"From the eastern mountainsPressing on they come,Wise men in their wisdom,To His humble home;Stirred by deep devotion,Hasting from afar,Ever journeying onward,Guided by a star."
"From the eastern mountainsPressing on they come,Wise men in their wisdom,To His humble home;Stirred by deep devotion,Hasting from afar,Ever journeying onward,Guided by a star."
"The leaves were reddening to their fall,'Coo!' said the gray doves, 'coo!'As they sunned themselves on the garden wall,And the swallows round them flew.'Whither away, sweet swallows?Coo!' said the gray doves, 'coo!''Far from this land of ice and snowTo a sunny southern clime we go,Where the sky is warm and bright and gay:Come with us, away, away!'"F. E. Weatherly.
"The leaves were reddening to their fall,'Coo!' said the gray doves, 'coo!'As they sunned themselves on the garden wall,And the swallows round them flew.'Whither away, sweet swallows?Coo!' said the gray doves, 'coo!''Far from this land of ice and snowTo a sunny southern clime we go,Where the sky is warm and bright and gay:Come with us, away, away!'"
F. E. Weatherly.
Just as they paused on the last note Joan uttered a scream of delight.
"Look, Darby, look!" she cried, clutching at her brother's arm. "The star! the star! God has sended it soon, hasn't He? He must have been listenin' close by when we sang. Auntie Alice says He is every place at once."
"Where?" eagerly asked Darby, peering anxiously into the darkness, but looking in the wrong direction.
"There—right behind you," replied Joan, pointing with her finger. "It's comin' nearer and nearer. Don't you see it?"
Yes, sure enough there was moving slowly towards them, out of the shadows, a small bright light not unlike the twinkle of a tiny star. It came steadily on, then stopped, wavered, and was gone.
"Holloa! who's there? Speak up!" called out a loud, hearty voice.
Heavy footsteps followed the voice—footsteps that halted and stumbled among the gnarled tree-roots and spreading branches, yet kept straight on—and in another instant the kind, ruddy face of Mr. Grey looked down upon the children.
"The babes in the wood, by George!" he ejaculated, at the same time stooping to peer into the small, eager faces which were so fearlessly upturned to meet his gaze. Then, when he made out who the forlorn-looking little objects really were, he gave expression to his astonishment in a long whistle, which frightened the birds in the trees, the rabbits within their burrows, and the wicked man and woman behind the hazel bushes, so that they cowered closer beneath the branches, wishing themselves well out of the way of Farmer Grey's stout blackthorn staff.
"Oh, it's you, Mr. Grey!" said Darby, with a curious catch in his voice of glad relief to find that the face bending over them with such kindly, quizzical scrutiny was not that of either gipsy, tramp, or poacher; for in spite of his lofty scorn of unknown dangers, he had grown terribly frightened for the possibilities which might lurk in the gloom of Copsley Wood.
"Ay, it's me, an' no mistake," replied Mr. Grey readily. "But I'm blessed if I knew ye at first in the dusk. 'They're tramps,' says I to myself, 'or gipsy weans.' But then, when I got a good look at ye, I saw that it was the little folks from Firgrove—Miss Turner's youngsters."
"We isn't Miss Turner's youngsters," struck in Joan stoutly; "we's daddy's chil'ens."
"Ho, ho! so that's the way the wind blows!" laughed Mr. Grey. "Ye're a pair o' pickles, anyway, an' no mistake! Who would thinkyewere the little angels whose pretty speeches my missis was divertin' me with all the time I was at my tea! An' what may the two o' ye be doin' here in the dark, I should like to know?" he demanded, in his big, gruff voice.
"We were lost—quite lost," cried Joan, "just like the babes in the wood. If God hadn't sended you to find us, I s'pose robin redbreast would have comed by-and-by to cover us up wif leaves and twigs and fings."
"Tush!" and Mr. Grey laughed into the little girl's earnest face, although he was moved at the thought of the anxiety and distress these small creatures must have endured. "Lost! why, you're not more'n half a dozen yards off the highroad."
"You must excuse Joan, please," put in Darby formally. "If she says silly things sometimes, it's because she's so little. At least, that's how I 'splains her to myself," he added.
Then he went on to give Mr. Grey a clear and full account of how and why they were wandering at what was for them such an unusual hour in the mazes of Copsley Wood—frankly owning up to more than his own share in the escapade, casting not a shadow of blame upon his little sister.
"So, so!" said Mr. Grey, much amused by the lad's quaint manner and grown-up air. "But I thought I heard some kind o' singin' as I came up the hill. It was that fetched me into the wood. I had been down at Firdale seein' about some seed-wheat for sowin' to-morrow, an' I was in a hurry home."
"It was us you heard," Joan told him gravely. "We were askin' God to send a star to show us the way out of the darkness."
"I'm afraid you'll certainly think my sister very childish," said Darby, in an apologetic tone. "But you see, just when we had finished the first verse of our hymn, a light really did shine. We didn't know at the time that it was only the matches you were striking for your pipe, and Joan thought (in fact, weboththought—for a moment, you know) that God had really sent a star to point us out the path, just as long ago He guided the wise men to the place where the dear little baby Jesus lay."
