diff options
Diffstat (limited to '146-0.txt')
| -rw-r--r-- | 146-0.txt | 7824 |
1 files changed, 7824 insertions, 0 deletions
diff --git a/146-0.txt b/146-0.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..32a6788 --- /dev/null +++ b/146-0.txt @@ -0,0 +1,7824 @@ +*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 146 *** + +A Little Princess + + +by + +Frances Hodgson Burnett + + + + +A LITTLE PRINCESS + + +Summary: Sara Crewe, a pupil at Miss Minchin's London school, is left +in poverty when her father dies, but is later rescued by a mysterious +benefactor. + + + + +CONTENTS + + 1. Sara + 2. A French Lesson + 3. Ermengarde + 4. Lottie + 5. Becky + 6. The Diamond Mines + 7. The Diamond Mines Again + 8. In the Attic + 9. Melchisedec + 10. The Indian Gentleman + 11. Ram Dass + 12. The Other Side of the Wall + 13. One of the Populace + 14. What Melchisedec Heard and Saw + 15. The Magic + 16. The Visitor + 17. "It Is the Child" + 18. "I Tried Not to Be" + 19. Anne + + + + +A Little Princess + + +1 + +Sara + + +Once on a dark winter's day, when the yellow fog hung so thick and +heavy in the streets of London that the lamps were lighted and the shop +windows blazed with gas as they do at night, an odd-looking little girl +sat in a cab with her father and was driven rather slowly through the +big thoroughfares. + +She sat with her feet tucked under her, and leaned against her father, +who held her in his arm, as she stared out of the window at the passing +people with a queer old-fashioned thoughtfulness in her big eyes. + +She was such a little girl that one did not expect to see such a look +on her small face. It would have been an old look for a child of +twelve, and Sara Crewe was only seven. The fact was, however, that she +was always dreaming and thinking odd things and could not herself +remember any time when she had not been thinking things about grown-up +people and the world they belonged to. She felt as if she had lived a +long, long time. + +At this moment she was remembering the voyage she had just made from +Bombay with her father, Captain Crewe. She was thinking of the big +ship, of the Lascars passing silently to and fro on it, of the children +playing about on the hot deck, and of some young officers' wives who +used to try to make her talk to them and laugh at the things she said. + +Principally, she was thinking of what a queer thing it was that at one +time one was in India in the blazing sun, and then in the middle of the +ocean, and then driving in a strange vehicle through strange streets +where the day was as dark as the night. She found this so puzzling +that she moved closer to her father. + +"Papa," she said in a low, mysterious little voice which was almost a +whisper, "papa." + +"What is it, darling?" Captain Crewe answered, holding her closer and +looking down into her face. "What is Sara thinking of?" + +"Is this the place?" Sara whispered, cuddling still closer to him. "Is +it, papa?" + +"Yes, little Sara, it is. We have reached it at last." And though she +was only seven years old, she knew that he felt sad when he said it. + +It seemed to her many years since he had begun to prepare her mind for +"the place," as she always called it. Her mother had died when she was +born, so she had never known or missed her. Her young, handsome, rich, +petting father seemed to be the only relation she had in the world. +They had always played together and been fond of each other. She only +knew he was rich because she had heard people say so when they thought +she was not listening, and she had also heard them say that when she +grew up she would be rich, too. She did not know all that being rich +meant. She had always lived in a beautiful bungalow, and had been used +to seeing many servants who made salaams to her and called her "Missee +Sahib," and gave her her own way in everything. She had had toys and +pets and an ayah who worshipped her, and she had gradually learned that +people who were rich had these things. That, however, was all she knew +about it. + +During her short life only one thing had troubled her, and that thing +was "the place" she was to be taken to some day. The climate of India +was very bad for children, and as soon as possible they were sent away +from it--generally to England and to school. She had seen other +children go away, and had heard their fathers and mothers talk about +the letters they received from them. She had known that she would be +obliged to go also, and though sometimes her father's stories of the +voyage and the new country had attracted her, she had been troubled by +the thought that he could not stay with her. + +"Couldn't you go to that place with me, papa?" she had asked when she +was five years old. "Couldn't you go to school, too? I would help you +with your lessons." + +"But you will not have to stay for a very long time, little Sara," he +had always said. "You will go to a nice house where there will be a +lot of little girls, and you will play together, and I will send you +plenty of books, and you will grow so fast that it will seem scarcely a +year before you are big enough and clever enough to come back and take +care of papa." + +She had liked to think of that. To keep the house for her father; to +ride with him, and sit at the head of his table when he had dinner +parties; to talk to him and read his books--that would be what she +would like most in the world, and if one must go away to "the place" in +England to attain it, she must make up her mind to go. She did not care +very much for other little girls, but if she had plenty of books she +could console herself. She liked books more than anything else, and +was, in fact, always inventing stories of beautiful things and telling +them to herself. Sometimes she had told them to her father, and he had +liked them as much as she did. + +"Well, papa," she said softly, "if we are here I suppose we must be +resigned." + +He laughed at her old-fashioned speech and kissed her. He was really +not at all resigned himself, though he knew he must keep that a secret. +His quaint little Sara had been a great companion to him, and he felt +he should be a lonely fellow when, on his return to India, he went into +his bungalow knowing he need not expect to see the small figure in its +white frock come forward to meet him. So he held her very closely in +his arms as the cab rolled into the big, dull square in which stood the +house which was their destination. + +It was a big, dull, brick house, exactly like all the others in its +row, but that on the front door there shone a brass plate on which was +engraved in black letters: + +MISS MINCHIN, + +Select Seminary for Young Ladies. + + +"Here we are, Sara," said Captain Crewe, making his voice sound as +cheerful as possible. Then he lifted her out of the cab and they +mounted the steps and rang the bell. Sara often thought afterward that +the house was somehow exactly like Miss Minchin. It was respectable +and well furnished, but everything in it was ugly; and the very +armchairs seemed to have hard bones in them. In the hall everything +was hard and polished--even the red cheeks of the moon face on the tall +clock in the corner had a severe varnished look. The drawing room into +which they were ushered was covered by a carpet with a square pattern +upon it, the chairs were square, and a heavy marble timepiece stood +upon the heavy marble mantel. + +As she sat down in one of the stiff mahogany chairs, Sara cast one of +her quick looks about her. + +"I don't like it, papa," she said. "But then I dare say soldiers--even +brave ones--don't really LIKE going into battle." + +Captain Crewe laughed outright at this. He was young and full of fun, +and he never tired of hearing Sara's queer speeches. + +"Oh, little Sara," he said. "What shall I do when I have no one to say +solemn things to me? No one else is as solemn as you are." + +"But why do solemn things make you laugh so?" inquired Sara. + +"Because you are such fun when you say them," he answered, laughing +still more. And then suddenly he swept her into his arms and kissed +her very hard, stopping laughing all at once and looking almost as if +tears had come into his eyes. + +It was just then that Miss Minchin entered the room. She was very like +her house, Sara felt: tall and dull, and respectable and ugly. She had +large, cold, fishy eyes, and a large, cold, fishy smile. It spread +itself into a very large smile when she saw Sara and Captain Crewe. +She had heard a great many desirable things of the young soldier from +the lady who had recommended her school to him. Among other things, she +had heard that he was a rich father who was willing to spend a great +deal of money on his little daughter. + +"It will be a great privilege to have charge of such a beautiful and +promising child, Captain Crewe," she said, taking Sara's hand and +stroking it. "Lady Meredith has told me of her unusual cleverness. A +clever child is a great treasure in an establishment like mine." + +Sara stood quietly, with her eyes fixed upon Miss Minchin's face. She +was thinking something odd, as usual. + +"Why does she say I am a beautiful child?" she was thinking. "I am not +beautiful at all. Colonel Grange's little girl, Isobel, is beautiful. +She has dimples and rose-colored cheeks, and long hair the color of +gold. I have short black hair and green eyes; besides which, I am a +thin child and not fair in the least. I am one of the ugliest children +I ever saw. She is beginning by telling a story." + +She was mistaken, however, in thinking she was an ugly child. She was +not in the least like Isobel Grange, who had been the beauty of the +regiment, but she had an odd charm of her own. She was a slim, supple +creature, rather tall for her age, and had an intense, attractive +little face. Her hair was heavy and quite black and only curled at the +tips; her eyes were greenish gray, it is true, but they were big, +wonderful eyes with long, black lashes, and though she herself did not +like the color of them, many other people did. Still she was very firm +in her belief that she was an ugly little girl, and she was not at all +elated by Miss Minchin's flattery. + +"I should be telling a story if I said she was beautiful," she thought; +"and I should know I was telling a story. I believe I am as ugly as +she is--in my way. What did she say that for?" + +After she had known Miss Minchin longer she learned why she had said +it. She discovered that she said the same thing to each papa and mamma +who brought a child to her school. + +Sara stood near her father and listened while he and Miss Minchin +talked. She had been brought to the seminary because Lady Meredith's +two little girls had been educated there, and Captain Crewe had a great +respect for Lady Meredith's experience. Sara was to be what was known +as "a parlor boarder," and she was to enjoy even greater privileges +than parlor boarders usually did. She was to have a pretty bedroom and +sitting room of her own; she was to have a pony and a carriage, and a +maid to take the place of the ayah who had been her nurse in India. + +"I am not in the least anxious about her education," Captain Crewe +said, with his gay laugh, as he held Sara's hand and patted it. "The +difficulty will be to keep her from learning too fast and too much. +She is always sitting with her little nose burrowing into books. She +doesn't read them, Miss Minchin; she gobbles them up as if she were a +little wolf instead of a little girl. She is always starving for new +books to gobble, and she wants grown-up books--great, big, fat +ones--French and German as well as English--history and biography and +poets, and all sorts of things. Drag her away from her books when she +reads too much. Make her ride her pony in the Row or go out and buy a +new doll. She ought to play more with dolls." + +"Papa," said Sara, "you see, if I went out and bought a new doll every +few days I should have more than I could be fond of. Dolls ought to be +intimate friends. Emily is going to be my intimate friend." + +Captain Crewe looked at Miss Minchin and Miss Minchin looked at Captain +Crewe. + +"Who is Emily?" she inquired. + +"Tell her, Sara," Captain Crewe said, smiling. + +Sara's green-gray eyes looked very solemn and quite soft as she +answered. + +"She is a doll I haven't got yet," she said. "She is a doll papa is +going to buy for me. We are going out together to find her. I have +called her Emily. She is going to be my friend when papa is gone. I +want her to talk to about him." + +Miss Minchin's large, fishy smile became very flattering indeed. + +"What an original child!" she said. "What a darling little creature!" + +"Yes," said Captain Crewe, drawing Sara close. "She is a darling +little creature. Take great care of her for me, Miss Minchin." + +Sara stayed with her father at his hotel for several days; in fact, she +remained with him until he sailed away again to India. They went out +and visited many big shops together, and bought a great many things. +They bought, indeed, a great many more things than Sara needed; but +Captain Crewe was a rash, innocent young man and wanted his little girl +to have everything she admired and everything he admired himself, so +between them they collected a wardrobe much too grand for a child of +seven. There were velvet dresses trimmed with costly furs, and lace +dresses, and embroidered ones, and hats with great, soft ostrich +feathers, and ermine coats and muffs, and boxes of tiny gloves and +handkerchiefs and silk stockings in such abundant supplies that the +polite young women behind the counters whispered to each other that the +odd little girl with the big, solemn eyes must be at least some foreign +princess--perhaps the little daughter of an Indian rajah. + +And at last they found Emily, but they went to a number of toy shops +and looked at a great many dolls before they discovered her. + +"I want her to look as if she wasn't a doll really," Sara said. "I +want her to look as if she LISTENS when I talk to her. The trouble with +dolls, papa"--and she put her head on one side and reflected as she +said it--"the trouble with dolls is that they never seem to HEAR." So +they looked at big ones and little ones--at dolls with black eyes and +dolls with blue--at dolls with brown curls and dolls with golden +braids, dolls dressed and dolls undressed. + +"You see," Sara said when they were examining one who had no clothes. +"If, when I find her, she has no frocks, we can take her to a +dressmaker and have her things made to fit. They will fit better if +they are tried on." + +After a number of disappointments they decided to walk and look in at +the shop windows and let the cab follow them. They had passed two or +three places without even going in, when, as they were approaching a +shop which was really not a very large one, Sara suddenly started and +clutched her father's arm. + +"Oh, papa!" she cried. "There is Emily!" + +A flush had risen to her face and there was an expression in her +green-gray eyes as if she had just recognized someone she was intimate +with and fond of. + +"She is actually waiting there for us!" she said. "Let us go in to +her." + +"Dear me," said Captain Crewe, "I feel as if we ought to have someone +to introduce us." + +"You must introduce me and I will introduce you," said Sara. "But I +knew her the minute I saw her--so perhaps she knew me, too." + +Perhaps she had known her. She had certainly a very intelligent +expression in her eyes when Sara took her in her arms. She was a large +doll, but not too large to carry about easily; she had naturally +curling golden-brown hair, which hung like a mantle about her, and her +eyes were a deep, clear, gray-blue, with soft, thick eyelashes which +were real eyelashes and not mere painted lines. + +"Of course," said Sara, looking into her face as she held her on her +knee, "of course papa, this is Emily." + +So Emily was bought and actually taken to a children's outfitter's shop +and measured for a wardrobe as grand as Sara's own. She had lace +frocks, too, and velvet and muslin ones, and hats and coats and +beautiful lace-trimmed underclothes, and gloves and handkerchiefs and +furs. + +"I should like her always to look as if she was a child with a good +mother," said Sara. "I'm her mother, though I am going to make a +companion of her." + +Captain Crewe would really have enjoyed the shopping tremendously, but +that a sad thought kept tugging at his heart. This all meant that he +was going to be separated from his beloved, quaint little comrade. + +He got out of his bed in the middle of that night and went and stood +looking down at Sara, who lay asleep with Emily in her arms. Her black +hair was spread out on the pillow and Emily's golden-brown hair mingled +with it, both of them had lace-ruffled nightgowns, and both had long +eyelashes which lay and curled up on their cheeks. Emily looked so like +a real child that Captain Crewe felt glad she was there. He drew a big +sigh and pulled his mustache with a boyish expression. + +"Heigh-ho, little Sara!" he said to himself "I don't believe you know +how much your daddy will miss you." + +The next day he took her to Miss Minchin's and left her there. He was +to sail away the next morning. He explained to Miss Minchin that his +solicitors, Messrs. Barrow & Skipworth, had charge of his affairs in +England and would give her any advice she wanted, and that they would +pay the bills she sent in for Sara's expenses. He would write to Sara +twice a week, and she was to be given every pleasure she asked for. + +"She is a sensible little thing, and she never wants anything it isn't +safe to give her," he said. + +Then he went with Sara into her little sitting room and they bade each +other good-by. Sara sat on his knee and held the lapels of his coat in +her small hands, and looked long and hard at his face. + +"Are you learning me by heart, little Sara?" he said, stroking her hair. + +"No," she answered. "I know you by heart. You are inside my heart." +And they put their arms round each other and kissed as if they would +never let each other go. + +When the cab drove away from the door, Sara was sitting on the floor of +her sitting room, with her hands under her chin and her eyes following +it until it had turned the corner of the square. Emily was sitting by +her, and she looked after it, too. When Miss Minchin sent her sister, +Miss Amelia, to see what the child was doing, she found she could not +open the door. + +"I have locked it," said a queer, polite little voice from inside. "I +want to be quite by myself, if you please." + +Miss Amelia was fat and dumpy, and stood very much in awe of her +sister. She was really the better-natured person of the two, but she +never disobeyed Miss Minchin. She went downstairs again, looking +almost alarmed. + +"I never saw such a funny, old-fashioned child, sister," she said. "She +has locked herself in, and she is not making the least particle of +noise." + +"It is much better than if she kicked and screamed, as some of them +do," Miss Minchin answered. "I expected that a child as much spoiled +as she is would set the whole house in an uproar. If ever a child was +given her own way in everything, she is." + +"I've been opening her trunks and putting her things away," said Miss +Amelia. "I never saw anything like them--sable and ermine on her +coats, and real Valenciennes lace on her underclothing. You have seen +some of her clothes. What DO you think of them?" + +"I think they are perfectly ridiculous," replied Miss Minchin, sharply; +"but they will look very well at the head of the line when we take the +schoolchildren to church on Sunday. She has been provided for as if she +were a little princess." + +And upstairs in the locked room Sara and Emily sat on the floor and +stared at the corner round which the cab had disappeared, while Captain +Crewe looked backward, waving and kissing his hand as if he could not +bear to stop. + + + +2 + +A French Lesson + + +When Sara entered the schoolroom the next morning everybody looked at +her with wide, interested eyes. By that time every pupil--from Lavinia +Herbert, who was nearly thirteen and felt quite grown up, to Lottie +Legh, who was only just four and the baby of the school--had heard a +great deal about her. They knew very certainly that she was Miss +Minchin's show pupil and was considered a credit to the establishment. +One or two of them had even caught a glimpse of her French maid, +Mariette, who had arrived the evening before. Lavinia had managed to +pass Sara's room when the door was open, and had seen Mariette opening +a box which had arrived late from some shop. + +"It was full of petticoats with lace frills on them--frills and +frills," she whispered to her friend Jessie as she bent over her +geography. "I saw her shaking them out. I heard Miss Minchin say to +Miss Amelia that her clothes were so grand that they were ridiculous +for a child. My mamma says that children should be dressed simply. She +has got one of those petticoats on now. I saw it when she sat down." + +"She has silk stockings on!" whispered Jessie, bending over her +geography also. "And what little feet! I never saw such little feet." + +"Oh," sniffed Lavinia, spitefully, "that is the way her slippers are +made. My mamma says that even big feet can be made to look small if +you have a clever shoemaker. I don't think she is pretty at all. Her +eyes are such a queer color." + +"She isn't pretty as other pretty people are," said Jessie, stealing a +glance across the room; "but she makes you want to look at her again. +She has tremendously long eyelashes, but her eyes are almost green." + +Sara was sitting quietly in her seat, waiting to be told what to do. +She had been placed near Miss Minchin's desk. She was not abashed at +all by the many pairs of eyes watching her. She was interested and +looked back quietly at the children who looked at her. She wondered +what they were thinking of, and if they liked Miss Minchin, and if they +cared for their lessons, and if any of them had a papa at all like her +own. She had had a long talk with Emily about her papa that morning. + +"He is on the sea now, Emily," she had said. "We must be very great +friends to each other and tell each other things. Emily, look at me. +You have the nicest eyes I ever saw--but I wish you could speak." + +She was a child full of imaginings and whimsical thoughts, and one of +her fancies was that there would be a great deal of comfort in even +pretending that Emily was alive and really heard and understood. After +Mariette had dressed her in her dark-blue schoolroom frock and tied her +hair with a dark-blue ribbon, she went to Emily, who sat in a chair of +her own, and gave her a book. + +"You can read that while I am downstairs," she said; and, seeing +Mariette looking at her curiously, she spoke to her with a serious +little face. + +"What I believe about dolls," she said, "is that they can do things +they will not let us know about. Perhaps, really, Emily can read and +talk and walk, but she will only do it when people are out of the room. +That is her secret. You see, if people knew that dolls could do +things, they would make them work. So, perhaps, they have promised +each other to keep it a secret. If you stay in the room, Emily will +just sit there and stare; but if you go out, she will begin to read, +perhaps, or go and look out of the window. Then if she heard either of +us coming, she would just run back and jump into her chair and pretend +she had been there all the time." + +"Comme elle est drole!" Mariette said to herself, and when she went +downstairs she told the head housemaid about it. But she had already +begun to like this odd little girl who had such an intelligent small +face and such perfect manners. She had taken care of children before +who were not so polite. Sara was a very fine little person, and had a +gentle, appreciative way of saying, "If you please, Mariette," "Thank +you, Mariette," which was very charming. Mariette told the head +housemaid that she thanked her as if she was thanking a lady. + +"Elle a l'air d'une princesse, cette petite," she said. Indeed, she was +very much pleased with her new little mistress and liked her place +greatly. + +After Sara had sat in her seat in the schoolroom for a few minutes, +being looked at by the pupils, Miss Minchin rapped in a dignified +manner upon her desk. + +"Young ladies," she said, "I wish to introduce you to your new +companion." All the little girls rose in their places, and Sara rose +also. "I shall expect you all to be very agreeable to Miss Crewe; she +has just come to us from a great distance--in fact, from India. As soon +as lessons are over you must make each other's acquaintance." + +The pupils bowed ceremoniously, and Sara made a little curtsy, and then +they sat down and looked at each other again. + +"Sara," said Miss Minchin in her schoolroom manner, "come here to me." + +She had taken a book from the desk and was turning over its leaves. +Sara went to her politely. + +"As your papa has engaged a French maid for you," she began, "I +conclude that he wishes you to make a special study of the French +language." + +Sara felt a little awkward. + +"I think he engaged her," she said, "because he--he thought I would +like her, Miss Minchin." + +"I am afraid," said Miss Minchin, with a slightly sour smile, "that you +have been a very spoiled little girl and always imagine that things are +done because you like them. My impression is that your papa wished you +to learn French." + +If Sara had been older or less punctilious about being quite polite to +people, she could have explained herself in a very few words. But, as +it was, she felt a flush rising on her cheeks. Miss Minchin was a very +severe and imposing person, and she seemed so absolutely sure that Sara +knew nothing whatever of French that she felt as if it would be almost +rude to correct her. The truth was that Sara could not remember the +time when she had not seemed to know French. Her father had often +spoken it to her when she had been a baby. Her mother had been a French +woman, and Captain Crewe had loved her language, so it happened that +Sara had always heard and been familiar with it. + +"I--I have never really learned French, but--but--" she began, trying +shyly to make herself clear. + +One of Miss Minchin's chief secret annoyances was that she did not +speak French herself, and was desirous of concealing the irritating +fact. She, therefore, had no intention of discussing the matter and +laying herself open to innocent questioning by a new little pupil. + +"That is enough," she said with polite tartness. "If you have not +learned, you must begin at once. The French master, Monsieur Dufarge, +will be here in a few minutes. Take this book and look at it until he +arrives." + +Sara's cheeks felt warm. She went back to her seat and opened the +book. She looked at the first page with a grave face. She knew it +would be rude to smile, and she was very determined not to be rude. But +it was very odd to find herself expected to study a page which told her +that "le pere" meant "the father," and "la mere" meant "the mother." + +Miss Minchin glanced toward her scrutinizingly. + +"You look rather cross, Sara," she said. "I am sorry you do not like +the idea of learning French." + +"I am very fond of it," answered Sara, thinking she would try again; +"but--" + +"You must not say 'but' when you are told to do things," said Miss +Minchin. "Look at your book again." + +And Sara did so, and did not smile, even when she found that "le fils" +meant "the son," and "le frere" meant "the brother." + +"When Monsieur Dufarge comes," she thought, "I can make him understand." + +Monsieur Dufarge arrived very shortly afterward. He was a very nice, +intelligent, middle-aged Frenchman, and he looked interested when his +eyes fell upon Sara trying politely to seem absorbed in her little book +of phrases. + +"Is this a new pupil for me, madame?" he said to Miss Minchin. "I hope +that is my good fortune." + +"Her papa--Captain Crewe--is very anxious that she should begin the +language. But I am afraid she has a childish prejudice against it. She +does not seem to wish to learn," said Miss Minchin. + +"I am sorry of that, mademoiselle," he said kindly to Sara. "Perhaps, +when we begin to study together, I may show you that it is a charming +tongue." + +Little Sara rose in her seat. She was beginning to feel rather +desperate, as if she were almost in disgrace. She looked up into +Monsieur Dufarge's face with her big, green-gray eyes, and they were +quite innocently appealing. She knew that he would understand as soon +as she spoke. She began to explain quite simply in pretty and fluent +French. Madame had not understood. She had not learned French +exactly--not out of books--but her papa and other people had always +spoken it to her, and she had read it and written it as she had read +and written English. Her papa loved it, and she loved it because he +did. Her dear mamma, who had died when she was born, had been French. +She would be glad to learn anything monsieur would teach her, but what +she had tried to explain to madame was that she already knew the words +in this book--and she held out the little book of phrases. + +When she began to speak Miss Minchin started quite violently and sat +staring at her over her eyeglasses, almost indignantly, until she had +finished. Monsieur Dufarge began to smile, and his smile was one of +great pleasure. To hear this pretty childish voice speaking his own +language so simply and charmingly made him feel almost as if he were in +his native land--which in dark, foggy days in London sometimes seemed +worlds away. When she had finished, he took the phrase book from her, +with a look almost affectionate. But he spoke to Miss Minchin. + +"Ah, madame," he said, "there is not much I can teach her. She has not +LEARNED French; she is French. Her accent is exquisite." + +"You ought to have told me," exclaimed Miss Minchin, much mortified, +turning to Sara. + +"I--I tried," said Sara. "I--I suppose I did not begin right." + +Miss Minchin knew she had tried, and that it had not been her fault +that she was not allowed to explain. And when she saw that the pupils +had been listening and that Lavinia and Jessie were giggling behind +their French grammars, she felt infuriated. + +"Silence, young ladies!" she said severely, rapping upon the desk. +"Silence at once!" + +And she began from that minute to feel rather a grudge against her show +pupil. + + + +3 + +Ermengarde + + +On that first morning, when Sara sat at Miss Minchin's side, aware that +the whole schoolroom was devoting itself to observing her, she had +noticed very soon one little girl, about her own age, who looked at her +very hard with a pair of light, rather dull, blue eyes. She was a fat +child who did not look as if she were in the least clever, but she had +a good-naturedly pouting mouth. Her flaxen hair was braided in a tight +pigtail, tied with a ribbon, and she had pulled this pigtail around her +neck, and was biting the end of the ribbon, resting her elbows on the +desk, as she stared wonderingly at the new pupil. When Monsieur +Dufarge began to speak to Sara, she looked a little frightened; and +when Sara stepped forward and, looking at him with the innocent, +appealing eyes, answered him, without any warning, in French, the fat +little girl gave a startled jump, and grew quite red in her awed +amazement. Having wept hopeless tears for weeks in her efforts to +remember that "la mere" meant "the mother," and "le pere," "the +father,"--when one spoke sensible English--it was almost too much for +her suddenly to find herself listening to a child her own age who +seemed not only quite familiar with these words, but apparently knew +any number of others, and could mix them up with verbs as if they were +mere trifles. + +She stared so hard and bit the ribbon on her pigtail so fast that she +attracted the attention of Miss Minchin, who, feeling extremely cross +at the moment, immediately pounced upon her. + +"Miss St. John!" she exclaimed severely. "What do you mean by such +conduct? Remove your elbows! Take your ribbon out of your mouth! Sit +up at once!" + +Upon which Miss St. John gave another jump, and when Lavinia and Jessie +tittered she became redder than ever--so red, indeed, that she almost +looked as if tears were coming into her poor, dull, childish eyes; and +Sara saw her and was so sorry for her that she began rather to like her +and want to be her friend. It was a way of hers always to want to +spring into any fray in which someone was made uncomfortable or unhappy. + +"If Sara had been a boy and lived a few centuries ago," her father used +to say, "she would have gone about the country with her sword drawn, +rescuing and defending everyone in distress. She always wants to fight +when she sees people in trouble." + +So she took rather a fancy to fat, slow, little Miss St. John, and kept +glancing toward her through the morning. She saw that lessons were no +easy matter to her, and that there was no danger of her ever being +spoiled by being treated as a show pupil. Her French lesson was a +pathetic thing. Her pronunciation made even Monsieur Dufarge smile in +spite of himself, and Lavinia and Jessie and the more fortunate girls +either giggled or looked at her in wondering disdain. But Sara did not +laugh. She tried to look as if she did not hear when Miss St. John +called "le bon pain," "lee bong pang." She had a fine, hot little +temper of her own, and it made her feel rather savage when she heard +the titters and saw the poor, stupid, distressed child's face. + +"It isn't funny, really," she said between her teeth, as she bent over +her book. "They ought not to laugh." + +When lessons were over and the pupils gathered together in groups to +talk, Sara looked for Miss St. John, and finding her bundled rather +disconsolately in a window-seat, she walked over to her and spoke. She +only said the kind of thing little girls always say to each other by +way of beginning an acquaintance, but there was something friendly +about Sara, and people always felt it. + +"What is your name?" she said. + +To explain Miss St. John's amazement one must recall that a new pupil +is, for a short time, a somewhat uncertain thing; and of this new pupil +the entire school had talked the night before until it fell asleep +quite exhausted by excitement and contradictory stories. A new pupil +with a carriage and a pony and a maid, and a voyage from India to +discuss, was not an ordinary acquaintance. + +"My name's Ermengarde St. John," she answered. + +"Mine is Sara Crewe," said Sara. "Yours is very pretty. It sounds +like a story book." + +"Do you like it?" fluttered Ermengarde. "I--I like yours." + +Miss St. John's chief trouble in life was that she had a clever father. +Sometimes this seemed to her a dreadful calamity. If you have a father +who knows everything, who speaks seven or eight languages, and has +thousands of volumes which he has apparently learned by heart, he +frequently expects you to be familiar with the contents of your lesson +books at least; and it is not improbable that he will feel you ought to +be able to remember a few incidents of history and to write a French +exercise. Ermengarde was a severe trial to Mr. St. John. He could not +understand how a child of his could be a notably and unmistakably dull +creature who never shone in anything. + +"Good heavens!" he had said more than once, as he stared at her, "there +are times when I think she is as stupid as her Aunt Eliza!" + +If her Aunt Eliza had been slow to learn and quick to forget a thing +entirely when she had learned it, Ermengarde was strikingly like her. +She was the monumental dunce of the school, and it could not be denied. + +"She must be MADE to learn," her father said to Miss Minchin. + +Consequently Ermengarde spent the greater part of her life in disgrace +or in tears. She learned things and forgot them; or, if she remembered +them, she did not understand them. So it was natural that, having made +Sara's acquaintance, she should sit and stare at her with profound +admiration. + +"You can speak French, can't you?" she said respectfully. + +Sara got on to the window-seat, which was a big, deep one, and, tucking +up her feet, sat with her hands clasped round her knees. + +"I can speak it because I have heard it all my life," she answered. +"You could speak it if you had always heard it." + +"Oh, no, I couldn't," said Ermengarde. "I NEVER could speak it!" + +"Why?" inquired Sara, curiously. + +Ermengarde shook her head so that the pigtail wobbled. + +"You heard me just now," she said. "I'm always like that. I can't SAY +the words. They're so queer." + +She paused a moment, and then added with a touch of awe in her voice, +"You are CLEVER, aren't you?" + +Sara looked out of the window into the dingy square, where the sparrows +were hopping and twittering on the wet, iron railings and the sooty +branches of the trees. She reflected a few moments. She had heard it +said very often that she was "clever," and she wondered if she was--and +IF she was, how it had happened. + +"I don't know," she said. "I can't tell." Then, seeing a mournful +look on the round, chubby face, she gave a little laugh and changed the +subject. + +"Would you like to see Emily?" she inquired. + +"Who is Emily?" Ermengarde asked, just as Miss Minchin had done. + +"Come up to my room and see," said Sara, holding out her hand. + +They jumped down from the window-seat together, and went upstairs. + +"Is it true," Ermengarde whispered, as they went through the hall--"is +it true that you have a playroom all to yourself?" + +"Yes," Sara answered. "Papa asked Miss Minchin to let me have one, +because--well, it was because when I play I make up stories and tell +them to myself, and I don't like people to hear me. It spoils it if I +think people listen." + +They had reached the passage leading to Sara's room by this time, and +Ermengarde stopped short, staring, and quite losing her breath. + +"You MAKE up stories!" she gasped. "Can you do that--as well as speak +French? CAN you?" + +Sara looked at her in simple surprise. + +"Why, anyone can make up things," she said. "Have you never tried?" + +She put her hand warningly on Ermengarde's. + +"Let us go very quietly to the door," she whispered, "and then I will +open it quite suddenly; perhaps we may catch her." + +She was half laughing, but there was a touch of mysterious hope in her +eyes which fascinated Ermengarde, though she had not the remotest idea +what it meant, or whom it was she wanted to "catch," or why she wanted +to catch her. Whatsoever she meant, Ermengarde was sure it was +something delightfully exciting. So, quite thrilled with expectation, +she followed her on tiptoe along the passage. They made not the least +noise until they reached the door. Then Sara suddenly turned the +handle, and threw it wide open. Its opening revealed the room quite +neat and quiet, a fire gently burning in the grate, and a wonderful +doll sitting in a chair by it, apparently reading a book. + +"Oh, she got back to her seat before we could see her!" Sara +explained. "Of course they always do. They are as quick as lightning." + +Ermengarde looked from her to the doll and back again. + +"Can she--walk?" she asked breathlessly. + +"Yes," answered Sara. "At least I believe she can. At least I PRETEND +I believe she can. And that makes it seem as if it were true. Have you +never pretended things?" + +"No," said Ermengarde. "Never. I--tell me about it." + +She was so bewitched by this odd, new companion that she actually +stared at Sara instead of at Emily--notwithstanding that Emily was the +most attractive doll person she had ever seen. + +"Let us sit down," said Sara, "and I will tell you. It's so easy that +when you begin you can't stop. You just go on and on doing it always. +And it's beautiful. Emily, you must listen. This is Ermengarde St. +John, Emily. Ermengarde, this is Emily. Would you like to hold her?" + +"Oh, may I?" said Ermengarde. "May I, really? She is beautiful!" And +Emily was put into her arms. + +Never in her dull, short life had Miss St. John dreamed of such an hour +as the one she spent with the queer new pupil before they heard the +lunch-bell ring and were obliged to go downstairs. + +Sara sat upon the hearth-rug and told her strange things. She sat +rather huddled up, and her green eyes shone and her cheeks flushed. She +told stories of the voyage, and stories of India; but what fascinated +Ermengarde the most was her fancy about the dolls who walked and +talked, and who could do anything they chose when the human beings were +out of the room, but who must keep their powers a secret and so flew +back to their places "like lightning" when people returned to the room. + +"WE couldn't do it," said Sara, seriously. "You see, it's a kind of +magic." + +Once, when she was relating the story of the search for Emily, +Ermengarde saw her face suddenly change. A cloud seemed to pass over +it and put out the light in her shining eyes. She drew her breath in +so sharply that it made a funny, sad little sound, and then she shut +her lips and held them tightly closed, as if she was determined either +to do or NOT to do something. Ermengarde had an idea that if she had +been like any other little girl, she might have suddenly burst out +sobbing and crying. But she did not. + +"Have you a--a pain?" Ermengarde ventured. + +"Yes," Sara answered, after a moment's silence. "But it is not in my +body." Then she added something in a low voice which she tried to keep +quite steady, and it was this: "Do you love your father more than +anything else in all the whole world?" + +Ermengarde's mouth fell open a little. She knew that it would be far +from behaving like a respectable child at a select seminary to say that +it had never occurred to you that you COULD love your father, that you +would do anything desperate to avoid being left alone in his society +for ten minutes. She was, indeed, greatly embarrassed. + +"I--I scarcely ever see him," she stammered. "He is always in the +library--reading things." + +"I love mine more than all the world ten times over," Sara said. "That +is what my pain is. He has gone away." + +She put her head quietly down on her little, huddled-up knees, and sat +very still for a few minutes. + +"She's going to cry out loud," thought Ermengarde, fearfully. + +But she did not. Her short, black locks tumbled about her ears, and +she sat still. Then she spoke without lifting her head. + +"I promised him I would bear it," she said. "And I will. You have to +bear things. Think what soldiers bear! Papa is a soldier. If there +was a war he would have to bear marching and thirstiness and, perhaps, +deep wounds. And he would never say a word--not one word." + +Ermengarde could only gaze at her, but she felt that she was beginning +to adore her. She was so wonderful and different from anyone else. + +Presently, she lifted her face and shook back her black locks, with a +queer little smile. + +"If I go on talking and talking," she said, "and telling you things +about pretending, I shall bear it better. You don't forget, but you +bear it better." + +Ermengarde did not know why a lump came into her throat and her eyes +felt as if tears were in them. + +"Lavinia and Jessie are 'best friends,'" she said rather huskily. "I +wish we could be 'best friends.' Would you have me for yours? You're +clever, and I'm the stupidest child in the school, but I--oh, I do so +like you!" + +"I'm glad of that," said Sara. "It makes you thankful when you are +liked. Yes. We will be friends. And I'll tell you what"--a sudden +gleam lighting her face--"I can help you with your French lessons." + + + +4 + +Lottie + + +If Sara had been a different kind of child, the life she led at Miss +Minchin's Select Seminary for the next few years would not have been at +all good for her. She was treated more as if she were a distinguished +guest at the establishment than as if she were a mere little girl. If +she had been a self-opinionated, domineering child, she might have +become disagreeable enough to be unbearable through being so much +indulged and flattered. If she had been an indolent child, she would +have learned nothing. Privately Miss Minchin disliked her, but she was +far too worldly a woman to do or say anything which might make such a +desirable pupil wish to leave her school. She knew quite well that if +Sara wrote to her papa to tell him she was uncomfortable or unhappy, +Captain Crewe would remove her at once. Miss Minchin's opinion was that +if a child were continually praised and never forbidden to do what she +liked, she would be sure to be fond of the place where she was so +treated. Accordingly, Sara was praised for her quickness at her +lessons, for her good manners, for her amiability to her fellow pupils, +for her generosity if she gave sixpence to a beggar out of her full +little purse; the simplest thing she did was treated as if it were a +virtue, and if she had not had a disposition and a clever little brain, +she might have been a very self-satisfied young person. But the clever +little brain told her a great many sensible and true things about +herself and her circumstances, and now and then she talked these things +over to Ermengarde as time went on. + +"Things happen to people by accident," she used to say. "A lot of nice +accidents have happened to me. It just HAPPENED that I always liked +lessons and books, and could remember things when I learned them. It +just happened that I was born with a father who was beautiful and nice +and clever, and could give me everything I liked. Perhaps I have not +really a good temper at all, but if you have everything you want and +everyone is kind to you, how can you help but be good-tempered? I +don't know"--looking quite serious--"how I shall ever find out whether +I am really a nice child or a horrid