As if to favor Giovanni's plot, it chanced, that, in the morning of the next day, Mrs. Ginniss received a sudden summons to the bedside of Ann Dolan, the friend whose advice had led to Teddy's being placed in his present situation.
The messenger had reported that Ann was "very bad wid her heart, an' the life was knocked out intirely, sure:" and Mrs. Ginniss felt herself bound to hasten to the help of her friend, should she still be alive; or to see that she was "waked dacent" if dead. Just as she was wondering if it was best to take Cherry with her, or to leave her locked up alone until her return, Giovanni appeared at the door, his face disposed in its most winning smile, and his manner as respectful as if he had been addressing the marchsa who had been his own and his daughter's patron.
"Will my good neighbor allow that the little girl go for a walk with me this fine morning?" asked he. "I would like to show her the flowers and the swans in the gardens of the city."
"An' will you take the monkey an' the grind-orgin the day?" askedMrs. Ginniss doubtfully.
"Indeed, no! I go to a walk to enjoy the fine time, and to see the flowers and the swans," explained Giovanni in his best English, and with a proportion of bows and smiles; while Cherry stood by, her little face full of surprise and mystery, not unmingled with a little shame as she felt that her good mammy was being deceived and misled by the wily Italian.
"Faith, thin, Mr. Jovarny, it's very perlite ye are iver an' always; but I don't jist feel aisy wid the child out uv my sight. Mabbe she'd better wait till night, when Teddy can take her out."
"Oh, let me go, mammy! I want to go with 'Varny, and I'll bring you"—
"Yes; we'll get the pretty flowers to bring to mammy, she would say," interrupted the Italian hastily; and Mrs. Ginniss, looking down at the little anxious face and pleading eyes, found her better judgment suddenly converted into a desire to please her little darling at any rate, and to see her smile again in her own sunny fashion.
"Sure, an' ye shall go, 'vourneen, if it's that bad ye're wantin' it," said she, stooping to take the child in her arms; and, as Cherry kissed her again and again, she added,—
"An' it's well ye don't ask the heart out uv me body; for it's inter yer hand I'd have to give it, colleen bawn."
Giovanni looked on, his half-shut, black eyes glittering, and a wily smile wrinkling his sallow cheek.
"Every one has his day," muttered he in Italian, "Your's to-day, good woman; mine to-morrow."
Half an hour later, Cherry, dressed as neatly as her foster-mother's humble means and taste would allow, and her face glowing with pleasure and excitement, skipped out of the door of the tenement-house, looking like the fairy princess in a pantomime as she suddenly emerges from the hovel where she has been hidden.
Giovanni followed, carrying a bundle, and his violin wrapped in papers. These, he explained to Mrs. Ginniss, were only some matters he had to leave with a friend as he went along; but he should not go into any house, or take the little girl anywhere but for the walk he had mentioned.
"Faix, an' it's mighty ginteel ye are, anyway, Misther Jovarny," said the Irishwoman, watching the pair from the window of her attic as they walked slowly up the street. "But I'm afther wishin' I'd said no whin I said yis. Nor yet I couldn't tell why, more than that Teddy'll be mad to hear she's been wid him. But the b'y hasn't sinse whin it's about the little sisther he's talkin'. He thinks the ground isn't good enough for her to walk on, nor goold bright enough for her to wear."
So saying, Mrs. Ginniss closed the window, and, throwing a little shawl over her head, locked the door, leaving the key underneath, and hurried away to her sick friend, with whom she staid till nearly night.
Giovanni and Cherry, meantime, walked gayly on, chatting, now of the wonderful things about them, now of the yet more wonderful scenes they were to visit. At a confectioner's shop, in a shady by-street, they stopped to rest for a while; and the Italian provided his little guest with ice-creams, cakes, and candies, to her heart's content.
"I like these better than potatoes and pork-meat. I used to eat these in heaven," said the little girl, pausing to look at a macaroon, and then finishing it with a relish.
The Italian laughed.
"Canary-birds do not feed with crows," said he. "When we are rich, picciola, you shall never eat worse than this."
"Shall we be rich soon, 'Varny?" asked the child eagerly.
"Upon the moment almost, if you will dance and laugh, and look so pretty as you can, always."
"But we needn't stop to be very rich before we go and carry some of the nice things to mammy," rejoined Cherry anxiously.
"No, no, indeed! We will but make a little turn in the country, and come back princes. But mind you this, picciola: I am to be your father now, or all the same; and I shall tell every one that you are my own little girl: so you must never say, 'Not so.'"
"But mammy said my father was dead, and Teddy said so too. He wasMichael darlint."
"I doubt not that Signor Michaelli died, and has gone to glory; but I strangely doubt if he were thy father, picciola," said the Italian with a grave smile. "However that may be, forget that you have ever had other father than me, and call me so always: 'Mio padre,' you must say, and no more 'Varny. Also, too, you must speak in Italian, as I shall to you; and never, as you do now, in English."
"But mammy and Teddy don't know Italian," said Cherry, beginning to look a little troubled.
"'In Rome, do as the Romans do.' When you are again with the woman and boy, speak as they speak: with me, speak as I speak."
