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diff --git a/28804-8.txt b/28804-8.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..ff3b29a --- /dev/null +++ b/28804-8.txt @@ -0,0 +1,9554 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of Oswald Bastable and Others, by Edith Nesbit + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: Oswald Bastable and Others + +Author: Edith Nesbit + +Illustrator: Charles E. Brock + H. R. Millar + +Release Date: May 14, 2009 [EBook #28804] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK OSWALD BASTABLE AND OTHERS *** + + + + +Produced by Suzanne Shell and the Online Distributed +Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net + + + + + + + + + + + +OSWALD BASTABLE AND OTHERS + + + + +[Illustration: '"Don't break down the door! The villains may return any +moment and destroy you."'--Page 115.] + + + + + OSWALD BASTABLE + AND OTHERS + + + _By_ + E. NESBIT + + _Illustrated by_ + CHARLES E. BROCK + AND + H. R. MILLAR + + ERNEST BENN LIMITED + LONDON + + COWARD-McCANN INC + NEW YORK + + _First re-issued in this edition 1960_ + + _Published by Ernest Benn Limited + Bouverie House · Fleet Street · London · EC4 + and Coward-McCann Inc + 210 Madison Avenue · New York 16 · NY_ + + _Printed in Great Britain_ + + TO + MY DEAR NIECE + ANTHONIA NESBIT + + + + +CONTENTS + + + OSWALD BASTABLE + + AN OBJECT OF VALUE AND VIRTUE _page_ 1 + + THE RUNAWAYS 34 + + THE ARSENICATORS: A TALE OF + CRIME 64 + + THE ENCHANCERIED HOUSE 89 + + + OTHERS + + MOLLY, THE MEASLES, AND THE + MISSING WILL 123 + + BILLY AND WILLIAM 151 + + THE TWOPENNY SPELL 167 + + SHOWING OFF; OR, THE LOOKING-GLASS + BOY 181 + + THE RING AND THE LAMP 200 + + THE CHARMED LIFE; OR, THE + PRINCESS AND THE LIFT-MAN 224 + + BILLY THE KING 247 + + THE PRINCESS AND THE CAT 275 + + THE WHITE HORSE 301 + + SIR CHRISTOPHER COCKLESHELL 318 + + MUSCADEL 343 + + + + +LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS + + + '_Don't break down the door! The villains may + return any moment and destroy you_' _Frontispiece_ + + _'Here is your prize,' said Oswald_ _facing page_ 30 + + _'Come into the kitchen,' said Oswald; 'you can drip + there quite comfortably'_ 52 + + _We consented to carry the unfortunate bed-woman to it_ 76 + + _The room was a very odd shape_ _page_ 103 + + _A little person in a large white cap_ 121 + + _Molly had a splendid ride behind the groom_ _facing page_ 134 + + _The bicycle started, Billy in the saddle and Harold on + the step_ 164 + + '_And what can we do for you to-day, Miss?_' 170 + + _The alligator very nearly had him_ 194 + + '_Your servant, Miss. Do I understand that you order + me to mend this?_' 206 + + _The little girl had slapped Fina, and taken the pagoda + away_ 214 + + '_We'll see if you are going to begin a-ordering of me + about_' 218 + + _'Come by post, your Lordship,' said the footman_ 254 + + _'Excuse my hair, Sire,' he said_ 256 + + '_Speak to the dragon as soon as it arrives_' 262 + + _The two skated into each other's arms_ 270 + + _'Take that!' cried he, aiming an apple at the old + man's head_ _facing page_ 306 + + _In the drawer was just one jewelled ring. It lay on a + written page_ 346 + + _A black-winged monster, with hundreds and hundreds + of eyes_ 350 + + _On the table stood the dazzling figure of a real full-sized + princess_ 358 + + _A blowzy, frowzy dairymaid_ 362 + + '_You've got a face as long as a fiddle_' 366 + + + + +AN OBJECT OF VALUE AND VIRTUE + + +This happened a very little time after we left our humble home in +Lewisham, and went to live at the Blackheath house of our Indian uncle, +which was replete with every modern convenience, and had a big garden +and a great many greenhouses. We had had a lot of jolly Christmas +presents, and one of them was Dicky's from father, and it was a +printing-press. Not one of the eighteenpenny kind that never come off, +but a real tip-topper, that you could have printed a whole newspaper out +of if you could have been clever enough to make up all the stuff there +is in newspapers. I don't know how people can do it. It's all about +different things, but it is all just the same too. But the author is +sorry to find he is not telling things from the beginning, as he has +been taught. The printing-press really doesn't come into the story till +quite a long way on. So it is no use your wondering what it was that we +did print with the printing-press. It was not a newspaper, anyway, and +it wasn't my young brother's poetry, though he and the girls did do an +awful lot of that. It was something much more far-reaching, as you will +see if you wait. + +There wasn't any skating those holidays, because it was what they call +nice open weather. That means it was simply muggy, and you could play +out of doors without grown-ups fussing about your overcoat, or bringing +you to open shame in the streets with knitted comforters, except, of +course, the poet Noël, who is young, and equal to having bronchitis if +he only looks at a pair of wet boots. But the girls were indoors a good +deal, trying to make things for a bazaar which the people our +housekeeper's elder sister lives with were having in the country for the +benefit of a poor iron church that was in difficulties. And Noël and H. +O. were with them, putting sweets in bags for the bazaar's lucky-tub. So +Dicky and I were out alone together. But we were not angry with the +others for their stuffy way of spending a day. Two is not a good number, +though, for any game except fives; and the man who ordered the vineries +and pineries, and butlers' pantries and things, never had the sense to +tell the builders to make a fives court. Some people never think of the +simplest things. So we had been playing catch with a fives ball. It was +Dicky's ball, and Oswald said: + +'I bet you can't hit it over the house.' + +'What do you bet?' said Dicky. + +And Oswald replied: + +'Anything you like. You couldn't do it, anyhow.' + +Dicky said: + +'Miss Blake says betting is wicked; but I don't believe it is, if you +don't bet money.' + +Oswald reminded him how in 'Miss Edgeworth' even that wretched little +Rosamond, who is never allowed to do anything she wants to, even lose +her own needles, makes a bet with her brother, and none of the grown-ups +turn a hair. + +'But _I_ don't want to bet,' he said. 'I know you can't do it.' + +'I'll bet you my fives ball I do,' Dicky rejoindered. + +'Done! I'll bet you that threepenny ball of string and the cobbler's wax +you were bothering about yesterday.' + +So Dicky said 'Done!' and then he went and got a tennis racket--when I +meant with his hands--and the ball soared up to the top of the house and +faded away. But when we went round to look for it we couldn't find it +anywhere. So he said it had gone over and he had won. And Oswald thought +it had not gone over, but stayed on the roof, and he hadn't. And they +could not agree about it, though they talked of nothing else till tea +time. + +It was a few days after that that the big greenhouse began to leak, and +something was said at brekker about had any of us been throwing stones. +But it happened that we had not. Only after brek Oswald said to Dicky: + +'What price fives balls for knocking holes in greenhouses?' + +'Then you own it went over the house, and I won my bet. Hand over!' +Dicky remarked. + +But Oswald did not see this, because it wasn't proved it was the fives +ball. It was only his idea. + +Then it rained for two or three days, and the greenhouse leaked much +more than just a fives ball, and the grown-ups said the man who put it +up had scamped the job, and they sent for him to put it right. And when +he was ready he came, and men came with ladders and putty and glass, +and a thing to cut it with a real diamond in it that he let us have to +look at. It was fine that day, and Dicky and H. O. and I were out most +of the time talking to the men. I think the men who come to do things to +houses are so interesting to talk to; they seem to know much more about +the things that really matter than gentlemen do. I shall try to be like +them when I grow up, and not always talk about politics and the way the +army is going to the dogs. + +The men were very jolly, and let us go up the ladder and look at the top +of the greenhouse. Not H. O., of course, because he is very young +indeed, and wears socks. When they had gone to dinner, H. O. went in to +see if some pies were done that he had made out of a bit of putty the +man gave him. He had put the pies in the oven when the cook wasn't +looking. I think something must have been done to him, for he did not +return. + +So Dicky and I were left. Dicky said: + +'If I could get the ladder round to the roof of the stovehouse I believe +I should find my fives ball in the gutter. I _know_ it went over the +house that day.' + +So Oswald, ever ready and obliging, helped his brother to move the +ladder round to the tiled roof of the stovehouse, and Dicky looked in +the gutter. But even he could not pretend the ball was there, because I +am certain it never went over at all. + +When he came down, Oswald said: + +'Sold again!' + +And Dicky said: + +'Sold yourself! You jolly well thought it was there, and you'd have to +pay for it.' + +This unjustness was Oswald's reward for his kind helpingness about +moving the ladder. So he turned away, just saying carelessly over his +retiring shoulder: + +'I should think you'd have the decency to put the ladder back where you +found it.' And he walked off. + +But he has a generous heart--a crossing-sweeper told him so once when he +gave him a halfpenny--and when Dicky said, 'Come on, Oswald; don't be a +sneak,' he proved that he was not one, and went back and helped with the +ladder. But he was a little distant to Dicky, till all disagreeableness +was suddenly buried in a rat Pincher found in the cucumber frame. + +Then the washing-hands-and-faces-for-dinner bell rang, and, of course, +we should have gone in directly, only just then the workmen came back +from their dinner, and we waited, because one of them had promised +Oswald some hinges for a ferrets' hutch he thought of making, and while +he was talking to this man the other one went up the ladder. And then +the most exciting and awful thing I ever saw happened, all in a minute, +before anyone could have said 'Jack Robinson,' even if they had thought +of him. The bottom part of the ladder slipped out along the smooth tiles +by the greenhouse, and there was a long, dream-like, dreadful time, when +Oswald knew what was going to happen; but it could only have been a +second really, because before anyone could do anything the top end of +the ladder slid softly, like cutting butter, off the top of the +greenhouse, and the man on the ladder fell too. I never saw anything +that made me feel so wrong way up in my inside. He lay there all in a +heap, without moving, and the men crowded round him. Dicky and I could +not see properly because of the other men. But the foreman, the one who +had given Oswald the hinges, said: + +'Better get a doctor.' + +It always takes a long time for a workman to understand what you want +him to do, and long before these had, Oswald had shouted 'I'll go!' and +was off like an arrow from a bow, and Dicky with him. + +They found the doctor at home, and he came that minute. Oswald and Dicky +were told to go away, but they could not bear to, though they knew their +dinner-bell must have been already rung for them many times in vain, and +it was now ringing with fury. They just lurked round the corner of the +greenhouse till the doctor said it was a broken arm, and nothing else +hurt; and when the poor man was sent home in a cab, Oswald and Dicky got +the cabman, who is a friend of theirs, to let them come on the box with +him. And thus they saw where the man lived, and saw his poor wife greet +the sufferer. She only said: + +'Gracious, Gus, whatever have you been up to now? You always was an +unlucky chap.' + +But we could see her loving heart was full to overflowing. + +When she had taken him in and shut the door we went away. The wretched +sufferer, whose name transpired to be Augustus Victor Plunkett, was +lucky enough to live in a mews. Noël made a poem about it afterwards: + + 'O Muse of Poetry, do not refuse + To tell about a man who loves the Mews. + It is his humble home so poor, + And the cabman who drove him home lives next door + But two: and when his arm was broke + His loving wife with tears spoke.' + +And so on. It went on for two hundred and twenty-four lines, and he +could not print it, because it took far too much type for the +printing-press. It was as we went out of the mews that we first saw the +Goat. I gave him a piece of cocoanut ice, and he liked it awfully. He +was tied to a ring in the wall, and he was black and white, with horns +and a beard; and when the man he belonged to saw us looking at him, he +said we could have that Goat a bargain. And when we asked, out of +politeness and not because we had any money, except twopence halfpenny +of Dicky's, how much he wanted for the Goat, he said: + +'Seven and sixpence is the lowest, so I won't deceive you, young gents. +And so help me if he ain't worth thribble the money.' + +Oswald did the sum in his head, which told him the Goat was worth one +pound two shillings and sixpence, and he went away sadly, for he did +want that Goat. + +We were later for dinner than I ever remember our being, and Miss Blake +had not kept us any pudding; but Oswald bore up when he thought of the +Goat. But Dicky seemed to have no beautiful inside thoughts to sustain +him, and he was so dull Dora said she only hoped he wasn't going to have +measles. + +It was when we had gone up to bed that he fiddled about with the studs +and old buttons and things in a velvety box he had till Oswald was in +bed, and then he said: + +'Look here, Oswald, I feel as if I was a murderer, or next-door to. It +was our moving that ladder: I'm certain it was. And now he's laid up, +and his wife and children.' + +Oswald sat up in bed, and said kindly: + +'You're right, old chap. It _was_ your moving that ladder. Of course, +you didn't put it back firm. But the man's not killed.' + +'We oughtn't to have touched it,' he said. 'Or we ought to have told +them we had, or something. Suppose his arm gets blood-poisoning, or +inflammation, or something awful? I couldn't go on living if I was a +doer of a deed like that.' + +Oswald had never seen Dicky so upset. He takes things jolly easy as a +rule. Oswald said: + +'Well, it is no use fuming over it. You'd better get out of your clothes +and go to bed. We'll cut down in the morning and leave our cards and +kind inquiries.' + +Oswald only meant to be kind, and by making this amusing remark he +wished to draw his erring brother's thoughts from the remorse that was +poisoning his young life, and would very likely keep him awake for an +hour or more thinking of it, and fidgetting about so that Oswald +couldn't sleep. + +But Dicky did not take it at all the way Oswald meant. He said: + +'Shut up, Oswald, you beast!' and lay down on his bed and began to blub. + +Oswald said, 'Beast yourself!' because it is the proper thing to say; +but he was not angry, only sorry that Dicky was so duffing as not to see +what he meant. And he got out of bed and went softly to the girls' room, +which is next ours, and said: + +'I say, come in to our room a sec., will you? Dicky is howling fit to +bring the house down. I think a council of us elder ones would do him +more good than anything.' + +'Whatever is up?' Dora asked, getting into her dressing-gown. + +'Oh, nothing, except that he's a murderer! Come on, and don't make a +row. Mind the mats and our boots by the door.' + +They came in, and Oswald said: + +'Look here, Dicky, old boy, here are the girls, and we're going to have +a council about it.' + +They wanted to kiss him, but he wouldn't, and shrugged his shoulders +about, and wouldn't speak; but when Alice had got hold of his hand he +said in a muffled voice: + +'You tell them, Oswald.' + +When Oswald and Dicky were alone, you will have noticed the just elder +brother blamed the proper person, which was Dicky, because he would go +up on the stovehouse roof after his beastly ball, which Oswald did not +care a rap about. And, besides, he knew it wasn't there. But now that +other people were there Oswald, of course, said: + +'You see, _we_ moved the men's ladder when they were at their dinner. +And you know the man that fell off the ladder, and we went with him in +the cab to the place where that Goat was? Well, Dicky has only just +thought of it; but, of course, it was really our fault his tumbling, +because we couldn't have put the ladder back safely. And Dicky thinks if +his arm blood-poisoned itself we should be as good as murderers.' + +Dicky is perfectly straight; he sat up and sniffed, and blew his nose, +and said: + +'It was my idea moving the ladder: Oswald only helped.' + +'Can't we ask uncle to see that the dear sufferer wants for nothing +while he's ill, and all that?' said Dora. + +'Well,' said Oswald, 'we could, of course. But, then, it would all come +out. And about the fives ball too. And we can't be at all sure it _was_ +the ball made the greenhouse leak, because I know it never went over the +house.' + +'Yes, it did,' said Dicky, giving his nose a last stern blow. + +Oswald was generous to a sorrowing foe, and took no notice, only went +on: + +'And about the ladder: we can't be quite sure it wouldn't have slipped +on those tiles, even if we'd never moved it. But I think Dicky would +feel jollier if we could do something for the man, and I know it would +me.' + +That looks mixed, but Oswald was rather agitated himself, and that was +what he said. + +'We must think of something to do to get money,' Alice said, 'like we +used to do when we were treasure-seekers.' + +Presently the girls went away, and we heard them jawing in their room. +Just as Oswald was falling asleep the door opened, and a figure in white +came in and bent above his almost sleeping form. It said: + +'We've thought of something! We'll have a bazaar, like the people Miss +Blake's elder sister lives with did for the poor iron church.' + +The form glided away. Miss Blake is our housekeeper. Oswald could hear +that Dicky was already sleeping, so he turned over and went to sleep +himself. He dreamed of Goats, only they were as big as railway engines, +and would keep ringing the church bells, till Oswald awoke, and it was +the getting-up bell, and not a great Goat ringing it, but only Sarah as +usual. + +The idea of the bazaar seemed to please all of us. + +'We can ask all the people we know to it,' said Alice. + +'And wear our best frocks, and sell the things at the stalls,' said +Dora. + +Dicky said we could have it in the big greenhouse now the plants were +out of it. + +'I will write a poem for the man, and say it at the bazaar,' Noël said. +'I know people say poetry at bazaars. The one Aunt Carrie took me to a +man said a piece about a cowboy.' + +H. O. said there ought to be lots of sweets, and then everyone would buy +them. + +Oswald said someone would have to ask my father, and he said he would do +it if the others liked. He did this because of an inside feeling in his +mind that he knew might come on at any moment. So he did. And 'Yes' was +the answer. And then the uncle gave Oswald a whole quid to buy things to +sell at the bazaar, and my father gave him ten bob for the same useful +and generous purpose, and said he was glad to see we were trying to do +good to others. + +When he said that the inside feeling in Oswald's mind began that he had +felt afraid would, some time, and he told my father about him and Dicky +moving the ladder, and about the hateful fives ball, and everything. And +my father was awfully decent about it, so that Oswald was glad he had +told. + +The girls wrote the invitations to all our friends that very day. We +boys went down to look in the shops and see what we could buy for the +bazaar. And we went to ask how Mr. Augustus Victor Plunkett's arm was +getting on, and to see the Goat. + +The others liked the Goat almost as much as Oswald, and even Dicky +agreed that it was our clear duty to buy the Goat for the sake of poor +Mr. Plunkett. + +Because, as Oswald said, if it was worth one pound two and six, we could +easily sell it again for that, and we should have gained fifteen +shillings for the sufferer. + +So we bought the Goat, and changed the ten shillings to do it. The man +untied the other end of the Goat's rope, and Oswald took hold of it, and +said he hoped we were not robbing the man by taking his Goat from him +for such a low price. And he said: + +'Not at all, young gents. Don't you mention it. Pleased to oblige a +friend any day of the week.' + +So we started to take the Goat home. But after about half a street he +would not come any more. He stopped still, and a lot of boys and people +came round, just as if they had never seen a Goat before. We were +beginning to feel quite uncomfortable, when Oswald remembered the Goat +liked cocoanut ice, so Noël went into a shop and got threepenn'orth, and +then the cheap animal consented to follow us home. So did the street +boys. The cocoanut ice was more for the money than usual, but not so +nice. + +My father was not pleased when he saw the Goat. But when Alice told him +it was for the bazaar, he laughed, and let us keep it in the stableyard. + +It got out early in the morning, and came right into the house, and +butted the cook in her own back-kitchen, a thing even Oswald himself +would have hesitated before doing. So that showed it was a brave Goat. + +The groom did not like the Goat, because it bit a hole in a sack of +corn, and then walked up it like up a mountain, and all the oats ran out +and got between the stones of the stableyard, and there was a row. But +we explained it was not for long, as the bazaar was in three days. And +we hurried to get things ready. + +We were each to have a stall. Dora took the refreshment stall. The uncle +made Miss Blake get all that ready. + +Alice had a stall for pincushions and brush-and-comb bags, and other +useless things that girls make with stuff and ribbons. + +Noël had a poetry stall, where you could pay twopence and get a piece of +poetry and a sweet wrapped up in it. We chose sugar almonds, because +they are not so sticky. + +H. O.'s stall was to be sweets, if he promised on his word of honour as +a Bastable only to eat one of each kind. + +Dicky wished to have a stall for mechanical toys and parts of clocks. He +has a great many parts of clocks, but the only mechanical toy was his +clockwork engine, that was broken ages ago, so he had to give it up, and +he couldn't think of anything else. So he settled to help Oswald, and +keep an eye on H. O. + +Oswald's stall was meant to be a stall for really useful things, but in +the end it was just a lumber stall for the things other people did not +want. But he did not mind, because the others agreed he should have the +entire selling of the Goat, and he racked his young brains to think how +to sell it in the most interesting and unusual way. And at last he saw +how, and he said: + +'He shall be a lottery, and we'll make people take tickets, and then +draw a secret number out of a hat, and whoever gets the right number +gets the Goat. I wish it was me.' + +'We ought to advertise it, though,' Dicky said. 'Have handbills printed, +and send out sandwich-men.' + +Oswald inquired at the printers in Greenwich, and handbills were an +awful price, and sandwich-men a luxury far beyond our means. So he went +home sadly; and then Alice thought of the printing-press. We got it out, +and cleaned it where the ink had been upset into it, and mended the +broken parts as well as we could, and got some more printers' ink, and +wrote the circular and printed it. It was: + + SECRET LOTTERY. + EXCEPTIONABLE AND RARE CHANCE. + _An Object of Value--_ + +'It ought to be object of _virtue_,' said Dicky. 'I saw it in the old +iron and china and picture shop. It was a carved ivory ship, and there +was a ticket on it: "Rare Object of Virtue."' + +'The Goat's an object, certainly,' Alice said, 'and it's valuable. As +for virtue, I'm not so sure.' + +But Oswald thought the two V's looked well, and being virtuous is +different to being valuable; but, all the same, the Goat might be both +when you got to know him really well. So we put it in. + + + SECRET LOTTERY. + EXCEPTIONABLE AND RARE CHANCE. + _An Object of Value and Virtue_ + + will be lotteried for on Saturday next, at four o'clock. Tickets + one or two shillings each, according to how many people want them. + The object is not disclosed till after the Lottery, but it cost a + lot of money, and is honestly worth three times as much. If you win + it, it is the same as winning money. Apply at Morden House, + Blackheath, at 3 o'clock next Saturday. Take tickets early to + prevent disappointment. + +We printed these, and though they looked a bit rum, we had not time to +do them again, so we went out about dusk and dropped them in people's +letter-boxes. Then next day Oswald, who is always very keen on doing the +thing well, got two baking-boards out of the kitchen and bored holes in +them with an auger I had, and pasted paper on them, and did on them +with a paint-brush and ink the following lines: + + SECRET LOTTERY. + + OBJECT OF VALUE AND VIRTUE. + + _Tickets 1/- and 2/-._ + + If you win, it will be the same as winning money. + + Lottery at Morden House, Blackheath. + + Saturday at 4. Come at 3. + +And he slung the boards round his neck, and tied up his mouth in one of +those knitted comforters he despises so much at other times, and, +pulling a cap of father's over his bold ears, he got Dicky to let him +out of the side-door. And then the brave boy went right across the heath +and three times up and down the village, till those boys that followed +him and the Goat home went for him near the corner of Wemyss Road, and +he made a fight for it, taking off the boards and using them as shields. +But at last, being far outnumbered, which is no disgrace, he had to +chuck the boards and run for it. + +Saturday was fine. We had hung the greenhouse with evergreens and +paper roses that looked almost like real among the green, and Miss +Blake let us have some Chinesy-looking curtains to cover over the +shelves and staging with. And the gardener let us have a lot of azaleas +and things in pots, so that it was all very bowery and flowery. + +Alice's stall was the smartest looking, because Miss Blake had let her +have all the ribbons and things that were over from the other bazaar. + +H. O.'s stall was also nice--all on silver tea-trays, so as not to be +stickier than needful. + +The poetry stall had more flowers on it than any of the others, to make +up for the poetry looking so dull outside. Of course, you could not see +the sweet inside the packets till you opened them. Red azaleas are +prettier than poetry, I think. I think the tropic lands in 'Westward +Ho!' had great trees with flowers like that. + +We got the Goat into the stovehouse. He was to be kept a secret till the +very last. And by half-past two we were all ready, and very clean and +dressed. We had all looked out everything we thought anyone could want +to buy, and that we could spare, and some things we could not, and most +of these were on Oswald's table--among others, several boxes of games +we had never cared about; some bags of marbles, which nobody plays now; +a lot of old books; a pair of braces with wool-work on them, that an +aunt once made for Oswald, and, of course, he couldn't wear them; some +bags of odd buttons for people who like sewing these things on; a lot of +foreign stamps, gardening tools, Dicky's engine, that won't go, and a +stuffed parrot, but he was moth-eaten. + +About three our friends began to come, Mrs. Leslie, and Lord Tottenham, +and Albert's uncle, and a lot of others. It was a very grand party, and +they admired the bazaar very much, and all bought things. Mrs. Leslie +bought the engine for ten shillings, though we told her honestly it +would never go again, and Albert's uncle bought the parrot, and would +not tell us what he wanted it for. The money was put on a blue dish, so +that everyone could see how it got on, and our hearts were full of joy +as we saw how much silver there was among the pennies, and two or three +gold pieces too. I know now how the man feels who holds the plate at the +door in church. + +Noël's poetry stall was much more paying than I thought it would be. I +believe nobody really likes poetry, and yet everyone pretends they do, +either so as not to hurt Noël's feelings, or because they think +well-brought-up people ought to like poetry, even Noël's. Of course, +Macaulay and Kipling are different. I don't mind them so much myself. + +Noël wrote a lot of new poetry for the bazaar. It took up all his time, +and even then he had not enough new stuff to wrap up all the sugar +almonds in. So he made up with old poetry that he'd done before. +Albert's uncle got one of the new ones, and said it made him a proud +man. It was: + + 'How noble and good and kind you are + To come to Victor A. Plunkett's Bazaar. + Please buy as much as you can bear, + For the sufferer needs all you can possibly spare. + I know you are sure to take his part, + Because you have such a noble heart.' + + +Mrs. Leslie got: + + 'The rose is red, the violet's blue, + The lily's pale, and so are you. + Or would be if you had seen him fall + Off the top of the ladder so tall. + Do buy as much as you can stand, + And lend the poor a helping hand.' + +Lord Tottenham, though, only got one of the old ones, and it happened to +be the 'Wreck of the _Malabar_.' He was an admiral once. But he liked +it. He is a nice old gentleman, but people do say he is 'excentric.' + +Father got a poem that said: + + 'Please turn your eyes round in their sockets, + And put both your hands in your pockets; + Your eyes will show you things so gay, + And I hope you'll find enough in your pockets to pay + For the things you buy. + Good-bye!' + +And he laughed and seemed pleased; but when Mrs. Morrison, Albert's +mother, got that poem about the black beetle that was poisoned she was +not so pleased, and she said it was horrid, and made her flesh creep. +You know the poem. It says: + + 'Oh, beetle, how I weep to see + Thee lying on thy poor back: + It is so very sad to see + You were so leggy and black. + I wish you were crawling about alive again, + But many people think this is nonsense and a shame.' + +Noël _would_ recite, no matter what we said, and he stood up on a chair, +and everyone, in their blind generousness, paid sixpence to hear him. +It was a long poem of his own about the Duke of Wellington, and it +began: + + 'Hail, faithful leader of the brave band + Who went to make Napoleon understand + He couldn't have everything his own way. + We taught him this on Waterloo day.' + +I heard that much; but then he got so upset and frightened no one could +hear anything till the end, when it says: + + 'So praise the heroes of Waterloo, + And let us do our duty like they had to do.' + +Everyone clapped very much, but Noël was so upset he nearly cried, and +Mrs. Leslie said: + +'Noël, I'm feeling as pale as a lily again! Take me round the garden to +recover myself.' + +She was as red as usual, but it saved Noël from making a young ass of +himself. And we got seventeen shillings and sixpence by his reciting. So +that was all right. + +We might as well not have sent out those circulars, because only the +people we had written to ourselves came. Of course, I don't count those +five street boys, the same Oswald had the sandwich-board fight with. +They came, and they walked round and looked at the things; but they had +no money to spend, it turned out, and only came to be disagreeable and +make fun. So Albert's uncle asked them if they did not think their +families would be lonely without them, and he and I saw them off at the +gate. Then they stood outside and made rude noises. And another stranger +came, and Oswald thought perhaps the circular was beginning to bear +fruit. But the stranger asked for the master of the house, and he was +shown in. Oswald was just shaking up the numbers in his hat for the +lottery of the Goat, and Alice and Dora were selling the tickets for +half a crown each to our visitors, and explaining the dreadful misery of +the poor man that all this trouble was being taken for, and we were all +enjoying ourselves very much, when Sarah came to say Master Oswald was +to go in to master's study at once. So he went, wondering what on earth +he could have been up to now. But he could not think of anything in +particular. But when his father said, 'Oswald, this gentleman is a +detective from Scotland Yard,' he was glad he had told about the fives +ball and the ladder, because he knew his father would now stand by him. +But he did wonder whether you could be sent to prison for leaving a +ladder in a slippery place, and how long they would keep you there for +that crime. + +Then my father held out one of the fatal circulars, and said: + +'I suppose this is some of your work? Mr. Biggs here is bound in honour +to do his best to find out when people break the laws of the land. Now, +lotteries are illegal, and can be punished by law.' + +Oswald gloomily wondered how much the law could do to you. He said: + +'We didn't know, father.' + +Then his father said: + +'The best thing you can do is to tell this gentleman all about it.' + +So Oswald said: + +'Augustus Victor Plunkett fell off a ladder and broke his arm, and +perhaps it was our fault for meddling with the ladder at all. So we +wanted to do something to help him, and father said we might have a +bazaar. It is happening now, and we had three pounds two and sevenpence +last time I counted the bazaar.' + +'But what about the lottery?' said Mr. Biggs, who did not look as if he +would take Oswald to prison just then, as our young hero had feared. In +fact, he looked rather jolly. 'Is the prize money?' + +'No--oh no; only it's so valuable it's as good as winning money.' + +'Then it's only a raffle,' said Mr. Biggs; 'that's what it is, just a +plain raffle. What _is_ the prize?' + +'Are we to be allowed to go on with it?' asked the wary Oswald. + +'Why, yes,' said Mr. Biggs; 'if it's not money, why not? What is the +valuable object?' + +'Come, Oswald,' said his father, when Oswald said nothing, 'what is the +object of _virtù_?' + +'I'd rather not say,' said Oswald, feeling very uncomfortable. + +Mr. Biggs said something about duty being duty, and my father said: + +'Come, Oswald, don't be a young duffer. I dare say it's nothing to be +ashamed of.' + +'I should think not indeed,' said Oswald, as his fond thoughts played +with that beautiful Goat. + +'Well, then?' + +'Well, sir'--Oswald spoke desperately, for he wondered his father had +been so patient so long, and saw that he wasn't going to go on +being--'you see, the great thing is, nobody is to know it's a G---- I +mean, it's a secret. No one's to know what the prize is. Only when +you've won it, it will be revealed.' + +'Well,' said my father, 'if Mr. Biggs will take a glass of wine with me, +we'll follow you down to the greenhouse, and he can see for himself.' + +Mr. Biggs said something about thanking father kindly, and about his +duty. And presently they came down to the greenhouse. Father did not +introduce Mr. Biggs to anyone--I suppose he forgot--but Oswald did while +father was talking to Mrs. Leslie. And Mr. Biggs made himself very +agreeable to all the ladies. + +Then we had the lottery. Everyone had tickets, and Alice asked Mr. Biggs +to buy one. She let him have it for a shilling, because it was the last, +and we all hoped he would win the Goat. He seemed quite sure now that +Oswald was not kidding, and that the prize was not money. Indeed, Oswald +went so far as to tell him privately that the prize was too big to put +in your pocket, and that if it was divided up it would be spoiled, which +is true of Goats, but not of money. + +[Illustration: '"Here is your prize," said Oswald.'--Page 31.] + +Everyone was laughing and talking, and wondering anxiously whatever the +prize could possibly be. Oswald carried round the hat, and everyone +drew a number. The winning number was six hundred and sixty-six, and +Albert's uncle said afterwards it was a curious coincidence. I don't +know what it meant, but it made Mrs. Leslie laugh. When everyone had +drawn a number, Oswald rang the dinner-bell to command silence, and +there was a hush full of anxious expectation. Then Oswald said: + +'The prize number is six hundred and sixty-six. Who has it?' + +And Mr. Biggs took a step forward and held out his paper. + +'The prize is yours! I congratulate you,' said Oswald warmly. + +Then he went into the stovehouse, and hastily placing a wreath of paper +roses on the Goat's head, that Alice had got ready for the purpose, he +got out the Goat by secretly showing it a bit of cocoanut ice, and led +it by the same means to the feet of the happy winner. + +'Here is your prize,' said Oswald, with feelings of generous pride. 'I +am very glad you've got him. He'll be a comfort to you, and make up for +all the trouble you've had over our lottery--raffle, I mean.' + +And he placed the ungoated end of the rope in the unresisting hand of +the fortunate detective. + +Neither Oswald nor any of the rest of us has ever been able to make out +why everyone should have laughed so. But they did. They said the lottery +was the success of the afternoon. And the ladies kept on congratulating +Mr. Biggs. + +At last people began to go, and the detective, so unexpectedly made rich +beyond his wildest dreams, said he, too, must be going. He had tied the +Goat to the greenhouse door, and now he moved away. But we all cried +out: + +'You've forgotten your Goat!' + +'No, I haven't,' he said very earnestly; 'I shall never forget that Goat +to my dying hour. But I want to call on my aunt just close by, and I +couldn't very well take the Goat to see her.' + +'I don't see why not,' H. O. said; 'it's a very nice Goat.' + +'She's frightened of them,' said he. 'One ran at her when she was a +little girl. But if you will allow me, sir'--and he winked at my father, +which is not manners--'if you'll allow me, I'll call in for the Goat on +my way to the station.' + +We got five pounds thirteen and fivepence by the bazaar and the raffle. +We should have had another ten shillings from father, but he had to +give it to Mr. Biggs, because we had put him to the trouble of coming +all the way from Scotland Yard, because he thought our circular was from +some hardened criminal wishing to cheat his trustful fellow-creatures. +We took the money to Augustus Victor Plunkett next morning, and I tell +you he _was_ pleased. + +We waited till long after dark for the detective to return for his rich +prize. But he never came. I hope he was not set upon and stabbed in some +dark alley. If he is alive, and not imprisoned, I can't see why he +didn't come back. I often think anxiously of him. Because, of course, +detectives have many enemies among felons, who think nothing of stabbing +people in the back, so that being murdered in a dark alley is a thing +all detectives are constantly liable to. + + + + +THE RUNAWAYS + + +It was after we had had the measles, that fell and blighting disorder +which we got from Alice picking up five deeply infected shillings that a +bemeasled family had wrapped in a bit of paper to pay the doctor with +and then carelessly dropped in the street. Alice held the packet hotly +in her muff all through a charity concert. Hence these tears, as it says +in Virgil. And if you have ever had measles you will know that this is +not what is called figuring speech, because your eyes do run like mad +all the time. + +When we were unmeasled again we were sent to stay at Lymchurch with a +Miss Sandal, and her motto was plain living and high thinking. She had a +brother, and his motto was the same, and it was his charity concert that +Alice held the fatal shillings in her muff throughout of. Later on he +was giving tracts to a bricklayer, and fell off a scaffold in his giddy +earnestness, and Miss Sandal had to go and nurse him. So the six of us +stayed in the plain living, high thinking house by ourselves, and old +Mrs. Beale from the village came in every day and did the housework. She +was of humble birth, but was a true lady in minding her own affairs, +which is what a great many ladies do not know how to do at all. We had +no lessons to do, and we were thus free to attend to any adventures +which came along. Adventures are the real business of life. The rest is +only in-betweenness--what Albert's uncle calls padding. He is an author. + +Miss Sandal's house was very plain and clean, with lots of white paint, +and very difficult to play in. So we were out a good deal. It was +seaside, so, of course, there was the beach, and besides that the +marsh--big green fields with sheep all about, and wet dykes with sedge +growing, and mud, and eels in the mud, and winding white roads that all +look the same, and all very interesting, as though they might lead to +almost anything that you didn't expect. Really, of course, they lead to +Ashford and Romney and Ivychurch, and real live places like that. But +they don't look it. + +The day when what I am going to tell you about happened, we were all +leaning on the stone wall looking at the pigs. The pigman is a great +friend of ours--all except H. O., who is my youngest brother. His name +is Horace Octavius, and if you want to know why we called him H. O. you +had better read 'The Treasure Seekers' and find out. He had gone to tea +with the schoolmaster's son--a hateful kid. + +'Isn't that the boy you're always fighting?' Dora asked when H. O. said +he was going. + +'Yes,' said H. O., 'but, then, he keeps rabbits.' + +So then we understood and let him go. + +Well, the rest of us were gazing fondly on the pigs, and two soldiers +came by. + +We asked them where they were off to. + +They told us to mind our own business, which is not manners, even if you +are a soldier on private affairs. + +'Oh, all right,' said Oswald, who is the eldest. And he advised the +soldiers to keep their hair on. The little they had was cut very short. + +'I expect they're scouts or something,' said Dicky; 'it's a field-day, +or a sham-fight, or something, as likely as not.' + +'Let's go after them and see,' said Oswald, ever prompt in his +decidings. So we did. + +We ran a bit at first, so as not to let the soldiers have too much of a +lead. Their red coats made it quite easy to keep them in sight on the +winding white marsh road. But we did not catch them up: they seemed to +go faster and faster. So we ran a little bit more every now and then, +and we went quite a long way after them. But they didn't meet any of +their officers or regiments or things, and we began to think that +perchance we were engaged in the disheartening chase of the wild goose. +This has sometimes occurred. + +There is a ruined church about two miles from Lymchurch, and when we got +close to that we lost sight of the red coats, so we stopped on the +little bridge that is near there to reconnoitre. + +The soldiers had vanished. + +'Well, here's a go!' said Dicky. + +'It _is_ a wild-goose chase,' said Noël. 'I shall make a piece of poetry +about it. I shall call the title the "Vanishing Reds, or, the Soldiers +that were not when you got there."' + +'You shut up!' said Oswald, whose eagle eye had caught a glimpse of +scarlet through the arch of the ruin. + +None of the others had seen this. Perhaps you will think I do not say +enough about Oswald's quickness of sight, so I had better tell you that +is only because Oswald is me, and very modest. At least, he tries to +be, because he knows it is what a true gentleman ought to. + +'They're in the ruins,' he went on. 'I expect they're going to have an +easy and a pipe--out of the wind.' + +'I think it's very mysterious,' said Noël. 'I shouldn't wonder if +they're going to dig for buried treasure. Let's go and see.' + +'No,' said Oswald, who, though modest, is thoughtful. 'If we do they'll +stop digging, or whatever they're doing. When they've gone away, we'll +go and see if the ground is scratched about.' + +So we delayed where we were, but we saw no more scarlet. + +In a little while a dull-looking man in brown came by on a bicycle. He +stopped and got off. + +'Seen a couple of Tommies about here, my lad?' he said to Oswald. + +Oswald does not like being called anybody's lad, especially that kind of +man's; but he did not want to spoil the review, or field-day, or +sham-fight, or whatever it might be, so he said: + +'Yes; they're up in the ruins.' + +'You don't say so!' said the man. 'In uniform, I suppose? Yes, of +course, or you wouldn't have known they were soldiers. Silly cuckoos!' + +He wheeled his bicycle up the rough lane that leads to the old ruin. + +'It can't be buried treasure,' said Dicky. + +'I don't care if it is,' said Oswald. 'We'll see what's happening. I +don't mind spoiling _his_ sport. "My ladding" me like that!' + +So we followed the man with the bicycle. It was leaning against the +churchyard gate when we got there. The man off it was going up to the +ruin, and we went after him. + +He did not call out to the soldiers, and we thought that odd; but it +didn't make us think where it might have made us if we had had any +sense. He just went creeping about, looking behind walls and inside +arches, as though he was playing at hide-and-seek. There is a mound in +the middle of the ruin, where stones and things have fallen during dark +ages, and the grass has grown all over them. We stood on the mound, and +watched the bicycling stranger nosing about like a ferret. + +There is an archway in that ruin, and a flight of steps goes down--only +five steps--and then it is all stopped up with fallen stones and earth. +The stranger stopped at last at this arch, and stooped forward with his +hands on his knees, and looked through the arch and down the steps. +Then he said suddenly and fiercely: + +'Come out of it, will you?' + +And the soldiers came. I wouldn't have. They were two to his one. They +came cringing out like beaten dogs. The brown man made a sort of bound, +and next minute the two soldiers were handcuffed together, and he was +driving them before him like sheep. + +'Back you go the same way as what you come,' he said. + +And then Oswald saw the soldiers' faces, and he will never forget what +they looked like. + +He jumped off the mound, and ran to where they were. + +'What have they done?' he asked the handcuffer. + +'Deserters,' said the man. 'Thanks to you, my lad, I got 'em as easy as +kiss your hand.' + +Then one of the soldiers looked at Oswald. He was not very old--about as +big as a fifth-form boy. And Oswald answered what the soldier looked at +him. + +'I'm _not_ a sneak,' he said. 'I wouldn't have told if I'd known. If +you'd told me, instead of saying to mind my own business I'd have helped +you.' + +The soldier didn't answer, but the bicycle man did. + +'Then you'd 'a helped yourself into the stone jug, my lad,' said he. +'Help a dirty deserter? You're young enough to know better. Come along, +you rubbish!' + +And they went. + +When they were gone Dicky said: + +'It's very rum. I hate cowards. And deserters are cowards. I don't see +why we feel like this.' + +Alice and Dora and Noël were now discovered to be in tears. + +'Of course we did right to tell. Only when the soldier looked at me ...' +said Oswald. + +'Yes,' said Dicky, 'that's just it.' + +In deepest gloom the party retraced its steps. + +As we went, Dora said with sniffs: + +'I suppose it was the bicycle man's duty.' + +'Of course,' said Oswald, 'but it wasn't _our_ duty. And I jolly well +wish we hadn't!' + +'And such a beautiful day, too,' said Noël, sniffing in his turn. + +It _was_ beautiful. The afternoon had been dull, but now the sun was +shining flat across the marshes, making everything look as if it had +been covered all over with the best gold-leaf--marsh and trees, and +roofs and stacks, and everything. + +That evening Noël wrote a poem about it all. It began: + + 'Poor soldiers, why did you run away + On such a beautiful, beautiful day? + If you had run away in the rain, + Perhaps they would never have found you again, + Because then Oswald would not have been there + To show the hunter the way to your lair.' + +Oswald would have licked him for that--only Noël is not very strong, and +there is something about poets, however young, that makes it rather like +licking a girl. So Oswald did not even say what he thought--Noël cries +at the least thing. Oswald only said, 'Let's go down to our pigman.' + +And we all went except Noël. He never will go anywhere when in the midst +of making poetry. And Alice stayed with him, and H. O. was in bed. + +We told the pigman all about the deserters, and about our miserable +inside remorsefulness, and he said he knew just how we felt. + +'There's quite enough agin a pore chap that's made a bolt of it without +the rest of us a-joinin' in,' he said. 'Not as I holds with +deserting--mean trick I call it. But all the same, when the odds is +that heavy--thousands to one--all the army and the navy and the pleece +and Parliament and the King agin one pore silly bloke. You wouldn't 'a +done it a purpose, I lay.' + +'Not much,' said Oswald in gloomy dejection. 