For a space there was silence. Joan was almost asleep on her seat on the tree-stump; not a quiver of the hazel bushes betrayed the presence of the couple lurking there. And into the big farmer's eyes a sudden moisture had sprung as he heard these little ones expressing in simple speech their perfect confidence in the ability and readiness of their heavenly Father to make good His own promise: "I will guide thee with mine eye."
"That's right, my boy," spoke Mr. Grey at length, in deep, earnest tones. "Always look out for God, an' you'll find Him close beside you, in the darkest forest as well as in the starry sky. An' now we must be movin', or the ladies'll be sendin' the police to look for the pair o' ye.—Eh! Anybody there?" he shouted, as the sudden snapping of a twig broke the stillness about them.
There was no answer, only the flutter of a belated bird as it failed to find its accustomed perch among the pines, and the sighing of the wind through the tree-tops overhead.
"Some beast, I expect, or a poacher, maybe," Mr. Grey muttered to himself. Then he turned towards the children. "I was never reckoned much o'a star," he said, with a chuckle of amusement, "but I guess I'll manage to steer ye straight to Firgrove."
"Do you think you could carry Joan, please, Mr. Grey? She's notveryheavy; I sometimes carry her myself," added Darby, as if doing so were a mere trifle instead of a feat of which he was privately proud. "She's tired, I'm afraid.—Joan! Waken up! Aren't you tired?"
"Yes, werry, werry tired," assented Joan sleepily, as the farmer cradled her comfortably in his strong arms; and with Darby holding hard by his coat-tail they started.
"The eggs, Darby! Is you forgettin' Aunt Catharine's eggs, and the bantam's too?" Joan cried, when they neared the opening in the wood.
Outside the fringe of dark trees twilight still lingered, and there, just where Darby had set it down, was the basket, safe and sound.
With a whoop of delight at the welcome sight of the basket—for its possible loss had lain heavily on his tender conscience—Darby sprang forward to seize it. But in the dusk he did not notice a long, twisted tree-root that straggled between him and his desire. His toe caught in it; he suddenly tripped, swayed, and fell flat forward, crunching right smash down into the shallow basket of smooth brown Cochin eggs.
"Whoa, there! steady, my man!" called the farmer, vainly struggling to suppress his amusement at sight of Darby's deplorable and moist condition. "You forget that you've a heavier seat on the eggs than a hen, young sir, an' you must sit down easy."
A sharp sob, however, and the smothered cry of "The bantams! we're bantams!" that burst from the little creature in his arms, indicated that what was a joke to him was a catastrophe to the children, and that his mirth was ill-timed and unseemly.
"Never mind, sonny," he added, in a soothing tone; "just tell the ladies when you get home that it was all an accident. Here, rub down your clothes wi' this wisp o' grass, an' I'll see if my missis can't coax them Cochins to lay some more eggs between this an' Christmas."
Then, with Joan cuddled cosily against his broad shoulder, and Darby's small hand clinging closely to his, the party set off down the winding road towards Firgrove.
At the same time two figures raised themselves from their cramped position behind the hazel thicket. The man stretched himself, hitched up on his shoulder a bag, from which peeped the tail of a pheasant and the paw of a rabbit, while he muttered savagely and shook his fist in the direction of the retreating farmer.
"Spoiled yer little game, did he?" and the dark-eyed woman laughed wickedly as she rearranged the faded scarlet shawl more closely round her shoulders. "Well, better luck next time, Joe my dear," she added airily.
"Shut up!" said the gentleman called Joe, with a heavy scowl. "It's kids like they I've been lookin' out for this many a day, an' I'll have them yet," he growled, "as sure as yer name's Moll! See if I don't! Come on!" And in another moment they were not to be seen, they had plunged into the heart of Copsley Wood.
At the gate of Firgrove Mr. Grey set Joan down, and watched until she and Darby reached the front door. There a curious group had collected—Auntie Alice, who was softly sobbing; Aunt Catharine, wearing her garden-hat and strongest boots; Nurse Perry, Mary the cook; and Green the gardener, armed with a stout staff and the stable lantern. It was the search-party in the act of setting out to explore the recesses of Copsley Wood in quest of the missing children.
Mr. Grey thought it would be in better taste to retire. He knew Miss Turner, and he guessed that probably the next scene in the drama would be purely private. Well, the youngsters had unquestionably disobeyed orders, and on their own showing. They must be punished, if by no other means they could be taught obedience, which is the first if not the chief lesson of life. Still, it was a pity, thought the big, soft-hearted man; and the confiding eyes of the children followed him as he sauntered up the hill, forgetting that he was in a hurry home. The words that had floated from their pure lips through the gloom of the pines rang in his ears, and as he went along he hummed softly to himself, in his deep, bass voice,—
"Ever journeying onward,Guided by a star."
"Ever journeying onward,Guided by a star."
"Aunt Catharine's real angry this time, and no mistake," Darby thought, as in almost perfect silence she gave him and Joan their supper, then helped Perry to undress, bath, and put them to bed. "She's sure to punish us somehow to-morrow though she's saying nothing about it to-night. Oh dear! if she would not look so cold and cross, but just give me enough spanking for us both and get it over, I'd much rather."
