CHAPTER XVIII.THE WIFE OF MICAH JONES.
If ever there was a girl whose mind was in a confused and complex state, that girl was Polly Maybright. Suddenly into her life of sunshine and ease and petting, into her days of love and indulgence, came the cold shadow of would-be justice. Polly had done wrong, and a very stern judge, in the shape of Aunt Maria Cameron, was punishing her.
Polly had often been naughty in her life; she was an independent, quick-tempered child; she had determination, and heaps of courage, but she was always supposed to want ballast. It was the fashion in the house to be a little more lenient to Polly’s misdemeanors than to any one else’s. When a very little child, Nurse had excused ungovernable fits of rage with the injudicious words, “Poor lamb, she can’t help herself!” The sisters, older or younger, yielded to Polly, partly because of a certain fascination which she exercised over them, for she was extremely brilliant and quick of idea, and partly because they did not want her to get into what they called her tantrums. Father, too, made a pet of her, and perhaps slightly spoiled her, but during mother’s lifetime all this did not greatly matter, for mother guided the imperious, impetuous, self-willed child, with the exquisite tact of love. During mother’s lifetime, when Polly was naughty, she quickly became good again; now matters were very different.
Mrs. Cameron was a woman who, with excellent qualities, and she had many, had not a scrap of the “mother-feel” within her. There are women who never called a child theirown who are full of it, but Mrs. Cameron was not one of these. Her rule with regard to the management of young people was simple and severe—she saw no difference between one child and another. “Spare the rod and spoil the child,” applied equally in every case, so now, constituting herself Polly’s rightful guardian in the absence of her father, she made up her mind on no account to spare the rod. Until Polly humbled herself to the very dust she should go unforgiven. Solitary confinement was a most safe and admirable method of correction. Therefore unrepentant Polly remained in her room.
The effects, as far as the culprit was concerned, were not encouraging. In the first place she would not acknowledge Mrs. Cameron’s right to interfere in her life; in the next harshness had a very hardening effect on her.
It was dull in Polly’s room. The naughtiest child cannot cry all the time, nor sulk when left quite to herself, and although, whenever Mrs. Cameron appeared on the scene, the sulks and temper both returned in full force, Polly spent many long and miserable hours perfectly distracted with the longing to find something to do. The only books in the room were Helen’s little Bible, a copy of “Robinson Crusoe,” and the Dictionary. For obvious reasons Polly did not care to read the Bible at present. “Robinson Crusoe” she knew already by heart, but found it slightly amusing trying to make something of the sentences read backwards. The Dictionary was her final resource, and she managed to pass many tedious hours working straight through it page after page. She had got as far as M, and life was becoming insupportable, when about the middle of the day, on Monday, she was startled by a cautious and stealthy noise, and also by a shadow falling directly on her page. She looked up quickly; there was the round and radiant face of Maggie glued to the outside of the window, while her voice came in, cautious but piercing, “Open the window quick, Miss Polly, I’m a-falling down.”
Polly flew to the rescue, and in a moment Maggie was standing in the room. In her delight at seeing a more genial face than Aunt Maria’s, Polly flung her arms round Maggie and kissed her.
“How good of you to come!” she exclaimed. “And you must not go away again. Where will you hide when Aunt Maria comes to visit me? Under the bed, or in this cupboard?”
“Not in neither place,” responded Maggie, who was still gasping and breathless, and whose brown winsey frock showed a disastrous tear from hem to waist.
“Not in neither place,” she proceeded, “for I couldn’t a-bear it any longer, and you ain’t going to stay in this room no longer, Miss Polly; I nearly brained myself a-clinging on to the honeysuckle, and the ivy-roots, but here I be, and now we’ll both go down the ladder and run away.”
“Run away—oh!” said Polly, clasping her hands, and a great flood of rose-color lighting up her face.
She ran to the window. The housemaid’s step-ladder stood below, but Polly’s window was two or three feet above.
“We’ll manage with a bit of rope and the bedroom towels,” said Maggie, eagerly. “It’s nothing at all, getting down—it’s what I did was the danger. Now, be quick, Miss Polly; let’s get away while they’re at dinner.”
It did not take an instant for Polly to decide. Between the delights of roaming the country with Maggie, and the pleasure of continuing to read through the M’s in Webster’s Dictionary, there could be little choice. On the side of liberty and freedom alone could the balance fall. The bedroom towels were quickly tied on to the old rope, the rope secured firmly inside the window-sill, and the two girls let themselves swing lightly on to the step-ladder. They were both agile, and the descent did not terrify them in the least. When they reached the ground they took each other’s hands, and looked into each other’s faces.
“You might have thought of bringing a hat, Miss Polly.”
“Oh, never mind, Maggie. You do look shabby; your frock is torn right open.”
“Well, Miss, I got it a-coming to save you. Miss Polly, Mrs. Power’s back in the kitchen. Hadn’t we better run? We’ll talk afterwards.”
