THE ESCAPE
WHEN Lady Talbot leaned over the side of the big bed to awaken Dickie
Harding she wished with all her heart that she had just such a little
boy of her own; and when Dickie awoke and looked in her kind eyes he
felt quite sure that if he had had a mother she would have been like
this lady.
"Only about the face," he told himself, "not the way she's got up; nor
yet her hair nor nuffink of that sort."
"Did you sleep well?" she asked him, stroking his hair with
extraordinary gentleness.
"A fair treat," said he.
"Was your bed comfortable?"
"Ain't it soft, neither," he answered. "I don't know as ever I felt of
anythink quite as soft without it was the geese as 'angs up along the
Broadway Christmas-time."
"Why, the bed's made of goose-feathers," she said, and Dickie was
delighted by the coincidence.
"'Ave you got e'er a little boy?" he asked, pursuing his first waking
thought.
"No, dear; if I had I could lend you some of his clothes. As it is, we
shall have to put you into your own." She spoke as though she were
sorry.
Dickie saw no matter for regret. "My father 'e bought me a little coat
for when it was cold of a night lying out."
"Lying out? Where?"
"In the bed with the green curtains," said Dickie. This led to Here
Ward, and Dickie would willingly have told the whole story of that hero
in full detail, but the lady said after breakfast, and now it was time
for our bath. And sure enough there was a bath of steaming water before
the fireplace, which was in quite another part of the room, so that
Dickie had not noticed the cans being brought in by a maid in a pink
print dress and white cap and apron.
"Come," said the lady, turning back the bed-clothes.
Somehow Dickie could not bear to let that lady see him crawl clumsily
across the floor, as he had to do when he moved without his crutch. It
was not because he thought she would make fun of him; perhaps it was
because he knew she would not. And yet without his crutch, how else was
he to get to that bath? And for no reason that he could have given he
began to cry.
The lady's arms were round him in an instant.
"What is it, dear? Whatever is it?" she asked; and Dickie sobbed out--
"I ain't got my crutch, and I can't go to that there barf without I got
it. Anything 'ud do--if 'twas only an old broom cut down to me 'eighth.
I'm a cripple, they call it, you see. I can't walk like wot you can."
She carried him to the bath. There was scented soap, there was a sponge,
and a warm, fluffy towel.
"I ain't had a barf since Gravesend," said Dickie, and flushed at the
indiscretion.
"Since _when_, dear?"
"Since Wednesday," said Dickie anxiously.
He and the lady had breakfast together in a big room with long windows
that the sun shone in at, and, outside, a green garden. There were a lot
of things to eat in silver dishes, and the very eggs had silver cups to
sit in, and all the spoons and forks had dogs scratched on them like the
one that was carved on the foot-board of the bed up-stairs. All except
the little slender spoon that Dickie had to eat his egg with. And on
that there was no dog, but something quite different.
"Why," said he, his face brightening with joyous recognition, "my
Tinkler's got this on it--just the very moral of it, so 'e 'as."
Then he had to tell all about Tinkler, and the lady looked thoughtful
and interested; and when the gentleman came in and kissed her, and said,
How were we this morning, Dickie had to tell about Tinkler all over
again; and then the lady said several things very quickly, beginning
with, "I told you so, Edward," and ending with "I knew he wasn't a
common child."
Dickie missed the middle part of what she said because of the way his
egg behaved, suddenly bursting all down one side and running over into
the salt, which, of course, had to be stopped at all costs by some means
or other. The tongue was the easiest.
The gentleman laughed. "Weh! don't eat the egg-cup," he said. "We shall
want it again. Have another egg."
But Dickie's pride was hurt, and he wouldn't. The gentleman must be very
stupid, he thought, not to know the difference between licking and
eating. And as if anybody could eat an egg-cup, anyhow! He was glad when
the gentleman went away.
