Johnny Ludlow First Series Part 2

"Pale blue silk; straw hat with wreath of daisies round it; open-worked white stockings, and thin black shoes; white drawers," recounted Tod, as if he had prepared the list by heart coming along.

"That's bad, that dress is," said Jenkins, putting down the pen.

"Why is it bad?"

"'Cause the things is tempting. Quite half the children that gets stole is stole for what they've got upon their backs. Tramps and that sort will run a risk for a blue silk that they'd not run for a brown holland pinafore. Auburn curls, too," added Jenkins, shaking his head; "that's a temptation also. I've knowed children sent back home with bare heads afore now. Any ornaments, sir?"

"She was safe to have on her little gold neck-chain and cross. They are very small, Jenkins--not worth much."

Jenkins lifted his nose--not in disdain, it was a habit he had. "Not worth much to you, sir, who could buy such any day, but an uncommon bait to professional child-stealers. Were the cross a coral, or any stone of that sort?"

"It was a small gold cross, and the chain was thin. They could only be seen when her cloak was off. Oh, I forgot the cloak; it was white: llama, I think they call it. She was going to a child's party."

Some more questions and answers, most of which Jenkins took down.

Handbills were to be printed and posted, and a reward offered on the morrow, if she was not previously found. Then we came away; there was nothing more to do at the station.

"Wouldn't it have been better, Tod, had Jenkins gone out seeking her and telling of the loss abroad, instead of waiting to write all that down?"

"Johnny, if we don't find her to night, I shall go mad," was all he answered.

He went back down Alcester Street at a rus.h.i.+ng pace--not a run but a quick walk.

"Where are you going now?" I asked.

"I'm going up hill and down dale until I find that gipsies' encampment.

You can go on home, Johnny, if you are tired."

I had not felt tired until we were in the police-station. Excitement keeps off fatigue. But I was not going to give in, and said I should stay with him.

"All right, Johnny."

Before we were clear of Alcester, Budd the land-agent came up. He was turning out of the public-house at the corner. It was dusk then. Tod laid hold of him.

"Budd, you are always about, in all kinds of nooks and by-lanes: can you tell me of any encampment of gipsies between here and the Manor-house?"

The agent's business took him abroad a great deal, you know, into the rural districts around.

"Gipsies' encampment?" repeated Budd, giving both of us a stare.

"There's none that I know of. In the spring, a lot of them had the impudence to squat down on the Marquis's----"

"Oh, I know all that," interrupted Tod. "Is there nothing of the sort about now?"

"I saw a miserable little tent to-day up Cookhill way," said Budd. "It might have been a gipsy's or a travelling tinker's. 'Twasn't of much account, whichever it was."

Tod gave a spring. "Whereabouts?" was all he asked. And Budd explained where. Tod went off like a shot, and I after him.

If you are familiar with Alcester, or have visited at Ragley or anything of that sort, you must know the long green lane leading to Cookhill; it is dark with overhanging trees, and uphill all the way. We took that road--Tod first, and I next; and we came to the top, and turned in the direction Budd had described the tent to be in.

It was not to be called dark; the nights never are at midsummer; and rays from the bright light in the west glimmered through the trees. On the outskirts of the coppice, in a bit of low ground, we saw the tent, a little mite of a thing, looking no better than a funnel turned upside down. Sounds were heard within it, and Tod put his finger on his lip while he listened. But we were too far off, and he took his boots off, and crept up close.

Sounds of wailing--of some one in pain. But that Tod had been three parts out of his senses all the afternoon, he might have known at once that they did not come from Lena, or from any one so young. Words mingled with them in a woman's voice; uncouth in its accents, nearly unintelligible, an awful sadness in its tones.

"A bit longer! a bit longer, Corry, and he'd ha' been back. You needn't ha' grudged it to us. Oh----h! if ye had but waited a bit longer!"

I don't write it exactly as she spoke; I shouldn't know how to spell it: we made a guess at half the words. Tod, who had grown white again, put on his boots, and lifted up the opening of the tent.

I had never seen any scene like it; I don't suppose I shall ever see another. About a foot from the ground was a raised surface of some sort, thickly covered with dark green rushes, just the size and shape of a gravestone. A little child, about as old as Lena, lay on it, a white cloth thrown over her, and just touching the white, still face. A torch, blazing and smoking away, was thrust into the ground and lighted up the scene. Whiter the face looked now, because it had been tawny in life. I would rather see one of our faces in death than a gipsy's. The contrast between the white face and dress of the child, and the green bed of rushes it lay on was something remarkable. A young woman, dark too, and handsome enough to create a commotion at the fair, knelt down, her brown hands uplifted; a gaudy ring on one of the fingers, worth sixpence perhaps when new, sparkled in the torchlight. Tod strode up to the dead face and looked at it for full five minutes. I do believe he thought at first that it was Lena.

"What is this?" he asked.

"It is my dead child!" the woman answered. "She did not wait that her father might see her die!"

But Tod had his head full of Lena, and looked round. "Is there no other child here?"

As if to answer him, a bundle of rags came out of a corner and set up a howl. It was a boy of about seven, and our going in had wakened him up.

The woman sat down on the ground and looked at us.

"We have lost a child--a little girl," explained Tod. "I thought she might have been brought here--or have strayed here."

"I've lost _my_ girl," said the woman. "Death has come for her!" And, when speaking to us, she spoke more intelligibly than when alone.

"Yes; but this child has been lost--lost out of doors! Have you seen or heard anything of one?"

"I've not been in the way o' seeing or hearing, master; I've been in the tent alone. If folks had come to my aid, Corry might not have died.

I've had nothing but water to put to her lips all day?"

"What was the matter with her?" Tod asked, convinced at length that Lena was not there.

"She have been ailing long--worse since the moon come in. The sickness took her with the summer, and the strength began to go out. Jake have been down, too. He couldn't get out to bring us help, and we have had none."

Jake was the husband, we supposed. The help meant food, or funds to get it with.

"He sat all yesterday cutting skewers, his hands a'most too weak to fas.h.i.+on 'em. Maybe he'd sell 'em for a few ha'pence, he said; and he went out this morning to try, and bring home a morsel of food."

"Tod," I whispered, "I wish that hard-hearted Molly had----"

"Hold your tongue, Johnny," he interrupted sharply. "Is Jake your husband?" he asked of the woman.

"He is my husband, and the children's father."

"Jake would not be likely to steal a child, would he?" asked Tod, in a hesitating manner, for him.

She looked up, as if not understanding. "Steal a child, master! What for?"

"I don't know," said Tod. "I thought perhaps he had done it, and had brought the child here."

Another comical stare from the woman. "We couldn't feed these of ours; what should we do with another?"

"Well: Jake called at our house to sell his skewers; and, directly afterwards, we missed my little sister. I have been hunting for her ever since."