Part 6

“No,” said his little Royal Highness, in an authoritative way, “we'll have private theatricals. We'll act out a play,” he added, when he saw by Nan's puzzled frown that she did not quite take in his idea.

“Good for you!” cried Harry, “that'll be the greatest fun. But oh! what do you suppose?” he exclaimed, suddenly lowering his voice to an excited whisper,--“crouch! crouch down, both of you; this way, close to the window.”

“What--what is it, Harry?” Nan asked, frightened at this strange performance, and regarding Harry in much the same dazed, sympathetic fashion as she had watched her little kitten endure the horrors of a fit the day before.

“Drop, drop, both of you!” was Harry's hoarse answer. “Don't you see? the Croxsons are coming.”

Oh! that was it, the Croxsons were coming! Regie and Nan quickly obeyed Harry's order.

“How many of 'em?” asked Nan, from her prostrate position.

“The whole five,” Harry answered, hopelessly; “but I don't believe they can see any of us, and if Sister Julia only does not hear them knock, and come down, they'll go away again and think no one's at home. Now, don't let's say a word.”

There was the patter of two pairs of little feet without, and the scuffle of three pairs of others, and then there came a vigorous knocking at the kitchen door, again repeated after an interval of a few moments. The children held their breath.

“Guess they're all out,” they heard Joe Croxson say, disconsolately.

“I think it's kind of mean to keep them out in the pouring rain,” Nan whispered.

“And I know it is,” answered Regie. “I say, let 'em in,” and it was no sooner said than done.

Immediately the Croxsons crowded in after the manner of a rubber ball which may be forced through a very small aperture. They all contrived somehow or other to get through the door at once, but straightway spread out into so large a company that one could but wonder how they had managed it. None of them spoke a word till they were safely within doors, evidently deeming conversation of no importance in comparison with simply “getting in.”

“We made up our minds you were all out,” said Joe Croxson, at last, while the family were in the process of removing damp-smelling outer garments.

“We thought we'd fool you a while,” Harry answered, with a nonchalant air.

The Croxsons were too glad to have gained entrance to take such treatment much to heart. “We've c-c-come to spend the morning, and stay to d-d-dinner, if you want us,” said little Madge, who stuttered dreadfully.

“I'm pretty sure it won't be convenient to have you stay to dinner,” said Nan, who no sooner beheld the shabby little Croxsons disposing themselves about the room with a permanent air, than with charming inconsistency she straightway regretted her noble impulse to let them all in. That they were a shabby little company no one could for a moment deny. The three girls, the youngest little more than a baby, each wore a ragged dress, and for an out-of-door wrap a faded and colourless strip, which collectively had once formed a shawl of their mother's.

The mother herself had died five years ago, and since then the children had managed for themselves as best they could. Their father was fireman on one of the engines belonging to the local road that ran through Moorlow, and the children were alone from morning till night. A poor woman came in every morning to cook their oatmeal and “tidy up,” but being poorly paid, the tidying up was always hasty, and never thorough. They were rather a stupid-looking set of children, and no wonder! You would hardly expect to find much that was bright in their faces, with so little brightness in their lives; besides, none of them had ever been to school, and Joe, who was the oldest of them all, knew little more than his letters, although he had passed his eleventh birthday. Everyone felt sorry for the Croxsons; and no doubt they would have fared better in one of the large cities, where they would have been reached by some of the organised charities, than in a little place like Moorlow. The rich people, who came in the summer in search of rest and refreshment, did not interest themselves in the villagers, and the villagers themselves were mostly hard-working fishermen with little time or money to devote to others. Had it not been for the Murrays the Croxsons would surely have fared much worse. Mrs. Murray did them many a kind turn, and when Madge had a fever the winter before, Harry or Nan had trudged backward and forward every day with beef tea or some other nourishing food. So there was one bright spot in their lives after all. Indeed, there was more than one, for born by the sea they loved it dearly, and in warm sunshiny weather they romped on the beach the whole day long, keenly enjoying their perfect freedom, and pitying the children obliged to go to school. Nan always spoke of them as the “poor little Croxsons,” and it was this pathetic side of their history which made her second Regie's motion to open the door.

