The visit to the wood came off the day after. Nurse arrayed all her little charges in large holland overalls, and sent them out into the fields for the afternoon. And the little party set out in good spirits, Bobby and Billy tramping sturdily along, under the firm conviction that they were going to meet with wild beasts, and go through the most harrowing adventures.
It was a long walk, but they reached it at last, and came to a standstill when they saw the ditch and the thick hedge that surrounded it.
'There's a castle and a princess inside, so they don't like people to come in,' asserted Douglas; 'but we'll find a hole somewhere and creep through.'
And this was soon done. The children looked round them with delight at the little winding paths, the banks of green moss, and the thick overhanging bushes and trees, that seemed so full of life and interest. Douglas was in his element.
'We'll find a place we must call home first, and then we'll see what food we've got.'
The foot of an old oak tree was chosen. Bits of cake, pudding, some biscuits, and a few lumps of sugar were then produced from different pockets, and these were given over to Douglas, who, wrapping them in paper, deposited them inside the hollow trunk of the tree.
'Now,' he said, 'we must all divide, and go in search for adventures; and when we've found them, we can come back and tell the others here, and then we'll have a feast.'
'And if we don't find any?' questioned Betty doubtfully.
'Then you must go on till you do. Why, of course a wood is full of dangers. I mean to have anawfultime. We must go two and two; Molly and I will take this path, and the twins can take that one, and you, Betty, must go by yourself, because you're the odd one.'
'I always have to go alone,' murmured Betty; 'it isn't fair.'
Bobby and Billy stood clasping each other's hands, and looking with anxious though determined faces along the path mapped out for them.
'And if we should meet a cwocodile?' Billy asked, lifting his blue eyes to those of his big brother.
'Then you must either kill it or run away,' said Douglas. 'And crocodiles don't live in woods.'
'And if we lose ourselves in the wood?' questioned Bobby.
'If you're frightened, you needn't go, but stay here till we come back,' put in Molly, her conscience a little uneasy with turning such little fellows loose on their own resources.
But this gave the twins courage. Frightened! Not a bit of it! And they trotted off, calling out they were going to kill every one they met.
Betty likewise started on her journey. She was feeling rather depressed with the truth of which she was always being reminded—namely, that she was the odd one.
'I wish there had just been one more of us,' she kept saying to herself; 'I'm either one too many or one too few, and it's very dull to be always alone.'
But her thoughts soon left herself when she saw some rabbits scudding away in the distance; and the flowers on her path, and the strangeness of her surroundings, were quite enough to occupy her mind. She soon found that her path was coming to an end; right across it was some fine wire netting, and for a moment she hesitated, then, deciding to go straight on, clambered over it with great difficulty. The grass was smoother here, and the path a wide one; a little distance farther was an iron seat, and then she came to a long, straight grass walk, with trees on either side, and at the end a gate, in an old stone wall.
'I shall have to get through that gate,' she mused, 'or else I must climb the wall. I wonder what is inside! It might be anything—a castle, with an ogre or giant, or a prince and princess—and I can't go back till I find out. My adventures have come. But I'm very tired. I'll just sit down for a little before I go on.'
A few moments after Betty's little body was lying full length on the grassy path, and she was counting over a cluster of primroses with great care and precision.
'Twenty-one, twenty-two, twenty-three—ah, what a pity! there is a little odd one, just like me!'
'What are you doing, child?'
Betty started to her feet. Looking down upon her was a tall old lady, dressed in a shady straw hat and black lace shawl; her black silk dress rustled as she moved. One hand was resting on a stick, the other was holding a sunshade. Her face was as still and cold-looking as some of the figures on the monuments in the little village church, and her voice stern and peremptory.
Wild thoughts flashed through Betty's brain. Was this a fairy godmother, a queen, a princess? Or might it possibly be the old governess that Mr. Roper loved so much?
Again the question was repeated, in the same stern tone, and Betty gazed up in awe, as she answered simply,—
'I was counting the primroses, to see if they were even or odd.'
'And what business have you to be trespassing in my private grounds?'
'I didn't know this was trespassing,' Betty faltered; 'a wood belongs to anybody in the country, and I haven't got inside your gate yet, though I was going to try.'
'And pray what were you coming inside my gate to do?'
'I'm—I'm looking for adventures; I have to do something before I go back.'
'I think you had better explain to me who you are.'
The voice was gentler, and Betty took courage. The lady listened to her attentively, and seemed interested; she even smiled when Betty, looking up, asked innocently, 'I suppose you are not a princess, are you?'
