"O dearest auntie. I have got nearly—not quite five shillings. Can I
get rid of him for that?"
My dear aunt looked grave.
"You are not jealous, are you, pet?"
"Jealous! Oh aunt! I hate him! I could kill him."
"My Tootsie! this is not yourself, indeed it is not. Your mother will
not love you the less because of him."
I smothered my tears. My heart beat furiously. I did not know how to
bear it—the sight of the horrid, beastly, tobackerish monster in our
pretty, tidy, sweet home.
I said no more in the cab to auntie, who I felt was hurt at what I
said; but aunt is so good and so kind that she could not hate or be
uncivil even to such an one as the New Master.
We reached home. The door was opened. Susan was smiling. Then I saw
Martha—she held some sweets in her hand; she was laughing.
"Oh, missie! what will you say! He is such a darling!"
He—the bailiff, smelling of smoke! putting his pot of stout on my
mamma's piano!
"How can you say so, Susan? You are wicked, heartless," I said.
"Come and see him, and kiss him," said my aunt.
"Kiss him! I will die first."
"See him, at all events."
"I don't want to see him. I want to see my mamma—and oh, where is my
papa?"
Then mamma's door opened, and out came papa, back from Nowhere. I
rushed to him. I was in his arms in an instant.
"Come and see him," said my father, and he carried me into my mother's
room.
"Where is he?" I asked, looking round for the monster.
"Here, pet; kiss him," said mamma—and held up to me the sweetest,
dearest Baby Brother!
[Illustration]
[Illustration]
Peter.
A RUSSIAN STORY.
_BY FANNY BARRY._
————————
IT was Fair Day in the village of Vuicksa, and a throng of gaily
dressed peasants, walked up and down the broad, sandy road between the
booths, or stood in groups bargaining or talking with the proprietors
of the various stalls. There was a deafening clatter, the sellers,
striving to attract the buyers, by descriptions of their wares, shouted
out at the top of their voices; and all were busily eating their
favourite sunflower seeds—the husks of which, peeled off and thrown
aside, strewed the ground thickly in all directions.
In one place, a tall woman with a brilliant handkerchief tied over
her head, and a holiday gown of brightest red; was haranguing an old
wizened man in a long grey coat, bound round the waist with a green
sash.
"It's all very well, Ivan Panovitch. You ask a rouble for these shoes,
and your conscience tells you they are not worth eighty copecks.
Satisfy yourself now by doing a just deed. Let me have them for
eighty-five! You will sleep better for it, you will indeed."
The old man shrugged his shoulders, and turned towards an
impish-looking boy, who sat cross-legged on a box by his side.
"What do you say, Peter, shall we let the worthy Katrina have them for
eighty-five?"
The child shook his long dark hair, and looked at the old man with a
sharp glance from his bright grey eyes.
"Certainly not," he said, decidedly; "they are worth ninety—not a
copeck less."
He got down leisurely from his box, and coming up to the counter, took
one of the shoes and tapped it critically.
"Good work and good material," he said, gravely; "not a copeck less
than ninety;" and he clambered up on to his seat again.
"He is a clever child, my Peter," said the old man, chuckling with
glee. "He knows the price of every shoe in the stall better than I do
myself. He has had an eye for a shoe ever since he was a baby."
After more haggling, "the worthy Katrina" finally bought the pair of
shoes she had set her heart upon, and prepared herself for a little
neighbourly conversation. She lived in a little wooden house next door
to the one-roomed log hut inhabited by Ivan Panovitch and his adopted
child, Peter; and frequently ran in to do a little sweeping up and
scrubbing for the old man, whom she had known from her childhood.
Who little Peter was nobody knew. Ivan had found him early one morning
as he went to his work in the great iron foundry close by, done up in a
shawl of grey homespun, and lying upon a heap of "slag," the refuse of
the smelting furnace.
Peter was a baby then, but even at that period of his life he was not
like other babies. He looked up at Ivan with a pair of bright, serious
eyes, and did not cry when he was lifted up and carried into the old
man's house.
Ivan did not know in the least what to do with him, and felt
embarrassed as the sharp eyes followed his every movement.
He had never had anything to do with children, but his first thought
was that the baby must be hungry, and he hesitated and considered
deeply as to what it would be best to give it to eat. "I can't leave
it out there for any stray dogs to sniff at," he said to himself. "I
wonder where it comes from! I shall go to the priest, and the police,
to enquire, but meantime what shall I do with it? I'll warm up a little
kwass, and give it some pieces of black bread in it."
This strange food was accordingly prepared, and the baby, who remained
solemnly staring at everything about it, was fed by the old man with
bits of the soaked bread, administered in a gaily-coloured wooden spoon.
Katrina happening to pass by, and seeing the door open, came in just
in time to see Ivan seated on a stool with the little grey bundle on
his knees, holding up its head with one arm, whilst with a face of the
greatest gravity he prodded at its mouth with the spoon.
"Hi! yi! Ivan Panovitch, what have you got there? A child! What a
strange-looking creature! It is solemn as a young owl! And what in the
world are you doing to it?"
"I am feeding it," replied Ivan Panovitch, with some pride. "It was not
exactly crying, but it had a hungry appearance. Where it comes from, I
know no more than you do. I found it by the slag heap and what I am to
do with it, the good Lord alone knows!"
Ivan crossed himself devoutly, spoon in hand, and laying down the
infant on the old sheepskin spread on the white plastered stove, he put
the wooden bowl he had been using on the shelf; wiped the spoon on the
tail of his long grey coat, and looked at Katrina as if expecting that
she would make some suitable suggestion.
"I guess who the child belongs to," she said, seating herself beside
the baby, and beginning to examine its clothing to see if there was
any mark or sign to distinguish it. "Did you see those gypsies, little
father, who came through the village, yesterday, with the dancing
bears? One of the women—a miserable creature with black hair—had a
child tied up in a bundle on her back. Look at this little 'charm,'
Ivan Panovitch, tied round the poor thing's neck. It isn't a Christian
cross, or a Saint's picture, but a strange three-cornered brass thing
with a hole in it. 'That' means no good, you may be sure. The people
have cast off the child, and are far enough away by this time."
"If that's so I shall keep it," answered Ivan Panovitch, and as he was
slow in taking up an idea, but held to it tenaciously when he had once
got it, Katrina did not remonstrate, but only observed with Russian
fatalism,—
"Well, little father, certainly it is the Lord's will, and we cannot
struggle against it. I can't take it myself, for I have too many to
look to already, but I will fasten it up a cradle, and look after it
sometimes, when I can. Don't feed it on kwass though. I will show you
how to make it some food that won't kill it."
So it was that Peter became an inmate of Ivan Panovitch's little log
hut, and though enquiries were made in every direction, no one found
out anything more about him.
Ivan had him christened by the priest, and tied a cross round his neck
by the side of the brass triangle, which, for some reason he could
hardly have explained to himself, he left where some loving hand had
perhaps tied it.
"It can't do any harm," Ivan said to himself. "The cross must be
stronger than any heathenish sign like that, and he may as well have
every chance he can."
The choice of a name had very much perplexed the old man, but he
finally decided on "Peter," as, being the name of a favourite brother,
and of a Saint, it seemed a happy combination which it would be
impossible to improve upon.
So little Peter stayed, and grew in a slow but visible manner. He
never cried, but would lie all the time Ivan was at the works, in his
swinging cradle hung like a hammock from the ceiling, looking round
at the log room with his great grey eyes, and playing with the wooden
figures Ivan carved for him from pieces of pine wood.
Ivan was astonished what a difference the baby made in his life. It was
quite an affair to feed him before he started to his work, and a still
greater affair to give him a bath on Saturday evening, when the old
man would cover himself with the sheepskin for an apron, and let Peter
splash about in a tub full of warm water.
Peter thoroughly enjoyed this ceremony, and would take the wooden
animals to bathe with him, and delighted to splash old Ivan as he
looked at him with admiring delight! The drying process was generally
hurried over very rapidly, as Peter would wriggle about like a little
eel, and make faces at Ivan every time he attempted to touch him with
the sheepskin apron, which also acted as a towel.
When once he was in the cradle again Peter would crow and chatter, and
laugh till—as his indulgent foster father remarked—"it was more like a
monkey than a child!"
Ivan devoted every spare minute to him. He had his own coloured
wooden bowl on the shelf—the best one the house could boast of—he had
the gayest spoon, the warmest covering, and strange little garments
composed by Ivan himself with much toil and thought in the long winter
evenings.
At a very early age he had a pair of odd little blue trousers sewn for
him. They were cut out after the same design as Ivan's own; his best
pair being spread out flat, and nailed against the wall, that their
shape might be exactly copied.
They turned out when finished to be too long in the leg, but this
difficulty was obviated by the addition of three tucks, "which could be
let out as the child grew," as Ivan sagely remarked. They also evinced
an inclination to drop off when Peter moved, and a string had to be run
into the waistband to tie them up—but this also was a good thing, as it
could be enlarged when the child got older.
