Chapter 6 The Little Princess of Tower Hill by L. T. Meade
JO'S ROOM
It was well for Maggie that Ralph was a very different boy when with his mother and when without her. When the children arrived in London and found themselves in Mrs. Grenville's pretty bright house in Bayswater, Ralph flew to the sweet-looking young mother who came up to meet them, clasped his arms round her neck, laid his head on her shoulder, and instantly a softened and sweet expression came over his dark and somewhat hard little face. Mrs. Grenville was very much like her brother, so that prevented Maggie being shy with her. She also petted the little girl a great deal, and, as a matter of course, took more notice of her than of Ralph. Mrs. Grenville also spoke about the Zoo and Madame Tussaud's, but she contrived to make these two places of entertainment sound quite delightful to her little visitor. Instead of dwelling on their horrors she spoke of their manifold and varied charms, until Maggie's eyes sparkled, and she said in her quick, excitable way:
"I'll go there with you, Aunt Violet; I'd like to go to both of those places with you."
Aunt Violet read between the lines here, and gave Ralph a quick little glance which he pretended not to see.
The next morning Mrs. Grenville asked Miss Grey to allow Maggie to have a holiday.
"To-morrow she will begin her lessons regularly," continued the lady. "Of course by this time such a tall girl can read and write nicely, and I shall like to inclose a little letter from her to her mother; but to-day the children and I mean to be very busy together. Ralph, as you are older, and as you know most about London, you shall choose what our amusement shall be."
Maggie felt herself turning first red and then white when Mrs. Grenville spoke of her reading and writing accomplishments, but Miss Grey was merciful and made no comment, and as Ralph had not yet been made acquainted with the poor little princess' profound ignorance, she trusted that her secret was safe.
"Mother," here eagerly burst in Ralph, "of course the very first thing we must do is to go and see Jo. Shall I go round to see Jo this morning, mother, and may I take Maggie with me? I think it would do Maggie lots of good to see a girl like Jo."
"Jo would do any one good," responded Mrs. Grenville. "It is a kind thought, Ralph, and you may carry it out. If you and Maggie like to run upstairs and get ready now, I will send Waters round with you, and I will call for you myself at Philmer's Buildings at twelve o'clock. After all, I should like to take Maggie myself to the Zoo – I want her to see the monkeys and the birds, and she shall have a ride on one of the elephants if she likes. As to the lions, dear," continued Mrs. Grenville, looking kindly at the little girl, "you shall not see them feed unless you like."
"I don't mind seeing them feed if you are with me," whispered back Maggie; but just then Ralph called to her imperiously, and she had to hurry out of the room.
"Aren't you glad that you are going at last to see my dear little Jo?" exclaimed the boy. "Now do hurry, Mag; get yourself up nice and smart, for Jo does so admire pretty things."
Maggie made no response, but went slowly into her little bedroom.
In her heart of hearts she was becoming intensely jealous of this wonderful Jo. She was putting her in the same category with those unpleasant little girls who liked needlework, and were exceedingly proper and good, and belonged to that tiresome class of little models of whom nurse was so fond of speaking. Maggie had borne patiently all Ralph's rhapsodies over this perfect little Jo, but quite a pang went through her heart when she heard Mrs. Grenville also praise her.
"I don't want to go," she said as Miss Grey helped her to put on her boots, and took out her neat little jacket and pretty shady hat from their drawers.
"Not want to go?" said the governess. "Oh, surely you will like the walk with Ralph this lovely morning, Maggie?"
"No, I won't," said Maggie. "I don't want to see Jo; I'm sure she's a horrid good little girl; she's like nurse's Sunday go-to-meeting girls, and I never could bear them."
Miss Grey could not help smiling slightly at Maggie's eager words.
"I remember," she said after a pause as she helped to put the little girl's sash straight, "when I was a child about your age, Maggie, I often amused myself making up pictures of people before I had seen them. I generally found that the pictures were wrong, and that the people were not at all like what I had fancied them to be."
Maggie pondered over this statement; then she said solemnly:
"But I know about Jo – I'm quite sure that my picture of Jo isn't wrong. She wears a white pinafore, and there are no spots on it, and her hair is so shiny – I 'spect there is vaseline on her hair – and her nails are neat, and her shoes are always buttoned, and – and – and – she's a horrid good little girl – and I don't like her – and I never will like her."
"Maggie! Maggie!" shouted Ralph from below, and Maggie, with a nod at Miss Grey, and the parting words, "I know all about her," rushed out of the room, danced down the stairs, and holding her cousin's hand, and accompanied by the sedate Waters, set out on their morning walk.
It was Maggie's first walk in London, and the children and maid soon found themselves crossing Hyde Park, coming out at one of the gates at the opposite side from Mrs. Grenville's pretty house, and then entering a crowded thoroughfare. Here Waters stepped resolutely between the little pair, took a hand of each, and hurried them along. Ralph carried a small closed basket in his hand, and Maggie wondered what it contained, and why Ralph looked so grave and thoughtful, and why he so often questioned Waters as to the contents of a square box which she also carried.
"You took great care of that box while I was away, Waters?"
"Well, yes, Master Ralph; it always stood on the mantelpiece in my mistress' room, and I dusted it myself most regularly."
"And do you really think it's getting heavy, Waters?"
"Well, sir, you were away exactly two nights and two days, and that means, by the allowance of one penny a day given to you, two pennies more in the money-box. It's two pennies heavier than it was, sir, when you left us, and that's all."
Ralph sighed profoundly.
"Time goes very slowly," he said. "How I wish I had more money, and that when I had it I didn't spend it so fast. Well, perhaps Jo has managed about the tambourine after all. If there is a good manager, Jo is one. Oh, here we are at last!"
