"And the booths of mountebanks,With the smell of tan and planks."Longfellow.
Longfellow.
The jolting had ceased, and it was quite dark before Duke and Pamela awoke. But through the little window of the van came twinkling lights, and as they sat up and looked about them they heard a good many unusual sounds—the voices of people outside calling to each other, the noise of wheels along stony roadways—a sort of general clatter and movement which soon told that the encampment for the night was not, as hitherto, on the edge of some quiet village or on a lonely moor.
"Bruvver," said Pamela, who had been the first to rouse up, "are you awake? What a long time us has been asleep! Is it the middle of the night, and what a noise there is."
Duke slowly collected his ideas. He did not speak, but he stood up on the bench and peeped out of the window.
"It must be that big place where there's a fair," he said. "Look, sister, there's lots and lots of carts and peoples. And over there do you see there's rows of little shops—that must be the fair."
He seemed rather excited, but Pamela, after one peep, would not look any more.
"No, no, bruvver," she said. "I am frightened. If it is the fair, that man will be coming that Diana told us about, and perhaps he'll take us before Diana and Tim can help us to run away. I'm too frightened."
But Duke had managed to get the window unhooked, and was now on tiptoe, stretching out his head as far as it would go.
"Oh sister," he exclaimed, drawing it in again, "youshouldsee. It's such a big place, and such lots and lots of peoples, and such a noise. Oh do climb up here, sister, and look out."
But Pamela still cowered down in her corner. Suddenly they heard the well-known sound of the key in the door,—for when the children were alone in the van they were always locked in,—and turningto look, they saw Diana. She brought with her a bowl of milk and some bread, which the children were very glad of, as they had eaten so little at dinner, and she said nothing till they had finished it.
"Are you still sleepy?" she said then. "Would you like to go to bed or to come out a little with me?"
"Oh, to go out a little," said Duke; but Pamela crept up close to Diana.
"I don't want to go out," she said. "I'm frightened. But I don't want to stay here alone for fear that man should come. Can't you help us to run away now, before he comes? Oh please do, dear Diana."
Diana soothed her very kindly.
"Don't be frightened, missy dear," she said. "He won't be coming just yet. I think you'd better come out a little with me. You'll sleep better for it."
"And you won't take us to that man?" said Pamela half suspiciously.
Diana looked at her reproachfully.
"Missy, missy dear, would I do such a thing?"
"Sister, you know she wouldn't," said Duke.
"Then I'll come," said Pamela, and in anotherminute the two children, each with a hand of the gipsy girl, were threading their way through the lanes of vans and carts, half-completed booths, tethered horses and donkeys, men, women, and children of all kinds, which were assembled on the outskirts of Crookford in preparation for the great fair. Nobody noticed them much, though one or two gipsies loitering about, not of her own party, nodded at Diana as she passed as an old acquaintance, with some more or less rough joke or word of greeting. And those belonging to Mick's caravan did not seem surprised at seeing the children at freedom. This was what Diana wished, and it had been partly with this object, as well as to accustom Duke and Pamela a little to their present quarters, that she had managed to get leave to take them out a little, late as it was. It had seemed quite dark outside—looking through the window of the van—but in reality it was only dusk, though the lights moving about, the fires lit here and there in little stoves outside the booths, and the general bustle and confusion, made it a very bewildering scene. Pamela tried not to be frightened, but she clutched Diana's hand close, till suddenly, on turning a corner, they ran against a boy coming at full speed.It was Tim, and the little girl let go of Diana to spring to him with a cry of pleasure.
"Oh Tim, dear Tim," she cried, "us hasn't seen you for such a long time!"
"True enough, missy," he said cheerfully; and, looking at him more closely, both children noticed that he did look brighter and merrier than ever, little as he was in the habit of seeming sad. "It's all right," he went on, turning to Diana; "such a piece o' luck!"
"Come and tell me as soon as we come back," said the girl. "I'll be in the van putting them to bed. Mick's off—gone to look for the Signor. I'll try for them to be asleep whentheycome," and with these rather mysterious words Diana drew on the children, and Tim ran off with a nod.
They walked on till they got a little clear of the crowd, and on to a road evidently leading out of the town. It had grown darker, but the moon had risen, and by her light at some little distance the children saw the same silvery thread that they had noticed winding along below them from the high moorland some days before.
"That's the river where the boats are like houses—that Tim told us about," said Pamela.
