PRINCE CHÉRI.
"I'll take my guinea-pig always to church."
CHILD WORLD.
If it were cold just then in the thick-walled, well-warmed old house,
which was Jeanne's home, you may fancy _how_ cold it was in the rumbling
diligence, which in those days was the only way of travelling in France.
And for a little boy whose experience of long journeys was small, this
one was really rather trying. But Jeanne's cousin Hugh was a very
patient little boy. His life, since his parents' death, had not been a
_very_ happy one, and he had learnt to bear troubles without
complaining. And now that he was on his way to the kind cousins his
mother had so often told him of, the cousins who had been so kind to
_her_, before she had any home of her own, his heart was so full of
happiness that, even if the journey had been twice as cold and
uncomfortable, he would not have thought himself to be pitied.
It was a pale little face, however, which looked out of the diligence
window at the different places where it stopped, and a rather timid
voice which asked in the pretty broken French he had not quite forgotten
since the days that his mother taught him her own language, for a little
milk for his "pet." The pet, which had travelled on his knees all the
way from England--comfortably nestled up in hay and cotton wool in its
cage, which looked something like a big mouse-trap--much better off in
its way certainly than its poor little master. But it was a great
comfort to him: the sight of its funny little nose poking out between
the bars of its cage made Hugh feel ever so much less lonely, and when
he had secured a little milk for his guinea-pig he did not seem to mind
half so much about anything for himself.
Still it was a long and weary journey, and poor Hugh felt very glad when
he was wakened up from the uncomfortable dose, which was all in the way
of sleep he could manage, to be told that at last they had arrived. This
was the town where his friends lived, and a "monsieur," the conductor
added, was inquiring for him--Jeanne's father's valet it was, who had
been sent to meet him and take him safe to the old house, where an eager
little heart was counting the minutes till he came.
They looked at each other curiously when at last they met. Jeanne's eyes
were sparkling and her cheeks burning, and her whole little person in a
flutter of joyful excitement, and yet she couldn't speak. Now that the
little cousin was there, actually standing before her, she could not
speak. How was it? He was not _quite_ what she had expected; he looked
paler and quieter than any boys she had seen, and--was he not glad to
see her?--glad to have come?--she asked herself with a little misgiving.
She looked at him again--his blue eyes were very sweet and gentle, and,
tired though he was, Jeanne could see that he was trying to smile and
look pleased. But he was _very_ tired and very shy. That was all that
was the matter. And his shyness made Jeanne feel shy too.
"Are you very tired, my cousin?" she said at last.
"Not very, thank you," said Hugh. "I am rather tired, but I am not very
hungry," he added, glancing at a side-table where a little supper had
been laid out for him. "I am not very hungry, but I think Nibble is.
Might I have a little milk for Nibble, please?"
As he spoke he held up for Jeanne to see the small box he was carrying,
and she gave a little scream of pleasure when, through the bars, she
caught sight of the guinea-pig's soft nose, poking out, saying as
plainly almost as if he had spoken, "I want my supper; please to see at
once about my supper, little girl."
"Neeble," cried Jeanne, "O my cousin, is Neeble your pet? Why, he is a
'cochon de Barbarie!' O the dear little fellow! We could not--at least
papa and mamma could not--read what he was. And have you brought him all
the way, my cousin, and do you love him very much? Marcelline,
Marcelline, oh, do give us some milk for the cochon de Barbarie--oh,
see, Marcelline, how sweet he is!"
Once set free, her tongue ran on so fast that sometimes Hugh had
difficulty to understand her. But the ice was broken any way, and when,
an hour or two later, Jeanne's mother told her she might take Hugh up to
show him his room, the two trotted off, hand-in-hand, as if they had
been close companions for years.
"I hope you will like your room, chéri," said Jeanne, with a tiny tone
of patronising. "It is not very far from mine, and mamma says we can
keep all our toys and books together in my big cupboard in the passage."
Hugh looked at Jeanne for a moment without speaking. "What was that name
you called me just now, Jeanne?" he asked, after a little pause.
Jeanne thought for a minute.
"'Mon cousin,' was it that?" she said. "Oh no, I remember, it was
'chéri.' I _cannot_ say your name--I have tried all these days. I cannot
say it better than 'Ee-ou,' which is not pretty."
