CHAPTER IX

A Strange Awakening

BUT run as they might, they could not overtake it, and at last, to their bitter disappointment and grief, it faded away in the distance, and they were left alone in the darkness once more. Then Irene's fortitude forsook her. She burst into frightened sobs.

"I'm so tired and hungry. I want to get home. Do take me home, Gypsy; I don't want to look for the light any more.

"Don't cry, Irene; perhaps we shall see it again."

But Gypsy's tone was forlorn. She looked round her in vain. No light was to be seen. Then a bright thought struck her.

"We'll make a light ourselves, Irene. I'll light my lantern. I've got some matches."

Irene stopped crying, and the little girls, with a great deal of fuss and difficulty, struck a match, and lighted up their small lantern. This did not seem to improve matters. Dark shadows seemed to collect across their path, and Gypsy, worn out and frightened at last, sat down on the ground, and sobbed out—

"I wish we hadn't come. I'm afraid we're lost for ever!"

"Are there any wolves, do you think?" wailed Irene. "Can't we go back, Gypsy?"

"I don't know which is back or front," was the sobbing reply.

To add to their discomfort, a drizzling rain now set in. They crouched on the ground together with shivering limbs and chattering teeth, but presently another light shone out, and Gypsy raised her head with eager expectancy.

"It's the Holy Thing," she said.

But Irene's quick ears had caught a familiar sound. "I think it's somebody in a carriage," she said.

And a few minutes later, out of the darkness appeared a cart and horse, with a lantern tied in front. It was only a tinker and his wife returning' home from a neighbouring fair, but the children hailed them with delight.

"We're lost; take us home!" they cried.

The tinker, a burly-looking man, a little the worse for drink, stopped his horse.

"Now then, what are you a-doin' of 'ere?" he demanded. "Do 'ee want to scare all decent folks a-passin' by? What be 'ee a-doin' of?"

"Oh, do take us away from here!" cried Irene. "We're lost, and it's so dark and cold!"

The tinker considered. His wife, who had all her wits about her, got out, and without another word-lifted both the little girls into the cart.

"There ye be; sit still, and we'll give ye a lift to the next town. Drive on, Tim, ye stupid, or we shall be out all night!"

Tim drove on slowly.

"What be 'ee a-goin' to do with 'em?" he asked surlily. "We ain't got enough bread for ourselves, let alone other folks' brats!"

Gypsy was so full of relief and thankfulness at being taken up, that her spirits rose at once.

"I've got some money," she assured him cheerfully; "a whole sovereign in my pocket, and I will buy some cake and buns for Irene and myself when we come to some shops. We're very hungry, for we haven't had anything since tea, and we always have some supper at home before we go to bed."

Furtive glances were exchanged between husband and wife, and then the woman said kindly—

"You'd best let me have that money, my dear, to spend for ye. Little ladies don't know what be good for 'em."

Before Gypsy could expostulate, the woman's hand was in her pocket, and the precious coin was transferred to another's care.

Gypsy grew a little uneasy, but she was too tired to express her feelings, and soon both she and Irene were fast asleep, the cart rattling along at an increased speed, and the owners of it talking in low tones, with many sidelong glances at the sleeping children.

Gypsy was roused with a start. She was being lifted out of the cart, and Irene, more asleep than awake, was deposited on a doorstep in a dark narrow street.

Before they could ask any questions, the cart had driven rapidly on, and they were left alone in the silence and darkness of the night.

"Irene, wake up! What has happened to us?"

But Irene did not reply—her sleep was sound—and then Gypsy sat down by her, and whilst considering gravely in her little mind what had better be done now, was again overtaken by sleep, and neither child woke till broad daylight.

Irene was the first to open her eyes, and very bewildered and frightened she was for the first few minutes.

"Gypsy, where are we? Are we in a dream? Do wake up and tell me."

Then Gypsy came to her senses, tried to stand up, but fell back on the doorstep with a little cry.

"My legs are quite stiff, and oh, Irene, we haven't got any boots on!"

[Illustration: "GYPSY, WHERE ARE WE?"]

"And my jacket has gone, and so has your cape!"

"How did we get out of the cart? We must have left our boots behind us!"

Irene staggered to her feet, and looked around her. The sun was shining brightly, but it was still very early. They were seated on the doorstep of a long low white house on the outskirts of a small country village. The house had green shutters to the windows, and a brass plate on the door which shone like burnished gold. All was quiet inside, and Irene said, a little hesitatingly—

"Shall I ring the bell, Gypsy? Some one inside might be sorry for us, and give us our breakfast."

Gypsy stared up at the house, and then looked away over to some hills behind which the sun was rising in a bed of golden glory.

The experience of the past night with all its misery rushed upon her, and she turned to her little companion with passionate protest in her tone:

"I've tried as hard as ever I could to find the Holy Thing. I've got up early, and now we've stayed up all night, and lost our boots, and don't know where we are! and it hasn't come to us, and it never will! And I don't believe there's any Holy Thing in the world at all! And I believe Galahad only saw the sun!" She buried her curly head in her arms, and burst into tears.

Irene could not comprehend the depths of woe that had overtaken her; she only felt they were cold, miserable, and hungry, and stretching up her little hand she rang the bell with such vehemence that it roused the inmates from their slumbers. A window was opened overhead.

"The doctor is away! Who is there?"

"Oh, do let us in," was Irene's wailing cry, "we're lost, and we want to get home."

A few minutes after the door opened, and an elderly maid-servant only partly dressed drew them gently in.

"You poor little dears! Wherever have you come from? Hush, hush, then, don't cry, we'll look after you, and see you home again. Why, your clothes are quite damp. You must have been out all night. Come this way, Jane will have just lighted her fire, and we'll soon get you warm and dry."

