The New Magdalen | Page 7

Wilkie Collins
without the faintest note of displeasure
in her tone. "I am accustomed to stand in the pillory of my own past life.
I sometimes ask myself if it was all my fault. I sometimes wonder if
Society had no duties toward me when I was a child selling matches in
the street--when I was a hard-working girl fainting at my needle for
want of food." Her voice faltered a little for the first time as it
pronounced those words; she waited a moment, and recovered herself.
"It's too late to dwell on these things now," she said, resignedly.
"Society can subscribe to reclaim me; but Society can't take me back.
You see me here in a place of trust--patiently, humbly, doing all the
good I can. It doesn't matter! Here, or elsewhere, what I am can never
alter what I was. For three years past all that a sincerely penitent
woman can do I have done. It doesn't matter! Once let my past story be
known, and the shadow of it covers me; the kindest people shrink."
She waited again. Would a word of sympathy come to comfort her
from the other woman's lips? No! Miss Roseberry was shocked; Miss
Roseberry was confused. "I am very sorry for you," was all that Miss
Roseberry could say.
"Everybody is sorry for me," answered the nurse, as patiently as ever;
"everybody is kind to me. But the lost place is not to be regained. I
can't get back! I can't get back?" she cried, with a passionate outburst of
despair--checked instantly the moment it had escaped her. "Shall I tell
you what my experience has been?" she resumed. "Will you hear the
story of Magdalen--in modern times?"

Grace drew back a step; Mercy instantly understood her.
"I am going to tell you nothing that you need shrink from hearing," she
said. "A lady in your position would not understand the trials and the
struggles that I have passed through. My story shall begin at the Refuge.
The matron sent me out to service with the character that I had honestly
earned--the character of a reclaimed woman. I justified the confidence
placed in me; I was a faithful servant. One day my mistress sent for
me--a kind mistress, if ever there was one yet. 'Mercy, I am sorry for
you; it has come out that I took you from a Refuge; I shall lose every
servant in the house; you must go.' I went back to the matron--another
kind woman. She received me like a mother. 'We will try again, Mercy;
don't be cast down.' I told you I had been in Canada?"
Grace began to feel interested in spite of herself. She answered with
something like warmth in her tone. She returned to her chair--placed at
its safe and significant distance from the chest.
The nurse went on:
"My next place was in Canada, with an officer's wife: gentlefolks who
had emigrated. More kindness; and, this time, a pleasant, peaceful life
for me. I said to myself, 'Is the lost place regained? Have I got back?'
My mistress died. New people came into our neighborhood. There was
a young lady among them--my master began to think of another wife. I
have the misfortune (in my situation) to be what is called a handsome
woman; I rouse the curiosity of strangers. The new people asked
questions about me; my master's answers did not satisfy them. In a
word, they found me out. The old story again! 'Mercy, I am very sorry;
scandal is busy with you and with me; we are innocent, but there is no
help for it--we must part.' I left the place; having gained one advantage
during my stay in Canada, which I find of use to me here."
"What is it?"
"Our nearest neighbors were French-Canadians. I learned to speak the
French language."

"Did you return to London?"
"Where else could I go, without a character?" said Mercy, sadly. "I
went back again to the matron. Sickness had broken out in the Refuge;
I made myself useful as a nurse. One of the doctors was struck with
me--'fell in love' with me, as the phrase is. He would have married me.
The nurse, as an honest woman, was bound to tell him the truth. He
never appeared again. The old story! I began to be weary of saying to
myself, 'I can't get back! I can't get back!' Despair got hold of me, the
despair that hardens the heart. I might have committed suicide; I might
even have drifted back into my old life--but for one man."
At those last words her voice--quiet and even through the earlier part of
her sad story--began to falter once more. She stopped, following
silently the memories and associations roused in her by what she
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