After supper the excitement waxed fast and furious. The boys, aided by the farmer and one of his men, proceeded to send off the fireworks. This was done on a little plateau of smoothly1 cut lawn just in front of the best sitting-room2 windows. The girls pressed their faces against the glass, and for a time were satisfied with this way of looking at the fun. But soon Nancy could bear it no longer.
“It is stupid to be mewed up in the close air,” she said. “Let’s go out.”
No sooner had she given utterance3 to the words than all four girls were helping4 the boys to let off the squibs, Catherine-wheels, rockets, and other fireworks. Pauline now became nearly mad with delight. Her shouts were the loudest of any. When the rockets went high into the air and burst into a thousand stars, she did not believe that the world itself could contain a more lovely sight. But presently her happiness came to a rude conclusion, for a bit of burning squib struck her arm, causing her fine muslin dress to catch fire, and the little girl’s arm was somewhat severely5 hurt. She put out the fire at once, and determined6 to hide the fact that she was rather badly burnt.
By-and-by they all returned to the house. Nancy sat down to the piano and began to sing some of her most rollicking songs. Then she played dance music, and the boys and girls danced with all their might. Pauline, however, had never learned to dance. She stood silent, watching the others. Her high spirits had gone down to zero. She now began to wish that she had never come. She wondered if she could possibly get home again without being discovered. At last Nancy noticed her grave looks.
“You are tired, Paulie,” she said; “and for that matter, so are we. I say, it’s full time for bed. Good-night, boys. Put out the lamps when you are tired of amusing yourselves. Dad has shut up the house already. Come, Paulie; come, Amy; come, Becky.”
The four girls ran upstairs, but as they were going down the passage which led to their pretty bedroom, Pauline’s pain was so great that she stumbled against Becky and nearly fell.
“What is it?” said Becky. “Are you faint?”
She put her arm around the little girl and helped her into the bedroom.
“Whatever can be wrong?” she said. “You seemed so lively out in the open air.”75
“Oh, you do look bad, Paulie!” said Nancy. “It is that terrible fasting you went through to-day. My dear girls, what do you think? This poor little aristocrat7, far and away too good to talk to the likes of us”—here Nancy put her arms akimbo and looked down with a mocking laugh at the prostrate8 Pauline—“far too grand, girls—fact, I assure you—was kept without her food until I gave her a bit of bread and a sup of water at supper. All these things are owing to an aunt—one of the tip-top of the nobility. This aunt, though grand externally, has a mighty9 poor internal arrangement, to my way of thinking. She put the poor child into a place she calls Punishment Land, and kept her without food.”
“That isn’t true,” said Pauline. “I could have had plenty to eat if I had liked.”
“That means that if you were destitute10 of one little spark of spirit you’d have crawled back to the house to take your broken food on a cold plate like a dog. But what is the matter now? Hungry again?”
“No; it is my arm. Please don’t touch it.”
“Do look!” cried Amy Perkins. “Oh, Nancy, she has got an awful burn! There’s quite a hole through the sleeve of her dress. Oh, do see this great blister11!”
“It was a bit of one of the squibs,” said Pauline. “It lit right on my arm and burned my muslin sleeve; but I don’t suppose it’s much hurt, only I feel a little faint.”
“Dear, dear!” said Nancy. “What is to be done now? I don’t know a thing about burns, or about any sort of illness. Shall we wake cook up? Perhaps she can tell us something.”
“Let’s put on a bandage,” said one of the other girls. “Then when you lie down in bed, Pauline, you will drop asleep and be all right in the morning.”
Pauline was so utterly12 weary that she was glad to creep into bed. Her arm was bandaged very unskilfully; nevertheless it felt slightly more comfortable. Presently she dropped into an uneasy doze13; but from that doze she awoke soon after midnight, to hear Nancy snoring loudly by her side, to hear corresponding snores in a sort of chorus coming from the other end of the long room, and to observe also that there was not a chink of light anywhere; and, finally, to be all too terribly conscious of a great burning pain in her arm. That pain seemed to awaken14 poor Pauline’s slumbering15 conscience.
“Why did I come?” she said to herself. “I am a wretched, most miserable16 girl. And how am I ever to get back? I cannot climb into the beech-tree with this bad arm. Oh, how it does hurt me! I feel so sick and faint I scarcely care what happens.”
Pauline stretched out her uninjured arm and touched Nancy.76
“What is it?” said Nancy. “Oh, dear! I’d forgotten. It’s you, Paulie. How is your arm, my little dear? Any better?”
“It hurts me very badly indeed; but never mind about that now. How am I to get home?”
“I’ll manage that. Betty, our dairymaid, is to throw gravel17 up at the window at four o’clock. You shall have a cup of tea before you start, and I will walk with you as far as the wicket-gate.”
“Oh, thank you! But how am I to get into my room when I do arrive at The Dales? I don’t believe I shall be able to use this arm at all.”
“Of course you will,” said Nancy. “You will be miles better when cook has looked to it. I know she’s grand about burns, and has a famous ointment18 she uses for the purpose. Only, for goodness’ sake, Paulie, don’t let that burn in the sleeve of your dress be seen; that would lead to consequences, and I don’t want my midnight picnic to be spoilt.”
“I don’t seem to care about that or anything else any more.”
“What nonsense! You don’t suppose I should like this little escapade of yours and mine to be known. You must take care. Why, you know, there’s father. He’s very crotchety over some things. He likes all of you, but over and over again he has said:
“‘I’m as proud of being an honest farmer as I should be to be a lord. My grandfather paid his way, and my father paid his way, and I am paying my way. There’s no nonsense about me, and I shall leave you, Nancy, a tidy fortune. You like those young ladies at The Dales, and you shall have them come here if they wish to come, but not otherwise. I won’t have them here thinking themselves too grand to talk to us. Let them keep to their own station, say I. I don’t want them.’
“Now you see, Paulie, what that means. If father found out that your aunt had written to me and desired me to have nothing further to do with you, I believe he’d pack me out of the country to-morrow. I don’t want to leave my home; why should I? So, you see, for my sake you must keep it the closest of close secrets.”
“You should have thought ............