But Aunt Catharine had decided not to administer any bodily chastisement to her nephew's children, although she considered that a smart whipping now and again was almost as necessary to the well-being of young people as cooling medicine in the spring. She had talked the matter over with Auntie Alice, who could not bear the idea of either Darby or Joan being put to any avoidable pain. They had been very disobedient certainly, she was obliged to admit, and must be taught somehow to do as they were told—Darby especially, who should have been so much wiser than Joan. She would herself have cheerfully borne the penalty of all their misdemeanours if she could. That was impossible, however; but she succeeded in impressing upon her sister that perhaps Captain Dene might not like his motherless children to be subjected to such old-fashioned discipline. Aunt Catharine, consequently, had laid her plans for a different course of action.
Next morning Darby slept quite late—for him—being tired out from the fatigue of the previous evening. He awoke refreshed and brisk, however, and was about to spring out of bed and dress himself in readiness for the fun, frolic, and mischief of a new day, when the nursery door was thrown wide open, and Aunt Catharine sailed into the room, arrayed in all the glory of a Paisley-pattern morning-gown and black crochet breakfast-cap. Now, Miss Turner was one of those people sometimes to be met with whose moods usually match their clothes. Darby understood this peculiarity of his aunt's in a vague sort of way, so that the moment he set eyes on the many-coloured wrapper and sombre headgear he knew that now they were in for it and no mistake.
"Well, what have you to say for yourselves?" she demanded in a loud voice, seating herself solemnly in a chair between the two cribs, and looking from one child to the other with her severest expression. "You can answer me, Guy; Doris is hardly awake yet."
She addressed them as Guy and Doris; and knowing what that meant as well as what was indicated by her awful attire, Darby discreetly held his peace.
Joan sat up in bed, rubbed her eyes with her dimpled knuckles, nodded her tangled curls towards her aunt, and, sweetly smiling, murmured, "Mornin'!" to which cheery greeting her aunt did not respond.
There was a prophetic pause for a while; then Miss Turner spoke.
"I am pleased that at least you have the grace to be silent, to make no excuses; because there is nothing you could say that would make your sin appear any less heinous in my eyes—and in God's eyes," she added as an after-thought.
"Where's the 'henas,' Aunt Catharine?" cried Joan, peeping in the direction of the door. "I'd love to see a 'hena!' There's a picter of some in Darby's Nat'ral Hist'ry book. They's just like wolves."
"Hush, Joan!" said Darby, in a frightened undertone; "there's no hyenas here. Aunt Catharine means 'heenyus,' and that's a thing in the Catechism—far on! It's only me that has come to it yet."
"You have both been guilty of the gravest disobedience," continued Miss Turner, "and it is my duty to punish you. I have therefore decided to keep you in bed until you repent of your naughtiness."
Here Darby started up in anger. His gray eyes flashed, his cheeks were scarlet, his small fists clenched under the bedclothes.
"This is Saturday," went on his aunt, in her relentless voice. "You shall stay where you are until to-morrow, Sabbath morning. Then, if you are in a proper frame of mind, you may both get up as usual; but for one week you shall not go beyond the garden.—And you, Guy, because you are older than Doris, and should set your sister a good example instead of leading her at your heels into every mischief you can devise—you are to have an additional punishment. I desire that while you are in bed you shall occupy yourself with your Catechism. And to-morrow, before breakfast, I will hear you repeat the fifth commandment, with the three following questions and the proofs thereto. After that perhaps you shall have a clearer conception of your duty to your parents, which means, in your case, those who are in charge of you." And having delivered herself thus, Aunt Catharine sailed away as majestically as she had come.
Darby flung himself about in his wrath.
"Parents indeed!" he cried, in passionate scorn. "She'snot our parents! she's nobody's parent. Why, I heard Postie telling Perry the other day that the Miss Turners were both old maids when he was a kid; and people can't be old maids and parents as well! Oh, if daddy hadn't gone away, or if mother was only here!" he wailed in his dire distress. Then he buried his head in the blankets, for his feelings were too deeply wounded to find relief in words.
For a while Joan howled lustily, but by-and-by, when she had eaten her breakfast of porridge and milk, she tumbled off to sleep again, being still weary after her recent wanderings.
Darby, however, lay wide awake, feeling, now that his burst of anger had passed away, very tired of things in general, and of himself in particular. It was too dreadful, he thought, to be kept in bed on a fine day when he was quite well, only stiff and aching all over. Outside the air was balmy and still. The garden was ablaze with late dahlias, hollyhocks, and asters; and down by the tool-shed Mistress Pussy and her family would be contentedly sunning themselves beside the boxwood border—the close-clipped boxwood border, which always gave out such a strong, queer, haunting smell.
Oh dear, how tiresome it all was, and what a pity a fellow could notsometimesdo as he liked without being called naughty and then punished! Should life always be like that, Darby wondered. Surely not, he told himself, or else he felt that already he had had about enough of it. But he did not believe things were quite the same with other children. They were different for him and Joan, because daddy was abroad and mother dead. If they had only not been left at Firgrove with Aunt Catharine! There were plenty of pleasant places in the world besides Firgrove. Could not he and Joan go away somewhere, just themselves together, where they would want only to be good, because there should be no temptation to be naughty; where there should be no Catechism, no Aunt Catharine, and no more punishment, especially putting to bed, which was Darby's detestation? He really wished to be obedient, this little lad of seven years old, and tried very hard to remember everything he was told. But forgetting comes easy; consequently he was frequently in trouble. He was often good for days together—quite good, as Joan said. But the difficulty with Darby, as with older folk, was not thebeinggood, but thekeepinggood.