Ivan, indeed, felt that he should never be capable of undertaking a
second pair.
"I have made them now because I am in the full use of my faculties,"
he said to Katrina, "but in a year or two I shall not have the brain
for them. That pair and the shirt have aged me. A woman would hardly
understand the trouble I had in letting in the pieces under the arms.
Threading the needle alone took me hours. I have trained Peter to do
that now. He sits by me and hands me the thread and pins as I want
them. He is a very intelligent child."
So little Peter grew up. He soon learned to help his adopted father,
and became more handy than boys twice his age. He could cook the soup
for dinner, brew tea in the Samivar, wash out the hut when it had to be
treated to such a luxury, salt the cucumbers and fish for the winter,
bargain at the market, and get better bargains than Ivan himself.
He was still a strange-looking boy, small and thin, with great dark
eyes and a shrill voice. He took violent likes and dislikes to everyone
he came across. Katrina was never a friend of his, she had corrected
him too often when he was a baby, but her children he was fond of, and
their dog "Panoff" was his devoted slave.
He loved Panoff, though he was old, ugly, and despised—perhaps because
of that—and he placed him in his affections only next to Ivan, his
foster father, who he looked upon as a being quite apart from all the
rest of the world.
Ivan had endeavoured to instil his own simple beliefs in religion into
the child's mind, and they went to Church very regularly and observed
all the fasts, eating no butter or animal food, but having a little oil
with their fish occasionally as a treat.
Peter wearied of this sometimes, and would have liked to buy some of
the nice things he saw at the baker's, but he never dreamt of asking
his father for a copeck, and stifled his longing without saying a word
about it to anybody but Panoff.
By the side of their hut stood a little box-like shelter, shaped like a
dove cot, on the top of a tall pole—a kindhearted preparation for the
birds in winter time, which is often seen outside a Russian peasant's
house. This Peter always kept strewn with grain or crumbs, scrambling
up the pole for the purpose like a young monkey; and sometimes when
it was freezing and food was scarce, he would save a piece of his own
black bread, without saying anything to Ivan.
"I couldn't let the birds starve," he would say to himself, and would
overcome the temptation to eat up the last morsel, which often came
over him so strongly, he could hardly resist it—but somehow he always
"did." When he was very hard put to it, he made a little prayer, and
begged that his appetite might become smaller; but he was surprised to
find that this never seemed to be answered.
Ivan Panovitch worked at the iron works, until he became too old for
the hard life. Out of his earnings, he had managed to save, what
appeared to him, and to his neighbours, quite a little fortune; and
with it he had invested in a store of boots and shoes of all kinds.
Plaited bark shoes, such as were worn by himself and most of his
friends; women's boots, with showy patent leather ornaments and elastic
sides; black leather holiday top boots for the men, with bright red
tops; and shoes of every imaginable sort and description.
"I want the child to be brought up to some thriving trade," he said
to Katrina, when he first started his stall at the weekly market. "I
want him to feel he can get on, and make a way for himself, and I
think boots are as thriving as anything. You see, I have argued it
all out. People 'must' have boots whatever happens; they can't walk
about on 'slag' barefoot; and as the 'slag' won't cease to exist, but
will probably spread about more and more, and as people are every day
wishing to become more and more fashionable, I am pretty sure always to
have a market. Why only yesterday old Marsha Ivanovna, who has never
known anything but a bark shoe since she was born, came driving her
cart out of the forest, and sold a pig in the market to buy herself a
pair of smart shoes, and all because her grand daughter-in-law from
Mourum was married in kid slippers with sandals! These new fashions
will make my fortune, but I don't like them."
No sooner was the shoe trade started than Peter became a connoisseur in
boots, and indeed very soon knew far more about them than his adopted
father, who looked on at his acquirements with more than parental pride.
"You save me all trouble, my child," he often said to Peter. "You are
the pride of my life. Fortunate was the day I found you on the 'slag'
heap!"
Many people might have thought—and indeed, did not hesitate to say—that
Peter was not much to be proud of. He was certainly a very ugly little
boy, but to old Ivan he appeared (for love is a wonderful softener of
defects) the most remarkable child that ever lived.
He still wore the celebrated blue homespun trousers, which had become a
sort of part of himself—a portion of his being, without which he would
not have been Peter at all.
The last tuck had been let out long ago, and the string had departed
from the waistband.
Ivan himself had become so used to them, that ever since the letting
out of the last tuck he had measured the child's height by them with a
measuring stick, which he borrowed from a shop close by. The measures
were written in charcoal high up on the white plaster of the stove (so
that they should not be rubbed off), and in large round figures of a
peculiar make, known only to Ivan himself, whose everyday calculations
were conducted on a many-wired frame, with a series of little coloured
balls that slid up and down.
The list was headed by a large "Peter," in Russian, and the date,
followed by a sketch of a leg in a trouser, with "1st year, 4½ inches"
("from the ground to the hem," as Ivan would explain to anyone who
asked him), "2nd year, 6¼ inches," "3rd year, 7½," and so on, up to the
day when Peter and his "father" stood in the stall at the Fair, and
bargained about the shoes with the "worthy Katrina."
Thus the blue trousers became historical, and were immortalized in a
frescoe, and Peter approached rapidly to the time when he would arrive
at the dignity of his first pair of top boots. These he was to choose
himself on the very day my story commences, and he had been enduring
much wear and tear of spirit in deciding which pair of the numerous
stock would be the best and wisest to fix upon.
Some had better soles, some brighter "tops," some better leather.
Altogether he was quite worn-out with the struggle to decide.
He had put three pairs on one side, and whenever he was not observed by
his adopted father, he hovered over these, pinching the leather, and
tapping upon the soles, and then, putting them in natural attitudes,
as if they were walking, he would go off to a distance to contemplate
the effect. Each boot was good of its kind, each had some almost cruel
advantage over its brethren. At last Peter decided that he would draw
lots for them. He marked the boots with numbers on the soles, and gave
Ivan small papers to hold with figures to correspond. He then drew one,
and the number he first chose was to be the decisive one.
He positively trembled as he put out his little hand and took a paper;
but he never thought of disobeying the verdict.
Number five became his property. A good, stout, serviceable pair of
boots, though not so red at the tops as he could have wished. Still you
cannot have everything in this world, and "use is better than show," as
he told himself with much philosophy.
Katrina had been looking on at the "lottery" with her little daughter
Maria, who was the greatest contrast to Peter that could possibly be
imagined. Maria was almost white-haired, through bleaching in the sun;
she had a fair, rosy face, and blue eyes, and her long holiday cotton
dress of emerald green was tied in round the waist with a bright gold
band. Her little legs were rolled up in linen bands tied with string,
instead of stockings, and bark shoes were on her feet. She also was
eating sunflower seeds, and looking at Peter out of her small eyes,
as if wondering what he would do next. Indeed she regarded him as so
eccentric that nothing would have surprised her.
"Will you come for a walk with me, and get a cake?" said Peter very
grandly, as he jumped over the counter, and took Maria's little soft
hand. "Panoff shall come too; and see, I have my new boots on," and
Peter looked at his new acquisitions with secret pride. "Next year I
am to have a felt hat with peacocks' feathers round it, like father
Ivan's. Shan't I look grown-up then, Maria?"
"Quite a tall man," said little Maria, admiringly.
The children threaded their way through the noisy groups till they
came to the sweet stall, where cakes of every description, and most
unwholesome appearance, decorated with gold leaf and pictures, were
disposed in tempting heaps.
Peter bargained for a cake horse on which Maria had set her affections,
and when this was secured he turned away, having bought a very
dry-looking biscuit for Ivan, and nothing for himself.
"Oh, Peter, you shall have one of the legs," said Maria. "How kind of
you to spend all your money on me."
But Peter would not hear of breaking up the animal. He liked to do
things in a princely manner, and was secretly much pleased at the added
respect with which Maria spoke to him now he had acquired the dignity
of top boots.
Ivan accepted the biscuit gratefully, as he would have accepted a
handful of sand if Peter had chosen to make him a present of it!
"He is a marvellous boy," he said to Katrina, who like some other
people was not too fond of hearing any children praised but her own.
"Oh, I daresay," she replied, "but wait till it comes to doing anything
he doesn't like—we shall see then!"
Peter, who heard this, looked at her with flashing eyes. "You are
a disagreeable woman," he said hotly, but Ivan hushed him up, and
apologised to Katrina—keeping the peace as well as he could between
these two who never understood each other.
So the Fair went on, and Peter worked very hard to attract customers to
his adopted father's stall. He felt very proud as he threaded his way
amongst the throng, with a string of gaily-coloured shoes across one
shoulder; and he fitted them on to several barefooted and unsuspecting
infants before they knew what he was doing, and so talked over the
parents that they were induced, by the handsome appearance of their
children's feet, to buy the slippers on the spot. Very likely they
repented it five minutes after, but that was not Peter's affair.