'No, I'm not a princess,' she said; 'but this is a private wood, and I cannot allow children to run wild all over it.'
'And mustn't we ever come here again?' asked Betty, with a grave face. 'We should be ever so careful, and we won't pick a flower if you'll only let us walk about. We've never seen a wood before, only read about one in our story-books; and children always go through woods in books without being stopped, unless it's an ogre or a giant that stops them.'
The lady did not speak for a minute, then she said,—
'How many are there of you?'
'Five with me; there's Molly and Douglas, and there's Bobby and Billy—I'm the odd one.'
'Why should you be the odd one?'
'Because Molly and Douglas are the eldest ones, and they always go together, and Bobby and Billy are the babies. Mother always calls them the babies, and I come in between, and I belong to no one. You see, in our games it's generally two and two; I always make everything odd, and Molly and Douglas are always having secrets, and that only leaves me the babies to play with, and they're only just four years old—much too small for me.'
'I suppose you have a doll or something to comfort yourself with? I remember I used to when I was a little girl.'
'I don't much like dolls,' said Betty, with a decided shake of her curly head; 'I like something really alive, something that moves by itself. There's a big sheepdog at our farm called Rough. I sometimes get hold of him for a game, but he likes Douglas better than me. Sam says he's always fond of boys.'
'Would you like to come inside my gate?' asked the lady, looking down upon Betty with a strange tenderness in her eyes, though her lips were still grave and stern.
Betty slipped her hand confidingly into hers.
'Yes, please; and will you tell me who you are? I think you're rather like a lady I'm trying to find. She teaches children, a governess she is, and she's old and young together. You're much more like her than Mrs. Giles is.'
But the lady did not satisfy Betty's curiosity; she only said,—
'I have never taught any children in my life,' and led her up the grassy walk to the gate in the wall.
'I am only going to let you stand inside for a moment, and then you must run away. And you must never come over the wire netting in the wood again. You and your brothers and sister can play in the other part of the wood, but I will not have children running over my private walks.'
She opened the gate, and Betty saw a lovely flower garden, with a smooth, grassy lawn, and away in the distance a great white house. The flowers were exquisite, and to Betty's London eyes they were a feast of delight. Her little face flushed with pleasure.
'Do you live here?' she asked. 'How happy you must be!'
'Do you like it better than my wood?'
Betty turned from the blaze of sunshine and brightness to look at the cool green glade behind her. She did not answer for a minute, then she said, pointing with her small finger down the grassy avenue,—
'It's something like church down there, it looks so quiet. But this garden is like heaven, I think.'
The lady smiled. 'I will give you any flower you like to take away, so choose.'
Betty was not long in making her choice. There were some beautiful white lilies close by—lilies that might have come from the same plant as that one lying between the little girl's hands in church.
'I should like one of those, please,' she said, with sparkling eyes.
She was given, not one, but several, and then was dismissed.
'And I shall never see you again,' Betty said, as she put up her mouth for a kiss. She did not say it regretfully, only as if stating a fact.
The lady stooped and kissed her. 'Not unless I send for you,' she said. 'Can you find your way back?'
Betty nodded brightly, and ran off. The lady stood watching her little figure for some minutes, then she gave a deep sigh, and her face relapsed into its usual stern and immovable expression as she entered her garden and locked the gate behind her.
Betty ran on as fast as she could to join the others. When she reached the oak tree, Douglas and Molly were already there, seated on the ground, busily employed in dividing the provisions for the feast. They exclaimed at the sight of her flowers.
'I've had a lovely adventure,' said Betty. 'Where are Bobby and Billy?'
'We don't know,' said Molly, rising to her feet and looking anxious. 'I'm sure they ought to be here by this time.'
'Perhaps they're lost,' Douglas suggested cheerfully; 'I was hoping some of us would get lost, and then we should have the fun of finding them. We'll go in a few minutes and look for them. Would you like to hear where we have been, Betty?'
'Yes.'
'Well, it is rather a stupid wood, for we came to nothing particular; only we've found a little house. It has three sides and a roof—tumbling in. We're going to mend it up, and live there, next time we come out here. At least, I mean to live in it. I shall be a disguised prince hiding for my life, and you will all have to search the wood to get food for me. Molly and I have made it all up. She is to be my daughter, who steals out at night time to visit me; you can be a servant, who mends the roof, and makes me comfortable; and the twins can be soldiers scouring the wood for me.'
