Tell Me a Story

“It won’t show so much when your majesty has the crown on,” said the Chinese princesses, answering as before to Louisa’s unspoken thoughts. Then some gentlemen fairies appeared with the crown, which fitted exactly, only it felt rather heavy. But it would never do for a queen to complain, even in thought, of so trifling a matter, so with great dignity Louisa ascended the throne which stood at one end of the hall, and sat down upon it to see what would come next.

The Fairies came next. One after the other, by dozens, and scores, and hundreds, they passed before her, each as he passed making the humblest of obeisances, as if to the great Mogul himself. It was very fine indeed, but after a while Louisa began to get rather tired of it, and though the throne was very grand to look at, it too felt rather hard, and the crown grew decidedly heavier.

“I think I’d like to come down for a little,” she said to some of the ladies and gentlemen beside her, but they took no notice. “I’d like to get down for a little and to take off my crown – it’s hurting my head, and this spangly dress is so cold,” she continued. Still the fairies took no notice.

“Don’t you hear what I say?” she exclaimed again, getting angry; “what’s the use of being a queen if you won’t answer me?”

Then at last some of the fairies standing beside the throne appeared to hear what she was saying.

“Her majesty wishes to take a little exercise,” said “Clarke’s Number 12,” and immediately the words were repeated in a sort of confusing buzz all round the hall. “Her majesty wishes to take a little exercise” – “her majesty wishes to take a little exercise,” till Louisa could have shaken them all heartily, she felt so provoked. Then suddenly the throne began to squeak and grunt (Louisa thought it was going to talk about her taking exercise next), and after it had given vent to all manner of unearthly sounds it jerked itself up, first on one side and then on the other, like a very rheumatic old woman, and at last slowly moved away. None of the fairies were pushing it, that was plain; and at first Louisa was too much occupied in wondering what made it move, to find fault with the mode of exercise permitted to her. The throne rolled slowly along, all round the hall, and wherever it appeared a crowd of fairies scuttled away, all chattering the same words – “Her majesty is taking a little exercise,” till at last, with renewed jerks and grunts and groans, her queer conveyance settled itself again in its old place. As soon as it was still, Louisa tried to get down, but no sooner did she put one foot on the ground than a crowd of fairies respectfully lifted it up again on to the footstool. This happened two or three times, till Louisa’s patience was again exhausted.

“Get out of my way,” she exclaimed, “you horrid little things, get out of my way; I want to get down and run about.”

But the fairies took no notice of what she said, till for the third time she repeated it. Then they all spoke at once.

“Her majesty wants to take a little more exercise,” they buzzed in all directions, till Louisa was so completely out of patience that she burst into tears.

“I won’t stay to be your queen,” she said, “it’s not nice at all. I want to go home to my mamma. I want to go home to my mamma. I want to go home to my mamma.”

“We don’t know what mammas are,” said the fairies. “We haven’t anything of that kind here.”

“That’s a story,” said Louisa. “There – are mammas here. I’ve seen several. There’s Mrs Brown, and there’s Lady Flossy, and there’s – no, the Chinese princesses haven’t a mamma. But you see there are two among my mamma’s own reels in her workb – .”

But before she could finish the word the fairies all set up a terrific shout. “The word, the word,” they cried, “the word that no one must mention here. Hush! hush! hush!”

They all turned upon Louisa as if they were going to tear her to pieces. In her terror she uttered a piercing scream, and – woke.

She wasn’t in bed; where was she? Could she be in the workbox? Wherever she was it was quite dark and cold, and something was pressing against her head, and her legs were aching. Suddenly there came a flash of light. Some one had opened the door, and the light from the hall streamed in. The some one was Louisa’s mamma.

“Who is in here? Did I hear some one calling out?” she exclaimed anxiously.

Louisa was slowly recovering her wits. “It was me, mamma,” she answered; “I didn’t know where I was, and I was so frightened and I am so cold. Oh mamma!”

A flood of tears choked her.

“You poor child,” exclaimed her mamma, hurrying back to the hall to fetch a lamp, as she spoke, “why, you have fallen asleep on the hearth-rug, and the fire’s out; and my workbox – what is it doing here? Were you using it for a pillow?”

