Witch Winnie Part 11

"My tear child," she said, kindly, drawing nearer to us, "how you haf suffer! Yes, you have done a sin, but you are sorry, and G.o.d he forgive ze sorrowful."

"But do you forgive me, Miss Prillwitz?" Winnie cried, pa.s.sionately.

"Can you ever love me again?"

"Yes, my tear, I forgive you freely, and I love you more as ever."

"And the elder brother and Jim? Have Jim's expectations been raised?

Will he be greatly disappointed, and will the prince be very angry?"

"My tear, in all zis it is not as you have t'inked. See, you haf not understand my way of talk. I t'ink Giacomo will, all ze same, pretty soon go to his Fazzer's house. Ze elder brother is may be gone wiz him by now. You have not, then, understand zat dis elder brother is ze Lord Christ? zat ze beautiful country is Heaven? Our little Giacomo lie very sick. Ze doctor, whom justly you did meet, he gif no hope. His poor muzzer sit by him so sad, so sad, it tear my heart. She cannot see he go to ze palace to be one Prince del Paradiso."

We sat bolt upright, dazed and stunned by this astounding information.

"Do you mean to say," Winnie said, slowly, grasping her head as though laboring to concentrate her ideas, "that Jim is dying, and that he is no more a prince than any of us? I mean that the other boy is not a real prince, and that no child ever strayed away from its father's house, or elder brother has been seeking for a lost one? Oh Miss Prillwitz, how could you make up such a story?"

"My tear, my tear, it is all true, and I t'ought you to understand my leetle vay of talk. Giacomo is a prince in disguise; you, my tears, are daughters of ze great King. Zat uzzer boy, ze butcher, he also inherit ze same heavenly palace. All ze children what come in zis world haf wander avay from zat home, and ze elder brother he go up and down looking for ze lost. He gif me commission; he gif effery Christians commission to find zose lost prince--to teach him and fit him for his high position. I did not have intention to deceive you, my tear. It was my little vay of talk."

"Oh! oh!" exclaimed Winnie, "I feel as if my brain were turning a somersault, but I cannot realize it. Then I did not really deceive you, after all, Miss Prillwitz, though I was just as wicked in intending to do so. And Jim--do not say there is no hope!"

"No, my tear. I know all ze time zis was not ze boy I expect. But I say to myself, 'How he come I know not, but he is also ze child of ze King.' Ze elder brother want him to be care for also. May be ze elder brother send him, and I take him very gladly. And surely, I never find one child to prove his t.i.tle to be one Prince of Paradise better as Giacomo. So gentle, so loving, so generous and soughtful. I not wonder at all ze elder brother want him. I sank him, I sank you, too, Winnie, I have privilege to know one such lovely character."

Miss Prillwitz looked at her watch. "I can no longer," she said quickly, and hurried back to her home. We crossed the park thoughtfully and entered the school. There was just time to tell the girls the news before chapel. The knowledge that dear Jim was lying at death's door overwhelmed every other consideration, and yet we talked over Miss Prillwitz's little allegory also.

"We were stupid not to see through it at first," said Adelaide. "She is just the woman to create an ideal world for herself and to live in it. I have no grudge against her because we misunderstood her meaning, and yet there certainly is something very fine in Jim's nature."

"Now I think it all over," said Emma Jane, "she has said nothing which was not true."

"I understand her letter better now," I said. "We have all been parts of a beautiful parable, and we have been as thickheaded as the disciples were when Jesus said, 'O fools, and slow of heart to believe.'"

Milly was silently weeping. "All the beauty of the idea doesn't change the fact that Jim is dying," she said.

"I have never loved any one so since I lost my mother and my baby brother," said Adelaide. "I can't remember how he looked--it was ten years ago, and I have no photographs, only this cameo pin, which father bought because it reminded him of mother. Not the face either, only the turn of the neck. He said she had a beautiful neck--and as he came home from his business at night he always saw her sitting in her little sewing-chair by the window looking every now and then over her shoulder for him with her neck turned so, and her profile clear cut against the dark of the room like the two colors of agate in this cameo."

It is not natural for girls to talk freely on what stirs them most deeply, and little more was said on the subject that morning, but we each thought a great deal, and if our hearts could have been laid bare to each other, we would have been startled by the similarity of the trains of thought which this event had roused. All through the morning's lessons our imaginations wandered to the house across the park, and we wondered whether all was indeed over, and dear, cheery, helpful Jim had gone. We did not remember that we had declared we would gladly let him go to an earthly princedom, and yet this was far better for him. Our imaginations saw only the white upturned face upon the pillow, the grief-stricken mother, and Miss Prillwitz flitting about drawing the sheet straight, and placing white lilacs in his hands.