Giovanni said this more decidedly than he had ever spoken before, and Cherry looked quickly up at him.
"Is that the way you talk because you want to make believe you are my father?" asked she.
A sudden smile shot across the Italian's face, lighting its dark features like a gleam of sunshine sweeping across a pine-clad mountain-land.
"Shame were it to me, dear little heart, if to be thy father were to make thee less happy than thou hast been with those others," said he softly in Italian, and using the form of address, which, in almost every language but the English, marks a different and more tender relation from that indicated by the more formal plural pronoun.
"You will be happy with me if we do not soon revisit these people we leave behind?" asked he.
The child's eyes grew large and deep as she fixed them upon his face, and presently asked,—
"Are you going with me to try to find heaven again?"
"Perhaps: who knows, picciola? The heaven you miss may come to you more easily if you go to seek it. At any rate, I will carry thee no farther from it. But come: we must get to our journey."
Leaving the confectioner's shop, Giovanni lingered no longer in the gay streets, or even upon the fresh green grass of the Common, where Cherry would have staid to play all day. Hurrying across it, and through some crowded streets, the Italian entered a large station-house, where stood the train of cars, already half filled with passengers; while the engine, puffing and panting with impatience, seemed unwilling to wait a moment longer.
Leaving Cherry in the ladies' room, the Italian bought his tickets, and reclaimed from the baggage-room, where he had left it, his organ, with Pantalon chained to the top of it. Then, calling the child, he hurried with her into the cars, and selected a seat behind the door, in the evident wish of being seen as little as possible.
"Now, then, Ciriegia mia, we go to seek our fortune," said he, as the train left the station, and began to rush through the suburbs of the city, scattering little dirty children, vagrant dogs, leisurely pigs, and dawdling carriages driven by honest old ladies, from its track.
Cherry never had ridden in the cars before; and she clung tight to the sleeve of her companion, afraid to move, or even to speak, until he laughingly asked,—
"It does not fear, the poor little one, does it?"
"No, I guess not, 'Varny," replied the child doubtfully; but theItalian sharply said,—
"What is this 'Varny you say? I am mio padre."
"I forgot. Won't I tumble out of this carriage, my father, it goes so quick?"
"Fear nothing, figlia mia. You are safe with me and with Pantalon," said the Italian, drawing the little girl close to his side; while the monkey, crouching upon the organ at their feet, chattered his own promises of protection and comfort.
With 'Toinette, to live was to love and trust; and, clinging close to her new guardian's side, she laid her little shining head upon his breast, clinging with one hand to the lappet of his coat; and, laughing down at Pantalon, she fell presently asleep.
At night the Italian left the train, and took lodgings at a hotel near the centre of a large town. His little charge-tired, hungry, and sleepy-was very glad to have supper, and to be allowed to go to bed, where she slept soundly until summoned the next morning by Giovanni, who brought her some breakfast with his own hands, and, placing it upon the table, laid a bundle of clothes beside it.
"Rise and eat, carissima," said be gayly; "and then make thyself as beautiful as the morning with these fine clothes. See, here are roses from the garden for a wreath! They are better than the others. When thou art ready, come out to me."
He left the room; and 'Toinette, rising, made a hasty breakfast; and then, putting on the brocade-silk dress, and placing upon her head the wreath Giovanni had twisted of natural flowers for her, she peeped into the glass, and laughed aloud at the fanciful and beautiful image that met her eyes.
"I am glad I look so pretty," murmured she, with an innocent delight at her own beauty, that was not vanity, although, it might, if untrained, lead to it.
"Come, Ciriegia, are you never ready?" called Giovanni from the other side of the door; and Cherry, running to open it, exclaimed in Italian,—
"Oh, see, my father! am I not beautiful?"
"Truly so; but you should not say it, bamb¡na. The charm of a maiden is her modesty," said the Italian gravely.
"But, if it is true, why mustn't I say so?" asked Cherry positively.
"Many things that we know are never to be said, Ciriega. But come, now: you are to dance first for these people, and they will make no charge for our beds and the miserable provender they have given us."
As he spoke, Giovanni led the way to the lower hall of the hotel, where a number of men were lounging, smoking, or talking; while through the open doors of the parlor and office were to be seen some ladies and gentlemen, idling away the hour after breakfast, before proceeding to their business, their journey, or their amusement.
Placing himself in the centre of the hall, Giovanni, with a bow to the company, played a little prelude, and then struck into the lively strains of the cachuca.
Cherry, who had stood looking at him, her head slightly bent, her lips apart, eyes and ears alert to catch the signal to begin, pointed her little foot at the precise moment, and, holding her dress in the tips of her slender fingers, slid into the movement with a grace and accuracy never to be attained except by vigorous practice, or a temperament as sensitive to time and tune, limbs as supple, and impulses as graceful, as were those of this gifted and unfortunate child.
"See there!-the poor little thing!" exclaimed one of the ladies, who came to the door of the drawing-room to see the performance.
"How can you say poor little thing?" asked another. "Don't you see how she enjoys it herself? That smile is not the artificial grimace of a ballet-dancer; and no eyes ever sparkled so joyously to order."
