_THE TRUTH_
"We both have undergone
That trouble which has left me thrice your own:
Henceforward I will rather die than doubt."
--TENNYSON.
Rather to his wife's disappointment, Mr. Bland decided at once that
he could not go to London that day. In a few minutes, in the dingy
waiting-room, while she sat on Mrs. Bland's damp but friendly lap,
and while the noise of the rain died gradually away, as if to listen
to her story, Lily told John's two friends how some wicked people had
stolen her away from the fair and said that John and mother should
not have her any more.
"Well! It is a queer story to be sure. There's something behind as
we don't understand," said Mrs. Bland. "As to this child, Isaac,
wherever John picked her up, she is a little lady. Now I wonder if
those people knew----"
She murmured these words mysteriously, while Lily gazed at her with
heartfelt anxiety in her blue eyes, and repeated, "Please take me
home."
"Yes, little one, and that's what we are going to do," said the
schoolmaster. "Lift her up, Jemima, if you please. I'll carry her,
and the umbrella too, if it isn't too wet to be of use. London must
keep for another day: this child's safety must be seen to first."
"It's very inconvenient."
"Our convenience is not at present the first thing to be considered,"
said Mr. Bland gravely. "And London town was not built in a day, and
is not likely to disappear in one. Come, my dear. We will take
John's little girl home, Jemima; she shall be warmed and fed. I will
then hire Dobson's trap and drive her over to Markwood. You can give
us the pleasure of your company, if you feel so inclined."
"You'll both get wet to the skin. Better write to John to come and
fetch her," said Mrs. Bland, rather disapprovingly.
"I shall do as I would be done by," said the schoolmaster.
Lily curled one arm round her new friend's neck, regardless of his
wet mackintosh. She pressed her cold little face against his rough
grey whiskers, and kissed him affectionately. As he carried her away
from the station, hidden under his large and dripping umbrella, she
looked over his shoulder and saw in the wet and misty distance the
woman from whom she had escaped, hurrying back through the mud to
rejoin her charge. Lily hid her eyes, and tightened her hold on Mr.
Bland. "Take me home quick," she whispered in his ear.
Later in the day the rain cleared off entirely, and there was a clear
yellow light shining in the sky when Mr. Bland, with Lily wrapped in
Mrs. Bland's largest cloak nestling close by his side, turned the
steady old horse from the high road into the Markwood lane. This was
a horse of great virtue, except that he would not understand that Mr.
Bland and Lily were in a hurry. They met a good many stragglers from
the fair, though Mr. Bland drove through by-lanes, so as to avoid the
main street of Carsham. Some of these people were noisy, but the
horse took no notice of them. One man called out, "Why, ain't that
the little kid as was lost? There's been folks hunting for her all
night, high and low, up and down, all round about Carsham. Where did
you pick her up, master?"
"Never you mind, my friend," replied the schoolmaster. "She'll be
safe at home in half-an-hour, and nobody need concern themselves
further."
Dobson's old horse, not being accustomed to such long journeys, chose
to proceed through Markwood at a foot's pace, and stopped at several
houses before he reached the blacksmith's door. Mr. Bland was not
great as a driver, and neither whip nor reins nor encouraging
"chucks" had any effect on the animal. At last, Lily dancing on the
seat with impatience, and followed by groups of such village children
as were not at the fair, the trap drew up at John's gate in the glow
of the evening sun.
A woman was passing at the moment; it was Mrs. Alfrick, who, not
being altogether bad, had spent some hours of self-reproach. "Well,
I never!" she said.
But neither Mr. Bland nor Lily took any notice of her, and she
hurried on home with the wonderful news. Mr. Bland was quite
occupied with climbing down from his high seat, begging Lily all the
time to wait till he could lift her down. As soon as the child's
feet touched the ground, she sprang across the yard. At the door she
waited a moment; and Mr. Bland never forgot the pretty, refined
little gesture with which she turned and held up her finger to him,
then gave three gentle taps on the old door.
"Any common child would have burst right in," he said to his wife
afterwards.
Mrs. Randal's kitchen was hardly as tidy and bright as usual that
afternoon. She had not had the heart for her usual cleaning and
polishing, having sat up half the night for John, who had never come
in at all till a couple of hours ago. He had found no trace of the
lost child; Lily's own father, when he lost her, could hardly have
been in a state of deeper dejection, more hopeless despair.
"I never would have believed it of Polly," said Mrs. Randal. "To
take that child to the fair, when she knew your wishes as well as
yourself, not to mention how uneasy I should be--and then never to
come near me, John, last night or this morning! I'd have gone up
myself to the farm, but what with worrying there was no strength left
in me--besides, I couldn't bear to be out of the house, for fear you
should come home--but I did think Polly----"
"Don't you mention Polly no more," said John, in a rough hoarse voice
which did not sound like his own.