one. Perhaps I'm a HIDEOUS child, +and no one will ever know, just because I never have any trials." + +"Lavinia has no trials," said Ermengarde, stolidly, "and she is horrid +enough." + +Sara rubbed the end of her little nose reflectively, as she thought the +matter over. + +"Well," she said at last, "perhaps--perhaps that is because Lavinia is +GROWING." This was the result of a charitable recollection of having +heard Miss Amelia say that Lavinia was growing so fast that she +believed it affected her health and temper. + +Lavinia, in fact, was spiteful. She was inordinately jealous of Sara. +Until the new pupil's arrival, she had felt herself the leader in the +school. She had led because she was capable of making herself +extremely disagreeable if the others did not follow her. She domineered +over the little children, and assumed grand airs with those big enough +to be her companions. She was rather pretty, and had been the +best-dressed pupil in the procession when the Select Seminary walked +out two by two, until Sara's velvet coats and sable muffs appeared, +combined with drooping ostrich feathers, and were led by Miss Minchin +at the head of the line. This, at the beginning, had been bitter +enough; but as time went on it became apparent that Sara was a leader, +too, and not because she could make herself disagreeable, but because +she never did. + +"There's one thing about Sara Crewe," Jessie had enraged her "best +friend" by saying honestly, "she's never 'grand' about herself the +least bit, and you know she might be, Lavvie. I believe I couldn't +help being--just a little--if I had so many fine things and was made +such a fuss over. It's disgusting, the way Miss Minchin shows her off +when parents come." + +"'Dear Sara must come into the drawing room and talk to Mrs. Musgrave +about India,'" mimicked Lavinia, in her most highly flavored imitation +of Miss Minchin. "'Dear Sara must speak French to Lady Pitkin. Her +accent is so perfect.' She didn't learn her French at the Seminary, at +any rate. And there's nothing so clever in her knowing it. She says +herself she didn't learn it at all. She just picked it up, because she +always heard her papa speak it. And, as to her papa, there is nothing +so grand in being an Indian officer." + +"Well," said Jessie, slowly, "he's killed tigers. He killed the one in +the skin Sara has in her room. That's why she likes it so. She lies on +it and strokes its head, and talks to it as if it was a cat." + +"She's always doing something silly," snapped Lavinia. "My mamma says +that way of hers of pretending things is silly. She says she will grow +up eccentric." + +It was quite true that Sara was never "grand." She was a friendly +little soul, and shared her privileges and belongings with a free hand. +The little ones, who were accustomed to being disdained and ordered out +of the way by mature ladies aged ten and twelve, were never made to cry +by this most envied of them all. She was a motherly young person, and +when people fell down and scraped their knees, she ran and helped them +up and patted them, or found in her pocket a bonbon or some other +article of a soothing nature. She never pushed them out of her way or +alluded to their years as a humiliation and a blot upon their small +characters. + +"If you are four you are four," she said severely to Lavinia on an +occasion of her having--it must be confessed--slapped Lottie and called +her "a brat;" "but you will be five next year, and six the year after +that. And," opening large, convicting eyes, "it takes sixteen years to +make you twenty." + +"Dear me," said Lavinia, "how we can calculate!" In fact, it was not +to be denied that sixteen and four made twenty--and twenty was an age +the most daring were scarcely bold enough to dream of. + +So the younger children adored Sara. More than once she had been known +to have a tea party, made up of these despised ones, in her own room. +And Emily had been played with, and Emily's own tea service used--the +one with cups which held quite a lot of much-sweetened weak tea and had +blue flowers on them. No one had seen such a very real doll's tea set +before. From that afternoon Sara was regarded as a goddess and a queen +by the entire alphabet class. + +Lottie Legh worshipped her to such an extent that if Sara had not been +a motherly person, she would have found her tiresome. Lottie had been +sent to school by a rather flighty young papa who could not imagine +what else to do with her. Her young mother had died, and as the child +had been treated like a favorite doll or a very spoiled pet monkey or +lap dog ever since the first hour of her life, she was a very appalling +little creature. When she wanted anything or did not want anything she +wept and howled; and, as she always wanted the things she could not +have, and did not want the things that were best for her, her shrill +little voice was usually to be heard uplifted in wails in one part of +the house or another. + +Her strongest weapon was that in some mysterious way she had found out +that a very small girl who had lost her mother was a person who ought +to be pitied and made much of. She had probably heard some grown-up +people talking her over in the early days, after her mother's death. So +it became her habit to make great use of this knowledge. + +The first time Sara took her in charge was one morning when, on passing +a sitting room, she heard both Miss Minchin and Miss Amelia trying to +suppress the angry wails of some child who, evidently, refused to be +silenced. She refused so strenuously indeed that Miss Minchin was +obliged to almost shout--in a stately and severe manner--to make +herself heard. + +"What IS she crying for?" she almost yelled. + +"Oh--oh--oh!" Sara heard; "I haven't got any mam--ma-a!" + +"Oh, Lottie!" screamed Miss Amelia. "Do stop, darling! Don't cry! +Please don't!" + +"Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh!" Lottie howled tempestuously. +"Haven't--got--any--mam--ma-a!" + +"She ought to be whipped," Miss Minchin proclaimed. "You SHALL be +whipped, you naughty child!" + +Lottie wailed more loudly than ever. Miss Amelia began to cry. Miss +Minchin's voice rose until it almost thundered, then suddenly she +sprang up from her chair in impotent indignation and flounced out of +the room, leaving Miss Amelia to arrange the matter. + +Sara had paused in the hall, wondering if she ought to go into the +room, because she had recently begun a friendly acquaintance with +Lottie and might be able to quiet her. When Miss Minchin came out and +saw her, she looked rather annoyed. She realized that her voice, as +heard from inside the room, could not have sounded either dignified or +amiable. + +"Oh, Sara!" she exclaimed, endeavoring to produce a suitable smile. + +"I stopped," explained Sara, "because I knew it was Lottie--and I +thought, perhaps--just perhaps, I could make her be quiet. May I try, +Miss Minchin?" + +"If you can, you are a clever child," answered Miss Minchin, drawing in +her mouth sharply. Then, seeing that Sara looked slightly chilled by +her asperity, she changed her manner. "But you are clever in +everything," she said in her approving way. "I dare say you can manage +her. Go in." And she left her. + +When Sara entered the room, Lottie was lying upon the floor, screaming +and kicking her small fat legs violently, and Miss Amelia was bending +over her in consternation and despair, looking quite red and damp with +heat. Lottie had always found, when in her own nursery at home, that +kicking and screaming would always be quieted by any means she insisted +on. Poor plump Miss Amelia was trying first one method, and then +another. + +"Poor darling," she said one moment, "I know you haven't any mamma, +poor--" Then in quite another tone, "If you don't stop, Lottie, I will +shake you. Poor little angel! There--! You wicked, bad, detestable +child, I will smack you! I will!" + +Sara went to them quietly. She did not know at all what she was going +to do, but she had a vague inward conviction that it would be better +not to say such different kinds of things quite so helplessly and +excitedly. + +"Miss Amelia," she said in a low voice, "Miss Minchin says I may try to +make her stop--may I?" + +Miss Amelia turned and looked at her hopelessly. "Oh, DO you think you +can?" she gasped. + +"I don't know whether I CAN", answered Sara, still in her half-whisper; +"but I will try." + +Miss Amelia stumbled up from her knees with a heavy sigh, and Lottie's +fat little legs kicked as hard as ever. + +"If you will steal out of the room," said Sara, "I will stay with her." + +"Oh, Sara!" almost whimpered Miss Amelia. "We never had such a +dreadful child before. I don't believe we can keep her." + +But she crept out of the room, and was very much relieved to find an +excuse for doing it. + +Sara stood by the howling furious child for a few moments, and looked +down at her without saying anything. Then she sat down flat on the +floor beside her and waited. Except for Lottie's angry screams, the +room was quite quiet. This was a new state of affairs for little Miss +Legh, who was accustomed, when she screamed, to hear other people +protest and implore and command and coax by turns. To lie and kick and +shriek, and find the only person near you not seeming to mind in the +least, attracted her attention. She opened her tight-shut streaming +eyes to see who this person was. And it was only another little girl. +But it was the one who owned Emily and all the nice things. And she +was looking at her steadily and as if she was merely thinking. Having +paused for a few seconds to find this out, Lottie thought she must +begin again, but the quiet of the room and of Sara's odd, interested +face made her first howl rather half-hearted. + +"I--haven't--any--ma--ma--ma-a!" she announced; but her voice was not +so strong. + +Sara looked at her still more steadily, but with a sort of +understanding in her eyes. + +"Neither have I," she said. + +This was so unexpected that it was astounding. Lottie actually dropped +her legs, gave a wriggle, and lay and stared. A new idea will stop a +crying child when nothing else will. Also it was true that while +Lottie disliked Miss Minchin, who was cross, and Miss Amelia, who was +foolishly indulgent, she rather liked Sara, little as she knew her. +She did not want to give up her grievance, but her thoughts were +distracted from it, so she wriggled again, and, after a sulky sob, +said, "Where is she?" + +Sara paused a moment. Because she had been told that her mamma was in +heaven, she had thought a great deal about the matter, and her thoughts +had not been quite like those of other people. + +"She went to heaven," she said. "But I am sure she comes out sometimes +to see me--though I don't see her. So does yours. Perhaps they can +both see us now. Perhaps they are both in this room." + +Lottie sat bolt upright, and looked about her. She was a pretty, +little, curly-headed creature, and her round eyes were like wet +forget-me-nots. If her mamma had seen her during the last half-hour, +she might not have thought her the kind of child who ought to be +related to an angel. + +Sara went on talking. Perhaps some people might think that what she +said was rather like a fairy story, but it was all so real to her own +imagination that Lottie began to listen in spite of herself. She had +been told that her mamma had wings and a crown, and she had been shown +pictures of ladies in beautiful white nightgowns, who were said to be +angels. But Sara seemed to be telling a real story about a lovely +country where real people were. + +"There are fields and fields of flowers," she said, forgetting herself, +as usual, when she began, and talking rather as if she were in a dream, +"fields and fields of lilies--and when the soft wind blows over them it +wafts the scent of them into the air--and everybody always breathes it, +because the soft wind is always blowing. And little children run about +in the lily fields and gather armfuls of them, and laugh and make +little wreaths. And the streets are shining. And people are never +tired, however far they walk. They can float anywhere they like. And +there are walls made of pearl and gold all round the city, but they are +low enough for the people to go and lean on them, and look down onto +the earth and smile, and send beautiful messages." + +Whatsoever story she had begun to tell, Lottie would, no doubt, have +stopped crying, and been fascinated into listening; but there was no +denying that this story was prettier than most others. She dragged +herself close to Sara, and drank in every word until the end came--far +too soon. When it did come, she was so sorry that she put up her lip +ominously. + +"I want to go there," she cried. "I--haven't any mamma in this school." + +Sara saw the danger signal, and came out of her dream. She took hold +of the chubby hand and pulled her close to her side with a coaxing +little laugh. + +"I will be your mamma," she said. "We will play that you are my little +girl. And Emily shall be your sister." + +Lottie's dimples all began to show themselves. + +"Shall she?" she said. + +"Yes," answered Sara, jumping to her feet. "Let us go and tell her. +And then I will wash your face and brush your hair." + +To which Lottie agreed quite cheerfully, and trotted out of the room +and upstairs with her, without seeming even to remember that the whole +of the last hour's tragedy had been caused by the fact that she had +refused to be washed and brushed for lunch and Miss Minchin had been +called in to use her majestic authority. + +And from that time Sara was an adopted mother. + + + +5 + +Becky + + +Of course the greatest power Sara possessed and the one which gained +her even more followers than her luxuries and the fact that she was +"the show pupil," the power that Lavinia and certain other girls were +most envious of, and at the same time most fascinated by in spite of +themselves, was her power of telling stories and of making everything +she talked about seem like a story, whether it was one or not. + +Anyone who has been at school with a teller of stories knows what the +wonder means--how he or she is followed about and besought in a whisper +to relate romances; how groups gather round and hang on the outskirts +of the favored party in the hope of being allowed to join in and +listen. Sara not only could tell stories, but she adored telling them. +When she sat or stood in the midst of a circle and began to invent +wonderful things, her green eyes grew big and shining, her cheeks +flushed, and, without knowing that she was doing it, she began to act +and made what she told lovely or alarming by the raising or dropping of +her voice, the bend and sway of her slim body, and the dramatic +movement of her hands. She forgot that she was talking to listening +children; she saw and lived with the fairy folk, or the kings and +queens and beautiful ladies, whose adventures she was narrating. +Sometimes when she had finished her story, she was quite out of breath +with excitement, and would lay her hand on her thin, little, +quick-rising chest, and half laugh as if at herself. + +"When I am telling it," she would say, "it doesn't seem as if it was +only made up. It seems more real than you are--more real than the +schoolroom. I feel as if I were all the people in the story--one after +the other. It is queer." + +She had been at Miss Minchin's school about two years when, one foggy +winter's afternoon, as she was getting out of her carriage, comfortably +wrapped up in her warmest velvets and furs and looking very much +grander than she knew, she caught sight, as she crossed the pavement, +of a dingy little figure standing on the area steps, and stretching its +neck so that its wide-open eyes might peer at her through the railings. +Something in the eagerness and timidity of the smudgy face made her +look at it, and when she looked she smiled because it was her way to +smile at people. + +But the owner of the smudgy face and the wide-open eyes evidently was +afraid that she ought not to have been caught looking at pupils of +importance. She dodged out of sight like a jack-in-the-box and +scurried back into the kitchen, disappearing so suddenly that if she +had not been such a poor little forlorn thing, Sara would have laughed +in spite of herself. That very evening, as Sara was sitting in the +midst of a group of listeners in a corner of the schoolroom telling one +of her stories, the very same figure timidly entered the room, carrying +a coal box much too heavy for her, and knelt down upon the hearth rug +to replenish the fire and sweep up the ashes. + +She was cleaner than she had been when she peeped through the area +railings, but she looked just as frightened. She was evidently afraid +to look at the children or seem to be listening. She put on pieces of +coal cautiously with her fingers so that she might make no disturbing +noise, and she swept about the fire irons very softly. But Sara saw in +two minutes that she was deeply interested in what was going on, and +that she was doing her work slowly in the hope of catching a word here +and there. And realizing this, she raised her voice and spoke more +clearly. + +"The Mermaids swam softly about in the crystal-green water, and dragged +after them a fishing-net woven of deep-sea pearls," she said. "The +Princess sat on the white rock and watched them." + +It was a wonderful story about a princess who was loved by a Prince +Merman, and went to live with him in shining caves under the sea. + +The small drudge before the grate swept the hearth once and then swept +it again. Having done it twice, she did it three times; and, as she +was doing it the third time, the sound of the story so lured her to +listen that she fell under the spell and actually forgot that she had +no right to listen at all, and also forgot everything else. She sat +down upon her heels as she knelt on the hearth rug, and the brush hung +idly in her fingers. The voice of the storyteller went on and drew her +with it into winding grottos under the sea, glowing with soft, clear +blue light, and paved with pure golden sands. Strange sea flowers and +grasses waved about her, and far away faint singing and music echoed. + +The hearth brush fell from the work-roughened hand, and Lavinia Herbert +looked round. + +"That girl has been listening," she said. + +The culprit snatched up her brush, and scrambled to her feet. She +caught at the coal box and simply scuttled out of the room like a +frightened rabbit. + +Sara felt rather hot-tempered. + +"I knew she was listening," she said. "Why shouldn't she?" + +Lavinia tossed her head with great elegance. + +"Well," she remarked, "I do not know whether your mamma would like you +to tell stories to servant girls, but I know MY mamma wouldn't like ME +to do it." + +"My mamma!" said Sara, looking odd. "I don't believe she would mind in +the least. She knows that stories belong to everybody." + +"I thought," retorted Lavinia, in severe recollection, "that your mamma +was dead. How can she know things?" + +"Do you think she DOESN'T know things?" said Sara, in her stern little +voice. Sometimes she had a rather stern little voice. + +"Sara's mamma knows everything," piped in Lottie. "So does my +mamma--'cept Sara is my mamma at Miss Minchin's--my other one knows +everything. The streets are shining, and there are fields and fields +of lilies, and everybody gathers them. Sara tells me when she puts me +to bed." + +"You wicked thing," said Lavinia, turning on Sara; "making fairy +stories about heaven." + +"There are much more splendid stories in Revelation," returned Sara. +"Just look and see! How do you know mine are fairy stories? But I can +tell you"--with a fine bit of unheavenly temper--"you will never find +out whether they are or not if you're not kinder to people than you are +now. Come along, Lottie." And she marched out of the room, rather +hoping that she might see the little servant again somewhere, but she +found no trace of her when she got into the hall. + +"Who is that little girl who makes the fires?" she asked Mariette that +night. + +Mariette broke forth into a flow of description. + +Ah, indeed, Mademoiselle Sara might well ask. She was a forlorn little +thing who had just taken the place of scullery maid--though, as to +being scullery maid, she was everything else besides. She blacked boots +and grates, and carried heavy coal-scuttles up and down stairs, and +scrubbed floors and cleaned windows, and was ordered about by +everybody. She was fourteen years old, but was so stunted in growth +that she looked about twelve. In truth, Mariette was sorry for her. +She was so timid that if one chanced to speak to her it appeared as if +her poor, frightened eyes would jump out of her head. + +"What is her name?" asked Sara, who had sat by the table, with her chin +on her hands, as she listened absorbedly to the recital. + +Her name was Becky. Mariette heard everyone below-stairs calling, +"Becky, do this," and "Becky, do that," every five minutes in the day. + +Sara sat and looked into the fire, reflecting on Becky for some time +after Mariette left her. She made up a story of which Becky was the +ill-used heroine. She thought she looked as if she had never had quite +enough to eat. Her very eyes were hungry. She hoped she should see +her again, but though she caught sight of her carrying things up or +down stairs on several occasions, she always seemed in such a hurry and +so afraid of being seen that it was impossible to speak to her. + +But a few weeks later, on another foggy afternoon, when she entered her +sitting room she found herself confronting a rather pathetic picture. +In her own special and pet easy-chair before the bright fire, +Becky--with a coal smudge on her nose and several on her apron, with +her poor little cap hanging half off her head, and an empty coal box on +the floor near her--sat fast asleep, tired out beyond even the +endurance of her hard-working young body. She had been sent up to put +the bedrooms in order for the evening. There were a great many of them, +and she had been running about all day. Sara's rooms she had saved +until the last. They were not like the other rooms, which were plain +and bare. Ordinary pupils were expected to be satisfied with mere +necessaries. Sara's comfortable sitting room seemed a bower of luxury +to the scullery maid, though it was, in fact, merely a nice, bright +little room. But there were pictures and books in it, and curious +things from India; there was a sofa and the low, soft chair; Emily sat +in a chair of her own, with the air of a presiding goddess, and there +was always a glowing fire and a polished grate. Becky saved it until +the end of her afternoon's work, because it rested her to go into it, +and she always hoped to snatch a few minutes to sit down in the soft +chair and look about her, and think about the wonderful good fortune of +the child who owned such surroundings and who went out on the cold days +in beautiful hats and coats one tried to catch a glimpse of through the +area railing. + +On this afternoon, when she had sat down, the sensation of relief to +her short, aching legs had been so wonderful and delightful that it had +seemed to soothe her whole body, and the glow of warmth and comfort +from the fire had crept over her like a spell, until, as she looked at +the red coals, a tired, slow smile stole over her smudged face, her +head nodded forward without her being aware of it, her eyes drooped, +and she fell fast asleep. She had really been only about ten minutes +in the room when Sara entered, but she was in as deep a sleep as if she +had been, like the Sleeping Beauty, slumbering for a hundred years. +But she did not look--poor Becky--like a Sleeping Beauty at all. She +looked only like an ugly, stunted, worn-out little scullery drudge. + +Sara seemed as much unlike her as if she were a creature from another +world. + +On this particular afternoon she had been taking her dancing lesson, +and the afternoon on which the dancing master appeared was rather a +grand occasion at the seminary, though it occurred every week. The +pupils were attired in their prettiest frocks, and as Sara danced +particularly well, she was very much brought forward, and Mariette was +requested to make her as diaphanous and fine as possible. + +Today a frock the color of a rose had been put on her, and Mariette had +bought some real buds and made her a wreath to wear on her black locks. +She had been learning a new, delightful dance in which she had been +skimming and flying about the room, like a large rose-colored +butterfly, and the enjoyment and exercise had brought a brilliant, +happy glow into her face. + +When she entered the room, she floated in with a few of the butterfly +steps--and there sat Becky, nodding her cap sideways off her head. + +"Oh!" cried Sara, softly, when she saw her. "That poor thing!" + +It did not occur to her to feel cross at finding her pet chair occupied +by the small, dingy figure. To tell the truth, she was quite glad to +find it there. When the ill-used heroine of her story wakened, she +could talk to her. She crept toward her quietly, and stood looking at +her. Becky gave a little snore. + +"I wish she'd waken herself," Sara said. "I don't like to waken her. +But Miss Minchin would be cross if she found out. I'll just wait a few +minutes." + +She took a seat on the edge of the table, and sat swinging her slim, +rose-colored legs, and wondering what it would be best to do. Miss +Amelia might come in at any moment, and if she did, Becky would be sure +to be scolded. + +"But she is so tired," she thought. "She is so tired!" + +A piece of flaming coal ended her perplexity for her that very moment. +It broke off from a large lump and fell on to the fender. Becky +started, and opened her eyes with a frightened gasp. She did not know +she had fallen asleep. She had only sat down for one moment and felt +the beautiful glow--and here she found herself staring in wild alarm at +the wonderful pupil, who sat perched quite near her, like a +rose-colored fairy, with interested eyes. + +She sprang up and clutched at her cap. She felt it dangling over her +ear, and tried wildly to put it straight. Oh, she had got herself into +trouble now with a vengeance! To have impudently fallen asleep on such +a young lady's chair! She would be turned out of doors without wages. + +She made a sound like a big breathless sob. + +"Oh, miss! Oh, miss!" she stuttered. "I arst yer pardon, miss! Oh, I +do, miss!" + +Sara jumped down, and came quite close to her. + +"Don't be frightened," she said, quite as if she had been speaking to a +little girl like herself. "It doesn't matter the least bit." + +"I didn't go to do it, miss," protested Becky. "It was the warm +fire--an' me bein' so tired. It--it WASN'T impertience!" + +Sara broke into a friendly little laugh, and put her hand on her +shoulder. + +"You were tired," she said; "you could not help it. You are not really +awake yet." + +How poor Becky stared at her! In fact, she had never heard such a +nice, friendly sound in anyone's voice before. She was used to being +ordered about and scolded, and having her ears boxed. And this one--in +her rose-colored dancing afternoon splendor--was looking at her as if +she were not a culprit at all--as if she had a right to be tired--even +to fall asleep! The touch of the soft, slim little paw on her shoulder +was the most amazing thing she had ever known. + +"Ain't--ain't yer angry, miss?" she gasped. "Ain't yer goin' to tell +the missus?" + +"No," cried out Sara. "Of course I'm not." + +The woeful fright in the coal-smutted face made her suddenly so sorry +that she could scarcely bear it. One of her queer thoughts rushed into +her mind. She put her hand against Becky's cheek. + +"Why," she said, "we are just the same--I am only a little girl like +you. It's just an accident that I am not you, and you are not me!" + +Becky did not understand in the least. Her mind could not grasp such +amazing thoughts, and "an accident" meant to her a calamity in which +some one was run over or fell off a ladder and was carried to "the +'orspital." + +"A' accident, miss," she fluttered respectfully. "Is it?" + +"Yes," Sara answered, and she looked at her dreamily for a moment. But +the next she spoke in a different tone. She realized that Becky did +not know what she meant. + +"Have you done your work?" she asked. "Dare you stay here a few +minutes?" + +Becky lost her breath again. + +"Here, miss? Me?" + +Sara ran to the door, opened it, and looked out and listened. + +"No one is anywhere about," she explained. "If your bedrooms are +finished, perhaps you might stay a tiny while. I thought--perhaps--you +might like a piece of cake." + +The next ten minutes seemed to Becky like a sort of delirium. Sara +opened a cupboard, and gave her a thick slice of cake. She seemed to +rejoice when it was devoured in hungry bites. She talked and asked +questions, and laughed until Becky's fears actually began to calm +themselves, and she once or twice gathered boldness enough to ask a +question or so herself, daring as she felt it to be. + +"Is that--" she ventured, looking longingly at the rose-colored frock. +And she asked it almost in a whisper. "Is that there your best?" + +"It is one of my dancing-frocks," answered Sara. "I like it, don't +you?" + +For a few seconds Becky was almost speechless with admiration. Then +she said in an awed voice, "Onct I see a princess. I was standin' in +the street with the crowd outside Covin' Garden, watchin' the swells go +inter the operer. An' there was one everyone stared at most. They ses +to each other, 'That's the princess.' She was a growed-up young lady, +but she was pink all over--gownd an' cloak, an' flowers an' all. I +called her to mind the minnit I see you, sittin' there on the table, +miss. You looked like her." + +"I've often thought," said Sara, in her reflecting voice, "that I +should like to be a princess; I wonder what it feels like. I believe I +will begin pretending I am one." + +Becky stared at her admiringly, and, as before, did not understand her +in the least. She watched her with a sort of adoration. Very soon Sara +left her reflections and turned to her with a new question. + +"Becky," she said, "weren't you listening to that story?" + +"Yes, miss," confessed Becky, a little alarmed again. "I knowed I +hadn't orter, but it was that beautiful I--I couldn't help it." + +"I liked you to listen to it," said Sara. "If you tell stories, you +like nothing so much as to tell them to people who want to listen. I +don't know why it is. Would you like to hear the rest?" + +Becky lost her breath again. + +"Me hear it?" she cried. "Like as if I was a pupil, miss! All about +the Prince--and the little white Mer-babies swimming about +laughing--with stars in their hair?" + +Sara nodded. + +"You haven't time to hear it now, I'm afraid," she said; "but if you +will tell me just what time you come to do my rooms, I will try to be +here and tell you a bit of it every day until it is finished. It's a +lovely long one--and I'm always putting new bits to it." + +"Then," breathed Becky, devoutly, "I wouldn't mind HOW heavy the coal +boxes was--or WHAT the cook done to me, if--if I might have that to +think of." + +"You may," said Sara. "I'll tell it ALL to you." + +When Becky went downstairs, she was not the same Becky who had +staggered up, loaded down by the weight of the coal scuttle. She had an +extra piece of cake in her pocket, and she had been fed and warmed, but +not only by cake and fire. Something else had warmed and fed her, and +the something else was Sara. + +When she was gone Sara sat on her favorite perch on the end of her +table. Her feet were on a chair, her elbows on her knees, and her chin +in her hands. + +"If I WAS a princess--a REAL princess," she murmured, "I could scatter +largess to the populace. But even if I am only a pretend princess, I +can invent little things to do for people. Things like this. She was +just as happy as if it was largess. I'll pretend that to do things +people like is scattering largess. I've scattered largess." + + + +6 + +The Diamond Mines + + +Not very long after this a very exciting thing happened. Not only Sara, +but the entire school, found it exciting, and made it the chief subject +of conversation for weeks after it occurred. In one of his letters +Captain Crewe told a most interesting story. A friend who had been at +school with him when he was a boy had unexpectedly come to see him in +India. He was the owner of a large tract of land upon which diamonds +had been found, and he was engaged in developing the mines. If all +went as was confidently expected, he would become possessed of such +wealth as it made one dizzy to think of; and because he was fond of the +friend of his school days, he had given him an opportunity to share in +this enormous fortune by becoming a partner in his scheme. This, at +least, was what Sara gathered from his letters. It is true that any +other business scheme, however magnificent, would have had but small +attraction for her or for the schoolroom; but "diamond mines" sounded +so like the Arabian Nights that no one could be indifferent. Sara +thought them enchanting, and painted pictures, for Ermengarde and +Lottie, of labyrinthine passages in the bowels of the earth, where +sparkling stones studded the walls and roofs and ceilings, and strange, +dark men dug them out with heavy picks. Ermengarde delighted in the +story, and Lottie insisted on its being retold to her every evening. +Lavinia was very spiteful about it, and told Jessie that she didn't +believe such things as diamond mines existed. + +"My mamma has a diamond ring which cost forty pounds," she said. "And +it is not a big one, either. If there were mines full of diamonds, +people would be so rich it would be ridiculous." + +"Perhaps Sara will be so rich that she will be ridiculous," giggled +Jessie. + +"She's ridiculous without being rich," Lavinia sniffed. + +"I believe you hate her," said Jessie. + +"No, I don't," snapped Lavinia. "But I don't believe in mines full of +diamonds." + +"Well, people have to get them from somewhere," said Jessie. +"Lavinia," with a new giggle, "what do you think Gertrude says?" + +"I don't know, I'm sure; and I don't care if it's something more about +that everlasting Sara." + +"Well, it is. One of her 'pretends' is that she is a princess. She +plays it all the time--even in school. She says it makes her learn her +lessons better. She wants Ermengarde to be one, too, but Ermengarde +says she is too fat." + +"She IS too fat," said Lavinia. "And Sara is too thin." + +Naturally, Jessie giggled again. + +"She says it has nothing to do with what you look like, or what you +have. It has only to do with what you THINK of, and what you DO." + +"I suppose she thinks she could be a princess if she was a beggar," +said Lavinia. "Let us begin to call her Your Royal Highness." + +Lessons for the day were over, and they were sitting before the +schoolroom fire, enjoying the time they liked best. It was the time +when Miss Minchin and Miss Amelia were taking their tea in the sitting +room sacred to themselves. At this hour a great deal of talking was +done, and a great many secrets changed hands, particularly if the +younger pupils behaved themselves well, and did not squabble or run +about noisily, which it must be confessed they usually did. When they +made an uproar the older girls usually interfered with scolding and +shakes. They were expected to keep order, and there was danger that if +they did not, Miss Minchin or Miss Amelia would appear and put an end +to festivities. Even as Lavinia spoke the door opened and Sara entered +with Lottie, whose habit was to trot everywhere after her like a little +dog. + +"There she is, with that horrid child!" exclaimed Lavinia in a whisper. +"If she's so fond of her, why doesn't she keep her in her own room? She +will begin howling about something in five minutes." + +It happened that Lottie had been seized with a sudden desire to play in +the schoolroom, and had begged her adopted parent to come with her. She +joined a group of little ones who were playing in a corner. Sara curled +herself up in the window-seat, opened a book, and began to read. It +was a book about the French Revolution, and she was soon lost in a +harrowing picture of the prisoners in the Bastille--men who had spent +so many years in dungeons that when they were dragged out by those who +rescued them, their long, gray hair and beards almost hid their faces, +and they had forgotten that an outside world existed at all, and were +like beings in a dream. + +She was so far away from the schoolroom that it was not agreeable to be +dragged back suddenly by a howl from Lottie. Never did she find +anything so difficult as to keep herself from losing her temper when +she was suddenly disturbed while absorbed in a book. People who are +fond of books know the feeling of irritation which sweeps over them at +such a moment. The temptation to be unreasonable and snappish is one +not easy to manage. + +"It makes me feel as if someone had hit me," Sara had told Ermengarde +once in confidence. "And as if I want to hit back. I have to remember +things quickly to keep from saying something ill-tempered." + +She had to remember things quickly when she laid her book on the +window-seat and jumped down from her comfortable corner. + +Lottie had been sliding across the schoolroom floor, and, having first +irritated Lavinia and Jessie by making a noise, had ended by falling +down and hurting her fat knee. She was screaming and dancing up and +down in the midst of a group of friends and enemies, who were +alternately coaxing and scolding her. + +"Stop this minute, you cry-baby! Stop this minute!" Lavinia commanded. + +"I'm not a cry-baby ... I'm not!" wailed Lottie. "Sara, Sa--ra!" + +"If she doesn't stop, Miss Minchin will hear her," cried Jessie. +"Lottie darling, I'll give you a penny!" + +"I don't want your penny," sobbed Lottie; and she looked down at the +fat knee, and, seeing a drop of blood on it, burst forth again. + +Sara flew across the room and, kneeling down, put her arms round her. + +"Now, Lottie," she said. "Now, Lottie, you PROMISED Sara." + +"She said I was a cry-baby," wept Lottie. + +Sara patted her, but spoke in the steady voice Lottie knew. + +"But if you cry, you will be one, Lottie pet. You PROMISED." Lottie +remembered that she had promised, but she preferred to lift up her +voice. + +"I haven't any mamma," she proclaimed. "I haven't--a bit--of mamma." + +"Yes, you have," said Sara, cheerfully. "Have you forgotten? Don't +you know that Sara is your mamma? Don't you want Sara for your mamma?" + +Lottie cuddled up to her with a consoled sniff. + +"Come and sit in the window-seat with me," Sara went on, "and I'll +whisper a story to you." + +"Will you?" whimpered Lottie. "Will you--tell me--about the diamond +mines?" + +"The diamond mines?" broke out Lavinia. "Nasty, little spoiled thing, +I should like to SLAP her!" + +Sara got up quickly on her feet. It must be remembered that she had +been very deeply absorbed in the book about the Bastille, and she had +had to recall several things rapidly when she realized that she must go +and take care of her adopted child. She was not an angel, and she was +not fond of Lavinia. + +"Well," she said, with some fire, "I should like to slap YOU--but I +don't want to slap you!" restraining herself. "At least I both want to +slap you--and I should LIKE to slap you--but I WON'T slap you. We are +not little gutter children. We are both old enough to know better." + +Here was Lavinia's opportunity. + +"Ah, yes, your royal highness," she said. "We are princesses, I +believe. At least one of us is. The school ought to be very +fashionable now Miss Minchin has a princess for a pupil." + +Sara started toward her. She looked as if she were going to box her +ears. Perhaps she was. Her trick of pretending things was the joy of +her life. She never spoke of it to girls she was not fond of. Her new +"pretend" about being a princess was very near to her heart, and she +was shy and sensitive about it. She had meant it to be rather a +secret, and here was Lavinia deriding it before nearly all the school. +She felt the blood rush up into her face and tingle in her ears. She +only just saved herself. If you were a princess, you did not fly into +rages. Her hand dropped, and she stood quite still a moment. When she +spoke it was in a quiet, steady voice; she held her head up, and +everybody listened to her. + +"It's true," she said. "Sometimes I do pretend I am a princess. I +pretend I am a princess, so that I can try and behave like one." + +Lavinia could not think of exactly the right thing to say. Several +times she had found that she could not think of a satisfactory reply +when she was dealing with Sara. The reason for this was that, somehow, +the rest always seemed to be vaguely in sympathy with her opponent. She +saw now that they were pricking up their ears interestedly. The truth +was, they liked princesses, and they all hoped they might hear +something more definite about this one, and drew nearer Sara +accordingly. + +Lavinia could only invent one remark, and it fell rather flat. + +"Dear me," she said, "I hope, when you ascend the throne, you won't +forget us!" + +"I won't," said Sara, and she did not utter another word, but stood +quite still, and stared at her steadily as she saw her take Jessie's +arm and turn away. + +After this, the girls who were jealous of her used to speak of her as +"Princess Sara" whenever they wished to be particularly disdainful, and +those who were fond of her gave her the name among themselves as a term +of affection. No one called her "princess" instead of "Sara," but her +adorers were much pleased with the picturesqueness and grandeur of the +title, and Miss Minchin, hearing of it, mentioned it more than once to +visiting parents, feeling that it rather suggested a sort of royal +boarding school. + +To Becky it seemed the most appropriate thing in the world. The +acquaintance begun on the foggy afternoon when she had jumped up +terrified from her sleep in the comfortable chair, had ripened and +grown, though it must be confessed that Miss Minchin and Miss Amelia +knew very little about it. They were aware that Sara was "kind" to the +scullery maid, but they knew nothing of certain delightful moments +snatched perilously when, the upstairs rooms being set in order with +lightning rapidity, Sara's sitting room was reached, and the heavy coal +box set down with a sigh of joy. At such times stories were told by +installments, things of a satisfying nature were either produced and +eaten or hastily tucked into pockets to be disposed of at night, when +Becky went upstairs to her attic to bed. + +"But I has to eat 'em careful, miss," she said once; "'cos if I leaves +crumbs the rats come out to get 'em." + +"Rats!" exclaimed Sara, in horror. "Are there RATS there?" + +"Lots of 'em, miss," Becky answered in quite a matter-of-fact manner. +"There mostly is rats an' mice in attics. You gets used to the noise +they makes scuttling about. I've got so I don't mind 'em s' long as +they don't run over my piller." + +"Ugh!" said Sara. + +"You gets used to anythin' after a bit," said Becky. "You have to, +miss, if you're born a scullery maid. I'd rather have rats than +cockroaches." + +"So would I," said Sara; "I suppose you might make friends with a rat +in time, but I don't believe I should like to make friends with a +cockroach." + +Sometimes Becky did not dare to spend more than a few minutes in the +bright, warm room, and when this was the case perhaps only a few words +could be exchanged, and a small purchase slipped into the old-fashioned +pocket Becky carried under her dress skirt, tied round her waist with a +band of tape. The search for and discovery of satisfying things to eat +which could be packed into small compass, added a new interest to +Sara's existence. When she drove or walked out, she used to look into +shop windows eagerly. The first time it occurred to her to bring home +two or three little meat pies, she felt that she had hit upon a +discovery. When she exhibited them, Becky's eyes quite sparkled. + +"Oh, miss!" she murmured. "Them will be nice an' fillin.' It's +fillin'ness that's best. Sponge cake's a 'evenly thing, but it melts +away like--if you understand, miss. These'll just STAY in yer +stummick." + +"Well," hesitated Sara, "I don't think it would be good if they stayed +always, but I do believe they will be satisfying." + +They were satisfying--and so were beef sandwiches, bought at a +cook-shop--and so were rolls and Bologna sausage. In time, Becky began +to lose her hungry, tired feeling, and the coal box did not seem so +unbearably heavy. + +However heavy it was, and whatsoever the temper of the cook, and the +hardness of the work heaped upon her shoulders, she had always the +chance of the afternoon to look forward to--the chance that Miss Sara +would be able to be in her sitting room. In fact, the mere seeing of +Miss Sara would have been enough without meat pies. If there was time +only for a few words, they were always friendly, merry words that put +heart into one; and if there was time for more, then there was an +installment of a story to be told, or some other thing one remembered +afterward and sometimes lay awake in one's bed in the attic to think +over. Sara--who was only doing what she unconsciously liked better +than anything else, Nature having made her for a giver--had not the +least idea what she meant to poor Becky, and how wonderful a benefactor +she seemed. If Nature has made you for a giver, your hands are born +open, and so is your heart; and though there may be times when your +hands are empty, your heart is always full, and you can give things out +of that--warm things, kind things, sweet things--help and comfort and +laughter--and