The Forbidden Room; Or, "Mine Answer was My Deed"

CHAPTER XXIV.

“HURRAH! HURRAH!” CHAPTER XXIV. “HURRAH! HURRAH!” “O H ! hurrah! Andrew, hurrah! They’re off at last! Did you think that they would ever start? Well, if this isn’t the rarest bit of good luck that ever was!” And, standing out in the broad noon-day sunshine on the grass plait in front of the farm-house, Diana pirouetted like an accomplished dervish. The headache that was on the road to her at breakfast must surely have lost its way. “What a blessing that Gaston has gone too,” said Andrew. “I was in a blue fright that he wouldn’t, after all, just because we wanted him to go so much.” “Yes, but I’ll tell you what’s even better,” rejoined Di. “Nellie’s going over to Spelmonden.” “What for?” “There’s an obliging old woman there who’s broken her arm or her neck, I forget which,” said Di, “and I heard Mrs. Busson tell Libbie that Nellie was not to hurry home. If she was back by supper-time it would do quite well.” “Splendid! She’ll be out of the way at any rate.” “Yes,” went on Di, “and so you see there will only be Libbie indoors, and Polly, who——” “Who doesn’t count,” put in Andrew, “for she’s always running after the pigs or the poultry, or gathering things in the garden.” “Exactly; and Libbie is going to be busy all the afternoon in the brew-house tapping the last barrel of cowslip wine.” “Are you quite sure?” “Yes. I heard her arranging with Mrs. Busson how she would bottle it to-day. When she is once in there she’ll be safely out of hearing of anything that we may do.” “Hadn’t we better soon begin?” suggested Andrew. “You see we don’t know how long it may take.” “We must watch Nellie off the premises first,” said Di. “We’ll go and sit under the walnut-tree near the stack-yard. We shall be able to see the back-door splendidly from there without seeming to be watching.” “All right,” assented Andrew. “You’re quite sure that you have got all your tools ready, Andrew?” enquired Di, presently, as the two young conspirators stretched themselves on the short grass in the shade of the venerable walnut. “No fear,” laughed Andrew; “I think these instruments ought to suffice, even for our undertaking,” and he put his hand into his jacket pocket and rattled the chisel, hammer and gimlet which lay concealed there. “That sounds like business, eh?” “And I’ve got two big knives,” announced Di, triumphantly. “Knives? But what for?” cried Andrew. “They may be very useful, very useful indeed,” repeated Di, with great emphasis. “What do you mean?” asked Andrew, nervously. “Well, you see,” said Di, slowly, “we’re not quite sure what or who we may find inside this mysterious chamber; anyway I think that we may as well be armed, both of us.” “But Di,” said Andrew, very distinctly alarmed now, “you don’t really suppose that there’s anyone really alive in there?” “I’m not so sure. I heard Libbie telling that man—a man who came about some cheeses, I think—that there were very odd customers inside there. Yes, really that was what she said.” “What did she say, tell me exactly,” insisted Andrew. “Oh, well, it was when Libbie and the man were coming downstairs from the cheese-room,” said Di. “The man asked—he was joking, you know—if she dealt in cobwebs as well as cheese, for he had never seen such a sight as over that door.” “Yes, and what did Libbie say?” asked Andrew, breathlessly. “Oh, she said the spiders had had a good time there, for the door hadn’t been opened for fifty years or more.” “And didn’t the man ask why?” “Yes, but I couldn’t hear Libbie’s answer; only when the man said, ‘Well, if that’s so I’d have a try and see what I could make out of it.’ Then I heard Libbie say: ‘Ah! that’s all very pretty, but I expect we’d find some rare awkward customers to deal with on the other side of the door.’ ” “What could she mean?” speculated Andrew. “It is odd that no one will open that door.” “Libbie told the man that the missus wouldn’t have it tried, not for any sake,” said Di. “What can it be?” repeated Andrew, with a very long face. “I did ask the little farm boy,” proceeded Di, “what all that odd rumbling noise in the cheese-room meant, and he looked dreadfully scared. He said that was what he’d never been able to find out, but people did say it was haunted by the ghosts of some wicked smugglers who lived long ago at the farm; in fact,” went on Di, drawing largely on her own imagination now, “from what Henry said I believe that the room is crammed full of all sorts of beautiful stolen goods, so that no one has ever been able to get the door open. Oh! Andrew, won’t it be grand if we’re the very first people who have ever been brave enough to force our way in?” “Yes,” said Andrew, but his assent was pitched in a less jubilant key. “I believe you’re getting into a fright already,” sneered Di. “No I’m not; only I can’t help wishing that there was a real window, so that we might get a peep at what is inside, before actually going in,” said Andrew. For though this mysterious room was furnished with a door and a chimney, it had no window. There was only a sham painted semblance of one set in the house wall, to match, as best it might, the other real ones. “You see,” continued Andrew, “one hasn’t the least idea what one may see when the door bursts open.” “Or what may see us,” laughed Diana. “Oh, don’t,” cried Andrew; “that’s too horrid.” “Nonsense,” said Di. “There wouldn’t be much real courage wanted in the world, if people could always see exactly what sort of danger they were going to face. Why, you silly Andrew, anyone could win a page in the book of golden deeds at that rate.” “But you don’t think, Di, that Mrs. Busson will be very angry?” “Angry! why, she’ll go on her knees with gratitude,” cried Di. “Will she really, do you think?” “Go on her knees, I say, and so will Mr. Busson, and Libbie, and everyone in the whole place, I expect,” asserted Di, trying hard to make herself believe in the probability of this crowd of grateful genuflectors, who were to flock round Andrew and herself, with the opened room as their background. “They’ll be awfully grateful.” “It’ll be a great score over the others,” said Andrew. “Yes, won’t