'Have a peppermint? They're +extra strong.' + +When the pigman had had one he went on talking. + +'There's a young chap, now,' he said, 'broke out of Dover Gaol. I 'appen +to know what he's in for--nicked a four-pound cake, he did, off of a +counter at a pastrycook's--Jenner's it was, in the High Street--part +hunger, part playfulness. But even if I wasn't to know what he was +lagged for, do you think I'd put the coppers on to him? Not me. Give a +fellow a chance is what I say. But don't you grizzle about them there +Tommies. P'raps it'll be the making of 'em in the end. A slack-baked +pair as ever wore boots. _I_ seed 'em. Only next time just you take and +think afore you pipes up--see?' + +We said that we saw, and that next time we would do as he said. And we +went home again. As we went Dora said: + +'But supposing it was a cruel murderer that had got loose, you ought to +tell then.' + +'Yes,' said Dicky; 'but before you do tell you ought to be jolly sure it +_is_ a cruel murderer, and not a chap that's taken a cake because he was +hungry. How do you know what _you'd_ do if you were hungry enough?' + +'I shouldn't steal,' said Dora. + +'I'm not so sure,' said Dicky; and they argued about it all the way +home, and before we got in it began to rain in torrents. + +Conversations about food always make you feel as though it was a very +long time since you had had anything to eat. Mrs. Beale had gone home, +of course, but we went into the larder. It is a generous larder. No +lock, only a big wooden latch that pulls up with a string, like in Red +Riding Hood. And the floor is clean damp red brick. It makes ginger-nuts +soft if you put the bag on this floor. There was half a rhubarb pie, and +there were meat turnovers with potato in them. Mrs. Beale is a +thoughtful person, and I know many people much richer that are not +nearly so thoughtful. + +We had a comfortable feast at the kitchen table, standing up to eat, +like horses. + +Then we had to let Noël read us his piece of poetry about the soldier; +he wouldn't have slept if we hadn't. It was very long, and it began as +I have said, and ended up: + + 'Poor soldiers, learn a lesson from to-day, + It is very wrong to run away; + It is better to stay + And serve your King and Country--hurray!' + +Noël owned that Hooray sounded too cheerful for the end of a poem about +soldiers with faces like theirs were. + +'But I didn't mean it about the soldiers. It was about the King and +Country. Half a sec. I'll put that in.' So he wrote: + + 'P.S.--I do not mean to be unkind, + Poor soldiers, to you, so never mind. + When I say hurray or sing, + It is because I am thinking of my Country and my King.' + +'You can't sing Hooray,' said Dicky. So Noël went to bed singing it, +which was better than arguing about it, Alice said. But it was noisier +as well. + +Oswald and Dicky always went round the house to see that all the doors +were bolted and the shutters up. This is what the head of the house +always does, and Oswald is the head when father is not there. There are +no shutters upstairs, only curtains. The White House, which is Miss +Sandal's house's name, is not in the village, but 'quite a step' from +it, as Mrs. Beale says. It is the first house you come to as you come +along the road from the marsh. + +We used to look in the cupboard and under the beds for burglars every +night. The girls liked us to, though they wouldn't look themselves, and +I don't know that it was much good. If there _is_ a burglar, it's +sometimes safer for you not to know it. Where ignorance is bliss, 'tis +folly to find a burglar, especially as he would be armed to the teeth as +likely as not. However, there is not much worth being a burglar about, +in houses where the motto is plain living and high thinking, and there +never was anyone in the cupboards or under the beds. + +Then we put out all the lights very carefully in +case of fire--all except Noël's. He does not like the dark. He says +there are things in it that go away when you light a candle, and however +much you talk reason and science to him, it makes no difference at all. + +Then we got into our pyjamas. It was Oswald who asked father to let us +have pyjamas instead of nightgowns; they are so convenient for dressing +up when you wish to act clowns, or West Indian planters, or any +loose-clothed characters. Then we got into bed, and then we got into +sleep. + +Little did the unconscious sleepers reck of the strange destiny that was +advancing on them by leaps and bounds through the silent watches of the +night. + +Although we were asleep, the rain went on raining just the same, and the +wind blowing across the marsh with the fury of a maniac who has been +transformed into a blacksmith's bellows. And through the night, and the +wind, and the rain, our dreadful destiny drew nearer and nearer. I wish +this to sound as if something was going to happen, and I hope it does. I +hope the reader's heart is now standing still with apprehensionness on +our account, but I do not want it to stop altogether, so I will tell you +that we were not all going to be murdered in our beds, or pass +peacefully away in our sleeps with angel-like smiles on our young and +beautiful faces. Not at all. What really happened was this. Some time +must have elapsed between our closing our eyes in serene slumber and the +following narrative: + +Oswald was awakened by Dicky thumping him hard in the back, and saying +in accents of terror--at least, he says not, but Oswald knows what they +sounded like: + +'What's that?' + +Oswald reared up on his elbow and listened, but there was nothing to +listen to except Dicky breathing like a grampus, and the giggle-guggle +of the rain-water overflowing from the tub under the window. + +'What's what?' said Oswald. + +He did not speak furiously, as many elder brothers would have done when +suddenly awakened by thumps. + +'_That!_' said Dicky. 'There it is again!' + +And this time, certainly, there it was, and it sounded like somebody +hammering on the front-door with his fists. There is no knocker to the +plain-living, high-thinking house. + +Oswald controlled his fears, if he had any (I am not going to say +whether he had or hadn't), and struck a match. Before the candle had had +time to settle its flame after the first flare up that doesn't last, the +row began again. + +Oswald's nerves are of iron, but it would have given anybody a start to +see two white figures in the doorway, yet so it was. They proved to be +Alice and Dora in their nighties; but no one could blame anyone for not +being sure of this at first. + +'Is it burglars?' said Dora; and her teeth did chatter, whatever she may +say. + +'_I_ think it's Mrs. Beale,' said Alice. 'I expect she's forgotten the +key.' + +Oswald pulled his watch out from under his pillow. + +'It's half-past one,' he said. + +And then the knocking began again. So the intrepid Oswald went to the +landing window that is over the front-door. The others went too. And he +opened the window in his pyjamas and said, 'Who's there?' + +There was the scraping sound of boots on the doorstep, as somebody down +there stepped back. + +'Is this the way to Ashford?' said the voice of a man. + +'Ashford's thirteen miles off,' said Oswald. 'You get on to the Dover +road.' + +'I don't want to get on the Dover road,' said the voice; 'I've had +enough of Dover.' + +A thrill ran through every heart. We all told each other so afterwards. + +'Well,' said Dicky, 'Ashford's thirteen miles----' + +'Anybody but you in the house?' + +'Say we've got men and dogs and guns,' whispered Dora. + +'There are six of us,' said Oswald, 'all armed to the teeth.' + +The stranger laughed. + +'I'm not a burglar,' he said; 'I've lost my way, that's all. I thought I +should have got to Ashford before dusk, but I missed the way. I've been +wandering all over these marshes ever since, in the rain. I expect +they're out after me now, but I'm dead beat. I can't go on. Won't you +let me in? I can sit by the kitchen fire.' + +Oswald drew his head back through the window, and a hasty council took +place on the landing. + +'It _is_,' said Alice. + +'You heard what he said about Dover, and their being out after him?' + +'I say, you might let a chap in,' said the voice outside. 'I'm perfectly +respectable. Upon my word I am.' + +'I wish he hadn't said that,' whispered Dora. [** ']Such a dreadful +story! And we didn't even ask him if he was.' + +'He sounds very tired,' said Alice. + +'And wet,' said Oswald. 'I heard the water squelching in his boots.' + +'What'll happen if we don't let him in?' said Dicky. + +'He'll be caught and taken back, like the soldiers,' said Oswald. 'Look +here, I'm going to chance it. You others can lock yourselves into your +rooms if you're frightened.' + +Then Oswald put his brave young head out of the window, and the rain +dripped on to the back of his bold young neck off the roof, like a +watering-pot on to a beautiful flower, and he said: + +'There's a porch to the side door. Just scoot round there and shelter, +and I'll come down in half a sec.' + +A resolve made in early youth never to face midnight encounters without +boots was the cause of this delay. Oswald and Dicky got into their boots +and jackets, and told the girls to go back to bed. + +Then we went down and opened the front-door. The stranger had heard the +bolts go, and he was outside waiting. + +We held the door open politely, and he stepped in and began at once to +drip heavily on the doormat. + +We shut the door. He looked wildly round. + +'Be calm! You are safe,' said Oswald. + +'Thanks,' said the stranger; 'I see I am.' + +All our hearts were full of pity for the outcast. He was, indeed, a +spectacle to shock the benevolent. Even the prison people, Oswald +thought, or the man he took the cake from, would have felt their +fierceness fade if they could have seen him then. He was not in prison +dress. Oswald would have rather liked to see that, but he remembered +that it was safer for the man that he had found means to rid himself of +the felon's garb. He wore a gray knickerbocker suit, covered with mud. +The lining of his hat must have been blue, and it had run down his face +in streaks like the gentleman in Mr. Kipling's story. He was wetter than +I have ever seen anyone out of a bath or the sea. + +'Come into the kitchen,' said Oswald; 'you can drip there quite +comfortably. The floor is brick.' + +He followed us into the kitchen. + +'Are you kids alone in the house?' he said. + +'Yes,' said Oswald. + +'Then I suppose it's no good asking if you've got a drop of brandy?' + +'Not a bit,' said Dicky. + +[Illustration: '"Come into the kitchen," said Oswald, "you can drip +there quite comfortably."'--Page 52] + +'Whisky would do, or gin--any sort of spirit,' said the smeared stranger +hopefully. + +'Not a drop,' said Oswald; 'at least, I'll look in the medicine +cupboard. And, I say, take off your things and put them in the sink. +I'll get you some other clothes. There are some of Mr. Sandal's.' + +The man hesitated. + +'It'll make a better disguise,' said Oswald in a low, significant +whisper, and turned tactfully away, so as not to make the stranger feel +awkward. + +Dicky got the clothes, and the stranger changed in the back-kitchen. The +only spirit Oswald could find was spirits of salts, which the stranger +said was poison, and spirits of camphor. Oswald gave him some of this on +sugar; he knows it is a good thing when you have taken cold. The +stranger hated it. He changed in the back-kitchen, and while he was +doing it we tried to light the kitchen fire, but it would not; so Dicky +went up to ask Alice for some matches, and finding the girls had not +gone to bed as ordered, but contrarily dressed themselves, he let them +come down. And then, of course, there was no reason why they should not +light the fire. They did. + +When the unfortunate one came out of the back-kitchen he looked quite a +decent chap, though still blue in patches from the lining of his hat. +Dicky whispered to me what a difference clothes made. + +He made a polite though jerky bow to the girls, and Dora said: + +'How do you do? I hope you are quite well.' + +'As well as can be expected,' replied the now tidy outcast, 'considering +what I've gone through.' + +'Tea or cocoa?' said Dora. 'And do you like cheese or cold bacon best?' + +'I'll leave it to you entirely,' he answered. And he added, without a +pause, 'I'm sure I can trust you.' + +'Indeed you can,' said Dora earnestly; 'you needn't be a bit afraid. +You're perfectly safe with us.' + +He opened his eyes at this. + +'He didn't expect such kindness,' Alice whispered. 'Poor man! he's quite +overcome.' + +We gave him cocoa, and cheese, and bacon, and butter and bread, and he +ate a great deal, with his feet in Mr. Sandal's all-wool boots on the +kitchen fender. + +The girls wrung the water out of his clothes, and hung them on the +clothes-horse on the other side of the fire. + +'I'm sure I'm very much obliged to you,' he said; 'real charity I call +this. I shan't forget it, I assure you. I ought to apologise for +knocking you up like this, but I'd been hours tramping through this +precious marsh of yours wet to the skin, and not a morsel of food since +mid-day. And yours was the first light I'd seen for a couple of hours.' + +'I'm very glad it _was_ us you knocked up,' said Alice. + +'So am I,' said he; 'I might have knocked at a great many doors before I +got such a welcome. I'm quite aware of that.' + +He spoke all right, not like a labouring man; but it wasn't a +gentleman's voice, and he seemed to end his sentences off short at the +end, as though he had it on the tip of his tongue to say 'Miss' or +'Sir.' + +Oswald thought how terrible it must be to be out alone in the rain and +the dark, with the police after you, and no one to be kind to you if you +knocked at their doors. + +'You must have had an awful day,' he said. + +'I believe you,' said the stranger, cutting himself more bacon. 'Thank +you, miss (he really did say it that time), just half a cup if you don't +mind. I believe you! I never want to have such a day again, I can tell +you. I took one or two little things in the morning, but I wasn't in the +mood or something. You know how it is sometimes.' + +'I can fancy it,' said Alice. + +'And then the afternoon clouded over. It cleared up at sunset, you +remember, but then it was too late. And then the rain came on. Not half! +My word! I've been in a ditch. Thought my last hour had come, I tell +you. Only got out by the skin of my teeth. Got rid of my whole outfit. +There's a nice thing to happen to a young fellow! Upon my Sam, it's +enough to make a chap swear he'll never take another thing as long as he +lives.' + +'I hope you never will,' said Dora earnestly; 'it doesn't pay, you +know.' + +'Upon my word, that's nearly true, though I don't know how _you_ know,' +said the stranger, beginning on the cheese and pickles. + +'I wish,' Dora was beginning, but Oswald interrupted. He did not think +it was fair to preach at the man. + +'So you lost your outfit in the ditch,' he said; 'and how did you get +those clothes?' + +He pointed to the steaming gray suit. + +'Oh,' replied the stranger, 'the usual way.' + +Oswald was too polite to ask what was the usual way of getting a gray +suit to replace a prison outfit. He was afraid the usual way was the way +the four-pound cake had been got. + +Alice looked at me helplessly. I knew just how she felt. + +Harbouring a criminal when people are 'out after him' gives you a very +chilly feeling in the waistcoat--or, if in pyjamas, in the part that the +plaited cotton cord goes round. By the greatest good luck there were a +few of the extra-strong peppermints left. We had two each, and felt +better. + +The girls put the sheets off Oswald's bed on to the bed Miss Sandal used +to sleep in when not in London nursing the shattered bones of her +tract-distributing brother. + +'If you will go to bed now,' Oswald said to the stranger, 'we will wake +you in good time. And you may sleep as sound as you like. We'll wake you +all right.' + +'You might wake me about eight,' he said; 'I ought to be getting on. +I'm sure I don't know what to say in return for the very handsome +reception you've given me. Good-night to you all, I'm sure.' + +'Good-night,' said everyone. And Dora added, 'Don't you bother. While +you're asleep we'll think what's best to be done.' + +'Don't _you_ bother,' said the stranger, and he absently glanced at his +own clothes. 'What's big enough to get out of's big enough to get into.' + +Then he took the candle, and Dicky showed him to his room. + +'What's big enough to get out of,' repeated Alice. 'Surely he doesn't +mean to creep back into prison, and pretend he was there all the time, +only they didn't notice him?' + +'Well, what are we to do?' asked Dicky, rejoining the rest of us. 'He +told me the dark room at Dover was a disgrace. Poor chap!' + +'We must invent a disguise,' said Dora. + +'Let's pretend he's our aunt, and dress him up--like in "Hard Cash,"' +said Alice. + +It was now three o'clock, but no one was sleepy. No one wanted to go to +sleep at all till we had taken our candles up into the attic and +rummaged through Miss Sandal's trunks, and found a complete disguise +exactly suited to an aunt. We had everything--dress, cloak, bonnet, +veil, gloves, petticoats, and even boots, though we knew all the time, +in our hearts, that these were far too small. We put all ready on the +parlour sofa, and then at last we began to feel in our eyes and ears and +jaws how late it was. So we went back to bed. Alice said she knew how to +wake exact to the minute, and we had known her do it before, so we +trusted her, and agreed that she was to wake us at six. + +But, alas! Alice had deemed herself cleverer than she was, by long +chalks, and it was not her that woke us. + +We were aroused from deep slumber by the voice of Mrs. Beale. + +'Hi!' it remarked,'wake up, young gentlemen! It's gone the half after +nine, and your gentleman friend's up and dressed and a-waiting for his +breakfast.' + +We sprang up. + +'I say, Mrs. Beale,' cried Oswald, who never even in sleep quite loses +his presence of mind, 'don't let on to anyone that we've got a visitor.' + +She went away laughing. I suppose she thought it was some silly +play-secret. She little knew. + +We found the stranger looking out of the window. + +'I wouldn't do that,' said Dora softly; 'it isn't safe. Suppose someone +saw you?' + +'Well,' said he, 'suppose they did?' + +'They might take you, you know,' said Dora; 'it's done in a minute. We +saw two poor men taken yesterday.' + +Her voice trembled at the gloomy recollection. + +'Let 'em take me,' said the man who wore the clothes of the plain-living +and high-thinking Mr. Sandal; '_I_ don't mind so long as my ugly mug +don't break the camera!' + +'We want to save you,' Dora was beginning; but Oswald, far-sighted +beyond his years, felt a hot redness spread over his youthful ears and +right down his neck. He said: + +'Please, what were you doing in Dover? And what did you take yesterday?' + +'I was in Dover on business,' said the man, 'and what I took was Hythe +Church and Burmarsh Church, and----' + +'Then you didn't steal a cake and get put into Dover Gaol, and break +loose, and----' said Dicky, though I kicked him as a sign not to. + +'_Me?_' said our friend. 'Not exactly!' + +'Then, _what_ are you? If you're not that poor escaped thief, what are +you?' asked Dora fiercely, before Oswald could stop her. + +'I'm a photographer, miss,' said he--'a travelling photographer.' + +Then slowly but surely he saw it all, and I thought he would never have +done laughing. + + * * * * * + +'Breakfast is getting cold,' said Oswald. + +'So it is,' said our guest. 'Lordy, what a go! This'll be something to +talk about between friends for many a year.' + +'No,' said Alice suddenly; 'we thought you were a runaway thief, and we +wanted to help you whatever you were.' She pointed to the sofa, where +the whole costume of the untrue aunt was lying in simple completeness. +'And you're in honour bound never to tell a soul. Think,' she added in +persuading tones--'think of the cold bacon and the cheese, and all those +pickles you had, and the fire and the cocoa, and us being up all night, +and the dry all-wool boots.' + +'Say no more, miss,' said the photographer (for such he indeed was) +nobly. 'Your will is my law; I won't never breathe a word.' + +And he sat down to the ham and eggs as though it was weeks since he had +tasted bacon. + + * * * * * + +But we found out afterwards he went straight up to the Ship, and told +everybody all about it. I wonder whether all photographers are +dishonourable and ungrateful. Oswald hopes they are not, but he cannot +feel at all sure. + +Lots of people chaffed us about it afterwards, but the pigman said we +were jolly straight young Britons, and it is something to be called that +by a man you really respect. It doesn't matter so much what the other +people say--the people you don't really care about. + +When we told our Indian uncle about it he said, 'Nonsense! you ought +never to try and shield a criminal.' But that was not at all the way we +felt about it at the time when the criminal was there (or we thought he +was), all wet, and hunted, and miserable, with people 'out after him.' +He meant his friends who were expecting him, but we thought he meant +police. It is very hard sometimes to know exactly what is right. If what +_feels_ right _isn't_ right, how are you to know, I wonder. + + * * * * * + +The only comforting thing about it all is that we heard next day that +the soldiers had got away from the brown bicycle beast after all. I +suppose it came home to them suddenly that they _were_ two to one, and +they shoved him into a ditch and got away. They were never caught; I am +very glad. And I suppose _that's_ wrong too--so many things are. But I +_am_. + + + + +THE ARSENICATORS + +A TALE OF CRIME + + +It was Mrs. Beale who put it into our heads that Miss Sandal lived plain +because she was poor. We knew she thought high, because that is what you +jolly well have to do if you are a vegetationist and an all-wooler, and +those sort of things. + +And we tried to get money for her, like we had once tried to do for +ourselves. And we succeeded by means that have been told alone in +another place in getting two golden pounds. + +Then, of course, we began to wonder what we had better do with the two +pounds now we had got them. + +'Put them in the savings-bank,' Dora said. + +Alice said: + +'Why, when we could have them to look at?' + +Noël thought we ought to buy her something beautiful to adorn Miss +Sandal's bare dwelling. + +H. O. thought we might spend it on nice tinned and potted things from +the stores, to make the plain living and high thinking go down better. + +But Oswald knew that, however nice the presents are that other people +buy for you, it is really more satisfying to have the chink to spend +exactly as you like. + +Then Dicky said: + +'I don't believe in letting money lie idle. Father always says it's bad +business.' + +'They give interest at the bank, don't they?' Dora said. + +'Yes; tuppence a year, or some rot like that! We ought to go into trade +with it, and try to make more of it. That's what we ought to do.' + +'If it's Miss Sandal's money, do you think we ought to do anything with +it without asking her?' + +'It isn't hers till she's got it, and it is hers because it's not ours +to spend. I think we're--what is it?--_in loco parentis_ to that two +quid, because anyone can see poor Miss Sandal doesn't know how to manage +her money. And it will be much better if we give her ten pounds than +just two.' + +This is how Dicky argued. + +We were sitting on the sands when this council took place, and Alice +said, 'Suppose we bought a shrimping-net, and sold shrimps from our +window in red handkerchiefs and white French caps.' But we asked her how +she would like going into the sea nearly up to her neck in all weathers, +and she had to own she had not thought of that. Besides, shrimps are so +beastly cheap--more than you can eat for twopence. + +The conversation was not interesting to anyone but Dicky, because we did +not then believe we could do it, though later we thought differently. +But I dare say we should have gone on with it just out of politeness to +him, only at this moment we saw a coastguard, who is a great friend of +ours, waving to us from the sea-wall. So we went up. And he said: + +'You take my tip and cut along home. There's something come for you.' + +'Perhaps it's heaps of things, like I said, to eat with the plain +living,' said H. O. + +And bright visions of hampers full of the most superior tuck winged our +young legs as we cut along home. + +It was not, however, a hamper that we found awaiting us. It was a large +box. And besides that there were two cases addressed to Dicky and me, +and through the gaps in the boards we could see twisted straw, and our +hearts leapt high in our breasts, because we knew that they were bikes. + +And such, indeed, they proved to be--free-wheels of the most unspotted +character, the noble gift of our Indian uncle, ever amiable, generous, +and esteemed. + +While we were getting the glorious bikes from their prison bars, the +others were undoing the box which had their names on it. + +It contained cakes and sweets, a work-basket for Dora, lined with red +satin, and dressed up with silver thimbles, and all sorts of bodkins and +scissors, and knives with silver handles. There was a lovely box of +paints for Alice. + +Noël had a paint-box too, and H. O. had a very good Aunt Sally. And +there were lots of books--not the sawdusty, dry kind that Miss Sandal +had in her house, but jolly good books, the kind you can't put down till +you've finished. But just now we hardly looked at them. For who with a +spark of manly spirit would think twice about a book with a new +free-wheel champing the oil like a charger in a ballad? + +Dicky and I had a three-mile spin before dinner, and only fell off five +times between us. Three spills were Dicky's, one was Oswald's, and one +was when we ran into each other. The bikes were totally uninjured. + +As time ran its appointed course we got a bit used to the bikes, and, +finding that you cannot ride all day and all night, we began to look at +the books. Only one of them comes into this story. It was called 'The +Youth's Manual of Scientific and Mechanical Recreation,' and, of course, +we none of us read it till we'd read everything else, and then we found +it wasn't half bad. It taught you how to make all sorts of +things--galvanic batteries, and kites, and mouse-traps, and how to +electroplate things, and how to do wood-carving and leather-work. We +tried as many of the things as we had money for, and some of them +succeeded. Then we made a fire-balloon. + +It took a long time to make, and then it caught fire and blazed away +before we could get it launched. + +So we made another, and Noël dropped it near the water-butt, where there +was a puddle, and, being tissue-paper, it was unable to stand the +strain. + +So we made another. But the paste was bad, and it did not stick. + +So we made another. + +Then, at last, when all was ready, Oswald climbed on to the pigsty at +Mrs. Beales', and held the balloon very steady while Dicky lighted the +cotton-wool, soaked in spirits of wine, which hangs from the end (where +cars are in larger sizes), and causes it to be called a fire-balloon. A +taper is burned inside the balloon, and then, according to the book, 'it +readily ascends, and is carried away by the wind, sometimes to a +considerable distance.' + +Well, this time everything happened just as the book said, which is not +always the case. + +It was a clear, dark night, bright stars only. And, to our relief and +agreeable surprise, our balloon rose up and sailed away, dragging its +lighted tail like a home-made comet. + +It sailed away over the marshes, getting smaller and smaller, and at +last it was, though lost to sight, to memory dear. Some of us thought it +wasn't worth doing, but Oswald was glad he had persevered. He does hate +to be beaten. However, we none of us cared to make another, so we went +to bed. + +Dicky always goes to sleep directly on these occasions, but Oswald, more +thoughtful for his years, sometimes reviews the events of the day. He +must have been nearly asleep, because he was just reviewing an elephant +that flew with a lamp inside, so that it looked like a fire-balloon, +when Alice suddenly came and woke him up completely. + +'Beware!' she said in tones of awe. + +And he said, but not crossly: + +'Well, what on earth's up now?' + +'The fire-balloon!' replied Alice. + +'What about it?' he rejoined, still calm and kind, though roused from +his reviews. + +'Why, it came to me all in a minute! Oh, Oswald--when it comes +down--there are lots of farms in the march. Suppose it comes down and +sets light to something! It's a crime--arsenic or something--and you can +be hanged for it!' + +'Don't be an idiot!' said Oswald kindly. 'The book wouldn't have told +youths how to make them if they were crimes. Go back to bed, for +goodness' sake!' + +'I wish we hadn't--oh, I do!' said Alice. + +But she did as she was told. Oswald has taught her this. + +Next day her fears had stopped, like silent watches in the night, and +we began to make a trap for badgers--in case we ever found one. + +But Dicky went to the top of the mill with some field-glasses he had +borrowed from Mr. Carrington to look at distant ships with, and he burst +into the busy circle of badger-trap makers, and said: + +'I say, come and look! There's a fire in the marsh!' + +'There!' said Alice, dropping the wire pliers on her good elder +brother's foot. 'What did I tell you?' + +We all tore to the top of the mill, and sure enough, far across the +sunny green marshes rose a little cloud of smoke, and blue and yellow +flames leaped out every now and then. We all took turns to look through +the glasses. + +Then Oswald said: + +'This is no time for looking through field-glasses with your mouths +open. We must go and help. We might fetch the fire-engines or something. +The bikes, Dicky!' + +Almost instantly we were in the saddle and tearing along the level marsh +towards the direction of the fire. At first we got down at every +crossroad and used the field-glasses to see which way to go; but as we +got nearer, or the fire got bigger, or perhaps both, we could see it +quite plainly with the naked eye. It was much further off than we had +thought, but we rode on undaunted, regardless of fatigue and of +dinner-time, being now long gone by. + +We got to the fire at last. It was at Crown Ovender Farm, and we had to +lift the bikes over fences and wheel them over ploughed fields to get +there, because we did not know the right way by road. + +Crown Ovender is a little farmhouse, and a barn opposite, and a great +rick-yard, and two of the ricks were alight. They smoked horribly, and +the wind blew the hot smoke into your eyes, and every now and then you +saw great flames--yards long they seemed--leap out as if they were +crying to get to the house. + +We had put our bikes in a ditch a field away, and now we went all round +about to ask if we could help; but there wasn't a soul to be seen. + +We did not know what to do. Even Oswald--always full of resource--almost +scratched his head, which seems to help some people to think, though I +don't think it ever would me, besides not looking nice. + +'I wish we'd told them in the village,' said Dicky. + +We had not done this, and the reason, the author is ashamed to say, was +because we wanted to get there before anyone else. This was very +selfish, and the author has often regretted it. + +The flames were growing larger and fiercer, and the tar on the side of +the barn next the rick-yard was melting and running down like treacle. + +'There's a well!' said Dicky suddenly. 'It isn't a deep well, and there +are two buckets.' + +Oswald understood. He drew up the water, and Dicky took the buckets as +they came up full and dripping and dashed the water on to the tarry face +of the barn. It hissed and steamed. We think it did some good. We took +it in turns to turn the well-wheel. It was hard work, and it was +frightfully hot. Then suddenly we heard a horrid sound, a sort of +out-of-breath scream, and there was a woman, very red in the face and +perspiring, climbing over the fence. + +'Hallo!' said Oswald. + +'Oh!' the woman said, panting, 'it's not the house, then? Thank them as +be it's not the house! Oh, my heart alive, I thought it was the house!' + +'It isn't the house,' said Oswald; 'but it jolly soon will be!' + +'Oh, my pore Lily!' said the woman. 'With this 'ere wind the house 'll +be alight in a minute. And her a-bed in there! Where's Honeysett?' + +'There's no one here but us. The house is locked up,' we said. + +'Yes, I know, 'cause of tramps. Honeysett's got the key. I comes in as +soon as I've cleared dinner away. She's ill a-bed, sleeping like a lamb, +I'll be bound, all unknowing of her burning end.' + +'We _must_ get her out,' said Oswald. + +But the woman didn't seem to know what to do. She kept on saying, +'Where's Honeysett? Oh, drat him! where's that Honeysett?' + +So then Oswald felt it was the time to be a general, like he always +meant to if he got the chance. He said, 'Come on!' and he took a stone +and broke the kitchen window, and put his hand through the jagged hole +and unfastened the catch, and climbed in. The back-door was locked and +the key gone, but the front-door was only bolted inside. But it stuck +very tight, from having been painted and shut before the paint was dry, +and never opened again. + +Oswald couldn't open it. He ran back to the kitchen window and shouted +to the others. + +'Go round to the other door and shove for all you're worth!' he cried in +the manly tones that all must obey. + +So they went; but Dicky told me afterwards that the woman didn't shove +for anything like all she was worth. In fact, she wouldn't shove at all, +till he had to make a sort of battering-ram of her, and then she seemed +to awake from a dream, and they got the door open. + +We followed the woman up the stairs and into a bedroom, and there was +another woman sitting up in bed trembling, and her mouth opening and +shutting. + +'Oh, it's you, Eliza,' she said, falling back against the pillows. 'I +thought it were tramps.' + +Eliza did not break things to the sufferer gently, like we should have +done, however hurried. + +'Mercy you aren't burnt alive in your bed, Lily!' she merely remarked. +'The place is all ablaze!' + +Then she rolled her sick sufferer in a blanket and took hold of her +shoulders, and told us to take her feet. + +But Oswald was too calm to do this suddenly. He said: + +'Where are you going to put her?' + +'Anywheres!' said Eliza wildly--'anywheres is better than this here.' + +'There's plenty of time,' said Oswald; and he and Dicky rushed into +another room, and got a feather-bed and bedclothes, and hunched them +down the stairs, and dragged them half a field away, and made a bed in a +nice dry ditch. And then we consented to carry the unfortunate bed-woman +to it. + +The house was full of smoke by this time, though it hadn't yet caught +fire; and I tell you we felt just like heroic firemen as we stumbled +down the crookety narrow stairs, back first, bearing the feet of the +sick woman. Oswald did so wish he had had a fireman's helmet to put on! + +When we got the fading Lily to her dry ditch, she clutched Oswald's arm +and whispered: + +'Save the sticks!' + +'What sticks?' asked Oswald, who thought it was the ragings of delirium. + +'She means the furniture,' said Eliza; 'but I'm afraid its doom is +written on high.' + +[Illustration: 'We consented to carry the unfortunate bed-woman to +it.'--Page 76] + +'Rubbish!' said Oswald kindly; and we flew back, us boys dragging Eliza +with us. + +There didn't seem to be much furniture in the house, but when we began +to move it, it at once seemed to multiply itself with the rapidity of +compound interest. We got all the clothes out first, in drawers and +clothes-baskets, and tied up in sheets. Eliza wasn't much use. The only +thing she could do was to look for a bed-key to unscrew the iron +bedsteads; but Oswald and Dicky toiled on. They carried out chairs and +tables and hearthrugs. As Oswald was staggering on under a Windsor +armchair, with a tea-tray and an ironing-board under his arms, he ran +into a man. + +'What's up?' said he. + +'Fire!' said Oswald. + +'I seed that,' said the man. + +Oswald shoved the chair and other things on to the man. + +'Then lend a hand to get the things away,' he said. + +And more and more people came, and all worked hard; but Oswald and Dicky +did most. Eliza never even found that bed-key, because when she saw +people beginning to come thicker and thicker across the fields, like +ants hurrying home, she went out and told everyone over and over again +that Honeysett had got the key. + +Then a woman came along, and Eliza got her into a corner by the stairs +and jawed. I heard part of the jaw. + +'An' pore Mrs. Simpkins, her man he's gone to Ashford Market with his +beasts and the three other men, and me and my man said we'd have Liz up +at my place, her being my sister, so as Honeysett could go off to Romney +about the sheep. But she wouldn't come, not though we brought the light +cart over for her. So we thought it best Honeysett stayed about his +work, and go for the sheep to-morrow.' + +'Then the house would ha' been all empty but for her not being wishful +to go along of you?' Oswald heard the other say. + +'Yes,' said Eliza; 'an' so you see----' + +'You keep your mouth shut,' the other woman fiercely said; 'you're +Lily's sister, but Tom, he's my brother. If you don't shut your silly +mouth you'll be getting of them into trouble. It's insured, ain't it?' + +'I don't see,' said Eliza. + +'You don't never see nothing,' said the other. 'You just don't say a +word 'less you're arst, and then only as you come to look after her and +found the fire a-raging something crool.' + +'But why----' + +The other woman clawed hold of her and dragged her away, whispering +secretly. + +All this time the fire was raging, but there were lots of men now to +work the well and the buckets, and the house and the barn had not +caught. + +When we had got out all the furniture, some of the men set to work on +the barn, and, of course, Oswald and Dicky, though weary, were in this +also. They helped to get out all the wool--bundles and bundles and +bundles of it; but when it came to sacks of turnip seed and things, they +thought they had had enough, and they went to where the things were that +had come out of the larder, and they got a jug of milk and some bread +and cheese, and took it to the woman who was lying in the dry ditch on +the nice bed they had so kindly made for her. She drank some milk, and +asked them to have some, and they did, with bread and cheese (Dutch), +and jolly glad they were of it. + +Just as we had finished we heard a shout, and there was the fire-engine +coming across the field. + +I do like fire-engines. They are so smart and fierce, and look like +dragons ready to fight the devouring element. + +It was no use, however, in spite of the beautiful costumes of the +firemen, because there was no water, except in the well, and not much +left of that. + +The man named Honeysett had ridden off on an old boneshaker of his to +fetch the engines. He had left the key in the place where it was always +kept, only Eliza had not had the sense to look for it. He had left a +letter for her, too, written in red pencil on the back of a bill for a +mowing-machine. It said: 'Rix on fir'; going to git fir'-injins.' + +Oswald treasures this letter still as a memento of happier days. + +When Honeysett saw the line of men handing up buckets to throw on the +tarry wall, he said: + +'That ain't no manner of use. Wind's changed a hour agone.' + +And so it had. The flames were now reaching out the other way, and two +more ricks were on fire. But the tarry walls were quite cool, and very +wet, and the men who were throwing the water were very surprised to +find that they were standing in a great puddle. + +And now, when everything in the house and the barn was safe, Oswald had +time to draw his breath and think, and to remember with despair exactly +who it was that had launched a devastating fire-balloon over the +peaceful marsh. + +It was getting dusk by this time; but even the splendour of all those +burning ricks against the darkening sky was merely wormwood and gall to +Oswald's upright heart, and he jolly soon saw that it was the same to +Dicky's. + +'I feel pretty sick,' he said. 'Let's go home.' + +'They say the whole eleven ricks are bound to go,' said Dicky, 'with the +wind the way it is.' + +'_We're_ bound to go,' said Oswald. + +'Where?' inquired the less thoughtful Dicky. + +'To prison,' said his far-seeing brother, turning away and beginning to +walk towards the bicycles. + +'We can't be sure it was our balloon,' said Dicky, following. + +'Pretty average,' said Oswald bitterly. + +'But no one would know it was us if we held our tongues.' + +'We can't hold our tongues,' Oswald said; 'if we do someone else will be +blamed, as sure as fate. You didn't hear what that woman said about +insurance money.' + +'We might wait and see if anyone _does_ get into trouble, and _then_ +come forward,' said Dicky. + +And Oswald owned they might do that, but his heart was full of despair +and remorse. + +Just as they got to their bikes a man met them. + +'All lost, I suppose?' he said, jerking his thumb at the blazing +farmyard. + +'Not all,' said Dicky; 'we saved the furniture and the wool and +things----' + +The man looked at us, and said heavily: + +'Very kind of you, but it was all insured.' + +'Look here,' said Oswald earnestly, 'don't you say that to anyone else.' + +'Eh?' said the man. + +'If you do, they're safe to think you set fire to it yourself!' + +He stared, then he frowned, then he laughed, and said something about +old heads on young shoulders, and went on. + +We went on, too, in interior gloom, that only grew gloomier as we got +nearer and nearer home. + +We held a council that night after the little ones had gone to bed. Dora +and Alice seemed to have been crying most of the day. They felt a little +better when they heard that no one had been burned to death. Alice told +me she had been thinking all day of large families burned to little +cinders. But about telling of the fire-balloon we could not agree. + +Alice and Oswald thought we ought. But Dicky said 'Wait,' and Dora said +'Write to father about it.' + +Alice said: + +'No; it doesn't make any difference about our not being sure whether our +balloon _was_ the cause of destruction. I _expect_ it was, and, anyway, +we ought to own up.' + +'I feel so too,' said Oswald; 'but I do wish I knew how long in prison +you got for it.' + +We went to bed without deciding anything. + +And very early in the morning Oswald woke, and he got up and looked out +of the window, and there was a great cloud of smoke still going up from +the doomed rickyard. So then he went and woke Alice, and said: + +'Suppose the police have got that poor farmer locked up in a noisome +cell, and all the time it's _us_.' + +'That's just what _I_ feel,' said Alice. + +Then Oswald said, 'Get dressed.' + +And when she had, she came out into the road, where Oswald, pale but +resolute, was already pacing with firm steps. And he said: + +'Look here, let's go and tell. Let's say you and I made the balloon. The +others can stop out of it if they like.' + +'They won't if it's really prison,' said Alice. 'But it would be noble +of us to try it on. Let's----' + +But we found we didn't know who to tell. + +'It seems so fatal to tell the police,' said Alice; 'there's no getting +out of it afterwards. Besides, he's only Jameson, and he's very stupid.' + +The author assures you you do not know what it is like to have a crime +like arsenic on your conscience, and to have gone to the trouble and +expense of making up your mind to confess it, and then not to know who +to. + +We passed a wretched day. And all the time the ricks were blazing. All +the people in the village went over with carts and bikes to see the +fire--like going to a fair or a show. In other circumstances we should +have done the same, but now we had no heart for it. + +In the evening Oswald went for a walk by himself, and he found his +footsteps turning towards the humble dwelling of the Ancient Mariner who +had helped us in a smuggling adventure once. + +The author wishes to speak the truth, so he owns that perhaps Oswald had +some idea that the Ancient Mariner, who knew so much about smugglers and +highwaymen, might be able to think of some way for us to save ourselves +from prison without getting an innocent person put into it. Oswald found +the mariner smoking a black pipe by his cottage door. He winked at +Oswald as usual. Then Oswald said: + +'I want to ask your advice; but it's a secret. I know you can keep +secrets.' + +When the aged one had agreed to this, Oswald told him all. It was a +great relief. + +The mariner listened with deep attention, and when Oswald had quite +done, he said: + +'It ain't the stone jug this time mate. That there balloon of yours, I +see it go up--fine and purty 'twas, too.' + +'We all saw it go _up_,' said Oswald in despairing accents. 'The +question is, where did it come down?' + +'At Burmarsh, sonny,' was the unexpected and unspeakably relieving +reply. 'My sister's husband's niece--it come down and lodged in their +pear-tree--showed it me this morning, with the red ink on it what +spelled your names out.' + +Oswald, only pausing to wring the hand of his preserver, tore home on +the wings of the wind to tell the others. + +I don't think we were ever so glad of anything in our lives. It is a +frightfully blighting thing when you believe yourself to be an +Arsenicator (or whatever it is) of the deepest dye. + +As soon as we could think of anything but our own cleanness from guilt, +we began to fear the worst of Tom Simkins, the farmer at Crown Ovenden. +But _he_ came out of it, like us, without a stain on his fair name, +because he and his sister and his man Honeysett all swore that he had +given a tramp leave to sleep up against the beanstack the night before +the fire, and the tramp's pipe and matches were found there. So he got +his insurance money; but the tramp escaped. + +But when we told father all about it, he said he wished he had been a +director of that fire insurance company. + +We never made another fire-balloon. Though it was not us that time, it +might have been. And we know now but too well the anxieties of a life of +crime. + + + + +THE ENCHANCERIED HOUSE + +A STORY ABOUT THE BASTABLES + + +The adventure which I am about to relate was a very long time ago, and +it was nobody's fault. The part of it that was most like a real crime +was caused by H. O. not being at that date old enough to know +better--and this was nobody's fault--though we took care that but a +brief half-hour elapsed between the discovery of his acts and his +_being_ old enough to know better, and knowing it, too (better, I mean), +quite thoroughly. We were residing at the residence of an old nurse of +father's while Dora was engaged in the unagreeable pastime of having +something catching at home. If she had been with us most likely none of +this would have happened. For she has an almost unerring nose for right +and wrong. Or perhaps what the author means is that she never does the +kind of thing that grown-ups don't like your doing. Father's old nurse +was very jolly to us, and did not bother too much, except about wet +feet and being late for meals, and not airing your shirt before you put +it on. But it is part of the nature of the nicest grown-ups to bother +about these little things, and we must not be hard on them for it, for +no one can help their natures. + +The part where old nurse's house was was where London begins to leave +off being London, but before it can make up its mind not to be it. There +are fields and bits of lanes and hedges, but the rows of ugly little +houses go creeping along like yellow caterpillars, eating up the green +fields. There are brickfields here and there, and cabbage fields, and +places where rhubarb is grown. And it is much more interesting than real +town, because there is more room to do things in, and not so many people +to say 'Don't!' when you do. + +Nurse's house was the kind that is always a house, no matter how much +you pretend it is a baron's castle or an enchanted palace. And to play +at its being a robber's cave or any part of a pirate ship is simply +silly, and no satisfaction to anyone. There were no books except sermons +and the Wesleyan Magazine. And there was a green cut-paper fuzziness on +the frame of the looking-glass in the parlour. There was a garden--at +least, there was enough ground for one, but nothing grew there except +nettles and brick-bats and one elder-tree, and a poor old oak-tree that +had seen better days. There was a hole in the fence, very convenient for +going through in a hurry. + +One morning there had been what old nurse called a 'set out' because +Noël was writing some of his world-without-end poetry, and he had got as +far as + + 'How beautiful the sun and moon + And all the stars appear! + They really are a long way off, + Although they look very near.' + + 'I do not think that they are worlds, + But apples on a tree; + The angels pick them whenever they like, + But it is not so with me. + I wish I was a little angel-child + To gather stars for my tea,' + +before Dicky found out that he was writing it on the blank leaf at the +end of the Latin prize Dicky got at the Preparatory School. + +Noël--for mysterious reasons unknown to Fame--is Alice's favourite +brother, and of course she stood up for him, and said he didn't mean it. + +And things were said on both sides, and the rest of us agreed with Dicky +that Noël was old enough to know better. It ended in Alice and Noël +going out for a walk by themselves as soon as Noël had had the crying +washed off his hands and face. + +The rest of us spent the shining hours in getting a board and nailing it +up in the oak-tree for a look-out station, in case of Saracens arriving +with an army to attack London. The oak is always hard to climb, and this +was a peculiarly hard day, because the next-door people had tied a +clothes-line to the oak, and hung their wet washing out on the line. + +The sun was setting (in the west as usual) before Alice and Noël +returned. They came across the wide fields from the direction of a +pinewood that we had never explored yet, though always meaning to. + +'There!' said Dicky, 'they've been and gone to the pinewood all by +themselves.' + +But the hatchet Dicky was still cherishing in his breast was buried at +once under the first words spoken by the returning party of explorers. + +'Oh, Oswald,' said Alice, 'oh, Dicky, we've found a treasure!' + +Dicky hammered the last nail into the Saracen watch-tower. + +'Not a real money one?' he said, dropping the hammer--which was a +careless thing to do, and the author told him so at the time. + +'No, not a money one, but it's real all the same. Let's have a council, +and I'll tell you.' + +It was then that Dicky showed that if he dropped hammers it was not +because he could not bury hatchets. He said, 'Righto! There's room for +us all up here. Catch hold, Noël. Oswald, give him a shove up. Alice and +he can sit in the Saracens' watch-tower, and I'll keep hold of H. O. if +you'll hand him up.' + +Alice was full of the politest compliments about the architecture of the +Saracens' watch-tower, and Noël said: + +'I say, Dicky, I'm awfully sorry about your prize.' + +'It's all right,' said Dicky; 'I rubbed it out with bread.' + +Noël opened his mouth. He looks like a very young bird when he does +this. + +'Then my beautiful poem's turned into dirty bread-crumbs,' he said +slowly. + +'Never mind,' said Alice; 'I remember nearly every word of it: we'll +write it out again after tea.' + +'I thought you'd be so pleased,' Noël went on, 'because it makes a book +more valuable to have an author's writing in it. Albert's uncle told me +so.' + +'But it has to be the same author that wrote the book,' Alice explained, +'and it was Cæsar wrote that book. And you aren't Cæsar _yet_, you +know.' + +'Nor don't want to be,' said Noël. + +Oswald now thought that politeness was satisfied on both sides, so he +said: + +'What price treasures?' + +And then Alice told. But it had to be in whispers, because the next-door +people, who always did things at times when not convenient to us, were +now taking in their washing off the line. I heard them remark that it +was a 'good drying day.' + +'Well,' Alice mysteriously observed, 'it was like this. (Do you think +the Saracens' watch-tower is really safe for two? It seems to go down +awfully much in the middle.)' + +'Sit nearer the ends, then,' said Oswald. 