“At that time,” he went on, “a great tidal wave of selfishness was sweeping over human thought. Right and Wrong had somehow been transformed into Gain and Loss, and Religion had become a sort of commercial transaction. We may be thankful that our preachers are beginning to take a nobler view of life.”
“But is it not taught again and again in theBible?” I ventured to ask.
“Not in the Bible as awhole,” said Arthur. “In the Old Testament, no doubt, rewards and punishments are constantly appealed to as motives for action. That teaching is best forchildren, and the Israelites seem to have been, mentally,utterchildren. We guide our children thus, at first: but we appeal, as soon as possible, to their innate sense of Right and Wrong: and, whenthatstage is safely past, we appeal to the highest motive of all, the desire for likeness to, and union with, the Supreme Good. I think you will find that to be the teaching of the Bible,as a whole, beginning with ‘that thy days may be long in the land,’ and ending with ‘be ye perfect, even as your Father which is in heaven is perfect.’”
We were silent for awhile, and then Arthur went off on another tack. “Look at the literature of Hymns, now. How cankered it is, through and through, with selfishness! There are few human compositions more utterly degraded than some modern Hymns!”
I quoted the stanza
“Whatever, Lord, we lend to Thee,Repaid a thousandfold shall be,Then gladly will we give to Thee,Giver of all!”
“Whatever, Lord, we lend to Thee,
Repaid a thousandfold shall be,
Then gladly will we give to Thee,
Giver of all!”
“Yes,” he said grimly: “that is the typical stanza. And the very last charity-sermon I heard was infected with it. After giving many good reasons for charity, the preacher wound up with ‘and, for all you give, you will be repaid a thousandfold!’ Oh the utter meanness of such a motive, to be put before men whodoknow what self-sacrifice is, whocanappreciate generosity and heroism! Talk of OriginalSin!” he went on with increasing bitterness. “Can you have a stronger proof of the Original Goodness there must be in this nation, than the fact that Religion has beenpreached to us, as a commercial speculation, for a century, and that we still believe in a God?”
“It couldn’t have gone on so long,” Lady Muriel musingly remarked, “if the Opposition hadn’t been practically silenced—put under what the French callla clôture. Surely in any lecture-hall, or in private society, such teaching would soon have been hooted down?”
“I trust so,” said Arthur: “and, though I don’t want to see ‘brawling in church’ legalised, I must say that our preachers enjoy anenormousprivilege—which they ill deserve, and which they misuse terribly. We put our man into a pulpit, and we virtually tell him ‘Now, you may stand there and talk to us for half-an-hour. We won’t interrupt you by so much as aword! You shall have it all your own way!’ And what does he give us in return? Shallow twaddle, that, if it were addressed to you over a dinner-table, you would think ‘Does the man take me for afool?’”
The return of Eric from his walk checked the tide of Arthur’s eloquence, and, after a few minutes’ talk on more conventional topics, we took our leave. Lady Muriel walked withus to the gate. “You have given me much to think about,” she said earnestly, as she gave Arthur her hand. “I’m so glad you came in!” And her words brought a real glow of pleasure into that pale worn face of his.
On the Tuesday, as Arthur did not seem equal to more walking, I took a long stroll by myself, having stipulated that he was not to give thewholeday to his books, but was to meet me at the Hall at about tea-time. On my way back, I passed the Station just as the afternoon-train came in sight, and sauntered down the stairs to see it come in. But there was little to gratify my idle curiosity: and, when the train was empty, and the platform clear, I found it was about time to be moving on, if I meant to reach the Hall by five.
As I approached the end of the platform, from which a steep irregular wooden staircase conducted to the upper world, I noticed two passengers, who had evidently arrived by the train, but who, oddly enough, had entirely escaped my notice, though the arrivals had been so few. They were a young woman and a little girl: the former, so far as one couldjudge by appearances, was a nursemaid, or possibly a nursery-governess, in attendance on the child, whose refined face, even more than her dress, distinguished her as of a higher class than her companion.
The child’s face was refined, but it was also a worn and sad one, and told a tale (or so I seemed to read it) of much illness and suffering, sweetly and patiently borne. She had a little crutch to help herself along with: and she was now standing, looking wistfully up the long staircase, and apparently waiting till she could muster courage to begin the toilsome ascent.
