Chapter XVII: Sarah's Opportunity

A few days later they made the move to the little house at Fulham, which, in poor lavish Mrs. Stubbs's eyes, was but a degree better than a removal to the workhouse.

But Sarah--who somehow seemed to have naturally the management of everything--worked like a slave to get everything into good order before her aunt should set foot in the place at all. She turned the house in Jesamond Road out that she might take the prettiest and most suitable things for the little Queen Anne box to which they were going, and, with the help of Johnnie and the new servant, succeeded in having everything in perfect order by the time of Mrs. Stubbs's arrival.

But it was very, very small. Mrs. Stubbs looked hopelessly at the narrow passage and the narrower doorways when she entered, sobbed as she recognised one article of furniture after another, or missed such as Sarah had not thought it wise or in good taste to bring.

"Oh, dear, dear! I ought to think it all very pretty and nice," she wailed; "I left it all to you, Sarah, and I know you've done your best--I know it; but I _did_ think I should have been able to keep my own inlaid market writing-table that Stubbs gave me on my last wedding-day--I did."

"Dear Auntie, you shall have it," Sarah explained, soothingly. "I couldn't get you to choose just what you would have, and I had to be guided by size a good deal. But we can fetch the table easily enough; it will stand here in the window beautifully, and just finish off the room nicely."

"Flossie says she'll not be able to come and see us very often." Mrs. Stubbs wandered off again. "She says it knocks the carriage about so, coming down these new neighbourhoods. Ah, _I_ never used to think of my carriages before my relations, never!"

"Flossie will have more sense by-and-by," said Sarah, who had but small patience with Mrs. Jones's airs and graces.

Poor Sarah was so tired of Flossie and her airs! To her mind, she was hardly worth a moment's consideration or regret; to her she was just an ungenerous, self-sufficient, very vulgar and heartless young person, who would have been more in her place had she been scrubbing floors or washing dishes than she was, or ever would be, riding in her own carriage behind a pair of high-stepping horses that had cost four hundred guineas.

"Don't think about Flossie at all, dear," she said to her aunt. "Some day she'll be sorry for all that has happened lately; perhaps some day she may have trouble herself, and then she will understand how unkind she has been to you. But May is always sweet and good, though she is tied up by that horrid old man, and can't help you as she would like; and the little ones are different--they would never hurt your feelings willingly."

Poor Mrs. Stubbs shook her head sadly. She had said nothing to Sarah, for a wonder--for as a rule she carried all her troubles to her--but only that morning Tom had flung off to "his beastly office" in a rage, because she had not been able to give him a sovereign and had suggested that the pound a week he was receiving ought to be more than enough for his personal expenses; and Minnie had pouted and cried because she could not have a pair of new gloves; and the little ones had looked at her in utter dismay because there was not a fresh pot of jam for their breakfast. Perhaps Mrs. Stubbs felt that Sarah was young, and must not be disheartened when she was doing her best; I know not. Any way, she kept these things to herself, and after shaking her head as a sort of tribute to her troubles, promised that she would try to make herself happy in her new home.

And then Sarah felt herself at liberty to go and pay a visit to Signor Capri, her violin master, one she had been wishing to pay ever since her uncle's death. She went at a time when she knew he would be alone, and indeed she found him so.

"Ah, my little Sara!" he cried; "I was hoping to see you again soon. And tell me, you have lost the good uncle, eh?"

"Yes, Signor," she answered, and briefly told him all the story of her uncle's misfortune and death. "And now," she ended, "I want to make money. They have done everything for me; now I want to do something for them. Can you help me?"

"You are a brave child!" the violin-master cried; "and God has given you the rarest of all good gifts--a grateful heart. I think I can help you; I think so. Only this morning I had a letter from a friend who is arranging a concert tour; he has first-rate _artistes_, and he wants a lady violinist."

"Me!" cried Sarah excitedly.

"But," said the maestro, raising his hand, "he does not give much money."

"But it would be a beginning," she broke in.

"He gives six pounds a week."

"I'll go!" Sarah cried.

"Then we will go and see him at once; I have an hour to spare," said the Italian kindly.

Well, before that hour was ended, Sarah had engaged herself to go on a twelve weeks' tour, at a salary of six pounds a week and her travelling expenses; and before ten days more had gone over her head, she had set off on her travels in search of fame and fortune.

