"Us" Part 15

"Yes," persisted Pamela, nodding her head. "There's like a little voice that speaks inside us--that tells us when we're" (Pamela could use the word "we," as correctly as possible when speaking in general, not merely of Duke and herself) "naughty and when we're good."

In her turn Diana nodded her head.

"And the more we listen to it the plainer we hear it," added Pamela.

"_Us_ didn't listen to it when us found that Toby had brokened the bowl," said Duke gravely. "At least I didn't, and it leaves off speaking when people doesn't listen."

Diana had long ago heard the story of the beginning of the children's troubles.

"Listening to it is almost like praying, you see, Diana," said Pamela.

"And of course when we know all the good comes from G.o.d, it's only _sense_ to pray to Him, isn't it?"

"I'll think about it," said the gipsy quietly. "Now go to sleep as fast as you can."

Easier in their innocent minds about their own affairs by a great deal than Diana was _for_ them, the twins quickly followed her advice. But Diana dared not go to rest herself; in the first place she had a long talk with Tim in a corner where they could not be overheard, and then, finding that Mick had not yet come back, she hung about, terrified of his returning with the Signor, and frightening the poor children, without her being at hand.

"You'd best go to bed, I think," said Tim. "I 'spex he's got to drinking somewhere, and he won't be seen to-night."

"I dursn't," said Diana. "He might come any minute, and that man might want to carry them off in their sleep, so as to have no noise about it."

"But how could you stop him?" asked Tim, his merry face growing very sober.

"I'd do my best, and you must be ready, you know," she said.

"He'd be in a nice taking if he didn't find the Signor, or if _he_ wanted to back out of it," said Tim.

"Not much fear of that," said Diana. "The Signor's too sharp; he'll soon see he couldn't get such a pretty pair once in twenty years. He's a man I shudder at; once he wanted me to join his show, but, bad and cruel as Mick is, I'd rather have to do with him. But hush, Tim, there they are!

I hear Mick's voice swearing--they're coming this way. Run you off and hide yourself, but try to creep up to the van where the children are when they're gone, and I'll tell you what has to be done."

Tim disappeared with marvellous quickness. Diana rose to her feet and went forward a little, with a light in her hand, to meet her brother. He was accompanied, as she expected, by the Signor, and she saw in a moment that Mick was more than half drunk, and in a humour which might become dangerous at any moment.

"He's made him drunk," she said to herself, "thinking he'll drive a better bargain. He'd better have let him alone."

The Signor was a very small, dark, fat man--dressed, as he considered, "quite like a gentleman." He had bright, beady, twinkling eyes, and a way of smiling and grinning as if he did not think nature had made him enough like a monkey already, in which I do not think any one would have agreed with him!

"So here's your handsome sister, my friend Mick," he said, as he caught sight of Diana--"handsomer than ever. And you were coming to meet us, were you--very amiable I'm sure."

Mick, whose eyes were dazzled by the light, and who was too stupid to take in things quickly, frowned savagely when he saw the girl standing quietly before him.

"What are you waiting there for?" he said, with some ugly words.

"There's no need of _you_. Get out of the way. I know where to find the childer. The Signor and I can manage our own affairs."

"Can you?" said Diana contemptuously. "Well, good-night, then. You'll waken them up and frighten them so that they'll scream for the whole fair to hear them. And how the Signor means to get them away quietly if they do so _I_ can't say. There'd maybe be some awkward questions to answer as to how they came among us at all, if some of the people about should be honest, decent folk. And there are fools of that kind where you'd little look for them sometimes. However, it's no business of mine, as you say. Good-night," and she turned away.

The Signor turned to Mick with a very evil look in his face.

"Fool that _you_ are," he muttered, but Mick only stared at him stupidly. The Signor caught his arm and shook him. "Are you going to let her go off?" he said. "You told me yourself she had looked after the brats and could do anything with them, and now you go and set her back up! She's fit to rouse the place out of spite, she is. And I can tell you I'm not going to get myself into trouble about these children you've made such a fuss about. I've not seen them yet, and rather than risk anything I'll be off," and he, in turn, seemed as if he were going off.

This roused Mick.