'Well?' + +'We thought we would go to the pinewoods because of reading in Bret +Harte that the resinous balsam of the pine is healing to the wounded +spirit.' + +'I should have thought if anybody's spirit was wounded...' said Dicky in +tones of heatening indignantness. + +'Yes, I know. But you'd got the oak, and I expect oaks are just as good, +if not better, especially for English people, because of Oakapple +Day--and----Where was I?' + +We told her. + +'So we went, and it is a very nice wood--quite tulgy, you know. We +expected to see a Bandersnatch every minute, didn't we, Noël? It's not +very big, though, and on the other side there's an enchanted +desert--rather bare, with patches of grass and brambles. And in the very +middle of it we found the treasure.' + +'Let's have a squint at the treasure,' said Dicky. 'Did you fetch it +along?' + +Noël and Alice sniggered. + +'Not exactly,' said Alice; 'the treasure is a _house_.' + +'It's an enchanted house,' said Noël, 'and it's a deserted house, and +the garden is like in "The Sensitive Plant" after the lady has given up +attending.' + +'Did you go in?' we asked. + +'No,' said Alice; 'we came back for you. And we asked an old man, and +he _did_ say it was in Chancery, so no one can live in it.' + +H. O. asked what was enchancery. + +'I'm certain the old man meant enchanted,' said Noël, 'only I expect +that's the old-fashioned word for it. Enchanceried is a very nice word. +And it means it's an enchanted house, just like I said.' + +Nurse now came out to remark, 'Tea, my dears,' so we left the Saracens' +tower and went in to that meal. + +Noël began to make a poem called 'The Enchanceried House,' but we got +him to stop till there was more for him to write about. There soon was +more, and more than enough, as it turned out. + +The setting sun had set, but it had left a redness in the sky (like one +of those distant fires that you go after, and they are always miles from +where you are) which shone through the pinetrees. The house looked +black and mysterious against the strawberry-ice-coloured horizon. + +It was a good-sized house. The bottom-floor windows were boarded up. It +had a Sensitive-Plantish garden and a paved yard and outhouses. The +garden had a high wall with glass on top, but Oswald and Dicky got into +the yard. Green grass was growing between the paving-stones. The corners +of the stable and coach-house doors were rough, as if from the attacks +of rats, but we never saw any of these stealthy rodents. The back-door +was locked, but we climbed up on the water-butt and looked through a +little window, and saw a plate-rack, and a sink with taps, and a copper, +and a broken coal-scuttle. It was very exciting. + +The day after we went again, and this time we borrowed the next-door +people's clothes-line, and by tying it in loops made a sort of +rope-ladder, and then all of us got over. We had a glorious game +besieging the pigsty, and all the military orders had to be given in +whispers for fear of us being turned out if anyone passed and heard us. +We found the pinewood, and the field, and the house had all got boards +to say what would be done to trespassers with the utmost rigour of the +law. It was such a swat untying the knots in the next-door people's +clothes-line, that we only undid one; and then we bought them a new line +with our own pocket-money, and kept the rope-ladder in a hidden bed of +nettles, always on the spot and ready for us. + +We found a way of going round, and getting to the house through a hole +in a hedge and across a lane, so as not to go across the big fields +where every human eye could mark our proceedings, and come after us and +tell us not to. + +We went there every day. It would have been a terrible thing if an army +of bloodthirsty Saracens had chosen that way to march on London, for +there was hardly ever a look-out in the tower now. + +It was a jolly place to play in, and Oswald had found out what 'in +Chancery' really means, so he had no fear of being turned into a +pig-headed lady, or marble from the waist down. + +And after a bit we began to want to get into the house, and we wanted it +so much that our hearts got quite cold about the chicken-house and the +pigsty, which at first had been a fairy dream of delight. + +But the doors were all locked. We got all the old keys we could, but +they were all the keys of desks and workboxes and tea-caddies, and not +the right size or shape for doors. + +Then one day Oswald, with his justly celebrated observingness, noticed +that one of the bars was loose in the brickwork of a sort of +half-underground window. To pull it out was to the lion-hearted youth +but the work of a moment. He got down through the gap thus obtained, and +found himself in a place like a very small area, only with no steps, and +with bars above him, broken glass and matted rags and straw beneath his +enterprising boots, and on one side a small cobwebby window. He got out +again and told the others, who were trying to get up the cobblestones +by the stable so as to make an underground passage into the stable at +the ratty corner of its door. + +They came at once, and, after a brief discussion, it was decided to +break the window a little more than it was already, and to try to get in +a hand that could unlatch the window. Of course, as Oswald had +found the bar, it was to be his hand. + +The dauntless Oswald took off his jacket, and, wrapping it round his +fist, shoved at the pane nearest the window fastening. The glass fell +inwards with the noise you would expect. In newspapers I suppose they +would call it a sickening thud. Really it was a sort of hollow tinkling +sound. It made even Oswald jump, and H. O. said: + +'Suppose the window opens straight into a bottomless well!' + +We did not think this likely, but you cannot be too careful when you are +exploring. + +Oswald got in his hand and undid the window fastening, which was very +rusty. The window opened out like a door. There was only just room in +the area under the bars for Oswald and the opening of the window. He +leaned forward and looked in. He was not surprised to find that it was +not a well, after all, but a cellar. + +'Come on,' he said; 'it's all right.' + +Dicky came on so rapidly that his boots grazed the shoulder of the +advancing Oswald. Alice was coming next, but Noël begged her to wait. + +'I don't think H. O. ought to go in till we're sure it's safe,' he said; +and Oswald hopes it was not because Noël was in a funk himself, though +with a poet you never know. + +The cellar into which Oswald now plunged had a damp and mouldering +smell, like of mouse-traps, and straw, and beer-barrels. Another cellar +opened out of it, and in this there was traces of coal having existed in +other ages. + +Passing the coal-cellar, we went out to a cellar with shelves on the +wall like berths in a ship, or the catacombs where early Christians +used to be bricked up. Of course, we knew it was only a wine-cellar, +because we have one at home. Matches had to be used here. Then we found +a flight of stone steps and went up. And Oswald is not ashamed to own +that, the staircase being of a twisty nature, he did think what it would +be like if he and Dicky were to meet Something at one of the corners; +but all was peace and solitude. Yet it was with joy, and like meeting an +old friend, that we got out of the cellars, stairs, and through a door +to the back-kitchen, where the sink was, and the copper and the +plate-rack. Oswald felt like a brother to the broken coal-scuttle. Our +first instant thought was the back door. + +It was bolted top and bottom, and the bolts were sort of cemented into +their places with rust. But they were unable to resist our patient and +determined onslaught. Only when we had undone them the door kept shut, +and by stooping down and looking we saw that this was because it was +locked. + +Dicky at once despaired, and said, 'It's no go.' + +But the researchful Oswald looked round, and there was a key on a nail, +which shows how wrong it is to despair. + +It was not the right key, proving later to be the key of the +chicken-house. So we went into the hall. There was a bunch of keys on a +nail on the back of the front-door. + +'There now, you see I was right,' remarked Oswald. And he was, as is so +often the case. All the keys had labels, and one of these said +'Back-kitchen,' so we applied it at once, and the locked door yielded to +it. + +'You can bring H. O. in quite safely,' Oswald said when the door had +creakingly consented to open itself, and to disclose the sunshine, and +the paved yard with the paving stones marked out with green grass, and +the interested expressions on the faces of Alice and the others. 'It's +quite safe. It's just a house like anyone else's, only it hasn't got any +furniture in it.' + +We went all over the house. There were fourteen rooms altogether, +fifteen if you counted the back-kitchen where the plate-warmer was, and +the copper, and the sink with the taps, and the brotherly coal-scuttle. +The rooms were quite different from the ones in old nurse's house. Noël +said he thought all the rooms in this house had been the scene of duels +or elopements, or concealing rightful heirs. The present author doesn't +know about that, but there was a splendid cupboardiness about the place +that spoke volumes to a discerning eye. Even the window seats, of which +there were six, lifted up like the lids of boxes, and you could have +hidden a flying Cavalier in any of them, if he had been of only medium +height and slender build, like heroes with swords so often are. + +Then there were three staircases, and these must have been darkly +convenient for getting conspirators away when the King's officers were +at the door, as so constantly happened in romantic times. + +The whole house was full of ideas for ripping games, and when we came +away Alice said: + +'We must be really better than we know. We must have done _something_ to +deserve a find like this.' + +'Don't worry,' said Oswald. 'Albert's uncle says you always have to pay +for everything. We haven't paid for this yet.' + +This reflection, like so many of our young hero's, was correct. + +I have not yet told you about the finest find of all the fine finds we +found finally (that looks very odd, and I am not sure if it is +allity-what's-its-name, or only carelessness. I wonder whether other +authors are ever a prey to these devastating doubts?) This find was on +the top floor. It was a room with bars to the windows, and it was a very +odd shape. You went along a passage to the door, and then there was the +room; but the room went back along the same way as the passage had come, +so that when you went round there no one could see you from the door. +The door was sort of in the middle of the room; but I see I must draw it +for you, or you will never understand. + +[Illustration] + +The door that is marked 'Another Door' was full of agitated excitement +for us, because it wasn't a door at all--at least, not the kind that you +are used to. It was a gate, like you have at the top of nursery stairs +in the mansions of the rich and affluent; but instead of being halfway +up, it went all the way up, so that you could see into the room through +the bars. + +'Somebody must have kept tame lunatics here,' said Dicky. + +'Or bears,' said H. O. + +'Or enchanceried Princes,' said Noël. + +'It seems silly, though,' said Alice, 'because the lunatic or the bear +or the enchanted Prince could always hide round the corner when he heard +the keepers coming, if he didn't happen to want to show off just then.' + +This was so, and the deep mystery of the way this room was built was +never untwisted. + +'Perhaps a Russian prisoner was kept there,' said Alice, 'and they did +not want to look too close for fear he would shoot them with his +bomb-gun. Poor man! perhaps he caught vodka, or some other of those +awful foreign diseases, and died in his hidden confinement.' + +It was a most ripping room for games. The key of it was on the bunch +labelled 'Mrs. S.'s room.' We often wondered who Mrs. S. was. + +'Let's have a regular round of gaieties,' said Oswald. 'Each of us to +take it in turns to have the room, and act what they like, and the +others look through the bars.' + +So next day we did this. + +Oswald, of course, dressed up in bath-towels and a sheet as the ghost of +Mrs. S., but Noël and H. O. screamed, and would not be calm till he tore +off the sheet and showed his knickerbockers and braces as a guarantee of +good faith. Alice put her hair up, and got a skirt, and a large +handkerchief to cry in, and was a hapless maiden imprisoned in a tower +because she would not marry the wicked Baron. Oswald instantly took the +part of the wicked Baron, and Dicky was the virtuous lover of low +degree, and they had a splendid combat, and Dicky carried off the lady. +Of course, that was the proper end to the story, and Oswald had to +pretend to be beaten, which was not the case. + +Dicky was Louis XVI. watch-making while waiting for the guillotine to +happen. So we were the guillotine, and he was executed in the paved +yard. + +Noël was an imprisoned troubadour dressed in bright antimacassars, and +he fired off quite a lot of poetry at us before we could get the door +open, which was most unfair. + +H. O. was a clown. He had no fancy dress except flour and two Turkish +towels pinned on to look like trousers, but he put the flour all over +himself, and it took the rest of the day to clean him. + +It was when Alice was drying the hair-brushes that she had washed after +brushing the flour out of Noël's hair in the back-garden that Oswald +said: + +'_I_ know what that room was made for.' + +And everyone said, 'What?' which is not manners, but your brothers and +sisters do not mind because it saves time. + +'Why, _coiners_,' said Oswald. 'Don't you see? They kept a sentinel at +the door, that _is_ a door, and if anyone approached he whispered +"_Cave_."' + +'But why have iron bars?' + +'In extra safety,' said Oswald; 'and if their nefarious fires were not +burning he need not say "_Cave_" at all. It's no use saying anything for +nothing.' + +It is curious, but the others did not seem to see this clear +distinguishedness. All people have not the same fine brains. + +But all the same the idea rankled in their hearts, and one day father +came and took Dicky up to London about that tooth of his, and when +Dicky came back he said: + +'Look here, talking of coiners, there was a man in St. Swithin's Lane +to-day selling little bottles of yellow stuff, and he rubbed some of it +on a penny, and it turned the penny into a half-crown before your +eyes--a new half-crown! It was a penny a bottle, so I bought three +bottles.' + +'I always thought the plant for coining was very expensive,' said Alice. + +'Ah! they tell you that to keep you from doing it, because of its being +a crime,' said Dicky. 'But now I've got this stuff we can begin to be +coiners right away. I believe it isn't really a crime unless you try to +buy things with the base coin.' + +So that very afternoon, directly after dinner, which had a suet pudding +in it that might have weighed down the enterprising spirit of anyone but +us, we went over to the Enchanceried House. + +We found our good rope ladder among its congealing bed of trusty +nettles, and got over into the paved yard, and through the kitchen-door. +Oswald always carried the key of this hung round his neck by a bootlace, +as if it was a talisman, or the hair of his lost love. Of course, Oswald +never had a lost love. He would scorn the action. But some heroes do +have. _De gustibus_ something or other, which means, one man's meat is +another man's poison. + +When we got up into the room with the iron-grated door, it all seemed +very bare. Three bottles of yellow stuff and tenpence halfpenny in +coppers is not much to start a coining enterprise with. + +'We ought to make it _look_ like coining, anyway,' said Oswald. + +'Coiners have furnaces,' said Dicky. + +Alice said: 'Wouldn't a spirit-lamp do? Old nurse has got an old one on +the scullery shelf.' + +We thought it would. + +Then Noël reminded us that coiners have moulds, and Oswald went and +bought a pair of wooden lemon squeezers for sevenpence three farthings. +In his far-sightedness he remembered that coiners use water, so he +bought two enamelled iron bowls at sixpence halfpenny the two. When he +came back he noticed the coal-scuttle we had always felt so friendly to, +and he filled it with water and brought it up. It did not leak worth +mentioning. + +'We ought to have a bench,' said Dicky; 'most trades have +that--shoemakers and watchmakers, and tailors and lawyers.' + +This was difficult, but we did it. There were some planks in the cellar, +and a tub and a beer-barrel. Unluckily, the tub and the beer-barrel were +not the same height, but we taught them better by getting old nurse's +'Pilgrim's Progress' and the _Wesleyan Magazine_, to put on top of the +tub; and then it was as high as the barrel, and we laid the boards +across, and there was a bench as beautiful as you could wish. + +Dicky was allowed to put the stuff on the coins, because he had bought +the bottles with his own money. But Alice held them for him to do, +because girls are inferior beings, except when you are ill, and you must +be kind to them or you need never hope to be a hero. There are drawbacks +to every ambition. + +She let Noël hold them part of the time. + +When she was not helping Dicky, she tried covering pennies with the +silver paper off chocolate, but it was not the kind of success that +would take anyone in. + +H. O. and Noël took it in turns to be sentinel, but they said it was +dull, so Oswald took it on. And before he had been there three minutes +he cried, 'Hist! someone approaches!' and the coining materials were +hastily concealed and everyone hid round the corner, like we had agreed +we would do if disturbed in our unlawful pursuits. + +Of course, there wasn't anyone really. After this the kids wanted to be +sentinels again, but Oswald would not let them. + +It was a jolly good game. And there was something about that house that +made whatever you played in it seem awfully real. When I was Mrs. S. I +felt quite unhappy, and when Dicky was the unfortunate monarch who +perished in the French Revolution he told me afterwards he didn't half +like it when it came to the guillotine, though, of course, he knew the +knife was only the little sliding-door of the chicken-house. + +We played coiners for several days, and all learned to give the alarm, +but we were beginning to feel it was time for something new. Noël was +saving the hairs out of his comb, and pulling them out of the horsehair +sofa in the parlour, to make a hair shirt to be a hermit in, and Oswald +had bought a file to get through the bars and be an escaped Bastille +prisoner, leaving his life-history concealed in the fireplace, when the +great event occurred. + +We found the silvered money turned to a dirty black when a few hours had +elapsed, and we tried silver paint and gold paint. Our pockets were +always full of gold and silver money, and we could jingle it and take it +out in handfuls and let people see it--not too near. + +Then came the great eventful day. + +H. O. had fallen into the water-butt that morning. We dried his holland +smock, but it went stiff like paper, so that old nurse noticed it, and +thus found out that he was wringing wet underneath. So she put him to +bed, for fear of his catching his death of cold, and the inveterate gang +of coiners had to go to their fell lair without him. We left all our +false money at home, because old nurse had given Alice a piece of +trimming, for dolls, that was all over little imitation silver coins, +called sequences, I believe, to imitate the coinage of Turkish regions. +We reached our Enchanceried House, got in as usual, and started our +desperate work of changing silver sequences into gold half-sovereigns, +with gold paint. + +Noël was very grumpy: he was odd altogether that day. He was trying to +write a poem about a Bastille prisoner. He asked to be sentry, so that +he could think about rhymes. + +We had not coined more than about four half-sovereigns when we heard +Noël say: 'Hist! Hide the plant!' + +We didn't take any notice, because we wanted to get enough of them done +to play a game of misers, which was Alice's idea. + +'Hist!' Noël said again. And then suddenly he rushed in and said: 'It's +a _real_ hist! I tell you there's someone on the stairs.' + +And he shut the wooden-grated door, and Oswald, with rare presence of +mind, caught up the bunch of keys and locked the wooden-grated door with +the key labelled 'Mrs. S.'s room.' + +Then, breathless and furtive, we all hid in the part of the room near +the fireplace, where no one could see us from the door. + +We hardly dared to breathe. Alice said afterwards that she could hear +Oswald's heart beating with terror, but the author is almost sure that +it was only his watch ticking. It had begun to go that week, after days +of unexplained idleness. If we _did_ have to pay for finding the +Enchanceried House, this was when we paid. + +There _were_ feet on the stairs. We all heard them. And voices. The +author distinctly heard the words 'replete with every modern +inconvenience,' and 'pleasantly situate ten minutes from tram and +rail.' + +And Oswald, at least, understood that, somehow or other, our house had +got itself disenchanceried, and that the owner was trying to let it. + +We held our breaths till they were nearly choked out of us. + +The steps came nearer and nearer. They came along the passage, and +stopped at the door. + +'This is the nursery,' said a manly voice. 'Ah, locked! I quite +understood from the agent that the keys were in the hall.' + +Of course _we_ had the keys, and this was the moment that Noël chose for +dropping them. Why he was fingering them where they lay on the +mantelpiece the author does not know, and never will know. There is +something about 'previously demented' in some Latin chap--Virgil or +Lucretius--that seems to hit the nail on the head. The keys fell on the +cracked hearthstone with a clang that Oswald, at any rate, will never +forget. + +There was an awful silence--quite a long one. + +Then another voice said: + +'There's someone in there.' + +'Look at that bench,' said the other man; 'it's coiners' work, that's +what it is, but there's nobody there. The keys must have _blown_ down!' + +The two voices talked some time, but we could not hear all their +conversation. We were all wondering, as it turned out afterwards, what +exactly the utmost rigour of the law was. Because, of course, we knew we +were trespassers of the very deepest dye, even if we could prove that we +were not real coiners. + +'No,' we heard one of them say, 'if we go for the police very likely the +gang will return and destroy everything. There's no one here now. Let's +secure the evidence. We can easily break the door down.' + +It is a sickening feeling when the evidence against you is going to be +secured, and you don't know what the punishment for coining is, or +whether anyone will believe you if you say you were only playing at it. + +We exchanged pallid glances. + +We could hear the two men shaking the door, and we had no means of +knowing just how weak it was, never having seriously tampered with it +ourselves. + +It was then that Noël suddenly went quite mad. I think it was due to +something old nurse had read to us at breakfast that day about a boy of +eight who played on the fiddle, and composed pieces of music. Affected +young ass! + +He darted from us into the middle of the room, where the two intruders +could see him, and said: + +'Don't break down the door! The villains may return any moment and +destroy you. Fetch the police!' + +The surprised outsiders could find no word but 'Er?' + +'You are surprised to see me here,' said Noël, not taking any notice of +the furious looks of the rest of us. 'I am an infant prodigy. I play the +violin at concerts; I play it beautifully. They take me to London to +play in a closed carriage, so that I can't tell anyone my woes on the +way.' + +'My poor child!' said one of the outsiders; 'tell us all about it. We +must rescue you.' + +'Born of poor but honest parents,' said Noël--and this was what nurse +had read out to us--'my musical talent early manifested itself on a toy +violin, the gift of a devoted great-aunt. Torn from my home----I say, do +fetch the police. If the monsters who live on my violin-playing return +and find you here, they will brain you with the tools of their trade, +and I shall be lost.' + +'Their trade?' said one of them. 'What trade?' + +'They are coiners,' said Noël, 'as well as what they do to me to make me +play.' + +'But if we leave you?' + +'Oh, they won't hurt _me_,' cried Noël, 'because I have to play to-night +at Exeter Hall. Fly--fly for the police! They may come up behind you any +moment and cleave you to the chine.' + +And they actually flew. The present author would have known instantly +that it was rot that about cleaving chines, but the man who wanted to +let the Disenchanteried House and the man who wanted to have it let to +him were of other mettle. + +We had remained perfectly still and silent. Of course, if the outsiders +had attacked Noël, his brothers would have rushed to his rescue. + +As soon as the retreating boots of the outsiders grew fainter on the +stairs, Noël turned green, and had to be revived by splashings from the +brotherly coal-scuttle full of water. He got better directly, and we all +scooted home to old nurse's, leaving our coining plant without a pang. +All great generals say that a retreat is best conducted without +impediments. + +Noël was so ill he had to go to bed and stay there. This was as well, +because of the neighbourhood being scoured for the ill-used infant +prodigy that had been imprisoned in the Enchanceried House. He got all +right again in time to go home when father came up for us. While he was +in bed he wrote a long poem in six different coloured chalks, called +'The Enchanceried Coiners, or the Liar's Remorse.' So I know he was +sorry for what he had done. He told me he could not think what made him, +and of course it was very wrong, but it did save our bacon, and preserve +us from the noisome cells and bread and water that I am sure are the +real meaning of the 'utmost rigour of the law.' + +Really the worst of it all was that while we were trembling in the +coiners' den, with the two outside gentlemen snorting and whispering on +the other side of the gate-door, H. O. had got up out of his bed at home +and answered the door. (Old nurse had gone out to get a lettuce and an +aerated loaf for tea.) He answered it to a butcher's bill for fifteen +and sevenpence that the butcher's little girl had brought, and he paid +it with six of the pennies that we had disguised as half-crowns, and +told the little girl to call for the sevenpence in the morning. I +believe many people have been hanged for less. It was lucky for H. O. +that old nurse was a friend of the butcher's, and able to persuade him +that it was only a joke. In sterner times, like the French Revolution +... but Alice does not like to think what would have happened then. As +this is the twentieth century, and not the eighteenth, our all going +down to the butcher and saying we were sorry made it all right. But +suppose it had been in other dates! + +The butcher's wife gave us cake and ginger wine, and was very jolly. She +asked us where we had got the false half-crowns. Oswald said they had +been given us. This was true, but when they were given us they were +pennies. + +Did Oswald tell a lie to the butcher? He has often wondered. He hopes +not. It is easy to know whether a thing is a lie or not when nothing +depends on it. But when events are happening, and the utmost rigour of +the law may be the result of your making a mistake, you have to tell the +truth as carefully as you can. + +No English gentleman tells a lie--Oswald knows that, of course. But an +Englishman is not obliged to criminalate himself. The rules of honour +and the laws of your country are very puzzling and contradictory. + +But the butcher got paid afterwards in real money--a half-sovereign and +two half-crowns, and seven unsilvered pennies. So nobody was injured, +and the author thinks that is the great thing after all. + +All the same, if ever he goes to stay with old nurse again, he thinks he +will tell the butcher. All in confidence. He does not like to have any +doubts about such a serious thing as the honour of a Bastable. + +THE END OF OSWALD'S PART OF THE BOOK. + + + +OTHERS + +[Illustration: 'A little person in a large white cap.'--Page 257] + + + + +MOLLY, THE MEASLES, AND THE MISSING WILL + + +We all think a great deal too much of ourselves. We all believe--every +man, woman, and child of us--in our very insidest inside heart, that no +one else in the world is at all like us, and that things happen to us +that happen to no one else. Now, this is a great mistake, because +however different we may be in the colour of our hair and eyes, the +inside part, the part that we feel and suffer with, is pretty much alike +in all of us. But no one seems to know this except me. That is why +people won't tell you the really wonderful things that happen to them: +they think you are so different that you could never believe the +wonderful things. But of course you are not different really, and you +can believe wonderful things as easily as anybody else. For instance, +you will be able to believe this story quite easily, for though it +didn't happen to you, that was merely an accident. It might have +happened, quite easily, to you or any else. As it happened, it happened +to Maria Toodlethwaite Carruthers. + +You will already have felt a little sorry for Maria, and you will have +thought that I might have chosen a prettier name for her. And so I +might. But I did not do the choosing. Her parents did that. And they +called her Maria after an aunt who was disagreeable, and would have been +more disagreeable than ever if the baby had been called Enid or Elaine +or Vivien, or any of the pretty names that will readily occur to you. +She was called Toodlethwaite after the eminent uncle of that name who +had an office in London and an office in Liverpool, and was said to be +rolling in money. + +'I _should_ like to see Uncle Toodlethwaite rolling in his money,' said +Maria, 'but he never does it when I'm about.' + +The third name, Carruthers, was Maria's father's name, and she often +felt thankful that it was no worse. It might so easily have been Snooks +or Prosser. + +Of course no one called Maria Maria except Aunt Maria herself. Her Aunt +Eliza, who was very refined, always wrote in the improving books that +she gave Maria on her birthday, 'To dearest Marie, from her affectionate +Aunt Elise,' and when she spoke to her she called her Mawrie. Her +brothers and sisters, whenever they wanted to be aggravating, called her +Toodles, but at times of common friendliness they called her Molly, and +so did most other people, and so shall I, and so may you. + +Molly and her brothers and sisters were taken care of by a young woman +who was called a nursery-governess. I don't know why, for she did not +nurse them, and she certainly did not govern them. In her last situation +she had been called a lady-help--I don't know the why of that, either. +Her name was Simpshall, and she was always saying 'Don't,' and 'You +mustn't do that,' and 'Put that down directly,' and 'I shall tell your +mamma if you don't leave off.' She never seemed to know what you ought +to do, but only what you oughtn't. + +One day the children had a grand battle with all the toy soldiers, and +the little brass cannons that shoot peas, and the other kind that shoot +pink caps with '_Fortes Amorces_' on the box. + +Bertie, who always liked to have everything as real as possible, did +not like the soldiers to be standing on the bare polished mahogany of +the dining-table. + +'It's not a bit like the field of glory,' he said. And indeed it was +not. + +So he borrowed the large kitchen knife-box and went out, and brought it +in full of nice real clean mould out of the garden. Half a dozen +knife-box-fulls were needed to cover the table. Then the children made +forts and ditches, and brought in sprigs of geranium and calceolaria and +box and yew and made trees and ambushes and hedges. It was a lovely +battlefield, and would have melted the heart of anyone but a +nursery-governess. + +But she just said, 'What a disgusting mess! How naughty you are!' and +fetched a brush and swept the field of glory away into the dustpan. +There was only just time to save the lives of the soldiers. + +And then Cecily put the knife-box back without saying what it had been +used for, and the knives were put into it, so that at dinner everything +tasted of earth, and the grit got between people's teeth, so that they +could not eat their mutton or potatoes or cabbage, or even their gravy. + +This, of course, was entirely Miss Simpshall's fault. If she had not +behaved as she did Bertie or Eva would have remembered to clean out the +knife-box. As it was, the story of the field of glory came out over the +gritty mutton and things, and father sent all the battlefield-makers to +bed. + +Molly was out of this. She was staying with Aunt Eliza, who was kind, if +refined. She was to come back the next day. But as mother was on her way +to the station to meet Aunt Maria for a day's shopping, she met a +telegraph boy, who gave her a telegram from Aunt Eliza saying: + + 'Am going to Palace to-day instead of to-morrow. Fetch + Marie.--ELISE.' + +So mother fetched her from Aunt Eliza's flat in Kensington and took her +shopping with Aunt Maria. There were hours of shopping in hot, stuffy +shops full of tired shop-people and angry ladies, and even the new hat +and jacket and the strawberry ice at the pastrycook's in Oxford Street +did not make up to Molly for that tiresome day. + +Still, she was out of the battlefield row. Only as she did not know that +it could not comfort her. + +When Aunt Maria had been put into her train, mother and Molly went home. +As their cab stopped, Miss Simpshall rushed out between the two dusty +laburnums by the gate. + +'Don't come in!' said Miss Simpshall wildly. + +'My dear Miss Simpshall----' said mother. + +The hair of the nursery-governess waved wildly in the evening breeze. +She shut the ornamental iron gate in mother's face. + +'Don't come in!' said Miss Simpshall again. 'You shan't, you +mustn't----' + +'Don't talk nonsense,' said mother, looking very white. 'Have you gone +mad?' + +Miss Simpshall said she hadn't. + +'But what's the matter?' said mother. + +'Measles,' said Miss Simpshall; 'it's all out on them--thick.' + +'Good gracious!' said mother. + +'And I thought you'd perhaps just as soon Molly didn't have it, Mrs. +Carruthers. And this is all the thanks I get, being told I'm insane.' + +'I'm sorry,' said mother absently. 'Yes, you were quite right. Keep the +children warm. Has the doctor seen them?' + +'Not yet; I've only just found it out. Oh, it's terrible! Their hands +and faces are all scarlet with purple spots.' + +'Oh dear, oh dear! I hope it's nothing worse than measles! I'll call in +and send the doctor,' said mother; 'I shall be home by the last train. +It's a blessing Molly's clothes are all here in her box.' + +So Molly was whisked off in the cab. + +'I must take you back to your aunt's,' said mother. + +'But Aunt Eliza's gone to stay at the Bishop's Palace,' said Molly. + +'So she has; we must go to your Aunt Maria's. Oh dear!' + +'Never mind, mother,' said Molly, slipping her hand into mother's; +'perhaps they won't have it very badly. And I'll be very good, and try +not to have it at all.' + +This was very brave of Molly; she would much rather have had measles +than have gone to stay at Aunt Maria's. + +Aunt Maria lived in a lovely old house down in Kent. It had beautiful +furniture and beautiful gardens; in fact, as Bertie said, it was a place + + 'Where every prospect pleases, + And only aunt is vile.' + +Molly and her mother arrived there just at supper-time. Aunt Maria was +very surprised and displeased. Molly went to bed at once, and her +supper was brought up on a tray by Clements, aunt's own maid. It was +cold lamb and mint-sauce, and jelly and custard. + +'Your aunt said to bring you biscuits and milk,' said Clements, 'but I +thought you'd like this better.' + +'You're a darling!' said Molly; 'I was so afraid you'd be gone for your +holiday. It's not nearly so beastly when you're here.' + +Clements was flattered, and returned the compliment. + +'And you aren't so bad when you're good, miss,' she said. 'Eat it up. +I'll come back and bring you a night-light by-and-by.' + +One thing Molly liked about Aunt Maria's was that there were no +children's bedrooms--no bare rooms with painted furniture and Dutch +drugget. All the rooms were 'best rooms', with soft carpets +and splendid old furniture. The beds were all four-posters with carved +pillars and silk damask curtains, and there were sure to be the +loveliest things to make believe with in whatever room you happened to +be put into. In this room there were cases of stuffed birds, and a +stuffed pike that was just like life. There was a wonderful old +cabinet, black and red and gold, very mysterious, and oak chests, and +two fat white Indian idols sitting cross-legged on the mantelpiece. It +was very delightful; but Molly liked it best in the daytime. And she was +glad of the night-light. + +She thought of Bertie, and Cicely, and Eva, and baby, and Vincent, and +wondered whether measles hurt much. + +Next day Aunt Maria was quite bearable. The worst thing she said was +about people coming when they weren't expected, and upsetting +everything. + +'I'll try not to upset anything,' said Molly, and went out and got the +gardener to put up a swing for her. + +Then she upset herself out of it, and got a bump on her forehead the +size of a hen's egg, and that, as Aunt Maria very properly said, kept +her out of mischief for the rest of the day. + +Next morning Molly had two letters. The first was from Bertie. It said: + + 'DEAR MOLLY, + + 'It is rough lines on you, but we did not mean to keep it up, and + it is your fault for coming home the day before you ought to have. + We did it to kid old Simpshall, because she was so beastly about us + making a real battlefield. We only painted all the parts of us that + show with vermilion, and put spots--mixed crimson lake and Prussian + blue--all over, and we pulled down the blinds and said our heads + ached, and so they did with crying--I mean the girls cried. She was + afraid to come near us; but she was sorry she had been such a + beast. And when she had come to the door and said so through the + keyhole we owned up, but you had gone by then. It was a rare + lark, but we've got three days bedder for it. I shall lower this on + the end of a fishingline to the baker's boy, and he will post it. + It is like a dungeon. He is going to bring us tarts, like a + faithful page. + + 'Your affectionate bro., + 'BERTRAND DE LISLE CARRUTHERS.' + + + +The other letter was from mother. + + 'MY DARLING MOLLY, + + It was all a naughty hoax, intended to annoy poor Miss Simpshall. + Your brothers and sisters had painted their faces red and + purple--they had not measles at all. But since you _are_ at Aunt + Maria's I think you may as well stay ...' + +'How awful!' said Molly. 'It _is_ too bad!' + + '... stay and make it your annual visit. Be a good girl, dear, and + do not forget to wear your pinafores in the morning. + + 'Your loving MOTHER.' + + + +Molly wrote a nice little letter to her mother. To her brother she said: + + DEAR BERTIE, + + I think you are beasts to have let me in for this. You might have + thought of me. I shall not forgive you till the sun is just going + down, and I would not then, only it is so wrong not to. I wish + _you_ had been named Maria, and had to stay here instead of me. + + 'Your broken-hearted sister, + + 'MOLLY CARRUTHERS.' + + + +When Molly stayed at the White House she was accustomed to read aloud in +the mornings from 'Ministering Children' or 'Little Pilgrims,' while +Aunt Maria sewed severely. But that morning Aunt Maria did not send for +her. + +'Your aunt's not well,' Clements told her; 'she won't be down before +lunch. Run along, do, miss, and walk in the garden like a young lady.' + +Molly chose rather to swagger out into the stableyard like a young +gentleman. The groom was saddling the sorrel horse. + +'I've got to take a telegram to the station,' said he. + +'Take me,' said Molly. + +'Likely! And what ud your aunt say?' + +'She won't know,' said Molly, 'and if she does I'll say I made you.' + +He laughed, and Molly had a splendid ride behind the groom, with her +arms so tight round his waistcoat that he could hardly breathe. + +When they got to the station a porter lifted her down, and the groom let +her send off the telegram. It was to Uncle Toodlethwaite, and it said: + + 'Please come down at once urgent business most important don't fail + bring Bates.--MARIA CARRUTHERS.' + +So Molly knew something very out of the way had happened, and she was +glad that her aunt should have something to think of besides her, +because the White House would have been a very nice place to stay at if +Aunt Maria had not so often remembered to do her duty by you. + +[Illustration: 'Molly had a splendid ride behind the groom.'--Page 134] + +In the afternoon Uncle Toodlethwaite came, and he and Aunt Maria and a +person in black with a shining black bag--Molly supposed he was Mr. +Bates, who was to be brought by Uncle Toodlethwaite--sat in the +dining-room with the door shut. + +Molly went to help the kitchenmaid shell peas, in the little grass +courtyard in the middle of the house. They sat on the kitchen steps, and +Molly could hear the voices of Clements and the housekeeper through the +open window of the servants' hall. She heard, but she did not think it +was eavesdropping, or anything dishonourable, like listening at doors. +They were talking quite out loud. + +'And a dreadful blow it will be to us all, if true,' the housekeeper was +saying. + +'_She_ thinks it's true,' said Clements; 'cried her eyes out, she did, +and wired for her brother-in-law once removed.' + +'Meaning her brother's brother-in-law--I see. But I don't know as I +really understand the ins and outs of it even yet.' + +'Well, it's like this,' said Clements: 'missis an' her brother they used +to live here along of their uncle, and he had a son, a regular bad egg +he was, and the old master said he shouldn't ever have a penny of his +money. He said he'd leave it to Mr. Carruthers--that's missis's brother, +see?' + +'That means father,' thought Molly. + +'And he'd leave missis the house and enough money to keep it up in +style. He was a warm man, it seems. Well, then the son's drowned at +sea--ship went down and all aboard perished. Just as well, because when +the old man died they couldn't find no will. So it all comes to missis +and her brother, there being no other relations near or far, and they +divides it the same as the old man had always said he wished. You see +what I mean?' + +'Near enough,' said the housekeeper; 'and then?' + +'Why, then,' said Clements, 'comes this letter--this very morning--from +a lawyer, to say as this bad egg of a son wasn't drowned at all: he was +in foreign parts, and only now heard of his father's decease, and tends +without delay to claim the property, which all comes to him, the +deceased have died insensate--that means without a will.' + +'I say, Clements,' Molly sung out, 'you must have read the letter. Did +aunt show it to you?' + +There was a dead silence; the kitchenmaid giggled. Someone whispered +inside the room. Then the housekeeper's voice called softly, 'Come in +here a minute, miss,' and the window was sharply shut. + +Molly emptied the peascods out of her pinafore and went in. + +Directly she was inside the door Clements caught her by the arm and +shook her. + +'You nasty mean, prying little cat!' she said; 'and me getting you jelly +and custard, and I don't know what all.' + +'I'm not,' said Molly. 'Don't, Clements; you hurt.' + +'You deserve me to,' was the reply. 'Doesn't she, Mrs. Williams?' + +'Don't you know it's wrong to listen, miss?' asked Mrs. Williams. + +'I didn't listen,' said Molly indignantly. 'You were simply shouting. No +one could help hearing. Me and Jane would have had to put our fingers in +our ears _not_ to hear.' + +'I didn't think it of you,' said Clements, beginning to sniff. + +'I don't know what you're making all this fuss about,' said Molly; 'I'm +not a sneak.' + +'Have a piece of cake, miss,' said Mrs. Williams, 'and give me your word +it shan't go any further.' + +'I don't want your cake; you'd better give it to Clements. It's she that +tells things--not me.' + +Molly began to cry. + +'There, I declare, miss, I'm sorry I shook you, but I was that put out. +There! I ask your pardon; I can't do more. You wouldn't get poor +Clements into trouble, I'm sure.' + +'Of course I wouldn't; you might have known that.' + +Well, peace was restored; but Molly wouldn't have any cake. + +That evening Jane wore a new silver brooch, shaped like a horseshoe, +with an arrow through it. + +It was after tea, when Uncle Toodlethwaite was gone, that Molly, +creeping quietly out to see the pigs fed, came upon her aunt at the end +of the hollyhock walk. Her aunt was sitting on the rustic seat that the +crimson rambler rose makes an arbour over. Her handkerchief was held to +her face with both hands, and her thin shoulders were shaking with +sobs. + +And at once Molly forgot how disagreeable Aunt Maria had always been, +and how she hated her. She ran to her aunt and threw her arms round her +neck. Aunt Maria jumped in her seat, but she let the arms stay where +they were, though they made it quite difficult for her to use her +handkerchief. + +'Don't cry, dear ducky _darling_ Aunt Maria,' said Molly--'oh, don't! +What _is_ the matter?' + +'Nothing you would understand,' said Aunt Maria gruffly; 'run away and +play, there's a good child.' + +'But I don't want to play while you're crying. I'm sure I could +understand, dear little auntie.' + +Molly embraced the tall, gaunt figure of the aunt. + +'Dear little auntie, tell Molly.' + +She used just the tone she was used to use to her baby brother. + +'It's--it's business,' said Aunt Maria, sniffing. + +'I know business is dreadfully bad--father says so,' said Molly. 'Don't +send me away, auntie; I'll be as quiet as a mouse. I'll just sit and +cuddle you till you feel better.' + +She got her arms round the aunt's waist, and snuggled her head against a +thin arm. Aunt Maria had always been one for keeping children in their +proper places. Yet somehow now Molly's proper place seemed to be just +where she was--where she had never been before. + +'You're a kind little girl, Maria,' she said presently. + +'I wish I could do something,' said Molly. 'Wouldn't you feel better if +you told me? They say it does you good not to grieve in solitary +concealment. I'm sure I could understand if you didn't use long words.' + +And, curiously enough, Aunt Maria did tell her, almost exactly what she +had heard from Clements. + +'And I know there was a will leaving it all to your father and me,' she +said; 'I saw it signed. It was witnessed by the butler we had then--he +died the year after--and by Mr. Sheldon: he died, too, out hunting.' + +Her voice softened, and Molly snuggled closer and said: + +'Poor Mr. Sheldon!' + +'He and I were to have been married,' said Aunt Maria suddenly. 