“I hope you have had a good night,” he said earnestly.
“Thank you,” she replied, “I was so cosy and warm. But you”—and she looked at his nakedness awkwardly—“don't you feel the least bit cold?”
Now cold was another word Peter had forgotten, so he answered, “I think not, but I may be wrong: you see I am rather ignorant. I am not exactly a boy, Solomon says I am a Betwixt-and-Between.”
“So that is what it is called,” said Maimie thoughtfully.
“That's not my name,” he explained, “my name is Peter Pan.”
“Yes, of course,” she said, “I know, everybody knows.”
You can't think how pleased Peter was to learn that all the people outside the gates knew about him. He begged Maimie to tell him what they knew and what they said, and she did so. They were sitting by this time on a fallen tree; Peter had cleared off the snow for Maimie, but he sat on a snowy bit himself.
“Squeeze closer,” Maimie said.
“What is that?” he asked, and she showed him, and then he did it. They talked together and he found that people knew a great deal about him, but not everything, not that he had gone back to his mother and been barred out, for instance, and he said nothing of this to Maimie, for it still humiliated him.
“Do they know that I play games exactly like real boys?” he asked very proudly. “Oh, Maimie, please tell them!” But when he revealed how he played, by sailing his hoop on the Round Pond, and so on, she was simply horrified.
“All your ways of playing,” she said with her big eyes on him, “are quite, quite wrong, and not in the least like how boys play!”
Poor Peter uttered a little moan at this, and he cried for the first time for I know not how long. Maimie was extremely sorry for him, and lent him her handkerchief, but he didn't know in the least what to do with it, so she showed him, that is to say, she wiped her eyes, and then gave it back to him, saying “Now you do it,” but instead of wiping his own eyes he wiped hers, and she thought it best to pretend that this was what she had meant.
She said, out of pity for him, “I shall give you a kiss if you like,” but though he once knew he had long forgotten what kisses are, and he replied, “Thank you,” and held out his hand, thinking she had offered to put something into it. This was a great shock to her, but she felt she could not explain without shaming him, so with charming delicacy she gave Peter a thimble which happened to be in her pocket, and pretended that it was a kiss. Poor little boy! he quite believed her, and to this day he wears it on his finger, though there can be scarcely anyone who needs a thimble so little. You see, though still a tiny child, it was really years and years since he had seen his mother, and I daresay the baby who had supplanted him was now a man with whiskers.
But you must not think that Peter Pan was a boy to pity rather than to admire; if Maimie began by thinking this, she soon found she was very much mistaken. Her eyes glistened with admiration when he told her of his adventures, especially of how he went to and fro between the island and the Gardens in the Thrush's Nest.
“How romantic,” Maimie exclaimed, but it was another unknown word, and he hung his head thinking she was despising him.
“I suppose Tony would not have done that?” he said very humbly.
“Never, never!” she answered with conviction, “he would have been afraid.”
“What is afraid?” asked Peter longingly. He thought it must be some splendid thing. “I do wish you would teach me how to be afraid, Maimie,” he said.
“I believe no one could teach that to you,” she answered adoringly, but Peter thought she meant that he was stupid. She had told him about Tony and of the wicked thing she did in the dark to frighten him (she knew quite well that it was wicked), but Peter misunderstood her meaning and said, “Oh, how I wish I was as brave as Tony.”
It quite irritated her. “You are twenty thousand times braver than Tony,” she said, “you are ever so much the bravest boy I ever knew!”
He could scarcely believe she meant it, but when he did believe he screamed with joy.
“And if you want very much to give me a kiss,” Maimie said, “you can do it.”
Very reluctantly Peter began to take the thimble off his finger. He thought she wanted it back.
“I don't mean a kiss,” she said hurriedly, “I mean a thimble.”
“What's that?” Peter asked.
“It's like this,” she said, and kissed him.
“I should love to give you a thimble,” Peter said gravely, so he gave her one. He gave her quite a number of thimbles, and then a delightful idea came into his head! “Maimie,” he said, “will you marry me?”
Now, strange to tell, the same idea had come at exactly the same time into Maimie's head. “I should like to,” she answered, “but will there be room in your boat for two?”
“If you squeeze close,” he said eagerly.
“Perhaps the birds would be angry?”
He assured her that the birds would love to have her, though I am not so certain of it myself. Also that there were very few birds in winter. “Of course they might want your clothes,” he had to admit rather falteringly.
She was somewhat indignant at this.
“They are always thinking of their nests,” he said apologetically, “and there are some bits of you”—he stroked the fur on her pelisse—“that would excite them very much.”
“They sha'n't have my fur,” she said sharply.
“No,” he said, still fondling it, however, “no! Oh, Maimie,” he said rapturously, “do you know why I love you? It is because you are like a beautiful nest.”