His mother lifted her tired eyes, full of a new sorrow, but his face
was hidden in his hands, and she could read nothing there.
"I met Polly on the road last night," he said. "We had words, and no
wonder. All's broke off between us two. So now you know, mother,
and just please to say no more about it."
"Oh, my boy, it's a double trouble," sighed Mrs. Randal, while the
fresh tears welled up in her sore and aching eyes.
Presently John went out of the house, and she sat brooding over the
fire, falling half asleep now and then from utter weariness. From
this dozing state she was suddenly roused by those three little taps
on the door. It seemed to her at first that she was dreaming.
"Who's there?" she said in a low voice.
Then the latch was lifted, the door opened very slowly, inch by inch,
and a fair little face looked in.
"Mother!" said Lily.
Mrs. Randal, in breathless surprise, was still holding the child in
her arms when Mr. Bland followed her into the kitchen.
"Here we are, among old friends," he said, his kind face alight with
smiles. "How are you to-day, Mrs. Randal? And where's John?"
"Ob, mother, we rode in a trap all the way--such a long way--and the
horse went so slow!" Lily was explaining. "And the men said there
was the little girl as was lost and her folks was looking for her;
but Mr. Bland said it didn't matter now she was found. Mother,
where's John?"
"I don't know, my precious. Go and look for him; he's wearying for
you," said Mrs. Randal tenderly. "He's in the forge or the garden,
maybe. Now, Mr. Bland, you're welcome indeed. Please to sit down.
You've brought back the sunshine to our house, sir. John's well-nigh
distracted over losing that child."
"That was only to be expected," said the schoolmaster, sitting down
in John's chair. "And now I should like to know how she got lost,
for her story was difficult to understand. Knowing John's views, I
was surprised that she ever found herself at Carsham on fair-day."
"No wonder," said Mrs. Randal with a sigh. "You couldn't be more
surprised than I was. Mary Alfrick took her to the fair."
"Did she really? Are you sure of that?"
"As sure as we can be. Ah, that's half my grief, and a half that
can't be mended, Mr. Bland. The best girl and the faithfullest and
steadiest girl for miles round. Well, you know the name she had in
this country for being superior. Ever since my John got engaged to
her, I've felt that his future life was safe to be all right and
happy, and I've left off fretting over leaving him, as I must some
day--a day not far off, too, for I'm not the woman I was. Well, Mr.
Bland, those two have quarrelled over this business of the fair, and
of losing Lily. They've had words--John told me himself--and all's
over between them."
Mrs. Randal's voice was choked by tears.
"My dear friend," said Mr. Bland, "I'm most sincerely sorry to hear
what you tell me. And you think this melancholy split is quite
beyond mending?"
Mrs. Randal nodded and shook her head; she could not speak.
"'Life is thorny, and youth is vain,'" muttered the schoolmaster, who
was well read in the poets. "Thus we break in an instant what we
would give our lives to repair. But I cannot reconcile the child's
own story with what you have told me, Mrs. Randal. She described
herself as going to the fair with other children. She told me that
_Mrs._ Alfrick--not _Miss_, or _Mary_--had sent her out of the
theatre because she was frightened--that she and another child had
then danced to an organ, after which she was decoyed away by the
people from whom my wife and I recovered her."
"Well, I don't know," said Mrs. Randal vaguely. "All I know is, Mr.
Bland, John told me as he and Polly Alfrick had had words about it
and broke off the engagement. But do go on, please. Who was it as
run away with Lily--and how did you chance to find her?"
In answer, Mr. Bland gave an eloquent account of the scene in the
Moreton Road waiting-room that morning. It appeared from this that
he had not seen Lily's captors. He knew from her own chatter that
they were a man and a woman--"ugly and nasty," she described them.
With a grave face and earnest manner, watching Mrs. Randal all the
time, he went on to repeat more of the child's talk. He thought it
of great importance, for it had convinced him that Lily was a child
stolen with the intention of gaining a reward; and he was inclined to
think that the same man and woman were the cause of both her
disappearances.
While these two were talking in the kitchen, Lily, happy and excited,
had found her John in the garden. He was gathering some late apples,
and it was not a wise day to choose for this, as grass and leaves and
fruit were all soaking from the late torrents of rain. But John was
not in a wise frame of mind. He was so miserable that he set to work
on the first thing that occurred to him, without stopping to
consider. There was already a heap of shining apples under the damp
tree when Lily came running down the path. It would have grieved
Mrs. Randal to see them, for after such treatment they were not
likely to keep, and it was the best apple-tree in the garden.