As he was crossing the sandy road to return to Ivan with his roubles,
he stumbled up against two gentlemen who were evidently strangers to
the place. They were dressed very fashionably, and Peter noticed their
pointed patent leather boots with a feeling of professional awe and
admiration.
They had rather disagreeable faces, though their hats were so
wonderfully new and shiny. One of them had a large red pin in his
necktie, that was almost the size, and just the shape, of a bird's egg.
"Perhaps it 'was' a bird's egg," thought Peter. "If so, how pleasant it
would be to live in a country where birds laid such eggs as that!"
"Why here's a young bootmaker, Nicholas!" said one to the other, with a
laugh. "Not the kind 'we' want, though, is it?"
His companion smiled, so that his black waxed moustache seemed to curl
up to his eyebrows.
"It may be a twig of the same branch, though," he said, with what Peter
thought a very disagreeable expression indeed.
"Here, you child," said the first speaker, "come up to the Post House
to-morrow morning, and bring some thick boots for us to see. Come
alone—do you hear?—and early. We don't want a crowd."
"We may be able to dig something out of him; he looks sharp," he added
in an aside to his friend.
Peter flew off to his adopted father, with his unusually large mouth
extended to its utmost limits by a broad smile.
"Oh, little father, such luck! We must give a candle to S. Peter! The
grand gentleman at the Post House wants boots. I am to take them there,
quite alone, to-morrow morning!"
The next day, about nine o'clock, Peter set off for the Post House,
carrying the boots in a bag over his back.
He was shown into an empty room, and putting his bag on the floor
behind the door, he looked about to see what he could amuse himself
with until the gentlemen came in.
There were some Russian and French books strewed about the table,
which was covered with what Peter considered to be an exceedingly
elegant table cover, with vast pink roses on a red ground. There were
cigarettes, and cigar cases, and writing materials; but better than
all, Peter discovered underneath the table a row of the most beautiful
shoes and slippers!
He was afraid of pulling them out, in case their owners should come in,
in the middle; so he dragged the edges of the table cloth well round
him, and began to examine the treasures with sparkling eyes.
What soles! What stitching! His heart beat with emulation. "If only
I could sell shoes like that, I should be quite happy!" he said to
himself.
Before Peter had half finished his admiration the door opened, and, to
his horror, in walked the two gentlemen of the Fair!
Peter was quite paralyzed. How could he come out from his ridiculous
position without making himself appear a mere silly child? They could
not know he had been prompted only by professional zeal. They would
refuse to buy boots of him. He would be degraded for ever!
While these thoughts chased each other rapidly through his head, the
two gentlemen had seated themselves by the window, and lighted their
cigarettes.
"We shall get him now, or someone quite near enough," said the man
with the black moustache. "As soon as the Cossacks come we can do the
thing quietly. We must satisfy Boris somehow. As we were told to hunt
down a 'Nihilist shoemaker' we can't do better than take old Panovitch.
I daresay he has no ideas at all, but that's not 'our' business. We
must think of the reward. He has been 'plotting against the Tzar,'
endangering the peace of the kingdom; away with him to Siberia!" and
the young man leant back in his chair, and laughed heartily.
The first part of this speech Peter had listened to in blank
astonishment; at the last words he sprang from under the table with a
roar like a little wild animal.
His violent movement upset the table, and the two strange gentlemen
bounded from their seats.
"Oh, it's our young friend of the Fair," said the Black Moustache,
coolly, as he picked up the tablecloth and gazed at Peter, whose eyes
were literally blazing with fury.
"I'm not your friend," cried Peter, in a voice he could scarcely
recognize as his own—it was so loud and fierce. "I 'hate' you! but you
shan't kill my little father. You shall send me to Siberia thirty times
before you touch him!"
The boy had seized a paper knife from the floor, and even his odd
scanty blue trousers could not deprive him of a certain wild grace and
freedom, which in spite of his plain face, moved the two gentlemen to
look at him with more attention.
"We can't bribe such a creature as this. What shall we do with him?"
said the fair-haired man, gazing at his friend helplessly. "If he goes
home all our plans will be upset, and we shall have to start off again
on this vile, fatiguing journey to find another shoemaker, who mayn't
be so easy to manage."
"Leave it to me. I've thought of a plan," replied Black Moustache. "I
know of a nice safe place, where our friend can be taken care of till
the evening," and before Peter could scream out he had tied a thick
handkerchief over his mouth and bundled him up in a long cloak which
covered his head and pinned his arms down to his sides.
Peter felt himself lifted up roughly and carried down some steps, and
then along level ground, in spite of his struggles to get free, which
seemed to amuse the two gentlemen, who laughed more and more loudly.
It seemed to Peter that they must have been walking miles before he was
thrown down, not too gently, on to the ground, and half-dazed, found
himself on the plain outside the village.
A belt of pine and birch trees hid them from the houses, and it was
such a solitary spot that he knew very well that even if he screamed
his loudest no one would be in the least likely to hear him. The road
to Mourum ran across the plain, about two hundred yards from the spot
on which they were standing, but it was very seldom used by either
foot passengers or carts, as there was little traffic between the two
villages.
The plain was all dotted over with disused ore pits and with piles of
"slag," which had been carted there in past times, and now lay about in
great heaps, grown over by rank weeds and bushes.
The gentleman with the black moustache seized Peter firmly by the hand
and led him towards the mouth of one of the old shafts, which gaped
black and gloomy like the entrance to a well.
Peter felt instinctively that it was no use trying to touch the hearts
of his two tormentors. "My only chance would be to wriggle away and
then run for it," he said to himself; and then, because he was a plucky
little boy, and determined not to allow his enemies to see that he was
on the point of crying, he forced back the tears and looked round to
see if there was any hope of rescue. He had guessed instantly what they
intended to do with him. He was to be let down one of the ore pits and
left there until the evening.
"Don't be frightened, my dear little savage," said Black Moustache,
cheerfully. "We will come and take you out again on our way to Mourum
this afternoon. I should be sorry to leave you here longer than was
necessary, and if you had not been such an unnatural child we should
not have had to take all this trouble. You see what comes of deceit and
interference."
As he spoke Black Moustache took a long piece of cord out of his
pocket, and, notwithstanding that Peter fought for his liberty like a
little tiger cat, the rope was tied firmly round his waist and he was
lowered into the hole close beside them.
Down, down, Peter went, and the light got dimmer and dimmer, until he
was in absolute darkness. He did not scream or cry out, but two great
tears fell splash on to his hands as they clutched at the rope round
his waist. What would father Ivan say if he could see him now! Oh, if
he had only, "only" not met those gentlemen at the market! At last, to
his relief, his feet touched the ground, and he saw that he had not
gone so very far, after all. The opening at the top of the shaft was
quite visible, and he could hear the two gentlemen talking as they
walked rapidly away.
They had thrown the cord in on the top of Peter, and it fell in a
tangled heap round his head. His first thought was to gather it up and
fold it carefully together. He then examined the walls of his prison,
groping about as well as he could in the darkness; but the sides of the
shaft were too straight and crumbling for him to find any foothold, and
he had to resign himself to the fact that it was hopeless to think of
liberating himself.
"Ivan! Ivan Panovitch! Help! help! It is I, Peter! Panoff! Help!" he
shouted again and again, but nobody answered. Indeed, he had very
little hope that they "would," for he knew that it was seldom indeed
that anyone wandered into the desolate neighbourhood of the iron pits.
His one chance was that "Panoff" might hear him, for the old dog was
sometimes in the habit of straying about the country, poaching. So the
child continued to shout until he was quite hoarse, and it seemed to
him that hours must have passed by since he was first captured.
Peter had always been a little afraid of the dark; for, like most
Russians, he was superstitious, and had heard terrible tales of ghosts
and goblins. These now all came crowding into his mind; he could almost
fancy he saw mocking faces grinning at him from the darkness; but he
was really a brave child, and he determined that he would not give way
to these horrible fancies.
He remembered what father Ivan had often told him—that nothing could
hurt him while God and the holy angels watched over him; so he fingered
the little cross round his neck, and prayed fervently that someone
might be sent to take him out of his prison, or that, if this could not
be done, father Ivan might be saved without him.
"Let me stop here, if you'll only save him!" cried little Peter,
simply. "If you haven't time to do both, please, 'please' take care of
father Ivan!"
No heroic soul ever made a greater sacrifice of self than Peter made
at that minute, for the black hole became every moment more horrible
to him, and a rustling of wings—which turned out to belong to a grey
owl—almost paralyzed him with terror.
"Panoff! Panoff! Ivan! Help! help!" he screamed again; and this time
his voice was answered by a loud and joyful bark, which sounded just at
the edge of the shaft's mouth. Then a black head was thrust over, with
more noisy barks of recognition, and Peter saw to his delight that it
was Panoff indeed!
"Good dog! fetch someone! Fetch someone to help me! Hi! Panoff!" cried
Peter, and Panoff wagged his tail, and ran round and round the pit,
peering down, and whisking a small shower of sand and pebbles on to the
child's head.
