The Palace Beautiful: A Story for Girls, L. T. Meade [fun books to read for adults txt] 📗

having put him in the way of such agreeable and profitable occupation, and more and more resolved to leave her alone for the future.

"Maybe if I was to talk to the pretty little dear she'd find me a deal more jobs of this yere sort," he said to himself. "A little lady she is, and no mistake, and she keeps very genteel friends, as any one can see with half an eye."

After Dove had worked for two or three hours he began to feel thirsty, for he was quite unaccustomed to any continuous labor. The sun was shining brightly on the balcony, and he was also a little hot, and the inside of Noel's room looked deliciously cool and inviting. He had just seen Lawson walking down the street, too, so he was quite sure of having the premises to himself. Slipping off his shoes he stepped into the room and began to look about him with an appreciative air. He handled some of Noel's choicest books, and looked through a portfolio of rare engravings but neither books nor engravings were quite in Dove's way, and after a time he strolled over to the mantel-piece, as he said, to see how he looked reflected in the over-mantel glass. There were letters there directed to Noel. Dove would have dearly liked to acquaint himself with their contents, but he was a slow and deficient reader. Some cigars lay in a little cigar-case at one end. Dove, as a matter of course, and without weighing the question at all, slipped a couple into his pocket. After doing this he did not feel quite so virtuous, nor so like the proverbial British workman; he jingled some of Daisy's sovereigns in his pocket, and laughed when they made a pleasant sound. Still eagerly peering at all the articles on the mantel-piece his quick eyes presently detected amongst a heap of rubbish and odds and ends Noel's valuable signet-ring; it was of heavy workmanship, and its gold alone made it worth money.

"Why, Isaacs the Jew would give me two pound ten, or perhaps three pounds for this," queried Dove. "It has plainly been forgotten here, and if the gent does miss it he'll lay the blame on that fine fellow Lawson."

It took a very small parley with Dove's seared conscience to make him pocket the ring, and by the time Lawson returned to the house the five-pound note had also been appropriated. Dove whistled more cheerily than ever over his work that afternoon, and in the evening he went home quite unsuspecting any little trap which might have been set for him.

He had scarcely gone before a boy arrived with a telegram directed to Lawson, and with a reply pre-paid. Lawson read the following words:—

"Look on the mantel-piece in my sitting-room for a blank envelope, open, which contains a five-pound note—No. 11267. I also left my ring in the cigar tray. Wire reply if note and ring are safe.—ARTHUR NOEL."

The address to reply to was added.

Poor Lawson spent an agonized ten minutes in searching over the contents of the mantel-piece. In the end he had to fill in the reply telegram with the news that nowhere could the five-pound note nor the ring be found.

A little over two hours passed, and again the worthy servant was startled by a telegraphic dispatch. This was what it contained:—

"Have reasons to believe that the painter Dove is the thief. Go instantly to the nearest police-station, give them the number of the note, and go with one of their staff to Dove's house. His address is, 10, Eden Street, Junction Road, Holloway. The note and ring will probably be found on his person. Get him apprehended if possible. Take all necessary cabs.—ARTHUR NOEL."

Thus it came to pass that when that evening Dove sat down tranquilly to a luxurious supper of lobster salad, chops, and bottled stout, he was unpleasantly interrupted. When two policemen, accompanied by Lawson, came into his room, he was guilty of using very violent language, and altogether conducted himself in a most excited manner; but, notwithstanding his resistance, and Mrs. Dove's hysterics, and some terribly distressing chuckles, really sounding more like laughter than tears, which were heard to issue from the lips of that naughty boy, Tommy, a strict search of his person was instituted, and in consequence he was that very night locked up in jail.

Oh, if only poor little Daisy, tossing on her hot and feverish pillow, could have known!

CHAPTER XLV. THE PRINCE TO THE RESCUE.

Hannah was doing well in her little shop at Teckford. She had always been a most saving body, and although Mrs. Mainwaring had never been able to pay her high wages, she had managed to put the greater portion of what she received away. Hannah was one of those fortunate individuals on whom even a shabby dress will look neat. Her boots lasted twice as long as any one else's, her caps retained their starch and their whiteness long after another servant's would have had to be resigned to a fresh cleaning process. Hannah therefore required little or no money to spend on dress, and in consequence, when the Mainwaring girls went away, she had a little nest-egg laid by to stock a shop. She found a suitable little house at Teckford, laid in her little store of provisions with care, for she argued wisely that however poor people were they required food, and was living very comfortably on the proceeds of her sales. Hannah, as a rule, had a smooth and unruffled brow; she was a careful woman, but not a troubled one. At the present moment, however it could scarcely be said of this good soul that she was without cares. The neighbors who came in to buy their bacon, and fresh eggs, and candles, and tea, remarked that Hannah had no longer a cheery word and a pleasant smile to give them, and the children, when they tumbled out their halfpennies and asked for "a little piece of taffy, please, ma'am," noticed that Hannah's eyes had red rims round them, and they wondered if she was naughty, and that was why she cried.

Yes, poor Hannah had a troubled heart during those early summer days, for Daisy lay so weak and languid, and indifferent to all external things, on her tiny little bed, never giving Hannah any information as to why she had wandered alone to Rosebury, never saying anything about the weight of sorrow which rested on her little heart, only now and then moaning out that she must get up and go to Mrs. Ellsworthy, and now and then feebly saying that she wished so very much that the Prince was there.