it,” said Di. “It will be such a sell for Jack and Phil,” remarked Andrew further. “But time’s precious,” said Di, “I think we ought to be stirring.” “But suppose Libbie hears us going upstairs,” began Andrew. “Oh, you Master Much-afraid,” cried Di, impatiently, “suppose you run and hide yourself with Mr. Despondency, in the pages of ‘Pilgrim’s Progress’; won’t you give me your tools, and you go and play with Marygold’s doll in the Cuckoo-copse?” “It isn’t that I’m the least afraid for myself,” began Andrew, “but—” But Di cut him short. “Now, look here, don’t be such a coward, and listen to me. I can get upstairs quietly enough, but you’re such an idiot that I can’t depend on you for doing anything decently.” “That’s cheek,” pouted Andrew. “So listen,” continued Di, “Libbie has just gone into the brew-house, to bottle the cowslip wine, so I’ll go in there and tease and worry her so much that she won’t have any ears to spare for what you may be doing. Meanwhile, take off your boots, and creep upstairs till you reach the door. When you’re once there you can’t do much harm, because you see the room isn’t over the brew-house, and the walls are so fearfully thick, I don’t believe that even a dancing elephant could make itself heard downstairs.” “But you will promise to come up soon,” said Andrew, terribly afraid of being left too long within reach of this dread, undiscovered territory, “I can’t stop up there too long, all by myself.” “I’ll come as soon as I’ve worried Libbie into wanting to be rid of me,” said wicked Di. “I’ll make her feel thankful to leave me to my own devices. But don’t you begin to do anything till I come.” “Oh, no, that I won’t,” said Andrew so fervently that Di felt sure that on this occasion, at any rate, Andrew might be trusted to keep his word. “Very well, then, I’m off to begin operations,” said Di, springing to her feet. Tilting her hat over her eyes, and walking with a very leisurely step, Di took her way to the back regions of the farmhouse. Poor Libbie, with her head and hands engaged in her bottling process, fell an easy prey to her wiles. If the truth were known, Libbie had been bitterly disappointed, and so had Mrs. Busson, by Andrew’s and Diana’s refusal to join the fair-going party. They had reckoned so confidently on securing a quiet, undisturbed afternoon for the “flasking and cellaring” of the cowslip wine, as Libbie termed it. “Headaches, indeed! Stuff and nonsense,” she had said, “it’s just their contrariness , and that’s all. I’d like to give them a good dose of senna tea each, and lock them up in a dark room.” So, when Di appeared in the doorway of the brew-house, she found exactly the kind of reception she would have chosen. “Now I can’t have you worrying in here, Miss Di,” said Libbie, “for as you can see for yourself, there isn’t standing room for a well grown rat,” and she pointed to the regiment of dusty bottles with which the door was crowded. “Why dear me! I thought you had a bad headache. What ever has become of it so soon?” “It never was a very bad one, besides I don’t make a fuss about things when I’m ill. I never do,” said Di, forgetting that never is a long word. “Well, I can’t have either you or Master Andrew bothering in here, this afternoon,” said Libbie, “it’ll be your own faults, if you find it dull, but you must amuse yourselves as best you can. Only don’t go getting into mischief. I’ve got my work cut out for me, here.” “And so have I,” thought naughty Di, only she took care not to say so. “Very well,” she answered aloud, “then if you won’t let me help you Libbie, I’ll go now.” And very slowly, Diana turned away and recrossed the threshold. CHAPTER XXV. A TRAGICAL AFTERNOON. O NCE out of sight of Libbie, Di bounded upstairs, three steps at a time, flinging herself down outside the door, breathless with speed and suppressed laughter. “Oh! I’m glad you’ve come,” said Andrew, “it’s been quite horrid waiting up here alone, with all that horrible noise going on all round.” “It sounds rather eerie, doesn’t it?” said Di. “Yes, really I do think it is rather dangerous,” began Andrew, “I—” “Then run away,” said Di, “only leave me your tools.” “No, I didn’t mean to say that,” said Andrew, “only—” “Now, look here, be sensible,” broke in Di, “just hold this chair steady, whilst I stand up on it. I want to have a good look at this door. Here’s the candle and matches, just light it, and hand it up to me, when I’m safe on the chair.” From her exalted position and aided by the light of the tallow dip, which Di had abstracted from Polly’s box in the scullery, she proceeded to make a careful inspection of the door and doorway. The labours of many generations of undisturbed spiders had resulted in layers upon layers of cobwebs, which hung in grey misty folds all about the panels and locks, and cracks, and hinges, of the long dis-used door. These were easily swept away, but when removed, an unwelcome fact became apparent. “Oh! I say,” cried Di, in dismay, “they’ve walled up the door!” Not only the keyhole but every hairbreadth of space all round the door had been filled in with solid cement. Yes, even between the floor and the lowest panel of the door, there was a thick seam of plaster. “Oh, the old fiends!” cried Di, jumping off her chair and stamping with rage, “Old wretches, whoever they were! I wonder if Mrs. Busson ever saw this.” As a matter of fact, she had not. Otherwise, she would not have been so anxious to keep the knowledge of that room’s existence from her little guests. “We are done, hopelessly done,” cried Di, “one might as well try to open a sealed up vault as that door.” “Are you quite sure of it?” asked Andrew, with a look of relief on his face which was not apparent in that dim light. His prolonged nearness to that uncomfortable rumbling noise had entirely quenched Andrew’s ardour for forcing an entrance into the forbidden room, and he was quite ready to abandon the undertaking without further ceremony. Not so Di, however. “Of course, we won’t be done,” she said. “But if we can’t help it,” began Andrew. “But we will help it, we won’t be beaten,” she said, “I’ve thought of something,” she went