There are some things onesaysin life—as well as things onedoes—which come automatically, byreflex action, as the physiologists say (meaning, no doubt, actionwithoutreflection, just aslucusis said to be derived ‘a non lucendo’). Closing one’s eyelids, when something seems to be flying into the eye, is one of those actions, and saying “May I carry the little girl up the stairs?” was another. It wasn’t that any thought of offering help occurred to me, and thatthenI spoke: thefirst intimation I had, of being likely to make that offer, was the sound of my own voice, and the discovery that the offer had been made. The servant paused, doubtfully glancing from her charge to me, and then back again to the child. “Would you like it, dear?” she asked her. But no such doubt appeared to cross the child’s mind: she lifted her arms eagerly to be taken up. “Please!” was all she said, while a faint smile flickered on the weary little face. I took her up with scrupulous care, and her little arm was at once clasped trustfully round my neck.
THE LAME CHILDTHE LAME CHILD
THE LAME CHILD
She was averylight weight—so light, in fact, that the ridiculous idea crossed my mind that it was rather easier going up, withher in my arms, than it would have been without her: and, when we reached the road above, with its cart-ruts and loose stones—all formidable obstacles for a lame child—I found that I had said “I’d better carry her over this rough place,” before I had formed anymentalconnection between its roughness and my gentle little burden. “Indeed it’s troubling you too much, Sir!” the maid exclaimed. “She can walk very well on the flat.” But the arm, that was twined about my neck, clung just an atom more closely at the suggestion, and decided me to say “She’s no weight, really. I’ll carry her a little further. I’m going your way.”
The nurse raised no further objection: and the next speaker was a ragged little boy, with bare feet, and a broom over his shoulder, who ran across the road, and pretended to sweep the perfectly dry road in front of us. “Give us a ‘ap’ny!” the little urchin pleaded, with a broad grin on his dirty face.
“Don’tgive him a ‘ap’ny!” said the little lady in my arms. Thewordssounded harsh: but thetonewas gentleness itself. “He’s anidlelittle boy!” And she laughed a laugh ofsuch silvery sweetness as I had never yet heard from any lips but Sylvie’s. To my astonishment, the boy actuallyjoinedin the laugh, as if there were some subtle sympathy between them, as he ran away down the road and vanished through a gap in the hedge.
But he was back in a few moments, having discarded his broom and provided himself, from some mysterious source, with an exquisite bouquet of flowers. “Buy a posy, buy a posy! Only a ‘ap’ny!” he chanted, with the melancholy drawl of a professional beggar.
“Don’tbuy it!” was Her Majesty’s edict, as she looked down, with a lofty scorn that seemed curiously mixed with tender interest, on the ragged creature at her feet.
But this time I turned rebel, and ignored the royal commands. Such lovely flowers, and of forms so entirely new to me, were not to be abandoned at the bidding of any little maid, however imperious. I bought the bouquet: and the little boy, after popping the halfpenny into his mouth, turned head-over-heels, as if to ascertain whether the human mouth is really adapted to serve as a money-box.
With wonder, that increased every moment, I turned over the flowers, and examined them one by one: there was not a single one among them that I could remember having ever seen before. At last I turned to the nursemaid. “Do these flowers grow wild about here? I never saw——” but the speech died away on my lips. The nursemaid had vanished!
“You can put me down,now, if you like,” Sylvie quietly remarked.
I obeyed in silence, and could only ask myself “Is this adream?”, on finding Sylvie and Bruno walking one on either side of me, and clinging to my hands with the ready confidence of childhood.
“You’re larger than when I saw you last!” I began. “Really I think we ought to be introduced again! There’s so much of you that I never met before, you know.”
“Very well!” Sylvie merrily replied. “This isBruno. It doesn’t take long. He’s only got one name!”
“There’sanothername to me!” Bruno protested, with a reproachful look at the Mistress of the Ceremonies. “And it’s—‘Esquire’!”
“Oh, of course. I forgot,” said Sylvie. “Bruno—Esquire!”
“And did you come here to meetme, my children?” I enquired.
“You know Isaidwe’d come on Tuesday,” Sylvie explained. “Are we the proper size for common children?”
