CHAPTER XIV

A DONKEY IN A NIGHT-CAP

DR. FENNING was an old man. He lives about six miles from us. He came out with a smiling face. I think he saw how frightened we all were.

"He'll do!" he said. "With care. But he must be kept absolutely quiet, and I can't allow any one to see him but Mrs. Blatch. She'll carry out my orders."

"Oh, please!" I said. "Couldn't I see him for a minute? Father is away. Is he much broken?"

"It's a mercy he fell where he did, on the grass; and it's a miracle that he is as much alive as he is. Broken? Well, he has got a rib broken and an arm, and a nasty crack on his head, but he's young, and I'll pull him round, so trot along home and leave him here."

Then cook and Baldwin would have their say, and Dr. Fenning got impatient and broke away from us, and then we went home, and I found Lynette and Aylwin knew nothing about the fire, so I told them. We all settled that I must write at once to father and tell him of it, and I wrote the letter before I went to bed, so that the postman could take it as early as possible the next morning.

And then, for the first time in my life, I was glad to get to bed to end our horrible day. I was so tired that I fell asleep directly, but when I woke the next morning it seemed as if there was a great weight on me pressing me down, and then I remembered Denys.

When the post came in, I had a letter from father. He wrote to say that dear grannie had just died, and he hoped we would all be good children, as he could not be back till after the funeral, which was to be on Saturday. Lynette and I felt very unhappy. We didn't think that granny would really die.

Aylwin's leg was paining him a good deal. He tried to order us about, and tell us what we were to do, but we wouldn't have it. We told him he was pretending to be like Denys, and he never could be. And then after breakfast we left him and went off to Mrs. Blatch's cottage to ask how Denys was. She wouldn't let us see him, and she told us that he was sleeping, and mustn't be disturbed.

"Is he in pain?" I asked. "Does he talk? What does he say?"

"He isn't rightly conscious, missy, but the doctor gave him some stuff to keep him quiet. He'll do nicely. Don't you fret."

"Father isn't coming home till Saturday," I said, trying to keep the tears out of my eyes; "and it's dreadful being without Denys. Are you quite sure he won't die, Mrs. Blatch?"

"I don't think he will, dearie, not if I can help it, and if the good God gives us His help."

"Oh, Lynette, let's go home and pray for him," I said; "I've been so miserable that I haven't done it."

So we went back. Lynette was quite grave, not a bit harum-scarum as she always is. And we went upstairs to our bedroom and knelt down and prayed that Denys might get better soon. And when we got up from our knees, we felt much better.

And then we went back to Aylwin, who was on the dining-room sofa. Puff was riding Andy in the field, and Aylwin was quite cross. We told him about Denys. He said:

"Well, I know I'm jolly ill; my leg gets worse and worse. I think it's going to mortify—it's turning black. I shall soon be every bit as bad as Denys; and then they'll amputate me, and I shall be on one leg for the rest of my life!"

We felt rather frightened, and made him pull off his linen bandage and show his leg to us.

"Oh!" I said. "It's badly bruised. Bruises always turn black; I've lots on my arms!"

I pulled up my sleeve and showed him.

"Yes," said Lynette eagerly, "and look at my forehead!"

"Pooh!" said Aylwin. "I'd swap my leg in a minute for any of your trifling bruises! I consider I ought to have had the doctor called in. Cook thinks herself very clever, but she's made a hash of me."

We couldn't help laughing, for that's cook's one saying to Aunt C. when she doesn't know what to have for dinner. "We'll make a hash, mum," she says, and she would give us hashes every day of the week if she could, and if there was meat to do it.

"I wonder what Denys feels like!" I said. "What an awful day yesterday was!"

"Andy was at the bottom of it all!" grumbled Aylwin. "If he hadn't run away, I shouldn't have hurt my leg, and I should have gone to the fire with you."

"And then what?" I said.

"I shouldn't have let Denys be so foolhardy as to run into a blazing house."