So they did, not meeting any one, for Mrs. Cameron and the children were all at dinner, and the servants were also in the house. They ran through the kitchen garden, vaulted over the sunken fence, and found themselves in the little sheltered green lane, where Polly had lain on her face and hands and caught the thrushes on the July day when her mother died. She stood almost in the same spot now, but her mind was in too great a whirl, and her feelings too excited, to cast back any glances of memory just then.
“Well, Maggie,” she said, pulling up short, “now, what are your plans? Where are we going to? Where are we to hide?”
“Eh?” said Maggie.
She had evidently come to the end of her resources, and the intelligent light suddenly left her face.
“I didn’t think o’ that,” she said: “there’s mother’s.”
“No, that wouldn’t do,” interrupted Polly. “Your mother has only two rooms. I couldn’t hide long in her house; and besides, she is poor, I would not put myself on her for anything. I’ll tell you what, Maggie, we’ll go across Peg-Top Moor, and make straight for the old hut by the belt of fir-trees. You know it, we had a picnic there once, and I made up a story of hermits living in the hut. Well, you and I will be the hermits.”
“But what are we to eat?” said Maggie, whose ideas were all practical, and her appetite capacious.
Polly’s bright eyes, however, were dancing, and her wholeface was radiant. The delight of being a real hermit, and living in a real hut, far surpassed any desire for food.
“We’ll eat berries from the trees,” she said, “and we’ll drink water from the spring. I know there’s a spring of delicious water not far from the hut. Oh! come along, Maggie, do; this is delightful!”
An old pony, who went in the family by the stately name of Sultan, had been wont to help the children in their long rambles over the moor. They were never allowed to wander far alone, and had not made one expedition since their mother’s death. It was really two years since Polly had been to the hut at the far end of Peg-Top Moor. This moor was particularly lonely, it was interspersed at intervals with thickets of rank undergrowth and belts of trees, and was much frequented on that account by gipsies and other lawless people. Polly, who went last over the moor, carried the greater part of the way on Sultan’s friendly back, had very little idea how far the distance was. It was September now, but the sun shone on the heather and fern with great power, and as Polly had no hat on her head, having refused to take Maggie’s from her; she was glad to take shelter under friendly trees whenever they came across her path.
At first the little girls walked very quickly, for they were afraid of being overtaken and brought back; but after a time their steps grew slow, their movement decidedly languid, and Maggie at least began to feel that berries from the trees and water from the spring, particularly when neither was to be found anywhere, was by no means a substantial or agreeable diet to dwell upon.
“I don’t think I like being a hermit,” she began. “I don’t know nought what it means, but I fancy it must be very thinning and running down to the constitootion.”
Polly looked at her, and burst out laughing.
“It is,” she said, “that’s what the life was meant for, to subdue the flesh in all possible ways; you’ll get as thin as a whipping-post, Mag.”
“I don’t like it,” retorted Maggie. “May-be we’d best be returning home, now, Miss Polly.”
Polly’s eyes flashed. She caught Maggie by the shoulder.
“You are a mean girl,” she said. “You got me into this scrape, and now you mean to desert me. I was sitting quietly in my room, reading through the M’s in Webster’s Dictionary, and you came and asked me to run away; it was your doing, Maggie, you know that.”
“Yes, miss! yes, Miss!”
Maggie began to sob. “But I never, never thought it meant berries and spring-water; no, that I didn’t. Oh, I be so hungry!”
At this moment all angry recriminations were frozen on the lips of both little girls, for rising suddenly, almost as it seemed from the ground at their feet, appeared a gaunt woman of gigantic make.
“May-be you’ll be hungrier,” she said in a menacing voice. “What business have you to go through Deadman’s Copse without leave?”
Maggie was much too alarmed to make any reply, but Polly, after a moment or two of startled silence, came boldly to the rescue.
“Who are you?” she said. “Maggie and I know nothing of Deadman’s Copse; this is a wood, and we are going through it; we have got business on the other side of Peg-Top-Moor.”
“That’s as it may be,” replied the woman, “this wood belongs to me and to my sons, Nathaniel and Patrick, and to our dogs, Cinder and Flinder, and those what goes through Deadman’s Copse must pay toll to me, the wife of Micah Jones. My husband is dead, and he left the wood to me, and them as go through it must pay toll.”
The woman’s voice was very menacing; she was of enormous size, and going up to the little girls, attempted to place one of her brawny arms on Polly’s shoulder. But Polly with all her faults possessed a great deal of courage; her eyes flashed, and she sprang aside from the woman’s touch.
“You are talking nonsense,” she said. “Father has over and over told me that the moor belongs to the Queen, so this little bit couldn’t have been given to your husband, Micah Jones, and we are just as free to walk here as you are. Come on, Maggie, we’ll be late for our business if we idle any longer.”
