Transcriber's note: Unusual and inconsistent spelling is as printed.
A LITTLE BREEZE BLEW IN AT THE OPEN WINDOW,
AND THEN A RED AND BROWN BUTTERFLY FLEW IN.
THE RED CORD SERIES
"The Comforter . . . whom the Father will send. . ."
LITTLE MISS
MOTH
THE STORY OF THREE MAIDENS
CHARITY, HOPE, AND FAITH
BY
AMY LE FEUVRE
Author of "Probable Sons," "Teddy's Button," "Tested,"
"Andy Man," "Chats with Children," etc.
PICKERING & INGLIS
14 PATERNOSTER ROW, LONDON, E. C. 4
229 BOTHWELL STREET, GLASGOW, C. 2
THE RED CORD LIBRARY
OF HEALTHY MORAL STORIES
FOR ALL YOUTHFUL READERS
By JOHN BUNYAN
THE PILGRIM'S PROGRESS
By AMY LE FEUVRE
LITTLE MISS MOTH
TESTED
BY M. L. CHARLESWORTH
MINISTERING CHILDREN
THE BASKETMAKER'S SHOP
(A SEQUEL TO MINISTERING CHILDREN)
BY CHARLOTTE MURRAY
WARDLAUGH; OR, WORKERS TOGETHER
THROUGH GREY TO GOLD
STUART'S CHOICE
MURIEL MALONE
FROM SCHOOL TO CASTLE
BY PANSY
A NEW GRAFT ON THE FAMILY TREE
BY M. E. DREWSEN
GRACIE AND GRANT, A HIGHLAND TALE
NEDDIE GARDNER; OR, THE OLD HOUSE
BY GRACE PETTMAN
GIVEN IN EXCHANGE
BY J. GOLDSMITH COOPER
HOPE GLYNNE'S AWAKENING
BY SYDNEY WATSON
WOPS THE WAIF, A TALE OF REAL LIFE
Made and Printed In Great Britain
CONTENTS
CHAPTER
[III. AN INVITATION TO THE HALL]
[VI. CHARLIE STILL IN COMMAND]
[XV. THE PIRATE'S CHRISTMAS STORY]
LITTLE MISS MOTH
[CHAPTER I]
A NEW HOME
THREE little girls were looking out of the window on a very wet afternoon in March. They were so close together in age and height that sometimes two of them were taken for twins, yet there was a year between each of them. And they were unlike each other in looks.
Charity, the eldest, had a quantity of red auburn hair down her back. She was very lively and talkative, and her eyes were always sparkling with fun and happiness.
Hope, next to her in age, had fair golden hair and blue eyes; she was sweet tempered and rather apt to be an echo of anyone with whom she was.
Faith, the youngest, was a quiet child, with short, dark, curly hair, and thoughtful brown eyes. She had a very sweet little face, but looked fragile and delicate beside her rosy, sturdy sisters.
It was not a very cheerful scene outside the window. One of those quiet, dingy streets towards the outskirts of London, where rows of houses faced each other, all exactly alike, and where the only traffic was the tradesmen's carts rattling along, and an occasional cab or motor. But the little girls were talking fast and happily. The rain beating against the window panes did not depress them. The dark grey sky, the wet pavements, the wind whirling the smoke along the street from the chimneys opposite, the people hurrying by under sodden umbrellas, all interested the six bright eyes.
And at last three voices shouted happily:
"Here she comes, Granny! Here's Aunt Alice!"
They left their post at the window and rushed to the door. Mrs. Blair, their grandmother, who was sitting in an easy chair by the fire, knitting small stockings, sprang up as if she were twenty instead of nearly seventy. She took a small kettle off the hob, and poured the hot water into a teapot.
Tea was laid on a round table in the middle of the room. There was only a loaf of bread and a pot of treacle, but everything was very bright and clean; and the little room looked quite cheerful in contrast to the grey, dingy street outside. There was a canary hanging up in the window, and a handsome black cat sat washing its face on the hearthrug. Bright pictures were on the walls, and in the centre of the table was a big bunch of yellow daffodils.
Now the door opened, and Aunt Alice appeared, with a bright, rosy face; and her three small nieces were instantly hanging round her.
"Oh, Granny, she's got some primroses!"
"She's picked them herself!"
"And there's a parcel—very special for you!"
"Now let me speak, chicks! And first I must shed my wet shoes. Charity, run and get me my slippers from upstairs. Yes, Faith, you can take these out into the kitchen, and ask Mrs. Cox to dry them for me."
Aunt Alice bent down and kissed Granny.
"You do look cosy here. I shall be thankful to have a cup of tea!"
In a few minutes all were gathered round the table, and then Granny opened her parcel, which contained a pound of golden butter.
"There!" said Aunt Alice. "What do you think of that? Old Mrs. Horn sold it to me. They are not rationed in butter down there. And, Mother, dear, I have had a very successful day, and the cottage is sweet. I have seen Sir George, and he will let it for ten pounds a year. Think of it, with no rates or taxes, and a garden big enough to grow our own vegetables, and an orchard with six good apple trees in it!"
"And what about the water?"
"Quite a good well close to the house, and these primroses are out of the orchard, and Mrs. Horn who lives only a field away will supply us with milk."
"What is the cottage like?"
"There is a big kitchen and dairy; the kitchen larger than this; a tiny best parlour, which I don't think we will use at all, and four good bedrooms, and cupboards in every room built into thick walls."
Granny's eyes sparkled as brightly as the children's. "And when can we have it?"
"Sir George said he would have it papered and painted throughout. It is in good repair. His coachman lived there for ten years before he went to the war, and his wife was a 'clean body,' so Mrs. Horn informed me. Poor thing, she died a month after she had left it. She had a weak heart, and she heard of her husband's death suddenly, and it just killed her."
"Did you see Lady Melville?"
"Just for a moment. Sir George sent his love to you. He said it would be like old times to see you again."
There was silence. The little girls were busy eating their bread and treacle, but their ears were taking everything in.
"And is the cottage lonely?" asked Granny.
"No, I don't think so. It lies just off a road. There's not much passing, but, Mother dear, you will revel in the peace and quiet after this!"
Aunt Alice waved her hand out of the window. She was smiling brightly. Granny looked at her rather wistfully. "And you have quite made up your mind to give up your war work and come with us? You don't think I could manage with the children?"
"I am sure you could not, Mother. There will be wood to be sawn, and the garden to be tilled. Sir George has given us leave to gather all the wood we want from his woods, but we can get no man or boy to help us. Mrs. Horn told me that. She is running her small farm without any man at all, her two daughters do everything. The children must make themselves useful."
"And what about their lessons?"
Aunt Alice looked grave.
"I don't know. If we can't find any one to teach them, I suppose I must try myself. There is the village school a mile off."
"No, Alice, I shall not let them sink to that."
Aunt Alice laughed and shrugged her shoulders
"Oh, Mother dear, we won't bring them up with empty brains as well as empty purses! They will have to earn their own living, so they must have a good education."
"Well, we will talk about that later."
"And we'll all have a slice of bread and butter now," said Aunt Alice briskly. Then she turned to the children, and began to tell them of all that she had seen and heard since she had left them two days ago.
And when tea was over, Charity slipped out to the kitchen. She was longing to impress Mrs. Cox with the wonderful new life in front of them.
Mrs. Cox was a thin, gaunt woman who came every day from eight o'clock to six in the afternoon. She cleaned, she cooked, she washed and ironed, and was the children's devoted friend. They were never tired of listening to her stories, but Mrs. Cox always enjoyed very dismal subjects. Funerals and illnesses were her chief topics; and her friends seemed to the children to have had the most marvellous diseases, and the most miraculous cures that they had ever heard.
"Oh, Mrs. Cox," cried Charity, dancing up to her, as she sat at the kitchen table enjoying her cup of tea, "we're going to the country to a house all our own, and no lodgers in the top floors of it, a house with a well, and primroses, and apple trees, and we shall have butter—real butter—every day, and a forest with big trees, and we shall pick up wood in it and light our fires. And Aunt Alice will be home all day!"
Mrs. Cox stared at her.
"Ah, well, yer h'aunt did say to me times was hard, and you couldn't h'afford to go on livin' here, that and the h'air raids—but never did I think you'd all sink down to the country! 'Tis only where folks live in their dotage, or sick children be sent for their 'olidays; nobody with brains or money be content with such a hom'! Why, me sister Ivy went down to a place there, an' were that skeered she's never prop'ly recovered since. She left before the end o' her month; she said when you looked out of the windys, there were nothin' but trees tapping their branches on the windy panes, and earwigs a crawlin' inter the beds, if you please, and you walks miles and never meets a single human soul, an' the nights black pitch, so's the evenings out were a crool joke! Not to speak of mud comin' up your legs over your boots—!"
"Go on—how perfectly lovely!" cried Charity with glowing eyes.
But Mrs. Cox shook her head gloomily, and refused to say another word.
"Granny lived in the country when she was little, and our Dad was born in the country, and when Grand-dad was alive, he kept a school in the country for little boys, and Granny used to love them, and they loved her. And George Melville had curly hair, and Granny used to keep a bag of chocolates in her room for him, and now he's grown-up, and has a big house, and he's going to let Granny and us live in one of his small houses. We're going to be awfully happy in the country, Aunt Alice says everything is nice there."
Mrs. Cox gave an unbelieving sniff.
"Once I went on a Mothers' treat. It rained twelve hours on end—and I sat on a damp log o' wood, and was ill in bed of rheumaticks for a month h'after! Give me a proper Lunnon park for beauty. Why, the park flowers beat the country ones holler!"
Charity left her. Mrs. Cox would not understand the joy of looking forward to a move into an unknown country.
Two hours later, the three little girls were in bed in one room upstairs. Aunt Alice and Granny always slept together.
They were talking hard over the prospect in front of them.
"I s'pose," said Hope with knitted brow, "that we're very, very poor. It's only since Granny and Aunt Alice were doing up sums together in their account books that they said they couldn't stay here any longer."
"No," said Charity; "it was when Faith was so ill the other day. The doctor said Granny must take her to the country, and Granny shook her head. And I heard her say to Aunt Alice after:
"'I should like to have something worth selling, my dear, but I've no more jewels, and all our silver is gone, and the bits of furniture left us are worth nothing.'
"Poor Granny! She wiped her spectacles when she said it, and she always does that when she's unhappy."
"And we do wear out our shoes, and eat a lot," said little Faith with fervour. "If we live in a cottage, p'raps it won't cost so much."
"And perhaps we shall be allowed to run about without shoes and stockings," said Hope; "that would be lovely, like we did at the sea, when Aunt Alice took us to Margate."
"I know one thing," said Charity, rolling round in bed in ecstasy; "I mean to get lost in the wood as soon as ever I can."
"And I shall climb the apple trees," said Hope.
"And I shall sit on the well," said Faith, "and draw water up and down in a bucket all day long!"
"And as for Mrs. Cox," said Charity, "she's only talking of the country she's seen—not of our cottage, which is perfectly beautiful. Aunt Alice says so!"
Then sleep overtook them, and when Granny came up to bed, she paid them her usual nightly visit.
"Poor little souls!" she said. "Life will not be so difficult for us in the country; we may be able to give them more pleasures."
The following days were full of bustle and excitement to the children. They had been going to a small private day school a few streets away, but now they were taken away from it, and Charity expressed a hope that they would never go to another school as long as they lived.
"It's our names," she confided to her aunt; "why did our father and mother give us such names? The girls all laugh at us, 'specially me! 'Charity' means everything nasty. If you live on people's charity, it means you're a nobody, and Charity schools are for the very lowest. I hate my name! I'm glad we're going to the country. Mrs. Cox says we shall have nobody there to notice what we're called."
"I like your names," said Aunt Alice laughing. "Don't be a little goose. Your Mother was a saint, and she got your names from the Bible, and so far from 'Charity' being a name to be despised, it is the greatest of all other names. We are told so, you read the chapter about Charity and see all you ought to do if you're worthy of your name."
"Oh, I know! Granny read it to me once. It is in Corinthians, but I couldn't be like that chapter, no, never!"
She shook her red hair vehemently and danced away. Charity was always jumping or running or dancing; she hated keeping her legs still, and school was a real trial to her.
Granny and Aunt Alice packed day after day. Mrs. Cox asked how they were going to manage in the country if they had no one to clean for them, and Hope asked her aunt anxiously about it, but she was laughed at.
"I am going to stay at home, and do all Mrs. Cox's work. I must, that is why I am leaving my work at the War Depôt. Don't you think I am able to keep a cottage clean, Hope? You will all have to help. Granny is not so young as she used to be, and we must spare her all heavy work."
"I love scrubbing," said Hope happily. "I hope you'll let me do that. Are we as poor as Mrs. Cox is?"
"Poorer, I think," said Aunt Alice cheerfully.
Nothing seemed to depress her, and Granny was just as cheerful, so Hope said to Mrs. Cox, "It will be all right, Mrs. Cox. Aunt Alice says it will. We are going to do everything ourselves. We've got very poor, I don't know how, but Granny always says a beggar is happier than a king! And we shall love it all, I know we shall."
The day came when a cab drew up to the door, and the little girls with their arms full of parcels and baskets followed Granny out of the house in which they had spent most of their lives, and rolled away to the big, bustling station. The journey in the train was a delight to them, and when early in the afternoon they arrived at a quiet little station called Deepcombe, and were told by their aunt that they must get out, they looked round them with shining eyes noting every detail around them.
There was a shabby little cart waiting for them outside the station, and it was a tight fit to pack themselves and their luggage into it. A girl drove it, and she and Aunt Alice walked up all the hills. It seemed as if the road was never going to end, but the children had plenty to see as they went along. Lambs in the meadows; primroses on the banks, and pretty thatched cottages and farmhouses standing back from the road.
Charity was loud in admiration and wonder, Hope asked questions about everything. Little Faith was the silent one, she looked up into the blue sky and across the green fields with a dreamy smile upon her small white face.
Granny bent down to her once: "Are you tired, darling?"
Faith's back ached, but she never acknowledged it. She only smiled up at her grandmother. "It's like heaven, I should think!" was all she said.