For a long time the boy lay pondering some of the problems of life which from the beginning have puzzled many a wiser head than his. But Darby did not know that he was only going over a well-beaten track. He just knew that he was wishful of finding some pleasant spot where, without effort or trouble, he could be happy after his own fashion, untrammelled and untroubled by restrictions or consequences.
The morning had glided on to noonday. Joan, having had her sleep out, was playing with Miss Carolina in her crib. Outside a family of lingering swallows sat on the meadow fence discussing their plans for a hurried departure on the morrow; and from the dovecot in the yard came the soft, continuous cooing of Auntie Alice's pigeons as they strutted about the flags or preened their feathers in the sun. The distant barking of Mr. Grey's collie, Scott, as he followed the sheep to the pasture, floated in through the open window; while from the next room came the soothing murmur of nurse's low, droning voice, singing baby Eric over to his midday sleep.
What was it she sang? but, indeed, she seemed always singing it. Nothing much; only a snatch here and there from that old hymn she was so fond of, or perhaps sang almost unconsciously from habit:—
"Oh, we shall happy be,When from sin and sorrow free!"Bright in that happy landBeams every eye;Kept by a Father's hand,Love cannot die."Come to this happy land,Come, come away;Why will ye doubting stand?Why still delay?"
"Oh, we shall happy be,When from sin and sorrow free!
"Bright in that happy landBeams every eye;Kept by a Father's hand,Love cannot die.
"Come to this happy land,Come, come away;Why will ye doubting stand?Why still delay?"
Suddenly Darby sat up in bed in his excitement. A brilliant thought had struck him. Why had it not occurred to him sooner? The Happy Land! that's where they would go. It was far, far away, certainly; but they should take some food with them, and ask the road from time to time.
Joan was soon weary of nursing Miss Carolina. She had slipped out of her crib and trotted over to the window, where she was occupying herself happily in catching and shutting up in an empty pill-box the flies that buzzed drowsily in the warm, bright sunshine.
She paused for an instant in the act of conveying with her nimble little fingers another captive to its dungeon, when she noticed Darby's flushed cheeks and shining eyes.
"What's the matter, dear?" inquired the tiny, white-robed maiden, in quite a motherly manner. "Has you got a pain, Darby? or was you dreamin' about somefin' werry nice? You does look awful funny, I fink."
"I'm not sick, and I haven't been dreaming," answered her brother, in earnest assurance. "But I've been thinking, and I've made up my mind. We're not going to stay here any longer. I've 'cided where we'll go. We'll go to the Happy Land—that place nurse is often singing about, where we shall always be good, and never be naughty, or sick, or punished, or put to bed any more. It'll never be dark or raining either, but always fine, and bright, bright as day!"
"How lovely!" cried Joan, clapping her hands in ecstasy, at the same time dropping the pill-box, from which the autumn flies crawled lazily, as if too indolent or too stupid to enjoy their newly-regained liberty.
"Just wouldn't it!" said Darby, with quivering lips and sparkling eyes, for he was terribly excited over his scheme. "And you'll come, Joan, won't you, lovey?"
"Yes," assented Joan, without the slightest hesitation, giving a decisive nod of her golden head that set all her curls bobbing up and down like daffodils in a March breeze—"yes, I'm comin' wif you, Darby dear. When's we goin'?" she inquired anxiously, as if in haste to be off.
Darby drew her into bed beside him, tucked up her cold pink toes in the blankets, and in earnest, subdued tones the two discussed the how and the when of their projected pilgrimage.
They could not set off that day, for they were prisoners. The next day was Sunday. They would be sure to be out; but then Sunday was not a suitable day on which to start on a lengthy journey. Monday would be a more fitting time, and Darby remembered with a thrill of thankfulness that early on Monday morning the aunts were going away to spend a couple of nights at Denescroft, as grannie's charming, China-rose-trimmed cottage was called. That would be their chance! Nurse would be almost entirely occupied with Eric, and they two should be left to do pretty much as they pleased. By the time their aunts returned on Wednesday evening the little travellers would be far away, or perhaps they should be safe within the boundaries of the Happy Land.
Before breakfast the following morning Darby repeated his appointed task, proofs and all, without so much as a single blunder. The children went with their aunts to church as usual. In the evening Auntie Alice remarked to her sister how very quiet the little ones had been all day. Aunt Catharine also had noticed their subdued demeanour. She set it down to the chastening effect of penitence for their recent disobedience, and hoped that it might continue during the days of their absence at least.
"Good-bye, pets," said Auntie Alice to the children the next day, as they hung about the basket-carriage and Billy, waiting to take his mistresses to the station. "Cheer up, Darby," she whispered. "Be a good brother, and take care of Joan; and see and be happy until we come back."
"Yes, Auntie Alice, I'll take care of her, sure. And we're going to be very, very happy," he added, with a look of exultation in his eyes that haunted his aunt until she saw him again.—"Aren't we, Joan?"
"Yes, werry, werry happy!" murmured Joan out of a tousle of sunny hair. "Good-bye, Auntie Alice. Kiss Joan again."
"There, that will do. Stand clear of the wheel, both of you," said Aunt Catharine, settling her ample figure comfortably into the little basket-chaise. "Don't dirty that nice clean pinafore, Joan; and Darby, see that you wash your hands properly before dinner."
