Two Little Pilgrims' Progress

XVI

It was such a strange thing – so unlike the things of every day, and so totally an unexpected thing, that for a little while they all three had a sense of scarcely knowing what to do with themselves. If Robin and Meg had not somehow rather liked the man, and vaguely felt him friendly, and if there had not been in their impressionable minds that fancy about his being far from as happy as the other people of the crowds looked, it is more than probable that they would not have liked their position, and would have felt that it might spoil their pleasure.

But they were sympathetic children, and they had been lonely and sad enough themselves to be moved by a sadness in others, even if it was an uncomprehended one.

As she walked by the man’s side, still letting her hand remain in his, Meg kept giving him scrutinizing looks aside, and trying in her way to read him. He was a man just past middle life, he was powerful and well-built, and had keen, and at the same time rather unhappy-looking, blue eyes, with brows and lashes as black as Rob’s and her own. There was something strong in his fine-looking, clean-shaven face, and the hand which held hers had a good, firm grasp, and felt like a hand which had worked in its time.

As for the man himself, he was trying an experiment. He had been suddenly seized with a desire to try it, and see how it would result. He was not sure that it would be a success, but if it proved one it might help to rid him of gloom he would be glad to be relieved of. He felt it rather promising when Meg went at once to the point and asked him a practical question.

“You don’t know our names?” she said.

“You don’t know mine,” he answered. “It’s John Holt. You can call me that.”

“John Holt,” said Meg. “Mr. John Holt.”

The man laughed. Her grave, practical little air pleased him.

“Say John Holt, without the handle to it,” he said. “It sounds well.”

Meg looked at him inquiringly. Though he had laughed, he seemed to mean what he said.

“It’s queer, of course,” she said, “because we don’t know each other well; but I can do it, if you like.”

“I do like,” he said, and he laughed again.

“Very well,” said Meg. “My name’s Margaret Macleod, I’m called Meg for short. My brother’s name is Robin, and Ben’s is Ben Nowell. Where shall we go first?”

“You are the leader of the party,” he answered, his face beginning to brighten a little. “Where shall it be?”

“The Palace of the Genius of the Flowers,” she said.

“Is that what it is called?” he asked.

“That’s what we call it,” she explained. “That’s part of the fairy story. We are part of a fairy story, and all these are palaces that the Genii built for the Great Magician.”

“That’s first-rate,” he said. “Just tell us about it. Ben and I have not heard.”

At first she had wondered if she could tell her stories to a grown-up person, but there was something in his voice and face that gave her the feeling that she could. She laughed a little when she began; but he listened with enjoyment that was so plain, and Ben, walking by her side, looked up with such eager, enraptured, and wondering eyes, that she went on bravely. It grew, as stories will, in being told, and it was better than it had been the day before. Robin himself saw that, and leaned towards her as eagerly as Ben.

By the time they entered the Palace of the Flowers and stood among the flame of colors, and beneath the great palm fronds swaying under the crystal globe that was its dome, she had warmed until she was all aglow, and as full of fancies as the pavilions were of blossoms.

As she dived into the story of the Genius who strode through tropical forests and deep jungles, over purple moors and up mountain sides, where strange-hued pale or vivid things grew in tangles, or stood in the sun alone, John Holt became of the opinion that his experiment would be a success. It was here that he began to find he had gifts to give. She asked him questions; Robin and Ben asked him questions; the three drew close to him, and hung on his every word.

“You know the things and the places where they grow,” Meg said. “We have never seen anything. We can only try to imagine. You can tell us.” And he did tell them; and as they went from court to pavilion, surrounded by sumptuous bloom and sumptuous leafage and sumptuous fragrance, the three beginning to cling to him, to turn to him with every new discovery, and to forget he was a stranger, he knew that he was less gloomy than he had been before, and that somehow this thing seemed worth doing.

And in this way they went from place to place. As they had seen beauties and wonders the day before, they saw wonders and beauties to-day, but to-day their pleasure had a flavor new to them. For the first time in years, since they had left their little seat at their own fireside, they were not alone, and some one seemed to mean to look after them. John Holt was an eminently practical person, and when they left the Palace of the Flowers they began vaguely to realize that, stranger or not, he had taken charge of them. It was evident that he was in the habit of taking charge of people and things. He took charge of the satchel. It appeared that he knew where it was safe to leave it.

“Can we get it at lunch time?” Robin asked, with some anxiety.

“You can get it when you want it,” said John Holt.

