The Annam Jewel (7 page)

Rose Ellen had begun to flag. It came home to Peter that they could not go much farther.

“Are you tired?” he said.

Rose Ellen walked a little faster. She said, “No!” rather quickly, and then added in a very small voice, “Augustabel is a little bit tired.”

“All right,” said Peter, “so am I.”

They struck off to the left and found a hollow full of dry leaves. A few very long-stalked primroses grew here and there. Rose Ellen sat down by a clump of primroses and rocked Augustabel. Every now and then she just touched one of the flowers with the tips of her fingers.

They spent the greater part of the day in the wood. The sun shone, and the air was mild. Not a soul came near them. Rose Ellen was very happy.

CHAPTER VII

It was midday on Monday when Mrs. Spottiswoode received a wire from Matthew Waring:

Little girl disappeared from orphanage. Is Peter with you? Please wire at once
.

She was too much upset to do anything at once except sob, and gasp, and dab her eyes, and say over and over again: “I knew he was too young to travel alone. I told you so, and you wouldn't listen to me, Charlotte.”

It was Charlotte who wrote the answer:

Peter left here Saturday morning to go to yon
.

By Monday evening a description of Peter and Rose Ellen had been telegraphed to police stations all over the country, and Matthew Waring's temper was hourly becoming worse.

Peter and Rose Ellen had spent the night in the beech wood to which they had returned after a pleasant afternoon excursion, in the course of which Peter obtained milk in a bottle and some hard-boiled eggs from a farm; he explained quite truthfully that he was camping out.

The night was fine and warm. Peter heaped beech leaves over them both, and they slept like birds in a nest. But the morning dawned red.

“Where are we going?” said Rose Ellen when they had breakfasted.

Peter didn't know; that was the trouble—he didn't know at all. He led the way back to the path, and they followed it until it came out upon a heathery upland covered with sheep tracks. It was a wide place, and empty. They walked on and saw no house.

They sat down amongst the heather, ate their midday meal, and afterwards Rose Ellen fell asleep, curled up like a kitten, with Augustabel in her arms. Peter did not mean to sleep, but a drowsiness came over him. When at last he woke the sunshine was gone. He waked Rose Ellen, and they took the road again. The sky was all clouds, and a small, cold wind blew across their path. The way seemed very long.

“Are you cold, Rose Ellen?” said Peter.

Rose Ellen shivered, and shook her head.

“Honest injun?”

Rose Ellen hesitated, and looked away.

“Augustabel is just a teeny bit cold,” she said.

Peter put his coat on her. The wind grew colder. He looked about and found a hollow, where they rested for a while. The sky began to darken and the clouds to hang down. There was not a house in sight.

Peter put down his bag and the now empty basket and walked a little way. About a quarter of a mile farther on the ground began to slope downwards. He could see trees in the distance.

Peter stood still and looked at the trees. There was a dreadful heaviness upon him. He had brought Rose Ellen here, and he must find shelter for her. The wind promised a stormy night, and Rose Ellen was too little to be out all night in the rain. Peter stood there, frowning dreadfully; and, still frowning, he put up the first real prayer that he had ever prayed.

“I don't know what to do,” he said. “I don't know where there's a place for Rose Ellen. I expect You know. I expect You are bound to know. There must be a place for her, and a proper home, not an institution one like that beastly St. Gunburga's, because she's too little not to have a proper home and someone to take care of her. And please let us find it quickly, because it's going to rain like anything, and Rose Ellen isn't old enough to be out all night in the ram, she really isn't.”

Peter concluded this very unorthodox prayer in the orthodox manner, and went back to Rose Ellen. He found her shivering in spite of his coat. They went on, following the downward slope and making for the trees. Long before they reached them, rain had begun to fall in torrents, soaking them to the skin. Rose Ellen walked more and more slowly. Then, with the coming of darkness, the rain ceased and the wind drove a track through the clouds, leaving a clear space from which a cold, white moon looked out.

They came through the trees, black trees dripping mournfully, and found themselves on the edge of a metalled road. A few hundred yards down this road a village church stood, ivy-covered. The ivy dripped too. The road took a sharp turn just here and ran between high stone walls.

