She lifted him from her shoulder, set him on her knee, and gave him a bit of cake. He sat and nibbled it, and then put his head on one side, looked at her, wrinkled his forehead, and then nibbled again, in the most companionable manner.
"But you must go home," said Sara at last; and she took him in her arms to carry him downstairs. Evidently he did not want to leave the room, for as they reached the door he clung to her neck and gave a little scream of anger.
"You mustn"t be an ungrateful monkey," said Sara. "You ought to be fondest of your own family. I am sure the Lascar is good to you."
n.o.body saw her on her way out, and very soon she was standing on the Indian Gentleman"s front steps, and the Lascar had opened the door for her.
"I found your monkey in my room," she said in Hindustani. "I think he got in through the window."
The man began a rapid outpouring of thanks; but, just as he was in the midst of them, a fretful, hollow voice was heard through the open door of the nearest room. The instant he heard it the Lascar disappeared, and left Sara still holding the monkey.
It was not many moments, however, before he came back bringing a message. His master had told him to bring Missy into the library. The Sahib was very ill, but he wished to see Missy.
Sara thought this odd, but she remembered reading stories of Indian gentlemen who, having no const.i.tutions, were extremely cross and full of whims, and who must have their own way. So she followed the Lascar.
When she entered the room the Indian Gentleman was lying on an easy chair, propped up with pillows. He looked frightfully ill. His yellow face was thin, and his eyes were hollow. He gave Sara a rather curious look--it was as if she wakened in him some anxious interest.
"You live next door?" he said.
"Yes," answered Sara. "I live at Miss Minchin"s."
"She keeps a boarding-school?"
"Yes," said Sara.
"And you are one of her pupils?"
Sara hesitated a moment.
"I don"t know exactly what I am," she replied.
"Why not?" asked the Indian Gentleman.
The monkey gave a tiny squeak, and Sara stroked him.
"At first," she said, "I was a pupil and a parlor boarder; but now--"
"What do you mean by `at first"?" asked the Indian Gentleman.
"When I was first taken there by my papa."
"Well, what has happened since then?" said the invalid, staring at her and knitting his brows with a puzzled expression.
"My papa died," said Sara. "He lost all his money, and there was none left for me--and there was no one to take care of me or pay Miss Minchin, so--"
"So you were sent up into the garret and neglected, and made into a half-starved little drudge!" put in the Indian Gentleman. "That is about it, isn"t it?"
The color deepened on Sara"s cheeks.
"There was no one to take care of me, and no money," she said. "I belong to n.o.body."
"What did your father mean by losing his money?" said the gentleman, fretfully.
The red in Sara"s cheeks grew deeper, and she fixed her odd eyes on the yellow face.
"He did not lose it himself," she said. "He had a friend he was fond of, and it was his friend, who took his money. I don"t know how. I don"t understand. He trusted his friend too much."
She saw the invalid start--the strangest start--as if he had been suddenly frightened. Then he spoke nervously and excitedly:
"That"s an old story," he said. "It happens every day; but sometimes those who are blamed--those who do the wrong--don"t intend it, and are not so bad. It may happen through a mistake--a miscalculation; they may not be so bad."
"No," said Sara, "but the suffering is just as bad for the others. It killed my papa."
The Indian Gentleman pushed aside some of the gorgeous wraps that covered him.
"Come a little nearer, and let me look at you," he said.
His voice sounded very strange; it had a more nervous and excited tone than before. Sara had an odd fancy that he was half afraid to look at her. She came and stood nearer, the monkey clinging to her and watching his master anxiously over his shoulder.
The Indian Gentleman"s hollow, restless eyes fixed themselves on her.
"Yes," he said at last. "Yes; I can see it. Tell me your father"s name."
"His name was Ralph Crewe," said Sara. "Captain Crewe. Perhaps,"--a sudden thought flashing upon her,--"perhaps you may have heard of him?
He died in India."
The Indian Gentleman sank back upon his pillows. He looked very weak, and seemed out of breath.
"Yes," he said, "I knew him. I was his friend. I meant no harm. If he had only lived he would have known. It turned out well after all. He was a fine young fellow. I was fond of him. I will make it right. Call--call the man."
Sara thought he was going to die. But there was no need to call the Lascar. He must have been waiting at the door. He was in the room and by his master"s side in an instant. He seemed to know what to do. He lifted the drooping head, and gave the invalid something in a small gla.s.s. The Indian Gentleman lay panting for a few minutes, and then he spoke in an exhausted but eager voice, addressing the Lascar in Hindustani:
"Go for Carmichael," he said. "Tell him to come here at once. Tell him I have found the child!"
When Mr. Carmichael arrived (which occurred in a very few minutes, for it turned out that he was no other than the father of the Large Family across the street), Sara went home, and was allowed to take the monkey with her. She certainly did not sleep very much that night, though the monkey behaved beautifully, and did not disturb her in the least. It was not the monkey that kept her awake--it was her thoughts, and her wonders as to what the Indian Gentleman had meant when he said, "Tell him I have found the child." "What child?" Sara kept asking herself.
"I was the only child there; but how had he found me, and why did he want to find me? And what is he going to do, now I am found? Is it something about my papa? Do I belong to somebody? Is he one of my relations? Is something going to happen?"