"Yes," said Diana, "it's the canal. It comes right into the town over that way," and she pointed the left. "The boats take stone from hereabouts,—there's lots of quarries near Crookford. I wanted you to see it, for we've been thinking, Tim and me—it's more his thought than mine—that that'd be the best way for you to get away. Mick'll not be likely to think of the canal, and Tim's been down to see if there was any one among the boat-people as would take you. He used to know some of them not far from here. And the canal goes straight on to a place called Monkhaven, on the road to Sandle'ham. Did you ever hear of that place?"
The children shook their heads.
"Well, it can't be helped. That's as far as you can get by the canal. After that Tim must use his wits and look about him; and when you get to Sandle'ham I'm afraid there's no help for it—you'll have to ask the police to take you home."
"But Tim too?" said Pamela. "Tim's to go home with us."
"I hope so," said Diana. "I hope the old gentleman and lady will be good to him, poor boy! Tell them it was none ofhisfault, your being stolen away—he's but a poor homeless waif himself; andeven if so be as they could do nothing for him, he mustn't come back here. Mick'd be like to kill him."
"But Grandpapa and Grandmamma will be good to him. Iknowthey will," said Duke and Pamela together. "They'd be good to you too, Diana," they added timidly.
But Diana again shook her head.
"That can't be," she said. "Still, when all this has blown over a bit, I'll try to hear of you some day. Tim'll maybe be able to let me know the name of the place where your home is."
"And you must come to see us. Oh yes, yes—you must, Diana!" said the children, dancing about with glee. The girl looked at them in some surprise; it was the first time she had seen them merry and light-hearted as they were at home, and it made her better understand how wretched their new life must have been for them to change them so.
"I'll try," she said; "but it doesn't much matter for that. The thing is for you to be safe at home yourselves."
Then she said it was time to go back. It was quite dark by now, and the children kept very close to her as they found themselves again in the rabbleof the behind-the-scenes of the fair. People there too were beginning to shut up for the night, for most of them, poor things, had been working hard all day.
As they came up to where Mick's party had encamped, Diana said something in the queer language the children did not understand to some of the gipsies who were hanging about. Their answer seemed to relieve her.
"Come, children," she said; "you must be tired. I'll get you to bed as quick as I can; and try to get to sleep. It's the best thing you can do."—"They'll not be coming just yet, maybe," she added to herself, "if they've got to drinking over their bargain; so much the better perhaps. If only the children are asleep they'll perhaps be none the wiser, and I'll hear all there is to hear."
The preparing for bed was a different thing indeed from the careful washing, hair-brushing, and attiring in snow-white nightgowns that was called "undressing" "at home." All that Diana could manage in the way of washing apparatus was a rough wooden tub with cold water, a bit of coarse soap, and an old rag by way of a towel! And even this she had done more to please the children thanbecause she saw any need for it. This evening she made no pretence of anything after taking off the children's outer clothes—Duke's nankin suit, now sadly soiled and dilapidated, and the old red flannel skirt and little shawl which had replaced Pamela's white frock. The frock was still in existence; but by Mick's orders Diana had trimmed it up gaudily for the child to make her appearance in to the Signor; so the little girl's attire was certainly very gipsy-like.
"Shall I have to go home to Grandmamma with this nugly old petticoat and no frock?" she asked, when Diana had taken off all her clothes down to her little flannel vest, and wrapped her up for the night in a clean, though old, cotton bedgown of her own. "And why have you taken off my chemise, Diana? I've kept it on other nights."
"I'm going to wash it," said Diana. "I'd like to send you back as decent as Ican."
Pamela seemed satisfied. Then she and Duke knelt together at the side of the shake-down Diana called their bed, and said their prayers together and aloud. The gipsy girl had heard them before—several times—but this evening she listened with peculiar attention, and when at the end the littlecreatures, after praying for dear Grandpapa and Grandmamma, and that God would please soon take them safe home again, went on to add a special petition for "dear Diana," who had been so kind to them, that she might be always good and happy, and that Mick and nobody should be unkind to her, the girl turned away her face to hide the tears which slowly welled up into her eyes.
"Good-night, dear Diana," said the two little voices, as she stooped to kiss them.
"Good-night, master and missy. Sleep well, and don't be frightened if you're wakened up. I'll be here." Then, as she was turning away, she hesitated. "Do you really think now," she said, "that it's any good praying for a wild gipsy girl like me?"
"Of course it is," said Pamela, starting up again. "Why shouldn't it be as much good for you as for any one? If you want to be good—and I think you are good, Diana—you can't help praying to God. For all the good comes from Him. That's what Grandmamma told us. And He puts little bits of His good into us."
Diana looked puzzled.
"Yes," persisted Pamela, nodding her head."There's like a little voice that speaks inside us—that tells us when we're" (Pamela could use the word "we," as correctly as possible when speaking in general, not merely of Duke and herself) "naughty and when we're good."
