Oswald Bastable and Others

The door opened a little further, and a face looked out – the face, of course, of Sir Christopher. All the house that showed through the crack of the door didn't, as Mabel said afterwards, show at all, because it was pitch-dark.

'I don't quite understand,' said Sir Christopher gently. Phyllis was a little surprised to find that the voice was what she called a gentleman's voice.

'We – you were so kind carrying Mab across the road that water-carty day when it thundered – '

'Oh, it's you, is it?' he said.

'Yes, it's us; and they wouldn't let us help with the school tree, and so we made one of our own and then we wanted someone to see it. And we thought of you, because you don't seem to have many friends, and we thought – But we'll take it home again if you don't care about it.'

She stopped, just on the right side of tears.

'There's a glass bird with a spun-lovely tail,' said Mabel persuasively, 'and sweets and fishes, and a crocodile that goes waggle-waddle when you wind him up.'

'My dears,' said Sir Christopher, and cleared his throat. 'My dears,' he began again, and again he stopped.

'We'll go away if – if you'd rather,' said Phyllis, and sniffed miserably.

'No, no!' he said; 'no, no – I was only thinking. I never thought – would you like to bring the tree into the house? It's just the sort of thing my little girl always liked.'

'Oh yes,' said Phyllis; 'we'll go and fetch it now.'

He closed the door gently. The children flew back to Guy and the tree.

'Oh, Guy! we've to take the tree inside the house! And he's got a little girl – at least, he says so. Come on, quick. We'd better carry it. The barrow's so heavy, and it does interfere so!'

They carried the pot between them. It was very heavy, and they had to put it down and rest several times. But at last they dumped it down in the dark on the front-door step of the castle, and breathed deep breaths of fatigue, relief, and excitement.

The door opened, and opened wide, and this time light streamed from within.

'Welcome!' said Sir Christopher. 'Come in. Let me help to lift it. What a beautiful tree!'

'It is rather decent, isn't it?' said Guy dispassionately.

Sir Christopher raised the pot, carried it in, and the door was shut. The children found themselves in a small square hall. A winding staircase of iron corkscrewed upwards in one corner. The hall was lighted only by two candles.

The old gentleman led the way through a door on the right into a round room with white walls.

'We're inside the tower now,' said Guy.

'Yes,' said their host, 'this is part of the tower.'

He hastily lighted a big lamp, and then a deep 'Oh!' broke from the children. For the walls were not white, they were all of mother-of-pearl, and here and there all over the walls round pearls shone with a starry, milky radiance.

'How radishing!' said Mabel in a whisper. 'I always said he wasn't a miser. He's a magician.'

'What a lovely, lovely room!' sighed Phyllis.

'What's it made of?' asked Guy downrightly.

'Oyster-shells,' said Sir Christopher, 'and pearl beads.'

And it was.

'Oh!' said Mabel gaily, 'then that's what you go prowling about in dirty gutters for?'

'Don't be rude, Mab dear!' whispered Phyllis.

But the old gentleman did not seem to mind. He just said, 'Yes, that's it,' in an absent sort of way. He seemed to be thinking about something else. Then he said, 'The Christmas-tree.'

The children had forgotten all about the Christmas-tree.

When its seventy-two candles were lighted the pearly room shone and glimmered like a fairy palace in a dream.

'It's many a year since my little girl had such a Christmas-tree,' he said. 'I don't know how to thank you.'

'Seeing your pearly halls is worth all the time and money,' said Mabel heartily.

And Phyllis added in polite haste:

'And you being pleased.'

'Would you like to see the black marble hall?' asked Sir Christopher.

And, of course, they said, 'Yes, awfully.'

So he led them into the room on the other side of the hall, and lighted a lamp. And the room was like a room of black marble, carved into little round knobs.

'How lovely!' said Phyllis.

'It's not lovely like the other,' said Mabel; 'but it's more serious, like when the organ plays in church.'

'Why,' said Guy suddenly, 'it's winkle-shells!'

And it was. Hundreds and thousands of winkle-shells sorted into sizes and stuck on the walls in patterns, and then, it seemed, polished or varnished.

'Come,' said Sir Christopher, 'I'll show you the red-room.'

As they turned to go a tall, white figure by the door seemed to come suddenly into the lamplight. It was covered with a sheet.

'Oh!' said all three, starting back, 'what's that?'

'That's my little girl,' he said.

'Is she trying to frighten us? Is she playing ghosts?' asked Guy.

'No,' he said; 'she never plays at ghosts. It isn't her really. That's only my fun. It's a statue really.'

'Aren't statues very dear?' asked Guy.