Little Lord Fauntleroy

by Burnett, Frances Hodgson;

  After that night the two saw each other often, and Mr. Hobbs was much more comfortable and less desolate. They read the Penny Story Gazette and other interesting things, and gained a knowledge of the habits of the nobility and gentry which would have surprised those despised classes if they had realized it. One day Mr. Hobbs made a pilgrimage to a bookstore down town for the express purpose of adding to their library. He went to a clerk and leaned over the counter to speak to him.

  “I want,” he said, “a book about earls.”

  “What!” exclaimed the clerk.

  “A book,” repeated the grocery-man, “about earls.”

  “I’m afraid,” said the clerk, looking rather queer, “that we haven’t what you want.”

  “Haven’t?” said Mr. Hobbs anxiously. “Well, say markises then—or dooks.”

  “I know of no such book,” answered the clerk.

  Mr. Hobbs was much disturbed. He looked down on the floor, then he looked up.

  “None about female earls?” he inquired.

  “I’m afraid not,” said the clerk with a smile.

  “Well,” exclaimed Mr. Hobbs, “I’ll be jiggered!”

  He was just going out of the store, when the clerk called him back and asked him if a story in which the nobility were chief characters would do. Mr. Hobbs said it would—if he could not get an entire volume devoted to earls. So the clerk sold him a book called The Tower of London, written by Mr. Harrison Ainsworth, and he carried it home.

  When Dick came they began to read it. It was a very wonderful and exciting book, and the scene was laid in the reign of the famous English queen who is called by some people Bloody Mary. And as Mr. Hobbs heard of Queen Mary’s deeds and the habit she had of chopping people’s heads off, putting them to the torture and burning them alive he became very much excited. He took his pipe out of his mouth and stared at Dick, and at last he was obliged to mop the perspiration from his brow with his red pocket-handkerchief.

  “Why, he ain’t safe!” he said. “He ain’t safe! If the women folks can sit up on their thrones an’ give the word for things like that to be done, who’s to know what’s happening to him this very minute? He’s no more safe than nothing! Just let a woman like that get mad, an’ no one’s safe!”

  “Well,” said Dick, though he looked rather anxious himself, “ye see this ’ere ’un isn’t the one that’s bossin’ things now. I know her name’s Victohry, an’ this ’un here in the book—her name’s Mary.”

  “So it is,” said Mr. Hobbs, still mopping his forehead, “so it is. An’ the newspapers are not sayin’ anything about any racks, thumbscrews, or stake-burnin’s—but still it doesn’t seem as if ’twas safe for him over there with those queer folks. Why, they tell me they don’t keep the Fourth o’ July!”

  He was privately uneasy for several days; and it was not until he received Fauntleroy’s letter and had read it several times, both to himself and to Dick, and had also read the letter Dick got about the same time, that he became composed again.

  But they both found great pleasure in their letters. They read and reread them, and talked them over and enjoyed every word of them. And they spent days over the answers they sent, and read them over almost as often as the letters they had received.

  It was rather a labor for Dick to write his. All his knowledge of reading and writing he had gained during a few months when he had lived with his elder brother, and had gone to a night school; but, being a sharp boy, he had made the most of that brief education, and had spelled out things in newspapers since then, and practiced writing with bits of chalk on pavements or walls or fences. He told Mr. Hobbs all about his life and about his elder brother, who had been rather good to him after their mother died, when Dick was quite a little fellow. Their father had died some time before. The brother’s name was Ben, and he had taken care of Dick as well as he could, until the boy was old enough to sell newspapers and run errands. They had lived together, and as he grew older Ben had managed to get along until he had quite a decent place in a store.

