Chapter VI: Carrots "all Right" Again

"When next the summer breeze comes by,
And waves the bush, the flower is dry."

_Walter Scott._

Floss crept upstairs to the dressing-room door. It was locked. Though the key was in the lock, she knew she must not turn it; and even had it been open she would not have dared to go in, after her father's forbidding it. But she thought she might venture to speak to Carrots, to comfort him a little, through the door. She was dreadfully afraid that he might feel frightened in there alone if it got dark before he was released, for sometimes he was afraid of the dark--he was such a little boy, remember.

Floss tapped at the door.

"Carrots," she said, "are you there?"

"Yes," said Carrots; "but you can't come in, Floss. Mott has locked me in."

"I know," said Floss; "what are you doing, Carrots? Are you very unhappy?"

"Not so very. I'm crying--I'm crying a great lot, Floss, but I don't think I'm so very unhappy--not now you've come to the door."

"Poor Carrots," said Floss, "I'll stay by the door, if you like. I'll just run down to the front door now and then, to see if mamma is coming, and then I'll come straight back to you."

"All right," said Carrots. Whenever he wanted to seem very brave, and rather a big boy, he used to say "all right," and just now he was trying very hard to be like a big boy.

There was silence for a minute or two... Then Carrots called out again.

"Floss," he said, "are you there?"

"Yes, dear," replied faithful Floss.

"I want just to tell you _one_ thing," he said. "Floss, I never did touch nurse's sovereigns. I never knowed she had any."

"It wasn't a sovereign; it was a _half_-sovereign," corrected Floss.

"I don't under'tand how it _could_ be a half-sovereign," said Carrots. "But I never touched nurse's drawer, nor nucken in it."

"Then where _did_ you find the half-sovereign?" began Floss, "and why--oh, Carrots," she broke off, "I do believe that's the front door bell. It'll be mamma coming. I must run down."

"All right," called out Carrots again. "Don't be long, Floss; but please tell mamma all about it. I _don't_ under'tand."

He gave a little sigh of perplexity, and lay down on the floor near the window, where the room was lightest, for the darkness was now beginning to creep in, and he felt very lonely.

Poor Mrs. Desart hardly knew what to think or say, when, almost before she had got into the house, she was seized upon by Maurice and Floss, each eager to tell their own story. _Carrots_ naughty, _Carrots_ in disgrace, was such an extraordinary idea!

"Nurse," she exclaimed, perceiving her at the end of the passage, whence she had been watching as anxiously as the children for her mistress's return, "nurse, what is the meaning of it all?"

"Indeed, ma'am," nurse was beginning, but she was interrupted. "Come in here, Lucy," said Captain Desart to his wife, opening the study door, "come in here before you go upstairs."

And Mrs. Desart did as he asked, but Floss again managed to creep in too, almost hidden in the folds of her mother's dress.

"I can't believe that Carrots is greedy, or cunning, or obstinate," said his mother, when she had heard all. "I cannot think that he understood what he was doing when he took the half-sovereign."

"But the hiding it," said Captain Desart, "the hiding it, and yet to my face persisting that he had never touched nurse's half-sovereign. I can't make the child out."

"He says he didn't know nurse had any sovereigns," put in Floss.

"Are you there again, you ubiquitous child?" said her father.

Floss looked rather frightened--such a long word as ubiquitous must surely mean something very naughty; but her father's voice was not angry, so she took courage.

"Does he know what a sovereign means?" said Mrs. Desart. "Perhaps there is some confusion in his mind which makes him seem obstinate when he isn't so really."

"He said he knew _I_ had sovereigns," said Floss, "and I couldn't think what he meant. Oh, mamma," she went on suddenly, "I do believe I know what he was thinking of. It was my kings and queens."

And before her father or mother could stop her, she had darted off to the nursery. In two minutes she was back again, holding out to her mother a round wooden box--the sort of box one often used to see with picture alphabets for little children, but instead of an alphabet, Floss's box contained a set of round cards, each about the size of the top of a wine-glass, with the heads of all the English kings and queens, from William the Conqueror down to Victoria!

"'Sovereigns of England,' mamma, you see," she exclaimed, pointing to the words on the lid, and quite out of breath with hurry and excitement, "and I very often call them my sovereigns; and of course Carrots didn't understand how there could be a _half_ one of them, nor how nurse could have any."

"It must be so," said Mrs. Desart to her husband; "the poor child really did _not_ understand."

"But still the taking the money at all, and hiding it?" said Captain Desart. "I don't see that it would be right not to punish him."

"He has been punished already--pretty severely for him, I fancy," said Floss's mother, with a rather sad smile. "You will leave him to me now, won't you, Frank?" she asked her husband. "I will go up and see him, and try to make him thoroughly understand. Give me the sovereigns, Floss dear, I'll take them with me."

