by Edith Nesbit
True himself, now grown large and thick of coat, seemed to recognize a friend, gambolled round her dreadful boots, sniffed at her withered hand.
“Give her a lift with her basket, shall us?” Dickie whispered to Mr. Beale and climbed out of the perambulator. “I can make shift to do this last piece.”
So the three went on together, in friendly silence. As they neared Orpington the woman said, “Our road parts here; and thank you kindly. A kindness is never wasted, so they say.”
“That ain’t nothing,” said Beale; “besides, there’s the blue ribbon.”
“That the dog?” the woman asked.
“Same ole dawg,” said Beale, with pride.
“A pretty beast,” she said. “Well — so long.”
She looked back to smile and nod to them when she had taken her basket and the turning to the right, and Dickie suddenly stiffened all over, as a pointer does when it sees a partridge.
“I say,” he cried, “you’re the nurse — —”
“I’ve nursed a many in my time,” she called back.
“But in the dream . . . you know.”
“Dreams is queer things,” said the woman. “And,” she added, “least said is soonest mended.”
“But . . .” said Dickie.
“Keep your eyes open and your mouth shut’s a good motto,” said she, nodded again, and turned resolutely away.
“Not very civil, I don’t think,” said Beale, “considerin’ — —”
“Oh, she’s all right,” said Dickie, wondering very much, and very anxious that Beale should not wonder. “May I ride in the pram, farver? My foot’s a bit blistered, I think. We ain’t done so much walkin’ lately, ‘ave us?”
“Ain’t tired in yourself, are you?” Mr. Beale asked, “‘cause there’s a place called Chevering Park, pretty as a picture — I thought we might lay out there. I’m a bit ‘ot in the ‘oof meself; but I can stick it if you can.”
Dickie could; and when they made their evening camp in a deep gully soft with beech-leaves, and he looked out over the ridge — cautiously, because of keepers — at the smoothness of a mighty slope, green-gray in the dusk, where rabbits frisked and played, he was glad that he had not yielded to his tiredness and stopped to rest the night anywhere else. Chevering Park is a very beautiful place, I would have you to know. And the travellers were lucky. The dogs were good and quiet, and no keeper disturbed their rest or their masters. Dickie slept with True in his arms, and it was like a draught of soft magic elixir to lie once more in the still, cool night and look up at the stars through the trees.
“Can’t think why they ever invented houses,” he said, and then he fell asleep.
By short stages, enjoying every step of every day’s journey, they went slowly and at their ease through the garden-land of Kent. Dickie loved every minute of it, every leaf in the hedge, every blade of grass by the roadside. And most of all he loved the quiet nights when he fell asleep under the stars with True in his arms.
It was all good, all. . . . And it was worth waiting and working for seven long months, to feel the thrill that Dickie felt when Beale, as they topped a ridge of the great South Downs, said suddenly, “There’s the sea,” and, a dozen yards further on, “There’s Arden Castle.”
There it lay, gray and green, with its old stones and ivy — the same Castle which Dickie had seen on the day when they lay among the furze bushes and waited to burgle Talbot Court. There were red roofs at one side of the Castle where a house had been built among the ruins. As they drew nearer, and looked down at Arden Castle, Dickie saw two little figures in its green courtyard, and wondered whether they could possibly be Edred and Elfrida, the little cousins whom he had met in King James the First’s time, and who, the nurse said, really belonged to the times of King Edward the Seventh, or Nowadays, just as he did himself. It seemed as though it could hardly be true; but, if it were true, how splendid! What games he and they could have! And what a play-place it was that spread out before him — green and glorious, with the sea on one side and the downs on the other, and in the middle the ruins of Arden Castle.
But as they went on through the furze bushes Dickie perceived that Mr. Beale was growing more and more silent and uneasy.
“What’s up?” Dickie asked at last. “Out with it, farver.”
“It ain’t nothing,” said Mr. Beale.
“You ain’t afraid those Talbots will know you again?”
“Not much I ain’t. They never see my face; and I ‘adn’t a beard that time like what I’ve got now.”