The aunts departed, and by the time they had reached the first stage on their journey, two little travellers stepped bravely out at the front door, down the gravelled drive, through the wide gate, and there they halted to hold a hurried council as to which way they should go.
Up the hill in one direction sloped the broad white road that led past Copsley Wood. No Happy Land lay in its vicinity! By another route, along which Billy and the basket-carriage had vanished, was the station; but who ever heard of any one arriving at the Happy Land by rail! Some other way still they must seek to bring them to their destination.
From the gable end of Firgrove the fields slid gradually down until they were merged in a long, level stretch of meadow ground, through which was cut a deep, straight canal, whose waters reached like a shining silver belt across the emerald sward of the surrounding pasture-lands. Many a time Darby and Joan had sat on the garden wall watching the dingy barge-boat come and go. They had listened curiously to the voices of the man and boy on board chatting to each other, or shouting to the patient, plodding horse that towed along the clumsy craft, laden with this and that for the villages and hamlets that dotted the landscape thickly between Firdale and the far-off range of hills, which rose so proudly up to meet the sunset and the sky.
The October day was mild, and bright as days not always are, even in midsummer. Great gold-tinged clouds floated slowly across the high, wide dome of the azure sky. The hilltops were bathed in a warm, soft glow; the placid waters of the canal sparkled, dimpled, and smiled beneath the caress of the passing breeze, until they broke into tiny ripples and wavelets against their sedge-grown banks.
Along that silvery waterway they shall go, the children decide. Up there, beyond the hills, they say, rise the walls of the Beautiful City. That radiance is assuredly reflected from its streets of gold. Those big, fleecy clouds certainly curtain the approach to the portals of pearl!
Just then, emerging from behind a screening clump of trees, theSmiling Jane, as the dingy old boat was called, slowly hove in sight. They would run fast and coax the man to take them on board when he stopped to get his vessel through the lock; or, better still, they would slip in unnoticed when he was otherwise engaged. Without a thought of wrong, with never a qualm of fear as to failure or consequences, hand in hand they raced along in the direction of the canal, casting not so much as a glance behind.
And thus it came about that Darby and Joan set out to seek the Happy Land.
"The old house by the lindensStood silent in the shade,And on the gravelled pathwayThe light and shadow played."I saw the nursery windowsWide open to the air;But the faces of the children,They were no longer there."Longfellow.
"The old house by the lindensStood silent in the shade,And on the gravelled pathwayThe light and shadow played.
"I saw the nursery windowsWide open to the air;But the faces of the children,They were no longer there."
Longfellow.
When dinner-time came without bringing the children in, nurse became very cross indeed. Baby had been somewhat troublesome all the forenoon. Auntie Alice had lately got into the habit of taking him of a morning, walking him about in her arms, crooning sweet nothings over him in her soothing voice. He was old enough to miss her, and to-day was not satisfied at being put off with only nurse. He had, besides, a new tooth coming—a tiny pearly thing, peeping like a speck of ivory from a bed of coral. Very pretty to look at, certainly, but doubtless extremely painful; at least Master Baby felt it so, for he fretted and cried in a way which set poor Perry's nerves all on edge, and made her think that the responsibilities of her position were almost too heavy to be borne on one pair of shoulders.
Then Master Darby and Miss Joan—how tiresome they were! always up to some mischief or other, said nurse to herself, as she ran between the nursery window and the front door to watch if they were not coming before their dinner should be spoiled. And such a nice dinner as it was, too! Cook had arranged it as a surprise for them, because they were all by themselves, knowing how much they enjoyed roast fowl, stewed apples and cream. Now the fowl would be dried to a cinder, the potatoes moist and sodden, the apples cold as charity!
They must have again disobeyed orders and gone away to the farm, nurse concluded, when twelve o'clock, one o'clock, two o'clock passed, and still no sign of the little ones. They would be well stuffed up there, she was sure, and quite safe; only it was really too bad of Master Darby to steal off that way without leave, and drag his little sister along with him. He should have nothing but dry bread for his tea, Perry decided. Then with a glance at the bassinet, where baby was soundly sleeping away some of his fretfulness, and a careful adjustment of the fire-guard on the nursery grate, nurse stole downstairs to get her own dinner, which, like the children's, would be none the better for waiting so long past the usual time.
Eric awoke from his sound, sweet sleep refreshed and hungry. Nurse fed him; then, as the air was mild and the sun warm, she put on his coat and cap and carried him into the garden to watch the pussies at play.
The afternoon shadows began to lengthen, the sun slipped slowly to the west, baby grew weary of pulling at the pussies' tails and turned peevish again, and still the others were absent. By this time nurse had grown downright angry with them for staying away so long. It was a shame of Mrs. Grey to keep them. Master Darby deserved a sound smacking, nurse said to herself; and only that she was not permitted to punish her charges in such a manner, a sound smacking Master Darby should have had—when nurse could catch him, that is to say. Now, however, she must go for them. Mrs. Grey would be thinking they were neglected in the absence of their aunts, and perhaps telling tales. So, after wrapping Eric up warmly in a big woolly shawl, she tucked him into his perambulator and set off up the glen road, past the wood and the turnip-field, to Copsley Farm, expecting at every turn to meet Darby and Joan rushing towards her on their homeward way. But no such interruption to her progress occurred.