In her turn Diana nodded her head.
"And the more we listen to it the plainer we hear it," added Pamela.
"Usdidn't listen to it when us found that Toby had brokened the bowl," said Duke gravely. "At least I didn't, and it leaves off speaking when people doesn't listen."
Diana had long ago heard the story of the beginning of the children's troubles.
"Listening to it is almost like praying, you see, Diana," said Pamela. "And of course when we know all the good comes from God, it's onlysenseto pray to Him, isn't it?"
"I'll think about it," said the gipsy quietly. "Now go to sleep as fast as you can."
Easier in their innocent minds about their own affairs by a great deal than Diana wasforthem, the twins quickly followed her advice. But Diana dared not go to rest herself; in the first place she had a long talk with Tim in a corner where theycould not be overheard, and then, finding that Mick had not yet come back, she hung about, terrified of his returning with the Signor, and frightening the poor children, without her being at hand.
"You'd best go to bed, I think," said Tim. "I 'spex he's got to drinking somewhere, and he won't be seen to-night."
"I dursn't," said Diana. "He might come any minute, and that man might want to carry them off in their sleep, so as to have no noise about it."
"But how could you stop him?" asked Tim, his merry face growing very sober.
"I'd do my best, and you must be ready, you know," she said.
"He'd be in a nice taking if he didn't find the Signor, or ifhewanted to back out of it," said Tim.
"Not much fear of that," said Diana. "The Signor's too sharp; he'll soon see he couldn't get such a pretty pair once in twenty years. He's a man I shudder at; once he wanted me to join his show, but, bad and cruel as Mick is, I'd rather have to do with him. But hush, Tim, there they are! I hear Mick's voice swearing—they're coming this way. Run you off and hide yourself, but try to creep up to the van where the children are whenthey're gone, and I'll tell you what has to be done."
Tim disappeared with marvellous quickness. Diana rose to her feet and went forward a little, with a light in her hand, to meet her brother. He was accompanied, as she expected, by the Signor, and she saw in a moment that Mick was more than half drunk, and in a humour which might become dangerous at any moment.
"He's made him drunk," she said to herself, "thinking he'll drive a better bargain. He'd better have let him alone."
The Signor was a very small, dark, fat man—dressed, as he considered, "quite like a gentleman." He had bright, beady, twinkling eyes, and a way of smiling and grinning as if he did not think nature had made him enough like a monkey already, in which I do not think any one would have agreed with him!
"So here's your handsome sister, my friend Mick," he said, as he caught sight of Diana—"handsomer than ever. And you were coming to meet us, were you—very amiable I'm sure."
Mick, whose eyes were dazzled by the light, and who was too stupid to take in things quickly,frowned savagely when he saw the girl standing quietly before him.
"What are you waiting there for?" he said, with some ugly words. "There's no need ofyou. Get out of the way. I know where to find the childer. The Signor and I can manage our own affairs."
"Can you?" said Diana contemptuously. "Well, good-night, then. You'll waken them up and frighten them so that they'll scream for the whole fair to hear them. And how the Signor means to get them away quietly if they do soIcan't say. There'd maybe be some awkward questions to answer as to how they came among us at all, if some of the people about should be honest, decent folk. And there are fools of that kind where you'd little look for them sometimes. However, it's no business of mine, as you say. Good-night," and she turned away.
The Signor turned to Mick with a very evil look in his face.
"Fool thatyouare," he muttered, but Mick only stared at him stupidly. The Signor caught his arm and shook him. "Are you going to let her go off?" he said. "You told me yourself she hadlooked after the brats and could do anything with them, and now you go and set her back up! She's fit to rouse the place out of spite, she is. And I can tell you I'm not going to get myself into trouble about these children you've made such a fuss about. I've not seen them yet, and rather than risk anything I'll be off," and he, in turn, seemed as if he were going off.
This roused Mick.
"Stay, stay—wait a bit," he said eagerly, "Diana," he called,—and as Diana was in reality only waiting behind a shed she soon appeared again,—"I were only joking. Of course it's for you to show the Signor the pretty dears—such care as she's had of them, so bright and merry as she's taught them to be, you wouldn't believe," he went on in a half whine. "It'll be a sore trouble to her to part with them—you'll have to think o' that, Signor. I've promised Diana we'd act handsome byher."
"Of course, of course," said the other, with a sneer. "Sure to be handsome doings where you and me's concerned, friend Mick. But wherearethe creatures? You're not playing me a trick after all, are you?" he went on, looking round as if heexpected to see the children start up from the earth or drop down from the sky.