But the woman with a loud and angry word detained her.
“Highty-tighty!” she said. “Here’s spirit for you, and who may your respected papa be, my dear? He seems to be mighty wise. And the wife of Micah Jones would much like to know his name.”
“You’re a very rude unpleasant woman,” said Polly. “Don’t hold me, I won’t be touched by you. My father is Dr. Maybright, of Sleepy Hollow, you must know his name quite well.”
The wife of Micah Jones dropped a supercilious curtsey.
“Will you tell Dr. Maybright, my pretty little dear,” she said, “that in these parts might is right, and that when the Queen wants Deadman’s Copse, she can come and have a talk with me, and my two sons, and the dogs, Cinder and Flinder. But, there, what am I idling for with a chit like you? You and that other girl there have got to pay toll. You have both of you got to give me your clothes. There’s no way out of it, so you needn’t think to try words, nor blarney, nor nothing else with me, I have a sack dress each for you, and what you have on is mine. That’s the toll, you will have to pay it. My hut is just beyond at the other side of the wood, my sons are away, but Cinder and Flinder will take care of you until I come back, at nine o’clock. Here, follow me, we’re close to the hut. No words, or it will be the worse for you. On in front, the two of you, or you, little Miss,” shaking her hand angrily at Polly, “will know what it means to bandy words with the wife of Micah Jones.”
The woman’s face became now very fierce and terrible, and even Polly was sufficiently impressed to walk quietly before her, clutching hold of poor terrified Maggie’s hand.
The hut to which the woman took the little girls was the very hermit’s hut to which their own steps had been bent. It was a very dirty place, consisting of one room, which was now filled with smoke from a fire made of broken faggots, fir-cones, and withered fern. Two ugly, lean-looking dogs guarded the entrance to the hut. When they saw the woman coming, they jumped up and began to bark savagely; poor Maggie began to scream, and Polly for the first time discovered that there could be a worse state of things than solitary confinement in her room, with Webster’s Dictionary for company.
“Sit you there,” said the woman, pushing the little girls into the hut. “I’ll be back at nine o’clock. I’m off now on some business of my own. When I come back I’ll take your clothes, and give you a sack each to wear. Cinder and Flinder will take care of you; they’re very savage dogs, and can bite awful, but they won’t touch you if you sit very quiet, and don’t attempt to run away.”
CHAPTER XIX.DISTRESSED HEROINES.
If ever poor little girls found themselves in a sad plight it was the two who now huddled close together in the hermit’s hut. Even Polly was thoroughly frightened, and as to Maggie, nothing but the angry growls of Cinder restrained the violence of her sobs.
“Oh, ain’t a hermit’s life awful!” she whispered more than once to her companion. “Oh! Miss Polly, why did you speak of Peg-Top Moor, and the hermit’s hut, and berries and water?”
“Don’t be silly, Maggie,” said Polly, “I did not mention the wife of Micah Jones, nor these dreadful dogs. This is a misfortune, and we must bear it as best we can. Have you none of the spirit of a heroine in you, Maggie; don’t you know that in all the story-books, when the heroines run away, they come to dreadful grief? If we look at it in that light, and think of ourselves as distressed heroines, it will help us to bear up. Indeed,” continued Polly, “if it wasn’t for my having been naughty a few days ago, and perhaps father coming back to-night, I think I’d enjoy this—I would really. As it is——” Here the brave little voice broke off into a decided quaver. The night was falling, the stars were coming out in the sky, and Polly, standing in the door of the hut, with her arm thrown protectingly round Maggie’s neck, found a great rush of loneliness come over her.
During those weary days spent in her bed-room, repentance, even in the most transient guise, had scarcely come near her. She was too much oppressed with a sense of injustice done to herself to be sorry about the feast in the attic. In short, all her time was spent in blaming Aunt Maria.
Now with the lonely feeling came a great soreness of heart, and an intense and painful longing for her mother. Those fits of longing which came to Polly now and then heralded in, as a rule, a tempest of grief. Wherever she was she would fling herself on the ground, and give way to most passionate weeping. Her eyes swam in tears now, she trembled slightly, but controlled herself. On Maggie’s account it would never do for her to give way. The ugly dogs came up and sniffed at her hands, and smelt her dress. Maggie screamed when they approached her, but Polly patted their heads. She was not really afraid of them, neither was she greatly alarmed at the thought of the wife of Micah Jones. What oppressed her, and brought that feeling of tightness to her throat, and that smarting weight of tears to her eyes, were the great multitude of stars in the dark-blue heavens, and the infinite and grand solitude of the moors which lay around.
The night grew darker; poor Maggie, worn out, crouched down on the ground; Polly, who had now quite made friends with Cinder, sat by Maggie’s side, and when the poor hungry little girl fell asleep, Polly let her rest her head in her lap. The dogs and the two children were all collected in the doorway of the hut, and now Polly could look more calmly up at the stars, and the tears rolled silently down her cheeks.