“No,” said Louisa, eyeing the workbox suspiciously, “it was on the chair, and the corner of it has hurt my head, mamma; it was pressing against it.” Her mamma lifted the box on to the table.

“Are they all in there, mamma?” whispered Louisa, timidly.

“All in where? All who? What are you speaking about, my dear?”

“The fairies – the reels I mean,” replied Louisa. “My dear, you are dreaming still,” said her mamma, laughing, but seeing that Louisa looked dissatisfied, “never mind, you shall tell me your dreams to-morrow. But just now you must really go to bed. It is nine o’clock – you have been two hours asleep. I went out of the room in a hurry, taking the lamp with me because it was not burning rightly, and then I heard baby crying – he is very cross to-night – and both nurse and I forgot about you. Now go, dear, and get well warmed at the nursery fire before you go to bed.”

Louisa trotted off. She had no more dreams that night, but when she woke the next morning, her poor little legs were still aching. She had caught cold the night before, there was no doubt, so her mamma, taking some blame to herself for her having fallen asleep on the floor, was particularly kind and indulgent to her. She brought her down to the drawing-room wrapped in a shawl, and established her comfortably in an arm-chair.

“What will you have to play with?” she asked. “Would you like my workbox?”

“I don’t know,” said Louisa, doubtfully. “Mamma,” she continued, after a moment’s silence, “can queens never do what they like?”

“Very often they can’t,” replied her mamma. “What makes you ask?”

“I dreamt I was a queen,” said Louisa.

“Did you? What country were you queen of?”

“I was queen of the reel fairies,” replied the child gravely. Her mother looked mystified “Tell me what you mean, dear,” she said. “Tell me all about it.”

So bit by bit Louisa explained the whole, and her mamma had for once a peep into that strange, fantastic, mysterious world, which we call a child’s imagination. She had a glimpse of something else too. She saw that her little girl was in danger of getting to live too much alone, was in need of sympathy and companionship.

“I think it was what Frances Gordon said that made me dream about being a queen,” she said.

“And do you still wish you were a queen?” said her mamma.

“No,” said Louisa.

“A princess then?”

“No,” she replied again. “But, mamma – ”

“Well, dear?”

“I do wish sometimes that I was pretty, and that – that – I don’t know how to say it – that people made a fuss about me sometimes.”

Her mamma looked a little grave and a little sad; but still she smiled. She could not be angry – thought Louisa.

“Is it naughty, mamma?” she whispered.

“Naughty? No, dear; it is a wish most little girls have, I fancy – and big ones too. But some day you will understand how it might grow into a wrong feeling, and how on the other side a little of it may be useful to help good feelings. And till you understand better, dear, doesn’t it make you happy to know that to me you could not be dearer if you were the most beautiful little princess in the world.”

“As beautiful as Princess Fair Star, mamma?”

“Yes, or any other princess you can think of. I would rather have my little mouse of a girl than any of them.”

Louisa nestled closer to her mamma with great satisfaction. “I like you to call me your mouse, mamma; and do you know I almost think I like having a cold.”

Her mother laughed. “Am I making a little fuss about you? Is that what you like?”

Louisa laughed too.

“Do you think I should leave off playing with the reels, and making stories about them, mamma? Is it silly?”

“No, dear, not if it amuses you,” said her mother.

But though Louisa did not leave off playing with the reels altogether, she gradually came to find that she preferred other amusements. Her mother taught her several pretty kinds of work, and read aloud stories to her more often than formerly. And, somehow, Louisa never again cared quite as much for her old friends. She thought the Chinese princesses had grown rather “stuck-up” and affected, and she could not get over a strong suspicion that “Clarke’s Number 12” was very ready to be impertinent, if he could ever again get a chance.

Chapter Three.

Good-Night, Winny

“Say not good-night – but, in some brighter clime, Bid me good-morning!”