Adelaide confessed to me, long after, that all of her worldly thoughts in reference to visiting Jim some day came back to her in a strange, sermonizing way. She said that in her secret heart she had rather dreaded the visit because she knew so little of the etiquette of foreign courts, and was afraid she might make some mistake. She had even studied several books on the subject, and knew the sort of costume it was necessary to wear in a royal presentation, just the length of the train, the degree of decolletee, and the veil, and the feathers. The thought came over her with great vividness that she had never studied the etiquette of Heaven or attempted to provide herself with garments fit for the presence of the King. Mrs. Hetterman had a habit of singing quaint old hymns. There was one which we often heard echoing up from the bas.e.m.e.nt--

"At His right hand our eyes behold The queen arrayed in purest gold; The world admires her heavenly dress, Her robe of joy and righteousness."

This sc.r.a.p was borne in upon Adelaide's mind now. "A robe of joy and righteousness," she thought to herself; "I wonder how it is made! it surely must be becoming."

Then she thought again of her mingled motives, of how glad she had been that she had befriended Jim because she could claim him as an acquaintance as a prince, in that foreign country, and how she had wished that she might entertain more traveling members of the n.o.bility in his country in order to have more acquaintances at court. "If the poor are Christ's brothers and sisters," she said to herself, "I have abundant opportunity to make many friends.h.i.+ps which may be carried over into that unknown country;" and a new purpose awoke in her heart, which had for its spring not the most unselfish motives, but a strong one, and destined to achieve good work, and to give place in time to higher aims.

Afternoon came, and no message had arrived from Jim. "Girls," said Adelaide, as we sat in the Amen Corner, "if Jim dies, I propose that we carry this sort of work on of fitting poor children for something higher, and broaden it, as a memorial to him. I don't exactly see my way yet, but we can do a good deal if we band together and try."

"Oh! don't talk about Jim's dying," said Milly, "we'll do it, anyway."

"I can't see why we don't hear from Miss Prillwitz," said Winnie, impatiently. "It is recreation hour; let us go out into the park, and perhaps she will see us and send us some word."

We walked around and around the paths which were in view from Miss Prillwitz's windows. Presently we saw Mary Hetterman coming toward us with a note in her hand.

"I know just what that note says," exclaimed Milly, sinking upon a bench. "The little prince has gone to his estates."

"Hus.h.!.+" exclaimed Adelaide. "See! is it a ghost?" We looked as she pointed, and saw at Jim's window a perfect representation of Adelaide's cameo. A white face against the dark interior. It vanished as she spoke, leaving us all with a strange, eerie sensation, a feeling that this was certainly an omen of Jim's death. But our premonitions, like so many others, did not come true. The note was not for us. Mary Hetterman pa.s.sed us with a smile and a nod, and a moment later Miss Prillwitz herself came out to us.

We knew by her face that she brought good news, but none of us spoke until she answered our unuttered question.

"No, tears, Jim haf not gone. Ze prince haf been here, but I sink he not take him zis time already. The doctor sink we keep him one leetle time longer. I cannot stay. It is time I go give him his medicine, and let loose ze nurse, for I care for him ze nights. Good-bye, my tears. Ah! I am so happy zat ze little prince go not yet to his estates; so happy, and yet so sleepy also." And we noticed for the first time the great dark rings which want of sleep and anxiety had drawn around Miss Prillwitz's eyes.

"Good-bye, princess," I cried; "surely no one deserves that t.i.tle more than you, for you have proved yourself a royal daughter of the King. We have called you so a long time among ourselves--our Princess del Paradiso."

She smiled, waved her hand, and vanished into the queer house which she had made a palace.

It was some time before Adelaide could recover from the shock of the apparition at the window, though we a.s.sured her that it was probably only the trained nurse; and we afterward ascertained that it was in reality Mrs. Halsey, who had come to the window for a moment to greet the glad new day, and who was now as joyful as she had been despairing.

So much tension of feeling, so great extremes of joy and sorrow, had affected her deeply, and she wept out her grat.i.tude on Miss Prillwitz's sympathizing heart. "You have been very good to him," Mrs. Halsey said, with emotion. "Some time, when the past all comes back to me, as I am sure it will some day, I may be able to return your kindness."