"Perhaps she does enjoy it; but all the more 'Poor little thing!' say I," rejoined the first speaker, adding thoughtfully, "What sort of training for a woman is that?"
"Oh, well! but it is very pretty to see her; and she would probably be running in the streets, or doing worse, if she did not dance; and so little as she is! It is equal to the theatre."
The speaker drew out her purse as she spoke, and carelessly threw a dollar-bill towards the child, who had finished her dance, and stood looking round with an innocent smile, as if asking for applause rather than reward.
"Go and take it, carissima; and then hold your hand to the others; each will give you something," said Giovanni in a low voice.
"How much we shall have to carry to mammy!" exclaimed the child eagerly; and, as she gathered in her harvest, she chattered away, always in Italian,—
"And more, and more, and more! O my father! how many cents they give me! What nice people they are! Let me dance some more for them; and let Pantalon come down, and let them see him."
" No, no, child! These are not of those who would care for Pantalon. While you rest by and by, I shall take him and the organ, and go about the streets; but your little feet are worth many Pantalons to me. Come, we will give them the tarantella as they have done so well."
Skipping to his side, with a childish grace more attractive than the studied movements of the most accomplished actress, Cherry stuffed the proceeds of her first attempt into the pocket of her guardian, and then, throwing herself into position, went through the wild and grotesque movements of the tarantella, with a life and freshness that drew from the spectators a burst of applause and surprise.
"That will do. We must not give them too much at once, lest the wonder come to an end. Make the pretty kiss of the hand, figlia mia, and run up the stairs to your own little room."
Cherry obeyed, calling back, as she disappeared, "Tell them I will dance some more for them by and by if they want me to."
IN the course of that day, Giovanni and his little danseuse visited all the principal public places in the town, and also several of the best private houses; and, at all, the performances of the child called forth the surprise, delight, and admiration of those who witnessed them. Nor were more substantial proofs of their approval wanting; so that at night, when Giovanni counted up his gains, he found them so large, that he cried, while embracing poor weary little Cherry,—
"O blessed, blessed moment when thou didst cross my path, Ciriegia carissima!"
"Now can't we go home to mammy? I am so tired, and my head feels sick!" moaned the child, laying the poor aching little head upon his shoulder.
Giovanni looked down at the pale face, and, meeting the languid eyes, felt a pang of conscience and pity.
"Thou art tired, bamb¡na povera mia," said he kindly. "Another day, we will be more careful. Lie down now, and sleep for a while. We go again in the steam-carriage to-night."
Cherry climbed upon the bed without reply, and in a moment was fast asleep. The Italian drew the coverings about her, and stooped to kiss the pale cheek, where showed already a dark circle beneath the eye, and a painful contraction at the corner of the mouth.
"Poveracita!" murmured he. "But soon we will have money enough to go home to the father-land, and then all will be well with her as with me."
Three hours later, he came to arouse the child, and prepare her to renew the journey.
"Oh, I am so tired! I want to sleep some more so bad, 'Varny!-no, my father, I mean. I don't want to go somewhere," said she piteously, closing her eyes, and struggling to lay her head again upon the pillow. Giovanni hesitated for a moment; and then, never knowing that the decision was one of life and death, the question of a whole future career, he determined to pursue his plan in spite of that plaintive entreaty, and, hastily wrapping a shawl about the child, took her in his arms, and carried her down stairs. The organ and Pantalon waited in the hall below; and Giovanni, setting Cherry upon her feet, shouldered the organ and, taking the little girl by the hand, led her out into the quiet street, where lay the light of a full moon, making the night more beautiful than day. Cherry's drowsy eyes flew wide open; and, looking up in Giovanni's face with eager joy, she cried,—
"Oh! now we're going back to heaven; aren't we, my father? It was bright and still like this in heaven; and I saw a star, and-and then the naughty lady struck me"—
"Peace, little one! I know not of what you speak, nor any thing of heaven," said the Italian in a troubled voice; and the child, hurrying along at his side, raised her face silently to the summer sky, seeking there, perhaps, the answer to the questions forever stirring in her struggling soul.
A little later, and the swift train, flying through the sleeping land, bore away the travellers; while Giovanni, settling himself as easily as possible, laid the head of his little Ciriegia upon his breast, tenderly smoothed down her silky curls, and laid his hand upon the bright eyes, that frightened him with the intensity of their gaze.
"Sleep, carissima mia, sleep," murmured he soothingly; "sleep, and forget thy weariness and thy memories."
"I can't sleep now, my father. It seems to me that we are going to heaven; and I want to be awake to see-the lady"—
The words faltered, and died upon her lips. The beautiful image of her mother, fading slowly from her memory, seemed already a vision so vague, that to name it were to lose it,—an idea too precious and too impalpable to put in words. The past, with all its love and joy and beauty, was becoming for our 'Toinette what we may fancy heaven is to a little baby, whose solemn eyes and earnest gaze seem forever attempting to recall the visions of celestial beauty it has left for the pale, sad skies, and mournful sounds of earth.
