Half-Past Bedtime

by Sir H. H. Bashford

"But I must come too," said Gwendolen. "I really must."

"And so must I," said Marian. "We must both come," and after a while they persuaded him to take them, and they set off again through the town. It was now so hot that it seemed as if the very earth must begin to melt and crumble away; and when they came to the house there were no signs of life—there was only that little window, dark and aching. For a moment they stood listening at the front door, and then they cautiously stepped inside; and there, in a lower room, asleep on the floor, they saw the big man with the fat face. Then they stole upstairs until they came to the little room under the roof to which the window belonged; and then, as they pushed the door open, the tears sprang to their eyes, and Lancelot swore a great oath.

For there they saw, tied to a staple in the wall, a little girl of about nine years old, ragged and scarred, with timid dark eyes and cheeks like a flower that has never seen the sun. Tied across her mouth was a dirty cloth, and when she first saw them she shrank away; but as Gwendolen went up to her with outstretched arms, her eyes widened in sheer astonishment. Then Lancelot stooped and cut the rope that bound her, and pulled away the cloth that was gagging her mouth; and then he jumped round just as the little girl's father came stumbling fiercely into the room.

Gwendolen heard him shouting something and using the word Pepita; and as she clasped the little girl in her arms she knew why it was that all these years the sorrowful picture seemed to have been calling to her. It was because the little girl's pain and longing for freedom had somehow stolen into the painter's brush. Then she saw Lancelot's fist shoot out like a bullet, and Pepita's father tumble to the floor; and then Lancelot shouted to them to hurry away, and picking up Pepita, he ran down the stairs. In less than a minute they were in the little track between the high garden walls; and in a few seconds more they were out in the street, and then a most strange and awful thing happened. For Marian stopped short and pointed with her finger.

"Why, what's the matter," she cried, "with the cathedral tower?"

They all stared at it, and saw it rock to and fro; and then Lancelot swung round toward the open country.

"Run for your lives," he said, and then, as they followed him, they felt the ground beneath them rise and fall. Then they heard a crash, and people shouting, and then all was still again, and they stopped running. Lancelot wiped his forehead.

"Well, now you know," he said, "what an earthquake's like. Lucky it wasn't a worse one."

And there was the cathedral tower still standing on its foundations, but when they looked for Pepita's house it had fallen down like a pack of cards, a fitting grave for Pepita's father. For they heard in the evening that he had been killed; and Pepita afterward told them how he had killed her mother, and how he had kept her for all those years tied to the wall in that dark upper room. As for Captain Jeremy, he was so rejoiced at seeing Marian and Gwendolen safe that he told Lancelot he would have forgiven him if he had brought fifty Pepitas on board. Lancelot was very pleased about that, because, in his heart of hearts, he knew that he ought never to have let them come with him. But, as he told Gwendolen, all was well that ended well, and he hoped that she would allow him to take care of Pepita.

Gwendolen wasn't quite sure at first, but when they arrived home her aunt and Mrs Robertson thought it a good idea. For Mrs Robertson had made up her mind to marry Lancelot, and Pepita was just the little girl, she said, that she had always wanted.