TWO TRUES.
"The little stars are the lambs, I guess,
The fair moon is the shepherdess."
NURSERY SONG.
A few mornings after the story telling in the garden, as Miss King was
passing along the passage on her way down to breakfast, she overheard
tumultuous sounds from the direction of the nursery. She stopped to
listen. Various little voices were to be distinguished raised much
higher than their wont, and among them, now and then, Martin's rather
anxious tones as if entreating the children to listen to her advice.
"I don't care," were among the first words Cousin Magdalen made out
clearly, "there isn't two trues, and what I'm telling is real true
_true_, as true as true."
The speaker was Hoodie. Then came the answer from Maudie.
"Hoodie, how _can_ you?" she said in a voice of real distress. "I think
it's dreadful to tell stories, and to keep on saying they're true when
you know they're not. It wouldn't have mattered if you had explained it
was a sort of fairy story like what Cousin Magdalen told us the other
day, for of course that wasn't true either, only in a way it was."
"And Hoodie didn't usplain a bit, not one bit," said Duke virtuously.
"Her keeped on saying it were as true as true."
"And we is too little to under'tand, isn't we?" put in Hec. "If Hoodie
had toldened us she was in fun----"
"But I _wasn't_ in fun, you ugly, naughty, _ugly_ boy," retorted Hoodie,
by this time most evidently losing her temper. "And if peoples 'zinks so
much about trues, they shouldn't vant me to say what isn't true about
being in fun when I wasn't in fun. The moon _does_----"
A choky sound was now heard, caused by Maudie's putting her hand over
her sister's mouth.
"Hoodie, you're _not_ to say that again," she exclaimed, no doubt with
the best intention, but with an unfortunate result. Hoodie turned upon
her like a little wild cat, and was in the act of slapping her
vigorously when Miss King hurried into the room.
"_Hoodie!_" she said reproachfully.
Hoodie looked up with a mixture of shame and defiance.
"Oh, Hoodie, I am _so_ sorry. I thought you had quite left off
everything like that," said her cousin.
One or two big tears crept slowly out of the corners of Hoodie's eyes.
"They shouldn't say I was telling untrue things," she muttered. "'Tisn't
my fault."
"Oh! Miss Hoodie," said Martin, injudiciously, "how _can_ you say so?
I'm sure, Miss," she went on, turning to Magdalen, "no one said a word
to put her out. She was telling fairy stories like, to Master Duke and
Master Hec, and they began asking her to explain and she would say it
was quite true, not fairy stories at all. And Miss Maudie just tried to
show her she shouldn't say that, and then you see, Miss, she flew into a
temper."
"What were the stories about, Hoodie?" inquired Miss King, kindly.
Hoodie vouchsafed not a word in reply.
Magdalen glanced at the others.
"_I'll_ tell," said Duke. "They was about things up in the sky, you
know."
"Angels, do you mean?" said Miss King.
"Oh no, not angels," said Maudie. "It was about the stars and the moon.
Hoodie has a fancy----"
"It _isn't_ a fancy," put in Hoodie fiercely.
"Hoodie says," continued Maudie calmly, "that the moon and the stars and
all of the things up in the sky, know each other, and talk to each
other, and that she has heard them. The moon takes care of the stars,
she says, and early in the morning when it is time for them all to go
away the moon calls to them. I mean Hoodie says she does."
"'Cos she _does_," replied Hoodie, before any one else had time to
speak. "She calls to them and they all come round her together, and then
they all go away like a flash--_so_ quick, and it is so bright."
Her funny eyes gleamed up into Magdalen's face. In the interest of what
she was telling she forgot her temper.
"Was it that that you saw?" asked Magdalen, gravely. "The flash of their
going, I mean?"
"Yes," said Hoodie, "I've seen it lots of times, and I try to keep awake
on purpose. It passes--the flash, I mean--it passes by the little window
near my head. The little window for seeing up into the sky, you know."
