The Old Tobacco Shop

They got to their feet. As they did so, a kind of groan startled them. They listened. It came again, from some point near by. Freddie thought he could make out a weak human voice, trying to call for help. Drawing Robert after him, he climbed over a number of boulders and mounted to the top of a rise in the ground, and looked down into a deep gully, covered on its sides with rocks and bushes. What he saw there gave him a start of alarm.

At the bottom was an old man, lying on his back, with one leg doubled under him, his face up to the sky. From his lips came a groan, followed by a faint cry for help. His head was bald, he was rather stout, he wore a long white beard, and he was clad in a short dark gown, belted about the middle. His legs were bare, and on the foot which was visible he wore a sandal.

Robert looked over Freddie's shoulder, and whispered in his ear. "That's him! He's fallen down and hurt himself."

It was true. The old man had evidently fallen, and he was plainly suffering. Freddie clambered down to him, and knelt beside him. The old man looked into the young man's eyes, and said, in a feeble whisper:

"My leg. Broken. Help me home."

Freddie assisted him into a sitting position, and then lifted him up and held him.

"I cannot walk," said the old man. "Unless you can carry me, I must die here."

Freddie was properly proud of his new strength, and he believed that he could carry the old man.

"Where do you live?" said he.

"Up the mountain. I will show you. I beg you to carry me home."

"I will do my best," said Freddie.

He turned his back to the old man, and supporting him at the same time put the old man's arms about his neck, and by a great effort got the poor creature on his back. Carrying him thus, he began to go haltingly up the side of the gully. The little boy watched them wonderingly.

It was a terrible journey. The old man directed Freddie from moment to moment, and the way led steadily up the mountain, by a course which Freddie had not seen that day. The burden on Freddie's back became heavier and heavier; he panted harder and harder under it; he stumbled from time to time, and every instant told himself that he could go no further. The old man seemed to think of nothing but of getting home. The little boy followed, staring with big eyes.

Freddie had gone but a short way up the mountain-side when he felt through all his back, where it touched the old man, a chill; his shoulders and throat, where the arms of the old man touched them, became cold; as he struggled on, the chill increased; he felt as if he were hugging to his back a burden of ice.

"Are we nearly there?" he asked, trying to wipe a cold perspiration from his forehead.

"No, no," said the old man. "Go on. A long way yet. You can't be tired so soon."

The cold upon Freddie's back and shoulders and throat became a dead numbness; he was too cold to shiver; his arms too were now becoming numb, and he felt that he could hold his burden no longer. He stopped.

"I must put you down," he said. "I must rest a moment. I don't know what makes me so cold."

"No, no," said the old man. "Too soon! too soon! Keep on!"

"I cannot," said Freddie. "I am freezing. My strength is gone. I must rest."

With these words he let the old man carefully down, and laid him on the ground. He stood there panting and rubbing his frozen hands together.

"Stupid weakling," said the old man, staring up at him, "go and search upon the mountain-side and bring me hither seeds of the fennel which you will there find, and be quick; for I perish."

Freddie and the little boy hastened away together, and at a distance on the mountain-side found, after a long search, a few plants of the fennel, with which they hurried back to the old man.

He was gone.

They looked far and near; they examined every nook and cranny; the mountain was steep at this point, and difficult for any sound man; for an old man, crippled, it seemed impossible, but he was nowhere to be found; he was gone.

Freddie and Robert turned homeward, and made hard work of it. The little boy became extremely heated with his labor; but Freddie remained as cold as ever. It is true that he perspired, but the beads upon his forehead were like the beads upon ice-cold glass. His hands were so numb that when he cut them slightly on a rock he felt no pain. His back, where the old man had clung to it with his body, was coldest of all; he was so stiff that he could scarcely bend his arms or body; many times the little boy had to help him down; the chill spread; at the foot of the mountain his legs were nearly as cold as his arms; when they passed the Tower, his knees were as if frozen, and would not bend; the little boy put his arm about him and tried to help him walk; he began to lose knowledge of his whereabouts; he held out a stiff arm before him, like a blind man, and dragged one foot after the other like a man whose legs are made of stone. The little boy, weeping to himself, took his icy outstretched hand, and led him home.

The palace door was thrown open. The little boy rushed in with a cry, and turned around to his companion. The white-faced rigid creature which was Freddie stood in the doorway, staring vacantly, and fell slowly forward on its face upon the floor.

CHAPTER XXVI

THE KING'S TOWER

Freddie was very ill. He was so ill that after a week the King gave up all hope, and believed he would die. The Queen wept bitterly; she scarcely left his side; at night she did not sleep for weeping, and by day she sat by his bed and watched his cold white face. His friends were not allowed to see him, and of these it appeared that Mr. Hanlon had been gone for some days up the Tower.

All that the best doctors in the city could do had been done, but the Chevalier was no better. He lay under the blankets, cold as ice and motionless as stone; and his eyes, big round eyes like the eyes of a child, stared up strangely out of deep sockets. They looked up at the King, who was bending down over the bed and smiling encouragingly. The Queen and her three children, Robert, Genevieve, and James, were standing close by, but they could not smile.

"Come, Chevalier," said the King, "you will be well soon, I am sure."

A faint voice came from the pale lips; not the voice of a grown man, but the voice of a child.

"That isn't my name," it said, "my name is – Fweddie."

The King went away, and took his children with him; and after they had gone the Queen heard the childish voice again from the bed.

"I want to see Aunt Amanda."

The Queen went to him, and stood beside the bed. He looked up at her.

"You aren't Aunt Amanda," he said. "I want to see Aunt Amanda."

"I think that was my name once," said the Queen. "Will you talk to me?"

He looked at her again, and she saw that he did not know her.

"My farver sent me," he said. "Mr. Toby has gone to the barber-shop, and my farver he wants a pound of Cage-Roach Mitchner."

"Mr. Toby is here in the palace now, and I'm sure he – "

"I don't know about any palace. I can't wait long. My farver told me to hurry."

The Queen said no more, and Freddie appeared to go to sleep. The night came on, and the Queen still sat by his side. It grew very late; her children had long since gone to bed, and even the King was asleep in his own apartments. The palace was silent, and there was scarcely a light anywhere in the great place except the light of a taper on a table in Freddie's room. The Queen was bending forward, watching the face on the pillow. The eyes were closed, the lips were together, and there was no sign of breathing. She knew that it could not be much longer; she buried her face in her hands and wept bitterly.

A gentle tap upon the door aroused her. She rose and admitted Mr. Toby and Mr. Punch, Thomas the Inferior, and Mr. Hanlon.

"Quick, ma'am," said Mr. Hanlon. "There's not a minute to be lost. If you plase, I'll ask ye to put on yer bonnet in a hurry, ma'am. We're off on a journey, and the poor sick young lad's coming along with us. If you'll just be in a hurry with the bonnet, ma'am!"

The Queen, scarcely realizing what she was doing, left the room, and went first to the nursery, where she bent over her three sleeping children and kissed them each, and murmured a loving good-bye above them, as if she were going to leave them; and for a long, long time she gazed at each rosy face, as if to fix it in her memory forever.

When she returned to the room, wearing a shawl over her head and shoulders, she was startled to see that the sick youth was sitting upright in a chair, thickly wrapped in blankets. His round childlike eyes were wide open, and to her surprise a faint smile seemed to hover about his lips.

She looked at the others. Each held, in his hand an empty hour-glass.

"Plase to get your hour-glass, ma'am," said Mr. Hanlon, "and Freddie's too."