A little later he looked at Ben’s pale, small face scrutinizingly.

“Look here,” he said, “you’re tired.” And without any further question he called up a rolling-chair.

“Get into that,” he said.

“Me?” said Ben, a little alarmed.

“Yes.”

And, almost a shade paler at the thought of such grandeur, Ben got in, and fell back with a luxurious sigh.

And at midday, when they were beginning to feel ravenous, though no one mentioned the subject, he asked Meg a blunt question.

“Where did you eat your lunch yesterday?” he asked.

Meg flushed a little, feeling that hospitality demanded that they should share the remaining eggs with such a companion, and she was afraid there would be very few to offer, when Ben was taken into consideration.

“We went to a quiet place on the Wooded Island,” she said, “and ate it with the roses. We pretended they invited us. We had only hard-boiled eggs and a sandwich each; but a kind woman gave us something of her own.”

“We brought the eggs from home,” explained Rob. “We have some chickens of our own, who laid them. We thought that would be cheaper than buying things.”

“Oh!” said John Holt. “So you’ve been living on hard-boiled eggs. Got any left?”

“A few,” Meg answered. “They’re in the satchel. We shall have to go and get it.”

“Come along, then,” said John Holt. “Pretty hungry by this time, aren’t you?”

“Yes,” said Meg, with heartfelt frankness, “we are!”

It was astonishing how much John Holt had found out about them during this one morning. They did not know themselves how much their answers to his occasional questions had told him. He had not known himself, when he asked the questions, how much their straightforward, practical replies would reveal. They had not sentimentalized over their friendless loneliness, but he had found himself realizing what desolate, unnoticed, and uncared-for things their lives were. They had not told him how they had tired their young bodies with work too heavy for them, but he had realized it. In his mind there had risen a picture of the Straw Parlor, under the tent-like roof of the barn, with these two huddled together in the cold, buried in the straw, while they talked over their desperate plans. They had never thought of calling themselves strong and determined, and clear of wit, but he knew how strong and firm of purpose and endurance two creatures so young and unfriended, and so poor, must have been to form a plan so bold, and carry it out in the face of the obstacles of youth and inexperience, and empty pockets and hands. He had laughed at the story of the Treasure saved in pennies, and hidden deep in the straw; but as he had laughed he had thought, with a quick, soft throb of his heart, that the woman he had loved and lost would have laughed with him, with tears in the eyes which Meg’s reminded him of. He somehow felt as if she might be wandering about with them in their City Beautiful this morning, they were so entirely creatures she would have been drawn to, and longed to make happier.

He liked their fancy of making their poor little feast within scent of the roses. It was just such a fancy as She might have had herself. And he wanted to see what they had to depend on. He knew it must be little, and it touched him to know that, little as they had, they meant to share it with their poorer friend.

They went for the satchel, and when they did so they began to calculate as to what they could add to its contents. They were few things, and poor ones.

He did not sit down, but stood by and watched them for a moment, when, having reached their sequestered nook, they began to spread out their banquet. It was composed of the remnant eggs, some bread, and a slice of cheese. It looked painfully scant, and Meg had an anxious eye.

“Is that all?” asked John Holt, abruptly.

“Yes,” said Meg. “We shall have to make it do.”

“My Lord!” ejaculated John Holt, suddenly, in his blunt fashion. And he turned round and walked away.

“Where’s he gone?” exclaimed Ben, timidly.

But they none of them could guess. Nice as he had been, he had a brusque way, and, perhaps, he meant to leave them.

But by the time they had divided the eggs, and the bread and cheese, and had fairly begun, he came marching back. He had a basket on his arm, and two bottles stuck out of one coat pocket, while a parcel protruded from the other. He came and threw himself down on the grass beside them, and opened the basket. It was full of good things.

“I’m going to have lunch with you,” he said, “and I have a pretty big appetite, so I’ve brought you something to eat. You can’t tramp about on that sort of thing.”

The basket they had seen the day before had been a poor thing compared to this. The contents of this would have been a feast for much more fastidious creatures than three ravenous children. There were chickens and sandwiches and fruit; the bottles held lemonade, and the package in the coat pocket was a box of candy.

“We – never had such good things in our lives,” Meg gasped, amazed.

“Hadn’t you?” said John Holt, with a kind, and even a happy, grin. “Well, pitch in.”

