A Little Princess (18 page)

She stood behind her window for a few moments and pondered. Then
her curiosity got the better of her. She went to the door and
spoke to the beggar child.

"Who gave you those buns?" she asked her. The child nodded her
head toward Sara's vanishing figure.

"What did she say?" inquired the woman.

"Axed me if I was 'ungry," replied the hoarse voice.

"What did you say?"

"Said I was jist."

"And then she came in and got the buns, and gave them to you, did
she?"

The child nodded.

"How many?"

"Five."

The woman thought it over.

"Left just one for herself," she said in a low voice. "And she
could have eaten the whole six—I saw it in her eyes."

She looked after the little draggled far-away figure and felt
more disturbed in her usually comfortable mind than she had felt
for many a day.

"I wish she hadn't gone so quick," she said. "I'm blest if she
shouldn't have had a dozen." Then she turned to the child.

"Are you hungry yet?" she said.

"I'm allus hungry," was the answer, "but 't ain't as bad as it
was."

"Come in here," said the woman, and she held open the shop door.

The child got up and shuffled in. To be invited into a warm
place full of bread seemed an incredible thing. She did not
know what was going to happen. She did not care, even.

"Get yourself warm," said the woman, pointing to a fire in the
tiny back room. "And look here; when you are hard up for a bit
of bread, you can come in here and ask for it. I'm blest if I
won't give it to you for that young one's sake."

Sara found some comfort in her remaining bun. At all events, it
was very hot, and it was better than nothing. As she walked
along she broke off small pieces and ate them slowly to make
them last longer.

"Suppose it was a magic bun," she said, "and a bite was as much
as a whole dinner. I should be overeating myself if I went on
like this."

It was dark when she reached the square where the Select
Seminary was situated. The lights in the houses were all
lighted. The blinds were not yet drawn in the windows of the
room where she nearly always caught glimpses of members of the
Large Family. Frequently at this hour she could see the
gentleman she called Mr. Montmorency sitting in a big chair, with
a small swarm round him, talking, laughing, perching on the arms
of his seat or on his knees or leaning against them. This
evening the swarm was about him, but he was not seated. On the
contrary, there was a good deal of excitement going on. It was
evident that a journey was to be taken, and it was Mr.
Montmorency who was to take it. A brougham stood before the
door, and a big portmanteau had been strapped upon it. The
children were dancing about, chattering and hanging on to their
father. The pretty rosy mother was standing near him, talking as
if she was asking final questions. Sara paused a moment to see
the little ones lifted up and kissed and the bigger ones bent
over and kissed also.

"I wonder if he will stay away long," she thought. "The
portmanteau is rather big. Oh, dear, how they will miss him! I
shall miss him myself—even though he doesn't know I am alive."

When the door opened she moved away—remembering the sixpence—
but she saw the traveler come out and stand against the
background of the warmly-lighted hall, the older children still
hovering about him.

"Will Moscow be covered with snow?" said the little girl Janet.
"Will there be ice everywhere?"

"Shall you drive in a drosky?" cried another. "Shall you see the
Czar?"

"I will write and tell you all about it," he answered, laughing.
"And I will send you pictures of muzhiks and things. Run into
the house. It is a hideous damp night. I would rather stay with
you than go to Moscow. Good night! Good night, duckies! God
bless you!" And he ran down the steps and jumped into the
brougham.

"If you find the little girl, give her our love," shouted Guy
Clarence, jumping up and down on the door mat.

Then they went in and shut the door.

"Did you see," said Janet to Nora, as they went back to the room-
-"the little-girl-who-is-not-a-beggar was passing? She looked
all cold and wet, and I saw her turn her head over her shoulder
and look at us. Mamma says her clothes always look as if they
had been given her by someone who was quite rich—someone who
only let her have them because they were too shabby to wear. The
people at the school always send her out on errands on the
horridest days and nights there are."

Sara crossed the square to Miss Minchin's area steps, feeling
faint and shaky.

"I wonder who the little girl is," she thought—"the little girl
he is going to look for."

And she went down the area steps, lugging her basket and finding
it very heavy indeed, as the father of the Large Family drove
quickly on his way to the station to take the train which was to
carry him to Moscow, where he was to make his best efforts to
search for the lost little daughter of Captain Crewe.

On this very afternoon, while Sara was out, a strange thing
happened in the attic. Only Melchisedec saw and heard it; and he
was so much alarmed and mystified that he scuttled back to his
hole and hid there, and really quaked and trembled as he peeped
out furtively and with great caution to watch what was going on.

The attic had been very still all the day after Sara had left it
in the early morning. The stillness had only been broken by the
pattering of the rain upon the slates and the skylight.
Melchisedec had, in fact, found it rather dull; and when the
rain ceased to patter and perfect silence reigned, he decided to
come out and reconnoiter, though experience taught him that Sara
would not return for some time. He had been rambling and
sniffing about, and had just found a totally unexpected and
unexplained crumb left from his last meal, when his attention was
attracted by a sound on the roof. He stopped to listen with a
palpitating heart. The sound suggested that something was moving
on the roof. It was approaching the skylight; it reached the
skylight. The skylight was being mysteriously opened. A dark
face peered into the attic; then another face appeared behind it,
and both looked in with signs of caution and interest. Two men
were outside on the roof, and were making silent preparations to
enter through the skylight itself. One was Ram Dass and the
other was a young man who was the Indian gentleman's secretary;
but of course Melchisedec did not know this. He only knew that
the men were invading the silence and privacy of the attic; and
as the one with the dark face let himself down through the
aperture with such lightness and dexterity that he did not make
the slightest sound, Melchisedec turned tail and fled
precipitately back to his hole. He was frightened to death. He
had ceased to be timid with Sara, and knew she would never throw
anything but crumbs, and would never make any sound other than
the soft, low, coaxing whistling; but strange men were dangerous
things to remain near. He lay close and flat near the entrance
of his home, just managing to peep through the crack with a
bright, alarmed eye. How much he understood of the talk he heard
I am not in the least able to say; but, even if he had understood
it all, he would probably have remained greatly mystified.

