“It’s best as it is,” answered the gentleman in a low voice. “Many a one has sent her child to rest in a cradle there above, and they’ve been all the better for it.”
Cherry did not know what he was talking about, but if she had been afraid of the child she was even more afraid of the old woman.
And indeed in the next few days Aunt Prudence made the girl’s life very unhappy. The gentleman gave Cherry full charge of the child, and seemed very contented with her, but the old woman grumbled and scolded, and found fault with everything she did.
It was Cherry’s duty to bathe the child every morning, and after she had washed him she was obliged to anoint his eyes with a certain ointment that was kept in a silver box. “And be very careful,” said her master, sternly, “that you never touch the least particle of it to your own eyes, for if you do, misfortune will certainly come upon you.”
Cherry promised that she would not, but she felt very curious about this ointment. She was sure it must have some very wonderful properties, for always after she had rubbed the child’s eyes with it they looked stranger and brighter than ever, and she was sure he saw things that she could not see. Sometimes he would seem to join in games invisible to her, and sometimes he would suddenly leave her and run down a path to meet someone, though as far as she could see not a living soul was there. But if Cherry asked him any questions he would become quite silent, and look at her sideways in a strange way.
There were doors in the house that Cherry was forbidden to open, and she used to wonder and wonder what was behind them. Once she saw her master come out from one of the rooms beyond, but he shut the door quickly behind him, and she caught no glimpse of what was within.
However, she was very comfortable there—well-fed, well-clothed and well-paid, and she would have been quite happy if it had not been for Aunt Prudence. Instead of growing kinder to her as time went on, the old woman grew crosser and crosser. She was always scolding, and her tongue was so sharp that she often made Cherry weep bitterly, and wish she was at home again, or any place but there. Once when she was sobbing to herself in the garden, her master came to her. “Cherry,” he said, “I see that you and Aunt Prudence can never live in peace together, and I am going to send her away for a while, but if I do, you must promise to do nothing that might displease me.”
Cherry promised, and after that the old woman disappeared, and the girl did not know what had become of her.
Cherry was now very happy. Her master was never cross with her, and the child was very obedient, and if he did not ever laugh, neither did he ever weep. She helped her master in the garden very often, and when she had done very well he would sometimes kiss her and call her a good child and then she was happier than ever.
But one time he went away for a few days, and Cherry seemed quite alone in the house except for the child, for the other servants she had never seen. The little boy went out to play in the garden, and suddenly Cherry began to feel so curious as to what was back of the forbidden doors that it seemed as though she would die if she did not look. She tried to think of other things, and to remember how displeased her master would be if she opened the doors, but at last she could bear it no longer. She would just see what was behind one of them, and then she would look no further. But first she made sure that the little boy was still at play in the garden. He was sitting on the edge of a fountain, looking down into it, and suddenly he waved his hand and called out as though to something in the water.