It was in this position that, at about a quarter to nine, Dr. Maybright found her. Some instinct seemed to lead him to Peg-Top Moor—a sudden recollection brought the hut to his memory, a ringing voice, and gay laugh came back to him. The laugh was Polly’s, the words were hers. “Oh, if there could be a delightful thing, it would be to live as a hermit in the hut at the other side of Peg-Top Moor!”
“The child is there,” he said to himself. And when this thought came to him he felt so sure that it was a true and guiding thought that he whistled for the men who were to help him in the search, and together they went to the hut.
Cinder and Flinder had got accustomed to Polly, whom they rather liked; Maggie they barely tolerated; but the firm steps of three strangers approaching the hut caused them to bristle up, to call all their canine ferocity to their aid, and to bark furiously.
But all their show of enmity mattered nothing in such a supreme moment as this to Polly. No dogs, however fierce, should keep her from the arms of her father. In an instant she was there, cuddling up close to him, while the men he had brought with him took care of Maggie, and beat off the angry dogs.
“Father, there never was any one as naughty as I have been!”
“My darling, you have found that out?”
“Yes, yes, yes! and you may punish me just whatever way you like best, only let me kiss you now. Punish me, but don’t be angry.”
“I’m going to take you home,” said Doctor, who feared mischief from Polly’s present state of strong excitement. “I expect you have gone through a fright and have had some punishment. The minute, too, we find out that we are really naughty, our punishment begins, as well as our forgiveness. I shall very likely punish you, child, but be satisfied, I forgive you freely. Now home, and to bed, and no talk of anything to-night, except a good supper, and a long restful sleep. Come, Polly, what’s the matter? Do you object to be carried?”
“But not in your arms, father. I am so big and heavy, it will half kill you.”
“You are tall, but not heavy, you are as light as a reed. Listen! I forbid you to walk a step. When I am tired there are two men to help me. Simpkins, will you and George give Maggie a hand, and keep close to us. Now, we had better all get home as fast as possible.”
It was more than half-past ten that night before Polly and the Doctor returned to Sleepy Hollow. But what a journey home she had! how comforting were the arms that supported her, how restful was the shoulder, on which now and then in an ecstasy to love and repentance, she laid her tired head! The stars were no longer terrible, far-off, and lonely, but near and friendly, like the faces of well-known friends. The moor ceased to be a great, vast, awful solitude, it smelt of heather, and was alive with the innumerable sounds of happy living creatures—and best of all, mother herself seemed to come back out of the infinite, to comfort the heart of the sorrowful child.
CHAPTER XX.LIMITS.
“Andnow, Maria, I want to know what is the meaning of all this,” said the Doctor.
It was late that night, very late. Polly was in bed, and Helen lay in her little white bed also close to Polly’s side, so close that the sisters could hold each other’s hands. They lay asleep now, breathing peacefully, and the Doctor, being satisfied that no serious mischief had happened to any of his family, meant to have it out with his sister-in-law.
Mrs. Cameron was a very brave woman, or at least she considered herself so; it was perfectly natural that people should fear her, she did not object to a little wholesome awe on the parts of those who looked up to her and dependedon her words of wisdom. To be afraid on her own part was certainly not her custom, and yet that evening, as she sat alone in the deserted old drawing-room, and listened to the wind as it rose fitfully and moaned through the belt of fir-trees that sheltered the lawn; as she sat there, pretending to knit, but listening all the time for footsteps which did not come, she did own to a feeling which she would not describe as fear, but which certainly kept her from going to bed, and made her feel somewhat uncomfortable.
It was about eleven o’clock that night when Dr. Maybright entered the drawing-room. He was a tall man with a slight stoop, and his eyes looked somewhat short-sighted. Tonight, however, he walked in quickly, holding himself erect. His eyes, too, had lost their peculiar expression of nearness of vision, and Mrs. Cameron knew at once that she was in for a bad time.
“And now, Maria, I want to know what is the meaning of all this,” he said, coming up close to her.
She was standing, having gathered up her knitting preparatory to retiring.
“I don’t understand you, Andrew,” she answered, in a somewhat complaining, but also slightly alarmed voice. “I think it is I who have to ask for an explanation. How is it that I have been left alone this entire evening? I had much to say to you—I came here on purpose, and yet you left me to myself all these hours.”
“Sit down, Maria,” said the Doctor, more gently. “I can give you as much time as you can desire now, and as you will be leaving in the morning it is as well that we should have our talk out to-night.”
Mrs. Cameron’s face became now really crimson with anger.
“You can say words like that to me?” she said—“your wife’s sister.”
“My dear wife’s half-sister, and until now my very good friend,” retorted the Doctor. “But, however well you have meant it, you have sown dissension and unhappiness in the midst of a number of motherless children, and for the present at least, for all parties, I must ask you, Maria, to return to Bath.”