Neither Betty nor Molly showed much interest in this plan; they were both thinking of the twins, and Douglas, having said his say, was quite ready to start off on the quest.
Together they ran along the path by which the little boys had gone. It led them under some low brushwood, and then along the banks of a stream. And then calling their names aloud, they were relieved to hear an answering call. A moment later and they came upon them. The stream was broad, and rather deep here, with great boulders of stone appearing above the water. Upon one of these boulders, in the centre of the stream, sat the two little boys, wet to the skin, and looking the pictures of abject despair.
'However did you get there?' said Douglas rather angrily.
'Billy was getting some forget-me-nots, and tumbled in, and so I came over to help him, and we can't get back,' explained Bobby, not very lucidly.
'If you got over there you can get back again,' Molly said decisively.
At this both the twins began to cry.
'It's so cold; we was nearly drownded; and we've seen a shark swim along.'
Douglas laughed, but took off his shoes and stockings.
'I shall have to wade in and bring them over on my back,' he said, with rather a lordly air.
And this he did, landing both the twins safely on the bank.
'Nurse will scold awfully, they're both so wet; we shall have to go home at once,' said prudent Molly, as with very small handkerchiefs she and Betty tried to wipe some of the wet off their clothes.
'And then she'll say we're never to come to the wood again. I wish we hadn't brought them with us!'
It was a quiet little party that returned to Brook Farm; and in the excitement of receiving the vials of nurse's wrath, and the fuss made over the poor little victims, Betty's adventures remained still unheard and unknown.
She was not sorry that this was so, and was quite content to muse in the secrecy of her own heart upon the beautiful cold lady who had given her the lilies. She thought of her sleeping and waking, and with a strange longing wondered if she would ever be allowed to see her again.
The next afternoon was a very warm one; but Betty's restless little feet could not stay in the buttercup meadow close to the house, where the others were playing, and soon a small white figure in a large sun-bonnet could have been seen plodding along the dusty road towards the churchyard in the distance.
Her little determined face relaxed into wonderful softness when she entered the cool church. Going on tip-toe up the aisle, she came to the monument of little Violet Russell, and here she paused, then clambering up with a little difficulty, she laid two fresh lilies by the side of the sculptured one, across the clasped hands of the child's figure.
'There,' she said in a hushed voice; 'you shan't always hold a cold dead lily, Violet dear; I've brought them to you from my own self, because they're mine, and I'll get you some other flowers when they are dead.'
She put her soft red lips down and left a kiss on the little clasped hands, and then slipped down to the ground again, where she stood for a moment looking up at the stained window above. A noise startled her: walking up the middle aisle was the lady who had played to her before, and following her a rough country boy, who disappeared through a little door behind the organ.
Betty slipped behind a pillar, and watched eagerly. Yes, she was going to play again; and her heart beat high with expectation. She crept into one of the high, old-fashioned pews, and sitting on a hassock, leant her little head back upon the seat, and prepared herself to listen.
The music began, and sent a little shiver of delight through Betty's soul. The long, soft notes that died away like a summer breeze, the deep, grand rolls that seemed to come from a cavern below, and then blend with the clear, sweet echoes rising and falling, and at length ascending in a burst of praise and gladness—it seemed to her that the angels above would be stooping to listen to such strains.
And then, after a little, the lady began to sing; and Betty drew in one deep breath after another. It must be an angel, surely! and yet there was something in the fresh holland dress and shady hat of the singer this afternoon that seemed hardly suitable for an angel's apparel.
The lady once looked round; and Betty thought her face looked sad; but when she began to sing her face was illumined with such light and gladness that the child watched it entranced.
An hour passed, and then the singer was startled by the sound of a sob. She was singing 'Oh, that I had wings like a dove!' and turning round, was startled at the sight of a white sun-bonnet and two small hands grasping the back of one of the pews. Betty had mounted on the hassock to have a full view of the singer long ago, and was now trying in vain to restrain the pent-up feelings of her sensitive little soul.
In an instant the lady had left her seat and come up to the child.
'What is the matter, little one? How did you find your way in here?' she asked gently, as she put her arm round the sobbing child.
But Betty could not put her feelings into words; she only shook her head and sobbed, 'I like the music; don't stop singing.'
'I must stop now: my hour is up. Tell me who you are.'
Betty made an effort to recover her self-possession.
'I'm only Betty,' she said, dabbing her face with her handkerchief; 'are you an angel?'
'Indeed I am not; do I look like one?'
And the lady threw back her head and laughed in a very amused way.
