EMMELINE TALKS THINGS OVER
Emmeline opened her eyes again to find herself half sitting, half lying
across the seat of a cab. A strange lady with a grave, kind face was
kneeling by her side, holding her arm.
‘Where—’ began Emmeline faintly, breaking off with a groan as the cab
gave a jolt and she felt a sudden shoot of pain rather like having a
tooth out, only it was much worse, and in her arm, not her mouth.
‘We are going to the Infirmary,’ said the lady gently; ‘they’ll soon make
you well.’
‘Can’t we go to Mary?’ said Emmeline, so feebly that the lady could not
quite catch the words.
‘You shall go home as soon as ever the doctor has put your arm right,’
she promised.
After that the pain grew so bad that there was nothing for it but just to
lie back on the seat and squeeze her lips tightly together so as to keep
from screaming. At that moment she did not care where she was going if
only she got there soon, and this dreadful jolting drive came to an end.
After a few minutes that seemed almost like as many hours the cab
stopped, and then somebody came and lifted her out with strong, careful
arms. She must have fainted again after that, for the next thing she knew
was that she was lying on a bed in a strange room, and that a doctor was
leaning over her, hurting her horribly by feeling her arm.
‘Only a simple fracture,’ he remarked cheerfully. ‘We shall soon set that
to rights.’
It was all very well for the doctor to speak cheerfully, but the process
of having her arm set gave Emmeline the sharpest pain she had ever known.
One agonised ‘Oh!’ did burst from her, but except for that she lay quite
still and quiet, only breathing harder than usual.
‘Well, you’re one of the pluckiest little things I’ve ever had to do
with,’ said the doctor warmly, when he had finished his work.
‘Yes, indeed she is,’ agreed the Nurse who had helped to bind up the arm.
Emmeline gave a wan little smile. ‘One must be—game,’ she remarked.
‘Game’ was one of Micky’s words which she would never have used if she
had been quite herself.
‘Well, you have been very game!’ said the doctor smiling as he left her.
Afterwards the Nurse began to undress her. Emmeline had a dreamy
impression that the proceeding was a strange one, and that there was
something very important she ought to have been doing, but she could not
remember what it was, and she felt so tired and so much disinclined to
argue that she just submitted without a word.
‘Now, dear, can you tell me your name and where you live?’ asked the
Nurse, as she put Emmeline into the narrow spring-bed on which she had
lain to have her arm set.
‘My name’s Emmeline Bolton,’ was the prompt answer, ‘and I live——’ She
hesitated, frowned with perplexity, and then broke into a weak little
laugh. ‘Why, how funny! I can’t remember the name of the place.’
‘Don’t you live in Eastwich, then?’ asked the Nurse.
‘No, I don’t think we live there now,’ said Emmeline in a puzzled way.
‘Mary does, though,’ she added as an afterthought.
‘Do you remember Mary’s address and what her surname is?’
Emmeline frowned again.
‘It’s very odd,’ she said after a moment. ‘I don’t seem able to remember
anything to-day.’
‘Never mind,’ said the Nurse, ‘it’ll all come back to you soon enough.’
She went out of the room and returned presently with a glass of warm
milk. ‘Drink this,’ she said, ‘and then go to sleep like a good child.’
Emmeline drained the glass obediently, after which she dropped her head
back on to the pillow, and in another minute she had fallen sound asleep.
‘Poor little thing!’ said the Nurse to herself as she went away. ‘She’s
still dazed with the blow on her head. Well, it can’t have been a very
bad one, or she wouldn’t have remembered as much as she did, so I dare
say she’ll be pretty well all right by to-morrow. For to-night all we can
do is to give notice at the police-station that she is here.’
Emmeline awoke the next morning to find the sunlight pouring full into
the room where she was lying—a strange room with three empty beds in it
instead of Kitty’s, and none of the familiar pictures nor furniture. Her
first feeling was one of bewilderment as to where she was, and why one
of her arms felt so funny. Then she remembered that this was Eastwich
Infirmary, and that she had been brought there in a cab to have her arm
put to rights.
What had she been doing in Eastwich? For a moment she could not think.
Then suddenly all the events of the last few days flashed back upon her,
up to the time when she had been standing talking to the stranger boy
outside the tall grim house, into which the policeman had just led Micky
and Diamond Jubilee!
When the Nurse came in to attend to her a few minutes later, there
was nothing to be seen of Emmeline but a restless lump, heaving about
stormily underneath the bedclothes.
