An Enchanted Garden: Fairy Stories

“Of course,” he replied. “When do you think we had best come? This afternoon we are going a walk with nurse, and she’d never let us off.”

“No,” said Alix, with a sigh, for a walk with nurse was not a very interesting affair. “But I’ll tell you what, Rafe; if I can get hold of mamma to-night, just even for a minute, I’ll ask her if we mayn’t take something for dinner out with us to-morrow, and not come in till tea-time – the way we sometimes did last summer; for just now it’s really as fine and warm as if it was June. I think she’ll let us.”

“I do hope she will,” said the boy.

Chapter Two.

Tapping

The children were not very fortunate in their nurse. Perhaps this helped to make them feel lonely and dull sometimes, when there scarcely seemed real reason for their being so. She was a good woman, and meant to be kind, and their mother trusted her completely. But she was getting old, and was rather tired of children. She had had such a lot to bring up – the four big brothers and sisters of Rafe and Alix, and before them a large family of their cousins. And I don’t think she was really very fond of children, though she was devoted to tiny babies. She didn’t in the least understand children’s fancifulnesses or many of their little ways, and was far too fond of saying, “Stuff and nonsense, Master Rafe,” or “Miss Alix,” as the case might be.

The walk this afternoon would not have been any livelier than usual, so far as nurse was concerned, but the children were so brimful of their new ideas that they felt quite bright and happy, and after a while even nurse was won over to enter into their talk, or at least to answer their questions pretty cheerfully.

For though of course they had not the least idea of telling her their secret, it was too much on their minds for them not to chatter round about it, so to say.

“Have you ever seen a fairy, nurse?” said Alix; and, rather to her surprise, nurse answered quite seriously:

“No, my dear. Time was, I suppose, as such things were to be seen, but that’s past and gone. People have to work too hard nowadays to give any thought to fairies or fairyland.”

But on the whole this reply was rather encouraging.

“You must have heard of fairies, though,” said Rafe. “Can’t you remember any stories about them?”

Nurse had never been great at story-telling.

“Oh dear no, Master Rafe,” she replied; “I never knew any except the regular old ones, that you’ve got far prettier in your books than I could tell them. Sayings I may have heard, just countryside talk, when I was a child. My old granny, who lived and died in the village here, would have it that, for those that cared to look for them, there were odd sights and sounds in the grounds of the old house down the lane. Beautiful singing her mother had heard there when she was a girl; and once when a cow strayed in there for a night, they said when she came out again she was twice the cow she had been before, and that no milk was ever as good as hers.”

The children looked at each other.

“I wonder they didn’t turn all the cows in there,” said Rafe practically.

“Why didn’t they, nurse?”

“Oh dear me, Master Rafe, that’s more than I can tell. It was but an old tale. You can’t expect much sense in such.”

“Whom did the old house belong to? Who lived there?” said Alix.

“Nobody knows,” said nurse. “It’s too long ago to say. But there’s always been good luck about the place, that’s certain. You’ve seen the flowers there in the summer time. Some of them look as beautiful as if they were in a proper garden; and it’s certain sure there’s no wood near here like it for the nightingales.”

This was very satisfactory so far as it went, but nurse would say no more, doubtless because she had nothing more to say.

“I do believe, Rafe,” said Alix, when they were sitting together after tea, “that the old garden is a sort of entrance to fairyland, and that it’s been waiting for us to find it out.”

Her eyes were shining with eagerness, and Rafe, too, felt very excited.

“I do hope mamma will let us have all to-morrow to ourselves,” he said. “You see, one has to be very careful with fairies, Alix – all the stories agree about that. We must go to work very cautiously, so as not to offend them in any way.”

“You’re always cautious,” said Alix, with a little contempt; “rather too cautious for me. Of course we shall be very polite, and take care not to spoil any of the plants, but we’ll have to be a little venturesome too. And,” she went on, “you may count that they’ve invited us. The wren brought a regular message. I only hope they’re not offended with us for not going to-day.”

“If they’re good kind of fairies,” said Rafe sagely – “and I think they’re sure to be – they wouldn’t have liked us to be disobedient; and you know mamma’s awfully particular about our coming in the moment we hear the bell ring.”