“Well, then?” said Dickie.
“Well, if you must ‘ave it,” said Beale, “we’re a-gettin’ very near my ole dad’s place, and I can’t make me mind up.”
“I thought we was settled we’d go to see ‘im.”
“I dunno. If ‘e’s under the daisies I shan’t like it — I tell you straight I shan’t like it. But we’re a long-lived stock — p’raps ‘e’s all right. I dunno.”
“Shall I go up by myself to where he lives and see if he’s all right?”
“Not much,” said Mr. Beale; “if I goes I goes, and if I stays away I stays away. It’s just the not being able to make me mind up.”
“If he’s there,” said Dickie, “don’t you think you ought to go, just on the chance of him being there and wanting you?”
“If you come to oughts,” said Beale, “I oughter gone ‘ome any time this twenty year. Only I ain’t. See?”
“Well,” said Dickie, “it’s your lookout. I know what I should do if it was me.”
Remembrance showed him the father who had leaned on his shoulder as they walked about the winding walks of the pleasant garden in old Deptford — the father who had given him the little horse, and insisted that his twenty gold pieces should be spent as he chose.
“I dunno,” said Beale. “What you think? Eh, matey?”
“I think let’s,” said Dickie. “I lay if he’s alive it ‘ud be as good as three Sundays in the week to him to see you. You was his little boy once, wasn’t you?”
“Ay,” said Beale; “he was wagoner’s mate to one of Lord Arden’s men. ‘E used to ride me on the big cart-horses. ‘E was a fine set-up chap.”
To hear the name of Arden on Beale’s lips gave Dickie a very odd, half-pleasant, half-frightened feeling. It seemed to bring certain things very near.
“Let’s,” he said again.
“All right,” said Beale, “only if it all goes wrong it ain’t my fault — an’ there used to be a foot-path a bit further on. You cut through the copse and cater across the eleven-acre medder, and bear along to the left by the hedge an’ it brings you out under Arden Knoll, where my old man’s place is.”
So they cut and catered and bore along, and came out under Arden Knoll, and there was a cottage, with a very neat garden full of gay flowers, and a brick pathway leading from the wooden gate to the front door. And by the front door sat an old man in a Windsor chair, with a brown spaniel at his feet and a bird in a wicker cage above his head, and he was nodding, for it was a hot day, and he was an old man and tired.
“Swelp me, I can’t do it!” whispered Beale. “I’ll walk on a bit. You just arst for a drink, and sort of see ‘ow the land lays. It might turn ‘im up seeing me so sudden. Good old dad!”
He walked quickly on, and Dickie was left standing by the gate. Then the brown spaniel became aware of True, and barked, and the old man said, “Down, Trusty!” in his sleep, and then woke up.
His clear old eyes set in many wrinkles turned full on Dickie by the gate.
“May I have a drink of water?” Dickie asked.
“Come in,” said the old man.
And Dickie lifted the latch of smooth, brown, sun-warmed iron, and went up the brick path, as the old man slowly turned himself about in the chair.
“Yonder’s the well,” he said; “draw up a bucket, if thy leg’ll let thee, poor little chap!”
“I draws water with my arms, not my legs,” said Dickie cheerfully.
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“There’s a blue mug in the wash-house window-ledge,” said the old man. “Fetch me a drop when you’ve had your drink, my lad.”
Of course, Dickie’s manners were too good for him to drink first. He drew up the dripping oaken bucket from the cool darkness of the well, fetched the mug, and offered it brimming to the old man. Then he drank, and looked at the garden ablaze with flowers — blush-roses and damask roses, and sweet-williams and candytuft, white lilies and yellow lilies, pansies, larkspur, poppies, bergamot, and sage.
It was just like a play at the Greenwich Theatre, Dickie thought. He had seen a scene just like that, where the old man sat in the sun and the Prodigal returned.
Dickie would not have been surprised to see Beale run up the brick path and throw himself on his knees, exclaiming, “Father, it is I — your erring but repentant son! Can you forgive me? If a lifetime of repentance can atone . . .” and so on.