Somewhat slowly, Carrots' mother made her way upstairs. She was tired and rather troubled. She did not believe that her poor little boy had really done wrong wilfully, but it seemed difficult to manage well among so many children; she was grieved also, at Maurice's hastiness and want of tender feeling, and she saw, too, how little fitted Carrots was to make his way in this rough-and-ready world.

"How would it be without me! My poor children," she thought with a sigh.

But a little hand was slipped into hers.

"Mamma, dear, I'm _so_ glad you thought of the sovereigns. I'm _sure_ Carrots didn't mean to be naughty. Mamma dear, though he _is_ so little, Carrots always means to be good; I don't think he could even be frightened into doing anything that he understood was naughty, though he is so easily frightened other ways."

"My good little Floss, my comforter," said her mother, patting Floss's hand, and then they together made their way to the dressing-room.

It was almost dark. The key was in the lock, and Mrs. Desart felt for it and turned it. But when she opened the door it was too dark in the room to distinguish anything.

"Carrots," she said, but there was no answer. "Where can he be?" she said rather anxiously. "Floss, run and get a light."

Floss ran off: she was back again in a minute, for she had met nurse on the stairs with a candle in her hand. But even with the light they could not all at once find Carrots, and though they called to him there was no answer.

"Can he have got out of the window?" Mrs. Desart was beginning to say, when Floss interrupted her.

"Here he is, mamma," she exclaimed. "Oh, poor little Carrots! mamma, nursie, do look."

There he was indeed--fast, fast asleep! Extra fast sleep, for his troubles and his tears had worn him out. He was lying in a corner of a large closet opening out of the dressing-room. In this closet Captain Desart hung up his coats and dressing-gowns, and doubtless Carrots had crept into it when the room began to get dark, feeling as if in the hanging garments there was some comfort and protection; and there he lay, looking so fair and innocent, prettier than when he was awake, for his cheeks had more colour, and his long eye-lashes, reddy-brown like his hair, showed clearly on his fair skin.

"Poor little fellow, how sweet he looks," said Mrs. Desart. "Nurse, lift him up and try to put him to bed without waking him. We must wait to disentangle the confusion in his mind till to-morrow morning."

And very tenderly nurse lifted him up and carried him off.

"My bonnie wee man," she murmured; for though it was many and many a day since she had seen her native land, and she had journeyed with her master and mistress to strange countries "far over the sea," she was apt when her feelings were stirred to fall back into her own childish tongue.

So no more was said to or about Carrots that evening; but Floss went to bed quite happy and satisfied that "mamma" would put it all right in the morning. I don't think Mott went to bed in so comfortable a mood; yet his mother had said nothing to him!

Cecil and Louise had, though. Cecil told him right out that he was a horrid tell-tale, and Louise said she only wished _he_ had red hair instead of Carrots; which expressions of feeling on the part of such very grown-up young ladies meant a good deal, for it was not often they troubled themselves much about nursery matters. Cecil, that is to say, for Louise, who was fair haired and soft and gentle, and played very nicely on the piano, was just a shadow of Cecil, and if Cecil had proposed that they should stay in bed all day and get up all night, would have thought it a very good idea!

And the next morning Mrs. Desart had a long talk with Carrots. It was all explained and made clear, and the difference between the two kinds of "sovereigns" shown to him. And he told his mother all--all, that is to say, except the "plan" for saving sugar and getting money instead, which had first put it into his head to keep the half-sovereign to get a new doll for Floss. He began to tell about the plan, but stopped when he remembered that it was Floss's secret as well as his own; and when he told his mother this, she said he was quite right not to tell without Floss's leave, and that as nurse knew about it, they might still keep it for their secret, if they liked, which Carrots was very glad to hear.

He told his mother about his thinking perhaps the fairies had brought the "sixpenny," and she explained to him that now-a-days, alas! that was hardly likely to be the case, though she seemed quite to understand his fancying it, and did not laugh at him at all. But she spoke very gravely to him, too, about _never_ taking anything that was not his; and after listening and thinking with all his might, Carrots said he thought he "kite under'tood."

"I am never, never to take nucken that I'm not sure is mine," he said slowly. "And if ever I'm not sure I'm to ask somebody, you, or nursie, or Floss--or _sometimes_, perhaps, Cecil. But I don't think I'd better ask Mott, for perhaps he wouldn't under'tand."

But Mott's mother took care that before the day was over Mott _should_ "under'tand" something of where and how he had been in fault; that there are sometimes ways of doing _right_ which turn it into "wrong;" and that want of pity and tenderness for the wrong _doer_ never, never can be right.