Magdalen nodded her head.
"I know," she said, "I had a window like that in my room when I was a
little girl, and I was very fond of it. But I don't think I ever saw the
moon and the stars saying good night, or good morning--which is it? And
are none of the little stars ever left behind?"
The whole of Hoodie's face lighted up with a smile, but the rest of the
faces round Miss King looked grave and rather puzzled. Was she really
going to encourage Hoodie in her fancies--thought Maudie and Martin?
"I don't _'zink_ so," said Hoodie, "but I'll look the next time."
"Cousin Magdalen," whispered Maudie, gently pulling her godmother's
dress, "it _isn't_ true. You don't want Duke and Hec to think it is."
"I don't think it would matter much if they did," replied Magdalen in
the same tone. "Thinking little fancies like that true would do them far
less harm than thinking their sister was telling falsehoods. But I will
try to explain to Hoodie that perhaps it is better not to say any more
about it to the little boys. Only, Maudie dear, I think you are old
enough to understand better that Hoodie was not meaning to tell
untruths."
"She said she heard the moon and the stars _talking_," remonstrated
Maudie.
"Well--what if she did? Many a time when I was a little girl I have
thought I heard the wind say real words when I was lying awake in my
little bed. Of course I know better now, but so will Hoodie, and if
these fancies please her and keep her content and happy, why not leave
her them?"
"_Martin_ doesn't think so," said Maudie, rather mortified that her
efforts to bring Hoodie to a sense of her wrong-doings were so little
appreciated.
"Miss Maudie, dear!" exclaimed Martin, "I never said so, I'm sure. I
don't think I rightly understood what it was all about. I'm sure I don't
want to be sharp on any of you for fancies that do no one any harm. I
had plenty of them myself when I was little."
"You see, Maudie, Martin does understand," said Miss King. "I'll try and
explain about it better to you afterwards, but just now I really must
hurry down to breakfast."
She was turning away when a clamour of little voices stopped her.
"Won't you come back after breakfast, Cousin Magdalen?"
"Oh, do tum back."
"It's such a wet day and we've nothing to do, 'cause it's Saturday, and
Saturday's a holiday."
"Do you want me to come and give you lessons then?" said Magdalen,
mischievously.
Dead silence--broken at last by Duke.
"Couldn't you tum and tell us more stories?"
Magdalen shook her head.
"I haven't got any ready. Truly I haven't," she said. "It takes me a
long time to think of them, always. But I'll tell you what we might do.
I'll come up after breakfast with my work and you might all tell _me_
stories. That would amuse everybody. Each of you try to think of one,
but you mustn't tell each other what it is."
Hoodie's face lighted up, but Maudie looked rather lugubrious.
"_I_ can't think of one," she said.
"Oh yes you can, if you try," said Magdalen, cheerfully.
"Must it be all out of my own head?"
Miss King hesitated.
"No, if you can remember one that you've read that the others don't
know, that would do."
Maudie looked relieved.
"_I_ don't need to remember one," said Hoodie. "I know such heaps. My
head's all spinning full of them."
"So's mine," said Duke, jumping about and clapping his hands.
"And mine too," said Hec. "Kite 'pinning full."
"What nonsense," said Hoodie. "You _don't_ know stories. It's only me
that does."
"Hush, hush," said Miss King. "My plan won't be nice at all if it makes
you quarrel. Now I _must_ run down."
The children were very quiet through breakfast time. Every now and then
the little boys leant over across their bowls of bread and milk to
whisper to each other.
"Wouldn't that be lovely?" or
"That'd be a vezy pitty story," till called to order by Martin, who told
them that spilling their breakfast over the table would not be at all a
good beginning to the stories.
"'Twouldn't matter," remarked Hoodie, philosophically. "The cloth isn't
clean; it's Saturday, you know, Martin."
