UNA ASKS A QUESTION.
That afternoon, as soon as dinner was over and Marie had settled
herself for her afternoon nap, Una slipped through the gap in the
fence--how well she knew it now!--and started off by herself to try and
find again the door into Fairyland.
On she ran, until she came to a place where three paths met, and was
uncertain which to take.
A yellow butterfly, dancing gaily along one of the paths, decided her,
and Una followed it gleefully.
"Perhaps it's a fairy sent to meet me," she thought.
At last she came to the stump of a tree where Marie had rested, and
from there she soon found her way to the old wall in which was the
secret door.
It took her longer to find the door than the little girl had expected.
The ivy grew so thickly over the wall that she had to walk quite a long
way--pushing aside the branches and peering between the leaves--before
she found the little door once more.
Then she pulled away the twisted branches of the ivy which had grown
across the door, and turned the handle timidly.
For a moment she thought the door was locked; then she heard a queer
sort of grating sound and something fell on the other side of the wall.
Una pulled once more, and the door opened slowly towards her.
What the little girl saw on the other side of the wall was so lovely
that she gave a gasp of delight, and then stood, quite still, looking
through the small doorway.
As far as she could see was a long bower of lovely pink and white
flowers. Hundreds of bees hummed amongst the blossoms; but to Una the
buzzing sounded like hundreds of tiny voices, and she thought she heard
the fairies talking.
"Fairies! Fairies!" she called softly. But no one answered, and very
soon the little girl stepped through the doorway and walked down the
apple-blossom path, looking from side to side to see if there were any
fairies hiding near.
On she went, until the pink and white bower turned into a wide walk
with masses of gay May flowers on either side, and this in turn ended
in a big square garden with stone walks and bright flower-beds, and a
fountain sparkling in the midst.
In the stone basin of the fountain were pretty gold and silver fish.
"Fairy fishes!" Una thought, for she had never seen goldfish before,
and she was still bending over the basin when she heard a tap, tap, tap
on the stone pathway, and, turning quickly, saw a very small, very old
lady coming towards her.
[Illustration: "She was still bending over the basin when she heard a
tap, tap, tap."]
"A fairy godmother," thought Una. "I didn't know they lived in
Fairyland."
Then she went to meet the old lady, giving a quaint little curtsey and
waiting for her to speak.
"Well, little girl," said the old lady kindly, "and who are you?"
"I'm Una," said the child gravely.
Then she gave a sudden jump in the air.
"Oh, fairy-godmother, how kind of you--there's my puppy dog!" she
cried, as a fat retriever puppy gambolled down the path and flung
itself playfully upon her.
The old lady looked amused.
"A fairy godmother, am I?" she said, smiling. "What can I do for you,
then?"
"Oh, such a lot of things!" said Una. Then a surprised look came into
her face: "Why, here's an old gentleman!" she said. "I didn't know
there were fairy godfathers too. Do you live in Fairyland together?"
The old lady laughed outright.
"Dear child, do you think this is Fairyland?" she asked.
"_Isn't it_ Fairyland?" said Una. "Oh, dear, I thought it must be when
I came through the little door."
"The little door?" said the old lady. "Where is that?"
"The door in the wall," said Una. "I found it yesterday when I was in
the wood, and I thought it was one of the doors to Fairyland."
"Ah! the little door at the end of the apple walk," said the old lady
"I had almost forgotten it, it is so long since it has been used--and I
thought it was locked, too," she added, half to herself. "Edward," she
said, raising her voice a little as she spoke to the old gentleman,
"here is a little girl who has found her way into our garden thinking
it was Fairyland."
"And a very nice kind of Fairyland too," said the old gentleman,
"especially when this kind of little fairy comes to visit us," and he
held out his hand to Una kindly.
"You are the little girl from the Grange, are you not?" asked the old
lady; then, remembering some rather queer tales she had heard of the
new people at the Grange, she asked no more questions, but said that
tea would soon be ready, and invited Una to stay and have it with them.
After all it was almost as nice as being in Fairyland, Una thought, as
they sat under a large cherry tree covered with snowy blossoms, and
drank tea out of the thinnest of china cups, each one shaped like a
different flower, with a beetle or a bird or a butterfly for the
handle. The clearest of honeycomb was on the table, which the old
gentleman had sent for especially for Una; and the black puppy sat at
her side all tea-time, opening his wet, black mouth for tastes of bread
and butter, and rubbing his head against her knee if she forgot to give
him any.
When tea was over Una looked at the sun.
"Oh, dear," she said, "the sun is getting quite low, and Marie will
think I am lost."
"Dear, dear! We ought to have thought of that," said the old lady.
"Will not your father be anxious also?"
"Papa is away from home for a few days," said Una.
Then she made a little curtsey.
"May I go now, please?" she asked; and the old lady walked with her as
far as the little door.
"Come another afternoon to Fairyland," she said, as she stooped to kiss
the little girl.
Una promised readily, and only remembered when she was half way through
the wood that her father did not like her to visit at strange houses.
"I'll tell him where I've been directly he comes home to-morrow," she
thought.
But when she pushed her way through the bushes in the Grange garden she
saw her father coming quickly across the lawn towards her, with a
short, stout gentleman beside him.
"My little girl, where have you been?" he said. "Marie came to me in
great distress just now and told me that Mademoiselle Una was lost, and
we have been looking for you everywhere."
"Father, dear father, don't be angry, please," said Una coaxingly; "but
I've been to tea this afternoon with a dear old lady and gentleman, and
they live in the loveliest garden in the world--at least I think it
must be. And they want me to come again; and I do want to go very
much, please, father. So don't say 'no,' as you do when I want to go
to tea with Norah and Dan. Please, _please_, father, say 'yes.'"
Monsieur Gen hesitated and glanced towards his friend. But the little
stout gentleman was frowning, and Una thought what a disagreeable man
he was, and wished that he had not come home with her father, when they
might have had such a nice evening together, just he and she alone.
"It is not wise to let the child go anywhere she likes among strangers.
You know what children's tongues are like, and how easily stories get
afloat," the stranger said in French.
But Una understood French as well as she understood English, and she
felt very angry with the stranger for trying to persuade her father not
to let her go and see the dear old lady and gentleman again.
"No, dear. You must learn to stay quietly here in the garden," said
her father; and Una said no more then, but walked slowly across the
lawn into the house and upstairs to the nursery, where she was scolded
by old Marie for having run away by herself that afternoon.
And it was not until some hours later--after she had watched the
strange gentleman driving away to the station--that she ran downstairs
to the library and asked the question which had been puzzling her
little brain for the last few weeks.
"Father," she said, "I want to know _why_ I mayn't go and see other
little boys and girls, and go to church, and go to see the people in
the cottages, as Norah and Tom and Ruth do."