That Little Beggar Part 8

"What has happened now?" I repeated.

"One of Master Chris's tricks again, that's all," she said, still angrily, as we all walked on to the house.

"I was--teach-teach--teaching J-J-Jack to--to swim--like Ro-Ro--Rover,"

the little beggar said between violent sobs, and bringing out the last word with a great gasp.

"Teaching Jack to swim like Rover!" I repeated.

"Yes," exclaimed Briggs, with much sarcasm; "and it was a mighty clever thing for Master Chris to do, seeing as how he can't swim himself.

"It was just like this, mum," she explained, as she hastened her steps, "(I think we had better hurry a bit if Master Chris isn't to take his death of cold. He'll be in bed to-morrow unless I'm much mistaken!) I was just speaking to one of the gardeners about a pot of musk we wanted in the nursery. I hadn't turned my back two minutes before I hear a splash and Master Chris crying out at the top of his voice, and when I look around there he is struggling nearly up to his neck in water, and Jacky struggling along by his side. Well, here we are back; we'll see what my mistress thinks of it all. I'll be bound she won't be over and above pleased. As for me, I can only say I am more than thankful it was at the shallow part of the pond; if it had been at the deep end, there's no saying if he wouldn't have been lying there now stiff and stark."

At this woeful picture of himself, Chris's grief, which had become slightly subdued, burst forth afresh, and as we entered the hall he sobbed more loudly and more violently than before. So loudly and so violently that the sound of his grief penetrated to the library where Granny was sitting, and brought her out into the hall, frightened and anxious to know what was wrong.

"He nearly drowned himself, that's what is the matter, mum," answered Briggs, with a certain gloomy satisfaction, in reply to the old lady's anxious questions. "It's nothing but a chance he isn't at the bottom of the deepest end of the pond at this very same minute that I speak to you!"

At this startling, not to say overwhelming statement, Granny became quite white, and, holding on to a chair near at hand, did not speak.

"There is nothing for you to alarm yourself about, Mrs. Wyndham," I said quietly.--"Chris, stop crying; you are frightening Granny.--He managed to fall into the pond, trying to teach Jack to swim, but it was at the shallow end, so there was no danger."

Thus rea.s.sured, Granny looked at me with relief.

"Thank G.o.d!" she said earnestly, as she kissed the little beggar thankfully, all wet and tear-stained as he was.

Then, with an attempt to control her emotion, but speaking in a voice that trembled in spite of herself:

"Come, come," she said to Briggs, "we must not waste time in talking. We must put Master Chris to bed at once, and get him warm. See how he s.h.i.+vers. Yes, come upstairs at once, my darling, and I will hear all about it by and by."

And, together with Briggs and the cause of all the confusion, she went upstairs to take precautions for the prevention of the ill consequences likely to follow upon his rash deed. It was some time before she came downstairs again, and when she did so she looked worried.

"I am afraid, very much afraid, he has caught a chill," she remarked.

"He so easily does that."

"Perhaps you may have prevented it," I said hopefully.

"I wish I could think so," she replied, shaking her head; "but I much fear that it cannot be altogether prevented. He is not strong, you see, my dear."

"And to think," she went on admiringly; "to think the darling ran that risk all because of his loving little heart; because he feared that some day we might be in danger of being drowned, and that if Jack could swim we should be rescued. Isn't it just like the pet to think of it?"

"It is," I agreed with conviction; adding cautiously, "It would have been better, I think, if he had told you of his idea before trying to put it into effect. It would have given everyone less trouble."

"He wished to surprise us all by showing us he had by himself taught Jack to swim," Granny returned, quick to defend her darling. "No, no, I see how it happened; he was thoughtless but not naughty. Indeed, I take what blame there is to myself. I should have considered, before I told him the story of Eliza and her dog Rover, the effect it was likely to have upon an active, quick little brain like his."

I smiled. It was quite plain that dear old Granny in her loving way wished to take all the blame upon her own willing shoulders, and to spare that incorrigible little beggar....

It was some three days after this, and I was sitting in the nursery by Chris's crib, trying to amuse him and wile away the time until Briggs came back with the lamp, when it would be the hour for him to say good-night and go to sleep. The bright September afternoon was drawing to a close, and twilight was beginning to fall.

In spite of all Granny's precautions he had not escaped from the consequences of his tumble into the pond, but had caught a severe chill, and so had had to stay in bed for these last three days. He was very sweet and gentle in his weakness, that poor little beggar; partly, I think, because he felt too tired to be mischievous, and also, I am glad to say, because he loved his Granny very dearly and was truly sorry for the fright he had given her. I had been telling him stories for the last half-hour, but having now come to the end of my resources, for the moment we were quiet.

With his hand in mine, Chris lay looking out through the window at the stars as they came out slowly, slowly in the gathering darkness.

Presently he asked:

"Do you like the stars? I like them very much."

"Yes, Chris," I answered; "so do I."

"I think they are the most beautifullest things," he remarked with enthusiasm.

"Yes, they are," I replied. "They are like the great and loving deeds of G.o.d, falling in a bright shower from heaven upon the earth beneath."

"When I go to heaven, will G.o.d give me some stars if I ask Him very much?" Chris inquired, most seriously. "P'r'aps if I ask Him every day in my prayers till I'm dead He will then."

I smiled a little.

"No, darling," I said, smoothing his hair gently; "the stars are not the little things they seem to you. You see, they are worlds like our world.

It is only because they are such thousands and thousands of miles away that they look to you so small."

Chris pondered over this for a moment or two, then he said thoughtfully:

"Miss Beggarley, I want to ask you, when the good man got to the top of the hill, did he see that the stars were big worlds and not little, tiny things?"

"Yes," I replied, half to him, half to myself; "he saw then that those things which, at the foot of the hill, had seemed to him so small and so far away he had given them but little consideration, were in reality great, and beautiful, and worlds in their importance. And he saw, too, that the things which in the valley beneath had appeared to him of such infinite value were by comparison poor and valueless, not worthy the thought he had given them or the pain they had so often caused him...."

I heard a footstep, and looking round, saw that Briggs had come back.

"I must go now," I said to Chris, kissing him. "It is time for you to sleep. Good-night, dear!"

"Good-night!" he said, then turned his head towards the window and lay still, gazing solemnly with big, sleepy eyes at the stars that shone without.

CHAPTER V.

THE DOCTOR'S HEAD!

As Chris regained his strength he also regained his love of mischief--a state of affairs that proved somewhat trying. To keep him in bed and to keep him good was not a very easy task.

"The trouble it is, mum, words can't tell," Briggs said to me with fervour one evening when I had come upstairs to see that Chris was comfortably settled for the night. "If I turn my back for a moment he is half out of bed," she said, as she detained me for a moment as I went through the day-nursery. "He is that full of mischief I hardly know what to do with him."

"It shows he is getting strong again," I said, half smiling.

"It's the only way I can get any comfort," she said, sighing.

Poor Briggs! She really looked tired as she spoke, and I felt sorry for her.

"You look very tired," I remarked.