Granny put her arm round her. Faith was very delicate, and she was continually in her grandmother's thoughts. Granny often said to Aunt Alice that Faith lived at Heaven's gates, and she was afraid that any day she might slip inside them.
At last they reached the Cottage. It had a white gate which had been freshly painted, and the door stood open; and kind Mrs. Horn had lighted a fire, and put a kettle on to boil and was standing outside the door, ready to welcome them.
The little girls tumbled over each other in their excitement to get inside. It seemed at first like a doll's house to them; the stairs were steep and narrow, and the rooms low, and the windows very small, but they loved the quaint cupboards; and then they ran out into the garden and orchard, and visited the well and picked some primroses, and whilst Granny and Aunt Alice were seeing to the luggage being carried in, their tongues wagged fast.
"It's all beautiful," said Charity, "just like the cottages in story books; and I hope we'll never go back to London again in our lives!"
"And we can pick flowers wherever we see them," said Faith, "without paying for them or having the keepers coming up to see what we're doing."
"Where is the wood?" asked Hope.
Charity began to climb one of the apple trees.
"I think I see some trees over there," she said, pointing to the corner of a field a short distance off. They were going to set off immediately in search of it, when they heard their aunt call them in.
"You mustn't run away," she said; "we're all going to have some tea, and then you must help me get your beds made up. There will be lots to do before we go to bed to-night."
"Is this our furniture?" asked Charity, looking round the room, which had only an empty glass-paned cupboard, a square table, a dresser, and six wooden chairs.
"Yes, we've taken over the furniture left here, but we'll make this kitchen quite pretty with nice curtains, and some cushions and some of Granny's pretty things."
So they gathered round the table for their evening meal, and then till bed-time Aunt Alice kept them all busy.
When they at last went up to the sloping-roofed bedroom where they were to sleep, the little girls were too tired to talk any more.
It was Charity who said just before she dropped asleep:
"To-morrow—we'll find the wood, and then our adventures will begin."
[CHAPTER II]
FIRST ADVENTURES
THE next day came, and Aunt Alice gave her small nieces permission to go off for the morning anywhere they liked.
"I don't think you can get into any mischief," she said. "Charity has a wise little head of her own, and if you like to go to the wood, and bring back some sticks for the fire, I shall be very glad."
"Aunt Alice seems to guess what we should like to do best," said Hope, skipping over the field as joyfully as the lambs had skipped the evening before.
They crossed the orchard, and found a footpath going through some fields. I do not think any little girls in the whole world could have been so happy as these three were on this bright sunny morning. And then just as they reached the wood, something happened to dim their joy. They heard the pitiful shrieks and cries of an animal in pain.
"Oh, what is it?" asked Faith with big eyes. "Is it a wild beast, do you think? It may be a wolf or a fox!"
"We must go and see," said Charity bravely.
They entered the wood by a narrow footpath, and trod one behind the other. Charity hurried along in front, and very soon found a beautiful brown dog writhing on the ground, with one of its legs fast caught in a gin.
They stood and looked at it with pitying eyes; but not one of them knew how to release it. Faith began to sob as if her heart would break. She never could bear to see the smallest creature in pain, and had often cried over a dead mouse in London.
"Let's call somebody," she cried, "he'll be dead, he's bleeding. Oh call somebody quick!"
"But there's nobody to come in the country, Mrs. Cox says so!" said Charity.
Hope and Faith raised their voices.
"Help! Help! Murder!" they cried, for Mrs. Cox had often told them how cries like that brought the policeman to help.
And then Charity joined them, and suddenly they heard a crackling of branches, and an old man appeared. He had a grey beard and a big shady felt hat over his eyes. A great knotted stick was in his hand, and he had leather gaiters up to his knees.
"Hullo! Hullo! What's doin' here?" he said, in a gruff voice.
Faith seized hold of his hands, and her tears dropped fast.
"It's a poor darling dog got caught in an iron thing. Come and get him out quick! Oh, it's cruel, cruel!"
The old man quickened his pace.
"'Tisn't my Sandy! Eh, sure enough it be, an' I be huntin' for him high and low. Still, my boy! So!"
He put his foot on the gin, and with a wriggle and a cry, the dog was free. He stopped whining and stood before his master trembling from head to foot. The old man knelt down and with his handkerchief began to bind up the poor torn leg. Charity and Hope watched the proceeding with the greatest interest, Faith shut her eyes tight. She was as white as a sheet, and, like Sandy, trembled from head to foot.
But Charity began to talk, she asked the old man his name.
"'Tis just Timothy Bendall, shepherd to Farmer Cratton, an' I be livin' at that small cottage three fields off. An' who be ye little ladies? Strangers in these parts, I reckon."
Charity told him all about themselves, how they had just come from London and had come over to the wood, in the hopes of finding some adventures.
He smiled at her, only half understanding what she said. And then when poor Sandy's leg was bound up, he took him up in his arms, and bade the children "Good morning."
Charity and Hope began to run on through the wood, but Faith stood still, and Timothy looked at her. He was fond of children, and he saw how white and shaken she was.
"You poor little maid, what be the matter then?"
"Oh, will he get well? Is he going to die? Does his leg still hurt him?"
"Bless yer little heart, he will be right as rain in a day or two. Would ye like to come on to my cottage and sit there for a bit?"
"Oh, yes."
Faith stretched out her little hand and took hold of his.
"I don't want to go through the wood, we might get our feet in a horrid trap. Who puts them there? Isn't it very wicked?"
"No, no, 'tis just the boys who will trap rabbits, but they oughter open them by day, an' I'll have a word to say to 'em on that score. Come along, and your sisters will find us when they get through the copse."
"What's a copse?"
"What you call a wood."
"But the boys don't catch dear little rabbits?" Faith's face was so distressed and horror-stricken that the old man tried to soothe her.
Charity, seeing her walk off with the old man, came running back, but Timothy told her he was taking Faith to his cottage to rest.
She looked up into his face very earnestly:
"You aren't a wicked robber or ogre in disguise?" she asked. "For we've read lots of stories about children being carried off in woods."
He shook his head.
"Old Timothy wouldn't harm a hair of your heads," he exclaimed; "and 'tis grateful I be, for you callin' help for my poor Sandy!"
"It's all right," said Charity gravely. "I see you've a good face, and if Faith likes to go with you she can; but we want to pick up firewood for Aunt Alice, and find some more adventures!"
She and Hope spent an exquisite hour in the wood. It was as the old man had said, only a small copse; beyond, were big stretches of coverts, but to the two little girls this wood held all their desires. They caught sight of a couple of rabbits scudding away in the undergrowth to their holes; they picked a bunch of the delicate white wood anemones and primroses; they rooted up some moss, and beautiful bits of young ivy; they collected some fir cones, and then began to gather wood. The fresh smell of the moss and earth around them, and the pure spring air filled their little souls with delight. And then they hushed their breaths to listen to the singing of the birds, and the cooing of a wood pigeon in the distance.
"Oh, Faith is missing a lot!" Hope said. "She was stupid to go off with that old man, instead of coming on with us."
"She looked white and sick," said Charity; "I think that trap frightened her, and the sight of Sandy's bleeding leg!"
They were busy picking up some wood, and tying it into small bundles with string, which their aunt had given them, when they heard a man's heavy step amongst the bushes, then a whistle, and Hope caught hold of Charity with frightened eyes:
"Let us hide, it may be a robber!"
"It's too early in the morning," said Charity sceptically, but she pulled her sister round to the back of a big tree, and both peeped round the corner with anxious, expectant eyes.
A tall, broad-shouldered man came in sight, followed by a big black retriever. He was a gentleman, and Charity took courage, and stepped out of her hiding place.
"Hullo! Whose little girls are you?"
"We've just come here, and we're picking wood for Aunt Alice."
"Then you must be related to Mrs. Blair."
"She's our Granny."
He smiled upon them, and emboldened by his smile, Hope came out and confronted him.
"Is this your wood?"
"Yes. Do you know who I am?"
"The boy who always came for sweets to Granny's room," Charity said.
Sir George laughed delightedly.
"The very same; and I'm on my way to pay my respects to her. Do you think she has any sweets to give me now?"
"No, Granny is too poor, and since the war she says it's wicked to buy sweets; for they take the sugar."
He laughed again.
"You must come up and see my wife. She loves small girls. We've only two boys; and school takes them from us most of the year."
Charity's eyes sparkled.
"We came out to meet adventures," she said confidentially; "and you're the second one we've met. Faith has gone off with the first one."
Sir George was then told about the dog, and the old man.
"Mrs. Cox said we would see nobody at all in the country," said Hope; "but we knew she was wrong, for all the books say you meet people in a wood, and we have."
"So you're fond of books."
"Oh," cried Charity, "we love them! I wish we could buy hundreds of books, and have them in book cases up to the top of the ceiling. When I grow up, I shall keep a book shop, and I shall read them all, every one of them."
"Capital! I'm a book lover myself, and you shall come up one day soon, and spend an afternoon with me and my books."
Charity beamed.
"Thank you very much," she said, trying to speak quietly.
"And what does this little maid like?"
He put his hand on Hope's shoulder as he spoke; and she gave her golden hair a shake, as she looked up into his kind eyes.
"Oh," she said, with determined lips, "I shall be a doctor for animals, 'specially horses. I shall keep one to ride myself, and I shall go riding over the country and make all the sick animals well. I bandaged Dinah's paw the other day when she got her claw hurt, and Aunt Alice said I did it better than she did. And I would have loved to bind up Sandy's leg, but I wasn't asked."
"You're going to be a couple of useful women one day," said Sir George; "and they say in the next generation you're going to rule us all. Whilst your sister is reading my books, you can be visiting my stables. They're rather empty these days, but horses are easier to keep than oil, and I believe we have a rough pony who isn't required now to mow the lawn, and who might be ridden upon by a small girl."
Hope's eyes sparkled.
"Why, you've come along just like a fairy," she said, "only you're a man and not a woman."
"And can't a poor man be a fairy?"
"Yes," said Charity hastily, "of course you can, but I think men are generally magicians."
Sir George gave a nod.
"That's what I am, of course," he said. "Good-bye, I shall see you again soon."
He strode along the footpath, and the little girls watched him out of sight.
Charity drew a deep breath of delight.
"Think what Faith has missed. Oh, Hope, you think he really meant what he said?"
"I'm sure he did. His eyes looked so straight and firm, they didn't wobble at all!"
Then they went on picking up their sticks. And when they had got as much as they could carry, Charity said:
"Shall we go to the cottage to find Faith?"
"It's quite near," said Hope, "but we can't carry all this wood up there. Let her find her way home herself."
They retraced their steps, and when they had got outside the wood, they saw Faith running across the field to them.
She looked quite rosy and happy again. They were so full of their meeting with Sir George and had so much to tell her, that they did not ask her what she had been doing, but at last Faith said:
"Well, you've had a lovely time, but I wouldn't have missed my time for all the world."
"What have you been doing?"
"He took me to his cottage; it's smaller than ours, and he lives there all alone, only once a week his niece comes from the village to cook and clean for him. He has the darlingest kitchen with lovely china plates, and mugs and shells, and a stuffed owl, and pictures of hunting. He was a keeper when he was younger, to Sir George, not like a park-keeper; he used to shoot and take care of dear little pheasants. But now he looks after sheep and cattle. And he gave me a drink of milk, and then he sat and talked to me, and he told me of things I've never heard before!"
"And how is Sandy?" asked Hope.
"He is lying in a basket. Do you think Aunt Alice would let me go and see old Timothy again?"
Faith's eyes were shining. Her sisters laughed at her.
"We're going to Sir George's big house, it will be much more adventure than yours."
But Faith shook her head.
"I've had such a wonderful talk," she said.
Hope looked at her curiously, but said nothing. She and Faith were better friends when Charity was not present. Faith had many quaint fancies which Charity laughed at, but Hope never laughed at Faith when she was alone with her.
When they reached the Cottage, they found that Sir George had come and gone. Aunt Alice and Granny were still very busy unpacking and arranging the house according to their liking. But dinner was ready. Only boiled potatoes, and a piece of cold boiled bacon brought from town, but there was a rice pudding, and the children made a hearty meal, for the country air had made them hungry.
After it was over, Charity went upstairs with Granny to help her sort out some of their clothes and put them into the drawers and cupboards. Aunt Alice washed up the dinner things, and Hope and Faith helped her wipe them dry. Then she said they might go out into the orchard and play there till tea-time.
They went off delighted, and soon found a low apple tree which they climbed, and made themselves a comfortable seat amongst its branches. Then Hope said:
"Tell me more about you and Timothy this morning."
Fan looked very sweet and serious.
"You won't tell Charity, for she may laugh."
"No, I won't tell her. I knew you were keeping something back, from your face."
"Well, I said he lives there alone, but it's not quite true, for he doesn't. Somebody else lives with him. Do you know, Hope, he's been telling me of quite a new God?"
Faith dropped her voice to an awed whisper.
"Oh, Faith, how wicked! 'There is no God but One,'" quoted Hope glibly.
"It isn't, it's all in the Bible. I know God lives in heaven, and Jesus went back to heaven, but this is the God Who has His Home on earth now, and He's called 'The Comforter,' old Timothy said:
"'The Comforter lives with me. He ought to live with you, little lady, for He lives to dry all tears.'
"I was crying, I couldn't help it, at poor Sandy's leg! Did you know there was a God called the Comforter, Hope?"
Hope hesitated: "I believe you mean the Holy Spirit."
"But I thought the Holy Spirit was just a Thing like a clean heart," said Faith; "this Comforter is a real person, just like God and Jesus, and Jesus sent Him to take His place when He went away, because He said the world would be so sad, and Timothy says the sad people miss a lot when they don't know the Comforter, for it's the thing He likes best to do to dry their tears and make them happy. So I promised him when I cried next time, I would ask the Comforter to dry them up. And Timothy says He will come and live with any one of us, and make us good if we ask Him."
"Yes, that's the Holy Spirit," said Hope with assurance; "you ask Granny about it. You are so funny, Faith. I knew you hadn't got hold of a new God."
"His Name is 'The Comforter,'" said Faith decidedly; "Timothy told me so, and he is going to teach me about Him when I go to see him."