‘It’s very bad for the child to lie with her head covered up like that,’
thought the Nurse, and, going up to the bed, she tried gently to pull
down the clothes. For a moment Emmeline held on fiercely, and when she
did let her face be uncovered it was tear-stained and flushed.
‘Well, how are you feeling this morning?’ asked the Nurse kindly,
ignoring the marks of tears. She was quite used to patients being
miserably shy and homesick just at first.
‘Better, thank you—I mean quite well,’ said Emmeline. ‘Please, I can’t
stay here,’ she went on. ‘There’s something dreadfully important I must
tell my friends. I can’t think how I came to forget it last night. I must
dress and go to them now, at once. You don’t know how frightfully it
matters!’
‘Don’t be so unhappy,’ said Nurse. ‘We’ll send for your friend, and I
daresay she’ll be here almost as soon as you’ve finished your breakfast.’
‘Oh, thank you!’ said Emmeline, as much relieved as she could be just
then. ‘It’s Miss Mary Bell I want to see, and her address is 14, East
Parade.’
‘I know,’ said the Nurse. ‘Her brother was round late last night
inquiring after you. They had found out at the police-station where you
were, and were very anxious about you, so mind you eat a good breakfast
and look as well as possible when your friend comes, so as to set her
mind at rest,’ and Nurse went away with a merry smile which poor Emmeline
felt quite incapable of returning.
Events turned out even better than Nurse’s word. Emmeline was still
struggling with her basin of arrowroot, when the sound of a voice in
the passage outside made her flush and tremble all over. Then the door
opened, and Nurse entered, followed by Mary, who hobbled in looking
anxious and worried, but otherwise so much her motherly self that there
would have been comfort in the very sight of her if Emmeline had been
less taken up with the thought of the terrible news she must tell.
‘Well, my poor darling, you have been through a lot!’ said Mary, coming
close to the bed and bending down to kiss Emmeline’s quivering face.
The kindly tone was too much for Emmeline, and she burst into tears.
‘You won’t want to k-kiss me when you’ve heard what dreadful things have
happened all through m-me!’ she sobbed.
‘There, there, my darling. Don’t take on so!’ said Mary, kissing her
again. ‘Things aren’t so bad as what you think. Master Micky have been
found.’
‘But, Mary,’ she broke out desperately, ‘he’s in _prison_. I saw a
policeman take him there yesterday afternoon.’
‘Oh no, dear,’ Mary hastened to explain, ‘not to prison, only to the
police-station. People can’t be sent to prison till they have been tried
in court, you know. Micky didn’t stay long even at the police-station,
for as soon as he gave his name and address they knew he must be the boy
who was missing, and sent for me to take him away.’
‘And is that really all that will happen,’ cried Emmeline.
‘Well, he’s had to go to the police-court this morning to be questioned
by the magistrate,’ Mary was forced to admit. ‘But I quite hope he will
get on all right. Nobody could talk to him without seeing what an honest
little boy he is really, and that he didn’t a bit understand what that
Diamond Jubilee was up to. That Diamond Jubilee is a real bad boy, if
ever there was one!’
‘I’m afraid he is,’ said Emmeline sorrowfully. ‘It’s a dreadful pity
Micky ever got mixed up with him. And oh, Mary, it’s all my fault that
he ever did! That’s what I was going to tell you about.’
‘I think Master Micky has told me,’ said Mary. ‘You mean about adopting
that boy unbeknown to Miss Bolton. I must say I was surprised to hear it
of _you_, Miss Emmeline. I should never have thought you would have done
anything so silly—to say nothing of its being very naughty to do such a
thing without leave.’
‘You see,’ faltered Emmeline, ‘I knew Aunt Grace wouldn’t understand or
sympathise with us trying to do a good work.’
‘And I don’t blame her either,’ said Mary. ‘Not good works of that kind.
They’re not suitable to children.’
Poor Emmeline felt as though her one friend had gone over to the enemy.
Mary’s remark was almost exactly what Aunt Grace had said last Sunday,
when Emmeline had been so indignant with her for not appreciating that
charitable little Kathleen.
‘But, Mary,’ she said piteously. ‘You _did_ say yourself that guileless
children could do more good to sinners than anybody else, and I’m sure
Diamond Jubilee is a sinner!’
Mary looked as much taken aback as people usually do when their own
theories are put by others into inconvenient practice.
