I hope you don't mind my telling you a good deal about Roberta. The fact is I am growing very fond of her. The more I observe her the more I love her. And I notice all sorts of things about her that I like.
For instance, she was quite oddly anxious to make other people happy. And she could keep a secret, a tolerably rare accomplishment. Also she had the power of silent sympathy. That sounds rather dull, I know, but it's not so dull as it sounds. It just means that a person is able to know that you are unhappy, and to love you extra on that account, without bothering you by telling you all the time how sorry she is for you. That was what Bobbie was like. She knew that Mother was unhappy—and that Mother had not told her the reason. So she just loved Mother more and never said a single word that could let Mother know how earnestly her little girl wondered what Mother was unhappy about. This needs practice. It is not so easy as you might think.
Whatever happened—and all sorts of nice, pleasant ordinary things happened—such as picnics, games, and buns for tea, Bobbie always had these thoughts at the back of her mind. “Mother's unhappy. Why? I don't know. She doesn't want me to know. I won't try to find out. But she IS unhappy. Why? I don't know. She doesn't—” and so on, repeating and repeating like a tune that you don't know the stopping part of.
The Russian gentleman still took up a good deal of everybody's thoughts. All the editors and secretaries of Societies and Members of Parliament had answered Mother's letters as politely as they knew how; but none of them could tell where the wife and children of Mr. Szezcpansky would be likely to be. (Did I tell you that the Russian's very Russian name was that?)
Bobbie had another quality which you will hear differently described by different people. Some of them call it interfering in other people's business—and some call it “helping lame dogs over stiles,” and some call it “loving-kindness.” It just means trying to help people.
She racked her brains to think of some way of helping the Russian gentleman to find his wife and children. He had learned a few words of English now. He could say “Good morning,” and “Good night,” and “Please,” and “Thank you,” and “Pretty,” when the children brought him flowers, and “Ver' good,” when they asked him how he had slept.
The way he smiled when he “said his English,” was, Bobbie felt, “just too sweet for anything.” She used to think of his face because she fancied it would help her to some way of helping him. But it did not. Yet his being there cheered her because she saw that it made Mother happier.
“She likes to have someone to be good to, even beside us,” said Bobbie. “And I know she hated to let him have Father's clothes. But I suppose it 'hurt nice,' or she wouldn't have.”
For many and many a night after the day when she and Peter and Phyllis had saved the train from wreck by waving their little red flannel flags, Bobbie used to wake screaming and shivering, seeing again that horrible mound, and the poor, dear trustful engine rushing on towards it—just thinking that it was doing its swift duty, and that everything was clear and safe. And then a warm thrill of pleasure used to run through her at the remembrance of how she and Peter and Phyllis and the red flannel petticoats had really saved everybody.
One morning a letter came. It was addressed to Peter and Bobbie and Phyllis. They opened it with enthusiastic curiosity, for they did not often get letters.
The letter said:—
“Dear Sir, and Ladies,—It is proposed to make a small presentation to you, in commemoration of your prompt and courageous action in warning the train on the —- inst., and thus averting what must, humanly speaking, have been a terrible accident. The presentation will take place at the —- Station at three o'clock on the 30th inst., if this time and place will be convenient to you.
“Yours faithfully,“Jabez Inglewood.“Secretary, Great Northern and Southern Railway Co.”
There never had been a prouder moment in the lives of the three children. They rushed to Mother with the letter, and she also felt proud and said so, and this made the children happier than ever.
“But if the presentation is money, you must say, 'Thank you, but we'd rather not take it,'” said Mother. “I'll wash your Indian muslins at once,” she added. “You must look tidy on an occasion like this.”
“Phil and I can wash them,” said Bobbie, “if you'll iron them, Mother.”
Washing is rather fun. I wonder whether you've ever done it? This particular washing took place in the back kitchen, which had a stone floor and a very big stone sink under its window.
“Let's put the bath on the sink,” said Phyllis; “then we can pretend we're out-of-doors washerwomen like Mother saw in France.”
“But they were washing in the cold river,” said Peter, his hands in his pockets, “not in hot water.”
“This is a HOT river, then,” said Phyllis; “lend a hand with the bath, there's a dear.”
“I should like to see a deer lending a hand,” said Peter, but he lent his.
“Now to rub and scrub and scrub and rub,” said Phyllis, hopping joyously about as Bobbie carefully carried the heavy kettle from the kitchen fire.
“Oh, no!” said Bobbie, greatly shocked; “you don't rub muslin. You put the boiled soap in the hot water and make it all frothy-lathery—and then you shake the muslin and squeeze it, ever so gently, and all the dirt comes out. It's only clumsy things like tablecloths and sheets that have to be rubbed.”
