WHEN the old woman left her, Norah sat for a while buried in thought, her scissors lying on one knee, one hand hanging idly by her side. The boy was very ill, the cough hardly left him for a moment and his eyes were bright and feverish.

“If he dies what am I to do?” Norah asked herself several times. “Then it would be that I’d have nothing to live for.”

She rose and followed Meg into the room. The woman sat beside the fire, humming an old song. A candle, stuck in the neck of a beer-bottle, was alight, and a cricket chirped behind the fireless grate. “I’m goin’ out for a while,” said Norah in a low, strained voice. “Will ye look after the boy until I come back? I’ll take him in here.”

“All right,” said the woman, rising to her feet. “Take the little thing in.”

When Norah re-entered her own room the boy was coughing weakly but insistently in the darkness. She lit a candle, sat down on the corner of the bed and was immediately deep in thought. Her money had now dwindled away; she had only one and threepence in her possession. She even felt hungry; for a long while this sensation was almost foreign to her. The weekly rent was due on the morrow, and the child needed the doctor, needed food, needed fresh air and, above all, the attention which she was unable to give him.

She lifted him tenderly from the bed and carried him in to Meg, who began to crow with delight when the child was placed in her withered arms. Once back in her own room Norah resumed her seat on the bedside and seemed to be debating some very heavy problem. The candle flared faintly in the sconce on the floor; large shadows chased one another on the grimy ceiling ... the cripple came upstairs, Norah could hear the rattle of his crutches ... the noise of the city was loud outside the windows.

Norah rose, swept the floor, lit the lamp, a thing which she had not done for many nights, candles being much cheaper than oil. She went out, bought some coal and a penny bundle of firewood: these she placed on the grate, ready for lighting. The bed she sorted with nervous care, sighing as she spread out the blankets and arranged the pillows.

She then began to dress herself carefully, brushing back her hair with trembling fingers as she looked into the little broken hand-mirror, one of Sheila Carrol’s belongings. Her well-worn dress still retained a certain coquetry of cut and suited her well, her broad-brimmed hat, which she had not worn for a long while, gave an added charm to her white brow and grey eyes.

When dressed she stood for a moment to listen to the child coughing in Meg’s room. Stifling with an effort the impulse to go in and have one look at the boy, she crossed herself on forehead and lips and went out on the landing. For a moment something seemed to perplex her; she stood and looked round on all sides. The place was deserted; nothing could be heard but the cripple singing “Annie Laurie” in a loud, melodious voice. Norah again crossed herself, stepped slowly down the stairs, and went out to the street.

II

AT midnight she returned for her child. The boy was still coughing, but more quietly than before, and the old woman was lying flat upon her stomach, asleep by the fireside. Norah lifted the child, took him into her own room and placed the frail bundle, in which was wrapped up all her life and all her hopes, on the bed.

The fire was burning brightly, the oil-lamp gave out a clear, comforting light which showed up the whole room, the bare floor, the black walls enlivened by no redeeming feature save the crude picture of the Virgin and Child and the little black cross hanging from a rusty nail near the window; the pile of dongaree jackets shoved into a corner, the orange-box and the bed with the blankets, which Norah had sorted such a short time before, now in strange disorder.

Old Meg suddenly bustled into the room, a frightened look on her face. “I thought that some yin had stolen the little dear,” she cried, her breath reeking with alcohol. “Ah, here he is, the wee laddie,” she cooed on seeing the little pink face in the bed. “I hae got a fright, I hae indeed, Norah Ryan!”

The woman sat down on the orange box and looked curiously round, first at the lighted lamp, then at the fire, then at Norah, and afterwards back to the fire again.

“Hae ye got siller the noo, lassie?” she exclaimed at last. “Has yer rich uncle kicked the bucket? Fire and light the noo and everything? Ah! what’s this?” she exclaimed, bending down and lifting a half-smoked cigarette from the floor. She looked at it for a moment, then threw it into the flames.

“Has it come to this, Norah Ryan?” she asked, and a faint touch of regret mingled with the woman’s tones.

Norah, who was bending over the child, turned round fiercely; for a moment she looked like some beautiful animal cornered in its own lair.

“It has come to this, Meg Morraws!” she shouted. “Did ye think that I couldn’t sell my soul? I would do anything under heaven to save my boy; that’s the kind of me, Meg Morraws. I’ve money now and Dermod won’t die. I won’t let him die!... What wouldn’t I do for him, child of my own and of my heart?... It’s ill luck that’s drawin’ me to ruin, Meg, but not the boy. He can’t help the sickness and it’s myself that has got to make him well again.... I had whisky this night: that made me brave. I could.... Isn’t it time that ye were in bed, Meg Morraws? I’m not feelin’ kind towards anyone but the child. I want no one here but Dermod, my little boy.”