  “And then,” exclaimed Dick with disgust, “blest if he didn’t go an’ marry a gal! Just went and got spoony, an’ hadn’t any more sense left! Married her, an’ set up housekeepin’ in two back rooms. An’ a hefty ’un she was, a regular tiger-cat. She’d tear things to pieces when she got mad—and she was mad all the time. Had a baby just like her—yell day ’n’ night! An’ if I didn’t have to ’tend it, an’ when it screamed, she’d fire things at me. She fired a plate at me one day an’ hit the baby—cut its chin. Doctor said he’d carry the mark till he died. A nice mother she was! Crackey! but didn’t we have a time—Ben ’n’ mehself ’n’ the young ’un. She was mad at Ben because he didn’t make money faster; ’n’ at last he went out West with a man to set up a cattle ranch. An’ hadn’t been gone a week ’fore one night, I got home from sellin’ my papers, ’n’ the rooms wus locked up ’n’ empty, ’n’ the woman o’ the house. she told me Minna ’d gone—shown a clean pair o’ heels. Some ’un else said she’d gone across the water to be nuss to a lady as had a little baby too. Never heard a word of her since—nuther has Ben. If I’d ha bin him, I wouldn’t ha’ fretted a bit—’n’ I guess he didn’t. But he thought a heap o’ her at the start. Tell you, he was spoons on her. She was a daisy-lookin’ gal, too, when she was dressed up ’n’ not mad. She’d big black eyes ’n’ black hair downs too her knees; she’d make it into a rope as big as your arm, and twist it ’round ’n’ ’round her head; ’n’ I tell you her eyes ’d snap! Folks used to say she was part Itali-un—said her mother or father ’d come from there, ’n’ it made her queer. I tell ye she was one of ’em—she was!”

  He often told Mr. Hobbs stories of her and of his brother Ben, who, since his going out West, had written once or twice to Dick. Ben’s luck had not been good, and he had wandered from place to place; but at last he had settled on a ranch in California, where he was at work at the time when Dick became acquainted with Mr. Hobbs.

  “That gal,” said Dick one day, “she took all the grit out o’ him. I couldn’t help feelin’ sorry for him sometimes.”

  They were sitting in the store doorway together, and Mr. Hobbs was filling his pipe.

  “He oughtn’t to ’ave married,” he said solemnly as he rose to get a match. “Women—I never could see any use in ’em myself.”

  As he took the match from its box, he stopped and looked down on the counter.

  “Why,” he said, “if here isn’t a letter! I didn’t see it afore. The postman must have laid it down when I wasn’t noticin’, or the newspaper slipped over it.”

  He picked it up and looked at it carefully.

  “It’s from him!” he exclaimed. “That’s the very one it’s from!”

  He forgot his pipe altogether. He went back to his chair quite excited, and took his pocket-knife and opened the envelope.

  “I wonder what news there is this time,” he said.

  And then he unfolded the letter and read as follows:

  DORINCOURT CASTLE

  My dear Mr. Hobbs,—i write this in a great hury becaus i have something curous to tell you i know you will be very much suprised my dear frend when i tel you. It is all a mistake and i am not a lord and i shall not have to be an earl there is a lady whitch was marid to my uncle bevis who is dead and she has a little boy and he is lord fauntleroy becaus that is the way it is in England the earls eldest sons little boy is the earl if every body is dead i mean if his farther and grandfarther are dead my grandfarther is not dead but my uncle bevis is and so his boy is lord Fauntleroy and i am not becaus my papa was the youngest son and my name is Cedric Errol like it was when i was in New York and all the things will belong to the other boy i thought at first i should have to give him my pony and cart but my grandfarther says i need not my grandfarther is very sorry and i think he does not like the lady but preaps he thinks dearest and i are sorry because i shall not be an earl i would like to be an earl now better than i thout i would at first becaus this is
a beautifle castle and i like every body so and when you are rich you can do so many things i am not rich now becaus when your papa is only the youngest son he is not very rich i am going to learn to work so that i can take care of dearest i have been asking Wilkins about grooming horses preaps i might be a groom or a coachman, the lady brought her little boy to the castle and my grandfarther and Mr. Havisham talked to her i think she was angry she talked loud and my grandfarther was angry too i never saw him angry before i wish it did not make them all mad i thort i would tell you and Dick right away becaus you would be intrusted so no more at present with love from

  your old frend

  CEDRIC ERROL (Not lord Fauntleroy)

  Mr. Hobbs fell back in his chair, the letter dropped on his knee, his penknife slipped to the floor, and so did the envelope.