John swung himself down from the tree, when Lily's voice called him,
and caught the child up in his arms.
"So you've come back, little one!" he said.
The strong young man was very pale, his eyes were wild and hollow; he
looked--and his looks told the truth--as if he had been tramping all
night and had eaten nothing for many hours.
"Who brought you back? Where did you come from?" he said to Lily.
In answer she poured out a torrent of musical chatter, chiefly about
Mr. and Mrs. Bland and the drive in the trap and the slowness of the
old horse. John listened for some time in silence. Presently he sat
down on the garden bench, where many happy hours had been spent on
summer evenings, and took the little girl on his knee.
"Look here--let's get a bit further back," he said. "Mr. and Mrs.
Bland found you at the station--how did you get there, little one?"
"In a cart. Oh, it was dark and nasty and cold. And then they put
me to bed in a room, and I was frightened--but I said my prayers--and
do you know"--her voice was smothered against John's shoulder--"I
asked GOD to please to bring me back to you. And so He did--didn't
He?"
"Yes--well, who put you to bed, dear?"
"Oh, she did--Dick's wife--I don't know what her name was--but she
said how she and Dick was my true friends, and she said they was
going to take me to such a beautiful house where my papa lived, and
brothers and sisters, and lots of beautiful pictures--and I seemed to
know----"
Lily stopped, wrinkling her brows with a puzzled expression.
"Go on; what did you seem to know? did you remember about that
house?" said John.
He spoke very gently, but he had arrived at that moment in life--some
of us have known it--when we realise that something we have cared
about very much is lost for ever--really for ever--that no change in
this world's circumstances can bring it back again. Yes, this little
treasure of his had a home of her own; he quite knew it and believed
it. She had returned to him, but only for a short time. He must
lose her, and he had already lost Mary.
"Did you remember about that house, Lily?" he repeated.
"No--I don't think so. I seemed to be carried upstairs, and there
was the blue lady up on the wall, she looked at me. But it was a
little dream."
"Well now, this woman, and this man Dick--what was they like to look
at?"
"Oh, ugly!" said the child, shaking her head in disgust. "Her face
was all red, and I couldn't bear her to kiss me, I tried to get my
face away. Dick had something else to do than to look after little
girls, you know. He looked after the horse, and he played the
organ--but he seemed awful pleased to see me, and him and her, they
both looked at my locket and twisted it about, and they said to be
sure it was the same."
"Had Dick got a little bit of a moustache, and a whitish sort of
unwholesome-looking face?"
"I don't know. Yes, I think so."
"It's the same couple as before," said John to himself. "Now they've
some object. Was they really going to take that child home, I
wonder? Look here, Lily, how did they come to leave you alone at the
station?"
Lily shook her head. "She wrapped me up on the seat, and told me not
to stir till she come back. She said she wouldn't be a minute, but
she was ever such a time, and Mr. and Mrs. Bland they come and took
me away."
"Well--and so you're back again. How did those people get you away
from the fair?"
There was a certain sternness in John's voice now.
"Was it naughty to dance under the tree?" Lily asked in rather
frightened tones. "Mrs. Alfrick said I was a naughty girl 'cause I
cried at all them murders, and then she sent Lizzie and me out of the
theatre, and while we was waiting we heard the music and ran and
danced a bit, and then Dick's wife she came out of the house and
spoke to me and give me some candy, and then she got me to come along
with her, and then I couldn't go back to Lizzie, and I cried ever so,
and then they carried me and put me in the cart. Was I naughty,
John?"
"No, dearie," the young man answered. "There was nothing to blame in
you. Those that took you to the fair, it was all their doings, and
no thanks to them as worse didn't come of it."
"She said you'd let me go," said Lily, with wide blue eyes fixed upon
his face.
"She never said that, did she? Well, I never would have believed it
of her."
His eyes fell, and his face became crimson. Lily stared at him in
astonishment.
"I telled her you said I wasn't to go," she murmured, "and she said
that was 'cause there was nobody to take me. And she said she'd take
me along of the other children, if I'd make haste and get ready. And
I run up and got my Sunday hat, and then she fetched down my locket
and tied it on for me, and she said it was a pretty locket and she'd
never seen it before, and she wanted to know if you gave it me, and I
telled her I'd had it always and I wasn't never to lose it."
"What are you talking about, child?" said John, bewildered.
"About my locket. Here 'tis. I haven't lost it, please."
"What did you mean, saying as Mary Alfrick had never seen that locket
before? Why, she's tied it round your neck on Sunday, dozens of
times."
