A Little Princess by Frances Hodgson Burnett (general ebook reader .txt) 📖

Dass, who stood near the door.

“Shall I give him to the Lascar?” she asked.

“How do you know he is a Lascar?” said the Indian gentleman, smiling a little.

“Oh, I know Lascars,” Sara said, handing over the reluctant monkey. “I was born in India.”

The Indian gentleman sat upright so suddenly, and with such a change of expression, that she was for a moment quite startled.

“You were born in India,” he exclaimed, “were you? Come here.” And he held out his hand.

Sara went to him and laid her hand in his, as he seemed to want to take it. She stood still, and her green-gray eyes met his wonderingly. Something seemed to be the matter with him.

“You live next door?” he demanded.

“Yes; I live at Miss Minchin’s seminary.”

“But you are not one of her pupils?”

A strange little smile hovered about Sara’s mouth. She hesitated a moment.

“I don’t think I know exactly WHAT I am,” she replied.

“Why not?”

“At first I was a pupil, and a parlor boarder; but now—”

“You were a pupil! What are you now?”

The queer little sad smile was on Sara’s lips again.

“I sleep in the attic, next to the scullery maid,” she said. “I run errands for the cook—I do anything she tells me; and I teach the little ones their lessons.”

“Question her, Carmichael,” said Mr. Carrisford, sinking back as if he had lost his strength. “Question her; I cannot.”

The big, kind father of the Large Family knew how to question little girls. Sara realized how much practice he had had when he spoke to her in his nice, encouraging voice.

“What do you mean by `At first,’ my child?” he inquired.

“When I was first taken there by my papa.”

“Where is your papa?”

“He died,” said Sara, very quietly. “He lost all his money and there was none left for me. There was no one to take care of me or to pay Miss Minchin.”

“Carmichael!” the Indian gentleman cried out loudly. “Carmichael!”

“We must not frighten her,” Mr. Carmichael said aside to him in a quick, low voice. And he added aloud to Sara, “So you were sent up into the attic, and made into a little drudge. That was about it, wasn’t it?”

“There was no one to take care of me,” said Sara. “There was no money; I belong to nobody.”

“How did your father lose his money?” the Indian gentleman broke in breathlessly.

“He did not lose it himself,” Sara answered, wondering still more each moment. “He had a friend he was very fond of—he was very fond of him. It was his friend who took his money. He trusted his friend too much.”

The Indian gentleman’s breath came more quickly.

“The friend might have MEANT to do no harm,” he said. “It might have happened through a mistake.”

Sara did not know how unrelenting her quiet young voice sounded as she answered. If she had known, she would surely have tried to soften it for the Indian gentleman’s sake.

“The suffering was just as bad for my papa,” she said. It killed him.”

“What was your father’s name?” the Indian gentleman said. “Tell me.”

“His name was Ralph Crewe,” Sara answered, feeling startled. “Captain Crewe. He died in India.”

The haggard face contracted, and Ram Dass sprang to his master’s side.

“Carmichael,” the invalid gasped, “it is the child—the child!”

For a moment Sara thought he was going to die. Ram Dass poured out drops from a bottle, and held them to his lips. Sara stood near, trembling a little. She looked in a bewildered way at Mr. Carmichael.

“What child am I?” she faltered.

“He was your father’s friend,” Mr. Carmichael answered her. “Don’t be frightened. We have been looking for you for two years.”

Sara put her hand up to her forehead, and her mouth trembled. She spoke as if she were in a dream.

“And I was at Miss Minchin’s all the while,” she half whispered. “Just on the other side of the wall.”

18

“I Tried Not to Be”

 

It was pretty, comfortable Mrs. Carmichael who explained everything. She was sent for at once, and came across the square to take Sara into her warm arms and make clear to her all that had happened. The excitement of the totally unexpected discovery had been temporarily almost overpowering to Mr. Carrisford in his weak condition.

“Upon my word,” he said faintly to Mr. Carmichael, when it was suggested that the little girl should go into another room. “I feel as if I do not want to lose sight of her.”

“I will take care of her,” Janet said, “and mamma will come in a few minutes.” And it was Janet who led her away.

“We’re so glad you are found,” she said. “You don’t know how glad we are that you are found.”

Donald stood with his hands in his pockets, and gazed at Sara with reflecting and self-reproachful eyes.

“If I’d just asked what your name was when I gave you my sixpence,” he said, “you would have told me it was Sara Crewe, and then you would have been found in a minute.” Then Mrs. Carmichael came in. She looked very much moved, and suddenly took Sara in her arms and kissed her.

“You look bewildered, poor child,” she said. “And it is not to be wondered at.”

Sara could only think of one thing.

“Was he,” she said, with a glance toward the closed door of the library—“was HE the wicked friend? Oh, do tell me!”

Mrs. Carmichael was crying as she kissed her again. She felt as if she ought to be kissed very often because she had not been kissed for so long.