If Dickie had been Beale he would certainly have made the speech, beginning, “Father, it is I.” But as he was only Dickie, he said —
“Your name’s Beale, ain’t it?”
“It might be,” old Beale allowed.
“I seen your son in London. ‘E told me about yer garden.”
“I should a thought ‘e’d a-forgot the garden same as ‘e’s forgot me,” said the old man.
“‘E ain’t forgot you, not ‘e,” said Dickie; “‘e’s come to see you, an ‘e’s waiting outside now to know if you’d like to see ‘im.”
“Then ‘e oughter know better,” said the old man, and shouted in a thin, high voice, “Jim, Jim, come along in this minute!”
Even then Beale didn’t act a bit like the prodigal in the play. He just unlatched the gate without looking at it — his hand had not forgotten the way of it, for all it was so long since he had passed through that gate. And he walked slowly and heavily up the path and said, “Hullo, dad! — how goes it?”
And the old man looked at him with his eyes half shut and said, “Why, it is James — so it is,” as if he had expected it to be some one quite different.
And they shook hands, and then Beale said, “The garden’s looking well.”
And the old man owned that the garden ‘ud do all right if it wasn’t for the snails.
That was all Dickie heard, for he thought it polite to go away. Of course, they could not be really affectionate with a stranger about. So he shouted from the gate something about “back presently,” and went off along the cart track towards Arden Castle and looked at it quite closely. It was the most beautiful and interesting thing he had ever seen. But he did not see the children.
When he went back the old man was cooking steak over the kitchen fire, and Beale was at the sink straining summer cabbage in a colander, as though he had lived there all his life and never anywhere else. He was in his shirt-sleeves too, and his coat and hat hung behind the back-door.
So then they had dinner, when the old man had set down the frying-pan expressly to shake hands with Dickie, saying, “So this is the lad you told me about. Yes, yes.” It was a very nice dinner, with cold gooseberry pastry as well as the steak and vegetables. The kitchen was pleasant and cozy though rather dark, on account of the white climbing rose that grew round the window. After dinner the men sat in the sun and smoked, and Dickie occupied himself in teaching the spaniel and True that neither of them was a dog who deserved to be growled at. Dickie had just thrown back his head in a laugh at True’s sulky face and stiffly planted paws, when he felt the old man’s dry, wrinkled hand under his chin.
“Let’s ‘ave a look at you,” he said, and peered closely at the child. “Where’d you get that face, eh? What did you say your name was?”
“Harding’s his name,” said Beale. “Dickie Harding.”
“Dickie Arden, I should a-said if you’d asked me,” said the old man. “Seems to me it’s a reg’lar Arden face he’s got. But my eyes ain’t so good as wot they was. What d’you say to stopping along of me a bit, my boy? There’s room in the cottage for all five of us. My son James here tells me you’ve been’s good as a son to him.”
“I’d love it,” said Dickie. So that was settled. There were two bedrooms for Beale and his father, and Dickie slept in a narrow, whitewashed slip of a room that had once been a larder. The brown spaniel and True slept on the rag hearth-rug in the kitchen. And everything was as cozy as cozy could be.
“We can send for any of the dawgs any minute if we feel we can’t stick it without ‘em,” said Beale, smoking his pipe in the front garden.
“You mean to stay a long time, then,” said Dickie.
“I dunno. You see, I was born and bred ‘ere. The air tastes good, don’t it? An’ the water’s good. Didn’t you notice the tea tasted quite different from what it does anywhere else? That’s the soft water, that is. An’ the old chap. . . . Yes — and there’s one or two other things — yes — I reckon us’ll stop on ‘ere a bit.”
And Dickie was very glad. For now he was near Arden Castle, and could see it any time that he chose to walk a couple of hundred yards and look down. And presently he would see Edred and Elfrida. Would they know him? That was the question. Would they remember that he and they had been cousins and friends when James the First was King?