After breakfast Dickie was measured for a crutch--that is to say, a
broom was held up beside him and a piece cut off its handle. Then the
lady wrapped flannel around the hairy part of the broom and sewed black
velvet over that. It was a beautiful crutch, and Dickie said so. Also
he showed his gratitude by inviting the lady to look "'ow spry 'e was on
'is pins," but she only looked a very little while, and then turned and
gazed out of the window. So Dickie had a good look at the room and the
furniture--it was all different from anything he ever remembered seeing,
and yet he couldn't help thinking he had seen them before, these
high-backed chairs covered with flowers, like on carpets; the carved
bookcases with rows on rows of golden-beaded books; the bow-fronted,
shining sideboard, with handles that shone like gold, and the corner
cupboard with glass doors and china inside, red and blue and goldy. It
was a very odd feeling. I don't think that I can describe it better than
by saying that he looked at all these things with a double pleasure--the
pleasure of looking at new and beautiful things, and the pleasure of
seeing again things old and beautiful which he had not seen for a very
long time.
His limping survey of the room ended at the windows, when the lady
turned suddenly, knelt down, put her hand under his chin and looked into
his eyes.
"Dickie," she said, "how would you like to stay here and be _my_ little
boy?"
"I'd like it right enough," said he, "only I got to go back to father."
"But if father says you may?"
"'E won't," said Dickie, with certainty, "an' besides, there's Tinkler."
"Well, you're to stay here and be my little boy till we find out where
father is. We shall let the police know. They're sure to find him."
"The pleece!" Dickie cried in horror. "Why, father, 'e ain't done
nothing."
"No, no, of course not," said the lady in a hurry; "but the police know
all sorts of things--about where people are, I know, and what they're
doing--even when they haven't _done_ anything."
"The pleece knows a jolly sight too much," said Dickie, in gloom.
And now all Dickie's little soul was filled with one longing; all his
little brain awake to one only thought: the police were to be set on the
track of Beale, the man whom he called father; the man who had been kind
to him, had wheeled him in a perambulator for miles and miles through
enchanted country; the man who had bought him a little coat "to put on
o' nights if it was cold or wet"; the man who had shown him the
wonderful world to which he awakens who has slept in the bed with the
green curtains.
The lady's house was more beautiful than anything he had ever
imagined--yet not more beautiful than certain things that he almost
imagined that he remembered. The lady was better than beautiful, she
was dear. Her eyes were the eyes to which it is good to laugh--her arms
were the arms in which it is good to cry. The tree-dotted parkland was
to Dickie the Land of Heart's Desire.
But father--Beale--who had been kind, whom Dickie loved!...
The lady left him alone with a book, beautiful beyond his dreams--three
great volumes with pictures of things that had happened and been since
the days of Hereward himself. The author's charming name was Green, and
recalled curtains and nights under the stars.
But even those beautiful pictures could not keep Dickie's thoughts from
Mr. Beale: "father" by adoption and love. If the police were set to find
out "where he was and what he was doing?"... Somehow or other Dickie
must get to Gravesend, to that house where there had been a bath, or
something like it, in a pail, and where kindly tramp-people had toasted
herrings and given apples to little boys who helped.
He had helped then. And by all the laws of fair play there ought to be
some one now to help him.
The beautiful book lay on the table before him, but he no longer saw it.
He no longer cared for it. All he cared for was to find a friend who
would help him. And he found one. And the friend who helped him was an
enemy.
The smart, pink-frocked, white-capped, white-aproned maid, who, unseen
by Dickie, had brought the bath-water and the bath, came in with a
duster. She looked malevolently at Dickie.
"Shovin' yourself in," she said rudely.
"I ain't," said he.
"If she wants to make a fool of a kid, ain't I got clever brothers and
sisters?" inquired the maid, her chin in the air.
"Nobody says you ain't, and nobody ain't makin' a fool of me," said
Dickie.
"Ho no. Course they ain't," the maid rejoined. "People comes 'ere
without e'er a shirt to their backs and makes fools of their betters.
That's the way it is, ain't it? Ain't she arst you to stay and be 'er
little boy?"
"Yes," said Dickie.
"Ah, I thought she 'ad," said the maid triumphantly; "and you'll stay.
But if I'm expected to call you Master Whatever-your-silly-name-is, I
gives a month's warning, so I tell you straight."
"I don't want to stay," said Dickie--"at least----"
"Oh, tell me another," said the girl impatiently, and left him, without
having made the slightest use of the duster.
Dickie was taken for a drive in a little carriage drawn by a
cream-colored pony with a long tail--a perfect dream of a pony, and the
lady allowed him to hold the reins. But even amid this delight he
remembered to ask whether she had put the police on to father yet, and
was relieved to hear that she had not.