Peter's heart beat high with hope. If he could only make Panoff
understand!
"Hi! Panoff! Fetch someone!" he shouted again and again; and at last
the old dog seemed to realize what was expected of him, and galloped
off, leaving Peter in a fever of excitement and suspense.
He could hardly believe his good fortune, when, in a very few minutes,
Panoff came trotting back, barking reassuringly, followed by the
sound of eager voices; and almost before Peter had realized what had
happened, he found himself drawn up to the surface, and blinking like a
little owl in the bright sunlight.
Panoff gambolled about him in excessive delight, jumping up to lick his
face a dozen times in a minute.
The party of rescuers looked on curiously. They were dark-complexioned,
rough-looking men, with long black hair, whom Peter knew at once to be
gypsies.
He had often heard about them from his foster father, and looked upon
them with awe as a roving people who never settled down anywhere in
"Christian" fashion.
However, he determined to try and induce them to help him, and as soon
as he had recovered himself a little he poured out his tale, and begged
them frantically to save Ivan Panovitch from the police and Siberia.
The group consulted together in low voices. Then one of the men stepped
forward, and took up the metal triangle that hung round Peter's neck,
and which had slipped out over his shirt as he was pulled up.
"Where did you get this, young one?" he asked.
Peter described how father Ivan had found him, a little baby, lying on
the "slag" heap.
"He is so good—there never was anyone so good!" cried Peter. "If only
you'll hide him till these wicked gentlemen have gone away, Katrina
will take care of the house and the boots."
"Well, we'll help you as much as we can," said the man, when Peter
had finished his little story. "That badge round your neck shows that
you once belonged to our tribe. Don't be frightened—we have too many
children to want to claim you! Run off as fast as your legs will carry
you and bring your old father here, and take this dog and lock him up
safely somewhere. Do you hear? We don't want him to follow us. He is
too fond of you, and might bring the Cossacks after us. Our carts and
the rest of our people are waiting on the road yonder, for we were on
our way to Vuicksa, but as soon as you join us we shall branch off into
the forest. Hurry! hurry! We will lend you some old clothes, though you
look the gypsy enough without them."
Peter scarcely waited to hear the end of the sentence. He had flown
across the plain, rushed into the yard at the back of the hut, closely
followed by Panoff; and, finding Ivan and Katrina planting some
sunflowers there, he breathlessly related his adventures, and hurried
the astonished old man through the woods to the place where the gypsies
were waiting, almost before he had realized the unexpected misfortune
which had overtaken him.
The gypsies instantly hurried the two away to their carts, and turning
the horses' heads, they galloped off towards Mourum again. As they went
along they threw an old coat over Ivan, and rubbed his face and Peter's
with some crushed berries, which made them appear a dark brown colour.
They next gave Peter an old shirt and some ragged brown trousers in
exchange for his cherished blue ones.
Peter's heart gave a great bound as they passed a group of Cossacks
riding along, but the men were laughing and talking, and did not even
glance at the gypsies' cavalcade.
"Let's go and get this job done," said one, "then we shall have a
chance of a little peace and rest at barracks," and they rode on
merrily.
Ivan clutched Peter's hand. The old man seemed to have wrinkled and
aged, and was trembling with fear and excitement. His life had hitherto
been so uneventful that the unexpected misfortune seemed to have
completely paralyzed him, and he clung to Peter pathetically as they
sat in the bottom of the rough cart on a heap of straw.
"They are going to fetch me, my child," he said. "If it had not been
for you I should never have escaped them! It is a blow, Peter, a sad
blow. After living for seventy years respected by all the village, to
be saved from Siberia by a pack of gypsies!"
The gypsies passed through Mourum, and pitched their camp in a clearing
in the forest beyond. Here they put up their tents, lighted a fire,
and, sitting about in picturesque groups, with their bright-coloured
clothing showing vividly against the gloom of the fir trees, they
cooked their food, and chatted together in their own strange language.
Meanwhile, Peter, sitting by Ivan's side, had begun to make friends
with the gypsy children, and was spinning tops with them upon the trunk
of a fallen tree. He was a real child in his power of throwing off
troubles, and at that moment his merry laugh—for Peter "had" a very
merry laugh—sounded like sweetest music to the old man's loving heart.
His face lost its dazed, careworn expression, and a smile gradually
stole over it as he watched the children's antics.
Suddenly, into the midst of this quiet woodland scene, one of the gypsy
boys, who had been sent into Mourum, came rushing like a whirlwind.
"Get up! get up!" he shouted, "the Cossacks have come into the town,
hunting for the old man and the boy. They are coming on here when they
have searched the houses. Someone has told them we are hiding; there is
no time to be lost!"
The gypsy chief rose from his seat under a rough tent, and, quietly
putting down his pipe, turned to his people.
"Get a cart ready immediately, Zedra," he said to one of the young men.
"Put provisions in, and drive our two friends to the hut in Viletna
wood, you know the one—near the village. Take care of them, and remain
there till we come."
Zedra got up obediently, everyone rousing themselves to help. The horse
was harnessed in an incredibly short time, and old Ivan Panovitch
and Peter being lifted into the cart, it drove off rapidly down the
twisting forest path.
The old man lay in a heap in the bottom of the cart, with his eyes
closed, and without moving. The terror and excitement had been too much
for him. He had fainted.
All Peter's frantic efforts to make him wake up had no effect, and at
last the child turned despairingly to Zedra—
"He isn't dead! He can't be dead! Oh, tell me he isn't dead!"
"Nonsense, boy; give him a dose of this," and the gypsy brought out a
leather bottle he carried in the pockets of his wide coat.
Peter poured some down Ivan's throat, and the old man opened his eyes
with a dazed, weary expression.
"The boots, Peter, the boots!" he murmured. "What a pity, what a waste!
The Cossacks will get them!"
Peter sat down amongst the straw and supported his foster father's head
on his knees.
"He is only a bit mazed from the shock—he'll get all right soon," said
Zedra, not unkindly; but Ivan did not get all right. On the contrary,
his mind began to wander, until he did not even recognize Peter.
On they drove, out from the forest and across the dreary plain, with
its scorched grass and stunted bushes; on and on, till Peter, in his
misery, began to think this horrible journey would never be ended.
At last they entered a wood again, and reached, by forest paths, a
hollow, which was so thickly surrounded by trees that at first it was
quite invisible. On the slope of this hollow stood a rough log hut
thatched with fir branches.
Here Zedra unharnessed the horse, and carrying poor Ivan Panovitch in
his strong arms, laid him down on a coat and some straw which Peter had
spread out on the floor of the hut.
This was the beginning of a long and tedious illness. Hardly ever
conscious, the old man lay quietly in the hut, refusing all food except
a little soaked bread, with which Peter fed him carefully from time to
time.
Every day Zedra went out on long expeditions into the country, and
brought back food of various kinds in the evening. Peter never asked
where it came from, for he shrewdly guessed that it would be better not
to enquire, and nothing seemed to matter much while Ivan Panovitch lay
so ill.
But one evening the twilight fell and Zedra did not appear. The moon
and stars shone out, and little Peter found himself quite alone in
the gloomy wood with his poor sick foster father. It was so still and
solitary that again dreadful tales came crowding into his mind, though
he tried bravely to drive them away and think only of Ivan Panovitch.
He shut and bolted the rough door, and sat down by father Ivan to watch
if he should show any signs of consciousness. A shaft of moonlight
shone between the trees, in through a hole in the roof, and lighted up
the old man's face. Two little stars appeared in the opening.
"We're not quite alone, for the angels are watching us," thought Peter.
"What bright eyes they have, and how far they must be away! Perhaps if
they look at father Ivan they will make him well again," and in the
silence of the hut Peter prayed from his heart, as he had often done
before, that the good old man might get better.
He then took off his own cross and the metal triangle from his neck,
and laid them by the side of Ivan Panovitch.
"Perhaps these might help to cure him," thought little Peter, "for I
seem to have tried everything else."
Ivan stirred feebly, and put out a hand to touch Peter. His eyes had
recognition in them. "Oh, he is better! he is better!" cried Peter, and
his heart sang for joy. He kissed the old man tenderly, and bent over
him asking how he felt, and smoothing the grey hair softly with one of
his rough little hands.
"I shall soon be better, Peter, my child—soon better," said Ivan
feebly. "You'll go home, my little one, and take the money, it's
hanging round my neck, and you'll go on at the market; but never buy
patent leather, it cracks so! The good God will take care of you—don't
forget that, Peter! I should like to have seen you in a felt hat, but
perhaps it is better like this. You've been the light of my eyes,
Peter, a wonderful boy. A wonderful boy!" murmured old Ivan. "Blessed
was the day I found you on the 'slag' heap!"
"Oh, don't go, dear little father! Stop with me! Don't leave me!"
cried Peter passionately, and threw himself down on his knees by the
old man's side; but Ivan could not hear his voice any more. The eyes
of the angels had looked down upon him, and little Peter's prayer was
answered. Ivan was better—better than he had ever been in all his
long toil-worn life. A happy smile was on his face; he seemed quietly
sleeping.