sometimes gay, kind laughter is the best help of all. + +Becky had scarcely known what laughter was through all her poor, little +hard-driven life. Sara made her laugh, and laughed with her; and, +though neither of them quite knew it, the laughter was as "fillin'" as +the meat pies. + +A few weeks before Sara's eleventh birthday a letter came to her from +her father, which did not seem to be written in such boyish high +spirits as usual. He was not very well, and was evidently overweighted +by the business connected with the diamond mines. + +"You see, little Sara," he wrote, "your daddy is not a businessman at +all, and figures and documents bother him. He does not really +understand them, and all this seems so enormous. Perhaps, if I was not +feverish I should not be awake, tossing about, one half of the night +and spend the other half in troublesome dreams. If my little missus +were here, I dare say she would give me some solemn, good advice. You +would, wouldn't you, Little Missus?" + +One of his many jokes had been to call her his "little missus" because +she had such an old-fashioned air. + +He had made wonderful preparations for her birthday. Among other +things, a new doll had been ordered in Paris, and her wardrobe was to +be, indeed, a marvel of splendid perfection. When she had replied to +the letter asking her if the doll would be an acceptable present, Sara +had been very quaint. + +"I am getting very old," she wrote; "you see, I shall never live to +have another doll given me. This will be my last doll. There is +something solemn about it. If I could write poetry, I am sure a poem +about 'A Last Doll' would be very nice. But I cannot write poetry. I +have tried, and it made me laugh. It did not sound like Watts or +Coleridge or Shakespeare at all. No one could ever take Emily's place, +but I should respect the Last Doll very much; and I am sure the school +would love it. They all like dolls, though some of the big ones--the +almost fifteen ones--pretend they are too grown up." + +Captain Crewe had a splitting headache when he read this letter in his +bungalow in India. The table before him was heaped with papers and +letters which were alarming him and filling him with anxious dread, but +he laughed as he had not laughed for weeks. + +"Oh," he said, "she's better fun every year she lives. God grant this +business may right itself and leave me free to run home and see her. +What wouldn't I give to have her little arms round my neck this minute! +What WOULDN'T I give!" + +The birthday was to be celebrated by great festivities. The schoolroom +was to be decorated, and there was to be a party. The boxes containing +the presents were to be opened with great ceremony, and there was to be +a glittering feast spread in Miss Minchin's sacred room. When the day +arrived the whole house was in a whirl of excitement. How the morning +passed nobody quite knew, because there seemed such preparations to be +made. The schoolroom was being decked with garlands of holly; the +desks had been moved away, and red covers had been put on the forms +which were arrayed round the room against the wall. + +When Sara went into her sitting room in the morning, she found on the +table a small, dumpy package, tied up in a piece of brown paper. She +knew it was a present, and she thought she could guess whom it came +from. She opened it quite tenderly. It was a square pincushion, made +of not quite clean red flannel, and black pins had been stuck carefully +into it to form the words, "Menny hapy returns." + +"Oh!" cried Sara, with a warm feeling in her heart. "What pains she +has taken! I like it so, it--it makes me feel sorrowful." + +But the next moment she was mystified. On the under side of the +pincushion was secured a card, bearing in neat letters the name "Miss +Amelia Minchin." + +Sara turned it over and over. + +"Miss Amelia!" she said to herself "How CAN it be!" + +And just at that very moment she heard the door being cautiously pushed +open and saw Becky peeping round it. + +There was an affectionate, happy grin on her face, and she shuffled +forward and stood nervously pulling at her fingers. + +"Do yer like it, Miss Sara?" she said. "Do yer?" + +"Like it?" cried Sara. "You darling Becky, you made it all yourself." + +Becky gave a hysteric but joyful sniff, and her eyes looked quite moist +with delight. + +"It ain't nothin' but flannin, an' the flannin ain't new; but I wanted +to give yer somethin' an' I made it of nights. I knew yer could PRETEND +it was satin with diamond pins in. _I_ tried to when I was makin' it. +The card, miss," rather doubtfully; "'t warn't wrong of me to pick it +up out o' the dust-bin, was it? Miss 'Meliar had throwed it away. I +hadn't no card o' my own, an' I knowed it wouldn't be a proper presink +if I didn't pin a card on--so I pinned Miss 'Meliar's." + +Sara flew at her and hugged her. She could not have told herself or +anyone else why there was a lump in her throat. + +"Oh, Becky!" she cried out, with a queer little laugh, "I love you, +Becky--I do, I do!" + +"Oh, miss!" breathed Becky. "Thank yer, miss, kindly; it ain't good +enough for that. The--the flannin wasn't new." + + + +7 + +The Diamond Mines Again + + +When Sara entered the holly-hung schoolroom in the afternoon, she did +so as the head of a sort of procession. Miss Minchin, in her grandest +silk dress, led her by the hand. A manservant followed, carrying the +box containing the Last Doll, a housemaid carried a second box, and +Becky brought up the rear, carrying a third and wearing a clean apron +and a new cap. Sara would have much preferred to enter in the usual +way, but Miss Minchin had sent for her, and, after an interview in her +private sitting room, had expressed her wishes. + +"This is not an ordinary occasion," she said. "I do not desire that it +should be treated as one." + +So Sara was led grandly in and felt shy when, on her entry, the big +girls stared at her and touched each other's elbows, and the little +ones began to squirm joyously in their seats. + +"Silence, young ladies!" said Miss Minchin, at the murmur which arose. +"James, place the box on the table and remove the lid. Emma, put yours +upon a chair. Becky!" suddenly and severely. + +Becky had quite forgotten herself in her excitement, and was grinning +at Lottie, who was wriggling with rapturous expectation. She almost +dropped her box, the disapproving voice so startled her, and her +frightened, bobbing curtsy of apology was so funny that Lavinia and +Jessie tittered. + +"It is not your place to look at the young ladies," said Miss Minchin. +"You forget yourself. Put your box down." + +Becky obeyed with alarmed haste and hastily backed toward the door. + +"You may leave us," Miss Minchin announced to the servants with a wave +of her hand. + +Becky stepped aside respectfully to allow the superior servants to pass +out first. She could not help casting a longing glance at the box on +the table. Something made of blue satin was peeping from between the +folds of tissue paper. + +"If you please, Miss Minchin," said Sara, suddenly, "mayn't Becky stay?" + +It was a bold thing to do. Miss Minchin was betrayed into something +like a slight jump. Then she put her eyeglass up, and gazed at her +show pupil disturbedly. + +"Becky!" she exclaimed. "My dearest Sara!" + +Sara advanced a step toward her. + +"I want her because I know she will like to see the presents," she +explained. "She is a little girl, too, you know." + +Miss Minchin was scandalized. She glanced from one figure to the other. + +"My dear Sara," she said, "Becky is the scullery maid. Scullery +maids--er--are not little girls." + +It really had not occurred to her to think of them in that light. +Scullery maids were machines who carried coal scuttles and made fires. + +"But Becky is," said Sara. "And I know she would enjoy herself. +Please let her stay--because it is my birthday." + +Miss Minchin replied with much dignity: + +"As you ask it as a birthday favor--she may stay. Rebecca, thank Miss +Sara for her great kindness." + +Becky had been backing into the corner, twisting the hem of her apron +in delighted suspense. She came forward, bobbing curtsies, but between +Sara's eyes and her own there passed a gleam of friendly understanding, +while her words tumbled over each other. + +"Oh, if you please, miss! I'm that grateful, miss! I did want to see +the doll, miss, that I did. Thank you, miss. And thank you, +ma'am,"--turning and making an alarmed bob to Miss Minchin--"for +letting me take the liberty." + +Miss Minchin waved her hand again--this time it was in the direction of +the corner near the door. + +"Go and stand there," she commanded. "Not too near the young ladies." + +Becky went to her place, grinning. She did not care where she was +sent, so that she might have the luck of being inside the room, instead +of being downstairs in the scullery, while these delights were going +on. She did not even mind when Miss Minchin cleared her throat +ominously and spoke again. + +"Now, young ladies, I have a few words to say to you," she announced. + +"She's going to make a speech," whispered one of the girls. "I wish it +was over." + +Sara felt rather uncomfortable. As this was her party, it was probable +that the speech was about her. It is not agreeable to stand in a +schoolroom and have a speech made about you. + +"You are aware, young ladies," the speech began--for it was a +speech--"that dear Sara is eleven years old today." + +"DEAR Sara!" murmured Lavinia. + +"Several of you here have also been eleven years old, but Sara's +birthdays are rather different from other little girls' birthdays. When +she is older she will be heiress to a large fortune, which it will be +her duty to spend in a meritorious manner." + +"The diamond mines," giggled Jessie, in a whisper. + +Sara did not hear her; but as she stood with her green-gray eyes fixed +steadily on Miss Minchin, she felt herself growing rather hot. When +Miss Minchin talked about money, she felt somehow that she always hated +her--and, of course, it was disrespectful to hate grown-up people. + +"When her dear papa, Captain Crewe, brought her from India and gave her +into my care," the speech proceeded, "he said to me, in a jesting way, +'I am afraid she will be very rich, Miss Minchin.' My reply was, 'Her +education at my seminary, Captain Crewe, shall be such as will adorn +the largest fortune.' Sara has become my most accomplished pupil. Her +French and her dancing are a credit to the seminary. Her +manners--which have caused you to call her Princess Sara--are perfect. +Her amiability she exhibits by giving you this afternoon's party. I +hope you appreciate her generosity. I wish you to express your +appreciation of it by saying aloud all together, 'Thank you, Sara!'" + +The entire schoolroom rose to its feet as it had done the morning Sara +remembered so well. + +"Thank you, Sara!" it said, and it must be confessed that Lottie jumped +up and down. Sara looked rather shy for a moment. She made a +curtsy--and it was a very nice one. + +"Thank you," she said, "for coming to my party." + +"Very pretty, indeed, Sara," approved Miss Minchin. "That is what a +real princess does when the populace applauds her. +Lavinia"--scathingly--"the sound you just made was extremely like a +snort. If you are jealous of your fellow-pupil, I beg you will express +your feelings in some more lady-like manner. Now I will leave you to +enjoy yourselves." + +The instant she had swept out of the room the spell her presence always +had upon them was broken. The door had scarcely closed before every +seat was empty. The little girls jumped or tumbled out of theirs; the +older ones wasted no time in deserting theirs. There was a rush toward +the boxes. Sara had bent over one of them with a delighted face. + +"These are books, I know," she said. + +The little children broke into a rueful murmur, and Ermengarde looked +aghast. + +"Does your papa send you books for a birthday present?" she exclaimed. +"Why, he's as bad as mine. Don't open them, Sara." + +"I like them," Sara laughed, but she turned to the biggest box. When +she took out the Last Doll it was so magnificent that the children +uttered delighted groans of joy, and actually drew back to gaze at it +in breathless rapture. + +"She is almost as big as Lottie," someone gasped. + +Lottie clapped her hands and danced about, giggling. + +"She's dressed for the theater," said Lavinia. "Her cloak is lined +with ermine." + +"Oh," cried Ermengarde, darting forward, "she has an opera-glass in her +hand--a blue-and-gold one!" + +"Here is her trunk," said Sara. "Let us open it and look at her +things." + +She sat down upon the floor and turned the key. The children crowded +clamoring around her, as she lifted tray after tray and revealed their +contents. Never had the schoolroom been in such an uproar. There were +lace collars and silk stockings and handkerchiefs; there was a jewel +case containing a necklace and a tiara which looked quite as if they +were made of real diamonds; there was a long sealskin and muff, there +were ball dresses and walking dresses and visiting dresses; there were +hats and tea gowns and fans. Even Lavinia and Jessie forgot that they +were too elderly to care for dolls, and uttered exclamations of delight +and caught up things to look at them. + +"Suppose," Sara said, as she stood by the table, putting a large, +black-velvet hat on the impassively smiling owner of all these +splendors--"suppose she understands human talk and feels proud of being +admired." + +"You are always supposing things," said Lavinia, and her air was very +superior. + +"I know I am," answered Sara, undisturbedly. "I like it. There is +nothing so nice as supposing. It's almost like being a fairy. If you +suppose anything hard enough it seems as if it were real." + +"It's all very well to suppose things if you have everything," said +Lavinia. "Could you suppose and pretend if you were a beggar and lived +in a garret?" + +Sara stopped arranging the Last Doll's ostrich plumes, and looked +thoughtful. + +"I BELIEVE I could," she said. "If one was a beggar, one would have to +suppose and pretend all the time. But it mightn't be easy." + +She often thought afterward how strange it was that just as she had +finished saying this--just at that very moment--Miss Amelia came into +the room. + +"Sara," she said, "your papa's solicitor, Mr. Barrow, has called to see +Miss Minchin, and, as she must talk to him alone and the refreshments +are laid in her parlor, you had all better come and have your feast +now, so that my sister can have her interview here in the schoolroom." + +Refreshments were not likely to be disdained at any hour, and many +pairs of eyes gleamed. Miss Amelia arranged the procession into +decorum, and then, with Sara at her side heading it, she led it away, +leaving the Last Doll sitting upon a chair with the glories of her +wardrobe scattered about her; dresses and coats hung upon chair backs, +piles of lace-frilled petticoats lying upon their seats. + +Becky, who was not expected to partake of refreshments, had the +indiscretion to linger a moment to look at these beauties--it really +was an indiscretion. + +"Go back to your work, Becky," Miss Amelia had said; but she had +stopped to pick up reverently first a muff and then a coat, and while +she stood looking at them adoringly, she heard Miss Minchin upon the +threshold, and, being smitten with terror at the thought of being +accused of taking liberties, she rashly darted under the table, which +hid her by its tablecloth. + +Miss Minchin came into the room, accompanied by a sharp-featured, dry +little gentleman, who looked rather disturbed. Miss Minchin herself +also looked rather disturbed, it must be admitted, and she gazed at the +dry little gentleman with an irritated and puzzled expression. + +She sat down with stiff dignity, and waved him to a chair. + +"Pray, be seated, Mr. Barrow," she said. + +Mr. Barrow did not sit down at once. His attention seemed attracted by +the Last Doll and the things which surrounded her. He settled his +eyeglasses and looked at them in nervous disapproval. The Last Doll +herself did not seem to mind this in the least. She merely sat upright +and returned his gaze indifferently. + +"A hundred pounds," Mr. Barrow remarked succinctly. "All expensive +material, and made at a Parisian modiste's. He spent money lavishly +enough, that young man." + +Miss Minchin felt offended. This seemed to be a disparagement of her +best patron and was a liberty. + +Even solicitors had no right to take liberties. + +"I beg your pardon, Mr. Barrow," she said stiffly. "I do not +understand." + +"Birthday presents," said Mr. Barrow in the same critical manner, "to a +child eleven years old! Mad extravagance, I call it." + +Miss Minchin drew herself up still more rigidly. + +"Captain Crewe is a man of fortune," she said. "The diamond mines +alone--" + +Mr. Barrow wheeled round upon her. "Diamond mines!" he broke out. +"There are none! Never were!" + +Miss Minchin actually got up from her chair. + +"What!" she cried. "What do you mean?" + +"At any rate," answered Mr. Barrow, quite snappishly, "it would have +been much better if there never had been any." + +"Any diamond mines?" ejaculated Miss Minchin, catching at the back of a +chair and feeling as if a splendid dream was fading away from her. + +"Diamond mines spell ruin oftener than they spell wealth," said Mr. +Barrow. "When a man is in the hands of a very dear friend and is not a +businessman himself, he had better steer clear of the dear friend's +diamond mines, or gold mines, or any other kind of mines dear friends +want his money to put into. The late Captain Crewe--" + +Here Miss Minchin stopped him with a gasp. + +"The LATE Captain Crewe!" she cried out. "The LATE! You don't come to +tell me that Captain Crewe is--" + +"He's dead, ma'am," Mr. Barrow answered with jerky brusqueness. "Died +of jungle fever and business troubles combined. The jungle fever might +not have killed him if he had not been driven mad by the business +troubles, and the business troubles might not have put an end to him if +the jungle fever had not assisted. Captain Crewe is dead!" + +Miss Minchin dropped into her chair again. The words he had spoken +filled her with alarm. + +"What WERE his business troubles?" she said. "What WERE they?" + +"Diamond mines," answered Mr. Barrow, "and dear friends--and ruin." + +Miss Minchin lost her breath. + +"Ruin!" she gasped out. + +"Lost every penny. That young man had too much money. The dear friend +was mad on the subject of the diamond mine. He put all his own money +into it, and all Captain Crewe's. Then the dear friend ran +away--Captain Crewe was already stricken with fever when the news came. +The shock was too much for him. He died delirious, raving about his +little girl--and didn't leave a penny." + +Now Miss Minchin understood, and never had she received such a blow in +her life. Her show pupil, her show patron, swept away from the Select +Seminary at one blow. She felt as if she had been outraged and robbed, +and that Captain Crewe and Sara and Mr. Barrow were equally to blame. + +"Do you mean to tell me," she cried out, "that he left NOTHING! That +Sara will have no fortune! That the child is a beggar! That she is +left on my hands a little pauper instead of an heiress?" + +Mr. Barrow was a shrewd businessman, and felt it as well to make his +own freedom from responsibility quite clear without any delay. + +"She is certainly left a beggar," he replied. "And she is certainly +left on your hands, ma'am--as she hasn't a relation in the world that +we know of." + +Miss Minchin started forward. She looked as if she was going to open +the door and rush out of the room to stop the festivities going on +joyfully and rather noisily that moment over the refreshments. + +"It is monstrous!" she said. "She's in my sitting room at this moment, +dressed in silk gauze and lace petticoats, giving a party at my +expense." + +"She's giving it at your expense, madam, if she's giving it," said Mr. +Barrow, calmly. "Barrow & Skipworth are not responsible for anything. +There never was a cleaner sweep made of a man's fortune. Captain Crewe +died without paying OUR last bill--and it was a big one." + +Miss Minchin turned back from the door in increased indignation. This +was worse than anyone could have dreamed of its being. + +"That is what has happened to me!" she cried. "I was always so sure of +his payments that I went to all sorts of ridiculous expenses for the +child. I paid the bills for that ridiculous doll and her ridiculous +fantastic wardrobe. The child was to have anything she wanted. She +has a carriage and a pony and a maid, and I've paid for all of them +since the last cheque came." + +Mr. Barrow evidently did not intend to remain to listen to the story of +Miss Minchin's grievances after he had made the position of his firm +clear and related the mere dry facts. He did not feel any particular +sympathy for irate keepers of boarding schools. + +"You had better not pay for anything more, ma'am," he remarked, "unless +you want to make presents to the young lady. No one will remember you. +She hasn't a brass farthing to call her own." + +"But what am I to do?" demanded Miss Minchin, as if she felt it +entirely his duty to make the matter right. "What am I to do?" + +"There isn't anything to do," said Mr. Barrow, folding up his +eyeglasses and slipping them into his pocket. "Captain Crewe is dead. +The child is left a pauper. Nobody is responsible for her but you." + +"I am not responsible for her, and I refuse to be made responsible!" + +Miss Minchin became quite white with rage. + +Mr. Barrow turned to go. + +"I have nothing to do with that, madam," he said uninterestedly. +"Barrow & Skipworth are not responsible. Very sorry the thing has +happened, of course." + +"If you think she is to be foisted off on me, you are greatly +mistaken," Miss Minchin gasped. "I have been robbed and cheated; I +will turn her into the street!" + +If she had not been so furious, she would have been too discreet to say +quite so much. She saw herself burdened with an extravagantly +brought-up child whom she had always resented, and she lost all +self-control. + +Mr. Barrow undisturbedly moved toward the door. + +"I wouldn't do that, madam," he commented; "it wouldn't look well. +Unpleasant story to get about in connection with the establishment. +Pupil bundled out penniless and without friends." + +He was a clever business man, and he knew what he was saying. He also +knew that Miss Minchin was a business woman, and would be shrewd enough +to see the truth. She could not afford to do a thing which would make +people speak of her as cruel and hard-hearted. + +"Better keep her and make use of her," he added. "She's a clever +child, I believe. You can get a good deal out of her as she grows +older." + +"I will get a good deal out of her before she grows older!" exclaimed +Miss Minchin. + +"I am sure you will, ma'am," said Mr. Barrow, with a little sinister +smile. "I am sure you will. Good morning!" + +He bowed himself out and closed the door, and it must be confessed that +Miss Minchin stood for a few moments and glared at it. What he had +said was quite true. She knew it. She had absolutely no redress. Her +show pupil had melted into nothingness, leaving only a friendless, +beggared little girl. Such money as she herself had advanced was lost +and could not be regained. + +And as she stood there breathless under her sense of injury, there fell +upon her ears a burst of gay voices from her own sacred room, which had +actually been given up to the feast. She could at least stop this. + +But as she started toward the door it was opened by Miss Amelia, who, +when she caught sight of the changed, angry face, fell back a step in +alarm. + +"What IS the matter, sister?" she ejaculated. + +Miss Minchin's voice was almost fierce when she answered: + +"Where is Sara Crewe?" + +Miss Amelia was bewildered. + +"Sara!" she stammered. "Why, she's with the children in your room, of +course." + +"Has she a black frock in her sumptuous wardrobe?"--in bitter irony. + +"A black frock?" Miss Amelia stammered again. "A BLACK one?" + +"She has frocks of every other color. Has she a black one?" + +Miss Amelia began to turn pale. + +"No--ye-es!" she said. "But it is too short for her. She has only the +old black velvet, and she has outgrown it." + +"Go and tell her to take off that preposterous pink silk gauze, and put +the black one on, whether it is too short or not. She has done with +finery!" + +Then Miss Amelia began to wring her fat hands and cry. + +"Oh, sister!" she sniffed. "Oh, sister! What CAN have happened?" + +Miss Minchin wasted no words. + +"Captain Crewe is dead," she said. "He has died without a penny. That +spoiled, pampered, fanciful child is left a pauper on my hands." + +Miss Amelia sat down quite heavily in the nearest chair. + +"Hundreds of pounds have I spent on nonsense for her. And I shall +never see a penny of it. Put a stop to this ridiculous party of hers. +Go and make her change her frock at once." + +"I?" panted Miss Amelia. "M-must I go and tell her now?" + +"This moment!" was the fierce answer. "Don't sit staring like a goose. +Go!" + +Poor Miss Amelia was accustomed to being called a goose. She knew, in +fact, that she was rather a goose, and that it was left to geese to do +a great many disagreeable things. It was a somewhat embarrassing thing +to go into the midst of a room full of delighted children, and tell the +giver of the feast that she had suddenly been transformed into a little +beggar, and must go upstairs and put on an old black frock which was +too small for her. But the thing must be done. This was evidently not +the time when questions might be asked. + +She rubbed her eyes with her handkerchief until they looked quite red. +After which she got up and went out of the room, without venturing to +say another word. When her older sister looked and spoke as she had +done just now, the wisest course to pursue was to obey orders without +any comment. Miss Minchin walked across the room. She spoke to herself +aloud without knowing that she was doing it. During the last year the +story of the diamond mines had suggested all sorts of possibilities to +her. Even proprietors of seminaries might make fortunes in stocks, +with the aid of owners of mines. And now, instead of looking forward to +gains, she was left to look back upon losses. + +"The Princess Sara, indeed!" she said. "The child has been pampered as +if she were a QUEEN." She was sweeping angrily past the corner table as +she said it, and the next moment she started at the sound of a loud, +sobbing sniff which issued from under the cover. + +"What is that!" she exclaimed angrily. The loud, sobbing sniff was +heard again, and she stooped and raised the hanging folds of the table +cover. + +"How DARE you!" she cried out. "How dare you! Come out immediately!" + +It was poor Becky who crawled out, and her cap was knocked on one side, +and her face was red with repressed crying. + +"If you please, 'm--it's me, mum," she explained. "I know I hadn't +ought to. But I was lookin' at the doll, mum--an' I was frightened +when you come in--an' slipped under the table." + +"You have been there all the time, listening," said Miss Minchin. + +"No, mum," Becky protested, bobbing curtsies. "Not listenin'--I +thought I could slip out without your noticin', but I couldn't an' I +had to stay. But I didn't listen, mum--I wouldn't for nothin'. But I +couldn't help hearin'." + +Suddenly it seemed almost as if she lost all fear of the awful lady +before her. She burst into fresh tears. + +"Oh, please, 'm," she said; "I dare say you'll give me warnin', mum--but +I'm so sorry for poor Miss Sara--I'm so sorry!" + +"Leave the room!" ordered Miss Minchin. + +Becky curtsied again, the tears openly streaming down her cheeks. + +"Yes, 'm; I will, 'm," she said, trembling; "but oh, I just wanted to +arst you: Miss Sara--she's been such a rich young lady, an' she's been +waited on, 'and and foot; an' what will she do now, mum, without no +maid? If--if, oh please, would you let me wait on her after I've done +my pots an' kettles? I'd do 'em that quick--if you'd let me wait on +her now she's poor. Oh," breaking out afresh, "poor little Miss Sara, +mum--that was called a princess." + +Somehow, she made Miss Minchin feel more angry than ever. That the +very scullery maid should range herself on the side of this child--whom +she realized more fully than ever that she had never liked--was too +much. She actually stamped her foot. + +"No--certainly not," she said. "She will wait on herself, and on other +people, too. Leave the room this instant, or you'll leave your place." + +Becky threw her apron over her head and fled. She ran out of the room +and down the steps into the scullery, and there she sat down among her +pots and kettles, and wept as if her heart would break. + +"It's exactly like the ones in the stories," she wailed. "Them pore +princess ones that was drove into the world." + +Miss Minchin had never looked quite so still and hard as she did when +Sara came to her, a few hours later, in response to a message she had +sent her. + +Even by that time it seemed to Sara as if the birthday party had either +been a dream or a thing which had happened years ago, and had happened +in the life of quite another little girl. + +Every sign of the festivities had been swept away; the holly had been +removed from the schoolroom walls, and the forms and desks put back +into their places. Miss Minchin's sitting room looked as it always +did--all traces of the feast were gone, and Miss Minchin had resumed +her usual dress. The pupils had been ordered to lay aside their party +frocks; and this having been done, they had returned to the schoolroom +and huddled together in groups, whispering and talking excitedly. + +"Tell Sara to come to my room," Miss Minchin had said to her sister. +"And explain to her clearly that I will have no crying or unpleasant +scenes." + +"Sister," replied Miss Amelia, "she is the strangest child I ever saw. +She has actually made no fuss at all. You remember she made none when +Captain Crewe went back to India. When I told her what had happened, +she just stood quite still and looked at me without making a sound. +Her eyes seemed to get bigger and bigger, and she went quite pale. +When I had finished, she still stood staring for a few seconds, and +then her chin began to shake, and she turned round and ran out of the +room and upstairs. Several of the other children began to cry, but she +did not seem to hear them or to be alive to anything but just what I +was saying. It made me feel quite queer not to be answered; and when +you tell anything sudden and strange, you expect people will say +SOMETHING--whatever it is." + +Nobody but Sara herself ever knew what had happened in her room after +she had run upstairs and locked her door. In fact, she herself +scarcely remembered anything but that she walked up and down, saying +over and over again to herself in a voice which did not seem her own, +"My papa is dead! My papa is dead!" + +Once she stopped before Emily, who sat watching her from her chair, and +cried out wildly, "Emily! Do you hear? Do you hear--papa is dead? He +is dead in India--thousands of miles away." + +When she came into Miss Minchin's sitting room in answer to her +summons, her face was white and her eyes had dark rings around them. +Her mouth was set as if she did not wish it to reveal what she had +suffered and was suffering. She did not look in the least like the +rose-colored butterfly child who had flown about from one of her +treasures to the other in the decorated schoolroom. She looked instead +a strange, desolate, almost grotesque little figure. + +She had put on, without Mariette's help, the cast-aside black-velvet +frock. It was too short and tight, and her slender legs looked long +and thin, showing themselves from beneath the brief skirt. As she had +not found a piece of black ribbon, her short, thick, black hair tumbled +loosely about her face and contrasted strongly with its pallor. She +held Emily tightly in one arm, and Emily was swathed in a piece of +black material. + +"Put down your doll," said Miss Minchin. "What do you mean by bringing +her here?" + +"No," Sara answered. "I will not put her down. She is all I have. My +papa gave her to me." + +She had always made Miss Minchin feel secretly uncomfortable, and she +did so now. She did not speak with rudeness so much as with a cold +steadiness with which Miss Minchin felt it difficult to cope--perhaps +because she knew she was doing a heartless and inhuman thing. + +"You will have no time for dolls in future," she said. "You will have +to work and improve yourself and make yourself useful." + +Sara kept her big, strange eyes fixed on her, and said not a word. + +"Everything will be very different now," Miss Minchin went on. "I +suppose Miss Amelia has explained matters to you." + +"Yes," answered Sara. "My papa is dead. He left me no money. I am +quite poor." + +"You are a beggar," said Miss Minchin, her temper rising at the +recollection of what all this meant. "It appears that you have no +relations and no home, and no one to take care of you." + +For a moment the thin, pale little face twitched, but Sara again said +nothing. + +"What are you staring at?" demanded Miss Minchin, sharply. "Are you so +stupid that you cannot understand? I tell you that you are quite alone +in the world, and have no one to do anything for you, unless I choose +to keep you here out of charity." + +"I understand," answered Sara, in a low tone; and there was a sound as +if she had gulped down something which rose in her throat. "I +understand." + +"That doll," cried Miss Minchin, pointing to the splendid birthday gift +seated near--"that ridiculous doll, with all her nonsensical, +extravagant things--I actually paid the bill for her!" + +Sara turned her head toward the chair. + +"The Last Doll," she said. "The Last Doll." And her little mournful +voice had an odd sound. + +"The Last Doll, indeed!" said Miss Minchin. "And she is mine, not +yours. Everything you own is mine." + +"Please take it away from me, then," said Sara. "I do not want it." + +If she had cried and sobbed and seemed frightened, Miss Minchin might +almost have had more patience with her. She was a woman who liked to +domineer and feel her power, and as she looked at Sara's pale little +steadfast face and heard her proud little voice, she quite felt as if +her might was being set at naught. + +"Don't put on grand airs," she said. "The time for that sort of thing +is past. You are not a princess any longer. Your carriage and your +pony will be sent away--your maid will be dismissed. You will wear your +oldest and plainest clothes--your extravagant ones are no longer suited +to your station. You are like Becky--you must work for your living." + +To her surprise, a faint gleam of light came into the child's eyes--a +shade of relief. + +"Can I work?" she said. "If I can work it will not matter so much. +What can I do?" + +"You can do anything you are told," was the answer. "You are a sharp +child, and pick up things readily. If you make yourself useful I may +let you stay here. You speak French well, and you can help with the +younger children." + +"May I?" exclaimed Sara. "Oh, please let me! I know I can teach them. +I like them, and they like me." + +"Don't talk nonsense about people liking you," said Miss Minchin. "You +will have to do more than teach the little ones. You will run errands +and help in the kitchen as well as in the schoolroom. If you don't +please me, you will be sent away. Remember that. Now go." + +Sara stood still just a moment, looking at her. In her young soul, she +was thinking deep and strange things. Then she turned to leave the +room. + +"Stop!" said Miss Minchin. "Don't you intend to thank me?" + +Sara paused, and all the deep, strange thoughts surged up in her breast. + +"What for?" she said. + +"For my kindness to you," replied Miss Minchin. "For my kindness in +giving you a home." + +Sara made two or three steps toward her. Her thin little chest heaved +up and down, and she spoke in a strange un-childishly fierce way. + +"You are not kind," she said. "You are NOT kind, and it is NOT a +home." And she had turned and run out of the room before Miss Minchin +could stop her or do anything but stare after her with stony anger. + +She went up the stairs slowly, but panting for breath and she held +Emily tightly against her side. + +"I wish she could talk," she said to herself. "If she could speak--if +she could speak!" + +She meant to go to her room and lie down on the tiger-skin, with her +cheek upon the great cat's head, and look into the fire and think and +think and think. But just before she reached the landing Miss Amelia +came out of the door and closed it behind her, and stood before it, +looking nervous and awkward. The truth was that she felt secretly +ashamed of the thing she had been ordered to do. + +"You--you are not to go in there," she said. + +"Not go in?" exclaimed Sara, and she fell back a pace. + +"That is not your room now," Miss Amelia answered, reddening a little. + +Somehow, all at once, Sara understood. She realized that this was the +beginning of the change Miss Minchin had spoken of. + +"Where is my room?" she asked, hoping very much that her voice did not +shake. + +"You are to sleep in the attic next to Becky." + +Sara knew where it was. Becky had told her about it. She turned, and +mounted up two flights of stairs. The last one was narrow, and covered +with shabby strips of old carpet. She felt as if she were walking away +and leaving far behind her the world in which that other child, who no +longer seemed herself, had lived. This child, in her short, tight old +frock, climbing the stairs to the attic, was quite a different creature. + +When she reached the attic door and opened it, her heart gave a dreary +little thump. Then she shut the door and stood against it and looked +about her. + +Yes, this was another world. The room had a slanting roof and was +whitewashed. The whitewash was dingy and had fallen off in places. +There was a rusty grate, an old iron bedstead, and a hard bed covered +with a faded coverlet. Some pieces of furniture too much worn to be +used downstairs had been sent up. Under the skylight in the roof, +which showed nothing but an oblong piece of dull gray sky, there stood +an old battered red footstool. Sara went to it and sat down. She +seldom cried. She did not cry now. She laid Emily across her knees +and put her face down upon her and her arms around her, and sat there, +her little black head resting on the black draperies, not saying one +word, not making one sound. + +And as she sat in this silence there came a low tap at the door--such a +low, humble one that she did not at first hear it, and, indeed, was not +roused until the door was timidly pushed open and a poor tear-smeared +face appeared peeping round it. It was Becky's face, and Becky had +been crying furtively for hours and rubbing her eyes with her kitchen +apron until she looked strange indeed. + +"Oh, miss," she said under her breath. "Might I--would you allow +me--jest to come in?" + +Sara lifted her head and looked at her. She tried to begin a smile, +and somehow she could not. Suddenly--and it was all through the loving +mournfulness of Becky's streaming eyes--her face looked more like a +child's not so much too old for her years. She held out her hand and +gave a little sob. + +"Oh, Becky," she said. "I told you we were just the same--only two +little girls--just two little girls. You see how true it is. There's +no difference now. I'm not a princess anymore." + +Becky ran to her and caught her hand, and hugged it to her breast, +kneeling beside her and sobbing with love and pain. + +"Yes, miss, you are," she cried, and her words were all broken. +"Whats'ever 'appens to you--whats'ever--you'd be a princess all the +same--an' nothin' couldn't make you nothin' different." + + + +8 + +In the Attic + + +The first night she spent in her attic was a thing Sara never forgot. +During its passing she lived through a wild, unchildlike woe of which +she never spoke to anyone about her. There was no one who would have +understood. It was, indeed, well for her that as she lay awake in the +darkness her mind was forcibly distracted, now and then, by the +strangeness of her surroundings. It was, perhaps, well for her that +she was reminded by her small body of material things. If this had not +been so, the anguish of her young mind might have been too great for a +child to bear. But, really, while the night was passing she scarcely +knew that she had a body at all or remembered any other thing than one. + +"My papa is dead!" she kept whispering to herself. "My papa is dead!" + +It was not until long afterward that she realized that her bed had been +so hard that she turned over and over in it to find a place to rest, +that the darkness seemed more intense than any she had ever known, and +that the wind howled over the roof among the chimneys like something +which wailed aloud. Then there was something worse. This was certain +scufflings and scratchings and squeakings in the walls and behind the +skirting boards. She knew what they meant, because Becky had described +them. They meant rats and mice who were either fighting with each +other or playing together. Once or twice she even heard sharp-toed feet +scurrying across the floor, and she remembered in those after days, +when she recalled things, that when first she heard them she started up +in bed and sat trembling, and when she lay down again covered her head +with the bedclothes. + +The change in her life did not come about gradually, but was made all +at once. + +"She must begin as she is to go on," Miss Minchin said to Miss Amelia. +"She must be taught at once what she is to expect." + +Mariette had left the house the next morning. The glimpse Sara caught +of her sitting room, as she passed its open door, showed her that +everything had been changed. Her ornaments and luxuries had been +removed, and a bed had been placed in a corner to transform it into a +new pupil's bedroom. + +When she went down to breakfast she saw that her seat at Miss Minchin's +side was occupied by Lavinia, and Miss Minchin spoke to her coldly. + +"You will begin your new duties, Sara," she said, "by taking your seat +with the younger children at a smaller table. You must keep them +quiet, and see that they behave well and do not waste their food. You +ought to have been down earlier. Lottie has already upset her tea." + +That was the beginning, and from day to day the duties given to her +were added to. She taught the younger children French and heard their +other lessons, and these were the least of her labors. It was found +that she could be made use of in numberless directions. She could be +sent on errands at any time and in all weathers. She could be told to +do things other people neglected. The cook and the housemaids took +their tone from Miss Minchin, and rather enjoyed ordering about the +"young one" who had been made so much fuss over for so long. They were +not servants of the best class, and had neither good manners nor good +tempers, and it was frequently convenient to have at hand someone on +whom blame could be laid. + +During the first month or two, Sara thought that her willingness to do +things as well as she could, and her silence under reproof, might +soften those who drove her so hard. In her proud little heart she +wanted them to see that she was trying to earn her living and not +accepting charity. But the time came when she saw that no one was +softened at all; and the more willing she was to do as she was told, +the more domineering and exacting careless housemaids became, and the +more ready a scolding cook was to blame her. + +If she had been older, Miss Minchin would have given her the bigger +girls to teach and saved money by dismissing an instructress; but while +she remained and looked like a child, she could be made more useful as +a sort of little superior errand girl and maid of all work. An ordinary +errand boy would not have been so clever and reliable. Sara could be +trusted with difficult commissions and complicated messages. She could +even go and pay bills, and she combined with this the ability to dust a +room well and to set things in order. + +Her own lessons became things of the past. She was taught nothing, and +only after long and busy days spent in running here and there at +everybody's orders was she grudgingly allowed to go into the deserted +schoolroom, with a pile of old books, and study alone at night. + +"If I do not remind myself of the things I have learned, perhaps I may +forget them," she said to herself. "I am almost a scullery maid, and +if I am a scullery maid who knows nothing, I shall be like poor Becky. +I wonder if I could QUITE forget and begin to drop my H'S and not +remember that Henry the Eighth had six wives." + +One of the most curious things in her new existence was her changed +position among the pupils. Instead of being a sort of small royal +personage among them, she no longer seemed to be one of their number at +all. She was kept so constantly at work that she scarcely ever had an +opportunity of speaking to any of them, and she could not avoid seeing +that Miss Minchin preferred that she should live a life apart from that +of the occupants of the schoolroom. + +"I will not have her forming intimacies and talking to the other +children," that lady said. "Girls like a grievance, and if she begins +to tell romantic stories about herself, she will become an ill-used +heroine, and parents will be given a wrong impression. It is better +that she should live a separate life--one suited to her circumstances. +I am giving her a home, and that is more than she has any right to +expect from me." + +Sara