“Of course we can't play that game now, and all our fun is spoiled,” said Harry, seeming to utterly disregard the feelings of the Croxsons. Fortunately they were not sensitive, and their stolid little faces showed no signs either of pain or resentment.

“Oh, yes, we can,” answered Regie; “they'll be the audience.”

“The very thing!” cried Nan, enthusiastically. “Now, children,” turning to the Croxsons, “we are going to have a play, and you'll be the audience, won't you?”

Each little Croxson nodded in the affirmative, though they had not the remotest idea what it was they were to be. They were literally clay in the hands of the potter when they were at the Murrays'. They did not care what was done with them, or to them, so long as they were simply allowed to stay. Harry fancied the idea of an audience, and preparations were at once begun.

The clothes-horse was converted into scenery by covering it with a green plaid blanket-shawl,' the ironing table was pressed into service as a settee for the audience, and the five Croxsons were packed into it in one tightly wedged row. From the commencement of the performance to its tragic end they sat staring in open-eyed astonishment; for they had never seen anything like it before--nor had any one else, for that matter. The plot of the play beggars description. Suffice it to say that Nan figured as the heroine, with a blue gingham apron for a train and a dish towel for a turban. Harry, muffled in a red table cover, was terrible as a sort of border ruffian, and Regie played the part of Nan's gallant brother. In a greater part of the performance there was so much action, so much rushing on and off the stage, that it was difficult to gain a clear idea of what was really intended; but matters culminated in a hand-to-hand scuffle between Harry and Reginald--a wooden spoon and a toasting fork doing service as weapons. Finally Harry succumbed, and fell to the ground with the rather inelegant exclamation, “Stabbed! stabbed to the liver!” and Nan falling in a swoon to the floor was enveloped in the green plaid shawl, which she accidentally pulled down with her.

“Oh, Harry! why did you give out?” cried Joe Croxson, never more excited in his life.

“It was planned for me to die,” Harry answered, still lying motionless on the floor. “I was Regie's sister's lover, and I'm a fraud and a wretch.”

The play had lasted almost an hour, and to the great delight of all concerned.

“P-p-please d-d-do it again!” begged little Madge. Rex and Nan were in favour of a repetition, but for Harry the novelty was gone, and novelty was everything with him.

“No, I've had enough,” he said, decidedly, and so the project had to be abandoned. Meanwhile Harry's assertion that it was going to rain all day was fast being contradicted, for it had stopped raining, and now and then the sun shone out bravely through a rift in the clouds. With the sunshine came a distaste for indoor fun, and there was a rush for hats and coats preparatory to a rush out into the November air. Nan, with tender thoughtfulness, had hung the Croxsons' wraps on chairs near the fire, and now they were dry, and as fit for use again as it was possible for such sorry clothes to be. At last all were ready, and Regie hurrying to open the door that led to the porch from the kitchen, found it locked and the key gone. The little party stared at each other. Harry was missing, and nowhere to be seen. Of course he was the guilty one. Then there was a stampede for the sitting-room door. Locked, too, and minus the key. A suppressed titter from the head of the stairs made them all look up.

“Why don't you go out?” Harry giggled; “I'd be ashamed if I couldn't open a door.”

“Come down and give us those keys this minute,” demanded Nan, in a tone most unlikely to accomplish her object. Harry only smiled provokingly. All in vain the children begged and coaxed. Finally they scrambled up the stairs to gain possession of them by main force if possible. Meanwhile Nan, evolving a little scheme out of her own head, slipped into Harry's room, appearing again in a trice with his Sunday suit in her hand. Harry had great regard for that Sunday suit, and Nan knew it.

“Look here, Harry!” she cried, “I will throw this downstairs if you don't give up those keys right away.”

“You dare!” called Harry, still engaged in a scuffle with the boys, “and I know what I'll do.”