The lilac and the Gloire de Dijon roses outside the window swayed in the soft breeze.
“It's a nice drying day—that's one thing,” said Bobbie, feeling very grown up. “Oh, I do wonder what wonderful feelings we shall have when we WEAR the Indian muslin dresses!”
“Yes, so do I,” said Phyllis, shaking and squeezing the muslin in quite a professional manner.
“NOW we squeeze out the soapy water. NO—we mustn't twist them—and then rinse them. I'll hold them while you and Peter empty the bath and get clean water.”
“A presentation! That means presents,” said Peter, as his sisters, having duly washed the pegs and wiped the line, hung up the dresses to dry. “Whatever will it be?”
“It might be anything,” said Phyllis; “what I've always wanted is a Baby elephant—but I suppose they wouldn't know that.”
“Suppose it was gold models of steam-engines?” said Bobbie.
“Or a big model of the scene of the prevented accident,” suggested Peter, “with a little model train, and dolls dressed like us and the engine-driver and fireman and passengers.”
“Do you LIKE,” said Bobbie, doubtfully, drying her hands on the rough towel that hung on a roller at the back of the scullery door, “do you LIKE us being rewarded for saving a train?”
“Yes, I do,” said Peter, downrightly; “and don't you try to come it over us that you don't like it, too. Because I know you do.”
“Yes,” said Bobbie, doubtfully, “I know I do. But oughtn't we to be satisfied with just having done it, and not ask for anything more?”
“Who did ask for anything more, silly?” said her brother; “Victoria Cross soldiers don't ASK for it; but they're glad enough to get it all the same. Perhaps it'll be medals. Then, when I'm very old indeed, I shall show them to my grandchildren and say, 'We only did our duty,' and they'll be awfully proud of me.”
“You have to be married,” warned Phyllis, “or you don't have any grandchildren.”
“I suppose I shall HAVE to be married some day,” said Peter, “but it will be an awful bother having her round all the time. I'd like to marry a lady who had trances, and only woke up once or twice a year.”
“Just to say you were the light of her life and then go to sleep again. Yes. That wouldn't be bad,” said Bobbie.
“WhenIget married,” said Phyllis, “I shall want him to want me to be awake all the time, so that I can hear him say how nice I am.”
“I think it would be nice,” said Bobbie, “to marry someone very poor, and then you'd do all the work and he'd love you most frightfully, and see the blue wood smoke curling up among the trees from the domestic hearth as he came home from work every night. I say—we've got to answer that letter and say that the time and place WILL be convenient to us. There's the soap, Peter. WE'RE both as clean as clean. That pink box of writing paper you had on your birthday, Phil.”
It took some time to arrange what should be said. Mother had gone back to her writing, and several sheets of pink paper with scalloped gilt edges and green four-leaved shamrocks in the corner were spoiled before the three had decided what to say. Then each made a copy and signed it with its own name.
The threefold letter ran:—
“Dear Mr. Jabez Inglewood,—Thank you very much. We did not want to be rewarded but only to save the train, but we are glad you think so and thank you very much. The time and place you say will be quite convenient to us. Thank you very much.
“Your affecate little friend,”
Then came the name, and after it:—
“P.S. Thank you very much.”
“Washing is much easier than ironing,” said Bobbie, taking the clean dry dresses off the line. “I do love to see things come clean. Oh—I don't know how we shall wait till it's time to know what presentation they're going to present!”
When at last—it seemed a very long time after—it was THE day, the three children went down to the station at the proper time. And everything that happened was so odd that it seemed like a dream. The Station Master came out to meet them—in his best clothes, as Peter noticed at once—and led them into the waiting room where once they had played the advertisement game. It looked quite different now. A carpet had been put down—and there were pots of roses on the mantelpiece and on the window ledges—green branches stuck up, like holly and laurel are at Christmas, over the framed advertisement of Cook's Tours and the Beauties of Devon and the Paris Lyons Railway. There were quite a number of people there besides the Porter—two or three ladies in smart dresses, and quite a crowd of gentlemen in high hats and frock coats—besides everybody who belonged to the station. They recognized several people who had been in the train on the red-flannel-petticoat day. Best of all their own old gentleman was there, and his coat and hat and collar seemed more than ever different from anyone else's. He shook hands with them and then everybody sat down on chairs, and a gentleman in spectacles—they found out afterwards that he was the District Superintendent—began quite a long speech—very clever indeed. I am not going to write the speech down. First, because you would think it dull; and secondly, because it made all the children blush so, and get so hot about the ears that I am quite anxious to get away from this part of the subject; and thirdly, because the gentleman took so many words to say what he had to say that I really haven't time to write them down. He said all sorts of nice things about the children's bravery and presence of mind, and when he had done he sat down, and everyone who was there clapped and said, “Hear, hear.”