"Saturday or no Saturday," replied Martin, "it isn't pretty for little
ladies and gentlemen to spill their food on the table. And it gets them
in the habit of it for when they get big and have their breakfasts and
dinners down-stairs."
"Doesn't big people _never_ spill things on the cloth?" inquired Hec,
solemnly.
"Mr. Fielding does," said Hoodie. "One day when he was here at luncheon,
he was helping Mamma to wine, and he poured all down the outside of her
glass. I think he's dedfully ugly. I wouldn't like ever to be a big
people if I was to be like him."
"Miss Hoodie," remonstrated Martin, hardly approving of the turn the
conversation was taking, "do get on with your breakfast, and you'd
better be thinking about your stories than talking about things you
don't understand."
Hoodie glanced at Martin with considerable contempt.
"I'd like to make a story about Beauty and the Beast," she said. "I know
who'd be the beast, but _you_ shouldn't be Beauty, Martin."
"Shouldn't I, Miss Hoodie?" said Martin, good-naturedly. "Miss King
would make a nice Beauty, to my mind."
Almost as she spoke the door opened, and Cousin Magdalen re-appeared.
"Children," she said, "your mother says we may have the fire lighted in
the billiard-room because it is such a chilly day, so I am going to take
my work there and you may all come. Martin will be glad to get rid of
you, because I know Saturday's a busy morning for her always."
The news was received with great satisfaction, and before the end of
another half-hour the four children were all under their cousin's charge
in the billiard-room, for an hour or two, greatly to Martin's relief.
"What pretty work you are doing, Cousin Magdalen," said Maudie, stroking
admiringly the large canvas stretched on a frame at which Miss King was
working.
"I am glad you think it's pretty," said her godmother. "I think it is
very pretty; but the colours are not very bright, and children generally
like very bright colours. The pattern is copied from a very old piece of
tapestry."
"What's tapestry?" said Hoodie.
"Old-fashioned work that used to be made long ago," said Miss King. "It
was more like great pictures than anything else, and such quantities of
it were made that whole walls were covered with it. Once when I was a
very little girl I slept in a room all covered with tapestry, and in the
middle of the night----"
She stopped suddenly.
"_What?_" said Hoodie eagerly, peering up into her face. "What came in
the middle of night?"
"I didn't say anything came," said Cousin Magdalen, laughing. "I
stopped because I thought I could make it into a little story and tell
it to you afterwards. But we are forgetting all about your stories. Who
is going to begin? Eldest first--you, Maudie, I suppose."
Maudie looked rather melancholy.
"I can't tell nice stories," she said. "I've been thinking such a time,
and I can't think of anything except something very stupid."
"Well, let us hear it, any way," said her cousin, "and then we can say
if it is stupid or not."
"It was a story I read," said Maudie, "or else some one told it me. I
can't remember which it was. It was about a very poor little girl--she
was dreadfully poor, just as poor as you could fancy."
"No clothes--hadn't she no clothes?" asked Duke.
"And nucken to eat?" added Hec.
"Very little," said Maudie. "Of course she had some, or else she would
have died. She hadn't any father or mother, only an old grandmother, who
wasn't very kind to her. At least she was very old and deaf and all
that, and perhaps that made her cross. And the little girl used to go
messages for a shop--that was how she got a little money. It was a
baker's shop near where they lived, and it was rather a grand shop--only
they kept this little girl to go messages, not to the _grand_ people
that came there, you know, but to the people that bought the bread when
it wasn't so new--and currant cakes that were rather stale--like that,
you know. And on Sunday mornings she had the most to do, because they
used to send a great lot of bread very early to a room where a kind lady
had breakfast for a great many poor people--for a treat because it was
Sunday. They used to have lots of bread and butter and hot coffee--very
nice. And Lizzie, that was the little girl's name, liked Sunday mornings
and going with the bread to that place, because it all looked so
cheerful and comfortable, and the smell of the hot coffee was so good."