Mrs. Halsey had made several mysterious allusions to the past, and Miss Prillwitz, who had a kindly way of gaining the confidence of everyone, said sweetly, "Tell me about your early life, my tear."

"It is a strange story," Mrs. Halsey replied. "I had a happy childhood and girlhood, and a happy married life up to the time that my dear parents died, and even after that, for my husband was the best of men, and I had a sweet little daughter. Their faces come back to me, waking and sleeping, though I have lost them, I sometimes fear, forever."

"Did they die?" Miss Prillwitz asked.

"No, dear, I think not; but now comes the strange part of my story: I remember a journey vaguely, and a steamer disaster, a night of horror with fire and water, and then all is a frightful blank; a curtain of blackness seems to have fallen on all my past life. I am told that I was rescued from the burning of a Sound steamer, with my baby-boy in my arms, and given shelter by some kindly farmer folk. I had received an injury--a blow on the head--and had brain-fever, from which I recovered in body, but with a disordered mind, my memory shattered; I could remember faces, but not names. I could not tell the name of the town in which I had lived, or my own name. I remained with the kind people who first received me for several months, but I did not wish to be a burden to them, and I hoped that I might find my home. I knew that it had been in a city, and I felt sure that if I ever saw any of my old surroundings, or old friends I would recognize them at once. It was thought, too, that New York physicians might help me, so I came to New York, and my case was advertised in the papers. But months had pa.s.sed since the accident, and my friends either did not see the advertis.e.m.e.nt, or did not recognize me in the story given. The doctors at the hospital p.r.o.nounced me incurable, and I was discharged. I wandered up and down the streets, but although I felt sure that I had been in New York before, I could not find my home. I read the names on the signs, hoping to recognize my own name, but I never came across it. Meantime I took the name of Halsey; it was necessary for me to live, and I knew that I could sew, and that I had a faculty for designing; and seeing Madame Celeste's advertis.e.m.e.nt for a designer, I applied at once for the situation. It seemed to me at first that I had seen Madame Celeste before, but she was repellent in manner, and I did not dare question her, and gradually that impression faded. I hired a woman to take care of Jim, and though he was not well cared for, he lived, and we got on until he was large enough to play upon the streets. Then I took him home to the little room in Rickett's Court, and finding that I could not be with him as much as he needed, I gave up my place at Madame Celeste's and worked at first for the costumer, where the young ladies found me, and afterward tried to keep soul and body together by taking sewing home. It was the life of a galley-slave, but I did not care so long as I could keep my boy at school, and with me out of school hours. But I could not do that, for to earn the money which was absolutely necessary for our support Jim had to work too, and driving the milkman's cart in the early morning was the best we could find for him out of school hours. He was so proud and happy to do it, and to help earn for us both; but, as you know, it cut into his hours for sleep, and left him no time to study. Oh! I was nearly in despair, when G.o.d sent you as angels to my help and Jim's."

"And have you never been able to guess what your old name was?" Miss Prillwitz asked.

"Never; sometimes it seems to me that I remember it in my dreams, but when I awake it is gone; still, I cannot help feeling that I shall find my own again. Sometimes there comes a great inward illumination, and the curtain seems to be lifting. I cannot think they have forgotten me--my husband tender and true, and my little girl with the great questioning eyes."

Miss Prillwitz did not share Mrs. Halsey's confidence, but her sympathy was enlisted, and she caressed and comforted Mrs. Halsey. "It shall be as you hope, my tear; if not just now and here, zen surely by and by, and zat is not very long. And meantime you have found some friends, ze young ladies and me, and ze Elder Brother have found you, and we are all one family, so you can be no longer lonely and wizout relation, even in zis world."

CHAPTER IX.

THE KING'S DAUGHTERS AND THE VENETIAN FeTE.

"O ladies, dear ladies, the next sunny day, Please trundle your hoops just out of Broadway, From its whirl and its bustle, its fas.h.i.+on and pride, And the temples of trade which tower on each side, To the alleys and lanes where Misfortune and Guilt Their children have gathered, their city have built.

Then say, if you dare, Spoiled children of fas.h.i.+on, you've nothing to wear!"

[Ill.u.s.tration: {Drawing of Milly Roseveldt.}]

Milly Roseveldt made an important entry in her diary a few days after this. She was very exact about keeping her diary, recording for the most part, however, very trivial matters, but the day that she wrote "We have organized a 'King's Daughters Ten'" was a day with a white stone in it, and deserved to be remembered.