On rushed the train through the quiet night, waking wild echoes in the woods, and leaving them to whisper themselves again to sleep when it had passed; lighting dark valleys that the moonlight left unlighted, with its whirling banner of flame and sparks, and its hundred blazing windows; moving across the holy calm of midnight like some strange and troubled vision, some ugly nightmare, that for the moment changes peace and rest to horror and affright, and then passes again to the dim and ghostly Dreamland, whose frontier crowds our daily life on every hand, and whence forever peep and beckon the mysteries that perplex and haunt the human mind.
On and on and on, through misty lowland and shadowy wood, and over shining rivers, and through sleeping hamlets, and winding, snake-like, between great round hills and along deep mountain-gorges, until the wild, bright eyes that watched beneath Cherry's matted curls grew soft and dim; and at last the white lids fell, and the curve of the sad lips relaxed beneath the kiss of God's mildest messenger to man,—the spirit of sleep.
As for Giovanni, he long had slumbered heavily; and even Pantalon, whose bright eyes were seldom known to close, was now curled up beneath the organ-covering, dreaming, perhaps, of the nut-groves and spice-islands where he had once known liberty and youth.
Just then it came,—a crash as if heaven and earth had met; a wild, deep cry, made up of all tones of human agony and fright; the shriek of escaping steam; the rending and splintering of wood and iron; destruction, terror, pain, and death, all mingled in one awful moment. Then those who had escaped unhurt began the sad and terrible task of withdrawing from the ruin the maimed and bleeding bodies of those who yet lived, the crushed remains and fragments of those who had been killed in the moment of the encounter: and, in all the bewildering confusion of the scene, none had eyes for the little childish figure, that, hurled from the splintered car, lay for a while stunned and shaken among the soft grass where it had fallen, and then, staggering to its feet, fled wildly away into the dim forest-land.
THE sun was setting upon the day succeeding that of the great railroad accident, that, for weeks, filled the whole land with horror and indignation, when a young girl, driving rapidly along a country-road at a point about five miles distant from the scene of the disaster, met a child walking slowly toward her, whose disordered dress, bare head, and wild, sweet face, attracted her attention and curiosity.
Checking her spirited horse with some difficulty, the young girl looked back, and found that the child had stopped, and stood watching her.
"See here, little girl!" called she. "Are you lost? Is any thing the matter with you?"
The child fixed her solemn eyes upon the face of the questioner, but made no answer.
"Come here, sissy! I want to talk to you; and I can't turn round to come to you. Come here!"
The little girl slowly obeyed the kind command, and stood presently beside the wagon, her pale face upraised, her startled eyes intently fixed upon the clear and honest ones bent to meet them.
"What is your name, little girl?"
"Sunshine," said the child vaguely; and her eyes dropped from the face of her questioner to fix themselves upon the far horizon, where hung already the evening-star, pale and trembling, as it had hung upon the evening of 'Toinette Legrange's birthday ten months before. Was it a sudden association with the star and the hour that had suggested to the heart of the desolate child this name, so long forgotten, once so appropriate, now so strange and sad?
"Sunshine?" replied the young girl wonderingly. "You don't look like it a bit. Where do you belong? and where are you going?"
The child's eyes travelled back from Dreamland, and rested wistfully upon the kind face above her.
"I don't know," said she sadly. "I want to go to heaven; but I've forgot the way."
"To heaven! You poor little thing, have you no home short of that?"
"I don't know. I wish I had some water."
"You had better jump into the wagon, and come home with me, Sunshine, if that is your name. Something has got to be done for you right away."
The child, still looking at her in that strange and solemn manner, asked suddenly,—
"Who are you?"
"I? Oh! I'm Dora Darling; and I live about five miles from here. Jump in quick; for it is growing dark, and we must be at home for supper."
As she spoke, she leaned down, and gave a hand to the little girl, who mechanically took it, and clambered into the carriage. Dora lifted her to the seat, and held her there, with one arm about her waist, saying kindly,—
"Hug right up to me, you poor little thing! and hold on tight. We'll be at home in half an hour, or less.-Now, Pope!"
The impatient horse, feeling the loosened rein, and hearing his own name, darted away at speed; whirling the light wagon along so rapidly, that the child clung convulsively to her new protector, murmuring,—
"I guess I shall spill out of this, and get kilt."
"Oh, no, you won't, Sunshine! I shall hold you in. You're not Irish, are you?"
"What's that?"
"Why, Irish, you know. You said 'kilt' just now, instead of 'killed,' as we do."
The child made no reply; but her head drooped upon Dora's shoulder yet more heavily, and her eyes closed.
"Are you sick, little girl? or only tired?" asked Dora, looking anxiously down into the colorless face, over which the evening breeze was gently strewing the tangled curls, as if to hide it from mortal view, while the poor, worn, spirit fled away to peace and rest.
"Sunshine!" exclaimed Dora, gently moving the heavy head that still drooped lower and lower, until now the face was hidden from view.
"She has fainted!" said Dora, looking anxiously about her. No house and no person were in sight, nor any stream or pond of water; and the young girl decided that the wisest course would be to drive home as rapidly as possible, postponing all attempt to revive her little patient until her arrival there.