"Didn't they never give her none?" asked Duke.
"No, I don't think so. At least not before what I'm going to tell you.
You should wait till I tell you. Well, one Sunday in winter, it was a
dreadfully cold day; snowing and raining, and all mixed together, and
wind too, I think--dreadful cold wind. And Lizzie nearly cried as she
was going along to that place. She had such dreadfully sore chilblains
on her feet and on her hands too. She got to the place and emptied the
basket, and she was just coming away at the door, when a carriage came
up and she stopped a minute to see the people get out. The first was the
lady who gave the breakfast, Lizzie had seen her before, for she came
sometimes--not every Sunday, but just sometimes--to see that the
breakfast was all nice for her poor people. But this day, after she got
out, she turned back to lift a little boy out of the carriage. And
Lizzie had never seen this little boy before, because this was the first
time he had ever come. His mother had brought him with her for a great
treat. He was a very pretty little boy and his name was Arthur, and he
was about six, I think it said in the story. The lady went into the room
quick without noticing Lizzie, as she was in a hurry not to be late for
the poor people, but Arthur stayed behind a minute and stared at Lizzie.
She was so very cold, you know, she did look miserable, and then she had
cried a little on the way, so her eyes were red.
"Arthur went close up to her, staring all the time. Lizzie didn't mind.
She stared at him too. He was so pretty and he had such pretty clothes
on. When he got close to her, he looked sharp up into her face and
said--
"'What is you crying for?'
"Lizzie had forgotten she had been crying, so she said, 'I'm not crying.
I'm only very cold.'
"'Poor little girl,' said Arthur, 'I'll ask Mamma to give you a penny.'
"He ran after his mother, who was wondering what he was staying for, and
in a minute he came back again and put a little paper packet into
Lizzie's hand.
"'That's all mother's got in her penny purse,' he said, and he ran off
again before Lizzie had time to thank him.
"She was going to open the packet and see how much there was, but just
then one of the men who helped to put out the breakfast came past and
told her not to loiter about. So she took up her basket and ran away,
for people often spoke crossly to her, and she was easily frightened.
All the way home she kept thinking about her pennies and what she would
buy with them, but she didn't open the packet, because the way she had
to go there were so many rude boys about that she was afraid they might
snatch it from her. And when she got to the shop where she had to take
the basket to, the baker sent her another message, so it wasn't till
much later than usual that she got home. And all this time she had never
opened the packet, at least it said so in the story, though I think _I_
would have peeped at it before--wouldn't you, Cousin Magdalen?"
"I'm not sure," said Magdalen. "I think if one has something nice it is
sometimes rather tempting to keep it for a while without looking it all
over. It is something to look forward to."
"Yes," said Hoodie. "_I'd_ have keepened it for alvays wrapped up, and
then I could have alvays thought perhaps it was a fairy thing like."
"You silly girl," said Maudie, "you're always fancying about fairies."
"Maudie, _dear_" said Magdalen, "do try not to say things like that. You
are telling the story so nicely and we're all so happy. Please don't
spoil it by saying unkind little things."
"I didn't mean to be unkind," said Maudie penitently.
"P'ease do on with the story," said the little boys.
"Well, when at last she got home, she opened the little packet,"
continued Maudie, "and what _do_ you think she saw? Instead of two
pennies and a halfpenny perhaps, or something like that, there were--let
me see--yes, that was it--there were a gold pound, a half-a-crown, and a
shilling. Just fancy! Lizzie was so surprised that she didn't know what
she felt--she looked at them and looked at them, and turned them in her
hand, and then all at once it came into her mind that of course the lady
had given her them by mistake, and that she should take them back to
her. And she jumped up very quick and said to her grandmother there was
another message she had to go, and without thinking anything about
whether the lady would still be there or not, off she ran back again to
the place where the poor people had their breakfast. She ran as hard as
she could, but of course when she got there it was too late--the
breakfast was done long ago, and all the people away and the doors
locked, and there was no one about at all to tell her where she could
find the lady. And Lizzie was so unhappy that she sat down on a step and
cried. You see it was such a disappointment, for she couldn't tell how
much the lady _had_ meant to give her, and so she didn't like to take
any. Besides, she felt that it would be better to give the packet back
just as it was, only she had so wanted the pennies, for she never had
any. The baker's wife always paid her grandmother, not Lizzie herself,
for Lizzie's going messages.