When I was a little girl I was called Meg. I do not mean to say that I have got a different name now that I am big, but my name is used differently. I am now called Margaret, or sometimes Madge, but never Meg. Indeed I do not wish ever to be called Meg, for a reason you will quite understand when you have heard my story. But perhaps I am wrong to call it a “story” at all, so I had better say at the beginning that what I have to tell you is only a sort of remembrance of something that happened to me when I was very little – of some one I loved more dearly, I think, than I can ever love any one again. And I fancy perhaps other little girls will like to hear it.

Well then, to begin again – long ago I used to be called Meg, and the person who first called me so was my sister Winny, who was not quite two years older than I. There were four of us then – four little sisters – Winny, and I, and Dolly, and Blanche, baby Blanche we used to call her. We lived in the country in a pretty house, which we were very fond of, particularly in the summer time, when the flowers were all out. Winny loved flowers more dearly than any one I ever knew, and she taught me to love them too. I never see one now without thinking of her and the things she used to say about them. I can see now, now that I am so much older, that Winny must have been a very clever little girl in some ways, not so much in learning lessons as in thinking things to herself, and understanding feelings and thoughts that children do not generally care about at all. She was very pretty too, I can remember her face so well. She had blue eyes and very long black eyelashes – our mamma used to teaze her sometimes, and say that she had what Irish people call “blue eyes put in with dirty fingers” – and pretty rosy cheeks, and a very white forehead. And her face always had a bright dancing look that I can remember best of all.

We learnt lessons together, and we slept together in two little beds side by side, and we did everything together, from eating our breakfast to dressing our dolls – and when one was away the other seemed only half alive. All our frocks and hats and jackets were exactly the same, and except that Winny was taller than I, we should never have known which was which of our things. I am sure Winny was a very good little girl, but when I try to remember all about her exactly, what seems to come back most to me is her being always so happy. She did not need to think much about being good and not naughty; everything seemed to come rightly to her of itself. She thought the world was a very pretty, nice place; and she loved all her friends, and she loved God most of all for giving them to her. She used to say she was sure Heaven would be a very happy place too, only she did so hope there would be plenty of flowers there, and she was disappointed because mamma said it did not tell in the Bible what kinds of flowers there would be. Almost the only thing which made her unhappy was about there being so many very poor people in the world. She used to talk about it very often and wonder why it was, and when she was very, very little, she cried because nurse would not let her give away her best velvet jacket to a poor little girl she saw on the road.

But though Winny was so sweet, and though we loved each other so, sometimes we did quarrel. Now and then it was quite little quarrels which were over directly, but once we had a bigger quarrel. Even now I do not like to remember it; and oh! how I do wish I could make other boys and girls feel as I do about quarrelling. Even little tiny squabbles seem to me to be sorrowful things, and then they so often grow into bigger ones. It was generally mostly my fault. I was peevish and cross sometimes, and Winny was never worse than just hasty and quick for a moment. She was always ready to make friends again, “to kiss ourselves to make the quarrel go away,” as our little sister Dolly used to say, almost before she could speak. And sometimes I was silly, and then it was right for Winny to find fault with me. My manners used occasionally to trouble her, for she was very particular about such things. One day I remember she was very vexed with me for something I said to a gentleman who was dining with our papa and mamma. He was a nice kind gentleman, and we liked him, only we did not think him pretty. Winny and I had fixed together that we did not think him pretty, only of course Winny never thought I would be so silly as to tell him so. We came down to dessert that evening – Winny sat beside papa, and I sat between Mr Merton and mamma, and after I had sat quite still, looking at him without speaking, I suddenly said, – I can’t think what made me – “Mr Merton, I don’t think you are at all pretty. Your hair goes straight down, and up again all of a sudden at the end, just like our old drake’s tail.”

Mr Merton laughed very much, and papa laughed, and mamma did too, though not so much. But Winny did not laugh at all. Her face got red, and she would not eat her raisins, but asked if she might keep them for Dolly, and she seemed quite unhappy. And when we had said good-night, and had gone upstairs, I could see how vexed she was. She was so vexed that she even gave me a little shake. “Meg,” she said, “I am so ashamed of you. I am really. How could you be so rude?”