XVII

What a feast it was – what a feast! They were so hungry, they were so happy, they were so rejoiced! And John Holt watched them as if he had never enjoyed himself so much before. He laughed, he made jokes, he handed out good things, he poured out lemonade.

“Let’s drink to the Great Magician!” he said, filling the little glasses he had brought; and he made them drink it standing, as a toast. In all the grounds that day there was no such a party, it was so exhilarated and amazed at itself. Little Ben looked and ate and laughed as if the lemonade had gone to his head.

“Oh, my!” he said, “if mother could see me!”

“We’ll bring her to-morrow,” said John Holt.

“Are you – ” faltered Meg, looking at him with wide eyes, “are you coming again to-morrow?”

“Yes,” John Holt answered, “and you are coming with me; and we’ll come every day until you’ve seen it all – if you three will pilot me around.”

“You must be very rich, John Holt,” said Meg. She had found out that it was his whim to want her to call him so.

“I have plenty of money,” he said, “if that’s being rich. Oh, yes, I’ve got money enough! I’ve more land than Aunt Matilda.”

And then it was that suddenly Robin remembered something.

“I believe,” he said, “that I’ve heard Aunt Matilda speak about you to Jones. I seem to remember your name. You have the biggest farm in Illinois, and you have houses and houses in town. Meg, don’t you remember – when he got married, and everybody talked about how rich he was?”

And Meg did remember. She looked at him softly, and thought she knew why he had seemed gloomy, for she remembered that this rich and envied man’s wife had had a little child and died suddenly. And she had even heard once that it had almost driven him mad, because he had been fond of her.

“Are you – that one?” she said.

“Yes,” he answered, “I’m the one who got married.” And the cloud fell on his face again, and for a minute or so rested there. For he thought this thing which had happened to him was cruel and hideous, and he had never ceased to rebel against it bitterly.

Meg drew a little closer to him, but she said no more about what she knew he was thinking of. She was a clever little thing, and knew this was not the time.

And after they had eaten of the good things, until hunger seemed a thing of the past, the afternoon began as a fairy story, indeed. Little by little they began to realize that John Holt was their good and powerful giant, for it seemed that he was not only ready to do everything for them, but was rich enough.

“Have you been to the Midway Plaisance?” he asked them. He felt very sure, however, that they had not, or that, if they had, with that scant purse, they had not seen what they longed to see.

“No, we haven’t,” said Meg. “We thought we would save it until we had seen so many other things that we should not mind so very much only seeing the outsides of places. We knew we should have to make up stories all the time.”

“We won’t save it,” said John Holt. “We’ll go now. We will hobnob with Bedouins and Japanese and Turks, and shake hands with Amazons and Indians; we’ll ride on camels and go to the Chinese Theatre. Come along.”

And to this Arabian Nights’ Entertainment he took them all. They felt as if he were a prince. And oh, the exciting strangeness of it! To be in such a place and amid such marvels, with a man who seemed to set no limit to the resources of his purse. They never had been even near a person who spent money as if it were made for spending, and the good things of life were made to be bought by it. What John Holt spent was only what other people with full purses spent in the Midway Plaisance, but to Meg and Robin and Ben it seemed that he poured forth money in torrents. They looked at him with timorous wonder and marvelling gratitude. It seemed that he meant them to see everything and to do everything. They rode on camels down a street in Cairo, they talked to chiefs of the desert, they listened to strange music, they heard strange tongues, and tasted strange confections. Robin and Ben went about like creatures in a delightful dream. Every few minutes during the first hour Robin would sidle close to Meg, and clutch her dress or her hand with a gasp of rapture.

“Oh, Meg!” he would say, “and yesterday we were so poor! And now we are seeing everything!”

And when John Holt heard him, he would laugh half to himself; a laugh with a touch of pleasant exultation in it, and no gloom at all. He had found something to distract him at last.

He liked to watch Meg’s face, as they went from one weirdly foreign place to another. Her eyes were immense with delight, and her face had the flush of an Indian peach. Once she stopped suddenly, in such a glow of strange delight that her eyes were full of other brightness than the shining of her pleasure.

“Fairy stories do happen!” she said. “You have made one! It was a fairy story yesterday – but now– oh! just think how like a fairy king you are, and what you are giving to us! It will be enough to make stories of forever!”

He laughed again. She found out in time that he often laughed that short half-laugh when he was moved by something. He had had a rough sort of life, successful as it had been, and it was not easy for him to express all he felt.

“That’s all right,” he said, “that’s just as it should be. But you are giving something to me, too – you three.”