When she reached the farm an unpleasant surprise awaited her. Neither Darby nor Joan had been there that day—not since the Friday, said Mrs. Grey; and she was disappointed, because, having heard that the ladies were going from home without the children, she quite expected they would have lost no time in paying her a visit.
At that moment Mr. Grey came in from the barn, where he had been threshing corn all the afternoon. He was tired, heated, and hungry for his tea, and only laughed when his wife told him that the little folks from Firgrove had gone amissing.
"Well, an' what if they have?" he exclaimed, in his loud, hearty voice. "That needn't scare you. Aren't they always gettin' into trouble o' some kind or another, the pair o' them? Why, sure it's only the other day there that I found them wandered in Copsley Wood, like two motherless lambs! They were lost, the little 'un told me, quite lost! An' there they were sittin', the two o' them, on the stump o' an old tree, wrapped in one another's arms, for all the world like the babes in the wood—an' not more'n half a dozen yards from the highway!"
"An' that's where they are now, sure enough," said Mrs. Grey, in a tone of conviction. "They'll have gone back after them squirrels that led them such a dance on Friday! What do you think, Miss Perry?" she asked anxiously.
"I am certain of it too, now that you mention it," replied nurse, looking aghast at the thought. "Miss Joan was fair wild to get a squirrel; and Master Darby, he's that venturesome he would face anything. He doesn't know the meaning of fear for all he's so gentle and innocent-like. And Miss Joan follows him just like a dog. Dear, dear—to think of it!"
"You may well say that, for Copsley Wood's no place for them to be in by themselves," said Mrs. Grey, eyeing nurse with some disapproval in her glance.
"It's no place for decent people, let alone children," retorted Perry in her turn. "It was no further back than yesterday that the butcher's young man was telling me that a couple of gipsies or tramps have set up their tent there. He was pressing me to take a walk with him," she explained, hanging her head and playing with the fringe of baby's shawl; "and I said as how I'd never been in the wood. 'All the better,' says Jenkins, quite short, 'because that wood ain't no place for you, nor for any other nice young lady.' Oh, if they've gone and got kidnapped or murdered, what ever shall I do!" sobbed Perry, who was really a well-meaning woman, and good at heart in spite of a certain narrow-mindedness, not uncommon to her class, which hindered her from seeing at any time much further than her own nose.
Mrs. Grey had listened to nurse's speech with ill-concealed scorn.
"Young lady indeed!" she said afterwards to Mr. Grey, giving a contemptuous sniff. "Her a lady—and young too! Why, she's eight-and-twenty if she's a day! And a lad like Jim Jenkins! Sakes alive! the conceit o' some folks is sickenin'!"
Then when Perry began to weep and lament, the older woman watched her curiously in order to make sure how little of her feeling was real, how much assumed. But such distress was undoubtedly genuine, Mrs. Grey decided, and her eyes held a kindlier expression as she said soothingly,—
"Come now, cheer up! Takin' on that way won't do no manner o' good. You had better hurry home with the baby now. It's gettin' late for him to be out, pretty dear! Maybe you'll find the other two there before you, and famishin' for their tea."
"The missis is right," agreed Mr. Grey, rising from the table as he spoke, and wiping his mouth with a huge, red cotton pocket-handkerchief. "You get along as fast as ever you can, an' if the young shavers isn't at Firgrove afore you, send somebody up wi' a message. Then me an' Tom Brook 'll take a look round; an' if they're anywhere inside Copsley Wood, we'll bring them home to you afore bedtime yet, I'll be bound."
But when nurse got back to Firgrove, Darby and Joan were still absent; so, giving Eric in charge to Mary the cook, she sped up the hill again herself, flying as fast as fear and excitement could urge her, and reached the farm, panting and breathless, just when Mr. Grey and his head man, Tom Brook, were putting on their coats and preparing to leave the barn for the night.
Until almost midnight the two men tramped hither and thither through the labyrinths of Copsley Wood, carrying the stable lantern to give them light, armed with stout sticks with which to poke among the dense undergrowth of laurel, holly, and hazel that formed such a close cover for the game of various sorts with which the wood was so thickly populated. Now and then from her form amid the withered fern a frightened hare leaped among their very feet. Startled rabbits scurried here and there over the soft moss and rustling leaves. The cry of a night-bird from time to time broke the intense stillness of the lonesome place, while more than once they were alarmed by a soft something that brushed their face, as a big, downy white owl passed them by in search of its prey. In a dell hidden in the very heart of the wood they came upon what apparently had been the camping-ground of some wanderers—the gipsies probably, concerning whom the tales and rumours were so rife and so exaggerated of late. It must have been used quite recently, for where the fire had been built the wood ash was white and undisturbed; while the crusts, bones, and fragments of a rough-and-ready meal still littered the green turf that spread in such a fresh, delicious carpet all around the spot. But now the dell was deserted. The feeling of desolation always conveyed by the sight of a burned-out fire, a forsaken hearth, struck chilly on Mr. Grey's senses, and he turned away in disappointment from the tenantless place. Then the two men gazed blankly into each other's eyes. The children could not be found; not a trace of them was to be seen, except a small battered shoe—the shoe that Joan had left behind the preceding Friday.
By this time they were so tired out that they were reluctantly obliged to give over their search for the night; so, feeling footsore, and disheartened by their want of success, they went each his own way homewards.