Without checking the horse, she dragged from under the seat a quilted carriage-robe, and spread it in the bottom of the wagon, arranging a paper parcel as a pillow. Then, laying poor Sunshine upon this extemporized couch, she took off her own light shawl, and covered her; leaving exposed only the face, white and lovely as the marble statue recumbent upon a little maiden's tomb.
"Now, Pope!" cried Dora, with one touch of the whip upon the glossy haunch of the powerful beast, who, at sound of that clear voice, neighed reply, and darted forward at the rate of twelve good miles an hour; so that, in considerably less than the promised time, Dora skilfully turned the corner from the road into a green country lane, and, a few moments after, stopped before the door of an old-fashioned one-story farm-house, painted red, with a long roof sloping to the ground at the back, an open well with a sweep and bucket, and a diamond-paned dairy-window swinging to and fro in the faint breeze. Around the irregular door-stone, the grass grew close and green; while nodding in at the window, and waving from the low eaves, and clambering upon the roof, a tangle of white and sweet-brier roses, of woodbine and maiden's-bower, lent a rare grace to the simple home, and loaded the air with a cloud of delicate perfume.
A young man, lounging upon the doorstep, started to his feet as the wagon came dashing up the lane, and was going to open the gate of the barn-yard; but Dora stopped before the open door, and called to him,—
"Karl! Come here, please."
"Certainly. I was running out of the way for fear of being ground to powder beneath your chariot-wheels; for I said to myself, 'Surely the driving is as the driving of Jehu, the son of Nimshi.'"
"I shouldn't have driven so fast; but-see here!"
She pulled away the shawl as she spoke, and showed to the young man, who now stood beside the carriage, the still inanimate form of the little waif at her feet.
"Phew! What's that? and where did you get it?"
"A little girl that I met; lost, I think. I took her into the buggy, and then she fainted, and I laid her down," rapidly explained Dora; adding, as she raised the little figure in her arms,—
"Take her in, and lay her on the bed in the rosy-room."
"Poor little thing! She's not dead, is she, Dora?" asked the young man softly, as he took the child in his arms and entered the house, followed by Dora.
"Oh, no! I think not; only fainted. I suppose there's hot water, for a bath, in the kitchen."
As she spoke, they entered the sitting-room,—a cool, shady apartment, with a great beam crossing the ceilings, and deep recesses to the windows, with seats in them.
At the farther side, Dora threw open the door of a little bedroom, whose gay-papered walls and flowered chintz furniture, not to speak of a great sweet-brier bush tapping and scratching at the window, with all its thousand sharp little fingers, gave it a good right to be called the rosy-room. Dora hastily drew away the bright counterpane, and nodded to Karl, who laid the little form he carried tenderly upon the bed.
At this moment, another door into the sitting-room opened; and a girl, somewhat older than Dora, put in her head, looked about for a moment, and then came curiously toward the door of the rosy-room.
"I thought I heard you, Dora," said she. "What are you doing in here? Why!-who's that?"
"O Kitty! can you warm a little of that broth we had for dinner, to give her? She's just starved, I really believe. And is there any ammonia in the house?-smelling-salts, you know. Didn't aunt have some?" asked Dora rapidly.
"I believe so. But where did you get this child? Who is she?"
"Run, Kitty, and get the salts first. We'll tell you afterward."
"What shall I do, Dora?" interposed the young man; and Kitty ran upon her errand, while Dora promptly replied,—
"Open the window, and bring some cold water; and then a little wine or brandy, if we have any."
"Enough for this time, at any rate," said Karl, hurrying away, and returning with both water and wine just as Kitty appeared with the salts; but it was Dora who applied the remedies, and with a skill and steadiness that would have seemed absolutely marvellous to one unacquainted with the young girl's previous history and training.
"She's coming to herself. You'd better both go out of sight, and let her see only me. Kitty, will you look to the broth?" whispered Dora; and Karl, taking his sister by the sleeve, led her out, softly closing the door after them.
"Dora does like to manage, I must say. Now, do tell me at last who this child is, and where she came from, and what's going to be done with her," said Kitty as they reached the kitchen. "Why shouldn't she like to manage, when she can do it so well? I can tell you, Miss Kitty, if she hadn't man aged to some purpose on one occasion, you wouldn't have had a brother to-day to plague you."
The girl's dark eyes grew moist as she turned them upon him, saying warmly,—
"I know it, Charley; and I would love her for that, if nothing else: but I can't forget she's almost a year younger than I am, and ought not to expect to take the lead in every thing."
"Pooh, Kit-cat, don't be ridiculous! Get the soup, and put it over the fire; and I'll tell you all I know about our little guest."
"I let the fire go down when tea was ready, it is so warm to-night," said Kitty, raking away the ashes in the open fireplace, and drawing together a few coals.
"That will do. You only want a cupful or so at once, and you can warm it in a saucepan over those coals."
"Dear me! I guess I know how to do as much as that without telling.Sit down now, and let me hear about the child."
So Karl dropped into the wooden arm-chair beside the hearth, and told his story; while Kitty, bustling about, warmed the broth, moved the tea-pot and covered dish of toast nearer to the remnant of fire, waved a few flies off the neat tea-table, and drove out an intrusive chicken, who, before going to roost, was evidently determined to secure a dainty bit for supper from the saucer of bread and milk set in the corner for pussy.