Somehow this made her uneasy. “I think you are speaking more like a bird than a boy now,” she said, holding back, and indeed he was even looking rather like a bird. “After all,” she said, “you are only a Betwixt-and-Between.” But it hurt him so much that she immediately added, “It must be a delicious thing to be.”
“Come and be one then, dear Maimie,” he implored her, and they set off for the boat, for it was now very near Open-Gate time. “And you are not a bit like a nest,” he whispered to please her.
“But I think it is rather nice to be like one,” she said in a woman's contradictory way. “And, Peter, dear, though I can't give them my fur, I wouldn't mind their building in it. Fancy a nest in my neck with little spotty eggs in it! Oh, Peter, how perfectly lovely!”
But as they drew near the Serpentine, she shivered a little, and said, “Of course I shall go and see mother often, quite often. It is not as if I was saying good-bye for ever to mother, it is not in the least like that.”
“Oh, no,” answered Peter, but in his heart he knew it was very like that, and he would have told her so had he not been in a quaking fear of losing her. He was so fond of her, he felt he could not live without her. “She will forget her mother in time, and be happy with me,” he kept saying to himself, and he hurried her on, giving her thimbles by the way.
But even when she had seen the boat and exclaimed ecstatically over its loveliness, she still talked tremblingly about her mother. “You know quite well, Peter, don't you,” she said, “that I wouldn't come unless I knew for certain I could go back to mother whenever I want to? Peter, say it!”
He said it, but he could no longer look her in the face.
“If you are sure your mother will always want you,” he added rather sourly.
“The idea of mother's not always wanting me!” Maimie cried, and her face glistened.
“If she doesn't bar you out,” said Peter huskily.
“The door,” replied Maimie, “will always, always be open, and mother will always be waiting at it for me.”
“Then,” said Peter, not without grimness, “step in, if you feel so sure of her,” and he helped Maimie into the Thrush's Nest.
“But why don't you look at me?” she asked, taking him by the arm.
Peter tried hard not to look, he tried to push off, then he gave a great gulp and jumped ashore and sat down miserably in the snow.
She went to him. “What is it, dear, dear Peter?” she said, wondering.
“Oh, Maimie,” he cried, “it isn't fair to take you with me if you think you can go back. Your mother”—he gulped again—“you don't know them as well as I do.”
And then he told her the woful story of how he had been barred out, and she gasped all the time. “But my mother,” she said, “my mother”—
“Yes, she would,” said Peter, “they are all the same. I daresay she is looking for another one already.”
Maimie said aghast, “I can't believe it. You see, when you went away your mother had none, but my mother has Tony, and surely they are satisfied when they have one.”
Peter replied bitterly, “You should see the letters Solomon gets from ladies who have six.”
Just then they heard a grating creak, followed by creak, creak, all round the Gardens. It was the Opening of the Gates, and Peter jumped nervously into his boat. He knew Maimie would not come with him now, and he was trying bravely not to cry. But Maimie was sobbing painfully.
“If I should be too late,” she called in agony, “oh, Peter, if she has got another one already!”
Again he sprang ashore as if she had called him back. “I shall come and look for you to-night,” he said, squeezing close, “but if you hurry away I think you will be in time.”
Then he pressed a last thimble on her sweet little mouth, and covered his face with his hands so that he might not see her go.
“Dear Peter!” she cried.
“Dear Maimie!” cried the tragic boy.
She leapt into his arms, so that it was a sort of fairy wedding, and then she hurried away. Oh, how she hastened to the gates! Peter, you may be sure, was back in the Gardens that night as soon as Lock-out sounded, but he found no Maimie, and so he knew she had been in time. For long he hoped that some night she would come back to him; often he thought he saw her waiting for him by the shore of the Serpentine as his bark drew to land, but Maimie never went back. She wanted to, but she was afraid that if she saw her dear Betwixt-and-Between again she would linger with him too long, and besides the ayah now kept a sharp eye on her. But she often talked lovingly of Peter and she knitted a kettle-holder for him, and one day when she was wondering what Easter present he would like, her mother made a suggestion.
“Nothing,” she said thoughtfully, “would be so useful to him as a goat.”
“He could ride on it,” cried Maimie, “and play on his pipe at the same time!”
“Then,” her mother asked, “won't you give him your goat, the one you frighten Tony with at night?”
“But it isn't a real goat,” Maimie said.
“It seems very real to Tony,” replied her mother.
“It seems frightfully real to me too,” Maimie admitted, “but how could I give it to Peter?”
Her mother knew a way, and next day, accompanied by Tony (who was really quite a nice boy, though of course he could not compare), they went to the Gardens, and Maimie stood alone within a fairy ring, and then her mother, who was a rather gifted lady, said,
“My daughter, tell me, if you can,What have you got for Peter Pan?”
To which Maimie replied,
“I have a goat for him to ride,Observe me cast it far and wide.”
She then flung her arms about as if she were sowing seed, and turned round three times.
