CHAPTER IX.

SUNDAY.

WINIFRED'S first thought on waking was, "Oh, how glad I am that this is Sunday, and I 'cannot' do anything except go to church and wait upon Jack!"

Never had the day of rest, always pleasant to her, been more welcome than after this week of excitement and fatigue. She slipped out of bed without waking her mother, and went to the window. How wonderfully calm and quiet everything seemed! The plow-horses, turned out in the field near the house, seemed to know that no work would be required of them this day, and stood with their heads together looking over the gate. The cows were collected in their lane, waiting to be milked and turned out. The cider-press, which had been groaning and creaking for several days, was quiet under its little roof of thatch; the very poultry seemed to make less noise than usual, and a pretty robin was singing his autumn song on the top of the porch.

Winifred drew a long breath, and again repeated to herself, "Oh, how glad I am that this is Sunday!"

After breakfast and the finishing up of the morning's work, arose the question who was to go to church, and who was to stay at home with Jack. Priscilla volunteered to stay, and was not at all pleased when Jack declared, peevishly, that he didn't want her—he wanted Winnie.

"Priscy will just keep scolding at me all the time, and she can't read either. She has to spell all the words. I want Winnie to read to me in the 'Pilgrim's Progress,' and about David, and Goliath, and Samson."

"Master Jack is very fond of hearing about all sorts of brave doings," said Priscilla. "He takes his bravery out in that way, I think. As for Miss Winnie's new book, 'tis no fit book to read on Sunday, in my opinion. 'Tis more like a fairy tale."

"O no, Priscy! It is just as good a Sunday book as 'The Whole Duty of Man,'" said Winifred. "I will explain it all to you, some day."

Priscy was still privately of opinion that a book which was so interesting could not possibly be fit for Sunday, but she did not like to contradict Winifred, whom she looked upon as a kind of saint. So she contented herself with declaring that there were no such books when she was young—which was undoubtedly true—and that my Lady Colville (with whom she had once lived, and who was her great authority upon all occasions) had severely reproved my Lady Alice and had kept her upon bread and water for two days because she found her reading in the "Arcadia" on Sunday evening.

"The 'Arcadia' is a story-book, I know," said Winifred. "I read out of it to Mrs. Alwright, and it is all about shepherds, and shepherdesses, and knights. That is not at all like the 'Pilgrim's Progress,' Priscy."

Priscy could not see the difference, but said she supposed Mrs. Winifred knew best.

"Of course she does," said Jack; "and you will stay with me, won't you, Winnie?"

Winifred had particularly wished to go to church. She always enjoyed the services very much, and she felt as though she specially needed their soothing and strengthening influence, after the worry and excitement of the week past, but she saw that Jack had set his heart upon her reading to him, and she knew that if he and Priscy were left together, they would do nothing but quarrel all the morning.

"Well, never mind, Jack, I will stay with you this morning, and go to church in the afternoon," said she. "It is very dull to lie in bed and do nothing. I found that out when I had the fever."

"Yes, and very much Master Jack put himself out for you then, did he not?" said Priscilla. "He would not so much as go down to the spring in the evening when you wanted some cool water, because he was afraid of the bogle. Suppose Miss Winifred should say she was afraid to stay alone in the house with you for fear of robbers, what then, Master Jack?"

Jack, having no better answer at hand, began to cry.

"Hush, hush, Priscy!" said Winifred, gravely. "I am sure that is not proper talk for Sunday. Did not you promise me that you would not tease Jack any more, while he was sick?"

"Well, he is enough to aggravate anybody. But I won't say any more, only next time I hope he will remember and do as he would be done by, that's all!" And Priscilla flounced out of the room, and went to "clean herself," as she said, for church.

"Don't say any more, Jack!" said Winifred. "You will make your head ache. You need not think so much of what Priscy says. You know she would do anything in the world for you."

"What do I care about her doing for me, when she plagues me all the time!" sobbed Jack. "She is always saying the hatefulest things she can think of, and then when I am mad, she begins to tell what she has done for me. I would rather people would never do anything for me, than that they should be always twitting me with it afterwards!"

"I have felt a good deal so myself," said Winifred. "It is very hard to be grateful for favors when they are thrown in one's face. Somehow one feels as if one had paid for them all that they were worth. But don't let us think anything more about it, lest we should spoil our Sunday. How far have you got in the book?"

"Just to where he came to the lions. But, Winnie," said Jack, with some little trepidation in his voice, "you are not afraid to stay all alone with me while they go to church, are you? You don't really think there is any danger?"

"Of course not!" said Winifred. "What is there to fear?"

"Oh, nothing—only—I wish Roger or grandfather would stay at home with us!"

"Roger has gone home to see his sick mother, and I am sure you would not want grandfather to stay at home. Just think, how long it is since he has been able to go to church before! What harm can possibly happen to us?"

Jack didn't know, only it was very disagreeable to be left alone with nobody but a little girl to take care of him. "Suppose the robbers should come, or suppose there should be a thunder-storm, or such an apparition as Dame Rogers saw when she was all alone in the house!"

"Or suppose one of the lions should come out of the book and bite you, which is quite as likely," said Winifred, laughing. "You are always talking about going to sea with my father, Jack. What sort of sailor will you make if you are afraid of storms at home, with a good roof over your head? Or what would you do if the ship was attacked by the Barbary pirates, as the Princess of Orange was once? Dear Jack, do try and not be so afraid of everything!"

"I don't see how I can help it," said Jack; "and I am not afraid of everything, either. If I had been, I should not have gone up the tree after the magpie. But I don't like to be alone here, and I think grandfather might stay at home."