Then she lapsed into silence, looking dreamily up into the sky.
Suddenly she said:
"I told Timothy He must be specially for children, for grown-up people hardly ever cry; but Timothy says they're often very sad in their hearts, and nobody knows it but the Comforter."
"Well, we're not going to be sad," said Hope, beginning to swing herself to and fro on the apple branch; "I think it's going to be like fairyland here."
"But we shall have to do lessons," said Faith.
Lessons were a greater trial to Faith than to either of her sisters; and many a tear was shed over the spelling-book and the slate of sums.
"We shan't do lessons for a long time Aunt Alice said to Granny this morning. 'We'll let the children run wild for a bit. It won't hurt them, and then we shall see later about a school for them.' Running wild is so lovely. It means swinging on trees like this, and going into the woods and meeting adventures as we did this morning! Charity and I did best, for we're going to see ponies and books in a big house very soon."
"No," said Faith, shaking her dark curls; "mine is best, for I mean to get to know the Comforter if He will let me, and Timothy is going to show me how to do it."
[CHAPTER III]
AN INVITATION TO THE HALL
"REALLY Lady Melville is very kind," said Granny, opening a note which had been brought her one morning; "she wants the three children to spend this afternoon at the Hall."
The little girls clapped their hands with delight.
"Sir George didn't forget us. He said he would ask us."
"And shall we stay to tea?"
"And wear our best frocks?"
Aunt Alice laughed at their excitement.
"Yes, wear your best frocks and best manners, and do us credit," she said, but Granny added quietly:
"I used to be told that there were no best manners, for the best ought to be the only ones ever used by us."
It was a bright sunny afternoon, when the little girls set out. It was cold weather still, and they wore their navy serge coats and skirts with white muslin blouses underneath. As Granny watched them go out of the white gate, she said to Aunt Alice:
"I shall break my heart if we have to send them to the village school, they look such gentle little creatures. I always say that breeding tells, and if we are poor, we own some ancestors worth having!"
"Oh, mother dear, I am afraid birth is not of much value nowadays," said Aunt Alice laughing; "they will have to be working women when they grow up; we must not forget that."
Charity and Hope walked along with shining faces. Faith was more sober. She had a kind of feeling that she was not really wanted, only included with the others; and she was a little shy of people whom she had never seen. But the joy of walking through green fields, and of seeing for the first time in her life some tiny calves and foals, and of coming across some cowslips, quite compensated for the little forlorn feeling in her heart. Their Aunt Alice had pointed out the big house on the hill, and told them exactly how to reach it. Three fields had to be crossed, then they kept to a green lane, reached some cross roads, took the turning towards the right and arrived at some big iron gates in a stone wall, and a pretty lodge by the side.
They walked in at the gates, and up an avenue of chestnuts.
"It feels like coming to a fairy palace," said Charity; "it all seems just like a story book, doesn't it?"
The old stone house looked very quiet and still when they reached it. There was a wide flight of stone steps to go up and then a big stone porch to be crossed. Charity was reaching up on tiptoe to ring the great door bell, when the door opened and Sir George came suddenly out.
"Hullo!" he said cheerily. "You're in the nick of time! Which is the one who loves horses? Golden hair, isn't it? Come along with me, I'm just off to the stables, and I'll take you with me. Here, Pitman, take these young ladies to the drawing-room."
Hope followed Sir George delightedly whilst Charity and Faith were taken by an old butler across a big hall into a beautiful room with five or six windows, full of china and all kinds of valuable curiosities. A bright fire was burning, and in a chintz-covered easy chair by the side of it, sat Lady Melville, a book in her hand. She smiled sweetly at the children when she saw them:
"I have heard about you," she said. "Aren't there three of you?"
"Yes," said Charity. "But Hope has gone to see the horses with Sir George. I am Charity and this is Faith. Hope is the middle one of us."
"What pretty names!" said Lady Melville. She shook hands with Charity, but she drew Faith by both hands towards her and kissed her. "It is very kind of you to come and see us," she said; "for this is a dull house when my boys are away. Which is the one who loves books?"
"I do," said Charity, flushing.
Then Lady Melville rang the bell, and when her maid appeared she sent them upstairs with her to take off their hats and coats.
"It is only three o'clock," she said, "so we have a long day in front of us. When you have got rid of your walking things, perhaps Charity would like to go into the library and have a look at some of the books there; and Faith can come and talk to me."
Both little girls liked this arrangement. Faith thought it would be very easy to talk to such a sweet kind lady, and Charity was wild to get at the books.
They were awed by the big staircase and the many rooms they passed; but Lacy, the maid, was very pleasant to them.
"Her ladyship ought to have a little daughter of her own," she said; "it's wonderful how she dotes on girls. Because she has only boys, I suppose. That's the way of the world."
Then she showed them a beautiful oil painting in the corridor, a portrait of two rosy-faced, happy boys, in white cricketing flannels.
"That was painted a year ago. The artist stayed in the house whilst he did it. The tallest is Master Lionel, and the youngest Master Fairfax."
"I wish we had brothers," said Charity, "or that one of us had been a boy. I think I should like to have been the boy."
Then they were taken into a big bedroom, and Lacy smoothed their hair; and when they were ready, took them downstairs again. They passed the library on the way to the drawing-room, and Faith, as she peeped in, and saw the books which lined the walls from the floor to the ceiling, wondered how Charity dared take any one of them from their places. They looked as if they had been built into the walls to stay. But Charity's eyes sparkled.
"Can I look at any book I like?" she said.
Lacy shrugged her shoulders.
"If Sir George has given you leave, you can. This is his room. But I'll show you the books Master Fairfax likes. Master Lionel is no reader. Sir George has a shelf for them over here."
She took Charity to a corner of the room, and Charity sat down upon the floor at once, and began to take the books out of the shelves.
Then Faith was taken on to the drawing-room, where she found Lady Melville working at a lace pillow.
"I have put my book by," she said to Faith, with her sweet smile, "because we are going to talk together. I am not very strong just now, so I cannot walk about much, and when I am tired of reading, I make lace. I have a class in the village for making it, and some of the village girls are learning very quickly."
Faith sat down upon a little chair by Lady Melville's side and watched the bobbins flying to and fro between her white fingers with the greatest interest.
"Now tell me how you like your little cottage, and all about yourselves. Do you like coming to the country?"
"Oh, so very much!"
Faith clasped her small hands tightly in her quaint fashion.
"I didn't know," she said, looking up at Lady Melville with her soft brown eyes, "that it would be quite so beautiful. Mrs. Cox didn't like the country, she said, because there was nobody to talk to, but we have found lots of people already. Do you know a nice old man called Timothy who looks after sheep? He is a friend of mine."
"Yes, he was very ill last winter, and I went to see him more than once. I felt sorry for him living all by himself, and nobody to take care of him."
"But he doesn't live quite alone," said Faith softly. "He has the Comforter living with him. He told me so, and when he sits by the fire in the dark, he feels very close to Him, he told me."
Lady Melville looked at Faith very tenderly.
"Did he tell you that, dear?"
"Yes, he told me all about Him. Because he thought it would be a good thing if He lives with me. I don't know if He will come, but I've begun to ask Him in my prayers. Timothy says that tears bring Him very quickly, but we're so happy that I haven't had much to cry about yet. I expect He is waiting till I really want Him."
"I hope you won't find much to cry about here," said Lady Melville in a bright tone. "Tell me how you amuse yourselves. Are you fond of dolls?"
Faith smiled.
"Yes, I love mine. She's called Violet, but Hope has cut her arms and legs dreadfully, and sewed them up again, playing at operations. Charity doesn't care for dolls; she says they aren't alive, but I feel Violet is, when we're alone together. I dare say she seems stupid to people who don't know her, but she's all my own, and I understand her."
"Yes, that makes all the difference," said Lady Melville. Then Faith found herself telling her all about their life in London, and the school they went to, and how the girls laughed at their names, and how they hoped they would not have to go to the village school here.
"Aunt Alice doesn't like teaching lessons," said Faith, shaking her curly head, "so we don't know what will come to us. We have got to learn to be clever, Aunt Alice says, because when we grow up we must work for our living; but being clever is very difficult, and I don't think I shall ever learn it."
"What do you want to do when you grow up?" asked Lady Melville.
Faith's face grew downcast.
"I'm 'fraid I don' know. Aunt Alice says 'time enough yet' and 'something will come.' Charity and Hope have quite settled themselves. I think I'd rather be a mother with about ten little children, all girls, and mostly babies, that I could nurse. But Hope says that is silly, for you can't earn money when you're nursing babies!"
"Oh, yes, you can," said Lady Melville, touched by this old-fashioned, anxious-faced child; "you can be nurse in a hospital for sick babies, or you can be a governess and look after little children, or a nurse in a private house, or you can help in a holiday home or a convalescent home. If you love little children, you will find lots of places open to you when you grow up."
"Without my being very clever?" questioned Faith.
"Yes," said Lady Melville, "and perhaps you won't have to earn any money at all. Perhaps you will have a husband who will do it for you."
"I am rather frightened of men," confessed Faith, "except Timothy. I'm not a bit frightened of him."
Lady Melville laughed.
"Now we won't think any more of your grown-up life, but of how you are going to enjoy yourself in the country. And I am going to think of this problem of lessons. I know a very nice girl about five miles from here. She used to be a teacher in a big London High School, but she wasn't very strong, and had to come to the country to live. She takes care of her invalid mother, but I believe she would be able to cycle over to you, and give you some lessons every morning. Would you like that? I think I must talk to your Granny about it."
Faith was not sure whether she would like it. And in a moment she looked up into Lady Melville's face rather coaxingly.
"You won't hurry about it too fast, will you, please? For Aunt Alice says we can have holidays till she thinks of something, and it is so lovely not having lessons. The children in Heaven don't have lessons, do they? I do so often wish I was playing with them."
"I don't know, I am sure," said Lady Melville, trying to look very grave; "sometimes I think all the lessons we have failed to learn on earth will be finished in Heaven."
"Oh, dear me!" sighed Faith; and then Lady Melville laughed so brightly that Faith laughed too.
And at that minute Sir George put his head in at the door.
"We've done the stables," he said, "but after lunch there is going to be a riding lesson up and down the drive, and the pony wants to see which young lady sticks on his back in best style. Where is Carrots?"
Faith laughed gleefully.
"That's what she's always called at school. She's reading all your books in the book-room."
"I must have a look at her."
Sir George disappeared.
"Do you think you could find a name for me?" questioned Faith wistfully. "We do hate our names so?"
"Oh, I think it's the sweetest little name!" said Lady Melville. "I should be very proud of it if I had it. I think I should try to live up to it."
"How?" asked Faith.
"Well, what does it mean?"
"Tell me."
"Faith is the belief or trust we have in anyone. Who do you trust most?"
Faith thought hard.
"Granny, and Aunt Alice."
"Nobody else?"
Faith nodded.
"Yes, God."
"Then, darling, if you have faith in God, you have everything that you need in this world and in the next. Never doubt God, He will never fail, it is only our faith that fails. And you are called Faith, so you can always remind yourself by your name of the faith you must have in God."
"And the Comforter," said Faith very softly to herself. She did not quite understand Lady Melville's words, but she understood when she grew bigger.
There was no more quiet talk, for tea was brought in, and Sir George came back, leading by the hand both Charity and Hope, who looked perfectly radiant.
And then they had a very merry tea. Sir George delighted Faith by calling her "Curly."
From that time the little girls were always called "Carrots," "Goldenhair," and "Curly," and they tried very hard to make everyone else use those names. After tea, the pony came round, and each one of them in turn had a ride on him. Hope proved to be the most fearless rider. Faith tried to enjoy it, but she had to fight with her fears, and she was relieved when her turn was over.
When half-past six came, three very happy children walked back over the fields home. Their tongues went fast.
Charity had found an old book of Grecian fables and stories which perfectly entranced her. She told the others of some of them as she walked along.
"And Sir George says I can come to his library any day I like and read there."
"And I can ride the pony every day if I like," said Hope. "Oh, isn't it a glorious place with so many dogs and horses?"
"I like the horse," said Charity. "I mean to get rich when I grow up. I shall make myself rich like other people do. I shall save every penny I earn and put it into the bank and buy a house like Sir George's, and have a big library and books just like his."
"But you always said you would keep a book shop."
"I shan't now. I shall have a library."
"I liked the house," said little Faith, "at least it was too big and grand for me, but I didn't mind it as much as I thought I would, for Lady Melville was so nice. I loved her best. I should like to live with her always, with her and with old Timothy!"
"That's just like you," said Charity a little contemptuously, "you're always for people instead of things!"
"Well, I don't care. I do love them better. I like Lady Melville better than a book!"
Faith could speak scornfully sometimes. Hope put in her word. Charity and Faith often quarrelled, and she made peace between them.
"And I think animals are the nicest things in the world," she said. "I shall have lots of ponies and dogs when I grow up."
Then the cottage was reached, and Granny and Aunt Alice were told of the delightful time they had had.
"I knew they would enjoy themselves," said Granny; "Sir George always had a weak spot in his heart for children even as a boy; and his wife seems just as kind."
"Lady Melville said she was coming to see you in a day or two," said Faith; "she knows somebody who may be able to teach us lessons!"
"Ah, that will be first-rate," said Aunt Alice; "if she can help me with that difficulty, I shall be deeply grateful."
The little girls looked at each other. They did not think that they agreed with their Aunt.
They helped Granny by running errands to the village, and each one had her own duties about the house. Charity helped her Aunt to wash up after each meal; Hope dusted all the rooms; and Faith cleaned the brass door handles, and taps, and kept them bright. But they had a great deal of time for play, and whenever it was fine, Aunt Alice encouraged them to be out of doors.
One afternoon Faith was coming back from the village. She had been to the post office to get some stamps, and she was just turning the corner of the road when she saw on a wide piece of grass that edged it a gipsy van. An old horse and a donkey were grazing by the side of it. Now, if there was anything that the little girls really loved, it was a caravan of any sort. They all thought that if they lived in one they would be as happy as the day was long. And Faith's eyes brightened as she came near. Then she saw a little bare-footed boy standing in the road, and crying as if his heart would break.