“He was not wicked, my dear,” she answered. “He did not really lose your papa’s money. He only thought he had lost it; and because he loved him so much his grief made him so ill that for a time he was not in his right mind. He almost died of brain fever, and long before he began to recover your poor papa was dead.”

“And he did not know where to find me,” murmured Sara. “And I was so near.” Somehow, she could not forget that she had been so near.

“He believed you were in school in France,” Mrs. Carmichael explained. “And he was continually misled by false clues. He has looked for you everywhere. When he saw you pass by, looking so sad and neglected, he did not dream that you were his friend’s poor child; but because you were a little girl, too, he was sorry for you, and wanted to make you happier. And he told Ram Dass to climb into your attic window and try to make you comfortable.”

Sara gave a start of joy; her whole look changed.

“Did Ram Dass bring the things?” she cried out. “Did he tell Ram Dass to do it? Did he make the dream that came true?”

“Yes, my dear—yes! He is kind and good, and he was sorry for you, for little lost Sara Crewe’s sake.”

The library door opened and Mr. Carmichael appeared, calling Sara to him with a gesture.

“Mr. Carrisford is better already,” he said. “He wants you to come to him.”

Sara did not wait. When the Indian gentleman looked at her as she entered, he saw that her face was all alight.

She went and stood before his chair, with her hands clasped together against her breast.

“You sent the things to me,” she said, in a joyful emotional little voice, “the beautiful, beautiful things? YOU sent them!”

“Yes, poor, dear child, I did,” he answered her. He was weak and broken with long illness and trouble, but he looked at her with the look she remembered in her father’s eyes—that look of loving her and wanting to take her in his arms. It made her kneel down by him, just as she used to kneel by her father when they were the dearest friends and lovers in the world.

“Then it is you who are my friend,” she said; “it is you who are my friend!” And she dropped her face on his thin hand and kissed it again and again.

“The man will be himself again in three weeks,” Mr. Carmichael said aside to his wife. “Look at his face already.”

In fact, he did look changed. Here was the “Little Missus,” and he had new things to think of and plan for already. In the first place, there was Miss Minchin. She must be interviewed and told of the change which had taken place in the fortunes of her pupil.

Sara was not to return to the seminary at all. The Indian gentleman was very determined upon that point. She must remain where she was, and Mr. Carmichael should go and see Miss Minchin himself.

“I am glad I need not go back,” said Sara. “She will be very angry. She does not like me; though perhaps it is my fault, because I do not like her.”

But, oddly enough, Miss Minchin made it unnecessary for Mr. Carmichael to go to her, by actually coming in search of her pupil herself. She had wanted Sara for something, and on inquiry had heard an astonishing thing. One of the housemaids had seen her steal out of the area with something hidden under her cloak, and had also seen her go up the steps of the next door and enter the house.

“What does she mean!” cried Miss Minchin to Miss Amelia.

“I don’t know, I’m sure, sister,” answered Miss Amelia. “Unless she has made friends with him because he has lived in India.”

“It would be just like her to thrust herself upon him and try to gain his sympathies in some such impertinent fashion,” said Miss Minchin. “She must have been in the house for two hours. I will not allow such presumption. I shall go and inquire into the matter, and apologize for her intrusion.”

Sara was sitting on a footstool close to Mr. Carrisford’s knee, and listening to some of the many things he felt it necessary to try to explain to her, when Ram Dass announced the visitor’s arrival.

Sara rose involuntarily, and became rather pale; but Mr. Carrisford saw that she stood quietly, and showed none of the ordinary signs of child terror.

Miss Minchin entered the room with a sternly dignified manner. She was correctly and well dressed, and rigidly polite.

“I am sorry to disturb Mr. Carrisford,” she said; “but I have explanations to make. I am Miss Minchin, the proprietress of the Young Ladies’ Seminary next door.”

The Indian gentleman looked at her for a moment in silent scrutiny. He was a man who had naturally a rather hot temper, and he did not wish it to get too much the better of him.

“So you are Miss Minchin?” he said.

“I am, sir.”

“In that case,” the Indian gentleman replied, “you have arrived at the right time. My solicitor, Mr. Carmichael, was just on the point of going to see you.”

Mr. Carmichael bowed slightly, and Miiss Minchin looked from him to Mr. Carrisford in amazement.

“Your solicitor!” she said. “I do not understand. I have come here as a matter of duty. I have just discovered that you have been intruded upon through the forwardness of one of my pupils—a charity pupil. I came to explain that she intruded without my knowledge.” She turned upon Sara. “Go home at once,” she commanded indignantly. “You shall be severely punished. Go home at once.”

The Indian gentleman drew Sara to his side and patted her hand.

“She is not going.”

Miss Minchin felt rather as if she must be losing her senses.

“Not going!” she repeated.

“No,” said Mr. Carrisford. “She is not going home—if you give your house that name. Her home