And then the old gentleman got up and said things, too. It was very like a prize-giving. And then he called the children one by one, by their names, and gave each of them a beautiful gold watch and chain. And inside the watches were engraved after the name of the watch's new owner:—
“From the Directors of the Northern and Southern Railway in grateful recognition of the courageous and prompt action which averted an accident on —- 1905.”
The watches were the most beautiful you can possibly imagine, and each one had a blue leather case to live in when it was at home.
“You must make a speech now and thank everyone for their kindness,” whispered the Station Master in Peter's ear and pushed him forward. “Begin 'Ladies and Gentlemen,'” he added.
Each of the children had already said “Thank you,” quite properly.
“Oh, dear,” said Peter, but he did not resist the push.
“Ladies and Gentlemen,” he said in a rather husky voice. Then there was a pause, and he heard his heart beating in his throat. “Ladies and Gentlemen,” he went on with a rush, “it's most awfully good of you, and we shall treasure the watches all our lives—but really we don't deserve it because what we did wasn't anything, really. At least, I mean it was awfully exciting, and what I mean to say—thank you all very, very much.”
The people clapped Peter more than they had done the District Superintendent, and then everybody shook hands with them, and as soon as politeness would let them, they got away, and tore up the hill to Three Chimneys with their watches in their hands.
It was a wonderful day—the kind of day that very seldom happens to anybody and to most of us not at all.
“I did want to talk to the old gentleman about something else,” said Bobbie, “but it was so public—like being in church.”
“What did you want to say?” asked Phyllis.
“I'll tell you when I've thought about it more,” said Bobbie.
So when she had thought a little more she wrote a letter.
“My dearest old gentleman,” it said; “I want most awfully to ask you something. If you could get out of the train and go by the next, it would do. I do not want you to give me anything. Mother says we ought not to. And besides, we do not want any THINGS. Only to talk to you about a Prisoner and Captive. Your loving little friend,
“Bobbie.”
She got the Station Master to give the letter to the old gentleman, and next day she asked Peter and Phyllis to come down to the station with her at the time when the train that brought the old gentleman from town would be passing through.
She explained her idea to them—and they approved thoroughly.
They had all washed their hands and faces, and brushed their hair, and were looking as tidy as they knew how. But Phyllis, always unlucky, had upset a jug of lemonade down the front of her dress. There was no time to change—and the wind happening to blow from the coal yard, her frock was soon powdered with grey, which stuck to the sticky lemonade stains and made her look, as Peter said, “like any little gutter child.”
It was decided that she should keep behind the others as much as possible.
“Perhaps the old gentleman won't notice,” said Bobbie. “The aged are often weak in the eyes.”
There was no sign of weakness, however, in the eyes, or in any other part of the old gentleman, as he stepped from the train and looked up and down the platform.
The three children, now that it came to the point, suddenly felt that rush of deep shyness which makes your ears red and hot, your hands warm and wet, and the tip of your nose pink and shiny.
“Oh,” said Phyllis, “my heart's thumping like a steam-engine—right under my sash, too.”
“Nonsense,” said Peter, “people's hearts aren't under their sashes.”
“I don't care—mine is,” said Phyllis.
“If you're going to talk like a poetry-book,” said Peter, “my heart's in my mouth.”
“My heart's in my boots—if you come to that,” said Roberta; “but do come on—he'll think we're idiots.”
“He won't be far wrong,” said Peter, gloomily. And they went forward to meet the old gentleman.
“Hullo,” he said, shaking hands with them all in turn. “This is a very great pleasure.”
“It WAS good of you to get out,” Bobbie said, perspiring and polite.
He took her arm and drew her into the waiting room where she and the others had played the advertisement game the day they found the Russian. Phyllis and Peter followed. “Well?” said the old gentleman, giving Bobbie's arm a kind little shake before he let it go. “Well? What is it?”
“Oh, please!” said Bobbie.
“Yes?” said the old gentleman.
“What I mean to say—” said Bobbie.
“Well?” said the old gentleman.
“It's all very nice and kind,” said she.
“But?” he said.
“I wish I might say something,” she said.
“Say it,” said he.
“Well, then,” said Bobbie—and out came the story of the Russian who had written the beautiful book about poor people, and had been sent to prison and to Siberia for just that.
“And what we want more than anything in the world is to find his wife and children for him,” said Bobbie, “but we don't know how. But you must be most horribly clever, or you wouldn't be a Direction of the Railway. And if YOU knew how—and would? We'd rather have that than anything else in the world. We'd go without the watches, even, if you could sell them and find his wife with the money.”