“Quite the right size forchildren,” I replied, (adding mentally “though notcommonchildren, by any means!”) “But what became of the nursemaid?”
“It aregone!” Bruno solemnly replied.
“Then it wasn’t solid, like Sylvie and you?”
“No. Oo couldn’ttouchit, oo know. If oo walkedatit, oo’d go right froo!”
“I quite expected you’d find it out, once,” said Sylvie. “Bruno ran it against a telegraph post, by accident. And it went in two halves. But you were looking the other way.”
I felt that I had indeed missed an opportunity: to witness such an event as a nursemaid going ‘in two halves’ does not occur twice in a life-time!
“When did oo guess it were Sylvie?” Bruno enquired.
‘IT WENT IN TWO HALVES’‘IT WENT IN TWO HALVES’
‘IT WENT IN TWO HALVES’
“I didn’t guess it, till itwasSylvie,” I said. “But how did you manage the nursemaid?”
“Brunomanaged it,” said Sylvie. “It’s called a Phlizz.”
“And how do you make a Phlizz, Bruno?”
“The Professor teached me how,” said Bruno. “First oo takes a lot of air——”
“Oh,Bruno!” Sylvie interposed. “The Professor said you weren’t to tell!”
“But who did hervoice?” I asked.
“Indeed it’s troubling you too much, Sir! She can walk very well on the flat.”
Bruno laughed merrily as I turned hastily from side to side, looking in all directions for the speaker. “That wereme!” he gleefully proclaimed, in his own voice.
“She can indeed walk very well on the flat,” I said. “And I thinkIwas the Flat.”
By this time we were near the Hall. “This is where my friends live,” I said. “Will you come in and have some tea with them?”
Bruno gave a little jump of joy: and Sylvie said “Yes, please. You’d like some tea, Bruno, wouldn’t you? He hasn’t tastedtea,” she explained to me, “since we left Outland.”
“Andthatweren’tgoodtea!” said Bruno. “It were sowellyweak!”
Lady Muriel’s smile of welcome could notquiteconceal the look of surprise with which she regarded my new companions.
I presented them in due form. “This isSylvie, Lady Muriel. And this isBruno.”
“Any surname?” she enquired, her eyes twinkling with fun.
“No,” I said gravely. “No surname.”
She laughed, evidently thinking I said it in fun; and stooped to kiss the children—a salute to whichBrunosubmitted with reluctance:Sylviereturned it with interest.
While she and Arthur (who had arrived before me) supplied the children with tea and cake, I tried to engage the Earl in conversation: but he was restless anddistrait, and we made little progress. At last, by a sudden question, he betrayed the cause of his disquiet.
“Wouldyou let me look at those flowers you have in your hand?”
“Willingly!” I said, handing him the bouquet. Botany was, I knew, a favourite study of his: and these flowers were to me so entirely new and mysterious, that I was really curious to see what a botanist would say of them.
They didnotdiminish his disquiet. On the contrary, he became every moment more excited as he turned them over. “Theseare all from Central India!” he said, laying aside part of the bouquet. “They are rare, even there: and I have never seen them in any other part of the world.Thesetwo are Mexican—Thisone—” (He rose hastily, and carried it to the window, to examine it in a better light, the flush of excitement mounting to his very forehead) “—is, I am nearly sure—but I have a book of Indian Botany here—” He took avolume from the book-shelves, and turned the leaves with trembling fingers. “Yes! Compare it with this picture! It is the exact duplicate! This is the flower of the Upas-tree, which usually grows only in the depths of forests; and the flower fades so quickly after being plucked, that it is scarcely possible to keep its form or colour even so far as the outskirts of the forest! Yet this is in full bloom!Wheredid you get these flowers?” he added with breathless eagerness.
I glanced at Sylvie, who, gravely and silently, laid her finger on her lips, then beckoned to Bruno to follow her, and ran out into the garden; and I found myself in the position of a defendant whose two most important witnesses have been suddenly taken away. “Let me give you the flowers!” I stammered out at last, quite ‘at my wit’s end’ as to how to get out of the difficulty. “You know much more about them than I do!”
“I accept them most gratefully! But you have not yet told me—” the Earl was beginning, when we were interrupted, to my great relief, by the arrival of Eric Lindon.
