Part 7 (1/2)
She had had nothing to eat since breakfast, and was quite tired out.
While still keeping her eyes upon Oliver, she felt a jerk. The basket knocked against something; and it made her quite sick. She immediately heard Ailwin's voice saying, ”'tis one of them, that's certain. Well!
If I didn't think it was some vile conjuring trick, up to this very moment!”
The poor dizzy child felt a strong arm pa.s.sed round her waist, and found herself carried near a fire in a room. She faltered out, ”Ailwin, get something for Oliver to eat. He will be here presently.”
”That I will: and for you first. You shall both have a drop of my cherry-brandy too.”
Mildred said she had rather have a draught of milk; but Ailwin said there was no milk. She had not been able to reach the cow, to milk her.
What had poor little George done, then?--He had had some that had been left from the morning. Ailwin added that she was very sorry,--she could not tell how she came to be so forgetful; but she had never thought of not being able to milk the cow in the afternoon, and had drunk up all that George left of the milk; her regular dinner having been drowned in the kitchen. Neither had she remembered to bring anything eatable up-stairs with her when the flood drove her from the lower rooms. The flower and grain were now all under water. The vegetables were, no doubt, swimming about in the cellar; and the meat would have been where the flour was, at this moment, if Roger, who said he had no mind to be starved, had not somehow fished up a joint of mutton. This was now stewing over the fire; but it was little likely to be good; for besides there being no vegetables, the salt was all melted, and the water was none of the best. Indeed, the water was so bad that it could not be drunk alone: and again good Ailwin pressed a drop of her cherry-brandy.
Mildred, however, preferred a cup of the broth, which, poor as it was, was all the better for the loaf--the only loaf of bread--being boiled in it.
Just when Mildred thought she could stand at the window, and watch for Oliver, Oliver came in at the window. He was not too tired to have his wits about him, as Ailwin said;--wits, she added, that were worth more than hers. He had brought over some dry wood with him,--as much as the basket would hold; thinking that the peat-stack was probably all afloat, and the wood-heap wetted through. All were pleased at the prospect of keeping up a fire during this strange night. All agreed that the bridge-rope must be left as it was, while the flood lasted. There were wild animals and birds enough on the Red-hill to last for food for a long while; and there alone could they get fuel.
”You can't catch game without my dog,” cried Roger, surlily, to Ailwin; ”and my dog shan't put his nose to the ground, if you don't feed him well: and he shall be where I am,--mind you that.”
As he spoke, he opened the door to admit the dog, which Ailwin had put out upon the stairs, for the sake of her pet hen and chicks which were all in the room. The hen fluttered up to a beam below the ceiling, on the appearance of the dog, and the chicks cluttered about, till Ailwin and Mildred caught them, and kept them in their laps. They glanced timidly at Roger, remembering the fate of the white hen, the day before.
Roger did not heed them. He had taken out his knife, forked up the mutton out of the kettle, and cut off the best half for himself and his dog.
Probably Oliver was thinking that Roger deserved the best they could give him, for his late services; for he said,--
”I am sure, Roger, Mildred and I shall never forget,--nor father and mother either, if ever they know, it,--what you have done for us to-night. We might have died on the Red-hill but for you.”
”Stuff!” muttered Roger, as he sat, swinging his legs, with his open knife in his hand, and his mouth crammed,--”Stuff! As if I cared whether you and she sink or swim! I like sport that's all.”
n.o.body spoke. Ailwin helped the children to the poor broth, and the remains of the meat, shaking her head when they begged her to take some.
She whispered a good deal to Oliver about cherry-brandy; but he replied aloud that it looked and smelled very good; but that the only time he had tasted it, it made him rather giddy; and he did not wish to be giddy to-night;--there was so much to think about; and he was not at all sure that the flood had got to its height. He said no more, though his mind was full of his father. Neither he nor Mildred could mention their father to Ailwin to-night, even if Roger had been out of the way.
Roger probably thought what Oliver did say very silly; for he sat laughing as he heard it, and for some time after. Half an hour later, when Ailwin pa.s.sed near him, while she was laying down a bed for Oliver, so that they might be all together during this night of alarm, she thought there was a strong smell of brandy. She flew to her bottle, and found it empty,--not a drop left Roger had drained it all. His head soon dropped upon his breast, and he fell from his chair in a drunken sleep. Mildred shrank back from him in horror; but Ailwin and Oliver rolled him into a corner of the room, where his dog lay down beside him.
Ailwin could not refrain from giving him a kick, while he lay thus powerless, and sneering in his face because he could not see her.
”Don't, Ailwin,--don't!” said Oliver. ”Mildred and I should not have been here now but for him.”
”And I should not have been terrified out of my wits, for these two hours past, nor have lost my cherry-brandy, but for him. Mercy! I shall never forget his popping up his face at that window, and sending his dog in before him. I was as sure as death that the flood was all of their making, and that they were come for me, after having carried off my master, and as I thought, you two.”
”Why, Ailwin, what nonsense!” cried Mildred from her bed,--trembling all over as she spoke. ”How could a boy make a flood?”
”And you see what he has done, instead of carrying us off,” observed Oliver.
”Well, it is almost worth my cherry-brandy to see him lie so,--dead drunk,--only it would be better still to see him really dead.--Well, that may be a wicked thing to say; but it is not so wicked as some things he has done;--and I am so mortally afraid of him!”
”I wish you would say your prayers, Ailwin, instead of saying such things: and then, perhaps, you would find yourself not afraid of anybody.”
”Well, that is almost as good as if the pastor had preached it. I will just hang up the chicks in the hand-basket, for fear of the dog; and then we will say our prayers, and go to sleep, please G.o.d. I am sure we all want it.”
Oliver chose to examine first how high the water stood in the lower rooms. He lighted a piece of wood, and found that only two steps of the lower flight of stairs remained dry. Ailwin protested so earnestly that the waters had not risen for two or three hours, that he thought they might all lie down to sleep. Ailwin and he were the only ones who could keep watch. He did not think Ailwin's watching would be worth much; he was so tired that he did not think he could keep awake; and he felt that he should be much more fit for all the business that lay before him for the next day, if he could get a good rest now. So he kissed little George, as he lay down beside him, and was soon as sound asleep as all his companions.
CHAPTER FIVE.