“Oh, and Dutch pulled her out again, did she?”
“Ness, and her head come kite out of her neck. But Yatty put ’e guepot on, and make it much better than ever a’most.”
“Now, Delushy, what a child you are!” cried Mrs. Thomas, proudly; “you never told Mr. Llewellyn that you ran into the sea yourself, to save your doll; and drownded you must have been, but for our Watkin.”
“Bardie ’poil her cothes,” she said, looking rather shy about it: “Bardie’s cothes not boofely now, not same as they used to be.”
But if she regretted her change of apparel, she had ceased by this time, Moxy said, to fret much for her father and mother. For Watkin, or someone, had inspired her with a most comforting idea—to wit, that her parents had placed her there for the purpose of growing faster; and that when she had done her best to meet their wishes in this respect, they would suddenly come to express their pride and pleasure at her magnitude. Little brother also would appear in state, and so would Susan, and find it needful to ascend the dairy-stool to measure her. As at present her curly head was scarcely up to the mark of that stool, the duty of making a timely start in this grand business of growing became at once self-evident. To be “a geat big gal” was her chief ambition; inasmuch as “ ’hen I’se a geat big gal, mama and papa be so peased, and say, ’hot a good gal ’e is, Bardie, to do as I tell ’a!”
Often when her heart was heavy in the loneliness of that house, and the loss of all she loved, and with dirty things around her, the smile would come back to her thoughtful eyes, and she would open her mouth again for the coarse but wholesome food, which was to make a “big gal” of her. Believing herself now well embarked toward this desired magnitude, she had long been making ready for the joy it would secure. “ ’E come and see, old Davy. I sow ’a sompfin,” she whispered to me, when she thought the others were not looking, so I gave a wink to Moxy Thomas, whose misbehaviour I had overlooked, and humouring the child I let her lead me to her sacred spot.
This was in an unused passage, with the end door nailed to jambs, and black oak-panelling along it, and a floor of lias stone. None in the house durst enter it except this little creature; at least unless there were three or four to hearten one another, and a strong sun shining. The Abbot’s Walk was its proper name; because a certain Abbot of Neath, who had made too much stir among the monks, received (as we say) his quietus there during a winter excursion; and in spite of all the masses said, could not keep his soul at rest. Therefore his soul came up and down; and that is worse than a dozen spirits; for the soul can groan, but the spirit is silent.
Into this dark lonely passage I was led by a little body, too newly inhabited by spirit to be at all afraid of it. And she came to a cupboard door, and tugged, and made a face as usual, when the button was hard to move. But as for allowing me to help her—not a bit of it, if you please. With many grunts and jerks of breath, at last she fetched it outward, having made me promise first not to touch, however grand and tempting might be the scene disclosed to me.
What do you think was there collected, and arranged in such a system that no bee could equal it? Why, every bit of everything that everyone who loved her (which amounts to everybody) ever had bestowed upon her, for her own sweet use and pleasure, since ashore she came to us. Not a lollipop was sucked, not a bit of “taffy” tasted, not a plaything had been used, but just enough to prove it; all were set in portions four, two of which were double-sized of what the other two were. Nearly half these things had come, I am almost sure, from Newton; and among the choicest treasures which were stored in scallop shells, I descried one of my own buttons which I had honestly given her, because two eyelets had run together; item, a bowl of an unsmoked pipe (which had snapped in my hand one evening); item, as sure as I am alive, every bit of the sugar which the Dolly had taken from out my locker.
Times there are when a hardy man, at sense of things (however childish), which have left their fibre in him, finds himself, or loses self, in a sudden softness. So it almost was with me (though the bait on my hooks all the time was drying), and for no better reason than the hopeless hopes of a very young child. I knew what all her storehouse meant before she began to tell me. And her excitement while she told me scarcely left her breath to speak.
“ ’Nat for papa, with ’e kean pipe to ’moke, and ’nat for mamma with ’e boofely bucken for her coke, and ’nat for my dear ickle bother, because it just fit in between his teeth, and ’nis with ’e ’ooking-gass for Susan, because she do her hair all day yong.”
She held up the little bit of tin, and mimicked Susan’s self-adornment, making such a comic face, and looking so conceited, that I felt as if I should know her Susan, anywhere in a hundred of women, if only she should turn up so. And I began to smile a little; and she took it up tenfold.
“ ’E make me yaff so, I do decare, ’e silly old Davy; I doesn’t know ’hat to do a’most. But ’e mustn’t tell anybody.”
This