And the others said so, too, though not with so much enthusiasm.
“Hum,” said the old gentleman, pulling down the white waistcoat that had the big gilt buttons on it, “what did you say the name was—Fryingpansky?”
“No, no,” said Bobbie earnestly. “I'll write it down for you. It doesn't really look at all like that except when you say it. Have you a bit of pencil and the back of an envelope?” she asked.
The old gentleman got out a gold pencil-case and a beautiful, sweet-smelling, green Russian leather note-book and opened it at a new page.
“Here,” he said, “write here.”
She wrote down “Szezcpansky,” and said:—
“That's how you write it. You CALL it Shepansky.”
The old gentleman took out a pair of gold-rimmed spectacles and fitted them on his nose. When he had read the name, he looked quite different.
“THAT man? Bless my soul!” he said. “Why, I've read his book! It's translated into every European language. A fine book—a noble book. And so your mother took him in—like the good Samaritan. Well, well. I'll tell you what, youngsters—your mother must be a very good woman.”
“Of course she is,” said Phyllis, in astonishment.
“And you're a very good man,” said Bobbie, very shy, but firmly resolved to be polite.
“You flatter me,” said the old gentleman, taking off his hat with a flourish. “And now am I to tell you what I think of you?”
“Oh, please don't,” said Bobbie, hastily.
“Why?” asked the old gentleman.
“I don't exactly know,” said Bobbie. “Only—if it's horrid, I don't want you to; and if it's nice, I'd rather you didn't.”
The old gentleman laughed.
“Well, then,” he said, “I'll only just say that I'm very glad you came to me about this—very glad, indeed. And I shouldn't be surprised if I found out something very soon. I know a great many Russians in London, and every Russian knows HIS name. Now tell me all about yourselves.”
He turned to the others, but there was only one other, and that was Peter. Phyllis had disappeared.
“Tell me all about yourself,” said the old gentleman again. And, quite naturally, Peter was stricken dumb.
“All right, we'll have an examination,” said the old gentleman; “you two sit on the table, and I'll sit on the bench and ask questions.”
He did, and out came their names and ages—their Father's name and business—how long they had lived at Three Chimneys and a great deal more.
The questions were beginning to turn on a herring and a half for three halfpence, and a pound of lead and a pound of feathers, when the door of the waiting room was kicked open by a boot; as the boot entered everyone could see that its lace was coming undone—and in came Phyllis, very slowly and carefully.
In one hand she carried a large tin can, and in the other a thick slice of bread and butter.
“Afternoon tea,” she announced proudly, and held the can and the bread and butter out to the old gentleman, who took them and said:—
“Bless my soul!”
“Yes,” said Phyllis.
“It's very thoughtful of you,” said the old gentleman, “very.”
“But you might have got a cup,” said Bobbie, “and a plate.”
“Perks always drinks out of the can,” said Phyllis, flushing red. “I think it was very nice of him to give it me at all—let alone cups and plates,” she added.
“So do I,” said the old gentleman, and he drank some of the tea and tasted the bread and butter.
And then it was time for the next train, and he got into it with many good-byes and kind last words.
“Well,” said Peter, when they were left on the platform, and the tail-lights of the train disappeared round the corner, “it's my belief that we've lighted a candle to-day—like Latimer, you know, when he was being burned—and there'll be fireworks for our Russian before long.”
And so there were.
It wasn't ten days after the interview in the waiting room that the three children were sitting on the top of the biggest rock in the field below their house watching the 5.15 steam away from the station along the bottom of the valley. They saw, too, the few people who had got out at the station straggling up the road towards the village—and they saw one person leave the road and open the gate that led across the fields to Three Chimneys and to nowhere else.
“Who on earth!” said Peter, scrambling down.
“Let's go and see,” said Phyllis.
So they did. And when they got near enough to see who the person was, they saw it was their old gentleman himself, his brass buttons winking in the afternoon sunshine, and his white waistcoat looking whiter than ever against the green of the field.
“Hullo!” shouted the children, waving their hands.
“Hullo!” shouted the old gentleman, waving his hat.
Then the three started to run—and when they got to him they hardly had breath left to say:—
“How do you do?”
“Good news,” said he. “I've found your Russian friend's wife and child—and I couldn't resist the temptation of giving myself the pleasure of telling him.”
But as he looked at Bobbie's face he felt that he COULD resist that temptation.
“Here,” he said to her, “you run on and tell him. The other two will show me the way.”
