CHAPTER XXXIII.
THE BABES IN THE WOOD.
“ARE you very hungry, Nello?’
“Oh, very, very. Are you? I have not had any breakfast. It was night, dark night when I came away. Have you had any breakfast, Lily?”
“How could I, when I have been in the railway all the night? Do you think you can get over the ditch? Jump! I jumped, and you always could jump better than I.”
“You forget everything when you go to school,” said Nello, mournfully, “and I am all trembling, I cannot help it. It is so cold. Oh Lily, if they come up—if they find us—you will not let them take me back?”
“Never, Nello! but let us get on, let us get on to the railway. Quick, it is not far off. If you would only jump. Now give me your hand. I am cold too, but we must get over it, we must get over it!” said Lilias, almost crying. Poor Nello’s limbs were cramped, he was chilled to the heart. He did not feel it possible to get on, all the courage was gone out of him. He had kept up until, after scrambling through many rough places, his poor little feet had sunk in that soft, newly-ploughed furrow. This had taken all the life out of him, and perhaps his meeting with Lilias, and the tumult of joyful emotion it caused, had not increased Nello’s power of endurance. He had always had the habit of trusting to her. But Lily it was quite certain could not drag him over the ditch. He made an effort at last to jump and failed, and stuck in the mud. That accident seemed at the moment to make an end of them both in their utter weariness. They mingled their tears, Lilias hanging on upon the bank above, Nello in the heavy soil below. The cry relieved them however, and by and by, by the help of his sister’s hand, he managed to scramble up the bank, and get through the scattered bushes on to the highroad. One of his feet was wet and clogged with the mud, and oh, how tired they both were, fit for nothing but to lie down and cry themselves to sleep.
“Oh, Nello, if you were at home, should you ever—ever want to go away again?”
Nello did not make any reply. He was too tired for anything but a dull little sob now and then, involuntary, the mere breathing of his weakness. And the highway looked so long, longer even than the fields. There was always some hope at the end of a field that deliverance might come round the corner, but a long unchangeable highway, how endless it was! They went on thus together for a little way in silence; then: “Oh, Lily, I am so hungry,” said Nello. What could she do? She was hungry too, more hungry than he was, for she had eaten nothing since the afternoon of the previous day.
“I have a shilling in my pocket, but we cannot eat a shilling,” said poor Lilias.
“And I have a shilling too—more than that—I have the golden sovereign Mary gave me.”
“We must just hurry—hurry to the railway, Nello, for we cannot eat money, and the railway will soon take us home; or there is a place, a big station, where we could buy a cake. Oh!’ cried Lilias, with a gleam of eager satisfaction in her eyes.
“What is it, Lily?”
“Look, only look?” She dragged him forward by the arm in her eagerness. “Oh, a few steps further, Nello—only a few steps further—look!”
The roadside cottage which had been so blank as she passed had awoke—a woman stood by the door—but the thing that caught Lilias’ eye was a few stale cakes and opaque glasses with strange confectionery in them. It was these that gave strength to her wearied feet. She hurried forward, while the woman looked at the strange little pair in wonder. “Oh, will you give us a little breakfast,” she said, “a little milk to drink, and some bread and butter for this little boy?”
“Where have you come from, you two children, at this hour in the morning?” cried the woman in consternation.
“Oh, we are going to the train,” said Lilias. “We are obliged to go; we must get the early train, and we don’t know, we don’t quite know when it goes; and my poor little brother has fallen into the mud—see! and—he got his breakfast so very early before he came away that he is hungry again. We have plenty of money,” cried the little girl, “plenty of money! We will give you a shilling if you will give us some milk and bread.”
“A shilling—two, three shillings,” said Nello, interposing. He was so hungry; and what was the good of shillings?—you could not eat them. The woman looked at them suspiciously. They were not little tramps; they were nicely dressed children, though the little boy was so muddy. She did not see what harm it could do to take them in; likewise her heart was touched by the poor little things standing there looking up at her as though she was the arbiter of their fate.
“You may come in and sit by the fire; there’s no train for two hours yet. It’s not six o’clock. Come in, you poor little things, and rest, and I’ll give you some nice hot tea. But you must tell me all the truth, for I know you’ve run away from somewhere,” she said.
“No,” said Lilias, looking her in the face. “Oh no, I have not run away from anywhere. My little brother was not happy, and I came to fetch him, that is all. I did not run away.”