'That's +his picture in the hall between the carp and your Great-uncle +Carruthers.' + +'Poor auntie!' said Molly, thinking of the handsome man in scarlet next +the stuffed carp--'oh, poor auntie, I do love you so!' + +Aunt Maria put an arm round her. + +'Oh, my dear,' she said, 'you don't understand. All the happy things +that ever happened to me happened here, and all the sad things too; if +they turn me out I shall die--I know I shall. It's been bad enough,' she +went on, more to herself than to Molly; 'but there's always been the +place just as it was when I was a girl, when he used to come here: so +bold and laughing he always was. I can see him here quite plainly; I've +only to shut my eyes. But I couldn't see him anywhere else.' + +'Don't wills get hidden away sometimes?' Molly asked; for she had read +stories about such things. + +'We looked everywhere,' said Aunt Maria--'everywhere. We had detectives +from London, because there were things he'd left to other people, and we +wanted to carry out his wishes; but we couldn't find it. Uncle must have +destroyed it, and meant to make another, only he never did--he never +did. Oh, I hope the dead can't see what we suffer! If my Uncle +Carruthers and dear James could see me turned out of the old place, it +would break their hearts even up in heaven.' + +Molly was silent. Suddenly her aunt seemed to awake from a dream. + +'Good gracious, child,' she said, 'what nonsense I've been talking! Go +away and play, and forget all about it. Your own troubles will begin +soon enough.' + +'I do love you, auntie,' said Molly, and went. + +Aunt Maria never unbent again as she had done that evening; but Molly +felt a difference that made all the difference. She was not afraid of +her aunt now, and she loved her. Besides, things were happening. The +White House was now the most interesting place in the world. + +Be sure that Molly set to work at once to look for the missing will. +London detectives were very careless; she was certain they were. She +opened drawers and felt in the backs of cupboards; she prodded the +padding of chairs, listening for the crackling of paper inside among the +stuffing; she tapped the woodwork of the house all over for secret +panels; but she did not find the will. + +She could not believe that her Great-uncle Carruthers would have been so +silly as to burn a will that he knew might be wanted at any moment. She +used to stand in front of his portrait, and look at it; he did not look +at all silly. And she used to look at the portrait of handsome, laughing +Mr. Sheldon, who had been killed out hunting instead of marrying Aunt +Maria, and more than once she said: + +'You might tell me where it is; you look as if you knew.' + +But he never altered his jolly smile. + +Molly thought of missing wills from the moment her eyes opened in the +morning to the time when they closed at night. + +Then came the dreadful day when Uncle Toodlethwaite and Mr. Bates came +down, and Uncle Toodlethwaite said: + +'I'm afraid there's no help for it, Maria; you can delay the thing a +bit, but you'll have to turn out in the end.' + +It was on that night that the wonderful thing happened--the thing that +Molly has never told to anyone except me, because she thought no one +could believe it. She went to bed as usual and to sleep, and she woke +suddenly, hearing someone call 'Molly, Molly!' + +She sat up in bed; the room was full of moonlight. As usual her first +waking thought was of the missing will. Had it been found? Was her aunt +calling her to tell the good news? No, the room was quite still. She was +alone. + +The moonlight fell full on the old black and red and gold cabinet; that, +she had often thought, was just the place where a will would be hidden. +It might have a secret drawer, that the London detectives had missed. +She had often looked over it carefully, but now she got out of bed and +lighted her candle, and went over to the cabinet to have one more look. +She opened all the drawers, pressed all the knobs in the carved +brasswork. There was a little door in the middle; she knew that the +little cupboard behind it was empty. It had red lacquered walls, and the +back wall was looking-glass. She opened the little cupboard, held up her +candle, and looked in. She expected to see her own face in the glass as +usual, but she did not see it; instead there was a black space, the +opening to something not quite black. She could see +lights--candle-lights--and the space grew bigger, or she grew smaller, +she never knew which. And next moment she was walking through the +opening. + +'Now I am going to see something really worth seeing,' said Molly. + +She was not frightened--from first to last she was not at all +frightened. + +She walked straight through the back of the cabinet in the best bedroom +upstairs into the library on the ground-floor. That sounds like +nonsense, but Molly declares it was so. + +There were candles on the table and papers, and there were people in the +library; they did not see her. + +There was great-uncle Carruthers and Aunt Maria, very pretty, with long +curls and a striped gray silk dress, like in the picture in the +drawing-room. There was handsome, jolly Mr. Sheldon in a brown coat. An +old servant was just going out of the door. + +'That's settled, then,' said Great-uncle Carruthers; 'now, my girl, +bed.' + +Aunt Maria--such a young, pretty Aunt Maria, Molly would never have +known her but for the portrait--kissed her uncle, and then she took a +Christmas rose out of her dress and put it in Mr. Sheldon's buttonhole, +and put up her face to him and said, 'Good-night, James.' He kissed her; +Molly heard the loud, jolly sound of the kiss, and Aunt Maria went away. + +Then the old man said: 'You'll leave this at Bates' for me, Sheldon; +you're safer than the post.' + +Handsome Mr. Sheldon said he would. Then the lights went out, and Molly +was in bed again. + +Quite suddenly it was daylight. Jolly Mr. Sheldon, in his red coat, was +standing by the cabinet. The little cupboard door was open. + +'By George!' he said, 'it's ten days since I promised to take that will +up to Bates, and I never gave it another thought. All your fault, Maria, +my dear. You shouldn't take up all my thoughts; 'I'll take it +to-morrow.' + +Molly heard something click, and he went out of the room whistling. + +Molly lay still. She felt there was more to come. And the next thing was +that she was looking out of the window, and saw something carried across +the lawn on a hurdle with two scarlet coats laid over it, and she knew +it was handsome Mr. Sheldon, and that he would not carry the will to +Bates to-morrow, or do anything else in this world ever any more. + +When Molly woke in the morning she sprang out of bed and ran to the +cabinet. There was nothing in the looking-glass cupboard. + +All the same, she ran straight to her aunt's room. It was long before +the hour when Clements soberly tapped, bringing hot water. + +'Wake up, auntie!' she cried. + +And auntie woke up, very cross indeed. + +'Look here, auntie,' she said, 'I'm certain there's a secret place in +that cabinet in my room, and the will's in it; I know it is.' + +'You've been dreaming,' said Aunt Maria severely; 'go back to bed. +You'll catch your death of cold paddling about barefoot like that.' + +Molly had to go, but after breakfast she began again. + +'But why do you think so?' asked Aunt Maria. + +And Molly, who thought she knew that nobody would believe her story, +could only say: + +'I don't know, but I am quite sure.' + +'Nonsense!' said Aunt Maria. + +'Aunty,' Molly said, 'don't you think uncle might have given the will to +Mr. Sheldon to take to Mr. Bates, and he may have put it in the secret +place and forgotten?' + +'What a head the child's got--full of fancies!' said Aunt Maria. + +'If he slept in that room--did he ever sleep in that room?' + +'Always, whenever he stayed here.' + +'Was it long after the will-signing that poor Mr. Sheldon died?' + +'Ten days,' said Aunt Maria shortly; 'run away and play. I've letters to +write.' + +But because it seemed good to leave no stone unturned, one of those +letters was to a cabinet-maker in Rochester, and the groom took it in +the dog-cart, and the cabinet-maker came back with him. + +And there _was_ a secret hiding-place behind the looking-glass in the +little red lacquered cupboard in the old black and red and gold cabinet, +and in that secret hiding-place was the missing will, and on it lay a +brown flower that dropped to dust when it was moved. + +'It's a Christmas rose,' said Molly. + + * * * * * + +'So, you see, really it was a very good thing the others pretended to +have measles, because if they hadn't I shouldn't have come to you, and +if I hadn't come I shouldn't have known there was a will missing, and if +I hadn't known that I shouldn't have found it, should I, aunty, should +I, uncle?' said Molly, wild with delight. + +'No, dear,' said Aunt Maria, patting her hand. + +'Little girls,' said Uncle Toodlethwaite, 'should be seen and not heard. +But I admit that simulated measles may sometimes be a blessing in +disguise.' + +All the young Carruthers thought so when they got the five pounds that +Aunt Maria sent them. Miss Simpshall got five pounds too because it was +owing to her that Molly was taken to the White House that day. Molly got +a little pearl necklace as well as five pounds. + +'Mr. Sheldon gave it to me,' said Aunt Maria. 'I wouldn't give it to +anyone but you.' + +Molly hugged her in silent rapture. + +That just shows how different our Aunt Marias would prove to be if they +would only let us know them as they really are. It really is not wise to +conceal _everything_ from children. + +You see, if Aunt Maria had not told Molly about Mr. Sheldon, she would +never have thought about him enough to see his ghost. Now Molly is grown +up she tells me it was only a dream. But even if it was it is just as +wonderful, and served the purpose just as well. + +Perhaps you would like to know what Aunt Maria said when the +cabinet-maker opened the secret hiding-place and she saw the paper with +the brown Christmas rose on it? Clements was there, as well as the +cabinet-maker and Molly. She said right out before them all, 'Oh, James, +my dear!' and she picked up the flower before she opened the will. And +it fell into brown dust in her hand. + + + + +BILLY AND WILLIAM + +A HISTORICAL TALE FOR THE YOUNG + + '_Have you found your prize essay?_' + '_No; but I have found the bicycle of the butcher's boy._' + + +It is rather trying to have to walk three miles to the station, to say +nothing of the three miles back, to meet a cousin you have never seen +and never wish to see, especially if you have to leave a kite half made, +and there is no proper lock to the shed you are making your kite in. + +The road was flat and dusty, the sun felt much too warm on his back, the +hill to the station was long and steep, and the train was nearly an hour +late, because it was a train on the South-Eastern Railway. So William +was exceedingly cross, and he would have been crosser still if he could +have known that I should ever call him William, for though that happened +to be his name, the one he 'answered to' (as the stolen-dog +advertisements say) was 'Billy.' So perhaps it would be kind of me to +speak of him as Billy, because it is rather horrid to do things you know +people won't like, even if you think they'll never know you've done +them. + +Well, the train came in, and it was annoying to Billy, very, that four +or five boys should bundle out of the train, and he should have to go up +to them one after the other and say: + +'I say, is your name Harold St. Leger?' + +He did not particularly like the look of any of the boys, and of course +it happened that the very last one he spoke to was Harold, and that he +was also the one whom Billy liked least particularly of the whole lot. + +'Oh, you are, are you?' was all he could find to say when Harold had +blushingly owned to his name. Then in manly tones Billy gave the order +about Harold's luggage and the carrier, said 'Come along!' and Harold +came. + +Harold was a fattish boy with whitey-brown hair, and he was as soft and +white as a silkworm. Billy did not admire him. He himself was hard and +brown, with thin arms and legs and joints like the lumps of clay on +branches that the gardener has grafted. And Harold did not admire _him_. + +There was little conversation on the way home; when you don't want to +have a visitor and he doesn't want to be one, talking is not much fun. +When they got home there was tea. Billy's mother talked politely to +Harold, but that did not make anyone any happier. Then Billy took his +cousin round and showed him the farm and the stock, and Harold was less +interested than you would think a boy could be. At last, weary of trying +to behave nicely, Billy said: + +'I suppose there must be _something_ you like, however much of a muff +you are. Well, you can jolly well find it out for yourself. I'm going to +finish my kite.' + +The silkworm-soft face of Harold lighted up. + +'Oh, _I_ can make kites,' he said; 'I've invented a new kind. I'll help +you if you'll let me.' + +Harold, eager, quick fingered, skilful, in the shed among the string, +and the glue, and the paper, and the bendable, breakable laths, was +quite a different person from Harold, nervous and dull, among the +farmyard beasts. Billy allowed him to help with the kite, and he began +to respect his cousin a little more. + +'Though it's rather like a girl, being so neat with your fingers,' he +said disparagingly. + +'I wish I'd got the proper sort of paper,' Harold said, 'then I'd make +my new patent kite that I've invented; but it's a very extra sort of +kind of paper. I got some once at a butter-shop in Bermondsey, but that +was in a dream.' + +Billy stared. + +'You must be off your chump,' he said; and he felt more sorry than ever +that his jolly country holiday was to be spoiled by a strange cousin, +who ought, perhaps, to be in a lunatic asylum rather than at a +respectable farm. + +That night Billy was awakened from the dreamless sleep which blesses the +sort of boy he was to find Harold excitedly thumping him on the back +with a roll of stiff paper. + +'Wake up,' he said--'wake up! I _will_ tell somebody that's awake. I +dreamed that a jackdaw came in and flew off with that thin paper thing +that was on the chest of drawers with the gilt button at the corner, and +then I dreamed I got up and found this roll of paper up the chimney. And +when I woke up I found _it_ had and _I_ had, and it's the real right +kite-paper for my patent kite--just like I dreamed I bought in the +butter-shop in Bermondsey. And it's five o'clock by the church clock, +and it's quite light. I'm going to get up directly minute and make my +patent kite.' + +'Patent fiddlestick!' replied Billy, sleepy and indignant. 'You get +along and leave me be; you've been dreaming, that's all. Just like a +girl!' + +'Yes,' repeated Harold gently, 'I _have_ been dreaming; but when I woke +up I found _it_ had and _I_ had; and here's the paper, and the flimsy +thing with the gold stud's _gone_. You get up and see----' + +Billy did. He got up with a bound, and he saw with an eye. And William +turned on Harold and shook him till his teeth nearly rattled in his head +and his pale eyes nearly dropped out. (I have called him William here +because I really think he deserves it. It is a cowardly thing to shake a +cousin, even if you do not happen to be pleased with him.) + +'Wha--wha--what's the matter?' choked the wretched Harold. + +'Why, you miserable little idiot, you've _not_ been dreaming at all! +You've been lying like a silly log, and letting that beastly bird carry +off my prize essay! That's _all_! And it took me ten days to do, and I +had to get almost all of it out of books, and the worse swat I ever did +in my life. And now it's all no good. And there aren't any books down +here to do it again out of. Oh, bother, _bother_, BOTHER!' + +'I'm very sorry for you,' said Harold, 'but I didn't lie like logs--I +did dream--and I've got the kite-paper, and I'll help you write the +essay again if you like.' + +'I shouldn't be surprised if it was all a make-up,' said William. (I +_must_ go on calling him William at present.) 'You've hidden the essay +so as to be able to send it in yourself.' + +'Oh, how _can_ you?' said Harold; and he turned pale just like a girl, +and just like a girl he began to cry. + +'Now, look here,' the enraged William went on, 'I've got to be civil to +you before people; but don't you dare to speak to me when we're alone. +You're either a silly idiot or a sneaking hound, and either way I'm not +going to have anything to do with you.' + +I don't know how he could have done it, but William kept his word, and +for three days he only spoke to Harold when other people were about. +This was horrible for Harold; he had been used to being his father's +pride and his mother's joy, and now he was Nobody's Anything, which is +the saddest thing in the world to be. He tried to console himself by +making kites all day long, but even kites cannot comfort you when nobody +loves you, and when you feel that it really is not your fault at all. + +William went about his own affairs; he was not at all happy. He finished +his kite and flew it, and he lost it because the string caught on the +church weather-cock, which cut it in two. And he tried to rewrite his +prize essay, but he couldn't, because he had taken all the stuffing for +it out of books and not out of his head, where it ought to have been. + +Harold found some moments of forgetfulness when he was making the patent +kite. It was very big, and the roll of paper he had found in his dream +in the chimney was exactly the right thing for patent kite-making. But +when it was done, what was the good? There was no one to see him fly it. +He did fly it, and it was perfect. It was shaped like a bird, and it +rose up, and up, and up, and hung poised above the church-tower, light +and steady as a hawk poised above its prey. William wouldn't even come +out to look at it, though Harold begged him to. + +The next morning Harold dreamed that he had not been able to bear things +any longer, and had run away, and when William woke up Harold was gone. +Then William remembered how Harold had offered to help him with his +kite, and would have helped him to rewrite the essay, and how through +those three cruel days Harold had again and again tried to make friends, +and how, after all, he was with his own people, and Harold was a +stranger. + +He said, 'Oh, bother, I wish I hadn't!' and he felt that he had been a +beast. This is called Remorse. Then he said, 'I'll find him, and I'll be +as decent to him as I can, poor chap! though he _is_ silly.' This is +called Repentance. + +Then he found a letter on Harold's bed. It said (and it was blotted with +tears, and it had a blob of glue on it): + + 'DEAR BILLY, + + 'It wasn't my fault about your essay, and I'm sorry, and am going + to run away to India to find my people. I shall go disguised as a + stowaway. + + 'Your affectionate cousin, + + 'HAROLD EGBERT DARWIN ST. LEGER.' + +Billy did not have to show this letter to his mother, because she had +gone away for the day, so he did not have to explain to her what a +beast he had been. If he had had to do this, it would have been part of +what is called Expiation. + +Then he got the farm men to go out in every direction, furnished with a +full description of Harold's silkworm-like appearance, and Billy +borrowed a bicycle from a noble-hearted butcher's boy in the village and +set out for Plymouth, because that seemed the likeliest place to look in +for a cousin who was running away disguised as a stowaway. The wind blew +straight towards the sea, and it occurred to Billy--he deserves to be +called Billy now, I think--that the great patent kite, which was ten +feet high, would drag him along like winking if he could only set it +flying, and then tie it to the handle-bar of the bicycle. It was rather +a ticklish business to get the kite up, but the butcher's boy helped--he +had a noble heart--and at last it was done. Billy saw the great +bird-kite flying off towards Plymouth. He hastily knotted the string to +the bicycle handle, held the slack of it in his hand, mounted, started, +paid out the slack of the string, and the next moment the string was +tight, and the kite was pulling Billy and the bicycle along the +Plymouth road at the rate of goodness-only-knows-how-improbably many +miles an hour. + +At last he came to the outskirts of Plymouth. I shall not tell you what +Plymouth was like, because Billy did not notice or know at all what it +was like, and there is no reason why you should. Plymouth seemed to +Billy very much like other places. The only odd thing was that he could +not stop his bicycle, though he pulled in the kite string as hard as he +could. He flew through the town. All the traffic stopped to let him +steer his mad-paced machine through the streets, and tradespeople, and +people walking on business, and people walking for pleasure, all stopped +with their respectable mouths wide open to stare at Billy on his +bicycle. And the kite pulled the machine on and on without pause, and at +a furious rate, and Billy, in despair, was just feeling in his pocket +for his knife to cut the string, when some mighty sky-wind seemed to +catch the kite, and it gave a leap and went twenty times as fast as it +had gone before, and the bicycle had to go twenty times as fast too, and +before Billy could say 'Jack Robinson,' or even 'J. R.,' for short, the +kite rushed wildly out to sea, dragging the bicycle after it, right slap +off the edge of England. So Billy and the butcher's boy's bicycle were +dragged into the sea? Not at all. They were dragged _on_ to the sea, +which is not at all the same sort of thing. For the kite was such a very +extra patent one, and so perfectly designed and made, that it was just +strong enough to bear the weight of Billy and the bicycle, and to keep +them out of the water. So that Billy found himself riding splendidly +over the waves, and there was no more splashing than there would have +been on the road on a very muddy day. Luckily, the sea was smooth, or I +don't know what would have happened. It was smooth and greeny-blue, and +the sun made diamond sparkles on it, and Billy felt as grand as grand to +be riding over such a glorious floor. It was a fine time, but rather an +anxious one too. Because, suppose the string had not held? No one could +possibly ride a bicycle on the sea unless they had the really only truly +right sort of kite to hold the machine up. + +Away and away went the kite, through the blue air up above, and away and +away went the bicycle over the greeny, foamy sea down below, and away +and away went Billy, and the kite went faster and faster and faster, and +faster went the bicycle--much, much faster than you would believe +unless you had seen it as Billy did. And just at the front-door of the +Bay of Biscay the bicycle caught up with a P. and O. steamer, and the +kite followed the course of the ship, and went alongside of it, so you +can guess how fast the bicycle was going. + +And the Captain of the ship hailed Billy through a speaking-trumpet, and +said: + +'Ahoy, there!' + +Billy replied: + +'Ahoy yourself!' + +But the Captain couldn't hear him. So the Captain said something that +Billy couldn't hear either. But the people who were meant to hear heard, +and the great ship stopped, and Billy rode close up to it, and they +hauled him up by the string of the kite, and they put the bicycle in a +safe place, and tied the string to the mast, and then the Captain said: + +'I suppose I'm dreaming you, boy, because what you're doing is +impossible.' + +'I know it is,' said Billy; 'only I'm doing it--at least, I was till you +stopped me.' + +They were both wrong, because, of course, if it had been impossible, +Billy could not have done it; but neither of them had a scientific +mind, as you and I have, dear reader. + +So the Captain asked Billy to dinner, which was very nice, only there +was an uncertain feeling about it. And when Billy had had dinner, he +said to the Captain: + +'I must be going.' + +'Is there nothing I can do for you?' said the Captain. + +'I don't know,' said Billy, 'unless you happen to have a boy named +Harold Egbert Darwin St. Leger on board. He said he was going away in a +ship to India, disguised as a stowaway.' + +The Captain at once ordered the ship to be searched for a boy of this +name in this disguise. The crew looked in the hold, and in the galley, +and in the foretop, and on the quarter, and in the gaff, and the jib, +and the topsail, and the boom, but they could not find Harold. They +ransacked the cross-trees, and the engine-room, and the bowsprit; they +explored the backstays, the stays, and the waist, but they found no +stowaway. They examined truck and block, they hunted through every +porthole, they left not an inch of the ribs unexplored; but no Harold. +He was not in any of the belaying-pins or dead-eyes, nor was he hidden +in the capstan or the compass. At last, in despair, the Captain thought +of looking in the cabins, and in one of them, hidden under the scattered +pyjamas and embroidered socks of a Major of Artillery, they found +Harold. + +He and Billy explained everything to each other, and shook hands, and +there was not a dry eye in the ship. (Did you ever see a dry eye? I +think it would look rather nasty.) + +Then said Billy to Harold: + +'This is all very well, but how am I to get you home?' + +'I can ride on the step of the bike,' said Harold. + +'But the wind won't take us back,' said Billy; 'it's dead against us.' + +'Excuse me,' said the Captain in a manly manner; 'you know that +Britannia rules the waves and controls the elements. Allow me one +moment.' + +He sent for the boatswain and bade him whistle for a wind, expressly +stating what kind of wind was needed. + +And everyone saw with delight, but with little surprise, the kite +deliberately turn round and retrace its steps towards the cliffs of +Albion. + +[Illustration: 'The bicycle started, Billy in the saddle and Harold on +the step.'--Page 165.] + +A cheer rose from passengers and crew alike as the bicycle was lowered +to the waves, the string tightened, and the bicycle started, Billy in +the saddle and Harold on the step. The event was a perfect windfall to +the passengers. It gave them something to talk of all the way to Suez; +some of them are talking about it still. + +The kite went back even faster than it had come; it pulled the bicycle +behind it as easily as a child pulls a cotton-reel along the floor by a +bit of thread. So that Harold and Billy were home by tea-time, and it +was the jolliest meal either of them had ever had. + +They had determined to stop the bicycle by cutting the string, and then +Harold would have lost the patent kite, which would have been a pity. +But, most happily, the string of the kite caught in the vane on the top +of the church tower, and the bicycle stopped by itself exactly opposite +the butcher's boy to whom it belonged. He had a noble heart, and he was +very glad to see his bicycle again. + +After tea the boys went up the church tower to get the kite; and I don't +suppose you will believe me when I tell you that there, in the niche of +a window of the belfry, was a jackdaw's nest, and in it the Historical +Essay which the jackdaw had stolen, as you will have guessed, for the +sake of the bright gilt manuscript fastener in the corner. + +And now Harold and Billy became really chums, in spite of all the +qualities which they could not help disliking in each other. Each found +some things in the other that he didn't dislike so very much, after all. + +When Harold grows up he will sell many patent kites, and we shall all be +able to ride bicycles on the sea. + +Billy sent in his essay, but he did not get the prize; so it wouldn't +have mattered if it had never been found, only I am glad it was found. + +I hope you will not think that this is a made-up story. It is very +nearly as true as any of the history in Billy's essay that didn't get a +prize. The only thing I can't quite believe myself is about the roll of +the right kind of paper being in the chimney; but Harold couldn't think +of anything else to dream about, and the most fortunate accidents do +happen sometimes even in stories. + + + + +THE TWOPENNY SPELL + + +Lucy was a very good little girl indeed, and Harry was not so bad--for a +boy, though the grown-ups called him a limb! They both got on very well +at school, and were not wholly unloved at home. Perhaps Lucy was a bit +of a muff, and Harry was certainly very rude to call her one, but she +need not have replied by calling him a 'beast.' I think she did it +partly to show him that she was not quite so much of a muff as he +thought, and partly because she was naturally annoyed at being buried up +to her waist in the ground among the gooseberry-bushes. She got into the +hole Harry had dug because he said it might make her grow, and then he +suddenly shovelled down a heap of earth and stamped it down so that she +could not move. She began to cry, then he said 'muff' and she said +'beast,' and he went away and left her 'planted there,' as the French +people say. And she cried more than ever, and tried to dig herself out, +and couldn't, and although she was naturally such a gentle child, she +would have stamped with rage, only she couldn't get her feet out to do +it. Then she screamed, and her Uncle Richard came and dug her out, and +said it was a shame, and gave her twopence to spend as she liked. So she +got nurse to clean the gooseberry ground off her, and when she was +cleaned she went out to spend the twopence. She was allowed to go alone, +because the shops were only a little way off on the same side of the +road, so there was no danger from crossings. + +'I'll spend every penny of it on myself,' said Lucy savagely; 'Harry +shan't have a bit, unless I could think of something he wouldn't like, +and then I'd get it and put it in his bread and milk!' She had never +felt quite so spiteful before, but, then, Harry had never before been +quite so aggravating. + +She walked slowly along by the shops, wishing she could think of +something that Harry hated; she herself hated worms, but Harry didn't +mind them. Boys are so odd. + +Suddenly she saw a shop she had never noticed before. The window was +quite full of flowers--roses, lilies, violets, pinks, +pansies--everything you can think of, growing in a tangled heap, as you +see them in an old garden in July. + +She looked for the name over the shop. Instead of being somebody or +other, Florist, it was 'Doloro de Lara, Professor of white and black +Magic,' and in the window was a large card, framed and glazed. It said: + + ENCHANTMENTS DONE WHILE YOU WAIT. + EVERY DESCRIPTION OF CHARM + CAREFULLY AND COMPETENTLY WORKED. + STRONG SPELLS FROM FIFTY GUINEAS + TO TUPPENCE. + WE SUIT ALL PURSES. + GIVE US A TRIAL. + BEST AND CHEAPEST HOUSE IN THE TRADE. + COMPETITION DEFIED. + +Lucy read this with her thumb in her mouth. It was the tuppence that +attracted her; she had never bought a spell, and even a tuppenny one +would be something new. + +'It's some sort of conjuring trick, I suppose,' she thought, 'and I'll +never let Harry see how it's done--never, never, never!' + +She went in. The shop was just as flowery, and bowery, and red-rosy, and +white-lilyish inside as out, and the colour and the scent almost took +her breath away. A thin, dark, unpleasing gentleman suddenly popped out +of a bower of flowering nightshade, and said: + +'And what can we do for you to-day, miss?' + +'I want a spell, if you please,' said Lucy; 'the best you can do for +tuppence.' + +'Is that all you've got?' said he. + +'Yes,' said Lucy. + +'Well, you can't expect much of a spell for that,' said he; 'however, +it's better that I should have the tuppence than that you should; you +see that, of course. Now, what would you like? We can do you a nice +little spell at sixpence that'll make it always jam for tea. And I've +another article at eighteenpence that'll make the grown-ups always think +you're good even if you're not; and at half a crown----' + +'I've only got tuppence.' + +'Well,' he said crossly, 'there's only one spell at that price, and +that's really a tuppenny-half-penny one; but we'll say tuppence. I can +make you like somebody else, and somebody else like you.' + +'Thank you,' said Lucy; 'I like most people, and everybody likes me.' + +'I don't mean _that_,' he said. 'Isn't there someone you'd like to hurt +if you were as strong as they are, and they were as weak as you?' + +[Illustration: '"And what can we do for you to-day, Miss?"'--Page +170.] + +'Yes,' said Lucy in a guilty whisper. + +'Then hand over your tuppence,' said the dark gentleman, 'and it's a +bargain.' + +He snatched the coppers warm from her hand. + +'Now,' he said, 'to-morrow morning you'll be as strong as Harry, and +he'll be little and weak like you. Then you can hurt him as much as you +like, and he won't be able to hurt back.' + +'Oh!' said Lucy; 'but I'm not sure I want----I think I'd like to change +the spell, please.' + +'No goods exchanged,' he said crossly; 'you've got what you asked for.' + +'Thank you,' said Lucy doubtfully, 'but how am I----?' + +'It's entirely self-adjusting,' said nasty Mr. Doloro. 'No previous +experience required.' + +'Thank you very much,' said Lucy. 'Good----' + +She was going to say 'good-morning,' but it turned into 'good gracious,' +because she was so very much astonished. For, without a moment's +warning, the flower-shop had turned into the sweet-shop that she knew so +well, and nasty Mr. Doloro had turned into the sweet-woman, who was +asking what she wanted, to which, of course, as she had spent her +twopence, the answer was 'Nothing.' She was already sorry that she had +spent it, and in such a way, and she was sorrier still when she got +home, and Harry owned handsomely that _he_ was sorry he had planted her +out, but he really hadn't thought she was such a little idiot, and he +_was_ sorry--so there! This touched Lucy's heart, and she felt more than +ever that she had not laid out her tuppence to the best advantage. She +tried to warn Harry of what was to happen in the morning, but he only +said, 'Don't yarn; Billson Minor's coming for cricket. You can field if +you like.' Lucy didn't like, but it seemed the only thing she could do +to show that she accepted in a proper spirit her brother's apology about +the planting out. So she fielded gloomily and ineffectively. + +Next morning Harry got up in good time, folded up his nightshirt, and +made his room so tidy that the housemaid nearly had a surprise-fit when +she went in. He crept downstairs like a mouse, and learned his lessons +before breakfast. Lucy, on the other hand, got up so late that it was +only by dressing hastily that she had time to prepare a thoroughly good +booby-trap before she slid down the banisters just as the breakfast-bell +rang. She was first in the room, so she was able to put a little salt in +all the tea-cups before anyone else came in. Fresh tea was made, and +Harry was blamed. Lucy said, 'I did it,' but no one believed her. They +said she was a noble, unselfish sister to try and shield her naughty +brother, and Harry burst into floods of tears when she kicked him under +the table; she hated herself for doing this, but somehow it seemed +impossible to do anything else. + +Harry cried nearly all the way to school, while Lucy insisted on sliding +along all the gutters and dragging Harry after her. She bought a +catapult at the toy-shop and a pennyworth of tintacks at the oil-shop, +both on credit, and as Lucy had never asked for credit before, she got +it. + +At the top of Blackheath Village they separated--Harry went back to his +school, which is at the other side of the station, and Lucy went on to +the High School. + +The Blackheath High School has a large and beautiful hall, with a +staircase leading down into it like a staircase in a picture, and at the +other end of the hall is a big statue of a beautiful lady. The High +School mistresses call her Venus, but I don't really believe that is her +name. + +Lucy--good, gentle, little Lucy, beloved by her form mistress and +respected by all the school--sat on those steps--I don't know why no +one caught her--and used her catapult to throw ink pellets (you know +what they are, of course) with her catapult at the beautiful white +statue-lady, till the Venus--if that is her name, which I doubt--was all +over black spots, like a Dalmation or carriage dog. + +Then she went into her class room and arranged tintacks, with the +business end up, on all the desks and seats, an act fraught with gloomy +returns to Blossoma Rand and Wilhelmina Marguerite Asterisk. Another +booby-trap--a dictionary, a pot of water, three pieces of chalk, and a +handful of torn paper--was hastily sketched above the door. Three other +little girls looked on in open-mouthed appreciation. I do not wish to +shock you, so I will not tell you about the complete success of the +booby-trap, nor of the bloodthirsty fight between Lucy and Bertha +Kaurter in a secluded fives-court during rec. Dora Spielman and Gertrude +Rook were agitated seconds. It was Lucy's form mistress, the adored Miss +Harter Larke, who interrupted the fight at the fifth round, and led the +blood-stained culprits into the hall and up the beautiful picture-like +steps to the Headmistress's room. + +The Head of the Blackheath High School has all the subtle generalship of +the Head in Mr. Kipling's 'Stalky.' She has also a manner which subdues +parents and children alike to 'what she works in, like the dyer's hand.' +Anyone less clever would have expelled the luckless Lucy--saddled with +her brother's boy-nature--on such evidence as was now brought forward. +Not so the Blackheath Head. She reserved judgment, the most terrible of +all things for a culprit, by the way, who thought it over for an hour +and a half in the mistress's room, and she privately wrote a note to +Lucy's mother, gently hinting that Lucy was not quite herself: might be +sickening for something. Perhaps she had better be kept at home for a +day or two. Lucy went home, and on the way upset a bicycle with a little +girl on it, and came off best in a heated physical argument with a +baker's boy. + +Harry, meanwhile, had dried his tears, and gone to school. He knew his +lessons, which was a strange and pleasing thing, and roused in his +master hopes destined to be firmly and thoroughly crushed in the near +future. But when he had emerged triumphantly from morning school he +suddenly found his head being punched by Simpkins Minor, on the ground +that he, Harry, had been showing off. The punching was scientific and +irresistible. Harry, indeed, did not try to resist; in floods of tears +and with uncontrolled emotion he implored Simpkins Minor to let him +alone, and not be a brute. Then Simpkins Minor kicked him, and several +other nice little boy-friends of his joined the glad throng, and it +became quite a kicking party. So that when Harry and Lucy met at the +corner of Wemyss Road his face was almost unrecognisable, while Lucy +looked as happy as a king, and as proud as a peacock. + +'What's up?' asked Lucy briskly. + +'Every single boy in the school has kicked me,' said Harry in flat +accents. 'I wish I was dead.' + +'So do I,' said Lucy cheerily; 'I think I'm going to be expelled. I +should be quite certain, only my booby-trap came down on Bessie Jayne's +head instead of Miss Whatshername's, and Bessie's no sneak, though she +has got a lump like an ostrich's egg on her forehead, and soaked through +as well. But I think I'm certain to be expelled.' + +'I wish I was,' said Harry, weeping with heartfelt emotion. 'I don't +know what's the matter with me; I feel all wrong inside. Do you think +you can turn into things just by reading them? Because I feel as if I +was in "Sandford and Merton," or one of the books the kind clergyman +lent us at the seaside.' + +'How awfully beastly!' said Lucy. 'Now, I feel as if I didn't care +tuppence whether I was expelled or not. And, I say, Harry, I feel as if +I was much stronger than you. I know I could twist your arm round and +then hit it like you did me the other day, and you couldn't stop me.' + +'Of course I couldn't! _I_ can't stop anybody doing anything they want +to do. Anybody who likes can hit me, and I can't hit back.' + +He began to cry again. And suddenly Lucy was really sorry. She had done +this, she had degraded her happy brother to a mere milksop, just because +he had happened to plant her out, and leave her planted. Remorse +suddenly gripped her with tooth and claw. + +'Look here,' she said, 'it's all my fault! Because you planted me out, +and I wanted to hurt you. But now I don't. I can't make you boy-brave +again; but I'm sorry, and I'll look after you, Harry, old man! Perhaps +you could disguise yourself in frocks and long hair, and come to the +High School. I'd take care nobody bullied you. It isn't nice being +bullied, is it?' + +Harry flung his arms round her, a thing he would never have done in the +public street if he had not been girlish inside at the time. + +'No, it's hateful,' he said. 'Lucy, I'm sorry I've been such a pig to +you.' + +Lucy put her arms round him, and they kissed each other, though it was +broad daylight and they were walking down Lee Park. + +The same moment the enchanter Doloro de Lara ran into them on the +pavement. Lucy screamed, and Harry hit out as hard as he could. + +'Look out,' said he; 'who are you shoving into?' + +'Tut-tut,' said the enchanter, putting his hat straight, 'you've bust up +your spell, my Lucy--child; no spells hold if you go kissing and saying +you're sorry. Just keep that in mind for the future, will you?' + +He vanished in the white cloud of a passing steam-motor, and Harry and +Lucy were left looking at each other. And Harry was Harry and Lucy was +Lucy to the very marrow of their little back-bones. They shook hands +with earnest feeling. + +Next day Lucy went to the High School and apologised in dust and ashes. + +'I don't think I was my right self,' she said to the Headmistress, who +quite agreed with her, 'and I never will again!' + +And she never has. Harry, on the other hand, thrashed Simpkins Minor +thoroughly and scientifically on the first opportunity; but he did not +thrash him extravagantly: he tempered pluck with mercy. + +For this is the odd thing about the whole story. Ever since the day when +the tuppenny spell did its work Harry has been kinder than before and +Lucy braver. I can't think why, but so it is. He no longer bullies her, +and she is no longer afraid of him, and every time she does something +brave for him, or he does something kind for her, they grow more and +more alike, so that when they are grown up he may as well be called +Lucius and she Harriett, for all the difference there will be between +them. + +And all the grown-ups look on and admire, and think that their incessant +jawing has produced this improvement. And no one suspects the truth +except the Headmistress of the High School, who has gone through the +complete course of Social Magic under a better professor than Mr. Doloro +de Lara; that is why she understands everything, and why she did not +expel Lucy, but only admonished her. Harry is cock of his school now, +and Lucy is in the sixth, and a model girl. I wish all Headmistresses +learned Magic at Girton. + + + + +SHOWING OFF; OR, THE LOOKING-GLASS BOY + + +His parents had thoughtlessly christened him Hildebrand, a name which, +as you see, is entirely unsuitable for school use. His friends called +him Brandy, and that was bad enough, though it had a sort of +pirate-smuggler sound, too. But the boys who did not like him called him +Hilda, and this was indeed hard to bear. In vain he told them that his +name was James as well. It was not true, and they would not have +believed it if it had been. + +He had not many friends, because he was not a very nice boy. He was not +very brave, except when he was in a rage, which is a poor sort of +courage, anyhow; and when the boys used to call him. 'Cowardy custard' +and other unpleasing names, he used to try to show off to them, and make +them admire him by telling them stories of the wild boars he had killed, +and the Red Indians he had fought, and of how he had been down Niagara +in an open boat, and been shipwrecked on the high seas. They were not +bad stories, and the boys would not have minded listening to them, but +Hildebrand wanted to have his stories not only listened to, but +believed, which is quite another pair of shoes. + +He had one friend who always liked his stories, and believed them almost +all. This was his little sister. But he was simply horrid to her. He +never would lend her a any of his toys, and he called her 'Kiddie,' +which she hated, instead of Ethel, which happened to be her name. + +All this is rather dull, and exactly like many boys of your +acquaintance, no doubt. But what happened to Hildebrand does not, +fortunately or unfortunately, happen to everybody; I dare say it has +never happened to you. It began on the day when Hildebrand was making a +catapult, and Billson Minor came up to him in the playground and said: + +'Much use it'll be to you when you've made it. You can't hit a haystack +a yard off!' + +'Can't I?' said Hildebrand. 'You just see! I hit a swallow on the wing +last summer, and when we had a house in Thibet I shot a llama dead with +one bullet. He was twenty-five feet long.' + +Billson laughed, and asked a boy who was passing if he'd ever been out +llama-shooting, and, if so, what his bag was. The other boy said: + +'Oh, I see--little Hilda gassing again!' + +Billson said: + +'Gassing! Lying I call it!' + +'Liar yourself!' said Hildebrand, who was now so angry that his fingers +trembled too much for him to be able to go on splicing the catapult. + +'Oh, run away and play,' said Billson wearily. 'Go home to nurse, Hilda +darling, and tell her to put your hair in curl-papers!' + +Then Hildebrand's rage turned into a sort of courage, and he hit out at +Billson, who, of course, hit back, and there was a fight. The other boy +held their coats and saw fair; and Hildebrand was badly beaten, because +Billson was older and bigger and a better fighter, so he went home, +crying with fury and pain. He went up into his own bedroom and bolted +the door, and wildly wished that he was a Red Indian, and that taking +scalps was not forbidden in Clapham. Billson's, he reflected gloomily, +would have been a sandy-coloured scalp, and a nice beginning to a +scalp-album. + +Presently he stopped crying, and let his little sister in. She had been +crying, too, outside the door, ever since he came home and pushed past +her on the stairs. She pitied his bruised face, and said it was a shame +of Billson Minor to hit a boy littler than he was. + +'I'm not so very little,' said Hildebrand; 'and you know how brave I am. +Why, it was only last week that I was the chief of the mighty tribe of +Moccasins, who waged war against Bill Billson, the Vulture-faced +Redskin----' + +He told the story to its gory end, and Ethel liked it very much, and +hoped it wasn't wrong to make up such things. She couldn't quite believe +it all. + +Then she went down, and Hildebrand had to wash his face for dinner; and +when he looked at the boy in the looking-glass and saw the black eye +Billson Minor had given him, and the cut lip from the same giver, he +clenched his fist and said: + +'I wish I could make things true by saying them. Wouldn't I bung up old +Billson's peepers, that's all?' + +'Well, you can if you like,' said the boy in the glass, whom Hildebrand +had thought was his own reflection. + +'What?' said he, with his mouth open. He was horribly startled. + +'You can if you like,' said the looking-glass boy again. 