Sara Crewe Part 5

"It is bewitched!" said Sara. "Or I am bewitched. I only think I see it all; but if I can only keep on thinking it, I don't care--I don't care--if I can only keep it up!"

She was afraid to move, for fear it would melt away. She stood with her back against the door and looked and looked. But soon she began to feel warm, and then she moved forward.

"A fire that I only thought I saw surely wouldn't feel warm," she said.

"It feels real--real."

She went to it and knelt before it. She touched the chair, the table; she lifted the cover of one of the dishes. There was something hot and savory in it--something delicious. The tea-pot had tea in it, ready for the boiling water from the little kettle; one plate had toast on it, another, m.u.f.fins.

"It is real," said Sara. "The fire is real enough to warm me; I can sit in the chair; the things are real enough to eat."

It was like a fairy story come true--it was heavenly. She went to the bed and touched the blankets and the wrap. They were real too. She opened one book, and on the t.i.tle-page was written in a strange hand, "The little girl in the attic."

Suddenly--was it a strange thing for her to do?--Sara put her face down on the queer, foreign looking quilted robe and burst into tears.

"I don't know who it is," she said, "but somebody cares about me a little--somebody is my friend."

Somehow that thought warmed her more than the fire. She had never had a friend since those happy, luxurious days when she had had everything; and those days had seemed such a long way off--so far away as to be only like dreams--during these last years at Miss Minchin's.

She really cried more at this strange thought of having a friend--even though an unknown one--than she had cried over many of her worst troubles.

But these tears seemed different from the others, for when she had wiped them away they did not seem to leave her eyes and her heart hot and smarting.

And then imagine, if you can, what the rest of the evening was like.

The delicious comfort of taking off the damp clothes and putting on the soft, warm, quilted robe before the glowing fire--of slipping her cold feet into the luscious little wool-lined slippers she found near her chair. And then the hot tea and savory dishes, the cus.h.i.+oned chair and the books!

It was just like Sara, that, once having found the things real, she should give herself up to the enjoyment of them to the very utmost. She had lived such a life of imagining, and had found her pleasure so long in improbabilities, that she was quite equal to accepting any wonderful thing that happened. After she was quite warm and had eaten her supper and enjoyed herself for an hour or so, it had almost ceased to be surprising to her that such magical surroundings should be hers. As to finding out who had done all this, she knew that it was out of the question. She did not know a human soul by whom it could seem in the least degree probable that it could have been done.

"There is n.o.body," she said to herself, "n.o.body." She discussed the matter with Emily, it is true, but more because it was delightful to talk about it than with a view to making any discoveries.

"But we have a friend, Emily," she said; "we have a friend."

Sara could not even imagine a being charming enough to fill her grand ideal of her mysterious benefactor. If she tried to make in her mind a picture of him or her, it ended by being something glittering and strange--not at all like a real person, but bearing resemblance to a sort of Eastern magician, with long robes and a wand. And when she fell asleep, beneath the soft white blanket, she dreamed all night of this magnificent personage, and talked to him in Hindustani, and made salaams to him.

Upon one thing she was determined. She would not speak to any one of her good fortune--it should be her own secret; in fact, she was rather inclined to think that if Miss Minchin knew, she would take her treasures from her or in some way spoil her pleasure. So, when she went down the next morning, she shut her door very tight and did her best to look as if nothing unusual had occurred. And yet this was rather hard, because she could not help remembering, every now and then, with a sort of start, and her heart would beat quickly every time she repeated to herself, "I have a friend!"

It was a friend who evidently meant to continue to be kind, for when she went to her garret the next night--and she opened the door, it must be confessed, with rather an excited feeling--she found that the same hands had been again at work, and had done even more than before. The fire and the supper were again there, and beside them a number of other things which so altered the look of the garret that Sara quite lost her breath.

A piece of bright, strange, heavy cloth covered the battered mantel, and on it some ornaments had been placed. All the bare, ugly things which could be covered with draperies had been concealed and made to look quite pretty. Some odd materials in rich colors had been fastened against the walls with sharp, fine tacks--so sharp that they could be pressed into the wood without hammering. Some brilliant fans were pinned up, and there were several large cus.h.i.+ons. A long, old wooden box was covered with a rug, and some cus.h.i.+ons lay on it, so that it wore quite the air of a sofa.

Sara simply sat down, and looked, and looked again.

"It is exactly like something fairy come true," she said; "there isn't the least difference. I feel as if I might wish for anything--diamonds and bags of gold--and they would appear! That couldn't be any stranger than this. Is this my garret? Am I the same cold, ragged, damp Sara?

And to think how I used to pretend, and pretend, and wish there were fairies! The one thing I always wanted was to see a fairy story come true. I am living in a fairy story! I feel as if I might be a fairy myself, and be able to turn things into anything else!"

It was like a fairy story, and, what was best of all, it continued.