'Not now,' said Betty soberly; 'but you did look like one when you were singing, and I—I hoped you might be.'
'Why did you hope so?'
Again Betty was silent; then, looking up, she seemed to gather courage from the kind face looking down upon her, and burying her face in the lady's dress, she sobbed out,—
'I thought God might have sent you; and then you could have told me lots of things I wanted to know.'
'Perhaps God may have sent me instead of an angel. Tell me some of the things you want to know.'
'I want to know about Violet, and heaven, and tribulation,' murmured Betty a little incoherently; and then she started as the church clock in the belfry began to chime five.
'It's tea-time; nurse will be looking for me.'
The lady stooped and kissed her. 'I must go too,' she said; 'will you come and see me to-morrow afternoon? I shall be here at the same time, and then we can have a little talk.'
'What is your name?' asked Betty.
'Nesta,' the young lady answered, a little briefly.
'And do you teach children?' was the next question, breathlessly put.
'Sometimes; on Sundays I do.'
Betty's face lighted up, but she said no more, and trotted out of the church and along the road as hard as ever she could.
The children were all at breakfast the next morning in the old-fashioned kitchen. Nurse and her brother were having an animated talk over some reminiscences of the past, when there was a knock at the back door, and Mrs. Giles went out. Coming back, she appeared with a small hamper under her arm, which she placed on the floor.
''Tis the queerest thing I know of,' she said; 'look at the label now, Jack; whoever is it for?'
Every one crowded round at once.
'For the little odd one at Brook Farm.'
''Tis for one of the children,' said Jack, rubbing his head; 'they be the only little 'uns that I know of.'
'It's for Betty!' shouted Douglas and Molly excitedly; 'she's the odd one! Open it quick, Betty; perhaps it's a big cake.'
'It's alive!' exclaimed nurse, as on her knees she tried to undo the fastenings. 'Come along, Miss Betty, you shall open it for yourself.'
Betty came near, and with trembling fingers cut the string.
A minute after, and out of the hamper jumped a beautiful little black and white spaniel.
There were screams of delight from all the children, and great surmises as to who could have sent it. Betty guessed, but said nothing when she found a piece of paper tied to a brass collar round his neck, with these words: 'From a friend, hoping he may prove a true companion.'
She clasped her arms round the dog's neck in ecstasy. 'He is my very, very own,' she said, looking up at nurse with shining eyes; 'and I'll have him for ever and ever.'
The little creature sniffed at her face, and then put out his tongue, and gave her a lick of satisfaction and approval. From that time the two were all in all to each other.
There was a great deal of discussion about him that morning, and Betty had to tell of the strange, stern lady who had spoken to her in the wood.
'I'm sure she sent him,' Betty kept repeating; 'I'm sure she did.'
'It was awfully mean to keep your adventure so secret, said Douglas, looking at the dog very wistfully; 'she must be a fairy godmother living in the wood. I wish she would send me something.'
'Perhaps she is a wicked fairy or witch,' suggested Molly, 'who has turned a prince into a little dog, and we must find a kind of spell to bring him back to a prince again.'
'That's what I'll call him,' said Betty, looking up; 'I'll call him Prince.'
Nurse at first demurred at having such an addition to her family, but Mrs. Giles comforted her with the assurance—'There, let the little miss enjoy him; she'll soon get tired of him—children always do—and when you go back to London you can leave him behind with us. He's a good breed, that we can see; and Jack will be able to sell him if we don't care about keeping him.'
It was fortunate Betty did not hear this suggestion. Prince was rapidly filling a void in her little heart of which only she perhaps had been dimly conscious. She was a child with strong affections and intense feelings, and a yearning to have some one to love, and to be loved in return. None of the little Stuarts were demonstrative, and few guessed how deeply and passionately the bright and mischievous Betty longed for the sympathy and love that was so rarely shown towards her.
So engrossing was the possession of Prince that the day went by, and tea-time came, before Betty thought of her new friend in the church.
But when tea was over she took Molly into her confidence. 'Molly, do you think I might take Prince for a walk? would he follow me?'
'Where are you going?'
'I'm going to see a lady that I think is the governess Mr. Roper told me about; Nesta, her name is, only I think he called her Mother Nesta. I told you about it one night, don't you remember? she's really very old, but she looks very young, and this one must be her.'
'Where did you find her?'
'In a church.'
'Oh!' and Molly's tone was indifferent; 'I don't like people in church. Nurse says she is going to take us to church to-morrow. I hoped she would forget; last Sunday it was too far, she said. And Douglas and I were going to have a beautiful church in the orchard. There's an apple tree just like a pulpit.'
