The Cuckoo Clock/Chapter 11
CHAPTER XI.
"CUCKOO, CUCKOO, GOOD-BYE!"
"Children, try to be good!
That is the end of all teaching;
Easily understood,
And very easy in preaching.
And if you find it hard,
Your efforts you need but double;
Nothing deserves reward
Unless it has given us trouble."
—When she forgot everything, and fell fast, fast asleep, to wake, of course, in her own little bed as usual!
"One of your tricks again, Mr. Cuckoo," she said to herself with a smile. "However, I don't mind. It was a short cut home, and it was very comfortable in the boat, and I certainly saw a great deal last night, and I'm very much obliged to you—particularly for making it all right with Phil about not coming to play with me to-day. Ah! that reminds me, I'm in disgrace. I wonder if Aunt Grizzel will really make me stay in my room all day. How tired I shall be, and what will Mr. Kneebreeches think! But it serves me right. I was very cross and rude."
There came a tap at the door. It was Dorcas with the hot water.
"Good morning, missie," she said gently, not feeling, to tell the truth, very sure as to what sort of a humour "missie" was likely to be found in this morning. "I hope you've slept well."
"Exceedingly well, thank you, Dorcas. I've had a delightful night," replied Griselda amiably, smiling to herself at the thought of what Dorcas would say if she knew where she had been, and what she had been doing since last she saw her.
"That's good news," said Dorcas in a tone of relief; "and I've good news for you, too, missie. At least, I hope you'll think it so. Your aunt has ordered the carriage for quite early this morning—so you see she really wants to please you, missie, ahout playing with little Master Phil; and if to-morrow's a fine day, we'll be sure to find some way of letting him know to come."
"Thank you, Dorcas. I hope it will be all right, and that Lady Lavander won't say anything against it. I dare say she won't. I feel ever so much happier this morning, Dorcas; and I'm very sorry I was so rude to Aunt Grizzel, for of course I know I should obey her."
"That's right, missie," said Dorcas approvingly.
"It seems to me, Dorcas," said Griselda dreamily, when, a few minutes later, she was standing by the window while the old servant brushed out her thick, wavy hair, "it seems to me, Dorcas, that it's all 'obeying orders' together. There's the sun now, just getting up, and the moon just going to bed—they are always obeying, aren't they? I wonder why it should be so hard for people—for children, at least."
"To be sure, missie, you do put it a way of your own," replied Dorcas, somewhat mystified; "but I see how you mean, I think, and it's quite true. And it is a hard lesson to learn."
"I want to learn it well, Dorcas," said Griselda, resolutely. "So will you please tell Aunt Grizzel that I'm very sorry about last night, and I'll do just as she likes about staying in my room or anything. But, if she would let me, I'd far rather go down and do my lessons as usual for Mr. Kneebreeches. I won't ask to go out in the garden; but I would like to please Aunt Grizzel by doing my lessons very well."
Dorcas was both delighted and astonished. Never had she known her little "missie" so altogether submissive and reasonable.
"I only hope the child's not going to be ill," she said to herself. But she proved a skilful ambassadress, notwithstanding her misgivings; and Griselda's imprisonment confined her only to the bounds of the house and terrace walk, instead of within the four walls of her own little room, as she had feared.
Lessons were very well done that day, and Mr. Kneebreeches' report was all that could be wished.
"I am particularly gratified," he remarked to Miss Grizzel, "by the intelligence and interest Miss Griselda displays with regard to the study of astronomy, which I have recently begun to give her some elementary instruction in. And, indeed, I have no fault to find with the way in which any of the young lady's tasks are performed."
"I am extremely glad to hear it," replied Miss Grizzel graciously, and the kiss with which she answered Griselda's request for forgiveness was a very hearty one.
And it was "all right" about Phil.
Lady Lavander knew all about him; his father and mother were friends of hers, for whom she had a great regard, and for some time she had been intending to ask the little boy to spend the day at Merrybrow Hall, to be introduced to her god-daughter Griselda. So, of course, as Lady Lavander knew all about him, there could be no objection to his playing in Miss Grizzel's garden!
And "to-morrow" turned out a fine day. So altogether you can imagine that Griselda felt very happy and light-hearted as she ran down the wood-path to meet her little friend, whose rosy face soon appeared among the bushes.
"What did you do yesterday, Phil?" asked Griselda. "Were you sorry not to come to play with me?"
