Harding’s Luck, E. Nesbit [summer reads .TXT] 📗

no bushes were nor stones, only the smooth curves of the down, so that it was easy to see that no little boy was there either.

They looked for Dickie to right and left and here and there under bushes, and by stiles and hedges, and with trembling hearts they searched in the little old chalk quarry, and the white moon came up very late to help them. But they did not find him, though they roused a dozen men in the village to join in the search, and old Beale himself, who knew every yard of the ground for five miles round, came out with the spaniel who knew every inch of it for ten. But True rushed about the house and garden whining and yelping so piteously that ’Melia tied him up, and he stayed tied up.

And so, when Edred and Elfrida came down to breakfast, Mrs. Honeysett met them with the news that Dickie was lost and their father still out looking for him.

“It’s that beastly magic,” said Edred as soon as the children were alone. “He’s done it once too often, and he’s got stuck some time in history and can’t get back.”

“And we can’t do anything. We can’t get to him,” said Elfrida. “Oh! if only we’d got the old white magic and the Mouldiwarp to help us, we could find out what’s become of him.”

“Perhaps he has fallen down a disused mine,” Edred suggested, “and is lying panting for water, and his faithful dog has jumped down after him and broken all its dear legs.”

Elfrida melted to tears at this desperate picture, melted to a speechless extent.

“We can’t do anything,” said Edred again; “don’t snivel like that, for goodness’ sake, Elfrida. This is a man’s job. Dry up. I can’t think, with you blubbing like that.”

“I’m not,” said Elfrida untruly, and sniffed with some intensity.

“If you could make up some poetry now,” Edred went on, “would that be any good?”

“Not without the dresses,” she sniffed. “You know we always had dresses for our magic, or nearly always; and they have to be dead and gone people’s dresses, and you’ll only go to the dead and gone people’s time when the dresses were worn. Oh! dear Dickie, and if he’s really down a mine, or things like that, what’s the good of anything?”

“I’m going to try, anyway,” said Edred, “at least you must too. Because I can’t make poetry.”

“No more can I when I’m as unhappy as this. Poetry’s the last thing you think of when you’re mizzy.”

“We could dress up, anyway,” said Edred hopefully. “The bits of armor out of the hall, and the Indian feather headdresses father brought home, and I have father’s shooting-gaiters and brown paper tops, and you can have Aunt Edith’s Roman sash. It’s in the right-hand corner drawer. I saw it on the wedding day when I went to get her prayerbook.”

“I don’t want to dress up,” said Elfrida; “I want to find Dickie.”

“I don’t want to dress up either,” said Edred; “but we must do something, and perhaps, I know it’s just only perhaps, it might help if we dressed up. Let’s try it, anyway.”

Elfrida was too miserable to argue. Before long two most miserable children faced each other in Edred’s bedroom, dressed as Red Indians so far as their heads and backs went. Then came lots of plate armor for chest and arms; then, in the case of Elfrida, petticoats and Roman sash and Japanese wickerwork shoes and father’s shooting-gaiters made to look like boots by brown paper tops. And in the case of Edred, legs cased in armor that looked like cricket pads, ending in jointed foot-coverings that looked like chrysalises. (I am told the correct plural is chrysalides, but life would be dull indeed if one always used the correct plural.) They were two forlorn faces that looked at each other as Edred said⁠—

“Now the poetry.”

“I can’t,” said Elfrida, bursting into tears again; “I can’t! So there. I’ve been trying all the time we’ve been dressing, and I can only think of⁠—

“Oh, call dear Dickie back to me,
I cannot play alone;
The summer comes with flower and bee,
Where is dear Dickie gone?

And I know that’s no use.”

“I should think not,” said Edred. “Why, it isn’t your own poetry at all. It’s Felicia M. Hemans’. I’ll try.” And he got a pencil and paper and try he did, his very hardest, be sure. But there are some things that the best and bravest cannot do. And the thing Edred couldn’t do was to make poetry, however bad. He simply couldn’t do it, any more than you can fly. It wasn’t in him, any more than wings are on you.

“Oh, Mouldiwarp, you said we must
Not have any more magic. But we trust
You won’t be hard on us, because Dickie is lost
And we don’t know how to find him.”

That was the best Edred could do, and I tell it to his credit, he really did feel doubtful whether what he had so slowly and carefully written was indeed genuine poetry. So much so, that he would not show it to Elfrida until she had begged very hard indeed. At about the thirtieth “Do, please! Edred, do!” he gave her the paper. No little girl was ever more polite than Elfrida or less anxious to hurt the feelings of others. But she was also quite truthful, and when Edred said in an ashamed, muffled voice, “Is it all right, do you think?” the best she could find by way of answer was, “I don’t know much about poetry. We’ll try it.”

And they did try it, and nothing happened.

“I knew it was no good,” Edred said crossly; “and I’ve made an ass of myself for nothing.”

“Well, I’ve often made one of myself,” said Elfrida comfortingly, “and I will again if you like. But I don’t suppose it’ll be any more good than yours.”

Elfrida frowned fiercely and the feathers on her Indian headdress quivered with the intensity of her effort.

“Is it coming?”