The nurse walked away, muttering under her breath:
"And a fine life ye"ll lead them, if ye get them under your thumb, to be sure! It"s a thousand pities you ever heard that speech of the doctor"s, you poor thing."
"She"s coming over here, Rob," said Nelly, as she saw the woman walking in their direction: "what do you suppose she wants?"
"Milk or eggs, I guess," said Rob. "I can get her some splendid fresh eggs right behind this door. Old Spotty"s got her nest in there now. The weasels got into her old nest and she won"t lay there any more."
When the nurse reached the door, she said very politely to the children:--
"Good morning, children. Do you live here?"
"No, ma"am," said Rob, gravely.
Nelly looked at him indignantly.
"Why, Rob!" she began. But Rob went on:--
"Our oxen and cows and hens live here: we live in the house over yonder."
Nelly laughed out, and so did the nurse.
"You have a droll tongue in your head, my boy," she said. "I came to ask you if you wouldn"t come over to the tent there and see Master Arthur. He"s in the chair there: see him? He"s lame: he can"t walk."
"What"s the matter with him?" asked Nelly. "Was he always lame?"
"Oh, no!" said the nurse: "he got a fall when he was about six years old, and he"s been lame ever since: he"s twelve now. But I must go right back: he don"t like to be alone a minute. Will you come across?"
Rob looked at Nelly.
"Mamma said we might go this afternoon," he said: "do you think she"d care if we went now?"
"We"d better go and ask her," answered Nelly. "You tell the little boy we"ve gone to ask our mother if we may come," she said to the nurse, and ran off with Rob to the house as fast as feet could go.
The nurse looked after them, and sighed.
"Well, those are well-brought-up children, whosever they are, to be found out in this wilderness. Oh, but I"d like to see Master Arthur run like that."
Flora had been little Arthur"s nurse ever since he was a baby; and, though she was often out of patience with him, she loved him dearly.
When she went back and told him what the children said, he muttered fretfully:--
"Oh, dear! they needn"t have gone to ask. Can"t they go two steps without getting leave? I should think they were babies. They looked as old as I am."
"They"re older, Master Arthur," replied Flora. "I think they are as much as thirteen: the girl is, at any rate."
"Is the boy nice?" asked Arthur.
Flora laughed.
"He"s funny," she replied. And then she told Arthur what Rob had said when she asked him if he and his sister lived there.
Arthur smiled faintly: he hardly ever laughed. His back ached all the time, so that he could very seldom forget it; and this constant pain made him very nervous and irritable.
"You go up to the house and ask their mother to let them come," he said.
"Well, dear," Flora replied, "I will, if they don"t come in a few minutes. But I"m sure they"ll come, for they said their mother had told them they might come this afternoon; and I"m sure she"ll let them come now instead."
"They can come in the afternoon too," said Arthur. "I want them all the time."
"Well, well: I dare say they"ll like to stay with you, and read your books, and see your things, very much," said Flora.
"I"ll show them my microscope," said Arthur: "that"s the only thing I"ve got that"s good for any thing. The books are no good."
Just now the cook came up, bringing Arthur"s breakfast on a tray. It looked very nice: milk-toast, and baked apples, and poached eggs, and a cup of nice cocoa. It was wonderful what good things Ralph used to cook, in that little bit of a camp stove, out of doors.
Ralph had lived in the family as long as Flora, and loved poor Arthur just as well as she did. It was into the area in front of the bas.e.m.e.nt that Arthur had fallen when he got his terrible hurt; and Ralph had picked him up and carried him upstairs in his arms, thinking all the way that he was dead. Ralph often said that he"d never forget that time,--not if he should live to be a thousand years old! He often told the story to people they met on their journeys. Everybody took an interest in poor Arthur, and wanted to know how he came to be so lame; but n.o.body liked to ask his father or mother: so they would ask Flora or Ralph. Ralph was an Englishman, and he had a very queer p.r.o.nunciation of all words beginning with _h_. He dropped the _h_"s off such words, and he put them on to other words; which made his sentences sound very queer indeed.
"It was just about height o"clock," he would say, "an" I"d just in my "and the "ot water for the master"s shaving; an" Thomas "ee was a takin" hof it out o" my "and, when we "ears such a screech, such a screech, and the missus she come a flyin" hover the stairs,--I"m blessed hif "er feet so much as lighted hon "em,--an" she screeching screechin", an" "ollerin"; an" the same minute I "ears a noise to the front o" the "ouse, an" a perliceman a knockin" at the airy door, an" the missus she got to"t fust; an" if it wan"t a meracle wat was it, for "er to "ave come down two flights o" "igh stairs in less time than I could "urry across the "all? An" I takes Master Harthur out o" the perliceman"s "ands; an" "is little "ead a "anging down "s if "t "a" been snapped off. Oh! if it seemed one minute afore I got "im hup to the nursery it seemed a "undred years; an"
the missus she was never "erself again,--not till she died. She allers said as "ow she"d killed "im "erself. You see "ee was all alone with "er in "er bedroom, an" she never noticed that "ee "ad gone to the window. She was never "erself again,--never: she"d sit an" look at "im, an" look at "im, an" the tears"d run down "er face faster"n rain. But she couldn"t "old a candle to this missus, in no respects: not to my way o" thinkin". It"s a "ard thing to say of "er, bein" she"s dead; but it"s my "onest opinion that she"s better in "eaven than hearth, an" all parties better suited."
This was Ralph"s story of the accident, and he told it wherever they went. Every one was much surprised to hear that Mrs. Cook was not Arthur"s own mother; for no own mother could have shown more patience and love than she did. She had never left Arthur for a whole day or a whole night since she became his mother; and it seemed as if she really thought of little else except how to invent some new thing to amuse him, and keep him from remembering his pain.
Just as Arthur had begun to eat his breakfast, he looked up and saw Rob and Nelly coming out of the door of the house. He pushed away his plate, and cried:--
"Take it away! take it away! I won"t eat another mouthful. That boy and girl are coming. Take it away!"
"Oh, Master Arthur," said Flora: "indeed you must eat some more.
You"ll never get well if you don"t eat."
"I won"t! I won"t! I tell you take it away," screamed Arthur. "I am not hungry. I hate it!"
Poor Arthur never was really hungry.
"Your mamma will be very unhappy when she comes out if you have not eaten any thing," said Flora.
Arthur"s face fell.
"Well, give me the cocoa, then, quick!" he said: "I"ll drink that, just to please mamma: that"s all. She don"t make me eat when I don"t want to."
At that moment Mrs. Cook came out of her tent, and hurried to Arthur"s chair.
"My darling," she said, "mamma was a lazy mamma, wasn"t she, this morning? Have you had a nice breakfast? Papa will be out in a minute."
"Mamma! mamma!" cried Arthur, "see that boy and girl, the other side of the fence: they"re coming over to see me. I sent Flora after them. I wish they"d hurry. Don"t they walk slow?"
Mrs. Cook looked inquiringly at Flora, who explained that Master Arthur had spied the children sitting in the barn-door, and that nothing would do but she must go over and ask them to come and see him.
"They seem to be most uncommon nice-spoken children for these parts, ma"am," said Flora; "and the little girl she wouldn"t come, nor let her brother come, till she"d gone into the house and asked leave of their mother."
Mrs. Cook was gazing very earnestly at the children, as they walked slowly towards the tent. In a moment more she sprang to her feet, and took two or three steps forward, and exclaimed, "Why, it is! it is my little Nelly!" and, to Arthur"s great astonishment, he saw his mother run very fast to meet the children, and throw her arms round the little girl"s neck, and kiss her over and over again.