'Molly,' called out Douglas, 'Sam is going down to the river to fish; he says he'll show us where we can fish too; do come on!'
Away ran Molly. The twins were playing in the garden porch, and nurse chatting in the kitchen with her sister-in-law. Betty called Prince, who had been busy with a saucer of scraps, and putting on her straw hat set off along the road to church. Prince was certainly a great charge; he was a dog of an inquiring mind, and his continual rushes into the hedge sides, and long searches after young frogs in the grass, considerably delayed his young mistress's progress.
But at length the church was reached; the evening shadows threw long, weird shapes across the darkened path that led to the porch, the rooks were noisier than usual, and Betty looked anxiously down at Prince.
'You won't bark, dear, will you?' she said stooping and lifting him into her arms; 'because church is a very quiet place, and music is the only noise allowed. I'll take you in to see the prettiest little girl you've ever seen, and she's lying so still. I've brought her some forget-me-nots.'
Prince struggled a little at first, but Betty soothed him and then crept inside.
'I'm afraid I've come too late,' she murmured, as she looked round the silent church and saw no signs of the lady; 'but I'll come another day soon and see her.'
Softly she made her way round to the stained-glass window she loved, but started in astonishment when she saw leaning against the monument a tall, strange gentleman.
He did not see Betty; his brows were knitted and his lips twitching strangely under his heavy dark moustache; with folded arms he stood leaning against the pillar, and looking down upon the fair figure of the recumbent child in front of him. Then he stooped, and taking up one of the fading lilies across the child's hands looked at it wonderingly.
'The picture more lasting than the thing itself,' he muttered; 'it is all that is left us; the fragile productions of nature cannot exist long in this hard, rough world, and yet how I tried to shield her from every blast!'
A slight whine from Prince startled him, and looking round he pulled himself together sternly.
'What are you doing here, little girl?'
Almost the same words that had been said to her in the wood the other day; and Betty began to wonder if she were again on forbidden ground.
'Does the church belong to you?' she asked, standing her ground, and looking up through her long dark lashes rather shyly; 'am I where I oughtn't to be? I came to see that little girl.'
He looked at her.
'What do you know about her?'
'I don't know anything, but I want to know. I love her, and I've brought her some more flowers.'
'Did you put these lilies here?'
'Yes; they're quite dead now, aren't they?'
'Of course they are; this is the place of death.'
Betty did not understand the bitter tone; but she said simply, pointing to the child's figure, 'She isn't really dead, is she? She has gone to sleep. I was thinking, when I was here before, if Jesus would only just walk out of that window and touch her hands with His, she would open her eyes and get up. I should like to see her, wouldn't you? I watched her the other day till I almost thought I saw her move. But she will wake up one day, won't she?'
There was no answer.
Betty slipped her little hand in his. 'Would you give her these forget-me-nots, or lift me up so that I can do it?' She had dropped Prince, who was sniffing suspiciously round the gentleman's heels, and waited anxiously for his reply. He took her in his arms, and held her there whilst she placed the flowers in the position she wished; and then, before she was lifted down, she said softly, 'I think she is really singing up in heaven. I like to believe she is there, but I'm not quite sure. Do you know if she came out of tribulation?'
'Why should she?'
'Because it says, about those in white robes with crowns, "These are they which came out of great tribulation, and have washed their robes, and made them white in the blood of the Lamb." It makes me feel very unhappy sometimes, because I haven't been through tribulation yet, and I shan't be ready to die till I have.'
She was set quickly down upon her feet, and without a word the gentleman left her, striding down the aisle and shutting the church door with a slam that echoed and re-echoed through the silent church.
Betty was startled at his sudden departure; she took up her dog in her arms again, and stood gazing silently up at the window above, through which the setting sun was sending coloured rays in all directions. Then with a little sigh she turned and left the church. Outside the porch was a grey-headed old man, the sexton, who was taking his evening walk amongst the graves.
'Hulloo!' he said, 'be you the one that banged this 'ere door just now? 'Twas enough to scare the owls and bats and all the other beasties from their holes for evermore.'
'No, it wasn't me; it was a gentleman.'
'Ah, was it now? Shouldn't be surprised if I knew who it was! 'Twas Mr. Russell, surely! There's no other gent that favours this 'ere building like him.'
'Is he Violet Russell's father?' questioned Betty eagerly.