“Yes,” said Alix; “that’s true.”

Mamma’s heart was extra soft that evening, I think. She had seen so little of the children lately that she was feeling rather sorry for them, and all the more ready to agree to any wish of theirs. So they had no difficulty in getting her consent to their picnic plan for to-morrow. And the weather was wonderfully settled, as it sometimes is even in England, though early in the year.

So the next morning saw them set off, carrying a little basket of provisions and a large parasol, full of eagerness and excitement as to what might be before them.

They did not cross the lawn as they had done the day before, for they had a sort of feeling that they did not wish anyone to see them start, or to know exactly which way they went. It added to the pleasant mystery of the expedition. So they went straight out by the front gates, and after following the high road for a quarter of a mile or so, entered a little wood which skirted the grass-grown lane along one side, and from which they made their way out with some scrambling and clambering at only a few yards’ distance from the entrance to the deserted garden where they had last seen the wren.

The sight of the gate-posts reminded Alix of the bird, and she stopped short with some misgiving.

“Rafe,” she said, “do you think perhaps we should have waited for her at the ilex tree? I never thought of it before.”

“Oh no,” said Rafe; “I’m sure it’s all right. We’ve come to the place she led us to. She didn’t need to show us the way twice! Fairies don’t like stupid people.”

“You seem to know a great lot about fairies,” said Alix, who had no idea of being snubbed herself, though she was fond of snubbing other people; “so I think you’d better settle what we’re to do.”

“I expect we’ll find the wren inside the gate,” said Rafe; and they made their way on in silence.

There was no difficulty in getting into the grounds, for though the gate on its rusty hinges would have been far too heavy for the children to move, there was a space between it and the posts where the wood had rotted away, through which it was easy for them to creep. First came Rafe, then the basket, next Alix, and finally the big parasol.

It was a good while since they had been in the Ladywood garden, and when they had got on to their feet again, they stood still for a minute or two looking round them. It was a curious-looking place certainly; the very beauty of it had something strange and dream-like about it.

Here and there the old paths were clearly to be traced. The main approach, or drive, as we should now call it, leading to where the house had been, was still quite distinct, though the house itself was entirely gone – not even any remains of ruins were to be seen, for all the stone and wood of which it had been built had long since been carted away to be used elsewhere.

But the children knew where the old hall had actually stood – a large, square, level plateau, bordered on three sides by a broad terrace, all grass-grown, showing in two or three places where stone steps had once led down to the lower grounds, told its own tale. Along the front of this plateau, supporting it, as it were, there was still a very strongly-built stone wall banked up into the soil. The children walked on slowly till they were near the foot of this wall, and then stood still again. It was about five feet high; they seemed attracted to it, they scarcely knew why – perhaps because it was the only remaining thing actually to show that here had been once a home where people had lived.

“I daresay,” said Alix, looking up, “that the children used to run along the terrace at the top of that wall, and their mammas and nurses would call after them to take care they didn’t fall over. Doesn’t it seem funny, Rafe, to think there have always been children in the world?”

“I daresay the boys jumped down sometimes,” said Rafe. “I’d like to try, but I won’t to-day, for I promised mamma to take care of you, and if I sprained my ankle it would be rather awkward.”

They had forgotten their little quarrel, and for the moment they had forgotten about the wren.

She was nowhere to be seen.

What was to be done?

“If we were only looking for a nice place for our picnic,” said Rafe, “nothing could be better than the shelter of this wall. With it on one side, and the parasol tilted up on the other, it would be as good as a tent.”

“But we’re not only looking for a picnic place,” said Alix impatiently. “The only thing to do is to poke about till we find something, for I’m perfectly certain the wren didn’t bring us here for nothing; and then, you know, there’s even what nurse told us about this garden.”

Alix’s words roused Rafe’s energy again; for he was a trifle lazy, and wouldn’t have been altogether disinclined to sit down comfortably and think about dinner. But once he got a thing in his head, he was not without ideas.

“Let’s follow right along the wall,” he said, “and examine it closely.”

“I don’t know what you expect to find,” said Alix. “It’s just a wall, as straight and plain as can be.”

And so indeed it seemed from where they stood.