“And what sort of people was it that sent a baby like you?” said the woman. “Come in, you poor little things, and sit by the fire. What could your mother be thinking of to send you—— ”
“We have not got any mother.” Nello took no share in this conversation. He was quite lost in the delight of the hard old settle that stood by the fire. Nestling up into the corner he thought he should like to fall asleep there, and never move any more. “We have not got any mother,” Lilias said, “and who could come but me? No one. I travelled all night, and now I am going to take him home. We are children without any mother.” Lilias could not but know that these words were a sure passport to any woman’s heart.
“You poor little things!” the woman said, with the tears in her eyes. Whether it has its origin in the self-complacency of womankind, it is difficult to say, but whereas men are generally untouched by the unhappiness of being fatherless, women are without defence in most cases before a motherless child. Such a plea has instant recognition with high and low. No mother!—everything is pardoned, everything conceded to a creature with such a plea. She was not quite satisfied with the story, which seemed to her very improbable, but she could not refuse her succour to the motherless children. Her little shop, such as it was, had no visitors till much later in the day, when the village children went past her door to school. She had made her own tea, which stood keeping itself hot upon the hob, and she came in hastily and put out cups and saucers, and shared the hot and comfortable fluid, though it was very weak and would not have suited more fastidious palates than the children’s. What life it seemed to pour into their wearied little frames! The bread was coarse and stale, but it tasted like bread from heaven. Nello in his corner of the settle began to blink and nod. He was even falling asleep, when suddenly a gig rattled past the windows. The child sprang up in a moment. “Oh, Lily, Lily!” he cried in horror, “they are after me! what shall I do?”
The woman had gone to the back of the house with the cups they had used, and so was not near to hear this revelation.
“Who is it?” cried Lilias, peering out of the window. She was restored to herself, and the name of an enemy, a pursuer, put her on her mettle. She had never encountered such a thing before, but she knew everything about it, how to behave. “Come, Nello, come,” she said, “we will go out the back way while nobody is looking. Let us go away, let us go away before any one can come here.”
Lilias seized some of the cakes which the woman had put in paper for them; wonderful productions, which nothing but a child’s appetite could contemplate, and put down two shillings in the centre of the table. On second thoughts it seemed better to her to go out at the front and get round under cover of the hedge to the wood on the other side of the station, which appeared temptingly near, rather than incur the risk of speaking to the woman. It did not occur to her that her own presence was enough to put any one completely off the scent who was seeking Nello. She got him away out of the house successfully, and through the gap behind the hedge where was a little footpath. “Now we must run—run! We must get past, while they are asking at the station. We must not say a word to the woman or any one. Oh, Nello, run—run!” Nello, still more anxious than she was, managed to run for a little way, but only for a little way. He broke down of all places in the world opposite to the station, where Mr. Swan was standing talking to the keeper. When Nello saw him through the hedge he turned round and clasped his sister convulsively, hiding his face on her shoulder. Lilias did not dare to say a word. They were hid from view, yet any movement might betray them, or any sound. She stood with trembling limbs, bearing Nello’s weight upon her shoulder, and watched through the hawthorn bush.
“Nobody has been here, not a mouse, far less a little boy. The train is not due for two hours,” said the station-keeper.
“A bit of a little fellow,” said Mr. Swan. “I can’t think he could have got so far; more likely he’s lying behind a hedge somewhere; but I thought it best to try first here.”
“He’s not here,” the station-keeper said again. He answered curtly, his sympathies being all with the fugitive, and he could not but give the troubled schoolmaster a corner of his mind. “It’s only a month since you lost the last one,” he said. “If it was my house the boys ran away from I should not like it.”
“Talk of things you know something of,” said Mr. Swan hotly; and then he added, shaking his head; “It is not my fault. My wife and I do everything we can, but it’s those rough boys and their practical jokes.”
“Little fellows, they don’t seem to understand them kind of jokes,” said the railway man.
Mr. Swan shook his head. It was not his fault. He was sorry, and vexed, and ashamed. “I would rather have lost the money twice over,” he said. Then he turned and gave a searching glance all around. Lilias quaked, and her heart sank within her. She held her little brother close to her breast. If he should stir, if he should cry, all would be over. She knew her situation well enough. Either their enemy would go away and get bloodhounds and fierce wicked men to put on their track, during which time the fugitives would have time to get into some wonderful cave, or to be taken into some old, old house by some benevolent stranger, and so escape; or else he would come straight to the very place where they were, guided by some influence unfavourable to them. Lilias stood and held her breath. “Oh, be still, Nello, be still, he is looking!” she whispered into Nello’s ear. Her limbs were nearly giving way, but she resisted fate and held out.