Bobbie ran. But when she had breathlessly panted out the news to the Russian and Mother sitting in the quiet garden—when Mother's face had lighted up so beautifully, and she had said half a dozen quick French words to the Exile—Bobbie wished that she had NOT carried the news. For the Russian sprang up with a cry that made Bobbie's heart leap and then tremble—a cry of love and longing such as she had never heard. Then he took Mother's hand and kissed it gently and reverently—and then he sank down in his chair and covered his face with his hands and sobbed. Bobbie crept away. She did not want to see the others just then.
But she was as gay as anybody when the endless French talking was over, when Peter had torn down to the village for buns and cakes, and the girls had got tea ready and taken it out into the garden.
The old gentleman was most merry and delightful. He seemed to be able to talk in French and English almost at the same moment, and Mother did nearly as well. It was a delightful time. Mother seemed as if she could not make enough fuss about the old gentleman, and she said yes at once when he asked if he might present some “goodies” to his little friends.
The word was new to the children—but they guessed that it meant sweets, for the three large pink and green boxes, tied with green ribbon, which he took out of his bag, held unheard-of layers of beautiful chocolates.
The Russian's few belongings were packed, and they all saw him off at the station.
Then Mother turned to the old gentleman and said:—
“I don't know how to thank you for EVERYTHING. It has been a real pleasure to me to see you. But we live very quietly. I am so sorry that I can't ask you to come and see us again.”
The children thought this very hard. When they HAD made a friend—and such a friend—they would dearly have liked him to come and see them again.
What the old gentleman thought they couldn't tell. He only said:—
“I consider myself very fortunate, Madam, to have been received once at your house.”
“Ah,” said Mother, “I know I must seem surly and ungrateful—but—”
“You could never seem anything but a most charming and gracious lady,” said the old gentleman, with another of his bows.
And as they turned to go up the hill, Bobbie saw her Mother's face.
“How tired you look, Mammy,” she said; “lean on me.”
“It's my place to give Mother my arm,” said Peter. “I'm the head man of the family when Father's away.”
Mother took an arm of each.
“How awfully nice,” said Phyllis, skipping joyfully, “to think of the dear Russian embracing his long-lost wife. The baby must have grown a lot since he saw it.”
“Yes,” said Mother.
“I wonder whether Father will think I'VE grown,” Phyllis went on, skipping still more gaily. “I have grown already, haven't I, Mother?”
“Yes,” said Mother, “oh, yes,” and Bobbie and Peter felt her hands tighten on their arms.
“Poor old Mammy, you ARE tired,” said Peter.
Bobbie said, “Come on, Phil; I'll race you to the gate.”
And she started the race, though she hated doing it. YOU know why Bobbie did that. Mother only thought that Bobbie was tired of walking slowly. Even Mothers, who love you better than anyone else ever will, don't always understand.
“That's a likely little brooch you've got on, Miss,” said Perks the Porter; “I don't know as ever I see a thing more like a buttercup without it WAS a buttercup.”
“Yes,” said Bobbie, glad and flushed by this approval. “I always thought it was more like a buttercup almost than even a real one—and I NEVER thought it would come to be mine, my very own—and then Mother gave it to me for my birthday.”
“Oh, have you had a birthday?” said Perks; and he seemed quite surprised, as though a birthday were a thing only granted to a favoured few.
“Yes,” said Bobbie; “when's your birthday, Mr. Perks?” The children were taking tea with Mr. Perks in the Porters' room among the lamps and the railway almanacs. They had brought their own cups and some jam turnovers. Mr. Perks made tea in a beer can, as usual, and everyone felt very happy and confidential.
“My birthday?” said Perks, tipping some more dark brown tea out of the can into Peter's cup. “I give up keeping of my birthday afore you was born.”
“But you must have been born SOMETIME, you know,” said Phyllis, thoughtfully, “even if it was twenty years ago—or thirty or sixty or seventy.”
“Not so long as that, Missie,” Perks grinned as he answered. “If you really want to know, it was thirty-two years ago, come the fifteenth of this month.”
“Then why don't you keep it?” asked Phyllis.
“I've got something else to keep besides birthdays,” said Perks, briefly.
“Oh! What?” asked Phyllis, eagerly. “Not secrets?”
“No,” said Perks, “the kids and the Missus.”
It was this talk that set the children thinking, and, presently, talking. Perks was, on the whole, the dearest friend they had made. Not so grand as the Station Master, but more approachable—less powerful than the old gentleman, but more confidential.
“It seems horrid that nobody keeps his birthday,” said Bobbie. “Couldn't WE do something?”
“Let's go up to the Canal bridge and talk it over,” said Peter. “I got a new gut line from the postman this morning. He gave it me for a bunch of roses that I gave him for his sweetheart. She's ill.”
“Then I do think you might have given her the roses for nothing,” said Bobbie, indignantly.
“Nyang, nyang!” said Peter, disagreeably, and put his hands in his pockets.