"And after she had cried a good while she got up and went home. But just
as she got near the baker's shop she thought she might ask there if they
knew the lady's name, so she went in to ask. There was no one in the
shop but the young woman who helped--the others had gone to church."
"How was it the shop was open, then, as it was Sunday?" asked Magdalen.
"It wasn't open, only there was a sort of door in the shutters that
Lizzie always went in and out by on Sunday mornings. I know that,
because there was a picture of it--I remember now where I read the
story--it was in a big picture magazine when I was quite a little girl,"
said Maudie. "And this young woman was tidying the shop a little, and
just going to shut it altogether when Lizzie went in. She was a
good-natured young woman and she looked in the money books for the
lady's name, but it wasn't in--only the name of the man the room
belonged to where the breakfast was--and then she asked Lizzie what she
wanted to know for, and Lizzie told her. The young woman told her she
was very silly to think of giving it back. She said to her that
certainly the lady had _given_ it her, it wasn't even as if she had
found it. And Lizzie could not say that was not true, and she felt so
puzzled at first that she didn't know what to say. The young woman
offered to change it for her so that nobody could wonder how she had got
a gold piece, but Lizzie said she would think about it first. And then
she went home, and thought, and thought, till at last it came quite
plain into her mind that though it was true that the lady had given it
her, still it was _more_ true that she hadn't meant to give it her. And
then she didn't feel so unhappy."
Maudie stopped for a moment. It had turned out quite a long story, and
she was a little tired.
"And what did she do then? Quick, Maudie," said Hoodie.
"What did her do? Kick, kick, Maudie," said the little boys.
"Hush, children, don't hurry Maudie so. Let her rest a minute," said
Cousin Magdalen; "she must be a little tired with speaking so long."
"No, I'm not tired now," said Maudie, "only I want to remember to tell
it quite right, and I couldn't quite remember what came next. Any way,
she couldn't do anything more that day. But she wrapped up the money
again quite safe, and put it in another paper, outside the one it had,
and--oh, yes, that was it, she settled that she would wait till the next
Sunday, and then stand at the door of the breakfast place to see the
lady again. She didn't like telling any more people for fear they might
take the money away from her, or something like that, and she couldn't
think of anything better to do. Well, the next Sunday morning she took
the bread as usual, and then she waited at the door for the lady to
come, but she never came. Lizzie waited and waited, but she never came,
and all the people had gone in and the breakfast was nearly done, but
the lady never came. And at last she went and asked somebody if the lady
wasn't coming--the woman who poured out the coffee, I think it was--and
she told her no, the lady wasn't coming that day, and wouldn't come
again for a great long while, because she was going away somewhere a
good way off. Lizzie was so sorry, she began to cry, so the woman asked
her what was the matter, and she told her, and the woman was so pleased
with her for being so honest, that she gave her the lady's address and
told her to go at once to the house, for perhaps she wouldn't have gone
yet. But it was only another disappointment, for when poor Lizzie got
there she found it was all shut up; they had gone away the day before."
"Poor Lizzie," said Magdalen, "what did she do then?"
"Poor Lizzie," said Hec and Duke, "and didn't she never get the real
pennies?"
"It wasn't pennies she wanted so much," said Hoodie, "she wanted the
lady to know how good she was."
"She wanted to _be_ good, don't you think that would be a nicer way to
say it, Hoodie?" said Cousin Magdalen. "You see, being so poor, it must
sometimes have been very difficult for her not to use any of the money."
