I
I frankly admit, whatever may be the consequences of doing so, that I was not fond of Barnjum; in fact, I detested him. Everything that fellow said and did jarred upon me to an absolutely indescribable extent, although I did not discover for some time that he regarded me with a strange and unreasonable aversion.
We were so essentially unlike in almost every particular—I, with my innate refinement and high culture, my over-fastidious exclusiveness in the choice of associates; and he, a big, red, coarse brute, with neither sweetness nor light, who knew himself a Philistine, and seemed to like it—we were so unlike, that I often asked him, with a genuine desire for information,whathad I in common with him?
And yet it will scarcely be believed, perhaps, that with such good reasons for keeping apart, we were continually seeking one another's company with a zest that knew no satiety. The only explanation I can offer for such a phenomenon is, that our mutual antipathy had become so much a part of ourselves, that we could not let it perish for lack of nourishment.
Perhaps we were not conscious of this at the time, and when we agreed to go on a walking tour together in North Wales, I think it was chiefly because we knew that we could devise no surer means of annoying one another; but, however that may be, in an ill-starred day for my own peace of mind, we started upon a journey from which but one of us was fated to return.
I pass by the painful experiences of the first few days of that unhappy tour. I will say nothing of Barnjum's grovelling animalism, of his consummate selfishness, his more than bucolic indifference to the charms of Nature, nor even of the mean and sordid way in which he contrived to let me in for railway tickets and hotel bills.
I wish to tell my melancholy story with perfect impartiality, and I am sure that I am not reduced to exciting any prejudice to secure the sympathies of all readers.
I shall pass, then, to the memorable day when mydisgust, so long pent up, so imperfectly concealed, culminated in one grand outburst of a not ignoble indignation, to the hour when I summoned up moral courage to sever the bonds which linked us so unequally.
I remember it so well, that brilliant morning in June when we left the Temperance Hotel, Doldwyddlm, and scaled in sulky silence the craggy heights of Cader Idris, which, I presume, still overhang that picturesque village, while, as we ascended, an ever-changing and ever-improving panorama unrolled itself before my delighted eyes.
The air up there was keen and bracing, and I recollect that I could not repress an æsthetic shudder at the crude and primitive tone which Barnjum's nose had assumed under atmospheric influences. I mentioned this (for we still maintained the outward forms of friendship), when he retorted, with the brutal personality which formed so strong an ingredient of his character, that if I could only see myself in that suit of mine, and that hat (referring to the dress I was then wearing), I should feel the propriety of letting his nose alone. To which I replied, with a sarcasm that I feel now was a little too crushing, that I had every intention of doing so, as it was quite painful enough to merely contemplate such a spectacle; and he, evidently meaning to be offensive, remarked, that no one could help his nose getting red, but that any man in my position could at leastdresslike a gentlemanI took no notice of this insult; a Bunting (I don't think I mentioned before that my name is Philibert Bunting)—a Bunting can afford to pass such insinuations by; indeed, I find it actually cheaper to do so, and I flattered myself that my dress was distinguished by a sort of studied looseness, that would appeal at once to a cultivated and artistic eye, though of course Barnjum's hard and shallow organs could not be expected to appreciate it.
I overlooked it, then, and presently we found ourselves skirting the edge of a huge chasm, whose steep sides sloped sheer down into the slate-blue waters of the lake below.
How can I hope to give an idea of the magnificent view which met our eyes as we stood there—a view of which, as far as I am aware, no description has ever yet been attempted?
To our right towered the Peaks of Dolgelly, with their saw-like outline cutting the blue sky with a faint grating sound, while the shreds of white cloud lay below in drifts. At our feet were the sun-lit waters of the lake, upon which danced a fleet of brown-sailed herring-boats; beyond was the plain of Capel Curig, and there, over on the left, sparkled the falls of Y-Dydd.
As I took all this in I felt a longing to say something worthy of the occasion. Being possessed of a considerable fund of carefully-dried and selected humour, I frequently amuse myself by a species ofintellectual exercise, which consists in so framing a remark that a word or more therein may bear two entirely opposite constructions; and some of the quaint names of the vicinity seemed to me just then admirably adapted for this purpose.
I was about to gauge my dull-witted companion's capacity by some such test, when he forestalled me.
'You ought to live up here, Bunting,' said he; 'you were made for this identical old mountain.'
I was not displeased, for, Londoner as I am, I have the nerve and steadiness of a practised mountaineer.
'Perhaps I was,' I said good-humouredly; 'but how didyoufind it out?'
'I'll tell you,' he replied, with one of his odious grins. 'This is Cader Idris, ain't it? well, and you're acad awry dressed, ain't you? Cader Idrissed, see?' (he was dastard enough to explain) 'That's howIget at it!'
He must have been laboriously leading up to that for the last ten minutes!
I solemnly declare that it was not the personal outrage that roused me; I simply felt that a paltry verbal quibble of that description, emitted amidst such scenery and at that altitude, required a protest in the name of indignant Nature, and I protested accordingly, although with an impetuosity which I afterwards regretted, and of which I cannot even now entirely approve.
He happened to be standing on the brink of an abyss, and had just turned his back upon me, as, with a vigorous thrust of my right foot, I launched him into the blue æther, with the chuckle at his unhallowed jest still hovering upon his lips.
I am aware that by such an act I took a liberty which, under ordinary circumstances, even the licence of a life-long friendship would scarcely have justified; but I thought it only due to myself to let him see plainly that I desired our acquaintanceship to cease from that instant, and Barnjum was the kind of man upon whom a more delicate hint would have been distinctly thrown away.
I watched his progress with some interest as he rebounded from point to point during his descent. I waited—punctiliously, perhaps, until the echoes he had aroused had died away on the breeze, and then, slowly and thoughtfully, I retraced my steps, and left a spot which was already becoming associated for me with memories the reverse of pleasurable.
I took the next up-train, and before I reached town had succeeded in dismissing the incident from my mind, or if I thought of it at all, it was only to indulge relief at the reflection that I had shaken off Barnjum for ever.
But when I had paid my cab, and was taking out my latch-key, a curious thing happened—the driver called me back.
'Beg pardon, sir,' he said hoarsely, 'but I think you've bin and left something white in my cab!'
I turned and looked in: there, grinning at me from the interior of the hansom, over the folding-doors, was the wraith of Barnjum!
I had presence of mind enough to thank the man for his honesty, and go upstairs to my rooms with as little noise as possible. Barnjum's ghost, as I expected, followed me in, and sat down coolly before the fire, in my arm-chair, thus giving me an opportunity of subjecting the apparition to a thorough examination.