Mrs. Cameron sank now plump down into her chair. She was too deeply offended for a moment to speak. Then she said, shortly:
“I will certainly return, but from this moment I wash my hands of you all.”
“I hope not,” said the Doctor. “I trust another time you will come to me as my welcome and invited guest. You see, Maria”—here his eyes twinkled with that sly humor which characterized him—“it was a mistake—it always is a mistake to take the full reins of government in any house uninvited.”
“But, Andrew, you were making such a fool of yourself.After that letter of yours I felt almost hopeless, so for poor Helen’s sake I came, atgreatpersonal inconvenience. Your home is most dreary, the surroundings appalling in their solitude. No wonder Helen died! Andrew, I thought it but right to do my best for those poor children. I came, the house was in a state of riot, you have not an idea what Polly’s conduct was. Disrespectful, insolent, impertinent. I consider her an almost wicked girl.”
“Stop,” said the Doctor. “We are not going to discuss Polly. She behaved badly, I grant. But I think, Maria, when you locked her up in her room, and forbade Helen to go to her, and treated her without a spark of affection or a vestige of sympathy; when you kept up this line of conduct for four long days, you yourself in God’s sight were not blameless. You at least forgot that you, too, were once fourteen, or perhaps you never were; no, I am sure you never were what that child is with all her faults—noble.”
“That is enough, Andrew, we will, as you say, not discuss Polly further. I leave by the first train that can take me away in the morning. You are a very much mistaking and ill-judging man; you were never worthy to be Helen’s husband, and I bitterly grieve that her children must be brought up by you. For Helen’s sake alone, I must now give you one parting piece of advice, it is this: When Miss Grinsted comes, treat her with kindness and consideration. Keep Miss Grinsted in this house at all hazards, and there may be a chance for your family.”
“Miss Grinsted!” said the Doctor. “Who, and what do you mean?”
“Andrew, when I introduce you to such a lady I heap coals of fire on your head. Miss Grinsted alone can bring order out of chaos, peace out of strife. In short, when she is established here, I shall feel at rest as far as my dear sister’s memory is concerned.”
“Miss Grinsted is not going to be established in this house,” said the Doctor. “But who is she? I never heard of her before.”
“She is the lady-housekeeper and governess whom I have selected for you. She arrives at mid-day to-morrow.”
“From where?”
“How queerly you look at me, Andrew. Nobody would suppose you were just delivered from a load of household care and confusion. Such a treasure, too, the best of disciplinarians. She is fifty, a little angular, but capital at breaking in. What is the matter, Andrew?”
“What is Miss Grinsted’s address?”
“Well, well; really your manners are bearish. She is staying with an invalid sister at Exeter at present.”
“Will you oblige me with the street and number of the house?”
“Certainly; but she can scarcely get here before mid-day now. Her trains are all arranged.”
“The name of the street and number of the house, if you please, Maria.”
“Vere Street, No. 30. But she can’t be here before twelve or one to-morrow, Andrew.”
“She is never to come here. I shall go into the village the first thing in the morning, and send her a telegram. She is never to come here. Maria, you made a mistake, you went too far. If you and I are to speak to each other in the future, don’t let it occur again. Good-night; I will see that you are called in good time in the morning.”
It was useless either to argue or to fight. Dr. Maybright had, as the children sometimes described it, a shut-up look on his face. No one was ever yet known to interfere seriously with the Doctor when he wore that expression, and Aunt Maria, with Scorpion under her arm, hobbled upstairs, tired, weary, and defeated.
“I wash my hands of him and his,” she muttered; and the unhappy lady shed some bitter tears of wounded mortification and vanity as she laid her head on her pillow.
“I know I was severe with her,” murmured the Doctor to himself, “but there are some women who must be put down with a firm hand. Yes, I can bear a great deal, but to have Maria Cameron punishing Polly, and establishing a housekeeper and governess of her own choosing in this family is beyond my patience. As I said before, there are limits.”
CHAPTER XXI.THE HIGH MOUNTAINS.
Helen and Polly slept late on the following morning. They were both awakened simultaneously by Nurse, who, holding baby in her arms, came briskly into the room. Nurse was immediately followed by Alice, bearing a tray with an appetizing breakfast for both the little girls.
“The Doctor says you are neither of you to get up until you have had a good meal,” said Nurse. “And, Miss Polly, he’d like to have a word with you, darling, in his study about eleven o’clock. Eh, dear, but it’s blessed and comforting to have the dear man home again; the house feels like itself, and we may breathe now.”
“And it’s blessed and comforting to have one we wot of away again,” retorted Alice. “The young ladies will be pleased, won’t they, Nurse?”
“To be sure they will. You needn’t look so startled, loveys, either of you. It’s only your aunt and the dog what is well quit of the house. They’re on their road to Bath now, and long may they stay there.”