Alas! Nan dared, and the precious suit fell in a crumpled mass to the floor below. By a sudden jerk Harry freed himself from his captors, and rushing into Nan's room, dragged pillow and bed-clothes from the bed, and then pitched them over the banisters. In a second they were followed by bolster and mattress. The little Crox-sons and Regie looked on in speechless astonishment The general encounter had reduced itself to single combat between Harry and Nan.

“Well!” said Nan, “mother will soon be home, and then we'll see what will happen. Harry Preston Murray” (Nan always called Harry by his full name when out of patience with him), “you have an awful temper!”

“I'll teach you not to touch my clothes again, any way,” Harry answered, carefully shaking and folding the precious trousers.

“But you don't know when to stop, Harry,” sighed Nan, coming down the stairs and surveying the havoc wrought with real dismay. What would her mother say and do about it? Harry began to have some misgivings of his own on the subject.

“You will have to carry all those things up again,” she said, in a half-pleading tone.

“And I'll help you, though you ought to be made to do it all yourself,” added Regie.

Harry came to the conclusion that he _would_ have to carry them up again sooner or later, and deemed it wise to commence before any one arrived on the scene. Besides, there was an ominous sound of wheels down the road. It might be Captain and Mrs. Murray. Joe Croxson had his own fears regarding this possibility, and beckoning his brothers and sisters into a corner, confided to them that he thought they had better take their departure. “There's going to be a row,” he whispered, “when the old 'uns come home. Harry 'll catch it, and if we don't look out we'll catch it too.” To the little Croxsons a hint was sufficient. Owing to certain personal experiences of a painful character, they seemed to live in a constant dread of what they termed “catching it.” The keys had fallen from Harry's pocket in the confusion, and hurriedly unlocking the door, the whole five slipped out and stole noiselessly away, without so much as saying “by your leave,” or “good-bye,” either to host or hostess. Harry and Rex and Nan, toiling, tugging, and shoving the unwieldy mattress upstairs, did not miss them till many minutes afterward. Indeed, they were each too much absorbed with their own thoughts to notice anything. Regie was the only one who saw any funny side to the proceeding, and the corners of his mouth twitched a little. Nan was on the verge of actual tears. The sight of her dainty little pillow shams and coverlid so sadly rumpled was almost too much for her. Harry was indignant over having to undo his own mischief, and did everything in a jerky, disagreeable way. Finally the little bed was in some sort of order, but as Nan was adjusting the pillow, Harry, giving her a shove which sent her into the middle of the bed, exclaimed, “You are enough to try the patience of a saint, Nan!”

It needed nothing more to bring Nan's threatening tears to the surface, and lying just where Harry had pushed her, she burst into sobs and tears. If there was one thing Harry hated more than another it was to have Nan cry, and to add to his discomfort Sister Julia came hurrying into the room. She had heard the romping in the hall, but never dreamed that it needed investigation till Nan's crying reached her.

“Why, what is the matter?” she questioned.

“There's a great deal the matter,” Regie replied, calmly; “and I should think Harry would be ashamed of himself.”

“Nan began it,” said Harry, with Adam-like self-excusing. “Harry got so mad,” explained Regie, excitedly, “that he threw----

“Wait a minute, Regie, let Harry tell me himself.”

“Yes, I got so mad,” said Harry, using Regie's own words, “that I took everything from Nan's bed and pitched it downstairs. Nan threw my Sunday suit down first, or I would never have thought of it. But I helped bring all the clothes up again, so I don't see what she wants to cry about it now for.”

“I am not crying about that at all, Sister Julia,” sobbed Nan, without raising her head; “I'm crying because he said 'I was enough to try the patience of a saint.' I don't know what it means, but I think it's an awful unkind thing for a brother to say.”

Sister Julia could hardly keep from smiling at this unexpected turn of affairs. Harry and Regie laughed outright, which did not help matters much.

Sister Julia motioned the boys from the room, and sitting down by Nan, on the side of the bed, stroked the brown curls till the sobs grew few and far between. Then she explained that “she was enough to try the patience of a saint” was not such a very dreadful thing for Harry to have said, and finally induced Nan to admit, smiling through her tears, that both she and Harry were to blame, and that on the whole they had had rather a funny time of it Presently Captain and Mrs. Murray came home, finding everything in order about the house. Only you and Sister Julia, little reader, ever heard the full history of that rainy Saturday morning.