It was quite the conventional ghost, filmy, transparent, and, though wanting firmness in outline, a really passable likeness of Barnjum. Before I retired to rest I had thrown both my boots and the contents of my bookcase completely through the thing, without appearing to cause it more than a temporary inconvenience—which convinced me that it was indeed a being from another world.
Its choice of garments struck me even then as decidedly unusual. I am not narrow; I cheerfully allow that, assuming the necessity for apparitions at all, it is well that they should be clothed in robes of some kind; but Barnjum's ghost delighted in a combination of costume which set the fitness of things at defiance.
It wore that evening, for instance, to the best of my recollection, striped pantaloons, a surplice, and animmense cocked hat; but on subsequent occasions its changes of costume were so rapid and eccentric, that I ceased to pay much attention to them, and could only explain them on the supposition that somewhere in space there exists a supernatural store in the nature of a theatrical wardrobe, and that Barnjum's ghost had the run of it.
I had not been in very long before my landlady came up to see if I wanted anything, and of course as soon as she came in, she saw the wraith. At first she objected to it very strongly, declaring that she would not have such nasty things inherhouse, and if I wanted to keep ghosts, I had better go somewhere else; but I pacified her at last by representing that it would give her no extra trouble, and that I was only taking care of it for a friend.
When she had gone, however, I sat up till late, thinking calmly over my position, and the complications which might be expected to ensue from it.
It would be very easy to harrow the reader's feelings and work upon his sympathies here by a telling description of my terror and my guilty confusion at the unforeseen consequences of what I had done. But I think, in relating an experience of this kind, the straightforward way is always the best, and I do not care to heighten the effect by attributing to myself a variety of sensations which I do not remember to have actually felt at the time.
My first impression had not unnaturally been thatthe spectre was merely the product of overwrought nerves or indigestion, but it seemed improbable that a cabman should be plagued by a morbid activity of imagination, and that a landlady's digestion could be delicate sufficiently to evolve a thing so far removed from the merely commonplace; and, reluctantly enough, I was forced to the conclusion that it was a real ghost, and would probably continue to haunt me to the end of my days.
Of course I was disgusted by this exhibition of petty revenge and low malice on the part of Barnjum, which might be tolerated perhaps in a Christmas annual, with a full-page illustration, but which, in real life and the height of summer, was a glaring anachronism.
Still, it was of no use to repine then; I resolved to look at the thing in a common-sense light—I told myself that I had made my ghost, and would have to live with it. And after all, I had much to be thankful for: Barnjum in the spirit was a decided improvement upon Barnjum in the flesh; and as the spirit did not appear to be gifted with speech, it was unlikely to tell tales.
Luckily for me, too, Barnjum was absolutely unknown about town: his only relative was an aunt resident at Camberwell, and so there was no danger of any suspicion being excited by chance recognition in the circles to which I belonged.
It would have been folly to shut one's eyes to thefact that it might require considerable nerve to re-enter society closely attended by an obscure and fancifully-attired apparition.
Society would sneer considerably at first and make remarks, but I was full of tact and knowledge of the world, and I knew, too, that men have overcome far more formidable obstacles to social success than any against which I should be called upon to contend.
And so, instead of weakly giving way to unreasonable panic, I took the more manly course of determining to live it down, with what success I shall have presently to show.
When I went out after breakfast the next morning, Barnjum's ghost insisted upon coming too, and followed me, to my intense annoyance, all down St. James's Street; in fact, for many weeks it was almost constantly by my side, and rendered me the innocent victim of mingled curiosity and aversion.
I thought it best to affect to be unaware of the presence of anything of a ghostly nature, and when taxed with it, ascribed it to the diseased fancy of my interlocutor; but, by-and-by, as the whole town began to ring with the story, I found it impossible to pretend ignorance any longer.
So I gave out that it was an artfully-contrived piece of spectral mechanism, of which I was the inventor, and for which I contemplated taking out a patent; and this would have earned for me a highreputation in the scientific world if Messrs. Maskelyne and Cooke had not grown envious of my fame, declaring that they had long since anticipated the secret of my machine, and could manufacture one in every way superior to it, which they presently did.
Then I was obliged to confide (in the strictest secrecy) to two members of the Peerage (both persons of irreproachable breeding, with whom I was at that time exceedingly intimate) that it was indeed abonâ fideapparition, and that I rather liked such things about me. I cannot explain how it happened, but in a very short time the story had gone the round of the clubs and drawing-rooms, and I found myself launched as a lion of the largest size—if it is strictly correct to speak of launching a lion.
I received invitations everywhere, on the tacit understanding that I was to bring my ghost, and the wraith of Barnjum, as some who read this may remember, was to be seen at all the best houses in town for the remainder of the season; while in the following autumn, I was asked down for the shooting by several wealthyparvenus, with a secret hope, unless I am greatly mistaken, that the ghost might conceive the idea of remaining with them permanently, thereby imparting to their brand-new palaces the necessary flavour of legend and mystery; but of course it never did.
To tell the truth, whatever novelty there was about it soon wore off—too soon, in fact, for, fickleas society is, I have no hesitation in asserting that we ought to have lasted it at least a second season, if only Barnjum's ghost had not persisted in making itself so ridiculously cheap that, in little more than a fortnight, society was as sick of it as I was myself.
And then the inconveniences which attached to my situation began to assert themselves more and more emphatically.
I began to stay at home sometimes in the evening, when I observed that the phantom had an unpleasant trick of illuminating itself at the approach of darkness with a bilious green light, which, as it was not nearly strong enough to enable me to dispense with a reading lamp, merely served to depress me.
And then it began to absent itself occasionally for days together, and though at first I was rather glad not to see so much of it, I grew uneasy at last. I was always fancying that the Psychical Society, who are credited with understanding the proper treatment of spectres in health and disease, from the tomb upwards, might have got hold of it and be teaching it to talk and compromise me. I heard afterwards that one of their most prominent members did happen to come across it, but, with a scepticism which I cannot but think was somewhat wanting in discernment, rejected it as a palpable imposition.
I had to leave the rooms where I had been so comfortable, for my landlady complained that the street was blocked up by a mob of the lowest description from seven till twelve every evening, and she really could not put up with it any longer.
On inquiry I found that this was owing to Barnjum's ghost getting out upon the roof almost every night after dark, and playing the fool among the chimney-pots, causing me, as its apparent owner, to be indicted five times for committing a common nuisance by obstructing the thoroughfare, and once for collecting an unlawful assembly: I spent all my spare cash in fines.
I believe there were portraits of us both in the 'Illustrated Police News,' but the distinction implied in this was more than outweighed by the fact that Barnjum's wraith was slowly but surely undermining both my fortune and my reputation.