It was Markham who was told to wash Dickie's hands when the drive was
over, and Markham was the enemy with the clever brothers and sisters.
"Wash 'em yourself," she said among the soap and silver and marble and
sponges. "It ain't my work."
"You'd better," said Dickie, "or the lady'll know the difference. It
ain't my work neither, and I ain't so used to washing as what you are,
and that's the truth."
So she washed him, not very gently.
"It's no use your getting your knife into me," he said as the towel was
plied. "I didn't _arst_ to come 'ere, did I?"
"No, you little thief!"
"Stow that!" said Dickie, and after a quick glance at his set lips she
said, "Well, next door to, anyhow. I should be ashamed to show my face
'ere, if I was you, after last night. There, you're dry now. Cut along
down to the dining-room. The servants' hall's good enough for honest
people as don't break into houses."
All through that day of wonder, which included real roses that you could
pick and smell and real gooseberries that you could gather and eat, as
well as picture-books, a clockwork bear, a musical box, and a doll's
house almost as big as a small villa, an idea kept on hammering at the
other side of a locked door in Dickie's mind, and when he was in bed it
got the door open and came out and looked at him. And he recognized it
at once as a really useful idea.
"Markham will bring you some warm milk. Drink it up and sleep well,
darling," said the lady; and with the idea very near and plain he put
his arms round her neck and hugged her.
"Good-bye," he said; "you _are_ good. I do love you." The lady went away
very pleased.
When Markham came with the milk Dickie said, "You want me gone, don't
you?"
Markham said she didn't care.
"Well, but how am I to get away--with my crutch?"
"Mean to say you'd cut and run if you was the same as me--about the
legs, I mean?"
"Yes," said Dickie.
"And not nick anything?"
"Not a bloomin' thing," said he.
"Well," said Markham, "you've got a spirit, I will say that."
"You see," said Dickie, "I wants to get back to farver."
"Bless the child," said Markham, quite affected by this.
"Why don't you help me get out? Once I was outside the park I'd do all
right."
"Much as my place is worth," said Markham; "don't you say another word
getting me into trouble."
But Dickie said a good many other words, and fell asleep quite satisfied
with the last words that had fallen from Markham. These words were:
"We'll see."
It was only just daylight when Markham woke him. She dressed him
hurriedly, and carried him and his crutch down the back stairs and into
that very butler's pantry through whose window he had crept at the
bidding of the red-haired man. No one else seemed to be about.
"Now," she said, "the gardener he has got a few hampers ready--fruit and
flowers and the like--and he drives 'em to the station 'fore any one's
up. They'd only go to waste if 'e wasn't to sell 'em. See? An' he's a
particular friend of mine; and he won't mind an extry hamper more or
less. So out with you. Joe," she whispered, "you there?"
Joe, outside, whispered that he was. And Markham lifted Dickie to the
window. As she did so she kissed him.
"Cheer-oh, old chap!" she said. "I'm sorry I was so short. An' you do
want to get out of it, don't you?"
"No error," said Dickie; "an' I'll never split about him selling the
vegetables and things."
"You're too sharp to live," Markham declared; and next moment he was
through the window, and Joe was laying him in a long hamper half-filled
with straw that stood waiting.
"I'll put you in the van along with the other hampers," whispered Joe as
he shut the lid. "Then when you're in the train you just cut the string
with this 'ere little knife I'll make you a present of and out you gets.
I'll make it all right with the guard. He knows me. And he'll put you
down at whatever station you say."
"Here, don't forget 'is breakfast," said Markham, reaching her arm
through the window. It was a wonderful breakfast. Five cold rissoles, a
lot of bread and butter, two slices of cake, and a bottle of milk. And
it was fun eating agreeable and unusual things, lying down in the roomy
hamper among the smooth straw. The jolting of the cart did not worry
Dickie at all. He was used to the perambulator; and he ate as much as he
wanted to eat, and when that was done he put the rest in his pocket and
curled up comfortably in the straw, for there was still quite a lot left
of what ordinary people consider night, and also there was quite a lot
left of the sleepiness with which he had gone to bed at the end of the
wonderful day. It was not only just body-sleepiness: the kind you get
after a long walk or a long play day. It was mind-sleepiness--Dickie had
gone through so much in the last thirty-six hours that his poor little
brain felt quite worn out. He fell asleep among the straw, fingering the
clasp-knife in his pocket, and thinking how smartly he would cut the
string when the time came.