Next Tony said,
“If P. doth find it waiting here,Wilt ne'er again make me to fear?”
And Maimie answered,
“By dark or light I fondly swearNever to see goats anywhere.”
She also left a letter to Peter in a likely place, explaining what she had done, and begging him to ask the fairies to turn the goat into one convenient for riding on. Well, it all happened just as she hoped, for Peter found the letter, and of course nothing could be easier for the fairies than to turn the goat into a real one, and so that is how Peter got the goat on which he now rides round the Gardens every night playing sublimely on his pipe. And Maimie kept her promise and never frightened Tony with a goat again, though I have heard that she created another animal. Until she was quite a big girl she continued to leave presents for Peter in the Gardens (with letters explaining how humans play with them), and she is not the only one who has done this. David does it, for instance, and he and I know the likeliest place for leaving them in, and we shall tell you if you like, but for mercy's sake don't ask us before Porthos, for were he to find out the place he would take every one of them.
Though Peter still remembers Maimie he is become as gay as ever, and often in sheer happiness he jumps off his goat and lies kicking merrily on the grass. Oh, he has a joyful time! But he has still a vague memory that he was a human once, and it makes him especially kind to the house-swallows when they revisit the island, for house-swallows are the spirits of little children who have died. They always build in the eaves of the houses where they lived when they were humans, and sometimes they try to fly in at a nursery window, and perhaps that is why Peter loves them best of all the birds.
And the little house? Every lawful night (that is to say, every night except ball nights) the fairies now build the little house lest there should be a human child lost in the Gardens, and Peter rides the marshes looking for lost ones, and if he finds them he carries them on his goat to the little house, and when they wake up they are in it and when they step out they see it. The fairies build the house merely because it is so pretty, but Peter rides round in memory of Maimie and because he still loves to do just as he believes real boys would do.
But you must not think that, because somewhere among the trees the little house is twinkling, it is a safe thing to remain in the Gardens after Lock-out Time. If the bad ones among the fairies happen to be out that night they will certainly mischief you, and even though they are not, you may perish of cold and dark before Peter Pan comes round. He has been too late several times, and when he sees he is too late he runs back to the Thrush's Nest for his paddle, of which Maimie had told him the true use, and he digs a grave for the child and erects a little tombstone and carves the poor thing's initials on it. He does this at once because he thinks it is what real boys would do, and you must have noticed the little stones and that there are always two together. He puts them in twos because it seems less lonely. I think that quite the most touching sight in the Gardens is the two tombstones of Walter Stephen Matthews and Phoebe Phelps. They stand together at the spot where the parishes of Westminster St. Mary's is said to meet the parish of Paddington. Here Peter found the two babes, who had fallen unnoticed from their perambulators, Phoebe aged thirteen months and Walter probably still younger, for Peter seems to have felt a delicacy about putting any age on his stone. They lie side by side, and the simple inscriptions read
+—————-+ +—————-+| | | || W | | 13a. || | | P.P. || St. M | | 1841 || | | |+—————-+ +—————-+
David sometimes places white flowers on these two innocent graves.
But how strange for parents, when they hurry into the Gardens at the opening of the gates looking for their lost one, to find the sweetest little tombstone instead. I do hope that Peter is not too ready with his spade. It is all rather sad.
David and I had a tremendous adventure. It was this, he passed the night with me. We had often talked of it as a possible thing, and at last Mary consented to our having it.
The adventure began with David's coming to me at the unwonted hour of six P.M., carrying what looked like a packet of sandwiches, but proved to be his requisites for the night done up in a neat paper parcel. We were both so excited that, at the moment of greeting, neither of us could be apposite to the occasion in words, so we communicated our feelings by signs; as thus, David half sat down in a place where there was no chair, which is his favourite preparation for being emphatic, and is borrowed, I think, from the frogs, and we then made the extraordinary faces which mean, “What a tremendous adventure!”
We were to do all the important things precisely as they are done every evening at his own home, and so I am in a puzzle to know how it was such an adventure to David. But I have now said enough to show you what an adventure it was to me.
For a little while we played with my two medals, and, with the delicacy of a sleeping companion, David abstained on this occasion from asking why one of them was not a Victoria Cross. He is very troubled because I never won the Victoria Cross, for it lowers his status in the Gardens. He never says in the Gardens that I won it, but he fights any boy of his year who says I didn't. Their fighting consists of challenging each other.
At twenty-five past six I turned on the hot water in the bath, and covertly swallowed a small glass of brandy. I then said, “Half-past six; time for little boys to be in bed.” I said it in the matter-of-fact voice of one made free of the company of parents, as if I had said it often before, and would have to say it often again, and as if there was nothing particularly delicious to me in hearing myself say it. I tried to say it in that way.