Mr. Grey was now thoroughly alarmed for the safety of his wife's little favourites, not knowing what mishap might have overtaken them. As for nurse, her state of mind was pitiable. She alone had been left in charge of the children, and she only was responsible to the Misses Turner for their safety. And what would Captain Dene say—her master, whom she had solemnly promised to take good care of his motherless children? She had done her best, poor Perry; for although often impatient and unsympathetic with the little ones, she loved them devotedly, and would now willingly have imperilled her own safety to secure theirs. Oh, how earnestly she wished that Miss Turner and Miss Alice were home again, or rather that they had not gone away! It was, of course, too late to communicate with them that night, but it must be done first thing next morning—as soon as the telegraph office should be open.
"How shall I face them?" cried nurse wildly, pushing cook and baby away in her impatience.
Cook looked hurt. She had good-naturedly taken care of Eric all evening, and been much diverted by his funny ways. She had offered the little fellow to nurse with the best intentions in the world, thinking that attending to his wants might distract her attention from her trouble. But nurse was not to be consoled thus. She could think of nothing except the calamity which had befallen the household in general, herself in particular, and for the time being baby was of no importance in her eyes; even the adoring Jenkins was forgotten! Nothing remained but her own nervous terror and distress.
Next morning, as soon as it was daylight, Mr. Grey hastened down to Firgrove to inquire if Perry had heard anything of the missing children. She had not, and was in a most miserable frame of mind after an anxious, sleepless night.
While she and Mr. Grey stood talking together, Tom Brook passed by on his way to work at the farm, and seeing the two in conversation, joined them. But he brought no comfort to their council with the tidings he had to tell—not much at most, yet important as furnishing a possible clue to the fate of the lost ones.
The previous forenoon some of his children at play beside the lock had noticed Master Darby and Miss Joan down along the tow-path; but as they were accustomed seeing the pair trotting about by themselves continually, here, there, and everywhere, they paid no particular attention to their movements.
"They didn't go to Copsley Wood after all, then," said Mr. Grey, looking very grave, for his fears had been directed into a fresh channel.
"They've gone playing about the canal and fallen in!" cried nurse, with a great outburst of tears. "Now they're drownded, dead drownded, both of them! O my poor lambs! why did I let you out of my sight for one minute? What will master say? O my dear, sweet mistress, this would never have happened if you hadn't been tooken away from us!"
Miss Turner and Miss Alice were seated at breakfast in Grannie Dene's pretty parlour, where the China roses, that were for all the world just the colour of Joan's cheeks, peeped and nodded round the window. They were chatting briskly with grannie, whom they had found much stronger, and able easily to move about and attend to the affairs of her small household, and making their plans for the day. Aunt Catharine was arranging everything in her usual capable way. Grannie nodded her head in approval, looking the very picture of a sweet, high-bred old lady; while Auntie Alice agreed to all her sister suggested, as was her placid wont. She appeared contented and at ease, yet from time to time an anxious, far-away look would unconsciously creep into her eyes and shadow her gentle face when she thought of the little ones at home, wondering how they were all getting on—whether Eric's new tooth had come properly through; if Darby was being an obedient boy and taking good care of Joan.
The click of the garden-gate attracted their attention, and immediately after a whistling telegraph-boy passed the window and the China roses on his way to the hall door. Auntie Alice rose from the breakfast-table with a queer, fluttering feeling about her heart, and hurried to meet the messenger. She took the rustling, brick-coloured envelope from his hand, and in another instant the message dictated with much anxiety by Mr. Grey lay open before the alarmed ladies,—
"Come home at once. Darby and Joan missing since yesterday."
"Oh, my dears, my dears! Sister, sister! why did we leave them?" was the cry that broke from Auntie Alice's trembling lips. It was but the expression of a nameless dread which had weighed upon her ever since she started from Firgrove, leaving Darby standing looking after them, with that expression in his eyes of such perfect purity and peace.
Grannie's thoughts flashed like lightning from the lost children to the absent father. She was not a woman of many words, and made little outward sign of the sorrow that had suddenly seized upon her. She just hid her patient face in her thin white hands, murmuring brokenly,—
"Oh, Guy, Guy! my son, my son!"
"Well, I declare! One would think those two had never got into a scrape before from the way you are going on," said Miss Turner sharply, addressing her sister, yet casting a glance of disapproval in the direction of Mrs. Dene. "It was only the other day that they went wandering into Copsley Wood; and here, when we were ready to set out in search of them, didn't they turn up as cool as you please, smiling as sweetly as a couple of cherubs! Mr. Grey is alarming us needlessly. He and his wife are perfectly silly about those children! It was exactly the same when Guy was a boy. He had nothing to do but run up to Mrs. Grey for petting and sympathy whenever he made things too hot for himself at Firgrove. Well, if Darby has disobeyed me this time, after all I said, and the Catechism and everything, I won't be so soft with him in future, that's certain!" declared Aunt Catharine, in her severest voice; yet her fresh-coloured face had grown pale, her eyes were troubled, her lips trembled. In her heart of hearts she wished she had not been quite so strict with her nephew's children, Darby especially—poor Dorothy Archdale's motherless little lad.