Peter's spirits rose. A church was no good; churches were always shut. But opposite the church, behind the other wall, was a house, and it seemed inconceivable to him that any house should not mean at least temporary shelter for Rose Ellen. As the thought went through his mind, a door in the right-hand wall opened suddenly, and a maid-servant came running out. She had a cloak over her head, and she seemed to be in a hurry. Peter heard a man whistle a few yards down the road. The girl ran to meet him.

Without an instant's hesitation Peter took Rose Ellen by the hand and went through the door in the wall. They found themselves in a funny, narrow alleyway with flagstones underfoot and very high brick walls on either hand; it was almost like a tunnel. At the far end of it light streamed from an open door—light and warmth. Peter looked in, and saw a large scullery opening into the kitchen beyond. He knocked and waited. Rose Ellen pressed against him, trembling with cold. No one came. He knocked again. And then Rose Ellen did a surprising thing. Quite suddenly she pulled her hand out of Peter's and ran into the house. Peter followed.

The kitchen was empty. Peter looked longingly at the generous fire, but Rose Ellen had already run out into the passage beyond. There was nobody in the passage, but a sound of voices and cheerful laughter came from a room on their left.

Rose Ellen ran along the passage until she came to the back stairs. She was on the tenth step when Peter's whisper reached her, “Rose Ellen, come down!” but Rose Ellen never turned her head. Peter caught her up as she opened the door which led on to the first-floor landing. Her little, drenched feet had left wet marks on every step.

“Come back, Rose Ellen!” said Peter.

Rose Ellen shook her head.

“Augustabel won't go back,” she said. “Augustabel likes this house. Oh, Peter de—ah, she likes it very much indeed.”

The landing had a soft, rich carpet on the floor. The light was soft and rich. A long corridor stretched in front of them, with a shaded light burning at the far end. On their right there was another passage, unlighted except by the moon which shone in through live long windows. The windows had arched tops like church windows. The moonlight lay in five broad bars upon the polished floor.

“Come back, Rose Ellen! You must!” said Peter, in a dreadfully piercing whisper; but Rose Ellen only shook her head again, and darted down the moonlit passage.

Opposite the windows there were doors. One door was a little open. Peter stopped to look in, but the room was dark. As he stopped, he put out his hand and touched something hot. A large radiator filled the space between this door and the next. Peter's heart leapt for joy. They could hide in one of the rooms and dry all their clothes! It was really a surprising bit of luck.

Meanwhile Rose Ellen had opened the door at the end of the corridor and come, still running, into a large room which was quite light because the moon shone straight in through two tall windows. Peter followed, and Rose Ellen clutched at him.

“Oh, Peter, Peter de—ah,” she said, “Oh, Augustabel
does
like this house, she
does.”

The room was a nursery. There were bars to the tall windows, and a high wire guard about the empty fireplace. The mild head of a rocking-horse looked out of one corner at them. There was cork carpeting on the floor. There were soft woolly rugs.

“Take off your wet things, Rose Ellen,” said Peter, severely practical.

Rose Ellen sat down on a woolly mat and took off her wet shoes and stockings, the drenched serge shorts, and Peter's sweater.

“My petticoat isn't so dreadfully wet,” she said.

Peter felt it, and frowned. Then he took one of the woolly mats and wrapped it round Rose Ellen and Augustabel.

“There's a hot place for these to dry. I won't be a minute,” he said, and went out.

He had reached the radiator when he heard the sound. It was like someone moving softly. In an instant he had slipped through the half-open door, and stood on the threshold of the dark room, holding his breath and listening. The sound was coming nearer. Peter leaned forward very cautiously, and saw that someone was coming along the corridor, a lady in a dark, traily dress. She stood still in one of the moonlight patches. She looked very sad, very sad indeed, and sort of hungry. She was looking at the wet footmarks on the passage floor. And then, all of a sudden, a really dreadful thing happened. Rose Ellen opened the nursery door. Peter couldn't stop her; he couldn't do anything.

She opened the door and came running out, a queer, pathetic little figure with bare arms and legs, and a draggly, wet petticoat cut off above the knees.