And David was deceived. To my exceeding joy he stamped his little foot, and was so naughty that, in gratitude, I gave him five minutes with a matchbox. Matches, which he drops on the floor when lighted, are the greatest treat you can give David; indeed, I think his private heaven is a place with a roaring bonfire.
Then I placed my hand carelessly on his shoulder, like one a trifle bored by the dull routine of putting my little boys to bed, and conducted him to the night nursery, which had lately been my private chamber. There was an extra bed in it tonight, very near my own, but differently shaped, and scarcely less conspicuous was the new mantel-shelf ornament: a tumbler of milk, with a biscuit on top of it, and a chocolate riding on the biscuit. To enter the room without seeing the tumbler at once was impossible. I had tried it several times, and David saw and promptly did his frog business, the while, with an indescribable emotion, I produced a night-light from my pocket and planted it in a saucer on the wash-stand.
David watched my preparations with distasteful levity, but anon made a noble amend by abruptly offering me his foot as if he had no longer use for it, and I knew by intuition that he expected me to take off his boots. I took them off with all the coolness of an old hand, and then I placed him on my knee and removed his blouse. This was a delightful experience, but I think I remained wonderfully calm until I came somewhat too suddenly to his little braces, which agitated me profoundly.
I cannot proceed in public with the disrobing of David.
Soon the night nursery was in darkness, but for the glimmer from the night-light, and very still save when the door creaked as a man peered in at the little figure on the bed. However softly I opened the door, an inch at a time, his bright eyes turned to me at once, and he always made the face which means, “What a tremendous adventure!”
“Are you never to fall asleep, David?” I always said.
“When are you coming to bed?” he always replied, very brave but in a whisper, as if he feared the bears and wolves might have him. When little boys are in bed there is nothing between them and bears and wolves but the night-light.
I returned to my chair to think, and at last he fell asleep with his face to the wall, but even then I stood many times at the door, listening.
Long after I had gone to bed a sudden silence filled the chamber, and I knew that David had awaked. I lay motionless, and, after what seemed a long time of waiting, a little far-away voice said in a cautious whisper, “Irene!”
“You are sleeping with me to-night, you know, David,” I said.
“I didn't know,” he replied, a little troubled but trying not to be a nuisance.
“You remember you are with me?” I asked.
After a moment's hesitation he replied, “I nearly remember,” and presently he added very gratefully, as if to some angel who had whispered to him, “I remember now.”
I think he had nigh fallen asleep again when he stirred and said, “Is it going on now?”
“What?”
“The adventure.”
“Yes, David.”
Perhaps this disturbed him, for by-and-by I had to inquire, “You are not frightened, are you?”
“Am I not?” he answered politely, and I knew his hand was groping in the darkness, so I put out mine and he held on tightly to one finger.
“I am not frightened now,” he whispered.
“And there is nothing else you want?”
“Is there not?” he again asked politely. “Are you sure there's not?” he added.
“What can it be, David?”
“I don't take up very much room,” the far-away voice said.
“Why, David,” said I, sitting up, “do you want to come into my bed?”
“Mother said I wasn't to want it unless you wanted it first,” he squeaked.
“It is what I have been wanting all the time,” said I, and then without more ado the little white figure rose and flung itself at me. For the rest of the night he lay on me and across me, and sometimes his feet were at the bottom of the bed and sometimes on the pillow, but he always retained possession of my finger, and occasionally he woke me to say that he was sleeping with me. I had not a good night. I lay thinking.
Of this little boy, who, in the midst of his play while I undressed him, had suddenly buried his head on my knees.
Of the woman who had been for him who could be sufficiently daring.
Of David's dripping little form in the bath, and how when I essayed to catch him he had slipped from my arms like a trout.
Of how I had stood by the open door listening to his sweet breathing, had stood so long that I forgot his name and called him Timothy.
But Mary spoilt it all, when I sent David back to her in the morning, by inquiring too curiously into his person and discovering that I had put his combinations on him with the buttons to the front. For this I wrote her the following insulting letter. When Mary does anything that specially annoys me I send her an insulting letter. I once had a photograph taken of David being hanged on a tree. I sent her that. You can't think of all the subtle ways of grieving her I have. No woman with the spirit of a crow would stand it.
“Dear Madam [I wrote], It has come to my knowledge that when you walk in the Gardens with the boy David you listen avidly for encomiums of him and of your fanciful dressing of him by passers-by, storing them in your heart the while you make vain pretence to regard them not: wherefore lest you be swollen by these very small things I, who now know David both by day and by night, am minded to compare him and Porthos the one with the other, both in this matter and in other matters of graver account. And touching this matter of outward show, they are both very lordly, and neither of them likes it to be referred to, but they endure in different ways. For David says 'Oh, bother!' and even at times hits out, but Porthos droops his tail and lets them have their say. Yet is he extolled as beautiful and a darling ten times for the once that David is extolled.
