The Boys And I Part 16

"Come back, come back," I said. "This isn't our house. Perhaps the people will be angry with us for pushing the door open."

But it was too late--the door had been a little open before we touched it, for there were people standing in the hall just inside, and one of them, an errand boy, was coming out, when the push Tom had given caught their attention. The door was pulled wide open from the inside and we saw plainly right into the brightly-lighted hall. A man-servant came forward to see who we were--or what we were doing.

"Now get off the steps you there," he said roughly. "My lady can't have beggars loitering about."

Frightened as we were, Tom's indignation could not be kept down.

"We're _not_ beggars, you rude man," he cried, "we thought this was our house, and--and--" he could say no more, poor little boy--for all his manliness he was only a very little boy, you know--the tears would not be kept back any longer, he burst out sobbing, and immediately he heard Tom's crying Racey of course began too. I did not know what to do-- I threw my arms round them and tried to comfort them. "Don't cry, dears,"

I said, "we'll go back to the chemist's, and he'll show us the way home.

And n.o.body shall scold _you_, I don't care what they say to me."

The man-servant was still standing holding the door; he seemed on the point of shutting it, but I suppose something in our way of speaking, though he could not clearly see how we were dressed, had made him begin to think he had been mistaken, and he stared at us curiously. I think too, for he wasn't an unkind man, he felt sorry to hear the boys crying so. The bustle on the steps caught the attention of the other person in the hall--who had been speaking to the errand-boy when we came up, though we had not noticed her. A voice, which even at that moment I fancied I had heard before, stopped us as we were turning away.

"What is the matter, James?" it said. "Is it some poor children on the steps? Don't be rough to them. I'd like to see what they want."

Then she came forward and stood right in our sight, though even now she couldn't see us well, as we were outside in the dark, you know. We all looked at her, and for a minute we felt too surprised to speak. It was the young lady in the black dress with the pretty goldy hair that had come one day to our house. We all knew her again--she looked sweeter and prettier than ever, with a nice grave sort of kindness in her face that I think children love even more than smiles and merriness. We all knew her again, but Racey was the first to speak. He pulled himself out of my arms--I didn't hold him back--and he rushed to the young lady and caught hold of her almost as if she had been mother.

"Oh please, please take care of us," he cried, hiding his fair, curly head in her black skirt, "we're lostened. Muzzie's done away, you know, and we don't like being at London at all."

The young lady for half a moment looked perfectly puzzled. Then a light broke over her face. She lifted Racey up in her arms, and pressing her face against his in a sort of kissing way, just almost as mother herself would have done, she came forward quite close to Tom and me, still on the steps in the rain, and spoke to us.

"My poor little people," she said, "you must be quite wet. I know who you are-- I remember. Come in--come in out of the cold, and tell me all about it."

My first wish was just to beg her to tell us the way to Uncle Geoff's house and to hurry off as fast as we could. I was beginning to be so terribly frightened as to what would happen when we _did_ get back. But her voice was so kind, and it was _so_ cold outside, and Racey was clinging to her so--it looked, too, so warm and comfortable inside the nice, bright house, that I could not help going in. Tom would have pulled me in, I think, had I refused. He was still sobbing, but once we got inside the hall he began fishing in his pocket till he got out his handkerchief and scrubbed at his eyes before he would look up at the young lady at all. _Nothing_ would take away Tom's dislike to be seen crying.

"James," said the young lady, "open the library door."

James, who had become particularly meek--I suppose he was rather ashamed of having taken us for little beggars, now that he saw the young lady knew us--did as she told him. And still carrying Racey in her arms Miss Goldy-hair (I think I told you that Tom and I called her that to ourselves after the day she had been at our house?) led the way into the library where she had been sitting when she was called to speak to the message boy in the hall. For there were books and some pretty work on the table, and a little tray with two or three cups and saucers and a plate with cake--all very nice and neat-looking--the sort of way mother had things at home. And the fire was burning brightly. It was a nice room, though rather grave-looking, for there were books all round and round the walls instead of paper.

The first thing she did--Miss Goldy-hair, I mean--was to draw us near to the fire. She put Racey down on a low chair that was standing there and began feeling us to see if we were very wet.

"Not so very bad," she said, smiling for the first time. "Audrey--are you surprised I remember your name?--take off your jacket, dear. I don't think the boys will get any harm, this rough serge throws off the rain.