The lady looked up at the sound of the opening door. She saw Rose Ellen in the moonlight, and, for a moment, she thought—who knows what she thought? She stood leaning against the wall, and then with a little gasping, sobbing breath she slipped into a half-sitting, half-kneeling position.

“I thought,” she whispered, “I thought …” and then, “No, no.”

Rose Ellen stood and looked at her. They looked at each other. Rose Ellen's eyes began to fill with tears; they brimmed over. The lady put out both her arms, and Rose Ellen ran straight into them.

Peter came out into the passage. He was clasping Rose Ellen's wet clothes. He heard the lady say:

“You little, little thing, you're wet.” And then she looked up and saw Peter, and made a sound like a very faint scream.

Rose Ellen was hugging the lady. She looked over her shoulder, and said:

“It's only Peter de—ah.”

Peter told his story in Mrs. Mortimer's little grey sitting-room. It was all grey and soft, and there were bowls of violets everywhere. There was a door which led into Mrs. Mortimer's bedroom, and every now and then she got up and looked in to see if Rose Ellen, warmed, fed, and comforted, was really asleep in the small blue bed which had once belonged to another little girl.

Peter didn't make a long story of it. He sat on the hearthrug, and explained in jerky sentences that Rose Ellen wasn't really his sister; that she had no relations; that St. Gunbtirga's was a beastly place, and naturally he, Peter,
had
to take her away and find her a home.

Mrs. Mortimer sat with her elbow on her knee and her chin in her hand. She didn't look at Peter. She looked into the heart of the wood fire and saw pictures there. When Peter had finished she nodded and said:

“Will you give her to me, Peter?”

Peter got up.

“I don't know,” he said. “May I go to bed now, please?”

CHAPTER VIII

Rose Ellen came dancing into the breakfast-room next morning. It was a very nice room. Two long windows opened upon a garden of lawns set with cedar trees, and of borders all golden with daffodils.

Rose Ellen had a pink colour in her cheeks. Her brown eyes shone. Her short curls had been brushed until they looked like dark gold. She wore a brown linen overall with buttercups and daisies worked on it, and in her arms she held Augustabel, rather pale from a drastic washing.

“Oh, Peter de—ah,” she said, and then stopped because she saw the daffodils.

Mrs. Mortimer came into the room behind her and asked Peter if he had slept well. After that she looked at Rose Ellen all the time.

“I'm going to make clothes for Augustabel, Peter,” said Rose Ellen. She nodded at Peter over her bread and milk.

Augustabel had a chair of her own and a little bowl from which she too might eat bread and milk if she chose.

“I'm going to make a velvet frock, a blue velvet frock, Peter, an' a satin frock, an' a white woolly frock. Dearest says she will help me.”

Peter frowned at Mrs. Mortimer, and went on eating his breakfast. After breakfast he talked to Rose Ellen; and after he had talked to Rose Ellen, Mrs. Mortimer asked him for the second time.

“Well, Peter, will you give me Rose Ellen?” She smiled sweetly, but there was something in her eyes that made Peter feel angry. It was something that looked as if Rose Ellen was hers already, and as if she dared Peter to take her away.

They were in the little grey sitting-room. The mantelpiece had china figures on it, frail and delicately coloured. Peter picked one up and began to fidget with it. It was a shepherdess with a garland of roses and a rose-wreathed crook.

“Will you, Peter?” said Mrs. Mortimer.

Peter had turned away, but now he looked at her. There was something defiant in his look. His fingers had closed hard upon the Dresden shepherdess.

“I can look after her and make her happy,” said Mrs. Mortimer. “I want her very much, Peter.”

Peter nodded.

“You wouldn't let them get her again?” he said. “They mustn't get her again. She wants someone to be fond of her. I expect it's just because she's a girl and rather little for her age. They weren't fond of her at that beastly place.”

“I won't let them get her back,” said Mrs. Mortimer quickly. “You'll have to give me your uncle's address, Peter, and then my solicitor will arrange it all with him. There won't be any difficulty about it, but if there were, I'd run away with her like you did. Will you give her to me, Peter?”

“All right,” said Peter gruffly.