Flossie's remarks were very pious. "I'm sure, Sarah," she said, setting her rich folds of crape and silk straight, "I am heartily glad to find that you have so much good feeling as to wish to relieve poor Ma of the expense of keeping you. How much happier you will be to feel you are no longer a burden on anybody! There's nothing like independence. I'm sure every time I think of poor Ma, I say to myself, 'Thank Heaven, _I'm_ no burden upon her!"

"That must be a great comfort to you, I'm sure, Flossie," said Sarah gravely.

"Yes; I often tell Mr. Jones so. And what salary are you going to have, Sarah?"

"Enough to help my aunt a little," replied Sarah coldly.

"Well, really, I can't see why you need be so close about it," Flossie observed, "nor why you should want to help Ma. I'm sure she'll have enough to live very comfortably, only, of course, she must be content to live a little less extravagantly than she did before. I do believe," she added, with a superb air, "in people being content and happy with what they have; it's so much more sensible than always pining after what they haven't got. By the bye, Sarah, we are going to have a dinner-party to-morrow night; I couldn't ask Ma because of her mourning, but if you like to come in in the evening, and bring your violin, we shall be very pleased, I'm sure."

"If you like to ask me as a professional, and pay my fee," began Sarah mischievously.

"Pay your fee! Well, I never! To your own cousin, and when you owe us so much!" Flossie exclaimed.

"I don't think I owe _you_ anything, Flossie, not even civility or kindness," said Sarah coldly; but Mrs. Jones had flounced away in a huff.

"Such impudence!" as she said to her husband afterwards.

Well, Sarah went off on her tour, and won a fair amount of success--enough to make her manager anxious to secure her for the following winter on the same terms. But Sarah had promised Signor Capri to do nothing without his knowledge, and he wrote back, "Wait! Before next winter you may be famous."

But the months passed over, and still fame had not come, except in a moderate degree. The manager was very glad to take Sarah on tour again at a salary advanced to seven pounds a week instead of six, and Sarah was equally glad to go.

In the meantime, she had made a good deal of money by playing at private houses and at concerts. She had taken a well-earned holiday to the Channel Islands, and had given her aunt and the little ones a very good time there, all out of her own pocket, and had added a very liberal sum to the housekeeping purse of the little Queen Anne house at Fulham.

Twice she had dined with the Giaths in Palace Gardens, and had taken her violin because May had not asked her to do so. And more than once she had been asked to go in the evening to grace the rooms of Mrs. Jones--an honour which she persistently declined.

So time went on, and Sarah worked late and early, hoping, longing, praying to be one day a great woman.

Thus several years went by, and at last there came a glad and joyous day when she received a command to play at a State concert--a day when she woke to find herself looked upon as one of the first violinists of the age. It was wonderful, then, how engagements crowded in upon her; how she was sought out, flattered, and made much of; how even the redoubtable Flossie was proud to go about saying that she was Miss Gray's cousin.

Not that she ever owned it to Sarah; but Sarah heard from time to time that Mrs. Jones had spread the fact of the relationship abroad. The object of Flossie's life now seemed to be to get Sarah to play at her house; for, as she explained to her mother and May--now a rich young widow--"Of course it looks odd to other people that they never see Sarah at my house, and I don't wish to do Sarah harm by saying that I don't care to have her there. But sometimes when she's staying with you, May, you might bring her."

"I don't think she would come," laughed May. "You see, you sat upon Sarah so frightfully when she wasn't anybody in particular, that now, when she is somebody of more consequence than all the lot of us put together, she naturally doesn't feel inclined to have anything to do with you. I know I shouldn't."

"And Lady Bright asked particularly if she was going to play on the 9th," said Flossie, with a rueful face, and not attempting to deny the past in any way.

"And what did you say?"

"I said I hoped so."

"Oh, well, that will be all the same. Lady Bright will understand after a time that 'Hope deferred maketh the heart sick.'" May laughed. "And perhaps it will be as well to remember in future that ugly ducklings may turn out swans some day, and that if they do, they are sometimes painfully aware of the fact that some people would have kept them ducklings for ever. You see, you and Tom, who is more horrid now even than he was as a boy--yes, I see you agree with me--gave her the name of Princess Sarah! She has grown up to the name, that is all."

THE END

Miss Mignon

It was a week before Christmas. There were no visitors at Ferrers Court, although a couple of days later the great hall would be filled to overflowing with a happy, light-hearted set of people, all bent, as they always were at Ferrers Court, on enjoying themselves to the uttermost.