“The manners of Porthos are therefore prettier than the manners of David, who when he has sent me to hide from him behind a tree sometimes comes not in search, and on emerging tamely from my concealment I find him playing other games entirely forgetful of my existence. Whereas Porthos always comes in search. Also if David wearies of you he scruples not to say so, but Porthos, in like circumstances, offers you his paw, meaning 'Farewell,' and to bearded men he does this all the time (I think because of a hereditary distaste for goats), so that they conceive him to be enamoured of them when he is only begging them courteously to go. Thus while the manners of Porthos are more polite it may be argued that those of David are more efficacious.
“In gentleness David compares ill with Porthos. For whereas the one shoves and has been known to kick on slight provocation, the other, who is noisily hated of all small dogs by reason of his size, remonstrates not, even when they cling in froth and fury to his chest, but carries them along tolerantly until they drop off from fatigue. Again, David will not unbend when in the company of babies, expecting them unreasonably to rise to his level, but contrariwise Porthos, though terrible to tramps, suffers all things of babies, even to an exploration of his mouth in an attempt to discover what his tongue is like at the other end. The comings and goings of David are unnoticed by perambulators, which lie in wait for the advent of Porthos. The strong and wicked fear Porthos but no little creature fears him, not the hedgehogs he conveys from place to place in his mouth, nor the sparrows that steal his straw from under him.
“In proof of which gentleness I adduce his adventure with the rabbit. Having gone for a time to reside in a rabbit country Porthos was elated to discover at last something small that ran from him, and developing at once into an ecstatic sportsman he did pound hotly in pursuit, though always over-shooting the mark by a hundred yards or so and wondering very much what had become of the rabbit. There was a steep path, from the top of which the rabbit suddenly came into view, and the practice of Porthos was to advance up it on tiptoe, turning near the summit to give me a knowing look and then bounding forward. The rabbit here did something tricky with a hole in the ground, but Porthos tore onwards in full faith that the game was being played fairly, and always returned panting and puzzling but glorious.
“I sometimes shuddered to think of his perplexity should he catch the rabbit, which however was extremely unlikely; nevertheless he did catch it, I know not how, but presume it to have been another than the one of which he was in chase. I found him with it, his brows furrowed in the deepest thought. The rabbit, terrified but uninjured, cowered beneath him. Porthos gave me a happy look and again dropped into a weighty frame of mind. 'What is the next thing one does?' was obviously the puzzle with him, and the position was scarcely less awkward for the rabbit, which several times made a move to end this intolerable suspense. Whereupon Porthos immediately gave it a warning tap with his foot, and again fell to pondering. The strain on me was very great.
“At last they seemed to hit upon a compromise. Porthos looked over his shoulder very self-consciously, and the rabbit at first slowly and then in a flash withdrew. Porthos pretended to make a search for it, but you cannot think how relieved he looked. He even tried to brazen out his disgrace before me and waved his tail appealingly. But he could not look me in the face, and when he saw that this was what I insisted on he collapsed at my feet and moaned. There were real tears in his eyes, and I was touched, and swore to him that he had done everything a dog could do, and though he knew I was lying he became happy again. For so long as I am pleased with him, ma'am, nothing else greatly matters to Porthos. I told this story to David, having first extracted a promise from him that he would not think the less of Porthos, and now I must demand the same promise of you. Also, an admission that in innocence of heart, for which David has been properly commended, he can nevertheless teach Porthos nothing, but on the contrary may learn much from him.
“And now to come to those qualities in which David excels over Porthos—the first is that he is no snob but esteems the girl Irene (pretentiously called his nurse) more than any fine lady, and envies every ragged boy who can hit to leg. Whereas Porthos would have every class keep its place, and though fond of going down into the kitchen, always barks at the top of the stairs for a servile invitation before he graciously descends. Most of the servants in our street have had the loan of him to be photographed with, and I have but now seen him stalking off for that purpose with a proud little housemaid who is looking up to him as if he were a warrior for whom she had paid a shilling.
“Again, when David and Porthos are in their bath, praise is due to the one and must be withheld from the other. For David, as I have noticed, loves to splash in his bath and to slip back into it from the hands that would transfer him to a towel. But Porthos stands in his bath drooping abjectly like a shamed figure cut out of some limp material.
“Furthermore, the inventiveness of David is beyond that of Porthos, who cannot play by himself, and knows not even how to take a solitary walk, while David invents playfully all day long. Lastly, when David is discovered of some offence and expresses sorrow therefor, he does that thing no more for a time, but looks about him for other offences, whereas Porthos incontinently repeats his offence, in other words, he again buries his bone in the backyard, and marvels greatly that I know it, although his nose be crusted with earth.
“Touching these matters, therefore, let it be granted that David excels Porthos; and in divers similar qualities the one is no more than a match for the other, as in the quality of curiosity; for, if a parcel comes into my chambers Porthos is miserable until it is opened, and I have noticed the same thing of David.