Meg went into her room, closing the door softly behind her. Norah took some money—five shillings—from her pocket and put it on the mantelpiece, under the picture of the Virgin and Child. It made a tinkling sound as she put it down and the silver coins sparkled brightly.

Then she turned down the light, threw some more coals on the fire, and taking the child from the bed she sat down and held the little bundle of pink flesh against her bosom. She could hear the water bubbling from the tap out on the landing; the noise of footsteps on the stairs; loud, vacant laughter from No. 8. Why did those women laugh, Norah wondered.... The fire blazed brightly, and as she raised her eyes she could see the silver coins on the mantelpiece shining like stars.

III

SOMEONE rapped; and receiving no answer, the caretaker, the woman with the red wisps of hair, and a string for a neck, poked her head through the door.

“Not in bed yet, Norah Ryan?” she asked.

“Just goin’,” the girl answered.

“They’re doin’ a big trade at No. 8 the night,” said the woman.

“I’m not wantin’ to hear; it’s nothing to me.”

The caretaker smiled, showing her teeth, sharp as a dog’s and in a good state of preservation.

“I’m only just tellin’ ye,” said the woman. “I suppose ye ken, lassie, that half the rooms up this stair are lyin’ idle, wi’ no yin to take them. What is the reason for that? I’ll tell ye. Some people, decent folk, ye ken, will not come to sic a place because they dinna like women of the kind at No. 8. If these two women were put away, this landing would be fillt ev’ry night. But I let the women stay. Why’s that? Because I like fair play. Give everyone a chance to live, is what I say. And they’re makin’ guid siller, them twa lassies at No. 8. Three pounds a night between them sometimes. And I wouldna turn them oot; wouldna do it for wurl’s, because I like fair play. But as ye ken yersel’, they must pay me a little more than other lodgers.”

“What do ye want me to pay extra?” asked Norah in a hard voice. “Tell me at once and leave me to meself.” “Say half and half,” answered the red-haired woman, glaring covertly at the Irish girl. “That’ll be fair, for ye’ll earn the money very easy, so to speak. And then ye can stay here as long as ye like. I wouldna turn ye oot, no for onything, because I like fair play. It’s not ev’ry house, ye ken, that would.... But ye know what I mean. I wish ye good-night, and I’ll make a note of all the men that come up. And if the police come along I’ll gi’e ye the wink. Good-night and good luck!”

The woman went out, but presently poked her red wisps in again. “I’ll take it that every man I see comin’ in here gies ye five bob. If they gie ye more ye can tell me; but five bob’ll be the least, and half and half is fair play. Good-night; good-night and good luck!”

“A dirty hag she is!” said old Meg, who had been listening at the door during the conversation and who now came into the room. “Dirty! and her makin’ piles of tin. Full of money she is and so is the woman that owns the buildin’. Mrs. Crawford they cry her, and she lives oot in Hillhead, the rich people’s place, and goes to church ev’ry Sunday with prayer books under her arm. Strike me dead! if she isn’t a swine, a swine unhung, a swine and a half. Has a motor car too, and is always writin’ to the papers about sanitary arrangements. ‘It isn’t healthy to have too many people in the one room,’ she says. But I ken what she’s up to, her with her sanitary and her fresh air and everything else, the swine! If few people stay in ev’ry room she can let more of them; God put her in the pit, the swine! And the woman downstairs, the thin-necked serpent! is just as bad. If the likes of her finds women like me and you goin’ to hell they try to rob us outright before Old Nick puts his mits on our shoulders.”

IV

IN the days which followed, Norah learned much which may not be written down in books, sad things that many dare not read, but which some, under the terrible tyranny of destiny, dare to endure. It now seemed to the girl that all freedom of action, all the events of her life had been irrevocably decided before she was born. Deep down in her heart this thought, lacking expression and almost undefined, was always with her.

She bought new dresses, learned the art of making every curl on her white brow look tempting, and every movement of her face and body to express desires which she did not feel. She followed up her new profession like one sentenced to death, with reason clogged, feeling deadened and intellect benumbed. As an alternative to this there was nothing but starvation and death, and even purity is costly at such a price. Dragged to the tribunal which society erects for the prosecution of the poor and pure, she was asked to renounce all that she cherished, all her hopes, her virginity, her soul. Society, sated with the labour of her hands, asked for her soul, and society, being the stronger, had its demand gratified.

But over it all, over the medley of pain and sorrow, over the blazing crucible of existence in which all fair dreams and hopes of the woman were melted away, greater and more powerful than anything else in Norah’s life, intense and enduring, unselfish and pure, shone the wonderful flame, the star of passionate love shining in the holy heaven of motherhood.