She screwed her rosy little mouth into the funniest shape as she tried
to manage "Hugh." Hugh could hardly help laughing.
"Never mind," he said. "I like 'chéri' ever so much better. I like it
better than 'mon cousin' or any name, because, do you know," he added,
dropping his voice a little, "I remember now, though I had forgotten
till you said it--that was the name mamma called me by."
"Chéri!" repeated Jeanne, stopping half-way up the staircase to throw
her arms round Hugh's neck at the greatest risk to the equilibrium of
the whole party, including the guinea-pig--"_Chéri!_ I shall always call
you so, then. You shall be my Prince Chéri. Don't you love fairy
stories, mon cousin?"
"_Awfully_," said Hugh, from the bottom of his soul.
[Illustration: 'ISN'T IT A FUNNY ROOM, CHÉRI?'--p. 25]
"I knew you would," said Jeanne triumphantly. "And oh, so do I!
Marcelline says, Chéri, that the tapestry room--that's the room you're
going to have--is full of fairy stories. I wonder if you'll find out
any of them. You must tell me if you do."
"The tapestry room?" repeated Hugh; "I don't think I ever saw a tapestry
room. Oh," he added, as a sudden recollection struck him, "is it like
what that queen long ago worked about the battles and all that? I mean
all about William the Conqueror."
"No," said Jeanne, "it's quite different from that work. I've seen that,
so I know. It isn't pretty at all. It's just long strips of linen with
queer-shaped horses and things worked on. Not _at all_ pretty. And I
think the pictures on the walls of your room _are_ pretty. Here it is.
Isn't it a funny room, Chéri?"
She opened the door of the tapestry room as she spoke, for while
chattering they had mounted the staircase and made their way along the
corridor. Hugh followed his little cousin into the room, and stood
gazing round him with curious surprise and pleasure. The walls were well
lighted up, for Marcelline had carried a lamp upstairs and set it down
on the table, and a bright fire was burning in the wide old-fashioned
hearth.
"Jeanne," said Hugh, after a minute's silence, "Jeanne, it is very
funny, but, do you know, I am _sure_ I have seen this room before. I
seem to know the pictures on the walls. Oh, _how_ nice they are! I
didn't think that was what tapestry meant. Oh, how glad I am this is to
be my room--is yours like this too, Jeanne?"
Jeanne shook her head.
"Oh no, Chéri," she said. "My room has a nice paper--roses and things
like that running up and down. I am very glad my room is not like this.
I don't think I should like to see all these funny creatures in the
night. You don't know how queer they look in the moonlight. They quite
frightened me once."
Hugh opened his blue eyes very wide.
"_Frightened_ you?" he said. "I should never be frightened at them. They
are so nice and funny. Just look at those peacocks, Jeanne. They are
lovely."
Jeanne still shook her head.
"I don't think so," she said. "I can't bear those peacocks. But I'm very
glad _you_ like them, Chéri."
"I wish it was moonlight to-night," continued Hugh. "I don't think I
should go to sleep at all. I would lie awake watching all the pictures.
I dare say they look rather nice in the firelight too, but still not
_so_ nice as in the moonlight."
"No, Monsieur," said Marcelline, who had followed the children into the
room. "A moonlight night is the time to see them best. It makes the
colours look quite fresh again. Mademoiselle Jeanne has never looked at
the tapestry properly by moonlight, or she would like it better."
"I shouldn't mind with Chéri," said Jeanne. "You must call me some night
when it's very pretty, Chéri, and we'll look at it together."
Marcelline smiled and seemed pleased, which was rather funny. Most
nurses would have begun scolding Jeanne for dreaming of such a thing as
running about the house in the middle of the night to admire the
moonlight on tapestry or on anything else. But then Marcelline certainly
was rather a funny person.
"And the cochon de Barbarie, where is he to sleep, Monsieur?" she said
to Hugh.
Hugh looked rather distressed.
"I don't know," he said. "At home he slept in his little house on a sort
of balcony there was outside my window. But there isn't any balcony
here--besides, it's so _very_ cold, and he's quite strange, you know."
He looked at Marcelline, appealingly.
"I daresay, while it is so cold, Madame would not mind if we put him in
the cupboard in the passage," she said; but Jeanne interrupted her.
