JIMMY SLEEPS IN A WINDMILL
'Hullo!' said a voice close in front of him, and looking up Jimmy saw a man smoking a pipe. Of course it was too dark for him to see anything very distinctly, but still his eyes had become used to the darkness, and he could see more than you would imagine.
'What are you after?' asked the man.
'Please I was looking for somewhere to sleep,' answered Jimmy.
'Well, you're a rum sort of youngster,' said the man. 'Here, come along o' me.'
Jimmy followed him along a path which led to the mill, and as they drew near to it the great sails seemed to swish through the air in a rather alarming manner. The man opened a door and Jimmy looked in. The floor was all white with flour, and dozens of sacks stood against the walls. The man also looked nearly as white as the floor, and he began to smile as the light fell upon Jimmy. But the boy did not feel at all inclined to smile.
'Why,' he asked, 'you look as if you've come from a circus?'
'I have,' answered Jimmy, feeling quite stupid from sleepiness.
'Run away?' said the man. 'Have you?'
'Yes,' answered Jimmy, gaping.
'Got nowhere to sleep?' asked the miller.
'No,' was the answer.
'Hungry?' asked the miller.
'I only want to go to sleep,' said Jimmy, gaping again.
'Come in here,' said the man, and without losing a moment, Jimmy followed him into the mill. There the man threw two or three sacks on to the floor, and told Jimmy to lie down. There seemed to be a great noise at first, but Jimmy shut his eyes and soon fell sound asleep, too sound asleep even to dream of Coote or the clown.
He was awakened by the miller's kicking one of the sacks on which he lay, and looking about to see where he was, Jimmy saw that it was broad daylight, and that the sun was shining brightly.
'Now, then, off with you,' cried the miller, 'before I get into trouble.'
'What time is it, please?' asked Jimmy sleepily, as he stood upright.
'It'll soon be six o'clock,' was the answer.
Jimmy thought it was a great deal too early to get up, and he felt so tired that he would very much have liked to lie down again, but he did not say so.
'Here, take this,' said the man, and he put twopence into Jimmy's hand. 'Mind they don't catch you,' he added.
'Please can you tell me the way to Chesterham?' asked Jimmy.
'Chesterham's a long way,' answered the miller; 'but you've got to get to Sandham first. Go back into the road and keep to your left. When you get to Sandham ask for Chesterham.'
'Thank you,' said Jimmy, and with the twopence held tightly in his hand he walked along the lane until he reached the road.
It was a beautiful morning, but Jimmy could do nothing but gape; his feet felt very heavy, and he wished that he had never put on the clown's clothes and left his own behind. Still he made sure that he should be able to reach Chesterham some day, and presently he passed a church and an inn and several small houses and poor-looking shops. With the twopence in his hand he looked in at the shop windows wondering what he should buy for breakfast, and seeing a card in one of them which said that lemonade was a penny a bottle, Jimmy determined to buy some of that.
The woman who served him looked very much astonished, and she called another woman to look at him too. But Jimmy stood drinking the cool, sweet lemonade, and thought it was the nicest thing he had ever tasted. As he stood drinking it his eyes fell on some cakes of chocolate cream.
'How much are those?' he asked.
'Two a penny,' said the woman.
'I'll have two, please,' said Jimmy, and he began to eat them as soon as he left the shop. But he was glad to leave the village behind, because everybody he met stared at him and he did not like it. Three boys and a girl followed him some distance along the road, no doubt expecting that he was really and truly a clown, and would do some tumbling and make them laugh. But at last they grew tired of following him, and they stopped and began to call him names, and one boy threw a stone at him, but Jimmy felt far too miserable to throw one back. Chocolate creams and lemonade are very nice things, but they don't make a very good breakfast. The morning seemed very long, and presently Jimmy sat down by a hedge and fell asleep. He awoke feeling more hungry than ever, and no one was in sight but a man on a hay cart. But it happened that the cart was going towards Sandham, and Jimmy waited until it came up, and then he climbed up behind and hung with one leg over the tailboard and got a long ride for nothing. He might have ridden all the way to Sandham, only that the carter turned round in a rather bad temper and hit Jimmy with his whip, so that he jumped down more quickly than he had climbed up.