"I would not say anything about it; they will only laugh at you," said Winifred. "I will read to you, and then they will be at home again before you can think."

The dread of being laughed at by his grandfather prevailed for the time over Jack's other fears, and he saw the family set out for church without making any more objections. But when they were gone, his terror revived. He insisted on Winifred's fastening all the doors and windows, and calling in the great house-dog to guard them; and she had no sooner done so, and settled herself down to read, than he concluded, after all, it would be safer to have Trusty in the yard, as he could give them notice by barking if any danger approached. Then he interrupted her once more to ask her if she did not hear a noise in the outer kitchen.

"I hear the kittens chasing one another and the cat mewing to them. I suppose Priscy shut them in to look out for the mice. Now, Jack, do listen!" And Winnie read on:

"Now, before he had gone far, he entered into a very narrow passage, which was about a furlong off the porter's lodge, and, looking very narrowly before him as he went, he spied two lions in the way. 'Now,' thought he—"

"Winnie, do listen!" said Jack. "I am sure I hear some one on the porch!"

"I dare say it is only Trusty," said Winifred. "I will look out of the window and see."

"No, don't!" whispered Jack. "What if it should be a robber, and he should see you? Don't stir, and then he will not know that there is anybody in the house! There, do you hear that?"

And Jack seized hold of Winifred's hand, and hid his face in the bed-clothes, as a man's foot was distinctly heard upon the stones outside.

"Dear Jack, don't be so scared!" said Winifred. "I don't think there is any danger. I dare say it is only some traveller wishing to inquire his way, or perhaps one of the neighbors has been taken ill. Let me peep out of the window and see."

But Jack would not allow her to move. He had fully persuaded himself that the stranger was captain of a band of robbers, and that his grandfather would come home in time to find him and his sister robbed and murdered, or perhaps carried off and sold as slaves.

"It is some one whom Trusty knows," said Winifred, after listening a little. "Just hear how the old dog whines and barks, exactly as he does when father comes home. O Jack! Suppose it should be father himself! It might be, you know. He might have set out from Plymouth the day before yesterday, and been delayed on the road. Do, Jack, let me look out and see!"

No, Jack would not let her stir. He knew that it was not his father, though it might very likely be his father's ghost, come to tell them that he had been murdered on the way home. More likely, however, it was a gypsy, who it was well blown knew how to tame any dog, however fierce. He grew so agitated that Winifred was afraid he might injure his broken arm in his struggles, and though she felt almost certain that the stranger was her father, she did not again try to move till the family came home. It did seem a very long time to her as well as to Jack before they were heard approaching. Then Winifred heard her mother's voice in a tone of joyful surprise, and then another which she knew right well.

"It 'is' father, as I told you!" said she, as she hastened to unbar the door. "What will he think of us for not letting him in?"

"Why, Winifred, what has come over you all at once?" said her grandfather. "Why did you not look out and see who was there? Here has been your father sitting in the porch this hour and more, thinking, to be sure, as all the doors and windows are fastened, there would be nobody at home. That is but a poor welcome to give your father, child!"

"Never mind," said the sailor, as he took Winifred in his arms. "We don't expect little girls to be very brave, and the many frightful things which have happened of late are enough to make cowards of older and stronger people than Winifred. But, sweetheart, you used not to be afraid of anything!"

Winifred did not say it was Jack who had prevented her from opening the door. She thought the truth would come out quite soon enough, and so it did, not by any good will of Jack's, however. He was in no hurry to let his father know that he was afraid, and laughed as heartily as anybody at the idea of Winifred's barring the door to keep out her own father.

"Of course you know 'I' could not get out of bed to open it!" said he. "So there we were listening and wondering who it could possibly be. You would not have stayed in the porch if I had been able to get about."

Unluckily for poor Jack, this speech was overheard by Priscilla, who had just come in behind the others. She pounced upon him directly.

"Yes, if you had been about, no doubt it would have been just right. I dare say it was you who held Miss Winifred fast, and would not let her stir. And thought your father was all the thieves and robbers that ever were in Bridgewater jail. Now wasn't it so, Miss Winifred?"

"Never mind, Priscy," replied Winifred, making her a sign to stop. "My father is in now, and what does it matter?"

"It matters a great deal!" said her father. "Now, Winifred, tell me the truth. Was it yourself or Jack who was afraid to open the door?"

"It was Jack, father," said Winifred, in a low tone, and casting a reproachful glance at Priscilla.

"And you, Jack, threw the blame upon your sister! Oh, my lad, for shame! It is bad enough to be a coward, but it is far worse to try to shift the blame of your own cowardice upon another person's shoulders. I see you have been young master at home too long. To sea you go, my lad, as soon as ever your arm is well. The ship is to be laid up for repairs, and by the time she is finished, you will be quite recovered."

Jack did not know whether to be glad or sorry at this decision. He was pleased with the thought of leaving home, where he often fancied that every one was very unjust and unkind to him; and he liked the notion of being a sailor, and seeing foreign countries. But, on the other hand, he had a great dread of the dangers of the sea, and he stood not a little in awe of his father. However, he comforted himself with reflecting that a great many things might happen in the course of six months, and he might never go after all. While, in the mean time, he might have the pleasure of talking about his prospects to all the boys in the village. So he finally concluded to make the best of matters, especially as they could not be helped. It was observable that Jack's recovery went on much more rapidly after his father's return. The next day but one he was up and dressed, and going about with his arm in a sling; and he even offered to carry Dame Sprat's milk to her, an offer which was dryly refused by his mother, with the remark that she had no milk to spare, to be thrown away the first time Jack saw his own shadow on the ground.