It followed me one day to one of the underground railway stations, andwouldget into a compartment with me, which led to a lawsuit that made a nine days' sensation in the legal world. I need only mention the celebrated case of 'The Metropolitan District Railwayv.Bunting,' in which the important principle was once for all laid down that a railway company by the terms of its contract is entitled to refuse to carry ghosts, spectres, or any other supernatural baggage, and can moreover exact a heavy penalty from passengers who infringe its bye-laws in this respect.
This was, of course, a decision against me, and carried heavy costs, which my private fortune was just sufficient to meet.
But Barnjum's ghost was bent upon alienating me from society also, for at one of the best dances of the season, at a house where I had with infinite pains just succeeded in establishing a precarious footing, that miserable phantom disgraced me for ever by executing a shadowy but decidedly objectionable species ofcancanbetween the dances!
Feeling indirectly responsible for its behaviour, I apologised profusely to my hostess, but the affair found its way into the society journals, and she never either forgave or recognised me again.
Shortly after that, the committee of my club (one of the most exclusive in London) invited me to resign, intimating that, by introducing an acquaintance of questionable antecedents and disreputable exterior into the smoking-room, I had abused the privileges of membership.
I had been afraid of this when I saw it following me into the building, arrayed in Highland costume and a tall hat; but I was quite unable to drive it away.
Up to that time I had been at the bar, where I was doing pretty well, but now no respectable firm of solicitors would employ a man who had such an unprofessional thing as a phantom about his chambers. I threw up my practice, and had no sooner changed my last sovereign than I was summoned for keeping a ghost without a licence!
Some men, no doubt, would have given up thereand then in despair—but I am made of sterner stuff, and, besides, an idea had already occurred to me of turning the table upon my shadowy persecutor.
Barnjum's ghost had ruined me: why should I not endeavour to turn an honest penny out of Barnjum's ghost? It was genuine—as I well knew; it was, in some respects, original; it was eminently calculated to delight the young and instruct the old; there was even a moral or two to be got out of it, and though it had long failed to attract in town, I saw no reason why it should not make a great hit in the provinces.
I borrowed the necessary funds and had soon made all preliminary arrangements for running the wraith of Barnjum on a short tour in the provinces, deciding to open at Tenby, in South Wales.
I took every precaution, travelling by night and keeping within doors all day, lest the shade (which was deplorably destitute of the commonest professional pride) should get about and exhibit itself beforehand for nothing; and so successful was I, that when it first burst upon a Welsh audience, from the platform of the Assembly Rooms, Tenby, no ghost could have wished for a more enthusiastic reception, and—for the first and last time—I felt positively proud of it!
But the applause gradually subsided, and was succeeded by an awkward pause. It had not struck me till that moment that it would be necessary todo or say anything in particular during the exhibition, beyond showing the spectators round the phantom, and making the customary assurance that there was no deception and no concealed machinery, which I could do with a clear conscience. But a terrible conviction struck me as I stood there bowing repeatedly, that the audience had come prepared for a comic duologue, with incidental music and dances.
This was quite out of the question, even supposing that Barnjum's ghost would have helped me to entertain them, which, perhaps, I could scarcely expect. As it was, it did nothing at all, except grimace at the audience and make an idiotic fool of itself and me—an exhibition of which they soon wearied. I am perfectly certain that an ordinary magic lantern would have made a far deeper impression upon them.
Whether the wraith managed in some covert way, when my attention was diverted, to insult the national prejudices of that sensitive and hot-blooded nation, I cannot say. All I know is, that after sitting still for some time they suddenly rose as one man; chairs were hurled at me through the ghost, and the stage was completely wrecked before the audience could be induced to go away.
It was all over. I was hopelessly ruined now! My weak fancy that even a spectre would have some remnants of common decency and good-feeling hanging about it, had put the finishing touch to my misfortunes!
I paid for the smashed platform and windows with the money that had been taken at the doors, and then I travelled back to London, third class, that night, with the feeling that everything was against me.
It was Christmas, and I was sitting gloomily in my shabby Bloomsbury lodgings, watching with a miserable, apathetic interest Barnjum's wraith as, clad in a Roman toga, topboots, and a turban, it flitted about the horsehair furniture.
I was wondering if they would admit me into any workhouse while the spectre continued my attendant; I was utterly and completely wretched, and now, for the first time, I really repented my conduct in having parted with Barnjum so abruptly by the bleak cliff side, that bright June morning.
I had heard no more of him—I knew he must have reached the bottom after his fall, because I heard the splash he made—but no tidings had come of the discovery of his body; the lake kept its dark secret well.
If I could only hope that this insidious shade, now that it had hounded me down to poverty, would consider this as a sufficient expiation of my error and go away and leave me in peace! But I felt, only too keenly, that it was one of those one-idea'd apparitions, which never know when they have had enough of a good thing—it would be sure to stay and see the very last of me!
All at once there came a sharp tap at my door, and another figure strode solemnly in. This, too, wore the semblance of Barnjum, but was cast in a more substantial mould, and possessed the power of speech, as I gathered from its addressing me instantly as a cowardly villain.
I started back, and stood behind an arm-chair, facing those two forms, the shadow and the solid, with a feeling of sick despair. 'Listen to me,' I said, 'both of you: so long as your—your original proprietor was content with a single wraith, I put up with it; I did not enjoy myself—but I endured it. But abraceof apparitions is really carrying the thing too far; it's more than any one man's fair allowance, and I won't stand it. I defy the pair of you. I will find means to escape you. I will leave the world! Other people can be ghosts as well as you—it's not a monopoly! If you don't go directly, I shall blow my brains out!'
There was no firearm of any description in the house, but I was too excited for perfect accuracy.
'Blow your brains out by all means!' said the solid figure; 'I don't know what all this nonsense you're talking is about. I'm not a ghost that I'm aware of; I'm alive (no thanks to you); and, to come back to the point—scoundrel!'
'Barnjum—and alive!' I cried, almost with relief. 'If that is so,' I added, feeling that I had been imposed upon in a very unworthy and ungentlemanlymanner, 'will you have the goodness to tell me what right you have to this ridiculous apparition here?'
He did not seem to have noticed it particularly till then. 'Hullo!' he said, looking at it with some curiosity, 'what d'ye callthatthing?'
'I call it a beastly nuisance!' I said. 'Ever since—since I last saw you, it's been following me about everywhere in a—in a very annoying manner!'
Will it be believed that the unfeeling brute only chuckled at this? 'Idon't know anything about it,' he said, 'but all I can say is that it serves you jolly well right, and I hope it will go on annoying you.'
'This is ungenerous,' I said, determined to appeal to any better feelings he might have; 'we did not part on—on the best of terms perhaps——'
'Considering that you kicked me over a precipice when I wasn't looking,' he retorted brutally, 'we may take that as admitted.'