At this news Helen looked a little puzzled, and not very joyful, but Polly instantly sat up in bed and spoke in very bright tones.
“What a darling father is! I’m as hungry as possible.Give me my breakfast, please, Alice; and oh, Nurse, mightn’t baby sit between us for a little in bed?”
“You must support her back well with pillows,” said Nurse. “And see as you don’t spill any coffee on her white dress. Eh! then, isn’t she the sweetest and prettiest lamb in all the world?”
The baby, whose little white face had not a tinge of color, and whose very large velvety brown eyes always wore a gentle, heavenly calm about them, smiled in a slow way. When she smiled she showed dimples, but she was a wonderfully grave baby, as though she knew something of the great loss which had accompanied her birth.
“She is lovely,” said Polly. “It makes me feel good even to look at her.”
“Then be good, for her sake, darling,” said Nurse, suddenly stooping and kissing the bright, vivacious girl, and then bestowing another and tenderer kiss on the motherless baby. “She’s for all the world like Peace itself,” said Nurse. “There ain’t no sort of naughtiness or crossness in her.”
“Oh, she makes me feel good!” said Polly, hugging the little creature fondly to her side.
Two hours later Polly stood with her father’s arm round her neck: a slanting ray of sunlight was falling across the old faded carpet in the study, and mother’s eyes smiled out of their picture at Polly from the wall.
“You have been punished enough,” said the Doctor. “I have sent for you now just to say a word or two. You are a very young climber, Polly, but if this kind of thing is often repeated, you will never make any way.”
“I don’t understand you, father.”
The Doctor patted Polly’s curly head.
“Child,” he said, “we have all of us to go up mountains, and if you choose a higher one, with peaks nearer to the sky than others, you have all the more need for the necessary helps for ascent.”
“Father is always delightful when he is allegorical,” Polly had once said.
Now she threw back her head, looked full into his dearly-loved face, clasped his hands tightly in both her own, and said with tears filling her eyes, “I am glad you are going to teach me through a kind of story, and I think I know what you mean by my trying to climb the highest mountain. I always did long to do whatever I did a little better than any one else.”
“Exactly so, Polly; go on wishing that. Still try to climb the highest mountain, only take with you humility instead of self-confidence, and then, child, you will succeed, for you will be very glad to avail yourself of the necessary helps.”
“The helps? What are they, father? I partly know what you mean, but I am not sure that I quite know.”
“Oh, yes, you quite know. You have known ever since you knelt at your mother’s knee, and whispered your prayersall the better to God because she was listening too. But I will explain myself by the commonest of illustrations. A shepherd wanted to rescue one of his flock from a most perilous situation. The straying sheep had come to a ledge of rock, from where it could not move either backwards or forwards. It had climbed up thousands of feet. How was the shepherd to get it? There was one way. His friends went by another road to the top of the mountain. From there they threw down ropes, which he bound firmly round him, and then they drew him slowly up. He reached the ledge, he rescued the sheep, and it was saved. He could have done nothing without the ropes. So you, too, Polly, can do nothing worthy; you can never climb your high mountain without the aid of that prayer which links you to your Father in heaven. Do you understand?”
“Yes, I understand,” said Polly; “I see. I won’t housekeep any more for the present, father.”
“You had better not, dear; you have plenty of talent for this, as well as for anything else you like to undertake, but you lack experience now, and discretion. It was just all this, and that self-confidence which I alluded to just now, which got my little girl into all this trouble, and caused Aunt Maria to think very badly of her. Aunt Maria has gone, so we will say nothing about her just at present. I may be a foolish old father, Polly, but I own I have a great desire to keep my children to myself just now. So I shall give Sleepy Hollow another chance of doing without a grownup housekeeper. Your governesses and masters shall come to teach you as arranged, but Helen must be housekeeper, with Mrs. Power, who is a very managing person, to help her. Helen, too, must have a certain amount of authority over you all, with the power to appeal to me in any emergency. This you must submit to, Polly, and I shall expect you to do so with a good grace.”
“Yes, father.”
“I have acceded to your wishes in the matter of bringing the Australian children here for at least six months. So you see you will have a good deal on your hands; and as I have done so at the express wish of Helen and yourself, I shall expect you both to take a good deal of responsibility, and to be in every sense of the word, extra good.”
Polly’s eyes danced with pleasure. Then she looked up into her father’s face, and something she saw there caused her to clasp her arms round his neck, and whisper eagerly and impulsively:
“Father, dear, what Helen told me isnottrue—is it?”
“You mean about my eyes, Polly? So Helen knows, and has spoken about it, poor girl?”
“Yes, yes, but it isn’t true, it can’t be?”