[Illustration: "THREE OR FOUR FACES LOOKED DOWN AT DICKIE"
[_Page 70_]
And he slept for a very long time. Such a long time that when he did
wake up there was no longer any need to cut the string of the hamper.
Some one else had done that, and the lid of the basket was open, and
three or four faces looked down at Dickie, and a girl's voice said--
"Why, it's a little boy! And a crutch--oh, dear!" Dickie sat up. The
little crutch, which was lying corner-wise above him in the hamper,
jerked out and rattled on the floor.
"Well, I never did--never!" said another voice. "Come out, dearie; don't
be frightened."
"How kind people are!" Dickie thought, and reached his hands to slender
white hands that were held out to him. A lady in black--her figure was
as slender as her hands--drew him up, put her arms round him, and lifted
him on to a black bentwood chair.
His eyes, turning swiftly here and there, showed him that he was in a
shop--a shop full of flowers and fruit.
"Mr. Rosenberg," said the slender lady--"oh, do come here, please! This
extra hamper----"
A dark, handsome, big-nosed man came towards them.
"It's a dear little boy," said the slender lady, who had a pale, kind
face, dark eyes, and very red lips.
"It'th a practical joke, I shuppothe," said the dark man. "Our gardening
friend wanth a liththon: and I'll thee he getth it."
"It wasn't his fault," said Dickie, wriggling earnestly in his high
chair; "it was my fault. I fell asleep."
The girls crowded round him with questions and caresses.
"I ought to have cut the string in the train and told the guard--he's a
friend of the gardener's," he said, "but I was asleep. I don't know as
ever I slep' so sound afore. Like as if I'd had sleepy-stuff--you know.
Like they give me at the orspittle."
I should not like to think that Markham had gone so far as to put
"sleepy-stuff" in that bottle of milk; but I am afraid she was not very
particular, and she may have thought it best to send Dickie to sleep so
that he could not betray her or her gardener friend until he was very
far away from both of them.
"But why," asked the long-nosed gentleman--"why put boyth in bathketth?
Upthetting everybody like thith," he added crossly.
"It was," said Dickie slowly, "a sort of joke. I don't want to go
upsetting of people. If you'll lift me down and give me me crutch I'll
'ook it."
But the young ladies would not hear of his hooking it.
"We may keep him, mayn't we, Mr. Rosenberg?" they said; and he judged
that Mr. Rosenberg was a kind man or they would not have dared to speak
so to him; "let's keep him till closing-time, and then one of us will
see him home. He lives in London. He says so."
Dickie had indeed murmured "words to this effect," as policemen call it
when they are not quite sure what people really _have_ said.
"Ath you like," said Mr. Rosenberg, "only you muthn't let him interfere
with bithneth; thath all."
They took him away to the back of the shop. They were dear girls, and
they were very nice to Dickie. They gave him grapes, and a banana, and
some Marie biscuits, and they folded sacks for him to lie on.
And Dickie liked them and was grateful to them--and watched his
opportunity. Because, however kind people were, there was one thing he
had to do--to get back to the Gravesend lodging-house, as his "father"
had told him to do.
The opportunity did not come till late in the afternoon, when one of the
girls was boiling a kettle on a spirit-lamp, and one had gone out to get
cakes in Dickie's honor, which made him uncomfortable, but duty is duty,
and over the Gravesend lodging-house the star of duty shone and
beckoned. The third young lady and Mr. Rosenberg were engaged in
animated explanations with a fair young gentleman about a basket of
roses that had been ordered, and had not been sent.
"Cath," Mr. Rosenberg was saying--"cath down enthureth thpeedy
delivery."
And the young lady was saying, "I am extremely sorry, sir; it was a
misunderstanding."
And to the music of their two voices Dickie edged along close to the
grapes and melons, holding on to the shelf on which they lay so as not
to attract attention by the tap-tapping of his crutch.