‘I wasn’t thinking of adoption when I said that,’ she explained rather
lamely. ‘Specially not a nasty, dirty little boy like that, who isn’t at
all fit company for little ladies and gentlemen. But there, my darling, I
don’t want to scold you, for I’m sure you meant well, and anyhow, you’ve
been punished more than enough already, both for adopting the boy, and
also for running away to find Micky, which is another thing you would
never have done if you had stopped to think how dreadfully anxious and
unhappy it would make everybody.’
‘Did it?’ and Emmeline looked self-reproachful; ‘but there wasn’t anyone
at home who would mind much. It isn’t as if Jane and Cook cared for us as
you do, Mary.’
‘It isn’t likely they should, but for all that they were nearly
frightened out of their wits, poor things,’ said Mary, ‘specially after
Miss Miller had got out of Kitty that you’d gone to Green Ginger Land to
look for Master Micky.’
‘How do you know all this?’ asked Emmeline.
‘I had a letter from Jane this morning, and a telegram from Miss Miller
yesterday evening,’ answered Mary.
There was a moment’s silence.
‘Yes, I see now that I oughtn’t to have gone off like that,’ said
Emmeline sadly. ‘But I was so dreadfully unhappy about Micky that nothing
seemed to matter except finding him.’
Mary was too kind to point out to Emmeline that Micky would have been
found just as soon if she had never made her expedition.
‘Yes, poor darling, I can just fancy what you must have been feeling!’
she said, ‘George would have left a message for you last night about
Master Micky, only while he’s in this trouble it seems best not to make
any more talk than can be helped, so I thought I’d come round and tell
you first thing this morning instead, and see how you were at the same
time. How did you come to get run over?’
‘I can’t remember anything about it, it seems just wiped out of my mind,’
said Emmeline; ‘it’s very funny, for I remember the early part of the
afternoon so well. Oh, Mary, it was just like a dreadful dream!’
Then she went on to tell of her adventures in Green Ginger Land.
Mary shuddered as she listened, for she knew far better than Emmeline
herself what a risk the child had run.
‘Thank God nothing worse happened than your watch being stolen!’ she
exclaimed from the bottom of her heart when she had heard the whole
story. ‘That’s very grieving, though. But maybe the police will be able
to get it back for you.’
‘Do you really think the police will get me back my watch?’ cried
Emmeline.
‘Well, you mustn’t reckon on it, but I can’t help hoping they may,’ said
Mary. ‘And now, my darling, I must be going, for Master Micky’s case will
be getting over, and I must go and hear how the poor lamb got on.’
‘You’ll come back and tell me as soon as ever you know anything, won’t
you?’ pleaded Emmeline.
‘I expect your aunt will want to come herself, dear, but if she doesn’t,
I certainly will,’ answered Mary.
‘Aunt Grace!’ exclaimed Emmeline. ‘Why, she isn’t here. She’s in London!’
‘She’s here now,’ said Mary. ‘Miss Miller telegraphed for her yesterday
evening, and when she reached home, about two o’clock this morning, she
found a telegram from George to say that both you and Micky were at
Eastwich, and that you had had an accident. So she came back here by the
seven o’clock train.’
‘How dreadfully tired she must be!’ exclaimed Emmeline. ‘And how could
she leave her friend?’
‘The poor lady died yesterday afternoon,’ said Mary in a low voice. ‘The
end came much more suddenly than anyone expected.’
‘Oh, Mary, I wish it hadn’t all happened just yesterday!’ said Emmeline,
with tears in her eyes.
‘So do I, dear,’ said Mary. ‘But it’s no use crying over spilt milk. The
only thing for you to do now is to tell your Aunt Grace how very sorry
you are. You’ll find she’ll understand.’
Emmeline heaved herself round and buried her face in the pillow.
‘No, she won’t,’ she muttered. ‘Nobody could, and besides, she never
really cared for me. She’ll hate me after this, I expect.’
‘Miss Emmeline, you mustn’t talk of your aunt like that,’ said Mary
gently. ‘She loves you all dearly—I never knew how dearly till I saw
her this morning, tired to death with the journey and all the worry and
anxiety following so quick on her grief at losing her friend, and yet
comforting poor little Micky as if she’d been his mother. Now that it
is all over, and I shall never misjudge her so again, perhaps there’s
no harm in telling you that there was a time when I had my doubts as to
how your living with her would turn out, what with her being so young
and pretty, and more used to a gay London life than to bringing up
children; but I’ve reproached myself many a time this morning for ever
having had such uncharitable thoughts, for a better Christian or a more
loving-hearted young lady doesn’t walk the earth.’