* * * * * *
Peter rushed from the hut out into the bright moonlight. The trees
waved and whispered overhead, for the wind had risen. Instinctively
Peter longed for human companionship. He ran rapidly towards the
village, but all the houses were dark and silent, and he did not dare
to knock at a door. Great waves of sorrow seemed rolling over him; he
felt alone in the world; and after wandering up and down the street
hopelessly, until he was too tired to walk any more, he sank down in
an angle of one of the walls, and worn-out with watching and grief, he
cried himself to sleep.
A good woman, from one of the cottages, found Peter the next morning,
but he did not realize that she was a stranger. He thought he was at
home in the little log hut at Vuicksa, and that Katrina was bending
over him, and he kept begging her piteously to take him to father Ivan.
He was carried into a house close by, and for several days he lay
tossing on the straw bed repeating pathetically the one cry for "Ivan!"
"Ivan!"
Everyone was interested in him, and he was nursed with real Russian
kindness; but no one could find out where he came from, until the
appearance of Zedra; who had been caught in the act of stealing some
vegetables on the very night of poor father Ivan's death, and was now
only liberated on the payment of a heavy fine.
He came with the gypsy leader and some of the tribe, and Peter's story
was soon known to the whole of the sympathizing village.
People who had felt sorry for him before now admired his courage and
self-devotion, and everyone tried who could do most to help him.
A messenger was sent off to Vuicksa to bring back Katrina and little
Maria, so that when Peter recovered, his first awakening should be to
friendly faces and not to those of strangers.
Katrina came gladly, for in her heart she sincerely loved Ivan and
Peter, and had waited anxiously, as the weeks passed and brought no
news of them. Maria—looking very important in the responsibility of her
first long journey—accompanied her mother, bringing a bag of her finest
sunflower seeds, and the hind portion of the veritable gilt cake horse,
that Peter had given her at the Fair more than a month ago, and which,
being her greatest treasure, she considered a suitable offering for the
invalid.
And Peter awoke one day to sense and reason—a sad awakening—but little
Maria was there with the faithful Panoff, and Peter was young, and the
world still held hope for him in the future.
His first act, when he recovered, was to beg the gypsies to return him
his blue homespun shirt and trousers; and, clad in these, he went, as
soon as he was strong enough, to visit the grave of father Ivan in the
churchyard of the little village. The gypsies had cared for it, and on
a wooden bar at the head these words were carved in crabbed Russian
characters—
IVAN PANOVITCH,
THE BELOVED FATHER OF
PETER.
Peter stood looking at it for some time, and then he knelt down in the
long grass and prayed silently.
Little Maria knelt too, with her hands clasped, and a bird, flying out
from a tree close by, settled on the board at the head of the grave,
and poured out a beautiful song of hope and thanksgiving.
[Illustration]
[Illustration]
Santa Klaus.
_BY HELEN WILMOT-BUXTON._
————————
"ROBIN, do you know when the ship will come home?"
"What ship, Bab?"
"Why, the one mother is always talking about. Don't you know, whenever
me or Paul wants anything, mother says, 'Not now, Bab, but 'some day,'
when our ship comes home.'"
Robin was much older than Bab; she was nine years old.
"I wish our ship would be quick and come home, that I do," said Paul.
"I think it will come soon, now, 'cause we have been waiting so long.
Don't you, Robin?"
"Perhaps this Christmas," suggested Bab.
Robin says nothing.
She is sitting on the low rocking-chair, looking pensively into the
glowing coals, and is wondering why she can no longer, like Bab and
Paul, believe in the ship that has been expected for so long, and has
not yet come—indeed, that seems as far as ever from coming.
Yes, sad as it may seem, Robin was actually beginning to doubt the very
existence of the ship that used to make her young life so happy.
"I wonder if there really 'is' such a ship," thinks Robin to herself.
"Ah! wouldn't it be nice if there were!"
"I think it must be a very big ship, Bab, don't you?" said little Paul,
wistfully.
"Of course it must be big, because it is going to bring us so many
things," said Barbara. "It is going to bring us everything we want."
"Robin, Santa Klaus will come to-night, you know, so we must not forget
to hang up our stockings," said Paul.
Poor Robin! Not only was her faith in the ship gone, but that in Santa
Klaus as well.
She had forebodings that this would be a very sad Christmas.
Father was ill, and mother had gone over the sea to him. It had
happened so suddenly that nothing had been arranged for Christmas;
indeed, no one had been able to think of anything but the sorrow and
anxiety sickness always brings.
For the first time in her life, Robin was sad. It was not so much for
herself, but for her father lying ill and her mother watching over him.
"I wonder what Santa Klaus will bring us," said Bab.
"I hope he'll bring me a whip and a box of soldiers," said Paul. "Then,
too, I should like a wheel-barrow and a spade, and a drum, and—"
"Oh, Paul dear, Santa Klaus will not bring so much. Only think how big
his pockets would have to be to hold all those things," said Robin.
"Well, I expect they are pretty large, or else how could he bring toys
to all the little boys and girls in the world," Paul answered. "What
would you like him to bring you, Robin?"
Robin looked thoughtful. "I should like him to bring me a letter saying
father was quite well, and that he and mother would come back in time
for Christmas."
"But won't mother?" cried Barbara, her eyes filling with tears.
"No, Bab dear, I don't think she will."
"Then we shan't have a Christmas tree, nor snapdragon, nor anything,"
said Paul.
"Is father very ill?" asked Barbara, plaintively.
"Don't cry, Bab dear—see, you are making Georgie begin. Father will
soon get well. Mother said I was to try and make you happy, and that we
were sure to be very good and do everything we were told. She would not
like us to sit and cry."
"I want a Christmas tree," said Paul.
"So do I, too," chimed in Georgie.
"Perhaps Santa Klaus will send us one if we are good," suggested Bab,
brightening up. "Don't you think he will, Robin?"
Then they forgot all about the Christmas tree and Santa Klaus, and had
a game of "fox and goose." They made so much noise that little Miss
Frost, the owner of the house, to whose care the children had been
temporarily consigned, came in to see what was the matter.
"Such a noise I never did hear," said Miss Frost. "I should have
thought the room to be full of young colts instead of nicely brought up
little girls."
"We were playing at 'fox and goose,'" said Robin. "Were we making too
much noise, Miss Frost?"
"Too much noise! Why, Miss Robin, me and Mrs. Evans could not hear
ourselves speak, with so much noise as that," said Miss Frost.
The younger children had taken hold of Robin's hand, and now stood
hiding their faces in their sister's frock.
They were afraid of Miss Frost when she was displeased with them, and
shrank from meeting her stern gaze.
"And such untidy, dirty little girls! What would mamma say, I
wonder—she would be shocked to see such nails, that she would."
Robin hung her head. She had quite forgotten about the washing and hair
brushing.
"I am very sorry, I am sure, Miss Frost, I forgot," she said humbly,
"It is all my fault."
"Some little girls always forget," observed Miss Frost. "A young lady
of your age ought not to forget; when I was a little girl, I can
remember saving up my money on purpose to buy myself a nail brush, so
that I might always be able to keep my nails nice."
This became interesting. The children had never realized before that
Miss Frost had ever been a child. That she had passed through that
delightful period, and actually saved up pennies, just as they were
doing, invested her with a new interest. Both Barbara and Paul ventured
to uncover their faces and look at her.
"How much was it?" asked Bab, putting a chubby finger between her lips.
"How much was it?" repeated Miss Frost, "I can't remember. It was a
very nice one with an ivory back, I remember that."
"Did you have any money left?" enquired Paul.
"Bless my heart! how can I remember?"
"Did you get anything else besides when you were a little girl?" Paul
asked, looking up into her face.
"Yes, I got books—nice, 'useful' books," said Miss Frost.
"Anything else?"
"I daresay," answered Miss Frost, not clearly remembering the
circumstances of her early life.
"Did not you buy sweets ever?" enquired Paul.
"Never," said Miss Frost, closing her lips very tight.
Paul's interest died away at once.
"Nor dolls?" enquired Barbara.
"Dolls. Ah I yes, I had a lovely wax doll, which my mamma kept on the
top shelf of her bureau, and which she was kind enough to let me play
with, when I was a very good little girl," said Miss Frost.
"I shouldn't have cared for that," said Barbara. "When mother used to
lock up my doll, I dressed up the sofa cushions and played with them.
Why didn't you?"
"When I was a little girl, I was not allowed to pull about the
furniture, as little girls seem to do now-a-days," Miss Frost answered
with significant emphasis.
"You must have been a very unhappy little girl, I think, poor Miss
Frost," Barbara said, deep sympathy in her voice.
"It is time for little girls to have their supper and go to bed," Miss
Frost said, changing the subject of conversation with quite a startling
rapidity.
"But it is Christmas Eve," said Barbara. "Mayn't we stay up?"
