The Palace in the Garden

I dare say you will think us too silly when I tell you that for about half a second we did think the princess had really stepped down out of the frame. It was so like her. There she stood, quite still, but smiling at us as if she had expected us. Her hair was dark – like Tib's and like the picture's – her eyes just the same as both of theirs; but she was far, far prettier than either! She was dressed in something white, and there was some pink about it, too; and though of course it wasn't really made the same way as the dress in the picture, it was like enough to give a confused feeling at the first of being the same. And she was standing a little in the same way, and a hat – a black hat with drooping feathers – was slung on her arm.

We three just stood and gaped, and stared as if our eyes would come out of our heads. And she stood, still smiling, but perfectly motionless.

Gerald was the first to come to his senses. He ran forward a little towards the end of the room where the portrait was – it was still there; it was only that one of the blinds had been drawn down so as to cast it into shade – and glancing up at the wall, he called out,

"It's still there – it isn't it. It's another princess."

And at his words a peal of laughter – not very loud, but such pretty clear laughter, I wish you could hear it! – rang through the room, and the new princess, the living, moving princess, came forward to us, holding out her hands.

"So you have come at last," she said; "I expected you this morning. I knew you heard me at the door yesterday, and I thought your curiosity would bring you early."

I didn't quite like her calling us "curious." It wasn't quite the right word to use for all our pretty fancies about the princess, and even about the mystery.

"We never can come in the morning," I said, "because of our lessons. And – it wasn't curiosity."

"Indeed!" she replied, a tiny little bit mockingly; "not curiosity. What shall I call it, then, your inquiring minds, eh?"

I felt my face get red, and I felt that Tib's was getting red too.

"I don't know who you are," I burst out, "and if you don't choose to tell us, I am not going to ask. That isn't curiosity. But I wish you hadn't come; you've spoilt it all. Our own princess," and I glanced up at the portrait, looking, I could not but confess, like a washed-out doll beside the brilliant living beauty of the girl beside us, "our own princess is much nicer than you. And if we had been so curious we might have tried to find out things in pokey ways. We've never done that."

I looked, I suppose ready to cry. The lady's face changed, and then I knew that while she had been talking in that half teasing way, something in her voice and smile had reminded me of grandpapa – of grandpapa, I mean, when he was in that sort of laughing-at-us way that we couldn't bear. Perhaps this had made us all feel more vexed at her than she really deserved us to be. But when her face changed, and a soft, sorry look came over it, she reminded me of more than any real face I had ever seen – she reminded me of all the prettiest and nicest fancies I had ever had; the sweet look in her eyes was so sweet, that I wished I might put my arms round her and kiss her. And Tib told me afterwards that she had felt exactly the same.

"I'm very sorry," she said, simply; "I didn't come here to hurt your feelings. Good fairies never do that, unless to very naughty children, whose feelings need to be hurt. And yours don't need to be hurt, for I know you're not naughty children – very far from it. Of course you wouldn't try to find out things in any way that wasn't nice, I know that. But wouldn't you like to know my name?"

"If you like to tell it," we said, smiling up at her.

"Or would you rather count me a sort of a fairy?" she went on.

"Are you one?" said Gerald, softly stroking the pretty soft stuff of which her dress was made.

"Perhaps," she said, smiling again. "I shouldn't wonder if you could decide that better than I can. Try to find out – think of some things I couldn't know unless I were a fairy."

"I know," said Gerald; "our names. You couldn't know them if you weren't a fairy, or – or if perhaps you knowed some fairies who had told you them," he added, getting a little muddled.

"If I had a fairy godmother, for instance, who had told me them," she said.

"Yes – that might be it," said Gerald.

"Well, then – dear me, I mustn't make any mistake, or my godmother would be very angry, after all her teaching," she said, pretending to look very trying-to-remember, like Gerald when he stops at "eight times nine," and screws up his mouth and knits his brows. "Well, to begin with, the eldest. This is Tib – but her real name is Mercedes Regina; this is Gustava; and this is Gerald Charles. And Gustava is generally called 'Gussie.' Now, have I said my lesson rightly?"

We all stared at her.

"You must be a fairy," said Gerald. But Tib and I felt too puzzled to say anything.

"What shall we call you?" I asked.