on, with sudden inspiration. “Hand up your tools, Andrew, I’ve got an idea.” Snatching the gimlet from Andrew, Di went on her knees. With a will, she set to work to bore a hole in one of the lower panels of the door. “Do you see what I’m doing?” she asked, without raising her head from her work. “I’m going to drill a hole.” “Oh! Just big enough to peep through, I suppose,” said Andrew, thinking this was a splendid idea. “Big enough, you booby, to put our hands through first of all, and then our bodies afterwards,” retorted Di. “O-oh!” was all Andrew found to say. He was quite determined that it should be Di’s hand that went in first. For some time, Di worked away laboriously with the gimlet. Then she paused. “I can’t get on with this,” she said, “I must try something else. Go half-way down the stairs, Andrew, and stand there and listen if you can hear me at work. It won’t do to attract Libbie’s attention. Go quietly.” “It’s all right,” reported Andrew, returning from executing Di’s orders. “I couldn’t hear a sound, not from you, at least, but there’s no end of a row going on downstairs. Libbie must have some friends to help her, for they are jawing no end in the brew-house.” “So much the better,” said Di; “now I’m going to do something desperate.” Therewith, seizing the hammer, Diana wrapt her handkerchief carefully round the head. “That’ll deaden the sound,” she said. Then taking one of the knives, she stuck the point into the panel, upon which she had already been operating, and then dealt a blow with the hammer on the handle of the knife with all her might. “Hurrah! Andrew, the wood is beginning to give,” she said, “with another blow or two, we’ll do it.” “Oh! dear,” gasped Andrew. “I wonder what we shall find.” “We shall know very soon now,” returned Di, “I hope this will settle the business!” Therewith she dealt another furious blow with the hammer. There came a noise of splintering wood,—Di remembered that afterwards, clearly enough, but what followed besides, she could never recall. Her first impulse on feeling the panel yield to her blows, was to thrust her hand and arm through the gaping slit, with a view to laying hands on the gold or precious stones or stores of sweet-stuff, which must surely be within her reach; her next was to draw her arm back again with all speed and to rend, not the door but the air with piercing, frantic shrieks. And these shrieks were echoed by Andrew. Anxious to secure his share in the booty, he had also thrust his hand—and his face, too—through the broken panel, and was now dancing and yelling like a maniac. “Shut your eyes; shut your eyes, Andrew,” shrieked Di. “Libbie, Libbie, Libbie! Come, come, come!” Crash went at least a dozen bottles in the brew-house, then helter-skelter up the stairs, came Libbie, followed by her visitor. By this time, the narrow bit of passage, which turned abruptly away from the head of the staircase was alive with clouds of angry bees, and a stouter heart than Libbie’s would have quailed at the prospect of encountering such a host. It was well for her, that her visitor, who was none other than the severe Nanny of other days, kept her wits about her. Nanny’s first step was to seize Andrew, who, with his hair full of humming bees and his hands held tightly over his eyes, was running aimlessly to and fro. In a moment, Nanny had dragged off his jacket, which was all alive with the infuriated creatures, and rolling it up tightly, she flung it back into the enemy’s country. “And now run as fast as ever you can,” she ordered Andrew, “and jump into the rain-water tank, close by the back door.” Andrew who was even more frightened than stung, promptly obeyed, howling and yelling so loudly all the way, that in a few minutes all the farm hands were running to know what had happened. “There, however any of us came out of it alive, is what I never shall understand,” was how Libbie always wound up “In a moment Nanny had dragged off his jacket.” p. 158. the narration of that tragical afternoon’s doings. “When I come to think over it now, I don’t seem able to remember nothing but pails of water on all sides, water dashed here and there, for all the world as if there had been a fire. And then oh! good me, the shovel-fulls of brimstone, which well-nigh suffocated the life out of one. There, I do say, that with all the humming and the buzzing about one, and all the furious creatures as well, one felt for all the world as if one had been turned into a bee-hive oneself, with just a pair of boots on. “But oh! dear, dear! What a sight poor Miss Di was! Well, there, if all the meddlesome-matties got their reward that way, the world would be very soon rid of them, I’ll be bound.” CHAPTER XXVI. “WHATEVER WILL THE MASTER SAY?” “O H ! isn’t this fun, isn’t this fun?” cried Hubert and Marygold in one breath, as by way of winding up the afternoon at the Fair, the whole party gathered round a plentifully spread tea-table in the old fashioned parlour of the “Cygnet” Inn. On the whole, the entertainment had been a glorious success. The younger children had been given into Ruth’s special keeping, whilst the two elder boys went off with Mr. Busson, ostensibly to knock over cocoa-nuts and shoot at stuffed pigeons and share in various similar sports, which they considered suitable to their advanced age. But though they returned with a cocoa-nut apiece, they each owned to having had a turn of the “galloping horses,” and more than one go in at the swings. To neither of these latter forms of entertainment were Ruth’s charges admitted. And though Hubert cast longing looks at the “merry-go rounds,” he soon forgot them for the other diversions which came in his way. There was a wonderful performing dog, which could tell the days of the week; there was a big brown bear, that climbed a pole and danced a jig; and a gold fish, the size of a herring. This prodigy, wonderful to relate, was reported to sing like a skylark—that is, if he had not “Happened to have caught a cold in his head on the way to Bramblehurst and lost his singing voice for the first time for over ten years.” These last details of the gold-fish’s personal history were