XI.--A NEW FRIEND

T was early in November, but if you had lain by Nan's side on the beach basking in the sunshine you would scarcely have guessed it. The air was mild and warm, and there were no trees near to betray what sad havoc blustering fall winds had made with the foliage. Old ocean was as blue and still as in midsummer, with just a single line of breakers falling at regular intervals on the hard white beach. Nan was fairly glorying in the June-like day, feeling there could hardly be such another till June herself should have come round again. The boys had gone off for the afternoon on some sort of an expedition, never so much as asking her to accompany them, but she was not sorry to be left at home. She was one of those little people who, like some big people, loved to have a chance for a quiet think now and then, and lying there by herself she was supremely happy and tranquil. She had been there fully an hour, and for a while had been busy building a little castle in the sand, making a foundation of clam shells, and using an old bottle for a tower.

Most of the time she had been “just thinking,” and thinking so hard that she did not notice some one coming nearer and nearer until, suddenly looking up, her eyes met those of a stranger. She was a pretty little picture lying there flat on the sand, with her dimpled face propped comfortably between her hands.

“I wonder what you are thinking about, my little friend,” said the new comer, kindly. “I know from your face that your thoughts are happy thoughts?”

“Pretty foolish ones, I guess you'd call them!” laughed Nan, for there was something about the stranger that at once won her confidence.

“I'm not so sure of that,” he answered; “but a stranger has no right to ask you what they were, so good-bye, my little dreamer.”

“I wish you would not go,” said Nan, sitting up and smoothing out her dress; “I would like to talk to you, because I think you look like a minister, and I never spoke to a real minister before.”

“Well, you shall now,” he answered, sitting down beside her, “for you have guessed rightly, and for that matter there is nothing the minister would rather do than talk to you for a while.”

There was a little pause, and then Nan asked hesitatingly, as though she feared to seem rude, “You don't belong about here, do you?”

“No, but I almost wish I did. I love the sea with all my heart, so that I have hard work to keep from saying something about it in every sermon I preach. But if I do not belong about here, it is very certain that you do. You must have lived by the ocean week in and week out, to get that shade of blue into your eyes.”

“That's what Reginald says!” laughed Nan.

“And who is Reginald?”

“Why, Reginald Fairfax; he's staying with us while his father and mother are in Europe. The poor little fellow broke his leg last summer, and Sister Julia is here too, to take care of him, but he's almost well now. I wish you knew Sister Julia. She comes from one of the great hospitals in New York, and she is the loveliest person you ever saw.”

“Well, I should say I did know her,” answered the minister. “She goes to my church in town, and so do Mr. and Mrs. Fairfax; and Regie and I are the best of friends.”

“Why, are you Mr. Vale?” queried Nan, astonished, for the name of the young minister had often been on Regie's lips.

“Yes, I am,” he answered, laughing, as though he must own up to the truth.

“But what are you doing here?”

“Well, I'll tell you. Do you see that red-tiled cottage yonder?” pointing down the beach.

“Do you mean Mr. Avery's?” for Nan knew the name of every resident in the neighbourhood of Moorlow.

“Yes; Mr. Avery is a friend of mine, and stays down here, you know, quite late into the fall, so he asked me to bring my sister, who is quite an invalid, to his cottage, thinking the change would do her good. So here we are; we came this morning, but I am obliged to go back to the city again this afternoon.”

“Oh, dear! I'm sorry for that,” said Nan, regretfully, “I would so much have liked to hear you preach.”

“Well, that is very kind of you. Perhaps you can some time, when you come to New York to visit Regie. By the way, where is he?”

“Oh, he's off with my brother Harry this afternoon, and I don't believe they'll be home before supper time.”

“That's too bad, but I shall probably see him the next time I come.”

“Oh, you are coming again then!” exclaimed Nan, her face brightening.