The schoolmaster made long inspection of all the landscape. “He was specially commended to me, too—I was warned—I was warned,” he said. Then he turned to the station-keeper, giving him the most urgent injunctions. “If he comes here you will secure him at once,” he said, filling Lilias with dismay, who did not see the shrug of the man’s shoulders, and the look with which he turned aside. Thus their retreat was cut off, the little girl thought, with anguish indescribable; how then were they to get home? This thought was so dreadful that Lilias was not relieved as she otherwise would have been by the sound of the wheels and the horse’s hoofs as the gig turned, and their enemy drove away. He had gone in his own person, but had he not left a horrible retainer to guard the passage? And how, oh how was she to take Nello home? She did not know where the next station was. She did not know the way in this strange, desolate, unknown country. “Nello,” she cried, in a whisper of despair, “we must get into that wood, it is the only thing we can do; they will not look for us there. I don’t know why, but I feel sure they will not look for us there. And perhaps we shall meet some one who will take care of us. Oh, Nello, rouse up, come quick, come quick. Perhaps there may be a hermit living there, perhaps——. Come, Nello, can you not go a little further? Oh, try, try.”
“Oh, Lily, I am so tired—I am so sleepy”
“I am tired too,” she said, a little rush of tears coming to her eyes; and then they stumbled on together, holding each other up. The wood looked gay and bright in the early morning. The sun had come out, which warmed everything, and the bright autumn colour on the trees cheered the children as a similar hour, and the beauty of the wild creatures of the woods, cheered the poet:—
“Si che a bene sperar m’era cagione
Di quella fera alla gaietta pelle
L’ora del tempo, e la dolce stagione.”
The trees seemed to sweep with a great luxuriance of shadow over a broad stretch of country. It must be possible to find some refuge there. There might be—a hermit, perhaps, in a little cell, who would give them nuts and some milk from his goat—or a charcoal burner, wild but kind, like those Lilias remembered to have seen in the forest with wild locks hanging over their eyes. If only no magician should be there to beguile them into his den, pretending to be kind! Thus Lilias mixed fact and fiction, her own broken remembrances of Italian woods sounding as fictitious among the English elms and beeches as the wildest visions of fancy. For this wood, though it had poetic corners in it, was traversed by the highroad, from end to end, and was as innocent of charcoal-burners as of magicians. And it turned out a great deal further off than they thought. They walked and walked, and still it lay before them, smiling in its yellow and red, waving and beckoning in the breeze, which was less chilly now that the sun was up. The sun reached to the footpath behind the hedge, and warmed the little wayfarers through and through—that was the best thing that had happened to them—for how good it is to be warmed when one is chilled and weary; and what a rising of hope and courage there is when the misty dawn disperses before the rising of the brave sun!
Nello almost recovered his spirits when he got within the wood. There were side-aisles even to the highroad, and deep corners in its depths where shelter could be had, and the ground was all flaked with shadow and sunshine; and there were green glades, half visible at every side, with warm grass all lit by the sun.
“Let us go and sit down, Lily. Oh, what a pretty place to sit down! Oh, Lily, I cannot—I cannot walk any more; I am so tired,” cried Nello.
“I am tired too,” she said, with a quiver in her mouth, looking vainly round for some trace of the charcoal-burner or of the hermit. All was silent, sunny, fresh with the morning, but vacant as the fields. And Lilias could not be satisfied with mere rest, though she wanted it so much. “How are we to get home, if we dare not go to the railway? and there is no other way,” she said. “Oh, Nello, it will be very nice to rest—but how are we to get home?”
“Oh, never mind; I am so tired,” said weary little Nello. “Look, Lily, what a warm place. It is quite dry, and a tree to lean against. Let us stay here.”
Never had a more tempting spot been seen; green soft turf at one side of the big tree, and beech-mast, soft and dry and brown, the droppings of the trees, on the other. The foot sank in it, it was so soft, and the early sun had dried it, and the thick boughs overhead had kept off the dew. It was as soft as a bed of velvet, and the little branches waved softly over it, while the greater boughs, more still, shaded and protected the children. They sat down, utterly worn out, and Lilias took out her cakes, which they ate together with delight, though these dainties were far from delicious; and there, propped up against each other, an arm of each round the other, Nello lying across Lilias’ lap, with his head pillowed upon her; she, half-seated, half-reclining, holding him, and held in her turn by a hollow of the tree: these babes in the wood first nodded, then dozed, and woke and dozed again, and finally, the yellow leaves dropping now and then upon them like a caress of nature, the sun cherishing their little limbs, fell fast asleep in the guardianship of God.