The Phoenix and the Carpet E. Nesbit (read more books .TXT) 📖

“I know exactly where we shall find the bones, too,” Robert went on. “You see that dark arch just along the passage? Well, just inside there⁠—”

“If you don’t stop going on like that,” said Jane, firmly, “I shall scream, and then I’ll faint⁠—so now then!”

“And I will, too,” said Anthea.

Robert was not pleased at being checked in his flight of fancy.

“You girls will never be great writers,” he said bitterly. “They just love to think of things in dungeons, and chains, and knobbly bare human bones, and⁠—”

Jane had opened her mouth to scream, but before she could decide how you began when you wanted to faint, the golden voice of the Phoenix spoke through the gloom.

“Peace!” it said; “there are no bones here except the small but useful sets that you have inside you. And you did not invite me to come out with you to hear you talk about bones, but to see you do some good and kind action.”

“We can’t do it here,” said Robert, sulkily.

“No,” rejoined the bird. “The only thing we can do here, it seems, is to try to frighten our little sisters.”

“He didn’t, really, and I’m not so very little,” said Jane, rather ungratefully.

Robert was silent. It was Cyril who suggested that perhaps they had better take the money and go.

“That wouldn’t be a kind act, except to ourselves; and it wouldn’t be good, whatever way you look at it,” said Anthea, “to take money that’s not ours.”

“We might take it and spend it all on benefits to the poor and aged,” said Cyril.

“That wouldn’t make it right to steal,” said Anthea, stoutly.

“I don’t know,” said Cyril. They were all standing up now. “Stealing is taking things that belong to someone else, and there’s no one else.”

“It can’t be stealing if⁠—”

“That’s right,” said Robert, with ironical approval; “stand here all day arguing while the candles burn out. You’ll like it awfully when it’s all dark again⁠—and bony.”

“Let’s get out, then,” said Anthea. “We can argue as we go.” So they rolled up the carpet and went. But when they had crept along to the place where the passage led into the topless tower they found the way blocked by a great stone, which they could not move.

“There!” said Robert. “I hope you’re satisfied!”

“Everything has two ends,” said the Phoenix, softly; “even a quarrel or a secret passage.”

So they turned round and went back, and Robert was made to go first with one of the candles, because he was the one who had begun to talk about bones. And Cyril carried the carpet.

“I wish you hadn’t put bones into our heads,” said Jane, as they went along.

“I didn’t; you always had them. More bones than brains,” said Robert.

The passage was long, and there were arches and steps and turnings and dark alcoves that the girls did not much like passing. The passage ended in a flight of steps. Robert went up them.

Suddenly he staggered heavily back on to the following feet of Jane, and everybody screamed, “Oh! what is it?”

“I’ve only bashed my head in,” said Robert, when he had groaned for some time; “that’s all. Don’t mention it; I like it. The stairs just go right slap into the ceiling, and it’s a stone ceiling. You can’t do good and kind actions underneath a paving-stone.”

“Stairs aren’t made to lead just to paving-stones as a general rule,” said the Phoenix. “Put your shoulder to the wheel.”

“There isn’t any wheel,” said the injured Robert, still rubbing his head.

But Cyril had pushed past him to the top stair, and was already shoving his hardest against the stone above. Of course, it did not give in the least.

“If it’s a trap-door⁠—” said Cyril. And he stopped shoving and began to feel about with his hands. “Yes, there is a bolt. I can’t move it.”

By a happy chance Cyril had in his pocket the oilcan of his father’s bicycle; he put the carpet down at the foot of the stairs, and he lay on his back, with his head on the top step and his feet straggling down among his young relations, and he oiled the bolt till the drops of rust and oil fell down on his face. One even went into his mouth⁠—open, as he panted with the exertion of keeping up this unnatural position. Then he tried again, but still the bolt would not move. So now he tied his handkerchief⁠—the one with the bacon-fat and marmalade on it⁠—to the bolt, and Robert’s handkerchief to that, in a reef knot, which cannot come undone however much you pull, and, indeed, gets tighter and tighter the more you pull it. This must not be confused with a granny knot, which comes undone if you look at it. And then he and Robert pulled, and the girls put their arms round their brothers and pulled too, and suddenly the bolt gave way with a rusty scrunch, and they all rolled together to the bottom of the stairs⁠—all but the Phoenix, which had taken to its wings when the pulling began.

Nobody was hurt much, because the rolled-up carpet broke their fall; and now, indeed, the shoulders of the boys were used to some purpose, for the stone allowed them to heave it up. They felt it give; dust fell freely on them.

“Now, then,” cried Robert, forgetting his head and his temper, “push all together. One, two, three!”

The stone was heaved up. It swung up on a creaking, unwilling hinge, and showed a growing oblong of dazzling daylight; and it fell back with a bang against something that kept it upright. Everyone climbed out, but there was not room for everyone to stand comfortably in the little paved house where they found themselves, so when the Phoenix had fluttered up from the darkness they let the stone down, and it closed like a trap-door, as indeed it was.

You can have no idea how dusty and dirty the children were. Fortunately there was no one to see them but each other.