Horatio Alger - Helen Ford

The next day found him closeted with Lewis Rand, from whom he received instructions as to his future course.

Helen had been long and anxiously considering in what manner she could employ herself so as to earn a sufficient amount to defray the expenses of living. Every day the little stock of money remaining in her purse became less. They lived very frugally, but there was the rent, and two persons cannot live on air. So the little hoard diminished, and five dollars were now all that remained to Helen. Five dollars! it might keep them ten days, but certainly would not last longer, economize as they might. From her father Helen could hope for no present assistance. He was always at work, but his labor, however well it might be compensated in the future, brought in no money now. And for money there would soon be pressing occasion. Helen grew very uneasy at the thought that they might be turned penniless into the street. Hitherto they had never been without money. The five dollars that remained was the last instalment of a small property left her father by his mother.

One morning Helen sat at the table, leaning her head upon her hand, plunged in anxious thought. At first she could think of no possible resource. But when everything looks dark, and all paths seem closed to us, suddenly from out the thick darkness there sometimes streams a ray of hope to cheer and sustain the sinking heart.

So it was in the present case.

In her humility, Helen had never dreamed that she possessed extraordinary musical powers, and it was only through the warm commendation of Martha Grey that this fact became known to her. Why should she not employ these in her father’s service? At the theatre a singer, but little older than herself, and as Martha declared inferior in talent, had won the popular applause. Why should not she gain employment in a similar capacity? Full of these thoughts, she entered Martha’s room.

The seamstress sat at the open window. The cool breeze that found its way in, lent a faint flush to her pale cheeks. In the cage over her head a canary bird sang—Martha’s solitary extravagance. As she sat alone from morning till night engaged in her monotonous task, the bird supplied the place of human company, and beguiled a portion of the weary time.

Helen came in and seated herself on a cricket at Martha’s feet.

Martha’s face brightened, for she had already learned to love the child.

“I am glad to see you, Helen,” she said. “How is your father, to-day?”

“Papa is much as usual.”

“Hard at work as ever, I suppose.”

“Yes; he allows himself no time to rest. I really think he ought. But, Martha, I am going to ask your advice about something very important to me,” said the child, gravely.

“Thank you for your confidence, Helen. Whatever is of importance to you will be of interest to me.”

“You remember telling me the other day that you liked my singing, and that I might some day become a great singer. You know I told you at the time how glad I was to hear you say so.”

“Yes, Helen; I remember it.”

“I did not tell you then why I felt glad; but I will now.”

Helen paused a moment, and then in a frank tone, which showed how little she was affected by the conventional shame some feel in disclosing their poverty, continued: “My father and I are very poor. We have been so for some time, but I got a little money by sewing, and that helped along. Now, you know, business is dull, and I can get no more work to do. The little money we have left will not last a fortnight, though I am very economical. So you see, Martha, it is quite necessary that I should find some way of earning more money at once.”

“Does your father know how near you are to destitution?” inquired the seamstress.

“No,” was the child’s reply; “and I hope he will not find out. I cannot bear to trouble him with that, when he has so much to think of. It can’t be very long before he finishes his model, and then we shall have plenty of money. If I can only earn enough to keep us along till that time I shall be very glad.”

“Poor child!” thought Martha, compassionately; “it will be long enough before your father’s invention fills your purse.”

She was about to offer to procure Helen some work from the establishment where she was employed, but when she looked at the bright face of the young girl, and thought to what hours and days of weariness it would consign her, how it would steal one by one the roses from her cheeks, and the freshness from her heart, leaving her with little to enjoy in the present and less to hope for in the future, she had not the heart to offer her the destiny which she had been compelled to accept for herself; nor could she bear to dim the child’s trustful confidence in her father’s success by the expression of a single doubt.

She remained silent.

Finding that Martha said nothing, Helen continued: “When I came to see you the other day, Martha, I had been trying to think of some way in which I could help poor papa, but I could think of nothing. Then when I sang to you and you liked it, I thought it possible that others might like it, too. Do you think,” she asked, lifting her eyes with a look of earnest expectation; “do you think they would hire me to sing at the theatre?”

Martha started in surprise. As yet no thought of the child’s purpose had entered her mind. To one so unobtrusive and retiring by natural temperament, the thought of going forth at the head of an army would have seemed scarcely more formidable that that of standing before a public audience. Yet this was what Helen, so diffident always, actually proposed to do.

“Can you really be in earnest, Helen?” she asked; gazing in amazement at the child who cherished such bold aspirations.

She did not understand the power of the motive which influenced Helen; how she made everything subordinate to the promptings of filial affection, which was stronger than any other feeling of her nature. That gave her courage to think of what she would otherwise have shrunk from with nervous timidity. For her father she felt that she could dare all. It was a strange position, that of a young girl at her age, called upon to assume the oversight and care of providing for her father’s comfort and necessities. Stranger still was it, that with all the knowledge of her father’s dependence upon herself and his utter ignorance of the world and its ways, she should yet have retained so thorough a respect and reverence for him.

“Can you be in earnest?”

It was Helen’s turn to be surprised at the question.

“Why not?” she asked. “It is my duty to help poor papa, and if I can do so in this way, why should I not?”

“That is true, Helen, but think of standing before so many hundreds, or perhaps thousands of people, with every eye fixed upon you. How could you bear that?”

“I should not think of it at all, Martha. When I am singing I can see nothing and hear nothing. I seem to be mounting up—up into the air, and floating among the clouds. I can’t tell you how much I enjoy singing.”

As Helen spoke her eyes sparkled, and her face flushed with enthusiasm. The exhibition of deep natural feeling is always impressive. Martha felt it to be so, and could not help admiring and loving the child more than ever. Helen had almost persuaded her.

“But,” she continued with returning caution, “you may not always feel so. There would be times when you would not feel like singing, but sing only because you were obliged to. Then when you encountered the glances of so many eyes, would not your heart sink and your courage fail you?”

“Then, Martha,” said Helen, with simplicity, “I should think of poor papa, and how by my exertions I was able to make him comfortable, and how by and by, when he had succeeded, I should not be obliged to do anything more. Then I should think how much he had done for me, and how hard he is laboring even now. There would be a great satisfaction in that. I ought not to hesitate when I have an opportunity to do something for him, ought I, Martha?”