did not expect much, and was far too proud to try to continue to +be intimate with girls who evidently felt rather awkward and uncertain +about her. The fact was that Miss Minchin's pupils were a set of dull, +matter-of-fact young people. They were accustomed to being rich and +comfortable, and as Sara's frocks grew shorter and shabbier and +queerer-looking, and it became an established fact that she wore shoes +with holes in them and was sent out to buy groceries and carry them +through the streets in a basket on her arm when the cook wanted them in +a hurry, they felt rather as if, when they spoke to her, they were +addressing an under servant. + +"To think that she was the girl with the diamond mines," Lavinia +commented. "She does look an object. And she's queerer than ever. I +never liked her much, but I can't bear that way she has now of looking +at people without speaking--just as if she was finding them out." + +"I am," said Sara, promptly, when she heard of this. "That's what I +look at some people for. I like to know about them. I think them over +afterward." + +The truth was that she had saved herself annoyance several times by +keeping her eye on Lavinia, who was quite ready to make mischief, and +would have been rather pleased to have made it for the ex-show pupil. + +Sara never made any mischief herself, or interfered with anyone. She +worked like a drudge; she tramped through the wet streets, carrying +parcels and baskets; she labored with the childish inattention of the +little ones' French lessons; as she became shabbier and more +forlorn-looking, she was told that she had better take her meals +downstairs; she was treated as if she was nobody's concern, and her +heart grew proud and sore, but she never told anyone what she felt. + +"Soldiers don't complain," she would say between her small, shut teeth, +"I am not going to do it; I will pretend this is part of a war." + +But there were hours when her child heart might almost have broken with +loneliness but for three people. + +The first, it must be owned, was Becky--just Becky. Throughout all +that first night spent in the garret, she had felt a vague comfort in +knowing that on the other side of the wall in which the rats scuffled +and squeaked there was another young human creature. And during the +nights that followed the sense of comfort grew. They had little chance +to speak to each other during the day. Each had her own tasks to +perform, and any attempt at conversation would have been regarded as a +tendency to loiter and lose time. "Don't mind me, miss," Becky +whispered during the first morning, "if I don't say nothin' polite. +Some un'd be down on us if I did. I MEANS 'please' an' 'thank you' an' +'beg pardon,' but I dassn't to take time to say it." + +But before daybreak she used to slip into Sara's attic and button her +dress and give her such help as she required before she went downstairs +to light the kitchen fire. And when night came Sara always heard the +humble knock at her door which meant that her handmaid was ready to +help her again if she was needed. During the first weeks of her grief +Sara felt as if she were too stupefied to talk, so it happened that +some time passed before they saw each other much or exchanged visits. +Becky's heart told her that it was best that people in trouble should +be left alone. + +The second of the trio of comforters was Ermengarde, but odd things +happened before Ermengarde found her place. + +When Sara's mind seemed to awaken again to the life about her, she +realized that she had forgotten that an Ermengarde lived in the world. +The two had always been friends, but Sara had felt as if she were years +the older. It could not be contested that Ermengarde was as dull as +she was affectionate. She clung to Sara in a simple, helpless way; she +brought her lessons to her that she might be helped; she listened to +her every word and besieged her with requests for stories. But she had +nothing interesting to say herself, and she loathed books of every +description. She was, in fact, not a person one would remember when +one was caught in the storm of a great trouble, and Sara forgot her. + +It had been all the easier to forget her because she had been suddenly +called home for a few weeks. When she came back she did not see Sara +for a day or two, and when she met her for the first time she +encountered her coming down a corridor with her arms full of garments +which were to be taken downstairs to be mended. Sara herself had +already been taught to mend them. She looked pale and unlike herself, +and she was attired in the queer, outgrown frock whose shortness showed +so much thin black leg. + +Ermengarde was too slow a girl to be equal to such a situation. She +could not think of anything to say. She knew what had happened, but, +somehow, she had never imagined Sara could look like this--so odd and +poor and almost like a servant. It made her quite miserable, and she +could do nothing but break into a short hysterical laugh and +exclaim--aimlessly and as if without any meaning, "Oh, Sara, is that +you?" + +"Yes," answered Sara, and suddenly a strange thought passed through her +mind and made her face flush. She held the pile of garments in her +arms, and her chin rested upon the top of it to keep it steady. +Something in the look of her straight-gazing eyes made Ermengarde lose +her wits still more. She felt as if Sara had changed into a new kind +of girl, and she had never known her before. Perhaps it was because she +had suddenly grown poor and had to mend things and work like Becky. + +"Oh," she stammered. "How--how are you?" + +"I don't know," Sara replied. "How are you?" + +"I'm--I'm quite well," said Ermengarde, overwhelmed with shyness. Then +spasmodically she thought of something to say which seemed more +intimate. "Are you--are you very unhappy?" she said in a rush. + +Then Sara was guilty of an injustice. Just at that moment her torn +heart swelled within her, and she felt that if anyone was as stupid as +that, one had better get away from her. + +"What do you think?" she said. "Do you think I am very happy?" And she +marched past her without another word. + +In course of time she realized that if her wretchedness had not made +her forget things, she would have known that poor, dull Ermengarde was +not to be blamed for her unready, awkward ways. She was always +awkward, and the more she felt, the more stupid she was given to being. + +But the sudden thought which had flashed upon her had made her +over-sensitive. + +"She is like the others," she had thought. "She does not really want +to talk to me. She knows no one does." + +So for several weeks a barrier stood between them. When they met by +chance Sara looked the other way, and Ermengarde felt too stiff and +embarrassed to speak. Sometimes they nodded to each other in passing, +but there were times when they did not even exchange a greeting. + +"If she would rather not talk to me," Sara thought, "I will keep out of +her way. Miss Minchin makes that easy enough." + +Miss Minchin made it so easy that at last they scarcely saw each other +at all. At that time it was noticed that Ermengarde was more stupid +than ever, and that she looked listless and unhappy. She used to sit +in the window-seat, huddled in a heap, and stare out of the window +without speaking. Once Jessie, who was passing, stopped to look at her +curiously. + +"What are you crying for, Ermengarde?" she asked. + +"I'm not crying," answered Ermengarde, in a muffled, unsteady voice. + +"You are," said Jessie. "A great big tear just rolled down the bridge +of your nose and dropped off at the end of it. And there goes another." + +"Well," said Ermengarde, "I'm miserable--and no one need interfere." +And she turned her plump back and took out her handkerchief and boldly +hid her face in it. + +That night, when Sara went to her attic, she was later than usual. She +had been kept at work until after the hour at which the pupils went to +bed, and after that she had gone to her lessons in the lonely +schoolroom. When she reached the top of the stairs, she was surprised +to see a glimmer of light coming from under the attic door. + +"Nobody goes there but myself," she thought quickly, "but someone has +lighted a candle." + +Someone had, indeed, lighted a candle, and it was not burning in the +kitchen candlestick she was expected to use, but in one of those +belonging to the pupils' bedrooms. The someone was sitting upon the +battered footstool, and was dressed in her nightgown and wrapped up in +a red shawl. It was Ermengarde. + +"Ermengarde!" cried Sara. She was so startled that she was almost +frightened. "You will get into trouble." + +Ermengarde stumbled up from her footstool. She shuffled across the +attic in her bedroom slippers, which were too large for her. Her eyes +and nose were pink with crying. + +"I know I shall--if I'm found out." she said. "But I don't care--I +don't care a bit. Oh, Sara, please tell me. What is the matter? Why +don't you like me any more?" + +Something in her voice made the familiar lump rise in Sara's throat. It +was so affectionate and simple--so like the old Ermengarde who had +asked her to be "best friends." It sounded as if she had not meant +what she had seemed to mean during these past weeks. + +"I do like you," Sara answered. "I thought--you see, everything is +different now. I thought you--were different." + +Ermengarde opened her wet eyes wide. + +"Why, it was you who were different!" she cried. "You didn't want to +talk to me. I didn't know what to do. It was you who were different +after I came back." + +Sara thought a moment. She saw she had made a mistake. + +"I AM different," she explained, "though not in the way you think. Miss +Minchin does not want me to talk to the girls. Most of them don't want +to talk to me. I thought--perhaps--you didn't. So I tried to keep out +of your way." + +"Oh, Sara," Ermengarde almost wailed in her reproachful dismay. And +then after one more look they rushed into each other's arms. It must +be confessed that Sara's small black head lay for some minutes on the +shoulder covered by the red shawl. When Ermengarde had seemed to +desert her, she had felt horribly lonely. + +Afterward they sat down upon the floor together, Sara clasping her +knees with her arms, and Ermengarde rolled up in her shawl. Ermengarde +looked at the odd, big-eyed little face adoringly. + +"I couldn't bear it any more," she said. "I dare say you could live +without me, Sara; but I couldn't live without you. I was nearly DEAD. +So tonight, when I was crying under the bedclothes, I thought all at +once of creeping up here and just begging you to let us be friends +again." + +"You are nicer than I am," said Sara. "I was too proud to try and make +friends. You see, now that trials have come, they have shown that I am +NOT a nice child. I was afraid they would. Perhaps"--wrinkling her +forehead wisely--"that is what they were sent for." + +"I don't see any good in them," said Ermengarde stoutly. + +"Neither do I--to speak the truth," admitted Sara, frankly. "But I +suppose there MIGHT be good in things, even if we don't see it. There +MIGHT"--doubtfully--"be good in Miss Minchin." + +Ermengarde looked round the attic with a rather fearsome curiosity. + +"Sara," she said, "do you think you can bear living here?" + +Sara looked round also. + +"If I pretend it's quite different, I can," she answered; "or if I +pretend it is a place in a story." + +She spoke slowly. Her imagination was beginning to work for her. It +had not worked for her at all since her troubles had come upon her. She +had felt as if it had been stunned. + +"Other people have lived in worse places. Think of the Count of Monte +Cristo in the dungeons of the Chateau d'If. And think of the people in +the Bastille!" + +"The Bastille," half whispered Ermengarde, watching her and beginning +to be fascinated. She remembered stories of the French Revolution +which Sara had been able to fix in her mind by her dramatic relation of +them. No one but Sara could have done it. + +A well-known glow came into Sara's eyes. + +"Yes," she said, hugging her knees, "that will be a good place to +pretend about. I am a prisoner in the Bastille. I have been here for +years and years--and years; and everybody has forgotten about me. Miss +Minchin is the jailer--and Becky"--a sudden light adding itself to the +glow in her eyes--"Becky is the prisoner in the next cell." + +She turned to Ermengarde, looking quite like the old Sara. + +"I shall pretend that," she said; "and it will be a great comfort." + +Ermengarde was at once enraptured and awed. + +"And will you tell me all about it?" she said. "May I creep up here at +night, whenever it is safe, and hear the things you have made up in the +day? It will seem as if we were more 'best friends' than ever." + +"Yes," answered Sara, nodding. "Adversity tries people, and mine has +tried you and proved how nice you are." + + + +9 + +Melchisedec + + +The third person in the trio was Lottie. She was a small thing and did +not know what adversity meant, and was much bewildered by the +alteration she saw in her young adopted mother. She had heard it +rumored that strange things had happened to Sara, but she could not +understand why she looked different--why she wore an old black frock +and came into the schoolroom only to teach instead of to sit in her +place of honor and learn lessons herself. There had been much +whispering among the little ones when it had been discovered that Sara +no longer lived in the rooms in which Emily had so long sat in state. +Lottie's chief difficulty was that Sara said so little when one asked +her questions. At seven mysteries must be made very clear if one is to +understand them. + +"Are you very poor now, Sara?" she had asked confidentially the first +morning her friend took charge of the small French class. "Are you as +poor as a beggar?" She thrust a fat hand into the slim one and opened +round, tearful eyes. "I don't want you to be as poor as a beggar." + +She looked as if she was going to cry. And Sara hurriedly consoled her. + +"Beggars have nowhere to live," she said courageously. "I have a place +to live in." + +"Where do you live?" persisted Lottie. "The new girl sleeps in your +room, and it isn't pretty any more." + +"I live in another room," said Sara. + +"Is it a nice one?" inquired Lottie. "I want to go and see it." + +"You must not talk," said Sara. "Miss Minchin is looking at us. She +will be angry with me for letting you whisper." + +She had found out already that she was to be held accountable for +everything which was objected to. If the children were not attentive, +if they talked, if they were restless, it was she who would be reproved. + +But Lottie was a determined little person. If Sara would not tell her +where she lived, she would find out in some other way. She talked to +her small companions and hung about the elder girls and listened when +they were gossiping; and acting upon certain information they had +unconsciously let drop, she started late one afternoon on a voyage of +discovery, climbing stairs she had never known the existence of, until +she reached the attic floor. There she found two doors near each other, +and opening one, she saw her beloved Sara standing upon an old table +and looking out of a window. + +"Sara!" she cried, aghast. "Mamma Sara!" She was aghast because the +attic was so bare and ugly and seemed so far away from all the world. +Her short legs had seemed to have been mounting hundreds of stairs. + +Sara turned round at the sound of her voice. It was her turn to be +aghast. What would happen now? If Lottie began to cry and any one +chanced to hear, they were both lost. She jumped down from her table +and ran to the child. + +"Don't cry and make a noise," she implored. "I shall be scolded if you +do, and I have been scolded all day. It's--it's not such a bad room, +Lottie." + +"Isn't it?" gasped Lottie, and as she looked round it she bit her lip. +She was a spoiled child yet, but she was fond enough of her adopted +parent to make an effort to control herself for her sake. Then, +somehow, it was quite possible that any place in which Sara lived might +turn out to be nice. "Why isn't it, Sara?" she almost whispered. + +Sara hugged her close and tried to laugh. There was a sort of comfort +in the warmth of the plump, childish body. She had had a hard day and +had been staring out of the windows with hot eyes. + +"You can see all sorts of things you can't see downstairs," she said. + +"What sort of things?" demanded Lottie, with that curiosity Sara could +always awaken even in bigger girls. + +"Chimneys--quite close to us--with smoke curling up in wreaths and +clouds and going up into the sky--and sparrows hopping about and +talking to each other just as if they were people--and other attic +windows where heads may pop out any minute and you can wonder who they +belong to. And it all feels as high up--as if it was another world." + +"Oh, let me see it!" cried Lottie. "Lift me up!" + +Sara lifted her up, and they stood on the old table together and leaned +on the edge of the flat window in the roof, and looked out. + +Anyone who has not done this does not know what a different world they +saw. The slates spread out on either side of them and slanted down +into the rain gutter-pipes. The sparrows, being at home there, +twittered and hopped about quite without fear. Two of them perched on +the chimney top nearest and quarrelled with each other fiercely until +one pecked the other and drove him away. The garret window next to +theirs was shut because the house next door was empty. + +"I wish someone lived there," Sara said. "It is so close that if there +was a little girl in the attic, we could talk to each other through the +windows and climb over to see each other, if we were not afraid of +falling." + +The sky seemed so much nearer than when one saw it from the street, +that Lottie was enchanted. From the attic window, among the chimney +pots, the things which were happening in the world below seemed almost +unreal. One scarcely believed in the existence of Miss Minchin and +Miss Amelia and the schoolroom, and the roll of wheels in the square +seemed a sound belonging to another existence. + +"Oh, Sara!" cried Lottie, cuddling in her guarding arm. "I like this +attic--I like it! It is nicer than downstairs!" + +"Look at that sparrow," whispered Sara. "I wish I had some crumbs to +throw to him." + +"I have some!" came in a little shriek from Lottie. "I have part of a +bun in my pocket; I bought it with my penny yesterday, and I saved a +bit." + +When they threw out a few crumbs the sparrow jumped and flew away to an +adjacent chimney top. He was evidently not accustomed to intimates in +attics, and unexpected crumbs startled him. But when Lottie remained +quite still and Sara chirped very softly--almost as if she were a +sparrow herself--he saw that the thing which had alarmed him +represented hospitality, after all. He put his head on one side, and +from his perch on the chimney looked down at the crumbs with twinkling +eyes. Lottie could scarcely keep still. + +"Will he come? Will he come?" she whispered. + +"His eyes look as if he would," Sara whispered back. "He is thinking +and thinking whether he dare. Yes, he will! Yes, he is coming!" + +He flew down and hopped toward the crumbs, but stopped a few inches +away from them, putting his head on one side again, as if reflecting on +the chances that Sara and Lottie might turn out to be big cats and jump +on him. At last his heart told him they were really nicer than they +looked, and he hopped nearer and nearer, darted at the biggest crumb +with a lightning peck, seized it, and carried it away to the other side +of his chimney. + +"Now he KNOWS", said Sara. "And he will come back for the others." + +He did come back, and even brought a friend, and the friend went away +and brought a relative, and among them they made a hearty meal over +which they twittered and chattered and exclaimed, stopping every now +and then to put their heads on one side and examine Lottie and Sara. +Lottie was so delighted that she quite forgot her first shocked +impression of the attic. In fact, when she was lifted down from the +table and returned to earthly things, as it were, Sara was able to +point out to her many beauties in the room which she herself would not +have suspected the existence of. + +"It is so little and so high above everything," she said, "that it is +almost like a nest in a tree. The slanting ceiling is so funny. See, +you can scarcely stand up at this end of the room; and when the morning +begins to come I can lie in bed and look right up into the sky through +that flat window in the roof. It is like a square patch of light. If +the sun is going to shine, little pink clouds float about, and I feel +as if I could touch them. And if it rains, the drops patter and patter +as if they were saying something nice. Then if there are stars, you +can lie and try to count how many go into the patch. It takes such a +lot. And just look at that tiny, rusty grate in the corner. If it was +polished and there was a fire in it, just think how nice it would be. +You see, it's really a beautiful little room." + +She was walking round the small place, holding Lottie's hand and making +gestures which described all the beauties she was making herself see. +She quite made Lottie see them, too. Lottie could always believe in +the things Sara made pictures of. + +"You see," she said, "there could be a thick, soft blue Indian rug on +the floor; and in that corner there could be a soft little sofa, with +cushions to curl up on; and just over it could be a shelf full of books +so that one could reach them easily; and there could be a fur rug +before the fire, and hangings on the wall to cover up the whitewash, +and pictures. They would have to be little ones, but they could be +beautiful; and there could be a lamp with a deep rose-colored shade; +and a table in the middle, with things to have tea with; and a little +fat copper kettle singing on the hob; and the bed could be quite +different. It could be made soft and covered with a lovely silk +coverlet. It could be beautiful. And perhaps we could coax the +sparrows until we made such friends with them that they would come and +peck at the window and ask to be let in." + +"Oh, Sara!" cried Lottie. "I should like to live here!" + +When Sara had persuaded her to go downstairs again, and, after setting +her on her way, had come back to her attic, she stood in the middle of +it and looked about her. The enchantment of her imaginings for Lottie +had died away. The bed was hard and covered with its dingy quilt. The +whitewashed wall showed its broken patches, the floor was cold and +bare, the grate was broken and rusty, and the battered footstool, +tilted sideways on its injured leg, the only seat in the room. She sat +down on it for a few minutes and let her head drop in her hands. The +mere fact that Lottie had come and gone away again made things seem a +little worse--just as perhaps prisoners feel a little more desolate +after visitors come and go, leaving them behind. + +"It's a lonely place," she said. "Sometimes it's the loneliest place +in the world." + +She was sitting in this way when her attention was attracted by a +slight sound near her. She lifted her head to see where it came from, +and if she had been a nervous child she would have left her seat on the +battered footstool in a great hurry. A large rat was sitting up on his +hind quarters and sniffing the air in an interested manner. Some of +Lottie's crumbs had dropped upon the floor and their scent had drawn +him out of his hole. + +He looked so queer and so like a gray-whiskered dwarf or gnome that +Sara was rather fascinated. He looked at her with his bright eyes, as +if he were asking a question. He was evidently so doubtful that one of +the child's queer thoughts came into her mind. + +"I dare say it is rather hard to be a rat," she mused. "Nobody likes +you. People jump and run away and scream out, 'Oh, a horrid rat!' I +shouldn't like people to scream and jump and say, 'Oh, a horrid Sara!' +the moment they saw me. And set traps for me, and pretend they were +dinner. It's so different to be a sparrow. But nobody asked this rat +if he wanted to be a rat when he was made. Nobody said, 'Wouldn't you +rather be a sparrow?'" + +She had sat so quietly that the rat had begun to take courage. He was +very much afraid of her, but perhaps he had a heart like the sparrow +and it told him that she was not a thing which pounced. He was very +hungry. He had a wife and a large family in the wall, and they had had +frightfully bad luck for several days. He had left the children crying +bitterly, and felt he would risk a good deal for a few crumbs, so he +cautiously dropped upon his feet. + +"Come on," said Sara; "I'm not a trap. You can have them, poor thing! +Prisoners in the Bastille used to make friends with rats. Suppose I +make friends with you." + +How it is that animals understand things I do not know, but it is +certain that they do understand. Perhaps there is a language which is +not made of words and everything in the world understands it. Perhaps +there is a soul hidden in everything and it can always speak, without +even making a sound, to another soul. But whatsoever was the reason, +the rat knew from that moment that he was safe--even though he was a +rat. He knew that this young human being sitting on the red footstool +would not jump up and terrify him with wild, sharp noises or throw +heavy objects at him which, if they did not fall and crush him, would +send him limping in his scurry back to his hole. He was really a very +nice rat, and did not mean the least harm. When he had stood on his +hind legs and sniffed the air, with his bright eyes fixed on Sara, he +had hoped that she would understand this, and would not begin by hating +him as an enemy. When the mysterious thing which speaks without saying +any words told him that she would not, he went softly toward the crumbs +and began to eat them. As he did it he glanced every now and then at +Sara, just as the sparrows had done, and his expression was so very +apologetic that it touched her heart. + +She sat and watched him without making any movement. One crumb was +very much larger than the others--in fact, it could scarcely be called +a crumb. It was evident that he wanted that piece very much, but it +lay quite near the footstool and he was still rather timid. + +"I believe he wants it to carry to his family in the wall," Sara +thought. "If I do not stir at all, perhaps he will come and get it." + +She scarcely allowed herself to breathe, she was so deeply interested. +The rat shuffled a little nearer and ate a few more crumbs, then he +stopped and sniffed delicately, giving a side glance at the occupant of +the footstool; then he darted at the piece of bun with something very +like the sudden boldness of the sparrow, and the instant he had +possession of it fled back to the wall, slipped down a crack in the +skirting board, and was gone. + +"I knew he wanted it for his children," said Sara. "I do believe I +could make friends with him." + +A week or so afterward, on one of the rare nights when Ermengarde found +it safe to steal up to the attic, when she tapped on the door with the +tips of her fingers Sara did not come to her for two or three minutes. +There was, indeed, such a silence in the room at first that Ermengarde +wondered if she could have fallen asleep. Then, to her surprise, she +heard her utter a little, low laugh and speak coaxingly to someone. + +"There!" Ermengarde heard her say. "Take it and go home, Melchisedec! +Go home to your wife!" + +Almost immediately Sara opened the door, and when she did so she found +Ermengarde standing with alarmed eyes upon the threshold. + +"Who--who ARE you talking to, Sara?" she gasped out. + +Sara drew her in cautiously, but she looked as if something pleased and +amused her. + +"You must promise not to be frightened--not to scream the least bit, or +I can't tell you," she answered. + +Ermengarde felt almost inclined to scream on the spot, but managed to +control herself. She looked all round the attic and saw no one. And +yet Sara had certainly been speaking TO someone. She thought of ghosts. + +"Is it--something that will frighten me?" she asked timorously. + +"Some people are afraid of them," said Sara. "I was at first--but I am +not now." + +"Was it--a ghost?" quaked Ermengarde. + +"No," said Sara, laughing. "It was my rat." + +Ermengarde made one bound, and landed in the middle of the little dingy +bed. She tucked her feet under her nightgown and the red shawl. She +did not scream, but she gasped with fright. + +"Oh! Oh!" she cried under her breath. "A rat! A rat!" + +"I was afraid you would be frightened," said Sara. "But you needn't +be. I am making him tame. He actually knows me and comes out when I +call him. Are you too frightened to want to see him?" + +The truth was that, as the days had gone on and, with the aid of scraps +brought up from the kitchen, her curious friendship had developed, she +had gradually forgotten that the timid creature she was becoming +familiar with was a mere rat. + +At first Ermengarde was too much alarmed to do anything but huddle in a +heap upon the bed and tuck up her feet, but the sight of Sara's +composed little countenance and the story of Melchisedec's first +appearance began at last to rouse her curiosity, and she leaned forward +over the edge of the bed and watched Sara go and kneel down by the hole +in the skirting board. + +"He--he won't run out quickly and jump on the bed, will he?" she said. + +"No," answered Sara. "He's as polite as we are. He is just like a +person. Now watch!" + +She began to make a low, whistling sound--so low and coaxing that it +could only have been heard in entire stillness. She did it several +times, looking entirely absorbed in it. Ermengarde thought she looked +as if she were working a spell. And at last, evidently in response to +it, a gray-whiskered, bright-eyed head peeped out of the hole. Sara +had some crumbs in her hand. She dropped them, and Melchisedec came +quietly forth and ate them. A piece of larger size than the rest he +took and carried in the most businesslike manner back to his home. + +"You see," said Sara, "that is for his wife and children. He is very +nice. He only eats the little bits. After he goes back I can always +hear his family squeaking for joy. There are three kinds of squeaks. +One kind is the children's, and one is Mrs. Melchisedec's, and one is +Melchisedec's own." + +Ermengarde began to laugh. + +"Oh, Sara!" she said. "You ARE queer--but you are nice." + +"I know I am queer," admitted Sara, cheerfully; "and I TRY to be nice." +She rubbed her forehead with her little brown paw, and a puzzled, +tender look came into her face. "Papa always laughed at me," she said; +"but I liked it. He thought I was queer, but he liked me to make up +things. I--I can't help making up things. If I didn't, I don't +believe I could live." She paused and glanced around the attic. "I'm +sure I couldn't live here," she added in a low voice. + +Ermengarde was interested, as she always was. "When you talk about +things," she said, "they seem as if they grew real. You talk about +Melchisedec as if he was a person." + +"He IS a person," said Sara. "He gets hungry and frightened, just as +we do; and he is married and has children. How do we know he doesn't +think things, just as we do? His eyes look as if he was a person. +That was why I gave him a name." + +She sat down on the floor in her favorite attitude, holding her knees. + +"Besides," she said, "he is a Bastille rat sent to be my friend. I can +always get a bit of bread the cook has thrown away, and it is quite +enough to support him." + +"Is it the Bastille yet?" asked Ermengarde, eagerly. "Do you always +pretend it is the Bastille?" + +"Nearly always," answered Sara. "Sometimes I try to pretend it is +another kind of place; but the Bastille is generally +easiest--particularly when it is cold." + +Just at that moment Ermengarde almost jumped off the bed, she was so +startled by a sound she heard. It was like two distinct knocks on the +wall. + +"What is that?" she exclaimed. + +Sara got up from the floor and answered quite dramatically: + +"It is the prisoner in the next cell." + +"Becky!" cried Ermengarde, enraptured. + +"Yes," said Sara. "Listen; the two knocks meant, 'Prisoner, are you +there?'" + +She knocked three times on the wall herself, as if in answer. + +"That means, 'Yes, I am here, and all is well.'" + +Four knocks came from Becky's side of the wall. + +"That means," explained Sara, "'Then, fellow-sufferer, we will sleep in +peace. Good night.'" + +Ermengarde quite beamed with delight. + +"Oh, Sara!" she whispered joyfully. "It is like a story!" + +"It IS a story," said Sara. "EVERYTHING'S a story. You are a story--I +am a story. Miss Minchin is a story." + +And she sat down again and talked until Ermengarde forgot that she was +a sort of escaped prisoner herself, and had to be reminded by Sara that +she could not remain in the Bastille all night, but must steal +noiselessly downstairs again and creep back into her deserted bed. + + + +10 + +The Indian Gentleman + + +But it was a perilous thing for Ermengarde and Lottie to make +pilgrimages to the attic. They could never be quite sure when Sara +would be there, and they could scarcely ever be certain that Miss +Amelia would not make a tour of inspection through the bedrooms after +the pupils were supposed to be asleep. So their visits were rare ones, +and Sara lived a strange and lonely life. It was a lonelier life when +she was downstairs than when she was in her attic. She had no one to +talk to; and when she was sent out on errands and walked through the +streets, a forlorn little figure carrying a basket or a parcel, trying +to hold her hat on when the wind was blowing, and feeling the water +soak through her shoes when it was raining, she felt as if the crowds +hurrying past her made her loneliness greater. When she had been the +Princess Sara, driving through the streets in her brougham, or walking, +attended by Mariette, the sight of her bright, eager little face and +picturesque coats and hats had often caused people to look after her. +A happy, beautifully cared for little girl naturally attracts +attention. Shabby, poorly dressed children are not rare enough and +pretty enough to make people turn around to look at them and smile. No +one looked at Sara in these days, and no one seemed to see her as she +hurried along the crowded pavements. She had begun to grow very fast, +and, as she was dressed only in such clothes as the plainer remnants of +her wardrobe would supply, she knew she looked very queer, indeed. All +her valuable garments had been disposed of, and such as had been left +for her use she was expected to wear so long as she could put them on +at all. Sometimes, when she passed a shop window with a mirror in it, +she almost laughed outright on catching a glimpse of herself, and +sometimes her face went red and she bit her lip and turned away. + +In the evening, when she passed houses whose windows were lighted up, +she used to look into the warm rooms and amuse herself by imagining +things about the people she saw sitting before the fires or about the +tables. It always interested her to catch glimpses of rooms before the +shutters were closed. There were several families in the square in +which Miss Minchin lived, with which she had become quite familiar in a +way of her own. The one she liked best she called the Large Family. +She called it the Large Family not because the members of it were +big--for, indeed, most of them were little--but because there were so +many of them. There were eight children in the Large Family, and a +stout, rosy mother, and a stout, rosy father, and a stout, rosy +grandmother, and any number of servants. The eight children were always +either being taken out to walk or to ride in perambulators by +comfortable nurses, or they were going to drive with their mamma, or +they were flying to the door in the evening to meet their papa and kiss +him and dance around him and drag off his overcoat and look in the +pockets for packages, or they were crowding about the nursery windows +and looking out and pushing each other and laughing--in fact, they were +always doing something enjoyable and suited to the tastes of a large +family. Sara was quite fond of them, and had given them names out of +books--quite romantic names. She called them the Montmorencys when she +did not call them the Large Family. The fat, fair baby with the lace +cap was Ethelberta Beauchamp Montmorency; the next baby was Violet +Cholmondeley Montmorency; the little boy who could just stagger and who +had such round legs was Sydney Cecil Vivian Montmorency; and then came +Lilian Evangeline Maud Marion, Rosalind Gladys, Guy Clarence, Veronica +Eustacia, and Claude Harold Hector. + +One evening a very funny thing happened--though, perhaps, in one sense +it was not a funny thing at all. + +Several of the Montmorencys were evidently going to a children's party, +and just as Sara was about to pass the door they were crossing the +pavement to get into the carriage which was waiting for them. Veronica +Eustacia and Rosalind Gladys, in white-lace frocks and lovely sashes, +had just got in, and Guy Clarence, aged five, was following them. He +was such a pretty fellow and had such rosy cheeks and blue eyes, and +such a darling little round head covered with curls, that Sara forgot +her basket and shabby cloak altogether--in fact, forgot everything but +that she wanted to look at him for a moment. So she paused and looked. + +It was Christmas time, and the Large Family had been hearing many +stories about children who were poor and had no mammas and papas to +fill their stockings and take them to the pantomime--children who were, +in fact, cold and thinly clad and hungry. In the stories, kind +people--sometimes little boys and girls with tender hearts--invariably +saw the poor children and gave them money or rich gifts, or took them +home to beautiful dinners. Guy Clarence had been affected to tears +that very afternoon by the reading of such a story, and he had burned +with a desire to find such a poor child and give her a certain sixpence +he possessed, and thus provide for her for life. An entire sixpence, he +was sure, would mean affluence for evermore. As he crossed the strip of +red carpet laid across the pavement from the door to the carriage, he +had this very sixpence in the pocket of his very short man-o-war +trousers; And just as Rosalind Gladys got into the vehicle and jumped +on the seat in order to feel the cushions spring under her, he saw Sara +standing on the wet pavement in her shabby frock and hat, with her old +basket on her arm, looking at him hungrily. + +He thought that her eyes looked hungry because she had perhaps had +nothing to eat for a long time. He did not know that they looked so +because she was hungry for the warm, merry life his home held and his +rosy face spoke of, and that she had a hungry wish to snatch him in her +arms and kiss him. He only knew that she had big eyes and a thin face +and thin legs and a common basket and poor clothes. So he put his hand +in his pocket and found his sixpence and walked up to her benignly. + +"Here, poor little girl," he said. "Here is a sixpence. I will give it +to you." + +Sara started, and all at once realized that she looked exactly like +poor children she had seen, in her better days, waiting on the pavement +to watch her as she got out of her brougham. And she had given them +pennies many a time. Her face went red and then it went pale, and for +a second she felt as if she could not take the dear little sixpence. + +"Oh, no!" she said. "Oh, no, thank you; I mustn't take it, indeed!" + +Her voice was so unlike an ordinary street child's voice and her manner +was so like the manner of a well-bred little person that Veronica +Eustacia (whose real name was Janet) and Rosalind Gladys (who was +really called Nora) leaned forward to listen. + +But Guy Clarence was not to be thwarted in his benevolence. He thrust +the sixpence into her hand. + +"Yes, you must take it, poor little girl!" he insisted stoutly. "You +can buy things to eat with it. It is a whole sixpence!" + +There was something so honest and kind in his face, and he looked so +likely to be heartbrokenly disappointed if she did not take it, that +Sara knew she must not refuse him. To be as proud as that would be a +cruel thing. So she actually put her pride in her pocket, though it +must be admitted her cheeks burned. + +"Thank you," she said. "You are a kind, kind little darling thing." +And as he scrambled joyfully into the carriage she went away, trying to +smile, though she caught her breath quickly and her eyes were shining +through a mist. She had known that she looked odd and shabby, but +until now she had not known that she might be taken for a beggar. + +As the Large Family's carriage drove away, the children inside it were +talking with interested excitement. + +"Oh, Donald," (this was Guy Clarence's name), Janet exclaimed +alarmedly, "why did you offer that little girl your sixpence? I'm sure +she is not a beggar!" + +"She didn't speak like a beggar!" cried Nora. "And her face didn't +really look like a beggar's face!" + +"Besides, she didn't beg," said Janet. "I was so afraid she might be +angry with you. You know, it makes people angry to be taken for +beggars when they are not beggars." + +"She wasn't angry," said Donald, a trifle dismayed, but still firm. +"She laughed a little, and she said I was a kind, kind little darling +thing. And I was!"