“He did, of course,” said Phyllis, in haste; “directly we heard she was ill we got the roses ready and waited by the gate. It was when you were making the brekker-toast. And when he'd said 'Thank you' for the roses so many times—much more than he need have—he pulled out the line and gave it to Peter. It wasn't exchange. It was the grateful heart.”
“Oh, I BEG your pardon, Peter,” said Bobbie, “I AM so sorry.”
“Don't mention it,” said Peter, grandly, “I knew you would be.”
So then they all went up to the Canal bridge. The idea was to fish from the bridge, but the line was not quite long enough.
“Never mind,” said Bobbie. “Let's just stay here and look at things. Everything's so beautiful.”
It was. The sun was setting in red splendour over the grey and purple hills, and the canal lay smooth and shiny in the shadow—no ripple broke its surface. It was like a grey satin ribbon between the dusky green silk of the meadows that were on each side of its banks.
“It's all right,” said Peter, “but somehow I can always see how pretty things are much better when I've something to do. Let's get down on to the towpath and fish from there.”
Phyllis and Bobbie remembered how the boys on the canal-boats had thrown coal at them, and they said so.
“Oh, nonsense,” said Peter. “There aren't any boys here now. If there were, I'd fight them.”
Peter's sisters were kind enough not to remind him how he had NOT fought the boys when coal had last been thrown. Instead they said, “All right, then,” and cautiously climbed down the steep bank to the towing-path. The line was carefully baited, and for half an hour they fished patiently and in vain. Not a single nibble came to nourish hope in their hearts.
All eyes were intent on the sluggish waters that earnestly pretended they had never harboured a single minnow when a loud rough shout made them start.
“Hi!” said the shout, in most disagreeable tones, “get out of that, can't you?”
An old white horse coming along the towing-path was within half a dozen yards of them. They sprang to their feet and hastily climbed up the bank.
“We'll slip down again when they've gone by,” said Bobbie.
But, alas, the barge, after the manner of barges, stopped under the bridge.
“She's going to anchor,” said Peter; “just our luck!”
The barge did not anchor, because an anchor is not part of a canal-boat's furniture, but she was moored with ropes fore and aft—and the ropes were made fast to the palings and to crowbars driven into the ground.
“What you staring at?” growled the Bargee, crossly.
“We weren't staring,” said Bobbie; “we wouldn't be so rude.”
“Rude be blessed,” said the man; “get along with you!”
“Get along yourself,” said Peter. He remembered what he had said about fighting boys, and, besides, he felt safe halfway up the bank. “We've as much right here as anyone else.”
“Oh, 'AVE you, indeed!” said the man. “We'll soon see about that.” And he came across his deck and began to climb down the side of his barge.
“Oh, come away, Peter, come away!” said Bobbie and Phyllis, in agonised unison.
“Not me,” said Peter, “but YOU'D better.”
The girls climbed to the top of the bank and stood ready to bolt for home as soon as they saw their brother out of danger. The way home lay all down hill. They knew that they all ran well. The Bargee did not look as if HE did. He was red-faced, heavy, and beefy.
But as soon as his foot was on the towing-path the children saw that they had misjudged him.
He made one spring up the bank and caught Peter by the leg, dragged him down—set him on his feet with a shake—took him by the ear—and said sternly:—
“Now, then, what do you mean by it? Don't you know these 'ere waters is preserved? You ain't no right catching fish 'ere—not to say nothing of your precious cheek.”
Peter was always proud afterwards when he remembered that, with the Bargee's furious fingers tightening on his ear, the Bargee's crimson countenance close to his own, the Bargee's hot breath on his neck, he had the courage to speak the truth.
“I WASN'T catching fish,” said Peter.
“That's not YOUR fault, I'll be bound,” said the man, giving Peter's ear a twist—not a hard one—but still a twist.
Peter could not say that it was. Bobbie and Phyllis had been holding on to the railings above and skipping with anxiety. Now suddenly Bobbie slipped through the railings and rushed down the bank towards Peter, so impetuously that Phyllis, following more temperately, felt certain that her sister's descent would end in the waters of the canal. And so it would have done if the Bargee hadn't let go of Peter's ear—and caught her in his jerseyed arm.
“Who are you a-shoving of?” he said, setting her on her feet.
“Oh,” said Bobbie, breathless, “I'm not shoving anybody. At least, not on purpose. Please don't be cross with Peter. Of course, if it's your canal, we're sorry and we won't any more. But we didn't know it was yours.”
“Go along with you,” said the Bargee.
“Yes, we will; indeed we will,” said Bobbie, earnestly; “but we do beg your pardon—and really we haven't caught a single fish. I'd tell you directly if we had, honour bright I would.”
