The boy sat up on his bed and laid his finger on his lips. His eyes were sparkling with mischief, yet his face wore a look of preternatural gravity.
“Hush!” he said, in a tragic whisper; “if any one hears us I am lost!”
“What do you mean, Phil?”
Queenie, however, lowered her voice to a whisper. If she did not believe in danger, at least she scented mischief, and her eyes began to shine like Phil’s with the anticipation of coming fun.
“Is anybody about?” asked Phil, cautiously.
“I don’t know. Shall I go and see?”
“Yes, do; and bring me something to eat if you can. I’m half famished.”
Queenie asked no more questions for the moment; but, after listening intently at the door, to make sure there was nobody outside, she glided out into the corridor and dashed across to the nursery. Nobody was there. She had announced her intention of spending the afternoon in the garden, so that her nurse had left her usual domain and had gone elsewhere. She might, of course, be back at any moment, as the child well knew, and she did not waste a moment in the fulfilment of her task.
Queenie was quite the spoiled darling of the household, and all the servants vied with each other to do her pleasure, and give her everything they thought she could want. The cook made her cakes of every description, of which she had quite a collection in the nursery cupboard; the butler gave her more figs and plums, almonds and raisins and crystallized fruits than she could possibly consume; and, as a natural consequence, Queenie could provide a feast for herself or anybody else at a moment’s notice, and in less time than it has taken to explain all this she had filled a little basket with all sorts of good things, and had rushed back to Phil as silently and swiftly as a bird.
The schoolboy’s eye sparkled as the contents of the basket were emptied upon the bed. He snatched up the most substantial of the cakes and set to work upon it with ravenous eagerness.