"This way," said Diana, more civilly than she had yet spoken, "follow me if you please—they're close by."
In another minute she was standing on the steps of the van with the key in the lock. Then suddenly she turned and faced the Signor.
"They're asleep," she said. "I kept them up and awake a long time, but I hadn't thought you'd be so late. I can wake them up if you like, and if they saw me there they wouldn't cry. But they'd be half asleep—there'd be no getting them to show off to-night. But of course it's as the Signor chooses."
He looked at her curiously. He was surprised to find her seemingly as eager as Mick that he should think well of the merchandise they were offering him for sale! He had rather expected the gipsy girl to set herself against the transaction, for he knew she disliked him, and that no money would have persuaded her herself to join his "troupe." But he was too low himself to explain anything in others except by the lowest motives. "She thinks she'll get something handsome out of me if she'scivil about it," he said to himself. Seeing, however, that civility was to be the order of the day, he answered her with an extra quantity of grins.
"Quite of your opinion, my young lady. Better not disturb the little dears. Should like a look at them, however, with your kind assistance."
Diana said no more, but, unlocking and opening the door, stepped carefully into the van, followed by her companions—Mick remaining somewhat behind, probably because he could not have got quite into the recesses of the waggon without tumbling, and such sense as remained to him telling him he had better not make a noise. The van inside was divided in two—something after the manner of a bathing-machine, such as I daresay most children have often seen. The door in the middle was not locked, and Diana pushed it softly open; then, advancing with the light held high so as to show the children's faces without flaring painfully upon them, stood at one side and signed to the Signor to come forward. And he was too much startled and impressed—ugly, cold-hearted little wretch though he was—by the sight before him to notice the strange, half-triumphant, half-defiant expression on Diana's dark beautiful face.
UPON MY WORD THEY ARE SOMETHING QUITE OUT OF THE COMMON
"UPON MY WORD THEY ARE SOMETHING QUITE OUT OF THE COMMON," HE SAID;"I WOULDN'T HAVE MISSED THEM FOR A GOOD DEAL. WHAT A KING ANDQUEEN OF THE PIGMIES, OR 'BABES IN THE WOOD,' THEY'D MAKE."—p.173.
"There they are," it seemed to say, "and could anything be lovelier?Wouldn'tyou like to have them?"
They lay there—the delicate little faces flushed with "rosy sleep"—the fair fluffy hair like a golden shadow on the rough cushion which served as a pillow, each with an arm thrown round the other; they looked so like each other that even Diana was not sure which was which. No pair of fairies decoyed from their own country could have been prettier.
The Signor was startled into speaking the truth for once.
"Upon my word they are something quite out of the common," he said; "I wouldn't have missed them for a good deal. What a king and queen of the pigmies, or 'babes in the wood,' they'd make! I'll have to get something set up on purpose for them. And they're sharp at learning and speak plain you say?—at least he did," he added, turning round to look for Mick, who by this time had lurched up to the middle door of the van and was leaning on the lintel, looking in stupidly.
"Ay, they're sharp enough, and pretty spoken too," said Diana.
"Sharp and pretty spoken," echoed Mick.
"Then I'm your man," said the Signor; "I'll——"
But the girl interrupted him.
"There's one thing to be said," she began. "You must not think of letting them be seen hereabouts. You might get yourself and us too into trouble. It's too near where they come from."
The Signor held up his hands warningly.
"Hush," he said, "I don't want to know nothing of all that. They're two desolate orphans, picked up by you out of charity, and I take them to teach them a way of gaining a livelihood. That's all about it."
"Well, all the same, you can do nothing with them hereabouts," repeated Diana, anxious to gain time to put into execution the plans of escape. "You'd better leave them here quietly with us till after the fair. No one shall see them except those who've seen them already."
They were in the outer half of the van by now, for Diana, afraid of disturbing the children, had drawn back with the light, and the Signor had followed her.
At her last speech he turned upon her with sudden and angry suspicion.
"No, no," he said. "I'll have no tricks served me. Have you been putting your handsome sister up to this, Mick, you fool? You promised me the brats at once."
"Yes, at once. You shall have them at once when you pay me," said Mick, beginning to get angry in turn, "but not before. I don't want to keep them—not I; they're the pest of my life, they are, but I'll see my money or you shall never set eyes on them again."
And he looked so stolidly obstinate that the other man glanced at Diana as if for advice.
"You'd better have left him alone," she said in a low voice, contemptuously. "If you make him angry now he's not sober, there's no saying what he'll do."