_Now_--" when we were all settled so as to get nice and warm--"now, who is going to tell me all about it? My little fellow," she added, turning to Tom, who was still shaking with sobs, partly I think because of the terrible way he was trying to force them down and to scrub his eyes dry, "my little man, don't look so unhappy," she put her arm round him as she spoke, "I'm sure we shall be able to put it all right."

"It's not all that," I said, "it's partly that he can't bear you to see him crying, Miss Goldy-hair. He thinks it's like a baby."

A different sort of smile came into her face for a moment, a smile of fun-- I wondered a little what it was. It wasn't till she told me afterwards that I understood how funny our name for her must have sounded, for I said it quite without thinking.

"Oh no," she said. "I didn't think that at all, my boy. Here, dear, take a little drink of this tea." She got up and poured some out. "It's still hot, and that will help to make the sobs go away."

"Tom had the measles worse than me," I said, "and he's not been so strong since," for though she said she didn't think him a bit like a baby, I couldn't bear it for him that he shouldn't be thought brave, when really he was.

"Ah!" she said quickly, "then we must take great care of him."

She looked at him anxiously while he drank the hot tea.

"I know a great deal about children," she said to me, nodding her head and smiling again. "Some day I'll show you what a number I have to help to take care of. But now, little Audrey, what were you three doing out in the street by yourselves in the dark and the rain?"

"We came out to post a letter," I said; "I didn't want anybody to know about it for perhaps they wouldn't have sent it. So Mrs. Partridge was out, and we were in the dining-room, and Uncle Geoff was out, and Sarah was busy sewing and we thought n.o.body would know, and Tom wanted to go alone, but I thought he'd get lost and Racey wouldn't stay alone, so we all came. And we lost the way, and we thought this was our house because it was opposite one with an air-garden and we didn't see it couldn't be ours because it had an air-garden too."

I stopped for a minute out of breath.

"It was me that sawed the air-garden _wurst_," said Racey. He spoke with great self-satisfaction. There he sat as comfortable as could be--he seemed to think he had got to an end of all his troubles and to have no intention of moving from where he was.

The young lady glanced at him with her kind eyes, and then turned again to me. She was evidently rather puzzled, but very patient, so it was not difficult to tell her everything. Indeed I couldn't have _helped_ telling her everything. She had a way of making you feel she was strong and you might trust her and that she could put things right, even though she was so soft and kind and like a pretty wavy sort of tree--not a bit hard and rough.

Her face looked a little grave as well as puzzled while I was speaking.

I don't think she liked what I said about not wanting them to know.

_Her_ face and eyes looked as if she had never hidden anything in her life.

"And what was the letter, Audrey? And whom was it to?"

"It was to Pierson--that's our old nurse," I said. I hesitated a little and Miss Goldy-hair noticed it.

"And what was it about?" she said, very kindly still, but yet in a way that I couldn't help answering.

"It was to tell her how unhappy we were," I said in a low voice, "and to tell her that I was going to try to go to her with the boys--to take them away from Uncle Geoff's, because Mrs. Partridge is so horrid and she makes Uncle Geoff think we're always being naughty. And mother said I was to make the boys happy while she's so far away, and I can't. And I can't make them good either--we're getting into quarrelling ways already. I'm sure we'd be better with Pierson in the country."

"Where does Pierson live?" asked the young lady.

"At a village called Cray--it's near Copple--Copple-- I forget the name, but I've got it written down. You won't tell Uncle Geoff?" I added anxiously.

"No," said Miss Goldy-hair, "not without your leave. But that reminds me--won't your uncle be frightened about you all this time?"

"He won't be in till late," I said. "But Sarah will be frightened--and oh! I'm so afraid Mrs. Partridge will be coming back. Oh! hadn't we better go now if you'll tell us the way. It's in this street, isn't it?"

"No, dear," said the young lady--and I was so glad she called me "dear."

I had been afraid she wouldn't like me any more when she knew what I had been thinking of doing. "No, dear," she said, "you've got into another street altogether--that's why you were so puzzled. This street is very like the one you live in and they run parallel, if you know what that means."

"I wish it was this street," I said.

"And so do I," said Tom.

"Why?" asked Miss Goldy-hair.

"Because we'd like to be near you," we both said, pressing close to her.

"You're like mother."

The tears came into Miss Goldy-hair's eyes--they really did--but she smiled too.

"And what do you say, my little man?" she said to Racey.

Racey was still reposing most comfortably in his big chair.

"I'll stay here," he said, "if Audrey and Tom can stay too. And I'd like 'tawberry jam for tea."

The young lady smiled again.