"Anything you like. I've got a lot of names. One of them, curious to say, is the same as the name scribbled on the portrait just above the name of the painter. Did you ever notice it?"

"Do you mean the same name as Tib's second one?" I asked; "Regina?"

The young lady nodded her head.

"That's very funny," we said. "That's the name in the book in London too."

"What book?" she asked, quickly.

I hesitated a moment. Then I thought as I had said so much it would be stupid not to explain. So I told her. She looked sad and thoughtful as she listened.

"It was scored out, you said?" she asked.

"Yes, with a thick black stroke, as if somebody had been very angry when they did it," I said. "If we hadn't known the name, from its being Tib's, I don't think we could ever have made it out."

"Ah," said the young lady, and it sounded like a sigh. But in a moment she smiled again.

"I didn't come here to make you sad," she said. "Won't you tell me about the games you play, and let me play with you. Perhaps my fairy godmother has taught me some that you don't know and that you would like to learn."

But we didn't feel quite ready for playing games yet. There were two or three things on our minds. The new princess saw that we looked uncertain.

"What is it?" she said. "You look as if you were afraid of me."

"No," said Tib, and "No," said I. "It isn't that, but there are some things we want to ask you."

"Ask them. I won't call you curious, I prom – "

But just that moment a bell rang – not loudly, but she heard it at once, and started up. She had been sitting on one of the old couches, with us all about her. "I must go," she said. "Come to-morrow and I will tell you all I can. Good-bye; good-bye till to-morrow," and in half an instant – I never saw any one move so quick – she had gone. We heard a key turn in the lock of the double door outside, and that was all!

We looked at each other again without speaking. Surely she must be a fairy of some kind, after all!

CHAPTER IX
OUR FAIRY

 
"A creature not too bright or good
For human nature's daily food."
 

Wordsworth.

t seemed a very long time to the next afternoon, and if Liddy hadn't been the most unnoticing old woman in the world, she would certainly have seen that there was something unusual in our heads. We could think of nothing but our new friend the fairy, or "the other princess," as Gerald would call her. Who could she be? where had she come from? how – and this, perhaps, was the thing we wondered most about – how in the world did she know all about us, or our names, even down to our pet names, any way?

Then another thought was in my mind and Tib's. Grandpapa had told us to make no friends with the neighbours. Would it be disobeying him to go to meet the young lady in the saloon and play with her, as she had asked us?

"Is she a neighbour?" said Tib. "We don't know – we don't know if she lives there, or where she lives, or anything."

"We must ask her," I said; "any way, we must go and see her again to ask her. We must go to see her once, and we will tell her what grandpapa said."

"I think she is a fairy, and that she lives in Fairyland; and grandpapa didn't say we weren't to speak to fairies," said Gerald.

"Oh! how I wish Mr. Truro was here; we could ask him about it," I said.

"And there's another thing," said Tib: "we almost promised Mr. Truro we wouldn't say anything about the palace and all that to grandpapa just now – not till they came again. It's rather a muddle altogether, don't you think, Gussie?"

"I dare say she – we must get a name for her, Tib – "

"We'd better just call her Regina," Tib said. "She said it was her name."

"Well, I dare say Regina will tell us what she thinks we should do. Any way, as you say, we must go to see her once to tell her about it. I wonder what the bell was that rang, and made her rush off in such a hurry. That part of it was really very like a fairy story."

"If only she had left a slipper behind her, it would have been a little like Cinderella," I said; "though the deserted, quiet rooms, and that part of it, is more like the Sleeping Beauty."

"And the first day, when we were trying to get in at the door in the wall, was like one of the stories of dwarfs and gnomes in the woods, wasn't it?" said Tib. "We've really had a good many adventures at Rosebuds."

This conversation took place the morning after we had first seen Regina. We were in the schoolroom, waiting for Mr. Markham. It was a little past his usual time when he came in.

"I'm a little late, I fear," he said. "I had to go to the Rectory to settle about giving some holiday lessons to one of the boys there. It will be Whit-week holidays soon, you know."

We didn't care very much; Whit-week would make no difference to us. Indeed, Christmas itself we didn't look forward to in those days, as most children do. It brought no happy family meetings, no Christmas-trees, or merry blind-man's buff and snap-dragon to us. But we knew too little about these things in other homes to think about what we missed, and grandpapa always gave us a pound each to spend as we chose. And at Ansdell, the Christmases we happened to be there, the servants had a party, and we used to watch them from the gallery that runs round the big hall. But Whit-week we cared nothing about.