"Stay, stay--wait a bit," he said eagerly, "Diana," he called,--and as Diana was in reality only waiting behind a shed she soon appeared again,--"I were only joking. Of course it's for you to show the Signor the pretty dears--such care as she's had of them, so bright and merry as she's taught them to be, you wouldn't believe," he went on in a half whine. "It'll be a sore trouble to her to part with them--you'll have to think o' that, Signor. I've promised Diana we'd act handsome by _her_."

"Of course, of course," said the other, with a sneer. "Sure to be handsome doings where you and me's concerned, friend Mick. But where _are_ the creatures? You're not playing me a trick after all, are you?"

he went on, looking round as if he expected to see the children start up from the earth or drop down from the sky.

"This way," said Diana, more civilly than she had yet spoken, "follow me if you please--they're close by."

In another minute she was standing on the steps of the van with the key in the lock. Then suddenly she turned and faced the Signor.

"They're asleep," she said. "I kept them up and awake a long time, but I hadn't thought you'd be so late. I can wake them up if you like, and if they saw me there they wouldn't cry. But they'd be half asleep--there'd be no getting them to show off to-night. But of course it's as the Signor chooses."

He looked at her curiously. He was surprised to find her seemingly as eager as Mick that he should think well of the merchandise they were offering him for sale! He had rather expected the gipsy girl to set herself against the transaction, for he knew she disliked him, and that no money would have persuaded her herself to join his "troupe." But he was too low himself to explain anything in others except by the lowest motives. "She thinks she'll get something handsome out of me if she's civil about it," he said to himself. Seeing, however, that civility was to be the order of the day, he answered her with an extra quant.i.ty of grins.

"Quite of your opinion, my young lady. Better not disturb the little dears. Should like a look at them, however, with your kind a.s.sistance."

Diana said no more, but, unlocking and opening the door, stepped carefully into the van, followed by her companions--Mick remaining somewhat behind, probably because he could not have got quite into the recesses of the waggon without tumbling, and such sense as remained to him telling him he had better not make a noise. The van inside was divided in two--something after the manner of a bathing-machine, such as I daresay most children have often seen. The door in the middle was not locked, and Diana pushed it softly open; then, advancing with the light held high so as to show the children's faces without flaring painfully upon them, stood at one side and signed to the Signor to come forward.

And he was too much startled and impressed--ugly, cold-hearted little wretch though he was--by the sight before him to notice the strange, half-triumphant, half-defiant expression on Diana's dark beautiful face.

[Ill.u.s.tration: "UPON MY WORD THEY ARE SOMETHING QUITE OUT OF THE COMMON," HE SAID;

"I WOULDN'T HAVE MISSED THEM FOR A GOOD DEAL. WHAT A KING AND QUEEN OF THE PIGMIES, OR 'BABES IN THE WOOD,' THEY'D MAKE."--p. 173.]

"There they are," it seemed to say, "and could anything be lovelier?

_Wouldn't_ you like to have them?"

They lay there--the delicate little faces flushed with "rosy sleep"--the fair fluffy hair like a golden shadow on the rough cushion which served as a pillow, each with an arm thrown round the other; they looked so like each other that even Diana was not sure which was which. No pair of fairies decoyed from their own country could have been prettier.

The Signor was startled into speaking the truth for once.

"Upon my word they are something quite out of the common," he said; "I wouldn't have missed them for a good deal. What a king and queen of the pigmies, or 'babes in the wood,' they'd make! I'll have to get something set up on purpose for them. And they're sharp at learning and speak plain you say?--at least he did," he added, turning round to look for Mick, who by this time had lurched up to the middle door of the van and was leaning on the lintel, looking in stupidly.

"Ay, they're sharp enough, and pretty spoken too," said Diana.

"Sharp and pretty spoken," echoed Mick.

"Then I'm your man," said the Signor; "I'll----"

But the girl interrupted him.

"There's one thing to be said," she began. "You must not think of letting them be seen hereabouts. You might get yourself and us too into trouble. It's too near where they come from."

The Signor held up his hands warningly.

"Hush," he said, "I don't want to know nothing of all that. They're two desolate orphans, picked up by you out of charity, and I take them to teach them a way of gaining a livelihood. That's all about it."

"Well, all the same, you can do nothing with them hereabouts," repeated Diana, anxious to gain time to put into execution the plans of escape.