The weather was cold and cheerless, though not cold enough to stop the hunting, and Captain Ferrers had been absent all day, and might now come home at any moment. Mrs. Ferrers was, in fact, rather putting on the time, hoping he might return before Browne brought in the tea. The children meantime were clamouring loudly for a story.

"A story?" said Mrs. Ferrers doubtfully; she never thought herself very good at story-telling, and often wondered that the children seemed to like hearing her so much.

"Yes, a story," cried three or four fresh young voices in a breath.

"I'm afraid I've told you _all_ my stories," Mrs. Ferrers said apologetically. "And I have told them all so many times."

"Tell us about Mignon," cried Maud, for Mignon, their half-sister, was still their favourite heroine.

Mrs. Ferrers pondered for a moment. "I don't believe," she remarked, "that I have ever told you about Mignon being lost."

"Mignon--lost!" cried Maud. "Oh! never."

"Lost!" echoed Pearl. "And where was she lost, Mother?"

"Tell us," cried Bertie.

"Yes; do tell us," echoed Cecil.

"Tell us," cried Madge and Baby in the same breath.

So Mrs. Ferrers gathered her thoughts together and began.

"It was when Pearl was about four months old"--at which Pearl drew herself up and looked important, as if she, too, had had a share in the adventure--"we went to London for the season. That was in April. We had not the house we have now, for that was let for a term, so your father took a house near the top of Queen's Gate."

"That's where the memorial is," said Pearl. "I know."

"Yes; we know," echoed Maud.

"Well, Humphie, who had attended Mignon ever since she was a year old, had, of course, the entire care of Pearl, and I engaged a very nice French maid--half-maid, half-nurse--for Mignon. She was under Humphie, of course, but she had to take Mignon out--not very often, for she was accustomed to going out a great deal with your father--and to dress her, and so on.

"Well, one day your father and I were going to a large afternoon party where we couldn't very well take Mignon. We stayed rather late, rushed back and dressed and went to a dinner-party, not really having time to see the children at all. We had a party or two later on, but to them we never went, for just as we ladies were going through the hall on our way up into the drawing-room, I caught sight of Browne at the door of the inner hall. I turned aside at once.

"'Is anything the matter, Browne?' I asked. Indeed, I saw by his white face that something dreadful had happened.

"'Oh, yes, ma'am, something dreadful!' he answered. 'I scarcely know how to tell you. Miss Mignon is lost.'

"'Miss Mignon lost, Browne! What do you mean?' I said. 'How can she be lost?'

"'I only know she is,' he said, in a shaking voice. 'That silly idiot Hortense went out with her about three o'clock, with orders to go into the Park. She--this is her story, I cannot vouch for the truth of it, ma'am--she admits that she took her first to look at the shop-windows in the High Street, and that then she thought she would like to go into the Gardens, and that while there she fell asleep. The afternoon being so warm, she sat on a bench asleep till half-past five, and when she woke up with a start, feeling very shivery and cold--and serve her right, too!--Miss Mignon was gone; there was not a trace of her to be seen.'

"'If the silly creature had come straight home,' Browne went on, 'something might have been done; but instead of doing that, she must go into hysterics--with nobody to see her, even!--and then go crying about from one gate to the other, wandering about, as if Miss Mignon would be likely to be sitting on the edge of the pavement waiting for her. At last--I suppose when she began to get hungry'--Browne went on savagely, 'she bethought herself of coming home, and there she landed herself at nine o'clock, and has been steadily going out of one faint into another ever since. I have sent James round to the police station,' he said, 'but I thought I had better come straight away and fetch you, ma'am.'

"Well," Mrs. Ferrers went on, "I said good-night to our hostess and sent for your father, and we went back at once. We were five miles from home, and it was half-past eleven when we got there. And there was no trace of Mignon. James had taken a cab and gone round to all the police stations within reach of the house, and Humphie was waiting for us, shaking like a leaf and as white as death, and at the sight of us Hortense went off into wild hysterics again and shrieked till--till--I could have shaken her," Mrs. Ferrers ended severely.

"Well, your father and I just stood and looked at one another. 'Where can she be?' I said. 'Can't you get any information out of Hortense? Surely the woman must know where she was last with her.'