He passed silently and slowly between the rose-filled window and the
heap of bananas that adorned the other side of the doorway, turned the
corner, threw his arm over his crutch, and legged away for dear life
down a sort of covered Arcade; turned its corner and found himself in a
wilderness of baskets and carts and vegetables, threaded his way through
them, in and out among the baskets, over fallen cabbage-leaves, under
horses' noses, found a quiet street, a still quieter archway, pulled
out the knife--however his adventure ended he was that knife to the
good--and prepared to cut the money out of the belt Mr. Beale had
buckled round him.
And the belt was not there! Had he dropped it somewhere? Or had he and
Markham, in the hurry of that twilight dressing, forgotten to put it on?
He did not know. All he knew was that the belt was not on him, and that
he was alone in London, without money, and that at Gravesend his father
was waiting for him--waiting, waiting. Dickie knew what it meant to
wait.
He went out into the street, and asked the first good-natured-looking
loafer he saw the way to Gravesend.
"Way to your grandmother," said the loafer; "don't you come saucing of
me."
"But which is the way?" said Dickie.
The man looked hard at him and then pointed with a grimy thumb over his
shoulder.
"It's thirty mile if it's a yard," he said. "Got any chink?"
"I lost it," said Dickie. "My farver's there awaitin' for me."
"Garn!" said the man; "you don't kid me so easy."
"I ain't arstin' you for anything except the way," said Dickie.
"More you ain't," said the man, hesitated, and pulled his hand out of
his pocket. "Ain't kiddin'? Sure? Father at Gravesend? Take your Bible?"
"Yuss," said Dickie.
"Then you take the first to the right and the first to the left, and
you'll get a blue 'bus as'll take you to the 'Elephant.' That's a bit of
the way. Then you arst again. And 'ere--this'll pay for the 'bus." He
held out coppers.
This practical kindness went to Dickie's heart more than all the kisses
of the young ladies in the flower-shop. The tears came into his eyes.
"Well, you _are_ a pal, and no error," he said. "Do the same for you
some day," he added.
The lounging man laughed.
"I'll hold you to that, matey," he said; "when you're a-ridin' in yer
carriage an' pair p'raps you'll take me on ter be yer footman."
"When I am, I will," said Dickie, quite seriously. And then they both
laughed.
The "Elephant and Castle" marks but a very short stage of the weary way
between London and Gravesend. When he got out of the tram Dickie asked
the way again, this time of a woman who was selling matches in the
gutter. She pointed with the blue box she held in her hand.
"It's a long way," she said, in a tired voice; "nigh on thirty mile."
"Thank you, missis," said Dickie, and set out, quite simply, to walk
those miles--nearly thirty. The way lay down the Old Kent Road, and
presently Dickie was in familiar surroundings. For the Old Kent Road
leads into the New Cross Road, and that runs right through the yellow
brick wilderness where Dickie's aunt lived. He dared not follow the road
through those well-known scenes. At any moment he might meet his aunt.
And if he met his aunt ... he preferred not to think of it.
Outside the "Marquis of Granby" stood a van, and the horses' heads were
turned away from London. If one could get a lift? Dickie looked
anxiously to right and left, in front and behind. There were wooden
boxes in the van, a lot of them, and on the canvas of the tilt was
painted in fat, white letters--
+----------------+
| FRY'S TONIC |
| |
| THE ONLY CURE |
+----------------+
There would be room on the top of the boxes--they did not reach within
two feet of the tilt.
Should he ask for a lift, when the carter came out of the "Marquis"? Or
should he, if he could, climb up and hide on the boxes and take his
chance of discovery on the lift? He laid a hand on the tail-board.
"Hi, Dickie!" said a voice surprisingly in his ear; "that you?"
Dickie owned that it was, with the feeling of a trapped wild animal, and
turned and faced a boy of his own age, a schoolfellow--the one, in fact,
who had christened him "Dot-and-go-one."
"Oh, what a turn you give me!" he said; "thought you was my aunt. Don't
you let on you seen me."
"Where you been?" asked the boy curiously.
"Oh, all about," Dickie answered vaguely. "Don't you tell me aunt."
"Yer aunt? Don't you know?" The boy was quite contemptuous with him for
not knowing.
"Know? No. Know what?"
"She shot the moon--old Hurle moved her; says he don't remember where
to. She give him a pint to forget's what I say."
"Who's livin' there now?" Dickie asked, interest in his aunt's address
swallowed up in a sudden desperate anxiety.