But she found out the very next day, in the morning; and it seemed that she had been living in a story even more than she had imagined. First, Mr. Carmichael came and had an interview with Miss Minchin. And it appeared that Mr. Carmichael, besides occupying the important situation of father to the Large Family was a lawyer, and had charge of the affairs of Mr. Carrisford--which was the real name of the Indian Gentleman--and, as Mr. Carrisford"s lawyer, Mr. Carmichael had come to explain something curious to Miss Minchin regarding Sara. But, being the father of the Large Family, he had a very kind and fatherly feeling for children; and so, after seeing Miss Minchin alone, what did he do but go and bring across the square his rosy, motherly, warm-hearted wife, so that she herself might talk to the little lonely girl, and tell her everything in the best and most motherly way.
And then Sara learned that she was to be a poor little drudge and outcast no more, and that a great change had come in her fortunes; for all the lost fortune had come back to her, and a great deal had even been added to it. It was Mr. Carrisford who had been her father"s friend, and who had made the investments which had caused him the apparent loss of his money; but it had so happened that after poor young Captain Crewe"s death one of the investments which had seemed at the time the very worst had taken a sudden turn, and proved to be such a success that it had been a mine of wealth, and had more than doubled the Captain"s lost fortune, as well as making a fortune for Mr. Carrisford himself. But Mr. Carrisford had been very unhappy. He had truly loved his poor, handsome, generous young friend, and the knowledge that he had caused his death had weighed upon him always, and broken both his health and spirit. The worst of it had been that, when first he thought himself and Captain Crewe ruined, he had lost courage and gone away because he was not brave enough to face the consequences of what he had done, and so he had not even known where the young soldier"s little girl had been placed. When he wanted to find her, and make rest.i.tution, he could discover no trace of her; and the certainty that she was poor and friendless somewhere had made him more miserable than ever. When he had taken the house next to Miss Minchin"s he had been so ill and wretched that he had for the time given up the search. His troubles and the Indian climate had brought him almost to death"s door--indeed, he had not expected to live more than a few months. And then one day the Lascar had told him about Sara"s speaking Hindustani, and gradually he had begun to take a sort of interest in the forlorn child, though he had only caught a glimpse of her once or twice and he had not connected her with the child of his friend, perhaps because he was too languid to think much about anything. But the Lascar had found out something of Sara"s unhappy little life, and about the garret. One evening he had actually crept out of his own garret-window and looked into hers, which was a very easy matter, because, as I have said, it was only a few feet away--and he had told his master what he had seen, and in a moment of compa.s.sion the Indian Gentleman had told him to take into the wretched little room such comforts as he could carry from the one window to the other. And the Lascar, who had developed an interest in, and an odd fondness for, the child who had spoken to him in his own tongue, had been pleased with the work; and, having the silent swiftness and agile movements of many of his race, he had made his evening journeys across the few feet of roof from garret-window to garret-window, without any trouble at all. He had watched Sara"s movements until he knew exactly when she was absent from her room and when she returned to it, and so he had been able to calculate the best times for his work. Generally he had made them in the dusk of the evening; but once or twice, when he had seen her go out on errands, he had dared to go over in the daytime, being quite sure that the garret was never entered by any one but herself. His pleasure in the work and his reports of the results had added to the invalid"s interest in it, and sometimes the master had found the planning gave him something to think of, which made him almost forget his weariness and pain. And at last, when Sara brought home the truant monkey, he had felt a wish to see her, and then her likeness to her father had done the rest.
"And now, my dear," said good Mrs. Carmichael, patting Sara"s hand, "all your troubles are over, I am sure, and you are to come home with me and be taken care of as if you were one of my own little girls; and we are so pleased to think of having you with us until everything is settled, and Mr. Carrisford is better. The excitement of last night has made him very weak, but we really think he will get well, now that such a load is taken from his mind. And when he is stronger, I am sure he will be as kind to you as your own papa would have been. He has a very good heart, and he is fond of children--and he has no family at all. But we must make you happy and rosy, and you must learn to play and run about, as my little girls do--"
"As your little girls do?" said Sara. "I wonder if I could. I used to watch them and wonder what it was like. Shall I feel as if I belonged to somebody?"
"Ah, my love, yes!--yes!" said Mrs. Carmichael; "dear me, yes!" And her motherly blue eyes grew quite moist, and she suddenly took Sara in her arms and kissed her. That very night, before she went to sleep, Sara had made the acquaintance of the entire Large Family, and such excitement as she and the monkey had caused in that joyous circle could hardly be described. There was not a child in the nursery, from the Eton boy who was the eldest, to the baby who was the youngest, who had not laid some offering on her shrine. All the older ones knew something of her wonderful story. She had been born in India; she had been poor and lonely and unhappy, and had lived in a garret and been treated unkindly; and now she was to be rich and happy, and be taken care of. They were so sorry for her, and so delighted and curious about her, all at once. The girls wished to be with her constantly, and the little boys wished to be told about India; the second baby, with the short round legs, simply sat and stared at her and the monkey, possibly wondering why she had not brought a hand-organ with her.