"He saved the dog," I said. "I think he was very kind and brave. I wouldn't like to have been him just before he jumped. It was awful! And I think he must have felt he was going to miss the mattress. He stood up so straight, and looked so grave. The village people think he was a regular hero."

Aylwin didn't say any more, but he made us help him out into the garden, where he lay on the grass, and we sat and talked to him. It was a very dull long day, and we didn't know what to do with ourselves. Cook and Emma kept going off to Mr. Blatch's to see how Denys was; at least they said they were there, but they stood in the village half the time, talking to every one. Mrs. Ribbon told cook we ought to have telegraphed to father about Denys, but she said she thought not, as we couldn't properly explain in a telegram.

And then in the afternoon we got a visit from Mrs. Rogers. We were so glad to see her. I began to feel I had had enough of being without any grown-ups to talk to. She went to see Denys at once, and stayed till the doctor came, and said she would write to father herself.

"You must all come over and spend a long day with us at the farm," she said. "You will cheer my husband up."

"But there's nothing but misfortune happened to us," I said: "accidents and death and illness. We don't feel very cheerful!"

"Yes, but we won't look at the blackest side. Andy isn't lost, and none of you were seriously hurt when you tumbled into the ditch with your cart, and Denys is going to get better, and your father will be home on Saturday!"

"Oh!" I said. "I wish you'd come and stay with us till father comes back!"

But she said she could not leave Captain Rogers. We were very sorry when she went, but we said we would like to spend a day at the farm the next day, and so we did, and quite enjoyed ourselves. I had another letter from father, and cook had one too. He said he had been coming straight back to us, only he telegraphed to the doctor, and he told him he need not, for Denys was going on well. And he said he hardly knew how to leave before granny's funeral, he had so much to do and arrange. And he told me that Aunt Mildred was coming back with him on Saturday instead of Aunt C.

We were quite delighted to hear that. Aunt Mildred is the very best story-teller we know. In winter we sit in the dark with just a little bit of fire, and she begins to tell us a story of the Civil Wars, hundreds of years ago, between the Royalists and Roundheads. She tells us about girls and boys hiding their fathers in secret rooms, and creeping along secret passages, in and out of dungeons. And our hearts thump, and we hold our breaths, because the most awful things are going to happen, and you think there is no possibility of escape this time, and then they just miss coming by a hair's breadth. It's so deliciously exciting to listen to her!

I haven't written in this book for a long while, so I must make up for lost time now. Denys got very slowly better, but even when father and Aunt Mildred came back, he couldn't be brought home. That came about three weeks later. We were very glad to see him, but he looked dreadfully white and thin, and his arm was in a sling, and he had to stay in bed; he was quite an invalid.

We used to go up to his room and sit with him, and we did a good many things up there to amuse him. We acted charades sometimes, and once we had a kind of acrobat performance, and Aylwin tried to walk across a pole between two chairs and balance a tumbler on his nose; he didn't do the tumbler badly, but he smashed both chairs and the pole itself, and came an awful cropper. Denys was just as full of fun and plans as ever, but one Sunday afternoon I was sitting with him alone, and he got quite grave and earnest.

He asked me about my class, and then he said, "Father was quite right, Grisel; I wasn't fit to teach them. I was trying to take a servant's message when I wasn't a servant at all. Do you know what I thought about when I stood on the windowsill and waited for the ladder to come, and felt the flames roar behind me and underneath me?"

"No," I said; "I knew you were thinking of something; you looked so grave and quiet. Oh, don't let us talk about it. It was horrible!"

"But I want to talk about it. The words on the knight's tomb flashed across me: 'Semper fidelis, semper paratus.' And I felt I was looking death in the face, and I wasn't 'paratus.' And I hadn't been 'fidelis.'"

"You didn't look frightened," I said. "I thought you didn't understand how near the fire was to you."

"A fellow wouldn't be much good if he funked at a time like that," said Denys, with his grand air. "It's never good form to show your feelings."

Then he added in a different tone:

"But all the same I was in a funk, and I had reason to be, for I wasn't ready to die, and I knew it. How would you have felt, Grisel?"