It was afternoon by the time the ladies arrived at Firdale, the small wayside station nearest to Firgrove. Mr. Grey had forsaken his farm and his threshing, and was waiting to receive them. But one glance at his honest face was sufficient to assure them that he was not the bearer of any good news. Nothing further had been heard of the missing children. Copsley Wood had been scoured by a band of beaters from end to end, with no better success than had attended the efforts of the two men the night before. Mr. Grey's thoughts had reverted again and again to the ill-favoured man and black-browed woman—gipsies they were said to be, but more likely they were only ordinary vagrants—who had been seen lately loitering about the neighbourhood, and whose appearance had given rise to the wildest and absurdest rumours. One cottager, it was said, had lost all her hens; another missed a young pig out of its sty, while the ailing infant of a third had died in convulsions soon after the dark-faced female was at the door demanding a draught of milk! Mrs. Grey had suggested that perhaps the evil pair had kidnapped the pretty children, meaning to make use of them in some way—for such things happened, if one was to believe all that appeared in the newspapers—or in order to draw a reward out of their friends. Her husband laughed at the idea; yet he caused the tramps to be traced and followed from their deserted quarters in the wood up to the time when they had forced their way, as the bargeman affirmed, on board the barge-boat close beside the village of Shendon. They had no youngsters with them then of any description, bargee was positive; just the man and woman by themselves. They were not gipsies at all, he added, but some sort of play-acting people journeying to join their party, who had preceded them to Barchester by a few days. Folks of that class were not likely to have had a hand in the disappearance of anybody's children; they usually had plenty of their own.
The ladies discussed the ins and outs of the odd affair with Mr. Grey in all its bearings. At length they were forced to the conclusion that it was in the region of the canal they must seek the little ones—whether about it or in it only time should tell. Miss Alice wept softly, while Miss Turner was wondering, with a terrible weight on her heart, what she should say in the cablegram to Africa; for if Darby and Joan did not turn up, and soon too, she knew that their father should have to be informed of the calamity which had befallen him.
Mr. Grey hurried home to snatch a hasty meal and tell his wife not to be anxious about his absence. Then he and Tom Brook, with two other men, set off to follow the clue furnished by Tom Brook's children. At Firgrove the household waited, eager for news, with what patience they could command, and they needed a good share; for waiting, as everybody knows, is wearier work than doing.
Step by step, two of them on one side and two on the other, they tramped along the course of the canal, poking with their sticks into the long, sedgy grass and reeds beside its banks, peering among the clumps of osiers that grew thick and tall in the damp, spongy ground below the tow-path. On, on they went, only pausing for a few minutes now and again, to take a rest or to hold a consultation. They questioned closely every pedestrian whom they met by the way, but nobody could give them any tidings to help them in their search. And still they pressed on, past locks, hamlets, villages—on, on, until, when night was closing in around them, they reached Barchester. There, perforce, they must pause; for beyond Barchester was the sea, so at Barchester the canal came to an abrupt conclusion.
It was a weary and dispirited little group that gathered on the wharf in the fast-falling darkness of the October evening. The other men, as well as Mr. Grey, had known Captain Dene from his infancy almost, and two of them had little ones of their own snug and safe by their cottage hearths at that dull evening hour. They consequently felt keenly the sorrow that threatened the absent father; also the distress and trouble of the aunts at Firgrove, who had so generously taken upon them the responsible duty, which not infrequently turns out a thankless task, of taking charge of somebody else's bairns.
The wharf, except for themselves, was deserted. It was almost dark, too, lighted only by one badly-trimmed paraffin lamp that swung above the door of the room or office which the keeper occupied during the day. Its flickering rays fell on the deep, sluggish waters of the canal as they lapped and gurgled round the wet, slimy beams on which the planks were supported. Mr. Grey stood somewhat apart from the others, and gazed idly at the shadows cast by the dimly-burning lamp, as they swayed backwards and forwards, up and down, with each slow movement of the water; yet he did not actually see anything. He was thinking of the winsome wee pair whom he had come upon a few days before sitting on a tree-stump in Copsley Wood—of their trusting eyes, their sweet voices, their artless prattle, their firm faith in the protecting power of their heavenly Father. Assuredly He had them in His careful keeping some place; but where?—on earth or in heaven? This was the question which so sorely perplexed the anxious searchers.
Suddenly something attracted Mr. Grey's attention—something that had got jammed in a space between two rotten beams which floated alongside the flooring of the crazy old wharf—and his heart leaped in his breast with a throb of sickening fear. He stooped over the water, reached forward his stout staff, and with its hooked head carefully hauled up that something which he instinctively shrank from seeing, without exactly knowing why.
Yet it was nothing much after all, neither more nor less than what may be seen any day drifting hither and thither amongst scraps and straws upon the surface of a stream—only a child's sailor-hat, which had once been white, but was now sadly discoloured, soaked with water, and hanging almost in pieces. A faded blue ribbon dangled from its battered brim, bearing on its surface in tarnished gold letters the title of the ship to which its wearer belonged—H.M.S.Dreadnought.
With a queer choking in his throat Mr. Grey carried his find close to what light there was beneath the dirty lamp, while with strained, eager faces the other men peered over his shoulder, and then, sure enough, they saw what they feared. For there, inside the hat, stitched to the lining of the crown by a careful mother's loving fingers, was a piece of tape on which a name was plainly written, the name of—Darby Dene!