The fair lady, who had been watching him with amusement, soon told him that he might now go in to her royal highness, but only for a few moments, as this was her morning for receiving the poor, and as she had many to talk with her she was very tired.
Nono saw nothing of the room into which he was now admitted, nothing but the tall, slender, stooping figure that came forward to meet him. The painters have liked to give the angels golden hair, but this was to Nono a black-haired angel. Smooth, dark, glossy bands framed in the high, full forehead, while the delicate chin made a corresponding point below. The large brown eyes were full of loving light, and the thin mouth smiled a welcome before the lips had spoken it.
"What have you to say to me, my boy?" said the princess. A weary look quickly clouded her face, and she sank suddenly into an easy-chair, saying, "I have had many visitors to-day, so you must say quickly and plainly what you have to tell me."
"Perhaps I had better come another day," said Nono. It grieved him to see his princess look so weak and worn. Recollecting himself, he added, "But I don't see how I could, for I have come just for this a long way—from near Aneholm Church."
"Aneholm Church!" exclaimed the princess, brightening. "I once had a dear friend who lived in that neighbourhood. What do you want to tell me?"
It was hard for Nono to make his story short. He must go back to the bear, and how he came to the cottage, or the princess would not understand why he loved Karin and little Decima so, and why he felt he must help them. The princess must hear, too, about the accident, and how it was almost his fault, because he had insisted on having Decima out with the boys.
The princess soon forgot her weariness. This was no common beggar, with sycophant whine and forced civility. Nono spoke freely, frankly, and trustfully. She was some one good and powerful, who, he was sure, would gladly help him. His dark eyes looked into hers as he stood before her, while his words sprang from his heart, and his hands and his whole figure helped to illustrate his story. When he came to little Decima, the sister whom the brothers loved and took care of, who played with the boys, and was the pet and darling of all, the whole face of the listener was aglow.
"I was just such a little sister!" exclaimed the princess. "I never played with a doll in my life. I was the special pet with one of my brothers, who loved me very dearly. We romped and we painted, and we made clay figures together. I know what a brother can be!" and the tears for a moment filled her eyes. She dashed them away, and told Nono to go on with his story.
Nono wanted to say that he had seen a beautiful thing the princess had made, and that was one reason why he felt so acquainted with her, but he wisely kept to Decima and what he wanted for her.
When the princess heard of Decima's misfortune, and of the big room where all the family lived, the boys always leaving the door open to blow on the little patient, her heart was quite melted, as it had been many times before, as she compared her own comfort with the surroundings of the sick poor. She herself had been long an invalid, and often for months a prisoner in her beautiful rooms. She put out her arm towards Nono, who had drawn near to her in his eagerness, and was now close at her side. Affectionately her white slender hand was laid on the boy's, as she said,—