“Also there is the taking of medicine. For at production of the vial all gaiety suddenly departs from Porthos and he looks the other way, but if I say I have forgotten to have the vial refilled he skips joyfully, yet thinks he still has a right to a chocolate, and when I remarked disparagingly on this to David he looked so shy that there was revealed to me a picture of a certain lady treating him for youthful maladies.
“A thing to be considered of in both is their receiving of punishments, and I am now reminded that the girl Irene (whom I take in this matter to be your mouthpiece) complains that I am not sufficiently severe with David, and do leave the chiding of him for offences against myself to her in the hope that he will love her less and me more thereby. Which we have hotly argued in the Gardens to the detriment of our dignity. And I here say that if I am slow to be severe to David, the reason thereof is that I dare not be severe to Porthos, and I have ever sought to treat the one the same with the other.
“Now I refrain from raising hand or voice to Porthos because his great heart is nigh to breaking if he so much as suspects that all is not well between him and me, and having struck him once some years ago never can I forget the shudder which passed through him when he saw it was I who had struck, and I shall strike him, ma'am, no more. But when he is detected in any unseemly act now, it is my stern practice to cane my writing table in his presence, and even this punishment is almost more than he can bear. Wherefore if such chastisement inflicted on David encourages him but to enter upon fresh trespasses (as the girl Irene avers), the reason must be that his heart is not like unto that of the noble Porthos.
“And if you retort that David is naturally a depraved little boy, and so demands harsher measure, I have still my answer, to wit, what is the manner of severity meted out to him at home? And lest you should shuffle in your reply I shall mention a notable passage that has come to my ears.
“As thus, that David having heard a horrid word in the street, uttered it with unction in the home. That the mother threatened corporal punishment, whereat the father tremblingly intervened. That David continuing to rejoice exceedingly in his word, the father spoke darkly of a cane, but the mother rushed between the combatants. That the problematical chastisement became to David an object of romantic interest. That this darkened the happy home. That casting from his path a weeping mother, the goaded father at last dashed from the house yelling that he was away to buy a cane. That he merely walked the streets white to the lips because of the terror David must now be feeling. And that when he returned, it was David radiant with hope who opened the door and then burst into tears because there was no cane. Truly, ma'am, you are a fitting person to tax me with want of severity. Rather should you be giving thanks that it is not you I am comparing with Porthos.
“But to make an end of this comparison, I mention that Porthos is ever wishful to express gratitude for my kindness to him, so that looking up from my book I see his mournful eyes fixed upon me with a passionate attachment, and then I know that the well-nigh unbearable sadness which comes into the face of dogs is because they cannot say Thank you to their masters. Whereas David takes my kindness as his right. But for this, while I should chide him I cannot do so, for of all the ways David has of making me to love him the most poignant is that he expects it of me as a matter of course. David is all for fun, but none may plumb the depths of Porthos. Nevertheless I am most nearly doing so when I lie down beside him on the floor and he puts an arm about my neck. On my soul, ma'am, a protecting arm. At such times it is as if each of us knew what was the want of the other.
“Thus weighing Porthos with David it were hard to tell which is the worthier. Wherefore do you keep your boy while I keep my dog, and so we shall both be pleased.”
We had been together, we three, in my rooms, David telling me about the fairy language and Porthos lolling on the sofa listening, as one may say. It is his favourite place of a dull day, and under him were some sheets of newspaper, which I spread there at such times to deceive my housekeeper, who thinks dogs should lie on the floor.
Fairy me tribber is what you say to the fairies when you want them to give you a cup of tea, but it is not so easy as it looks, for all the r's should be pronounced as w's, and I forget this so often that David believes I should find difficulty in making myself understood.
“What would you say,” he asked me, “if you wanted them to turn you into a hollyhock?” He thinks the ease with which they can turn you into things is their most engaging quality.
The answer is Fairy me lukka, but though he had often told me this I again forgot the lukka.
“I should never dream,” I said (to cover my discomfiture), “of asking them to turn me into anything. If I was a hollyhock I should soon wither, David.”
He himself had provided me with this objection not long before, but now he seemed to think it merely silly. “Just before the time to wither begins,” he said airily, “you say to them Fairy me bola.”
Fairy me bola means “Turn me back again,” and David's discovery made me uncomfortable, for I knew he had hitherto kept his distance of the fairies mainly because of a feeling that their conversions are permanent.
So I returned him to his home. I send him home from my rooms under the care of Porthos. I may walk on the other side unknown to them, but they have no need of me, for at such times nothing would induce Porthos to depart from the care of David. If anyone addresses them he growls softly and shows the teeth that crunch bones as if they were biscuits. Thus amicably the two pass on to Mary's house, where Porthos barks his knock-and-ring bark till the door is opened. Sometimes he goes in with David, but on this occasion he said good-bye on the step. Nothing remarkable in this, but he did not return to me, not that day nor next day nor in weeks and months. I was a man distraught; and David wore his knuckles in his eyes. Conceive it, we had lost our dear Porthos—at least—well—something disquieting happened. I don't quite know what to think of it even now. I know what David thinks. However, you shall think as you choose.