'But, at all events,' I argued, 'it is ridiculous to cherish an old grudge all this time; you must see the absurdity of it yourself.'
'No, I don't,' he said.
I determined to make a last effort to move him. 'It is Christmas Eve, Barnjum,' I said earnestly, 'Christmas Eve. Think of it. At this hour, thousands of throbbing human hearts are speeding the cheap but genial Christmas card to such of their relations as they consider at all likely to respond with a turkey. The costermonger, imaginative for thenonce, is investing damaged evergreens with a purely fictitious value, and the cheery publican is sending the member of his village goose-club back to his cottage home, rich in the possession of a shot-distended bird and a bottle of poisonous port. Hear my appeal. If I was hasty with you, I have been punished. That detestable thing on the hearthrug there has dogged my path to misery and ruin; you cannot be withoutsomeresponsibility for its conduct. I ask you now, as a man—nay, as an individual—to call it off. You can do it well enough if you only choose; you know you can.'
But Barnjum wouldn't; he only looked at his own wraith with a grim satisfaction as it capered in an imbecile fashion upon the rug.
'Do,' I implored him; 'I would do it foryou, Barnjum. I've had it about me for six months, and Iamso sick of it.'
Still he hesitated. Some waits outside were playing one of those pathetic American melodies—I forget now whether it was 'Silver Threads among the Gold,' or 'In the Sweet By-and-By'—but, at all events, they struck some sympathetic chord in Barnjum's rough bosom, for his face began to twitch, and presently he burst unexpectedly into tears.
'You don't deserve it,' he said between his sobs, 'but be it so'; then, turning to the ghost, he added: Here, you, what's your name? avaunt! D'ye hear, hook it!'
It wavered for an instant, and then, to my joy, it suddenly 'gave' all over, and, shrivelling up into a sort of cobweb, was drawn by the draught into the fireplace, and carried up the chimney, and I never saw it again.
Barnjum's escape was very simple; he had fallen upon one of the herring-boats in the lake, and the heap of freshly-caught fish lying on the deck had merely broken his fall instead of his neck. As soon as he had recovered from the effects, he was called away from this country upon urgent business, and found himself unable to return for months.
But to this day the appearance of the wraith is a mystery to me. If Barnjum had been the kind of man to be an 'esoteric Buddhist,' it might be accounted for as an 'astral shape'; but esoteric Buddhism requires an exemplary character and years of abstract meditation—both of which conditions were far beyond Barnjum's attainment.
The shape may have been one of those subtle emanations which we are told some people are constantly shedding, like the coats of an onion, and which certain conditions of the atmosphere, and the extreme activity of Barnjum's mind under sudden excitement, possibly contributed to materialise in this particular instance.
Or, perhaps, it was merely a caprice of one of those vagrantPoltergeists, or supernatural buffoons,which took upon itself, very officiously, the duty of avenging my behaviour to Barnjum.
Upon one point I am clear: the whole of this system of deliberate persecution being undertaken directly on Barnjum's account, he is morally and legally bound to reimburse me for the heavy expense and damage which have resulted therefrom.
Hitherto I have been unable to impress Barnjum with this principle, and so my wrongs are still without redress.
I may be asked why I do not make them the basis of an action at law; but persons of any refinement will understand my reluctance to resort to legal proceedings against one with whom I have at least lived on a footing of friendship. I would fain persuade, and shrink from appealing to force; and, besides, I have not succeeded as yet in persuading any solicitor—even a shady one—to take up my case.
[1]Reprinted fromTemple Barfor March 1879, by permission of the Proprietors.
T
his story is mostly about dolls, and I am afraid that all boys, and a good many girls who have tried hard to forget that they ever had dolls, will not care about hearing it. Still, as I have been very careful to warn them at the very beginning, they must not blame me if they read on and find that it does not interest them.
It was after dark, and the criss-cross shadows of the high wire-fender were starting in and out on the walls and ceiling of Winifred's nursery in the flickeringfirelight, and Winifred's last new doll Ethelinda was sitting on the top of a chest of drawers, leaning back languidly against the wall.
Ethelinda was a particularly handsome doll; she had soft thick golden hair, arranged in the latest fashion, full blue eyes, with rather more expression in them than dolls' eyes generally have, a rose-leaf complexion, the least little haughty curl on her red lips, and a costume that came direct from Paris.
She ought to have been happy with all these advantages, and yet she was plainly dissatisfied; she looked disgustedly at all around her, at the coloured pictures from the illustrated papers on the walls, the staring red dolls' house, the big Noah's ark on the shelf, and the dingy dappled rocking-horse in the corner—she despised them all.
'I do wish I was back in Regent Street again,' she sighed aloud.
There was another doll sitting quite close to her, but Ethelinda had not made the remark to him, as he did not seem at all the sort of person to be encouraged.
He was certainly odd-looking: his head was a little too big for his body, and his body was very much too big for his legs; he had fuzzy white hair, and a face which was rather like Punch's only with all the fun taken out of it.
When anyone pinched him in the chest hard, he squeaked and shut his eyes, as if it hurt him—andvery likely it did. He wore a tawdry jester's dress of red and blue, and once he had even carried a cymbal in each hand and clapped them together every time they made him squeak; but he had always disliked being obliged to make so much noise, for he was of a quiet and retiring nature, and so he had got rid of his unmusical instruments as soon as he could.
Still, even without the cymbals, his appearance was hardly respectable, and Ethelinda was a little annoyed to find him so near her, though he never guessed her feelings, which was fortunate for him, for he had fallen in love with her.
Since he first entered the nursery he had had a good deal of knocking about, but his life there had begun to seem easier to put up with from the moment she formed part of it.
He had never dared to speak to her before, she had never given him the chance; and besides, it was quite enough for him to look at her; but now he thought she meant to be friendly and begin a conversation.
'Are you very dull here then?' he asked rather nervously.
Ethelinda stared at first; no one had introduced him, and she felt very much inclined to take no notice; however, she thought after her long silence that it might amuse her to talk to somebody, even if it was only a shabby common creature like this jester.
So she said, 'Dull! You were never in Regent Street, or you wouldn't ask such a question.'
'I came from the Lowther Arcade,' he said.
'Oh, really?' drawled Ethelinda; 'then, of course, this would be quite a pleasant change for you.'
'I don't know,' he said; 'I liked the Arcade. It was so lively; a little noisy perhaps—too much top spinning, and pop-gunning, and mouth-organ playing all round one—but very cheerful. Yes, I liked the Arcade.'
'Very mixed the society there, isn't it?' she asked; 'aren't you expected to know penny things?'
'Well, therewerea good many penny things there,' he owned, 'and very amusing they were. There was a wooden bird there that used to duck his head and wag his tail when they swung a weight underneath—he would have made you laugh so!'