"If the broth is ready, I'll take it in," said Karl, as his sister removed it from the fire.
"Well, here it is; and do tell Dora to come to supper, or at least come yourself. I want to get cleared away some time."
"I'll tell her," said Karl briefly, as he took the bowl of broth, set it in a plate, and laid a silver spoon beside it.
"How handy he is! just like a woman," said Kitty to herself as her brother left the room; and then, going out into the sink-room, she finished washing and putting away the "milk-things,"-a process interrupted by the arrival of Dora with her little charge.
"How is she now, Dora?" asked Karl, softly opening the door of the rosy-room.
"Better. You can come in if you want to. Have you got the broth?"
"Yes: here it is."
"That's nice. Now hold her up, please, this way, while I feed her. See, little Sunshine! here is some nice broth for you. Take a little, won't you?"
The pale lips slightly opened, and Dora deftly slipped the spoon between them. The effect was instantaneous; and, as the half-starved child tasted and smelled the nourishing food, she opened wide her eyes, and, fixing them upon the cup, nervously worked her lips, and half extended her poor little hands, wasted and paled by even two days of privation and fatigue.
"I tell you what, Dora, this child has had a mighty narrow chance of it," said Karl aside, as Dora patiently administered the broth, waiting a moment between each spoonful.
"Yes," replied she softly. "I am so glad I met her! it was a real providence."
"For her?"
"For me as much," returned Dora simply. "It is so pleasant to be able to do something again!"
"You miss your wounded and invalid soldiers, and find it very dull here," said Karl quickly, as he glanced sharply into the open face of the young girl.
"Hush, Karl! don't talk now: it will disturb her. Is tea ready?"
"Yes, and Kitty sent word for you to come. Run along, and I will stay with the chick till you come back."
"No: I can't leave her yet. You go to supper, and perhaps, when you are done, I will leave you with her; or Kitty can stay, and I will clear away."
"Won't you let me stay now?" asked the young man hesitatingly.
"No. Here, take the bowl, and run along."
"'Just as you say, not as I like,' I suppose," said Karl, laughing; and, taking the bowl, he went softly out.
"Now, little girl, you feel better, don't you?" asked Dora cheerily, as she laid the heavy head back upon the pillow, and tenderly smoothed away the tangled hair.
"Si, signora," murmured Giovanni's pupil.
"What's that? I don't know what you mean. Say it again, won't you?"
But the child only fixed her dreamy eyes upon the face of the questioner, with no effort at reply; and then the lids began slowly to close.
"Now, before you go to sleep, Sunshine, I am going to take you up stairs, and put you in my own bed, because I sha'n't want to leave you alone to-night; and no one sleeps here. Wait till I fold this shawl round you, and then pull your arms about my neck. There: now we'll go."
She lifted the child as she spoke, and carried her again into the front entry, and up the square staircase to a cottage-chamber with white, scoured floor, common pine furniture, the cheapest of white earthern toilet-sets, and nothing of expense or luxury to be found within its four whitewashed walls, and yet a room that gave one a feeling of satisfaction and peace not always inhabiting far wider and more costly chambers: for the little bed was artistically composed, and covered with snow-white dimity, as was the table between the windows, and the cushion of the wooden rocking-chair; while curtains of the same material, escaped from their tri-colored fastenings, floated in upon the soft breeze like great sails, or the draperies of twilight spirits departing before mortal presence.
In the fireplace stood a large pitcher, filled with common flowers, fresh and odorous; and upon the high mantle-shelf, and all around the room, was disposed a collection of the oddest ornaments that ever decked a young girl's sleeping-chamber. Among them we will but pause to mention two muskets, the one bent, the other splintered at the stock; four swords, each more or less disabled; an officer's sash; three sets of shoulder-straps; a string of army-buttons, each with a name written upon a strip of paper, and tied to the eye; two or three dozen bone rings, of more or less elaborate workmanship, disposed upon the branches of a little tree carved of pine; a large collection of crosses, hearts, clasped hands, dogs'-heads, and other trinkets, in bone, some white, and some stained black; a careful drawing of a crooked and grotesque old negro, in a frame of carved wood; and, finally, a suit of clothes hung against the wall in the position of a human figure, consisting of a jaunty scarlet cap, with a little flag of the United States fastened to the front by an army-badge; a basque, skirt, and trousers of blue cloth, with a worn and clumsy pair of boots below. From a belt fastened across the waist hung a little barrel, a flask, and by a wide ribbon of red, white and blue, a boatswain's silver whistle.
Singular ornaments, we have said, for a young girl's sleeping-room, and yet, in this case, touchingly appropriate and harmonious: for they were the keepsakes given to the daughter of the regiment by the six hundred brave men, who each loved her as his own; they were the mementoes of a year in Dora Darling's life, of such vivid experiences that it threatened to make all the years that should come after pale and vapid in comparison.
Just now, however, all the girl's strong sympathies were aroused and glowing; and as she tenderly cared for the child so strangely placed within her hands, and finally laid her to sleep in the clover-scented sheets of the fair white bed, she felt happier than she had for months before.