  “Well,” he ejaculated, “I am jiggered!”

  He was so dumbfounded that he actually changed his exclamation. It had always been his habit to say, “I will be jiggered,” but this time he said, “I am jiggered.” Perhaps he really was jiggered. There is no knowing.

  “Well,” said Dick, “the whole thing’s bust up, hasn’t it?”

  “Bust!” said Mr. Hobbs. “It’s my opinion it’s all a put-up job o’ the British ’ristycrats to rob him of his rights because he’s an American. They’ve had a spite agin us ever since the Revolution, an’ they’re takin’ it out on him. I told you he wasn’t safe, an’ see what’s happened! Like as not, the whole government’s got together to rob him of his lawful ownin’s.” He was very much agitated. He had not approved of the change in his young friend’s circumstances at first, but lately he had become more reconciled to it, and after the receipt of Cedric’s letter he had perhaps even felt some secret pride in his young friend’s magnificence. He might not have a good opinion of earls, but he knew that even in America money was considered rather an agreeable thing, and if all the wealth and grandeur were to go with the title, it must be rather hard to lose it.

  “They’re trying to rob him,” he said, “that’s what they’re doing, and folks that have money ought to look after him.”

  And he kept Dick with him until quite a late hour to talk it over, and when that young man left he went with him to the corner of the street; and on his way back he stopped opposite the empty house for some time, staring at the “To Let,” and smoking his pipe in much disturbance of mind.

  12. The Rival Claimants

  A VERY few days after the dinner party at the Castle, almost everybody in England who read the newspapers at all knew the romantic story of what had happened at Dorincourt. It made a very interesting story when it was told with all the details. There was the little American boy who had been brought to England to be Lord Fauntleroy, and who was said to be so fine and handsome a little fellow, and to have already made people fond of him; there was the old Earl, his grandfather, who was so proud of his heir; there was the pretty young mother who had never been forgiven for marrying Captain Errol; and there was the strange marriage of Bevis, the dead Lord Fauntleroy, and the strange wife, of whom no one knew anything, suddenly appearing with her son, and saying that he was the real Lord Fauntleroy and must have his rights. All these things were talked about and written about, and caused a tremendous sensation. And then there came the rumor that the Earl of Dorincourt was not satisfied with the turn affairs had taken, and would perhaps contest the claim by law, and the matter might end with a wonderful trial.

  There never had been such excitement before in the county in which Erlesboro was situated. On market-days, people stood in groups and talked and wondered what would be done; the farmers’ wives invited one another to tea that they might tell one another all they had heard and all they thought and all they thought other people thought. They related wonderful anecdotes about the Earl’s rage and his determination not to acknowledge the new Lord Fauntleroy, and his hatred of the woman who was the claimant’s mother. But of course it was Mrs. Dibble who could tell the most, and who was more in demand than ever.

  “An’ a bad look-out it is,” she said. “An’ if you were to ask me, ma’am, I should say as it was a judgement on him for the way he’s treated that sweet young cre’tur as he parted from her child—for he’s got that fond of him an’ that set on him an’ that proud on him as he’s a’most drove mad by what’s happened. An’ what’s more, this new one’s no lady, as his little lordship’s ma is. She’s a bold-faced, black-eyed thing, as Mr. Thomas says no gentleman in livery ’u’d bemean hisself to be guv orders by; an’ let her come into the house, he says, an’ he goes out of it. An’ the boy don’t no more compare with the other one than nothin’ you could mention. An’ mercy knows what’s goin’ to come of it all, an’ where it’s to end, an’ you might have knocked me down with a feather when Jane brought the news.”

  In fact there was excitement everywhere; at the Castle, in the library, where the Earl and Mr. Havisham sat and talked; in the servants’ hall, where Mr. Thomas and the butler and the other men and women servants gossiped and exclaimed at all times of the day; and in the stables, where Wilkins went about his work in a quite depressed state of mind, and groomed the brown pony more beautifully than ever, and said mournfully to the coachman that he “never taught a young gen’leman to ride as took to it more nat’ral or was a better-plucked one than he was. He was a one as it were some pleasure to ride behind.”