Hannah knew all about Mrs. Ellsworthy, and how she had taken the girls up, and tried to help them, after their mother's death; but who was the Prince?

Finding that the child continued slightly feverish, and most unnaturally weak—finding that the dainties she prepared were only just tasted by the little sufferer—Hannah looked well into her little store of hardly-earned money, and finding that she had sufficient to pay him, called in the village doctor.

Of course, with his limited experience, this good man could little understand Daisy's case. He ordered medicine for her, and plenty of cooling drinks, and said that he could not find anything very much the matter, only she was most unnaturally weak.

"It's my thinking, sir," said Hannah, "that this is the kind of weakness that ends in death. My little lady is all on the pine for something or some one, and unless she gets what she wants soon she will die."

Hannah's view of the case was rather puzzling to the doctor, who stared at her, and considered her from that day forward a very fanciful woman. He repeated his injunctions to give Daisy plenty of milk, and to see that she took her tonic three times a day; and then he took his leave.

When he was gone Hannah went to her next-door neighbor and asked her if she would be so very kind as to go and sit in the child's room for a couple of hours. Then she put on her bonnet and neat black cloak, and started off on foot to Rosebury. She had made up her mind to get Mrs. Ellsworthy's address from some one, and to write to her about Daisy. In due time she arrived at the lodge, saw the woman who kept the gates, obtained from her without much difficulty Mrs. Ellsworthy's address, and then prepared to return home. Just as she reached the stile, however, which led into the field where she had found Daisy, a thought struck her—she had no writing-paper in the house, and what could be bought at Teckford was almost too bad to use. Hannah made up her mind to go to Rosebury, which was a much more important village than Teckford, and get a few sheets of note-paper, and an envelope or two. She walked very fast, for she did not like to leave Daisy so long by herself, and, panting and hurried, she at last arrived at the little stationer's shop. The stationer's wife knew Hannah, and greeted her with effusion.

"I'm truly pleased to see you, Mrs. Martin," she said. "Why you're quite a stranger in these parts, and I did not expect to see you round now, with one of your young ladies returned and all."

Hannah heaved a profound sigh.

"She's very, very ill, poor darling," she said. "Very dangerously weak and ill; and I must trouble you to hasten with the paper, Mrs. Jones. One penn'orth of your most shining note, and two envelopes to match. Mind you, give me a paper with a good gloss on it, Mrs. Jones."

Mrs. Jones stared at Hannah Martin; but fetching down a box of note-paper, prepared to wrap some sheets in tissue paper.

"I shouldn't say Miss Primrose was ill," she remarked as she did so, "though she do seem worried, dear young lady."

When the shop-woman made this observation Hannah's pence tumbled down on the counter with a crash.

"Goodness gracious me, ma'am!" she exclaimed, "you don't mean to tell me that Miss Primrose Mainwaring is at Rosebury?"

"Why, of course, ma'am; why, don't you know? why you said but now how weak and ill she was."

"Never mind the paper," answered Hannah, "and never mind a word I said about anybody; just have the goodness to tell me where I'll find Miss Primrose."

"She was staying with Miss Martineau but yesterday and there's a gentleman come down, too—a very 'ansome, harristocratic-looking young man, I call him, and for all the world as like our pretty Miss Jasmine as if he was own brother to her—and they two and Miss Martineau are fairly scouring the place for that poor little tot Miss Daisy, who it seems 'as run away from home. Why, Hannah—Hannah Martin, woman! are you daft?"

For Hannah had rushed from the shop while Mrs. Jones was speaking, leaving her neglected paper and two or three pence behind her on the counter. A few moments later the good soul was knocking at Miss Martineau's door, and very soon Primrose and Arthur Noel too were in possession of all the facts that Hannah could give them.

"Oh, Hannah! it is so good to think you were the one to save her and find her," said Primrose, as she kissed her old nurse, and shed some thankful tears.

"You had better come back with me now, Miss Primrose," said Hannah, "and perhaps the gentleman or Miss Martineau will send a telegraphic message to poor Miss Jasmine."

But Primrose's difficulties had not come to an end. She instantly started to walk across the fields with Hannah; but when Daisy heard she had come she absolutely refused to see her, and cried so piteously, and got into such an excited state, that Primrose felt herself obliged to yield to the child's caprice, and to keep out of the room.

"I can't see her, Hannah," poor little Daisy said. "Of all people in all the world, I can't see my own Primrose. Oh, if only I were well enough to go to Mrs. Ellsworthy, or if only the Prince would come!"

Primrose heard Daisy's weak little voice through the thin walls of Hannah's cottage.

"Hannah," she said, "I know who Daisy means by the Prince. The Prince is that kind Mr. Noel, who has been helping me to find the little darling. If he has not gone back to London, for he said he would go back at once after he knew we had found Daisy, he could come to her. Oh, Hannah," continued poor Primrose, "I cannot think what has happened to your dear baby, Daisy. I begin to believe what Mr. Noel has been hinting to me—that some one has got a secret influence over her."

"We had better see and find this Mr. Noel at once, miss, now," said practical Hannah. "We can think of secret influences and