I began to cry, and I said I did not mean to be rude; and I promised that I would never say things like that again; and then Winny forgave me; but I never forgot it. And once I remember, too, that she was vexed with me because I would not speak to a little girl who came to pay a visit to her grandfather, who lived at our grandfather’s lodge. Winny stopped to say good-morning to her, and to ask her if her friends at home were quite well; and the little girl curtseyed and looked so pleased. But I walked on, and when Winny called to me to stop I would not; and then, when she asked me what was the matter, I said I did not think we needed to speak to the little girl, she was quite a common child, and we were ladies. Winny was vexed with me then; she was too vexed to give me a little shake even. She did not speak for a minute, and then she said, very sadly, “Meg, I am sorry you don’t know better than that what being a lady means.”

I do know better now, I hope; but was it not strange that Winny always seemed to know better about these things? It came of itself to her, I think, because her heart was so kind and happy.

Winny was very fond of listening to stories, and of making them up and telling them to me; but she was not very fond of reading to herself. She liked writing best, and I liked reading. We used to say that when we were big girls, Winny should write all mamma’s letters for her, and I should read aloud to her when she was tired. How little we thought that time would never come! We were always talking about what we should do when we were big; but sometimes when we had been talking a long time, Winny would stop suddenly, and say, “Meg, growing big seems a dreadfully long way off. It almost tires me to think of it. What a great, great deal we shall have to learn before then, Meg!” I wonder what gave her that feeling.

Shall I tell you now about the worst quarrel we ever had? It was about Winny’s best doll. The doll’s name was “Poupée.” Of course I know now that that is the French for all dolls; but we were so little then we did not understand, and when our aunt’s French maid told us that “poupée” was the word for doll, we thought it a very pretty name, and somehow the doll was always called by it. Grandfather had given “Poupée” to Winny – I think he brought it from London for her – and I cannot tell you how proud she was of it. She did not play with it every day, only on holidays and treat-days; but every day she used to peep at “Poupée” in the drawer where she lay, and kiss her, and say how pretty she looked. One afternoon Winny was going out somewhere – I don’t remember exactly where; I daresay it was a drive with mamma – and I was not to go, and I was crying; and just as Winny was running down-stairs all ready dressed to go, she came back and whispered to me, “Meg, dear, don’t cry. It takes away all my pleasure to see you. Will you leave off crying and look happy if I let you have ‘Poupée’ to play with while I am out?”

I wiped away my tears in a minute, I was so pleased. Winny ran to “Poupée’s” drawer and got her out, and brought her to me. She kissed her as she put her into my arms, and she said to her, “My darling ‘Poupée,’ you are going to spend the afternoon with your aunt. You must be a very good little girl, and do exactly what she tells you.”

And then Winny said to me, “You will be very careful of her, won’t you, Meg?” and I promised, of course, that I would.

I did mean to be careful, and I really was; but for all that a sad accident happened. I had been very happy with “Poupée” all the afternoon, and I had made her a new apron with a piece of muslin nurse gave me, and some ribbon, which did nicely for bows; and I was carrying her along the passage to show nurse how pretty the apron looked, when the housemaid, who was coming along with a trayful of clean clothes from the wash in her arms, knocked against me, and “Poupée” was thrown down; and, terrible to tell, her dear, sweet little right foot was broken. I cannot tell you how sorry I was, and nurse was sorry too, and so was Jane; but all the sorrow would not mend the foot. I was sitting on the nursery floor, with “Poupée” in my lap, crying over her, as miserable as could be, when Winny rushed in, laden with parcels, in the highest spirits.

“O! I have had such a nice drive, and I have brought some buns and sponge-cakes for tea, and a toy donkey for Blanche. And has Poupée been good?” she exclaimed. But just then she caught sight of my face. “What is the matter, Meg? What have you done to my darling, beautiful Poupée? O Meg, Meg, you surely haven’t broken her?”

I was crying so I could hardly speak.

“O Winny!” I said, “I am so sorry.”

But Winny was too vexed to care just at first for anything I could say. “You naughty, naughty, unkind Meg,” she said, “I do believe you did it on purpose.”