however only furnished after the penny (paid in advance for the privilege of hearing his song) had been safely pocketed by his mendacious owner. A marvellous peep-show, exhibiting all the principal cities of the world, with their “male and female celebrities, taking an airing in the handsomest streets,” proved a huge attraction to the children. And after the peep-show, there was the lucky-bag, with its penny dips and marvellous possibilities. Marygold drew a diamond brooch, and a box with the portrait of the Prince of Wales on it. Hubert got a knife and a pincushion the latter he intended to give to Diana; whilst Gaston drew a whistle and a shawl-pin, with a blue bead for its head, which he at once offered to Mrs. Busson. Then there was the gingerbread-stall, with its strutting cocks and hens, its gilded elephants and almond-hearted knights and ladies, all very funny to look at, the children agreed, but nicer to look at than to eat. Faith and Phoena invested in some baskets of doubtful durability, while Hubert made friends with a lame gipsy boy, from whom he bought a dozen washing pegs. These he thought, would make a suitable gift for Nellie, whom he had observed using these homely implements. Whilst bargaining over the baskets, Phoena had kept a persistent look out for the traces of any waif or stray, who might be stowed away in one of the gaily painted vans, and was woefully disappointed to see none. “You’re glad now, Gaston, that you came with us, aren’t you?” enquired Hubert as they sat down to tea. “But yes, I am very glad,” was the cordial reply. “Won’t Andrew and Di be sorry that they didn’t come,” said Phil, “when they hear all about it.” “Rather,” said Jack, “I call it a stunning spree.” “Yes, it is a very funny sort of place,” said Phoena, thoughtfully. “I wish,” said Jack, “that their wretched horses were fatter.” “Do you think that they’re werry hungry?” asked Hubert, pausing in the act of attacking a plum bun. “That poor thing out there looks like it,” answered Phil, pointing to a miserable white skeleton of a pony, tethered by the roadside. Hubert put down his cake and looked at Mrs. Busson. “Anything wrong with the bun, my dear?” she asked. “No,” answered Hubert, “but may I give it to the poor horse?” Hubert was very fond of cake, but the thought of anything within his reach that was hungrier than himself, always quenched his appetite. “Bless your dear heart!” cried Mrs. Busson, “that mouthful of bun wouldn’t do the poor thing any good.” Then noting Hubert’s look of disappointment, she added, “But look here, when you’ve finished your tea, you go out to Busson in the yard and tell him from me to ask the ostler for sixpennyworth of oats, and then Master Jack’ll go across the Green with you, and Master Phil too, I daresay, and help you to give them to the poor pony.” Charmed with this delightful prospect, Hubert finished his tea, with equal enjoyment and alacrity, and then all the party arose from the table to assist in the feeding of the poor white starveling. And perhaps this closing scene was the brightest moment in all that long bright summer afternoon. “My word! won’t he enjoy himself!” cried Jack, who under Busson’s directions had presented the feast of oats in a pail of water. “I bet it’s the first time in your life, you’ve ever had such a blow out, you wretched specimen.” “He’s a poor, poor thing, but very ugly,” said Hubert, with more truth than tenderness for his protegé. “Oh! Gaston, Gaston, how can you?” For Gaston had laid his cheek against the neglected creature’s dirty matted mane, and was stroking his untempting coat with hands as gentle and caressing as if he were fondling some faultlessly groomed, satin-coated pony. “Oh! Gaston,” cried Fay, dragging him away, “he’s not fit to touch.” “He’s so sad,” said Gaston, simply. There were tears in the boy’s big brown eyes. “Oh! he won’t be sad now,” said Hubert, “Mr. Busson says that he will stop being hungry by the time he has eaten all those oats.” “Ah! one is often sad, when one is not hungry,” said Gaston, slowly. But no one heeded his last remark. Ruth was running across the Green, to call them back to the Inn, at the door of which the Gaybrook van was standing already, with old Mr. Busson frantically waving his whip at the scattered party. What a scramble there was to pack not only everyone, but everyone’s newly-acquired property, into the tilted waggon. For though Jack and Phil went off in search of their ponies, they committed divers articles, such as cocoa-nuts, walking sticks, in great variety, a top or two, some brilliant green performing frogs of vast size, a rat-trap, a marvellous kite, a stuffed pigeon for target practice, to Fay and Phoena, for the safety of which they were to hold themselves responsible. The homeward drive, through the long winding lanes, in the soft golden light of the westering sun, was very delightful, if less noisy than the morning drive had been. After the first few miles, Hubert and Marygold fell fast asleep, the latter on Fay’s lap. Hubert, who had yielded his place on the front seat to Gaston—Phoena having represented to him that it was rather selfish to monopolise it both ways—was dreaming a confusion of sights and sounds, with his head resting on Ruth’s shoulder, whilst Fay and Phoena were carrying on a low-voiced discussion. “Oh! of course, you must put him down in the ledger of golden deeds,” Fay was saying, “for he wanted to help the poor and distressed by giving up his cake but I can’t see why Gaston should go in too.” “Because,” said Phoena, slowly, “I think he was quite as kind.” “Because he went and stroked that horribly dirty creature? Oh! I say that was very dirty of him.” “I think it was rather grand,” said Phoena, “we only thought of comforting the poor pony’s body, but Gaston wanted to comfort his sad heart too. For instance, I should think it was much more noble to kiss a dirty old beggar-woman than to give her my dinner. I know at any rate, which I’d rather not do.” “That’s true,” admitted Fay, “still I can’t understand Gaston, I don’t think he really is a bit kind-hearted; he couldn’t hate Andrew as he does, if he had a