--stoutly. "It was my whole sixpence." + +Janet and Nora exchanged glances. + +"A beggar girl would never have said that," decided Janet. "She would +have said, 'Thank yer kindly, little gentleman--thank yer, sir;' and +perhaps she would have bobbed a curtsy." + +Sara knew nothing about the fact, but from that time the Large Family +was as profoundly interested in her as she was in it. Faces used to +appear at the nursery windows when she passed, and many discussions +concerning her were held round the fire. + +"She is a kind of servant at the seminary," Janet said. "I don't +believe she belongs to anybody. I believe she is an orphan. But she is +not a beggar, however shabby she looks." + +And afterward she was called by all of them, +"The-little-girl-who-is-not-a-beggar," which was, of course, rather a +long name, and sounded very funny sometimes when the youngest ones said +it in a hurry. + +Sara managed to bore a hole in the sixpence and hung it on an old bit +of narrow ribbon round her neck. Her affection for the Large Family +increased--as, indeed, her affection for everything she could love +increased. She grew fonder and fonder of Becky, and she used to look +forward to the two mornings a week when she went into the schoolroom to +give the little ones their French lesson. Her small pupils loved her, +and strove with each other for the privilege of standing close to her +and insinuating their small hands into hers. It fed her hungry heart to +feel them nestling up to her. She made such friends with the sparrows +that when she stood upon the table, put her head and shoulders out of +the attic window, and chirped, she heard almost immediately a flutter +of wings and answering twitters, and a little flock of dingy town birds +appeared and alighted on the slates to talk to her and make much of the +crumbs she scattered. With Melchisedec she had become so intimate that +he actually brought Mrs. Melchisedec with him sometimes, and now and +then one or two of his children. She used to talk to him, and, +somehow, he looked quite as if he understood. + +There had grown in her mind rather a strange feeling about Emily, who +always sat and looked on at everything. It arose in one of her moments +of great desolateness. She would have liked to believe or pretend to +believe that Emily understood and sympathized with her. She did not +like to own to herself that her only companion could feel and hear +nothing. She used to put her in a chair sometimes and sit opposite to +her on the old red footstool, and stare and pretend about her until her +own eyes would grow large with something which was almost like +fear--particularly at night when everything was so still, when the only +sound in the attic was the occasional sudden scurry and squeak of +Melchisedec's family in the wall. One of her "pretends" was that Emily +was a kind of good witch who could protect her. Sometimes, after she +had stared at her until she was wrought up to the highest pitch of +fancifulness, she would ask her questions and find herself ALMOST +feeling as if she would presently answer. But she never did. + +"As to answering, though," said Sara, trying to console herself, "I +don't answer very often. I never answer when I can help it. When +people are insulting you, there is nothing so good for them as not to +say a word--just to look at them and THINK. Miss Minchin turns pale +with rage when I do it, Miss Amelia looks frightened, and so do the +girls. When you will not fly into a passion people know you are +stronger than they are, because you are strong enough to hold in your +rage, and they are not, and they say stupid things they wish they +hadn't said afterward. There's nothing so strong as rage, except what +makes you hold it in--that's stronger. It's a good thing not to answer +your enemies. I scarcely ever do. Perhaps Emily is more like me than I +am like myself. Perhaps she would rather not answer her friends, even. +She keeps it all in her heart." + +But though she tried to satisfy herself with these arguments, she did +not find it easy. When, after a long, hard day, in which she had been +sent here and there, sometimes on long errands through wind and cold +and rain, she came in wet and hungry, and was sent out again because +nobody chose to remember that she was only a child, and that her slim +legs might be tired and her small body might be chilled; when she had +been given only harsh words and cold, slighting looks for thanks; when +the cook had been vulgar and insolent; when Miss Minchin had been in +her worst mood, and when she had seen the girls sneering among +themselves at her shabbiness--then she was not always able to comfort +her sore, proud, desolate heart with fancies when Emily merely sat +upright in her old chair and stared. + +One of these nights, when she came up to the attic cold and hungry, +with a tempest raging in her young breast, Emily's stare seemed so +vacant, her sawdust legs and arms so inexpressive, that Sara lost all +control over herself. There was nobody but Emily--no one in the world. +And there she sat. + +"I shall die presently," she said at first. + +Emily simply stared. + +"I can't bear this," said the poor child, trembling. "I know I shall +die. I'm cold; I'm wet; I'm starving to death. I've walked a thousand +miles today, and they have done nothing but scold me from morning until +night. And because I could not find that last thing the cook sent me +for, they would not give me any supper. Some men laughed at me because +my old shoes made me slip down in the mud. I'm covered with mud now. +And they laughed. Do you hear?" + +She looked at the staring glass eyes and complacent face, and suddenly +a sort of heartbroken rage seized her. She lifted her little savage +hand and knocked Emily off the chair, bursting into a passion of +sobbing--Sara who never cried. + +"You are nothing but a DOLL!" she cried. "Nothing but a +doll--doll--doll! You care for nothing. You are stuffed with sawdust. +You never had a heart. Nothing could ever make you feel. You are a +DOLL!" Emily lay on the floor, with her legs ignominiously doubled up +over her head, and a new flat place on the end of her nose; but she was +calm, even dignified. Sara hid her face in her arms. The rats in the +wall began to fight and bite each other and squeak and scramble. +Melchisedec was chastising some of his family. + +Sara's sobs gradually quieted themselves. It was so unlike her to +break down that she was surprised at herself. After a while she raised +her face and looked at Emily, who seemed to be gazing at her round the +side of one angle, and, somehow, by this time actually with a kind of +glassy-eyed sympathy. Sara bent and picked her up. Remorse overtook +her. She even smiled at herself a very little smile. + +"You can't help being a doll," she said with a resigned sigh, "any more +than Lavinia and Jessie can help not having any sense. We are not all +made alike. Perhaps you do your sawdust best." And she kissed her and +shook her clothes straight, and put her back upon her chair. + +She had wished very much that some one would take the empty house next +door. She wished it because of the attic window which was so near +hers. It seemed as if it would be so nice to see it propped open +someday and a head and shoulders rising out of the square aperture. + +"If it looked a nice head," she thought, "I might begin by saying, +'Good morning,' and all sorts of things might happen. But, of course, +it's not really likely that anyone but under servants would sleep +there." + +One morning, on turning the corner of the square after a visit to the +grocer's, the butcher's, and the baker's, she saw, to her great +delight, that during her rather prolonged absence, a van full of +furniture had stopped before the next house, the front doors were +thrown open, and men in shirt sleeves were going in and out carrying +heavy packages and pieces of furniture. + +"It's taken!" she said. "It really IS taken! Oh, I do hope a nice +head will look out of the attic window!" + +She would almost have liked to join the group of loiterers who had +stopped on the pavement to watch the things carried in. She had an idea +that if she could see some of the furniture she could guess something +about the people it belonged to. + +"Miss Minchin's tables and chairs are just like her," she thought; "I +remember thinking that the first minute I saw her, even though I was so +little. I told papa afterward, and he laughed and said it was true. I +am sure the Large Family have fat, comfortable armchairs and sofas, and +I can see that their red-flowery wallpaper is exactly like them. It's +warm and cheerful and kind-looking and happy." + +She was sent out for parsley to the greengrocer's later in the day, and +when she came up the area steps her heart gave quite a quick beat of +recognition. Several pieces of furniture had been set out of the van +upon the pavement. There was a beautiful table of elaborately wrought +teakwood, and some chairs, and a screen covered with rich Oriental +embroidery. The sight of them gave her a weird, homesick feeling. She +had seen things so like them in India. One of the things Miss Minchin +had taken from her was a carved teakwood desk her father had sent her. + +"They are beautiful things," she said; "they look as if they ought to +belong to a nice person. All the things look rather grand. I suppose +it is a rich family." + +The vans of furniture came and were unloaded and gave place to others +all the day. Several times it so happened that Sara had an opportunity +of seeing things carried in. It became plain that she had been right +in guessing that the newcomers were people of large means. All the +furniture was rich and beautiful, and a great deal of it was Oriental. +Wonderful rugs and draperies and ornaments were taken from the vans, +many pictures, and books enough for a library. Among other things there +was a superb god Buddha in a splendid shrine. + +"Someone in the family MUST have been in India," Sara thought. "They +have got used to Indian things and like them. I AM glad. I shall feel +as if they were friends, even if a head never looks out of the attic +window." + +When she was taking in the evening's milk for the cook (there was +really no odd job she was not called upon to do), she saw something +occur which made the situation more interesting than ever. The +handsome, rosy man who was the father of the Large Family walked across +the square in the most matter-of-fact manner, and ran up the steps of +the next-door house. He ran up them as if he felt quite at home and +expected to run up and down them many a time in the future. He stayed +inside quite a long time, and several times came out and gave +directions to the workmen, as if he had a right to do so. It was quite +certain that he was in some intimate way connected with the newcomers +and was acting for them. + +"If the new people have children," Sara speculated, "the Large Family +children will be sure to come and play with them, and they MIGHT come +up into the attic just for fun." + +At night, after her work was done, Becky came in to see her fellow +prisoner and bring her news. + +"It's a' Nindian gentleman that's comin' to live next door, miss," she +said. "I don't know whether he's a black gentleman or not, but he's a +Nindian one. He's very rich, an' he's ill, an' the gentleman of the +Large Family is his lawyer. He's had a lot of trouble, an' it's made +him ill an' low in his mind. He worships idols, miss. He's an 'eathen +an' bows down to wood an' stone. I seen a' idol bein' carried in for +him to worship. Somebody had oughter send him a trac'. You can get a +trac' for a penny." + +Sara laughed a little. + +"I don't believe he worships that idol," she said; "some people like to +keep them to look at because they are interesting. My papa had a +beautiful one, and he did not worship it." + +But Becky was rather inclined to prefer to believe that the new +neighbor was "an 'eathen." It sounded so much more romantic than that +he should merely be the ordinary kind of gentleman who went to church +with a prayer book. She sat and talked long that night of what he +would be like, of what his wife would be like if he had one, and of +what his children would be like if they had children. Sara saw that +privately she could not help hoping very much that they would all be +black, and would wear turbans, and, above all, that--like their +parent--they would all be "'eathens." + +"I never lived next door to no 'eathens, miss," she said; "I should +like to see what sort o' ways they'd have." + +It was several weeks before her curiosity was satisfied, and then it +was revealed that the new occupant had neither wife nor children. He +was a solitary man with no family at all, and it was evident that he +was shattered in health and unhappy in mind. + +A carriage drove up one day and stopped before the house. When the +footman dismounted from the box and opened the door the gentleman who +was the father of the Large Family got out first. After him there +descended a nurse in uniform, then came down the steps two +men-servants. They came to assist their master, who, when he was helped +out of the carriage, proved to be a man with a haggard, distressed +face, and a skeleton body wrapped in furs. He was carried up the +steps, and the head of the Large Family went with him, looking very +anxious. Shortly afterward a doctor's carriage arrived, and the doctor +went in--plainly to take care of him. + +"There is such a yellow gentleman next door, Sara," Lottie whispered at +the French class afterward. "Do you think he is a Chinee? The +geography says the Chinee men are yellow." + +"No, he is not Chinese," Sara whispered back; "he is very ill. Go on +with your exercise, Lottie. 'Non, monsieur. Je n'ai pas le canif de +mon oncle.'" + +That was the beginning of the story of the Indian gentleman. + + + +11 + +Ram Dass + + +There were fine sunsets even in the square, sometimes. One could only +see parts of them, however, between the chimneys and over the roofs. +From the kitchen windows one could not see them at all, and could only +guess that they were going on because the bricks looked warm and the +air rosy or yellow for a while, or perhaps one saw a blazing glow +strike a particular pane of glass somewhere. There was, however, one +place from which one could see all the splendor of them: the piles of +red or gold clouds in the west; or the purple ones edged with dazzling +brightness; or the little fleecy, floating ones, tinged with rose-color +and looking like flights of pink doves scurrying across the blue in a +great hurry if there was a wind. The place where one could see all +this, and seem at the same time to breathe a purer air, was, of course, +the attic window. When the square suddenly seemed to begin to glow in +an enchanted way and look wonderful in spite of its sooty trees and +railings, Sara knew something was going on in the sky; and when it was +at all possible to leave the kitchen without being missed or called +back, she invariably stole away and crept up the flights of stairs, +and, climbing on the old table, got her head and body as far out of the +window as possible. When she had accomplished this, she always drew a +long breath and looked all round her. It used to seem as if she had +all the sky and the world to herself. No one else ever looked out of +the other attics. Generally the skylights were closed; but even if +they were propped open to admit air, no one seemed to come near them. +And there Sara would stand, sometimes turning her face upward to the +blue which seemed so friendly and near--just like a lovely vaulted +ceiling--sometimes watching the west and all the wonderful things that +happened there: the clouds melting or drifting or waiting softly to be +changed pink or crimson or snow-white or purple or pale dove-gray. +Sometimes they made islands or great mountains enclosing lakes of deep +turquoise-blue, or liquid amber, or chrysoprase-green; sometimes dark +headlands jutted into strange, lost seas; sometimes slender strips of +wonderful lands joined other wonderful lands together. There were +places where it seemed that one could run or climb or stand and wait to +see what next was coming--until, perhaps, as it all melted, one could +float away. At least it seemed so to Sara, and nothing had ever been +quite so beautiful to her as the things she saw as she stood on the +table--her body half out of the skylight--the sparrows twittering with +sunset softness on the slates. The sparrows always seemed to her to +twitter with a sort of subdued softness just when these marvels were +going on. + +There was such a sunset as this a few days after the Indian gentleman +was brought to his new home; and, as it fortunately happened that the +afternoon's work was done in the kitchen and nobody had ordered her to +go anywhere or perform any task, Sara found it easier than usual to +slip away and go upstairs. + +She mounted her table and stood looking out. It was a wonderful +moment. There were floods of molten gold covering the west, as if a +glorious tide was sweeping over the world. A deep, rich yellow light +filled the air; the birds flying across the tops of the houses showed +quite black against it. + +"It's a Splendid one," said Sara, softly, to herself. "It makes me +feel almost afraid--as if something strange was just going to happen. +The Splendid ones always make me feel like that." + +She suddenly turned her head because she heard a sound a few yards away +from her. It was an odd sound like a queer little squeaky chattering. +It came from the window of the next attic. Someone had come to look at +the sunset as she had. There was a head and a part of a body emerging +from the skylight, but it was not the head or body of a little girl or +a housemaid; it was the picturesque white-swathed form and dark-faced, +gleaming-eyed, white-turbaned head of a native Indian man-servant--"a +Lascar," Sara said to herself quickly--and the sound she had heard came +from a small monkey he held in his arms as if he were fond of it, and +which was snuggling and chattering against his breast. + +As Sara looked toward him he looked toward her. The first thing she +thought was that his dark face looked sorrowful and homesick. She felt +absolutely sure he had come up to look at the sun, because he had seen +it so seldom in England that he longed for a sight of it. She looked at +him interestedly for a second, and then smiled across the slates. She +had learned to know how comforting a smile, even from a stranger, may +be. + +Hers was evidently a pleasure to him. His whole expression altered, +and he showed such gleaming white teeth as he smiled back that it was +as if a light had been illuminated in his dusky face. The friendly look +in Sara's eyes was always very effective when people felt tired or dull. + +It was perhaps in making his salute to her that he loosened his hold on +the monkey. He was an impish monkey and always ready for adventure, +and it is probable that the sight of a little girl excited him. He +suddenly broke loose, jumped on to the slates, ran across them +chattering, and actually leaped on to Sara's shoulder, and from there +down into her attic room. It made her laugh and delighted her; but she +knew he must be restored to his master--if the Lascar was his +master--and she wondered how this was to be done. Would he let her +catch him, or would he be naughty and refuse to be caught, and perhaps +get away and run off over the roofs and be lost? That would not do at +all. Perhaps he belonged to the Indian gentleman, and the poor man was +fond of him. + +She turned to the Lascar, feeling glad that she remembered still some +of the Hindustani she had learned when she lived with her father. She +could make the man understand. She spoke to him in the language he +knew. + +"Will he let me catch him?" she asked. + +She thought she had never seen more surprise and delight than the dark +face expressed when she spoke in the familiar tongue. The truth was +that the poor fellow felt as if his gods had intervened, and the kind +little voice came from heaven itself. At once Sara saw that he had +been accustomed to European children. He poured forth a flood of +respectful thanks. He was the servant of Missee Sahib. The monkey was +a good monkey and would not bite; but, unfortunately, he was difficult +to catch. He would flee from one spot to another, like the lightning. +He was disobedient, though not evil. Ram Dass knew him as if he were +his child, and Ram Dass he would sometimes obey, but not always. If +Missee Sahib would permit Ram Dass, he himself could cross the roof to +her room, enter the windows, and regain the unworthy little animal. +But he was evidently afraid Sara might think he was taking a great +liberty and perhaps would not let him come. + +But Sara gave him leave at once. + +"Can you get across?" she inquired. + +"In a moment," he answered her. + +"Then come," she said; "he is flying from side to side of the room as +if he was frightened." + +Ram Dass slipped through his attic window and crossed to hers as +steadily and lightly as if he had walked on roofs all his life. He +slipped through the skylight and dropped upon his feet without a sound. +Then he turned to Sara and salaamed again. The monkey saw him and +uttered a little scream. Ram Dass hastily took the precaution of +shutting the skylight, and then went in chase of him. It was not a very +long chase. The monkey prolonged it a few minutes evidently for the +mere fun of it, but presently he sprang chattering on to Ram Dass's +shoulder and sat there chattering and clinging to his neck with a weird +little skinny arm. + +Ram Dass thanked Sara profoundly. She had seen that his quick native +eyes had taken in at a glance all the bare shabbiness of the room, but +he spoke to her as if he were speaking to the little daughter of a +rajah, and pretended that he observed nothing. He did not presume to +remain more than a few moments after he had caught the monkey, and +those moments were given to further deep and grateful obeisance to her +in return for her indulgence. This little evil one, he said, stroking +the monkey, was, in truth, not so evil as he seemed, and his master, +who was ill, was sometimes amused by him. He would have been made sad +if his favorite had run away and been lost. Then he salaamed once more +and got through the skylight and across the slates again with as much +agility as the monkey himself had displayed. + +When he had gone Sara stood in the middle of her attic and thought of +many things his face and his manner had brought back to her. The sight +of his native costume and the profound reverence of his manner stirred +all her past memories. It seemed a strange thing to remember that +she--the drudge whom the cook had said insulting things to an hour +ago--had only a few years ago been surrounded by people who all treated +her as Ram Dass had treated her; who salaamed when she went by, whose +foreheads almost touched the ground when she spoke to them, who were +her servants and her slaves. It was like a sort of dream. It was all +over, and it could never come back. It certainly seemed that there was +no way in which any change could take place. She knew what Miss Minchin +intended that her future should be. So long as she was too young to be +used as a regular teacher, she would be used as an errand girl and +servant and yet expected to remember what she had learned and in some +mysterious way to learn more. The greater number of her evenings she +was supposed to spend at study, and at various indefinite intervals she +was examined and knew she would have been severely admonished if she +had not advanced as was expected of her. The truth, indeed, was that +Miss Minchin knew that she was too anxious to learn to require +teachers. Give her books, and she would devour them and end by knowing +them by heart. She might be trusted to be equal to teaching a good +deal in the course of a few years. This was what would happen: when +she was older she would be expected to drudge in the schoolroom as she +drudged now in various parts of the house; they would be obliged to +give her more respectable clothes, but they would be sure to be plain +and ugly and to make her look somehow like a servant. That was all +there seemed to be to look forward to, and Sara stood quite still for +several minutes and thought it over. + +Then a thought came back to her which made the color rise in her cheek +and a spark light itself in her eyes. She straightened her thin little +body and lifted her head. + +"Whatever comes," she said, "cannot alter one thing. If I am a +princess in rags and tatters, I can be a princess inside. It would be +easy to be a princess if I were dressed in cloth of gold, but it is a +great deal more of a triumph to be one all the time when no one knows +it. There was Marie Antoinette when she was in prison and her throne +was gone and she had only a black gown on, and her hair was white, and +they insulted her and called her Widow Capet. She was a great deal more +like a queen then than when she was so gay and everything was so grand. +I like her best then. Those howling mobs of people did not frighten +her. She was stronger than they were, even when they cut her head off." + +This was not a new thought, but quite an old one, by this time. It had +consoled her through many a bitter day, and she had gone about the +house with an expression in her face which Miss Minchin could not +understand and which was a source of great annoyance to her, as it +seemed as if the child were mentally living a life which held her above +the rest of the world. It was as if she scarcely heard the rude and +acid things said to her; or, if she heard them, did not care for them +at all. Sometimes, when she was in the midst of some harsh, +domineering speech, Miss Minchin would find the still, unchildish eyes +fixed upon her with something like a proud smile in them. At such +times she did not know that Sara was saying to herself: + +"You don't know that you are saying these things to a princess, and +that if I chose I could wave my hand and order you to execution. I only +spare you because I am a princess, and you are a poor, stupid, unkind, +vulgar old thing, and don't know any better." + +This used to interest and amuse her more than anything else; and queer +and fanciful as it was, she found comfort in it and it was a good thing +for her. While the thought held possession of her, she could not be +made rude and malicious by the rudeness and malice of those about her. + +"A princess must be polite," she said to herself. + +And so when the servants, taking their tone from their mistress, were +insolent and ordered her about, she would hold her head erect and reply +to them with a quaint civility which often made them stare at her. + +"She's got more airs and graces than if she come from Buckingham +Palace, that young one," said the cook, chuckling a little sometimes. +"I lose my temper with her often enough, but I will say she never +forgets her manners. 'If you please, cook'; 'Will you be so kind, +cook?' 'I beg your pardon, cook'; 'May I trouble you, cook?' She +drops 'em about the kitchen as if they was nothing." + +The morning after the interview with Ram Dass and his monkey, Sara was +in the schoolroom with her small pupils. Having finished giving them +their lessons, she was putting the French exercise-books together and +thinking, as she did it, of the various things royal personages in +disguise were called upon to do: Alfred the Great, for instance, +burning the cakes and getting his ears boxed by the wife of the +neat-herd. How frightened she must have been when she found out what +she had done. If Miss Minchin should find out that she--Sara, whose +toes were almost sticking out of her boots--was a princess--a real one! +The look in her eyes was exactly the look which Miss Minchin most +disliked. She would not have it; she was quite near her and was so +enraged that she actually flew at her and boxed her ears--exactly as +the neat-herd's wife had boxed King Alfred's. It made Sara start. She +wakened from her dream at the shock, and, catching her breath, stood +still a second. Then, not knowing she was going to do it, she broke +into a little laugh. + +"What are you laughing at, you bold, impudent child?" Miss Minchin +exclaimed. + +It took Sara a few seconds to control herself sufficiently to remember +that she was a princess. Her cheeks were red and smarting from the +blows she had received. + +"I was thinking," she answered. + +"Beg my pardon immediately," said Miss Minchin. + +Sara hesitated a second before she replied. + +"I will beg your pardon for laughing, if it was rude," she said then; +"but I won't beg your pardon for thinking." + +"What were you thinking?" demanded Miss Minchin. +"How dare you think? What were you thinking?" + +Jessie tittered, and she and Lavinia nudged each other in unison. All +the girls looked up from their books to listen. Really, it always +interested them a little when Miss Minchin attacked Sara. Sara always +said something queer, and never seemed the least bit frightened. She +was not in the least frightened now, though her boxed ears were scarlet +and her eyes were as bright as stars. + +"I was thinking," she answered grandly and politely, "that you did not +know what you were doing." + +"That I did not know what I was doing?" Miss Minchin fairly gasped. + +"Yes," said Sara, "and I was thinking what would happen if I were a +princess and you boxed my ears--what I should do to you. And I was +thinking that if I were one, you would never dare to do it, whatever I +said or did. And I was thinking how surprised and frightened you would +be if you suddenly found out--" + +She had the imagined future so clearly before her eyes that she spoke +in a manner which had an effect even upon Miss Minchin. It almost +seemed for the moment to her narrow, unimaginative mind that there must +be some real power hidden behind this candid daring. + +"What?" she exclaimed. "Found out what?" + +"That I really was a princess," said Sara, "and could do +anything--anything I liked." + +Every pair of eyes in the room widened to its full limit. Lavinia +leaned forward on her seat to look. + +"Go to your room," cried Miss Minchin, breathlessly, "this instant! +Leave the schoolroom! Attend to your lessons, young ladies!" + +Sara made a little bow. + +"Excuse me for laughing if it was impolite," she said, and walked out +of the room, leaving Miss Minchin struggling with her rage, and the +girls whispering over their books. + +"Did you see her? Did you see how queer she looked?" Jessie broke +out. "I shouldn't be at all surprised if she did turn out to be +something. Suppose she should!" + + + +12 + +The Other Side of the Wall + + +When one lives in a row of houses, it is interesting to think of the +things which are being done and said on the other side of the wall of +the very rooms one is living in. Sara was fond of amusing herself by +trying to imagine the things hidden by the wall which divided the +Select Seminary from the Indian gentleman's house. She knew that the +schoolroom was next to the Indian gentleman's study, and she hoped that +the wall was thick so that the noise made sometimes after lesson hours +would not disturb him. + +"I am growing quite fond of him," she said to Ermengarde; "I should not +like him to be disturbed. I have adopted him for a friend. You can do +that with people you never speak to at all. You can just watch them, +and think about them and be sorry for them, until they seem almost like +relations. I'm quite anxious sometimes when I see the doctor call +twice a day." + +"I have very few relations," said Ermengarde, reflectively, "and I'm +very glad of it. I don't like those I have. My two aunts are always +saying, 'Dear me, Ermengarde! You are very fat. You shouldn't eat +sweets,' and my uncle is always asking me things like, 'When did Edward +the Third ascend the throne?' and, 'Who died of a surfeit of lampreys?'" + +Sara laughed. + +"People you never speak to can't ask you questions like that," she +said; "and I'm sure the Indian gentleman wouldn't even if he was quite +intimate with you. I am fond of him." + +She had become fond of the Large Family because they looked happy; but +she had become fond of the Indian gentleman because he looked unhappy. +He had evidently not fully recovered from some very severe illness. In +the kitchen--where, of course, the servants, through some mysterious +means, knew everything--there was much discussion of his case. He was +not an Indian gentleman really, but an Englishman who had lived in +India. He had met with great misfortunes which had for a time so +imperilled his whole fortune that he had thought himself ruined and +disgraced forever. The shock had been so great that he had almost died +of brain fever; and ever since he had been shattered in health, though +his fortunes had changed and all his possessions had been restored to +him. His trouble and peril had been connected with mines. + +"And mines with diamonds in 'em!" said the cook. "No savin's of mine +never goes into no mines--particular diamond ones"--with a side glance +at Sara. "We all know somethin' of THEM." + +"He felt as my papa felt," Sara thought. "He was ill as my papa was; +but he did not die." + +So her heart was more drawn to him than before. When she was sent out +at night she used sometimes to feel quite glad, because there was +always a chance that the curtains of the house next door might not yet +be closed and she could look into the warm room and see her adopted +friend. When no one was about she used sometimes to stop, and, holding +to the iron railings, wish him good night as if he could hear her. + +"Perhaps you can FEEL if you can't hear," was her fancy. "Perhaps kind +thoughts reach people somehow, even through windows and doors and +walls. Perhaps you feel a little warm and comforted, and don't know +why, when I am standing here in the cold and hoping you will get well +and happy again. I am so sorry for you," she would whisper in an +intense little voice. "I wish you had a 'Little Missus' who could pet +you as I used to pet papa when he had a headache. I should like to be +your 'Little Missus' myself, poor dear! Good night--good night. God +bless you!" + +She would go away, feeling quite comforted and a little warmer herself. +Her sympathy was so strong that it seemed as if it MUST reach him +somehow as he sat alone in his armchair by the fire, nearly always in a +great dressing gown, and nearly always with his forehead resting in his +hand as he gazed hopelessly into the fire. He looked to Sara like a man +who had a trouble on his mind still, not merely like one whose troubles +lay all in the past. + +"He always seems as if he were thinking of something that hurts him +NOW," she said to herself, "but he has got his money back and he will +get over his brain fever in time, so he ought not to look like that. I +wonder if there is something else." + +If there was something else--something even servants did not hear +of--she could not help believing that the father of the Large Family +knew it--the gentleman she called Mr. Montmorency. Mr. Montmorency +went to see him often, and Mrs. Montmorency and all the little +Montmorencys went, too, though less often. He seemed particularly fond +of the two elder little girls--the Janet and Nora who had been so +alarmed when their small brother Donald had given Sara his sixpence. He +had, in fact, a very tender place in his heart for all children, and +particularly for little girls. Janet and Nora were as fond of him as +he was of them, and looked forward with the greatest pleasure to the +afternoons when they were allowed to cross the square and make their +well-behaved little visits to him. They were extremely decorous little +visits because he was an invalid. + +"He is a poor thing," said Janet, "and he says we cheer him up. We try +to cheer him up very quietly." + +Janet was the head of the family, and kept the rest of it in order. It +was she who decided when it was discreet to ask the Indian gentleman to +tell stories about India, and it was she who saw when he was tired and +it was the time to steal quietly away and tell Ram Dass to go to him. +They were very fond of Ram Dass. He could have told any number of +stories if he had been able to speak anything but Hindustani. The +Indian gentleman's real name was Mr. Carrisford, and Janet told Mr. +Carrisford about the encounter with the +little-girl-who-was-not-a-beggar. He was very much interested, and all +the more so when he heard from Ram Dass of the adventure of the monkey +on the roof. Ram Dass made for him a very clear picture of the attic +and its desolateness--of the bare floor and broken plaster, the rusty, +empty grate, and the hard, narrow bed. + +"Carmichael," he said to the father of the Large Family, after he had +heard this description, "I wonder how many of the attics in this square +are like that one, and how many wretched little servant girls sleep on +such beds, while I toss on my down pillows, loaded and harassed by +wealth that is, most of it--not mine." + +"My dear fellow," Mr. Carmichael answered cheerily, "the sooner you +cease tormenting yourself the better it will be for you. If you +possessed all the wealth of all the Indies, you could not set right all +the discomforts in the world, and if you began to refurnish all the +attics in this square, there would still remain all the attics in all +the other squares and streets to put in order. And there you are!" + +Mr. Carrisford sat and bit his nails as he looked into the glowing bed +of coals in the grate. + +"Do you suppose," he said slowly, after a pause--"do you think it is +possible that the other child--the child I never cease thinking of, I +believe--could be--could POSSIBLY be reduced to any such condition as +the poor little soul next door?" + +Mr. Carmichael looked at him uneasily. He knew that the worst thing +the man could do for himself, for his reason and his health, was to +begin to think in the particular way of this particular subject. + +"If the child at Madame Pascal's school in Paris was the one you are in +search of," he answered soothingly, "she would seem to be in the hands +of people who can afford to take care of her. They adopted her because +she had been the favorite companion of their little daughter who died. +They had no other children, and Madame Pascal said that they were +extremely well-to-do Russians." + +"And the wretched woman actually did not know where they had taken +her!" exclaimed Mr. Carrisford. + +Mr. Carmichael shrugged his shoulders. + +"She was a shrewd, worldly Frenchwoman, and was evidently only too glad +to get the child so comfortably off her hands when the father's death +left her totally unprovided for. Women of her type do not trouble +themselves about the futures of children who might prove burdens. The +adopted parents apparently disappeared and left no trace." + +"But you say 'IF the child was the one I am in search of. You say 'if.' +We are not sure. There was a difference in the name." + +"Madame Pascal pronounced it as if it were Carew instead of Crewe--but +that might be merely a matter of pronunciation. The circumstances were +curiously similar. An English officer in India had placed his +motherless little girl at the school. He had died suddenly after +losing his fortune." Mr. Carmichael paused a moment, as if a new +thought had occurred to him. "Are you SURE the child was left at a +school in Paris? Are you sure it was Paris?" + +"My dear fellow," broke forth Carrisford, with restless bitterness, "I +am SURE of nothing. I never saw either the child or her mother. Ralph +Crewe and I loved each other as boys, but we had not met since our +school days, until we met in India. I was absorbed in the magnificent +promise of the mines. He became absorbed, too. The whole thing was so +huge and glittering that we half lost our heads. When we met we +scarcely spoke of anything else. I only knew that the child had been +sent to school somewhere. I do not even remember, now, HOW I knew it." + +He was beginning to be excited. He always became excited when his +still weakened brain was stirred by memories of the catastrophes of the +past. + +Mr. Carmichael watched him anxiously. It was necessary to ask some +questions, but they must be put quietly and with caution. + +"But you had reason to think the school WAS in Paris?" + +"Yes," was the answer, "because her mother was a Frenchwoman, and I had +heard that she wished her child to be educated in Paris. It seemed +only likely that she would be there." + +"Yes," Mr. Carmichael said, "it seems more than probable." + +The Indian gentleman leaned forward and struck the table with a long, +wasted hand. + +"Carmichael," he said, "I MUST find her. If she is alive, she is +somewhere. If she is friendless and penniless, it is through my fault. +How is a man to get back his nerve with a thing like that on his mind? +This sudden change of luck at the mines has made realities of all our +most fantastic dreams, and poor Crewe's child may be begging in the +street!" + +"No, no," said Carmichael. "Try to be calm. Console yourself with the +fact that when she is found you have a fortune to hand over to her." + +"Why was I not man enough to stand my ground when things looked black?" +Carrisford groaned in petulant misery. "I believe I should have stood +my ground if I had not been responsible for other people's money as +well as my own. Poor Crewe had put into the scheme every penny that he +owned. He trusted me--he LOVED me. And he died thinking I had ruined +him--I--Tom Carrisford, who played cricket at Eton with him. What a +villain he must have thought me!" + +"Don't reproach yourself so bitterly." + +"I don't reproach myself because the speculation threatened to fail--I +reproach myself for losing my courage. I ran away like a swindler and +a thief, because I could not face my best friend and tell him I had +ruined him and his child." + +The good-hearted father of the Large Family put his hand on his +shoulder comfortingly. + +"You ran away because your brain had given way under the strain of +mental torture," he said. "You were half delirious already. If you +had not been you would have stayed and fought it out. You were in a +hospital, strapped down in bed, raving with brain fever, two days after +you left the place. Remember that." + +Carrisford dropped his forehead in his hands. + +"Good God! Yes," he said. "I was driven mad with dread and horror. I +had not slept for weeks. The night I staggered out of my house all the +air seemed full of hideous things mocking and mouthing at me." + +"That is explanation enough in itself," said Mr. Carmichael. "How +could a man on the verge of brain fever judge sanely!" + +Carrisford shook his drooping head. + +"And when I returned to consciousness poor Crewe was dead--and buried. +And I seemed to remember nothing. I did not remember the child for +months and months. Even when I began to recall her existence +everything seemed in a sort of haze." + +He stopped a moment and rubbed his forehead. "It sometimes seems so +now when I try to remember. Surely I must sometime have heard Crewe +speak of the school she was sent to. Don't you think so?" + +"He might not have spoken of it definitely. You never seem even to +have heard her real name." + +"He used to call her by an odd pet name he had invented. He called her +his 'Little Missus.' But the wretched mines drove everything else out +of our heads. We talked of nothing else. If he spoke of the school, I +forgot--I forgot. And now I shall never remember." + +"Come, come," said Carmichael. "We shall find her yet. We will +continue to search for Madame Pascal's good-natured Russians. She +seemed to have a vague idea that they lived in Moscow. We will take +that as a clue. I will go to Moscow." + +"If I were able to travel, I would go with you," said Carrisford; "but +I can only sit here wrapped in furs and stare at the fire. And when I +look into it I seem to see Crewe's gay young face gazing back at me. +He looks as if he were asking me a question. Sometimes I dream of him +at night, and he always stands before me and asks the same question in +words. Can you guess what he says, Carmichael?" + +Mr. Carmichael answered him in a rather low voice. + +"Not exactly," he said. + +"He always says, 'Tom, old man--Tom--where is the Little Missus?'" He +caught at Carmichael's hand and clung to it. "I must be able to answer +him--I must!" he said. "Help me to find her. Help me." + + +On the other side of the wall Sara was sitting in her garret talking to +Melchisedec, who had come out for his evening meal. + +"It has been hard to be a princess today, Melchisedec," she said. "It +has been harder than usual. It gets harder as the weather grows colder +and the streets get more sloppy. When Lavinia laughed at my muddy +skirt as I passed her in the hall, I thought of something to say all in +a flash--and I only just stopped myself in time. You can't sneer back +at people like that--if you are a princess. But you have to bite your +tongue to hold yourself in. I bit mine. It was a cold afternoon, +Melchisedec. And it's a cold night." + +Quite suddenly she put her black head down in her arms, as she often +did when she was alone. + +"Oh, papa," she whispered, "what a long time it seems since I was your +'Little Missus'!" + +This was what happened that day on both sides of the wall. + + + +13 + +One of the Populace + + +The winter was a wretched one. There were days on which Sara tramped +through snow when she went on her errands; there were worse days when +the snow melted and combined itself with mud to form slush; there were +others when the fog was so thick that the lamps in the street were +lighted all day and London looked as it had looked the afternoon, +several years ago, when the cab had driven through the thoroughfares +with Sara tucked up on its seat, leaning against her father's shoulder. +On such days the windows of the house of the Large Family always looked +delightfully cozy and alluring, and the study in which the Indian +gentleman sat glowed with warmth and rich color. But the attic was +dismal beyond words. There were no longer sunsets or sunrises to look +at, and scarcely ever any stars, it seemed to Sara. The clouds hung +low over the skylight and were either gray or mud-color, or dropping +heavy rain. At four o'clock in the afternoon, even when there was no +special fog, the daylight was at an end. If it was necessary to go to +her attic for anything, Sara was obliged to light a candle. The women +in the kitchen were depressed, and that made them more ill-tempered +than ever. Becky was driven like a little slave. + +"'Twarn't for you, miss," she said hoarsely to Sara one night when she +had crept into the attic--"'twarn't for you, an' the Bastille, an' +bein' the prisoner in the next cell, I should die. That there does +seem real now, doesn't it? The missus is more like the head jailer +every day she lives. I can jest see them big keys you say she carries. +The cook she's like one of the under-jailers. Tell me some more, +please, miss--tell me about the subt'ranean passage we've dug under the +walls." + +"I'll tell you something warmer," shivered Sara. "Get your coverlet +and wrap it round you, and I'll get mine, and we will huddle close +together on the bed, and I'll tell you about the tropical forest where +the Indian gentleman's monkey used to live. When I see him sitting on +the table near the window and looking out into the street with that +mournful expression, I always feel sure he is thinking about the +tropical forest where he used to swing by his tail from coconut trees. +I wonder who caught him, and if he left a family behind who had +depended on him for coconuts." + +"That is warmer, miss," said Becky, gratefully; "but, someways, even +the Bastille is sort of heatin' when you gets to tellin' about it." + +"That is because it makes you think of something else," said Sara, +wrapping the coverlet round her until only her small dark face was to +be seen looking out of it. "I've noticed this. What you have to do +with your mind, when your body is miserable, is to make it think of +something else." + +"Can you do it, miss?" faltered Becky, regarding her with admiring eyes. + +Sara knitted her brows a moment. + +"Sometimes I can and sometimes I can't," she said stoutly. "But when I +CAN I'm all right. And what I believe is that we always could--if we +practiced enough. I've been practicing a good deal lately, and it's +beginning to be easier than it used to be. When things are +horrible--just horrible--I think as hard as ever I can of being a +princess. I say to myself, 'I am a princess, and I am a fairy one, and +because I am a fairy nothing can hurt me or make me uncomfortable.' +You don't know how it makes you forget"--with a laugh. + +She had many opportunities of making her mind think of something else, +and many opportunities of proving to herself whether or not she was a +princess. But one of the strongest tests she was ever put to came on a +certain dreadful day which, she often thought afterward, would never +quite fade out of her memory even in the years to come. + +For several days it had rained continuously; the streets were chilly +and sloppy and full of dreary, cold mist; there was mud +everywhere--sticky London mud--and over everything the pall of drizzle +and fog. Of course there were several long and tiresome errands to be +done--there always were on days like this--and Sara was sent out again +and again, until her shabby clothes were damp through. The absurd old +feathers on her forlorn hat were more draggled and absurd than ever, +and her downtrodden shoes were so wet that they could not hold any more +water. Added to this, she had been deprived of her dinner, because +Miss Minchin had chosen to punish her. She was so cold and hungry and +tired that her face began to have a pinched look, and now and then some +kind-hearted person passing her in the street glanced at her with +sudden sympathy. But she did not know that. She hurried on, trying to +make