"No, indeed, they never come singly," said Miss Tabitha, shaking her head and wiping her eyes.
So off they set; and Griselda, in her arm-chair by the ante-room fire, with some queer little old-fashioned books of her aunts", which she had already read more than a dozen times, beside her by way of amus.e.m.e.nt, felt that there was one comfort in her troubles--she had escaped the long weary drive to her G.o.dmother"s.
But it was very dull. It got duller and duller. Griselda curled herself up in her chair, and wished she could go to sleep, though feeling quite sure she couldn"t, for she had stayed in bed much later than usual this morning, and had been obliged to spend the time in sleeping, for want of anything better to do.
She looked up at the clock.
"I don"t know even what to wish for," she said to herself. "I don"t feel the least inclined to play at anything, and I shouldn"t care to go to the mandarins again. Oh, cuckoo, cuckoo, I am so dull; couldn"t you think of anything to amuse me?"
It was not near "any o"clock." But after waiting a minute or two, it seemed to Griselda that she heard the soft sound of "coming" that always preceded the cuckoo"s appearance. She was right. In another moment she heard his usual greeting, "Cuckoo, cuckoo!"
"Oh, cuckoo!" she exclaimed, "I am so glad you have come at last. I _am_ so dull, and it has nothing to do with lessons this time. It"s that I"ve got such a bad cold, and my head"s aching, and I"m so tired of reading, all by myself."
"What would you like to do?" said the cuckoo. "You don"t want to go to see the mandarins again?"
"Oh no; I couldn"t dance."
"Or the mermaids down under the sea?"
"Oh, dear, no," said Griselda, with a little shiver, "it would be far too cold. I would just like to stay where I am, if some one would tell me stories. I"m not even sure that I could listen to stories. What could you do to amuse me, cuckoo?"
"Would you like to see some pictures?" said the cuckoo. "I could show you pictures without your taking any trouble."
"Oh yes, that would be beautiful," cried Griselda. "What pictures will you show me? Oh, I know. I would like to see the place where you were born--where that very, very clever man made you and the clock, I mean."
"Your great-great-grandfather," said the cuckoo. "Very well. Now, Griselda, shut your eyes. First of all, I am going to sing."
Griselda shut her eyes, and the cuckoo began his song. It was something like what he had sung at the mandarins" palace, only even more beautiful. It was so soft and dreamy, Griselda felt as if she could have sat there for ever, listening to it.
The first notes were low and murmuring. Again they made Griselda think of little rippling brooks in summer, and now and then there came a sort of hum as of insects buzzing in the warm sunshine near. This humming gradually increased, till at last Griselda was conscious of nothing more--_everything_ seemed to be humming, herself too, till at last she fell asleep.
When she opened her eyes, the ante-room and everything in it, except the arm-chair on which she was still curled up, had disappeared--melted away into a misty cloud all round her, which in turn gradually faded, till before her she saw a scene quite new and strange. It was the first of the cuckoo"s "pictures."
An old, quaint room, with a high, carved mantelpiece, and a bright fire sparkling in the grate. It was not a pretty room--it had more the look of a workshop of some kind; but it was curious and interesting. All round, the walls were hung with clocks and strange mechanical toys.
There was a fiddler slowly fiddling, a gentleman and lady gravely dancing a minuet, a little man drawing up water in a bucket out of a gla.s.s vase in which gold fish were swimming about--all sorts of queer figures; and the clocks were even queerer. There was one intended to represent the sun, moon, and planets, with one face for the sun and another for the moon, and gold and silver stars slowly circling round them; there was another clock with a tiny trumpeter perched on a ledge above the face, who blew a horn for the hours. I cannot tell you half the strange and wonderful things there were.
Griselda was so interested in looking at all these queer machines, that she did not for some time observe the occupant of the room. And no wonder; he was sitting in front of a little table, so perfectly still, much more still than the un-living figures around him. He was examining, with a magnifying gla.s.s, some small object he held in his hand, so closely and intently that Griselda, forgetting she was only looking at a "picture," almost held her breath for fear she should disturb him. He was a very old man, his coat was worn and threadbare in several places, looking as if he spent a great part of his life in one position. Yet he did not look _poor_, and his face, when at last he lifted it, was mild and intelligent and very earnest.
While Griselda was watching him closely there came a soft tap at the door, and a little girl danced into the room. The dearest little girl you ever saw, and _so_ funnily dressed! Her thick brown hair, rather lighter than Griselda"s, was tied in two long plaits down her back. She had a short red skirt with silver braid round the bottom, and a white chemisette with beautiful lace at the throat and wrists, and over that again a black velvet bodice, also trimmed with silver. And she had a great many trinkets, necklaces, and bracelets, and ear-rings, and a sort of little silver coronet; no, it was not like a coronet, it was a band with a square piece of silver fastened so as to stand up at each side of her head something like a horse"s blinkers, only they were not placed over her eyes.