ToArthur, however, the new-comer was, I saw clearly, anything but welcome. His face clouded over: he drew a little back from the circle, and took no further part in the conversation, which was wholly maintained, for some minutes, by Lady Muriel and her lively cousin, who were discussing some new music that had just arrived from London.
“Do just try this one!” he pleaded. “The music looks easy to sing at sight, and the song’s quite appropriate to the occasion.”
“Then I suppose it’s
‘Five o’clock tea!Ever to theeFaithful I’ll be,Five o’clock tea!’”
‘Five o’clock tea!
Ever to thee
Faithful I’ll be,
Five o’clock tea!’”
laughed Lady Muriel, as she sat down to the piano, and lightly struck a few random chords.
“Not quite: and yet itisa kind of ‘ever to thee faithful I’ll be!’ It’s a pair of hapless lovers:hecrosses the briny deep: andsheis left lamenting.”
“That isindeedappropriate!” she replied mockingly, as he placed the song before her.
“And amIto do the lamenting? And who for, if you please?”
She played the air once or twice through, first in quick, and finally in slow, time; and then gave us the whole song with as much graceful ease as if she had been familiar with it all her life:—
“He stept so lightly to the land,All in his manly pride:He kissed her cheek, he pressed her hand,Yet still she glanced aside.‘Too gay he seems,’ she darkly dreams,‘Too gallant and too gayTo think of me—poor simple me—When he is far away!’
“He stept so lightly to the land,
All in his manly pride:
He kissed her cheek, he pressed her hand,
Yet still she glanced aside.
‘Too gay he seems,’ she darkly dreams,
‘Too gallant and too gay
To think of me—poor simple me—
When he is far away!’
‘I bring my Love this goodly pearlAcross the seas,’ he said:‘A gem to deck the dearest girlThat ever sailor wed!’She clasps it tight: her eyes are bright:Her throbbing heart would say‘He thought of me—he thought of me—When he was far away!’
‘I bring my Love this goodly pearl
Across the seas,’ he said:
‘A gem to deck the dearest girl
That ever sailor wed!’
She clasps it tight: her eyes are bright:
Her throbbing heart would say
‘He thought of me—he thought of me—
When he was far away!’
The ship has sailed into the West:Her ocean-bird is flown:A dull dead pain is in her breast,And she is weak and lone;Yet there’s a smile upon her face,A smile that seems to say‘He’ll think of me—he’ll think of me—When he is far away!
The ship has sailed into the West:
Her ocean-bird is flown:
A dull dead pain is in her breast,
And she is weak and lone;
Yet there’s a smile upon her face,
A smile that seems to say
‘He’ll think of me—he’ll think of me—
When he is far away!
‘Though waters wide between us glide,Our lives are warm and near:No distance parts two faithful hearts—Two hearts that love so dear:And I will trust my sailor-lad,For ever and a day,To think of me—to think of me—When he is far away!’”
‘Though waters wide between us glide,
Our lives are warm and near:
No distance parts two faithful hearts—
Two hearts that love so dear:
And I will trust my sailor-lad,
For ever and a day,
To think of me—to think of me—
When he is far away!’”
The look of displeasure, which had begun to come over Arthur’s face when the young Captain spoke of Love so lightly, faded away as the song proceeded, and he listened with evident delight. But his face darkened again when Eric demurely remarked “Don’t you think ‘mysoldier-lad’ would have fitted the tune just as well!”
“Why, so it would!” Lady Muriel gaily retorted. “Soldiers, sailors, tinkers, tailors, what a lot of words would fit in! I think ‘mytinker-lad’ sounds best. Don’tyou?”
To spare my friend further pain, I rose to go, just as the Earl was beginning to repeat his particularly embarrassing question about the flowers.
“You have not yet——”
“Yes, I’vehadsome tea, thank you!” I hastily interrupted him. “And now we reallymustbe going. Good evening, Lady Muriel!” And we made our adieux, and escaped, while the Earl was still absorbed in examining the mysterious bouquet.
Lady Muriel accompanied us to the door. “Youcouldn’thave given my father a more acceptable present!” she said, warmly. “He is so passionately fond of Botany. I’m afraidIknow nothing of thetheoryof it, but I keep hisHortus Siccusin order. I must get some sheets of blotting-paper, and dry these new treasures for him before they fade.”