“Don’t tremble, Polly. I am quite willing to tell you how things really are. I don’t wish it to be spoken of, but it is a relief to trust some one. I saw Sir James Dawson whenin town. He is the first oculist in England. He told me that my sight was in a precarious state, and that if matters turned out unfavorably it is possible, nay probable, that I may become quite blind. On the other hand, he gives me a prescription which he thinks and hopes will avert the danger.”
“What is it? Oh! father, you will surely try it?”
“If you and the others will help me.”
“But what is it?”
Dr. Maybright stroked back Polly’s curls.
“Very little anxiety,” he said. “As much rest as possible, worries forbidden, home peace and rest largely insisted upon. Now run away, my dear. I hear the tramp of my poor people. This is their morning, you remember.”
Polly kissed her father, and quietly left the room.
“See if I’m not good after that,” she murmured. “Wild horses shouldn’t drag me into naughtiness after what father has just said.”
CHAPTER I.A COUPLE OF BARBARIANS.
All the young Maybrights, with the exception of the baby, were collected in the morning-room. It was the middle of October. The summer heat had long departed, the trees were shedding their leaves fast, the sky had an appearance of coming wind and showers; the great stretch of moorland which could be seen best in winter when the oaks and elms were bare, was distinctly visible. The moor had broad shadows on it, also tracts of intense light; the bracken was changing from green to brown and yellow color—brilliant color was everywhere. At this time of year the moors in many ways looked their best.
The Maybright children, however, were not thinking of the landscape, or the fast approach of winter, they were busily engaged chattering and consulting together. It was four o’clock in the afternoon, and they knew that the time left for them to prepare was short, consequently their busy fingers worked as well as their tongues. Helen was helping the twins and the little boys to make up a wreath of enormous dimensions, and Polly, as usual, was flitting about the room, followed by her satellite Firefly. As usual, too, Polly was first to remark and quickest to censure. She looked very much like the old Polly; no outward change was in the least visible, although now she yielded a kind of obedience to the most gentle and unexacting of sisters, and although she still vowed daily to herself, that she, Polly, would certainly climb the highest mountain, and for father’s sake would be the best of all his children.
“How slow you are, Nell,” she now exclaimed, impatiently; “and look what a crooked ‘E’ you have made to the end of ‘WELCOME.’ Oh, don’t be so slow, boys! Paul and Virginia will be here before we are half ready.”
“They can’t come before six o’clock,” said Helen. “We have two hours yet left to work in. Do, dear, pretty Polly, find something else to take up your time, and let the twins and the boys help me to finish this wreath.”
“Oh, if you don’t want me,” said Polly, in a slightly offended voice. “Come along, Fly, we’ll go up and see if Virginia’s room is ready, and then we’ll pay a visit to our baby. You and I won’t stay where we are not wanted. Come along.”
Fly trotted off by her elder sister’s side, a great light of contentment filling her big eyes. The two scampered upstairs,saw that a cozy nest was all ready for the Australian girl, while a smaller room at the other side of the passage was in equal readiness for the boy.
“Oh, what darling flowers!” said Firefly, running up to the dressing table in the principal bedroom, and sniffing at the contents of a dainty blue jar. “Why, Polly, these buds must be from your own pet tea-rose.”
“Yes,” said Polly, in a careless voice, “they are; I picked them for Virginia this morning. I’d do anything for Virginia. I’m greatly excited about her coming.”
“You never saw her,” said Firefly, in an aggrieved voice. “You wouldn’t give me your tea-roses. I don’t think it’s nice of you to be fonder of her than you are of me. And Nursie says her name isn’t Virginia.”
“Never mind, she’s Virginia to me, and the boy is Paul. Why, Fly, what a jealous little piece you are. Come here, and sit on my lap. Of course I’m fond of you, Fly, but I’m not excited about you. I know just the kind of nose you have, and the kind of mouth, and the kind of big, scarecrow eyes, but you see I don’t know anything at all about Virginia, so I’m making up stories about her, and pictures, all day long. I expect she’s something of a barbarian, both she and her brother, and isn’t it delicious to think of having two real live barbarians in the house?”
“Yes,” said Firefly, in a dubious voice. “I suppose if they are real barbarians, they won’t know a bit how to behave, and we’ll have to teach them. I’ll rather like that.”
“Oh, you’ll have to be awfully good, Fly, for they’ll copy you in every way; no sulking or sitting crooked, or having untidy hair, or you’ll have a couple of barbarians just doing the very same thing. Now, jump off my lap, I want to go to Nurse, and you may come with me as a great treat. I’m going to undress baby. I do it every night; and you may see how I manage. Nurse says I’m very clever about the way I manage babies.”
“Oh, you’re clever about everything,” said Fly, with a prolonged, deep-drawn breath. “Well, Polly, I do hope one thing.”
“Yes?”
“I do hope that the barbarians will be very, very ugly, for after you’ve seen them you won’t be curious any more, and after you know them there won’t be any stories to make up, and then you won’t love them better than me.”
“What a silly you are, Fly,” responded Polly.