A light tap at the door, and Kitty entered.
"I'll stay with her while you go and eat supper. Charles said he'd come; but I'd like well enough to sit down a little while. My!-she's pretty-looking; isn't she?"
"The prettiest child I ever saw," replied Dora, with her usual decision; and then the two girls stood for a moment looking down at the delicate little face, where, since the food and broth Dora had administered, a bright color showed itself upon the cheeks and lips; while the short, thick curls, carefully brushed, clustered around the white forehead, defining its classic shape, and contrasting with its pearly tints.
"Who can she be?" asked Kitty in a whisper.
"Some sort of foreigner,—French maybe, or perhaps Italian. She has talked considerably since I gave her the broth; but I can't make out a word she says. She spoke English when I first met her; but I don't believe she knows much of it," said Dora thoughtfully.
"There is something sewed up in a little bag, and hung round her neck," added she, "just such as some of our foreign volunteers had,—a sort of charm, you know, to keep them from being struck by the evil eye. That shows that her friends must have been foreigners."
"Yes; and Catholics too, likely enough," said Kitty rather contemptuously; adding, after a pause,—
"Well, you go down, and I'll sit by her a while. If she sleeps as sound as this, I don't suppose I need stay a great while. There's the supper-dishes to do."
"I'll wash them, of course; but, if you want to come down, you might leave the door open at the head of the back stairs, and I should hear if she called or cried. And, now I think of it, I have a letter to show Karl and you. I got it at the post-office."
"From Mr. Brown?" asked Kitty quickly.
"No, from a Mr. Burroughs; a man I never heard of in my life till to-day. But come down in a few minutes, and I will read it to you."
"Well, don't read it till I come."
"No: I won't." And Dora quietly went out of the room, leaving Kitty to swing backward and forward in the white-cushioned rocking-chair, her dark eyes wandering half contemptuously, half enviously, over Dora's collection of treasures, with an occasional glance at the sleeping child.
IN the kitchen, Dora found Karl waiting for her; and, while she eat her supper with the healthy relish of a young and vigorous creature, she gave her cousin an account of all the circumstances attending her meeting with the little girl, whom she described again as a foreigner, and probably French.
"And what's to be done with her, Dora?" asked the young man rather gravely, when she had finished.
"Why, when she is well enough to tell who she is, and where she came from,—that is, if she can talk English at all,—we can return her to her friends; or, if they are not to be discovered, I will keep her myself. That is,"-and the young girl paused suddenly, the blood rushing to her face, as she added,—" that is, if you and Kitty are willing. It is your house, not mine; though I'm afraid I am apt to forget."
Karl looked at her reproachfully.
"When I brought you here, Dora Darling, I brought you home; and when my mother died, not yet a year ago, did she not bid us live together as brother and sisters, in love and harmony?"
"Yes; but"—
"But what, Dora?"
"I am afraid sometimes I behave too much as if it were my own house," faltered Dora.
"And so it is your own house, just as it is my own and Kitty's own. Have either of us ever made you feel that there was any difference, or that you had less right here than we?"
Dora made no reply; and, while Karl still waited for one the staircase-door opened softly, and Kitty appeared.
"The child is fast asleep," said she: "so I thought I would come down and hear the letter."
"What letter?" asked Karl a little impatiently.
"Oh! I haven't told you. Here it is."
And Dora drew from her pocket, and held toward him, a large white envelope, boldly directed to "Miss DORA DARLING, care of Capt. Charles Windsor"
"That's nonsense. I have beaten my sword into a ploughshare now, and am only plain mister," said Capt. Karl, glancing at the direction.
"Well, read the letter, do; I'm dying to hear it," said Kitty impatiently; and her brother, with an affectation of extreme haste, unfolded the thick, large sheet of note-paper and read aloud:—
"Having been requested to communicate with Miss Darling upon a matter of importance, Mr. Thomas Burroughs will do himself the honor of calling upon her, probably in the afternoon of Thursday, Aug. 25.
"CINCINNATI, Aug. 20."
"Thursday, 25th! Why, that is to-morrow!" exclaimed Karl, as he finished reading.
"Dated Cincinnati, you see! It is some message from Mr. Brown. He lives about twenty miles from Cincinnati," said Kitty eagerly.
"I don't think so. Why should Mr. Brown send a message when he writes to me so often?" replied Dora with simplicity.
"I should think he did. I suppose you expected a letter this afternoon, and that was what made you so bent upon driving to town in all the heat."
"It wasn't very hot, and you know we needed these things from the shop."
"From the grocery-store, do you mean?" asked Kitty sharply.
"Yes."
"Why can't you talk as we do, then? You have been here long enough now, I should think."
"Because she knows how to talk better, Miss Kit," said Karl good-humoredly. "Calling a shop a store is an Americanism, like calling a station-house a dpt, or trousers pants."
"Well, I thought we were Americans, Dora and all," retorted Kitty.
"Mercy, child! don't let us plunge from philology into ethnology. I prefer to speculate upon Mr. Thomas Burroughs. Who is he? and what does he want of our Dora?"