The child’s illness grew worse. One doctor was called in; then another. Both looked wise for a moment, strove to appear unconcerned, passed different verdicts and went away. One condemned the bedclothes; they were unsanitary. Norah procured new clothes; but the child became worse. Medicines were bought one day; they were condemned the next. A pretty pink dress was obtained for the child; it did not suit. When taken back to the clothes-seller he declared it was ruined and charged afresh for new garments.

So day after day, each full of a killing anxiety and bringing its own particular trouble, passed by. Her house had attained a certain fame as houses of the kind rapidly do.

The hooligans who stood at the street corner soon knew her by repute, for an ill name flies far and sticks fast. Little Tommy Macara looked in at her door no more; the boy’s mother had warned him against the woman. Life was now to Norah one vast intolerable burden that crushed her down. If only the child were dead things would be clearer; then she would know what to do. If Dermod died everything would be simplified; one easy plunge into the river where it swirled under Glasgow Bridge would for ever end all heartbreak and sorrow.

V

NORAH went out into the city on her usual errand; she had now known the life of the streets for fully two months. It was nearly midnight, the streets were well nigh deserted, save for the occasional prowlers and drunken men who were coming home from their clubs or from the foul haunts of the city.

As she walked along, her head held down against the cutting breeze that had suddenly risen and was now whirling round every corner, she heard steps coming behind her, and in these steps she detected something strangely familiar. For a moment she felt like a wayfarer who goes alone, along a dark road, and waits for some horrible apparition to stretch out from the darkness and put a hand on his shoulder. The steps drew nearer, came closer ... somebody was passing her. Norah looked up, started a little and cried:

“Under God, the day and the night! It’s Dermod Flynn that’s in it!”

She was again looking at Dermod Flynn; he stood in front of her, his hand stretched out in welcome.

“Is this you, Norah?” he asked.

The crushing fatality of her years pressed down upon her; she suddenly realised that she had lost something very precious; that all her accidents and faults were bunched together and now laid before her. He had grown so big too; a man he looked.

“Is it yerself that’s in it, Dermod Flynn?” she asked. “I didn’t expect to meet you here. Have ye been away home since I saw ye last?” She thought she detected a wave of pity sweeping over Dermod’s face and resting in his eyes.

“I have never been at home yet,” he answered. “Have you?”

“Me go home!” she replied almost defiantly. “What would I be going home for now with the black mark of shame over me? D’ye think that I’d darken me mother’s door with the sin that’s on me, heavy on me soul? Sometimes I’m thinkin’ long, but I never let on to anybody, and it’s meself that would like to see the old spot again. It’s a good lot I’d give to see the grey boats of Dooey goin’ out beyond Trienna Bar in the grey duskus of the harvest evenin’. D’ye mind the time ye were at school, Dermod, and the way ye struck the master with the pointer?”

“I mind it well,” said Dermod with a laugh, “and you said that he was dead when he dropped on the form.”

“And d’ye mind the day that ye went over beyont the mountains with the bundle under yer arm? I met ye on the road and ye said that ye were never comin’ back.”

“You did not care whether I returned or not. You did not stop to bid me good-bye.”

“I was frightened of ye,” answered Norah, who noticed that Dermod spoke resentfully, as if she had been guilty of some unworthy action.

“Why were ye frightened?” he asked.

“I don’t know.”

“And you did not even turn to look after me!”

“That was because I knew that ye yerself was lookin’ round.”

“Do you remember the night on the Derry boat?” Dermod asked wistfully.

“Quite well, Dermod,” she replied. “I often be thinkin’ of them days, I do indeed.”

There was a momentary silence. Norah dreaded the next question which instinctively she knew Dermod would ask. He was better dressed than formerly, she noticed, and he was tall and strong. She felt that he was one in whom great reliance could be placed.

“Where are you going at this hour of the night?” he asked, and Norah read accusation in his tones.

“I’m goin’ out for a walk,” she answered.

“Where are you workin’?”

“How much does he know?” Norah asked herself. What could she tell him? That she was a servant in a gentleman’s house. But even as the lie was stammering on her tongue she faltered and burst into tears.

“Don’t cry,” said the young man awkwardly. “Is there—what’s wrong with ye, Norah?”

She did not answer, but low sobs shook her bosom. How much she wished to be away, and yet—how she liked to be beside him! Surely Dermod would think her a very funny girl to weep like that! A momentary remembrance of a morning long ago when she met him on the Glenmornan road flashed across her mind, and she held out her hand.

“Slan agiv, Dermod,” she said in a choking voice, “I must be goin’. It was good of ye to speak to me in that nice way of yers, Dermod.”

His hand closed on hers but he did not speak. The sound of far-off footsteps reached her ears.... A window was lifted somewhere near at hand ... a cab rattled on the streets. Norah withdrew her hand and went on her journey, leaving Dermod alone on the pavement.