'I hope,' said Ethelinda freezingly, 'I should never so far forget myself as to laugh under any circumstances—and certainly not at apennything!'
'I wonder how muchhecost?' she thought; 'not very much, I can see from his manner. But perhaps I can get him to tell me. Do you remember,' she asked aloud, 'what was the—ah—the premium they asked for introducing you here—did you happen to catch the amount?
'Do you mean my price?' he said; 'oh, elevenpence three farthings—it was on the ticket.'
'What a vulgar creature!' thought Ethelinda; 'I shall really have to drop him.'
'Dear me,' she said,'that sounds very reasonable, very moderate indeed; but perhaps you were "reduced"?' for she thought he would be more bearable if he had cost a little moreonce.
'I don't think so,' he said; 'that's the fair selling price.'
'Well, that's very curious,' said she, 'because the young man at Regent Street (a most charming person, by the way) positively wouldn't part withmeunder thirty-five shillings, and he said so many delightful things about me that I feel quite sorry for him sometimes, when I think how he must be missing me. But then, very likely he's saying the same thing about some other doll now!'
'I suppose he is,' said the jester (he had seen something of toy-selling in his time); 'it's his business, you know.'
'I don't see how you can possibly tell,' said Ethelinda, who had not expected him to agree with her; 'the Lowther Arcade is not Regent Street.'
The jester did not care to dispute this. 'And were you very happy at Regent Street?' he asked.
'Happy?' she repeated. 'Well, I don't know; at least, one was not bored there. I was in the best set, you see, the two-guinea one, and they were alwaysgetting up something to amuse us in the window—a review, or a sham fight, or a garden-party, or something. Last winter they gave us a fancy-dress ball—I went as Mary Stuart, and was very much admired. But here——' and she finished the sentence with a disdainful little shrug.
'I don't think you'll find it so very bad here, when you get a little more used to it,' he said; 'our mistress——'
'Pray don't use that very unpleasant word,' she interrupted sharply. 'Did you never hear of "dolls' rights?"Wecall these people "hostesses."'
'Well, our hostess, then—Winifred, she's not unkind. She doesn't care much about me, and that cousin of hers, Master Archie, gives me a bad time of it when I come in his way, but really she's very polite and attentive toyou.'
'Polite and attentive!' sneered Ethelinda (and if you have never seen a doll sneer, you can have no idea how alarming it is). 'I don't call it an attention to be treated like a baby by a little chit of a girl who can't dress herself properly yet—no style, no elegance, and actually a pinafore in the mornings!'
This is the way some of these costly lady dolls talk about their benefactresses when the gas is out and they think no one overhears them. I don't know whether the plain old-fashioned ones, who are not so carefully treated, but often more tenderly loved, are as bad; but it is impossible to say—dolls are exceedinglyartful, and there are persons, quite clever in other things, who will tell you honestly that they do not understand them in the least.
'Then the society here,' Ethelinda went on, without much consideration for the other's feelings—perhaps she thought he was too cheap to have any—'it's really something too dreadful for words. Why, those people in the poky little house over there, with only four rooms and a front door they can't open, have never had the decency to call upon me. Not that I should take any notice, of course, if they did, but it just shows what they are. And the other day I actually overheard one frightful creature in a print dress, with nothing on her head but a great tin-tack, ask another horror "which she liked best—make-believe tea or orange-juice!"'
'Well,Iprefer make-believe tea myself,' said the jester, 'because, you see, I can't get the orange-juice down, and so it's rather bad for the dress and complexion.'
'Possibly,' she said scornfully. 'I'm thankful to say I've not been called upon to try it myself—even Miss Winifred knows better than that. But, anyhow, it's horribly insipid here, and I suppose it will be like this always now. I did hope once that when I went out into the world I should be a heroine and have a romance of my own.'
'What is a romance?' he asked.
'I thought you wouldn't understand me,' she said;'a romance is—well, there's champagne in it, and cigarettes, to begin with.'
'But what is champagne?' he interrupted.
'Something you drink,' she said; 'what else could it be?'
'I see,' he said; 'a sort of orange-juice.'
'Orange-juice!' Ethelinda cried contemptuously; 'it's not in the least like orange-juice; it's——' (she didn't know what it was made of herself, but there was no use in telling him so) 'I couldn't make you understand without too much trouble, you really are soveryignorant, but there's a good deal of it in romances. And dukes, and guardsmen, and being very beautiful and deliciously miserable, till just before the end—that's a romance! My milliner used to have it read out to her while she was dressing me for that ball I told you about.'
'Do you mind telling me what a heroine is?' he asked. 'I know I'm very stupid.'
'A heroine? oh,anydoll can be a heroine. I felt all the time the heroines were all just like me. They were either very good or very wicked, and I'm sure I could be the one or the other if I got the chance. I think it would be more amusing, perhaps, to be a little wicked, but then it's not quite so easy, you know.'
'I should think it would be more uncomfortable,' he suggested.
'Ah, but then you see you haven't any sentiment about you,' she said disparagingly.
'No,' he admitted, 'I'm afraid I haven't. I suppose they couldn't put it in for elevenpence three farthings.'
'I should think not,' Ethelinda observed, 'it's veryexpensive.' And then, after a short silence, she said more confidentially, 'you were talking of Master Archie just now. I rather like that boy, do you know. I believe I could make something of him if he would only let me.'
'He's a mischievous boy,' said the jester, 'and ill-natured too.'
'Yes,isn'the?' she agreed admiringly; 'I like him for that. I fancy a duke or a guardsman must be something like him; they all had just his wicked black eyes and long restless fingers. It wouldn't be quite so dull if he would notice me a little; but he never will!'
'He's going back to school next week,' the jester said rather cheerfully.
'So soon!' sighed Ethelinda. 'There's hardly time for him to make a real heroine of me before that. How I wish he would! I shouldn't care how he did it, or what came of it. I'm sure I should enjoy it, and it would give me something to think about all my life.'
'Say that again, my dainty little lady; say it again!' cried a harsh, jeering voice from beside them, 'and, if you really mean it, perhaps the old Sausage-Glutton can manage it for you. He's done morewonderful things than that in his time, I can tell you.'
The voice came from an old German clock which stood on the mantelpiece, or rather, from a strange painted wooden figure which was part of it—an ugly old man, who sat on the top with a plate of sausages on his knees, and a fork in one hand. Every minute he slowly forked up a sausage from the plate to his mouth, and swallowed it suddenly, while his lower jaw wagged, and his narrow eyes rolled as it went down in a truly horrible manner.
The children had long since given him the name of 'Sausage-Glutton,' which he richly deserved. He was a sort of magician in his way, having so much clockwork in his inside, and he was spiteful and malicious, owing to the quantity of wooden sausages he bolted, which would have ruined anyone's digestion and temper.
