“You must not cry, Nello; for one thing you are too big to cry; or if you are not too big you are too old. You are eight—past! and then the old gentleman downstairs is such a funny, funny old man, that he will eat us, Nello, if we make a noise.”
“I don’t believe you,” said the little boy, whom England had much improved in strength. “Old men do not eat children,” but he drew back a little, and stopped crying all the same.
“We do not know no-ting about old men in England,” said Lilias—the th was still a difficulty to her; and they both pronounced their rs in a way which was unfamiliar to English ears, though the letter exists and retains its natural sound in the north country. “They are very very strange; they sit in a chair all day, like the wild beasts. I go to the door and peep in. He has no cap on his head like Don Pepé, but a bare place here, where the cap should be, and white hair. And he never moves nor speaks. Sometimes I think he will be cut out of wood; and then all at once he rises up,—and me, I run away.”
“Are you not afraid, Lilias? I should be frightened,” said the little boy, looking at her with large wondering eyes.
“That is because you are only eight, but I am twelve, and one is never frightened after twelve. I run away, and it makes me beat and thump here,” Lilias put her hand to her heart to indicate the place, “and I like it.”
“Yes,” said the little brother, “when you run it makes that beat; but I do not like it.”
“Ah, you are a baby,” said Lilias. She stood with her dark hair shaken back, and her eyes shining, an image of visionary daring. Nothing could be more unlike than these two children. The boy had all the features of his race, blue eyes, fair hair, with a touch of gold in it, a fair complexion, browned and reddened, indeed, with his long journey and the warm sun he had been used to, but already changing into the pink and white of English childhood. But there were none of the Musgrave features in Lilias. Her dark eyes, dancing with life and energy, her warm colour, clear brown with an underlying rose tint, and a downy bloomy surface which softened every outline, and her crisp, yet shining dark hair, all belonged, not only to a different species, but to a different type of race. The Musgraves were robust and strong, but their strength was not of this buoyant kind. The cloud of anxiety which had been about her on her first appearance, that mystery of doubt with which a little human creature regards the strange and novel, in whatever form, not knowing if harm or good may be coming, had floated away, and Lilias had already taken back her natural character. She was at home in the house, every room of it, though she knew that she was hidden and thrust into corners, on account of “the old gentleman downstairs.” This did not depress or trouble her, but felt like a joke, a mystification and masquerading such as is dear to childhood. She threw herself into the spirit of it with enjoyment, instead of brooding over it with melancholy consciousness, which was what Mary, forgetting childhood, as all grown people do, had feared.
The children were in the hall, which had now grown so familiar to them that they could not understand how they had ever feared it. It was one of those exceptional days which occur now and then in the winter before the turn of the year. The whole world was full of sunshine. There was not a cloud in the sky, and the great green hill in front of them rose up in dazzling clearness of relief, like a visible way of ascent into heaven. There was not a breath stirring; the trees, without a leaf upon them, printed themselves against the blue of the sky and the green of the hill, in minute perfection of branch and twig, like a photograph. The lake was as still and as blue as the sky—everything lay in the sunshine charmed and stilled, hanging motionless as it were between earth and heaven. The sense that it was mid-winter, the natural season of storms, seemed to have got into the air, which wondered over its own stillness, and into the skies, which excelled themselves in lightness and soft blueness, snatching this moment of delight with a fearful joy. Earth took that ecstasy as one who was well aware that she could not answer for the morrow. The great doorway of the hall stood wide open; it was after mid-day, and the sun streamed in, having got to the west so much earlier than in summer. Lilias and her little brother, children of the sun, were planted in the midst of it, enjoying it with unconscious exhilaration. Martuccia sat in the open doorway, basking in it, knitting; a tranquil, almost motionless figure, with that faculty of repose which is no doubt awarded to nurses in compensation for the endless calls upon their activity. She had put a little tartan shawl—congenial garment—upon her fine shoulders, and, with her silver pins and glowing black hair all whitened by the sunshine, sat perfectly motionless except for the little rustle of her hands and click of her knitting-needles. It seemed immaterial whether it might be years or moments that the robust and comely watcher should hold that peaceful guardian place. She was paying no attention to the children, yet the lightest appeal, a querulous exclamation, a longer pause than usual, anything or nothing, would have brought her to her nurselings. It was the repose of the mother, who sees everything and feels everything, even when she does not see: and the additional security which her presence brought to them, though she sat apart and had nothing to do with their talk or their play, the strong support of the background which she made, it would be hard to tell in words. They had been playing in the spacious place, all lighted and warmed through and through with sunshine. Miss Musgrave had not yet made her appearance; either she had less time to spend in her favourite resort, or the fact that it had been appropriated to the children, as specially suitable in its size and separateness for their enjoyment, had made her relinquish its use. The great bay window in the recess gave back a reflected light from the shining of the lake, which added a colder tone to the prevailing brightness; and in the old fireplace there burned a smouldering fire, half coals half wood. Every feature of the place had grown familiar to the two little things who were once so alarmed by its dark corners—so familiar that they could not understand how they had ever been afraid. The kind old spacious silent hall sheltered them with a large passive protection not unlike that of Martuccia herself.
But the afternoon languor had stolen upon the boy and girl, notwithstanding the brightness. They, had come to a pause in their round of amusement, and though half-tired, were yet looking about with all their quick senses for some new delight. A little scuffle, a little quarrel and crying fit on Nello’s part, which had been put a stop to by the warning of Lilias already recorded, had left them free for a new start, but not with the old plays, which were worn out for the moment. They made an unconscious pause, and looked about them to find some novelty; and both pounced upon one at the same moment with a burst of sudden and unlooked-for rapture. A great broad sheet of something white lay stretched out on Mary’s table, in company with an open colour-box and brushes—a sight too tempting to be resisted by any child, especially after the exhaustion of a long day’s play. It was wonderful that they had overlooked it so long. They caught sight of it simultaneously now, and the result was a sudden rush of eager curiosity. The boy got first to the goal; perhaps he had been by a second of time the first to start. He grasped one side of the white sheet with his hot little hand, and climbing into the chair which stood before it, threw himself upon the new wonder. “It is Mary’s,” said Lilias, making a feeble effort to hold him back; but her own curiosity was much stronger than her sense of duty to Mary, who allowed them to see everything and share everything she had. They both leant over the table breathless, the mysterious whiteness crackling beneath their hands. It was a sheet of dazzling white vellum, ornamented with what they considered beautiful pictures, a puzzling, yet a tempting sight to the children. It was nothing less than a genealogical tree, their own pedigree, which Miss Musgrave, skilled in such works, was preparing for her father, ornamented with emblazoned coats of arms, some of them unfinished and inviting completion with a seductive force which made the children’s hearts beat.
“What is it?” said Nello, in a tone of awe.