her mind think of something else. It was really very necessary. +Her way of doing it was to "pretend" and "suppose" with all the +strength that was left in her. But really this time it was harder than +she had ever found it, and once or twice she thought it almost made her +more cold and hungry instead of less so. But she persevered +obstinately, and as the muddy water squelched through her broken shoes +and the wind seemed trying to drag her thin jacket from her, she talked +to herself as she walked, though she did not speak aloud or even move +her lips. + +"Suppose I had dry clothes on," she thought. "Suppose I had good shoes +and a long, thick coat and merino stockings and a whole umbrella. And +suppose--suppose--just when I was near a baker's where they sold hot +buns, I should find sixpence--which belonged to nobody. SUPPOSE if I +did, I should go into the shop and buy six of the hottest buns and eat +them all without stopping." + +Some very odd things happen in this world sometimes. + +It certainly was an odd thing that happened to Sara. She had to cross +the street just when she was saying this to herself. The mud was +dreadful--she almost had to wade. She picked her way as carefully as +she could, but she could not save herself much; only, in picking her +way, she had to look down at her feet and the mud, and in looking +down--just as she reached the pavement--she saw something shining in +the gutter. It was actually a piece of silver--a tiny piece trodden +upon by many feet, but still with spirit enough left to shine a little. +Not quite a sixpence, but the next thing to it--a fourpenny piece. + +In one second it was in her cold little red-and-blue hand. + +"Oh," she gasped, "it is true! It is true!" + +And then, if you will believe me, she looked straight at the shop +directly facing her. And it was a baker's shop, and a cheerful, stout, +motherly woman with rosy cheeks was putting into the window a tray of +delicious newly baked hot buns, fresh from the oven--large, plump, +shiny buns, with currants in them. + +It almost made Sara feel faint for a few seconds--the shock, and the +sight of the buns, and the delightful odors of warm bread floating up +through the baker's cellar window. + +She knew she need not hesitate to use the little piece of money. It +had evidently been lying in the mud for some time, and its owner was +completely lost in the stream of passing people who crowded and jostled +each other all day long. + +"But I'll go and ask the baker woman if she has lost anything," she +said to herself, rather faintly. So she crossed the pavement and put +her wet foot on the step. As she did so she saw something that made +her stop. + +It was a little figure more forlorn even than herself--a little figure +which was not much more than a bundle of rags, from which small, bare, +red muddy feet peeped out, only because the rags with which their owner +was trying to cover them were not long enough. Above the rags appeared +a shock head of tangled hair, and a dirty face with big, hollow, hungry +eyes. + +Sara knew they were hungry eyes the moment she saw them, and she felt a +sudden sympathy. + +"This," she said to herself, with a little sigh, "is one of the +populace--and she is hungrier than I am." + +The child--this "one of the populace"--stared up at Sara, and shuffled +herself aside a little, so as to give her room to pass. She was used +to being made to give room to everybody. She knew that if a policeman +chanced to see her he would tell her to "move on." + +Sara clutched her little fourpenny piece and hesitated for a few +seconds. Then she spoke to her. + +"Are you hungry?" she asked. + +The child shuffled herself and her rags a little more. + +"Ain't I jist?" she said in a hoarse voice. "Jist ain't I?" + +"Haven't you had any dinner?" said Sara. + +"No dinner," more hoarsely still and with more shuffling. "Nor yet no +bre'fast--nor yet no supper. No nothin'. + +"Since when?" asked Sara. + +"Dunno. Never got nothin' today--nowhere. I've axed an' axed." + +Just to look at her made Sara more hungry and faint. But those queer +little thoughts were at work in her brain, and she was talking to +herself, though she was sick at heart. + +"If I'm a princess," she was saying, "if I'm a princess--when they were +poor and driven from their thrones--they always shared--with the +populace--if they met one poorer and hungrier than themselves. They +always shared. Buns are a penny each. If it had been sixpence I could +have eaten six. It won't be enough for either of us. But it will be +better than nothing." + +"Wait a minute," she said to the beggar child. + +She went into the shop. It was warm and smelled deliciously. The +woman was just going to put some more hot buns into the window. + +"If you please," said Sara, "have you lost fourpence--a silver +fourpence?" And she held the forlorn little piece of money out to her. + +The woman looked at it and then at her--at her intense little face and +draggled, once fine clothes. + +"Bless us, no," she answered. "Did you find it?" + +"Yes," said Sara. "In the gutter." + +"Keep it, then," said the woman. "It may have been there for a week, +and goodness knows who lost it. YOU could never find out." + +"I know that," said Sara, "but I thought I would ask you." + +"Not many would," said the woman, looking puzzled and interested and +good-natured all at once. + +"Do you want to buy something?" she added, as she saw Sara glance at +the buns. + +"Four buns, if you please," said Sara. "Those at a penny each." + +The woman went to the window and put some in a paper bag. + +Sara noticed that she put in six. + +"I said four, if you please," she explained. "I have only fourpence." + +"I'll throw in two for makeweight," said the woman with her +good-natured look. "I dare say you can eat them sometime. Aren't you +hungry?" + +A mist rose before Sara's eyes. + +"Yes," she answered. "I am very hungry, and I am much obliged to you +for your kindness; and"--she was going to add--"there is a child +outside who is hungrier than I am." But just at that moment two or +three customers came in at once, and each one seemed in a hurry, so she +could only thank the woman again and go out. + +The beggar girl was still huddled up in the corner of the step. She +looked frightful in her wet and dirty rags. She was staring straight +before her with a stupid look of suffering, and Sara saw her suddenly +draw the back of her roughened black hand across her eyes to rub away +the tears which seemed to have surprised her by forcing their way from +under her lids. She was muttering to herself. + +Sara opened the paper bag and took out one of the hot buns, which had +already warmed her own cold hands a little. + +"See," she said, putting the bun in the ragged lap, "this is nice and +hot. Eat it, and you will not feel so hungry." + +The child started and stared up at her, as if such sudden, amazing good +luck almost frightened her; then she snatched up the bun and began to +cram it into her mouth with great wolfish bites. + +"Oh, my! Oh, my!" Sara heard her say hoarsely, in wild delight. "OH +my!" + +Sara took out three more buns and put them down. + +The sound in the hoarse, ravenous voice was awful. + +"She is hungrier than I am," she said to herself. "She's starving." +But her hand trembled when she put down the fourth bun. "I'm not +starving," she said--and she put down the fifth. + +The little ravening London savage was still snatching and devouring +when she turned away. She was too ravenous to give any thanks, even if +she had ever been taught politeness--which she had not. She was only a +poor little wild animal. + +"Good-bye," said Sara. + +When she reached the other side of the street she looked back. The +child had a bun in each hand and had stopped in the middle of a bite to +watch her. Sara gave her a little nod, and the child, after another +stare--a curious lingering stare--jerked her shaggy head in response, +and until Sara was out of sight she did not take another bite or even +finish the one she had begun. + +At that moment the baker-woman looked out of her shop window. + +"Well, I never!" she exclaimed. "If that young un hasn't given her +buns to a beggar child! It wasn't because she didn't want them, +either. Well, well, she looked hungry enough. I'd give something to +know what she did it for." + +She stood behind her window for a few moments and pondered. Then her +curiosity got the better of her. She went to the door and spoke to the +beggar child. + +"Who gave you those buns?" she asked her. The child nodded her head +toward Sara's vanishing figure. + +"What did she say?" inquired the woman. + +"Axed me if I was 'ungry," replied the hoarse voice. + +"What did you say?" + +"Said I was jist." + +"And then she came in and got the buns, and gave them to you, did she?" + +The child nodded. + +"How many?" + +"Five." + +The woman thought it over. + +"Left just one for herself," she said in a low voice. "And she could +have eaten the whole six--I saw it in her eyes." + +She looked after the little draggled far-away figure and felt more +disturbed in her usually comfortable mind than she had felt for many a +day. + +"I wish she hadn't gone so quick," she said. "I'm blest if she +shouldn't have had a dozen." Then she turned to the child. + +"Are you hungry yet?" she said. + +"I'm allus hungry," was the answer, "but 't ain't as bad as it was." + +"Come in here," said the woman, and she held open the shop door. + +The child got up and shuffled in. To be invited into a warm place full +of bread seemed an incredible thing. She did not know what was going +to happen. She did not care, even. + +"Get yourself warm," said the woman, pointing to a fire in the tiny +back room. "And look here; when you are hard up for a bit of bread, +you can come in here and ask for it. I'm blest if I won't give it to +you for that young one's sake." + + * * * + +Sara found some comfort in her remaining bun. At all events, it was +very hot, and it was better than nothing. As she walked along she +broke off small pieces and ate them slowly to make them last longer. + +"Suppose it was a magic bun," she said, "and a bite was as much as a +whole dinner. I should be overeating myself if I went on like this." + +It was dark when she reached the square where the Select Seminary was +situated. The lights in the houses were all lighted. The blinds were +not yet drawn in the windows of the room where she nearly always caught +glimpses of members of the Large Family. Frequently at this hour she +could see the gentleman she called Mr. Montmorency sitting in a big +chair, with a small swarm round him, talking, laughing, perching on the +arms of his seat or on his knees or leaning against them. This evening +the swarm was about him, but he was not seated. On the contrary, there +was a good deal of excitement going on. It was evident that a journey +was to be taken, and it was Mr. Montmorency who was to take it. A +brougham stood before the door, and a big portmanteau had been strapped +upon it. The children were dancing about, chattering and hanging on to +their father. The pretty rosy mother was standing near him, talking as +if she was asking final questions. Sara paused a moment to see the +little ones lifted up and kissed and the bigger ones bent over and +kissed also. + +"I wonder if he will stay away long," she thought. "The portmanteau is +rather big. Oh, dear, how they will miss him! I shall miss him +myself--even though he doesn't know I am alive." + +When the door opened she moved away--remembering the sixpence--but she +saw the traveler come out and stand against the background of the +warmly-lighted hall, the older children still hovering about him. + +"Will Moscow be covered with snow?" said the little girl Janet. "Will +there be ice everywhere?" + +"Shall you drive in a drosky?" cried another. "Shall you see the Czar?" + +"I will write and tell you all about it," he answered, laughing. "And +I will send you pictures of muzhiks and things. Run into the house. It +is a hideous damp night. I would rather stay with you than go to +Moscow. Good night! Good night, duckies! God bless you!" And he ran +down the steps and jumped into the brougham. + +"If you find the little girl, give her our love," shouted Guy Clarence, +jumping up and down on the door mat. + +Then they went in and shut the door. + +"Did you see," said Janet to Nora, as they went back to the room--"the +little-girl-who-is-not-a-beggar was passing? She looked all cold and +wet, and I saw her turn her head over her shoulder and look at us. +Mamma says her clothes always look as if they had been given her by +someone who was quite rich--someone who only let her have them because +they were too shabby to wear. The people at the school always send her +out on errands on the horridest days and nights there are." + +Sara crossed the square to Miss Minchin's area steps, feeling faint and +shaky. + +"I wonder who the little girl is," she thought--"the little girl he is +going to look for." + +And she went down the area steps, lugging her basket and finding it +very heavy indeed, as the father of the Large Family drove quickly on +his way to the station to take the train which was to carry him to +Moscow, where he was to make his best efforts to search for the lost +little daughter of Captain Crewe. + + + +14 + +What Melchisedec Heard and Saw + + +On this very afternoon, while Sara was out, a strange thing happened in +the attic. Only Melchisedec saw and heard it; and he was so much +alarmed and mystified that he scuttled back to his hole and hid there, +and really quaked and trembled as he peeped out furtively and with +great caution to watch what was going on. + +The attic had been very still all the day after Sara had left it in the +early morning. The stillness had only been broken by the pattering of +the rain upon the slates and the skylight. Melchisedec had, in fact, +found it rather dull; and when the rain ceased to patter and perfect +silence reigned, he decided to come out and reconnoiter, though +experience taught him that Sara would not return for some time. He had +been rambling and sniffing about, and had just found a totally +unexpected and unexplained crumb left from his last meal, when his +attention was attracted by a sound on the roof. He stopped to listen +with a palpitating heart. The sound suggested that something was moving +on the roof. It was approaching the skylight; it reached the skylight. +The skylight was being mysteriously opened. A dark face peered into +the attic; then another face appeared behind it, and both looked in +with signs of caution and interest. Two men were outside on the roof, +and were making silent preparations to enter through the skylight +itself. One was Ram Dass and the other was a young man who was the +Indian gentleman's secretary; but of course Melchisedec did not know +this. He only knew that the men were invading the silence and privacy +of the attic; and as the one with the dark face let himself down +through the aperture with such lightness and dexterity that he did not +make the slightest sound, Melchisedec turned tail and fled +precipitately back to his hole. He was frightened to death. He had +ceased to be timid with Sara, and knew she would never throw anything +but crumbs, and would never make any sound other than the soft, low, +coaxing whistling; but strange men were dangerous things to remain +near. He lay close and flat near the entrance of his home, just +managing to peep through the crack with a bright, alarmed eye. How much +he understood of the talk he heard I am not in the least able to say; +but, even if he had understood it all, he would probably have remained +greatly mystified. + +The secretary, who was light and young, slipped through the skylight as +noiselessly as Ram Dass had done; and he caught a last glimpse of +Melchisedec's vanishing tail. + +"Was that a rat?" he asked Ram Dass in a whisper. + +"Yes; a rat, Sahib," answered Ram Dass, also whispering. "There are +many in the walls." + +"Ugh!" exclaimed the young man. "It is a wonder the child is not +terrified of them." + +Ram Dass made a gesture with his hands. He also smiled respectfully. +He was in this place as the intimate exponent of Sara, though she had +only spoken to him once. + +"The child is the little friend of all things, Sahib," he answered. +"She is not as other children. I see her when she does not see me. I +slip across the slates and look at her many nights to see that she is +safe. I watch her from my window when she does not know I am near. She +stands on the table there and looks out at the sky as if it spoke to +her. The sparrows come at her call. The rat she has fed and tamed in +her loneliness. The poor slave of the house comes to her for comfort. +There is a little child who comes to her in secret; there is one older +who worships her and would listen to her forever if she might. This I +have seen when I have crept across the roof. By the mistress of the +house--who is an evil woman--she is treated like a pariah; but she has +the bearing of a child who is of the blood of kings!" + +"You seem to know a great deal about her," the secretary said. + +"All her life each day I know," answered Ram Dass. "Her going out I +know, and her coming in; her sadness and her poor joys; her coldness +and her hunger. I know when she is alone until midnight, learning from +her books; I know when her secret friends steal to her and she is +happier--as children can be, even in the midst of poverty--because they +come and she may laugh and talk with them in whispers. If she were ill +I should know, and I would come and serve her if it might be done." + +"You are sure no one comes near this place but herself, and that she +will not return and surprise us. She would be frightened if she found +us here, and the Sahib Carrisford's plan would be spoiled." + +Ram Dass crossed noiselessly to the door and stood close to it. + +"None mount here but herself, Sahib," he said. "She has gone out with +her basket and may be gone for hours. If I stand here I can hear any +step before it reaches the last flight of the stairs." + +The secretary took a pencil and a tablet from his breast pocket. + +"Keep your ears open," he said; and he began to walk slowly and softly +round the miserable little room, making rapid notes on his tablet as he +looked at things. + +First he went to the narrow bed. He pressed his hand upon the mattress +and uttered an exclamation. + +"As hard as a stone," he said. "That will have to be altered some day +when she is out. A special journey can be made to bring it across. It +cannot be done tonight." He lifted the covering and examined the one +thin pillow. + +"Coverlet dingy and worn, blanket thin, sheets patched and ragged," he +said. "What a bed for a child to sleep in--and in a house which calls +itself respectable! There has not been a fire in that grate for many a +day," glancing at the rusty fireplace. + +"Never since I have seen it," said Ram Dass. "The mistress of the +house is not one who remembers that another than herself may be cold." + +The secretary was writing quickly on his tablet. He looked up from it +as he tore off a leaf and slipped it into his breast pocket. + +"It is a strange way of doing the thing," he said. "Who planned it?" + +Ram Dass made a modestly apologetic obeisance. + +"It is true that the first thought was mine, Sahib," he said; "though +it was naught but a fancy. I am fond of this child; we are both +lonely. It is her way to relate her visions to her secret friends. +Being sad one night, I lay close to the open skylight and listened. The +vision she related told what this miserable room might be if it had +comforts in it. She seemed to see it as she talked, and she grew +cheered and warmed as she spoke. Then she came to this fancy; and the +next day, the Sahib being ill and wretched, I told him of the thing to +amuse him. It seemed then but a dream, but it pleased the Sahib. To +hear of the child's doings gave him entertainment. He became interested +in her and asked questions. At last he began to please himself with +the thought of making her visions real things." + +"You think that it can be done while she sleeps? Suppose she +awakened," suggested the secretary; and it was evident that whatsoever +the plan referred to was, it had caught and pleased his fancy as well +as the Sahib Carrisford's. + +"I can move as if my feet were of velvet," Ram Dass replied; "and +children sleep soundly--even the unhappy ones. I could have entered +this room in the night many times, and without causing her to turn upon +her pillow. If the other bearer passes to me the things through the +window, I can do all and she will not stir. When she awakens she will +think a magician has been here." + +He smiled as if his heart warmed under his white robe, and the +secretary smiled back at him. + +"It will be like a story from the Arabian Nights," he said. "Only an +Oriental could have planned it. It does not belong to London fogs." + +They did not remain very long, to the great relief of Melchisedec, who, +as he probably did not comprehend their conversation, felt their +movements and whispers ominous. The young secretary seemed interested +in everything. He wrote down things about the floor, the fireplace, +the broken footstool, the old table, the walls--which last he touched +with his hand again and again, seeming much pleased when he found that +a number of old nails had been driven in various places. + +"You can hang things on them," he said. + +Ram Dass smiled mysteriously. + +"Yesterday, when she was out," he said, "I entered, bringing with me +small, sharp nails which can be pressed into the wall without blows +from a hammer. I placed many in the plaster where I may need them. +They are ready." + +The Indian gentleman's secretary stood still and looked round him as he +thrust his tablets back into his pocket. + +"I think I have made notes enough; we can go now," he said. "The Sahib +Carrisford has a warm heart. It is a thousand pities that he has not +found the lost child." + +"If he should find her his strength would be restored to him," said Ram +Dass. "His God may lead her to him yet." + +Then they slipped through the skylight as noiselessly as they had +entered it. And, after he was quite sure they had gone, Melchisedec +was greatly relieved, and in the course of a few minutes felt it safe +to emerge from his hole again and scuffle about in the hope that even +such alarming human beings as these might have chanced to carry crumbs +in their pockets and drop one or two of them. + + + +15 + +The Magic + + +When Sara had passed the house next door she had seen Ram Dass closing +the shutters, and caught her glimpse of this room also. + +"It is a long time since I saw a nice place from the inside," was the +thought which crossed her mind. + +There was the usual bright fire glowing in the grate, and the Indian +gentleman was sitting before it. His head was resting in his hand, and +he looked as lonely and unhappy as ever. + +"Poor man!" said Sara. "I wonder what you are supposing." + +And this was what he was "supposing" at that very moment. + +"Suppose," he was thinking, "suppose--even if Carmichael traces the +people to Moscow--the little girl they took from Madame Pascal's school +in Paris is NOT the one we are in search of. Suppose she proves to be +quite a different child. What steps shall I take next?" + +When Sara went into the house she met Miss Minchin, who had come +downstairs to scold the cook. + +"Where have you wasted your time?" she demanded. "You have been out +for hours." + +"It was so wet and muddy," Sara answered, "it was hard to walk, because +my shoes were so bad and slipped about." + +"Make no excuses," said Miss Minchin, "and tell no falsehoods." + +Sara went in to the cook. The cook had received a severe lecture and +was in a fearful temper as a result. She was only too rejoiced to have +someone to vent her rage on, and Sara was a convenience, as usual. + +"Why didn't you stay all night?" she snapped. + +Sara laid her purchases on the table. + +"Here are the things," she said. + +The cook looked them over, grumbling. She was in a very savage humor +indeed. + +"May I have something to eat?" Sara asked rather faintly. + +"Tea's over and done with," was the answer. "Did you expect me to keep +it hot for you?" + +Sara stood silent for a second. + +"I had no dinner," she said next, and her voice was quite low. She +made it low because she was afraid it would tremble. + +"There's some bread in the pantry," said the cook. "That's all you'll +get at this time of day." + +Sara went and found the bread. It was old and hard and dry. The cook +was in too vicious a humor to give her anything to eat with it. It was +always safe and easy to vent her spite on Sara. Really, it was hard +for the child to climb the three long flights of stairs leading to her +attic. She often found them long and steep when she was tired; but +tonight it seemed as if she would never reach the top. Several times +she was obliged to stop to rest. When she reached the top landing she +was glad to see the glimmer of a light coming from under her door. +That meant that Ermengarde had managed to creep up to pay her a visit. +There was some comfort in that. It was better than to go into the room +alone and find it empty and desolate. The mere presence of plump, +comfortable Ermengarde, wrapped in her red shawl, would warm it a +little. + +Yes; there Ermengarde was when she opened the door. She was sitting in +the middle of the bed, with her feet tucked safely under her. She had +never become intimate with Melchisedec and his family, though they +rather fascinated her. When she found herself alone in the attic she +always preferred to sit on the bed until Sara arrived. She had, in +fact, on this occasion had time to become rather nervous, because +Melchisedec had appeared and sniffed about a good deal, and once had +made her utter a repressed squeal by sitting up on his hind legs and, +while he looked at her, sniffing pointedly in her direction. + +"Oh, Sara," she cried out, "I am glad you have come. Melchy WOULD +sniff about so. I tried to coax him to go back, but he wouldn't for +such a long time. I like him, you know; but it does frighten me when +he sniffs right at me. Do you think he ever WOULD jump?" + +"No," answered Sara. + +Ermengarde crawled forward on the bed to look at her. + +"You DO look tired, Sara," she said; "you are quite pale." + +"I AM tired," said Sara, dropping on to the lopsided footstool. "Oh, +there's Melchisedec, poor thing. He's come to ask for his supper." + +Melchisedec had come out of his hole as if he had been listening for +her footstep. Sara was quite sure he knew it. He came forward with an +affectionate, expectant expression as Sara put her hand in her pocket +and turned it inside out, shaking her head. + +"I'm very sorry," she said. "I haven't one crumb left. Go home, +Melchisedec, and tell your wife there was nothing in my pocket. I'm +afraid I forgot because the cook and Miss Minchin were so cross." + +Melchisedec seemed to understand. He shuffled resignedly, if not +contentedly, back to his home. + +"I did not expect to see you tonight, Ermie," Sara said. Ermengarde +hugged herself in the red shawl. + +"Miss Amelia has gone out to spend the night with her old aunt," she +explained. "No one else ever comes and looks into the bedrooms after +we are in bed. I could stay here until morning if I wanted to." + +She pointed toward the table under the skylight. Sara had not looked +toward it as she came in. A number of books were piled upon it. +Ermengarde's gesture was a dejected one. + +"Papa has sent me some more books, Sara," she said. "There they are." + +Sara looked round and got up at once. She ran to the table, and +picking up the top volume, turned over its leaves quickly. For the +moment she forgot her discomforts. + +"Ah," she cried out, "how beautiful! Carlyle's French Revolution. I +have SO wanted to read that!" + +"I haven't," said Ermengarde. "And papa will be so cross if I don't. +He'll expect me to know all about it when I go home for the holidays. +What SHALL I do?" + +Sara stopped turning over the leaves and looked at her with an excited +flush on her cheeks. + +"Look here," she cried, "if you'll lend me these books, _I'll_ read +them--and tell you everything that's in them afterward--and I'll tell +it so that you will remember it, too." + +"Oh, goodness!" exclaimed Ermengarde. "Do you think you can?" + +"I know I can," Sara answered. "The little ones always remember what I +tell them." + +"Sara," said Ermengarde, hope gleaming in her round face, "if you'll do +that, and make me remember, I'll--I'll give you anything." + +"I don't want you to give me anything," said Sara. "I want your +books--I want them!" And her eyes grew big, and her chest heaved. + +"Take them, then," said Ermengarde. "I wish I wanted them--but I +don't. I'm not clever, and my father is, and he thinks I ought to be." + +Sara was opening one book after the other. "What are you going to tell +your father?" she asked, a slight doubt dawning in her mind. + +"Oh, he needn't know," answered Ermengarde. "He'll think I've read +them." + +Sara put down her book and shook her head slowly. "That's almost like +telling lies," she said. "And lies--well, you see, they are not only +wicked--they're VULGAR. Sometimes"--reflectively--"I've thought perhaps +I might do something wicked--I might suddenly fly into a rage and kill +Miss Minchin, you know, when she was ill-treating me--but I COULDN'T be +vulgar. Why can't you tell your father _I_ read them?" + +"He wants me to read them," said Ermengarde, a little discouraged by +this unexpected turn of affairs. + +"He wants you to know what is in them," said Sara. "And if I can tell +it to you in an easy way and make you remember it, I should think he +would like that." + +"He'll like it if I learn anything in ANY way," said rueful Ermengarde. +"You would if you were my father." + +"It's not your fault that--" began Sara. She pulled herself up and +stopped rather suddenly. She had been going to say, "It's not your +fault that you are stupid." + +"That what?" Ermengarde asked. + +"That you can't learn things quickly," amended Sara. "If you can't, +you can't. If I can--why, I can; that's all." + +She always felt very tender of Ermengarde, and tried not to let her +feel too strongly the difference between being able to learn anything +at once, and not being able to learn anything at all. As she looked at +her plump face, one of her wise, old-fashioned thoughts came to her. + +"Perhaps," she said, "to be able to learn things quickly isn't +everything. To be kind is worth a great deal to other people. If Miss +Minchin knew everything on earth and was like what she is now, she'd +still be a detestable thing, and everybody would hate her. Lots of +clever people have done harm and have been wicked. Look at +Robespierre--" + +She stopped and examined Ermengarde's countenance, which was beginning +to look bewildered. "Don't you remember?" she demanded. "I told you +about him not long ago. I believe you've forgotten." + +"Well, I don't remember ALL of it," admitted Ermengarde. + +"Well, you wait a minute," said Sara, "and I'll take off my wet things +and wrap myself in the coverlet and tell you over again." + +She took off her hat and coat and hung them on a nail against the wall, +and she changed her wet shoes for an old pair of slippers. Then she +jumped on the bed, and drawing the coverlet about her shoulders, sat +with her arms round her knees. "Now, listen," she said. + +She plunged into the gory records of the French Revolution, and told +such stories of it that Ermengarde's eyes grew round with alarm and she +held her breath. But though she was rather terrified, there was a +delightful thrill in listening, and she was not likely to forget +Robespierre again, or to have any doubts about the Princesse de +Lamballe. + +"You know they put her head on a pike and danced round it," Sara +explained. "And she had beautiful floating blonde hair; and when I +think of her, I never see her head on her body, but always on a pike, +with those furious people dancing and howling." + +It was agreed that Mr. St. John was to be told the plan they had made, +and for the present the books were to be left in the attic. + +"Now let's tell each other things," said Sara. "How are you getting on +with your French lessons?" + +"Ever so much better since the last time I came up here and you +explained the conjugations. Miss Minchin could not understand why I +did my exercises so well that first morning." + +Sara laughed a little and hugged her knees. + +"She doesn't understand why Lottie is doing her sums so well," she +said; "but it is because she creeps up here, too, and I help her." She +glanced round the room. "The attic would be rather nice--if it wasn't +so dreadful," she said, laughing again. "It's a good place to pretend +in." + +The truth was that Ermengarde did not know anything of the sometimes +almost unbearable side of life in the attic and she had not a +sufficiently vivid imagination to depict it for herself. On the rare +occasions that she could reach Sara's room she only saw the side of it +which was made exciting by things which were "pretended" and stories +which were told. Her visits partook of the character of adventures; +and though sometimes Sara looked rather pale, and it was not to be +denied that she had grown very thin, her proud little spirit would not +admit of complaints. She had never confessed that at times she was +almost ravenous with hunger, as she was tonight. She was growing +rapidly, and her constant walking and running about would have given +her a keen appetite even if she had had abundant and regular meals of a +much more nourishing nature than the unappetizing, inferior food +snatched at such odd times as suited the kitchen convenience. She was +growing used to a certain gnawing feeling in her young stomach. + +"I suppose soldiers feel like this when they are on a long and weary +march," she often said to herself. She liked the sound of the phrase, +"long and weary march." It made her feel rather like a soldier. She +had also a quaint sense of being a hostess in the attic. + +"If I lived in a castle," she argued, "and Ermengarde was the lady of +another castle, and came to see me, with knights and squires and +vassals riding with her, and pennons flying, when I heard the clarions +sounding outside the drawbridge I should go down to receive her, and I +should spread feasts in the banquet hall and call in minstrels to sing +and play and relate romances. When she comes into the attic I can't +spread feasts, but I can tell stories, and not let her know +disagreeable things. I dare say poor chatelaines had to do that in +time of famine, when their lands had been pillaged." She was a proud, +brave little chatelaine, and dispensed generously the one hospitality +she could offer--the dreams she dreamed--the visions she saw--the +imaginings which were her joy and comfort. + +So, as they sat together, Ermengarde did not know that she was faint as +well as ravenous, and that while she talked she now and then wondered +if her hunger would let her sleep when she was left alone. She felt as +if she had never been quite so hungry before. + +"I wish I was as thin as you, Sara," Ermengarde said suddenly. "I +believe you are thinner than you used to be. Your eyes look so big, +and look at the sharp little bones sticking out of your elbow!" + +Sara pulled down her sleeve, which had pushed itself up. + +"I always was a thin child," she said bravely, "and I always had big +green eyes." + +"I love your queer eyes," said Ermengarde, looking into them with +affectionate admiration. "They always look as if they saw such a long +way. I love them--and I love them to be green--though they look black +generally." + +"They are cat's eyes," laughed Sara; "but I can't see in the dark with +them--because I have tried, and I couldn't--I wish I could." + +It was just at this minute that something happened at the skylight +which neither of them saw. If either of them had chanced to turn and +look, she would have been startled by the sight of a dark face which +peered cautiously into the room and disappeared as quickly and almost +as silently as it had appeared. Not QUITE as silently, however. Sara, +who had keen ears, suddenly turned a little and looked up at the roof. + +"That didn't sound like Melchisedec," she said. "It wasn't scratchy +enough." + +"What?" said Ermengarde, a little startled. + +"Didn't you think you heard something?" asked Sara. + +"N-no," Ermengarde faltered. "Did you?" {another ed. has "No-no,"} + +"Perhaps I didn't," said Sara; "but I thought I did. It sounded as if +something was on the slates--something that dragged softly." + +"What could it be?" said Ermengarde. "Could it be--robbers?" + +"No," Sara began cheerfully. "There is nothing to steal--" + +She broke off in the middle of her words. They both heard the sound +that checked her. It was not on the slates, but on the stairs below, +and it was Miss Minchin's angry voice. Sara sprang off the bed, and +put out the candle. + +"She is scolding Becky," she whispered, as she stood in the darkness. +"She is making her cry." + +"Will she come in here?" Ermengarde whispered back, panic-stricken. + +"No. She will think I am in bed. Don't stir." + +It was very seldom that Miss Minchin mounted the last flight of stairs. +Sara could only remember that she had done it once before. But now she +was angry enough to be coming at least part of the way up, and it +sounded as if she was driving Becky before her. + +"You impudent, dishonest child!" they heard her say. "Cook tells me +she has missed things repeatedly." + +"'T warn't me, mum," said Becky sobbing. "I was 'ungry enough, but 't +warn't me--never!" + +"You deserve to be sent to prison," said Miss Minchin's voice. +"Picking and stealing! Half a meat pie, indeed!" + +"'T warn't me," wept Becky. "I could 'ave eat a whole un--but I never +laid a finger on it." + +Miss Minchin was out of breath between temper and mounting the stairs. +The meat pie had been intended for her special late supper. It became +apparent that she boxed Becky's ears. + +"Don't tell falsehoods," she said. "Go to your room this instant." + +Both Sara and Ermengarde heard the slap, and then heard Becky run in +her slipshod shoes up the stairs and into her attic. They heard her +door shut, and knew that she threw herself upon her bed. + +"I could 'ave e't two of 'em," they heard her cry into her pillow. "An' +I never took a bite. 'Twas cook give it to her policeman." + +Sara stood in the middle of the room in the darkness. She was +clenching her little teeth and opening and shutting fiercely her +outstretched hands. She could scarcely stand still, but she dared not +move until Miss Minchin had gone down the stairs and all was still. + +"The wicked, cruel thing!" she burst forth. "The cook takes things +herself and then says Becky steals them. She DOESN'T! She DOESN'T! +She's so hungry sometimes that she eats crusts out of the ash barrel!" +She pressed her hands hard against her face and burst into passionate +little sobs, and Ermengarde, hearing this unusual thing, was overawed +by it. Sara was crying! The unconquerable Sara! It seemed to denote +something new--some mood she had never known. Suppose--suppose--a new +dread possibility presented itself to her kind, slow, little mind all +at once. She crept off the bed in the dark and found her way to the +table where the candle stood. She struck a match and lit the candle. +When she had lighted it, she bent forward and looked at Sara, with her +new thought growing to definite fear in her eyes. + +"Sara," she said in a timid, almost awe-stricken voice, "are--are--you +never told me--I don't want to be rude, but--are YOU ever hungry?" + +It was too much just at that moment. The barrier broke down. Sara +lifted her face from her hands. + +"Yes," she said in a new passionate way. "Yes, I am. I'm so hungry +now that I could almost eat you. And it makes it worse to hear poor +Becky. She's hungrier than I am." + +Ermengarde gasped. + +"Oh, oh!" she cried woefully. "And I never knew!" + +"I didn't want you to know," Sara said. "It would have made me feel +like a street beggar. I know I look like a street beggar." + +"No, you don't--you don't!" Ermengarde broke in. "Your clothes are a +little queer--but you couldn't look like a street beggar. You haven't +a street-beggar face." + +"A little boy once gave me a sixpence for charity," said Sara, with a +short little laugh in spite of herself. "Here it is." And she pulled +out the thin ribbon from her neck. "He wouldn't have given me his +Christmas sixpence if I hadn't looked as if I needed it." + +Somehow the sight of the dear little sixpence was good for both of +them. It made them laugh a little, though they both had tears in their +eyes. + +"Who was he?" asked Ermengarde, looking at it quite as if it had not +been a mere ordinary silver sixpence. + +"He was a darling little thing going to a party," said Sara. "He was +one of the Large Family, the little one with the round legs--the one I +call Guy Clarence. I suppose his nursery was crammed with Christmas +presents and hampers full of cakes and things, and he could see I had +nothing." + +Ermengarde gave a little jump backward. The last sentences had +recalled something to her troubled mind and given her a sudden +inspiration. + +"Oh, Sara!" she cried. "What a silly thing I am not to have thought of +it!" + +"Of what?" + +"Something splendid!" said Ermengarde, in an excited hurry. "This very +afternoon my nicest aunt sent me a box. It is full of good things. I +never touched it, I had so much pudding at dinner, and I was so +bothered about papa's books." Her words began to tumble over each +other. "It's got cake in it, and little meat pies, and jam tarts and +buns, and oranges and red-currant wine, and figs and chocolate. I'll +creep back to my room and get it this minute, and we'll eat it now." + +Sara almost reeled. When one is faint with hunger the mention of food +has sometimes a curious effect. She clutched Ermengarde's arm. + +"Do you think--you COULD?" she ejaculated. + +"I know I could," answered Ermengarde, and she ran to the door--opened +it softly--put her head out into the darkness, and listened. Then she +went back to Sara. "The lights are out. Everybody's in bed. I can +creep--and creep--and no one will hear." + +It was so delightful that they caught each other's hands and a sudden +light sprang into Sara's eyes. + +"Ermie!" she said. "Let us PRETEND! Let us pretend it's a party! And +oh, won't you invite the prisoner in the next cell?" + +"Yes! Yes! Let us knock on the wall now. The jailer won't hear." + +Sara went to the wall. Through it she could hear poor Becky crying +more softly. She knocked four times. + +"That means, 'Come to me through the secret passage under the wall,' +she explained. 