really good heart.” “Of course it’s wrong to hate people,” said Phoena; “still, I’m sure many kind people can’t help it sometimes. But just because they are kind-hearted, they’d never be cruel to those they hate. I’m quite sure if Gaston had the chance, he would be quite as kind to Andrew as Jack or Phil would be, only he wouldn’t be kind so gladly.” Fay shook her head. “When you’re as old as I am, Phoena,” she said, with her superior wisdom, “you’ll understand more the wickedness of ha—” But she broke off suddenly. “John made a clumsy attempt to rein in his flying steed.” p. 169 The sharp clatter of quick-trotting horse’s hoofs coming towards them, smote on their ears, and Mrs. Busson started forward with a cry. “That’s Blackberry,” she said. “I know his trot. That means there’s mischief at home.” In another minute, the stout black cob, ridden by one of the farm men, came in sight. “John! John Honybun, what has happened?” shouted Mrs. Busson. “Where are you off to?” “Doctor,” was the brief reply, whilst John made a clumsy but ineffectual attempt to rein in his flying steed. A great consternation fell into the midst of that hitherto happy vanful. For full thirty seconds no one spoke at all, not indeed until Blackberry became lost to view round the corner of the long lane they were just leaving. Then poor Mrs. Busson wailed out— “Please God it’s not the children.” But Phoena, with lips grown white, leant over to whisper into Fay’s ear, “Don’t you remember we guessed that they were going to do something?” The remainder of that drive was a very sorry affair. Though Mr. Busson whipped his horses into a pace, which greatly astonished those sleek, slow-going animals, it seemed to all concerned as if the chimneys of the Farm would never come in sight. At length, however, the old van jolted up to the door, whence they had set out so merrily that morning. “Please God it’s not the children,” repeated Mrs. Busson, as Libbie came flying to meet them at the open door. Poor Libbie, usually so trim and dainty! She looked now as if she had been through a campaign! She was capless, her drenched hair hung loosely over her shoulders, her face was flushed, swollen and blotched, her gown was be-draggled and torn, her apron burnt into holes, and one hand was tied up in rags. “Oh! ma’am, oh! ma’am,” she cried, in piteous distress, “they’ve been and broken through into the bee-room!” “But speak, woman, are the children hurt?” cried Mrs. Busson. “That’s it, that’s it, ma’am! Miss Di’s been stung that venomous, that we’ve had to send off for the doctor. Manny’s got her into bed, and is doing her best for her, but she’s been most cruelly punished. As for her poor eyes, it’s my belief that she’ll never see out of them again. There, you can hear her screaming, she hasn’t left off, not for five seconds together.” “And Andrew?” asked Faith, whilst Mrs. Busson and Ruth flew indoors. “Oh! he’s nothing hurt to speak of,” said Libbie, “got about twenty stings perhaps, but Nanny’s sent him to bed and locked him into his room, too. So he can’t take any harm after jumping into the water-tank. But there, oh! there, what ever will the master say when he sees the muddling mess that has been made of his house, what with all the sulphur and brimstone that we had to burn before we could get the beasties under, and all the buckets of water that we had to throw down, as well! Never, no never have I seen such a set-out!” CHAPTER XXVII. “WHAT THE MASTER DID SAY.” W HAT the master did say, was far more terrible than even Libbie had imagined possible. “You treat Busson properly,” his wife was wont to assert, “and give him his dues, and he’s as mild as buttermilk; but take liberties with him and his, and you’ll see what’s in him, then. Good me! he’d crumple up a stone wall as if it were brown paper, and snap a six-inch iron bar, like a cobweb! “No, I do say, Busson hasn’t got his match in all the country round, either for good temper or bad, according as the fit is on him, for one way or the other.” Unfortunately, on his return from the Fair, Mr. Busson did consider—small blame to him—that a very great liberty had been taken with his house. Consequently, he was promptly overtaken with the fit for “crumbling stone walls, and snapping iron bars.” In plain English, Mr. Busson flew into a furious rage. “Thank goodness,” sighed poor Mrs. Busson, “that Ruth has packed the girls off to their rooms for the night, whilst Busson was still out.” For he had remained in the yard to discharge his duties to the horses, and thus his return to the house, and his further initiation into the full extent of that afternoon’s doings had been delayed some time. But as Fay and Phoena, cowered together in their bedroom, which was directly over the parlour, where the farmer was giving free vent to his anger, the drift, if not all the words, of his fierce displeasure, reached the two girls very distinctly. Their teeth chattered, and their limbs shook, but they were too petrified with terror to shed a tear. Jack and Phil, following the farmer indoors, a few minutes later, after putting away their ponies, as they loved to do, beat a hasty retreat, though their untasted supper stood ready within their reach. They were in blissful ignorance as to the cause of the farmer’s rage, but a look from Mrs. Busson warned them that they were not wanted, and with the ready tact of good breeding, they had quickly vanished to their own quarters. “Oh, I wish,” cried Phoena, “that Ruth, or Libbie, or someone would come and see us. It is getting so late, and it will be too dreadful it we have to wait till to-morrow morning without knowing any more.” “Well, we can make out something for ourselves,” said matter-of-fact Faith. “For you can hear that Mr. Busson is evidently determined to turn us out to-morrow morning. Just listen, now.” “Can’t turn ’em out, you, say,” Busson was roaring. “Can’t turn who I choose out of my own house! Well, I call that a pretty pair of walking boots. Don’t you make any mistake about it, Missus, out they’ll go, bag and baggage, neck and crop, leggins or no leggins, soon as ever the sun’s up to-morrow.” Then came the sound of pleading in a low tone from Mrs. Busson. This was speedily cut short by the farmer’s loud voice. “Respect for Miss Agatha, indeed! Let her teach her young ’uns to show respect for my goods and chattels. Let her, I say, before they ever set foot under my roof again.” Then, after a moment’s lull, the farmer raged on anew. “And as for that boy, this very night, I’ll give him such a thrashing as he’ll never forget for the rest of his born days. My word! if I don’t break a stick or two over him, my name’s not Benjamin Busson. Polly, I say?”