'Good gracious!' cried Ethelinda, with a start, 'who is that person?'
'Somebody who can be a good kind friend to you, pretty lady, if you only give him leave. So you want some excitement here, do you? You want to be wicked, and interesting, and unfortunate, and all the rest of it, eh? And you'd like young Archibald (a nice boy that, by the way), you'd likehimto give you a little romance? Well, then, he shall, and to-morrow too, hot and strong, if you like to say the word.'
Ethelinda was too much fluttered to speak at first,and she was a little afraid of the old man, too, for he leered all round in such an odd way, and ate so fast and jerkily.
'Don't—oh,pleasedon't!' cried a little squeaky voice above him. It came from a queer little angular doll, with gold-paper wings, a spangled muslin dress, and a wand with a tinsel star at the end of it, who was fastened up on the wall above a picture. 'You won't like it—you won't, really!'
'Don't trust him,' whispered the jester; 'he's a bad old man; he ruined a very promising young dancing nigger only the other day, unhinged him so that he will never hook on any more.'
'Ha, ha!' laughed the Sausage-Glutton, as he disposed of another sausage, 'that old fellow in the peculiar coat is jealous, you know;hecan't make a heroine of you, and so he doesn't want anyone else to. Who cares what he says? And as for our little wooden friend up above, well, Ishouldhope a dainty duchess like you is not going to let herself be dictated to by a low jointed creature, who sets up for a fairy when she knows her sisters dance round white hats every Derby Day.'
'They're not sisters; they're second cousins,' squeaked the poor Dutch doll, very much hurt, 'and they don't mean any harm by it; it's only their high spirits. And whatever you say,I'ma fairy. I had a Christmas-tree of my own once; but I had to leave it, it was so expensive to keep up. Now, you takemy advice, my dear, do,' she added to Ethelinda, 'don't you listen to him. He'd give all his sausages to see you in trouble, he would; but he can't do anything unless you give him leave.'
But of course it would have been a little too absurd if Ethelinda had taken advice from a flat-headed twopenny doll and a flabby jester from the Lowther Arcade. 'My good creatures,' she said to them, 'you mean well, no doubt, but pray leave this gentleman and me to settle our own affairs. Can you really get Master Archie to take some notice of me, sir?' she said to the figure on the clock.
'I can, my loveliest,' he said.
'And will it be exciting,' she asked, 'and romantic, and—and just the least bitwicked, too?'
'You shall be the very wickedest heroine in any nursery in the world,' he replied. 'Oh, dear me, how youwillenjoy yourself!'
'Then I accept,' said Ethelinda; 'I put myself quite in your hands—I leave everything to you.'
'That's right!' cried the Sausage-Glutton, 'that's a brave little beauty. It's a bargain, then? To-morrow afternoon the fun will begin, and then—my springs and wheels—what a time you will have of it! He, he! You look out for Archibald!'
And then he trembled all over as the clock struck twelve, and went on eating his sausages without another word, while Ethelinda gave herself up to delightful anticipations of the wonderfuladventures that were actually about to happen to her at last.
But the jester felt very uneasy about it all; he felt so sure that the old Sausage-Glutton's amiability had some trickery underneath it.
'You are a fairy, aren't you?' he said to the Dutch doll in a whisper; 'can't you do anything to help her?'
'No,' she said sulkily; 'and if I could, I wouldn't. She has chosen to put herself in his power, and whatever comes of it will serve her right. I don't know what he means to do, and I can't stop him. Still, if I can't help her, I can help you; and you may want it, because he is sure to be angry with you for trying to warn her.'
'But I never gave him leave to meddle withme,' said the jester.
'Have you got sawdust or bran inside you, or what?' asked the fairy.
'Neither,' he said; 'only the bellows I squeak with, and wire. But why?'
'I was afraid so. It's only the dolls with sawdust or bran inside them that he can't do whatever he likes with without their consent. He can do anything he chooses with you; but he shan't hurt you this time, if you only take care—for I'll grant you the very next thing you wish. Onlydobe careful now about wishing; don't be in a hurry and waste the wish. Wait till things are at their very worst.'
'Thank you very much,' he said; 'I don't mind for myself so much, but I should like to prevent any harm from coming to her. I'll remember.'
Then he bent towards Ethelinda and whispered: 'You didn't believe what the old man on the clock told you about me, did you? I'm not jealous—I'm only a poor jester, and you're a great lady. But you'll let me sit by you, and you'll talk to me sometimes in the evenings as you did to-night, won't you?'
But Ethelinda, though she heard him plainly, pretended to be fast asleep—it was of no consequence to her whether he was jealous or not.
Winifred was sitting the next afternoon alone in her nursery, trying to play. She was a dear little girl about nine years old, with long, soft, brown hair, a straight little nose, and brown eyes which just then had a wistful, dissatisfied look in them—for the fact was that, for some reason or other, she could not get on with her dolls at all.
The jester was not good-looking enough for her; they had put his eyes in so carelessly, and his face had such a 'queer' look, and he was altogether a limp, unmanageable person. She always said to herself that she liked him 'for the sake of the giver,' poor clumsy, good-hearted Martha, the housemaid, who had left in disgrace, and presented him as her parting gift; but one might as well not be cared for at all as be liked in that roundabout way.
And Ethelinda, beautiful and fashionable as she was, was not friendly, and Winifred never could get intimate with her; she felt afraid to treat her as a small child younger than herself, it seemed almost a liberty to nurse her, for Ethelinda seemed to be quite grown up and to know far more than she did herself.
She sat there looking at Ethelinda, and Ethelinda stared back at her in a cold, distant way, as if she half remembered meeting her somewhere before. There was a fixed smile on her vermilion lips which seemed false and even a little contemptuous to poor lonely little Winifred, who thought it was hard that her own doll should despise her.
The jester's smile was amiable enough, though it was rather meaningless, but then no one cared about him or how he smiled, as he lay unnoticed on his back in the corner.
You would not have guessed it from their faces, but both dolls were really very much excited; each was thinking about the Sausage-Glutton and his vague promises, and wondering if, and how, those promises were to be carried out.
The wooden magician himself was bolting his sausage a minute on the top of the clock just as usual, only the jester fancied his cunning eyes rolled round at them with a peculiar leer as a cheerful whistle was heard on the stairs outside.
A moment afterwards a lively brown-faced boy insailor dress put his head in at the door. 'Hullo, Winnie,' he said, 'are you all alone?'
'Nurse has gone downstairs,' said Winnie, plaintively; 'I've got the dolls, but it's dull here somehow. Can't you come and help me to play, Archie?'