The old man nodded. 'Yes, he be that little maid's parent, and he'll never get over her loss. She were the apple of his eye, and when she were took, he were like a man demented. Ah, 'tis the young as well as the old I have to dig for!'
'Does that gentleman live here?' asked Betty.
'Ay, surely, for he be the owner of the whole property hereabout. But 'tis not money will give comfort; he have had a deal o' trouble. I mind when his father turned him out o' doors for his painting and sich-like persoots. And he went to Italy, and there he taught hisself to be a hartist, and painted and carved a lot o' stone figures, and folks say he made a name for hisself in Lunnon. He were taken back by his father after a bit, and came a-coorting Miss Violet Granger, that lived over at Deemster Hall. But his brother, Mr. Rudolph, cut him out, when he went off to Germany for a spell, and he and Miss Violet runned away together, and when he come back he found his bride stolen. He were terrible cut up, and off he goes to foreign parts again, and never a sight of he did us get till the old squire were dead, and Mr. Rudolph had killed hisself out hunting. Then Mr. Frank comes home agen with a bran-new wife, and we thought as how his life were a mending, and things were looking up. He seemed brighter, too; but lack-a-day, 'twere not ten months afore I had to dig a grave for her, and she left him a two-day-old babe to bring up—and little Miss Violet were the joy of his heart—she were a purty, bright little maid, and were out on her little pony every day wi' her father. She just doated on him, and he were as lovin' as a woman wi' her. Then there come the day when the little maid got a ugly fall from her pony, and all the Lunnon doctors were sent for, but could do no good, and she were in bed a wasting away for nigh a twelve-month, and then she died. 'Twere a mercy, for she'd have been a hunchbacked cripple had she lived; and Mary Foster, what were her maid, said as 'ow she suffered terrible at times. The Lord were marciful in takin' of her. But 'tis not to be wondered at Mr. Frank takin' it sorely. And then he shut hisself up in his painting room, and never comed out of it till he had cut the little maid's figure out in stone, like as you see it in the church. Many's the visitor that I've a taken in to see it; and the ladies, they comes away sheddin' tears at the little dear. He put up the coloured window too, and comes to church reg'lar; but he's hard and cold, like the stones he cut, and 'tis his troubles have spoilt him. I mind he were a bright-faced, bonny lad once, that I used to show birds' nests to in the hedges; but now he passes me wi'out a civil word or look. Ay, it's trouble and toil and tribbylation that is man's lot here below!'
Betty listened to this long harangue breathlessly. Much of it she could not follow, but the old man's closing sentence made her look at him eagerly.
'Do you know about tribulation?' she asked.
'Me know of it! Ay, surely, when I've buried six sons and daughters, and last of all my woife, and dug all their graves mysel', save two, which were Jack in Mericky, which died of yellow fever, and only a packet of letters sent back to us belonging to him, and in them there were a bit o' his mother's grey hair which he had cut off that playful afore he went away; and then there were Rob, that were killed down a coal mine, and we could never get at his body, and he left a widder and three childer, and she were married to one o' his chums afore a twelvemonth past—the unfeeling hussy; but I've washed my hands of the lot. Ay, I've been through troubles and tribbylation, which is our lot in this world, but I've had a many more than most folks.'
'Then you must be quite ready to die?' said Betty, looking at him thoughtfully.
The old man looked at her; then rubbed his head in a puzzled way.
'I'm no so sure about that, little lassie; I've seen scores brought into this churchyard and placed in my graves, but there are toimes when I think o' seeing mysel' let down into a strange grave, and one not cut half so foine as mine, for I'm up to my trade, and none could do it better, and I'm thinkin' if that day will wait till I'm ready for it; well—'twill be a good way off yet!'
Betty knitted her brows in perplexity.
'If you've been through tribulation, you must be very nearly ready for heaven—the Bible says so.'
'Ay, do it? Let's hear, missy; for sure I've had my lot o' woe, and the Lord do be marciful!'
For a second time that afternoon Betty repeated the text that was so occupying her mind and thoughts. The old man listened attentively.
'You see,' said Betty, leaning against an old yew tree and hugging Prince close to her, 'it's the first part that's so difficult to me, but it must be quite easy for you. The end of it fits us all, but the tribulation doesn't fit me.'
'And what be the end of it?' asked the sexton.
'It says, they washed their robes and made them white in the blood of the Lamb.'
'Ay,' said the old man, after a minute's silence, 'and 'tis the end of it don't fit me.'
The child looked up, astonishment coming into her blue eyes.