"I think I should have screamed with fright," I said; "I'm afraid I should. But it wouldn't be death that would frighten me, it would be the fire. I think—" I stopped, for I always find it difficult to talk about myself—"I think I shouldn't be afraid of dying—because it would be all right after."

"How do you know?"

"The Bible says so. Sometimes I wonder, when I feel very blue, if I've made a mistake after all, and if I'm not safe in the fold. And then I think of that chapter about sheep, and how Jesus said about His sheep, 'I give unto them eternal life; and they shall never perish, neither shall any man pluck them out of My hand.'"

"Yes, but how do you know you're one of the sheep?"

"He died for me," I said slowly; "and He called me, and I came. I can't explain it better."

Denys was silent.

"I'm going to be jolly sure of myself before I leave this bed," he said. He didn't mean it irreverently; he always talks like that. "I'm going to be so sure, that if I was to meet sudden death every day, I should never blink, or think it mattered a bit. A man has no business to have anything to make him funk; I mean inside him. I shall be 'paratus' for death. I'll make it my business to be."

"Father will tell you how," I murmured.

We didn't say any more, but a few days after Denys said to me:

"It's done. I've settled it, or I suppose I should say, God has. I don't think I shall funk death again—at least, I hope I shan't. And I hope if I'm 'paratus,' I shall be able to keep 'fidelis.'"

I nodded, but I didn't speak, and we didn't talk about it again.

Aylwin went off to school before Denys was well, and Lynette and I did our lessons with Aunt Mildred. And now it began to get cold and wet, and we began fires, and the winter slowly came along.

Sometimes when we couldn't go out we played hide-and-seek all over the house, and Aunt Mildred played with us. She used to come out with us in the donkey-cart, and father drove to one or two places with Andy. He got more and more useful. He used to bring up parcels from the station, and coals and oil, and every week I drove Annie Steel out, and did errands for the village people. And at last Denys got well enough to drive out, and then he went back to school.

One thing Aunt Mildred did which was very nice. She changed the choir practice to Friday, so that every Saturday we could go out for the whole day if we wanted to, and we generally had a plan which lasted all day, for it was our holiday. But sometimes it was a wet day, and then it was horrid. I don't know how it is, but it is quite impossible to stay the whole day in the house without doing something wrong, and we generally end by having a regular fight all round.

Last Saturday was a dreadfully wet day. We shut ourselves up in the schoolroom in the morning, and determined to be jolly without getting into any scrapes. And then Aylwin said:

"We've had old Andy a perfect age, and we haven't taught him any tricks yet. He ought to be like a circus donkey."

"What do circus donkeys do?" asked Lynette.

"Why, they sit up and eat dinner with table-napkins, and dance the hornpipe in caps and gowns, and play the piano with their hoofs, and all kinds of things."

"I think we ought to train him a little," said Denys thoughtfully.

"I heard of a donkey who used to come indoors," I said.

Then we all put our heads together, and Aylwin ran out of the room. He was going to see if Andy had been brought into the stable. Lynette and I went upstairs to our piece box. Our piece box is a box where Aunt C. puts odd pieces of our dresses and anything she cuts out. And at the bottom of it are some old clothes we play charades with. We chose out an old lady's night-cap that we had, and a long blue cloak, and a black-and-white plaid shawl. These two last were very moth-eaten, but we thought that wouldn't matter, and we got some tape and pins and scissors and needle and cotton and went downstairs to the drawing-room.

Aunt Mildred had gone out to see a sick woman with father. She never stops in for the rain.

Denys was holding the hall door open, and then I thought of the dining-room carpet, so Lynette and I very carefully put newspapers down in case Andy might be muddy. And presently we heard a great noise in the hall, and we ran out, and there was Andy looking quite pleased with himself! Aylwin had found him in the stable, and he had groomed him down and washed his hoofs before he brought him in. Aylwin is a very tidy boy. He had put the halter on, and Andy was in a very good temper. He didn't pull back at all; he just walked in straight after Aylwin and came into the dining-room like a lamb. We shut the door and locked it, in case Emma or cook would come peeping in. We wished we could have taken him to the schoolroom, but Denys said he would never go upstairs, he was sure. That would come afterwards when he was properly trained. Denys had meanwhile got a lovely bunch of carrots from Baldwin, and this was to train Andy with.