Archie had been skating all the morning, and could not settle down just then to any of his favourite books, so he had come up to see Winnie with the idea of finding something to amuse him there—for though he was a boy, he did unbend at times, so far as to help her in her games, out of which he managed to get a good deal of amusement in his own peculiar way.
But of course he had to make a favour of it, and must not let Winifred see that it was anything but a sacrifice for him to consent.
'I've got other things to do,' he said; 'and you know you always make a fuss when I do play with you. Look at last time!'
'Ah, but then you played at being a slave-driver, Archie, and you made me sell you my old black Dinah for a slave, and then you tied her up and whipped her. I didn't likethatgame! But if you'll stay this time, I won't mind what else you do!'
For Archie had a way of making the dolls go through exciting adventures, at which Winifred assisted with a fearful wonder that had a fascination about it.
'Girls don't know how to play with dolls, and that'sa fact,' said Archie. 'I could get more fun out of that dolls' house than a dozen girls could' (he would have set fire to it); 'but I tell you what: if you'll let me do exactly what I like, and don't go interfering, except when I tell you to, perhaps I will stay a little while—not long, you know.'
'I promise,' said Winifred, 'if you won't break anything. I'll do just what you tell me.'
'Very well then, here goes; let's see who you've got. I say, who's this in the swell dress?'
He was pointing to Ethelinda, whose brain began to tingle at once with a delicious excitement. 'He has noticed me at last,' she thought; 'I wonder if I could make him fall desperately in love with me!' and she turned her big blue eyes full upon him. 'Ah, if I could only speak—but perhaps I shall presently. I'm quite sure the romance is going to begin!'
'That's Ethelinda, Archie—isn't she pretty?'
'I've seen them uglier,' he said; 'she's like that Eve de Something we saw at Drury Lane—we'll have her, and there's that chap in the fool's dress, we may want him. Now we're ready.'
'What are you going to do with them, Archie?'
'You leave that to me. I've an idea, something much better than your silly tea-parties.'
'Why doesn't he tell that child to go?' thought Ethelinda, 'we don't wanther!'
'Now listen, Winifred,' said Archie: 'this is thegame. You're a beautiful queen (only do sit up and take that finger out of your mouth—queens don't do that). Well, and I'm the king, and this is your maid of honour, the beautiful Lady Ethelinda, see?'
'Go on, Archie; I see,' cried Winifred; 'and I like it so far.'
'I thinkIought to have been the queen!' said Ethelinda to herself.
'Well, now,' said the boy, 'I'll tell you something. This maid of honour of yours doesn't like you (don't say she does, now; I'm telling this, and I know). You watch her carefully. Can't you see a sort of look in her face as if she didn't think much of you?'
'How clever he is,' thought Ethelinda; 'he knows exactly how I feel!'
'Do you really think it's that, Archie?' said Winifred; 'it's just what I was afraid of before you came in.'
'That's it. Look out for a kind of glare in her eye when I pay you any attention. (How does Your Majesty do? Well, I hope.) There, didn't you see it? Well, that's jealousy, that is. She hates you like anything!'
'I'm sure she doesn't, then,' protested Winifred.
'Oh, well, if you know better than I do, you can finish it for yourself. I'm going.'
'No, no; do stay. I like it. I'll be good after this!'
'Don't you interrupt again, then. Now the real truth is that she'd like to be queen instead of you; she's ambitious, you know—that's what's the matter with her. And so she's got it into her head that if you were only out of the way, I should askherto be the next queen!'
Winifred could not say a word, she was so overcome by the idea of her doll's unkindness; and Archie took Ethelinda by the waist and brought her near her royal mistress as he said: 'Now you'll see how artful she is; she's coming to ask you if she may go out. Listen. "Please, Your Gracious Majesty, may I go out for a little while?"'
'This is even better than if I spoke myself,' Ethelinda thought; 'he can talk for me, and I do believe I'm going to be quite wicked presently.'
'Am I to speak to her, Archie?' Winifred asked, feeling a little nervous.
'Of course you are. Go on; don't be silly; give her leave.'
'Certainly, Ethelinda, if you wish it,' replied Winifred, with a happy recollection of her mother's manner on somewhat similar occasions, 'but I should like you to be in to prayers.'
'A maid of honour isn't the same as ahousemaid, you know,' said Archie; 'but never mind—she's off.Youdon't see where she goes, of course.'
'Yes I do,' said Winifred.
'Ah, but not in the game; nobody does. She goesto the apothecary's—here's the apothecary.' And he caught hold of the jester, who thought helplessly, 'I'mbeing brought into it now; I wish he'd let me alone—I don't like it!' 'Well, so she says, "Oh, if you please, Mr. Apothecary, I want some arsenic to kill the royal blackbeetles with; not much—a pound or two will be plenty." So he takes down a jar (here Archie got up and fetched a big bottle of citrate of magnesia from a cupboard), 'and he weighs it out, and wraps it up, and gives it to her. And he says, "You'll mind and be very careful with it, my lady. The dose is one pinch in a teaspoonful of treacle to each blackbeetle, the last thing at night; but it oughtn't to be left about in places." And so Lady Ethelinda takes it home and hides it.'
'I've bought some poison now,' thought Ethelinda, immensely delighted, 'Iama wicked doll! How convenient it is to have it all done for one like this! I do hope he's going to make me give Winifred some of that stuff, to get her out of the way, and have the romance all to our two selves.'
'Now you and I,' Archie continued, 'haven't the least idea of all this. But one day, the Court jester ('I was an apothecary just now,' thought the jester; 'it's really very confusing!')—the Court jester comes up, looking very grave, and sneaks of her. The reason of that is that he's angry with her because she never will have anything to do with him, and he saysthat he's seen her folding up a powder in paper and writing on it, and he thought I ought to be told about it.' ('This is awful,' thought the jester. 'What will Ethelinda think of me for telling tales? and what has come to Ethelinda? It's all that miserable Sausage-Glutton's doing—and I can't help myself!')
'Well, I'm very much surprised of course,' said Archie; 'anyking would be—but I wait, and one day, when she has gone out for a holiday, the jester and I go to her desk and break it open.'
'Oh, Archie,' objected the poor little Queen in despair, 'isn't that rathermeanof you?'
'Now look here, Winnie, I can't have this sort of thing every minute. For a gentleman, it might be rather mean, perhaps, but then I'm a king, and I've got a right to do it, and it's all for your sake, too—so you can't say anything. Besides, it's the jester does it; I only look on. Well, and by-and-by,' said Archie, as he scribbled something laboriously on a piece of paper, 'by-and-by he findsthis!'
And with imposing gravity he handed Winifred a folded paper, on which she read with real terror and grief the alarming words—'Poisin for the Queen!'
'There, what do you think of that?' he asked triumphantly; 'looks bad, doesn't it?'
