I walked straight up to Campbell and said, as loudly as I could:—
“I have hanged that doll you gave me, and I’ve pitched the other things into the creek. You’re a swindler and a scoundrel, and I hate you.”
There was a great commotion, but I gave no heed to that or anything else. Before anybody could think of what was best to be done, I turned about and marched out of the room with all the dignity I could muster.
I am not sorry or ashamed over these things, Dorothy. I think I was right, and I am glad I did as I did. But that was the beginning of trouble for me.
Chapter the Fifth
WE were living then in Campbell’s big house, in some Western city. It was a very fine and costly place, I reckon. A little bedroom had been furnished for me, opening off the suite of rooms that Campbell and my mother were to occupy. If it had been in anybody’s house but Campbell’s, I should have loved that beautiful bedroom. As it was, I hated it with all my soul. My grandmother and I had gone to the house on the day before my mother’s return, and that night—the night before they came back—I was put to bed in my room. I lay there with my eyes wide open till I knew that everybody else in the house was asleep. Then I slipped out of bed, crept downstairs, and out over the wet grass to a kennel that had been assigned to my own big Saint Bernard dog, Prince. I crept in, and slept beside the big, shaggy fellow till morning, when a great outcry was raised because I was missing from my room.
All the servants said my behaviour was due to my loneliness in the great house. That wasn’t so. I was never lonely in my life, because whenever I began to feel lonely I always called the fairy people to me, and they were glad to come. I had created them in my own fancy, and they loved me very much. But I wouldn’t invite them into that room or that house. So I went to Prince, as my only other friend.
But after my outbreak in the drawing-room, a servant was directed to take me to my room and lock me in. I sat there in the window-seat for a long time, wondering what would be done to me next, and wondering how I was to escape from my prison; for I fully intended to escape, even if I should find no other way than by leaping out of my second-story window.
After a while, the door was opened and Campbell came in. I could see that he was very angry, and I was particularly glad of that, because it showed me that my words had hurt his feelings very much. That was what I intended.