Chapter 11

A Little Messenger

Miss Fairfax seemed the most talkative, but her conversation was a perpetual flow of complaints; the food, the weather, and her ailments were her chief topics, and Betty's round eyes of amazement, as she sat opposite, served to irritate her more. At length she gave a little start and scream.

'I am sure there is a dog in the room!' she exclaimed. 'How often I have told you, Jennings' (this to the butler), 'to keep the dogs out of our rooms!'

'It's my dog,' said Betty at once; 'it's only Prince; he always sits under my chair; he's such a dear, he waits as quiet as a mouse.'

'Take him out of the room at once, Jennings; I can't eat another mouthful while he is here. You ought never to have allowed him to come in!'

'Oh, Grace, he won't hurt you!' said Nesta, remonstrating.

Miss Fairfax put her knife and fork together, and leant back in her chair.

'Very well; as my nerves are never considered in the least, it is useless for me to speak; I had better go back to my room. I am continually being urged to join you at meal-times; yet, when I do, I am expected to go through the misery of having a wretched dog crawling round my feet, and setting every nerve in my head quivering and throbbing.'

'Take the dog outside,' said Mrs. Fairfax quietly; then, turning to Betty, who looked very perturbed and flushed, she said, 'Jennings will take care of him, and he shall have some dinner in the kitchen.'

'He won't be beaten, will he? He didn't know it was wrong to follow me'; and Betty's eyes began to fill with tears, as she saw Prince seized by the scruff of his neck, and carried off, in spite of indignant growls and snaps.

'No, he won't be beaten,' she was assured; but after this she had no appetite for her dinner; and when the ladies rose from the table she ran up to Mrs. Fairfax.

'May I have Prince again now? He's so very good. I want him dreadfully.'

'Yes, he shall be brought to you. What are you going to do with the child, Nesta?'

'I will take her out into the garden, mother. But I hear old Mrs. Parr has come up for some linseed meal I promised her. Her husband is very ill again with bronchitis. I shall not be gone long.'

'Then Betty shall come upstairs with me.'

Again Nesta wondered, but wisely said nothing.

Prince came scampering across the hall, and Betty, now completely happy, took hold of Mrs. Fairfax's hand, and went upstairs into a lovely little boudoir, where she sat down in a low cushioned seat by the window, and chattered away to her heart's content.

'Did you send Prince to me? You did, didn't you? I knew it was you! He is such a darling, and it makes me into a couple--which I've never been before.'

Mrs. Fairfax smiled; she seemed to lose some of her stiffness when with Betty alone.

'And is he as much a companion as another brother or sister might be?'

'I think he's much nicer. I wouldn't have any one instead of him for all the world.'

'What have you been doing with yourself since I saw you?'

'Lots and lots of things. I go to church to hear Miss Fairfax play the organ; and I take flowers to dead Violet; and I have got into lots of scrapes; but I don't think I'm quite as naughty here as I used to be in London. At least, we can't quite make it out. Douglas was saying the other day, nurse lets him climb any trees here; but if he tried to climb a lamp-post, or even one of the trees in the parks, in London, he was always being whipped or put into cells for it! And in the country we can go out without gloves, and run races along the roads, and swing on gates, and we never get punished at all. We don't want to go back to London; it's so dreadfully hard to be good there.'

'But don't you want to see your father and mother again?'

'Yes, I s'pose so; but we don't see them very much in London. I'd like to stay in the country for ever and ever, and so would Prince.' After a pause she went on, 'You see, there's a good deal more going on in the country than in London. We know a lot more people, and there's always something fresh happening. Now, in London every day is the same, and we have only the nursery to play in, we get so tired of it. At the farm where we live we're always having nice surprises; lots of little calves are born quite suddenly, or little horses, and we don't know anything about it till we go and see them in the morning. Yesterday there were six little black pigs, such little beauties! And then we have so many more people to talk to. There's Farmer and Mrs. Giles, and Sam, and all the carters, and the old man who digs the graves, and old Jenny, and you, and Miss Fairfax, and Mr. Russell, but I've only seen him once.'

Betty paused for breath.

'And what do you find to talk about to so many people?'

'I've been talking rather grave talks with some of them,' Betty said reflectively, 'about tribulation.'

Mrs. Fairfax raised her eyebrows.

'That is very grave talk indeed for such a mite as you. What do you know about it?'

'I know that everybody has got it except me, and I want to have it; and old Jenny said I'd be sure to come to it soon. She's had it, and Reuben has, and Mr. Russell, and nurse, and Miss Fairfax has. Has the cross lady downstairs had it, and have you?'

Mrs. Fairfax's lips quivered a little as she turned away her head. The soft, childish fingers were probing the wound, and she shrank from their touch.

Betty went on dreamily, 'I often wonder what it's like, and whether you feel like Christian did in the dark valley; but he got through it all right at last! I should like to come right through it into the middle of the text, and Jenny says I shall some day!'

There was glad triumph in her tone.

'What text?' asked Mrs. Fairfax, looking out of the window, and away to the green woods in the distance.

Betty repeated once more the familiar words,--

'"These are they which came out of great tribulation, and have washed their robes, and made them white in the blood of the Lamb." How glad they must be to have had it! don't you think so?'