"No," said Phil mysteriously, "I didn't mind. I was looking for the way to fairyland to show you, and I do believe I've found it. Oh, it is such a pretty way."
Griselda smiled.
"I'm afraid the way to fairyland isn't so easily found," she said. "But I'd like to hear about where you went. Was it far?"
"A good way," said Phil. "Won't you come with me? It's in the wood. I can show you quite well, and we can be back by tea-time."
"Very well," said Griselda; and off they set.
Whether it was the way to fairyland or not, it was not to be wondered at that little Phil thought so. He led Griselda right across the wood to a part where she had never been before. It was pretty rough work part of the way. The children had to fight with brambles and bushes, and here and there to creep through on hands and knees, and Griselda had to remind Phil several times of her promise to his nurse that his clothes should not be the worse for his playing with her, to prevent his scrambling through "anyhow" and having bits of his knickerbockers behind him.
But when at last they reached Phil's favourite spot all their troubles were forgotten. Oh, how pretty it was! It was a sort of tiny glade in the very middle of the wood—a little green nest enclosed all round by trees, and right through it the merry brook came rippling along as if rejoicing at getting out into the sunlight again for a while. And all the choicest and sweetest of the early summer flowers seemed to be collected here in greater variety and profusion than in any other part of the wood.
"Isn't it nice?" said Phil, as he nestled down beside Griselda on the soft, mossy grass. "It must have been a fairies' garden some time, I'm sure, and I shouldn't wonder if one of the doors into fairyland is hidden somewhere here, if only we could find it."
"If only!" said Griselda. "I don't think we shall find it, Phil; but, any way, this is a lovely place you've found, and I'd like to come here very often."
Then at Phil's suggestion they set to work to make themselves a house in the centre of this fairies' garden, as he called it. They managed it very much to their own satisfaction, by dragging some logs of wood and big stones from among the brushwood hard by, and filling the holes up with bracken and furze.
"And if the fairies do come here," said Phil, "they'll be very pleased to find a house all ready, won't they?"
Then they had to gather flowers to ornament the house inside, and dry leaves and twigs all ready for a fire in one corner. Altogether it was quite a business, I can assure you, and when it was finished they were very hot and very tired and rather dirty. Suddenly a thought struck Oriselda.
"Phil," she said, "it must be getting late."
"Past tea-time?" he said coolly.
"I dare say it is. Look how low down the sun has got. Come, Phil, we must be quick. Where is the place we came out of the wood at?"
"Here," said Phil, diving at a little opening among the bushes.
Griselda followed him. He had been a good guide hitherto, and she certainly could not have found her way alone. They scrambled on for some way, then the bushes suddenly seemed to grow less thick, and in a minute they came out upon a little path.
"Phil," said Griselda, '"'this isn't the way we came."
"Isn't it?" said Phil, looking about him. "Then we must have comed the wrong way."
"I'm afraid so," said Griselda, "and it seems to be so late already. I'm so sorry, for Aunt Grizzel will be vexed, and I did so want to please her. Will your nurse be vexed, Phil?"
"I don't care if she are," replied Phil valiantly.
"You shouldn't say that, Phil. You know we shouldn't have stayed so long playing."
"Nebber mind," said Phil. "If it was mother I would mind. Mother's so good, you don't know. And she never 'colds me, except when I am naughty—so I do mind."
"She wouldn't like you to be out so late, I'm sure," said Griselda in distress, "and it's most my fault, for I'm the biggest. Now, which way shall we go?"
They had followed the little path till it came to a point where two roads, rough cart-ruts only, met; or, rather, where the path ran across the road. Right, or left, or straight on, which should it be? Griselda stood still in perplexity. Already it was growing dusk; already the moon's soft light was beginning faintly to glimmer through the branches. Griselda looked up to the sky.
"To think," she said to herself—"to think that I should not know my way in a little bit of a wood like this—I that was up at the other side of the moon last night."
The remembrance put another thought into her mind.
"Cuckoo, cuckoo," she said softly, "couldn't you help us?"
Then she stood still and listened, holding Phil's cold little hands in her own.
She was not disappointed. Presently, in the distance, came the well-known cry, "cuckoo, cuckoo," so soft and far away, but yet so clear.
Phil clapped his hands.
"He's calling us," he cried joyfully. "He's going to show us the way. That's how he calls me always. Good cuckoo, we're coming;" and, pulling Griselda along, he darted down the road to the right—the direction from whence came the cry.