The Signor began to be really afraid that his prey might slip through his hands. He turned to Diana.
"I'm one for quick work and no shilly-shallying," he said. "And I have Mick's word for it. He's signed a paper. I'll take care to get myself and you into no trouble, but I must have the children at once. Now listen, Mick. I'll be here to-morrow morning at say eight—well, nine o'clock, with the money. And you must have the children ready—and help me to take 'em off quietly, or—or—I don't want no bother," he added meaningly.
"All right," said Mick; "they'll be ready," and he followed the Signor down the steps of the van, Diana still holding the light.
"Nine o'clock," said the Signor once more, as if he depended more on the girl than on the man.
"At nine o'clock," she repeated, and she stood there till quite sure that the Signor had taken himself off, and that Mick had no intention of returning.
Then she blew out the light and crept softly in and out among the vans, tethered horses, etc., forming the gipsy caravan, till she came to the waggon where she knew Tim slept. He was wide awake, expecting her, and in answer to her whispered call said nothing till they had got some yards away.
"I think the other boys is asleep," he said, "but best make sure. Well, Diana?"
"You must go at once—no, not just at once, but as soon as the dawn breaks. That man's coming for them at nine, and once in his hands——!" Diana shook her head, and though she said no more the boy understood her, that then all hope of escape would be gone.
"I'll be ready," said Tim.
"And now Ihavea little boat."Peter Bell.
Peter Bell.
The children were still sleeping when the first straggling feeble rays of dawn began to creep through the darkness. Diana stood at the door of the van and looked anxiously at the sunrise. Her experienced eye soon saw that it was going to be a fine day, and she gave a sigh of relief. She was still dressed as she had been the night before, for she had not slept, not lain down even—so great had been her fear of falling asleep—at all. She had spent all the dark hours in preparing for the flight of the little prisoners—all that her hands, untrained in such matters as sewing and mending, could do to make the twins appear in decent guise on their return to their own home had been done. And now all was ready. There was nothing to dobut to wake them and explain to them what was before them. Tim was already up and off—for she had arranged with him to meet the children a little way out of the town, and he had tapped at the door of the van as he passed.
There was no one stirring among the queer inhabitants of the fair, as Diana remarked with satisfaction. Everything was perfectly still, and with a sigh the gipsy girl stepped up into the van again and went through to the inner part. Duke and Pamela were lying much as they had been the evening before. It seemed a pity to wake them, but it had to be done. Diana stooped down and gently shook Duke's arm.
"Master," she said,—"master and missy, you must wake up."
Duke opened his sleepy eyes and stared before him; Pamela, more quickly awakened, started up, crying:
"What is it, Diana? It isn't that naughty man come for us?"
"No, no," said the gipsy, glad to see that Pamela had her wits about her. "It is that Tim is ready to run away with you, as you've so often planned. And you must get up and dress as quick as youcan before Mick or any one is awake, for the man will be coming this morning, and I must have you ever so far away before then."
Her words completely aroused both children. In an instant they were on their feet, nervously eager to be dressed and off. There was no question of bathsthismorning, but Diana washed their faces and hands well, and smoothed their tangled hair.
"I must make them as tidy as I can," she said to herself with a sob in her throat.
Duke saw with satisfaction that his nankin suit—which Diana had persuaded him not to wear the day before, having lent him a pair of trowsers of Tim's, which she had washed on purpose, and in which, doubled up nearly to his waist, he looked very funny—was quite clean; and Pamela, to her still greater surprise, found herself attired in a tidy little skirt and jacket of dark blue stuff, with a little hood of the same for her head.
"Why, what's this?" she said. "It's a new gown!"
"I made it," said Diana quietly. "I wanted you to look as tidy as I could. You'll tell them, missy dear—won't you?—that poor Diana did her best."
"Indeed us will," cried both together. But they did not know that the gipsy girl had cut up her one decent dress to clothe little Pamela.
"And shall us see Grandpapa and Grandmamma to-day?" they went on, hugging Diana in their joy as they spoke.
"Not to-day, nor to-morrow, but before long, I hope," she replied. And then, as they were eager to go, "Won't you say your prayers, master and missy, that you may come safe to your home; and," she added in a low voice, "ask God to show poor Diana how to be good?"
"Us will always pray for you, dear Diana," they said, after they had risen from their knees again, "and some day, you know, youmustcome and see us."
She did not answer, but, quickly lifting them down the steps of the waggon, locked the door and put the key in her pocket. Then, still without speaking,—the children seeming to understand they must be as quiet as possible,—she lifted Pamela in her arms, and Duke running beside, they had soon made their way out of the midst of the vans and carts and booths, all of whose owners were still asleep.
