Читать книгу The Quiver, 1/ 1900 - Anonymous - Страница 12

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A big yew-tree hid the corner of the wall, where the adventurers, on their enterprise, dropped down into the cathedral yard. Numerous square tombstones and old monuments made splendid hiding-places. There was only one little bit of open space to cross, where the evening sunshine cast long shadows, and where for a few moments the strange little truant procession looked a procession of giants.

David and Sandy each held a hand of Barbara, she having declined to be carried. Ross and Orme followed solemnly. If anybody had met them, the boys would have turned down the path to their home, and their presence there would have seemed quite natural. But no one passed—no one was in sight. David had chosen the time for his move well. The Court households were busy preparing for dinner. And though windows commanded the cathedral yard, from none, as it turned out, was the start of the little party into the world observed. Once across the grass, they were soon hidden by the many projections and buttresses and corners of the walls.

In the angle of the south aisle and its chapel was the tiny room whence the spiral staircase started, in the thickness of the wall, up to the clerestory of the choir. It also led through a narrow door lower down, on to the roof of the south aisle. Sandy knew all the keys of the cathedral, and the place in Mr. Galton's house where each hung. The door of the little room was, however, open; Mr. Galton therefore was somewhere about, though he often lingered on his last look round. They must be quick.

In a few minutes the excited children were mounting the spiral staircase. David went first, helping Barbara's unaccustomed feet; Sandy came last, having closed the little door of communication at the foot of the stairs. They were embarked on their "climb up the mountain." Issuing through the narrow door which came first in sight, the delighted children found themselves in the wide gutter at the base of the roof. Guarded by its low parapet, it was as safe as their own garden, provided they did not attempt to climb. David gave strict orders that they were to keep under the "shelter of the forts," and on no account to show their faces to the enemy.

Up here, they were in another world—a delightful, wide, spacious world, whence they could look down on the earth they had left. The Palace grounds lay below them; beyond were the parks, intersected by their hedges, like the sections of a map. From the flat chapel roof they could see their own garden and Mr. Warde's, with the Deanery trees beyond.

"Ross, and Orme, and Barbie, remember you're our family now, and you must do what you are bid," was David's solemn reminder to them of the altered condition of things.

Up and down the children ran, with a pitter-patter of clamouring feet on the leads. Barbara was a little unhappy because she could not make as much noise as the boys, owing to the make of her shoes, and to her misfortune in having lost one in transit. Sandy set this right.

"Stop the march!" he ordered. "You'll give notice to the enemy, you duffers"—this to the wide-eyed boys—"where we are." So they stopped. Ross then proceeded to clamber on hands and knees up the incline of the roof, and, turning, to slide down on his other side. This amusement lasted all three some time. When their clothes looked pretty well spoilt, the fun palled. Then came supper, the crowning act of the evening's proceedings. After this, they intended to return to ordinary life and the earth they had left; abandoning their fortress till another opportunity arrived. They intended to be at home before they would be much missed.

But all this had taken longer than they thought, and when the "family" was called to its repast the little boys refused to be hurried. With much self-denial, this meal had been saved. They meant to enjoy it. By the time they were satisfied, the darkness and cold were beginning to be appreciably perceived.

Then Sandy hugged himself for his pioneering knowledge.

"No settlers goes wivout blankets," he announced. "Knew we should want it."

"Hurry up," David urged, beginning to be a little alarmed at the aspect of things in their aërial world. "We've got to get Barbie home. It's time to go."

Ten minutes later the boy turned a white face to the expectant babes behind him. He and Sandy had pushed with all their might at the little iron door, which had so easily admitted them to the roof. It was fast and firm—locked up securely for the night—and they were prisoners. Probably they would not be released until the workmen arrived in the morning.

"I wouldn't mind, if we could let mother know, not to be frightened," the boy said, "and Barbie's father. Think, Sandy; couldn't we let 'em know?"

Sandy desisted from fruitless bangings on the door, propped his elbows on the parapet, and put his head between his hands in the most approved attitude of thinking. Possibly, this attitude was useful for another purpose than thinking. Sandy was only seven, but he had a fervent belief in his mother's fragility, and in the power of himself and his brothers to keep her laughing presence on her sofa or to banish her elsewhere. He had heard things said which made him realise that a very little thing might transfer her to a narrower couch—in a sunny, railed-off corner just under the cathedral walls. Already a little white stone marked the resting-place of "Archibald, aged one year." Sandy sometimes pitied Archibald for being all by himself there. He had one day suggested to his mother that "P'r'aps one of us ought to go and mind him—as he was so little." For answer, the mother had gathered the bright head on to her breast, fervently breathing, "No, Sandy, mother can't let one go, not the very littlest bit of any of you. God is minding little Archie better than we can."

So up there in the air, within sight of the familiar garden—within sound almost of the mother who as yet was not concerned about him—her little son may be excused if, in process of his thinking, he blinked away a tear. The responsibility was so great. This had been his scheme more than David's. And there was Barbie's father, too. But he wasted no sentiment on him.

"My finks is all in a mess," he said at last, lifting his face. "On'y we must signal. It's like a desert island up here. P'r'aps we might frow down something."

The gathering darkness, alas! hid the fluttering signal which, after some protestations from Barbara, they tied to a carved projection. It was the longest thing they had about them. How tiny it looked up there, they did not realise.

The little feet were growing weary, the "family" by this time were showing signs of restive discontent.

"Ain't we got no beds in this home?" asked Ross, his hands in his pockets, his legs wide apart, surveying the leads, of whose hardness he had made ample trial.

"Not yet," said Sandy cheerily. Whatever he felt himself, he was not going to let the babes be unhappy, if he could help it. "On'y pioneers to-night. Beds have to be made."

"Nur' did maked Ross's bed—see'd her—mornin'," announced Ross in a dissatisfied tone; and he brought his brows together, and signified generally that he was disgusted.

"No barf?" inquired Orme, planting himself by his elder brother in a similar revolutionary attitude.

"Bar?" echoed Barbara, unwilling to be kept out of whatever anarchy might be going. "Barbedie's bar?" she inquired of Sandy; and it said much for Sandy's ability in translating languages that he quite understood what she was demanding.

David turned out his pockets, in the hope of finding enough string to let down a basket, or a letter describing their distressed condition. But the utmost length they could attain, when every pocket had been ransacked, and all their ties, and hat ribbons, and pocket-handkerchiefs tied together, was about midway down the long windows. No hope that way, even if the darkness of the summer night had not by this time settled down upon the land. David gave it up at last.