"But, as your father said, the Gardens were all deserted and closed hours ago. She was not at all likely to be there. Almost without doubt she had strayed out into the busy street, had then found herself in a strange neighbourhood, and--and I simply shuddered to think what might have happened to her after that.

"For the time we were helpless; we did not know, we could not think what to do next. A policeman came up from the nearest station as we stood considering what we should do. But he had no news; he shook his head at my eager inquiry. 'No, madam,' he said, 'I'm sorry we have no news of the little lady; but we telegraphed to all the stations near, but no lost child has been brought in. She must have fallen in with some private person.'

"As you may imagine," Mrs. Ferrers went on, "I felt dreadfully blank--indeed, your father and I simply stood and looked at one another. What should we, what could we do next? To go out and search about the streets at nearly midnight would be like looking for a needle in a truss of hay--we could not send a crier out with a bell--we were at our wits' end. Indeed, it seemed as if we could do nothing but wait till morning, when we might advertise.

"Then just as the policeman was turning away, another policeman came and knocked at the door. A little girl had been taken into the police station at Hammersmith, a pretty fair-haired child about six years old, who did not know where she lived, and could not make the men there understand who she was.

"'That's not Miss Mignon,' cried Humphie indignantly; 'Miss Mignon knows perfectly well who she is and who she belongs to. That's never Miss Mignon.'

"'Ah, well, Humphie,' said your father, 'Miss Mignon has never been lost at dead of night before; it's enough to frighten any child, and though she's as quick as a needle, she's only a baby after all.'

"The carriage was still at the door, and we went down as quickly as the horses could go to Hammersmith, feeling sure that we should find Mignon there, frightened and tired, but safe. And when we got there the child wasn't Mignon at all, but a little, commonly-dressed thing who didn't seem even to know what her name was. However, its mother came whilst we were there, and scolded her properly for what she called 'running away.'

"I couldn't help it," Mrs. Ferrers went on. "I was in such trouble, wondering what had got Mignon, and I just spoke to her straight. 'Oh,' I said, 'you ought only to be thankful your little girl is safe and sound, and not be scolding the poor little frightened thing like that. How can your speak to her so?'

"'Well,' she said, 'if you had seven of them always up to some mischief or other, and you'd been running about for hours till you were fit to drop, and you hadn't a carriage to take her home in, I daresay you'd feel a bit cross, too.'

"And I felt," Mrs. Ferrers went on reflectively, "that there was a great deal in what she said. They didn't live more than a mile off, and it was our way back, so we drove them home, and the little girl went to sleep on her mother's knee; and I told her what trouble we were in about Mignon. She was quite grateful for the lift, and I promised to let her know if we found Mignon all right.

"Well, we reached home again, and there wasn't a sign of Mignon anywhere. With every moment I got more and more uneasy, for Mignon was turned six years old, and was well used to going about and seeing strange people. I knew she wasn't a child to get nervous unduly, or be frightened of any one who offered to take care of her, only I was so afraid that the wrong sort of people might have got hold of her, and might have decoyed her away for the sake of her clothes or a reward.

"Oh, dear, what a dreadful night it was! Your father went out and got a cab and went round to all the police-stations, inquiring everywhere for traces of her. And then he went and knocked up all the park-keepers, but none of them had noticed her either.

"And Humphie and I sat up by the nursery fire; and about two in the morning, Hortense crept down and went on her knees to me, praying and imploring me to forgive her, and saying that if anything had happened to little missie, she would make away with herself."

"What's that?" asked Madge suddenly.

"Hanging herself," answered Pearl. "Judas hanged himself."

"Judas went out and hanged himself," corrected Maud, who had a passion for accuracy of small details.

"Yes, of course, but that doesn't matter," said Pearl. "The hanging was the principal thing. He could have hanged himself without going out, but going out without hanging himself would not have been anything."

"Go on, Mother," cried a chorus of voices. "What happened next?"

"Well, nothing happened for a long time," Mrs. Ferrers replied. "We all stayed up; I think nobody thought of going to bed that night at all--I know Humphie and I never did--and at last the morning broke, and your father and Browne began to make arrangements for putting notices in all the papers, and when they had written them all, they went off in the grey dim light to try to get them put into that day's papers. Oh! it was a most dreadful night, and a terrible morning.

"I didn't like to put it into words, but all night long I had thought of the Round Pond, and wondered if my Mignon was in there. I found out afterwards that your father had thought of it too, and had made all arrangements for having it dragged, though he wouldn't speak of it to me, because he fancied I had not thought of it.