Faith could not pass him without asking him what was the matter. And then he pointed to a broken jug of milk in the road.
"It was Mother's milk," he sobbed, "and Dad is away, and she's ill, and I've no money for more."
"Don't cry, dear," said Faith. "I've got two pennies in my pocket. Could you get some more milk with them?"
He looked at her with his sharp little eyes, but seized the pennies she held out to him, and taking hold of a tin can on the grass, he tore back along the road as fast as he could go.
Faith stood still admiring the van, which was painted green, and had white muslin curtains at the small windows tied with blue ribbon. Then she heard a weak voice calling:
"Dan! Dan!"
And acting on the impulse of the moment Faith climbed up the steps of the van and looked inside:
"Your little boy will soon be here; he had an accident with the milk, and he's gone to fetch some more."
A woman raised her head from a narrow bed which seemed to take up nearly all the space inside. A little boy of about two sat on the floor munching an orange.
The woman had dark hair and flushed cheeks.
"I'm so thirsty," she moaned, "and oh, so miserable! Who are you?"
[CHAPTER IV]
CHARLIE'S RAFT
FAITH lost all feeling of shyness in her desire to help this sick woman. She came up to the bedside, and looked at her with her eyes full of pity.
"I'm Faith Blair. We've only just come to live in a cottage here. Can I get you a drink of water?"
The woman pointed to a jug on a shell.
"There's a drop o' cold tea there. I'm never to get up no more, the doctor's told me. He's going to try to get me in the 'Firmary, an' I will not go. My Jim has had to join up, but I promised him I'd keep the van till he comes back, and I want Dan back. He must put the horse in and we must be off!"
She spoke breathlessly. Her cheeks were sunken and she was so thin that all her bones showed through her skin.
Faith got the jug of tea, and poured it out into a cup. She gave it to the woman, who drank it eagerly, then sank back on her pillow as if she were quite exhausted. Then as Faith watched her, the tears came to her eyes, and rolled down her cheeks. She wiped them away with the corner of the sheet.
"Nobody to care for me!" she muttered. "My Jim is away, and when he comes home, I'll be lyin' under the earth like a dog!"
"Oh, but you'll be in heaven," said Faith eagerly; "that will be only your body, and may I just tell you what old Timothy has told me? You needn't be alone or unhappy, for the Comforter will come and stay with you. He is God, you know, and He loves unhappy people. He dries their tears and comforts them. Would you like Him to come to you now? He lives in our world, nowhere else and nobody wipes tears away like Him, Timothy said so."
The woman looked at Faith's eager little face. "I used to hear about them things. I weren't born in a van. I lived proper with my father and mother in a small farm, and Jim used to mend our pots and pans. Oh, he were a handsome boy! An' we was wild to marry, so we just stole off, and I've never been home since. I used to go to Sunday school and church!"
"And have you got a father and mother?" asked Faith.
"No, they've both died."
"Then you're like us; our father and mother died, but we live with Granny. Oh, don't cry! You're beginning again. Do have the Comforter. Timothy says you ask Him to come, and He comes——do ask Him!"
The woman shook her head.
"I haven't said my prayers for years, but I'm scared to die, an' the doctor says both my lungs is gone; you say a little prayer, dearie. It won't do no harm, and p'raps God will be merciful."
So Faith knelt down. She was so much in earnest that all shyness had left her.
"Please, Lord Jesus, will you tell the Comforter to come here quick, for He's wanted. Timothy says You promised to send Him to everybody when You went away. And please let Him comfort this poor sick woman, for Jesus' sake. Amen."
It was only a child's prayer, but it reached Heaven as all such prayers do, and a look of relief and peace crept over the woman's face.
"A prayer said over one always does good," she murmured; and then they heard little Dan clambering up into the van with milk.
She drank it eagerly, and told the boy to put the horse in the van, and drive on as fast as he could.
"I won't be taken into the 'Firmary," she muttered.
So Faith wished her good-bye, and slipped down, and went home.
Charity and Hope were in the garden. She told her story to them. Charity was very interested.
"What was the van like inside? Oh, I wish I had been there! How did you dare to do it? They might have driven off with you, and we should never have heard of you again."
"I should like to have gone," said Faith. "The poor woman had no little girl to do anything for her. The inside wasn't nearly as nice as the outside, it was stuffy and untidy, and not very clean. There seemed no room for anything."
"Here's Granny. Let's tell her about it."
Granny was coming to the cottage door to get a breath of fresh air, but when she heard Faith's story, she did not look very pleased.
"You ought not to have gone in, Faith. She might have been ill of an infectious fever. I don't like it at all. You must never do such a thing again! You are getting too independent."
Faith hung her head.
"What did she say to you?"
Faith told as much as she remembered; but she was shy of telling anybody about her little prayer or of what she herself had said to the woman, and Granny said:
"It was your spirit of curiosity which led you there; and if the woman hadn't been very ill, she might have been very angry at your going in, when you had not been asked to do so. You must never do such a thing again—promise me. Has the van gone away?"
Faith nodded.
"I saw Dan get the horse and fasten it in. They had a grey donkey, too. It followed the van all by itself. They were just moving away before I came into our lane. I'm sorry, Granny, I won't go in again, but I expect I shall never see another van."
"You may see several," said Granny. "I hear there is a common near here where they always encamp, and I won't have any of you go near them."
"Do gipsies steal children now?" asked Hope.
"They wouldn't steal any of you," said Granny with a little laugh; "you are not worth the risk!"
She went indoors again, and Charity said a little indignantly:
"Granny thinks nothing at all of us, but they might steal us, and make us their servants."
"Wouldn't it be fun?" said Hope with gleaming eyes. "And we would eat rabbits in a pot over a bonfire, and live in the fields always. Oh, I wish our home was a van!"
"I like this cottage better," said Faith gravely; "that woman looked most uncomfortable, and her bed was all in a muddle!"
Faith heard no more of Dan and his mother, but she did not forget them, and every night prayed for the sick woman.
Lady Melville was as good as her word. She came to see Granny, and Aunt Alice went over to the neighbouring town to see this governess who might help them.
Every day got warmer and longer. The children soon became friends with the neighbours round. The rector had no family. He was an old man, and his wife was very rheumatic, so was confined to the house a great deal, but the doctor, who lived at the other end of the village, had a little boy who was very delicate, and one day Hope and Faith met him in the village shop buying sweets.
Hope made friends with him by telling him which sweets she thought were the nicest. He was a slim little boy, with brown hair and pale face, and when he come out of the shop, he said:
"My name is Charlie Evans. What's yours? I saw you all in church last Sunday. I don't always come to church. I have headaches."
He said it with an air of pride. Faith looked at him pityingly.
"And don't you go to school?"
"No. I do lessons with mother, and she hates them, and so do I."
"And so do I!" said Faith eagerly. "But we shall have to begin them soon."
"Come and see my rabbits," Charlie said.
The little girls hesitated.
"We won't come to-day, till we ask Granny," said Hope; "but we'll come to-morrow, if she'll let us. Faith went to see some gipsies the other day and she didn't like it."
Charlie turned to Faith.
"Did you? What were they like? Dad told mother he was going to get a sick gipsy out of her van into hospital. She had nobody to look after her, but she went off before he could move her. Gipsies hate being taken care of!"
"Yes," said Faith; "that was the woman I saw. I'm so sorry she went away so quick! She seemed so ill, and so alone."
"I wish you were boys," said Charlie, looking at them with dissatisfaction. "I do want boys to play with so much. Do you know Lionel and Fairfax at the Hall?"
"No," said Hope. "I expect we shall know them, when they come home for the holidays."
"They won't think anything of you," said Charlie rather rudely; "they won't even let me play cricket with them, because I can't run fast enough."
"P'raps we can run faster than you?" Hope said.
Charlie looked gloomily at her, then he brightened up.
"I've got a lovely raft I made all myself on a stream under the willows," he said; "sometimes I go out on it all day to escape Indians."
Hope and Faith pressed nearer him.
"If Granny says we may play with you, will you let us play that?"
"It isn't play," said Charlie with sparkling eyes; "it's a real hard work. I take cargo with me—live cargo!"
Then he walked off and waved his cap in the air.
"If you want to join Captain Charles on his voyage to the Treasure Islands, you'll have to sign on before next Wednesday. The voyage begins on Thursday. That's the first day of my Easter holidays, and Mother and I mean to have three weeks' holidays if Father agrees, and the voyage will last three weeks."
Hope and Faith ran home in the greatest excitement. When Charity heard of the raft, she was determined to know Charlie as soon as possible. And when Aunt Alice heard of it, she said to Granny:
"Mrs. Evans told us of her delicate boy when she called the other day; there is no harm in the children playing together."
So when a little note came from Mrs. Evans, asking the three little girls to lunch on the next Wednesday, they were allowed to go, and went off to the doctor's house in high spirits.
Charlie welcomed them warmly. He took them to his schoolroom and showed them some silkworms and guinea pigs.
"Are these your live cargo?" asked Hope.
He looked at her sharply.
"I have a good deal more than these. Are you going to sign on?"
"I am," cried Hope delightedly.
Faith echoed her words, but Charity demurred.
"Look here," she said; "I always like fair play. One man doesn't want three servants."
"Crew," said Charlie; "you'll be the crew."
"Yes, I know," said Charity, her nose rather high in the air, "and if the Captain chooses, he can flog his crew and put them in irons. I've read all about it, and if they mutiny, what then?"
"They'll have to walk the plank," said Charlie, loftily.
"Oh, what fun!" exclaimed Hope.
"Well, you can do it," said Charity, "but I'm not going to do it; so I shall just be the Captain's wife."
Her audacity struck the three other children dumb.
"Then the wife stops at home," said Charlie, when he had recovered himself.
He had a weak body but a strong spirit.
"A Captain never takes his wife to sea, never!" he said.
"Oh, yes," said Charity, "when he finds her on a desert island and marries her, he brings her to his ship and they sail on together. You found me on the island. Don't you remember? You went to sleep, and when you woke up and you saw a strange shoe, it was too small for any man so you knew it was a woman's, and then you took it in your hand and went along to look, and suddenly you came upon me sitting in a bower with a crown of flowers in my hair, and I told you I had been shipwrecked, and I was Queen of the Island, and if you dared hurt me, I had an army of monkeys who would come down from the trees and kill you. And then we settled together to get married, and you took me away in your ship the next day."
Hope and Faith hung on Charity's words with open mouths and eyes. Charlie set his lips firmly together.
"I don't remember anything about it," he said. "I shall want three to make the crew. One is the cook, the other the one who rows, and the other who cleans and does the dirty work."
Charity set her lips tightly too.
"I'm not going to do what I am told by a boy no taller than myself," she said. "I'm your wife, and I'll promise to be the cook too. But I must be the wife first, and you and I must consult together about everything! And if you won't make me your wife, I'll turn into an alligator and upset the raft, and pull you all into the water. I really will, I know how to do it."
Charlie looked at her with an uncertain eye. But they were called to dinner, before anything could be settled, and as Charlie sat opposite to Charity, he was weighing in his mind the desirability of making her his wife. Hope and Faith looked easy to manage, but he did not want mutiny on his raft, nor did he want it upset, for he thought of his live cargo.
After dinner, they went back to the schoolroom, for the signing on must be accomplished.
"I'll join you as your wife, and it will be ripping," said Charity. "I've lived on a desert island, so I know how to turn my hand to anything; but I won't be one of your crew. I should mutiny the first five minutes, and remember we would be three against one. And I'm sure I could tie your legs together, and arms too, if I were to try; and you would be just a bundle to be sat on, while we went on and had the most thrilling adventures!"
Charlie felt the modern woman too much for him.
"All right," he said; "but if you're my wife, and contradict my orders, I'll land you on the first island we come to, and leave you there. Now, you two crew, sign on. Your names will be Bolt and Ben."
Hope and Faith signed their names on a crumpled bit of paper which set forth that for the whole of the voyage they obeyed the Captain in every particular, and stuck to the raft through every danger. Charity looked on with smiling superiority. But Charlie produced another piece of paper for her.
"A wife has nothing to sign," she said.
"Oh, yes," said Charlie, in a masterful tone: "A wife always signs in a church book after she is married, to make sure she means what she says when she promises to obey her husband and to serve him."
Charity pouted.
"I did that when we were married on the island."
"No, you didn't, for there was no proper church or prayer-book or clergyman," said Charlie quickly, "and you'll have to do it now, and then we shall be quite ready for to-morrow. And my ship sails punctual at eleven o'clock—all aboard by half-past ten."
"Oh, sign, Charity! It will be fun!" cried Hope.
And very reluctantly Charity read and signed the following declaration:
"I promise to obey and serve my husband for the whole of the voyage and until death us do part."
But before her signature, she added the words:
"If I think well."
And as Charlie did not see what she had written till after it was done, he was after all worsted by the woman.
Then they all went out into the garden, and down to the stream where the raft was moored.
It was quite big enough to hold them all, and the stream was just wide enough to let it go floating along without touching the banks. Charlie told them that the stream turned into a river, a mile or two along the fields.
"And then the river goes into the sea; so there's nothing between us and the real ocean, and we can go on for ever."
"Till we reach the Treasure," said Hope, "I hope we shall reach something, Charlie!"
Charlie nodded mysteriously.
The little girls went home in high spirits.
Granny looked slightly alarmed when she heard of what they intended to do, but Charity relieved her mind.
"The stream is so narrow, Granny, that we could step off the raft on the bank, any minute we wanted to, and oh, it will be such fun!"
Granny remembered the pranks of the boys in olden times, when she had so many of them in her house, and smiled.
"It is good to be young," she said.
"And the poor boy is prevented from a great deal of pleasure," said Aunt Alice; "Mrs. Horn was telling me about him. He will never make a strong man, they say."
"He has got a very strong spirit," said Hope; "or is it his soul that is strong and makes him like ordering girls about?"
"What's the difference between a spirit and a soul?" asked Faith.
"Oh, children, let us get away from such discussions," said Aunt Alice laughing; "they are too difficult for us altogether."
The little girls said no more, but they anxiously looked forward to the next day. Suppose it should rain?