“Yes, surely. Once a week, at least, so long as my sister stays. And now, suppose you tell me something about yourself. Your name is----”

“Nannie--Nannie Murray,” answered Nan.

“And you live----”

“In that brown cottage behind us there on the bluff,” nodding her head in the direction of the house.

“And you have lived there always?”

“Yes, sir,” she replied, proudly.

“Then you are a fortunate little maiden. To have grown up by the sea is something to be very thankful for. It seems a pity to live in town when one loves the sea and open country as much as I do.”

“Why don't you come down here?” urged Nan. “There are plenty of houses.”

“But the bother of it is there are plenty of people in town, and the preacher must stay near the people. It is more beautiful and wonderful, you know, to be able to help a soul struggle up toward high-water mark, than even to watch the tide come in as we are doing. But I think I must be talking quite over your head. Now that we are friends, perhaps you will not mind telling me what you were thinking about when I so rudely interrupted you?”

“Do you see that schooner, away off there?” Nan answered. “Well, when you came it was right in front of me, and I was pretending it was sailing away to a beautiful island with a crowd of poor city children on board, who had never been very well, or had a very happy time, and I pretended they were already beginning to look fresh and rosy with the salt breeze blowing in their faces; and I made believe that some of the children had a glass, and were looking here at me on the beach, and that some of them thought I was a mermaid, and others a queer sort of a fish. Now I suppose you think those were pretty foolish thoughts, don't you?”

“Not a bit of it. It is like a fairy story, only better. But before you began to build a castle in the air, I see you built a little one here in the sand. I suppose you have peopled this with a lot of queer little people of your own too.”

“No,” said Nan, honestly, “I don't make up things much, except when I am just looking out to sea.”

“Have you ever thought, Nan,” said Mr. Vale, earnestly, as he banked up a falling wall of her castle with his hand, “that your own life is a sort of little castle, wonderfully made, richly furnished, beautiful and hopeful to look upon? It is fitting that only One should live in that fair house--He who is purity and goodness and truth Himself. Ask Him to come and dwell within you, to look out of your eyes, to hear with your ears, to speak through your lips, to guide your hands and your feet.”

“You mean Jesus, don't you?” asked Nan, looking frankly into his face with sweet simplicity.

“Yes, my little friend, I do.”

“Well, it is just like a sermon.”

“But you said, you know, that you would like to hear me preach.”

“Yes, I did,” answered Nan, thoughtfully, gathering up a handful of sand and letting it sift through her fingers, “and I like your preaching; I like it very much indeed.”

“Thank you,” and Mr. Vale looked as though he deeply appreciated Nan's honest praise; “but it is high time the preacher was off. There is the train whistle now! give my love to Regie, and I shall surely run over to see him next week when I come down.”

Nan watched her new friend hurrying away to the station, and stood transfixed till a low sand-hill hid him from sight. Then she scampered to the house to tell of her good fortune.

As soon as Regie came home, and while he was making a hurried toilet for supper, Nan ran into his room, and curling herself up on the window-box, commenced, for the third time (for Sister Julia and Mrs. Murray had already been favoured), to give an excited narration of the afternoon's experiences.

“Oh, Regie!” she began, “I've had the most splendid time--a good long chat with a real live minister. He came from the city, and he told me the nicest things, sort of preached, you know; and he loves the sea just as much as I do, and his sister is staying up at the Averys', so he's coming again. He's a young minister, Regie, and he has the loveliest face.”

“I don't like men with lovely faces,” said Regie, scornfully.

“Well, you'd like his face, Regie. It was like a great strong angel's face, and he told me he knew you, and for me to give you his love, and to tell you that when he came again he would surely come and see----”

“You don't mean Mr. Vale, do you?” cried Regie

“That's just who I do mean,” Nan answered, complacently.

“Oh, dear me! why wasn't I round? Are you sure he's coming again?”

“Sure,” said Nan, wondering if it was selfish to be glad that just this once Regie had not been “round” at all, and that she had the young; clergyman quite to herself.

XII.--THE STARLING RUNS ASHORE