She made quite a jingle as she came into the room, and the old man looked up with a smile of pleasure.
"Well, my darling, and are you all ready for your _fete_?" he said; and though the language in which he spoke was quite strange to Griselda, she understood his meaning perfectly well.
"Yes, dear grandfather; and isn"t my dress lovely?" said the child. "I should be _so_ happy if only you were coming too, and would get yourself a beautiful velvet coat like Mynheer van Huyten."
The old man shook his head.
"I have no time for such things, my darling," he replied; "and besides, I am too old. I must work--work hard to make money for my pet when I am gone, that she may not be dependent on the bounty of those English sisters."
"But I won"t care for money when you are gone, grandfather," said the child, her eyes filling with tears. "I would rather just go on living in this little house, and I am sure the neighbours would give me something to eat, and then I could hear all your clocks ticking, and think of you.
I don"t want you to sell all your wonderful things for money for me, grandfather. They would remind me of you, and money wouldn"t."
"Not all, Sybilla, not all," said the old man. "The best of all, the _chef-d"oeuvre_ of my life, shall not be sold. It shall be yours, and you will have in your possession a clock that crowned heads might seek in vain to purchase."
His dim old eyes brightened, and for a moment he sat erect and strong.
"Do you mean the cuckoo clock?" said Sybilla, in a low voice.
"Yes, my darling, the cuckoo clock, the crowning work of my life--a clock that shall last long after I, and perhaps thou, my pretty child, are crumbling into dust; a clock that shall last to tell my great-grandchildren to many generations that the old Dutch mechanic was not altogether to be despised."
Sybilla sprang into his arms.
"You are not to talk like that, little grandfather," she said. "I shall teach my children and my grandchildren to be so proud of you--oh, so proud!--as proud as I am of you, little grandfather."
"Gently, my darling," said the old man, as he placed carefully on the table the delicate piece of mechanism he held in his hand, and tenderly embraced the child. "Kiss me once again, my pet, and then thou must go; thy little friends will be waiting."
As he said these words the mist slowly gathered again before Griselda"s eyes--the first of the cuckoo"s pictures faded from her sight.
When she looked again the scene was changed, but this time it was not a strange one, though Griselda had gazed at it for some moments before she recognized it. It was the great saloon, but it looked very different from what she had ever seen it. Forty years or so make a difference in rooms as well as in people!
The faded yellow damask hangings were rich and brilliant. There were bouquets of lovely flowers arranged about the tables; wax lights were sending out their brightness in every direction, and the room was filled with ladies and gentlemen in gay attire.
Among them, after a time, Griselda remarked two ladies, no longer very young, but still handsome and stately, and something whispered to her that they were her two aunts, Miss Grizzel and Miss Tabitha.
"Poor aunts!" she said softly to herself; "how old they have grown since then."
But she did not long look at them; her attention was attracted by a much younger lady--a mere girl she seemed, but oh, so sweet and pretty! She was dancing with a gentleman whose eyes looked as if they saw no one else, and she herself seemed br.i.m.m.i.n.g over with youth and happiness. Her very steps had joy in them.
"Well, Griselda," whispered a voice, which she knew was the cuckoo"s; "so you don"t like to be told you are like your grandmother, eh?"
Griselda turned round sharply to look for the speaker, but he was not to be seen. And when she turned again, the picture of the great saloon had faded away.
One more picture.
Griselda looked again. She saw before her a country road in full summer time; the sun was shining, the birds were singing, the trees covered with their bright green leaves--everything appeared happy and joyful.
But at last in the distance she saw, slowly approaching, a group of a few people, all walking together, carrying in their centre something long and narrow, which, though the black cloth covering it was almost hidden by the white flowers with which it was thickly strewn, Griselda knew to be a coffin.
It was a funeral procession, and in the place of chief mourner, with pale, set face, walked the same young man whom Griselda had last seen dancing with the girl Sybilla in the great saloon.
The sad group pa.s.sed slowly out of sight; but as it disappeared there fell upon the ear the sounds of sweet music, lovelier far than she had heard before--lovelier than the magic cuckoo"s most lovely songs--and somehow, in the music, it seemed to the child"s fancy there were mingled the soft strains of a woman"s voice.
"It is Sybilla singing," thought Griselda dreamily, and with that she fell asleep again.