Poor dear Mary! She little thought that Emmeline had all along been quite
aware of those misgivings of hers, which she had been too loyal and good
a woman ever to express in words, or that it is far easier to suggest
doubts than to put trust and confidence in their place. Emmeline said
nothing, but she none the less looked forward with dread to the possible
visit from Aunt Grace. Even Mary thought she had done very wrong, dear
kind Mary, who always took the best view of things, and as to Aunt Grace,
she would never really forgive her, or believe how very sorry she was.
Emmeline’s heart sank when, about half an hour afterwards, Aunt Grace
herself arrived. She was looking so ill and sad that a dreadful fear came
over Emmeline lest Micky might, after all, have been sent to prison, and
she could only look at Aunt Grace in dumb suspense. Fortunately, her aunt
understood at once, and hastened to set her mind at rest.
‘It’s all right, Emmeline,’ she said; ‘Micky has come out of the affair
all right, and is quite cleared of the charge of helping the other boy
to thieve. Micky stood up before the magistrate like a little hero, and
answered every question so frankly and pluckily that no one could doubt
that he was telling the truth. Then it came to the other boy’s turn, and
though he whimpered, and altogether did not cut nearly such a good figure
as Micky, he was quite ready to own that Micky had known nothing of his
meaning to pick the lady’s pocket. I dare say poor Diamond Jubilee is a
very naughty little boy, but I shall always have a kindly feeling towards
him, for being so anxious as he certainly was to clear Micky’s character.
The end of it all was that Micky was acquitted. I’m not altogether sorry
he had the fright, as a punishment for his naughtiness in running away.
As to the other poor child, he was sentenced to have six strokes of the
birch.’
‘Then even _he_ won’t be sent to prison?’ asked Emmeline.
‘Oh no, they would never think of sending such a child to prison,’ Aunt
Grace assured her. ‘You poor little Emmeline, I don’t wonder you looked
so white and frightened just now, if you were expecting to hear of
Micky’s being sent to prison! But now your mind is easy about him, I want
you to tell me what’s been happening to _you_, my poor child.’
Something in the unexpected gentleness of the question brought the tears
into Emmeline’s eyes again. ‘Oh, Aunt Grace,’ she said, ‘I am so very,
very sorry!’
Aunt Grace bent over her suddenly, and gave her one of her rare kisses.
‘I know you are, darling,’ she said—she had never called Emmeline
‘darling’ before—‘tell me all about it. Of course I know a good deal from
what Micky has told me, but I want to hear it from you too. Tell me
from the very beginning. What made you first think of adopting Diamond
Jubilee?’
It was very odd; all the morning Emmeline had been dreading more than
anything else having to tell her story to Aunt Grace, and yet, now,
almost before she knew what she was doing, she found herself pouring it
all out as freely and fully as if Aunt Grace had been her most intimate
friend. She began by speaking of the Meeting in the Village School, and
of how much it had made her want to do good to the poor. Then came the
history of the day they had gone to the Fair alone—‘and I knew all the
time you wouldn’t like us to go alone, though I pretended to myself that
you wouldn’t mind,’ Emmeline confessed—and of the encounter with Diamond
Jubilee, and of how it had almost seemed ‘meant’ that they should adopt
him when his dire need of being plucked as a brand from the burning was
brought home to them so forcibly.
‘I thought how b-beautiful it would be to bring him up to be a
m-missionary!’ said Emmeline, with two little sobs at the remembrance of
the woeful way in which Diamond Jubilee had disappointed her.
‘I shouldn’t have thought myself he was quite cut out for a missionary,’
said Aunt Grace gravely, though her eyes could not help twinkling a
little, ‘but go on.’
Emmeline went on to tell of all the plans for Diamond Jubilee’s
welfare, of the Feudal Castle where he was to dwell, and the chocolate
and monkey-nuts on which he was to live, and of all their plots and
contrivances. Once or twice she noticed that her listener looked away
quickly, but she did not pay much attention to this, and was continuing
her tale quite gravely and sorrowfully, when all at once Aunt Grace broke
into one of those clear, ringing laughs which Emmeline had been wont to
consider so frivolous and unsuitable for an aunt. For a moment Emmeline
stared at her, puzzled and half offended; then suddenly it struck her for
the first time that the whole affair really was rather funny, and she too
laughed, though a little doubtfully.
‘I’m so sorry, Emmeline,’ said Aunt Grace; ‘I didn’t mean to laugh, but
you raised such an absurd picture in my mind that I simply couldn’t help
it!’
‘I don’t mind at all,’ said Emmeline, and it was the truth, though a week
ago she would have been greatly displeased at anyone’s venturing to be
amused at her.