CHAPTER IX. KIDNAPPED
And now New Cross seemed to go backwards and very far away, its dirty streets, its sordid shifts, its crowds of anxious, unhappy people, who never had quite enough of anything, and Dickie’s home was in a pleasant cottage from whose windows you could see great green rolling downs, and the smooth silver and blue of the sea, and from whose door you stepped, not on to filthy pavements, but on to a neat brick path, leading between beds glowing with flowers.
Also, he was near Arden, the goal of seven months’ effort. Now he would see Edred and Elfrida again, and help them to find the hidden treasure, as he had once helped them to find their father.
This joyful thought put the crown on his happiness.
But he presently perceived that though he was so close to Arden Castle he did not seem to be much nearer to the Arden children. It is not an easy thing to walk into the courtyard of a ruined castle and ring the bell of a strange house and ask for people whom you have only met in dreams, or as good as dreams. And I don’t know how Dickie would have managed if Destiny had not kindly come to his help, and arranged that, turning a corner in the lane which leads to the village, he should come face to face with Edred and Elfrida Arden. And they looked exactly like the Edred and Elfrida whom he had played with and quarrelled with in the dream. He halted, leaning on his crutch, for them to come up and speak to him. They came on, looking hard at him — the severe might have called it staring — looked, came up to him, and passed by without a word! But he saw them talking eagerly to each other.
Dickie was left in the lane looking after them. It was a miserable moment. But quite quickly he roused himself. They were talking to each other eagerly, and once Elfrida half looked round. Perhaps it was his shabby clothes that made them not so sure whether he was the Dickie they had known. If they did not know him it should not be his fault. He balanced himself on one foot, beat with his crutch on the ground, and shouted, “Hi!” and “Hullo!” as loud as he could. The other children turned, hesitated, and came back.
“What is it?” the little girl called out; “have you hurt yourself?” And she came up to him and looked at him with kind eyes.
“No,” said Dickie; “but I wanted to ask you something.”
The other two looked at him and at each other, and the boy said, “Righto.”
“You’re from the Castle, aren’t you?” he said. “I was wondering whether you’d let me go down and have a look at it?”
“Of course,” said the girl. “Come on.”
“Wait a minute,” said Dickie, nerving himself to the test. If they didn’t remember him they’d think he was mad, and never show him the Castle. Never mind! Now for it!
“Did you ever have a tutor called Mr. Parados?” he asked. And again
the others looked at him and at each other. “Parrot-nose for short,” Dickie hastened to add; “and did you ever shovel snow on to his head and then ride away in a carriage drawn by swans?”
“It is you!” cried Elfrida, and hugged him. “Edred, it is Dickie! We were saying, could it be you? Oh! Dickie darling, how did you hurt your foot?”
Dickie flushed. “My foot’s always been like that,” he said, “in Nowadays time. When we met in the magic times I was like everybody else, wasn’t I?”
Elfrida hugged him again, and said no more about the foot. Instead, she said, “Oh, how ripping it is to really and truly find you here! We thought you couldn’t be real because we wrote a letter to you at the address it said on that bill you gave us. And the letter came back with ‘not known’ outside.”
“What address was it?” Dickie asked.
“Laurie Grove, New Cross,” Edred told him.
“Oh, that was just an address Mr. Beale made up to look grand with,” said Dickie. “I remember his telling me about it. He’s the man I live with; I call him father because he’s been kind to me. But my own daddy’s dead.”
“Let’s go up on the downs,” said Elfrida, “and sit down, and you tell us all about everything from the very beginning.”
So they went up and sat among the furze bushes, and Dickie told them all his story — just as much of it as I have told to you. And it took a long time. And then they reminded each other how they had met in the magic or dream world, and how Dickie had helped them to save their father — which he did do, only I have not had time to tell you about it; but it is all written in “The House of Arden.”
“But our magic is all over now,” said Edred sadly. “We had to give up ever having any more magic, so as to get father back. And now we shall never find the treasure or be able to buy back the old lands and restore the Castle and bring the water back to the moat, and build nice, dry, warm, cozy cottages for the tenants. But we’ve got father.”