Faith was snubbed when she suggested such a thing.
And when the day dawned it was a sunny Spring day.
There were no happier little girls in the world than Charity, Hope and Faith, as they started for the Doctor's house. Aunt Alice gave them a package of egg sandwiches, and some thick slices of bread and jam.
"Go and enjoy yourselves," she said, "but I expect you all back by six o'clock in the evening."
"And by that time," said Faith thoughtfully; "we shall have been a long sea voyage and back, and perhaps we shall come home laden with treasures!"
"Anything may happen," said Charity with fervour, "the very best, or the very worst!"
And so they marched away to meet their adventures.
[CHAPTER V]
THE PIRATE
PUNCTUALLY at eleven, Captain Charlie's raft with its live cargo, crew and Captain and wife, started for its voyage down the Adderbrook. Every few yards added fresh excitement to the crew. There were frogs, and tadpoles to be seen scurrying out of their way, ducks taking an airing filled the air with their quacks, as they hurriedly made for land; once a water rat sprang on board, but hurriedly splashed back into the stream, when he was greeted with frightened screams.
"Just like girls!" said the Captain scornfully.
"Don't you know a crocodile when you see it?" retorted his wife. "I suppose you will call it a rat! As if we have rats in mid-ocean!"
Several times the raft threatened to upset. The little girls had to be most wary in their movements. Of course such moments were the result of violent storms, when waves sought to engulf them, and the Captain's wife seemed to aid and abet the rough elements when she could. More than once she had to be called to order by the Captain.
They passed through two open fields, and then came to where the willows and rushes bent over the stream and made it very difficult navigation.
The crew had to lie flat on their chests to prevent the willow branches hitting them in the face. But every difficulty was an added delight, and when the Captain struck a gong, and said it was time to dine, and they must land on a desert island and do it, they scrambled ashore with joy.
The raft was tied securely to a tree trunk, and under a white hawthorn tree, the voyagers spread out their lunch and made a hearty meal.
Charlie's mother had given him bacon pasties and cake, and biscuits and cheese—enough for them all. He was not a greedy boy, and was quite willing to share. Charity undertook to divide everything with equal fairness, and in this way every one was more than satisfied.
CHARITY UNDERTOOK TO DIVIDE EVERYTHING WITH EQUAL FAIRNESS.
Up to now they had seen very few people. A boy driving cattle in the distance was an Indian chasing buffaloes; an old man with a dog was a chief with his wolf hound.
But when they took to their raft again, their sharp eyes spied a fisherman some distance away with his line across the stream.
"Now you'll hear him swear," said Charlie, with a delighted chuckle. "I know what fishermen are like. I've passed them before."
"He isn't a fisherman," said Hope; "he's a pirate looking out for ships from his island."
"It's a pity we have no gun to blow him to pieces! My dear husband, put a bit more strength into that old punt stick of yours! Let's rush down the stream and pull hold of his line—perchance we may pull in the pirate to his death!"
So all four got hold of their oars, and by dint of prodding the banks in punt-like fashion, the raft began to quicken its pace. The fisherman saw them before they reached him and pulled in his line. He did not swear but laughed heartily as the raft approached.
"Who the dickens is this?" he asked. "Here, hi, don't pass me by! Is there room for me on board?"
He was a tall, broad-shouldered young man.
Charlie threw a ferocious look at him.
"You're a pirate, let us pass!"
The young man had stopped the raft with his foot. Charlie was rather exhausted with his efforts, and the little girls were panting for breath.
"If I'm a pirate, I beg to tell you that this water is mine, and that you are my prisoners. You'll land at once, and forfeit your ship."
With a quick, dexterous stroke, he had seized hold of the rope, and drawn the raft close to the bank.
Winding it round a tree stump, the discomfited voyagers found their passage stopped.
Charity looked up into the pirate's face. She saw that his eyes were twinkling, and she felt reassured.
"The ocean is free to all," she said boldly.
The young man pointed to a board close by.
"Private water. Trespassers will be prosecuted."
And then Charlie saw that he had brought his raft along the wrong bend of the stream. He had seldom before come as far as this.
For a moment the little Captain looked perplexed.
"We are on a peace voyage," he said, "otherwise with cutlasses and guns we would make short work of you. We are searching for an island called 'Tarjak,' and for treasure thereon."
"Ah," said the young man in a mysterious tone, "now you've come to the right party. I know the very spot and will lead you to it, if I may share in the booty."
"He means treachery!" said Charity in a loud whisper.
"I've got you in my power!" said the young man sternly.
Charlie and the little girls hastily consulted together.
"We'll just let him join us," was Charlie's decision.
Then he turned to the stranger.
"Now will you lead us?"
"I'll tow you along," was the cheerful reply. "You have spoilt my fishing, but I'll take you straight to a treasure island such as you have never seen before."
In a very short time, this amazing young man was marching along the banks rope in hand, and the raft was being towed along without any effort on the part of the crew. They gave themselves up to the delight of it, for all small backs and wrists were aching, and it was delicious to be towed along so swiftly, without any effort.
And presently the stream widened considerably and a veritable small island appeared. The Pirate used the oars now, and stood in the middle of the raft himself. He brought it to the edge of the island and told the children to get out.
To their delight there was a tiny thatched hut in the middle of it.
"Years ago," said the pirate, "I landed here in a small boat, having been shipwrecked, and having lost all I possessed. I built myself this hut and lived here in peace, quitting it for rougher waters and sea fishing occasionally. For the most part I lived on fish. One day I was digging for bait, when I stumbled on a—a cache, and in a certain spot on this island is one hidden now. Treasure is in it. If you have brought spades, dig away till you find it. I will give you a clue. Four paces from Security, an arm's length to the right, dig for two feet down!"
"We haven't any spades," said the little girls. "The Captain has the only one."
The young man went into the hut, and soon appeared with a pitchfork and two spades of very small proportions.
"And now," said Charity, "where is Security? It must be the hut, of course!"
In a very few minutes each child was digging four paces from the hut. But Charlie began to flag, whereupon the young man whispered something to him.
"Your Captain is ill," he said; "he's going to rest. I'll take his place."
Charlie sat down on the step leading to the hut and watched the others with a rather bitter face. It was hard to be bowled over so soon, just when he would like to prove his strength to be superior to the girls.
Digging went on steadily, but the three little girls made slow progress.
The young man dug too, but he presently said, "I'll give another clue:"
"By the side of a singer's home, a hand's span from the base."
The little girls were completely puzzled. Charlie's bright eyes roved to and fro. At last his face lightened.
"I have it. A singer's home is a bird's tree, and the base is the trunk of it. There's only one tree which it can mean, and it's the ash tree between Bolt and Ben."
Charity made a rush to the spot, and Charlie sprang up declaring he was quite rested. He and the three girls all attacked the ground round the ash tree, and the young man quietly slipped into the hut, leaving them at work.
It was not long before Charity's spade hit against something hard. Then four eager pairs of hands dragged it to light. It was a rusty tin box tied with string and sealed.
Charlie took command as Captain, and cut the string with his clasp knife. His face was solemn as he did it, but the little girls' faces bubbled all over with curiosity and delight.
It was hard to open, but at last the lid gave way, and then Charlie very carefully lifted out the contents.
Four black farthings, a blue marble, and two peach stones.
Faith's face fell; she was dreadfully disappointed. She had really expected to find it full of precious stones.
Charity danced up and down.
"Golden sovereigns, a blue jewel worth a million pounds, and seeds of a pomegranate that grew in Paradise!" she cried.
Charlie turned to her with an approving face.
"You are right, my wife, wonderful treasure indeed! Does the Pirate mean to let us carry it off?"
"The Pirate invites you to a meal. He is tired of a very lonely life and welcomes treasure seekers to his home."
It was the young man who spoke. The children dashed into the hut, Charlie clutching his tin box. There another surprise awaited them.
A kettle was boiling merrily. A cake was on the table, and some ham sandwiches. The Pirate had cups and saucers, and was measuring tea into a brown teapot.
"We have no cow on the island, but we have sugar and good tea. Let us fall to!"
It seemed like magic. The children sat up round a little table and they had a merry meal. After it was over, the treasure box was produced and the treasures divided. The Pirate took one of the peach stones. Charity took the other.
"I as Captain's wife have first choice," she said. "I am going to plant this wonderful seed, and perhaps it will spring up into a magic tree which will reach the sun."
Charlie gave Hope and Faith a farthing each.
"A guinea for Bolt and Ben," he said. "I being Captain keep the blue diamond and a guinea, my wife can have the other."
Then the Pirate pulled out his pipe, and sitting cross legged on the ground told them the most wonderful story of how the treasures had been obtained and hidden away. The children listened breathlessly, but at last the Captain said it was getting late, and they must go. The Pirate took them back to their raft, and then he surprised them again. He got out a very small boat from under the willows, tucked himself into it, and fastening the rope of the raft to his painter, rowed gaily off down the stream, towing the children back to the spot where he found them. Then he bade them good-bye.
"We shall never meet again most likely," he said, "but I warn you to keep to your own waters. There are other pirates who would make short work of you should they find you where I did!"
The children waved their hands gaily to him. Charlie was supremely happy, and content at the result of his voyage after treasure, and all their tongues wagged fast as they made their way down the stream towards Charlie's home. It was nearly six o'clock when they got there, so the little girls bade their new friend a hasty good-bye.
"It has been perfect—simply perfect!" said Charity, and the others echoed her words.
They ran home then as fast as they could, and told Granny all of their adventures.
"Who do you think the Pirate can be?" Faith asked. "He has such nice kind eyes, but a very grave face."
Granny said she could not possibly tell, and Aunt Alice could not help them.
But the next day the rector's wife paid a long call. Charity happened to be in the room, and though she was as quiet as a little mouse she kept her ears wide open, and when she was alone with Hope and Faith she was quite excited.
"I believe Mrs. Webster was talking about the Pirate, I believe she was! She told Aunt Alice she had a little grandson staying with her last week, and she wished she had asked us over to tea with him, as he was so lonely. And then she said that Fred Cardwell had been so good to him. He had taken him off fishing with him several days, and had entertained him on an island which the little boy had loved. She asked Aunt Alice if she knew the Cardwells, and I pricked up my ears and listened hard. Aunt Alice said no, and she said Fred Cardwell lived with a very cross, ill father—I think he's a squire, like Sir George, and they live about five miles from here. The father is parry—something—a long word, and Fred had to come home and look after him, and he's no mother or brothers and sisters, and Mrs. Webster said it was a terrible life for him, and it made him gloomy, and he doesn't go anywhere or won't know anybody, but he likes children and she said her little grandson loved him. Don't you think Fred may be our pirate? Because there can't be lots of islands about, and perhaps that was why he had cake and tea in the hut, he had put them there when the little boy was with him!"
Charity paused for breath.
"I wish we could see him again," said Faith.
"We'll keep a sharp look-out along the roads when we walk," said Hope. "Mrs. Cox wasn't at all right about the country. We do meet people very often, and we may meet him."
"We'll ask Lady Melville if she knows him when we see her next," Charity said; "and now I'm going to plant my magic seed. Come and see me do it."
So Hope and Faith accompanied her to the little garden, and she planted it just below their bedroom window.
"Perhaps it will be like Jack's beanstalk, and grow so high that we can step out of our window on to its branches," said Hope.
"It's sure to be different from any other tree, for it has been hidden away for years, I'm sure," said Charity.
They did not see Charlie for some time after this. They heard that he was ill, and one day a letter came from him addressed to "My Wife and Crew."
The little girls opened it with great delight. It was very short.
"This is to tell you that youre Captin lies dangirosly wunded, and his sickness is suvere. His next voyage will not take plaice, and when he gets better Ben is to come to him to delever messages to his wife and to Bolt.
"Charles, Captain of the 'Success.'"
Faith was Ben. She wondered why she was especially invited. Charity tossed her head.
"He knows he can do what he likes with Faith. I expect none of us will be able to go with him now, for Aunt Alice said we were to begin lessons. This new governess, Miss Vale, is coming next Monday."
"Well, anyhow," said Hope, "I'm glad it isn't school, and Aunt Alice says she will be very nice."
"I must answer his letter," said Faith.
But she was not very fond of letter-writing and put it off. She left Charity and Hope playing in the orchard that afternoon and went off to visit her friend the shepherd. There was nothing she enjoyed so much as creeping into his little cottage and sitting on a small stool in the chimney corner with the old man. Sandy would come and rest his nose in her lap, and she and Timothy found plenty to say to each other. She told him all about Charlie, and the raft and the Pirate.
"'Tis a pity the little laddie enjoys such poor health," said Timothy to her. "The doctor be such a hearty man, but there—the Lord have a way of His Own with each o' us, and 'tis ordained for him to be weakly. I often sits and thinks o' strength. 'Tis misused in the body, and if so be the soul is strong, 'tisn't so much odds about the body!"
"I wonder how strong my soul is," said Faith. "I'm not very strong in my body, Granny says. Can I make my soul strong, Timothy?"
"Ask the Comforter," said the old man. "He'll strengthen the weak. We are told 'He helpeth our infirmities.'"
"What do infirmities mean?"
"Our weakness and ailments, surely. The Book says, 'We can be strengthened with might in the inner man' by Him."
"Is our inner man our souls?" asked Faith.
"I suppose I have an inner woman—I'm not a man."
"'Tis just a figure o' speech. 'Tis your little soul you want to be made strong."
"I like the Comforter very much," said Faith softly and reverently; "He came and comforted me this morning, Timothy. Aunt Alice scolded me because she told us not to leave the front door open, there was such a wind. And Hope left it open; she came out last, and the wind knocked a china vase off the table, and broke it, and Aunt Alice was very angry and scolded me, because she thought I'd gone out last. And I went away and cried, and then I distinctly felt the Comforter near me, and I asked Him to comfort me. I almost felt He took me in His Arms. He was so close. And I kept quite still, and then I couldn't be sorry any more, for I knew He knew I hadn't done it. He was so kind!"
Faith heaved a sigh of happiness, and Timothy nodded his head.
"'Tis just so!" he said simply.
And then they began to talk about Sandy and the sheep, and when she left the cottage, Faith's little face was radiant.