"Certainly not. I never heard of such a thing—never," said Miss Frost.
"See, I have brought you bread and jam, that's because it is Christmas
Eve, think of the poor little boys and girls that only have bread and
butter. Ah! is it not nice," and Miss Frost made a grimace supposed to
be expressive of supreme delight.
"But we have got to hang up our stockings," said Paul.
"Pack of nonsense!" said Miss Frost. "Fold them up neatly, and put them
in the chair beside your bed."
"But Santa Klaus won't be able to find them, you know," said Barbara.
"We always hang up our stockings on Christmas Eve. Didn't you, when you
were a little girl?"
"I don't remember that I ever did," said Miss Frost. "What do you think
you'll find in them, eh?"
"A wax doll and a scrap-book, some sweets, and perhaps something else,"
said Barbara.
"Well, I wouldn't expect too much if I were you," said Miss Frost.
"Him, whom you spoke of, has been very busy, and it is possible he may
forget to look in—he does sometimes, I have heard."
"He has never forgotten us—never," said Barbara.
"Eat your supper, my dear, and don't go romping again, there's good
children," said Miss Frost, and so saying she left the room.
After supper the little ones clustered round Robin, who told them a
story.
It was all about the ship that was to come, and was so absorbing in its
interest that the clock struck seven long before anyone had the least
idea it was bedtime.
Miss Frost prided herself upon her punctuality, and made her appearance
before the clock had ceased striking.
"Oh! please let us stay up just a little tiny minute longer," coaxed
Bab.
Miss Frost was not to be cajoled. "Come to bed at once, and don't be
naughty," she said.
"You don't expect 'me' to go to bed at seven, do you, Miss Frost?"
enquired Robin, incredulity in her voice.
"Why not, Miss Robin?"
"Because I am nine years old, and mother lets me stay up till eight
always," objected Robin.
Miss Frost gave in, but not without a protest.
When she was a little girl of nine she invariably went to bed at seven,
she said, and it was a good rule.
The children, having hung up their stockings, kissed and hugged Robin
and Miss Frost, and cuddled down in their warm beds to dream about
Santa Klaus and the ship. When the light had been extinguished Robin
followed Miss Frost into the passage.
"Please," she said, "may I run as far as the toy shop?"
Miss Frost was in a hurry, and did not wish to keep her friends in the
parlour waiting.
Without pausing to consider the motive of the request, she answered
quickly, and in the negative—"Read your book in the nursery, and at
eight I will come to put out the candle," she said.
And so, without another word, she hurried away, leaving Robin in
rebellious tears.
"Mother told me I was to make the little ones happy, and how am I
do that I should like to know if I can't go out and buy them toys?
If mother were here she would do it—I know she would. They will be
expecting presents all night, and when they wake up the first thing
they will do will be to look in their stockings, and then how horribly
disappointed they will be!"
She went to the cupboard, and reaching up to the top shelf, where her
money-box was, sprang down with it in her hand.
Poor little Robin! She had saved her pennies for a whole year. It had
been an act of self-denial, for she did not like saving so well as
spending. But she had had an object in view—a definite purpose—and
when one has an object steadily before one, a little self-denial is
necessary before achieving it.
She counted out her savings—there were pennies in abundance, a few
sixpences, some threepenny-bits, a great many farthings, and a stray
shilling or two, for shillings did not as a rule fall in Robin's way.
And all this self-denial! What did it mean?
Had she saved and hoarded for the sake of giving the little ones a
happy Christmas?
Oh, no! When she had begun to amass this wealth her object had been
quite other.
She had saved five shillings and sixpence, and with this money her
object might have been carried out. For five and sixpence she might
have purchased a large new cage for her favourite "Goldie," as she
called her bird—just the one she had set her heart upon.
"How I wish mother had said something about Christmas Eve," she said,
counting the money for a second time. "It does seem such a pity, and I
did so want 'Goldie' to have a new cage. How I wish there were such a
person as Santa Klaus, but of course there is not, or else why should
mother have come in so softly last Christmas Eve, and filled our
stockings herself. She will be so unhappy when she remembers that she
forgot to tell me what to do. I suppose it would be best to give up the
cage; how happy I could make the little ones with five shillings' worth
of toys; and as for Miss Frost, I must choose between her and mother."
So she put on her hat and cloak, and managed to slip out of the house
unobserved, the money in her pocket.
Her conscience smote her, it is true, for thus openly disobeying Miss
Frost, but she silenced it by thinking that she was doing what her
mother had told her, and that, after all, it was better to obey her
than Miss Frost.
Her heart beat quickly, and her eyes sparkled with excitement, for it
was a novel sensation to be thus out in the streets among the shops
alone, and in secret.
There was so much to be seen that she could scarcely tear herself away
from the shops.
All and each had some new attraction.
At last, and after frequent stoppages, she reached a toy shop, and went
boldly in, conscious of having five shillings in her pocket.
The shop was full of people, so she had to wait until her turn came to
be served.
There was an old gentleman seated at the counter reading the newspaper.
Robin wondered how it was possible for him to be as indifferent as he
seemed to the beautiful things lying about him.
There were, indeed, countless treasures in that toy shop, and if I had
the time I would try to describe some of them. As for Robin, her eyes
were riveted upon a bird cage, just the very one she had dreamt of—the
identical one Dickey at home would appreciate; in fact for any bird,
even the most fastidious, a most desirable mansion. But it was marked
five shillings. Among the cages and basket work, for one side of the
shop was devoted to such things, she saw a knitting basket which she
longed to buy for mother; then there was a tobacco-pouch which would
have suited father precisely; but no, these things were not for Robin.
"Some day, when I am rich, I will get them—when the ship comes home,"
she said to herself, and then, turning resolutely to the toys and
bon-bons, which she knew the children would like best, she carefully
made her choice.
The man was fastening up her purchases—there were a doll, a scrap-book,
a whip, reins, a box of soldiers, crackers, and I don't know what
besides—in fact, a most tempting display. The time had come to pay, and
Robin put her hand into her pocket to draw out her purse, feeling proud
of possessing so much money.
Alas! the purse was gone, and the pocket too. The shop began to swim
before her eyes. She felt hot and faint, she could scarcely breathe.
Where could it be? What had happened?
Little maidens, little maidens, take warning, and do not venture out
into the streets alone with five and sixpence in your pockets.
"Aren't you well, my dear?" said the old gentleman, kindly.
Robin answered nothing; but turning, fled into the street, leaving her
packages in the hand of the astonished shopman.
Her pocket was gone, quite gone; it had been cut out! Poor Robin!
Her precious savings; her little hoard—her self-denial—all, all
gone—useless!
No wonder she gave a choking sob and burst into tears.
Hardly knowing where she went, she ran down a long, dark street, where
there were fewer people. She had lost, not only her money, but her way.
"My dear, what are you crying about?" said a kind voice. "Have you lost
anything?"
She looked up and recognized the elderly gentleman who had been reading
the newspaper in the toy shop.
"I—I have lost my money and—and my way," sobbed Robin.
"Bless my soul!" said the old gentleman. "What a horrible catastrophe.
May I be allowed to ask how much?"
"Five shillings and sixpence," answered Robin, drying her eyes.
"Two half-crowns and a sixpence, eh?"
"No; shillings, sixpences, and pennies, and half-pennies, and
farthings," explained Robin. "I had been saving up, you know, and I
came out to buy toys and things to put in Barbara's, and Paul's, and
Georgie's stockings."
"And do you mean to tell me that Barbara, Paul and Georgie wear
stockings big enough to hold a five shillings' worth of goods?"
exclaimed the old gentleman, with evident incredulity. "Why, they must
be giants!"
Robin's sobs gave way to mirth.
"No; of course I was not going to put the doll and the scrap-book in,
only the little things," she explained.
"What is your name, my dear?"
"Robin."
"Any relation to the Robin Red-breast? Barbara, Paul, and Georgie are
your sister and brothers?"
Robin was astonished at the penetrating nature of the old gentleman's
intellect.
"And you were going to buy them Christmas presents with your own money;
all your little capital you were going to invest in toys, in fact."
Robin looked up, puzzled.
"I was going to buy them toys to make them forget what a dull Christmas
it is, because, you know, father is ill, and mother had to go and nurse
him, and so we are all alone. Then the little ones don't understand
that there is not such a person as Santa Klaus, and they have hung up
their stockings, which if I don't fill will—"
"Remain empty," remarked the old gentleman. "But surely, little maid,
'you' believe in Santa Klaus?"
"No, I don't," said Robin, with superior wisdom. "I am nine years old,
and I guessed it was mother who put the things in our stockings, so I
kept awake, and saw her come in. I was very sorry when I found out. I
liked to think there really was a Santa Klaus."
"And so there is, of course," said the old gentleman.
"What! Do you believe in him?" cried Robin.
The old gentleman winked knowingly, then placed his finger to his lips
with an air of supreme mystery.
"If I had thought there was I should have bought that bird cage," said
Robin. "I wanted it dreadfully, and have saved all my money to get it;
and now it is all gone."