The children and Waters had turned into a shabby-looking street, and were now standing before a block of buildings which looked new and tolerably clean. Unlike any ordinary house Maggie had ever seen, this one appeared to possess no hall door, but was entered at once by a flight of stone stairs. The children and the servant began to ascend the stairs, and Maggie wondered how many they would have to go up before they reached the rooms where the little girl in the spotless pinafore with the white hands and the smoothly vaselined hair resided. Maggie was rather puzzled and disconcerted by the bare look of the stone stairs, and also by the somewhat anxious and grave expression on Ralph's face. She was unacquainted with that kind of look, and it puzzled her, and she began dimly to wonder if Miss Grey was right, and her picture of Jo was untrue.
At last they stopped at a door, which was shut, and which contained some writing in large black letters on its yellow paint. Maggie could not read, but Ralph pointed to the letters, and said joyfully:
"Here we are at last!"
The words on the door where these: "Mrs. Aylmer, Laundress and Charwoman," but Maggie, of course, was not enlightened by what she could not understand.
Waters knocked at the door; a quick, eager little voice said, "Come in." There was the pattering of some small feet, the door was flung wide open, and Maggie, Ralph, and Waters found themselves inside Jo's room.
That was the first impression the room gave; it seemed to belong to Jo; Jo's spirit seemed to pervade it all over. Mrs. Aylmer, laundress and charwoman, might own the room and pay the rent for it, but that made no difference – it was Jo's.
Who was Jo? Maggie asked herself this question; then she turned red; then she felt her lips trembling; then she became silent, absorbed, fascinated. The picture she had conjured up faded never to return, and the real Jo took its place.
Jo was the most beautiful little girl Maggie had ever seen – she had fluffy, shining, tangled hair; her pale face was not thin, but round and smooth; each little feature was delicate and chiseled; the lips were little rosebuds; the eyes had that serene light which you never see except in the faces of those children who have been taught patience through suffering. Jo was a sadly crippled little girl lying on a low bed. Maggie, of course, had seen poor children in the village at home; but those children had not been ill; they were rosy and hearty and strong. This child looked fragile, and yet there was nothing absolutely weak about her. At the moment when Ralph and Maggie entered Jo was keeping school; two twin boys were standing by her bedside, and listening eagerly to her instructions.
"No, no, Bob," she was saying, "you mustn't do it that way; you must do it more carefully, Bob, and slower. Now, shall we begin again?"
Bob tried to drone something in a monotonous sing-song, but just then the visitors' faces appeared, and all semblance of school vanished on the spot. Ralph poured out a whole string of remarks. The contents of the money-box were emptied on Jo's bed, and the exciting question of Susy's tambourine came under earnest discussion. If Susy had a proper tambourine she could use her rather sweet voice to advantage, and earn money by singing and dancing in the streets. Susy was ten years old – a thick-set little girl with none of Jo's transparent beauty. Sixpence had been already collected for the coveted musical instrument; Ralph's box contained eightpence, but, alas! the tambourine on which Susy had set her heart could not be obtained for a smaller sum than half a crown.
"They are not worth nothing for less than that," she exclaimed; "they makes no sound, and when you sings or dances with them, your voice don't seem to carry nohow. No, I'd a sight rayther wait and have a good one. Them cheap 'uns cracks, too, when they gets wet. Here's sixpence and here's eightpence; that makes one shilling and two pennies. Oh! but it do seem as if it were a long way off afore we see our way to 'arf a crown."
Here Susy, whose face had been radiant, became suddenly depressed, and Maggie felt a lump in her throat, and an earnest, almost passionate, wish to get hold of her father's purse-strings.
"Now come and talk to Jo," said Ralph, drawing his little cousin forward. "We need not say any more about the tambourine to-day; I'm saving up all my money; I earn a penny every day that I'm good, and I'll give my penny to Susy for the present, so she'll really have the half-crown by and by. Now, Jo, this is my Cousin Maggie; I've told her about you. She lives down in the country; she doesn't know much, but then that's not to be wondered at. She was very naughty and careless too about my rabbits; she has asked me to forgive her, and of course I haven't said much; it wouldn't be at all manly to scold a girl; but you are really the one to forgive her, Jo, for the rabbits were yours before they were mine."
"What, Bianco and Lily?" answered Jo, the pink color coming into her little face. "Oh, missie, wasn't they beautiful and white?"
"Yes, and they're lost," said Maggie; "'twas I did it. I opened the door of their little house, and they ran out, and went into a wood, and none of us could find them since. Ralph said it was you gave them to him, and he doesn't really and truly forgive me, though he pretends he does. I was sorry, but I won't go on being sorry if he doesn't really and truly forgive me."
To this rather defiant little speech of Maggie's Jo made a very eager reply. She looked into the pretty little country lady's face, right straight up into her eyes, and then she said ecstatically:
"Oh, ain't I happy to think as my beautiful darling white Bianco and Lily has got safe away into a real country wood! Oh, missie, are there real trees there, and grass? and I hopes, oh, I hopes there's a little stream."
"Yes, there is," said Maggie, "a sweet little stream, and it tinkles away all day and all night, and of course there are trees, and there's grass. It's just like any other country wood."
"I'm so glad," said Jo; "I can picter it. In course I has never seen it, but I can picter it. Trees, grass, and the little stream a-tinkling, and the white bunnies ever and ever so happy. Yes, missie, thank you, missie; it's real beautiful, and when I shuts my eyes I can see it all."
Jo had said nothing about forgiving Maggie; on the contrary, she seemed to think her careless deed something rather heroic, Ralph raised his dark brows, fidgeted a little, and began to look at his cousin with a new respect. At this moment Mrs. Grenville's footman came up to say that the carriage was waiting for the children; so Maggie's first visit to Jo was over.