The dining-room was a very good place to have him in, we thought, because if Andy got troublesome, we could just open the French window and take him into the garden, back to the stable again.

"Now," said Denys, "we must dress him first."

So we put the night-cap on, and first he began twitching his ears and shaking himself about, until we thought of cutting holes to let his ears through, and then he let us tie it under his chin properly, and he looked so funny that we all went into shrieks of laughter. It was rather small for him, but we fixed it very firmly on so that he couldn't shake it off. Then we folded the blue cloak round him and tied it round and round with tape. And then came the most difficult part, and I had to do this with needle and cotton. We cut up the black-and-white shawl into four bits and made him trousers. We sewed them round his legs and fastened them on to the blue cloak, so that they couldn't slip down. He kept shaking himself, and looked at us as if he thought we were humbugging him, but he was awfully good until Denys tried to make him sit up and beg like a dog.

He held the carrots up very high, for he tied them on a stick, and then when we all tried to heave Andy on his hind legs, he suddenly kicked out and tore round the room. We opened the window quickly, for fear he should break something, and he dashed out.

It was raining horribly, but Denys and Aylwin rushed out after him. That stupid Baldwin had got the front gate wide open, and of course Andy tore out of it and along the village as hard as ever he could. Denys said he could hardly run after him for laughing, for he looked so awfully funny in his night-cap and blue coat and trousers. Some men were coming home from work, and they didn't attempt to catch him. They simply stood still in the middle of the road, and roared with laughter.

Lynette and I had promised Aunt Mildred we wouldn't go out, so we left the boys to catch Andy, and we tidied up the dining-room, as it was in an awful mess. We thought the boys would never come back. Father and Aunt Mildred came in, and asked us where they were, so we told them, and father was very shocked. He said he would send Andy right away if ever we brought him into the house again. Aunt Mildred laughed.

"I should love to have seen him," she said. "I think we'll dress him up another day in the stable, and then I shall be in the fun."

It wasn't till dinner was nearly over that the boys came back, and then they were in the most awful state of mind. They had lost Andy altogether. He got to the four cross-roads before they did, and they didn't know which way he had gone.

"He tore like the furies," said Denys, "and if he meets a carriage, he'll frighten the horses into fits. I can't tell you what he looked like going through the village."

"There's one comfort," said Aunt Mildred, "he will easily be traced. Donkeys in night-caps are not common in this part."

"You must go out again and look till you find him, boys," said father sternly. "It would serve you right if you lost him altogether. You must have thoroughly frightened him."

Denys and Aylwin were quite willing to go off again. They got into dry clothes, had their dinner, and then went off. And this time they didn't come home till tea-time, and they were dead tired.

But they had not found Andy!

Father sent Denys straight to bed, and told Aunt Mildred to give him something hot to drink, for since his fall, he hasn't been quite as strong as he used to be.

"We'll put up a notice," I said. "He is sure to come back; he always does."

But we had to wait till Monday came to do that, and all Sunday passed and no one had seen or heard anything of Andy.

Mrs. Rogers was in church in the morning, and we told her all about it. She said that she and Captain Rogers were leaving their lodgings very soon, and going back to London. We were awfully sorry to hear it, for we all loved Captain Rogers, and used to go over to the farm very often and see him.

"I'm sure," she said, "I don't know what we shall do without you children. You keep us so lively. I must tell Charlie about poor old Andy."

"There's always something happening to us," I said. "We hardly go a week without some scrape coming."

She laughed.

"I would back you against any one for getting into scrapes!" she said.

And when she had gone, I didn't feel very happy. The odd thing is, that when we do things they never seem wrong till afterwards. I didn't think dressing up Andy was wicked, but it seems as if it was now, and we have lost him through doing it.