'I'll give you +your wish. Will you have it?' + +'Is this a fairy-tale?' asked Hildebrand cautiously. + +'Yes,' said the boy. + +Hildebrand had never expected to be allowed to take part in a +fairy-tale, and at first he could hardly believe in such luck. + +'Do you mean to say,' he said, 'that if I say I found a pot of gold in +the garden yesterday I did find a pot of gold?' + +'No; you'll find it to-morrow. The thing works backwards, you see, like +all looking-glass things. You know your "Alice," I suppose? There's only +one condition: you won't be able to see yourself in the looking-glass +any more!' + +'Who wants to,' said Hildebrand. + +'And things you say to _yourself_ don't count.' + +'There's always Ethel,' said Ethel's brother. + +'You accept, then?' said the boy in the glass. + +'Rather!' + +'Right' And with that the looking-glass boy vanished, and Hildebrand was +left staring at the mirror, which now reflected only the wash-hand-stand +and the chest of drawers, and part of the picture of Lord Roberts pinned +against the wall. You have no idea how odd and unpleasant it is to look +at a glass and see everything reflected as usual, except yourself, +though you are right in front of it. Hildebrand felt as if he must have +vanished as well as the looking-glass boy. But he was reassured when he +looked down at his hands. They were still there, and still extremely +dirty. The second bell had rung, and he washed them hastily and went +down. + +'How untidy your hair is!' said his mother; 'and oh, Hildebrand, what a +disagreeable expression, dear! and look at your eye! You've been +fighting again.' + +'I couldn't help it,' said our hero sulkily; 'he called names. Anyway, I +gave him an awful licking. He's worse than I am. Potatoes, please.' + +Next day Hildebrand had forgotten the words he had said at dinner. And +when Billson asked him if one licking was enough, and whether he, +Billson, was a liar or not, Hildebrand said: + +'You can lick me and make me anything you like, but you _are_, all the +same, just as much as me,' and he began to cry. + +And Billson called him schoolgirl and slapped his face--because Billson +knew nothing of the promise of the looking-glass boy, that whatever +Hildebrand said had happened should happen. + +It was a dreadful fight, and when it was over Hildebrand could hardly +walk home. He was much more hurt than he had been the day before. But +Billson Minor had to be carried home. Only he was all right again next +day, and Hildebrand wasn't, so he did not get much out of this affair, +except glory, and the comfort of knowing that Billson and the other boys +would now be jolly careful how they called him anything but Pilkings, +which was his father's and his mother's name, and therefore his as well. + +He had to stay in bed the next day, and his father punished him for +fighting, so he consoled himself by telling Ethel how he had found a pot +of gold in the cellar the day before, after digging in the hard earth +for hours, till his hands were all bleeding, and how he had hidden it +under his bed. + +'Do let me see, Hildy dear,' she said, trying hard to believe him. + +But he said, 'No, not till to-morrow.' + +Next day he was well enough to go to school, but he thought he would +just take some candle-ends and have a look at the cellar, and see if it +was really likely that there was any gold there. It did not seem +probable, but he thought he would try, and he did. It was terribly hard +work, for he had no tools but a spade he had had at the seaside, and +when that broke, as it did almost at once, he had to go on with a piece +of hoop-iron and the foot of an old bedstead. He went on till long past +dinner-time, and his hands were torn and bleeding, his back felt broken +in two, and his head was spinning with hunger and tiredness. At last, +just as the tea-bell rang, he reached his hand down deep into the hole +he had made, and felt something cold and round. He held his candle down. +It was a pot, tied over with brown paper, like pickled onions. When he +got it out he took off the paper. The pot was filled to the brim with +gold coins. Hildebrand blew out his candle and went up. The cook stopped +him at the top of the cellar stairs. + +'What's that you got there, Master Hildy? Pickles, I lay my boots,' she +said. + +'It's not,' said he. + +'Let me look,' said she. + +'Let me alone,' said Hildebrand. + +'Not me,' said the cook. + +She had her hand on the brown paper. + +Hildebrand had heard how treasure-trove has to be given up to +Government, and he did not trust the cook. + +'You'd better not,' he said quickly; 'it's not what you think it is.' + +'What is it, then?' + +'It's--it's _snakes_!' said Hildebrand desperately--'snakes out of the +wine-cellar.' + +The cook went into hysterics, and Hildebrand was punished twice, once +for staying away from school without leave, and once for frightening the +servants with silly stories. But in the confusion brought about by the +cook's screams he managed to hide the pot of gold in the bottom of the +boot cupboard, among the old gaiters and goloshes, and when peace was +restored and he was sent to bed in disgrace he took the pot with him. He +lay long awake thinking of the model engine he would buy for himself, +also of the bay pony, the collections of coins, birds' eggs, and +postage-stamps, the fishing-rods, the guns, revolvers, and bows and +arrows, the sweets and cakes and nuts, he would get all for himself. He +never thought of so much as a pennyworth of toffee for Ethel, or a +silver thimble for his mother, or a twopenny cigar for Mr. Pilkings. + +The first thing in the morning he jumped up and felt under the bed for +the pot of gold. His hand touched something that was not the pot. He +screamed, and drew his hand back as quickly as though he had burned it; +but what he had touched was not hot: it was cold, and thin, and alive. +It was a snake. And there was another on his bed, and another on the +dressing-table, and half a dozen more were gliding about inquisitively +on the floor. + +Hildebrand gathered his clothes together--a snake tumbled out of his +shirt as he lifted it--and made one bound for the door. He dressed on +the landing, and went to school without breakfast. I am glad to be able +to tell you that he did say to Sarah the housemaid: + +'For goodness' sake don't go into my bedroom--it's running alive with +snakes!' + +She did not believe him, of course; and, indeed, when she went up the +snakes were safe back in the pot. She did not see this, because she was +not the kind of girl who sweeps under things every day. That night +Hildebrand secretly slept in the boxroom, on a pile of newspapers, with +a rag-bag and a hearthrug over him. + +Next day he said to Sarah: + +'Did you go into my room yesterday?' + +'Of course,' said she. + +'Did you take the snakes away?' + +'Go along with your snakes!' she said. + +So he understood that she had not seen any, and very cautiously he +looked into his room, and finding it snakeless, crept in, hoping that +the snakes had changed back into gold. But they had not--snakes and gold +and pot had all vanished. Then he thought he would be very careful. He +said to Ethel: + +'I had twenty golden sovereigns in my pocket yesterday.' + +This was Saturday. Next day was Sunday, and all day long he jingled the +twenty golden sovereigns he had found that morning in his knickerbocker +pocket. But they were not there on Monday. And then he saw that though +he could make things _happen_, he could not make them _last_. So he told +Ethel he had had seven jam-tarts. He meant to eat them as soon as he got +them. But the next day when they came he had a headache and did not +want to eat them. He might have given them to Ethel, but he didn't, and +next day they had disappeared. + +It was very annoying to Hildebrand to know that he had this wonderful +power, yet he could not get any good out of it. He tried to consult his +father about it, but Mr. Pilkings said he had no time for romances, and +he advised Hildebrand to learn his lessons and stick to the truth. But +this was just what Hildebrand could not do, even after the awful +occasion when his schoolfellows began to tease him again, and, to +command their respect, he related how he had met a bear in the lane by +the church and fought it single-handed, and been carried off more dead +than alive. Next day, of course, he had to fight the bear, which was +very brown and clawy and toothy and fierce, and though the +more-dead-than-alive feeling had gone by next day, it was not a pleasant +experience. But even that was better than the time when they laughed at +a very bad construe of his--the form was in Cæsar--and he told them how +he had once translated the inscription on an Egyptian Pyramid. He had no +peace for weeks after that, because he had forgotten to say how long it +took him. Every time he was alone he was wafted away to Egypt and set +down at that Pyramid. But he could not find the inscription, and if he +had found it he could not have translated it. So, in self-defence, he +spent most of his waking-time with Ethel. But every night the Pyramid +had its own way, and it was not till he had cut an inscription himself +on the Pyramid with the broken blade of his pocket-knife, and translated +it into English, that he was allowed any rest at all. The inscription +was _Ich bin eine Gans_, and you can translate it for yourself. + +But that did him good in one way; it made him fonder of Ethel. Being so +much with her, he began to see what a jolly little girl she really was. +When she had measles--Hildebrand had had them, or it, last Christmas, so +he was allowed to see his sister--he was very sorry, and really wished +to do something for her. Mr. Pilkings brought her some hothouse grapes +one day, and she liked them so much that they were very soon gone. Then +Hildebrand, who had been very careful since the Pyramid occasion to say +nothing but the truth, said: + +'Ethel, some grapes and pineapples came for you yesterday.' + +Ethel knew it wasn't true, but she liked the idea, and said: + +'Anything else?' + +'Oh yes!' said her brother--'a wax doll and a china tea-set with pink +roses on it, and books and games,' and he went on to name everything he +thought she would like. + +And, of course, next day the things came in a great packing-case. No one +ever knew who sent them, but Mr. and Mrs. Pilkings thought it was +Ethel's godfather in India. And, curiously enough, these things did not +vanish away, but were eaten and enjoyed and played with as long as they +lasted. Ethel has one of the dolls still, though now she is quite grown +up. + +Now Hildebrand began to feel sorry to see how ill and worried his mother +looked; she was tired out with nursing Ethel, so he said to Sarah: + +'Mother was quite well yesterday.' + +Sarah answered: + +'Much you know about it; your poor ma's wore to a shadow.' + +[Illustration: 'The alligator very nearly had him.'--Page 195.] + +But next day mother _was_ quite well, and this lasted, too. Then he +wanted to do something for his father, and as he had heard Mr. Pilkings +complain of his business being very bad, Hildebrand said to Ethel: + +'Father made a most awful lot of money yesterday.' + +And next day Mr. Pilkings came home and kissed Mrs. Pilkings in the hall +under the very eyes of Sarah and the boot-boy, and said: + +'My dear, our fortune's made!' + +The family did not have any nicer things to eat or wear than before, so +Hildebrand gained nothing by this, unless you count the pleasure he had +in seeing his father always jolly and cheerful and his mother well, and +not worried any more. Hildebrand _did_ count this, and it counted for a +good deal. + +But though Hildebrand was now a much happier as well as a more agreeable +boy, he could not quite help telling a startling story now and then. As, +for instance, when he informed the butcher's boy that there was an +alligator in the back-garden. The butcher's boy did not go into the +garden--indeed, he had no business there, though that would have been no +reason if he had wanted to go--but next day, when Hildebrand, having +forgotten all about the matter, went out in the dusk to look for a fives +ball he had lost, the alligator very nearly had him. + +And when he related that adventure of the lost balloon, he had to go +through with it next day, and it made him dizzy for months only to think +of it. + +But the worst thing of all was when Ethel was well, and he was allowed +to go back to school. Somehow the fellows were much jollier with him +than they used to be. Even Billson Minor was quite polite, and asked him +how the kid was. + +'She's all right,' said Hildebrand. + +'When my kiddie sister had measles,' Billson said, 'her eyes got bad +afterwards; she could hardly see.' + +'Oh,' said Hildebrand promptly, '_my_ sister's been much worse than +that; she couldn't see at all.' + +When Hildebrand went home next day he found his mother pale and in +tears. The doctor had just been to see Ethel's eyes--and Ethel was +blind. + +Then Hildebrand went up to his own room. He had done this--his own +little sister who was so fond of him. And she was such a jolly little +thing, and he had made her blind, just for a silly bit of show-off to +Billson Minor; and he knew that the things he had said about Ethel +before had come true, and had not vanished like the things he said +about himself, and he felt that this, too, would last, and Ethel would +go on being blind always. So he lay face down on his bed and cried, and +was sorry, and wished with all his heart that he had been a good boy, +and had never looked in the glass, and wished to bung up the eyes of +Billson Minor, who, after all, was not such a bad sort of chap. + +When he had cried till he could not cry any more he got up, and went to +the looking-glass to see if his eyes were red, which is always +interesting. He never could remember that he couldn't see himself in the +glass now. Then suddenly he knew what to do. He ran down into the +street, and said to the first person he met: + +'I say, I saw the looking-glass boy yesterday, and he let me off things +coming true, and Ethel was all right again.' + +It was a policeman, and the constable boxed his ears, and promised to +run him in next time he had any of his cheek. But Hildebrand went home +calmer, and he read 'The Jungle Book' aloud to Ethel all the evening. + +Next morning he ran to his looking-glass, and it was strange and +wonderful to him to see his own reflection again after all these weeks +of a blank mirror, and of parting his hair as well as he could just by +feeling. But it wasn't his own reflection, of course: it was the +looking-glass boy. + +'I say, you look very different to what you did that day,' said +Hildebrand slowly. + +'So do you,' said the boy. + +That other day, which was weeks ago, the looking-glass boy had been +swollen and scowling and angry, with a black eye and a cut lip, and +revengeful looks and spiteful words. Now he looked pale and a little +thinner, but his eyes were only anxious, and his mouth was kind. It was +just the same ugly shape as ever, but it looked different. And +Hildebrand was as like the boy in the glass as one pin is like another +pin. + +'I say,' said Hildebrand suddenly and earnestly, 'let me off; I don't +want it any more, thank you. And oh, do--do make my sister all right +again.' + +'Very well,' said the boy in the looking-glass; 'I'll let you off for +six months. If you haven't learned to speak the truth by then--well, +you'll see. Good-bye.' + +He held out his hand, and Hildebrand eagerly reached out to shake it. He +had forgotten the looking-glass, and it smashed against his fist, and +cracked all over. He never saw the boy again, and he did not want to. + +When he went down Ethel's eyes were all right again, and the doctor +thought it was _his_ doing, and was as proud as a King and as pleased as +Punch. Hildebrand could only express his own gladness by giving Ethel +every toy he had that he thought she would like, and he was so kind to +her that she cried with pleasure. + +Before the six months were up Hildebrand was as truthful a boy as anyone +need wish to meet. He made little slips now and then, just at first, +about his escape from the mad bull, for instance, and about the +press-gang. + +His stories did not come true next day any more, but he had to dream +them, which was nearly as bad. So he cured himself, and did his lessons, +and tried to stick to the truth; and when he told romances he let people +know what he was playing at. Now he is grown up he dreams his stories +first, and writes them afterwards; for he writes books, and also he +writes for the newspapers. When you do these things you may tell as many +stories as you like, and you need not be at all afraid that any of them +will come true. + + + + +THE RING AND THE LAMP + + +You are, of course, a singularly intelligent child, and so must often +have wondered what has become of all the interesting things that you +read about in the old fairy-tales--the shoes of swiftness, and the sword +of sharpness, and the cloak that made its wearer invisible, and things +like that. Well, the fact is all these things are still in the world, +hidden about somewhere, only people are so busy with new inventions, +wireless telegraphs and X rays, and air-ships, that they don't trouble +any more to look for the really interesting things. And if you don't +look for things, you don't find them--at least, not often; though some +lucky persons have only to walk out of doors and adventures happen to +them as readily as breakfast and bed happen to ordinary folk. But when +people do find any of the wonderful old treasures they generally hold +their tongues about it, because it is so difficult to make people +believe the truth if it is at all out of the way. Two of the wonder +things out of the old stories were found only the other day by a little +girl in Sussex; and she never told anyone but me and one other person. I +often have things told me that no one else ever hears of, because +everyone knows that I can believe anything. + +The little-girl-in-Sussex's name was Seraphina Bodlett. She did not +belong to Sussex, having been born in Tooting; but she was staying at a +Sussex farmhouse for the summer holidays. It was the very nicest place +to stay at, plenty of room to play in--all the Sussex Downs, in +fact--and plenty of animals to pet and feed. The only thing was that all +the other people at the farm were grown up, and Seraphina longed very +much for someone to play with. The farmer's daughter, Miss Patty, was +very kind, and always quite willing to play Halma; only it happened that +Halma was not what Seraphina wanted to play. + +It was summer, and Seraphina went to bed early, while it was still +daylight. She used to lie awake in the big four-post bed, with the white +dimity curtains, and look at the latticed window and the oak chest of +drawers with the shell boxes on it, and try to make herself dream that +she had another little girl to play with. But she always surprised +herself by waking up in the morning without having dreamed of anything +at all. + +The best parlour at the farm was a very nice place, but Seraphina (whose +name takes so long to write that I think I had better call her Fina, as +everyone else did) was not usually allowed to play there, and the blinds +were always drawn down exactly halfway, because that is genteel. + +Sometimes Fina was taken into the parlour by Miss Patty, and then Miss +Patty would bring out the curiosities that her brother the sailor had +brought home from his voyages: South Sea necklaces of seeds and beads +and cut-up reeds, and fat idols from India, with far more arms than most +of us could find a use for. Then there were beady pincushions made by +seamen, and a stuffed parrot exactly like life, except that one eye was +out, and Chinese junks in beautiful carved ivory, and a pagoda (or +Chinese temple), and that was of ivory too, and all carved out of one +solid block, Miss Patty said. Fina loved the pagoda best of all the +curiosities. You could see right into it. It was a tower with seven +stories, and it had little gold bells on it that rang when Miss Patty +took off the glass case and gently shook the wooden stand. Of course, +Fina was never allowed to shake it herself. + +'Where did it come from?' She asked this question every time she was +shown the pagoda. + +'It came from the Emperor of China's own Summer Palace at Pekin,' Miss +Patty always said; 'but my brother Bob never would tell me how he got +it.' + +Then, when Fina had had a last peep through the windows of the pagoda, +the glass case would be put on again, and Fina would be told to 'run +along now and play.' + +One day she was 'running along and playing' when she met a playfellow. +It was a fat foxhound puppy, very clumsy and very affectionate. They had +a romp together, and then the puppy blundered off, and Fina went indoors +to wash her hands, because the puppy's idea of a romp had been a roll in +the dust, which Fina had gladly consented to share. + +But as she passed the door of the best parlour she stopped a minute, for +the door was open. It was the day for cleaning out the room, but Miss +Patty had stopped in the middle of the cleaning to go to the back-door +to see a pedlar who had some really wonderful bargains in handkerchiefs +and silk dresses, and mixed white pins and back-hair combs. Fina often +wondered afterwards whether that pedlar was a real pedlar or a magician +in disguise. + +Now, Fina was an obedient little girl. She did _not_ slip into the +parlour to have a look round just because the door was open and no one +was about. But she had not been forbidden to _look_ in, if she got the +chance, so she stood at the door and looked at the stuffed parrot, and +the junk, and the rest of the things; and as she looked she started, and +said: + +'_Oh!_ it will tumble down--I know it will--if a door banged even!' + +And just then the front-door _did_ bang, and the pagoda trembled; for it +was standing at the very edge of the chiffonnier, and one of the little +black, carved claw-feet of its stand was actually overhanging the +chiffonnier edge. + +'I _must_ stand it steady,' said Fina. 'If I go and tell Miss Patty it +may tumble off before I get back.' + +So she went quickly in and took the glass case and stand and pagoda very +carefully in her hands to move them back to a safe place. + +It was this very moment that the foxhound puppy chose for rushing +in--all wriggle and bark and clumsy paws--and plunging between Fina's +feet. She reeled, staggered, and she, the puppy, the stand, the glass +case, and the precious pagoda, all went down together in a crushing +heap. + +When Fina picked herself up the puppy's tail was just disappearing round +the door, and at her feet lay a scattered heap of splintered ivory and +glass, the hopeless ruins of the beautiful pagoda. + +Her heart seemed to stand still, and then began to beat so hard and fast +that she felt as though she had a steam-engine in her chest. + +Her hands trembled so much that she could hardly pick up the pieces; but +she did begin to pick them up. + +'Perhaps it could be mended,' she said, 'with glue or white of egg, like +nurse did the china basin; only the pieces are so small and chippety, +some of them, that I don't see how you could ever fit them together. And +Miss Patty will be in in a minute! Oh, I wish I was somebody else and +not me! Oh, whatever will she say?' + +Among the shivered splinters of ivory the little gold bells were +scattered. + +'But what's that?' said Fina. 'It's not a bell or----' + +She picked whatever it was up from among the shattered ivory and glass. +It was a gold ring, thick and beautiful, with a strange design on it +like on the sides of tea-caddies. She slipped it on her hand to keep it +safe while she went on with the dismal work of picking up the pieces. +And then, suddenly, the dreadfulness of the deed she had done--though +quite the puppy's fault, and not hers at all--came over her. She began +to breathe quickly and then to make faces, and in a moment she was +sobbing and sniffing, and rubbing her wet eyes with her knuckles, still +dirty from her politeness in letting the puppy choose what game she and +it should play at. + +She was roused from her crying by a voice, and it was not Miss Patty's +voice. It said: + +'Your servant, miss. What can I have the pleasure of doing for you?' + +She took her knuckles out of her eyes, and saw, from between her very +dirty eyelids, a tall footman who was bowing respectfully before her. +He was dressed wonderfully in green satin--his large and lovely legs +wore white silk stockings, and his hair was powdered till it was as +white as the inside of a newly-sheared fleece. + +[Illustration: '"Your servant, Miss. Do I understand that you order me +to mend this?"'--Page 207.] + +'Thank you,' said Fina, sobbing, but polite; 'no one can do anything +for me, unless they can mend all this, and of course nobody can.' + +'Your servant, miss,' said the footman. 'Do I understand that you order +me to mend this?' + +'If you can,' said Fina, a ray of hope lighting her blighted existence; +'but, of course----WHAT?' + +The pagoda stood on the table _mended_! Indeed, it seemed as though +there had never been any breaking. It was there, safe and sound as it +had always been, on its ebony stand, with the shining bubble of its +glass case rising dome-like over it. + +The footman had vanished. + +'_Well!_' said Fina, 'I suppose it was all a waking dream. How horrible! +I've read of waking dreams, but I didn't know there were ever waking +nightmares. Perhaps I better _had_ wash my hands--and my face,' she +added, when she saw it, round, red, and streaked with mud (made of dust +and tears), in the glass of the chiffonnier. + +She dipped her face in fresh water in the willow-patterned basin in her +big attic bedroom. Then she washed her hands. And as she began to rub +the soap on she heard a noise. + +'Your servant, miss. What can I have the pleasure of doing for you?' + +And there was that footman again. + +'Who are you?' said Fina. 'Why do you follow me about?' + +'I am the Slave of the Ring, please, miss,' replied the footman, with +another bow. 'And, of course, when you rubs it I appears.' + +'The Slave of the Ring?' said Fina, letting the soapsuds drip from her +hands to the carpet. 'Do you mean Aladdin's ring?' + +'The ring belonged to the gentleman you mentions at one time, miss.' + +'But I thought the Slave of the Ring was a genie--a great, foaming, +fierce, black slave in a turban.' + +'Times is changed, miss,' said the footman. 'In this here civilised +country there aren't no slaves, only servants. You have to keep up with +the times, even if you're a----' + +'But I thought the Slave of the Ring spoke Chinese?' + +'So I does, miss, when in that country. But whatever'd be the use of +talking Chinese to you?' + +'But tell me--oh, there's the dinner-bell! Look here, I wish you'd not +keep appearing so suddenly. It does startle me so.' + +'Then don't you go on rubbing the ring sudden, miss. It's that as does +it. Nothing I can do for you, miss?' + +'Not now,' said Fina, and he vanished as she spoke. + +When Fina sat down to dinner in the farm kitchen--a very nice dinner it +was, boiled pork and beans, and a treacle-tart to follow--she picked up +her horn-handled knife and fork and clutched them hard. They felt real +enough. But the footman--she must have dreamed him, and the ring. She +had left the ring in the dressing-table drawer upstairs, for fear she +should rub it accidentally. She knew what a start it would give Miss +Patty and the farmer if a genie footman suddenly appeared from nowhere +and stood behind their chairs at dinner. + +Miss Patty seemed very cheerful. + +'It _was_ a piece of luck, father, wasn't it, that pedlar wanting +Chinese things? He gave me two pieces of broadcloth that'll cut into +three or four coats for you, and a length of black silk that rich it'll +stand alone, and ten pounds in gold, and half a dozen silk +neck-squares.' + +'Yes,' said the farmer, 'it was a good bargain for you; and Bob give you +the pagoda, and you've a right to do as you like with your own.' + +'Oh, Miss Patty,' said Fina, 'you've never been and sold the pagoda--the +beautiful, darling pagoda?' + +'Yes, I have, dear; but never mind, I'll buy you a new doll out of the +money I got for it.' + +'Thank you,' said Fina; but the pork and beans did not taste so nice now +she knew that the pretty pagoda was sold. Also she was rather worried +about the ring. Ought she to keep it? She had found it, of course, but +someone must have lost it. Yet she couldn't bear to give it up, when she +hadn't made the slave of it do a single thing for her, except to mend +the pagoda. + +After dinner Fina went and got the ring. She was very careful not to rub +it till she was safe and alone in a quiet green nook in the little wood +at the end of the garden, where the hazels and sweet chestnuts and +hornbeams grew so closely that she was quite hidden. + +Then she rubbed the ring, and instantly the footman was there. But there +was no room for him to stand up under the thicket, so he appeared +kneeling, and trying to bow in that position. + +'Then it's not a dream?' said she. + +'How often I have heard them very words!' said the Slave of the Ring. + +'I want you to tell me things,' said Fina. 'Do sit down; you look so +uncomfortable like that.' + +'Thank you, miss,' said the footman; 'you're very thoughtful for a child +of your age, and of this age, too! Service ain't what it was.' + +'Now, tell me,' she said, 'where did the ring come from?' + +'There's seven secrets I ain't allowed to tell,' the footman said, 'and +that there what you asked me's one of them; but the ring's as old as +old--I can tell you that.' + +'But I mean where did it come from just now--when I found it?' + +'Oh, _then_. Why, it come out of the pagoda, of course. The floor of the +third story was made double, and the ring was stuck between the floor of +that and the ceiling of the second floor, and when you smashed the +pagoda o' course it rolled out. The pagoda was made o' purpose to take +care of the ring.' + +'Who made it?' asked Fina. + +'I did,' said the genie proudly. + +'And now,' said Fina, 'what shall we do?' + +'Excuse me,' the footman said firmly; 'one thing I'm _not_ bound to do +is to give advice.' + +'But you'll do anything else I tell you?' + +'Yes, miss--almost anything. I'll talk to you willing, I will, and tell +you my life's sorrows.' + +'I should like that some other time,' said Fina, 'but just now, perhaps, +you'd better get me a doll.' + +And a doll lay at her feet among the dead leaves. It was a farthing +Dutch doll. + +'You didn't say what sort of a doll,' said the footman, when she had +rubbed the ring and he had reappeared, and she had reproached him. 'I've +been in service long enough to do exactly what I am told. My life-sorrow +has been----' + +'I say,' Fina said suddenly, 'can't you get the pagoda back for me?' + +Instantly the pagoda was there and the footman was not. Fina spent the +afternoon playing with the beautiful ivory toy, but when it was tea-time +she had to ask the genie footman to take it away again, for she dared +not face the questions and she could not invent the explanations that +would have followed if she had turned up at the house with the pagoda +under her arm. + +You will think that Fina ought to have been the happiest of little +girls, now that she had a genie footman Slave of the Ring in a green +coat to get her anything she wanted, and run her errands on his +beautiful balustrade-like white silk legs. But this was not so. + +It was all very well to go into the wood every day and make the footman +fetch her the most beautiful dolls and toys and sweets, but even sweets +are dull if you eat them alone; and what is the use of toys, or even +pagodas, if you have no one to show them to, and dare not have them +except in a secret corner of the wood? + +She tried to get the footman to play with her, but he said that was a +little more than anyone could expect, and began again about his sorrows; +and as for getting him to take any interest in the wonderful things he +fetched for her, she felt at once that these were nothing to a genie +footman with such a jewelled and exciting past as his. + +She was not a very clever little girl. She wished for a white pony, and, +of course, it came, but there was no room for it in the wood, and it +walked on her foot and tried to bite her, and she hastily had to send it +away. She wished for a pet lamb, but it baaed so loudly that she was +almost discovered by the farmer, so that had to go too. And she had +been wishing for these vain and unsatisfying things for more than a week +before she thought of asking for a little girl to play with. + +The genie brought a little girl at once, but she was a horrid little +girl, with a red pigtail and a green frock trimmed with black bead +trimming, and she broke the toys and laughed at Fina when she tried to +tell her the story of the pagoda and the Ring Slave. Also there was no +room to play in the secret nook in the wood, and when the little girl +had slapped Fina and taken the pagoda away from her it seemed best to +ask the genie to take the little girl herself away. Fina never saw her +again, and never wanted to either! + +At last Fina knew that what she really wanted was not only someone to +play with, but a good place to play in, so she shut her eyes and +thought--as hard as a not very clever person of eight can think--and +then she rubbed the ring and said: + +'Please take me somewhere where there is a little girl who will play +with me, a nice little girl, and room to play in.' + +And at once the wood vanished--like a magic-lantern picture when the +kind clergyman who is showing it changes the slide--and she was in a +strange room. + +[Illustration: 'The little girl had slapped Fina and taken the pagoda +away.'--Page 214.] + +It was a nursery--very large and light. There were flowers at the +window, and pictures on the walls, and many toys. And on a couch, +covered with a bright green rug with yellow daisies embroidered on it, +lay a little girl with pretty yellow hair and kind, merry blue eyes. + +'_Oh!_' said the little girl, very much astonished. + +'_Oh!_' said Fina, at the same minute, and with the same quantity of +astonishment. + +'I've come to play with you, if you'll let me,' said Fina. + +'How lovely! But how did you get in?' + +'The Slave of the Ring brought me.' + +'The Slave of the Ring! How wonderful!' + +'Yes, isn't it? What's your name?' + +'Ella.' + +'Mine's Fina. Wouldn't you like to see my Ring Slave, Ella?' + +'Yes--oh yes!' Ella was laughing softly. + +Fina rubbed the ring and the footman genie appeared, his silk legs more +beautifully silk than ever. + +'Please fetch the pagoda.' + +The pagoda toppled on to the couch, and the genie vanished, as he +always did when he had executed an order. + +When Ella had admired the pagoda, which she did very thoroughly and +satisfyingly, she said: + +'And now I'll show you _mine_!' + +She pulled a battered iron thing from under her pillow and rubbed it. +Instantly a very grand stout gentleman in evening dress stood before +them. He had most respectable whiskers, and he said: + +'What can I do for you, madam?' + +'Who is it?' whispered Fina. + +'It's the Slave of the Lamp,' said Ella. 'He says he's disguised as a +perfect butler because times have changed so since _his_ time.' + +'Send him away,' said Fina. + +'Oh, dear Ella,' she went on, when they were alone, 'tell me all about +yours, and I'll tell you all about mine.' + +'Well,' said Ella, 'I found the lamp at the seaside, just before I hurt +my back. I fell off the sea-wall, you know, and I shan't be able to walk +for ever so long. And one day I rubbed it by accident, and since then my +beautiful perfect butler gets me anything I want. Look here, I'll tell +him to make it like it was yesterday.' + +The lamp was rubbed, the order given, and the nursery became a palace +hall hung with cloth of gold and blazing with jewels and softly-coloured +lamps. + +'But can't your butler cure your back?' + +'No. Time is the only genie who can do that, my butler says. You don't +know how I've wanted someone to show it all to! But I never thought of +wishing for you. It's only a week since I found the lamp----' + +'Do they leave you alone all the time?' + +'Oh no, only when I say I'm sleepy; and my butler has orders to change +everything to ordinary directly the door-handle turns.' + +'Have you told anyone?' + +'Oh _no_! My butler says if you tell anyone grown-up that you've got the +lamp it will vanish away. I can't remember whether it's like that in the +"Arabian Nights"; perhaps it's a new rule.' + +The two little girls talked all the afternoon about the wonderful things +they would make their slaves do for them, and they were so contented +with each other's company that they never once called on their slaves +for anything. + +But when Fina began to feel the inside feeling that means teatime, she +rubbed the ring for her slave to take her back to the farm. + +'I'll get my slave to take me to see you home,' said Ella. 'He can carry +me quite without hurting me.' + +So she rubbed the lamp, and the stately butler instantly appeared. + +'Please----' Ella began; but the glorious butler interrupted. + +'James,' he said to the footman, 'what are you doing here?' + +'I'm in service with this young lady, Mr. Lamp, sir.' + +'Give me the ring, James.' + +And instantly the footman took the ring, very gently but quite +irresistibly, from Fina's finger, and handed it to the butler. + +'Oh _no_!' Fina cried, 'you've no right to take my ring. And he's no +right to obey you. He's _my_ slave.' + +'Excuse me, madam,' said the butler, looking more and more perfect, and +more and more the sort of person who is sure to know best, 'he is not +_your_ slave. He is the Slave of the Ring. But then, you see, he is a +footman, and footmen have to obey butlers all the world over.' + +[Illustration: '"We'll see if you are going to begin a-ordering of me +about."'--Page 219.] + +'That's so, miss,' said the footman; 'but the lamp's stronger than the +ring.' He snatched up the lamp. 'Now, then,' he said, turning fiercely +to the butler, 'we'll see if you're going to begin a-orderin' of me +about!' + +The butler so far forgot himself as to scratch his head thoughtfully. + +'Yes,' he said, after a pause; 'I've got to own that you've got the +better of me there, James Rings. But why dispute--which is beneath the +dignity of a six-foot footman like yourself, to say nothing of the +dignity of a butler, which is a thing words can't do justice to? You're +my slave because I've got the ring and because I'm a butler and you're a +footman. And I'm your slave because you've got the lamp. It's half a +dozen of one and six and a half of the other. Can't we come to some +agreement between ourselves, James?' + +'Oh,' cried Ella, 'what about _us_?' + +'We are excessively sorry to cause any inconvenience, madam,' said the +butler, 'but we give you five minutes' notice. We are leaving service +for good.' + +'Oh, Lamps!' cried Ella. 'And you were always such a beautiful butler. I +thought you enjoyed being it.' + +'Don't you make any mistake, miss,' the footman put in. 'Nobody _enjoys_ +being in service, though they has to put up with it. Me and Mr. Lamps is +retiring from service. Perhaps we may take a little business and go into +partnership, and always wishing you well, young ladies both.' + +'But,' said Fina, 'you _can't_ go and leave me here! Why, I should never +get home. I don't so much as know what county I'm in.' + +'You're in Auckland, miss,' said James. + +'There isn't such a country.' + +'Pardon me, madam,' said the butler, 'there is. In New Zealand.' + +'Don't cry, miss,' said James. 'If Mr. Lamps 'll only give the word, +I'll take you home.' + +'And then I shall never see Ella again.' + +'Oh, tell Lamps to rub the ring and tell you to arrange for me to come +and live near her in England,' cried Ella; 'if he'll do that I don't +care. I'd rather have a friend than twenty slaves.' + +'A very proper sentiment, ma'am,' said the butler approvingly. 'Is there +any other little thing we could do to oblige you?' + +'The pagoda,' said Fina. 'If you could only get it back to Miss Patty, +so that she won't lose the things she sold it for, and won't know about +the ring having been in it.' + +'Consider it done, madam,' said the Slave of the Lamp, stroking his +respectable butlerial whisker. 'Now, if you're ready, your footman shall +see you home.' + +'Good-bye, oh, good-bye,' said the little girls, kissing each other very +much. + +Then Fina shut her eyes, and there she was in the wood in Sussex--alone. + +'Now, _have_ I dreamed it all?' she said, and went slowly home to tea. + +The first thing she saw on the tea-table was the pagoda! And the next +was a brown-faced sailor eating hot buttered toast in the Windsor +armchair. + +'Well may you look!' said Miss Patty; 'this is my brother Bob, newly +arrived from foreign parts. And he met that pedlar and bought the pagoda +off him for two pounds and a highly-coloured cockatoo he was bringing +home. And these ten sovereigns the wicked old man gave me are bad ones. +But the dresses and the cloth are good. It's a wonderful world!' + +Fina thought so too. + +Now, the oddest thing about all this is that six months later some new +people came to live in the house next door to the house where Fina lived +in Tooting. And those new people came from New Zealand. And one of them +was called Ella! + +Fina knew her at once, but Ella had forgotten her, and forgotten the +beautiful perfect butler and the perfect footman, and the lamp and the +ring, and everything. Perhaps a long sea-voyage is bad for the memory. +Anyway, the two little girls are close friends, and Ella loves to hear +Fina tell the story of the two slaves, though she doesn't believe a word +of it. + + +Fina's father and Ella's father have left Tooting now. They live in +lovely houses at Haslemere. And Fina has a white pony and Ella has a +brown one. Their fathers are very rich now. They both got situations as +managers to branch houses of Messrs. Lamps, Rings, and Co., Electrical +Engineers. Mr. Lamps attends to the lighting department, and Mr. Rings +is at the head of the bells, which always ring beautifully. And I hear +that Ella's father and Fina's father are likely to be taken into +partnership. Mr. Bodlett has bought the pagoda, at Fina's earnest +request, and it stands on a sideboard in his handsome drawing-room. +Fina sometimes asks it whether she really did dream the whole story or +not. But it never says a word. + +Of course, you and I know that every word of the story is true. + + + + +THE CHARMED LIFE; OR, THE PRINCESS AND THE LIFT-MAN + + +There was once a Prince whose father failed in business and lost +everything he had in the world--crown, kingdom, money, jewels, and +friends. This was because he was so fond of machinery that he was always +making working models of things he invented, and so had no time to +attend to the duties that Kings are engaged for. So he lost his +situation. There is a King in French history who was fond of machinery, +particularly clock-work, and he lost everything too, even his head. The +King in this story kept his head, however, and when he wasn't allowed to +make laws any more, he was quite contented to go on making machines. And +as his machines were a great deal better than his laws had ever been, he +soon got a nice little business together, and was able to buy a house in +another kingdom, and settle down comfortably with his wife and son. The +house was one of those delightful villas called after Queen Anne (the +one whose death is still so often mentioned and so justly deplored), +with stained glass to the front-door, and coloured tiles on the +front-garden path, and gables where there was never need of gables, and +nice geraniums and calceolarias in the front-garden, and pretty red +brick on the front of the house. The back of the house was yellow brick, +because that did not show so much. + +Here the King and the Queen and the Prince lived very pleasantly. The +Queen snipped the dead geraniums off with a pair of gold scissors, and +did fancy-work for bazaars. The Prince went to the Red-Coat School, and +the King worked up his business. In due time the Prince was apprenticed +to his father's trade; and a very industrious apprentice he was, and +never had anything to do with the idle apprentices who play pitch and +toss on tombstones, as you see in Mr. Hogarth's picture. + +When the Prince was twenty-one his mother called him to her. She put +down the blotting-book she was embroidering for the School Bazaar in +tasteful pattern of stocks and nasturtiums, and said: + +'My dear son, you have had the usual coming-of-age presents--silver +cigar-case and match-box; a handsome set of brushes, with your initials +on the back; a Gladstone bag, also richly initialled; the complete works +of Dickens and Thackeray; a Swan fountain-pen mounted in gold; and the +heartfelt blessing of your father and mother. But there is still one +more present for you.' + +'You are too good, mamma,' said the Prince, fingering the +nasturtium-coloured silks. + +'Don't fidget,' said the Queen, 'and listen to me. When you were a baby +a fairy, who was your godmother, gave you a most valuable present--a +Charmed Life. As long as you keep it safely, nothing can harm you.' + +'How delightful!' said the Prince. 'Why, mamma, you might have let me go +to sea when I wanted to. It would have been quite safe.' + +'Yes, my dear,' said the Queen, 'but it's best to be careful. I have +taken care of your life all these years, but now you are old enough to +take care of it for yourself. Let me advise you to keep it in a safe +place. You should never carry valuables about on your person.' + +And then she handed the Charmed Life over to him, and he took it and +kissed her, and thanked her for the pretty present, and went away and +hid it. He took a brick out of the wall of the villa, and hid his Life +behind it. The bricks in the walls of these Queen Anne villas generally +come out quite easily. + +Now, the father of the Prince had been King of Bohemia, so, of course, +the Prince was called Florizel, which is their family name; but when the +King went into business he went in as Rex Bloomsbury, and his great +patent Lightning Lift Company called itself R. Bloomsbury and Co., so +that the Prince was known as F. Bloomsbury, which was as near as the +King dared go to 'Florizel, Prince of Bohemia.' His mother, I am sorry +to say, called him Florrie till he was quite grown up. + +Now, the King of the country where Florizel lived was a very go-ahead +sort of man, and as soon as he heard that there were such things as +lifts--which was not for a long time, because no one ever lets a King +know anything if it can be helped--he ordered one of the very, very best +for his palace. Next day a card was brought in by one of the palace +footmen. It had on it: 'Mr. F. Bloomsbury, R. Bloomsbury and Co.' + +'Show him in,' said the King. + +'Good-morning, sire,' said Florizel, bowing with that perfect grace +which is proper to Princes. + +'Good-morning, young man,' said the King. 'About this lift, now.' + +'Yes, sire. May I ask how much your Majesty is prepared to----' + +'Oh, never mind price,' said the King; 'it all comes out of the taxes.' + +'I should think, then, that Class A ... our special Argentinella +design--white satin cushions, woodwork overlaid with ivory and inset +with pearls, opals, and silver.' + +'Gold,' said the King shortly. + +'Not with pearls and ivory,' said Florizel firmly. He had excellent +taste. 'The gold pattern--we call it the Anriradia--is inlaid with +sapphires, emeralds, and black diamonds.' + +'I'll have the gold pattern,' said the King; 'but you might run up a +little special lift for the Princess's apartments. I dare say she'd like +that Argentinella pattern--"Simple and girlish," I see it says in your +circular.' + +So Florizel booked the order, and the gold and sapphire and emerald lift +was made and fixed, and all the Court was so delighted that it spent +its whole time in going up and down in the lift, and there had to be new +blue satin cushions within a week. + +Then the Prince superintended the fixing of the Princess's lift--the +Argentinella design--and the Princess Candida herself came to look on at +the works; and she and Florizel met, and their eyes met, and their hands +met, because his caught hers, and dragged her back just in time to save +her from being crushed by a heavy steel bar that was being lowered into +its place. + +'Why, you've saved my life,' said the Princess. + +But Florizel could say nothing. His heart was beating too fast, and it +seemed to be beating in his throat, and not in its proper place behind +his waistcoat. + +'Who are you?' said the Princess. + +'I'm an engineer,' said the Prince. + +'Oh dear!' said the Princess, 'I thought you were a Prince. I'm sure you +look more like a Prince than any Prince _I've_ ever seen.' + +'I wish I was a Prince,' said Florizel; 'but I never wished it till +three minutes ago.' + +The Princess smiled, and then she frowned, and then she went away. + +Florizel went straight back to the office, where his father, Mr. Rex +Bloomsbury, was busy at his knee-hole writing-table. + +He spent the morning at the office, and the afternoon in the workshop. + +'Father,' he said, 'I don't know what ever will become of me. I wish I +was a Prince!' + +The King and Queen of Bohemia had never let their son know that he was a +Prince; for what is the use of being a Prince if there's never going to +be a kingdom for you? + +Now, the King, who was called R. Bloomsbury, Esq., looked at his son +over his spectacles and said: + +'Why?' + +'Because I've been and gone and fallen head over ears in love with the +Princess Candida.' + +The father rubbed his nose thoughtfully with his fountain pen. + +'Humph!' he said; 'you've fixed your choice high.' + +'Choice!' cried the Prince distractedly. 'There wasn't much choice about +it. She just looked at me, and there I was, don't you know? I didn't +_want_ to fall in love like this. Oh, father, it hurts most awfully! +What ever shall I do?' + +After a long pause, full of thought, his father replied: + +'Bear it, I suppose.' + +'But I _can't_ bear it--at least, not unless I can see her every day. +Nothing else in the world matters in the least.' + +'Dear me!' said his father. + +'Couldn't I disguise myself as a Prince, and try to make her like me a +little?' + +'The disguise you suggest is quite beyond our means at present.' + +'Then I'll disguise myself as a lift attendant,' said Florizel. + +And what is more, he did it. His father did not interfere. He believed +in letting young people manage their own love affairs. + +So that when the lift was finished, and the Princess and her ladies +crowded round to make the first ascent in it, there was Florizel dressed +in white satin knee-breeches, and coat with mother-o'-pearl buttons. He +had silver buckles to his shoes, and a tiny opal breast-pin on the +lappet of his coat, where the white flower goes at weddings. + +When the Princess saw him she said: + +'Now, none of you girls are to go in the lift at all, mind! It's _my_ +lift. You can use the other one, or go up the mother-of-pearl staircase, +as usual.' + +Then she stepped into the lift, and the silver doors clicked, and the +lift went up, just carrying her and him. + +She had put on a white silky gown, to match the new lift, and she, too, +had silver buckles on her shoes, and a string of pearls round her +throat, and a silver chain set with opals in her dark hair; and she had +a bunch of jasmine flowers at her neck. As the lift went out of sight +the youngest lady-in-waiting whispered: + +'What a pretty pair! Why, they're made for each other! What a pity he's +a lift-man! He looks exactly like a Prince.' + +'Hold your tongue, silly!' said the eldest lady-in-waiting, and slapped +her. + +The Princess went up and down in the lift all the morning, and when at +last she had to step out of it because the palace luncheon-bell had rung +three times, and the roast peacock was getting cold, the eldest +lady-in-waiting noticed that the Lift-man had a jasmine flower fastened +to his coat with a little opal pin. + +The eldest lady-in-waiting kept a sharp eye on the Princess, but after +that first day the Princess only seemed to go up and down in the lift +when it was really necessary, and then she always took the youngest +lady-in-waiting with her; so that though the Lift-man always had a +flower in his buttonhole, there was no reason to suppose it had not been +given him by his mother. + +'I suppose I'm a silly, suspicious little thing,' said the eldest +lady-in-waiting. 