"We're not to have holidays, then, are we?" I asked.

"Oh, no; Mr. Ansdell has said nothing about it," Mr. Markham replied. "By the by, Miss Gussie, you don't know when he will be coming down again, do you?"

"No," I said. "It won't be next Saturday, and perhaps not the Saturday after."

"Ah well! I can write to him. I thought perhaps he would say something for me to the rector – you don't know the family at the Rectory, I think?"

"No," said Tib.

"It is curious," said Mr. Markham – he was rather talkative this morning; perhaps it had put him into an extra good humour to have the hope of some more pupils – "it is curious – I saw a young lady there this morning that I could really have thought was an elder sister of Miss Tib's – she was so very like her."

We were all ears and attention now.

"So like Tib?" said Gerald and I.

"So like me?" said Tib.

"Yes," repeated Mr. Markham, "exceedingly like."

He didn't add, as I have done, "only a great deal prettier." Perhaps it is because Tib is my own sister, and I'm always seeing her and know her face so well, that I don't think her as pretty as other people do – or rather, I don't think about it. When you love people dearly you don't think about whether they're pretty or not – even now with Reg – Oh! I am too stupid again.

"It is very funny," we said, in which Mr. Markham agreed. He was thinking, of course, that the likeness was curious; we were thinking of far more than that – of how strange it would be if our mysterious lady was staying at the Rectory. If so, how did she get into the saloon? – how did she know our names? – how did she know that we went there to play?

"Yes, I should like you to see it for yourselves. But you don't know the family there?"

"No," repeated Tib, rather sharply, "we don't. Grandpapa doesn't wish us to make any friends here."

"Oh, exactly – I beg your pardon," said poor Mr. Markham. Probably grandpapa had said something about it to our tutor himself, which for the moment he had forgotten, for he got rather red, poor young man, and began rather hurriedly to get the books ready. "We mustn't waste any more time," he said, and, as we were sorry to see him looking uncomfortable, we didn't remind him, as we might have done, that it was he, and not we, who had begun the conversation.

It was a little later than usual when we got out that afternoon. Nurse had kept us to try on some new frocks she was making for us, and we were very cross about it, I remember. But after all, it didn't matter. When we found ourselves at last in the saloon, and looked round eagerly, there was no one to greet us, but the smiling face of the portrait – the same which we had before thought so lovely, but which now seemed uninteresting and disappointing compared to the living, changing, half-mischievous, half-tender face, which already I really believe we had learnt to love.

"She'll be coming soon, I dare say," said Tib. "Let's sit down quietly, and think of all we want to ask her, in case she makes off in a hurry like yesterday," and we were turning towards the end of the room where stood all the old chairs and couches, when something on one of the marble consols caught our eyes. It was something lightly covered with a sheet of white tissue-paper, and lifting it up, there were three little nosegays of lovely flowers – delicate, brilliant hot-house flowers they were, and each nosegay lay on a book, and a card with writing on it was put so that it could be seen at once on the middle nosegay. The words on the card were these: —

"For Tib, Gussie, and Gerald. I am so sorry I cannot come to-day. The books are to amuse you instead, and I will come again the first day I can.

"R."

We were very disappointed. Still, it was very nice and funny to receive messages and presents in this mysterious way. The flowers were really beautiful, and the books were chosen as if she had known us all our lives. We knew at once which was for which, by the way they were lying on the table. Gerald's was about animals – stories, I mean – and Tib's was Lamb's Tales from Shakespeare, and mine was The Wonder Book.

We sat down and looked at our books, and scented our flowers – don't you think it's very ugly to talk of smelling flowers? we always say "scenting," though somebody laughs at us for it, and says it isn't the proper meaning of the word – and then we all three made ourselves very comfortable in different corners of the arm-chairs and couches, and read our new stories. And thus we spent the afternoon. It wasn't as long a one as usual, for we had come so late. But before we went away we got into a great puzzle about how to thank her for the books and flowers.

"It would be rude to go away and leave no message," said Tib. "And she doesn't say she'll come to-morrow, only 'The first day I can.' Perhaps she'll come in the morning, and look to see if we've taken the books."