—this was addressed, in stentorian tones, to the girl in the back kitchen, “where have you locked that young rascal up?” “Oh, Busson, Busson, let him be till the morning,” the girls heard Mrs. Busson entreating her husband, her voice shrill with alarm. Evidently she was trying, by main force, to hold the infuriated man back. “It will be plenty soon enough to punish him to-morrow.” Involuntarily, Phoena thought of the scenes they had so often enacted in their ogre games, where the pitiful ogress sought to gain time for the luckless victims. But how far Mrs. Busson would have succeeded or not was doubtful, if, at that critical moment, the doctor had not appeared on the scene. His presence produced at once a comparative calm. “I wonder if poor Di will soon be better,” said Phoena, as they heard Dr. Forbes going upstairs to Di’s room, whence her screams still came at very short intervals. Libbie had put her to bed in another part of the house. “Do you suppose that she really will be blind?” asked Faith. “Oh, how could she and Andrew have done such a thing!” “I thought they were up to something,” said Phoena; “but I never thought, after all we had said about it, that they would have done that .” “And I’m so sorry for poor Mrs. Busson,” said Fay, “it seems so hard that she should get such a scolding for our ill-doing.” “Yes, and after she’d been giving us such a happy afternoon. What’s that?” added Phoena. “Only me,” said Marygold, peeping through the door of an adjoining room, where she was supposed to be asleep. “Is all the people downstairs in a turkey-cock rage still, do you think?” she added, in a quivering tone. Before anyone could answer, the door opened, and Nanny appeared. Grim as she looked, the girls greeted her gladly. “Oh, Nanny, do tell us what’s happening,” they implored. “Get back into your bed at once , Miss Marion, if you don’t want a slapping,” was the first utterance of the late nursery-tyrant; “you were never trained under me, or you would know better than to run about barefoot.” And it was not till Marygold was tightly tucked into her bed, and the door closed behind her, with a recommendation to open it again if she dared, that Nanny would answer the elder girls’ questions. “Suffering, indeed,” she said, “yes, I believe you, Miss Di is suffering. There, if you could see her now, it would cure you of wishing to meddle with what doesn’t concern you. It’ll be ever so long, the doctor says, before she’s quite over it. She’ll have to be kept shut up in a dark room for many days to come. The only wonder is, that she’s likely to recover at all.” “Oh, poor, dear Di!” said Faith. “Poor Di, indeed!” echoed Nanny, indignantly; “naughty Di, that’s what she is. But then, she and Master Andrew always were the most troublesome pair that you could find on a long summer’s day. It’s poor Mrs. Busson, I pity. A nice time she’s having with the farmer. He’s just beside himself with rage, and no wonder, either. A proper pig-stye they’ve made of all that part of his house. And if Joe Wintle hadn’t had a head on his shoulders, I can’t think where the mischief would have stopped.” “But,” enquired Faith, “do tell us what actually happened. What was the bee-room? We never heard anything about it before.” “No, and you never were meant to hear about it, either,” was the grim rejoinder, “if those children hadn’t been prying about as they had no right to have done, they wouldn’t have known anything of it, and all this terrible business would never have come to pass.” “But when you say a bee-room,” asked Phoena, “do you mean a room full of bees? I thought bees were always kept out of doors.” “Well, and so they always are,” said Nanny, “but that was the odd thing about this room. Years and years ago, so long ago, that no one can remember when, a swarm of bees took possession, first of the real roof over that room, and then of the false roof—that space, you know, between the outer and inner walls of the upper storey—till at last, they ended by invading the room itself. It was used, no doubt, as an odd sort of lumber room, never as a living room, for though it has a door and a chimney, there’s no proper window to it. Clouds of bees are always flying round the chimney, and very often swarms come from there. There must be thousands and thousands of bees at home in that room now. One gentleman, so Mrs. Busson told me, who was a visitor in this neighbourhood, and heard of the room, was very anxious to open it at his own risk and expense, for he was specially curious about bees and their ways, but the farmer wouldn’t hear of it being touched. He always vowed that it should never be disturbed in his time, as his father and grandfather had said before him.” “Why, of course, the risk of such a thing must have seemed dreadful,” said Faith, in awe-struck tones. “Risk! I should think so,” said Nanny, “there, as I said, if it hadn’t been for Joe Wintle, I don’t believe we’d any of us been left here.” “But what did Joe Wintle do?” enquired Faith. “Well, you see, those children had smashed in half the lower part of the door, so they had made a fine disturbance amongst all the bees they had dislodged, and they all came flying about like mad. So Joe, like a wise man, rushed down to the village, and got hold of a sheet of zinc, which he nailed right over the broken panel of the door. He put on his regular bee-dress first; then he fitted a thick shutter over the whole door, so there’s no likelihood now of any more bees escaping. But, oh, the hundreds and thousands that came buzzing out, at first, you wouldn’t believe. Every one of us got pretty nicely stung, I