"Yes," said Maudie, "it said that in the story. Well, any way she _was_
good. She sewed the money up in a little bag and put it in a safe place,
and tried not to think about it. And all that winter she kept it and
never touched it, though they were very poor that winter. It was so very
cold, and poor people are always poorer in very cold winters, Martin
says. Often they had no fire, and Lizzie's chilblains were dreadful, for
her boots didn't keep out the rain and snow a bit, and often she was
very hungry too, but still she never touched the money. And at last,
after a very long time, the winter began to go away and the spring began
to come, and the woman who poured out the coffee told Lizzie she had
heard that the lady was coming home in the spring. So Lizzie began to
wait a little every Sunday morning when she had given in the bread, to
see if perhaps the lady would come. She waited like that for about six
Sundays, I think, till at last one Sunday just as she was thinking it
was no use waiting any more, the lady wouldn't be coming, a carriage
drove up to the door, the very same carriage that Lizzie had seen come
there before, and--and--the lady--the real same lady, and the real same
little boy, got out! And Lizzie was so pleased she didn't know what to
do, for though she had only seen them once before, she had watched for
them so long that they seemed like great friends to her. But though she
was so pleased, she began all to tremble and at first she couldn't
speak, her voice went all away. She just pulled the lady's dress and
looked up in her face but she couldn't speak. At first the lady didn't
understand, though she was a kind lady she didn't like a dirty-looking
little girl pulling her dress, and she looked at her a little sharply.
But the little boy understood, and he called out--
"'Oh, mamma, mamma, it's the same little girl. Don't you remember? I
wonder if she's been waiting here ever since.'
"_That_ was rather silly of him; of course she couldn't have been there
ever since, but he was quite a little boy. And then the lady looked
kindly at Lizzie and Lizzie's voice came back, and she said--
"'Oh, ma'am, this is the money you gave me by mistake. I've kept it all
this time,' and she put the little packet into the lady's hand. And then
something came over her; the feeling of having waited so long, I
suppose, and she burst into tears. And what _do_ you think the lady did?
She was so sorry for poor Lizzie, and so pleased with her, that she
actually kissed her!"
"Aczhally _kissed_ her," repeated Hoodie, Hec, and Duke. "That dirty
girl!"
"No," said Maudie, "she wasn't dirty. She was poor, but she wasn't
dirty."
"You said she was once," said Hoodie.
"Well, I didn't mean dirty, really. I meant she looked so, because her
clothes were so old. And any way the lady did kiss her, and then she was
so kind. She had never thought of having given Lizzie the money. It was
some she had put up to pay a bill with, and she had meant to put it in
her other purse, and when she couldn't find it, she thought she had lost
it somehow. And though she was sorry, of course it didn't matter so very
much. And she said if she had known she would have written a letter to
the coffee woman to tell her to spend it for warm clothes for poor
Lizzie. But after all, it all turned out nice. The lady was very kind to
Lizzie after that, and paid for her going to school and being taught all
nice things, so that when she got a little bigger she was a very nice
servant. I think it said in the story that she learnt to be a nurse, and
she was a very kind nurse always."
"Like Martin?" said Duke.
"Yes," said Maudie.
"Perhaps she was even kinder than Martin," suggested Hec. "Perhaps she
was _awful_ kind."
"Nobody could be kinder than Martin, except when we're naughty," said
Duke, reproachfully.
"Don't you think we should all thank Maudie for telling us such a nice
story?" said Magdalen. "_I_ thank her very much."
"So do I," said Duke.
"And me," said Hec.
"And me," said Hoodie, "only I want to tell a story too."
"We're all ready to listen," said Miss King. "But it mustn't be _very_
long. I've to go out with your mother this afternoon, so I must write
some letters before luncheon. And Hec and Duke have stories to tell,
too, haven't they? So fire away, Hoodie."