They had some way to go, for they had wandered far in a wrong direction, but the cuckoo never failed them. Whenever they were at a loss—whenever the path turned or divided, they heard his clear, sweet call; and, without the least misgiving, they followed it, till at last it brought them out upon the high-road, a stone's throw from Farmer Crouch's gate.
"I know the way now, good cuckoo," exclaimed Phil. "I can go home alone now, if your aunt will be vexed with you."
"No," said Griselda, "I must take you quite all the way home, Phil dear. I promised to take care of you, and if nurse scolds any one it must be me, not you."
There was a little bustle about the door of the farmhouse as the children wearily came up to it. Two or three men were standing together receiving directions from Mr. Crouch himself, and Phil's nurse was talking eagerly. Suddenly she caught sight of the truants.
"Here he is, Mr. Crouch!" she exclaimed. "No need now to send to look for him. Oh, Master Phil, how could you stay out so late? And to-night of all nights, just when your I forgot, I mustn't say. Come in to the parlour at once—and this little girl, who is she?"
"She isn't a little girl, she's a young lady," said Master Phil, putting on his lordly air, "and she's to come into the parlour and have some supper with me, and then some one must take her home to her auntie's house—that's what I say."
More to please Phil than from any wish for "supper," for she was really in a fidget to get home, Griselda let the little boy lead her into the parlour. But she was for a moment perfectly startled by the cry that broke from him when he opened the door and looked into the room. A lady was standing there, gazing out of the window, though in the quickly growing darkness she could hardly have distinguished the little figure she was watching for so anxiously.
The noise of the door opening made her look round.
"Phil," she cried, "my own little Phil; where have you been to? You didn't know I was waiting here for you, did you?"
"Mother, mother!" shouted Phil, darting into his mother's arms.
But Griselda drew back into the shadow of the doorway, and tears filled her eyes as for a minute or two she listened to the cooings and caressings of the mother and son.
Only for a minute, however. Then Phil called to her.
"Mother, mother," he cried again, "you must kiss Griselda, too! She's the little girl that is so kind, and plays with me; and she has no mother," he added in a lower tone.
The lady put her arm round Griselda, and kissed her, too. She did not seem surprised.
"I think I know about Griselda," she said very kindly, looking into her face with her gentle eyes, blue and clear like Phil's.
And then Griselda found courage to say how uneasy she was about the anxiety her aunts would be feeling, and a messenger was sent off at once to tell of her being safe at the farm.
But Griselda herself the kind lady would not let go till she had had some nice supper with Phil, and was both warmed and rested.
"And what were you about, children, to lose your way?" she asked presently.
"I took Griselda to see a place that I thought was the way to fairyland, and then we stayed to build a house for the fairies, in case they come, and then we came out at the wrong side, and it got dark," explained Phil.
"And was it the way to fairyland?" asked his mother, smiling.
Griselda shook her head as she replied—
"Phil doesn't understand yet," she said gently. "He isn't old enough. The way to the true fairyland is hard to find, and we must each find it for ourselves, mustn't we?"
She looked up in the lady's face as she spoke, and saw that she understood.
"Yes, dear child," she answered softly, and perhaps a very little sadly. "But Phil and you may help each other, and I perhaps may help you both."
Griselda slid her hand into the lady's. "You're not going to take Phil away, are you?" she whispered.
"No, I have come to stay here," she answered, "and Phil's father is coming too, soon. We are going to live at the White House—the house on the other side of the wood, on the way to Merrybrow. Are you glad, children?"
******
Griselda had a curious dream that night—merely a dream, nothing else. She dreamt that the cuckoo came once more; this time, he told her, to say "good-bye."
"For you will not need me now," he said. "I leave you in good hands, Griselda. You have friends now who will understand you—friends who will help you both to work and to play. Better friends than the mandarins, or the butterflies, or even than your faithful old cuckoo."
And when Griselda tried to speak to him, to thank him for his goodness, to beg him still sometimes to come to see her, he gently fluttered away. "Cuckoo, cuckoo, cuckoo," he warbled; but somehow the last "cuckoo" sounded like "good-bye."
In the morning, when Griselda awoke, her pillow was wet with tears. Thus many stories end. She was happy, very happy in the thought of her kind new friends; but there were tears for the one she felt she had said farewell to, even though he was only a cuckoo in a clock.
THE END.
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