"I feel when I'm talking to you," she said as she bade the old man farewell, "that I'm getting happier every minute. I shan't be able to come and see you so often when we do lessons, but I'll come whenever I can!"
Charity and Hope could not understand her friendship with the old man. But Faith paid no heed to them. She was a quiet, old-fashioned child, and loved to go her own way without any interference of other people.
[CHAPTER VI]
CHARLIE STILL IN COMMAND
MISS VALE arrived on Monday, and the little girls fell in love with her. She was very pretty, with bright, dark eyes, and a quick, cheerful manner. But they found she was very firm and strict in some things, and lessons could not be trifled with.
"I shall not give you any lessons you cannot prepare, and when I come I expect to find them done. If they are not, I shall conclude it is idleness that is the cause and will deal with it accordingly."
This sounded very alarming, but the children found that she was right, and that there was no excuse for their lessons not being learnt.
She came from nine o'clock to one, and they had an hour every afternoon in which they did what they called their "prep" for her.
Charity and Hope did everything together, Faith could not keep up with them. She was slow and persevering, but not very clever at books. Yet Miss Vale, if she had any preference, liked to teach her the best of the three, for her whole heart was in what she did, and she was extremely conscientious.
In a few days' time, Faith was allowed to go to see Charlie. His mother met her at the door.
"My boy did too much with you that day. He has been in bed ever since. His father says there must be no voyages down the stream for a long time to come, so don't encourage him to talk about it."
Faith was taken into the sitting-room, where Charlie lay on the couch, looking very white and frail, but he greeted her most cheerfully:
"Come on, Ben. Isn't it hard lines for me?"
"What's been the matter with you?" asked Faith in a sympathetic tone.
"Oh temperature; it's always that. My head nearly bursting and I'm hot as fire! But I'm all right now. What have you been doing?"
Faith gave an account of their days since last they met, and from being very bright Charlie's spirits sank, and he began to talk most gloomily.
"It's no use my trying to do anything like other fellows. If God had made me a girl, I shouldn't have minded half so much, but boys are meant to be strong, and I think it's a shame I shouldn't be. I quite hate myself sometimes. If I was meant to be weak and ill, I oughtn't to have been born a boy. It was a big mistake."
"But," said Faith with rather a shocked look, "God borned you, and He can't make mistakes. And I don't see why girls should be ill and not boys. Besides, Charlie, if you aren't strong outside, you can be inside. I was talking with my friend Timothy about you. He said:"
"'It wasn't any odds about the body, it's the soul that really matters.'"
"Don't you like people with strong souls?"
"I don't know what they're like," Charlie said, staring at her.
Faith's eyes grew big and glowed with light as she replied:
"Oh, they're heroes!—Always smiling at difficult days and going straight on with their heads up, even if they're hurt. I've thought about them a lot. And I'm hoping the Comforter will make my soul grow big and strong. I should like never to cry when I'm hurt, and never grumble when things are horrid! And keep smiling even if the whole world turned against me and trampled me down!"
Faith spoke with such fervour that Charlie was much impressed.
She added:
"We all think you have a strong soul because you're so cheerful."
"Oh, I'm not!" said Charlie. "I've been beastly to Mother I'm so awfully disappointed that Dad won't let me go on the raft. It's the one thing I really enjoy! There's nothing else I can play at. It does seem a shame."
"We play lots of games," said Faith, "and we've no raft."
"No, but you are girls, and you can run about, and climb trees. I've had a miserable time shut up here all alone."
"I suppose," said Faith shyly, "you wouldn't like the Comforter to stay with you? I think you would feel better if He did. I don't know Him very well yet, but Timothy talks to me about Him. And I think it's so wonderful that He likes coming and living with boys and girls and making them happy and good and strong!"
"What do you mean?" asked Charlie.
"Timothy told me about Him first. If you're ill and unhappy, He would like to come to you and comfort you. That's why He's called the Comforter. Wherever He goes He comforts, and He does it perfectly, because, you know, He is God."
Faith's voice sank to an awed whisper.
"What a funny girl you are!" said Charlie. "You seemed as if you were talking about a real person!"
"But the Comforter is real."
"Well, a real person is somebody you can see."
"If you can't see Him, you can hear Him," said Faith gravely. "There are lots of real things we can't see. The wind—"
"Oh, I know, but you're preaching a sermon."
"Am I?"
Faith subsided into silence. Presently she said:
"Then I can't tell you how to be happy and comforted, if you won't believe what Timothy says."
"Can you find out this puzzle?"
Charlie would have no more serious talk; and produced a little puzzle box with a padlock which opened itself in a wonderful way; Faith was interested at once. She paid him quite a long visit, and when the time came for her to go, Charlie produced two packets which he charged her to give to the wife and to Bolt.
"They're my wishes," he said. "You signed on to do what I told you for a year, and I'm still in command, though I'm ill!"
"Aye, sir, aye!" said Faith, saluting him in best style.
Then she went home, and Charity and Hope opened their packets eagerly.
There was a great deal of paper but not much writing. Charity's was as follows:
"Captain Charles sends greetings to his wife. He wishes her to find the Pirate's Haunt, and let me know his house and his riteful name. She must make the journey by land, but she must not fale to do it. For a lot hangs on the Finding! And she must rite the name in sekrecy and seal her letter with a red seal and send it through the post. And if she does not keep it sekret death will o'ertake her.
"(Signed) CAPTAIN CHARLES."
Hope opened hers and found a strange map, drawn in red ink by Charlie. This was the letter accompanying it.
"Captain Charles to his humble and devotted servant Bolt. I charge you to studey this map, and to find on your walks the place that is called Boggy Glen. There is a wonderful herbe therein, called Wild peppermint, whichesame will releave the Captain of his mortal sicknes, and is to be sent to me in a sealed letter by poste with no derlay.
"(Signed) CAPTAIN CHARLES."
"What fun!" cried Hope. "You and me, Charity, will have to be busy!"
"And he's given me nothing to do," said Faith, feeling aggrieved; "nothing at all."
"You're his messenger," said Charity, "you must take back answers to these notes. A King's messenger is most important, and so is a Captain's messenger."
Faith's face brightened. She took back two notes the next day to the doctor's house, but did not see Charlie. These were the notes:
"MY DEAR HUSBAND,
"I'm sorry you're sick, but I'll find the Pirate in a jiffy. I wish you had told me to hang him or something difficult like that, but after all I don't want him hanged, because he was very kind. I mustn't let him know of course. I'll criep about like a spy and follow his tracks. I think I've already found out his name. But I'll write it hidden in a sentence and you'll have to find it out. Good-bye and good luck.
"Your sooperior WIFE."
"MY DEAR CAPTAIN,
"I will find the heeling herb, no fear about that! And I'll make a potion of it to be swallowed at midnight in the dark. And you will rise up early a hale and harty man. So three cheers for our Captain and his crew.
"Yours as signed, BOLT."
Faith had these letters read aloud to her and she thought them wonderfully clever.
The very next day, Charity and Hope set off on their different quests. Faith wandered out alone. She called at Timothy's cottage, but he was out; and then she rambled on through some fields, and made her way along a strange lane, which had banks of primroses on each side. Presently she saw a hole through the hedge; she crept through, and then she started, for two men were talking together. They were standing by a rick of hay, and she heard one man say with passion in his tone:
"I tell you, Fielding, I'm so dead sick of rotting here like a vegetable, when I might be up and doing with the rest of the working world, that at times I feel inclined to make a bolt for it!"
"It's hard lines," murmured the other man, and then the two separated.
One went on across the field, the other turned and faced Faith, and she saw it was the Pirate. Just for a moment he looked as if he were going to pass her without speaking, and his brows were knitted so fiercely, and his face so gloomy, that Faith was frightened. He stood still, as he saw her shrinking into the hedge, and then his brow cleared.
"Why, it's one of the treasure seekers, isn't it?" he said in his pleasant voice.
Then Faith held out her small hand.
"I'm so glad you will speak to me," she said, "I should have been so disappointed, if you hadn't."
"Would you? And what are you doing alone here?"
"Just walking about and trying to amuse myself," answered Faith. "Charity and Hope have gone off to do errands for Charlie, but I've none to do."
For a moment she was tempted to tell him that Charity was looking for him, then she remembered that Charlie said it was to be kept a secret, so she shut her lips determinedly.
"Well, I'm an idle person too. We'll take a walk together, I want to go to Dapperton Bridge to see if there's a chance of any salmon there. Will you come with me?"
"Is it very far? I should love to."
"No, it is only half a mile further on."
He took hold of her hand, and chatted about different things till they came to the bridge; then he leant his arms on it, and as he gazed at the river flowing beneath, his face became gloomy again, and absorbed. Faith stood by his side and watched him, then she put her little hand softly on his arm.
"Are you very unhappy?" she asked.
He started, but did not look at her; his eyes were on the rushing water.
"I am not exactly happy, child," he said, slowly; "my life is distasteful. I'm a discontented grumbler, that's what I am. How did you find it out?"
"I heard you speak to that other man," said Faith, truthfully. "You said you were sick of it or something like it."
"So I did. Little pitchers have long ears they say, but it's true."
They were silent for a moment or two.
"Do you know a friend of mine called Timothy Bendall?" asked Faith suddenly.
"I'm afraid I haven't that pleasure."
"He's an old man, a shepherd who has a cottage all his own, and he lets me come in and talk to him. He's told me how all the unhappy people in the world can get happy, every one of them."
The young man gave a short laugh.
"And what is the wonderful recipe? How is it done?"
Faith looked up at him with shining eyes.
"They get to know the Comforter, and fancy! I didn't know He was in the world. Nobody ever talks about Him. Timothy says He loves unhappy people. It's what He keeps in the world for, instead of living in heaven, just to comfort them and make them happy. I suppose you know Him, don't you?"
"What an old-fashioned mite you are! I didn't know children thought about such things—they're never unhappy."
"Oh, we are, we are," said Faith eagerly. "Charlie is miserable because he's ill, and can't go any more on his raft, and we cry often and often. I haven't cried so much lately, because I've asked the Comforter to come and live with me. You can't cry very well when you feel Him quite close to you. I think you'd find He would make you very happy. If you went to Timothy, he would tell you all about Him. He reads bits of the Bible out to me. The Comforter is really God, you know. He came into the world when Jesus went out of it. Jesus sent him, so that nobody should feel sad."
"Go on," said the young man with a smile; "tell me more. You're quite a little preacher."
And then Faith got scarlet in her cheeks and stopped speaking.
"Charlie said I preached a sermon," she murmured. "I don't mean to do it, but it's so new to me, I like talking about it to people. Charity and Hope laugh at me, but they're hardly ever unhappy for long. I won't say any more. Have you seen any fish yet?"
"I like listening to you. Go on talking about this Comforter."
But Faith would say no more.
He did not press her, and presently the sight of a big fish rising with a splash seized her attention.
Then the Pirate began telling Faith about some wonderful salmon he had caught. He told her his name, which was the same as the children had heard—Fred Cardwell. He also told her about his poor sick father.
"Now, if he could believe in this Comforter you talk about, it would be a good thing for himself and every one else. Do you think you could come up one day and talk to him about it?"
"Timothy would," said Faith doubtfully; "I should be afraid to."
"But you weren't afraid of me, and my father is only a poor old sick man who hates his life, and makes everyone who comes near him as miserable as he is."
"Couldn't you tell him better than me?" said Faith, shyly.
"I'm sure I couldn't. Will you come to tea one day—you and your sisters—and play in an untidy old garden? Would you like to?"
"Oh, we should love it! We adore going out to tea, and everybody is so kind here. And we love seeing new gardens. Nobody had gardens in London."
"All right. One day I'll drive over for the three of you. Would the Captain like to come too?"
"He's ill now. Oh, how kind you are!"
Faith danced softly up and down on her toes. Then her friend walked back to the village with her and she ran home and told Granny all about her meeting.
Granny was amused.
"You children seem making friends with everybody," she said. "But don't set your heart upon people's promises. They often go their way and forget. A grown-up man does not often care to entertain children."
When Charity and Hope came home they had as much to tell Faith as she had to tell them.
Hope had found the wild peppermint in the right place. She had been studying her map as she walked along the road, and the old Rector came up and told her at once how she could find Boggy Glen. It was over some fields behind a pine wood. Charity had not been so fortunate, but the post office woman had told her that the Towers was the name of Mr. Cardwell's place, and a carrier's cart passed it every Wednesday.
"If only Miss Vale would give us a holiday, I could go," said Charity, "but she won't. And I'm not quite sure that the Pirate is Mr. Cardwell."
"But I'm sure," cried Faith delightedly, "because I've been talking to him, and we're all going to his house to tea very soon."
Then she told her story, and Charity was not best pleased.
"You've been doing what I ought to have done," she said. "You'd no business to go and speak to him. You ought to have come off and told me where he was."
"But I didn't know where to find you," said Faith.
Charity sniffed.
"It's not secret at all if you know all about it," she said. "You've spoiled the whole thing!"
She walked out of the room as she spoke, and banged the door behind her.
Faith felt inclined to cry, but Hope told her that Charity had come home tired and cross, and that she didn't mean what she said, and when the sisters met at tea Charity was her bright self again, and quite interested about writing her sealed letter to the captain.
"I shall tell him I have gained the information from a trustworthy person, but I shan't tell him it's you," she said.
Faith brightened up.
"And you did hear about him first, didn't you?" she cried.
Charity nodded.
"It will be fun if we go to tea with him properly. Mrs. Budd, at the post office, told me it was a beautiful house, but that old Mr. Cardwell led his son a dog's life. I wonder what that means?"
No one could enlighten her.
After tea, Charity wrote her letter, and Hope was very busy soaking her mint in hot water, and pouring it into a bottle which she begged from her aunt. She managed to put a drop or two of vinegar in it and some salt, so she assured her sisters it was quite as nasty as it ought to be. And then there was a great fuss sealing the packages up. Granny found an odd bit of sealing wax she lent them. Charity read her sentence out proudly to her sisters in which the Pirate's name was buried. It was this:
"First read end down. Cut all right dates with easy little letters."
And she added below: "Follow this advice and you will find what you want."