She held out her hands and Phyllis turned out her little empty pocket to show that really they hadn't any fish concealed about them.
“Well,” said the Bargee, more gently, “cut along, then, and don't you do it again, that's all.”
The children hurried up the bank.
“Chuck us a coat, M'ria,” shouted the man. And a red-haired woman in a green plaid shawl came out from the cabin door with a baby in her arms and threw a coat to him. He put it on, climbed the bank, and slouched along across the bridge towards the village.
“You'll find me up at the 'Rose and Crown' when you've got the kid to sleep,” he called to her from the bridge.
When he was out of sight the children slowly returned. Peter insisted on this.
“The canal may belong to him,” he said, “though I don't believe it does. But the bridge is everybody's. Doctor Forrest told me it's public property. I'm not going to be bounced off the bridge by him or anyone else, so I tell you.”
Peter's ear was still sore and so were his feelings.
The girls followed him as gallant soldiers might follow the leader of a forlorn hope.
“I do wish you wouldn't,” was all they said.
“Go home if you're afraid,” said Peter; “leave me alone. I'M not afraid.”
The sound of the man's footsteps died away along the quiet road. The peace of the evening was not broken by the notes of the sedge-warblers or by the voice of the woman in the barge, singing her baby to sleep. It was a sad song she sang. Something about Bill Bailey and how she wanted him to come home.
The children stood leaning their arms on the parapet of the bridge; they were glad to be quiet for a few minutes because all three hearts were beating much more quickly.
“I'm not going to be driven away by any old bargeman, I'm not,” said Peter, thickly.
“Of course not,” Phyllis said soothingly; “you didn't give in to him! So now we might go home, don't you think?”
“NO,” said Peter.
Nothing more was said till the woman got off the barge, climbed the bank, and came across the bridge.
She hesitated, looking at the three backs of the children, then she said, “Ahem.”
Peter stayed as he was, but the girls looked round.
“You mustn't take no notice of my Bill,” said the woman; “'is bark's worse'n 'is bite. Some of the kids down Farley way is fair terrors. It was them put 'is back up calling out about who ate the puppy-pie under Marlow bridge.”
“Who DID?” asked Phyllis.
“Idunno,” said the woman. “Nobody don't know! But somehow, and I don't know the why nor the wherefore of it, them words is p'ison to a barge-master. Don't you take no notice. 'E won't be back for two hours good. You might catch a power o' fish afore that. The light's good an' all,” she added.
“Thank you,” said Bobbie. “You're very kind. Where's your baby?”
“Asleep in the cabin,” said the woman. “'E's all right. Never wakes afore twelve. Reg'lar as a church clock, 'e is.”
“I'm sorry,” said Bobbie; “I would have liked to see him, close to.”
“And a finer you never did see, Miss, though I says it.” The woman's face brightened as she spoke.
“Aren't you afraid to leave it?” said Peter.
“Lor' love you, no,” said the woman; “who'd hurt a little thing like 'im? Besides, Spot's there. So long!”
The woman went away.
“Shall we go home?” said Phyllis.
“You can. I'm going to fish,” said Peter briefly.
“I thought we came up here to talk about Perks's birthday,” said Phyllis.
“Perks's birthday'll keep.”
So they got down on the towing-path again and Peter fished. He did not catch anything.
It was almost quite dark, the girls were getting tired, and as Bobbie said, it was past bedtime, when suddenly Phyllis cried, “What's that?”
And she pointed to the canal boat. Smoke was coming from the chimney of the cabin, had indeed been curling softly into the soft evening air all the time—but now other wreaths of smoke were rising, and these were from the cabin door.
“It's on fire—that's all,” said Peter, calmly. “Serve him right.”
“Oh—how CAN you?” cried Phyllis. “Think of the poor dear dog.”
“The BABY!” screamed Bobbie.
In an instant all three made for the barge.
Her mooring ropes were slack, and the little breeze, hardly strong enough to be felt, had yet been strong enough to drift her stern against the bank. Bobbie was first—then came Peter, and it was Peter who slipped and fell. He went into the canal up to his neck, and his feet could not feel the bottom, but his arm was on the edge of the barge. Phyllis caught at his hair. It hurt, but it helped him to get out. Next minute he had leaped on to the barge, Phyllis following.
“Not you!” he shouted to Bobbie; “ME, because I'm wet.”
He caught up with Bobbie at the cabin door, and flung her aside very roughly indeed; if they had been playing, such roughness would have made Bobbie weep with tears of rage and pain. Now, though he flung her on to the edge of the hold, so that her knee and her elbow were grazed and bruised, she only cried:—
“No—not you—ME,” and struggled up again. But not quickly enough.