“Thatwon’t be no good at all!” said Bruno, who was waiting for us in the garden.
“Why won’t it?” said I. “You know Ihadto give the flowers, to stop questions.”
“Yes, it ca’n’t be helped,” said Sylvie: “but theywillbe sorry when they find them gone!”
“But how will they go?”
“Well, I don’t knowhow. But theywillgo. The nosegay was only aPhlizz, you know. Bruno made it up.”
These last words were in a whisper, as she evidently did not wish Arthur to hear. But of this there seemed to be little risk: he hardly seemed to notice the children, but paced on, silent and abstracted; and when, at the entrance to the wood, they bid us a hasty farewell and ran off, he seemed to wake out of a day-dream.
The bouquet vanished, as Sylvie had predicted; and when, a day or two afterwards, Arthur and I once more visited the Hall, we found the Earl and his daughter, with the old housekeeper, out in the garden, examining the fastenings of the drawing-room window.
“We are holding an Inquest,” Lady Muriel said, advancing to meet us: “and we admit you, as Accessories before the Fact, to tell us all you know about those flowers.”
“The Accessories before the Fact decline to answeranyquestions,” I gravely replied. “And they reserve their defence.”
“Well then, turn Queen’s Evidence, please! The flowers have disappeared in the night,” she went on, turning to Arthur, “and we arequitesure no one in the house has meddled with them. Somebody must have entered by the window——”
“But the fastenings have not been tampered with,” said the Earl.
“It must have been while you were dining, my Lady,” said the housekeeper.
“That was it,” said the Earl. “The thief must have seen you bring the flowers,” turning to me, “and have noticed that you didnottake them away. And he must have known their great value—they are simplypriceless!” he exclaimed, in sudden excitement.
“And you never told us how you got them!” said Lady Muriel.
“Some day,” I stammered, “I may be free to tell you. Just now, would you excuse me?”
The Earl looked disappointed, but kindly said “Very well, we will ask no questions.”
FIVE O’CLOCK TEAFIVE O’CLOCK TEA
FIVE O’CLOCK TEA
“But we consider you averybad Queen’s Evidence,” Lady Muriel added playfully, as we entered the arbour. “We pronounce you to be an accomplice: and we sentence you to solitary confinement, and to be fed on bread and—butter. Do you take sugar?”
“It is disquieting, certainly,” she resumed, when all ‘creature-comforts’ had been duly supplied, “to find that the house has been entered by a thief—in this out-of-the-way place. If only the flowers had beeneatables, one might have suspected a thief of quite another shape——”
“You mean that universal explanation for all mysterious disappearances, ‘thecatdid it’?” said Arthur.
“Yes,” she replied. “What a convenient thing it would be if all thieves had the same shape! It’s so confusing to have some of them quadrupeds and others bipeds!”
“It has occurred to me,” said Arthur, “as a curious problem in Teleology—the Science of Final Causes,” he added, in answer to an enquiring look from Lady Muriel.
“And a Final Cause is——?”
“Well, suppose we say—the last of a series of connected events—each of the series being the cause of the next—for whose sake the first event takes place.”
“But the last event is practically aneffectof the first, isn’t it? And yet you call it acauseof it!”
Arthur pondered a moment. “The words are rather confusing, I grant you,” he said. “Will this do? The last event is an effect of the first: but thenecessityfor that event is a cause of thenecessityfor the first.”
“That seems clear enough,” said Lady Muriel. “Now let us have the problem.”
“It’s merely this. What object can we imagine in the arrangement by which each different size (roughly speaking) of living creatures has its special shape? For instance, the human race has one kind of shape—bipeds. Another set, ranging from the lion to the mouse, are quadrupeds. Go down a step or two further, and you come to insects with six legs—hexapods—a beautiful name, is it not? But beauty, in our sense of the word, seems to diminish as we go down: the creature becomesmore—I won’t say ‘ugly’ of any of God’s creatures—more uncouth. And, when we take the microscope, and go a few steps lower still, we come upon animalculæ, terribly uncouth, and with a terrible number of legs!”