He guessed that he was near the town, because there were houses by the roadside, and passing carts, and even an omnibus. If Jimmy had had any more money he would have got into the omnibus; as he had none he was compelled to walk on. It was quite late in the afternoon when he entered Sandham, and he had eaten nothing since the chocolate creams. He was annoyed to find that a number of children were following him again, and as he went farther into the town they crowded round in a ring, so that Jimmy was brought to a standstill.
He felt very uncomfortable standing there, with dozens of children and a few grown-up persons round him. They cried out to him to 'go on,' and this was just what Jimmy would have liked to do. He felt so miserable that he put an arm to his eyes and began to cry, and then the crowd began to laugh, for they thought he was going to begin to do something to amuse them at last. But when they saw he did nothing funny as a clown ought to do, but only kept on crying, they began to jeer at him, and one boy came near as if he would hit him. Jimmy took down his arm then, and the two boys, one dressed in rags and the other in the dirty clown's dress, stood staring at each other with their small fists doubled, when Jimmy felt some one take hold of his arm, and looking round he saw a rather tall, dark-haired lady, with a pretty-looking face. Her hand was on his arm, and her eyes wore a very curious expression, almost as if she were going to cry also, just to keep Jimmy company.
But from the moment that Jimmy looked at her face he felt that things would be better with him.
'Come with me, dear,' she whispered, and taking his hand in her own she led him out of the crowd.
'Where to?' asked Jimmy, wondering why she held his hand so tightly.
'I think the best thing to do will be to put you to bed,' she answered.
'Yes,' said Jimmy, 'I should like to go to bed—to a real bed, you know—not sacks.'
'You shall go into a real bed,' she answered.
'I think I should like to have something to eat first,' he cried.
'Oh yes, you shall have something to eat,' she said.
If a good many persons had stopped to stare at Jimmy when he was alone, many more stared now to see a dirty-faced, poor little clown being led away by a nicely-dressed lady. But the fact was that Jimmy did not care what they thought. They might stare as much as they liked, and it did not make any difference. He felt that he was all right at last, although he did not in the least know who his friend could be. But he felt that she was a friend, and that was the great thing; he felt that whatever she did would be pleasant and good, and that she was going to give him something nice to eat and a comfortable bed to sleep in.
Somehow he did not feel at all surprised, only extremely tired, so that he could scarcely keep his eyes open. Things that happened did not seem quite real, it was almost like a dream. The lady stopped in front of a house where lodgings were let, although Jimmy knew nothing about that. The door was opened by a pleasant, rosy-cheeked woman in a cotton dress.
'Well, I am glad!' she cried; and Jimmy wondered, but only for a moment, what she had to be glad about.
'I think some hot soup will be the best thing,' said the lady, 'and then we will put him to bed.'
'What do you think about a bath?' asked the landlady.
'The bath will do to-morrow,' was the answer. 'Just some soup and then bed. And I shall want you to send a telegram to the Post Office.'
'You're not going to send a telegram to the policeman,' exclaimed Jimmy; but as the landlady left the room to see about the soup, the lady placed her arm round him and drew him towards her. Jimmy thought that most ladies would not have liked to draw him close, because he really looked a dirty little object, but this lady did not seem to mind at all.
Suddenly she held him farther away from her, and looked strangely into his face.
'What is your name?' she asked.
'James—Orchardson—Sinclair—Wilmot,' said Jimmy with a gape between the words.
Then she pressed him closer still, and kissed his face again and again, and for once Jimmy rather liked being kissed. Perhaps it was because he had felt so tired and lonely; but whatever the reason may have been, he did not try to draw away, but nestled down in her arms and felt more comfortable than he had felt for ever so long.
It was not long before the landlady came back with a plate of hot soup, and Jimmy sat in a chair by the table and the lady broke some bread and dipped it in, and Jimmy almost fell asleep as he fed himself. Still he enjoyed the soup, and when it was finished she took him up in her arms and carried him to another room where there were two beds. She stood Jimmy down, and he leaned against the smaller bed with his eyes shut whilst she took off the clown's dress, and the last thing he recollected was her face very close to his own before he fell sound asleep.