And then the stately Mrs. Fairfax sat down, and took Betty upon her knee; drawing her close to her, till she had the little dark curly head resting against her shoulder, she bent her head to hers, and said, almost passionately,--

'God grant you will never know such trouble as mine, little one--trouble that turns your heart to stone, and blots all heaven from your sight!'

Betty put her little arms round her neck.

'Old Jenny said I should have it,' she repeated, 'and she told me when I was in the middle of it to remember, "Be thou faithful unto death"--I forget the other part.'

There was silence for some moments; then Mrs. Fairfax kissed the upturned face.

'Now run downstairs, little woman, and find Nesta. I will say good-bye now, for I shall not see you again.'

Betty obeyed instantly, and when she had gone, for the first time for many a long month, the sorrowful woman knelt in prayer. 'God help me!' she cried; 'I have been an unfaithful servant, and have refused to turn to Thee for comfort.'

The rest of the afternoon was as delightful as the morning to Betty. She visited the stables and poultry yard; she picked strawberries, and ate them whilst she picked; she gathered a large nosegay of flowers to take home to nurse; and then, at four o'clock, she came in to a delicious little tea in the cool, shady drawing-room. Miss Fairfax was lying on the sofa there, but she seemed to like to hear the child talk, and even condescended to allow Prince to come inside to receive a lump of sugar on his nose, whilst he sat up and begged.

'I've had a lovely day,' said Betty, as Nesta was putting on her hat upstairs in the bedroom.

'And so have I,' responded Nesta, laughing. 'You have been very good company, Betty; I shall be quite dull when you are gone.'

'Have you no one to talk to, when I'm not here? Are you an odd one?'

'Perhaps I may be.'

Why don't you make yourself into a couple with some one, like Prince and me?'

But this made Nesta's soft eyes fill with tears; and Betty felt very uncomfortable until she was kissed and told she was the funniest little chatterbox living. The pony carriage came round; and a little later she was being driven home, rather tired, and very happy, at her day's outing.

Nesta left her at the gate, and drove silently home. Betty had brought a good deal of brightness into her life; and though she was always outwardly so cheery in her manner, her heart was often heavy and sore. It was not a cheerful house; and as an hour later she tried to enliven the solemn dinner-table, expecting as usual to meet with no response, but grumbles from Grace and chilling indifference on the part of her mother, she was surprised by Mrs. Fairfax's efforts to take part in the conversation.

'That child is an original character,' she observed. 'Do you know who they are, Nesta?'

'Yes, Mr. Crump was telling me the other day; their father is the Member for Stonycroft, and their mother that Mrs. Stuart who is so busy in philanthropical objects in town. She was one of the Miss Champneys, the clever Miss Champneys, as we used to call them. I think the children must inherit the talents of their parents, for though they are regular little pickles for mischief, they are all original in their way. Betty thinks the most, I should say, the others seem to live in dreamland half their time. I came across the other girl and boy in an old willow tree the other day. I spoke to them, but was hushed up at once by the boy, who put his fair curly head out of the branches, and said, "You're not to speak to us just now; we're hiding from the Queen of the Brook! she comes dashing down in foam, she's so angry with us; and if she splashes us we shall be turned into black dogs, and have to go on all fours till dinner time!" I laughed and left them. I don't altogether envy their nurse!'

'Betty is not enough of a child,' Mrs. Fairfax said; 'some of her sayings are quite uncanny.'

'Do you think so? She has plenty of life and spirits. But she is a child of intense feeling. I am afraid she will suffer for it as she grows older. Yesterday I came upon her outside the churchyard crying, as if her heart would break, over a dead frog. I tried to comfort her. "Oh," she sobbed; "I'm so afraid Prince has killed it. I didn't see him, but he may have; and he doesn't look a bit sorry. What shall I do if he grows up a murderer!"'

Mrs. Fairfax would have thought Betty a stranger child still, if she could have seen her that evening tossing in her little bed.

Molly was fast asleep; nurse had left the room, and all was quiet; but Betty was going over in her busy little mind the events of the past day. At last she stretched out her hand to Prince in his basket.

'She said you had no soul, Prince; I wonder if you haven't! I wish you'd say prayers to God; I'm sure God will give you a soul, if you ought to have one! Prince, wake up!'

Prince rolled over, shook himself, and jumped up on the bed, wondering what was the reason of this summons.

Betty sat up with flushed cheeks and bright eyes. 'Come here. Prince! Now beg! that's right. Now say a prayer; just a very little one. I pray for you, darling, every night; but you're big enough to pray yourself. God will know your language if you speak to Him, and you can just speak secret to Him--I do often. Now, Prince--no--don't lick my hand, and keep your tail still. I wish you'd shut your eyes. I'll put my hand over them--there! Now Prince, ask God to give you a soul, and forgive your sins, and take you to heaven when you die.'

Betty bent her head in silence; whilst for two minutes Prince kept perfectly still; then she took her little hands from his eyes, and he gave a quick short bark of delight, perhaps in anticipation of a lump of sugar for this new trick taught him. If so, he was disappointed, he was only kissed and put back into his basket. And Betty laid her little head on the pillow, but only half satisfied. 'O God,' she murmured sleepily, 'if Prince hasn't prayed properly, please forgive him, and give him a soul and make him a good dog, for Jesus Christ's sake. Amen.'