My first hope was that Porthos had strolled to the Gardens and got locked in for the night, and almost as soon as Lock-out was over I was there to make inquiries. But there was no news of Porthos, though I learned that someone was believed to have spent the night in the Gardens, a young gentleman who walked out hastily the moment the gates were opened. He had said nothing, however, of having seen a dog. I feared an accident now, for I knew no thief could steal him, yet even an accident seemed incredible, he was always so cautious at crossings; also there could not possibly have been an accident to Porthos without there being an accident to something else.
David in the middle of his games would suddenly remember the great blank and step aside to cry. It was one of his qualities that when he knew he was about to cry he turned aside to do it and I always respected his privacy and waited for him. Of course being but a little boy he was soon playing again, but his sudden floods of feeling, of which we never spoke, were dear to me in those desolate days.
We had a favourite haunt, called the Story-seat, and we went back to that, meaning not to look at the grass near it where Porthos used to squat, but we could not help looking at it sideways, and to our distress a man was sitting on the acquainted spot. He rose at our approach and took two steps toward us, so quick that they were almost jumps, then as he saw that we were passing indignantly I thought I heard him give a little cry.
I put him down for one of your garrulous fellows who try to lure strangers into talk, but next day, when we found him sitting on the Story-seat itself, I had a longer scrutiny of him. He was dandiacally dressed, seemed to tell something under twenty years and had a handsome wistful face atop of a heavy, lumbering, almost corpulent figure, which however did not betoken inactivity; for David's purple hat (a conceit of his mother's of which we were both heartily ashamed) blowing off as we neared him he leapt the railings without touching them and was back with it in three seconds; only instead of delivering it straightway he seemed to expect David to chase him for it.
You have introduced yourself to David when you jump the railings without touching them, and William Paterson (as proved to be his name) was at once our friend. We often found him waiting for us at the Story-seat, and the great stout fellow laughed and wept over our tales like a three-year-old. Often he said with extraordinary pride, “You are telling the story to me quite as much as to David, ar'n't you?” He was of an innocence such as you shall seldom encounter, and believed stories at which even David blinked. Often he looked at me in quick alarm if David said that of course these things did not really happen, and unable to resist that appeal I would reply that they really did. I never saw him irate except when David was still sceptical, but then he would say quite warningly “He says it is true, so it must be true.” This brings me to that one of his qualities, which at once gratified and pained me, his admiration for myself. His eyes, which at times had a rim of red, were ever fixed upon me fondly except perhaps when I told him of Porthos and said that death alone could have kept him so long from my side. Then Paterson's sympathy was such that he had to look away. He was shy of speaking of himself so I asked him no personal questions, but concluded that his upbringing must have been lonely, to account for his ignorance of affairs, and loveless, else how could he have felt such a drawing to me?
I remember very well the day when the strange, and surely monstrous, suspicion first made my head tingle. We had been blown, the three of us, to my rooms by a gust of rain; it was also, I think, the first time Paterson had entered them. “Take the sofa, Mr. Paterson,” I said, as I drew a chair nearer to the fire, and for the moment my eyes were off him. Then I saw that, before sitting down on the sofa, he was spreading the day's paper over it. “Whatever makes you do that?” I asked, and he started like one bewildered by the question, then went white and pushed the paper aside.
David had noticed nothing, but I was strangely uncomfortable, and, despite my efforts at talk, often lapsed into silence, to be roused from it by a feeling that Paterson was looking at me covertly. Pooh! what vapours of the imagination were these. I blew them from me, and to prove to myself, so to speak, that they were dissipated, I asked him to see David home. As soon as I was alone, I flung me down on the floor laughing, then as quickly jumped up and was after them, and very sober too, for it was come to me abruptly as an odd thing that Paterson had set off without asking where David lived.
Seeing them in front of me, I crossed the street and followed. They were walking side by side rather solemnly, and perhaps nothing remarkable happened until they reached David's door. I say perhaps, for something did occur. A lady, who has several pretty reasons for frequenting the Gardens, recognised David in the street, and was stooping to address him, when Paterson did something that alarmed her. I was too far off to see what it was, but had he growled “Hands off!” she could not have scurried away more precipitately. He then ponderously marched his charge to the door, where, assuredly, he did a strange thing. Instead of knocking or ringing, he stood on the step and called out sharply, “Hie, hie, hie!” until the door was opened.
The whimsy, for it could be nothing more, curtailed me of my sleep that night, and you may picture me trying both sides of the pillow.