For even now it was barely dawn, and the air felt chilly, as is generally the case early of a May morning.
Diana walked so fast, though she had a big basket as well as a little girl in her arms, that Duke, though he would not have owned it, could scarcely keep up with her. But at last, just as he was beginning to feel he must cry mercy, she slackened her pace and began to look about her.
"He should be somewhere near," she said, more as if speaking to herself than to the children, and just then, with a sort of whoop, out tumbled Tim from the other side of a low hedge, where there was a dry ditch in which he had been comfortably lying.
"Hush!" said Diana, glancing round her.
"There's no need," said Tim; "there's not a soul within hearing. I needn't have come on before for that matter. No one saw us start."
"And which way do you go now?" asked the gipsy, setting Pamela down as she spoke, to the child's great satisfaction, though she had not liked to say to Diana that she was really too big to be carried.
"Straight on for about half a mile," answeredthe boy; "then there's a road to the right takes us straight to the canal. It's not light enough yet for you to see, but there's a little house close to the towing path over there, where the boats often stop the night when it's crowded in the town. That's where they're to be."
"All right," said Diana. "I'll go with you to the turn, and then I must get back as fast as I can."
"Let me carry the basket," said Tim. He had a bundle under his arm, but it was very light, for his possessions were few.
"What's in the basket?" asked Duke.
"All I could get," said Diana. "Some bread and eggs, and some oranges I bought last night. I thought you'd be glad of them maybe. And Tim, you have the money safe?"
Tim nodded his head.
In a few minutes they reached the road he had spoken of. In silence poor Diana kissed the three children and turned away, for she could not speak. But Duke and Pamela burst into tears.
"Oh if you would but come with us," they said over and over again. But Diana shook her head.
"You shouldn't cry, master and missy dear, togo to your own home. It was a wicked shame to take you from it, but I hope God will forgive me the little I had to do with it, for I've truly done my best to get you safe back. And you'll ask the kind gentleman and lady to be good to poor Tim, and put him in an honest way of life."
"Oh yes," sobbed the children. And then Diana kissed them again and resolutely turned away. But Tim ran after her.
"You don't think Mick'll beat you?" he said anxiously.
"He shan't have the chance," she answered scornfully. "No, no, Tim, I'll take care of myself. Be a good boy; getting away from us is the best thing could come to you. And some day maybe I'll have news of you, and you of me perhaps."
Tim hastened back to the children, but his merry face was sad and his heart heavy.
A short time brought them to the edge of the canal, and there sure enough a boat was moored. There was no one moving about the little house Tim had pointed out, but on board the canal boat two figures were to be seen—or rather three, for they were those of a young man and a younger woman with a baby in her arms; and in answer toa whistle from Tim the man came forward and called out cheerfully, "Good morning; is it all right?"
"All right," called back Tim, and then he turned to the children.
"We're going in this boat, master and missy. See, won't it be fine fun, sailing away along the canal?"
Pamela seemed a little frightened.
"You're sure he won't take us to that naughty man?" she said, holding Tim's hand tight.
"Bless you, no; it's to get away from him we're going in the boat. Peter—that's the name of the man there—Peter's promised to take us as far as he goes towards Sandle'ham. It's such a piece of luck as never was to have come across him; he's the cousin of the boy I told you of who let me stay in his boat when I was a little 'un."
"Oh," cried the children,—"oh yes, us remembers that story. It was a boy and his mother. And was it a boat just like this, Tim?"
"Not near so clean and tidy. This one's been all new painted, don't you see? It's as clean as clean. But we must be quick. Peter and I'll jump you in. He's all ready to start. There's the horse a-waiting."
Duke was quite content, but Pamela still hung back a little.
"Us has never been in a boat," she said.
"Come on," called out Peter, and the young woman with the baby came forward with a smile.
"You must look sharp," said Peter, in what was meant to be an encouraging tone. "The morning's getting on, you know," he added to Tim, "and if those folk down yonder took it in their heads to come this way it'd be awk'ard."
"I know," said Tim, and lifting Duke in his arms he handed him over to Peter, thinking Pamela would be sure to follow. So she was, for she would have gone after "bruvver" down the crater of Vesuvius itself I do believe, but she looked white and trembled, and whispered piteously,
"I am so frightened, Tim."
"But it's better than if Mick had cotched us, and you'd had to go to that Signor man, missy," said Tim encouragingly.