“The other alternative,” said the Earl, “would be adiminuendoseries of repetitions of the same type. Never mind the monotony of it: let’s see how it would work in other ways. Begin with the race of men, and the creatures they require: let us say horses, cattle, sheep, and dogs—we don’t exactly require frogs and spiders, do we, Muriel?”
Lady Muriel shuddered perceptibly: it was evidently a painful subject. “We can dispense withthem,” she said gravely.
“Well, then we’ll have a second race of men, half-a-yard high——”
“—who would haveonesource of exquisite enjoyment, not possessed by ordinary men!” Arthur interrupted.
“Whatsource?” said the Earl.
“Why, the grandeur of scenery! Surely the grandeur of a mountain, tome, depends on itssize, relative to me? Double the heightof the mountain, and of course it’s twice as grand. Halvemyheight, and you produce the same effect.”
“Happy, happy, happy Small!” Lady Muriel murmured rapturously. “None but the Short, none but the Short, none but the Short enjoy the Tall!”
“But let me go on,” said the Earl. “We’ll have a third race of men, five inches high; a fourth race, an inch high——”
“They couldn’t eat common beef and mutton, I’m sure!” Lady Muriel interrupted.
“True, my child, I was forgetting. Each set must have its own cattle and sheep.”
“And its own vegetation,” I added. “What could a cow, an inch high, do with grass that waved far above its head?”
“That is true. We must have a pasture within a pasture, so to speak. The common grass would serve our inch-high cows as a green forest of palms, while round the root of each tall stem would stretch a tiny carpet of microscopic grass. Yes, I think our scheme will work fairly well. And it would be very interesting, coming into contact with the racesbelow us. What sweet little things the inch-high bull-dogs would be! I doubt if evenMurielwould run away from one of them!”
“Don’t you think we ought to have acrescendoseries, as well?” said Lady Muriel. “Only fancy being a hundred yards high! One could use an elephant as a paper-weight, and a crocodile as a pair of scissors!”
“And would you have races of different sizes communicate with one another?” I enquired. “Would they make war on one another, for instance, or enter into treaties?”
“Warwe must exclude, I think. When you could crush a whole nation with one blow of your fist, you couldn’t conduct war on equal terms. But anything, involving a collision ofmindsonly, would be possible in our ideal world—for of course we must allowmentalpowers to all, irrespective of size. Perhaps the fairest rule would be that, thesmallerthe race, thegreatershould be its intellectual development!”
“Do you mean to say,” said Lady Muriel, “that these manikins of an inch high are toarguewith me?”
“Surely, surely!” said the Earl. “An argument doesn’t depend for its logical force on thesizeof the creature that utters it!”
She tossed her head indignantly. “I wouldnotargue with any man less than six inches high!” she cried. “I’d make himwork!”
“What at?” said Arthur, listening to all this nonsense with an amused smile.
“Embroidery!” she readily replied. “Whatlovelyembroidery they would do!”
“Yet, if they did it wrong,” I said, “you couldn’targuethe question. I don’t knowwhy: but I agree that it couldn’t be done.”
“The reason is,” said Lady Muriel, “one couldn’t sacrifice one’sdignityso far.”
“Of course one couldn’t!” echoed Arthur. “Any more than one could argue with a potato. It would be altogether—excuse the ancient pun—infra dig.!”
“I doubt it,” said I. “Even a pun doesn’tquiteconvince me.”
“Well, if that isnotthe reason,” said Lady Muriel, “what reason would you give?”
I tried hard to understand the meaning of this question: but the persistent humming ofthe bees confused me, and there was a drowsiness in the air that made every thought stop and go to sleep before it had got well thought out: so all I could say was “That must depend on theweightof the potato.”
I felt the remark was not so sensible as I should have liked it to be. But Lady Muriel seemed to take it quite as a matter of course. “In that case——” she began, but suddenly started, and turned away to listen. “Don’t you hear him?” she said. “He’s crying. We must go to him, somehow.”
And I said to myself “That’s very strange! I quite thought it wasLady Murieltalking to me. Why, it’sSylvieall the while!” And I made another great effort to say something that should have some meaning in it. “Is it about the potato?”
“I don’t know,” said Sylvie. “Hush! I must think. I could go to him, by myself, well enough. But I wantyouto come too.”