'Of course, it was the lift that amused her, just at +first. How _could_ a Princess be interested in a lift-man?' + +Now, when people are in love, and want to be quite certain that they are +loved in return, they will take any risks to find out what they want to +know. But as soon as they are _quite sure_ they begin to be careful. + +And after those seventy-five ups and downs in the lift, on the first +day, the Princess no longer had any doubt that she was beloved by the +Lift-man. Not that he had said a word about it, but she was a clever +Princess, and she had seen how he picked up the jasmine flower she let +fell, and kissed it when she pretended she wasn't looking, and he +pretended he didn't know she was. Of course, she had been in love with +him ever since they met, and their eyes met, and their hands. She told +herself it was because he had saved her life, but that wasn't the real +reason at all. + +So, being quite sure, she began to be careful. + +'Since he really loves me he'll find a way to tell me so, right out. +It's his part, not mine, to make everything possible,' she said. + +As for Florizel, he was quite happy. He saw her every day, and every day +when he took his place in his lift there was a fresh jasmine flower +lying on the satin cushion. And he pinned it into his buttonhole and +wore it there all day, and thought of his lady, and of how that first +wonderful day she had dropped a jasmine flower, and how he had picked it +up when she pretended she was not looking, and he was pretending that he +did not know she was. But all the same he wanted to know exactly how +that jasmine flower came there every day, and whose hand brought it. It +might be the youngest lady-in-waiting, but Florizel didn't think so. + +So he went to the palace one morning bright and early, much earlier than +usual, and there was no jasmine flower. Then he hid behind one of the +white velvet window-curtains of the corridor and waited. And, presently, +who should come stealing along on the tips of her pink toes--so as to +make no noise at all--but the Princess herself, fresh as the morning in +a white muslin frock with a silver ribbon round her darling waist, and +a bunch of jasmine at her neck. She took one of the jasmine flowers and +kissed it and laid it on the white satin seat of the lift, and when she +stepped back there was the Lift-man. + +'Oh!' said Candida, and blushed like a child that is caught in mischief. + +'Oh!' said Florizel, and he picked up the jasmine and kissed it many +times. + +'Why do you do that?' said the Princess. + +'Because you did,' said the Prince. 'I saw you. Do you want to go on +pretending any more?' + +The Princess did not know what to say, so she said nothing. + +Florizel came and stood quite close to her. + +'I used to wish I was a Prince,' he said, 'but I don't now. I'd rather +be an engineer. If I'd been a Prince I should never have seen you.' + +'I don't want you to be a bit different,' said the Princess. And she +stooped to smell the jasmine in his buttonhole. + +'So we're betrothed,' said Florizel. + +'Are we?' said Candida. + +'Aren't we?' he said. + +'Well, yes, I suppose we are,' said she. + +'Very well, then,' said Florizel, and he kissed the Princess. + +'You're sure you don't mind marrying an engineer?' he said, when she had +kissed him back. + +'Of course not,' said the Princess. + +'Then I'll buy the ring,' said he, and kissed her again. + +Then she gave him the rest of the jasmine, with a kiss for each star, +and he gave her a little keepsake in return, and they parted. + +'My heart is yours,' said Florizel, 'and my life is in your hands.' + +'My life is yours,' said she, 'and my heart is in your heart.' + +Now, I am sorry to say that somebody had been listening all the time +behind another curtain, and when the Princess had gone to her breakfast +and the Lift-man had gone down in his lift, this somebody came out and +said, 'Aha!' + +It was a wicked, ugly, disagreeable, snub-nosed page-boy, who would have +liked to marry the Princess himself. He had really no chance, and never +could have had, because his father was only a rich brewer. But he felt +himself to be much superior to a lift-man. And he was the kind of boy +who always sneaks if he has half a chance. So he went and told the King +that he had seen the Princess kissing the Lift-man in the morning all +bright and early. + +The King said he was a lying hound, and put him in prison at once for +mentioning such a thing--which served him right. + +Then the King thought it best to find out for himself whether the +snub-nosed page-boy had spoken the truth. + +So he watched in the morning all bright and early, and he saw the +Princess come stealing along on the tips of her little pink toes, and +the lift (Argentinella design) came up, and the Lift-man in it. And the +Princess gave him kissed jasmine to put in his buttonhole. + +So the King jumped out on them and startled them dreadfully. And +Florizel was locked up in prison, and the Princess was locked up in her +room with only the eldest lady-in-waiting to keep her company. And the +Princess cried all day and all night. And she managed to hide the +keepsake the Prince had given her. She hid it in a little book of +verses. And the eldest lady saw her do it. Florizel was condemned to be +executed for having wanted to marry someone so much above him in +station. But when the axe fell on his neck the axe flew to pieces, and +the neck was not hurt at all. So they sent for another axe and tried +again. And again the axe splintered and flew. And when they picked up +the bits of the axe they had all turned to leaves of poetry books. + +So they put off the execution till next day. + +The gaoler told the snub-nosed page all about it when he took him his +dinner of green water and mouldering crusts. + +'Couldn't do the trick!' said the gaoler. 'Two axes broke off short and +the bits turned to rubbish. The executioner says the rascal has a +Charmed Life.' + +'Of course he has,' said the ugly page, sniffing at the crusts with his +snub-nose. 'I know all about that, but I shan't tell unless the King +gives me a free pardon and something fit to eat. Roast pork and onion +stuffing, I think. And you can tell him so.' + +So the gaoler told the King. And the King gave the snub-nosed page the +pardon and the pork, and then the page said: + +'He has a Charmed Life. I heard him tell the Princess so. And what is +more, he gave it to her to keep. And she said she'd hide it in a safe +place!' + +Then the King told the eldest lady-in-waiting to watch, and she did +watch, and saw the Princess take Florizel's Charmed Life and hide it in +a bunch of jasmine. So she took the jasmine and gave it to the King, and +he burnt it. But the Princess had not left the Life in the jasmine. + +Then they tried to hang Florizel, because, of course, he had an ordinary +life as well as a charmed one, and the King wished him to be without any +life at all. + +Thousands of people crowded to see the presumptuous Lift-man hanged, and +the execution lasted the whole morning, and seven brand new ropes were +wasted one after the other, and they all left off being ropes and turned +into long wreaths of jasmine, which broke into bits rather than hang +such a handsome Lift-man. + +The King was furious. But he was not too furious to see that the +Princess must have taken the Charmed Life out from the jasmine flowers, +and put it somewhere else, when the eldest lady was not looking. + +And it turned out afterwards that the Princess had held Florizel's life +in her hand all the time the execution was going on. The eldest +lady-in-waiting was clever, but she was not so clever as the Princess. + +The next morning the eldest lady brought the Princess's silver mirror to +the King. + +'The Charmed Life is in that, your Majesty,' she said. 'I saw the +Princess put it in.' + +And so she had, but she had not seen the Princess take it out again +almost directly afterwards. + +The King smashed the looking-glass, and gave orders that poor Florizel +was to be drowned in the palace fishpond. + +So they tied big stones to his hands and feet and threw him in. And the +stones changed to corks and held him up, and he swam to land, and when +they arrested him as he landed they found that on each of the corks +there was a beautiful painting of Candida's face, as she saw it every +morning in her mirror. + +Now, the King and Queen of Bohemia, Florizel's father and mother, had +gone to Margate for a fortnight's holiday. + +'We will have a thorough holiday,' said the King; 'we will forget the +world, and not even look at a newspaper.' + +But on the third day they both got tired of forgetting the world, and +each of them secretly bought a newspaper and read it on the beach, and +each rushed back and met the other on the steps of the boarding-house +where they were staying. And the Queen began to cry, and the King took +her in his arms on the doorstep, to the horror of the other boarders, +who were looking out of the windows at them; and then they rushed off to +the railway station, leaving behind them their luggage and the +astonished boarders, and took a special train to town. Because the King +had read in his newspaper, and the Queen in hers, that the Lift-man was +being executed every morning from nine to twelve; and though, so far, +none of the executions had ended fatally, yet at any moment the Prince's +Charmed Life might be taken, and then there would be an end of the daily +executions--a very terrible end. + +Arrived at the capital, the poor Queen of Bohemia got into a hansom with +the King, and they were driven to the palace. The palace-yard was +crowded. + +'What is the matter?' the King of Bohemia asked. + +'It's that Lift-man,' said a bystander, with spectacles and a straw hat; +'he has as many lives as a cat. They tried boiling oil this morning, and +the oil turned into white-rose leaves, and the fire under it turned to +a white-rose bush. And now the King has sent for Princess Candida, and +is going to have it out with her. The whole thing has been most +exciting.' + +'I should think so,' said the Lift-man's father. + +'Of course,' said the bystander in spectacles, 'everyone who has read +any history knows that Lift-men don't have charmed lives. But our King +never would learn history, so he doesn't see that of course the Lift-man +is a Prince disguised. The question is, Will he find out in time? I +can't think why the Lift-man doesn't own his Princishness, and have done +with it.' + +'Perhaps he doesn't know it himself,' said the King of Bohemia. + +He gave his arm to his wife, and they managed to squeeze through to the +great council hall, where the King of that country sat on his gold +throne, surrounded by lords-in-waiting, judges in wigs, and other people +in other things. + +Florizel was there loaded with chains, and standing in a very noble +attitude at one corner of the throne steps. At the other stood the +Princess, looking across at her lover with her dear gray eyes. + +'Now,' said the King, 'I am tired of diplomacy and tact, and the eldest +lady-in-waiting is less of a Sherlock Holmes than I thought her, so let +us be straightforward and honest. Have you got a Charmed Life?' + +'I haven't exactly got it,' said Florizel. 'My life is not my own now.' + +'Did he give it to you?' the King asked his daughter. + +'I cannot tell a lie, father,' said the Princess, just as though her +name had been George Washington instead of Candida; 'he did give it to +me.' + +'What have you done with it?' + +'I have hidden it in different places. I have saved it; he saved mine +once.' + +'Where is it?' asked her father, 'as you so justly observe you cannot +tell a lie.' + +'If I tell you,' said the Princess, 'will you give your Royal word that +the execution you have ordered for this morning shall be really the +last? You can destroy the object that I have hidden his Charmed Life in, +and then you can destroy him. But you must promise me not to ask me to +hide his Life in any new place, because I am tired of hide-and-seek.' + +All the judges and lords-in-waiting and people felt really sorry for +the Princess, for they thought all these executions had turned her +brain. + +'I give you my Royal word,' said the King upon his throne. 'I won't ask +you to hide his Life any more. Indeed, I was against the practice from +the first. Now, where have you hidden his Life?' + +'In my heart,' said the Princess, brave and clear, so that everyone +heard her in the big hall. 'You can't take his Life without taking mine, +and if you take mine you may as well take his, for he won't care to go +on living without me.' + +She sprang across the throne steps to Florizel, and his fetters jangled +as she threw her arms round him. + +'Dear me!' said the King, rubbing his nose with his sceptre; 'this is +very awkward.' + +The Princess laughed happily. + +'Oh, my clever Princess,' whispered Florizel; 'you're as clever as +you're dear, and as dear as you're beautiful.' + +There was a silence. + +'Well, really,' said the King, 'I don't quite see----' + +The father and mother of Florizel had wriggled and wormed their way +through the crowd to a front place, and now the father spoke. + +'Your Majesty, allow me. Perhaps I can assist your decision.' + +'Oh, all right,' said the King upon his throne; 'go ahead. I'm struck +all of a heap.' + +'You see before you,' said the King of Bohemia, 'one known to the world +of science and of business as R. Bloomsbury, inventor and patenter of +many mechanical novelties--among others the Patent Lightning Lift--now +formed into a company of which I am the chairman. The young +Lift-man--whose fetters are most clumsily designed, if you will pardon +my saying so--is my son.' + +'Of course he's somebody's son,' said the King upon his throne. + +'Well, he happens to be mine, and I gather that you do not think him a +good enough match for your daughter.' + +'Without wishing to hurt your feelings----' began Candida's father. + +'Exactly. Well, know, O King on your throne, and everyone else, that +this young Lift-man is no other than Florizel, Prince of Bohemia. I am +the King of Bohemia, and this is my Queen.' + +As he spoke he took his crown out of his pocket and put it on. His wife +took off her bonnet and got her crown out of her reticule and put that +on, and Florizel's crown was handed to the Princess, who fitted it on +for him, because his hands were awkward with chains. + +'Your most convincing explanation alters everything,' said the King upon +his throne, and he came down to meet the visitors. 'Bless you, my +children! Strike off his chains, can't you? I hope there's no +ill-feeling, Florizel,' he added, turning to the Prince; 'you see, an +engineer is only an engineer, whereas a Prince is a Prince, be he never +so disinherited. Will half an hour from now suit you for the wedding?' + +So they were married, and they still live very happily. They will live +as long as is good for them, and when Candida dies Florizel will die +too, because she still carries his Life in her heart. + + + + +BILLY THE KING + + +'Now, William,' said Billy King's great-uncle, 'you are old enough to +earn your own living, so I shall find you a nice situation in an office, +and you will not return to school.' + +The blood of Billy King ran cold in his veins. He looked out over the +brown wire blinds into Claremont Square, Pentonville, which was where +his uncle lived, and the tears came into his eyes; for, though his uncle +thought he was old enough to earn his own living, he was still young +enough to hate the idea of having to earn it in an office, where he +would never do anything, or make anything, or see anything, but only add +up dull figures from year's end to year's end. + +'I don't care,' said Billy to himself. 'I'll run away and get a +situation on my own--something interesting. I wonder if I could learn +how to be a pirate captain or a highwayman?' + +And next morning Billy got up very early, before anyone was about, and +ran away. + +He ran till he was out of breath and then he walked, and he walked till +he was out of patience, and then he ran again, and between walking and +running he came at last plump up to the door of a shop. And over the +shop there were big painted letters saying, 'Registry office for all +sorts of persons out of employment.' + +'I'm out of employment, anyway,' said he. The window of the shop had big +green-baize-shutter sort of things in them, with white cards fastened +on to them with drawing-pins, and on the cards were written the kind of +persons out of employment the registry office had got places for. And in +the very first one he read there was his own name--King! + +'I've come to the right shop,' said Billy, and he read the card through. +'Good general King wanted. Must be used to the business.' + +'That's not me, I'm afraid,' thought Billy, 'because whatever a general +King's business is I can't be used to it till I've tried it.' + +The next was: 'Good steady King wanted. Must be quick, willing, and up +to his work.' + +'I'm willing enough,' said Billy, 'and I'm quick enough--at any rate, +at fives or footer--but I don't know what a steady King's work is.' So +he looked at another card. + +'Wanted, respectable King to take entire charge of Parliament, and to +assist in Cabinet Councils and Reform of the Army, to open Bazaars and +Schools of Art, and make himself generally useful.' + +Billy shook his head. + +'I think that must be a very hard place,' said he. + +The next was: 'Competent Queen wanted; economical and good manager.' + +'Whatever else I am I'm not a Queen,' said Billy, and he was just +turning sadly away, when he saw a little card stuck away in the +right-hand top corner of the baize field. + +'Hard-working King wanted; no objection to one who has not been out +before.' + +'I can but try,' said Billy, and he opened the door of the registry +office and walked in. + +Inside there were several desks. At the first desk a lion with a pen +behind its ear was dictating to a unicorn, who was writing in a series +of Blue-books with his horn. Billy noticed that the horn had been +sharpened to a nice point, like a lead pencil when the drawing-master +does it for you as a favour. + +'I think you want a King?' said Billy timidly. + +'No, we don't,' said the lion, and it turned on him so quickly that +Billy was sorry he had spoken. 'The situation is filled, young man, and +we're thoroughly suited.' + +Billy was turning away, much dispirited, when the unicorn said: 'Try +some of the others.' + +So he went on to the next desk, where a frog sat sadly. But it only +wanted Presidents; and at the next desk an eagle told him that only +Emperors were wanted, and those very seldom. It was not till he got to +the very end of the long room that Billy found a desk where a fat pig in +spectacles sat reading a cookery-book. + +'Do you want a King?' said Billy. 'I've not been out before.' + +'Then you're the King for us,' said the pig, shutting the cookery-book +with a bang. 'Hard-working, I suppose, as the notice says?' + +'I think I should be,' said Billy, adding, honestly, 'especially if I +liked the work.' + +The pig gave him a square of silver parchment and said, 'That's the +address.' + +On the parchment was written: + +'Kingdom of Plurimiregia. Billy King, Respectable Monarch. Not been out +before.' + +'You'd better go by post,' said the pig. 'The five o'clock post will +do.' + +'But why--but how--where is it?' asked Billy. + +'I don't know where it is,' said the pig, 'but the Post-Office knows +everything. As to how--why, you just tie a label round your neck and +post yourself in the nearest letter-box. As to why, that's a silly +question, really, your Majesty. Don't you know the Post-Office always +takes charge of the Royal males?' + +Billy was just putting the address carefully away in what would have +been his watch-pocket if he had had any relation in the world except a +great-uncle, when the swing door opened gently and a little girl came +in. She looked at the lion and unicorn and the other busy beasts behind +their desks, and she did not seem to like the look of them. She looked +up the long room and she saw Billy, and she came straight up to him and +said: + +'Please I want a situation as Queen. It says in the window previous +experience not required.' + +She was a very shabby little girl, with a clean, round, rosy face, and +she looked as little like a Queen with previous experience as anybody +could possibly have done. + +'I'm not the registry office, my good kid,' said Billy. + +And the pig said, 'Try the next desk.' + +Behind the next desk sat a lizard, but it was so large it was more like +an alligator, only with a less unpleasant expression about the mouth. + +'Speak to him,' said the pig, as the lizard leaned forward on his front +paws like a draper's assistant when he says, 'What's the next article?' + +'I don't like to,' said the little girl. + +'Nonsense, you little duffer!' said Billy kindly; 'he won't eat you.' + +'Are you sure?' said the little girl very earnestly. + +Then Billy said, 'Look here, I'm a King, and so I've got a situation. +Are you a Queen?' + +'My name's Eliza Macqueen,' said the little girl. 'I suppose that's near +enough.' + +'Well, then,' said Billy to the lizard, 'will she do?' + +'Perfectly, I should say,' replied the lizard, with a smile that did not +become him very well. 'Here is the address.' He gave it to her; it read: + +'Kingdom of Allexanassa. Queen, not been out before; willing, obliging, +and anxious to learn.' + +'Your kingdoms,' he added, 'are next door to each other.' + +'So we shall see each other often,' said Billy. 'Cheer up! We might +travel together, perhaps.' + +'No,' said the pig; 'Queens go by railway. A Queen has to begin to get +used to her train as soon as she can. Now, run along, do. My friend here +will see her off.' + +'You're sure they won't eat me?' said Eliza--and Billy was certain they +wouldn't, though he didn't know why. So he said, 'Good-bye. I hope +you'll get on in your new place,' and off he went to buy a penny luggage +label at the expensive stationer's three doors down the street on the +right-hand side. And when he had addressed the label and tied it round +his neck, he posted himself honourably at the General Post-Office. The +rest of the letters in the box made a fairly comfortable bed, and Billy +fell asleep. When he awoke he was being delivered by the early morning +postman at the Houses of Parliament in the capital of Plurimiregia, and +the Houses of Parliament were just being opened for the day. The air of +Plurimiregia was clear and blue, very different from the air of +Claremont Square, Pentonville. The hills and woods round the town looked +soft and green, from the hill in the middle of the town where the +Parliament Houses stood. The town itself was small and very pretty, like +one of the towns in old illuminated books, and it had a great wall all +round it, and orange trees growing on the wall. Billy wondered whether +it was forbidden to pick the oranges. + +When Parliament was opened by the footman whose business it was, Billy +said: + +'Please, I've come about the place----' + +'The King's or the cook's?' asked the footman. + +Billy was rather angry. + +'Now, do I look like a cook?' he said. + +'The question is, do you look like a King?' said the footman. + +'If I get the place you will be sorry for this,' said Billy. + +'If you get the place you won't keep it long' said the footman. 'It's +not worth while being disagreeable; there's not time to do it properly +in. Come along in.' + +Billy went along in, and the footman led him into the presence of the +Prime Minister, who was sitting with straws in his hair, wringing his +hands. + +[Illustration: '"Come by post, your Lordship," said the footman.'--Page +255.] + +'Come by post, your lordship,' the footman said--'from London.' + +The Prime Minister left off wringing his hands, and held one of them out +to Billy. 'You will suit!' he said. 'I'll engage you in a minute. But +just pull the straws out of my hair first, will you? I only put them in +because we hadn't been able to find a suitable King, and I find straws +so useful in helping my brain to act in a crisis. Of course, once you're +engaged for the situation, no one will ask you to do anything useful.' + +Billy pulled the straws out, and the Prime Minister said: + +'Are they all out? Thanks. Well, now you're engaged--six months on +trial. You needn't do anything you don't want to. Now, your Majesty, +breakfast is served at nine. Let me conduct you to the Royal +apartments.' + +In ten minutes Billy had come out of a silver bath filled with scented +water, and was putting on the grandest clothes he had ever seen in his +life. Everything was of thick, soft, pussy silk, and his boots had gold +heels with gold spurs on them. + +For the first time in his life it was with personal pleasure, and not +from a sense of duty, that he brushed his hair and satisfied himself +that none of his nails were in mourning. Then he went to breakfast, +which was so fine that none but a French cook could have either cooked +or described it. He was a little hungry--he had had nothing to eat since +the bread and cheese at supper in Claremont Square the night before +last. + +After breakfast he rode out on a white pony, a thing he might have lived +in Claremont Square for ever without doing. And he found he rode very +well. After the ride he went on the sea in a boat, and was surprised and +delighted to find that he knew how to sail as well as how to steer. In +the afternoon he was taken to a circus; and in the evening the whole +Court played blind-man's buff. A most enchanting day! + +Next morning the breakfast was boiled underdone eggs and burnt herrings. +The King was too polite to make remarks about his food, but he did feel +a little disappointed. + +The Prime Minister was late for breakfast and came in looking hot and +flurried, and a garland of straw was entwined in the Prime Ministerial +hair. + +'Excuse my hair, sire,' he said. 'The cook left last night, but a new +one comes at noon to-day. Meantime, I have done my best.' + +[Illustration: '"Excuse my hair, Sire," he said.'--Page 256.] + +Billy said it was all right, and he had had an excellent breakfast. The +second day passed as happily as the first; the cook seemed to have +arrived, for the breakfast was made up for by the lunch. And Billy had +the pleasure of shooting at a target at two thousand yards with the +Lee-Metford rifle which had arrived by the same post as himself, and +hitting the bull's-eye every time. + +This is really a rare thing--even when you are a King. But Billy began +to think it curious that he should never have found out before how +clever he was, and when he took down a volume of Virgil and found that +he could read it as easily as though it had been the 'Child's First +Reading-Book,' he was really astonished. So Billy said to the Prime +Minister: + +'How is it I know so many things without learning them?' + +'It's the rule here, sire,' said the Prime Minister. 'Kings are allowed +to know everything without learning it.' + +Now, the next morning Billy woke very early, and got up and went out +into the garden, and, turning a corner suddenly, he came upon a little +person in a large white cap, with a large white apron on, in which she +was gathering sweet pot-herbs, thyme, and basil, and mint, and savory, +and sage, and marjoram. She stood up and dropped a curtsy. + +'Halloa!' said Billy the King; 'who are you?' + +'I'm the new cook,' said the person in the apron. + +Her big flapping cap hid her face, but Billy knew her voice. + +'Why,' said he, turning her face up with his hands under her chin, +'you're Eliza!' + +And sure enough it was Eliza, but her round face looked very much +cleverer and prettier than it had done when he saw it last. + +'Hush!' she said. 'Yes, I am. I got the place as Queen of Allexanassa, +but it was all horribly grand, and such long trains, and the crown is +awfully heavy. And yesterday morning I woke very early, and I thought +I'd just put on my old frock--mother made it for me the very last thing +before she was taken ill.' + +'Don't cry,' said Billy the King gently. + +'And I went out, and there was a man with a boat, and he didn't know I +was the Queen, and I got him to take me for a row on the sea, and he +told me some things.' + +'What sort of things?' + +'Why, about us, Billy. I suppose you're the same as I am now, and know +everything without learning it. What's Allexanassa Greek for?' + +'Why, something like the Country of Changing Queens, isn't it?' + +'And what does Plurimiregia mean?' + +'That must mean the land of many Kings. Why?' + +'Because that's what it is. They're always changing their Kings and +Queens here, for a most horrid and frightening reason, Billy. They get +them from a registry office a long way off so that they shouldn't know. +Billy, there's a dreadful dragon, and he comes once a month to be fed. +And they feed him with Kings and Queens! That's why we know everything +without learning. Because there's no time to learn in. And the dragon +has two heads, Billy--a pig's head and a lizard's head--and the pig's +head is to eat _you_ with and the lizard's head will eat _me_!' + +'So they brought us here for that,' said Billy--'mean, cruel, cowardly +brutes!' + +'Mother always said you could never tell what a situation was like until +you tried it,' said Eliza. 'But what are we to do? The dragon comes +to-morrow. When I heard that I asked where your kingdom was, and the +boatman showed me, and I made him land me here. So Allexanassa hasn't +got a Queen now, but Plurimiregia has got us both.' + +Billy rumpled his hair with his hands. + +'Oh, my cats alive!' he said, 'we must do something; but I'll tell you +what it is, Eliza. You're no end of a brick to come and tell me. You +might have got off all by yourself, and left me to the pig's head.' + +'No, I mightn't,' said Eliza sharply. 'I know everything that people can +learn, the same as you, and that includes right and wrong. So you see I +_mightn't_.' + +'That's true! I wonder whether our being clever would help us? Let's +take a boat and steer straight out, and take our chance. I can sail and +steer beautifully.' + +'So can I,' said Eliza disdainfully; 'but, you see, it's too late for +that. Twenty-four hours before the beast comes the sea-water runs away, +and great waves of thick treacle come sweeping round the kingdoms. No +boat can live in such a sea.' + +'Well, but how does the dragon get here? Is he on the island?' + +'No,' said Eliza, squeezing up handfuls of herbs in her agitation till +the scent quite overpowered the scent of the honeysuckle. 'No; he comes +out of the sea. But he is very hot inside, and he melts the treacle so +that it gets quite thin, like when it runs out of a treacle-pudding, and +so he can swim in it, and he comes along to the quay, and is fed--with +_Us_.' + +Billy shuddered. + +'I wish we were back in Claremont Square,' said he. + +'So do I, I'm sure,' said Eliza. 'Though I don't know where it is, nor +yet want to know.' + +'Hush!' said Billy suddenly. 'I hear a rustling. It's the Prime +Minister, and I can hear he's got straws in his hair again, most likely +because you're disappeared, and he thinks he will have to cook the +breakfast. Meet me beside the lighthouse at four this afternoon. Hide in +this summer-house and don't come out till the coast's clear.' + +He ran out and took the Prime Minister's arm. + +'What is the straw for now?' + +'Merely a bad habit,' said the Prime Minister wearily. + +Then Billy suddenly saw, and he said: + +'You're a beastly mean, cowardly sneak, and you feel it; that's what the +straws are about!' + +'Your Majesty!' said the Prime Minister feebly. + +'Yes,' said Billy firmly; 'you know you are. Now, I know all the laws of +Plurimiregia, and I'm going to abdicate this morning, and the next in +rank has to be King if he can't engage a fresh one. You're next in rank +to me, so by the time the dragon comes you'll be the King. I'll attend +your Coronation.' + +The Prime Minister gasped, 'How did you find out?' and turned the colour +of unripe peaches. + +'That's tellings,' said Billy. 'If you hadn't all been such sneaks, I +expect heaps of your Kings had sense enough to have got rid of the +dragon for you. Only I suppose you've never told them in time. Now, look +here. I don't want you to do anything except keep your mouth shut, and +let there be a boat, and no boatman, on the beach under the lighthouse +at four o'clock.' + +'But the sea's all treacle.' + +[Illustration: '"Speak to the dragon as soon as it arrives."' Page 263.] + +'I said on the beach, not on the sea, my good straw merchant. And what I +say you've jolly well got to do. You must be there--and no one else. +If you tell a soul I'll abdicate, and where will you be then?' + +'I don't know,' said the wretched Prime Minister, stooping to gather +some more straws from the strawberry bed. + +'But I do,' said Billy. 'Now for breakfast.' + +Before four o'clock that afternoon the Prime Minister's head was a +perfect bird's-nest of straws. But he met Billy at the appointed place, +and there was a boat--and also Eliza. Billy carried his Lee-Metford. + +A wind blew from the shore, and the straws in the Prime Minister's hair +rustled like a barley-field in August. + +'Now,' said Billy the King, 'my Royal Majesty commands you to speak to +the dragon as soon as it arrives, and to say that your King has +abdicated----' + +'But he hasn't,' said the Prime Minister in tears. + +'But he _does now_--so you won't be telling a lie. I abdicate. But I +give you my word of honour I'll turn King again as soon as I've tried my +little plan. I shall be quite in time to meet my fate--and the dragon. +Say "The King has abdicated. You'd better just look in at Allexanassa +and get the Queen, and when you call again I'll have a nice fat King +all ready for you."' + +The straws trembled, and Eliza sobbed. + +Billy went on; and he had never felt so truly regal as now, when he was +preparing to risk his life in order to save his subjects from the +monthly temptation to be mean and cowardly and sneakish. I think myself +it was good of Billy. He might just have abdicated and let things slide. +Some boys would have. + +The sea of greeny-black treacle heaved and swelled sulkily against the +beach. The Prime Minister said: + +'Very well; I'll do it. But I'd sooner die than see my King false to his +word.' + +'You won't have to choose between the two,' said Billy, very pale, but +determined. 'Your King's not a hound, like--like some-people.' + +And then, far away on the very edge of the green treacly sea, they saw a +squirming and a squelching and clouds of steam, and all sorts of +exciting and unpleasant things happening very suddenly and all together. + +The Prime Minister covered his head with dry seaweed and said: + +'That's Him.' + +'That's _He_,' corrected Eliza the Queen and Billy the King in one +breath. + +But the Prime Minister was long past any proper pride in his grammar. + +And then, cutting its way through the thick, sticky waves of the treacle +sea, came the hot dragon, melting a way for himself as he came. And he +got nearer and nearer and bigger and bigger, and at last he came close +to the beach, snouting and snorting, and opened two great mouths in an +expecting, hungry sort of way; and when he found he was not being fed +the expression of the mouths changed to an angry and surprised question. +And one mouth was a pig's mouth and one was a lizard's. + +Billy the King borrowed a pin from Eliza the Queen to stick into the +Prime Minister, who was by this time nearly buried in the seaweed which +he had been trying to arrange in his hair. + +'Speak up, silly!' said His Majesty. + +The Prime Minister spoke up. + +'Please, sir,' he said to the two-headed dragon, 'our King has +abdicated, so we've nothing for you just now, but if you could just run +over to Allexanassa and pick up their Queen, we'll have a nice fat King +ready for you if you'll call on your way home.' + +The Prime Minister shuddered as he spoke. He happened to be very fat. + +The dragon did not say a word. He nodded with both his heads and grunted +with both his mouths, and turned his one tail and swam away along the +track of thin, warm treacle which he had made in swimming across the +sea. + +Quick as thought, Billy the King signed to the Prime Minister and to +Eliza, and they launched the boat. Billy sprang on board and pushed off, +and it was not till the boat was a dozen yards from shore that he turned +to wave a farewell to Eliza and the Prime Minister. The latter was +indeed still on the beach, searching hopefully among the drifts and +weeds for more straws, to mark his sense of the constitutional crisis, +but Eliza had disappeared. + +'Oh dear, oh dear,' said Billy the King; 'surely that brute of a Prime +Minister can't have killed her right off, so as to have her ready for +the dragon when he comes back. Oh, my dear little Eliza!' + +'I'm here,' said a thick voice. + +And, sure enough, there was Eliza, holding on to the gunwale of the +boat and swimming heavily in the warm treacle. Nearly choked with it, +too, for she had been under more than once. + +Billy hastened to haul her aboard, and, though she was quite brown and +very, very sticky, the moment she was safe in the boat he threw his arms +round her and said: + +'Dear, darling Eliza, you're the dearest, bravest girl in the world. If +we ever get out of this you'll marry me, won't you? There's no one in +the world like you. Say you will.' + +'Of course I will,' said Eliza, still spluttering through the treacle. +'There's no one in the world like you, either.' + +'Right! Then, if that's so, you steer and I'll sail, and we'll get the +better of the beast yet,' said Billy. + +And he set the sail, and Eliza steered as well as she could in her +treacly state. + +About the middle of the channel they caught up with the dragon. Billy +took up his Lee-Metford and fired its eight bullets straight into the +dragon's side. You have no idea how the fire spurted out through the +bullet-holes. But the wind from shore had caught the sails, and the boat +was now going very much faster than the dragon, who found the +bullet-holes annoying, and had slowed up to see what was the matter. + +'Good-bye, you dear, brave Eliza,' said Billy the King. '_You're_ all +right, anyhow.' + +And, holding his reloaded Lee-Metford rifle high over his head, he +plunged into the treacly sea and swam back towards the dragon. It is +very difficult to shoot straight when you are swimming, especially in +nearly boiling treacle, but His Majesty King Billy managed to do it. He +sent his eight bullets straight into the dragon's heads, and the huge +monster writhed and wriggled and squirmed and squawked, all over the sea +from end to end, till at last it floated lifeless on the surface of the +clear, warm treacle, and stretched its wicked paws out, and shut its +wicked eyes, all four of them, and died. The lizard's eyes shut last. + +Then Billy began to swim for dear life towards the shore of +Plurimiregia, and the treacle was so hot that if he hadn't been a King +he would have been boiled. But now that the dreadful dragon was cold in +death there was nothing to keep the treacle sea thin and warm, and it +began to thicken so fast that swimming was very difficult indeed. If you +don't understand this, you need only ask the attendants at your nearest +swimming-baths to fill the baths with treacle instead of water, and you +will very soon comprehend how it was that Billy reached the shore of his +kingdom quite exhausted and almost speechless. + +The Prime Minister was there. He had fetched a whole truss of straw when +he thought Billy's plan had failed, and that the dragon would eat him as +the next in rank, and he wanted to do the thing thoroughly; and when he +warmly embraced the treacly King, Billy became so covered with straws +that he hardly knew himself. He pulled himself together, however, enough +to withdraw his resignation, and then looked out over the sea. In +mid-channel lay the dead dragon, and far in the distance he could see +the white sails of the boat nearing the shores of Allexanassa. + +'And what are we to do now?' asked the Prime Minister. + +'Have a bath,' said the King. 'The dragon's dead, and I'll fetch Eliza +in the morning. They won't hurt her over there now the dragon's killed.' + +'_They_ won't hurt her,' said the Prime Minister. 'It's the treacle. +Allexanassa is an island. The dragon brought the treacle up by his +enchantments, and now there is no one to take it away again. You'll +never get a boat to live in a sea like that--never.' + +'Won't I?' said Billy. 'I'm cleverer than you.' + +But, all the same, he didn't quite see his way to sailing a boat in that +sea, and with a sad and aching heart he went back to the palace to the +silver bath. The treacle and straws took hours to wash off, and after +that he was so tired that he did not want any supper, which was just as +well, because there was no one to cook it. Tired as he was, Billy slept +very badly. He woke up again and again to wonder what had become of his +brave little friend, and to wish that he could have done something to +prevent her being carried away in that boat; but, think as he might, he +failed to see that he could have done any differently. And his heart +sank, for, in spite of his bold words to the Prime Minister, he had no +more idea than you have how to cross the sea of thick treacle that lay +between his kingdom and Allexanassa. He invented steamships with red-hot +screws and paddle-wheels all through his dreams, and when he got up in +the morning he looked out of his window on the dark sea and longed for a +good, gray, foamy, salt, tumbling sea like we have at home in +England, no matter how high the waves and the winds might be. But the +wind had fallen, and the dark brown sea looked strangely calm. + +[Illustration: 'The two skated into each other's arms.'--Page 271.] + +Hastily snatching a dozen peaches out of the palace garden by way of +breakfast, Billy the King hurried to the beach by the lighthouse. No +heaving of the treacle sea broke the smooth line of it against the +beach. Billy looked--looked again, swallowed the last peach, stone and +all, and tore back to the town. + +He rushed into the chief ironmonger's and bought a pair of skates and a +gimlet. In less time than I can write it he had scurried back to the +beach, bored holes in his gold heels, fastened on the skates, and was +skating away over the brown sea towards Allexanassa. For the treacle, +heated to boiling-point by the passing of the dragon, had now grown +cold, and, of course, it was now _toffee_! Far off, Eliza had had the +same idea as soon as she saw the toffee, and, of course, as Queen of +Allexanassa, she could skate beautifully. So the two skated into each +other's arms somewhere near the middle of the channel between the two +islands. + +They stood telling each other how happy they were for a few moments, or +it may have been a few hours; and when they turned to go back to +Plurimiregia they found that the toffee-ice of the treacle sea was black +with crowds of skaters--for the Allexanassians and the Plurimiregians +had found out the wonderful truth, and were hurrying across to pay +visits to their friends and relations in the opposite islands. Near the +shore the toffee was hidden by troops of children, who had borrowed the +family hammers and were chipping into the solid toffee and eating the +flakes of it as they splintered off. + +People were pointing out to each other the spot where the dragon had +sunk, and when they perceived Billy the King and Eliza the Queen they +sent up a shout that you could have heard miles out at sea--if there had +been any sea--which, of course, there wasn't. The Prime Minister had +lost no time in issuing a proclamation setting forth Billy's splendid +conduct in ridding the country of the dragon, and all the populace were +in a frenzy of gratitude and loyalty. + +Billy turned on a little tap inside his head by some means which I +cannot describe to you, and a bright flood of cleverness poured through +his brain. + +'After all,' he said to Eliza, 'they were going to give us to the +dragon to save their own lives. It's bad, I know. But I don't know +that's it's worse than people who let other people die of lead-poisoning +because they want a particular glaze on their dinner-plates, or let +people die of phosphorus-poisoning so that they may get matches at six +boxes a penny. We're as well off here as in England.' + +'Yes,' said Eliza. + +So they agreed to stay and go on being King and Queen, on condition that +the Prime Minister consented to give up straws altogether, even in +moments of crisis. + +'I will, your Majesties,' he said, adding, with a polite bow, 'I shall +not need a single straw under your Majesty's able kingship.' + +And all the people cheered like mad. + +Eliza and Billy were married in due course. The kingdoms are now +extremely happy. Both are governed by Billy, who is a very good King +because he knows so much. Eliza got him to change the law about Queens +knowing everything, because she wanted her husband to be cleverer than +she was. But Billy didn't want to make laws to turn his Eliza stupid, so +he just changed the law--only a little bit--so that the King knows +everything a man ought to know, and the Queen knows everything that +ought to be known by a woman. So that's all right. + +Exploring expeditions were fitted out to find the edge of the toffee. It +was found to stand up in cliffs two hundred feet high, overhanging the +real, live, salt-watery sea. The King had ships built at once to sail on +the real sea and carry merchandise to other lands. And so Allexanassa +and Plurimiregia grew richer and richer every day. The merchandise, of +course, is toffee, and half the men in the kingdoms work in the great +toffee-mines. All the toffee you buy in shops comes from there. And the +reason why some of the cheaper kinds you buy are so gritty is, I need +hardly say, because the toffee-miners will not remember, before they go +down into the mines, to wipe their muddy boots on the doormats provided +by Billy the King, with the Royal Arms in seven colours on the middle of +each mat. + + + + +THE PRINCESS AND THE CAT + + +The day when everything began to happen to the Princess began just like +all her ordinary days. The sun was shining, the birds were singing, and +the Princess jumped out of bed and ran into the nursery to let the mice +out of the traps in the nursery cupboard. The traps were set every night +with a little bit of cheese in each, and every morning nurse found that +not a single trap had caught a single mouse. This was because the +Princess always let them go. No one knew this except the Princess and, +of course, the mice themselves. And the mice never forgot it. + +Then came bath and breakfast, and then the Princess ran to the open +window and threw out the crumbs to the birds that flew down fluttering +and chirping into the marble terrace. Before lessons began she had an +hour for playing in the garden. But she never began to play till she had +been round to see if any rabbits or moles were caught in the traps the +palace gardeners set. The gardeners were lazy, and seldom got to work +before half-past eight, so she always had plenty of time for this. + +Then came lessons with dear old Professor Ouatidontnoisuntwuthnoing, and +then more play, and dinner, and needlework, and play again. + +And now it was teatime. + +'Eat up your bread-and-butter, your Highness,' said nurse, 'and then you +shall have some nice plummy cake.' + +'I don't feel plum-cakey at all to-day, somehow,' said the Princess. 'I +feel just exactly as if something was going to happen.' + +'Something's always happening,' said nurse. + +'Ah! but I mean something horrid,' said the Princess. 'I expect uncle's +going to make some nasty new law about me. Last time it was: "The +Princess is only to wear a white frock on the first Sunday in the +month." He said it was economy, but I know it was only spite.' + +'You mustn't say that, dear,' said nurse. 'You know your rosy and bluey +frocks are just as pretty as the white;' but in her heart she agreed +with the Princess Everilda. + +The Princess's father and mother had died when she was quite little, +and her uncle was Regent. Now, you will have noticed that there is +something about uncles which makes it impossible for them to be good in +fairy stories. So of course this uncle was bad, as bad as he could be, +and everyone hated him. + +In fact, though it was now, as I have said, everybody's teatime, nobody +was making any tea: instead they were making a revolution. And just as +the Princess was looking at the half-moon-shaped hole left by her first +bite into her first piece of bread-and-butter, the good Professor burst +into the nursery with his great gray wig all on one side, crying out in +a very loud and very choky voice: + +'The revolution! It's come at last. I _knew_ the people would never +stand that last tax on soap.' + +'The Princess!' said nurse, turning very pale. + +'Yes, I know,' said the Professor. 'There's a boat on the canal, blue +sails with gold letters "P.P."