'I have something to communicate.'" + +Five quick knocks answered her. + +"She is coming," she said. + +Almost immediately the door of the attic opened and Becky appeared. Her +eyes were red and her cap was sliding off, and when she caught sight of +Ermengarde she began to rub her face nervously with her apron. + +"Don't mind me a bit, Becky!" cried Ermengarde. + +"Miss Ermengarde has asked you to come in," said Sara, "because she is +going to bring a box of good things up here to us." + +Becky's cap almost fell off entirely, she broke in with such excitement. + +"To eat, miss?" she said. "Things that's good to eat?" + +"Yes," answered Sara, "and we are going to pretend a party." + +"And you shall have as much as you WANT to eat," put in Ermengarde. +"I'll go this minute!" + +She was in such haste that as she tiptoed out of the attic she dropped +her red shawl and did not know it had fallen. No one saw it for a +minute or so. Becky was too much overpowered by the good luck which +had befallen her. + +"Oh, miss! oh, miss!" she gasped; "I know it was you that asked her to +let me come. It--it makes me cry to think of it." And she went to +Sara's side and stood and looked at her worshipingly. + +But in Sara's hungry eyes the old light had begun to glow and transform +her world for her. Here in the attic--with the cold night +outside--with the afternoon in the sloppy streets barely passed--with +the memory of the awful unfed look in the beggar child's eyes not yet +faded--this simple, cheerful thing had happened like a thing of magic. + +She caught her breath. + +"Somehow, something always happens," she cried, "just before things get +to the very worst. It is as if the Magic did it. If I could only just +remember that always. The worst thing never QUITE comes." + +She gave Becky a little cheerful shake. + +"No, no! You mustn't cry!" she said. "We must make haste and set the +table." + +"Set the table, miss?" said Becky, gazing round the room. "What'll we +set it with?" + +Sara looked round the attic, too. + +"There doesn't seem to be much," she answered, half laughing. + +That moment she saw something and pounced upon it. It was Ermengarde's +red shawl which lay upon the floor. + +"Here's the shawl," she cried. "I know she won't mind it. It will make +such a nice red tablecloth." + +They pulled the old table forward, and threw the shawl over it. Red is +a wonderfully kind and comfortable color. It began to make the room +look furnished directly. + +"How nice a red rug would look on the floor!" exclaimed Sara. "We must +pretend there is one!" + +Her eye swept the bare boards with a swift glance of admiration. The +rug was laid down already. + +"How soft and thick it is!" she said, with the little laugh which Becky +knew the meaning of; and she raised and set her foot down again +delicately, as if she felt something under it. + +"Yes, miss," answered Becky, watching her with serious rapture. She +was always quite serious. + +"What next, now?" said Sara, and she stood still and put her hands over +her eyes. "Something will come if I think and wait a little"--in a +soft, expectant voice. "The Magic will tell me." + +One of her favorite fancies was that on "the outside," as she called +it, thoughts were waiting for people to call them. Becky had seen her +stand and wait many a time before, and knew that in a few seconds she +would uncover an enlightened, laughing face. + +In a moment she did. + +"There!" she cried. "It has come! I know now! I must look among the +things in the old trunk I had when I was a princess." + +She flew to its corner and kneeled down. It had not been put in the +attic for her benefit, but because there was no room for it elsewhere. +Nothing had been left in it but rubbish. But she knew she should find +something. The Magic always arranged that kind of thing in one way or +another. + +In a corner lay a package so insignificant-looking that it had been +overlooked, and when she herself had found it she had kept it as a +relic. It contained a dozen small white handkerchiefs. She seized +them joyfully and ran to the table. She began to arrange them upon the +red table-cover, patting and coaxing them into shape with the narrow +lace edge curling outward, her Magic working its spells for her as she +did it. + +"These are the plates," she said. "They are golden plates. These are +the richly embroidered napkins. Nuns worked them in convents in Spain." + +"Did they, miss?" breathed Becky, her very soul uplifted by the +information. + +"You must pretend it," said Sara. "If you pretend it enough, you will +see them." + +"Yes, miss," said Becky; and as Sara returned to the trunk she devoted +herself to the effort of accomplishing an end so much to be desired. + +Sara turned suddenly to find her standing by the table, looking very +queer indeed. She had shut her eyes, and was twisting her face in +strange convulsive contortions, her hands hanging stiffly clenched at +her sides. She looked as if she was trying to lift some enormous +weight. + +"What is the matter, Becky?" Sara cried. "What are you doing?" + +Becky opened her eyes with a start. + +"I was a-'pretendin',' miss," she answered a little sheepishly; "I was +tryin' to see it like you do. I almost did," with a hopeful grin. "But +it takes a lot o' stren'th." + +"Perhaps it does if you are not used to it," said Sara, with friendly +sympathy; "but you don't know how easy it is when you've done it often. +I wouldn't try so hard just at first. It will come to you after a +while. I'll just tell you what things are. Look at these." + +She held an old summer hat in her hand which she had fished out of the +bottom of the trunk. There was a wreath of flowers on it. She pulled +the wreath off. + +"These are garlands for the feast," she said grandly. "They fill all +the air with perfume. There's a mug on the wash-stand, Becky. Oh--and +bring the soap dish for a centerpiece." + +Becky handed them to her reverently. + +"What are they now, miss?" she inquired. "You'd think they was made of +crockery--but I know they ain't." + +"This is a carven flagon," said Sara, arranging tendrils of the wreath +about the mug. "And this"--bending tenderly over the soap dish and +heaping it with roses--"is purest alabaster encrusted with gems." + +She touched the things gently, a happy smile hovering about her lips +which made her look as if she were a creature in a dream. + +"My, ain't it lovely!" whispered Becky. + +"If we just had something for bonbon dishes," Sara murmured. +"There!"--darting to the trunk again. "I remember I saw something this +minute." + +It was only a bundle of wool wrapped in red and white tissue paper, but +the tissue paper was soon twisted into the form of little dishes, and +was combined with the remaining flowers to ornament the candlestick +which was to light the feast. Only the Magic could have made it more +than an old table covered with a red shawl and set with rubbish from a +long-unopened trunk. But Sara drew back and gazed at it, seeing +wonders; and Becky, after staring in delight, spoke with bated breath. + +"This 'ere," she suggested, with a glance round the attic--"is it the +Bastille now--or has it turned into somethin' different?" + +"Oh, yes, yes!" said Sara. "Quite different. It is a banquet hall!" + +"My eye, miss!" ejaculated Becky. "A blanket 'all!" and she turned to +view the splendors about her with awed bewilderment. + +"A banquet hall," said Sara. "A vast chamber where feasts are given. +It has a vaulted roof, and a minstrels' gallery, and a huge chimney +filled with blazing oaken logs, and it is brilliant with waxen tapers +twinkling on every side." + +"My eye, Miss Sara!" gasped Becky again. + +Then the door opened, and Ermengarde came in, rather staggering under +the weight of her hamper. She started back with an exclamation of joy. +To enter from the chill darkness outside, and find one's self +confronted by a totally unanticipated festal board, draped with red, +adorned with white napery, and wreathed with flowers, was to feel that +the preparations were brilliant indeed. + +"Oh, Sara!" she cried out. "You are the cleverest girl I ever saw!" + +"Isn't it nice?" said Sara. "They are things out of my old trunk. I +asked my Magic, and it told me to go and look." + +"But oh, miss," cried Becky, "wait till she's told you what they are! +They ain't just--oh, miss, please tell her," appealing to Sara. + +So Sara told her, and because her Magic helped her she made her ALMOST +see it all: the golden platters--the vaulted spaces--the blazing +logs--the twinkling waxen tapers. As the things were taken out of the +hamper--the frosted cakes--the fruits--the bonbons and the wine--the +feast became a splendid thing. + +"It's like a real party!" cried Ermengarde. + +"It's like a queen's table," sighed Becky. + +Then Ermengarde had a sudden brilliant thought. + +"I'll tell you what, Sara," she said. "Pretend you are a princess now +and this is a royal feast." + +"But it's your feast," said Sara; "you must be the princess, and we +will be your maids of honor." + +"Oh, I can't," said Ermengarde. "I'm too fat, and I don't know how. +YOU be her." + +"Well, if you want me to," said Sara. + +But suddenly she thought of something else and ran to the rusty grate. + +"There is a lot of paper and rubbish stuffed in here!" she exclaimed. +"If we light it, there will be a bright blaze for a few minutes, and we +shall feel as if it was a real fire." She struck a match and lighted +it up with a great specious glow which illuminated the room. + +"By the time it stops blazing," Sara said, "we shall forget about its +not being real." + +She stood in the dancing glow and smiled. + +"Doesn't it LOOK real?" she said. "Now we will begin the party." + +She led the way to the table. She waved her hand graciously to +Ermengarde and Becky. She was in the midst of her dream. + +"Advance, fair damsels," she said in her happy dream-voice, "and be +seated at the banquet table. My noble father, the king, who is absent +on a long journey, has commanded me to feast you." She turned her head +slightly toward the corner of the room. "What, ho, there, minstrels! +Strike up with your viols and bassoons. Princesses," she explained +rapidly to Ermengarde and Becky, "always had minstrels to play at their +feasts. Pretend there is a minstrel gallery up there in the corner. +Now we will begin." + +They had barely had time to take their pieces of cake into their +hands--not one of them had time to do more, when--they all three sprang +to their feet and turned pale faces toward the +door--listening--listening. + +Someone was coming up the stairs. There was no mistake about it. Each +of them recognized the angry, mounting tread and knew that the end of +all things had come. + +"It's--the missus!" choked Becky, and dropped her piece of cake upon +the floor. + +"Yes," said Sara, her eyes growing shocked and large in her small white +face. "Miss Minchin has found us out." + +Miss Minchin struck the door open with a blow of her hand. She was pale +herself, but it was with rage. She looked from the frightened faces to +the banquet table, and from the banquet table to the last flicker of +the burnt paper in the grate. + +"I have been suspecting something of this sort," she exclaimed; "but I +did not dream of such audacity. Lavinia was telling the truth." + +So they knew that it was Lavinia who had somehow guessed their secret +and had betrayed them. Miss Minchin strode over to Becky and boxed her +ears for a second time. + +"You impudent creature!" she said. "You leave the house in the +morning!" + +Sara stood quite still, her eyes growing larger, her face paler. +Ermengarde burst into tears. + +"Oh, don't send her away," she sobbed. "My aunt sent me the hamper. +We're--only--having a party." + +"So I see," said Miss Minchin, witheringly. "With the Princess Sara at +the head of the table." She turned fiercely on Sara. "It is your +doing, I know," she cried. "Ermengarde would never have thought of +such a thing. You decorated the table, I suppose--with this rubbish." +She stamped her foot at Becky. "Go to your attic!" she commanded, and +Becky stole away, her face hidden in her apron, her shoulders shaking. + +Then it was Sara's turn again. + +"I will attend to you tomorrow. You shall have neither breakfast, +dinner, nor supper!" + +"I have not had either dinner or supper today, Miss Minchin," said +Sara, rather faintly. + +"Then all the better. You will have something to remember. Don't +stand there. Put those things into the hamper again." + +She began to sweep them off the table into the hamper herself, and +caught sight of Ermengarde's new books. + +"And you"--to Ermengarde--"have brought your beautiful new books into +this dirty attic. Take them up and go back to bed. You will stay +there all day tomorrow, and I shall write to your papa. What would HE +say if he knew where you are tonight?" + +Something she saw in Sara's grave, fixed gaze at this moment made her +turn on her fiercely. + +"What are you thinking of?" she demanded. "Why do you look at me like +that?" + +"I was wondering," answered Sara, as she had answered that notable day +in the schoolroom. + +"What were you wondering?" + +It was very like the scene in the schoolroom. There was no pertness in +Sara's manner. It was only sad and quiet. + +"I was wondering," she said in a low voice, "what MY papa would say if +he knew where I am tonight." + +Miss Minchin was infuriated just as she had been before and her anger +expressed itself, as before, in an intemperate fashion. She flew at +her and shook her. + +"You insolent, unmanageable child!" she cried. "How dare you! How +dare you!" + +She picked up the books, swept the rest of the feast back into the +hamper in a jumbled heap, thrust it into Ermengarde's arms, and pushed +her before her toward the door. + +"I will leave you to wonder," she said. "Go to bed this instant." And +she shut the door behind herself and poor stumbling Ermengarde, and +left Sara standing quite alone. + +The dream was quite at an end. The last spark had died out of the +paper in the grate and left only black tinder; the table was left bare, +the golden plates and richly embroidered napkins, and the garlands were +transformed again into old handkerchiefs, scraps of red and white +paper, and discarded artificial flowers all scattered on the floor; the +minstrels in the minstrel gallery had stolen away, and the viols and +bassoons were still. Emily was sitting with her back against the wall, +staring very hard. Sara saw her, and went and picked her up with +trembling hands. + +"There isn't any banquet left, Emily," she said. "And there isn't any +princess. There is nothing left but the prisoners in the Bastille." +And she sat down and hid her face. + +What would have happened if she had not hidden it just then, and if she +had chanced to look up at the skylight at the wrong moment, I do not +know--perhaps the end of this chapter might have been quite +different--because if she had glanced at the skylight she would +certainly have been startled by what she would have seen. She would +have seen exactly the same face pressed against the glass and peering +in at her as it had peered in earlier in the evening when she had been +talking to Ermengarde. + +But she did not look up. She sat with her little black head in her +arms for some time. She always sat like that when she was trying to +bear something in silence. Then she got up and went slowly to the bed. + +"I can't pretend anything else--while I am awake," she said. "There +wouldn't be any use in trying. If I go to sleep, perhaps a dream will +come and pretend for me." + +She suddenly felt so tired--perhaps through want of food--that she sat +down on the edge of the bed quite weakly. + +"Suppose there was a bright fire in the grate, with lots of little +dancing flames," she murmured. "Suppose there was a comfortable chair +before it--and suppose there was a small table near, with a little +hot--hot supper on it. And suppose"--as she drew the thin coverings +over her--"suppose this was a beautiful soft bed, with fleecy blankets +and large downy pillows. Suppose--suppose--" And her very weariness +was good to her, for her eyes closed and she fell fast asleep. + + +She did not know how long she slept. But she had been tired enough to +sleep deeply and profoundly--too deeply and soundly to be disturbed by +anything, even by the squeaks and scamperings of Melchisedec's entire +family, if all his sons and daughters had chosen to come out of their +hole to fight and tumble and play. + +When she awakened it was rather suddenly, and she did not know that any +particular thing had called her out of her sleep. The truth was, +however, that it was a sound which had called her back--a real +sound--the click of the skylight as it fell in closing after a lithe +white figure which slipped through it and crouched down close by upon +the slates of the roof--just near enough to see what happened in the +attic, but not near enough to be seen. + +At first she did not open her eyes. She felt too sleepy and--curiously +enough--too warm and comfortable. She was so warm and comfortable, +indeed, that she did not believe she was really awake. She never was as +warm and cozy as this except in some lovely vision. + +"What a nice dream!" she murmured. "I feel quite warm. +I--don't--want--to--wake--up." + +Of course it was a dream. She felt as if warm, delightful bedclothes +were heaped upon her. She could actually FEEL blankets, and when she +put out her hand it touched something exactly like a satin-covered +eider-down quilt. She must not awaken from this delight--she must be +quite still and make it last. + +But she could not--even though she kept her eyes closed tightly, she +could not. Something was forcing her to awaken--something in the room. +It was a sense of light, and a sound--the sound of a crackling, roaring +little fire. + +"Oh, I am awakening," she said mournfully. "I can't help it--I can't." + +Her eyes opened in spite of herself. And then she actually smiled--for +what she saw she had never seen in the attic before, and knew she never +should see. + +"Oh, I HAVEN'T awakened," she whispered, daring to rise on her elbow +and look all about her. "I am dreaming yet." She knew it MUST be a +dream, for if she were awake such things could not--could not be. + +Do you wonder that she felt sure she had not come back to earth? This +is what she saw. In the grate there was a glowing, blazing fire; on +the hob was a little brass kettle hissing and boiling; spread upon the +floor was a thick, warm crimson rug; before the fire a folding-chair, +unfolded, and with cushions on it; by the chair a small folding-table, +unfolded, covered with a white cloth, and upon it spread small covered +dishes, a cup, a saucer, a teapot; on the bed were new warm coverings +and a satin-covered down quilt; at the foot a curious wadded silk robe, +a pair of quilted slippers, and some books. The room of her dream +seemed changed into fairyland--and it was flooded with warm light, for +a bright lamp stood on the table covered with a rosy shade. + +She sat up, resting on her elbow, and her breathing came short and fast. + +"It does not--melt away," she panted. "Oh, I never had such a dream +before." She scarcely dared to stir; but at last she pushed the +bedclothes aside, and put her feet on the floor with a rapturous smile. + +"I am dreaming--I am getting out of bed," she heard her own voice say; +and then, as she stood up in the midst of it all, turning slowly from +side to side--"I am dreaming it stays--real! I'm dreaming it FEELS +real. It's bewitched--or I'm bewitched. I only THINK I see it all." +Her words began to hurry themselves. "If I can only keep on thinking +it," she cried, "I don't care! I don't care!" + +She stood panting a moment longer, and then cried out again. + +"Oh, it isn't true!" she said. "It CAN'T be true! But oh, how true it +seems!" + +The blazing fire drew her to it, and she knelt down and held out her +hands close to it--so close that the heat made her start back. + +"A fire I only dreamed wouldn't be HOT," she cried. + +She sprang up, touched the table, the dishes, the rug; she went to the +bed and touched the blankets. She took up the soft wadded +dressing-gown, and suddenly clutched it to her breast and held it to +her cheek. + +"It's warm. It's soft!" she almost sobbed. "It's real. It must be!" + +She threw it over her shoulders, and put her feet into the slippers. + +"They are real, too. It's all real!" she cried. "I am NOT--I am NOT +dreaming!" + +She almost staggered to the books and opened the one which lay upon the +top. Something was written on the flyleaf--just a few words, and they +were these: + +"To the little girl in the attic. From a friend." + +When she saw that--wasn't it a strange thing for her to do--she put her +face down upon the page and burst into tears. + +"I don't know who it is," she said; "but somebody cares for me a +little. I have a friend." + +She took her candle and stole out of her own room and into Becky's, and +stood by her bedside. + +"Becky, Becky!" she whispered as loudly as she dared. "Wake up!" + +When Becky wakened, and she sat upright staring aghast, her face still +smudged with traces of tears, beside her stood a little figure in a +luxurious wadded robe of crimson silk. The face she saw was a shining, +wonderful thing. The Princess Sara--as she remembered her--stood at +her very bedside, holding a candle in her hand. + +"Come," she said. "Oh, Becky, come!" + +Becky was too frightened to speak. She simply got up and followed her, +with her mouth and eyes open, and without a word. + +And when they crossed the threshold, Sara shut the door gently and drew +her into the warm, glowing midst of things which made her brain reel +and her hungry senses faint. "It's true! It's true!" she cried. +"I've touched them all. They are as real as we are. The Magic has come +and done it, Becky, while we were asleep--the Magic that won't let +those worst things EVER quite happen." + + + +16 + +The Visitor + + +Imagine, if you can, what the rest of the evening was like. How they +crouched by the fire which blazed and leaped and made so much of itself +in the little grate. How they removed the covers of the dishes, and +found rich, hot, savory soup, which was a meal in itself, and +sandwiches and toast and muffins enough for both of them. The mug from +the washstand was used as Becky's tea cup, and the tea was so delicious +that it was not necessary to pretend that it was anything but tea. +They were warm and full-fed and happy, and it was just like Sara that, +having found her strange good fortune real, she should give herself up +to the enjoyment of it to the utmost. She had lived such a life of +imaginings that she was quite equal to accepting any wonderful thing +that happened, and almost to cease, in a short time, to find it +bewildering. + +"I don't know anyone in the world who could have done it," she said; +"but there has been someone. And here we are sitting by their +fire--and--and--it's true! And whoever it is--wherever they are--I +have a friend, Becky--someone is my friend." + +It cannot be denied that as they sat before the blazing fire, and ate +the nourishing, comfortable food, they felt a kind of rapturous awe, +and looked into each other's eyes with something like doubt. + +"Do you think," Becky faltered once, in a whisper, "do you think it +could melt away, miss? Hadn't we better be quick?" And she hastily +crammed her sandwich into her mouth. If it was only a dream, kitchen +manners would be overlooked. + +"No, it won't melt away," said Sara. "I am EATING this muffin, and I +can taste it. You never really eat things in dreams. You only think +you are going to eat them. Besides, I keep giving myself pinches; and +I touched a hot piece of coal just now, on purpose." + +The sleepy comfort which at length almost overpowered them was a +heavenly thing. It was the drowsiness of happy, well-fed childhood, +and they sat in the fire glow and luxuriated in it until Sara found +herself turning to look at her transformed bed. + +There were even blankets enough to share with Becky. The narrow couch +in the next attic was more comfortable that night than its occupant had +ever dreamed that it could be. + +As she went out of the room, Becky turned upon the threshold and looked +about her with devouring eyes. + +"If it ain't here in the mornin', miss," she said, "it's been here +tonight, anyways, an' I shan't never forget it." She looked at each +particular thing, as if to commit it to memory. "The fire was THERE", +pointing with her finger, "an' the table was before it; an' the lamp +was there, an' the light looked rosy red; an' there was a satin cover +on your bed, an' a warm rug on the floor, an' everythin' looked +beautiful; an'"--she paused a second, and laid her hand on her stomach +tenderly--"there WAS soup an' sandwiches an' muffins--there WAS." And, +with this conviction a reality at least, she went away. + +Through the mysterious agency which works in schools and among +servants, it was quite well known in the morning that Sara Crewe was in +horrible disgrace, that Ermengarde was under punishment, and that Becky +would have been packed out of the house before breakfast, but that a +scullery maid could not be dispensed with at once. The servants knew +that she was allowed to stay because Miss Minchin could not easily find +another creature helpless and humble enough to work like a bounden +slave for so few shillings a week. The elder girls in the schoolroom +knew that if Miss Minchin did not send Sara away it was for practical +reasons of her own. + +"She's growing so fast and learning such a lot, somehow," said Jessie +to Lavinia, "that she will be given classes soon, and Miss Minchin +knows she will have to work for nothing. It was rather nasty of you, +Lavvy, to tell about her having fun in the garret. How did you find it +out?" + +"I got it out of Lottie. She's such a baby she didn't know she was +telling me. There was nothing nasty at all in speaking to Miss +Minchin. I felt it my duty"--priggishly. "She was being deceitful. +And it's ridiculous that she should look so grand, and be made so much +of, in her rags and tatters!" + +"What were they doing when Miss Minchin caught them?" + +"Pretending some silly thing. Ermengarde had taken up her hamper to +share with Sara and Becky. She never invites us to share things. Not +that I care, but it's rather vulgar of her to share with servant girls +in attics. I wonder Miss Minchin didn't turn Sara out--even if she +does want her for a teacher." + +"If she was turned out where would she go?" inquired Jessie, a trifle +anxiously. + +"How do I know?" snapped Lavinia. "She'll look rather queer when she +comes into the schoolroom this morning, I should think--after what's +happened. She had no dinner yesterday, and she's not to have any +today." + +Jessie was not as ill-natured as she was silly. She picked up her book +with a little jerk. + +"Well, I think it's horrid," she said. "They've no right to starve her +to death." + +When Sara went into the kitchen that morning the cook looked askance at +her, and so did the housemaids; but she passed them hurriedly. She had, +in fact, overslept herself a little, and as Becky had done the same, +neither had had time to see the other, and each had come downstairs in +haste. + +Sara went into the scullery. Becky was violently scrubbing a kettle, +and was actually gurgling a little song in her throat. She looked up +with a wildly elated face. + +"It was there when I wakened, miss--the blanket," she whispered +excitedly. "It was as real as it was last night." + +"So was mine," said Sara. "It is all there now--all of it. While I +was dressing I ate some of the cold things we left." + +"Oh, laws! Oh, laws!" Becky uttered the exclamation in a sort of +rapturous groan, and ducked her head over her kettle just in time, as +the cook came in from the kitchen. + +Miss Minchin had expected to see in Sara, when she appeared in the +schoolroom, very much what Lavinia had expected to see. Sara had always +been an annoying puzzle to her, because severity never made her cry or +look frightened. When she was scolded she stood still and listened +politely with a grave face; when she was punished she performed her +extra tasks or went without her meals, making no complaint or outward +sign of rebellion. The very fact that she never made an impudent +answer seemed to Miss Minchin a kind of impudence in itself. But after +yesterday's deprivation of meals, the violent scene of last night, the +prospect of hunger today, she must surely have broken down. It would +be strange indeed if she did not come downstairs with pale cheeks and +red eyes and an unhappy, humbled face. + +Miss Minchin saw her for the first time when she entered the schoolroom +to hear the little French class recite its lessons and superintend its +exercises. And she came in with a springing step, color in her cheeks, +and a smile hovering about the corners of her mouth. It was the most +astonishing thing Miss Minchin had ever known. It gave her quite a +shock. What was the child made of? What could such a thing mean? She +called her at once to her desk. + +"You do not look as if you realize that you are in disgrace," she said. +"Are you absolutely hardened?" + +The truth is that when one is still a child--or even if one is grown +up--and has been well fed, and has slept long and softly and warm; when +one has gone to sleep in the midst of a fairy story, and has wakened to +find it real, one cannot be unhappy or even look as if one were; and +one could not, if one tried, keep a glow of joy out of one's eyes. Miss +Minchin was almost struck dumb by the look of Sara's eyes when she made +her perfectly respectful answer. + +"I beg your pardon, Miss Minchin," she said; "I know that I am in +disgrace." + +"Be good enough not to forget it and look as if you had come into a +fortune. It is an impertinence. And remember you are to have no food +today." + +"Yes, Miss Minchin," Sara answered; but as she turned away her heart +leaped with the memory of what yesterday had been. "If the Magic had +not saved me just in time," she thought, "how horrible it would have +been!" + +"She can't be very hungry," whispered Lavinia. "Just look at her. +Perhaps she is pretending she has had a good breakfast"--with a +spiteful laugh. + +"She's different from other people," said Jessie, watching Sara with +her class. "Sometimes I'm a bit frightened of her." + +"Ridiculous thing!" ejaculated Lavinia. + +All through the day the light was in Sara's face, and the color in her +cheek. The servants cast puzzled glances at her, and whispered to each +other, and Miss Amelia's small blue eyes wore an expression of +bewilderment. What such an audacious look of well-being, under august +displeasure could mean she could not understand. It was, however, just +like Sara's singular obstinate way. She was probably determined to +brave the matter out. + +One thing Sara had resolved upon, as she thought things over. The +wonders which had happened must be kept a secret, if such a thing were +possible. If Miss Minchin should choose to mount to the attic again, +of course all would be discovered. But it did not seem likely that she +would do so for some time at least, unless she was led by suspicion. +Ermengarde and Lottie would be watched with such strictness that they +would not dare to steal out of their beds again. Ermengarde could be +told the story and trusted to keep it secret. If Lottie made any +discoveries, she could be bound to secrecy also. Perhaps the Magic +itself would help to hide its own marvels. + +"But whatever happens," Sara kept saying to herself all day--"WHATEVER +happens, somewhere in the world there is a heavenly kind person who is +my friend--my friend. If I never know who it is--if I never can even +thank him--I shall never feel quite so lonely. Oh, the Magic was GOOD +to me!" + +If it was possible for weather to be worse than it had been the day +before, it was worse this day--wetter, muddier, colder. There were +more errands to be done, the cook was more irritable, and, knowing that +Sara was in disgrace, she was more savage. But what does anything +matter when one's Magic has just proved itself one's friend. Sara's +supper of the night before had given her strength, she knew that she +should sleep well and warmly, and, even though she had naturally begun +to be hungry again before evening, she felt that she could bear it +until breakfast-time on the following day, when her meals would surely +be given to her again. It was quite late when she was at last allowed +to go upstairs. She had been told to go into the schoolroom and study +until ten o'clock, and she had become interested in her work, and +remained over her books later. + +When she reached the top flight of stairs and stood before the attic +door, it must be confessed that her heart beat rather fast. + +"Of course it MIGHT all have been taken away," she whispered, trying to +be brave. "It might only have been lent to me for just that one awful +night. But it WAS lent to me--I had it. It was real." + +She pushed the door open and went in. Once inside, she gasped +slightly, shut the door, and stood with her back against it looking +from side to side. + +The Magic had been there again. It actually had, and it had done even +more than before. The fire was blazing, in lovely leaping flames, more +merrily than ever. A number of new things had been brought into the +attic which so altered the look of it that if she had not been past +doubting she would have rubbed her eyes. Upon the low table another +supper stood--this time with cups and plates for Becky as well as +herself; a piece of bright, heavy, strange embroidery covered the +battered mantel, and on it some ornaments had been placed. All the +bare, ugly things which could be covered with draperies had been +concealed and made to look quite pretty. Some odd materials of rich +colors had been fastened against the wall with fine, sharp tacks--so +sharp that they could be pressed into the wood and plaster without +hammering. Some brilliant fans were pinned up, and there were several +large cushions, big and substantial enough to use as seats. A wooden +box was covered with a rug, and some cushions lay on it, so that it +wore quite the air of a sofa. + +Sara slowly moved away from the door and simply sat down and looked and +looked again. + +"It is exactly like something fairy come true," she said. "There isn't +the least difference. I feel as if I might wish for anything--diamonds +or bags of gold--and they would appear! THAT wouldn't be any stranger +than this. Is this my garret? Am I the same cold, ragged, damp Sara? +And to think I used to pretend and pretend and wish there were fairies! +The one thing I always wanted was to see a fairy story come true. I am +LIVING in a fairy story. I feel as if I might be a fairy myself, and +able to turn things into anything else." + +She rose and knocked upon the wall for the prisoner in the next cell, +and the prisoner came. + +When she entered she almost dropped in a heap upon the floor. For a +few seconds she quite lost her breath. + +"Oh, laws!" she gasped. "Oh, laws, miss!" + +"You see," said Sara. + +On this night Becky sat on a cushion upon the hearth rug and had a cup +and saucer of her own. + +When Sara went to bed she found that she had a new thick mattress and +big downy pillows. Her old mattress and pillow had been removed to +Becky's bedstead, and, consequently, with these additions Becky had +been supplied with unheard-of comfort. + +"Where does it all come from?" Becky broke forth once. "Laws, who does +it, miss?" + +"Don't let us even ASK," said Sara. "If it were not that I want to +say, 'Oh, thank you,' I would rather not know. It makes it more +beautiful." + +From that time life became more wonderful day by day. The fairy story +continued. Almost every day something new was done. Some new comfort +or ornament appeared each time Sara opened the door at night, until in +a short time the attic was a beautiful little room full of all sorts of +odd and luxurious things. The ugly walls were gradually entirely +covered with pictures and draperies, ingenious pieces of folding +furniture appeared, a bookshelf was hung up and filled with books, new +comforts and conveniences appeared one by one, until there seemed +nothing left to be desired. When Sara went downstairs in the morning, +the remains of the supper were on the table; and when she returned to +the attic in the evening, the magician had removed them and left +another nice little meal. Miss Minchin was as harsh and insulting as +ever, Miss Amelia as peevish, and the servants were as vulgar and rude. +Sara was sent on errands in all weathers, and scolded and driven hither +and thither; she was scarcely allowed to speak to Ermengarde and +Lottie; Lavinia sneered at the increasing shabbiness of her clothes; +and the other girls stared curiously at her when she appeared in the +schoolroom. But what did it all matter while she was living in this +wonderful mysterious story? It was more romantic and delightful than +anything she had ever invented to comfort her starved young soul and +save herself from despair. Sometimes, when she was scolded, she could +scarcely keep from smiling. + +"If you only knew!" she was saying to herself. "If you only knew!" + +The comfort and happiness she enjoyed were making her stronger, and she +had them always to look forward to. If she came home from her errands +wet and tired and hungry, she knew she would soon be warm and well fed +after she had climbed the stairs. During the hardest day she could +occupy herself blissfully by thinking of what she should see when she +opened the attic door, and wondering what new delight had been prepared +for her. In a very short time she began to look less thin. Color came +into her cheeks, and her eyes did not seem so much too big for her face. + +"Sara Crewe looks wonderfully well," Miss Minchin remarked +disapprovingly to her sister. + +"Yes," answered poor, silly Miss Amelia. "She is absolutely fattening. +She was beginning to look like a little starved crow." + +"Starved!" exclaimed Miss Minchin, angrily. "There was no reason why +she should look starved. She always had plenty to eat!" + +"Of--of course," agreed Miss Amelia, humbly, alarmed to find that she +had, as usual, said the wrong thing. + +"There is something very disagreeable in seeing that sort of thing in a +child of her age," said Miss Minchin, with haughty vagueness. + +"What--sort of thing?" Miss Amelia ventured. + +"It might almost be called defiance," answered Miss Minchin, feeling +annoyed because she knew the thing she resented was nothing like +defiance, and she did not know what other unpleasant term to use. "The +spirit and will of any other child would have been entirely humbled and +broken by--by the changes she has had to submit to. But, upon my word, +she seems as little subdued as if--as if she were a princess." + +"Do you remember," put in the unwise Miss Amelia, "what she said to you +that day in the schoolroom about what you would do if you found out +that she was--" + +"No, I don't," said Miss Minchin. "Don't talk nonsense." But she +remembered very clearly indeed. + +Very naturally, even Becky was beginning to look plumper and less +frightened. She could not help it. She had her share in the secret +fairy story, too. She had two mattresses, two pillows, plenty of +bed-covering, and every night a hot supper and a seat on the cushions +by the fire. The Bastille had melted away, the prisoners no longer +existed. Two comforted children sat in the midst of delights. +Sometimes Sara read aloud from her books, sometimes she learned her own +lessons, sometimes she sat and looked into the fire and tried to +imagine who her friend could be, and wished she could say to him some +of the things in her heart. + +Then it came about that another wonderful thing happened. A man came to +the door and left several parcels. All were addressed in large +letters, "To the Little Girl in the right-hand attic." + +Sara herself was sent to open the door and take them in. She laid the +two largest parcels on the hall table, and was looking at the address, +when Miss Minchin came down the stairs and saw her. + +"Take the things to the young lady to whom they belong," she said +severely. "Don't stand there staring at them. + +"They belong to me," answered Sara, quietly. + +"To you?" exclaimed Miss Minchin. "What do you mean?" + +"I don't know where they come from," said Sara, "but they are addressed +to me. I sleep in the right-hand attic. Becky has the other one." + +Miss Minchin came to her side and looked at the parcels with an excited +expression. + +"What is in them?" she demanded. + +"I don't know," replied Sara. + +"Open them," she ordered. + +Sara did as she was told. When the packages were unfolded Miss +Minchin's countenance wore suddenly a singular expression. What she +saw was pretty and comfortable clothing--clothing of different kinds: +shoes, stockings, and gloves, and a warm and beautiful coat. There were +even a nice hat and an umbrella. They were all good and expensive +things, and on the pocket of the coat was pinned a paper, on which were +written these words: "To be worn every day. Will be replaced by others +when necessary." + +Miss Minchin was quite agitated. This was an incident which suggested +strange things to her sordid mind. Could it be that she had made a +mistake, after all, and that the neglected child had some powerful +though eccentric friend in the background--perhaps some previously +unknown relation, who had suddenly traced her whereabouts, and chose to +provide for her in this mysterious and fantastic way? Relations were +sometimes very odd--particularly rich old bachelor uncles, who did not +care for having children near them. A man of that sort might prefer to +overlook his young relation's welfare at a distance. Such a person, +however, would be sure to be crotchety and hot-tempered enough to be +easily offended. It would not be very pleasant if there were such a +one, and he should learn all the truth about the thin, shabby clothes, +the scant food, and the hard work. She felt very queer indeed, and +very uncertain, and she gave a side glance at Sara. + +"Well," she said, in a voice such as she had never used since the +little girl lost her father, "someone is very kind to you. As the +things have been sent, and you are to have new ones when they are worn +out, you may as well go and put them on and look respectable. After you +are dressed you may come downstairs and learn your lessons in the +schoolroom. You need not go out on any more errands today." + +About half an hour afterward, when the schoolroom door opened and Sara +walked in, the entire seminary was struck dumb. + +"My word!" ejaculated Jessie, jogging Lavinia's elbow. "Look at the +Princess Sara!" + +Everybody was looking, and when Lavinia looked she turned quite red. + +It was the Princess Sara indeed. At least, since the days when she had +been a princess, Sara had never looked as she did now. She did not +seem the Sara they had seen come down the back stairs a few hours ago. +She was dressed in the kind of frock Lavinia had been used to envying +her the possession of. It was deep and warm in color, and beautifully +made. Her slender feet looked as they had done when Jessie had admired +them, and the hair, whose heavy locks had made her look rather like a +Shetland pony when it fell loose about her small, odd face, was tied +back with a ribbon. + +"Perhaps someone has left her a fortune," Jessie whispered. "I always +thought something would happen to her. She's so queer." + +"Perhaps the diamond mines have suddenly appeared again," said Lavinia, +scathingly. "Don't please her by staring at her in that way, you silly +thing." + +"Sara," broke in Miss Minchin's deep voice, "come and sit here." + +And while the whole schoolroom stared and pushed with elbows, and +scarcely made any effort to conceal its excited curiosity, Sara went to +her old seat of honor, and bent her head over her books. + +That night, when she went to her room, after she and Becky had eaten +their supper she sat and looked at the fire seriously for a long time. + +"Are you making something up in your head, miss?" Becky inquired with +respectful softness. When Sara sat in silence and looked into the +coals with dreaming eyes it generally meant that she was making a new +story. But this time she was not, and she shook her head. + +"No," she answered. "I am wondering what I ought to do." + +Becky stared--still respectfully. She was filled with something +approaching reverence for everything Sara did and said. + +"I can't help thinking about my friend," Sara explained. "If he wants +to keep himself a secret, it would be rude to try and find out who he +is. But I do so want him to know how thankful I am to him--and how +happy he has made me. Anyone who is kind wants to know when people +have been made happy. They care for that more than for being thanked. +I wish--I do wish--" + +She stopped short because her eyes at that instant fell upon something +standing on a table in a corner. It was something she had found in the +room when she came up to it only two days before. It was a little +writing-case fitted with paper and envelopes and pens and ink. + +"Oh," she exclaimed, "why did I not think of that before?" + +She rose and went to the corner and brought the case back to the fire. + +"I can write to him," she said joyfully, "and leave it on the table. +Then perhaps the person who takes the things away will take it, too. I +won't ask him anything. He won't mind my thanking him, I feel sure." + +So she wrote a note. This is what she said: + + +I hope you will not think it is impolite that I should write this note +to you when you wish to keep yourself a secret. Please believe I do +not mean to be impolite or try to find out anything at all; only I want +to thank you for being so kind to me--so heavenly kind--and making +everything like a fairy story. I am so grateful to you, and I am so +happy--and so is Becky. Becky feels just as thankful as I do--it is +all just as beautiful and wonderful to her as it is to me. We used to +be so lonely and cold and hungry, and now--oh, just think what you have +done for us! Please let me say just these words. It seems as if I +OUGHT to say them. THANK you--THANK you--THANK you! + +THE LITTLE GIRL IN THE ATTIC. + + +The next morning she left this on the little table, and in the evening +it had been taken away with the other things; so she knew the Magician +had received it, and she was happier for the thought. She was reading +one of her new books to Becky just before they went to their respective +beds, when her attention was attracted by a sound at the skylight. +When she looked up from her page she saw that Becky had heard the sound +also, as she had turned her head to look and was listening rather +nervously. + +"Something's there, miss," she whispered. + +"Yes," said Sara, slowly. "It sounds--rather like a cat--trying to get +in." + +She left her chair and went to the skylight. It was a queer little +sound she heard--like a soft scratching. She suddenly remembered +something and laughed. She remembered a quaint little intruder who had +made his way into the attic once before. She had seen him that very +afternoon, sitting disconsolately on a table before a window in the +Indian gentleman's house. + +"Suppose," she whispered in pleased excitement--"just suppose it was +the monkey who got away again. Oh, I wish it was!" + +She climbed on a chair, very cautiously raised the skylight, and peeped +out. It had been snowing all day, and on the snow, quite near her, +crouched a tiny, shivering figure, whose small black face wrinkled +itself piteously at sight of her. + +"It is the monkey," she cried out. "He has crept out of the Lascar's +attic, and he saw the light." + +Becky ran to her side. + +"Are you going to let him in, miss?" she said. + +"Yes," Sara answered joyfully. "It's too cold for monkeys to be out. +They're delicate. I'll coax him in." + +She put a hand out delicately, speaking in a coaxing voice--as she +spoke to the sparrows and to Melchisedec--as if she were some friendly +little animal herself. + +"Come along, monkey darling," she said. "I won't hurt you." + +He knew she would not hurt him. He knew it before she laid her soft, +caressing little paw on him and drew him towards her. He had felt human +love in the slim brown hands of Ram Dass, and he felt it in hers. He +let her lift him through the skylight, and when he found himself in her +arms he cuddled up to her breast and looked up into her face. + +"Nice monkey! Nice monkey!" she crooned, kissing his funny head. "Oh, +I do love little animal things." + +He was evidently glad to get to the fire, and when she sat down and +held him on her knee he looked from her to Becky with mingled interest +and appreciation. + +"He IS