But not one of us had a pencil or a scrap of paper in our pockets, though we turned them inside out. Gerald had a top and some nails, and an awful little pink and white grimy ball that he called his "handkercher"; and Tib had her garden gloves, and a rather clean handkerchief, and some red wool with a crochet needle stuck in it, as she was learning to crochet; and I had nothing at all. What was to be done?

"I know," I said; "you don't mind using your wool, do you, Tib? Well, look here, we'll write with it on the white marble," and I set to work, and very soon I had written the words, "Thank you, kind fairy," to which Gerald made me add, "Come soon," and our initials, "T" and two "G's." It really looked quite pretty, and one comfort was, there was no fear of any one spoiling it before Regina saw it.

And then we went home, but we left our new books in the conservatory, because we shouldn't have known what to say if nurse had asked us about them.

The next day, to our great vexation, something prevented our going at all – I forget what it was – oh no! I remember. It was that nurse took us to the little town where Mr. Markham came from, to get us spring hats. She had got grandpapa's leave to take us when he was at Rosebuds, and she hadn't told us – poor old Liddy! – because she thought it would be such a delightful surprise.

It would have been a great treat if we hadn't had our heads so full of Regina, and wanting to see her again. But we were not so unkind and selfish as not to look pleased when nurse told us about it.

"How are we to go to the station?" I asked, for nurse had said it was two stations off by train, and when she said we should walk to the station – it was quite fine, and if it hadn't been fine we would have had to wait for another day – we were very pleased.

"We can peep in at the Rectory garden as we pass," I said to Tib, "and perhaps we'll see the lady that's like you, whoever she is. I wonder if she is Regina?"

"So do I," said Tib; "I wonder about it altogether."

But though we stared in with all our eyes at the garden of the pretty house next the church, on our way to the station, there was nobody to be seen.

"That is the Rectory, isn't it, nurse?" Tib asked her.

"I suppose so, my dears," she replied, rather nervously. "But I couldn't say for certain, having been so little in the village."

She was always in such a fright, for fear of getting to know any one or anything in the village. It was rather stupid of her to show it so, for it only put all grandpapa's funny ways about it more into our heads, but we didn't like to tease her, so we said no more.

But on the way home we took another peep in at the Rectory gates. Nurse was a little way behind, loaded with parcels which she wouldn't let us help her to carry; and we ran on a little. It was easy to peep in without being seen, but what we saw added to our puzzle. A lady was walking up and down the avenue with a book in her hand which she was reading, and as she turned our way, we saw her face clearly.

"Tib," I whispered, "she's like you, and she's like Regina, too – only she's old. And, Tib, she's like grandpapa."

So she was. She had the same straight-up, rather proud way of holding herself as he has, dark hair, which was beginning to get grey, and those pretty blue eyes with the bright eager look which all the blue eyes among us have – yes, she was like them all– the portrait, too. And just as we were staring, there came a call from the house, and an old, quite old, lady came to a glass door which opened on to the terrace. I knew afterwards that this old lady was the clergyman's mother or his wife's mother, who lived with them, and they have all lived there a very long time.

"Regina, Queenie, my dear," the old lady called out, "tea is ready. Frances wants you to come in."

The lady turned quickly.

"I'm coming, Mrs. Leslie," she said, and then she walked quickly to the house.

"Regina, another Regina!" we exclaimed. "And Queenie: what a pretty name for a pet name! I wonder our Regina didn't tell us to call her 'Queenie.'"

For of course, as we had learned a little Latin, we knew that Regina meant "queen."

"We must ask her why she didn't," said Gerald.

You can fancy how we looked forward to the next afternoon, and how we hoped our pretty lady would be there.

It all went right for once. Nurse was more busy than usual about all the things she had bought for us at Welford, and very glad to get rid of us as soon as we had had our dinner. For, happily, she had no trying-on to do to-day.

"You may have a good long afternoon in the garden," she said. "I must say you're wonderful good children for amusing yourselves. There's never any tease-teasing, like with some I've known – 'What shall we do, nurse?' or, 'We've nothing to play at.' And you're getting very good, too, about never getting into mischief. You're much better, Miss Gussie, than you were last year at Ansdell: for it was you as was the ringleader."