'Perhaps,' suggested the Queen feebly, 'perhaps it was only in fun?'
'Fun—there's not much fun about her! Now the guard' (here he used the bewildered jester once more)'arrests her. Do you want to ask the prisoner any questions?—you can if you like.'
'You—you didn't mean to poison me really, did you, Ethelinda dear?' said Winifred, who was taking it all very seriously, as she took most things. 'Archie, do make her say something!'
'Why can't you answer when the Queen asks you a question, eh?' demanded Archie. 'No, she won't say a word; she'll only grin at you; you see she's quite hardened. There's only one thing that would make her confess,' he added cautiously, aware that he was on rather delicate ground, 'and that's the torture. I could make a beautiful rack, Winnie, if you didn't mind?'
'Whatever she's done,' said the Queen, firmly, 'I'm not going to have her tortured! And I believe she's sorry inside and wants me to forgive her!'
'Then why doesn't she say so?' said Archie. 'No, no, Winnie. Look here, this is a serious thing, you know; it won't do to pass it over; it's high treason, and she'll have to be tried.'
'But I don't want her tried,' said Winifred.
'Oh, very well then; I had better go downstairs again and read. The best part was all coming, but if you don't care, I'm sureIdon't!'
'Little idiot!' thought Ethelinda angrily, 'she'll spoil the whole thing; every heroine has to be tried!'
But Winnie gave in, as she usually did, to Archie.'Well, then, she shall be tried if you really think she ought to be, Archie; it won't hurt her though, will it?'
'Of course it won't; it's all right. Now for the trial: here's the court, and here's a place for the judge' (he built it all up with books and bricks as he spoke); 'here's the dock—stick Lady What's-her-name inside—that's it. We must do without a jury, but I suppose weoughtto have a judge; oh, this fellow will do for judge!'
And he seized the jester and raised him to the Bench at once. The jester was more puzzled than ever. 'Now I'm ajudge,' he thought, 'I shall have to try her; but I'm glad of it—I'll let her off!'
But unluckily he very soon found that he had no voice at all in the matter, except what Archie chose to lend him.
'Oh, but Archie,' said Winifred, who was determined to defeat the ends of justice if she possibly could, 'can a jester be a judge?'
'Why not?' said Archie; 'judges make jokes sometimes—I've heard papa say so, and he's a barrister, and ought to know.'
'But this one doesn't make real jokes!' persisted Winifred.
'Who asked him to? Judges are not obliged to make jokes, Winnie. I believe you are trying to get her off, but I'm going to see justice done, I tell you. So now then, Lady Ethelinda, you are charged with high treason and trying to poison Her MostGracious Majesty, Queen Winifred Gladys Robertson, by putting arsenic in Her Majesty's tea. Guilty or not guilty! Speak up!'
'Notguilty!' put in Winifred quickly, thinking that would settle the whole trial comfortably. 'There, Archie, you can't say she didn't speakthattime!'
'Now, you have done it!' Archie said triumphantly. 'If she'd confessed, we might have shown mercy. Now we shall have to prove it, and if we do I'm sorry for her, that's all!'
'If she says "Guilty, and she won't do it again!"' suggested Winifred.
'It's too late for that now,' said Archie, who was not going to have his trial cut short in that way: 'no, we must prove it.'
'But how are you going to prove it?'
'You wait. I've been in court once or twice with papa, and seen him prove all sorts of things. First, we must have in the fellow who sold the poison—the apothecary, you know. Oh, I say, though, I forgot that—he's the judge; that won't do!'
'Then you can't prove it after all—I'm so glad!' cried the Queen, with her eyes sparkling.
'One would think you rather liked being poisoned,' said Archie, in an offended tone.
'I like magnesia, and it isn't poison, really—it's medicine.'
'It isn't magnesia now; it's arsenic; and she shan'tget off like this. I'll call the apothecary's young man, he'll prove it (this brick is the apothecary's young man). There, he says it's all right; she did it right enough. Now for the sentence! (put a penwiper on the judge's head, will you, Winnie; it's solemner).'
'What's a sentence?' asked Winifred, much disturbed at these ill-omened arrangements.
'You'll see; this is the judge talking now: "Lady Ethelinda, you've been found guilty of very bad conduct; you've put arsenic in your beloved Queen's tea!"'
'Why, I haven'thadtea yet!' protested the Sovereign.
"Her Majesty is respectfully ordered not to interrupt the judge when he's summing up; it puts him out. Well, as I was saying, Lady Ethelinda, I'm sorry to tell you that we shall have to cut your head off!"'
'What have I done?' thought the jester; 'she'll think I'm in earnest; she'll never forgive me!'
But Ethelinda was perfectly delighted, for not one of her heroines had ever been in such a romantic position as this. 'And of course,' she thought, 'it will all come right in the end; it always does.'
Winifred, however, was terrified by the sternness of the court: 'Archie,' she cried, 'she mustn't have her head cut off.'
'It will be all right, Winnie, if you will only leave it to me and not interfere. You promised not to interrupt, and yet you will keep on doing it!'
Archie's head was full of executions just then, for he had been reading 'The Tower of London;' he had been artfully leading up to an execution from the very first, and he meant to have his own way.
But first he amused himself by working upon Winifred's feelings, which was a bad habit of his on these occasions. To do him justice, he did not know how keenly she felt things, and how soon she forgot it was only pretence; it flattered him to see how easily he could make Winifred cry about nothing, and he never guessed what real pain he was giving her.
'Winnie,' he began very dolefully, 'she's in prison now, languishing in her prison cell, and do you know, I rather think her heart's beginning to soften a little: she wants you to come and see her. You won't refuse her last request, Winnie, will you?'
'As if I could!' cried Winifred, full of the tenderest compassion.
'Very well then; this is the last meeting. "My dear kind mistress" (it's Ethelinda speaking to you now), "that I once loved so dearly in the happy days when I was innocent and good, I couldn't die till I had asked you to forgive me. Let your poor wicked maid-of-honour kiss your hand just once more as she used to do; tell her you forgive her about that arsenic." Now then, Winnie!'
'I—Ican't, Archie!' sobbed Winifred, quite melted by this pathetic appeal.
'If you don't, she'll think you're angry still, andwon't forgive her,' said Archie. 'Just you listen; this is her now: "Won't you say one little word, Your Majesty; you might as well. When I'm gone and mouldering away in my felon's grave it will be too late then, and you'll be sorry. It's the last thing I shall ever ask you!"'
'Oh, Ethelinda, darling,don't!' implored her Queen; 'don't go on talking in that dreadful way; I can't bear it. Archie, Imustforgive her now!'
'Oh yes, forgive her,' he said with approval; 'queens shouldn't sulk or bear malice.'