"I never said--I don't know"--Lily stared and hesitated, herself
quite as much at a loss as John. He looked angry, too, and she was
frightened. A little over-wrought, tired with the excitement of
those two days, the child was ready to burst out crying. She could
not answer John, the meaning of his question being entirely beyond
her.
"There, there!" he said suddenly. "Never mind, Lily. Mary ought to
have known better than talk all that stuff and take you to the fair.
That's all. It can't be helped now. Don't cry, my pretty flower; it
was no fault of yours, you know. Taking you inside such places as
them theatres too! Mrs. Alfrick and all was there, then, as well as
Mary?"
Lily nodded. She still looked puzzled, her brain being rather too
young to understand John's mistake. But her next words enlightened
him, though dimly.
"Polly was coming down to tea with mother and me. She'd got my
pinnies to iron. I 'spect I ought to have stopped for her. Mrs.
Alfrick said she wasn't coming yet awhile, and mother had gone to
Mrs. Nash and left me all alone."
John passed his hand over his face. Slowly, gradually, the knowledge
was dawning on him that he had made a tremendous mistake. He tried
hard not to frown, not to frighten Lily by any hard word or rough
tone. He spoke after a minute's pause, asking the question on which
his life's happiness now seemed to depend, while his heart beat so
heavily that the words could hardly make their way.
"Who was it as took you to Carsham, Lily?"
"Mrs. Alfrick," was the instant answer.
"And Polly--was she there too?"
Lily shook her head violently. "No."
"But she was at the fair. I know she was, for I met her. Didn't you
see her--wasn't she with you there?"
"No."
Lily had never been known to speak a word that was not true.
John stared at her in silent surprise, but never thought of doubting
her.
"This is a black business," he said after a minute, more to himself
than to her. "Somebody's been telling lies. The next thing is to
get to the bottom of it. Come along, little one. Let's go and say
thank-you to Mr. Bland for bringing of you home. He must have had a
job, a troublesome piece of goods like you!"
Something of John's old happy smile shone in his face as he kissed
the child and lifted her to his shoulder and carried her through the
garden where flowers were almost over, under the dripping apple-trees.
"Good afternoon, John," said the old schoolmaster, stretching out his
hand. "We didn't expect to meet again so soon."
"No, sir. Thank you for bringing her home," said John.
He stood in the middle of the kitchen with a grave, thoughtful face.
He did not look altogether unhappy, but a kind of bewilderment seemed
to weigh upon him. The eyes of his mother and his old friend were
full of sympathy; they knew that the loss of Lily had not been the
only trouble of those twenty-four hours. The child, when he put her
down, still clung to his hand.
"Go to mother, dear," said John, and Mrs. Randal held out her arms.
For a minute there was no sound but the loving words that she
whispered in Lily's ear.
"Mother, there's been some big mistake," John burst out suddenly.
"The child says it wasn't Mary as took her to the fair after all. It
was Mrs. Alfrick as walked her off before Mary came down."
Mrs. Randal stared and shook her head.
"Oh, that can't be, John. Granny Pierce told me she'd seen them.
And--why--you met Polly yourself coming back. You said so."
"Yes, of course," John said impatiently. "Polly knew the child was
lost--she'd been looking for her--but I see now it wasn't Polly as
lost her. I expect she went after them, when she found her
stepmother had taken the child. That's what she would be sure to do.
What a blind fool I've been!"
His voice shook.
"Well, my lad, that quarrel will be soon made up," said Mr. Bland
consolingly; but John seemed hardly to hear.
"I don't understand, my dear," murmured Mrs. Randal. "Granny Pierce
said----"
"Oh, mother, don't you go setting that poor old creature's word
against our Lily's here. She's told me the solid truth. Polly never
fetched her yesterday; she never even saw her at the fair. I believe
that child's word, mother, for she's never told you nor me a lie in
her life yet."
"No more she has," said Mrs. Randal, stroking Lily's fair curls.
"But, John, if that's so, why hasn't Polly been down here before now?
I'm sure she must have known as I wanted her bad enough."
"She wasn't likely, mother, after the words as passed between her and
me."
There was another painful minute of silence. Mr. Bland's kind eyes
were full of tears as he watched his old scholar. Lily jumped
suddenly down from Mrs. Randal's knee and clutched at John's hand.
"Come along!" she cried. "Let's go and fetch Polly."
John lifted her in his arms for a moment, then set her down on the
floor. "Stop here, little one," he said.
Then he left the house, without another word to any of them, shutting
the door and the gate sharply behind him.
"That matter will soon be settled, I trust," said the schoolmaster.
"And now, my good friend, may I point out that your kettle is boiling
over."