"Oh no," she said. "He would be far better in the chickens' house. It's
nice and warm, I know, and his cage can be in one corner. He wouldn't be
nearly so lonely, and to-morrow I'll tell Houpet and the others that
they must be very kind to him. Houpet always does what I tell him."
"Who is Houpet?" said Hugh.
"He's my pet chicken," replied Jeanne. "They're all pets, of course, but
he's the most of a pet of all. He lives in the chicken-house with the
two other little chickens. O Chéri," she added, glancing round, and
seeing that Marcelline had left the room, "do let us run out and peep at
Houpet for a minute. We can go through the tonnelle, and the chickens'
house is close by."
She darted off as she spoke, and Hugh, nothing loth, his precious Nibble
still in his arms, followed her. They ran down the long corridor, on to
which opened both the tapestry room and Jeanne's room at the other end,
through a small sort of anteroom, and then--for though they were
_upstairs_, the garden being built in terraces was at this part of the
house on a level with the first floor--then straight out into what
little Jeanne called "the tonnelle."
Hugh stood still and gazed about him with delight and astonishment.
"O Jeanne," he exclaimed, "how pretty it is! oh, how very pretty!"
Jeanne stopped short in her progress along the tonnelle.
"What's pretty?" she said in a matter-of-fact tone. "Do you mean the
garden with the snow?"
"No, no, that's pretty too, but I mean the trees. Look up, Jeanne, do."
There was no moonlight, but the light from the windows streamed out to
where the children stood, and shone upon the beautiful icicles on the
branches above their heads. For the tonnelle was a kind of arbour--a
long covered passage made by trees at each side, whose boughs had been
trained to meet and interlace overhead. And now, with their fairy
tracery of snow and frost, the effect of the numberless little branches
forming a sparkling roof was pretty and fanciful in the extreme. Jeanne
looked up as she was told.
"Yes," she said, "it's pretty. If it was moonlight it would be prettier
still, for then we could see right along the tonnelle to the end."
"I don't think that _would_ be prettier," said Hugh; "the dark at the
end makes it look so nice--like as if it was a fairy door into some
queer place--a magic cavern, or some place like that."
"So it does," said Jeanne. "What nice fancies you have, Chéri! But I
wish you could see the tonnelle in summer. It _is_ pretty then, with all
the leaves on. But we must run quick, or else Marcelline will be calling
us before we have got to the chicken-house."
Off she set again, and Hugh after her, though not so fast, for Jeanne
knew every step of the way, and poor Hugh had never been in the garden
before. It was not very far to go, however--the chickens' house was in a
little courtyard just a few steps from the tonnelle, and guided by
Jeanne's voice in front as much as by the faint glimpses of her figure,
dark against the snow, Hugh soon found himself safe beside her at the
door of the chickens' house. Jeanne felt about till she got hold of the
latch, which she lifted, and was going to push open the door and enter
when Hugh stopped her.
"Jeanne," he said, "it's _quite_ dark. We can't possibly see the
chickens. Hadn't we better wait till to-morrow, and put Nibble in the
cupboard, as Marcelline said, for to-night?"
"Oh no," said Jeanne. "It doesn't matter a bit that it's dark." She
opened the door as she spoke, and gently pulled Hugh in after her.
"Look," she went on, "there is a very, very little light from the
kitchen window after all, when the door is opened. Look, Chéri, up in
that corner sleep Houpet and the others. Put the cochon de Barbarie down
here--so--that will do. He will be quite safe here, and you feel it is
not cold."
"And are there no rats, or naughty dogs about--nothing like that?" asked
Hugh rather anxiously.
"Of course not," replied Jeanne. "Do you think I'd leave Houpet here if
there were? I'll call to Houpet now, and tell him to be kind to the
little cochon."
"But Houpet's asleep, and, besides, how would he know what you say?"
objected Hugh.
For all answer Jeanne gave a sort of little whistle--half whistle, half
coo it was. "Houpet, Houpet," she called softly, "we've brought a little
cochon de Barbarie to sleep in your house. You must be very kind to
him--do you hear, Houpet dear? and in the morning you must fly down and
peep in at his cage and tell him you're very glad to see him."
A faint, a very faint little rustle was heard up above in the corner
where Jeanne had tried to persuade her cousin that the chickens were to
be _seen_, and delighted at this evidence that any way they were to be
_heard_, she turned to him triumphantly.