Faith could not understand it at all, until Charity showed that the first letters of each word spelt his name, and then she thought it wonderfully clever and wondered if Charlie would discover it quickly.
She took the packages off that same evening, but only left them at the door for him, as Granny said she was not to stay, for bed-time was close at hand.
And all three children went to bed very satisfied with their day's work.
[CHAPTER VII]
THE PIRATE'S HOME
CHARLIE was delighted with his packages and wrote a little note thanking them, but he was not allowed out of his bedroom yet, and for the time the little girls had to be content to play without him.
Sir George arrived one morning, wanting to carry off the children to lunch with his wife, but Miss Vale was very stern and would not let lessons be interfered with. So he deferred his invitation to the afternoon, and then they went to tea with Lady Melville instead. As before, Charity and Hope went off with Sir George to see his books and horses, and Faith stayed to talk to Lady Melville. Of course she told her of their new friend, the Pirate, and Lady Melville knew all about him.
"I wish he would come and see us oftener; but he is rather unsociable, and he does not lead a natural life. He is a devoted son, but a man ought not to be a sick nurse; that is a woman's vocation."
Then Lady Melville smiled at Faith's puzzled face.
"I always forget I am talking to a child," she said. "You seem like a grown-up person sometimes, little Faith."
"I don't feel like one," said Faith, smiling. "Is old Mr. Cardwell very dreadful? Everybody says he is. If we go to tea there, shall we have to see him?"
"I don't think you will. He is the last person in the world to have children about him. Poor old man! He has always rebelled against his fate, and as he gets older seems to grow more bitter and angry. He used to hunt a great deal, but he has been stretched helpless on a bed for nearly ten years, and I don't think he is able to raise his hand to his mouth. It is very, very sad, and no one seems able to help him."
Faith was silent, but her thoughts were busy.
Then Lady Melville began to talk about Charlie Evans. He was a more cheerful subject of conversation, and Faith chattered away, telling of all their games. She was quite sorry when her sisters came back into the drawing-room. When they were present, Faith grew silent.
They had a very nice tea, and as they were going away, Lady Melville said:
"My boys come home next week for the Easter holidays. I wish they were not quite so big, for they would be better companions for you, but we must try and get some young people in the neighbourhood together one day and then you must all come too."
As the little girls walked home, Charity said:
"Sir George told me that in the summer holidays, there would be picnics, and garden parties, and all kinds of nice things, but he says his boys don't do much but fish when they come home now. I think we have come to a lovely place to live. We never had such treats in London."
"We sometimes went out to tea," said Hope; "but it makes such a difference when there are big gardens to play in."
Faith skipped gaily along the road.
"I like going out to tea anywhere," she said; "I like having tea with Timothy, and he has no garden."
"I believe I know why we enjoy ourselves better in the country," said Charity thoughtfully. "Grownup people are kinder to us here. They have time to talk to us, and they have no time in London. They are always so busy there, and in such a rush!"
Hope nodded.
"Yes, when Aunt Alice's friends came to see her they always said, 'I've no time to stay, I don't know how to get through!' Why do people rush about so in London?"
"They always shop so much," said Charity; "and there are no shops here; and then I suppose the crowds of people make a difference, they have so many friends to see."
"Well," said Faith, "we have friends here. I have Timothy, and Charlie, and Sir George and Lady Melville, and the Pirate, that's five, and perhaps we may have more."
"Timothy doesn't count," said Charity scornfully; "and the Pirate is almost a stranger. We may never see him again."
"He is going to have us to tea," said Faith eagerly.
But Charity tossed her head unbelievingly.
"He has forgotten all about it," she said.
Faith knew better, and three days after, as they were doing their lessons in the tiny best parlour which had been turned into their schoolroom, they saw through the window, the Pirate ride up to the gate on a big brown horse. Aunt Alice went out to speak to him, and she had quite a long conversation at the gate.
Miss Vale, seeing how this distracted her pupils' attention from their lessons, and how each of the little girls would stare out of the window, promptly stepped across the room and drew down the blind. Charity was the only one who was brave enough to offer an objection:
"You should control your curiosity," said Miss Vale cheerfully. "You are very poor things, if you always let that get the better of you. And your eyes must be on your lesson books, don't let them run off anywhere else. Whilst you are little, you must learn to be masters of your members. Do you understand what I mean?"
The children shook their heads.
"Your eyes must not look away from what you are doing. If your brain insists that they do not, you are the master of your members, and the same with your hands and your feet. Charity need not let her feet kick the legs of her chair when she is impatient, nor need Hope bite her finger nails, nor Faith slip her feet in and out of her shoes. Don't say, 'I can't help it,' for that is letting your hands and feet manage you, instead of you managing them!"
Miss Vale had successfully captured their attention now. It was a new idea to all of them, that they had to manage their hands and feet as well as their eyes and the other parts of their body.
Lessons went on very quietly after that, but when Miss Vale had gone, they rushed off to find their Aunt Alice.
"Well," she said, "I expect you have guessed already. Mr. Cardwell is coming to-morrow to drive you over to the Towers to spend the afternoon."
"Our dear Pirate, how lovely!" exclaimed Charity.
Faith got pink with pleasure.
"All of us are to go?" questioned Hope.
"Yes. I think it is remarkably good of him to be troubled with you," said Aunt Alice laughing.
The next afternoon at three o'clock a very high and smart dogcart stopped at the gate, and the children walked out most importantly to meet it.
"If only Mrs. Cox could see us!" said Hope.
They packed themselves in with glee.
"We don't feel a bit frightened of going with you now," said Charity; "but we were rather nervous the other day, when you played pirate and pretended you were going to take us prisoners. Even when you said you'd lead us to the treasure, we suspected treachery."
"You are quite sure I'm to be trusted now?"
"Oh, yes, because you've seen Aunt Alice!"
They had the most delightful drive, and the Pirate was most amusing.
"You seem to understand very well," said Hope, when he had been condoling with them about the unhappiness of monotony.
"Ah," he said, "I remember when I was a boy how I loved all unexpected events, I didn't care how grown-up people were inconvenienced. If a cistern burst, and the water came pouring downstairs, if the wind blew a tree down and smashed an open casement window, if a cook ran off, and left us without any dinner, or any other domestic disaster came upon us, how delighted and excited I was!"
"Yes," chuckled Charity. "I think disasters are more exciting than pleasures. I almost wish we could have some at the Cottage. Mrs. Cox used to have a lot happen to her, but we never did!"
"Would you like to be tossed by a furious bull? We have one in a field by himself, he's a bad-tempered brute."
"Oh, no," cried Faith. "I don't like disasters at all; we have come out to enjoy ourselves. It's when we're very dull, we wish for accidents and things of that sort."
"I'll do my best to prevent you feeling dull," the Pirate said.
The Towers was a bigger house than Sir George's, but the children all agreed it was a gloomy looking place. The shrubberies and evergreen oaks round it overshadowed it, ivy crept up the stone walls, but no climbing roses or jessamine or any sweet scented creeper. In front of the house was a tiled garden with fountains and stone vases; the weeds grew apace everywhere, and there were only flowering shrubs, no bright flower beds.
Still it was lovely to explore, there were so many winding paths and walled gardens.
For an hour the little girls were absolutely happy, rambling about the grounds and seeing all that the Pirate could show them. Then he took them into the house, through a big stone hall, into a very comfortable smoking-room, where, he told them, he always lived, and where tea was now laid out on a square table.
"What a lot of rooms you have," said Charity; "don't you use them all?"
"No, most of them are shut up. It's a barrack of a place, and wants a large family to occupy it."
"You've got too big a house," said Hope thoughtfully, "and we have too little a one. We're dreadfully crowded. We have to be so tidy, that it takes up all our time putting our things away!"
"I wish I could cut off a slice of this house and stick it on to yours," said the Pirate.
"Wouldn't it be fun if you could!" said Charity. "I see you've a lot of books but not so many as Sir George. I mean to have a house full of books when I grow up; a very big house I shall have, and an enormous library!"
They chattered on and made a very good tea; in fact, there were so many biscuits and cakes that Charity said she did not consider it a war tea. When it was over, the Pirate took Charity and Hope upstairs to a big picture gallery. He left them there looking at the pictures, whilst he asked Faith to follow him along a wide passage to a room at the end of it.
"Now," he said, "come in and see my father. Remember he is a poor sick old gentleman, and talk to him as you did to me the other day, and tell him how he can be happy."
Faith shrank back, then fighting with her fears she took hold of the Pirate's hand.
"I'm very afraid," she said, "and p'raps he won't like to see me. And I can't talk to him like I do to you."
"Never mind, just talk to him about anything."
And then the Pirate opened the door of a large sunny room; there were four big windows in a row, and drawn up to one of them, which was wide open, was a big couch. The invalid was lying on it, but he did not turn his head when they, came in.
An elderly man-servant was standing by his couch; he was just taking away a small tray of tea which stood on a table by the side of it, and old Mr. Cardwell was thundering out:
"You clumsy fool! Can't you do your duties without shaking the whole room with your heavy tread? And pull down the blind—that confounded sun is—"
He stopped short, for he had caught sight of Faith. She was promptly introduced:
"A little friend of mine, father, whom I am going to leave with you for a short time."
Without waiting for a response, the Pirate hurried away, the servant following him as quickly as he could.
Faith found herself standing by the couch, facing an angry old man.
Faith's greatest friends always said her extreme gentleness was her chief attraction. With her small heart beating violently, she had self-control enough to place her soft little hand on the old helpless wrinkled hand that was restlessly moving to and fro.
"I hope I shan't disturb you," she said.
Old Mr. Cardwell looked at her tiny face with its earnest eyes, and pointed chin, and sensitive little mouth, and was speechless.
Her soft lisping voice, for most of Faith's "s's" sounded like "th's," and her still softer touch made him say with a short laugh:
"Disturb me! You've alighted in my room like a butterfly or moth—a little grey moth, that's what you are!"
Faith wore a grey hat and coat, and the simile was apt.
"Now, what the d—ahem!—dickens, does Fred mean by landing you here and leaving you here?"
Faith did not speak.
"Are you tongue tied, child?"
"No, I'm—a little afraid of you—not very much, for you look a little like my dearest friend."
"And who is he?"
"Timothy his name is. He isn't ill like you, but he has a beard, and his eyes are blue. I think I came to see you to tell you about him."
"Sit down in that chair, little Miss Moth. Now tell me about yourself, not about this old bearded Timothy."
Faith smiled all over her face.
"I do love it when people give me names. Sir George calls me Curly, and Charlie calls me Ben. My real name is Faith. Will you always call me Miss Moth?"
"Is there going to be an always? Have you come into my house prepared to take root and stay?"
"Oh, no, we're going home very soon, we've come to tea with the Pirate. May I tell you?"
So the whole story was poured out, and the lonely, irritable old man listened, and felt a faint interest in the little speaker.
"Well," he said, when she had finished, "I'm a miserable old man, a living, helpless log; and Fred, who poses to you children as a gallant pirate, is my gaoler, and he hates his job and I don't wonder at it!"
Faith looked at him with her great eyes. Then she bent forward eagerly:
"Why don't you have Somebody I know come and live with you? He would make you so very happy."
"Happy! That's a strange word to use, Miss Moth."
"Oh, it's all true!"
Faith threw off her shyness, she began to speak eagerly:
"I've only been hearing about Him lately. Timothy told me. Mrs. Cox used to say the world was an unhappy place—a weary world she called it; she said we were born to trouble—but she didn't know what I do. Nobody, not a single person, need be unhappy, they've only got to send for the Comforter. He's waiting, He wants to comfort, He goes all over the world finding out the sad.
"Hasn't He ever come to you? It's what He stays in the world for. Jesus sent Him when He went away from us. Do you know about Him? You couldn't possibly be unhappy if you have Him staying with you. Timothy told me thousands of people have died in agonies of pain—they were burnt alive, lots of them—and they only smiled because the Comforter put His Arms round them and held them tight. It's what I ask Him to do to me, to hold me so tight that I only feel Him and nothing else. He wipes away tears, and tells us it is all right, and He knows and He loves us. And I'm getting to love Him so much since I've known about Him. It's Timothy who teaches me. Oh, I wish you could hear how he tells about it. He says if anybody is sick the Comforter is ready to go to them at once."
She stopped. Old Mr. Cardwell gazed at her as if he had never seen or heard a child talk before.
"Well, I'm dashed!" he said. "There, that's a harmless exclamation! Where on earth do you get your gift of eloquence from? You little insignificant grey moth, talking of personalities that doctors of divinity are chary of mentioning! So you think I could be made content and happy. Will you take me in hand?"
Faith looked puzzled.
"Go on," he said, "talk away. I like to hear you. Perhaps you had better describe this wonderful Timothy to me. Is he a spirit, or is he flesh and blood?"
"Timothy is a shepherd. He has a dog and a little cottage. He lives close to us. I sit on a stool by his fire, and he sits in a big wooden chair and he smokes a pipe—oh, I wish you knew Timothy. Would you like him to come and see you?"
"Indeed I would not!"
There was a grim smile on the invalid's lips, the first that had lingered there for many a long day.
Half an hour later the Pirate came into the room, and found Faith with a happy face chattering to his father as if she had known him all her life.
He told her the trap was at the door, and Faith rose at once and shook hands with the invalid.
"Good-bye, and thank you for talking to me," she said.
Mr. Cardwell looked at his son.
"I congratulate you on your discovery," he said. "She can come again if she likes. I'll never shut my door upon her."
The Pirate knew how many times his father's door had been shut upon unwelcome visitors, and he took Faith away with a glad heart.
Then the children were driven home, and chattered all the evening to their Granny and Aunt, telling of all that they had seen and done.
[CHAPTER VIII]
CHARITY PLAYS TRUANT
THE very next day the three little girls met Lionel and Fairfax Melville at the village shop.
Charity was shopping for her aunt, and she was doing it with her most important air. Hope and Faith were outside the door looking in at the window, and wondering if it would be very wicked in war-time to buy two pennyworth of sweets. Suddenly two cyclists dashed up and dismounted. They were boys of fourteen and fifteen, and had come to the shop to buy some machine oil. They did not notice Faith and Hope, but stared at Charity, and then the elder, Lionel, who had a very frank, easy way with him, said:
"I believe you're Carrots, aren't you? The Pater calls you that."