--Pupil of the Professor. It's waiting. +You go down there at once. I'll take the Princess out down the back +stairs.' + +He caught the Princess by her pink bread-and-buttery hand, and dragged +her away. + +'Hurry, my dear,' he panted; 'it's as much as your life is worth to +delay a minute.' + +But he himself delayed quite three minutes, and that was one minute too +long. He had just run into the palace library for the manuscript of his +life's work, 'Everything Easily Explained,' when the revolutionary crowd +burst in, shouting 'Liberty and Soap!' and caught him. They did not see +the Princess Everilda, because he had just time, when he heard them +coming, to throw a red and green crochet antimacassar over her, and to +hide her behind an armchair. + +'When they've taken me away, go down the back stairs, and try to find +the boat,' he whispered, just before they came and took him away. + +And then Everilda was left alone. When everything was quiet, she said to +herself: 'Now, you mustn't cry; you must do as you're told.' And she +went down the palace back-stairs, and out through the palace kitchen +into the street. + +She had never set foot in the streets before, but she had been driven +through them in a coach with four white horses, and she knew the way to +the canal. + +The canal boat with the blue sails was waiting, and she would have got +to it safely enough, but she heard a rattling sound, and when she +looked she saw two boys tying an old rusty kettle to a cat's tail. + +'You horrid boys!' she said; 'let poor pussy alone.' + +'Not us,' said the boys. + +Everilda instantly slapped them both, and they were so surprised that +they let the cat go. It scuttled and scurried off, and so did the +Princess. The boys threw stones after her and also after the cat, but +fortunately they were both very bad shots and nobody was hit. + +Even then the Princess would have got safely away, but she saw a boy +sitting on a doorstep crying. So she stopped to ask what was the matter. + +'I'm hungry,' said the boy, 'and father and mother are dead, and my +uncle beat me, so I'm running away----' + +'Oh,' said the Princess, 'so am I. What fun! And I've got a horrid +uncle, too. You come with me, and we'll find my nurse. _She's_ running +away, too. Make haste, or it'll be too late.' + +But when they got to the corner, it _was_ too late. + +The revolutionary crowd caught them; they shouted 'Liberty and Soap!' +and they sent the boy to the workhouse, and they put the Princess in +prison; and a good many of them wanted to cut off her pretty little head +then and there, because they thought she would be sure to grow up horrid +like her uncle the Regent. + +But all the people who had ever been inside the palace said what a nice +little girl the Princess really was, and wouldn't hear of cutting off +her darling head. So at last it was decided to get rid of her by +enchantment, and the Head Magician to the Provisional Revolutionary +Government was sent for. + +'Certainly, citizens,' he said, 'I'll put her in a tower on the Forlorn +Island, in the middle of the Perilous Sea--a nice strong tower, with +only one way out.' + +'That's one too many. There's not to be any way out,' said the people. + +'Well, there's a way out of everything, you know,' said the Magician +timidly--he was trembling for his own head--'but it's fifty thousand +millions to one against her ever finding it.' + +So they had to be content with that, and they fetched Everilda out of +her prison; and the Magician took her hand and called his carriage, +which was an invention of his own--half dragon, and half motor-car, and +half flying-machine--so that it was a carriage and a half, and came when +it was called, tame as any pet dog. + +He lifted Everilda in, and said 'Gee up!' to his patent carriage, and +the intelligent creature geed up right into the air and flew away. The +Princess shut her eyes tight, and tried not to scream. She succeeded. + +When the Magician's carriage got to the place where it knew it ought to +stop, it did stop, and tumbled Everilda out on to a hard floor, and went +back to its master, who patted it, and gave it a good feed of oil, and +fire, and water, and petroleum spirit. + +The Princess opened her eyes as the sound of the rattling dragon wings +died away. She was alone--quite alone. 'I won't stay here,' said +Everilda; 'I'll run away again.' + +She ran to the edge of the tower and looked down. The tower was in the +middle of a garden, and the garden was in the middle of a wood, and the +wood was in the middle of a field, and after the field there was nothing +more at all except steep cliffs and the great rolling, raging waves of +the Perilous Sea. + +'There's no way to run away by,' she said; and then she remembered that +even if she ran away, there was now nowhere to run to, because the +people had taken her palace away from her, and the palace was the only +home she had ever had--and where her nurse was goodness only knew. + +'So I suppose I've got to live here till someone fetches me,' she said, +and stopped crying, like a brave King's daughter as she was. + +'I'll explore,' said Everilda all alone; 'that will be fun.' She said it +bravely, and really it was more fun than she expected. The tower had +only one room on each floor. The top floor was Everilda's bedroom; she +knew that by her gold-backed brushes and things with 'E. P.' on them +that lay on the toilet-table. The next floor was a sitting-room, and the +next a dining-room, and the last of all was a kitchen, with rows of +bright pots and pans, and everything that a cook can possibly want. + +'Now I can play at cooking,' said the Princess. 'I've always wanted to +do that. If only there was something to cook!' + +She looked in the cupboards, and there were lots of canisters and jars, +with rice, and flour, and beans, and peas, and lentils, and macaroni, +and currants, and raisins, and candied peel, and sugar, and sago, and +cinnamon. She ate a whole lump of candied citron, and enjoyed it very +much. + +'I shan't starve, anyway,' she said. 'But oh! of course, I shall soon +eat up all these things, and then----' + +In her agitation she dropped the jar; it did not break, but all the +candied peel rolled away into corners and under tables. Yet when she +picked the jar up it was as full as ever. + +'Oh, hooray!' cried Everilda, who had once heard a sentry use that low +expression; 'of course it's a magic tower, and everything is magic in +it. The jars will always be full.' + +The fire was laid, so she lighted it and boiled some rice, but it stuck +to the pot and got burned. You know how nasty burned rice is? and the +macaroni she tried to cook would not get soft. So she went out into the +garden, and had a very much nicer dinner than she could ever have +cooked. Instead of meat she had apples, and instead of vegetables she +had plums, and she had peaches instead of pudding. + +There were rows and rows of beautiful books in the sitting-room, and she +read a little, and wrote a long letter to nurse, in case anyone ever +came who knew nurse's address and would post it for her. And then she +had a nectarine-and-mulberry tea. + +By this time the sun was sinking all red and splendid beyond the dark +waters of the Perilous Sea, and Everilda sat down on the window seat to +watch it. + +I shall not tell you whether she cried at all then. Perhaps you would +have cried just a little if you had been in her place. + +'Oh dear! oh dear! oh dear!' she said, sniffing slightly. (Perhaps she +had a cold.) 'There's nobody to tuck me up in bed--nobody at all.' + +And just as she said it something fat and furry flew between her and the +sunset. It hovered clumsily a moment, and then swooped in at the window. + +'Oh!' cried the Princess, very much frightened indeed. + +'Don't you know me?' said the stout furry creature, folding its wings. +'I'm the cat you saved from the indignity of a rusty kettle in +connection with my honourable tail.' + +'But that cat hadn't got wings,' said Everilda, 'and you're much bigger +than it, and it couldn't talk.' + +'How do you know it couldn't talk,' said the Cat; 'did you ask it?' + +'No,' said the Princess. + +'Well, then!' said the Cat 'And as for wings, I needn't wear them if +you'd rather I didn't.' + +The Cat took off her wings, rolled them neatly up, like your father +rolls his umbrella, tied them round with a piece of string, and put them +in the left-hand corner drawer in the bureau. + +'That's better,' said Everilda. + +'And as for size,' said the Cat, 'if I stayed ordinary cat-size I +shouldn't be any use to you. And I've come to be cook, companion, +housemaid, nurse, professor, and everything else, so----' + +'Oh, don't,' said the Princess--'_don't_ get any bigger.' + +For while she was speaking the Cat had been growing steadily, and she +was now about the size of a large leopard. + +'Certainly not,' said the Cat obligingly; 'I'll stop at once.' + +'I suppose,' said the Princess timidly, 'that you're magic?' + +'Of course,' said the Cat; 'everything is, here. Don't you be afraid of +me, now! Come along, my pet, time for bed.' + +Everilda umped, for the voice was the voice of her nurse; but it was +also the voice of the Cat. + +'Oh!' cried the Princess, throwing her arms round the cat's large furry +neck, 'I'm not afraid of _any_ thing when you speak like that.' + +So, after all, she had someone to tuck her up in bed. The Cat did it +with large, soft, furry, clever paws, and in two minutes Everilda was +fast asleep. + +And now began the long, lonely, but all the same quite happy time which +the Princess and the Cat spent together on the Forlorn Island. + +Everilda had lessons with the Cat--and then it was the Professor's voice +that the Cat spoke with; and the two did the neat little housework of +the tower together--and then the Cat's voice was like the voices of the +palace housemaids. And they did the cooking and then the Cat's voice was +the cook's voice. And they played games together--and then the voice of +the Cat was like the voices of all sorts of merry children. It was +impossible to be dull with a companion who changed so often. + +'But who are you _really_?' the Princess used to ask. + +And the Cat always answered: + +'I give it up! Ask another!' as if the Princess had been playing at +riddles. + +'How is it our garden is always so tidy and full of nice fruit and +vegetables?' the Princess asked once, when they had been on the island +about a year. + +'Oh,' said the Cat, 'didn't you know? The moles you used to let out of +the traps do the digging, and the birds you used to feed bring the seeds +in their little beaks, and the mice you used to save from the palace +mouse-traps do the weeding and raking with their sharp little teeth, and +their fine, neat, needly claws.' + +'But how did they get here?' asked the Princess. + +'The usual way--swimming and flying,' said the Cat. + +'But aren't the mice afraid of _you_?' + +'Of me?' The great Cat drew herself up to her full height. 'Anyone would +think, to hear you, that I was a _common_ cat.' And she was really cross +for nearly an hour. + +That was the only approach to a quarrel that the two ever had. + +Sometimes, at first, the Princess used to say: + +'How long am I to stay here, pussy-nurse?' + +And the Cat always said in nurse's voice: + +'Till you're grown up, my dear.' + +And the years went by, and each year found the Princess more good, and +clever, and beautiful. And at last she was quite grown up. + +'Now,' said the Cat briskly, 'we must get to work. There's a Prince in a +kingdom a long way off, and he's the only person who can get you off +this island.' + +'Does he know?' asked Everilda. + +'He knows about _you_, but he doesn't know that he's the person to find +you, and he doesn't know where you are. So now every night I must fly +away and whisper about you in his ear. He'll think it's dreams, but he +believes in dreams; and he'll come in a grand ship with masts of gold +and sails of silk, and carry my Pretty away and make a Queen of her.' + +'Shall I like that, pussy-nurse, do you think?' asked the Princess. + +And the Cat replied: + +'Yes, very much indeed. But you wouldn't like it if it were any other +King than this one, so it's just as well that it's quite impossible for +it to _be_ any other.' + +'How will he come?' asked the Princess. + +'Don't I tell you? In a ship, of course,' said the Cat. + +'Aren't the rocks dangerous?' asked the Princess. + +'Oh, very,' the Cat answered. + +'Oh,' said the Princess, and grew silent and thoughtful. + +That night the Cat got out its rolled-up wings, and unrolled them, and +brushed them, and fitted them on; then she lighted a large lamp and set +it in the window that looked out on the Perilous Sea. + +'That's the beacon to guide the King to you,' she said. + +'Won't it guide other ships here?' asked the Princess, 'with perhaps +the wrong Kings on board--the ones I shouldn't like being Queen with?' + +'Very likely,' said the Cat; 'but it doesn't matter: they'd only be +wrecked. Serve them right, coming after Princesses that don't want +them.' + +'Oh,' said Everilda. + +The Cat spread her wings, and after one or two trial flights round the +tower, she spread them very wide indeed, and flew away across the black +Perilous Sea, towards a little half moon that was standing on its head +to show sailors that there would be foul weather. + +The Princess leaned her elbows on the window-sill and looked out over +the sea. Down below in the garden she could hear the kind moles digging +industriously, and the good little mice weeding and raking with their +sharp teeth and their fine needly claws. And far away against the +low-hanging moon she saw the sails and masts of a ship. + +'Oh,' she cried, 'I _can't_! It's sure not to be _his_ ship. It mustn't +be wrecked.' + +And she turned the lamp out. And then she cried a little, because +perhaps after all it might be _his_ ship, and he would pass by and never +know. + +Next night the Cat went out on another flying excursion, leaving the +lamp lighted. And again the Princess could not bear to go to bed leaving +a lamp burning that might lure honest Kings and brave mariners to +shipwreck, so she put out the lamp and cried a little. And this happened +for many, many, many nights. + +When the Cat swept the room of a morning she used to wonder where all +the pearls came from that she found lying all about the floor. But it +was a magic place, and one soon ceased to wonder much about anything. +She never guessed that the pearls were the tears the Princess shed when +she had put out the lamp, and seen ship after ship that perhaps carried +her own King go sailing safely and ignorantly by, no one on board +guessing that on that rock was a pretty, dear Princess waiting to be +rescued--_the_ Princess, the only Princess that that King would be happy +and glad to have for his Queen. + +And the years went on and on. Every night the Cat lighted the lamp and +flew away to whisper dreams into the ears of the only King who could +rescue the Princess, and every night the Princess put out the lamp and +cried in the dark. And every morning the Cat swept up a dustpan full of +pearls that were Everilda's tears. And again and again the King would +fit out a vessel and sail the seas, and look in vain for the bright +light that he had dreamed should guide him to his Princess. + +The Cat was a good deal vexed; she could not understand how any King +could be so stupid. She always stayed out all night. She used to go and +see her friends after she had done whispering dreams to the King, and +only got home in time to light the fire for breakfast, so she never knew +how the Princess put out the lamp every night, and cried in the dark. + +The years went by and went by, and the Princess grew old and gray, for +she had never had the heart to leave the lamp alight, for fear that some +poor mariners who were not her King should be drawn by the lamp to those +cruel rocks and wrecked on them, for of course it wouldn't and couldn't +be the poor mariners' fault that they didn't happen to be the one and +only King who could land safely on the Forlorn Island. + +And when the Princess was quite old, and the tear pearls that had been +swept up by the Cat filled seven big chests in the back-kitchen, the +Princess fell ill. + +'I think I am going to die,' she said to the Cat, 'and I am not really +at all sorry except for you. I think you'll miss me. Tell me now--it's +almost all over--who are you, really?' + +'I give it up,' said the Cat as usual. 'Ask another.' + +But the Princess asked nothing more. She lay on her bed in her white +gown and waited for death, for she was very tired of being alive. Only +she said: + +'Put out that lamp in the window; it hurts my eyes.' + +For even then she thought of the poor men whose ships might be wrecked +just because they didn't happen to be the one and only King with whom +she could be happy. + +So the Cat took the lamp away, but she did not put it out; she set it in +the window of the parlour, and its light shone out over the black waters +of the Perilous Sea. + +And that very night the one and only King--who in all these years had +never ceased to follow the leading of the dreams the Cat whispered in +his ear--came in the black darkness sailing over the Perilous Sea. And +in the black darkness he saw at last the bright white light that his +dreams had promised, and he knew that where the light was his Princess +was, and his heart leaped up, and he bade the helmsmen steer for the +light. + +And for the light they steered. And because he was the only possible +King to mate that Princess, the helmsman found the only possible passage +among the rocks, and the ship anchored safely in a little quiet creek, +and the King landed and went up to the door of the tower and knocked. + +'Who's there?' said the Cat. + +'Me,' said the King, just as you or I might have done. + +'You're late,' said the Cat. 'I'm afraid you've lost your chance.' + +'I took the first chance I got,' said the King. 'Let me in, and let me +see her.' + +He had been so busy all these years trying to find the bright white +light of his dreams that he had not noticed that his hair had gone gray +long ago. + +So the Cat let him in, and led him up the winding stair to the room +where the Princess, very quiet, lay on her white bed waiting for death +to come, for she was very tired. + +The old King stumbled across the bar of moonlight on the floor, flung +down a clanking wallet, and knelt by the bed in the deep shadow, saying: + +'Oh, my dear own Princess, I have come at last.' + +'Is it really you?' she said, and gave him her hands in the shadow. I +hoped it was Death's foot-step I heard coming up the winding stair.' + +'Oh, did you hope for death,' he cried, 'while I was coming to you?' + +'You were long in coming,' said she, 'and I was very tired.' + +'My beautiful dear Princess,' he said, 'you shall rest in my arms till +you are not tired any more.' + +'My beautiful King,' she said, 'I am not tired any more now.' + +And then the Cat came in with the lamp, and they looked in each other's +eyes. + +Instead of the beautiful Princess of his dreams the King saw a white, +withered woman whose piteous eyes met his in a look of longing love. The +Princess saw a bent, white-haired man, but love was in his eyes. + +'_I_ don't mind.' + +'_I_ don't mind.' + +They both spoke together. And both thought they spoke the truth. But the +truth was that both were horribly disappointed. + +'Yet, all the same,' said the King to himself, 'old and withered as she +is, she is more to me than the youngest and loveliest of all other +Princesses.' + +'I don't care if he _is_ gray,' said the Princess to herself; 'whatever +he is, he's the only possible one.' + +'Here's a pretty kettle of fish!' said the Cat. 'Why on earth didn't you +come before?' + +'I came as soon as I could,' said the King. + +The Cat, walking about the room in an agitated way, kicked against the +wallet the King had dropped. + +'What's this,' she said crossly, rubbing her toes, for the wallet was +hard, and she had hurt herself more than a little. + +'Oh, that,' said the King--'that's just the steel bolts and hammers and +things that my resolves to find the Princess turned into when I failed +and never did find her. I never could bear to throw them away; I had a +sort of feeling that they might be good for something, since they hurt +me so much when they came to me. I thought perhaps I could batter down +the doors of the Princess's tower with them.' + +'They're good for something better than that,' said the Cat joyously. + +She went away, and the two heard her hammering away below. Presently she +staggered in with a great basket of white powder, and emptied it on the +floor; then she went away for more. + +The King helped her with the next basketful, and the next, and the next, +and the next, and the next, and the next, for there were seven of them, +and the heap of white powder stood up in the room as high as the King's +middle. + +'That's powder of pearls,' said the Cat proudly. 'Now, tell me, have you +been a good King?' + +'I have tried to be,' said the white-haired King 'I was a workhouse +boy, and then I was apprenticed to a magician, who taught me how to make +people happy. There was a revolution just at the time when I was put +into the workhouse, and they had a Republic. And I worked my way up till +they made me President.' + +'What became of the King in that revolution?' + +'There wasn't a King, only a Regent. They had him taught a trade, and he +worked for his living. It was the worst punishment they could invent for +him. There was a Princess, too, but she was hidden by a magician. I saw +her once when she was trying to run away. She asked me to run too--to +her nurse----' + +Here his eyes met the Princess's. + +'Oh,' she said, 'that was you, was it?' + +'Oh,' said he, 'then that was you!' + +And they looked long and lovingly in each other's faded eyes. + +'Hurry up,' said the Cat impatiently; 'you were made President. And +then----' + +'Oh, why, then,' said the King, 'they thought it wouldn't be any more +dangerous or expensive to have a King than a President, and prettier at +State shows--ermine, crown, and sceptre, and all that--prettier than +frock-coat and spats. So I agreed.' + +'And do your people love you?' the Cat asked. + +'I don't know,' said the King simply; 'I love them----' + +As he spoke there came a flutter and flicker of many thousand wings at +the closed casement. The Cat threw the window wide, and in swarmed a +countless crowd of white pigeons. + +'These are the blessings of your people,' said the Cat. + +The wings fluttered and flickered and fanned the heap of pearl dust on +the floor till it burst into flame, and the flame rose up high and white +and clear. + +'Quick!' cried the Cat, 'walk through it. Lead her through.' + +The old King gave his hand to his poor faded love, and raised her from +her couch, and together they passed through the clear fire made of her +patience and self-sacrifice, his high resolve, and the blessings of his +people. And they came out of that fire on the other side. + +'Oh, love, how beautiful you are!' cried the King. + +'Oh, my King, your face is the face of all my dreams!' cried the +Princess. + +And they put their arms round each other and cried for joy, because now +they were both young and beautiful again. + +The Cat cried for sympathy. + +'And now we shall live happy ever after,' said the Princess, putting her +other arm round the Cat. 'Dear pussy-nurse, do tell me, now it's all +over, who you really are.' + +'I give it up. Ask another,' said the Cat. + +But as she spoke she went herself through the fire, and on the other +side came out--not one person, but eleven. She was, in fact, the +Professor, the nurse, the palace butler, footman, housemaid, +parlourmaid, between-maid, boots, scullion, boy in buttons, as well as +the rescued cat--all rolled into one! + +'But we only used one part of ourselves at a time,' they all said with +one voice, 'and I hope we were useful.' + +'You were a darling,' said the Princess--'darlings, I mean. But who +turned you all into exactly the pussy-nurse I wanted?' + +'Oh, that was the Magician,' said all the voices in unison; 'he was your +fairy-godfather, you know.' + +'What has become of him?' asked the Princess, clinging to her lover's +arm. + +'He's been asleep all this time. It was the condition, the only way he +got leave to work the good magic for all of us,' said the many voices +that were one. + +'Let's go and wake him,' said the King. + +So they all went. And when they woke the Magician, who was sleeping +quietly in his own private room in the palace where the Princess had +once lived, he sneezed seven times for pure joy, and then called for +Welsh rabbit and baked Spanish onions for supper. + +'For after all these years of starvation,' he said, 'I do really think I +may for once take a liberty with my digestion.' + +So he had the supper he wanted; but the King and the Princess had roses +and lilies and wedding-cake, because they were married that very +evening. + +And when you have passed through exactly the sort of fire those two had +passed through, you can never be old, or ugly, or unhappy again, so +those two are happy, and beautiful, and young to this very hour. + + + + +THE WHITE HORSE + + +'Please, father,' Diggory said, 'I want to go out and seek my fortune.' + +'Seek your grandmother,' said his father, but not unkindly. He was +smoking a pipe outside his cottage door, and he had a red-spotted +handkerchief over his head because of the flies. There were flies +then, just the same as there are now, though it was a hundred years ago +by the church clock. + +'I wasn't thinking of my grandmother,' said Diggory; 'I was thinking of +my Uncle Diggory. He was the third son of a woodcutter, just like I am, +and he saw right enough that that's the sort that _has_ to go out and +seek its fortune. And I'm getting on, father; I shall be twenty before +you know where you are.' + +'You'll have to be twenty and more before I agree not to know where +_you_ are,' said his father. 'Your Uncle Diggory did well for himself, +sure enough, and many a turkey and chine he's sent us at +Christmas-time; but he started a-horseback, he did. He got the horse +from _his_ Uncle Diggory, and he was a rover too. Now, if you went, +you'd have to go on Shank's mare, and them that go a-foot comes back +a-foot.' + +'Will you let me go, then, if I can get a horse?' said Diggory +coaxingly. 'Do say yes, dad, and then I won't say another word about it +till I've got the horse.' + +'Drat the lad--_yes_, then!' shouted the father. + +Diggory jumped up from the porch seat. + +'Then farewell home and hey for the road,' cried he, 'for I've got the +horse, dad. My Uncle Diggory sent it to me this very day, and it's tied +up behind the lodge; white it is, and a red saddle and bridle fit for a +King.' + +The woodcutter grumbled, but he was a woodcutter of honour, and having +said 'Yes,' he had to stick to yes. + +So Diggory rode off on the white horse with the scarlet saddle, and all +the village turned out to see him go. He had on his best white smock, +and he had never felt so fine in all his days. + +So he rode away. When he came to the round mound windmill he stopped, +for there was Joyce taking in the clean clothes from the hedge, because +it was Monday evening. + +He told her where he was going. + +'You might take me with you,' she said. 'I'm not so very heavy but what +we could both ride on that great big horse of yours.' And she held up a +face as sweet as a bunch of flowers. + +But Diggory said, 'No, my dear. Why, you little silly, girls can't go to +seek their fortunes. You'd only be in my way! Wish me luck, child.' + +So he rode on, and she folded up the linen all crooked, and damped it +down with her tears, so that it was quite ready for ironing. + +Diggory rode on, and on, and on. He rode through dewy evening, and +through the cool black night, and right into the fresh-scented pinky +pearly dawning. And when it was real live wide-awake morning, Diggory +felt very thin and empty inside his smock, and he remembered that he had +had nothing to eat since dinner-time yesterday, and then it was pork and +greens. + +He rode on, and he rode on, and by-and-by he came to a red brick wall, +very strong and stout, with big buttresses and a stone coping. His horse +(whom he had christened Invicta, and perhaps if he had known as much +Latin as you do he would have called him something different) was a +very high horse indeed, and by standing up in his stirrups Diggory could +see over the wall. And he saw that on the other side was an orchard full +of trees full of apples, red, and yellow, and green. He reined Invicta +in close under the wall and said, 'Woa, there! stand still, will 'e?' +And he stood up on the broad saddle and made a jump and caught at the +stone coping of the wall, and next moment he had hung by his hands and +dropped into the orchard. And it was a very long drop indeed. For he had +quite made up his mind to take some of the apples. First, because he was +hungry, and, secondly, because boys _will_ take apples--in stories that +is, of course; _really_, they would never think of such a thing. + +With a practised eye, Diggory chose the tree with the fattest, rosiest +apples on it. He climbed the tree, and had just settled himself astride +a convenient bough when he heard a voice say: 'Hi! You up there!' + +And, looking down, he saw a flat-faced old man with a red flannel +waistcoat standing under the tree looking up spitefully. + +'Good-morning, my fine fellow,' said the old man. 'You seem a nice +honest lad, and I'm sorry for your sake that apple stealing's punished +so severely in these parts.' + +'I've not had any apples yet,' said Diggory. 'Look here, I'll go away if +you like, and we'll say no more about it.' + +'That's a handsome offer, very,' said the nasty old man; 'but this is an +enchanted orchard, and you can't go away without with your leave or by +your leave, as you came in. Why, you can't even get out of the tree--and +as for climbing the wall, no one can do it without a white horse to help +him. So now where are you?' + +Diggory knew very well where he was, and he tried at once to be +somewhere else, but the old man was right. He could move all about the +tree from branch to branch, but the tree felt wrong way up and he felt +wrong way up; that is to say, he could not get to the ground except by +jumping much harder than he knew how to, and then he knew he would only +have fallen back again, just as you would fall back if you jumped up to +the ceiling. He could have fallen off the tree the other way, of course, +but then he would have fallen up into the sky, and there seemed to be +nothing there to stop his falling for ever and ever. So he held tight +and looked at the old man. And Diggory thought he looked nastier than +ever. + +So he said: 'Well?' + +And the old man said: 'Not at all! However, since you had the sense not +to fall off wrong way, I suppose you're the boy I want. Now, look here, +you throw me down those ten big apples, one by one, so that I can catch +them, and I'll let you go out by the Apple Door that no one but me has +the key of.' + +'Why don't you pick them yourself?' Diggory asked. + +'I'm too old; you know very well that old men don't climb trees. Come, +is it a bargain?' + +'I don't know,' said the boy; 'there are lots of apples you can reach +without climbing. Why do you want these so particularly?' + +As he spoke, he picked one of the apples and threw it up and caught it. +I say up, but it was down instead, because of the apple-tree being so +very much enchanted. + +'Oh, _don't_!' the old man squeaked like a rat in a trap--'_don't_ drop +it! Throw it down to me, you nasty slack-baked, smock-frocked son of a +speckled toad!' + +Diggory's blood boiled at hearing his father called a toad. + +[Illustration: '"Take that," cried he, aiming an apple at the old man's +head.'--Page 307.] + +'Take that!' cried he, aiming the apple at the old man's head.' I wish I +could get out of this tree.' + +The apple hit the old man's head and bounced on to the grass, and the +moment that apple touched the ground Diggory found that he _could_ get +out of the tree if he liked, for he felt that he was now the proper way +up once more, and so was the tree. + +'So,' he said, 'these are wish-apples, are they?' + +'No, no, no, no!' shrieked the old man so earnestly that Diggory knew he +was lying. 'I've just disenchanted you, that's all. You see, most people +fall up out of the tree and you didn't, so I thought I'd let you go, +because I'm a nice kind old man, I am, and I wouldn't so much as hurt a +fly. They aren't wish-apples, indeed they aren't.' + +'Really,' said Diggory. 'I wish you'd speak the truth.' + +With that he picked the second apple and threw it. And the old man began +to speak the truth as hard as ever he could speak. It was like a child +saying a lesson it has just learned, and is afraid of forgetting before +it can get it said. + +'I am a wicked magician. I have turned hundreds of people's heads in +that tree so that they fall into the sky, and when they fall back again, +as they have to do when the tide turns, I make them into apple-trees. I +don't know why I do, but I like to. I suppose it's because I'm wicked. I +never did anything useful with my magic, but I can hurt. And there's +only one way out of this, and I don't mean to show it you.' + +'It's a pity you're so wicked,' said Diggory. 'I wish you were good.' + +He threw down another apple, and instantly the magician became so good +that he could do nothing but sit down and cry to think how wicked he had +been. He was now perfectly useless. But Diggory was no longer afraid of +him, so he gathered the ten apples that were left and put them inside +his shirt, and came down the tree. + +The old man couldn't tell him how to get out, and he couldn't disenchant +the fruit-trees or anything. So Diggory had to spend three wish-apples. +First he spent one on making the old man happy. This was done as it is +in Miss Edgeworth's stories--by giving him a thatched cottage and a +garden, and a devoted grand-daughter to look after him. The next apple +showed Diggory the Apple Door, which he had not been able to find, and +he went out by it. You, of course, can find it on the map, but he had no +map, and, besides, it is spelt differently. Before he went out of the +orchard he threw down another apple, and wished the apple-trees to be +disenchanted. And they were. And then the red-walled orchard was full of +Kings and Princesses, and swineherds and goosegirls, and statesmen and +stevedores, and every kind of person you can or can't think of. + +Diggory left them to find their own ways home--some of them lived ever +so long before, and ever so far away--and he himself went out by the +Apple Door, and found his good white horse, who had been eating grass +very happily all the time he had been in the company of the magician, +and that had been two days and a night. + +So Invicta was not hungry, but Diggory was; and, in fact, he was so +hungry that he had to use a wish-apple to get his supper, and that was +very, very wasteful of him, and he often regretted it in after years. It +is true that he wished for the best supper in the world, and had it; but +it was only bread-and-milk! If he had wished for the nicest supper it +would have been different, no doubt. + +Diggory rode on anxiously, arranging what wishes he should have with +the rest of the apples, but in the dusk he missed his way and was nearly +drowned in a rain-flooded ford, and poor white Invicta was quite carried +away. + +Then Diggory took off his shirt to wring the water out, and as he took +it off he said: 'I wish I had my good white horse again.' + +And as he said it all the apples but one tumbled out of his shirt on to +the ground, and he heard soft neighings and stampings and hustlings and +rustlings all round him in the dark, and when the moon rose he saw that +he had had his wish--he had his good white horse back again. But as he +had dropped eight apples, he had his good white horse back eight times, +and as eight times one is eight, he had now eight good white horses, all +called Invicta. + +'Well, eight horses are better than nothing!' he said; and when he had +tethered the horses he went to sleep, for he felt strangely feeble and +tired. + +In the morning he woke with pains in every limb. He thought it was a +cold from the wetting in the ford, but it was really rheumatism. And he +could not get rid of it. He tied seven horses together and led them, +riding on the eighth. + +'Eight horses are a pretty good fortune for a woodcutter's son,' he said +to himself, 'and, anyway, I'm too tired to go looking for any better +one.' + +So he rode home. + +He knew the roads well enough, and yet they seemed different; they were +much better roads to ride over, for one thing, and the hedges and trees +were odd somehow. And the big wood near his father's house seemed very +small as he looked down on it from the hill. But when he got to the +village he thought he must have gone mad, for in the day and two nights +and a day that he had been away the village had grown big and ugly and +yellow-bricky, and there were eight shops and six public-houses besides +the Bill and Billet, and many more people than there used to be, all in +ugly, untidy clothes, and the Round Mound windmill was _gone_! The +people came crowding round him. + +'What's become of the mill?' he asked, trembling all over. + +The boys and girls and men and women stared, and a very old man stepped +out of the crowd. + +'It were pulled down,' he said, 'when I were a boy.' + +'And the woodcutter's cottage?' + +'That were burnt down a matter of fifty year ago. Was you a native of +these parts, old man?' + +There was a large plate-glass shop-window just opposite the crowd that +surrounded Diggory. A dark blind was pulled down inside, because it was +Wednesday and early-closing day. This made a fine mirror, and Diggory +happened to look in it, and there he saw himself--an old, old +white-haired man on a white horse. He had a white beard, too, but it was +quite short, because it had only had since bedtime last night to grow +in. + +He almost tumbled off his horse. The landlord of the Ship led him in +to sit by the fire in the bar parlour, and the eight horses were put up +in the stable. + +The old man who had told him about the mill came and sat by him, and +poor old Diggory asked questions till he grew tired of hearing the +answer, which was always the same: 'Dead, dead, dead!' + +Then he sat silent, and the people in the bar talked about his horses, +and a young man said: + +'I wish I'd got e'er a one on 'em. I'd do a tidy bit in fish, an' set up +for myself--so I would.' + +'Young man,' said Diggory, 'you may take one of them; its name is +Invicta.' + +The young man could hardly believe his fortunate ears. Diggory felt his +heart warm to think that he had made someone else so happy. He felt +actually younger. And next morning he made up his mind to give away all +the horses but one. That one he would sell, and its price would keep him +for the rest of his life: he hoped that would not be long, for he did +not care to go on living now that he had seen the tombstones in the +churchyard with the names of his father and brothers and little Joyce of +the mill. + +He led his horses away next day. He did not want to give them all away +in one village, because that would have lessened the value of his gift +to the young man who was going into fish, and, besides, it would have +been awkward to have so many horses of the same name in one village. + +He gave away a horse at each village he passed through, and with every +horse he gave away he felt happier and lighter. And when he had given +away the fourth his rheumatism went, and when he had given away the +seventh his beard was gone. + +'Now,' he said to himself, 'I will ride home and end my days in my own +village, and be buried with my own people.' + +So he turned his horse's head towards home, and he felt so gay and +light-limbed he could hardly believe that he was really an old, old man. +And he rode on. + +And at the end of the village he stopped and rubbed his eyes, for there +stood the Round Mound windmill, and on the slope was Joyce, looking +prettier than ever in a russet petticoat and a white neckerchief and a +pink print gown with little red rosebuds on it. + +'Oh, Diggory, Diggory,' she cried, 'you've come back, then! You'll take +me with you now, won't you?' + +'Have you got a looking-glass, my dear?' said he. 'Then run in and fetch +it.' + +She ran. He took it and looked in it. And he saw the same young brown +face and the same bright brown hair that he had always known for _him_, +and he was not old any more. And there was Joyce holding up a face as +sweet as a bunch of flowers. + +'Will you take me?' said she. + +He stooped down and kissed the face that was so sweet. + +'I'll take you,' said he. + +And as they went along to his home he told her all the story. + +'Well, but,' she said, 'you've got one wish-apple left.' + +'Why, so I have,' said he; 'if I hadn't forgotten it!' + +'We'll make that into the fortune you went out to find. Do, do let me +look at it!' + +He pulled out the apple, and she took it in her hand as she sat behind +him on the big white horse. + +'Yes, our fortune's made,' he said; 'but I do wish I knew why I turned +old like that.' + +Just then Invicta stumbled, and Joyce caught at her lover to save +herself from falling, and as she caught at him the apple slipped from +her hand and the last wish was granted. For as it bounced on the road +Diggory did know why he had grown old like that. He knew that the +magician had arranged long before that every wish-apple that was used +outside the orchard should add ten years to the wisher's age. So that +the eight horses had made him a hundred years old, and the spell could +only be undone by the wisher's giving away what he'd wished for. So that +it was Diggory's generosity in giving away the horses that had taken him +back to the proper age for being happy in. I don't want to be moral, and +I'm very sorry--but it really was that. + +He carried Joyce home to his father's house. They were much too pleased +with each other to bother about the wasted wish-apples. + +'You're soon back, my son,' said the woodcutter, laughing. + +'Yes,' said Diggory. + +'Have you found your fortune?' + +'Yes,' said Diggory; 'here she is!' + +And he presented Joyce. The woodcutter laughed more than ever, for the +miller's daughter was a bit of an heiress. + +'Well, well!' he said. + +So they were married, and they had a little farm, and the white horse +was put to the plough, and to the cart, and the harrow, and the waggon; +and he worked hard, and they worked hard, so that they all throve and +were very happy as long as ever they lived. + +Said Joyce one day to Diggory, 'How was it you wanted to take me with +you directly you came back, and when you were going away you didn't.' + +'I've often wondered about that myself,' he said; 'I think it must have +been the bread-and-milk. You see, it was one of the wish-apple things, +just like the horses were, only they were outside things, so they made +me old outside; but the bread-and milk----' + +'Was an inside thing, of course--quite inside.' + +'Yes, so it made me old inside of my mind, just old enough to have the +sense to see that _you_ were all the fortune I wanted, and more than I +deserved.' + +'I didn't have to be so very old to know what fortune _I_ wanted,' said +Joyce, 'but, then, I was a girl. Boys are always much stupider than +girls, aren't they?' + + * * * * * + +The only person in this story you are likely to have heard of is, of +course, Invicta, and he is better known as the White Horse of Kent. + +You can see pictures of him all over his county: on brewers circulars +and all sorts of documents, and carved in stone on buildings, and even +on the disagreeable, insulting fronts of traction-engines. +Traction-engines pretend to despise horses, but they carry the image of +the White Horse on their hearts. And his name is generally put +underneath his picture, so that there shall be no mistake. + + + + +SIR CHRISTOPHER COCKLESHELL + + +The children called him Sir Christopher Cockleshell.--'Sir,' in token of +respect for his gray hairs and noble-looking face; Christopher, because +he had once carried Mabel across the road on a very muddy day, when +thunder showers and the parish water-carts had both been particularly +busy; and Cockleshell, because of the house he lived in. + +It was a most wonderful house--like the gateway of an old castle. It had +a big arch in the middle and a window over the arch, and there were +windows, too, in the towers on each side of the arch. All along the top +were in-and-out battlements. It had been covered with white plaster +once, but flakes of this had fallen away and showed the pinky bricks +underneath. But the oddest thing about the house was the trimming that +ran all round the bottom story about the height of a tall man. This +trimming was of oyster-shells, and cockle-shells, and mussel-shells, +and whelk-shells, and scallop-shells, all stuck on the wall of the house +in patterns. It was a very wonderful house indeed, and the children +always tried to go past it on their way to everywhere. + +The children themselves lived in a large, square, ordinary brown-brick +house among other ordinary brown-brick houses. Their house had a long +garden with tall old trees in it, and so had the other houses. Looking +out of the boxroom window was like looking down on the top of a green +forest, Phyllis always thought. Only now, of course, the trees were not +green any more, because it was nearly Christmas. + +'I wish Sir Christopher had a garden to his house,' Phyllis said one day +to the new housemaid. + +'There used to be a pleasure-gardens there, I've heard father tell,' +said the new housemaid. 'Quite a big gardens, it was. The gent as owned +it was as rich as rich, kep' his carriage and butlers and all. But when +his son come into the property he sold the gardens for building on, and +only kep' the gate-house--the Grotto they calls it. An' there 'e's lived +ever since in quite a poor way. Nasty old miser, that's what he is!' + +'He may be a miser,' said Phyllis, 'but he's not nasty. He carried Mabel +as kind as could be.' + +'Have you ever spoke to him since?' demanded the housemaid. + +'No,' said Phyllis; 'he always smiles at us, but he's always in a +hurry.' + +'That's it,' said the housemaid; ''e's afraid to let anyone inside of +his house, fear they should get to see all the sacks of money he's got +there. And he pokes about and picks things outer the gutters, so he +won't get to know anyone. My young brother he knocked at the door once +to arst for a drink of water--thought he'd get a squint at the inside of +the house while the old chap was gone to draw it. But he shuts the door +in Elf's face, and only opens it a crack to hand him the mug through.' + +'It was kind of him to give your brother the water,' said Phyllis. + +'Elf didun want the water,' said Alf's sister; ''e'd just 'ad a lemonade +at the paper shop.' + +Phyllis had often wanted to do something kind for Sir Christopher, but +she could not think of anything that wasn't just as likely to annoy him +as to please him. If she had known when his birthday was, she would have +put a birthday card under his door; but no one can be pleased at having +a card with 'Bright be thy natal morn' on it when really the natal morn +is quite a different date. She would have taken him flowers at the time +when dahlias and sunflowers grew at the end of the garden, but perhaps +he would not like the bother of putting them in water; and, if he was +really poor, and not a miser, as Jane said, he might not have a vase or +jug to put them in. + +And now it was Christmas-time. Guy was home for the holidays, and that +was splendid. But, on the other hand, mother and father had had to go to +granny, who was ill. So there would be no real Christmas in the brown +house. + +'But I'll tell you what,' said Phyllis; 'there's the Christmas-tree for +the poor children at the schools. Suppose we were to make some things +for that, and buy some, and go down and help decorate? Mother said we +might.' + +Guy was rather clever with his fingers, and as we all like doing what we +can do really well, he did not make such a fuss over making things as +some boys do. He could make doll's furniture out of pins and wool, and +armchairs out of the breast-bones of geese; only there are so seldom +enough breast-bones of geese to make a complete set of furniture. + +There was nearly a week to make things in, and long before its end the +schoolroom began to look like a bazaar. There were little boxes of +sweets covered with silver paper, and scrapbooks made of postcards +covered with red calico, and some little dolls that the girls dressed, +as well as all the things that Guy made. + +'How ravishingly beautiful!' said Mabel, when the shiny, shimmery, real +Christmas-tree things bought at the shop were spread out with the +others. + +The day before Christmas Eve the children were very happy indeed, +although they had had to be made thoroughly tidy before Jane would allow +them to go down to the school; and being thoroughly tidy, as you know, +often means a lot of soap in your eyes, and having your nails cleaned by +someone who does not know as well as you do where the nail leaves off +and the real you begins. + +They went to the side-door of the school, and left the baskets and +bundles of pretty things in the porch and went in. + +The big tree was there, but it was just plain fir-tree so far, nothing +Christmassy about it, except that it was planted in a tub. + +'How do you do?' said Guy politely to the stout lady in a bonnet with +black beads and a violet feather; 'I'm so glad we're in time.' + +'What for?' said the stout lady. 