"No one don't live there. It's shut up to let apply Roberts 796
Broadway," said the boy. "I say, what'll you do?"
"I don't know," said Dickie, turning away from the van, which had
abruptly become unimportant. "Which way you goin'?"
"Down home--go past your old shop. Coming?"
"No," said Dickie. "So long--see you again some day. I got to go this
way." And he went it.
All the same the twilight saw him creeping down the old road to the
house whose back-yard had held the rabbit-hutch, the garden where he had
sowed the parrot food, and where the moonflowers had come up so white
and beautiful. What a long time ago! It was only a month really, but all
the same, what a long time!
The news of his aunt's departure had changed everything. The steadfast
desire to get to Gravesend, to find his father, had given way, at any
rate for the moment, to a burning anxiety about Tinkler and the white
stone. Had his aunt found them and taken them away? If she hadn't and
they were still there, would it not be wise to get them at once? Because
of course some one else might take the house and find the treasures.
Yes, it would certainly be wise to go to-night, to get in by the front
window--the catch had always been broken--to find his treasures, or at
any rate to make quite sure whether he had lost them or not.
No one noticed him as he came down the street, very close to the
railings. There are so many boys in the streets in that part of the
world. And the front window went up easily. He climbed in, dragging his
crutch after him.
He got up-stairs very quickly, on hands and knees, went straight to the
loose board, dislodged it, felt in the hollow below. Oh, joy! His hands
found the soft bundle of rags that he knew held Tinkler and the seal. He
put them inside the front of his shirt and shuffled down. It was not too
late to do a mile or two of the Gravesend road. But the moonflower--he
would like to have one more look at that.
He got out into the garden--there stood the stalk of the flower very
tall in the deepening dusk. He touched the stalk. It was dry and
hard--three or four little dry things fell from above and rattled on his
head.
"Seeds, o' course," said Dickie, who knew more about seeds now than he
had done when he saved the parrot seeds. One does not tramp the country
for a month, at Dickie's age, without learning something about seeds.
He got out the knife that should have cut the string of the basket in
the train, opened it and cut the stalk of the moonflower, very carefully
so that none of the seeds should be, and only a few were, lost. He crept
into the house holding the stalk upright and steady as an acolyte
carries a processional cross.
[Illustration: "HE MADE, WITH TRIPLE LINES OF SILVERY SEEDS, A
SIX-POINTED STAR"
[_Page 81_]
The house was quite dark now, but a street lamp threw its light into the
front room, bare, empty, and dusty. There was a torn newspaper on the
floor. He spread a sheet of it out, kneeled by it and shook the
moonflower head over it. The seeds came rattling out--dozens and dozens
of them. They were bigger than sunflower seeds and flatter and rounder,
and they shone like silver, or like the pods of the plant we call
honesty.
"Oh, beautiful, beautiful!" said Dickie, letting the smooth shapes slide
through his fingers. Have you ever played with mother-of-pearl card
counters? The seeds of the moonflower were like those.
He pulled out Tinkler and the seal and laid them on the heap of seeds.
And then knew quite suddenly that he was too tired to travel any further
that night.
"I'll doss here," he said; "there's plenty papers"--he knew by
experience that, as bed-clothes, newspapers are warm, if noisy--"and get
on in the morning afore people's up."
He collected all the paper and straw--there was a good deal littered
about in the house--and made a heap in the corner, out of the way of the
window. He did not feel afraid of sleeping in an empty house, only very
lordly and magnificent because he had a whole house to himself. The
food still left in his pockets served for supper, and you could drink
quite well at the wash-house tap by putting your head under and turning
it on very slowly.
And for a final enjoyment he laid out his treasures on the
newspaper--Tinkler and the seal in the middle and the pearly counters
arranged in patterns round them, circles and squares and oblongs. The
seeds lay very flat and fitted close together. They were excellent for
making patterns with. And presently he made, with triple lines of
silvery seeds, a six-pointed star, something like this--
[Illustration]
^
/ \
_____/___\_____
\ / \ /
\ / \ /
^ ^
/ \ / \
/___\_____/___\
\ /
\ /
v
with the rattle and the seal in the middle, and the light from the
street lamp shone brightly on it all.
"That's the prettiest of the lot," said Dickie Harding, alone in the
empty house.
And then the magic began.