"Well, the fact is, my dear, Santa Klaus has been playing you a trick,"
said the old gentleman.
Robin looked up wistfully.
"Do you think he has?" she asked, doubtfully, her eyes beginning to
twinkle.
"Haven't a doubt of it—Santa Klaus is a very sly personage, very
sly. Perhaps you can't believe it, my dear, but the fact is, I have
discovered the identical sum that you have lost in my waistcoat pocket,
and I have a shrewd suspicion that Santa Klaus knows how it came there."
"But is it in pennies, farthings, sixpences, and two shillings?"
questioned Robin, "because, you know, mine was."
"That is precisely the point I was going to draw your attention to; I
see that you are a very sharp little girl; it is conclusive, you see,
my dear."
The old gentleman began to rattle the money in his pocket, and it
sounded very pleasant in Robin's ears. "Oh! do let me see it!" she
cried.
Her companion winked mysteriously, as if he had particular reasons of
his own for refusing this natural request.
"Better not, my dear," he said, impressively. "Money has a habit of
flying away from me when I take it out of my pocket. We'll let it
repose in safety."
She looked up wonderingly into the kind face, and a rather troubled
expression came into her bright eyes.
"We had better go back to the toy shop, and fetch your parcels; I told
the man you had forgotten your purse," said the old gentleman.
"But is it true, 'really?'" asked Robin, much puzzled.
"Certainly; quite true."
"Then I wish Santa Klaus had not frightened me, because he has given me
a headache," said Robin, plaintively.
"He is a mischievous dog, but it does not do for us to make personal
remarks, he is rather huffy, and I think I had better keep your money,
and pay the man, lest he should be up to some new trick."
"I always thought he was such a kind, little man," said Robin.
The old gentleman laughed immoderately.
"So he is; he is the best-natured fellow alive, only full of his fun,"
he said.
"Did he give you my pocket as well?" said Robin, incredulously.
"No; he kept that for a keep-sake, I expect. You must not forget to
make yourself a new one. Where do you live, my dear?"
"At Miss Frost's, No. 6, Lovelace Terrace."
"Ah. Well, here we are at the toy shop. I'll fetch your parcels. Wait
here for me."
Robin would have liked to have seen the money paid over the counter,
for that would have proved without further doubt the truth of her new
friend's statement.
She did not like to doubt the old gentleman's word, of course, but when
a little girl has ceased to believe in the existence of Santa Klaus, it
is difficult for her to conquer her incredulity all at once.
Presently he came out, with the packages in his arms, and they resumed
their walk.
Robin soon forgot all her troubles, and her headache among them, her
new friend was so kind and so entertaining.
She confided to him her disobedience to Miss Frost, and asked him if
she had acted very wickedly in taking the matter into her own hands.
"There is Miss Frost herself, on the door-step, looking for you," said
the old gentleman.
"Yes; and she looks very angry, too," Robin whispered, holding her
friend's hand with a tighter clasp. "Do speak for me, and take my part,
please."
"Never fear, my dear," said the old gentleman. "I'll take the entire
blame, I assure you."
Robin could not but admire the noble resolution and daring of her
companion, and much envied him his courage.
He went forward with a polite bow, confronting the awful Miss Frost
with a bland smile.
"Excuse me, my dear madam," he said, "but my little friend and I have
been looking at the shops; if there is any blame, I assure you it rests
upon me alone."
Miss Frost smiled.
"Ah, sir, if that's the case, of course—but—the fact is, I was anxious,
very anxious. May I enquire your name, sir?"
The old gentleman had handed his parcels to Robin. He stepped a few
paces back and raised his hat.
"Madam," he said, "I am Santa Klaus!"
The next minute he had gone. I don't mean that he disappeared into
space—he did not do that. He walked slowly and with stately pace to the
end of the terrace, where he turned the corner and was lost to sight.
"What did the gentleman say his name was?" enquired Miss Frost.
"He said he was Santa Klaus," said Robin; "I don't understand it."
Then, following Miss Frost into the passage, she added, in a tremulous
voice, but with a brave little face, "It was not his fault, it was
mine, Miss Frost. I went out to buy these toys for the children, and I
lost my way. Will you forgive me, please? I—I hope you won't be very
angry."
Miss Frost looked grave, but after administering a severe reproof, she
kissed Robin and even helped her to arrange the toys.
"I think I'll hang up my stocking as well, but I don't expect to find
anything in it, because you know, Miss Frost, I don't believe in Santa
Klaus—not 'quite,' at least," she added thoughtfully.
When Robin awoke next morning she rubbed her eyes very hard, for what
do you think she saw—there, at the foot of her bed, was the very
identical bird cage she had seen in the shop. Surely she was dreaming.
To assure herself of its reality, she rose from her bed and touched the
visionary object. It was substantial, and so admitted of no further
doubt. Then she awoke the others, and there was tremendous excitement.
"Robin, look at your stocking—it is full of candied fruit and
bon-bons!" cried Barbara.
"So it is," said Robin. "Then it is true after all."
"What a dear, sweet darling, Santa Klaus is; how I do love him. I knew
he wouldn't forget us," cried Barbara.
Then they laughed and clapped their hands, and, as it was still early,
tumbled all four into one bed, and Robin related to them her last
night's adventure with Santa Klaus, and it was the nicest story she had
ever told them, because it was quite true.
But I have something more to tell you which was better far than the
presents sent by Santa Klaus.
When Miss Frost came in with the hot water, she was laden with letters
and Christmas cards, and there was a scramble, of course—a scramble in
which, strange to say, Robin took no part.
The fact was, she was slowly and laboriously making out a letter from
mother, and the contents of this letter was of a nature so pleasing
that she could think of nothing else.
"Bab, Paul, Georgie, listen!" she cried. Then, as the uproar still
continued, she mounted the table, and from this commanding position
succeeded in obtaining a hearing.
"News! news! such news!" Robin cried. "Father is better and is coming
home. He and mother are on their way now—only think of it!"
The shouting recommenced after that, and all four children fell to
embracing each other.
Then they stationed themselves at the window waiting for the arrivals,
and in the new and glad excitement poor Santa Klaus was for the time
quite forgotten.
[Illustration]
[Illustration]
Wattie and the Wolves.
_BY FRANCES CLARE,_
AUTHOR OF "A CHILD'S PILGRIMAGE," "A STORE OF STORIES," &c.
————————
WATTIE Moate was the eldest child and only son of a small fruit farmer
in Worcestershire. He was a brave, honest, manly lad, and the pride
of his father and mother and good old grandmother and was devoted to
his little sister, Hetty, who was seven years younger than himself,
and the pet and darling of them all; and no wonder, for Hetty was one
of the sweetest, dearest, prettiest little girls in the county of
Worcestershire. Her eyes were as blue as a Highland lake in summer,
her cheeks were like damask roses, her round arms were dimpled, her
little fat hands were dimpled, and when she laughed—which she very
often did—the corners of her cherry mouth were dimpled also. Of course
she was a little spoilt with so many people to make much of her, and
therefore she liked to do as she liked, and not as other and wiser folk
liked, and she gave them all a great deal of trouble by the scrapes she
got into, but she was so loving and winning, and so penitent when she
had been naughty, that it was not difficult to forgive her. And after
a time something happened that made her almost as thoughtful as her
brother. I will tell you what it was.
[Illustration]
When Hetty was seven years of age, and Wattie fourteen, their father,
Farmer Moate, decided to try and "better himself," that is to say, to
improve his fortune, and in order to do so he sold his little fruit
farm and emigrated to the newly opened up State of Michigan, in the
backwoods of America. But though he took the old carved bureau, the old
eight-day clock, and the old spinning wheel with him as well as his
wife and his children, he couldn't take the old grandmother, for she
slept "under the daisies" in Bromsgrove churchyard, and when her little
granddaughter forgot to be good the kind old grandmother could never
plead for her forgiveness any more.
Farmer Moate's new house was called Creek Cot, and it stood in an open
clearing near some great woods, even as the old Worcestershire farm
house had done.
But here all resemblance ended, for the English house had been a red
brick one, with a tiled roof, on which the yellow-flowered ginger root
and the friendly house-leek grew and flourished, whilst the American
dwelling was merely a log hut, or shanty, whose sole adornment was a
coat of green paint.
And oh, how different was the vast American forest from the quiet
Bromsgrove woods; for in the latter you would sometimes unwittingly
startle a rabbit or hare, but in the former it might happen that a wolf
or a panther would startle "you."
One day it happened that Hetty was not very well, and as there were
many things needed in the humble home, and Farmer Moate wanted some
implements, Mrs. Moate decided to go with her husband, in order to
consult the doctor about Hetty's ailment and also to replenish the
empty medicine chest—a very necessary piece of business; for far away
in the backwoods the possession of a few simple drugs may sometimes
mean the saving of a life. So, on the day of which I am speaking, Mr.