'But that's very easy,' she said, 'that is coming to Jesus and asking Him to wash our sins away in His blood. I thought everybody did that. I do it every night, because I'm an awful wicked girl. I'm always forgetting to be good.'
Again there was silence; the old man looked away over the hills in the distance. It was just the quietest time in the evening; the birds were already in their nests for the night,—even the rooks had subsided; and the stillness and peace around drew his heart and mind upwards. Betty thought he was looking at the sunset, which was shedding its last golden rays over the misty blue outlines of the hills across the horizon. Presently he drew the cuff of his sleeve across his eyes. 'And who be they that the Book says that of?' he asked.
'Why, it's the people in heaven—every one who dies, I s'pose. I like to think of them there, but I do want dreadfully to join them one day; and I'm afraid sometimes I shall be left out.'
Tears were filling the earnest little eyes, and the curly head bent over Prince to hide them.
'I mind,' said the sexton slowly, 'that my missus, before she died, told me to pray, "Wash me, and I shall be whiter than snow." I expect she knew all about the washing, but I've never done much harm to any one, and I've attended church reg'lar.'
'I wish I was as good as you.' And Betty looked up with emphatic utterance. 'I'm always doing some one harm, and nurse will scold me when I get in for being out so late—I know she will. Good-bye, old man.'
She put Prince down on the ground, and trotted off, and the old sexton looked after her with a shake of his head.
'She be a queer little lass! Ay, I would be glad to have her chance of getting to the Kingdom. But I'll have a look at the old Book, and see what it says about this 'ere washing.'
The next morning being Sunday, the three elder children were taken to church by nurse. It was a small village congregation; and Betty looked round in vain for her friend Nesta. She saw Mr. Russell standing grim and solitary in his large, old-fashioned pew; and she had a nod from the sexton at the church door. The clergyman's wife and grown-up daughter and a few grandly dressed farmers' wives were the only others who occupied seats of their own. The organ was played by the schoolmaster, and after Nesta's playing it did not seem the same instrument. Betty was quieter than her brother and sister; she could see her stained window and little Violet's figure from where she sat; she could even catch sight of her forget-me-nots—now looking withered and dead; and her thoughts kept her restless little body still. Molly and Douglas did not like church; their fair heads were close together, and occasionally a faint sniggle would cause nurse to look round with stern reproval. But at last the long service was over, and they came out into the fresh, sweet air of a June morning.
Nurse had several friends to talk to in the churchyard, and Molly and Betty walked on soberly in front of her, feeling subdued and a little uncomfortable in their stiff white frocks and best Leghorn hats and feathers.
'Where is Douglas?' whispered Betty.
'Hush! don't let nurse know; he saw a pair of legs through a little hole at the back of the organ, and he's gone to see if it is a robber hiding.'
'Will he fight him if it is?' said Betty, with an awe-struck look; then an expression of relief crossing her face, she said, 'I know; it's a boy that goes in at the back whenever a person plays. I don't know what he does, but I've seen him there before.'
'When did you see him?' asked Molly eagerly.
Betty's private adventures never remained secret for long, and she poured forth a long account of her various visits to the church. Molly was much impressed, but Douglas's return soon turned her thoughts into another channel. He looked flushed and dishevelled, and his white sailor suit was soiled and dusty; but nurse was too busy talking to notice his appearance, and he joined the others with some importance in his tone.
'I've made a discovery,' he said; 'how do you think a church organ is played?'
'Like a piano,' said Molly promptly.
'It isn't, then; you turn a handle like the organs in the street, and a man or boy does all the work behind.'
The little girls looked sceptical, and Betty said, 'I'm sure you don't, then, for we can see the person playing.'
'Well, they're only pretending; I've seen the handle myself, and the boy told me if he didn't pull it up and down the organ wouldn't play. It must be like a kind of duet, perhaps. I expect he makes all the big booming notes, and the squeaky notes are made by the person in front. I've promised him sixpence out of my new half-crown, if he'll let me play instead of him one day; and he says he will.'
'Nurse won't let you play it on Sundays,' said Molly; 'besides, you won't be able to do it properly, and if you made a mistake it would be awful.'
'I shall play it on a week-day, and I'll make the old organ sound, you see if I don't!'
Directly the children reached home, Betty flew to her dog, who had been shut up in the garret whilst they had been at church. Prince was already getting to know his little mistress, and welcomed her back with short happy barks and a great many licks. And Betty poured out all her heart's love for him in the shape of caresses and pats and kisses, whispering in his silken ears many a secret, and hugging him to her breast with a passionate vehemence which astonished and amused those who saw her.