“Let me go with you,” I pleaded. “I can walk as fast asyoucan, I’m sure.”
Sylvie laughed merrily. “What nonsense!” she cried. “Why, you ca’n’t walk a bit! You’re lying quite flat on your back! You don’t understand these things.”
“I can walk as well asyoucan,” I repeated. And I tried my best to walk a few steps: but the ground slipped away backwards, quite asfast as I could walk, so that I made no progress at all. Sylvie laughed again.
“There, I told you so! You’ve no idea how funny you look, moving your feet about in the air, as if you were walking! Wait a bit. I’ll ask the Professor what we’d better do.” And she knocked at his study-door.
The door opened, and the Professor looked out. “What’s that crying I heard just now?” he asked. “Is it a human animal?”
“It’s a boy,” Sylvie said.
“I’m afraid you’ve been teasing him?”
“No,indeedI haven’t!” Sylvie said, very earnestly. “Inevertease him!”
“Well, I must ask the Other Professor about it.” He went back into the study, and we heard him whispering “small human animal—says she hasn’t been teasing him—the kind that’s called Boy——”
“Ask herwhichBoy,” said a new voice. The Professor came out again.
“WhichBoy is it that you haven’t been teasing?”
Sylvie looked at me with twinkling eyes. “You dear old thing!” she exclaimed, standingon tiptoe to kiss him, while he gravely stooped to receive the salute. “How youdopuzzle me! Why, there areseveralboys I haven’t been teasing!”
The Professor returned to his friend: and this time the voice said “Tell her to bring them here—allof them!”
“I ca’n’t, and I won’t!” Sylvie exclaimed, the moment he reappeared. “It’sBrunothat’s crying: and he’s my brother: and, please, webothwant to go: he ca’n’t walk, you know: he’s—he’sdreaming, you know” (this in a whisper, for fear of hurting my feelings). “Dolet’s go through the Ivory Door!”
“I’ll ask him,” said the Professor, disappearing again. He returned directly. “He says you may. Follow me, and walk on tip-toe.”
The difficulty with me would have been, just then,notto walk on tip-toe. It seemed very hard to reach down far enough to just touch the floor, as Sylvie led me through the study.
The Professor went before us to unlock the Ivory Door. I had just time to glance at the Other Professor, who was sitting reading, with his back to us, before the Professor showed usout through the door, and locked it behind us. Bruno was standing with his hands over his face, crying bitterly.
‘WHAT’S THE MATTER, DARLING?’‘WHAT’S THE MATTER, DARLING?’
‘WHAT’S THE MATTER, DARLING?’
“What’s the matter, darling?” said Sylvie, with her arms round his neck.
“Hurted mine selfwellymuch!” sobbed the poor little fellow.
“I’msosorry, darling! How everdidyou manage to hurt yourself so?”
“Course I managed it!” said Bruno, laughing through his tears. “Doos oo think nobody else butooca’n’t manage things?”
Matters were looking distinctly brighter, now Bruno had begun to argue. “Come, let’s hear all about it!” I said.
“My foot took it into its head to slip——” Bruno began.
“A foot hasn’t got a head!” Sylvie put in, but all in vain.
“I slipted down the bank. And I tripted over a stone. And the stone hurted my foot! And I trod on a Bee. And the Bee stinged my finger!” Poor Bruno sobbed again. The complete list of woes was too much for his feelings. “And it knewed I didn’tmeanto trod on it!” he added, as the climax.
“That Bee should be ashamed of itself!” I said severely, and Sylvie hugged and kissed the wounded hero till all tears were dried.
“My finger’s quite unstung now!” said Bruno. “Why doos there be stones? Mister Sir, doos oo know?”
“They’re good forsomething,” I said: “even if we don’t knowwhat. What’s the good ofdandelions, now?”
“Dindledums?” said Bruno. “Oh, they’re ever so pretty! And stones aren’t pretty, one bit. Would oo like some dindledums, Mister Sir?”
“Bruno!” Sylvie murmured reproachfully. “You mustn’t say ‘Mister’ and ‘Sir,’ both at once! Remember what I told you!”
“You telled me I were to say ‘Mister’ when I spokedabouthim, and I were to say ‘Sir’ when I spokedtohim!”