This appealed to Pamela's common sense, and in a few minutes she seemed quite happy. For Peter's wife introduced her to the baby, and as it was really rather a nice baby—much cleaner than one could have expected to find one of its species on a canalboat—the little girl soon found it a most interesting object of study. She had seldom seen little babies, and her pride was great when its mother proposed to her to hold it on her own knee, and even allowed her to pull off its socks to count for herself its ten little round rosy buttons of toes. The toes proved too much for Duke, who had hitherto stood rather apart, considering himself, as a boy, beyond the attractions of dolls and babies. But when Tim even—great grown-up, twelve years old Tim—knelt down to admire the tiny feet at Pamela's call, Duke condescended to count the toes one by one for himself, and to say what a pity it was Toby was not here—baby could ride so nicely on Toby's back, couldn't she? This idea, expressed with the greatest gravity, set Peter and his wife off laughing, and all five, or six if baby is to be included, were soon the best friends in the world.
"How nice it is here," said Pamela; "I'm not frightened now, Tim; only I wish Diana could have come. It's so much nicer than in the waggon. You don't think Mick will find out where us is, do you, Tim?" and a little shudder passed through her.
"Oh no, no; no fear," said Tim, but her wordsreminded him and Peter that they were by no means "out of the wood." Peter was far from anxious for a fight with the gipsies, whose lawless ways he knew well; and besides this, being a kind-hearted though rough fellow, he had already begun to feel an interest in the stolen children for their own sake; though no doubt his consent to take them as passengers had been won by the promises of reward Tim had not hesitated to hold out.
He and the boy looked at each other.
"We must be starting," said the bargeman, and he turned to jump ashore and attach the towing ropes to the patient horse. "You must keep them in the cabin for a while," he said to his wife. "They mustn't risk being seen till we're a long way out of Crookford."
Duke and Pamela looked up, but without clearly understanding what their new host said. And Tim, who saw that Peter's queer accent puzzled them, was not sorry. He did not want them to be frightened; he was frightened enough himself to do for all three, he reflected, and they were so good and biddable he could keep them quiet without rousing their fears. For, though he could not have explained his own feelings, it somehow went to the boy'sheart to see the two little creatures already looking happier and more peaceful than he had ever seen them! Why should they not be quite happy? They were going to Grandpapa and Grandmamma and Toby; they had no longer cruel Mick to fear; they had Tim to take care of them—only the thought of poor Diana left behind made them a little sad!
"It is so nice here," repeated Pamela, when Tim's words had completely reassured her. "But I'm rather hungry. Us hadn't any breakfast, you know, Tim. Mightn't us, have some of the bread in the basket."
"I've got some bread and some fresh milk," said Mrs. Peter. "I got the milk just before you came; the girl at the 'Rest'"—the 'Rest' was the little house where the canal boats stopped—"fetched it early."
"Oh, us would like some milk," said the children eagerly.
"Come into the cabin then, and you'll show me what you have in your basket," said the young woman; and thus the children were easily persuaded to put themselves in hiding.
The cabin was but one room, though with whatin a house would have been called a sort of "lean-to," large enough to hold a bed. All was, of course, very tidy, but so much neater and, above all, cleaner than the gipsies' van that Duke and Pamela thought it delightful. The boat had been newly repaired and painted, and besides this, Peter's wife—though she could neither read nor write and had spent all her life on a canal boat—was quite a wonder in her love of tidiness and cleanliness.
"I'd like to live here always," said Pamela, whose spirits rose still higher when she had had some nice fresh milk and bread.
"Not without Grandpapa and Grandmamma," said Duke reproachfully.
"Oh no, of course not," said Pamela. "But there wouldn't be quite enough room for them in here, would there, Mrs. Peter?"
"I am afraid not," she replied. "You see there's only one bed. But we've made a nice place for you, master and missy, in here," and she drew back a clean cotton curtain in one corner, behind which, on a sort of settle, Peter and she had placed one of their mattresses so as to make a nice shake-down. "You'll sleep very well in here, don't you think?"
"Oh yes," exclaimed the children, "us will bevery comfortable. What nice clean sheets!" continued Pamela; "it makes me fink of our white beds at home," and her voice grew rather doleful, as if she were going to cry.
"But you've no need to cry about your homenow, missy dear," said Tim. "You're on the way there."
"Yes, how silly I am!" said Pamela. "I fink I forgot. It's such a long time ago since us slept in a nice clean bed with sheets. I wish it was time to go to bed now."
"I think it would be a very good plan if you and master was to take a little sleep. You must be tired getting up so early," suggested Mrs. Peter, devoutly hoping they would agree to let themselves be quietly stowed away behind the checked cotton curtain. For poor Mrs. Peter was dreadfully afraid of the gipsies, and her motive in agreeing to befriend Tim and the children was really far more the wish to save them from the hands they had fallen among than any hope of reward.
