enough," George agreed, and at once began to unknot the string which fastened down the lid.

"Here is a Christmas card at the top!" he shouted. He turned it over. On the back were the words:

"With all good wishes, Helen Penrose."

"Well, that is kind," George said in rather a husky voice; and indeed it was the kindness that prompted the gift rather than the gift itself that touched him.

"Now, then, George," Bill remonstrated; "never mind that there card, let's see what's inside."

The hamper was unpacked, and was found to contain a cold goose, a Christmas pudding, and some oranges and apples. These were all placed on the table, and when Mrs. Grimstone had retired Bill executed a war-dance in triumph and delight.

"I never did see such a game," he said at last, as he sat down exhausted. "There's a Christmas dinner for yer! Why, it's like them stories of the genii you was a-telling me about – chaps as come whenever yer rubbed a ring or an old lamp, and brought a tuck-out or whatever yer asked for. Of course that wasn't true; yer told me it wasn't, and I shouldn't have believed it if yer hadn't, but this 'ere is true. Now I sees, George, as what yer said was right and what I said was wrong. I thought yer were a flat 'cause yer wouldn't take nothing for getting back that there locket, and now yer see what's come of it, two good berths for us and a Christmas dinner fit for a king. Now what are we going to do with it, 'cause yer know we dines with them downstairs to-morrow?"

"The best thing we can do, I think," George answered, "will be to invite all of them downstairs, Bob Grimstone, his wife, and the three young uns, to supper, not to-morrow night nor the night after, because I shan't be back from Croydon till late, but say the evening after."

"But we can't hold them all," Bill said, looking round the room.

"No, we can't hold them here, certainly, but I dare say they will let us have the feed in their parlor. There will be nothing to get, you know, but some bread and butter, and some beer for Bob. Mrs. Grimstone don't take it, so we must have plenty of tea."

"I should like some beer too, just for once, George, with such a blow-out as that."

"No, no, Bill, you and I will stick to tea. You know we agreed that we wouldn't take beer. If we begin it once we shall want it again, so we are not going to alter from what we agreed to. We see plenty of the misery which drink causes all round and the way in which money is wasted over it. I like a glass of beer as well as you do, and when I get to be a man I dare say I shall take a glass with my dinner regularly, though I won't do even that if I find it makes me want to take more; but anyhow at present we can do without it."

Bill agreed, and the dinner-party downstairs and the supper two nights afterwards came off in due course, and were both most successful.

The acknowledgment of the gift had been a matter of some trouble to George, but he had finally bought a pretty New Year's card and had written on the back, "with the grateful thanks of George Andrews," and had sent it to the daughter of his employer.

At the beginning of April George had consulted Grimstone and his wife as to the question of preparing a home for his mother.

"How much would two rooms cost?" he had asked; "one a good-sized one and the other the same size as ours."

"Four shillings or four and sixpence," Mrs. Grimstone replied.

"And supposing we had a parlor and two little bedrooms?"

"Five and sixpence or six shillings, I should say," Mrs. Grimstone replied.

"And how much for a whole house?"

"It depends upon the size. We pay seven shillings a week, but you might get one without the kitchen and bedroom over it behind for six shillings."

"That would be much the nicest," George said, "only it would cost such a lot to furnish it."

"But you needn't furnish it all at once," Mrs. Grimstone suggested. "Just a kitchen and two bedrooms for a start, and you can put things into the parlor afterwards. That's the way we did when we first married. But you must have some furniture."

"And how much will it cost for the kitchen and two bedrooms?"

"Of course going cheaply to work and buying the things secondhand, I should say I could pick up the things for you, so that you could do very well," Mrs. Grimstone said, "for six or seven pounds."

"That will do capitally," George said, "for by the end of this month Bill and I will have more than ten pounds laid by."

"What! since you came here?" Grimstone exclaimed in astonishment. "Do you mean to say you boys have laid by five pounds apiece?"

"Yes, and bought a lot of things too," his wife put in.

"Why, you must have been starving yourselves!"

"We don't look like it," George laughed. "I am sure Bill is a stone heavier than when he came here."

"Well, young chap, it does you a lot of credit," Bob Grimstone said. "It isn't every boy, by a long way, would stint himself as you must have done for the last five months to make a comfortable home for his mother, for I know lots of men who are earning their two quid a week and has their old people in the workhouse. Well, all I can say is that if I or the missis here can be of any use to you in taking a house we shall be right down glad."

"Thank you," George said. "We will look about for a house, and when we have fixed on one if you or Mrs. Grimstone will go about it for us I shall be much obliged, for I don't think landlords would be inclined to let a house to two boys."

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