But she gave her little sister’s hand an affectionate squeeze, which satisfied the hungry and exacting heart of its small owner for the present.
Meanwhile the enormous wreath progressed well, and presently took upon important position over the house doorway. As the daylight was getting dim, and as it would, in the estimation of the children, be the cruellest thing possible if the full glories of the wreath were not visible to the eyes ofthe strangers when they approached Sleepy Hollow, lamps were cunningly placed in positions where their full light could fall on the large “Welcome,” which was almost the unaided work of the twins and their small brothers.
But now six o’clock was drawing near, and Polly and Firefly joined the rest of the children in the hall. The whole house was in perfect order; an excellent supper would be ready at any moment, and there was little doubt that when the strangers did appear they would receive a most hearty welcome.
“Wheels at last!” said Bunny, turning a somersault in the air.
“Hurrah! Three cheers for the barbarians!” sang out Firefly.
“I do hope Virginia will be beautiful,” whispered Polly, under her breath.
Helen went and stood on the doorsteps. Polly suddenly raised a colored lamp, and waved it above her head.
“Welcome” smiled down from the enormous wreath, and shone on the features of each Maybright as the Doctor opened the door of the carriage, and helped a tall, slender girl, and a little boy in a black velvet suit, to get out.
“Our travelers are very hungry, Polly,” he said, “and—and—very tired. Yes, I see you have prepared things nicely for them. But first of all they must have supper, and after that I shall prescribe bed. Welcome, my dear children, to Sleepy Hollow! May it be a happy home to you both.”
“Thank you,” said the girl.
She had a pale face, a quantity of long light hair, and dreamy, sleepy eyes; the boy, on the contrary, had an alert and watchful expression; he clung to his sister, and looked in her face when she spoke.
“Do tell us what you are called,” said Polly. “We are all just dying to know. Oh! I trust, I do trust that you are really Paul and Virginia. How perfectly lovely it would be if those were your real names.”
The tall girl looked full into Polly’s eyes, a strange, sweet, wistful light filled her own, her words came out musically.
“I am Flower,” she said, “and this is David. I am thirteen years old, and David is eight. Father sent us away because after mother died there was no one to take care of us.”
A sigh of intense interest and sympathy fell from the lips of all the young Maybrights.
“Come upstairs, Flower; we know quite well how to be sorry for you,” said Helen.
She took the strange girl’s hand, and led her up the broad staircase.
“I’ll stay below,” said David. “I’m not the least tired, and my hands don’t want washing. Who’s the jolliest here? Couldn’t we have a game of ball? I haven’t played ball since I left Ballarat. Flower wouldn’t let me. She said I might when I came here. She spoke about coming here all thetime, and she always wanted to see your mother. She cried the whole of last night because your mother was dead. Now has nobody got a ball, and won’t the jolliest begin?”
“I’ll play with you, David,” said Polly. “Now catch; there! once, twice, thrice. Aren’t you starving? I want my tea, if you don’t.”
“Flower said I wasn’t to ask for anything to eat now that your mother is dead,” responded David. “She said it wasn’t likely we’d stay, but that while we did I was to be on my good behavior. I hate being on my good behavior; but Flower’s an awful mistress. Yes, of course, I’m starving.”
“Well, come in to tea, then,” said Polly, laughing. “Perhaps you will stay, and anyhow we are glad to have you for a little. Children, please don’t stare so hard.”
“I don’t mind,” said David. “They may stare if it pleases them; I rather like it.”
“Like being stared at!” repeated Firefly, whose own sensitive little nature resented the most transient glance.
“Yes,” responded David, calmly; “it shows that I’m admired; and I know that I’m a very handsome boy.”
So he was, with dark eyes like a gipsy, and a splendid upright figure and bearing. Far from being the barbarian of Polly’s imagination, he had some of the airs and graces of a born aristocrat. His calm remarks and utter coolness astonished the little Maybrights, who rather shrank away from him, and left him altogether to Polly’s patronage.
At this moment Helen and the young Australian girl came down together. David instantly trotted up to his sister.
“She thinks that perhaps we’ll stay, Flower,” pointing with his finger at Polly, “and in that case I needn’t keep up my company manners, need I?”
“But you must behave well, David,” responded Flower, “or the English nation will fancy we are not civilized.”
She smiled in a lovely languid way at her brother, and looked round with calm indifference at the boys and girls who pressed close to her.
“Come and have tea,” said Helen.
She placed Flower at her right hand. The Doctor took the head of the table, and the meal progressed more or less in silence. Flower was too lazy or too delicate to eat much. David spent all his time in trying to make Firefly laugh, and in avoiding the Doctor’s penetrating glance. The Maybrights were too astonished at the appearance of their guests to feel thoroughly at ease. Polly had a sensation of things being somehow rather flat, and the Doctor wondered much in his inward soul how this new experiment would work.