Moate and his wife set out with their wagon to go to Cliftonville, the
nearest town. But it was at least seven miles distant from Creek Cot,
and the farmer did not altogether like leaving Wattie to take charge of
the house, although the sturdy little fellow was almost inclined to be
vexed at the very idea of anyone fearing for "him."
"Never trouble for me, daddy," he said. "I shall have a splendid time,
and I'll take care of Hetty, never fear."
"I don't, my lad; I don't," cried the farmer. "God bless thee. You'll
see mother and me back long before nightfall."
"All right," shouted the lad, and then he went into the cabin and
tidied up: that is to say, he made up the fire (as it was a bitterly
cold winter's morning), and put the kitchen in neat order. For you must
know that Wattie was what country people in Worcestershire called a
"handy boy," by which I think they mean that he could turn his willing
brown hands to many and various uses.
After he had finished this task he took Hetty on his knee, and told her
an amusing tale, which brought a smile on her pale little face, and she
seemed so much better that when the story was ended Wattie went out
into the clearing and brought in a good supply of logs for the fire;
then he looked in the fowl pen, found two newly-laid eggs, brought them
back into the shanty, boiled one for his sister, put the other by in
the cupboard for his mother, and began to make Hetty a long-promised
doll's house.
"It will be splendid when it's done," said the cheerful boy, as he cut
up strips of white pine wood and glued them together, "and you won't
make a hole in the roof for the dolls to go in by as you did in the
last one, will you, darling, for Brother Wattie is taking extra pains
with this?"
"I'll take great care of this one," replied Hetty, "because it's new,
but you might please put me a back and a front door in if you've time,
will you?"
"Yes; and I tell you what, Hetty, I mean to try and finish as much as
I can of the house before daddy gets back from Cliftonville," said the
eager Wattie, who little thought how much would have happened when he
saw his father and mother again.
Time passed on.
Wattie and Hetty took their simple meal of bread and milk, and after
that the first floor of the doll's new residence was completed and duly
admired; then, as it was too dark for Wattie to get any more wood, the
doll's house was set away on the top of the bureau until another day.
And still Mr. and Mrs. Moate did not return, and when night began to
draw on the lad guessed that something had unexpectedly detained his
parents, and began to feel a little, only a little, lonely, as well
indeed he might, for Creek Cot stood quite by itself, and as far as eye
could see stretched the great dark forest.
But you must remember that besides being handy and industrious, Walter
Moate was also a brave little fellow, so he resolved not to give way to
foolish fears, and as he had no one to cheer him up he determined to
cheer up himself, and in order to do this he began to whistle.
He whistled all the tunes he had heard in "the Old Country," as his
mother always called it; he whistled all the airs he had learnt in the
New. He whistled "God save the Queen" as he put a big log of wood on
the fire, and he had begun to whistle "The Star-spangled Banner" when
he went outside the log cabin to put up the shutters.
But he never finished the tune; for to his horror he beheld some slowly
moving, dark, and terrible forms—forms as of large, thin dogs in the
distance—forms which skulked and prowled round the clearing outside his
home.
And as he glanced at the dimly seen, but only too well recognized
objects, a long, shrill, whining howl came borne on the keen, clear,
frosty, air; and the lad, his worst fears confirmed, put his hands to
his ears and cried—
"Oh, father, if only you were here! Oh do make haste home; it's the
wolves!" For he had heard old hunters' stories, and though this was his
very first winter in Michigan, he guessed at once what these terrible
visitors were.
Hardly could his trembling fingers close the shutters, scarcely could
his limbs bear him into the house, so feeble did he feel from fear.
But he made all the haste he could, and once inside he shut the door
and barred it with a feeling of thankfulness that he was inside, and
longing, oh how fervently, for his father's return.
He looked at Hetty, who lay on the broad settle near the fire in a
sweet and peaceful sleep, and made up his mind not to frighten her if
he could possibly help it. "It would make her ill again," he thought.
"I must keep them outside somehow," he murmured; then he took
down a wood-cutter's axe from the wall, planted himself near the
strongly-barred door, and listened.
Listened as if there was nothing to do but listen—listened until it
seemed as if all other senses had failed and were all merged in that
one intense power of hearing.
And all at once he thought of grandmother, sitting as she used to sit
and spin in the homestead near Bromsgrove woods, of grandmother telling
his sister the story of Little Red Riding Hood.
But those days were past. Grandmother neither toiled nor spun any
longer, and the wolves were at their own door.
Yes, they were at the very door, for their howling sounded quite close
to his ear, and he saw the door shake and knew they were trying to
force it; and again he put his hands to his ears, as if to shut out the
sound which refused to be shut out.
Then the door all at once ceased shaking, and there was a curious
gnawing sound. And the oil in the lamp sank down, the light grew
dimmer, dimmer, dimmer; soon, very soon, they would be in total
darkness—save, indeed, for the firelight—if the lamp were not
replenished. So, trembling, Wattie refilled the lamp, and just as he
lit it Hetty awoke and looked around her.
And her still sleepy blue eyes fell on a large hairy paw which was
thrust through an aperture in the bottom of the door, where it joined
the step of the roughly-built log cabin.
"Look, Wattie, look!" she exclaimed, "a doggie wants to get in. See,
see, there's its paw."
"All right, love," said Wattie, in a voice which he tried to make
cheerful, "all right; you go to sleep and leave me to see to the dogs."
But Hetty, who from her corner could not see very clearly what was
going on, was more amused than frightened, and begged her brother not
to be cross with the poor dog, but to "give it a bone, and then it
would go away."
"But, darling, they're not dogs, they're wolves," said poor Wattie,
feeling it was best to tell her.
"Wolves! What, like Red Riding Hood's wolf, Wattie? They won't hurt us,
will they?"
"No, darling, I won't let them!" said Wattie, setting his teeth and
looking stern, as he felt he could die, if need were, for his little
sister. At this moment the paw came through again, and this time it was
pushed farther into the room. Without a word Wattie seized his axe, and
bringing it down with all his might, and with the skilful stroke he
had learnt since he had been in the backwoods, he smote off the evilly
intruding limb. A howl followed, then a silence, and then another paw
was thrust under the door to share the fate of the former one.
Hetty lay quite still on the settle, and watched her heroic defender.
"Oh, Wattie, don't you wish father and mother would come? Why don't
you get father's gun and shoot them? You can shoot now, you know; and
didn't Mr. Hughes say that was what you would have to do if the wolves
came around this winter?"
"Yes; but, Hetty dear, father took his gun with him—he never likes to
go away without it. Oh, Hetty! do you remember Mr. Hughes saying that
if anyone blew out a bladder and hung it in the wind that the wolves
would never come very near it? Oh, if we only had a bladder!"
"Why, we have! Mother said she must buy some lard to-day when she
looked at the empty bladder."
"Oh, you good girl to remember that! Where is it, Hetty?"
"Up in the loft. I saw it when I was up there with mother this morning.
But I was poorly, you know, so I didn't care to play with it then, and
I hung it up in the loft. Father blew it out and tied a piece of string
to it, and told me I might have it to play with, as I couldn't buy
balls out here in the backwoods."
"Oh, Hetty, God must have put it into father's heart to do that. Come,
dear, take my hand while there's a minute's silence, and we'll baulk
them yet."
Quickly the two ascended the ladder into the loft, and there, sure
enough, was the bladder, fastened to a rafter and swaying about in the
wind, which came keenly in through the rough little shutters of the
window which lighted the loft.
Very quickly Wattie pushed open the shutter; very quickly, but very
firmly, he tied the string to the hook which held the shutter, making
sure that the other end of the string was fast to the bladder. Then he
left it to flutter in the now rapidly-rising wind, and, with his little
sister, descended the ladder again, and piled more logs on the fire and
waited.
"Why," he said, after a pause of anxious watching, "Farmer Hughes must
have known what he was talking about, after all!"
No paw was thrust under the door, although Wattie awaited it with
uplifted axe. The fierce howling changed to a half-fearful whine, and
it was more distant, too. After a while it almost ceased.
Presently, Hetty said, "I'm not a bit afraid, Wattie; I'll say my
prayers and go to sleep. I know you'll take care of me," and she
nestled into her brother's arms and fell asleep, thoroughly tired out;
nor did she even awaken when Wattie started up at the sound of a shot
at some distance, then another and another in quick succession, and
then the welcome, welcome sound of his father's shout!
Gently laying the sleeping child on the settle, Wattie rushed to the
door.
"My boy, what has happened? Have you been frightened by the wolves?
I've settled some of the brutes to-night, at any rate. How is Hetty?
We've been delayed because the doctor was away from home, and mother
here is nearly out of her mind with anxiety about you. And what's that
fluttering up at the loft window?"
Wattie soon related all that had happened after his father's departure,
and when his mother hugged and kissed and cried over him, and his
father called him a little hero, and even had tears in his eyes as he
said it, Wattie felt prouder than ever he had done in his life, and
thought he was richly rewarded for all that he had gone through during
that terrible, never-to-be-forgotten night with the wolves.
[Illustration]