Peter had already gone down two of the cabin steps into the cloud of thick smoke. He stopped, remembered all he had ever heard of fires, pulled his soaked handkerchief out of his breast pocket and tied it over his mouth. As he pulled it out he said:—
“It's all right, hardly any fire at all.”
And this, though he thought it was a lie, was rather good of Peter. It was meant to keep Bobbie from rushing after him into danger. Of course it didn't.
The cabin glowed red. A paraffin lamp was burning calmly in an orange mist.
“Hi,” said Peter, lifting the handkerchief from his mouth for a moment. “Hi, Baby—where are you?” He choked.
“Oh, let ME go,” cried Bobbie, close behind him. Peter pushed her back more roughly than before, and went on.
Now what would have happened if the baby hadn't cried I don't know—but just at that moment it DID cry. Peter felt his way through the dark smoke, found something small and soft and warm and alive, picked it up and backed out, nearly tumbling over Bobbie who was close behind. A dog snapped at his leg—tried to bark, choked.
“I've got the kid,” said Peter, tearing off the handkerchief and staggering on to the deck.
Bobbie caught at the place where the bark came from, and her hands met on the fat back of a smooth-haired dog. It turned and fastened its teeth on her hand, but very gently, as much as to say:—
“I'm bound to bark and bite if strangers come into my master's cabin, but I know you mean well, so I won't REALLY bite.”
Bobbie dropped the dog.
“All right, old man. Good dog,” said she. “Here—give me the baby, Peter; you're so wet you'll give it cold.”
Peter was only too glad to hand over the strange little bundle that squirmed and whimpered in his arms.
“Now,” said Bobbie, quickly, “you run straight to the 'Rose and Crown' and tell them. Phil and I will stay here with the precious. Hush, then, a dear, a duck, a darling! Go NOW, Peter! Run!”
“I can't run in these things,” said Peter, firmly; “they're as heavy as lead. I'll walk.”
“Then I'LL run,” said Bobbie. “Get on the bank, Phil, and I'll hand you the dear.”
The baby was carefully handed. Phyllis sat down on the bank and tried to hush the baby. Peter wrung the water from his sleeves and knickerbocker legs as well as he could, and it was Bobbie who ran like the wind across the bridge and up the long white quiet twilight road towards the 'Rose and Crown.'
There is a nice old-fashioned room at the 'Rose and Crown; where Bargees and their wives sit of an evening drinking their supper beer, and toasting their supper cheese at a glowing basketful of coals that sticks out into the room under a great hooded chimney and is warmer and prettier and more comforting than any other fireplaceIever saw.
There was a pleasant party of barge people round the fire. You might not have thought it pleasant, but they did; for they were all friends or acquaintances, and they liked the same sort of things, and talked the same sort of talk. This is the real secret of pleasant society. The Bargee Bill, whom the children had found so disagreeable, was considered excellent company by his mates. He was telling a tale of his own wrongs—always a thrilling subject. It was his barge he was speaking about.
“And 'e sent down word 'paint her inside hout,' not namin' no colour, d'ye see? So I gets a lotter green paint and I paints her stem to stern, and I tell yer she looked A1. Then 'E comes along and 'e says, 'Wot yer paint 'er all one colour for?' 'e says. And I says, says I, 'Cause I thought she'd look fust-rate,' says I, 'and I think so still.' An' he says, 'DEW yer? Then ye can just pay for the bloomin' paint yerself,' says he. An' I 'ad to, too.” A murmur of sympathy ran round the room. Breaking noisily in on it came Bobbie. She burst open the swing door—crying breathlessly:—
“Bill! I want Bill the Bargeman.”
There was a stupefied silence. Pots of beer were held in mid-air, paralysed on their way to thirsty mouths.
“Oh,” said Bobbie, seeing the bargewoman and making for her. “Your barge cabin's on fire. Go quickly.”
The woman started to her feet, and put a big red hand to her waist, on the left side, where your heart seems to be when you are frightened or miserable.
“Reginald Horace!” she cried in a terrible voice; “my Reginald Horace!”
“All right,” said Bobbie, “if you mean the baby; got him out safe. Dog, too.” She had no breath for more, except, “Go on—it's all alight.”
Then she sank on the ale-house bench and tried to get that breath of relief after running which people call the 'second wind.' But she felt as though she would never breathe again.
Bill the Bargee rose slowly and heavily. But his wife was a hundred yards up the road before he had quite understood what was the matter.
Phyllis, shivering by the canal side, had hardly heard the quick approaching feet before the woman had flung herself on the railing, rolled down the bank, and snatched the baby from her.
“Don't,” said Phyllis, reproachfully; “I'd just got him to sleep.”