“Well, you’re not doingboth, you know.”
“Ah, but Iisdoing bofe, Miss Praticular!” Bruno exclaimed triumphantly. “I wishted to speakaboutthe Gemplun—and I wishted to speaktothe Gemplun. So a course I said ‘Mister Sir’!”
“That’s all right, Bruno,” I said.
“Courseit’s all right!” said Bruno. “Sylvie just knows nuffin at all!”
“There neverwasan impertinenter boy!” said Sylvie, frowning till her bright eyes were nearly invisible.
“And there never was an ignoranter girl!” retorted Bruno. “Come along and pick some dindledums.That’s all she’s fit for!” he added in a very loud whisper to me.
“But why do you say ‘Dindledums,’ Bruno?Dandelionsis the right word.”
“It’s because he jumps about so,” Sylvie said, laughing.
“Yes, that’s it,” Bruno assented. “Sylvie tells me the words, and then, when I jump about, they get shooken up in my head—till they’re all froth!”
I expressed myself as perfectly satisfied with this explanation. “But aren’t you going to pick me any dindledums, after all?”
“Course we will!” cried Bruno. “Come along, Sylvie!” And the happy children raced away, bounding over the turf with the fleetness and grace of young antelopes.
“Then you didn’t find your way back to Outland?” I said to the Professor.
“Oh yes, I did!” he replied, “We never got to Queer Street; but I found another way. I’ve been backwards and forwards several times since then. I had to be present at the Election,you know, as the author of the new Money-Act. The Emperor was so kind as to wish thatIshould have the credit of it. ‘Let come what come may,’ (I remember the very words of the Imperial Speech) ‘if itshouldturn out that the Wardenisalive,youwill bear witness that the change in the coinage is theProfessor’sdoing, notmine!’ I never was so glorified in my life, before!” Tears trickled down his cheeks at the recollection, which apparently was notwhollya pleasant one.
“Is the Warden supposed to bedead?”
“Well, it’ssupposedso: but, mind you,Idon’t believe it! The evidence isveryweak—mere hear-say. A wandering Jester, with a Dancing-Bear (they found their way into the Palace, one day) has been telling people he comes from Fairyland, and that the Warden died there.Iwanted the Vice-Warden to question him, but, most unluckily, he and my Lady were always out walking when the Jester came round. Yes, the Warden’s supposed to be dead!” And more tears trickled down the old man’s cheeks.
“But what is the new Money-Act?”
The Professor brightened up again. “The Emperor started the thing,” he said. “He wanted to make everybody in Outland twice as rich as he was before—just to make the new Government popular. Only there wasn’t nearly enough money in the Treasury to do it. SoIsuggested that he might do it by doubling the value of every coin and bank-note in Outland. It’s the simplest thing possible. I wonder nobody ever thought of it before! And you never saw such universal joy. The shops are full from morning to night. Everybody’s buying everything!”
“And how was the glorifying done?”
A sudden gloom overcast the Professor’s jolly face. “They did it as I went home after the Election,” he mournfully replied. “It was kindly meant—but I didn’t like it! They waved flags all round me till I was nearly blind: and they rang bells till I was nearly deaf: and they strewed the road so thick with flowers that I lost my way!” And the poor old man sighed deeply.
“How far is it to Outland?” I asked, to change the subject.
“About five days’ march. But onemustgo back—occasionally. You see, as Court-Professor, I have to bealwaysin attendance on Prince Uggug. The Empress would beveryangry if I left him, even for an hour.”
“But surely, every time you come here, you are absent ten days, at least?”
“Oh, more than that!” the Professor exclaimed. “A fortnight, sometimes. But of course I keep a memorandum of the exact time when I started, so that I can put the Court-time back to the very moment!”
“Excuse me,” I said. “I don’t understand.”
Silently the Professor drew from his pocket a square gold watch, with six or eight hands, and held it out for my inspection. “This,” he began, “is an Outlandish Watch——”
“So I should have thought.”
“—which has the peculiar property that, instead ofitsgoing with thetime, thetimegoes withit. I trust you understand me now?”
“Hardly,” I said.
“Permit me to explain. So long as it is let alone, it takes its own course. Time hasnoeffect upon it.”