Almost every day something new was done to the garret. Some new comfort or ornament appeared in it when Sara opened her door at night, until actually, in a short time it was a bright little room, full of all sorts of odd and luxurious things. And the magician had taken care that the child should not be hungry, and that she should have as many books as she could read. When she left the room in the morning, the remains of her supper were on the table, and when she returned in the evening, the magician had removed them, and left another nice little meal. Downstairs Miss Minchin was as cruel and insulting as ever, Miss Amelia was as peevish, and the servants were as vulgar. Sara was sent on errands, and scolded, and driven hither and thither, but somehow it seemed as if she could bear it all. The delightful sense of romance and mystery lifted her above the cook's temper and malice. The comfort she enjoyed and could always look forward to was making her stronger. If she came home from her errands wet and tired, she knew she would soon be warm, after she had climbed the stairs. In a few weeks she began to look less thin.

A little color came into her cheeks, and her eyes did not seem much too big for her face.

It was just when this was beginning to be so apparent that Miss Minchin sometimes stared at her questioningly, that another wonderful thing happened. A man came to the door and left several parcels. All were addressed (in large letters) to "the little girl in the attic." Sara herself was sent to open the door, and she took them in. She laid the two largest parcels down on the hall-table and was looking at the address, when Miss Minchin came down the stairs.

"Take the things upstairs to the young lady to whom they belong," she said. "Don't stand there staring at them."

"They belong to me," answered Sara, quietly.

"To you!" exclaimed Miss Minchin. "What do you mean?"

"I don't know where they came from," said Sara, "but they're addressed to me."

Miss Minchin came to her side and looked at them with an excited expression.

"What is in them?" she demanded.

"I don't know," said Sara.

"Open them!" she demanded, still more excitedly.

Sara did as she was told. They contained pretty and comfortable clothing,--clothing of different kinds; shoes and stockings and gloves, a warm coat, and even an umbrella. On the pocket of the coat was pinned a paper on which was written, "To be worn every day--will be replaced by others when necessary."

Miss Minchin was quite agitated. This was an incident which suggested strange things to her sordid mind. Could it be that she had made a mistake after all, and that the child so neglected and so unkindly treated by her had some powerful friend in the background? It would not be very pleasant if there should be such a friend, and he or she should learn all the truth about the thin, shabby clothes, the scant food, the hard work. She felt queer indeed and uncertain, and she gave a side-glance at Sara.

"Well," she said, in a voice such as she had never used since the day the child lost her father--"well, some one is very kind to you. As you have the things and are to have new ones when they are worn out, you may as well go and put them on and look respectable; and after you are dressed, you may come downstairs and learn your lessons in the school-room."

So it happened that, about half an hour afterward, Sara struck the entire school-room of pupils dumb with amazement, by making her appearance in a costume such as she had never worn since the change of fortune whereby she ceased to be a show-pupil and a parlor-boarder. She scarcely seemed to be the same Sara. She was neatly dressed in a pretty gown of warm browns and reds, and even her stockings and slippers were nice and dainty.

"Perhaps some one has left her a fortune," one of the girls whispered.

"I always thought something would happen to her, she is so queer."

That night when Sara went to her room she carried out a plan she had been devising for some time. She wrote a note to her unknown friend. It ran as follows:

"I hope you will not think it is not polite that I should write this note to you when you wish to keep yourself a secret, but I do not mean to be impolite, or to try to find out at all, only I want to thank you for being so kind to me--so beautiful kind, and making everything like a fairy story. I am so grateful to you and I am so happy! I used to be so lonely and cold and, hungry, and now, oh, just think what you have done for me! Please let me say just these words. It seems as if I ought to say them. Thank you--thank you--thank you!

"THE LITTLE GIRL IN THE ATTIC."

The next morning she left this on the little table, and it was taken away with the other things; so she felt sure the magician had received it, and she was happier for the thought.

A few nights later a very odd thing happened. She found something in the room which she certainly would never have expected. When she came in as usual she saw something small and dark in her chair,--an odd, tiny figure, which turned toward her a little, weird-looking, wistful face.

"Why, it's the monkey!" she cried. "It is the Indian Gentleman's monkey!

Where can he have come from?"

It was the monkey, sitting up and looking so like a mite of a child that it really was quite pathetic; and very soon Sara found out how he happened to be in her room. The skylight was open, and it was easy to guess that he had crept out of his master's garret-window, which was only a few feet away and perfectly easy to get in and out of, even for a climber less agile than a monkey. He had probably climbed to the garret on a tour of investigation, and getting out upon the roof, and being attracted by the light in Sara's attic, had crept in. At all events this seemed quite reasonable, and there he was; and when Sara went to him, he actually put out his queer, elfish little hands, caught her dress, and jumped into her arms.

"Oh, you queer, poor, ugly, foreign little thing!" said Sara, caressing him. "I can't help liking you. You look like a sort of baby, but I am so glad you are not, because your mother could not be proud of you, and n.o.body would dare to say you were like any of your relations. But I do like you; you have such a forlorn little look in your face. Perhaps you are sorry you are so ugly, and it's always on your mind. I wonder if you have a mind?"

The monkey sat and looked at her while she talked, and seemed much interested in her remarks, if one could judge by his eyes and his forehead, and the way he moved his head up and down, and held it sideways and scratched it with his little hand. He examined Sara quite seriously, and anxiously, too. He felt the stuff of her dress, touched her hands, climbed up and examined her ears, and then sat on her shoulder holding a lock of her hair, looking mournful but not at all agitated. Upon the whole, he seemed pleased with Sara.

"But I must take you back," she said to him, "though I'm sorry to have to do it. Oh, the company you would be to a person!"