"And over and over again Humphie kept saying, 'I'm sure my precious lamb knows perfectly well who she is and all about herself. I'm sure of it. Why, we taught her years ago, ma'am, in case it ever happened she got lost. "I'm Miss Mignon, and I belong to Booties," and "Captain Ferrers, the Scarlet Lancers." She knew it all, years since.'

"'Yes, but, Humphie, has any one taught her 304, Queen's Gate, S.W.?' I asked.

"'No,' said Humphie. 'I can't say that we have.'

"'Then she might fall in with hundreds and thousands of people in London who wouldn't know Captain Ferrers from Captain Jones; and she might be too frightened to remember anything about the Scarlet Lancers. It isn't as if we were with the regiment still.'

"The morning wore on; nothing happened. Your father went to Scotland Yard, and detectives came down and examined Hortense, who went off into fresh hysterics, and threatened to go right away and drown herself there and then; but there was no news of Mignon. And then Algy came in and told me they had dragged the pond, and, thank God, she wasn't there; though the suspense was almost unbearable as it was.

"But we seemed no nearer to hearing anything of her, and hardly knew what to be doing next, though the day was wearing away, and it was horrible to think of going through such another night as the one we had just passed.

"And then--just at four o'clock--a handsome carriage drew up at the door, and I heard Mignon's voice: 'Yes, I'm sure that's the house,' she said.

"Oh! I don't know how I got to the door; I think I tore it open, and ran down the steps to meet her. I don't remember what I said--I think I cried. I'm sure your father nearly choked himself in trying to keep his sobs back. We nearly smothered Mignon with kisses, and it was ever so long before we had time to take any notice of the strange lady who had brought her home.

"'I'm afraid you've had a terrible night,' she said, with tears in her eyes. 'I found your dear little maid wandering about in South Kensington--oh! right down in Onslow Gardens. I saw that she was not a child accustomed to being out alone, and I asked her how it was. She was perfectly cool and unconcerned.

"'"I've lost my maid," she said. "She sat down on a seat, and I was picking daisies, and I don't know how, but I couldn't find her again."

"'"And what is your name?" I asked her.

"'"Oh! I'm Miss Mignon," she answered.

"'"And where do you live?" I inquired.

"'"Well, that's just what I can't remember. When I'm at home I live at Ferrers Court, and when we were with the regiment, our address was, "The Scarlet Lancers"--just that. But now we are in Town, I _can't_ remember the name of the street. I thought when I lost Hortense that I should know my way back, but I missed it somehow. And Mother will be so uneasy," she ended.

"'Well,' said the lady, 'I told her she had much better come home with me, and that I would try to find out Captain Ferrers; and so I did, but without success. Then it occurred to me that as soon as the offices were open I would telegraph to the Scarlet Lancers, asking for Captain Ferrers' address. And so I did; and when the answer came back, it was your country address--

"CAPTAIN FERRERS, _Ferrers Court,_
_Farlington, Blankshire._"

"'So I had no choice but to telegraph to Ferrers Court for your town address. And oh, dear lady! my heart was aching for you all the time, for I knew you must be suffering agonies," she ended, holding out her hands to me.

"And so, of course, I had been," Mrs. Ferrers went on; "but 'all's well that ends well'; and we at once taught Mignon the name of the house she lived in, and, indeed, for a long time we sewed a little ticket on to the hem of her frock, so that if she did forget it, she would easily make some one understand where she wished to be taken."

"And Hortense--what did you do with her?" Pearl asked.

"Oh! we gave her a month's wages, and sent her away," Mrs. Ferrers answered; "and now here is Browne with the tea, Pearl. Can you manage it?"

"Oh! yes, Mother," Pearl answered. She was nearly fourteen, and loved to make the tea now and then. "Oh! here's Miss Maitland coming! Miss Maitland, _I_ am to pour out the tea. Mother says so."

"Willingly, so long as you don't scald yourself," said Miss Maitland, smiling.

"And here is Father," cried Maud. "Bootles, Mother has been telling us the dreadful story of how Mignon was lost."

"Has she, sweetheart? Well, we don't want to go through that particular experience any more, do we, darling?"

"No! once was once too often," said Mrs. Ferrers, slipping her hand into his.

"Two lumps of sugar," said Pearl, bringing her father his cup.

"And muffins!" added Maud.

Boy's Love