  But in the midst of all this disturbance there was one person who was quite calm and untroubled. That person was the little Lord Fauntleroy who was said not to be Lord Fauntleroy at all. When first the state of affairs had been explained to him, he had felt some little anxiousness and perplexity, it is true, but its foundation was not in baffled ambition.

  While the Earl told him what had happened, he had sat on a stool holding on to his knee, as he so often did when he was listening to anything interesting; and by the time the story was finished he looked quite sober.

  “It makes me feel very queer,” he said; “it makes me feel—queer!”

  The Earl looked at the boy in silence. It made him feel queer too—queerer than he had ever felt in his whole life. And he felt more queer still when he saw that there was a troubled expression on the small face which was usually so happy.

  “Will they take Dearest’s house from her—and her carriage?” Cedric asked in a rather unsteady, anxious little voice.

  “No!” said the Earl decidedly—in quite a loud voice in fact. “They can take nothing from her.”

  “Ah,” said Cedric, with evident relief. “Can’t they?”

  Then he looked up at his grandfather, and there was a wistful shade in his eyes, and they looked very big and soft.

  “That other boy,” he said rather tremulously, “he will have to—to be your boy now—as I was—won’t he?”

  “No!” answered the Earl—and he said it so fiercely and loudly that Cedric quite jumped.

  “No?” he exclaimed in wonderment. “Won’t he? I thought—”

  He stood up from his stool quite suddenly.

  “Shall I be your boy, even if I’m not going to be an earl?” he said. “Shall I be your boy, just as I was before?” And his flushed little face was all alight with eagerness.

  How the old Earl did look at him from his head to foot, to be sure! How his great shaggy brows did draw themselves together, and how queerly his deep eyes shone under them—how very queerly!

  “My boy!” he said—and, if you’ll believe it, his very voice was queer, almost shaky and a little broken and hoarse, not at all what you would expect an Earl’s voice to be, though he spoke more decidedly and peremptorily even than before. “Yes, you’ll be my boy as long as I live; and, by George, sometimes I feel as if you were the only boy I had ever had.”

  Cedric’s face turned red to the roots of his hair; it turned red with relief and pleasure. He put both his hands deep into his pockets and looked squarely into his noble relative’s eyes.

  “Do you?” he said. “Well then, I don’t care about the ea
rl part at all. I don’t care whether I’m an earl or not. I thought—you see, I thought the one that was going to be the earl would have to be your boy, too, and—and I couldn’t be. That was what made me feel so queer.”

  The Earl put his hand on his shoulder and drew him nearer.

  “They shall take nothing from you that I can hold for you,” he said, drawing his breath hard. “I won’t believe yet that they can take anything from you. You were made for the place, and—well, you may fill it still. But whatever comes, you shall have all that I can give you—all!”

  It scarcely seemed as if he were speaking to a child, there was such determination in his face and voice; it was more as if he were making a promise to himself—and perhaps he was.

  He had never before known how deep a hold upon him his fondness for the boy and his pride in him had taken. He had never seen his strength and good qualities and beauty as he seemed to see them now. To his obstinate nature it seemed impossible—more than impossible—to give up what he had so set his heart upon. And he had determined that he would not give it up without a fierce struggle.

  Within a few days after she had seen Mr. Havisham, the woman who claimed to be Lady Fauntleroy presented herself at the Castle, and brought her child with her. She was sent away. The Earl would not see her, she was told by the footman at the door; his lawyer would attend to her case. It was Thomas who gave the message, and who expressed his opinion of her freely afterward, in the servants’ hall. He “hoped,” he said, “as he had wore livery in ’igh famblies long enough to know a lady when he see one, an’ if that was a lady he was no judge of females.”

  “The one at the Lodge,” added Thomas loftily, “’Merican or no ’Merican, she’s one o’ the right sort, as any gentleman u’d reckinize with ’alf a heye. I remarked it myself to Henery when fust we called there.”