'The tree's not till to-morrow. Run +away, little boy.' + +'Oh, Mrs. Philkins,' said Phyllis, 'he's not a little boy, he's Guy; +don't you remember him?' + +'I remember him in petticoats,' said Mrs. Philkins: 'he's grown. +Good-afternoon.' + +'Mother said,' said Guy, keeping his temper beautifully, 'that we might +come and help.' + +'Very kind of your mother to arrange it like that. But _I_ happen to be +in charge of the tree, and I don't want any outside assistance.' + +The children turned away without a word. When they got outside Guy said: + +'I hate Mrs. Philkins!' + +'We oughtn't to hate anybody,' said Mabel. + +'She isn't anybody--at least, not anybody in particular,' said Phyllis; +'I heard father say so.' + +'She wouldn't have been such a pig to us if she'd known what we'd +brought for the tree,' said Phyllis. + +'I'm glad she didn't know. I wish we hadn't done the things at all,' +said Guy; 'it's always the way if you try to do good to others.' + +'It _isn't_,' said the others indignantly; 'you know it isn't.' + +'That's right!' said Guy aggravatingly, 'let's begin to quarrel about +it--_us_--that would just please her. Let's drop the whole lot into the +canal, and say no more about it.' + +'Oh _no_!' cried both the girls together, clutching the precious parcels +they carried. + +'But what's the good?' said Guy; 'we don't know anyone who's got a +Christmas-tree to give them to.' + +Phyllis stopped short on the pavement, struck motionless by an idea. + +'I know,' she said: 'we'll have a tree of our very own.' + +'What's the good if there's no one to see it?' + +'We'll ask someone to see it.' + +'Who?' + +'Sir Christopher!' + +The daring and romance of this idea charmed even Guy. But he thought it +would be better not to ask Sir Christopher to come to their house: +'Servants are so odd,' he said; 'they might be rude to him, or +something. No; we'll get it ready, and we'll wheel it round after dark, +and ask him to let us light it in his yard. Then he won't think we're +trying to pry into his house.' + +Half an hour later Guy staggered in, bearing a fir-tree. + +'Only ninepence,' he said; 'it's a bit lop-sided, but we can tie ivy on +or something to make that right. I'm glad that old cat wouldn't let us +help. It's much jollier like this.' + +The tree was planted in a pot that a dead azalea had lived in; and Mrs. +Philkins was quite forgotten in the joy of trimming their own tree. +Besides the things they had made there were the lovely things they had +bought--stars and flags, and a sugar bird-cage with a yellow bird in it, +and a glass boat with glass sails, and a blue china bird with a tail of +spun glass. + +Guy went out and borrowed a wheelbarrow from the gardener who +cut their grass when it was cut, and when the tree was trimmed he and +Phyllis carried it downstairs. The top branch with the star on it got +banged against the banisters, and the side branch got into Guy's eye, +and Phyllis's thumb got jammed between the pot and the banister rail. +But what are trifles like these in an adventure like this? + +They got the tree out of the front-door without being seen by the +servants--a real triumph. They stood the pot in the barrow, and started +to wheel it out of the front-gate. But directly they lifted the handles +of the barrow the floor of it naturally ceased to be straight, and the +flower-pot toppled over and cracked itself slightly against the side of +the barrow, while the boughs of the tree, with their gay decorations, +took the opportunity to entangle themselves in the bad-tempered leaves +of the holly that stood there, and were disengaged with difficulty. + +Then the pot refused to stand up, and at last it had to be laid down in +the barrow, with its shiny treasures dangling over the front-wheel. + +Then, the barrow was extremely heavy even without the tree in it; and +the children did not go the nearest way to the Grotto, because they did +not want to meet people, so they were thoroughly tired and extremely hot +by the time they approached Sir Christopher Cockleshell's castle. + +There was a bit of waste land close to it, where someone had once begun +to build a house and had then thought better of it. A bit of this +house's wall was standing on each side of the space where its front-door +would have been if it had ever come to the point of having one. They +wheeled the barrow in, and the light of a street lamp that obligingly +shone through the door-space made it possible for them to disentangle +the little strings that had got twisted round each other, to disengage +the gilt fish from the sugar bird-cage, and to take the glass bird out +of the goose-bone armchair in which it was trying to sit. Also they set +up all the candles--six dozen of them. This is done with tin-tacks, as +no doubt you know. + +'Now,' said Guy, 'one of us must go and ask if he'll let us light it in +his yard, and one of us must wait here with the tree.' + +'What about me?' said Mabel. + +'You can do which you like,' said Guy. + +'I want to do both,' said Mabel; 'I want to stay with the pretty tree, +_and_ I want to go and ask him if he wants us.' + +Mabel was still too small to understand thoroughly how hard it is, even +for a grown-up person, to be in two places at once. + +It ended in Guy's staying with the tree. + +'In case of attacks by boys,' he said. + +'Then I shall go with Phyllis,' said Mabel. + +Both girls felt their hearts go quite pitter-pattery when at last they +stood on the doorstep of the castle. + +'Why don't you knock?' Mabel asked. + +'I don't like to,' said Phyllis. + +Mabel instantly knocked very loudly with a wooden ninepin-ball that she +happened to have in her pocket. + +'Oh, I _wish_ you hadn't!' said Phyllis; 'I wanted to think what to say +first, and now there's no time.' + +There certainly was not. The door opened a cautious inch, and a voice +said: + +'Who's there?' + +'It's us,' said Phyllis, 'please. We don't want to pry into your +beautiful house like Jane's brother Alf when he asked you for the drink +of water, only we've made up a Christmas-tree, and may we stand it in +your yard and light it--the candles, I mean?' + +The door opened a little further, and a face looked out--the face, of +course, of Sir Christopher. All the house that showed through the crack +of the door didn't, as Mabel said afterwards, show at all, because it +was pitch-dark. + +'I don't quite understand,' said Sir Christopher gently. Phyllis was a +little surprised to find that the voice was what she called a +gentleman's voice. + +'We--you were so kind carrying Mab across the road that water-carty day +when it thundered----' + +'Oh, it's you, is it?' he said. + +'Yes, it's us; and they wouldn't let us help with the school tree, and +so we made one of our own and then we wanted someone to see it. And we +thought of you, because you don't seem to have many friends, and we +thought---- But we'll take it home again if you don't care about it.' + +She stopped, just on the right side of tears. + +'There's a glass bird with a spun-lovely tail,' said Mabel persuasively, +'and sweets and fishes, and a crocodile that goes waggle-waddle when you +wind him up.' + +'My dears,' said Sir Christopher, and cleared his throat. 'My dears,' he +began again, and again he stopped. + +'We'll go away if--if you'd rather,' said Phyllis, and sniffed +miserably. + +'No, no!' he said; 'no, no--I was only thinking. I never thought--would +you like to bring the tree into the house? It's just the sort of thing +my little girl always liked.' + +'Oh yes,' said Phyllis; 'we'll go and fetch it now.' + +He closed the door gently. The children flew back to Guy and the tree. + +'Oh, Guy! we've to take the tree inside the house! And he's got a little +girl--at least, he says so. Come on, quick. We'd better carry it. The +barrow's so heavy, and it does interfere so!' + +They carried the pot between them. It was very heavy, and they had to +put it down and rest several times. But at last they dumped it down in +the dark on the front-door step of the castle, and breathed deep breaths +of fatigue, relief, and excitement. + +The door opened, and opened wide, and this time light streamed from +within. + +'Welcome!' said Sir Christopher. 'Come in. Let me help to lift it. What +a beautiful tree!' + +'It is rather decent, isn't it?' said Guy dispassionately. + +Sir Christopher raised the pot, carried it in, and the door was shut. +The children found themselves in a small square hall. A winding +staircase of iron corkscrewed upwards in one corner. The hall was +lighted only by two candles. + +The old gentleman led the way through a door on the right into a round +room with white walls. + +'We're inside the tower now,' said Guy. + +'Yes,' said their host, 'this is part of the tower.' + +He hastily lighted a big lamp, and then a deep 'Oh!' broke from the +children. For the walls were not white, they were all of +mother-of-pearl, and here and there all over the walls round pearls +shone with a starry, milky radiance. + +'How radishing!' said Mabel in a whisper. 'I always said he wasn't a +miser. He's a magician.' + +'What a lovely, lovely room!' sighed Phyllis. + +'What's it made of?' asked Guy downrightly. + +'Oyster-shells,' said Sir Christopher, 'and pearl beads.' + +And it was. + +'Oh!' said Mabel gaily, 'then that's what you go prowling about in dirty +gutters for?' + +'Don't be rude, Mab dear!' whispered Phyllis. + +But the old gentleman did not seem to mind. He just said, 'Yes, that's +it,' in an absent sort of way. He seemed to be thinking about something +else. Then he said, 'The Christmas-tree.' + +The children had forgotten all about the Christmas-tree. + +When its seventy-two candles were lighted the pearly room shone and +glimmered like a fairy palace in a dream. + +'It's many a year since my little girl had such a Christmas-tree,' he +said. 'I don't know how to thank you.' + +'Seeing your pearly halls is worth all the time and money,' said Mabel +heartily. + +And Phyllis added in polite haste: + +'And you being pleased.' + +'Would you like to see the black marble hall?' asked Sir Christopher. + +And, of course, they said, 'Yes, awfully.' + +So he led them into the room on the other side of the hall, and lighted +a lamp. And the room was like a room of black marble, carved into little +round knobs. + +'How lovely!' said Phyllis. + +'It's not lovely like the other,' said Mabel; 'but it's more serious, +like when the organ plays in church.' + +'Why,' said Guy suddenly, 'it's winkle-shells!' + +And it was. Hundreds and thousands of winkle-shells sorted into sizes +and stuck on the walls in patterns, and then, it seemed, polished or +varnished. + +'Come,' said Sir Christopher, 'I'll show you the red-room.' + +As they turned to go a tall, white figure by the door seemed to come +suddenly into the lamplight. It was covered with a sheet. + +'Oh!' said all three, starting back, 'what's that?' + +'That's my little girl,' he said. + +'Is she trying to frighten us? Is she playing ghosts?' asked Guy. + +'No,' he said; 'she never plays at ghosts. It isn't her really. That's +only my fun. It's a statue really.' + +'Aren't statues very dear?' asked Guy. + +'Very,' said Sir Christopher--'very, very dear.' + +He led the way up the winding iron stair and showed them the red-room. +Its walls were covered with bits of red lobster-shells, overlapping like +a fish's scales or the plates of armour. + +'How resplendid!' said Mabel; 'I believe you're a mighty magician.' + +'No,' he said; 'at least--no, not exactly. There's only one more room.' + +The other room was a bedroom, quite dull and plain, with whitewashed +walls and painted deal furniture. + +'I like the pearly halls best,' said Mabel: 'they're more eloquent;' and +they all went down to the room where the seventy-two candles of the +Christmas-tree were burning steadily and brightly, though there was no +one to see them. + +'Won't you call your little girl?' said Phyllis. 'The candles won't last +so very long; they're the cheap kind.' + +Sir Christopher twisted his fingers together. + +'It's no use calling her,'he said. 'Would you mind--do you mind leaving +the tree for to-night? You could fetch it to-morrow. And you won't tell +anyone about the inside of my house, will you? They'd only laugh at it.' + +'I don't see how they could,' said Mabel indignantly; 'it's the +beautifullest, gorgerest house that ever was.' + +'But we won't tell anyone,' said Guy. 'And we'll come again +to-morrow--about the same time.' + +Sir Christopher said, 'Yes, please.' + +And they all shook hands with him and came away, leaving the +Christmas-tree, with all its seventy-two candles, still making the +pearly room a dream of fairy beauty. + +They ran all the way home, because it was rather late, and they did not +want the servants to fetch them from the parish schoolroom, where they +had not spent the evening. It would have been very difficult to explain +exactly where and how they _had_ spent it, and the fact that they had +promised not to say anything about it would have added considerably to +the difficulty. + +When they had been let in, and had taken off their hats and jackets and +got their breaths, they looked at each other. + +'Well?' said Phyllis. + +'Yes,' said Mabel; 'what an inciting adventure! What a dear he is! I do +hope we shall see his little girl to-morrow.' + +'Yes,' said Guy slowly, 'but I don't think we shall.' + +'Why ever not?' + +'Because I don't believe he's got any little girl. We went into all the +rooms, and the hall and landing. There wasn't any other room for the +little girl to be in.' + +'Perhaps it was really her under the sheet, trying to be ghosts,' said +Phyllis. + +'It was too high up,' said Mabel. + +'She might have been standing on a stool,' said Phyllis. + +'Well,' said Guy, with a satisfied look; 'it's a very thrilling +mystery.' + +It was. And it gave them something to think of for the next few days. +For that evening when they went to fetch the Christmas-tree, they found +the door of Sir Christopher's castle tight shut, and their +Christmas-tree was standing alone on the doorstep in the dark. + +After vainly knocking several times, they put the tree into the +wheelbarrow and got it home, only upsetting it three times by the way. + +When they got it into the light of their schoolroom they saw that there +was a piece of paper on it--a note. + +'My dears,' it said, 'here is your beautiful tree. Thank you very much. +If you knew how much pleasure it had given me you would be glad. Why not +give the tree to some poor child? Good-bye. God bless you!' + +There were some letters tangled together at the bottom of the page. + +'His initials, I suppose,' said Guy. But nobody could read them. + +'Anyway, it means he doesn't want to see us any more,' said Phyllis. +'Oh, I do wish we knew something more about him.' + +But they took his advice, and the tree went to the gardener's little +boy, who was ill. It made him almost forget his illness for days and +days. + +When father came home they asked him who lived in the Grotto. He told +them. + +'He has lived there for years,' he said. 'I have heard that when he came +into his property he found that his property was almost all debts. So he +sold the tea-gardens for building on, and has lived there in the Grotto +on next to nothing, and all these years he's been paying off his +father's creditors. I should think they're about paid off by now.' + +'Has he a little girl?' asked Phyllis. + +'Yes--I believe so,' said father absently. + +'It's very odd,' Mabel was beginning, but the others silenced her. + +After this the children were more interested than ever in Sir +Christopher. They used to paint illuminated texts, and make +picture-frames of paper rosettes, and buy toys, and leave them on his +doorstep in the dark, 'For the little girl,' and as the spring came +on, bunches of flowers. + +It was one evening when Phyllis came to the castle with a big bunch of +plumy purple lilac. She was earlier than usual, and it was not quite +dark, and--wonder of wonders--the door of the castle was open. Still +more wonderful, Sir Christopher stood on the doorstep. + +'I was watching for you,' he said. 'I had a sort of feeling you'd come +to-night. Will you come in?' + +He led her into the black marble room and stood looking wistfully at +her. + +'Would you like to see my little girl?' he said suddenly. + +'Yes,' said Phyllis. + +'I didn't think you'd understand,' he said, 'when you came at Christmas. +But you've been so kind and faithful all these months. I think you will +understand. Look!' + +He pulled the sheet from the statue, and Phyllis looked on the white +likeness of a little girl of her own age, dressed in a long gown like a +nightgown. + +'It is very beautiful,' she said. + +'Yes,' he said. 'Have you ever heard any tales about me?' he asked. + +'Yes,' said Phyllis, and told him. + +'It's not true,' he said. My father had no debts. But I married someone +he didn't like; and then I got ill, and couldn't work. My father was +very hard. He wouldn't help us. My wife died, and then my father died, +and all his great wealth came to me. Too late! too late! The letter that +told me I was rich came to me when I was sitting beside my dead child. +The money came _then_--the money that would have saved her. The first +money I spent out of it all was spent on that statue. It was done as she +lay dead.' + +Phyllis looked at the statue, and felt--she didn't know why--very +frightened. Then she looked at him, and she was not frightened any more. +She ran to him and put her arms round him. + +'Oh, poor, poor, dear Sir Christopher!' she said. + +'That's how she looked when she was dead,' he said; 'would you like to +see my ladybird as she was when she was alive and well, and I was a +strong man able to work for her?' + +'Yes--oh yes,' said Phyllis. + +He led the way into the pearly room, and drew back a green curtain that +hung there. Phyllis caught her breath sharply, and tears pricked her +eyes. Not because the picture was a sad one--ah, no! not that! + +As the curtain was withdrawn the figure of a child seemed to spring +towards them from the canvas--a happy, laughing child, her arms full of +roses, her face full of health and beauty and the joy of life; a child +whose glad, unclouded eyes met Phyllis's in a free, joyous look. + +'Oh no!' cried Phyllis; 'she can't be dead--she _can't_!' + +The old man took her in his arms, for she was crying bitterly. + +'Thank you--thank you, dear,' he said, soothing her. 'Now I know that +you are the right person to help me.' + +'I? Help _you_?' + +Phyllis's tears began to dry at the beautiful thought, but she still +sobbed. + +'Don't cry,' he said, and gently drew the green curtain over the lovely +laughing face. 'Don't cry. I want to tell you of many things. When that +money came--I've told you when--as soon as I could see or think again, I +saw what I ought to do. Ever since I've not spent a penny of that money +on myself--on anything but the plainest food, the plainest clothes. If +I've made the house beautiful for her picture to live in, it's been with +my own work. All the rest of the money has gone to help little girls +whose fathers can't work for them--little girls that can be saved, as my +little girl could have been saved. That's the work I want you to carry +on for me when you grow up. Will you promise?' + +'Yes,' said Phyllis; 'only I'm very stupid.' + +'I will have you taught. You shall learn how to do my work. Ask your +father to come and see me. And now, good-bye. Perhaps I shan't see you +again. Will you always remember that your Christmas-tree came to me like +a light in a dark night to show me that there was someone still who +cared to be kind.... Good-bye.' + +Father, when he heard the story, almost thought that Phyllis was +dreaming. But he went to the Grotto, and when he came back his face was +very sad. + +'It is a very great honour for you, Phyllis,' he said gravely. 'Are you +sure that you understand how much hard work it will mean?' + +'I don't mind hard work,' said Phyllis, 'if only I can do what he +wants.' + +So Phyllis is learning many things and preparing for the great work that +has so wonderfully come to her. I think she will do it well, because she +is not at all stupid really, and she has the gift of being sorry for sad +people, and happy with happy ones. I think Sir Christopher chose well. + +Some distant relations of Sir Christopher's have tried to make out that +he was mad, and so couldn't do what he liked with his money. But when +they took the matter to the judges to decide, hundreds and hundreds of +people he had been good to and helped broke the promise of secrecy that +he had always asked of them. And all England rang with the tale of his +goodness, and of all the kind and clever things he had done for poor +children all those long years, for the sake of his own little child. And +the judges decided he was quite right to use his money in that way, and +not mad at all. So the tiresome relations got nothing but lawyers' bills +for their pains. + +Phyllis only saw Sir Christopher once again. He sent for her when he was +dying. They had moved his bed into the pearly room, and he lay facing +the green curtain. + +'If it seems too hard when the time comes,' he said, 'you need not do +the work. Your father knows how to arrange that.' + +'You needn't be afraid,' said Phyllis; 'it's the most splendid chance +anyone ever had.' + +'Kiss me, dear,' he said, 'and then draw back the curtain.' + +But before Phyllis's hand had touched the green curtain he sat up in the +bed and held out his arms towards the picture. + +'Why, ladybird!' he cried, his face all alight with love and joy. 'Why, +my little girl!' + + + + +MUSCADEL + + +Of course, there was a grand party when Princess Pandora came of age. +The palace was hung with garlands of white roses, all the carpets were +taken up, and the floor of every room was covered close with green turf +with daisies in it, for in that country the cruel practice of rooting +daisies out of lawns with a spud was a crime. + +The Queen-mother had died when Pandora was a little baby, so now the +Princess had to be hostess, and to receive all the guests, and speak to +each one a little, and see that everyone had enough to eat and the right +sort of person to talk to. + +She did it all very nicely indeed, for she was a properly brought up +Princess and had been to a school for the daughters of monarchs only, +where, every Wednesday evening, she and her school-fellows were taught +'deportment, manners, and how to behave at Court.' + +All the guests went away very pleased with her and with themselves, +which is how people ought always to feel after a party. + +When they had all gone she went and curled up at the feet of her father, +who had sunk back on his throne exhausted by his hospitable exertions. +The two were quite alone, except for a particularly fine house-fly who +had settled on the back of the throne, just above the carved Royal arms. +Of course, neither the King nor the Princess noticed such a little thing +as a fly. + +'Well, daddy dear,' said the Princess, 'did it go off all right? Did I +behave prettily?' + +'Ah!' said the King, 'you're a born Princess, my pet. Pretty face, +pretty manners, good heart, good head. You're your dear mother over +again. And that reminds me----' + +'Yes?' said the Princess. + +'When your mother died,' said the King--and he sighed, though it was +twenty-one years to a day since he had lost his Queen-love--'I promised +her to lock up her apartments, and only to give the keys of them to you +when you should be twenty-one. And now you _are_, so here are the keys, +my precious. You've always wanted to explore the rooms in the south +wing. Well, now you can.' + +'How lovely!' cried the Princess, jumping up; 'won't you come too, +daddy?' + +'I'd rather not, dear,' said the King, so sadly that Pandora at once +said: + +'Well, then, _I_ won't either. I'll stay with you.' + +But the King said 'No,' and she had better take a housemaid or two with +brooms and dusters. 'The dust grows thick in twenty-one years,' said +he. + +But the Princess didn't want any of the palace housemaids to help her to +explore her mother's rooms. She went alone, holding up her +cloth-of-silver train because of the dust. + +And the rooms that she unlocked with the six gold keys with pearls in +their handles were very dusty indeed. The windows were yellow with dust, +so the Princess threw them all open. And then, even through the dust, +she could see how beautiful the rooms were--far more beautiful even than +her own--and everyone had always said that hers were the most beautiful +rooms in the seven kingdoms. She dusted the tops of a few of the tables +and cabinets with her lace handkerchief, so that she could just see how +everything was inlaid with ivory and jade and ebony and precious stones. + +Six of the keys--the pearly ones--opened six beautiful rooms, but the +seventh had rubies in its handle, and it was a little, little key, not +at all like a door-key; so Pandora looked about for a little keyhole +that the key would fit, and at last she found a cabinet of ebony inlaid +with gold and red tortoiseshell, and the little seventh key just fitted +through the opening of the gold lock-plate and into the keyhole. Pandora +turned the key and opened the cabinet. Inside the cabinet were seven +little drawers with gold handles set with rubies, like the key. + +Pandora pulled the drawers out one after the other. She was alone, +except for the house-fly, who had followed her and now sat on the top of +the cabinet door, watching her with all his hundreds of eyes. But no one +notices a fly. + +Five of the drawers contained jewels. The first was full of necklaces, +the second held rings and brooches, the third had tiaras and chaplets, +the fourth girdles, and the fifth bracelets, and they were all of the +most beautiful jewels in the world--rubies, sapphires, emeralds, pearls +and diamonds, and opals, and many other stones that the Princess did not +even know the names of. + +In the sixth drawer was a dry brown wreath that fell to pieces as +Pandora lifted it. It had been jasmine once, and the Queen had worn +it at her wedding. + +[Illustration: 'In the drawer was just one jewelled ring. It lay on a +written page.'--Page 347.] + +And in the seventh drawer was just one jewelled ring. It lay on a +written page. + +The Princess read the writing: + +'This ring is for my son's wife, or for my daughter, if I have no son. +It is the magic ring given thousands of years ago to a Queen of this +country. It has the power of changing the wearer into whatever shapes he +chooses. But it has never been used, because the Kings of this country +have always been so good and kind, and clever and beloved, that their +wives could never think of any change that would not be a change for the +worse. There is only one thing in the world that this jewel cannot touch +or change. And this is of all things in the world the most important +thing.' + +Pandora kissed the written words and slipped the ring on to her finger. +It was a wonderful stone, like a sapphire that had tried to change into +an opal, and stopped halfway. + +There was not a happier Princess living than Pandora. Yet she was not +afraid of change. Girls are like this sometimes, and she was very young +for her age. + +She stood looking at the ring and turning it on her finger, and the fly +watched her with all its hundreds of eyes. + +Now, you will, perhaps, have guessed that this fly was not an ordinary +fly, and you are right. But if you think he was an enchanted Prince or +anything of that sort you are wrong. The fly was simply the cleverest +fly of all flies--someone must be the cleverest in any society, you +know--and he was just clever enough to like to be where the Princess +was, and to look at her beauty with all his hundreds of eyes. He was +clever enough to like this and to know that he liked it, but he was not +clever enough to know why. + +So now, as the Princess stood fingering her ring and trying to make her +mind up, he gave an interested buzz, and the Princess jumped. + +'Oh,' she said, 'it's only a horrid fly! But it has wings. It must be +lovely to have wings. I wish I were a fairy no bigger than that fly.' + +And instantly she and her silver-trained gown, and her silver shoes, and +the magic ring, and everything about her, grew suddenly small, till she +was just as big as the fly and no bigger, and that is flower-fairy size. +Silver gauze wings grew out of her shoulders; she felt them unfolding +slowly, like a dragon-fly's wings when he first comes out of that dull +brown coat of his that hasn't any wing-parts. + +She gave a tiny shriek of joyous surprise, and fluttered out through the +open window and down across the marble terraces to the palace +flowergarden. The fly buzzed heavily after her. + +Pandora fluttered among roses and lilies on her bright, light, white +wings, but presently she was tired, because flying is much harder work +than you would think, especially when you have not been brought up to it +from a child. So she looked about for a place to rest in, and saw near +her the cool pink cave of a foxglove flower. She alighted on its lip, +folded her wings, and walked in on her little fairy feet. It was very +pleasant inside the foxglove. The Princess sat down by a drop of dew, +which was quite a pool to the tiny lady, and presently she took off her +rings and laid them on the smooth floor of the pink cave, and began to +dabble her hands in the dew-pool. The fly had settled on the outer edge +of the flower, and watched her with all his hundreds of eyes. + +And now the dreadful thing happened. Pandora, her hands and face wet +with dew, suddenly saw the daylight darken at the entrance of her +foxglove cave. Then a black-winged monster, with hundreds and hundreds +of eyes, came quickly towards her on its six legs. Pandora was very +frightened, and squeezed herself close to the back of her cave. The fly +moved on, and quickly picked up the magic ring, now so tiny that it +fitted nicely on to one of its front feet. + +Next moment it had backed out of the foxglove, taking the ring with it, +and had flown off, and the Princess was left alone. + +If she cried a little you can hardly blame her. You wait till you find +yourself one million three hundred thousand two hundred and seventy-four +times as small as you usually are, with no means whatever of getting +back to your proper size, then you'll understand how the Princess felt. + +But she was a brave Princess; so she soon stopped crying, spread her +gauzy wings, and flew across the garden and up over the marble terraces +and in at the library window of the palace. + +The King was reading the account of the birthday-party in the evening +paper, and he did not notice the Princess at all till she settled on his +ear. Then he put up his hand to brush her away, for he thought she was a +fly. She dodged his hand and settled again, and shouted 'Papa!' into his +ear as loud as ever she could. And the shout was no louder than a +fly's buzzing, but, as it was close to his ear, the King heard it very +distinctly. + +[Illustration: 'A black-winged monster, with hundreds and hundreds of +eyes.'--Page 350] + +'Bless my soul!' said the King, sitting very bolt upright. + +'Don't move, daddy,' said the tiny Princess, 'even if I tickle your ear +with my wings. I found a magic jewel in one of dear mother's cabinets, +and I made it turn me into a fairy, and now a horrid fly has buzzed off +with the jewel, and I can't get back to my right size.' + +'I must be dreaming,' said the King. + +'I wish you were--I mean I wish I was--but it's true. I'll settle on +your hand now, and you'll see.' + +The King looked at the tiny winged thing--flower-fairy size--that +settled on his hand. And he put on his spectacles and looked again. And +then he got a magnifying-glass and looked through that. + +'Yes,' he said, 'it certainly is you! What a thing to happen, and on +your birthday, too! Oh dear! oh dear!' + +'It _is_ rather hard, daddy,' said the poor Princess; 'but you are so +wise and clever, you'll be able to get me back to my right size again.' + +'My dear,' said the King, 'I received a thorough commercial education, +but I never learned magic. In fact, I doubt whether it is still taught +even at Oxford.' + +'Daddy dear,'said the Princess shyly, 'I've read a good many books about +magic--fairy-tales they're called, you know--and----' + +'Yes,' said the King, who saw at once what she meant. 'Of course, I +shall do that first thing.' + +And next morning all the newspapers contained an advertisement: + + 'Wanted, competent Prince to undo magic and restore Princesses to + their right size. None but eldest sons need apply. The usual reward + offered. Apply at the palace.' + +'I think _that's_ a mistake, daddy,' said the Princess; 'in the fairy +stories it's always the youngest son who makes everything come right. +And people don't know their fairy history nowadays; they mayn't know +what the reward is.' + +So the next day the advertisement was changed to: + + 'Any sons of respectable monarchs may apply. The successful + candidate will receive the Princess's hand in marriage.' + +'It's all very well to put that in,' said the Princess to herself, 'but +if I don't like him I shan't marry him. I'll give him all my jewels +instead.' + +But all the Kings' sons in the world had forgotten their magic, if they +ever knew any, and not one single Prince applied at the palace. + +So the Princess had to do the only possible thing--make the best of it. +And she did it bravely. + +Now, when the fly, whose name, by the way, was Muscadel, flew off from +the foxglove-bell with the magic jewel on his feathery foot, he flew +straight to the Princess's boudoir and settled down on his favourite +spot, the corner of the frame of her mirror. And there he sat and +wondered how he could best use the magic jewel. And he thought so hard +that he never noticed a large spider who spun a web right across the +corner where he sat, and when he spread his wings to assist his +meditations by a little exercise he was caught in the web. + +'Aha!' said the spider, smiling greedily. + +'Oh dear! oh dear!' said the fly. + +'How nice you look!' said the spider. + +Then very slowly and carefully she began to move towards him. + +'What a terrible thing it is to be a fly!' said he. 'I wish I was a +spider.' + +And, of course, instantly he was. He broke the web and scrambled down +the mirror, for he was still horribly frightened of the other spider. He +got out of the window and down into the garden, and hid himself under a +leaf of a burdock, which was there because the gardener was a lazy +fellow and neglected his business. + +But it's an ill wind that blows nobody any good. Before Muscadel had got +his breath after the shock of that dreadful web he saw a slow, +wrinkled-skinned creature, with bright yellow eyes, quite close to him. +It was a toad, and he knew that toads eat spiders. + +'Oh, a spider's life isn't worth living!' he cried; 'I wish I was a +toad.' + +And, of course, he was, for the magic jewel was still on his front foot. + +Now that Muscadel was a toad he felt he should like to find a quiet damp +place to live in, so he crawled to the edge of the basin of the palace +fountain. + +And when he had found a nice damp crack in the marble he squeezed in and +stayed there for some days. But one day, when he went out for a breath +of air and a woodlouse or two, a great beak clattered quite near him, +and startled him so that he nearly jumped out of his toad's skin. + +The person with a beak was a stork, and Muscadel knew what the stork +wanted. + +'Oh, a toad's life is a dog's life,' said Muscadel; 'I wish I was a +stork.' + +So he was a stork, and the magic jewel, grown bigger, was round his +right leg. + +It was fine to be a stork, and he did not envy even the golden eagle +that flew down to drink at the fountain. And when the eagle came within +a yard or two of him he felt so large and brave that he said: + +'Keep to your own side, will you? Where are you shoving to?' + +The golden eagle, whose temper is very short, looked at him with evil +golden eyes, and said: + +'You'll soon see where I am shoving to,' and flew at him. + +Muscadel saw that he had made a mistake that might cost him his life. + +'Oh, what's the good of being a stork?' he said. 'I wish I was an +eagle.' + +And as soon as he was one he flew away, leaving the other eagle with its +beak open in amazement, too much 'struck of a heap,' as he told his +wife afterwards, to follow the new bird and finish off their quarrel in +the air. + +'Oh, how grand it is to be an eagle!' said Muscadel, sailing on +widespread wings; and just as he said it an arrow caught him under the +left wing. It hurt horribly. 'What a powerful thing an arrow is!' he +said. 'Dear me, how it hurts! I wish I was an arrow.' + +So he was one, but he was an arrow in the quiver of a very stupid +bowman, who shot next day at a buzzard and missed it. So the arrow, +which was Muscadel, lodged high in an oak-tree, and the stupid bowman +could not get it down again. + +'I don't like being a slave to a mere bow,' said Muscadel; 'I'll be a +bow myself.' + +But when he was a bow the archer who owned him hurt his bow-back so in +fitting him with a new string that he got very cross, and said: + +'This is worse slavery than the other. I want to be an archer.' + +So he was an archer. And as it happened he was one of the King's +archers. The magic jewel was round his arm like a bracelet, and no one +saw it, for he kept it hidden up his arm under the sleeve of his buff +coat. + +Now that Muscadel was a man, of course, he read the newspapers, and in +them he saw the King's advertisement, which was still appearing every +day. + +'Dear me!' said Muscadel; 'of course the Princess couldn't get back to +her right size when I had taken the magic jewel away. I never thought of +that. Flies are thoughtless little things. And, by the way, taking that +jewel was stealing. Very wrong indeed. But I didn't know that when I was +a fly. So _I'm_ not a thief, and no more was the fly, because he didn't +know any better.' + +That evening he had a little talk with the captain of the King's +archers, and in the morning the captain called on the King very early +and said: + +'Sire, there's a crack-brained chap among my archers who says he can +make the Princess her right size again. Of course, it's all tommy-rot, +your Majesty, if I may be pardoned the expression, but I thought your +Majesty would like to know.' + +'Oh, let him try,' said the King wearily; 'it's something to find +someone who even thinks he can do it.' + +So next day Muscadel, the archer, put on his Sunday clothes and went up +to the palace, and a great, red-faced, burly fellow he was. + +The King and all the Court were assembled to see the archer make the +Princess her own size again, though nobody believed he could do it. + +The King was on his throne, and Pandora, still flower-fairy size, was +sitting on one of the carved gold flowers that adorned the throne's +right arm. + +The archer bowed to the King and the Court, and to the Princess, though +he could not see her. + +Then he looked round the crowded throne-room and said: + +'Look here, your Majesty, this will never do.' + +'Eh?' said the King. + +'Magic can't be done in this sort of public way. I must be left alone +with the Princess. No; I can't have anyone bothering round. Not even +you, your Majesty.' + +The King was rather offended, but the Princess got to his ear and +whispered, and then he gave the order for the throne-room to be cleared; +and when that was done, he set the tiny Princess on the table, and went +away himself and shut the door honourably behind him. + +[Illustration: "On the table stood the dazzling figure of a real +full-sized princess."--Page 359.] + +Then the archer said: + +'Little Princess, you can be made your right size again if you will do +just what I tell you. Do you promise?' + +The Princess's little voice said, 'Yes.' + +'Well, then,' said the archer, 'I have got the jewel here that the fly +stole from you, and I will lend it to you, and you can wish yourself +Princess-size again, and then you must give me back the jewel.' + +'Why, the jewel was stolen! You've no right to it. I shall call the +guard,' said Pandora angrily. + +'They wouldn't hear you, little Princess, if you did call,' said the +archer; 'but I'll call them for you if you like. Only you promised.' + +'So I did,' said the Princess. 'Well, lend me the jewel.' + +He took it off his arm and laid it upon the table, and as soon as the +Princess touched it, it grew small, small, small, so that she could put +it on her finger. Then she said: + +'I wish I were my right size again!' + +And the archer rubbed his eyes, for there on the table stood the +dazzling figure of a real, full-sized Princess in a cloth-of-silver +gown, and a face more beautiful than the morning. + +'Oh, how lovely you are!' he said, and gave her his hand to help her +down. + +She jumped lightly from the table and stood before him, laughing with +joy at being her own real right size once more. + +'Oh, thank you! thank you!' she cried; 'I must run and show my father +this very minute.' + +'The jewel?' said the archer. + +'Oh!' said Pandora. 'Well, yes, I did promise, but--well, I'm a Princess +of my word. Here it is.' + +She held it out, but he did not take it. + +'You may keep it for ever and ever, Princess dear,' he said, 'if you +will only marry me.' + +'Oh, I can't!' she cried. 'I'm never going to marry anyone unless I love +him more than all the world.' + +'I feel as if I'd loved you all my lives,' said Muscadel--'all my life, +I mean. Couldn't you wish to love me?' + +'I don't think I want to,' said the Princess doubtfully. + +'Then I must have the jewel. I'll find some way yet of making you love +me, and then you shall have it for ever and ever.' + +'If I loved you,' said she, 'I suppose I shouldn't mind your having red +hair, and a red face, and red ears, and red hands, should I?' + +'Not a bit,' said the archer cheerfully. + +She stood there, twisting the magic jewel round and round on her Royal +finger. + +'I suppose it's more important than anything else to love someone?' she +said. + +'Much,' said he. + +'Well, then,' said she, 'but are you the sort of person I ought to +love?' + +'No,' said he, 'I'm not half good enough for you. But then nobody is.' + +'That's nice of you, anyhow,' she said. 'I'll do it. I wish I loved +you!' + +There was a silence. Then Pandora said: + +'Nothing's happened. I don't love you. I feel just the same as usual. +Your hair, and hands, and face, and ears are redder than ever. You'll +excuse my candour, won't you?' + +'Then there's nothing for it but for me to wish not to love you,' said +Muscadel, 'for I really can't bear loving you to this desperate degree +when you don't care a snap of your Royal fingers for me. Lend me the +jewel a moment. You shall have it back. If you don't care for me, I +don't want to care for anything. I'll live and die a red-faced, +red-eared, red-haired, red-handed archer, so I will.' + +The Princess lent him the jewel, and he wished and waited. Then, 'It's +no good,' he said; 'I adore you as much as ever--more, if possible.' + +'Ah, I see,' said the Princess; 'there _is_ one thing that the magic +ring won't touch. I suppose that's love. How funny!' + +'I don't think it's funny at all,' said he. 'I suppose really it's +because you're not the sort of person that could love the sort of person +I am.' + +'Well, then,' said she, 'I'll wish I was the sort of person who _could_. +I won't be made a silly of by a stupid magic jewel. Only let me call my +father, because goodness knows what sort of person the person who could +love you would be like. _I_ can't imagine anyone who could!' + +'You may be as cruel as you like now,' said Muscadel, 'if only somehow +or other you'll get to love me afterwards. I will call the King.' + +So he went to the door and shouted: + +'Hi, your Majesty! Step this way for a moment, will you, please?' + +And His Majesty stepped. + +'Look here, daddy,' said the Princess, 'I'm real Princess size again, so +give me a kiss!' + +[Illustration: 'A blowzy, frowzy dairymaid.' Page 363.] + +When this was done she said very quickly, and before the King could stop +her: + +'I wish I was the kind of person that could love this archer.' + +And then and there, before the horrified eyes of the other two, the +Princess turned into the kind of person who could love the archer. + +'Bless my soul and body!' said the King, turning purple. + +'Oh, my heart!' said Muscadel, turning white. + +For the kind of person the Princess had changed into was a blowzy, +frowzy dairymaid, with oily black hair and shining red cheeks, and +little black eyes like the currant eyes in gingerbread pigs. Her hands +were fat and red, and her feet would not bear looking at for a moment. + +'Good old Muscadel!' said the dairymaid that Pandora had turned into; +'now we'll be married and live as happy as two mice in a cheese!' + +'Never in this world!' cried Muscadel, snatching the ring from her hand, +which was not manners, but we must remember that he was very much upset. +He snatched the ring, and he rushed out of the room and out of the +palace, and when he got to the archers' quarters he flung himself face +down among the rushes on the floor, and lay there till his comrades +began to mock him and even to kick him as he lay; and then he got up and +fought them with his red fists, one down, t'other come on, till seven of +them had owned that they did not want any more. + +'Oh dear! oh dear!' said the King in his palace; 'I'd rather have had +you flower-fairy size for life than like this! We must get back the +jewel and make you into your old self.' + +'Not a bit of it,' said the dairymaid Princess. 'I never was so happy in +my life. I love that lovely archer, and if I'm a Princess you can order +him to marry me, and he'll have to.' + +'Lackaday!' said the King. 'Dairymaids don't seem to love like +Princesses do.' + +'I dare say not,' said she, 'but we know our own minds. I tell you I'm +happy, governor, and I'll stay as I am.' + +The dairymaid Princess called for cold pork and cheese and beer, and, +having had quite enough of all three, she went to bed in the Princess's +green and white bedroom. + +Now, when all the archers had gone to sleep poor Muscadel stole out and +wandered through the palace gardens, and looked at the white fountains +rising and falling in the moonlight. He saw the white lilies sleeping +standing up, just like real live sentinels. He saw the white pea-cocks +roosting in the yew-trees, and the white swans cuddled up among the +reeds by the lake. He went hither and thither through the cold white +beauty of the night, and he thought and thought, but he could not think +any thought that was worth the trouble of thinking. + +And at last he sat down on a marble bench and very nearly wished that he +were dead. Not quite, of course, because people very seldom do that; and +if he had there would have been an end to this story. + +The silence and the moonlight soothed him; his poor brain felt clearer +and brighter, and at last he had the sense to say, without at all +knowing that he was saying anything sensible, 'I wish I was clever.' + +And instantly he was. + +The change was so great, so sudden, and so violent that it nearly choked +him. He drew two or three difficult breaths, and then he said: + +'Oh, I see! How stupid of me! I wish I were the kind of person the real +Princess could love.' + +And he felt his body change. He grew thinner, and his face seemed to +grow a different shape. He hastened to the lake and leaned over it, and +saw by the moonlight the reflection of his own face in the water. It was +not particularly handsome, but he was not ashamed of the deep-set eyes, +largish nose, and firm lips and chin. + +'So that's the sort of man she could love!' he said, and went home to +bed like a sensible person. + +Early in the morning he went out into the palace garden, and it was not +all gray and white, as it had been the night before, with moonlight and +white lilies, but gold and red, with sunshine and roses, and hollyhocks +and carnations. + +He went and waited under the Princess's window, for he had grown clever +enough to know that the Princess, since she was now a dairymaid, would +be awake betimes. And sure enough the green silk curtains were presently +drawn back, and the drowsy, blowzy, frowzy face of the dairymaid looked +out. + +'Halloa!' she said to Muscadel, among the roses, 'what are _you_ up to?' + +'I am the archer you love,' said Muscadel, among the roses. + +'Not you,' she said. + +'But indeed!' said he. + +[Illustration: '"You've got a face as long as a fiddle."'--Page 367.] + +'Lawks!' said the dairymaid. + +'Don't you love me like this?' said Muscadel. + +'Not a bit,' said she; 'go along, do! You've got a face as long as a +fiddle, and I never could abide black hair.' + +'I'm going to stay like this,' said he. + +'Then what's to become of me?' she asked, and waited for an answer with +her mouth half open. + +'I'll tell you,' said Muscadel. 'You can stay as you are all your life, +and go on loving an archer who isn't anywhere at all, or I'll lend you +the magic jewel, and then you can change back into the Princess. And +when you're the Princess, you'll love me ever so much more than you ever +loved the archer.' + +'Humph!' said the dairymaid, fingering the Princess's pearl necklace. +'Well, if my dear archer really isn't any more, anywhere---- As you say, +the really important thing is to love someone.' Although she was a silly +dairymaid she had the sense to see that. 'Give me the jewel,' she said. + +He threw it up, and she caught it overhand, put it on, and said: + +'I wish I was the Princess again.' + +And there was the Princess leaning out of the window and covering her +face with her hands. + +'Look at me,' said Muscadel; 'am I the sort of person you could love?' + +'I don't know,' said Pandora, peeping at him between her rosy +finger-tips. 'You had better ask papa.' + +'I'd rather ask you,' said Muscadel, as he climbed up the palace ivy and +leaned in at her window-sill to ask her. + +And she leaned out to answer him. + + * * * * * + +They were married the very next day, and everyone in the kingdom, rich +and poor, had roast beef and plum-pudding for dinner. + +And as soon as the wedding was over, Muscadel and his bride went down to +the lake, and he threw the magic jewel far, far out. It gleamed redly as +it flew through the sunlit air and with a tiny splash sank in the lake, +and there it is to this day. You might try to find it one of these days +when you have nothing better to do. I dare say you often feel that you +would like to change from what you are into something else, and, for +anything I know, it might be a very good thing for you, and for the rest +of the world. + +But Pandora and Muscadel were so happy at belonging to each other that +they never wished to change at all, so they did not want the magic ring, +and that is why they threw it away. For, as all good housekeepers know, +it is very foolish to keep useless things about--just to litter the +house up. + + +THE END + +PHOTOGRAPHED AND PRINTED IN GREAT BRITAIN +BY BUTLER AND TANNER LIMITED +FROME AND LONDON + + + + + +End of Project Gutenberg's Oswald Bastable and Others, by Edith Nesbit + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK OSWALD BASTABLE AND OTHERS *** + +***** This file should be named 28804-8.txt or 28804-8.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/2/8/8/0/28804/ + +Produced by Suzanne Shell and the Online Distributed +Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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