‘Well, go on with your story,’ said Aunt Grace, and Emmeline began to
relate the troubles and adventures of yesterday. Aunt Grace listened so
sympathetically that it must be owned that her niece quite enjoyed giving
a graphic description of the past perils of Green Ginger Land and of her
horror at seeing Micky in the hands of the policeman. It was only when
she had come to the end of her tale and Aunt Grace remained silent that
she remembered it had really been in the nature of a confession.
‘Are you going to scold me, Aunt Grace?’ she asked at the end, a little
uneasily.
There was a moment’s pause before Aunt Grace answered: ‘No, I don’t think
I will scold you. Of course, it was very wrong to adopt the child without
leave, but I think what has happened has taught you just how wrong and
foolish it was better than anything I could say. And in itself it was a
good and beautiful thing to want to help poor little Diamond Jubilee to a
better life.’
Again there was a silence. Then Emmeline said timidly: ‘Do you know, Aunt
Grace, I always thought you didn’t care about such things.’
‘What made you think I didn’t?’ asked Aunt Grace, who did not seem at all
offended.
‘Because—because’—Emmeline stammered and turned rather red, ‘you seemed
almost to dislike that wonderful little girl Mr. Faulkner told us about—I
mean the one who was so very good to the poor children.’
‘I’m sure she was a little prig,’ said Aunt Grace, quickly, ‘and, anyhow,
she wasn’t worthy of all the fuss Mr. Faulkner was making about her. But
it doesn’t follow, because I don’t think very much of that particular
little girl, that I don’t like other little girls trying to do unselfish
things, even if they make mistakes sometimes, for I do’; and once more
she bent down and kissed Emmeline. A sudden recollection stung Emmeline.
‘You wouldn’t think nearly so well of me if you knew everything,’ she
blurted out; ‘there’s something ever so much worse I was forgetting
to tell you. We had spent all our money that day we went to the Fair,
and—and I thought we might use the extra money-box money to buy Diamond
Jubilee’s food with. You see we _had_ collected it for children like
him.’ She broke off, not knowing how to tell the rest.
‘You had collected it on the understanding that it was for the Home, not
to buy chocolates and monkey-nuts for any ragged little boy you chanced
to come across,’ said Aunt Grace gently, ‘so I’m afraid you’ll have to
pay it back gradually out of your pocket-money. By the way, did you buy
your railway ticket out of the extra money-box fund?’
‘Oh no, I borrowed that from the chickens’ money, and I did mean to pay
it back next Saturday. But that isn’t all I was going to tell you’—she
turned away her head—‘I as good as told a story about the extra money-box
money afterwards’—her voice grew choky—‘Jane found out it was empty,
like the prying old thing she is, and said she was sure Alice had taken
the money, as she had been doing my room.’
‘And you didn’t tell her you’d taken it yourself?’ said Aunt Grace
quietly, as Emmeline hid her face in the pillow.
A stifled sound that could just be distinguished as ‘No!’ came from the
depths of the pillow.
‘Well, I’m very sorry indeed about this,’ said Aunt Grace, ‘far more
sorry than about anything else that’s happened. But I’m glad you’ve told
me. You’ll have to tell Jane as soon as you get home.’
Emmeline hated the idea of telling Jane, but she saw that it was the only
honourable thing to be done, and resolved to do it on the first possible
opportunity; a resolution which she bravely carried out when the right
time came.
That was all Aunt Grace said in the way of reproof. For the rest of the
visit she spoke chiefly of Miss King, telling Emmeline about the last few
hours of her life as though she found comfort in the child’s sympathy.
‘I can’t grieve very much,’ she said simply. ‘For years we had been
dreading the end, and when it really came she suffered so very little.
Of course, there must always be one’s selfish sorrow at the loss, but I
can’t feel she is at all far off.’
A few minutes later Aunt Grace went away, and for the rest of the morning
Emmeline was left alone except for a short visit from the Doctor. She
did not feel at all dull or lonely, however, for there seemed so much to
think and wonder over.
‘It’s very odd how different people are from what you expect them to be,’
was the upshot of her reflections. ‘Mary was dear and kind, as she always
is, but she didn’t understand a bit. It was Aunt Grace who understood
that adopting Diamond Jubilee wasn’t _all_ naughtiness. Well, that plan’s
been a great failure, and I don’t suppose we shall ever see him again,
but anyhow, there’s one good thing come of it. If it hadn’t been for
Diamond Jubilee I might never have known how good and nice Aunt Grace
really is!’