"That's Houpet," she said. "Dear little fellow, he's too sleepy to
crow--he just gives a little wriggle to show that he's heard me. Now put
down the cage, Chéri--oh, you have put it down--and let's run in again.
Your pet will be quite safe, you see, but if we're not quick, Marcelline
will be running out to look for us."
She felt about for Hugh's hand, and having got it, turned to go. But she
stopped to put her head in again for a moment at the door.
"Houpet, dear," she said, "don't let Dudu come into your house. If he
tries to, you must fly at him and scold him and peck him."
"Who is Dudu?" said Hugh, as they were running back to the house
together along the snowy garden path.
"He is----" began Jeanne. "Hush," she went on, in a lower voice, "there
he is! I do believe he heard what I said, and he's angry." For right
before them on the path stood the old raven, on one leg as usual, though
this it was too dark to see clearly. And, as Jeanne spoke, he gave a
sharp, sudden croak, which made both the children jump, and then
deliberately hopped away.
"He's a raven!" said Hugh with surprise. "Why, what funny pets you have,
Jeanne!"
Jeanne laughed.
"Dudu isn't my pet," she said. "I don't like him. To tell you the truth,
Chéri, I'm rather frightened of him. I think he's a sort of a fairy."
Hugh looked much impressed, but not at all surprised.
"Do you really, Jeanne?" he said.
"Yes," she said, "I do. And I'm not _sure_ but that Grignan is too. At
least I think Grignan is enchanted, and that Dudu is the spiteful fairy
that did it. Grignan is the tortoise, you know."
"Yes," said Hugh, "you told me about him. I do wonder if what you think
is true," he added reflectively. "We must try to find out, Jeanne."
"But we mustn't offend Dudu," said Jeanne. "He might, you know, turn
_us_ into something--two little mice, perhaps--that wouldn't be very
nice, would it, Chéri?"
"I don't know," Hugh replied. "I wouldn't mind for a little, if he would
turn us back again. We could get into such funny places and see such
funny things--couldn't we, Jeanne?"
They both laughed merrily at the idea, and were still laughing when they
ran against Marcelline at the door which they had left open at the end
of the tonnelle.
"My children!" she exclaimed. "Monsieur Chéri and Mademoiselle Jeanne!
Where have you been? And in the snow too! Who would have thought it?"
Her tone was anxious, but not cross. She hurried them in to the warm
fire, however, and carefully examined their feet to make sure that their
shoes and stockings were not wet.
"Marcelline is very kind," said Hugh, fixing his soft blue eyes on the
old nurse in surprise. "At home, grandmamma's maid would have scolded me
dreadfully if I had run out in the snow."
"Yes," said Jeanne, flinging her arms round the old nurse's neck, and
giving her a kiss first on one cheek then on the other; "she is very
kind. Nice little old Marcelline."
"Perhaps," said Hugh, meditatively, "she remembers that when she was a
little girl she liked to do things like that herself."
"I don't believe you ever were a little girl, were you, Marcelline?"
said Jeanne. "I believe you were always a little old woman like what you
are now."
Marcelline laughed, but did not speak.
"Ask Dudu," she said at last. "If he is a fairy, he should know."
Jeanne pricked up her ears at this.
"Marcelline," she said solemnly, "I believe you do know something about
Dudu. Oh, _do_ tell us, dear Marcelline."
But nothing more was to be got out of the old nurse.
When the children were undressed, Jeanne begged leave to run into Hugh's
room with him to tuck him into bed, and make him feel at home the first
night. There was no lamp in the room, but the firelight danced curiously
on the quaint figures on the walls.
"You're sure you're not frightened, Chéri?" said little Jeanne in a
motherly way, as she was leaving the room.
"Frightened! what is there to be frightened at?" said Hugh.
"The funny figures," said Jeanne. "Those peacocks look just as if they
were going to jump out at you."
"I think they look very nice," said Hugh. "I am sure I shall have nice
dreams. I shall make the peacocks give a party some night, Jeanne, and
we'll invite Dudu and Grignan, and Houpet and the two little hens, and
Nibble, of course, and we'll make them all tell stories."
Jeanne clapped her hands.
"Oh, what fun!" she exclaimed. "And you'll ask me and let me hear the
stories, won't you, Chéri?"
"_Of course_," said Hugh. So Jeanne skipped off in the highest spirits.