plain-looking, miss, ain't he?" said Becky. + +"He looks like a very ugly baby," laughed Sara. "I beg your pardon, +monkey; but I'm glad you are not a baby. Your mother COULDN'T be proud +of you, and no one would dare to say you looked like any of your +relations. Oh, I do like you!" + +She leaned back in her chair and reflected. + +"Perhaps he's sorry he's so ugly," she said, "and it's always on his +mind. I wonder if he HAS a mind. Monkey, my love, have you a mind?" + +But the monkey only put up a tiny paw and scratched his head. + +"What shall you do with him?" Becky asked. + +"I shall let him sleep with me tonight, and then take him back to the +Indian gentleman tomorrow. I am sorry to take you back, monkey; but +you must go. You ought to be fondest of your own family; and I'm not a +REAL relation." + +And when she went to bed she made him a nest at her feet, and he curled +up and slept there as if he were a baby and much pleased with his +quarters. + + + +17 + +"It Is the Child!" + + +The next afternoon three members of the Large Family sat in the Indian +gentleman's library, doing their best to cheer him up. They had been +allowed to come in to perform this office because he had specially +invited them. He had been living in a state of suspense for some time, +and today he was waiting for a certain event very anxiously. This +event was the return of Mr. Carmichael from Moscow. His stay there had +been prolonged from week to week. On his first arrival there, he had +not been able satisfactorily to trace the family he had gone in search +of. When he felt at last sure that he had found them and had gone to +their house, he had been told that they were absent on a journey. His +efforts to reach them had been unavailing, so he had decided to remain +in Moscow until their return. Mr. Carrisford sat in his reclining +chair, and Janet sat on the floor beside him. He was very fond of +Janet. Nora had found a footstool, and Donald was astride the tiger's +head which ornamented the rug made of the animal's skin. It must be +owned that he was riding it rather violently. + +"Don't chirrup so loud, Donald," Janet said. "When you come to cheer +an ill person up you don't cheer him up at the top of your voice. +Perhaps cheering up is too loud, Mr. Carrisford?" turning to the Indian +gentleman. + +But he only patted her shoulder. + +"No, it isn't," he answered. "And it keeps me from thinking too much." + +"I'm going to be quiet," Donald shouted. "We'll all be as quiet as +mice." + +"Mice don't make a noise like that," said Janet. + +Donald made a bridle of his handkerchief and bounced up and down on the +tiger's head. + +"A whole lot of mice might," he said cheerfully. "A thousand mice +might." + +"I don't believe fifty thousand mice would," said Janet, severely; "and +we have to be as quiet as one mouse." + +Mr. Carrisford laughed and patted her shoulder again. + +"Papa won't be very long now," she said. "May we talk about the lost +little girl?" + +"I don't think I could talk much about anything else just now," the +Indian gentleman answered, knitting his forehead with a tired look. + +"We like her so much," said Nora. "We call her the little un-fairy +princess." + +"Why?" the Indian gentleman inquired, because the fancies of the Large +Family always made him forget things a little. + +It was Janet who answered. + +"It is because, though she is not exactly a fairy, she will be so rich +when she is found that she will be like a princess in a fairy tale. We +called her the fairy princess at first, but it didn't quite suit." + +"Is it true," said Nora, "that her papa gave all his money to a friend +to put in a mine that had diamonds in it, and then the friend thought +he had lost it all and ran away because he felt as if he was a robber?" + +"But he wasn't really, you know," put in Janet, hastily. + +The Indian gentleman took hold of her hand quickly. + +"No, he wasn't really," he said. + +"I am sorry for the friend," Janet said; "I can't help it. He didn't +mean to do it, and it would break his heart. I am sure it would break +his heart." + +"You are an understanding little woman, Janet," the Indian gentleman +said, and he held her hand close. + +"Did you tell Mr. Carrisford," Donald shouted again, "about the +little-girl-who-isn't-a-beggar? Did you tell him she has new nice +clothes? P'r'aps she's been found by somebody when she was lost." + +"There's a cab!" exclaimed Janet. "It's stopping before the door. It +is papa!" + +They all ran to the windows to look out. + +"Yes, it's papa," Donald proclaimed. "But there is no little girl." + +All three of them incontinently fled from the room and tumbled into the +hall. It was in this way they always welcomed their father. They were +to be heard jumping up and down, clapping their hands, and being caught +up and kissed. + +Mr. Carrisford made an effort to rise and sank back again. + +"It is no use," he said. "What a wreck I am!" + +Mr. Carmichael's voice approached the door. + +"No, children," he was saying; "you may come in after I have talked to +Mr. Carrisford. Go and play with Ram Dass." + +Then the door opened and he came in. He looked rosier than ever, and +brought an atmosphere of freshness and health with him; but his eyes +were disappointed and anxious as they met the invalid's look of eager +question even as they grasped each other's hands. + +"What news?" Mr. Carrisford asked. "The child the Russian people +adopted?" + +"She is not the child we are looking for," was Mr. Carmichael's answer. +"She is much younger than Captain Crewe's little girl. Her name is +Emily Carew. I have seen and talked to her. The Russians were able to +give me every detail." + +How wearied and miserable the Indian gentleman looked! His hand +dropped from Mr. Carmichael's. + +"Then the search has to be begun over again," he said. "That is all. +Please sit down." + +Mr. Carmichael took a seat. Somehow, he had gradually grown fond of +this unhappy man. He was himself so well and happy, and so surrounded +by cheerfulness and love, that desolation and broken health seemed +pitifully unbearable things. If there had been the sound of just one +gay little high-pitched voice in the house, it would have been so much +less forlorn. And that a man should be compelled to carry about in his +breast the thought that he had seemed to wrong and desert a child was +not a thing one could face. + +"Come, come," he said in his cheery voice; "we'll find her yet." + +"We must begin at once. No time must be lost," Mr. Carrisford fretted. +"Have you any new suggestion to make--any whatsoever?" + +Mr. Carmichael felt rather restless, and he rose and began to pace the +room with a thoughtful, though uncertain face. + +"Well, perhaps," he said. "I don't know what it may be worth. The +fact is, an idea occurred to me as I was thinking the thing over in the +train on the journey from Dover." + +"What was it? If she is alive, she is somewhere." + +"Yes; she is SOMEWHERE. We have searched the schools in Paris. Let us +give up Paris and begin in London. That was my idea--to search London." + +"There are schools enough in London," said Mr. Carrisford. Then he +slightly started, roused by a recollection. "By the way, there is one +next door." + +"Then we will begin there. We cannot begin nearer than next door." + +"No," said Carrisford. "There is a child there who interests me; but +she is not a pupil. And she is a little dark, forlorn creature, as +unlike poor Crewe as a child could be." + +Perhaps the Magic was at work again at that very moment--the beautiful +Magic. It really seemed as if it might be so. What was it that brought +Ram Dass into the room--even as his master spoke--salaaming +respectfully, but with a scarcely concealed touch of excitement in his +dark, flashing eyes? + +"Sahib," he said, "the child herself has come--the child the sahib felt +pity for. She brings back the monkey who had again run away to her +attic under the roof. I have asked that she remain. It was my thought +that it would please the sahib to see and speak with her." + +"Who is she?" inquired Mr. Carmichael. + +"God knows," Mr. Carrrisford answered. "She is the child I spoke of. A +little drudge at the school." He waved his hand to Ram Dass, and +addressed him. "Yes, I should like to see her. Go and bring her in." +Then he turned to Mr. Carmichael. "While you have been away," he +explained, "I have been desperate. The days were so dark and long. Ram +Dass told me of this child's miseries, and together we invented a +romantic plan to help her. I suppose it was a childish thing to do; +but it gave me something to plan and think of. Without the help of an +agile, soft-footed Oriental like Ram Dass, however, it could not have +been done." + +Then Sara came into the room. She carried the monkey in her arms, and +he evidently did not intend to part from her, if it could be helped. +He was clinging to her and chattering, and the interesting excitement +of finding herself in the Indian gentleman's room had brought a flush +to Sara's cheeks. + +"Your monkey ran away again," she said, in her pretty voice. "He came +to my garret window last night, and I took him in because it was so +cold. I would have brought him back if it had not been so late. I knew +you were ill and might not like to be disturbed." + +The Indian gentleman's hollow eyes dwelt on her with curious interest. + +"That was very thoughtful of you," he said. + +Sara looked toward Ram Dass, who stood near the door. + +"Shall I give him to the Lascar?" she asked. + +"How do you know he is a Lascar?" said the Indian gentleman, smiling a +little. + +"Oh, I know Lascars," Sara said, handing over the reluctant monkey. "I +was born in India." + +The Indian gentleman sat upright so suddenly, and with such a change of +expression, that she was for a moment quite startled. + +"You were born in India," he exclaimed, "were you? Come here." And he +held out his hand. + +Sara went to him and laid her hand in his, as he seemed to want to take +it. She stood still, and her green-gray eyes met his wonderingly. +Something seemed to be the matter with him. + +"You live next door?" he demanded. + +"Yes; I live at Miss Minchin's seminary." + +"But you are not one of her pupils?" + +A strange little smile hovered about Sara's mouth. She hesitated a +moment. + +"I don't think I know exactly WHAT I am," she replied. + +"Why not?" + +"At first I was a pupil, and a parlor boarder; but now--" + +"You were a pupil! What are you now?" + +The queer little sad smile was on Sara's lips again. + +"I sleep in the attic, next to the scullery maid," she said. "I run +errands for the cook--I do anything she tells me; and I teach the +little ones their lessons." + +"Question her, Carmichael," said Mr. Carrisford, sinking back as if he +had lost his strength. "Question her; I cannot." + +The big, kind father of the Large Family knew how to question little +girls. Sara realized how much practice he had had when he spoke to her +in his nice, encouraging voice. + +"What do you mean by 'At first,' my child?" he inquired. + +"When I was first taken there by my papa." + +"Where is your papa?" + +"He died," said Sara, very quietly. "He lost all his money and there +was none left for me. There was no one to take care of me or to pay +Miss Minchin." + +"Carmichael!" the Indian gentleman cried out loudly. "Carmichael!" + +"We must not frighten her," Mr. Carmichael said aside to him in a +quick, low voice. And he added aloud to Sara, "So you were sent up +into the attic, and made into a little drudge. That was about it, +wasn't it?" + +"There was no one to take care of me," said Sara. "There was no money; +I belong to nobody." + +"How did your father lose his money?" the Indian gentleman broke in +breathlessly. + +"He did not lose it himself," Sara answered, wondering still more each +moment. "He had a friend he was very fond of--he was very fond of him. +It was his friend who took his money. He trusted his friend too much." + +The Indian gentleman's breath came more quickly. + +"The friend might have MEANT to do no harm," he said. "It might have +happened through a mistake." + +Sara did not know how unrelenting her quiet young voice sounded as she +answered. If she had known, she would surely have tried to soften it +for the Indian gentleman's sake. + +"The suffering was just as bad for my papa," she said. "It killed him." + +"What was your father's name?" the Indian gentleman said. "Tell me." + +"His name was Ralph Crewe," Sara answered, feeling startled. "Captain +Crewe. He died in India." + +The haggard face contracted, and Ram Dass sprang to his master's side. + +"Carmichael," the invalid gasped, "it is the child--the child!" + +For a moment Sara thought he was going to die. Ram Dass poured out +drops from a bottle, and held them to his lips. Sara stood near, +trembling a little. She looked in a bewildered way at Mr. Carmichael. + +"What child am I?" she faltered. + +"He was your father's friend," Mr. Carmichael answered her. "Don't be +frightened. We have been looking for you for two years." + +Sara put her hand up to her forehead, and her mouth trembled. She +spoke as if she were in a dream. + +"And I was at Miss Minchin's all the while," she half whispered. "Just +on the other side of the wall." + + + +18 + +"I Tried Not to Be" + + +It was pretty, comfortable Mrs. Carmichael who explained everything. +She was sent for at once, and came across the square to take Sara into +her warm arms and make clear to her all that had happened. The +excitement of the totally unexpected discovery had been temporarily +almost overpowering to Mr. Carrisford in his weak condition. + +"Upon my word," he said faintly to Mr. Carmichael, when it was +suggested that the little girl should go into another room. "I feel as +if I do not want to lose sight of her." + +"I will take care of her," Janet said, "and mamma will come in a few +minutes." And it was Janet who led her away. + +"We're so glad you are found," she said. "You don't know how glad we +are that you are found." + +Donald stood with his hands in his pockets, and gazed at Sara with +reflecting and self-reproachful eyes. + +"If I'd just asked what your name was when I gave you my sixpence," he +said, "you would have told me it was Sara Crewe, and then you would +have been found in a minute." Then Mrs. Carmichael came in. She looked +very much moved, and suddenly took Sara in her arms and kissed her. + +"You look bewildered, poor child," she said. "And it is not to be +wondered at." + +Sara could only think of one thing. + +"Was he," she said, with a glance toward the closed door of the +library--"was HE the wicked friend? Oh, do tell me!" + +Mrs. Carmichael was crying as she kissed her again. She felt as if she +ought to be kissed very often because she had not been kissed for so +long. + +"He was not wicked, my dear," she answered. "He did not really lose +your papa's money. He only thought he had lost it; and because he +loved him so much his grief made him so ill that for a time he was not +in his right mind. He almost died of brain fever, and long before he +began to recover your poor papa was dead." + +"And he did not know where to find me," murmured Sara. "And I was so +near." Somehow, she could not forget that she had been so near. + +"He believed you were in school in France," Mrs. Carmichael explained. +"And he was continually misled by false clues. He has looked for you +everywhere. When he saw you pass by, looking so sad and neglected, he +did not dream that you were his friend's poor child; but because you +were a little girl, too, he was sorry for you, and wanted to make you +happier. And he told Ram Dass to climb into your attic window and try +to make you comfortable." + +Sara gave a start of joy; her whole look changed. + +"Did Ram Dass bring the things?" she cried out. "Did he tell Ram Dass +to do it? Did he make the dream that came true?" + +"Yes, my dear--yes! He is kind and good, and he was sorry for you, for +little lost Sara Crewe's sake." + +The library door opened and Mr. Carmichael appeared, calling Sara to +him with a gesture. + +"Mr. Carrisford is better already," he said. "He wants you to come to +him." + +Sara did not wait. When the Indian gentleman looked at her as she +entered, he saw that her face was all alight. + +She went and stood before his chair, with her hands clasped together +against her breast. + +"You sent the things to me," she said, in a joyful emotional little +voice, "the beautiful, beautiful things? YOU sent them!" + +"Yes, poor, dear child, I did," he answered her. He was weak and +broken with long illness and trouble, but he looked at her with the +look she remembered in her father's eyes--that look of loving her and +wanting to take her in his arms. It made her kneel down by him, just +as she used to kneel by her father when they were the dearest friends +and lovers in the world. + +"Then it is you who are my friend," she said; "it is you who are my +friend!" And she dropped her face on his thin hand and kissed it again +and again. + +"The man will be himself again in three weeks," Mr. Carmichael said +aside to his wife. "Look at his face already." + +In fact, he did look changed. Here was the "Little Missus," and he had +new things to think of and plan for already. In the first place, there +was Miss Minchin. She must be interviewed and told of the change which +had taken place in the fortunes of her pupil. + +Sara was not to return to the seminary at all. The Indian gentleman +was very determined upon that point. She must remain where she was, +and Mr. Carmichael should go and see Miss Minchin himself. + +"I am glad I need not go back," said Sara. "She will be very angry. +She does not like me; though perhaps it is my fault, because I do not +like her." + +But, oddly enough, Miss Minchin made it unnecessary for Mr. Carmichael +to go to her, by actually coming in search of her pupil herself. She +had wanted Sara for something, and on inquiry had heard an astonishing +thing. One of the housemaids had seen her steal out of the area with +something hidden under her cloak, and had also seen her go up the steps +of the next door and enter the house. + +"What does she mean!" cried Miss Minchin to Miss Amelia. + +"I don't know, I'm sure, sister," answered Miss Amelia. "Unless she +has made friends with him because he has lived in India." + +"It would be just like her to thrust herself upon him and try to gain +his sympathies in some such impertinent fashion," said Miss Minchin. +"She must have been in the house for two hours. I will not allow such +presumption. I shall go and inquire into the matter, and apologize for +her intrusion." + +Sara was sitting on a footstool close to Mr. Carrisford's knee, and +listening to some of the many things he felt it necessary to try to +explain to her, when Ram Dass announced the visitor's arrival. + +Sara rose involuntarily, and became rather pale; but Mr. Carrisford saw +that she stood quietly, and showed none of the ordinary signs of child +terror. + +Miss Minchin entered the room with a sternly dignified manner. She was +correctly and well dressed, and rigidly polite. + +"I am sorry to disturb Mr. Carrisford," she said; "but I have +explanations to make. I am Miss Minchin, the proprietress of the Young +Ladies' Seminary next door." + +The Indian gentleman looked at her for a moment in silent scrutiny. He +was a man who had naturally a rather hot temper, and he did not wish it +to get too much the better of him. + +"So you are Miss Minchin?" he said. + +"I am, sir." + +"In that case," the Indian gentleman replied, "you have arrived at the +right time. My solicitor, Mr. Carmichael, was just on the point of +going to see you." + +Mr. Carmichael bowed slightly, and Miss Minchin looked from him to Mr. +Carrisford in amazement. + +"Your solicitor!" she said. "I do not understand. I have come here as +a matter of duty. I have just discovered that you have been intruded +upon through the forwardness of one of my pupils--a charity pupil. I +came to explain that she intruded without my knowledge." She turned +upon Sara. "Go home at once," she commanded indignantly. "You shall be +severely punished. Go home at once." + +The Indian gentleman drew Sara to his side and patted her hand. + +"She is not going." + +Miss Minchin felt rather as if she must be losing her senses. + +"Not going!" she repeated. + +"No," said Mr. Carrisford. "She is not going home--if you give your +house that name. Her home for the future will be with me." + +Miss Minchin fell back in amazed indignation. + +"With YOU! With YOU sir! What does this mean?" + +"Kindly explain the matter, Carmichael," said the Indian gentleman; +"and get it over as quickly as possible." And he made Sara sit down +again, and held her hands in his--which was another trick of her papa's. + +Then Mr. Carmichael explained--in the quiet, level-toned, steady manner +of a man who knew his subject, and all its legal significance, which +was a thing Miss Minchin understood as a business woman, and did not +enjoy. + +"Mr. Carrisford, madam," he said, "was an intimate friend of the late +Captain Crewe. He was his partner in certain large investments. The +fortune which Captain Crewe supposed he had lost has been recovered, +and is now in Mr. Carrisford's hands." + +"The fortune!" cried Miss Minchin; and she really lost color as she +uttered the exclamation. "Sara's fortune!" + +"It WILL be Sara's fortune," replied Mr. Carmichael, rather coldly. "It +is Sara's fortune now, in fact. Certain events have increased it +enormously. The diamond mines have retrieved themselves." + +"The diamond mines!" Miss Minchin gasped out. If this was true, +nothing so horrible, she felt, had ever happened to her since she was +born. + +"The diamond mines," Mr. Carmichael repeated, and he could not help +adding, with a rather sly, unlawyer-like smile, "There are not many +princesses, Miss Minchin, who are richer than your little charity +pupil, Sara Crewe, will be. Mr. Carrisford has been searching for her +for nearly two years; he has found her at last, and he will keep her." + +After which he asked Miss Minchin to sit down while he explained +matters to her fully, and went into such detail as was necessary to +make it quite clear to her that Sara's future was an assured one, and +that what had seemed to be lost was to be restored to her tenfold; +also, that she had in Mr. Carrisford a guardian as well as a friend. + +Miss Minchin was not a clever woman, and in her excitement she was +silly enough to make one desperate effort to regain what she could not +help seeing she had lost through her worldly folly. + +"He found her under my care," she protested. "I have done everything +for her. But for me she should have starved in the streets." + +Here the Indian gentleman lost his temper. + +"As to starving in the streets," he said, "she might have starved more +comfortably there than in your attic." + +"Captain Crewe left her in my charge," Miss Minchin argued. "She must +return to it until she is of age. She can be a parlor boarder again. +She must finish her education. The law will interfere in my behalf." + +"Come, come, Miss Minchin," Mr. Carmichael interposed, "the law will do +nothing of the sort. If Sara herself wishes to return to you, I dare +say Mr. Carrisford might not refuse to allow it. But that rests with +Sara." + +"Then," said Miss Minchin, "I appeal to Sara. I have not spoiled you, +perhaps," she said awkwardly to the little girl; "but you know that +your papa was pleased with your progress. And--ahem--I have always been +fond of you." + +Sara's green-gray eyes fixed themselves on her with the quiet, clear +look Miss Minchin particularly disliked. + +"Have YOU, Miss Minchin?" she said. "I did not know that." + +Miss Minchin reddened and drew herself up. + +"You ought to have known it," said she; "but children, unfortunately, +never know what is best for them. Amelia and I always said you were +the cleverest child in the school. Will you not do your duty to your +poor papa and come home with me?" + +Sara took a step toward her and stood still. She was thinking of the +day when she had been told that she belonged to nobody, and was in +danger of being turned into the street; she was thinking of the cold, +hungry hours she had spent alone with Emily and Melchisedec in the +attic. She looked Miss Minchin steadily in the face. + +"You know why I will not go home with you, Miss Minchin," she said; +"you know quite well." + +A hot flush showed itself on Miss Minchin's hard, angry face. + +"You will never see your companions again," she began. "I will see +that Ermengarde and Lottie are kept away--" + +Mr. Carmichael stopped her with polite firmness. + +"Excuse me," he said; "she will see anyone she wishes to see. The +parents of Miss Crewe's fellow-pupils are not likely to refuse her +invitations to visit her at her guardian's house. Mr. Carrisford will +attend to that." + +It must be confessed that even Miss Minchin flinched. This was worse +than the eccentric bachelor uncle who might have a peppery temper and +be easily offended at the treatment of his niece. A woman of sordid +mind could easily believe that most people would not refuse to allow +their children to remain friends with a little heiress of diamond +mines. And if Mr. Carrisford chose to tell certain of her patrons how +unhappy Sara Crewe had been made, many unpleasant things might happen. + +"You have not undertaken an easy charge," she said to the Indian +gentleman, as she turned to leave the room; "you will discover that +very soon. The child is neither truthful nor grateful. I suppose"--to +Sara--"that you feel now that you are a princess again." + +Sara looked down and flushed a little, because she thought her pet +fancy might not be easy for strangers--even nice ones--to understand at +first. + +"I--TRIED not to be anything else," she answered in a low voice--"even +when I was coldest and hungriest--I tried not to be." + +"Now it will not be necessary to try," said Miss Minchin, acidly, as +Ram Dass salaamed her out of the room. + + +She returned home and, going to her sitting room, sent at once for Miss +Amelia. She sat closeted with her all the rest of the afternoon, and +it must be admitted that poor Miss Amelia passed through more than one +bad quarter of an hour. She shed a good many tears, and mopped her +eyes a good deal. One of her unfortunate remarks almost caused her +sister to snap her head entirely off, but it resulted in an unusual +manner. + +"I'm not as clever as you, sister," she said, "and I am always afraid +to say things to you for fear of making you angry. Perhaps if I were +not so timid it would be better for the school and for both of us. I +must say I've often thought it would have been better if you had been +less severe on Sara Crewe, and had seen that she was decently dressed +and more comfortable. I KNOW she was worked too hard for a child of her +age, and I know she was only half fed--" + +"How dare you say such a thing!" exclaimed Miss Minchin. + +"I don't know how I dare," Miss Amelia answered, with a kind of +reckless courage; "but now I've begun I may as well finish, whatever +happens to me. The child was a clever child and a good child--and she +would have paid you for any kindness you had shown her. But you didn't +show her any. The fact was, she was too clever for you, and you always +disliked her for that reason. She used to see through us both--" + +"Amelia!" gasped her infuriated elder, looking as if she would box her +ears and knock her cap off, as she had often done to Becky. + +But Miss Amelia's disappointment had made her hysterical enough not to +care what occurred next. + +"She did! She did!" she cried. "She saw through us both. She saw that +you were a hard-hearted, worldly woman, and that I was a weak fool, and +that we were both of us vulgar and mean enough to grovel on our knees +for her money, and behave ill to her because it was taken from +her--though she behaved herself like a little princess even when she +was a beggar. She did--she did--like a little princess!" And her +hysterics got the better of the poor woman, and she began to laugh and +cry both at once, and rock herself backward and forward. + +"And now you've lost her," she cried wildly; "and some other school +will get her and her money; and if she were like any other child she'd +tell how she's been treated, and all our pupils would be taken away and +we should be ruined. And it serves us right; but it serves you right +more than it does me, for you are a hard woman, Maria Minchin, you're a +hard, selfish, worldly woman!" + +And she was in danger of making so much noise with her hysterical +chokes and gurgles that her sister was obliged to go to her and apply +salts and sal volatile to quiet her, instead of pouring forth her +indignation at her audacity. + +And from that time forward, it may be mentioned, the elder Miss Minchin +actually began to stand a little in awe of a sister who, while she +looked so foolish, was evidently not quite so foolish as she looked, +and might, consequently, break out and speak truths people did not want +to hear. + +That evening, when the pupils were gathered together before the fire in +the schoolroom, as was their custom before going to bed, Ermengarde +came in with a letter in her hand and a queer expression on her round +face. It was queer because, while it was an expression of delighted +excitement, it was combined with such amazement as seemed to belong to +a kind of shock just received. + +"What IS the matter?" cried two or three voices at once. + +"Is it anything to do with the row that has been going on?" said +Lavinia, eagerly. "There has been such a row in Miss Minchin's room, +Miss Amelia has had something like hysterics and has had to go to bed." + +Ermengarde answered them slowly as if she were half stunned. + +"I have just had this letter from Sara," she said, holding it out to +let them see what a long letter it was. + +"From Sara!" Every voice joined in that exclamation. + +"Where is she?" almost shrieked Jessie. + +"Next door," said Ermengarde, "with the Indian gentleman." + +"Where? Where? Has she been sent away? Does Miss Minchin know? Was +the row about that? Why did she write? Tell us! Tell us!" + +There was a perfect babel, and Lottie began to cry plaintively. + +Ermengarde answered them slowly as if she were half plunged out into +what, at the moment, seemed the most important and self-explaining +thing. + +"There WERE diamond mines," she said stoutly; "there WERE!" Open mouths +and open eyes confronted her. + +"They were real," she hurried on. "It was all a mistake about them. +Something happened for a time, and Mr. Carrisford thought they were +ruined--" + +"Who is Mr. Carrisford?" shouted Jessie. + +"The Indian gentleman. And Captain Crewe thought so, too--and he died; +and Mr. Carrisford had brain fever and ran away, and HE almost died. +And he did not know where Sara was. And it turned out that there were +millions and millions of diamonds in the mines; and half of them belong +to Sara; and they belonged to her when she was living in the attic with +no one but Melchisedec for a friend, and the cook ordering her about. +And Mr. Carrisford found her this afternoon, and he has got her in his +home--and she will never come back--and she will be more a princess +than she ever was--a hundred and fifty thousand times more. And I am +going to see her tomorrow afternoon. There!" + +Even Miss Minchin herself could scarcely have controlled the uproar +after this; and though she heard the noise, she did not try. She was +not in the mood to face anything more than she was facing in her room, +while Miss Amelia was weeping in bed. She knew that the news had +penetrated the walls in some mysterious manner, and that every servant +and every child would go to bed talking about it. + +So until almost midnight the entire seminary, realizing somehow that +all rules were laid aside, crowded round Ermengarde in the schoolroom +and heard read and re-read the letter containing a story which was +quite as wonderful as any Sara herself had ever invented, and which had +the amazing charm of having happened to Sara herself and the mystic +Indian gentleman in the very next house. + +Becky, who had heard it also, managed to creep up stairs earlier than +usual. She wanted to get away from people and go and look at the +little magic room once more. She did not know what would happen to it. +It was not likely that it would be left to Miss Minchin. It would be +taken away, and the attic would be bare and empty again. Glad as she +was for Sara's sake, she went up the last flight of stairs with a lump +in her throat and tears blurring her sight. There would be no fire +tonight, and no rosy lamp; no supper, and no princess sitting in the +glow reading or telling stories--no princess! + +She choked down a sob as she pushed the attic door open, and then she +broke into a low cry. + +The lamp was flushing the room, the fire was blazing, the supper was +waiting; and Ram Dass was standing smiling into her startled face. + +"Missee sahib remembered," he said. "She told the sahib all. She +wished you to know the good fortune which has befallen her. Behold a +letter on the tray. She has written. She did not wish that you should +go to sleep unhappy. The sahib commands you to come to him tomorrow. +You are to be the attendant of missee sahib. Tonight I take these +things back over the roof." + +And having said this with a beaming face, he made a little salaam and +slipped through the skylight with an agile silentness of movement which +showed Becky how easily he had done it before. + + + +19 + +Anne + + +Never had such joy reigned in the nursery of the Large Family. Never +had they dreamed of such delights as resulted from an intimate +acquaintance with the little-girl-who-was-not-a-beggar. The mere fact +of her sufferings and adventures made her a priceless possession. +Everybody wanted to be told over and over again the things which had +happened to her. When one was sitting by a warm fire in a big, glowing +room, it was quite delightful to hear how cold it could be in an attic. +It must be admitted that the attic was rather delighted in, and that +its coldness and bareness quite sank into insignificance when +Melchisedec was remembered, and one heard about the sparrows and things +one could see if one climbed on the table and stuck one's head and +shoulders out of the skylight. + +Of course the thing loved best was the story of the banquet and the +dream which was true. Sara told it for the first time the day after +she had been found. Several members of the Large Family came to take +tea with her, and as they sat or curled up on the hearth-rug she told +the story in her own way, and the Indian gentleman listened and watched +her. When she had finished she looked up at him and put her hand on his +knee. + +"That is my part," she said. "Now won't you tell your part of it, +Uncle Tom?" He had asked her to call him always "Uncle Tom." "I don't +know your part yet, and it must be beautiful." + +So he told them how, when he sat alone, ill and dull and irritable, Ram +Dass had tried to distract him by describing the passers by, and there +was one child who passed oftener than any one else; he had begun to be +interested in her--partly perhaps because he was thinking a great deal +of a little girl, and partly because Ram Dass had been able to relate +the incident of his visit to the attic in chase of the monkey. He had +described its cheerless look, and the bearing of the child, who seemed +as if she was not of the class of those who were treated as drudges and +servants. Bit by bit, Ram Dass had made discoveries concerning the +wretchedness of her life. He had found out how easy a matter it was to +climb across the few yards of roof to the skylight, and this fact had +been the beginning of all that followed. + +"Sahib," he had said one day, "I could cross the slates and make the +child a fire when she is out on some errand. When she returned, wet +and cold, to find it blazing, she would think a magician had done it." + +The idea had been so fanciful that Mr. Carrisford's sad face had +lighted with a smile, and Ram Dass had been so filled with rapture that +he had enlarged upon it and explained to his master how simple it would +be to accomplish numbers of other things. He had shown a childlike +pleasure and invention, and the preparations for the carrying out of +the plan had filled many a day with interest which would otherwise have +dragged wearily. On the night of the frustrated banquet Ram Dass had +kept watch, all his packages being in readiness in the attic which was +his own; and the person who was to help him had waited with him, as +interested as himself in the odd adventure. Ram Dass had been lying +flat upon the slates, looking in at the skylight, when the banquet had +come to its disastrous conclusion; he had been sure of the profoundness +of Sara's wearied sleep; and then, with a dark lantern, he had crept +into the room, while his companion remained outside and handed the +things to him. When Sara had stirred ever so faintly, Ram Dass had +closed the lantern-slide and lain flat upon the floor. These and many +other exciting things the children found out by asking a thousand +questions. + +"I am so glad," Sara said. "I am so GLAD it was you who were my friend!" + +There never were such friends as these two became. Somehow, they +seemed to suit each other in a wonderful way. The Indian gentleman had +never had a companion he liked quite as much as he liked Sara. In a +month's time he was, as Mr. Carmichael had prophesied he would be, a +new man. He was always amused and interested, and he began to find an +actual pleasure in the possession of the wealth he had imagined that he +loathed the burden of. There were so many charming things to plan for +Sara. There was a little joke between them that he was a magician, and +it was one of his pleasures to invent things to surprise her. She +found beautiful new flowers growing in her room, whimsical little gifts +tucked under pillows, and once, as they sat together in the evening, +they heard the scratch of a heavy paw on the door, and when Sara went +to find out what it was, there stood a great dog--a splendid Russian +boarhound--with a grand silver and gold collar bearing an inscription. +"I am Boris," it read; "I serve the Princess Sara." + +There was nothing the Indian gentleman loved more than the recollection +of the little princess in rags and tatters. The afternoons in which +the Large Family, or Ermengarde and Lottie, gathered to rejoice +together were very delightful. But the hours when Sara and the Indian +gentleman sat alone and read or talked had a special charm of their +own. During their passing many interesting things occurred. + +One evening, Mr. Carrisford, looking up from his book, noticed that his +companion had not stirred for some time, but sat gazing into the fire. + +"What are you 'supposing,' Sara?" he asked. + +Sara looked up, with a bright color on her cheek. + +"I WAS supposing," she said; "I was remembering that hungry day, and a +child I saw." + +"But there were a great many hungry days," said the Indian gentleman, +with rather a sad tone in his voice. "Which hungry day was it?" + +"I forgot you didn't know," said Sara. "It was the day the dream came +true." + +Then she told him the story of the bun shop, and the fourpence she +picked up out of the sloppy mud, and the child who was hungrier than +herself. She told it quite simply, and in as few words as possible; +but somehow the Indian gentleman found it necessary to shade his eyes +with his hand and look down at the carpet. + +"And I was supposing a kind of plan," she said, when she had finished. +"I was thinking I should like to do something." + +"What was it?" said Mr. Carrisford, in a low tone. "You may do +anything you like to do, princess." + +"I was wondering," rather hesitated Sara--"you know, you say I have so +much money--I was wondering if I could go to see the bun-woman, and +tell her that if, when hungry children--particularly on those dreadful +days--come and sit on the steps, or look in at the window, she would +just call them in and give them something to eat, she might send the +bills to me. Could I do that?" + +"You shall do it tomorrow morning," said the Indian gentleman. + +"Thank you," said Sara. "You see, I know what it is to be hungry, and +it is very hard when one cannot even PRETEND it away." + +"Yes, yes, my dear," said the Indian gentleman. "Yes, yes, it must be. +Try to forget it. Come and sit on this footstool near my knee, and +only remember you are a princess." + +"Yes," said Sara, smiling; "and I can give buns and bread to the +populace." And she went and sat on the stool, and the Indian gentleman +(he used to like her to call him that, too, sometimes) drew her small +dark head down on his knee and stroked her hair. + +The next morning, Miss Minchin, in looking out of her window, saw the +things she perhaps least enjoyed seeing. The Indian gentleman's +carriage, with its tall horses, drew up before the door of the next +house, and its owner and a little figure, warm with soft, rich furs, +descended the steps to get into it. The little figure was a familiar +one, and reminded Miss Minchin of days in the past. It was followed by +another as familiar--the sight of which she found very irritating. It +was Becky, who, in the character of delighted attendant, always +accompanied her young mistress to her carriage, carrying wraps and +belongings. Already Becky had a pink, round face. + +A little later the carriage drew up before the door of the baker's +shop, and its occupants got out, oddly enough, just as the bun-woman +was putting a tray of smoking-hot buns into the window. + +When Sara entered the shop the woman turned and looked at her, and, +leaving the buns, came and stood behind the counter. For a moment she +looked at Sara very hard indeed, and then her good-natured face lighted +up. + +"I'm sure that I remember you, miss," she said. "And yet--" + +"Yes," said Sara; "once you gave me six buns for fourpence, and--" + +"And you gave five of 'em to a beggar child," the woman broke in on +her. "I've always remembered it. I couldn't make it out at first." She +turned round to the Indian gentleman and spoke her next words to him. +"I beg your pardon, sir, but there's not many young people that notices +a hungry face in that way; and I've thought of it many a time. Excuse +the liberty, miss,"--to Sara--"but you look rosier and--well, better +than you did that--that--" + +"I am better, thank you," said Sara. "And--I am much happier--and I +have come to ask you to do something for me." + +"Me, miss!" exclaimed the bun-woman, smiling cheerfully. "Why, bless +you! Yes, miss. What can I do?" + +And then Sara, leaning on the counter, made her little proposal +concerning the dreadful days and the hungry waifs and the buns. + +The woman watched her, and listened with an astonished face. + +"Why, bless me!" she said again when she had heard it all; "it'll be a +pleasure to me to do it. I am a working-woman myself and cannot afford +to do much on my own account, and there's sights of trouble on every +side; but, if you'll excuse me, I'm bound to say I've given away many a +bit of bread since that wet afternoon, just along o' thinking of +you--an' how wet an' cold you was, an' how hungry you looked; an' yet +you gave away your hot buns as if you was a princess." + +The Indian gentleman smiled involuntarily at this, and Sara smiled a +little, too, remembering what she had said to herself when she put the +buns down on the ravenous child's ragged lap. + +"She looked so hungry," she said. "She was even hungrier than I was." + +"She was starving," said the woman. "Many's the time she's told me of +it since--how she sat there in the wet, and felt as if a wolf was +a-tearing at her poor young insides." + +"Oh, have you seen her since then?" exclaimed Sara. "Do you know where +she is?" + +"Yes, I do," answered the woman, smiling more good-naturedly than ever. +"Why, she's in that there back room, miss, an' has been for a month; +an' a decent, well-meanin' girl she's goin' to turn out, an' such a +help to me in the shop an' in the kitchen as you'd scarce believe, +knowin' how she's lived." + +She stepped to the door of the little back parlor and spoke; and the +next minute a girl came out and followed her behind the counter. And +actually it was the beggar-child, clean and neatly clothed, and looking +as if she had not been hungry for a long time. She looked shy, but she +had a nice face, now that she was no longer a savage, and the wild look +had gone from her eyes. She knew Sara in an instant, and stood and +looked at her as if she could never look enough. + +"You see," said the woman, "I told her to come when she was hungry, and +when she'd come I'd give her odd jobs to do; an' I found she was +willing, and somehow I got to like her; and the end of it was, I've +given her a place an' a home, and she helps me, an' behaves well, an' +is as thankful as a girl can be. Her name's Anne. She has no other." + +The children stood and looked at each other for a few minutes; and then +Sara took her hand out of her muff and held it out across the counter, +and Anne took it, and they looked straight into each other's eyes. + +"I am so glad," Sara said. "And I have just thought of something. +Perhaps Mrs. Brown will let you be the one to give the buns and bread +to the children. Perhaps you would like to do it because you know what +it is to be hungry, too." + +"Yes, miss," said the girl. + +And, somehow, Sara felt as if she understood her, though she said so +little, and only stood still and looked and looked after her as she +went out of the shop with the Indian gentleman, and they got into the +carriage and drove away. + + + + + + + + + +End of Project Gutenberg's A Little Princess, by Frances Hodgson Burnett + +*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 146 *** |