can tell you.” “Were you badly hurt, Nanny?” asked Fay, politely. “Of course I was, Miss Faith, but a blue-bag, and some sweet oil set me right. Poor Libbie was badly punished, her left hand is just a sight; she worked so hard to get Miss Di free.” “I suppose Di and Andrew were dreadfully frightened when they found out what they had done?” enquired Phoena. “If you’d heard their screams as we heard them down in the brew-house, you wouldn’t have much doubt of that. Both Libbie and I thought they must have set themselves on fire, and be calling out of the flames.” “I suppose Di was dreadfully stung,” said Faith. “I tell you that it was only a wonder that she didn’t die, then and there,” said Nanny, “what with the shock, and the pain. As it is, she hasn’t come to herself yet. But there, I repeat it, I don’t pity her, not as I do Mrs. Busson.” “I suppose Mr. Busson takes a long time to get over things,” said Fay. “I should think he’d take a long time to get over this thing. There, however the poor old lady will make it right with him, I can’t think. Never did I see anyone fly all to bits, as he’s done. ’Twouldn’t do Master Andrew any harm to have a taste of his displeasure.” “Oh, but he won’t beat Andrew, will he, Nanny? You won’t let him,” implored Faith. “I would let him, gladly, if I could,” was the merciless rejoinder—as a matter-of-fact, Nanny had taken effectual measures to prevent such a thing happening—“only I believe that it would break Mrs. Busson’s heart, if anyone laid a finger on him in her house, and I’m sure I don’t want her troubles added to.” “But,” faltered Phoena, “shall we all be sent away to-morrow?” “More than likely. All that is, but Miss Di. I shouldn’t be surprised if the farmer sends her to the nearest hospital. But now I must go back to her room; I’ve promised that I’ll sit up the night with her. And the sooner that you two get to bed, and out of the way of doing fresh mischief, the better. Good-night to you both.” “Good-night, Nanny,” responded the girls. They were too dejected to resent the glaring injustice implied in her last sentence. The next morning they woke with very heavy hearts. “Won’t it be an awful disgrace, Phoena,” sighed Fay, “if we really are sent back to-day. What will mother say?” “I shall be so sorry for Mrs. Busson,” said Phoena, “because, you see, she will be so sad if it all ends so badly. Perhaps the farmer has waked up in a better temper.” “I rather hope he has,” chimed in little Marygold, “for I’m werry afraid of seeing him, if he’s still in that turkey-cock rage.” And so, in sooth, were her elders, whose courage was at a very low ebb when they reluctantly left the shelter of their room for breakfast. Even Jack and Phil were unusually subdued. They had heard the whole story from Joe Wintle, the hero of the zinc sheet, and they had heard also how Mr. Busson had vowed that every one of them was to be cleared off the premises that day. “And Joe says that the farmer is a man of his word,” said Phil. No one had seen Andrew. Jack had tried the door of his room, but had found it still locked. “Poor beggar, he must be having a lively time of it,” said Phil. “Serve him right,” said Jack, “it was a dirty trick to play.” “Hush,” said Phoena, “here comes Mrs. Busson. Oh dear, what will she be like?” CHAPTER XXVIII. “A PRETTY PICTURE.” W ELL knowing all that she had gone through for their sakes, the children felt terribly shy of meeting their hostess. But, save that her face was a little pale, and that her eyelids showed narrow red rims, there was nothing in her quiet, pleasant greeting, no lack of warmth in her bright smile, to betray that anything had gone wrong with her. For the first time, perhaps, in their lives, Fay and Phoena realised how much elder folk may suffer for the misdoings of the young, and how unselfishly they may conceal that suffering from its authors. “Well, now, my dears,” she began, and there was a certain jerkiness in her tone now, which, to older ears would have told its own story, “I want you all to make an extra good breakfast, and I’ll tell you the reason why.” Oh, then they were going to be sent away. Faith felt sure of that. “We’re going to have such beautiful weather to-day,” Mrs. Busson went on—as if a fine day during that remarkably dry season were quite a novelty—“that I’ve thought of a little treat for you all.” The elder girls breathed freely. “And it’s this. You’ve often heard talk of the old oak at Barnby.” “Under which Queen Elizabeth is said to have drunk a cup of cider?” asked Phoena, eagerly. “Yes, quite right, that’s the tree. Well, suppose now you all make an expedition to see it. It’s seven miles there, every step, but you can take the little donkey-trap, and that’ll carry four of you at a time, as well as the dinner and tea baskets, for you’d best not set out to come home till it’s got cool. Now, do you think you’d like to go?” “Of course we should,” cried the children in chorus. Phoena, noting the look of relief on Mrs. Busson’s face at the unanimous consent to her plan, guessed the old lady’s good reasons for arranging that they should be out of the house for that whole day. “And now you’ll finish your breakfast nice and quietly,” besought Mrs. Busson, “and then you’ll just stop indoors out of the sun, till you are ready to start. The house is still topsy-turvy after yesterday’s upset, so we don’t want more little feet running about than can be helped. Besides, poor Miss Di must be kept quiet.” “Is she better to-day?” asked Fay, timidly, feeling almost guilty in asking after one of the culprits. “Not much, I’m afraid; she hasn’t had a wink of sleep.” “And Andrew,” asked Jack, “will he come with us?” “No, sir, that he certainly won’t,” said Nanny, appearing at the door, to fetch a cup of milk for Di, “Master Andrew’s got to stop at home to be punished, and a rare punishment we’ve thought out for him, too, Mr. Busson and I.” Without another word, Nanny took the milk, and departed. Mrs. Busson hurried after her. “What a horrid old crab-stick,” cried Jack, “no wonder that you all hated her, when she was your nurse.” “Small blame to Andrew that he didn’t want to see her again,” said