The secretary, who was light and young, slipped through the
skylight as noiselessly as Ram Dass had done; and he caught a
last glimpse of Melchisedec's vanishing tail.

"Was that a rat?" he asked Ram Dass in a whisper.

"Yes; a rat, Sahib," answered Ram Dass, also whispering. "There
are many in the walls."

"Ugh!" exclaimed the young man. "It is a wonder the child is
not terrified of them."

Ram Dass made a gesture with his hands. He also smiled
respectfully. He was in this place as the intimate exponent of
Sara, though she had only spoken to him once.

"The child is the little friend of all things, Sahib," he
answered. "She is not as other children. I see her when she
does not see me. I slip across the slates and look at her many
nights to see that she is safe. I watch her from my window when
she does not know I am near. She stands on the table there and
looks out at the sky as if it spoke to her. The sparrows come at
her call. The rat she has fed and tamed in her loneliness. The
poor slave of the house comes to her for comfort. There is a
little child who comes to her in secret; there is one older who
worships her and would listen to her forever if she might. This
I have seen when I have crept across the roof. By the mistress
of the house—who is an evil woman—she is treated like a pariah;
but she has the bearing of a child who is of the blood of kings!"

"You seem to know a great deal about her," the secretary said.

"All her life each day I know," answered Ram Dass. "Her going
out I know, and her coming in; her sadness and her poor joys; her
coldness and her hunger. I know when she is alone until
midnight, learning from her books; I know when her secret friends
steal to her and she is happier—as children can be, even in the
midst of poverty—because they come and she may laugh and talk
with them in whispers. If she were ill I should know, and I
would come and serve her if it might be done."

"You are sure no one comes near this place but herself, and that
she will not return and surprise us. She would be frightened if
she found us here, and the Sahib Carrisford's plan would be
spoiled."

Ram Dass crossed noiselessly to the door and stood close to it.

"None mount here but herself, Sahib," he said. "She has gone
out with her basket and may be gone for hours. If I stand here I
can hear any step before it reaches the last flight of the
stairs."

The secretary took a pencil and a tablet from his breast pocket.

"Keep your ears open," he said; and he began to walk slowly and
softly round the miserable little room, making rapid notes on his
tablet as he looked at things.

First he went to the narrow bed. He pressed his hand upon the
mattress and uttered an exclamation.

"As hard as a stone," he said. "That will have to be altered
some day when she is out. A special journey can be made to bring
it across. It cannot be done tonight." He lifted the covering
and examined the one thin pillow.

"Coverlet dingy and worn, blanket thin, sheets patched and
ragged," he said. "What a bed for a child to sleep in—and in a
house which calls itself respectable! There has not been a fire
in that grate for many a day," glancing at the rusty fireplace.

"Never since I have seen it," said Ram Dass. "The mistress of
the house is not one who remembers that another than herself may
be cold."

The secretary was writing quickly on his tablet. He looked up
from it as he tore off a leaf and slipped it into his breast
pocket.

"It is a strange way of doing the thing," he said. "Who planned
it?"

Ram Dass made a modestly apologetic obeisance.

"It is true that the first thought was mine, Sahib," he said;
"though it was naught but a fancy. I am fond of this child; we
are both lonely. It is her way to relate her visions to her
secret friends. Being sad one night, I lay close to the open
skylight and listened. The vision she related told what this
miserable room might be if it had comforts in it. She seemed to
see it as she talked, and she grew cheered and warmed as she
spoke. Then she came to this fancy; and the next day, the Sahib
being ill and wretched, I told him of the thing to amuse him. It
seemed then but a dream, but it pleased the Sahib. To hear of
the child's doings gave him entertainment. He became interested
in her and asked questions. At last he began to please himself
with the thought of making her visions real things."

"You think that it can be done while she sleeps? Suppose she
awakened," suggested the secretary; and it was evident that
whatsoever the plan referred to was, it had caught and pleased
his fancy as well as the Sahib Carrisford's.

"I can move as if my feet were of velvet," Ram Dass replied; "and
children sleep soundly—even the unhappy ones. I could have
entered this room in the night many times, and without causing
her to turn upon her pillow. If the other bearer passes to me
the things through the window, I can do all and she will not
stir. When she awakens she will think a magician has been here."

He smiled as if his heart warmed under his white robe, and the
secretary smiled back at him.

"It will be like a story from the Arabian Nights," he said.
"Only an Oriental could have planned it. It does not belong to
London fogs."

They did not remain very long, to the great relief of
Melchisedec, who, as he probably did not comprehend their
conversation, felt their movements and whispers ominous. The
young secretary seemed interested in everything. He wrote down
things about the floor, the fireplace, the broken footstool, the
old table, the walls—which last he touched with his hand again
and again, seeming much pleased when he found that a number of
old nails had been driven in various places.

"You can hang things on them," he said.

Ram Dass smiled mysteriously.

"Yesterday, when she was out," he said, "I entered, bringing
with me small, sharp nails which can be pressed into the wall
without blows from a hammer. I placed many in the plaster where
I may need them. They are ready."

The Indian gentleman's secretary stood still and looked round
him as he thrust his tablets back into his pocket.

"I think I have made notes enough; we can go now," he said. "The
Sahib Carrisford has a warm heart. It is a thousand pities that
he has not found the lost child."

"If he should find her his strength would be restored to him,"
said Ram Dass. "His God may lead her to him yet."