"Yes," said Charity beaming, "and you're Lionel and Fairfax. We've seen your pictures."
She had finished her shopping, and did not like to linger, but as she was going out she said:
"If we were boys, we could chum up together, but we're girls."
"Yes," said Lionel, with an awkward laugh; "I suppose you don't fish? Girls never do."
"We could learn," said Charity. "Good-bye!"
Then she walked out of the shop; and wished harder than ever that she was a boy.
"They're too big for us," said Hope dejectedly. "Charlie is more our sort. I wish he would make haste and get well."
They did not see the boys again for some days, and then Charity met with a nasty accident, and Fairfax came to her aid. She was trying to get some marshmallows that grew by the side of the river, and in stretching out for them, she fell in. Happily a tree stretched over the water, and she managed to get hold of a branch, and cling on to it, whilst she called wildly for help. Fairfax and Lionel were fishing a short distance off, and Fairfax came up and soon pulled her up to the bank again.
"What a little duffer to fall in!" he said.
Charity stood and shivered in her wet clothes, but resented his tone.
"Anybody may have an accident," she said loftily.
"Run home and change your clothes," said Fairfax.
Charity walked away trying to appear dignified, but she was very near tears.
"I'll race you," said Fairfax. "Girls ought to be able to run."
Charity prided herself upon her swiftness. Dignity was forgotten. She sped away, and Fairfax could not outdistance her.
"I say, you can leg it!" he said.
When Charity arrived at the Cottage she stopped, and turned to him quite graciously, though she could hardly speak from breathlessness.
"Thank you for pilling me out," she said. "You're the one that likes books, aren't you?" Fairfax nodded.
"And you're the one who has been reading some of my books in the library," he said, "and my Greek legend book is missing."
"Sir George said I could borrow it. Do you mind?"
He laughed.
"Of course I don't, if you take care of it. We're going to take our lunch out to-morrow, we're walking out to the keeper's cottage the other side of our coverts. It's at the top of Hobbs Hill, it's A1 there. Like to come? Can you do three miles there and three back?"
"Oh, I could easy! Oh, how I should like to come, but we do lessons! And we aren't having holidays like you."
Charity's face fell.
"Take a day off! Play truant! Here's somebody! I'm off!"
He scampered back as Aunt Alice came to the gate. She was so concerned at Charity's wet state that she could not listen to her account of her misfortune. She popped her in bed and gave her a hot drink, and then Hope and Faith came upstairs to hear all about it.
Charity did not like staying in bed and protested loudly; then Aunt Alice scolded her, and said she deserved a punishment for being so careless, and Charity pursed up her mouth in a naughty way, and said:
"Then I shall do it to-morrow."
Hope asked her what she should do, but she would not say.
The next morning they settled down to lessons as usual. From nine to ten they worked steadily, and then Miss Vale took Hope to her music lesson. There was a small piano in the corner of the room. Charity and Faith were working at their arithmetic whilst the music was going on.
Presently Charity slipped out of the room. Nobody noticed her absence or thought it strange till Faith happened to hear the click of the garden gate, and looking out, saw Charity in her coat and hat running away from the cottage as fast as she could. She stared out as if she could not believe her eyes. What was Charity doing? Then she tried to bring her attention back to her sum, but it was quite impossible.
When Miss Vale left the piano and came back, she scolded her sharply for her idleness.
"You have only done one tiny sum this whole half-hour! For shame, Faith!"
Faith hung her head.
"I couldn't seem to think it out," she said.
"Where is Charity? I did not hear her leave the room."
Faith made no reply. After waiting a little, Miss Vale went to the door and called. There was no answer. Aunt Alice came out of the kitchen, and said she had not seen her. Hope was sent upstairs to look for her, and came back to say she was nowhere in the house. Faith's cheeks were burning, and there was such a troubled look in her eyes that Miss Vale noticed it.
"You know where she is, Faith. Tell me."
Faith wriggled in her seat. It was a point of honour with the sisters never to tell tales of each other.
"I don't know where she is now, Miss Vale, I really don't," Faith murmured at last.
"Tell me what you know about her."
Faith shook her head.
"She couldn't tell tales, Miss Vale," said Hope, "'specially if Charity's doing something she oughtn't. It's quite exciting! I do wonder where she is?"
"I'm afraid, Faith, you must tell me what you know," said Miss Vale.
And then Faith began to cry.
"I don't know anything," she sobbed; "I only saw her from the window going out at the gate."
She felt she had betrayed her sister most meanly, but Miss Vale had such a determined way with her, that she was compelled to tell the truth.
It all seemed strange and perplexing.
Then Miss Vale said lessons must continue, and for the rest of the morning she had two pupils with very wandering thoughts and divided attention.
When lessons hours were over, Charity was still absent. Miss Vale went home, and the children had their dinner. Granny was anxious, and Aunt Alice cross.
"I can't conceive how she dared behave so," Aunt Alice said. "She has never before gone off like this."
Then Hope suddenly guessed.
"I believe Fairfax Melville asked her to go out with him to-day," she said. "He pulled her out of the water, you know. Charity told him she couldn't go because of lessons. I shouldn't wonder if she has done it."
"It she has, she will have to be severely punished," said Aunt Alice.
But she and Granny seemed relieved by this possibility.
Faith and Hope played with their dolls in the orchard in the afternoon, but they talked a great deal about Charity.
"Isn't she daring?" said Hope. "I wish children could do those kind of things without getting punished. It's the afterwards that's so dreadful!"
But she spoke in admiring tones, and could not understand why Faith was so distressed about it.
"She has only played truant like children do in books, only it's easier to manage if you go to school."
"But think, when she walks in and has to meet Granny and Aunt Alice," said Faith. "Why, I should be ready to die, if I had to do it."
"Oh, Charity isn't so soft as you. Perhaps she'll get Sir George to bring her back, and then Granny won't be so angry."
"Granny is only sorry, not angry," said Faith; "but Aunt Alice is very angry indeed. She said to Granny that she deserved a whipping."
Hope and Faith looked at each other with awed eyes. The afternoon seemed long to them. Tea-time came and passed, still no Charity. At last, at half-past seven, just as Faith was being sent to bed, the truant arrived. She walked up to the door with firm step and head lifted high, but there was a nervous look in her eyes, and she was pale and was biting her lips, a trick which was her custom when perturbed.
Aunt Alice met her in the passage.
"Well, Charity, what is the meaning of this?"
"I only missed two hours' lessons," said Charity, trying to speak grandly; "and I thought I'd make them up to-morrow. I knew it was no good asking, but I've been spending the day out with Lionel and Fairfax, and—" here she paused, then rushed the words breathlessly and defiantly—"I've had a glorious time!"
This was no repentant sinner.
Aunt Alice marched her upstairs to her own bedroom, and she was closeted there with her a good half-hour.
Faith and Hope were both in bed when Charity came into the room. She had been crying. Her sisters felt sorry for her, but intensely curious. They had hardly ever seen her cry, and they felt that they would not shame her by showing her that they saw it, so they pretended to be asleep and covered their heads over with the bedclothes, leaving a little hole to peep out of, and watch her secretly.
Charity soon discovered this. She faced them boldly.
"You needn't peep at me like that! I'm not going to speak to you or tell you anything at all, so you can just go to sleep."
Then Hope threw back the bedclothes.
"We're so sorry for you, Charity."
"I hate your sorriness!"
Charity's tone was furious, and Hope dared say no more. Very soon she and Faith were fast asleep, but Charity lay awake, and sobbed her heart out. Some time later, the door of the children's room opened very softly. It was Granny. She came to Charity's bed, shielding her lighted candle with her hand, so that the rays should not disturb the sleeping children.
Charity lay very still and quiet, with closed eyes, feigning sleep, but Granny saw the swollen, reddened eyelids.
"Poor little soul!" she murmured, and then she knelt down by the bedside and bowed her head in prayer. Her whispered words were heard distinctly by Charity.
"Oh, Loving Father, pity and forgive, and save this dear child from the evils of self-will and waywardness. May her strong character be for good and not for evil, and teach us how to train her for her Saviour's sake. Amen."
Then there was a convulsive movement in the small bed, and Charity's arms were round Granny's neck.
"I'm awake, and I'm sorry and miserable, Granny, and I never will behave so wickedly again. Don't leave off loving me. Aunt Alice has. She's simply furious!"
"No, no, my darling, your Aunt is vexed. She has a right to be, but she has forgiven you already."
"But I'm to be punished to-morrow."
"To stamp it upon your memory," said Granny; then she kissed Charity very lovingly:
"Tell God what you have told me, my child, and go to sleep. You have a fresh day to begin to-morrow, and wake up good."
Then Granny went away. She never said much to the children, but she knew that Aunt Alice's words to her niece had been many and severe, and she did not wish to add to them.
It was a very subdued Charity who came to lessons next morning. She apologised to Miss Vale for what she had done, and for the whole of that afternoon Charity sat in the schoolroom writing an imposition for her aunt. It was only one sentence she had to write over and over again, many hundreds of times.
"Self-will and independence, unless under authority, always lead to disaster. Charity Blair."
Her back ached, her fingers ached, and her head ached before she had finished, but Charity had learned her lesson, and she never played truant again.
She told Faith and Hope afterwards about her day, and though she joined the boys, and actually caught a fish with a rod which they lent her, and though she had talked and laughed with them and was as jolly as she could be, underneath all was the miserable feeling of having done wrong.
"It doesn't really pay," she said.
Later on the three little girls spent an afternoon at the Hall with some other boys and girls. Charlie was well enough to be out again, and he was there.
Faith felt sorry for him when he could not join the boys in a game of hockey, but his spirits were good, and Sir George took him and Faith to see a small museum of curiosities, which interested them greatly.
He gave them each a small Roman coin with a hole pierced through, and told them that it was used in the time when our Lord was in the Holy Land.
"Do you think," said Faith, "that it could possibly be that Jesus Christ had this in His own Hand. Could He, do you think?"
"I shouldn't like to say," said Sir George.
When Faith got home, she put her coin in a little box which she kept carefully locked, and every night she would open it and finger it lovingly.
Charity warned her against making an idol of it.
Faith asked how a piece of money could be an idol.
"Anything is an idol if you worship it, or love it better than God," said Charity, with her superior air.
"But I don't worship it, and I only love it because it might have belonged to Jesus."
"I think that's very irreverent," said Charity.
"If you don't love it more than you ought to do, will you give it to me?"
"Never, never! It's my very own."
Faith shut up her box hastily and pocketed the key. After that she only took it out and looked at it when she was quite alone.
Lionel and Fairfax soon went back to school, and Charlie began his lessons again.
Then one Saturday afternoon, just before three o'clock, the Pirate's high dogcart appeared in charge of a groom. A note was sent in, which demanded an answer, and it was addressed to "Little Miss Moth."
Faith's fingers trembled as she opened the envelope.
"Will little Miss Moth keep a lonely old man company this afternoon? If so, she must return in the trap.
"W. CARDWELL."
A very short note, but it sent the colour flying into Faith's cheeks and the light into her eyes.
"Oh, Granny, Aunt Alice, may I go?"
Permission was given. Charity and Hope were very disappointed that they were not asked too. They went out and talked to the groom whilst Faith was getting ready to go, and Hope stroked the bay mare's nose and talked affectionately to her. They were not quite so disappointed when they heard that the Pirate was in London.
"It wouldn't be much fun to sit and talk to an old man the whole time," said Hope.
"No," said Charity; "Faith is so funny; she likes talking to Timothy. So dull, I think."
Faith drove off with a radiant face, and she entered the invalid's room with the same expression.
"Ah!" said the old man. "You're glad to come, then? You don't look so perturbed as when you saw me first."
"I love coming," said Faith.
She settled herself down in a chair which was put in readiness for her by the old man's side, and she and he talked away about all kinds of things. Then very mysteriously Faith brought out of her pocket her precious little box.
"I want to show you something wonderful," she said, "I thought you might like to see it."
[CHAPTER IX]
FAITH'S OLD FRIEND
OLD Mr. Cardwell admired the coin, but was not quite so much impressed as Faith considered he ought to be. He rang the bell for his servant, and told him to bring a small cabinet. Then he asked for his bunch of keys, and he made Faith unlock it, and take out some old coins that he had collected.
"These are all B.C.," he said. "Hundreds of years before."
Faith looked at them, asked what "B.C." meant, and in her turn was not much impressed.
"I shouldn't care for them so much," she said. "It's only because this might—it might, you know—have lain in the Hand of Jesus."
"Oh, you little piece of superstition!" said the old man. "You ought to have been born an R.C. Then you would have believed anything."
"But I might be right," said Faith. "Nobody could make sure I'm not, and I like to think it, very, very much."
"Why are you so religious? Is it the way in your family? Children aren't as a rule. What makes you such a little sober-sides?"
Faith shook her curls.
"I can't tell you," she said, "but I don't feel sober when I come to see you. I feel I could dance for joy, and I don't think I'm religious—we're pretty naughty, as a rule."
Then she put her coin back carefully in its box.
"I think the children who lived in the Bible time when Jesus Christ went about their villages were the most fortunate children in the world."
There was a pause in their conversation.
Then her little face brightened.
"But I suppose we're fortunate, too, for we have the Comforter going about with us in the world now."
"Ah!" said old Mr. Cardwell, "I thought you would start that hare again. How's the old shepherd? Seen him lately?"
"Yes, one day last week. I met him in the road, taking his sheep to another field, and Sandy was with him. Timothy knows you. I asked him if he did. And he feels very sorry for our Pirate, because he wanted to go to the war, didn't he? And they wouldn't have him, because he had a bad heart?"
"That was the way of it. Bad luck has been in this house for twenty years—ever since I lost my wife."
"Did she die?" Faith asked with interest.
"Yes, caught a cold—and died after three days' illness. Everything went wrong after that."
"You must have felt just like the disciples did," said Faith thoughtfully.
The old man did not reply. A shadow had come across his face, but there was a softer look in his eyes as he thought about the wife he had adored.