"To marry her, I suppose, or to ask her to marry Mr. Brown," snappedKitty.
"Perhaps he wants to ask my good word toward marrying you," suggested Dora, coloring deeply.
"No such good luck as that, eh, Kitty?" said Karl with a laugh.
"Good luck! I'm sure I'm in no hurry to be married; and, though I haven't had Dora's chances of seeing all sorts of men, I dare say I shall get as good a husband in the end," replied Kitty loftily.
"But, contemplating for one moment the idea that it may not be an offer of marriage that Mr. Thomas Burroughs means by a 'matter of importance,' let us consider what else it can be," said Karl with a quizzical smile.
"Perhaps he wants your ideas upon the campaign in Western Virginia, and a report of the general's real motives and intentions," suggested Dora gayly.
"Perhaps he wants to engage his winter's butter; though I don't believe Dora is the one to ask about that," said Kitty.
"Now, Kitty! I'm sure I made up the last, and you said it was as nice as you could do yourself."
"Yes; but you turned all the buttermilk into the pig's pail instead of saving it for biscuits."
"So I did. Well, as dear old Picter used to say, 'What's the use ob libin' if you've got trew larnin'?'"
"O Dora! how can you, how can you!-you cruel, cruel girl, how can you speak of him!" cried Kitty in a passion of anger and grief; and, pushing back her chair so violently as to upset it, she rushed out of the room.
"Oh, I am so sorry!" exclaimed Dora in great distress; and would have followed her, had not Karl held her back.
"Don't go, dear; it will be of no use: she will not let you into her room. Poor Kitty! she loved her mother so passionately, and her nature is so intense! We must make great excuses, Dora, for our sister's little inequalities of temper: I think her great loss is at the bottom of all."
Dora looked thoughtful, and presently said slowly, "I know it, Karl; but it does seem to me rather unjust that she should hate poor Pic's memory so bitterly even now. He did not know any more than I that he had small-pox when he came back that time from New York; and when Kitty told him that Aunt Lucy had taken it from him, and was very sick, he felt so badly, that I think it prevented his getting well."
"O Dora, don't say that! Kitty could not have blamed him openly."
"I don't know what she said; but, from that day, he grew worse, and died without being able to bid me good-by,—Pic, who brought me away from those cruel people, and cared for me as if I had been his child. O dear, dear old Pic!"
She did not cry; she very seldom did: but she clasped her hands tightly together, and looked so white and wild, that Karl came to her, and, taking her in his arms, would have soothed and caressed her like a little child, had not she repulsed him.
"Please not, dear Karl! I must bear my griefs alone for I am alone in all the world."
It was the bitterest sentence Dora had ever spoken, and her cousin looked at her in dismay.
"If Picter could have given the disease to me instead of to aunt, and he and I could have journeyed on together into another world as we had through this, and left your mother to Kitty and you!" continued Dora; while in her eyes, and about her white lips, quivered a passion of grief far beyond any tears,—far beyond, thank God! any grief that eyes and lips so young are often called to express. And as it rose and swelled in her girl heart, and shook her strong young soul, Dora uttered in one word all the bitterness of her orphaned life.
"Mother!" cried she, and clinched her hands above the sharp pain that seemed to suffocate her, the pain we call heart-ache, and might sometimes more justly call heart-break.
Karl looked at her, and his gay young face grew strong, and full of meaning. He folded her again in his arms, and said,—
"Dora, I had not meant to speak yet; but I cannot see you so, or hear you say such words. Do not you know, cousin, that there is nothing in all the world I love like you; and that, while I live, you can never be alone; and, while I have a home, you can never want one, or be other than its head and centre? Dora, marry me, and I will make you forget all other loves in the excess of mine." Dora allowed her head to droop upon his shoulder, and a sudden sense of peace and rest fell temptingly upon her spirit.
"Dora, Dora Darling always, even when you are all my Dora!" whispered Karl; but Dora released herself from his arms, and stood upright. Her face was strong again now, although very white; and she said,—
"Thank you, cousin. You are good and kind, as you always have been, and I am glad you love me as I love you; but what else you have said we will forget. I am too young to think of such things, and you will not feel so to-morrow or next day. Be my brother, as you have been, and let me be sister to you and Kitty, as aunt told us. I wish I could make Kitty love me."
The young man would have persisted; but Dora, gravely shaking her head, said,—
"Karl dear, you only distress me, and I want to be quiet. Do not speak of this again for at least another year, and then, perhaps, you will not want to."
"But in a year I may, if I do want to?" asked Karl eagerly.
"I don't want to say that; for I don't know that I should want you to then," said Dora, with such exquisite simplicity, that the young man laughed outright, and said,—
"But you don't know that you sha'n't, do you, darling Dorelle?"
"I didn't say so."
"No; but—Well, I won't insist; only I shall put down the date. Let me see: Aug. 24, isn't it?"
He took out his note-book, wrote a few words, and, glancing at Dora with a suppressed smile, put it away again. Then, more seriously, he took her hand, saying,—
"Only remember one thing, Dora; and that is, whatever may come in the future, this house is your home as long as it is ours; and, while I live, there is always some one who loves you best of all God's creatures."