They were led into a bright cheerful kitchen, and before long, rolled up in blankets, were seated in two big chairs enjoying basins of hot bread and milk. Gypsy then tried to tell her story, but it was not surprising that it should sound absolutely unintelligible to the two maids, who came to the conclusion that she must be delirious from fright and exposure.

"I live with Gubby, and the boys, and the Ogre. It's the Ogre's house. I don't know what it's called. It's full of armour like King Arthur's knights had. We wouldn't do what Agony told us, because it was too difficult, and we ran away to find the Holy Thing, and it got dark, and we thought we saw the Holy Light once, only it ran away from us, and then we got into a cart, but we didn't get out of it, and then we found ourselves here."

This story was repeated an hour later to two ladies who came into the kitchen, and who looked upon the little girls with consternation and amazement.

One was in a widow's dress, and the elder of the two, but she seemed more youthful in looks and manner than her younger sister, who regarded them with soft, pitying eyes.

"You're quite sure they're not village children, Mary," said the widow, Mrs. Webster by name; "they might be anybody's in those blankets, but they look clean, and one of them is decidedly pretty. Make them talk, Mary, and we shall soon see by their accent what class they belong to!"

Mary turned to Gypsy. "Tell the ladies where you come from, dear, and all about yourselves."

Gypsy repeated her story, and Mrs. Webster listened, then turned to her sister excitedly.

"Isn't she a pretty little thing, Helen? She talks as if she has come out of a fairy tale. Who is the Ogre, and Agony, and Gubby? And what is the Holy Thing? They will enliven our dulness. Are they lost children? For I vote we keep them here for a time, and say nothing about it. I always dote on children—if they are pretty!"

Helen shook her head at her sister, as she might to a naughty child, then she bent over the children.

"They look flushed and feverish, Mary," she said gravely: "I think you had better put them in the large spare-room bed, and let them have a good sleep. They evidently want it, and after that we will talk about what we will do with them."

"Yes, miss, you are right. They're both worn out, and a sound sleep will do them all the good in the world."

So to bed Gypsy and Irene went, and for some days after, Gypsy's mind was sadly confused. The wetting and exposure brought on a great deal of fever, and she narrowly escaped an attack of rheumatic fever. Irene was very little the worse, and amused Mrs. Webster downstairs by her old-fashioned talk, whilst Helen nursed the little invalid.

"I don't care for sick nursing," Mrs. Webster said plaintively, "I always get so over-anxious and depressed. You ought to be a stoic to be a successful nurse, and that I could never be."

The sisters had only lately come to the neighbourhood, to make their home with their bachelor brother Doctor Scott. He was away for a day or two when the children made their appearance, but returned in time to doctor Gypsy, and was as much mystified as his sisters as to their whereabouts.

It was impossible to gain any information from Gypsy, and Irene either wilfully or stupidly would not help them. Truth to tell, for the first time in her small life, she was enjoying the importance of her position. Mrs. Webster petted and flattered her, and drew her out to talk for her amusement. And Irene had visions of her governess's wrath upon her return home; and the dreary loveless life she lived seemed much less desirable than her present one. She did not want to leave Gypsy, she did not want to be sent home; and with wonderful astuteness for so small a child, she parried all their questions, even going so far as to omit her surname and give her two baptismal ones instead.

"My name is Irene Stuart; I live ever so far the other side of Gypsy's home. I don't know where it is now, for we came such a long way in the cart, and it was dark. Father and mother are in London, they won't miss me, and Miss Carr is horrid. She makes me do lessons all day. Do keep me here till Gypsy is better; I will be very good, I promise I will."

"What is the name of your house?"

It was the doctor who spoke. He was standing opposite Irene, leaning against the drawing-room mantelpiece, and the little girl was seated close to Mrs. Webster, looking at an old-fashioned photograph album.

"She looked up a little puzzled: I don't think it is called anything," she said slowly.

"But you must know where you live? Are you in a town, or village, or where?"

"We live quite by ourselves," was the prompt reply, "and there are fields and trees, and woods all round us; we don't live in a town, and our door doesn't open into the road like yours does."

"Don't tease her, poor mite, with so many questions," said Mrs. Webster, quite as unwilling as the child herself for her home to be known; "Irene is very happy with us, and I have a great idea of adopting her as my child. She says she was 'born all wrong,' Frank, think of that! And girls aren't wanted in her family!"

"I shall write to the police at once, and advertise," said Dr. Scott, a little sternly; "it seems an extraordinary thing that two children should be lost about here, and we unable to trace their belongings. Their friends must be in a terrible state about them."

Irene looked terrified at the name of "police," and slipped her little hand in Mrs. Webster's.

"We aren't going to be put in prison for running away, are we?" she whispered. "We didn't mean to be naughty. Gypsy said it was a good thing to do—to find the Holy Light!"

"Hear her!" said Mrs. Webster, with a rippling laugh. "Oh, how delicious children are! Do you know what this quest is, Frank? Have you heard of a Holy Thing or a Holy Light that all good people run after?"

"Perhaps they mean the Holy Grail," said Dr. Scott gravely.

Irene clasped her hands delightfully.

"That's the other name for it," she said; "I remember now. Do you know the way to it?"

She was looking at the doctor rather shyly under her long dark lashes, and he gave a short little laugh.

"I wonder you didn't try to get to the moon," he said; "it would have been just as easy!"

Irene flushed at his mocking tone, and said no more until he had left the room; then she turned to Mr. Webster.

"It's a good thing we didn't go on, if it's as difficult as that, Gypsy said it was no good, for she'd tried as hard as ever she could, and it wouldn't be found. I don't think I shall ever run away to look for it again."