'He is my own, my very own,' she kept repeating; 'and I shall never feel odd no more!'
She did not. It was a new and delightful sensation to be one of a couple. 'Molly and Douglas, Bobby and Billy, and Prince and I,' she would say. No longer was she to trot off alone in some of their games,—Prince was always ready to go with her; if Molly and Douglas were deep in some conspiracy, so could she and Prince be; and the pent-up feelings and thoughts of rather a lonely little heart were poured out to one who listened and sympathised with his soft brown eyes and curly tail, but who never betrayed the confidence reposed in him.
At no time in her life had Betty been so happy as she was now; her little pensive face sparkled with gladness when Prince gambolled by her side; and nurse asserted that the dog kept her out of mischief, and was a very successful addition to their party. It was some days before she visited the church again; but when she did, the organ was sounding, and she found her friend already playing. Rolling Prince up in her large holland overall, until only his little black nose peeped out, Betty crept up close to the player, and stood unnoticed for some minutes. Then Nesta Fairfax turned round and gave the child a pleased smile.
'My little friend again!' she said; 'I have been wondering what has become of you. Have you come for a talk?'
'No, only to listen to the music,' said Betty.
'Then I will go on playing.'
She turned back to the organ, and for some time Betty listened in silence, sitting on a hassock and rocking Prince backwards and forwards, till warm and exhausted with his ineffectual struggles to free himself, he fell asleep in her arms.
At last, when there was a pause in the music, Betty said earnestly,—
'Will you sing again what you did when I thought you were an angel?'
'What was it, I wonder?'
'It was about—"these are they which came out of great tribulation!"'
'Oh yes, I remember.'
And the sweet clear voice rang out through the silent church, and the organ rose and fell to the beautiful words, till Betty could hardly bear it.
'Is it over?' she asked, as the last note died away.
Nesta Fairfax turned her glowing face upon the child.
'You love it as much as I do, you little mite!' she said; 'but you mustn't cry. Do you know where those words come from?'
She put her arms round her, and drew her to rest against her as she spoke,—
'Yes,' said Betty with a nod; 'I know all about them; I've read it sixty hundred times, I think, and I know that verse by heart. I want to ask you about it.'
Nesta waited, and with a little effort Betty said,—
'I want dreadfully to be one of them one day, and I'm afraid I never shall. I was talking to the old man who digs graves, the other day; the first part of the verse doesn't fit me, and the last doesn't fit him—at least he said so. I wonder if both parts fit you.'
Nesta gazed at Betty in a puzzled kind of way; then looked away, for her eyes were filling with tears.
'Perhaps it may,' she said softly; 'I should like to think it did.'
'And can you tell me how I can go through tribulation? I want to get it over, so that I can be quite ready for heaven.'
'My dear child, if God means you to have it, He will send it in His own good time. Never wish for troubles; they will come fast enough as you grow older.'
'That's what nurse says; she tells us when we get to her age we shall know what distress and trouble is. But s'posing if I don't live to grow up? Violet didn't, and I'm so afraid I may not get inside heaven. I may be left out of those in the text, because I haven't been through tribulation. I don't want to be left out; I want to be in the very middle of them all! I want to stand singing, and have a crown and a palm, and I want to hear some one ask who I am; and then I want to hear the answer, "She came out of tribulation!" Oh! do tell me how I can go into it! Mr. Roper said you would teach me a lot of things.'
Betty's voice was eloquent in her beseeching tone, and Nesta was silent for a moment; then she said,—
'Trouble doesn't take us to heaven; tribulation, even martyrdom, does not. Don't you know what does? What did Jesus Christ come into the world for? What did He die for? Will you sing a little hymn with me? I expect you know it.'
Betty looked delighted.
'And will you play the organ?'
'Yes.'
Then Nesta began to sing; and Betty's sweet little voice chimed in; for well she knew the words,—
'There is a green hill far away,Beyond the city wall,Where our dear Lord was crucified,Who died to save us all.
We may not know, we cannot tellWhat pains He had to bear;But we believe it was for usHe hung and suffered there.
He died that we may be forgiven,He died to make us good,That we might go at last to heaven,Saved by His precious blood.
There was no other good enoughTo pay the price of sin;He only could unlock the gateOf heaven and let us in.
Oh, dearly, dearly has He loved,And we must love Him too,And trust in His redeeming blood,And try His works to do.'