I could not bear that. I thought it very hard indeed that she should say so, when any one could see how miserable I was. I did not answer her; I ran out of the nursery, and though Winny called to me to come back (for the moment she had said those words she was sorry for them), I would not listen to her. Nurse fetched me back soon, however, for it was tea-time, but I would not speak to Winny. We never had such a miserable tea; there we sat, two red-eyed, unhappy little girls, looking as if we did not love each other a bit. If mamma had come up to the nursery she would have put it all right – she did put Poupée’s foot right the very next day, she mended it so nicely with diamond cement, that the place hardly showed at all – but she was busy that evening, and did not happen to come up. So bed-time came, and still we had not made friends, though I heard Winny crying when she was saying her prayers. After we were in bed, and nurse had gone away, Winny whispered to me, “Meg, won’t you forgive me for saying that unkind thing? Won’t you kiss me and say good-night, Winny?”

A minute before, I had been feeling as sorry as could be, but when Winny spoke to me, a most hard, horrid, unkind feeling seemed to come back into my heart, and I would not answer. I breathed as if I were asleep, pretending not to hear. I think Winny thought I was asleep, for she did not speak again. I heard her crying softly, and then after a while I heard by her breathing that she had really gone to sleep. But I couldn’t. I lay awake a long time, I thought it was hours and hours, and I tossed and turned, but I couldn’t go to sleep. I listened but I could not hear Winny breathing – I put my hand out of my cot, and stretched across to hers to feel for her; she seemed to be lying quite still. Then a dreadful feeling came into my mind – suppose Winny were dead, and that I had refused to make friends and say good-night! I must have got fanciful with lying awake, I suppose, and you know I was only a very little girl. I could not bear it – I stretched myself across to Winny and put my arms round her.

“Winny! Winny!” I said, “wake up, Winny, and kiss me, and let us say good-night.”

Winny woke up almost immediately, and she seemed to understand at once.

“Poor little Meg,” she said, “poor little Meg. We will never be unkind to each other again – never. Good-night, dear Meg.”

“Good-night, Winny,” I said. And just as I was falling asleep I whispered to her – “I will never let you go to sleep again, Winny, without saying good-night.” And I never did, never except once.

I could tell you ever so many other things about Winny, but I daresay you would be tired, for, of course, they cannot be so interesting to any other little girls as to me. But I think you will wish to hear about our last good-night.

Have I told you about our aunts at all? We had two aunties we were very fond of. They were young and merry and so kind to us, and there was nothing we liked so much as going to stay with them, for their home – our grandfather’s – was not far away. We generally all went there to spend Christmas, but one year something, I forget what, had prevented this, so to make up for it we were promised to spend Easter with them. We did so look forward to it – we were to go by ourselves, just like young ladies going to pay a visit, and we were to stay from Saturday till Easter Monday or Tuesday.

On the Saturday morning we woke up so early – hours before it was time to be dressed – we were so excited about our visit. But somehow Winny did not seem quite as happy about it as I wanted her to be. I asked her what made her dull, and she said it was because she did not like leaving papa and mamma, and Dolly and Blanche, not even for two or three days. And when we went into mamma’s room to say good-morning as usual, Winny said so to her too. Mamma laughed at her a little, and said she was a great baby after all; and Winny smiled, but still she seemed dull, and I shall never forget what a long long kiss she gave mamma that morning, as if she could When we went to the nursery for breakfast, baby Blanche was crying very much, and nurse said she was very cross. She did not think she was quite well, and we must be good and quiet. After breakfast, when mamma came to see baby, she seemed anxious about her, but baby went to sleep before long quite comfortably, and then nurse said she would be better when she awoke; it was probably just a little cold. And very soon the pony carriage was ready for Winny and me, and we kissed them all and set off on our visit. I was in high spirits, but as we drove away I saw that Winny was actually crying a little, and she did not often cry.

When we got to our aunties’, however, she grew quite happy again. We were very happy indeed on Sunday, only Winny kept saying how glad she would be to see them all at home again on Monday or Tuesday. But on Monday morning there came a letter, which made our aunties look grave. They did not tell us about it till Winny asked if we were to go home “to-day,” and then they told us that perhaps we could not go home for several days – not for two or three weeks even, for poor baby Blanche was very ill, and it was a sort of illness we might catch from her if we were with her.