"Yes," said I, not very much ashamed of the distinction. "Do you remember the day I took grandpapa's new railway rug to make a carpet to our tent, and left it out all night, and it rained and all the colour ran? And do you remember when I pushed Gerald into the pond to catch the little fishes, and how he stood shivering and crying?"

"Ah, yes, indeed," said nurse. "But speaking of ponds – the one at Ansdell was nothing; but those nasty pits or pools in the fields near by: you never go near them? Your grandpapa has a real fear of them, and he told me not to let you forget what he'd said."

"No fear," we all answered, "we never go near them. We promised him we wouldn't, nurse."

Then off we ran.

"Even if she isn't there, she's sure to have left some message for us, like the last time," said Gerald as we ran. "I wish she'd bring us some butter-scotch."

"Gerald!" exclaimed Tib and I, "what sort of ideas have you? Fairies and butter-scotch mixed in the same breath. I only hope," Tib went on, "that she won't think we're ungrateful for the books, or that we don't care for them, because we had to leave them in the conservatory."

"If only she's there, we can explain everything," said I.

And she was there.

Not waiting in the saloon this time, but running down the long passage to meet us as soon as she heard our steps, looking prettier, and merrier, and sweeter than ever. Dear Regina!

I have never minded her teasing since that first day, when I really didn't understand her. I shall never mind it again, I am sure.

She led us into the big drawing-room, where she had prepared another little surprise for us. She was as pleased about it as we were ourselves. It was more of Gerald's kind of treat this time – not butter-scotch, but fruit – grapes, and beautiful little Tangiers oranges, and little cakes and biscuits of ever so many kinds. They were so nice, and we ate such a lot of them, and Regina ate a good many herself.

"You see, though I am a fairy, I like nice things," she said.

"Do you have afternoon luncheon every day?" asked Gerald. "Oh, how I would like to be you."

"Isn't he a greedy boy?" I said; and then I told her about the butter-scotch, and somehow the butter-scotch led to our talking of grandpapa – you remember about Gerald wishing he'd bring us some – and then we all got rather grave, for we had a great deal to tell our new princess, and to ask her.

We sat together in a little group on one of the arm-chairs, and Regina listened to us very attentively. We told her all that grandpapa had said to us before we came to Rosebuds, and all about the book in the library in London, and how we wanted to love grandpapa better, as Mrs. Munt had told us we should, but that it was rather difficult. We told her all we had told Mr. Truro, only more, for we had to tell her all about him as well. And then we asked her if she thought it was disobeying grandpapa for us to come to see her; and when we had told her all we could think of, we waited very anxiously to hear what she would say. Her face looked grave, though not exactly sad.

"Your friend – Mr. Truro – told you to wait till he came back again?" she said.

"Yes, but that was only about coming in here to play. We hadn't seen you then – and grandpapa told us not to make friends with any of the neighbours. Are you a neighbour? Do you live here?"

"No," said Regina. "I live far from here."

"And how can you come so often to see us, then?" we asked.

She smiled.

"Can't you fancy I come on a sunbeam, or a cloud, or on a broomstick if you like? Or if I had only thought of taking the picture away, you might really have thought I had come out of the frame! No children, I'm not going to tell you where I come from, or how I come, or anything. Then you can feel you're not hearing from me anything your grandfather would not wish you to hear, and when he and Mr. Truro come here again, you can tell them all – everything, and see what they say. You can bring Mr. Truro here to see me, if you like, and we'll talk it over. Now, as who knows how seldom we may see each other again, suppose we make the best use of our time. I've got some games to teach you – new games. Let us be as happy and merry as we can be while we are together."

And you cannot fancy what fun we had.

She kept us playing, and guessing tricks and riddles, and even singing little glees – she had such a pretty voice – so busily that we hadn't time to ask her any more questions, and indeed forgot to do so. So that when it grew late and we had to go home, and Regina kissed us and said good-bye, we knew as little about her, or where she had come from or was going to, as if she had really flown down to us from some fairy country invisible to mortal eyes.

"And will you come again soon?" we asked.

"Whenever I can, but that is all I can promise," she said, and then she disappeared behind the heavy doors, and we heard the key turn in the lock on the other side.

And we went home, wishing it were to-morrow.

"No, not to-morrow – she's sure not to come so soon again, but, all the same, we must come and see."