"I'd rather bury baby, bless her, any day, than think of her among such," she had said on hearing the story.
Duke and Pamela looked longingly at the "nicewhite sheets." They were both, to tell the truth, very sleepy, but dignity had to be considered.
"It's only babies that go to bed in the day, Nurse says," objected Duke. "She said so one day that us got into our beds, and she said us had dirtied them with our shoes. Us had been playing in the garden."
"But you've no need to keep your shoes on," said Mrs. Peter. "And many a big person's very glad to take a sleep in the day, when they're tired and have been up very early maybe."
So at last the twins allowed themselves to be persuaded, and Mrs. Peter's heart, and Tim's too, for that matter, were considerably lighter when the curtain was drawn forward and no trace of the little passengers was to be seen. Tim, following the young woman's advice, curled himself up in a corner where he was easily hidden.
"And now," said Mrs. Peter, "I'll just go up on the deck as usual, so that if any boats pass us who know us by sight, they'll never think we've any runaways on board; though for my part I can't see as that Mick'd dare to make much stir, seeing as he might be had up for stealing them."
"It's not him I'm so much afeared of as thatSignor," said Tim. "He's such a terrible sharp one, Diana says."
"But the perlice must be after the children by now," persisted Mrs. Peter. "And every one far and wide knows of Crookford Fair and the gipsies that comes to it."
"P'raps they've never thought of gipsies," said Tim; and in this, as we know, he was about right.
The day passed peacefully. They met several boats making for Crookford, who hailed them as usual, and they were overtaken by one or two others making their way more quickly, because towed by two horses. But whether or not there had been any inquiry among the canal people at Crookford after the children, Peter and his party were left unmolested, and the sight of his wife and baby as usual on the deck would have prevented any one suspecting anything out of the common.
It was late afternoon when the three—for Tim had slept as soundly as the others—awoke. At first, in their nest behind the curtain, Duke and Pamela could not imagine where they were—then the touch and sight of the clean sheets recalled their memory.
"Oh, bruvver, aren't you glad?" said Pamela."I wonder what o'clock it is, and if we've come a long way. Oh, I'm so hungry! I wonder where Tim is!"
Up jumped the boy like a faithful hound at the sound of his own name.
"Here I am, missy," he said, rubbing his eyes. "I've been asleep too—it makes one sleepy, I think, the smooth way the boat slips along."
"Not like the jogging and jolting in the van," said Duke. "I'm hungry too, Tim," he added.
"Just stop where you are a bit while I go out on the deck and see," said the boy.
He made his way cautiously, peeping out before he let himself be seen. The coast was clear, however. Mrs. Peter was knitting tranquilly, baby asleep on her knee—Peter himself enjoying an afternoon pipe.
For it was already afternoon.
"You've had a good nap, all on you," said the young woman, smiling. "I thought you'd 'a wakened up for your dinner. But I looked in two or three times and the little dears was sleeping like angels in a picture—so Peter and I we thought it would be a pity to disturb you. Had you so far to come this morning?
"Not far at all," said Tim. "I cannot think what made me so sleepy, nor master and missy neither. Perhaps it's the being so quiet-like here after all the flurry of getting off and thinking they'd be after us. It's not often I sleep past my dinner time."
"I've kep' it for you," said Mrs. Peter. "There's some baked 'taters hot in the pan, and maybe the little master and missy'd like one of their eggs."
"I'm sure they would," said Tim; "a hegg and a baked 'tater's a dinner for a king. And there's the oranges for a finish up."
And he skipped back merrily to announce the good news.
The dinner was thoroughly approved of by Duke and Pamela, and after they had eaten it they were pleased at being allowed to stay on the deck of the boat, and to run about and amuse themselves as they chose, for they had now left Crookford so far behind them that Peter and his wife did not think it likely any one would be coming in pursuit.
"They'd 'a been after us by now if they'd been coming," said Peter. "A horse'd have overtook us long afore this, and not going so very fast nayther."
The children had not enjoyed so much libertyfor many weary days, and their merry laughter was heard all over the boat, as they played hide-and-seek with Tim, or paddled their hands in the clear water, leaning over the sides of the boat. For they were now quite out in the country, and the canal bore no traces of the dirt of the town. It was a very pretty bit of country too through which they were passing; and though the little brother and sister were too young to have admired or even noticed a beautiful landscape of large extent, they were delighted with the meadows dotted over with daisies and buttercups, and the woods in whose recesses primroses and violets were to be seen, through which they glided.