Jack. “Her bark is worse than her bite,” said Faith; “she always used to threaten us with a great deal more than she ever carried out.” “I expect,” said Phoena, with her natural shrewdness, “that she has really been doing Andrew a kind turn, and that whatever the punishment may be, she only invented it to get Andrew off the merciless beating he seemed likely to get last evening.” “It won’t be much fun,” said tender-hearted Marygold, “to go to our picnic, and not know all the time what dreadful things may be happening to Andrew.” “Yes,” chimed in Hubert, “it does seem werry sad to leave him behind in disgrace, when we are going to enjoy ourselves.” “He has no one to thank for it but himself,” said Phil. “No one asked him to go and kick up all this shine, and do us out of our supper last night. He ought to be licked for it.” A little later, Jack was quite ready to endorse Phil’s opinion. Forgetting Mrs. Busson’s directions as to staying indoors, Jack strayed round to the straw-yard, where he ran up against Mr. Busson. Not heeding the signs of the times, Jack accosted the farmer—who had rather pointedly turned his back upon him—and asked if they might have the ponies. The old man turned on him in a fury. “Now, clear out of this,” he cried, seizing Jack by the ear, “I’ve told the missus, and I’ll tell you, that I’m not going to be walked over in my place by a parcel of ill-behaved youngsters.” Therewith, he dragged Jack across the yard, pushing him through the gate, and slamming it after him with quite unnecessary violence. “Bother Andrew,” cried Jack, indignantly, rejoining the others, “I do call it a beastly shame that he has gone and spoilt everything for us. Look here, Phil, he’s done us out of the ponies now, for old Busson has cut up rusty, and won’t let us have them.” “I’d like to kick Andrew,” said Phil, with more heartiness than heart. “I think,” said Fay, “that you may leave Andrew to the tender mercies of Nanny and Busson. I expect that he’ll get all that he deserves.” “I hope to goodness that he will,” said Philip, whose disappointment about the ponies made him very vengeance-thirsty. “Well,” said Jack, gloomily, “he has made the farmer as cross as a bear with two sore heads.” “I hope we’ll soon start now,” said Marygold, “I don’t want to see Mr. Busson, I don’t, at all.” “Not much fear of your seeing him,” said Fay, “if you keep indoors, like a good little girl.” But Faith proved a false prophet. For, just as the children were thinking of setting off, the door opened, and Mr. Busson put his dreaded head in. “Now, you little gentlemen and ladies,” he began, “just you come along with me, and see what comes of meddling with what does not belong to you. Never too late to learn, or too early, says I.” These last words were aimed at Marygold, who was shaking with fear. So a very subdued procession followed the farmer, as he strode down the garden, and across the fowl-yard to the orchard, beloved of Gaston. On plodded Mr. Busson through the long, rank grass, till he reached nearly the middle of the orchard. Then he paused. “Now, here’s a pretty sight for you,” he said, “look at it. Look at it!” This recommendation was entirely superfluous, however. Faith and Phoena were standing with eyes and mouth wide open, and fixed in a rigid stare, whilst Hubert and Marygold were backing like the traditional crabs. “What is it? What is it?” they all asked. “Why, it’s your brother, Andrew, doing penance, my dears,” said the farmer. “Take a nearer look at him.” In the middle of the orchard was a big, artificial mound, surmounted by a flagstaff. This table-mountain, as Phoena had christened it, had been described by Marygold, in a letter to her mother, as being “a mile high,” and affording a view “all over the country.” As a matter of fact, it was about twenty feet high, and from its top you could command a good view of the lane, which ran alongside of the orchard. But though the surface of the mound was now so thickly overgrown with coarse weeds and grass, that to the unknowing it might almost appear a natural hillock, it was really entirely made up of broken brick-bats, and crockery, and all the other miscellaneous objects which go to form a rubbish heap. But it was a rubbish heap of ancient date, and of very literal long-standing. It was this table mountain that Mr. Busson had selected as the theatre of Andrew’s punishment. A wide-bottomed tub, turned topsy-turvy, was set at the foot of the flag-staff, and in the middle of the tub was placed a chair, and on the chair was what appeared to be a monster straw bee-hive. It was of the old-fashioned extinguisher shape, wide at the edge of the skirt—as the cottagers term it—whence three wooden legs projected, and tapering upwards into quite a narrow circumference round the neck. Above this neck, and struggling out of a thick garnish of stiff, struggling straws, Andrew’s head was just apparent. In front of the brim of his straw hat was a huge card, bearing the words, in Nanny’s largest writing, “Who would be a curious boy?” A further decoration was added to the hat, in the shape of Libbie’s scorched and rent apron, which was spread over it after the fashion of those cloths which sometimes serve to protect hives from the undue heat. “There now, don’t you call that a pretty picture, and all made with a truss of straw, and a good-for-nothing youngster?” asked the farmer, turning upon Jack and Phil, who were holding their sides with laughter, so absolutely ludicrous did Andrew appear. “Go away, all of you, you nasty cowards,” howled Andrew, “if you were not such a sneaking lot, all of you, you would never let me be treated like this.” “Oh, I say, none of your cheek, old bee-hive,” said Jack, “you chain up, after all the row you’ve kicked up for everyone.” “I wish I’d kicked up ten times more,” snarled Andrew, “you’re all traitors and snea—” “Look here, old straw-sides,” said Phil, “you’d better take your punishment meekly, or you may get something worse than that shied at you,” he added, flinging a pellet of grass, which he took care should only shave Andrew’s face.

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