I recalled other queer things of Paterson, and they came back to me charged with new meanings. There was his way of shaking hands. He now did it in the ordinary way, but when first we knew him his arm had described a circle, and the hand had sometimes missed mine and come heavily upon my chest instead. His walk, again, might more correctly have been called a waddle.
There were his perfervid thanks. He seldom departed without thanking me with an intensity that was out of proportion to the little I had done for him. In the Gardens, too, he seemed ever to take the sward rather than the seats, perhaps a wise preference, but he had an unusual way of sitting down. I can describe it only by saying that he let go of himself and went down with a thud.
I reverted to the occasion when he lunched with me at the Club. We had cutlets, and I noticed that he ate his in a somewhat finicking manner; yet having left the table for a moment to consult the sweets-card, I saw, when I returned, that there was now no bone on his plate. The waiters were looking at him rather curiously.
David was very partial to him, but showed it in a somewhat singular manner, used to pat his head, for instance. I remembered, also, that while David shouted to me or Irene to attract our attention, he usually whistled to Paterson, he could not explain why.
These ghosts made me to sweat in bed, not merely that night, but often when some new shock brought them back in force, yet, unsupported, they would have disturbed me little by day. Day, however, had its reflections, and they came to me while I was shaving, that ten minutes when, brought face to face with the harsher realities of life, we see things most clearly as they are. Then the beautiful nature of Paterson loomed offensively, and his honest eyes insulted over me. No one come to nigh twenty years had a right to such faith in his fellow-creatures. He could not backbite, nor envy, nor prevaricate, nor jump at mean motives for generous acts. He had not a single base story about women. It all seemed inhuman.
What creatures we be! I was more than half ashamed of Paterson's faith in me, but when I saw it begin to shrink I fought for it. An easy task, you may say, but it was a hard one, for gradually a change had come over the youth. I am now arrived at a time when the light-heartedness had gone out of him; he had lost his zest for fun, and dubiety sat in the eyes that were once so certain. He was not doubtful of me, not then, but of human nature in general; that whilom noble edifice was tottering. He mixed with boys in the Gardens; ah, mothers, it is hard to say, but how could he retain his innocence when he had mixed with boys? He heard your talk of yourselves, and so, ladies, that part of the edifice went down. I have not the heart to follow him in all his discoveries. Sometimes he went in flame at them, but for the most part he stood looking on, bewildered and numbed, like one moaning inwardly.
He saw all, as one fresh to the world, before he had time to breathe upon the glass. So would your child be, madam, if born with a man's powers, and when disillusioned of all else, he would cling for a moment longer to you, the woman of whom, before he saw you, he had heard so much. How you would strive to cheat him, even as I strove to hide my real self from Paterson, and still you would strive as I strove after you knew the game was up.
The sorrowful eyes of Paterson stripped me bare. There were days when I could not endure looking at him, though surely I have long ceased to be a vain man. He still met us in the Gardens, but for hours he and I would be together without speaking. It was so upon the last day, one of those innumerable dreary days when David, having sneezed the night before, was kept at home in flannel, and I sat alone with Paterson on the Story-seat. At last I turned to address him. Never had we spoken of what chained our tongues, and I meant only to say now that we must go, for soon the gates would close, but when I looked at him I saw that he was more mournful than ever before; he shut his eyes so tightly that a drop of blood fell from them.
“It was all over, Paterson, long ago,” I broke out harshly, “why do we linger?”
He beat his hands together miserably, and yet cast me appealing looks that had much affection in them.
“You expected too much of me,” I told him, and he bowed his head. “I don't know where you brought your grand ideas of men and women from. I don't want to know,” I added hastily.
“But it must have been from a prettier world than this,” I said: “are you quite sure that you were wise in leaving it?”
He rose and sat down again. “I wanted to know you,” he replied slowly, “I wanted to be like you.”
“And now you know me,” I said, “do you want to be like me still? I am a curious person to attach oneself to, Paterson; don't you see that even David often smiles at me when he thinks he is unobserved. I work very hard to retain that little boy's love; but I shall lose him soon; even now I am not what I was to him; in a year or two at longest, Paterson, David will grow out of me.”
The poor fellow shot out his hand to me, but “No,” said I, “you have found me out. Everybody finds me out except my dog, and that is why the loss of him makes such a difference to me. Shall we go, Paterson?”
He would not come with me, and I left him on the seat; when I was far away I looked back, and he was still sitting there forlornly.
For long I could not close my ears that night: I lay listening, I knew not what for. A scare was on me that made me dislike the dark, and I switched on the light and slept at last. I was roused by a great to-do in the early morning, servants knocking excitedly, and my door opened, and the dear Porthos I had mourned so long tore in. They had heard his bark, but whence he came no one knew.
He was in excellent condition, and after he had leaped upon me from all points I flung him on the floor by a trick I know, and lay down beside him, while he put his protecting arm round me and looked at me with the old adoring eyes.
But we never saw Paterson again. You may think as you choose.