15. The Magic

A Little Princess

by Francis Hodgson Burnett

When Sara had passed the house next door she had seen Ram Dass
closing the shutters, and caught her glimpse of this room also.

"It is a long time since I saw a nice place from the inside,"
was the thought which crossed her mind.

There was the usual bright fire glowing in the grate, and the
Indian gentleman was sitting before it. His head was resting in his
hand, and he looked as lonely and unhappy as ever.

"Poor man!" said Sara. "I wonder what you are supposing."

And this was what he was "supposing" at that very moment.

"Suppose," he was thinking, "suppose--even if Carmichael traces
the people to Moscow--the little girl they took from Madame Pascal's
school in Paris is not the one we are in search of. Suppose she
proves to be quite a different child. What steps shall I take
next?"

When Sara went into the house she met Miss Minchin, who had come
downstairs to scold the cook.

"Where have you wasted your time?" she demanded. "You have been
out for hours."

"It was so wet and muddy," Sara answered, "it was hard to walk,
because my shoes were so bad and slipped about."

"Make no excuses," said Miss Minchin, "and tell no
falsehoods."

Sara went in to the cook. The cook had received a severe
lecture and was in a fearful temper as a result. She was only too
rejoiced to have someone to vent her rage on, and Sara was a
convenience, as usual.

"Why didn't you stay all night?" she snapped.

Sara laid her purchases on the table.

"Here are the things," she said.

The cook looked them over, grumbling. She was in a very savage
humor indeed.

"May I have something to eat?" Sara asked rather faintly.

"Tea's over and done with," was the answer. "Did you expect me
to keep it hot for you?"

Sara stood silent for a second.

"I had no dinner," she said next, and her voice was quite low.
She made it low because she was afraid it would tremble.

"There's some bread in the pantry," said the cook. "That's all
you'll get at this time of day."

Sara went and found the bread. It was old and hard and dry. The
cook was in too vicious a humor to give her anything to eat with it.
It was always safe and easy to vent her spite on Sara. Really, it was
hard for the child to climb the three long flights of stairs leading
to her attic. She often found them long and steep when she was
tired; but tonight it seemed as if she would never reach the top.
Several times she was obliged to stop to rest. When she reached the
top landing she was glad to see the glimmer of a light coming from
under her door. That meant that Ermengarde had managed to creep up
to pay her a visit. There was some comfort in that. It was better
than to go into the room alone and find it empty and desolate. The
mere presence of plump, comfortable Ermengarde, wrapped in her red
shawl, would warm it a little.

Yes; there Ermengarde was when she opened the door. She was
sitting in the middle of the bed, with her feet tucked safely under
her. She had never become intimate with Melchisedec and his family,
though they rather fascinated her. When she found herself alone in
the attic she always preferred to sit on the bed until Sara arrived.
She had, in fact, on this occasion had time to become rather nervous,
because Melchisedec had appeared and sniffed about a good deal, and
once had made her utter a repressed squeal by sitting up on his hind
legs and, while he looked at her, sniffing pointedly in her
direction.

"Oh, Sara," she cried out, "I am glad you have come. Melchy
would sniff about so. I tried to coax him to go back, but he
wouldn't for such a long time. I like him, you know; but it does
frighten me when he sniffs right at me. Do you think he ever would
jump?"

"No," answered Sara.

Ermengarde crawled forward on the bed to look at her.

"You do look tired, Sara," she said; "you are quite pale."

"I am tired," said Sara, dropping on to the lopsided footstool.
"Oh, there's Melchisedec, poor thing. He's come to ask for his
supper."

Melchisedec had come out of his hole as if he had been listening
for her footstep. Sara was quite sure he knew it. He came forward
with an affectionate, expectant expression as Sara put her hand in
her pocket and turned it inside out, shaking her head.

"I'm very sorry," she said. "I haven't one crumb left. Go
home, Melchisedec, and tell your wife there was nothing in my pocket.
I'm afraid I forgot because the cook and Miss Minchin were so
cross."

Melchisedec seemed to understand. He shuffled resignedly, if
not contentedly, back to his home.

"I did not expect to see you tonight, Ermie," Sara said.
Ermengarde hugged herself in the red shawl.

"Miss Amelia has gone out to spend the night with her old aunt,"
she explained. "No one else ever comes and looks into the bedrooms
after we are in bed. I could stay here until morning if I wanted
to."

She pointed toward the table under the skylight. Sara had not
looked toward it as she came in. A number of books were piled upon
it. Ermengarde's gesture was a dejected one.

"Papa has sent me some more books, Sara," she said. "There they
are."

Sara looked round and got up at once. She ran to the table, and
picking up the top volume, turned over its leaves quickly. For the
moment she forgot her discomforts.

"Ah," she cried out, "how beautiful! Carlyle's French
Revolution. I have so wanted to read that!"

"I haven't," said Ermengarde. "And papa will be so cross if I
don't. He'll expect me to know all about it when I go home for the
holidays. What shall I do?"

Sara stopped turning over the leaves and looked at her with an
excited flush on her cheeks.

"Look here," she cried, "if you'll lend me these books, _I'll_
read them--and tell you everything that's in them afterward-- and
I'll tell it so that you will remember it, too."

"Oh, goodness!" exclaimed Ermengarde. "Do you think you
can?"

"I know I can," Sara answered. "The little ones always remember
what I tell them."

"Sara," said Ermengarde, hope gleaming in her round face, "if
you'll do that, and make me remember, I'll--I'll give you
anything."

"I don't want you to give me anything," said Sara. "I want your
books--I want them!" And her eyes grew big, and her chest heaved.

"Take them, then," said Ermengarde. "I wish I wanted them--but
I don't. I'm not clever, and my father is, and he thinks I ought to
be."

Sara was opening one book after the other. "What are you going
to tell your father?" she asked, a slight doubt dawning in her
mind.

"Oh, he needn't know," answered Ermengarde. "He'll think I've
read them."

Sara put down her book and shook her head slowly. "That's
almost like telling lies," she said. "And lies--well, you see, they
are not only wicked--they're vulgar. Sometimes"-- reflectively--"I've
thought perhaps I might do something wicked-- I might suddenly fly
into a rage and kill Miss Minchin, you know, when she was
ill-treating me--but I couldn't be vulgar. Why can't you tell your
father _I_ read them?"

"He wants me to read them," said Ermengarde, a little
discouraged by this unexpected turn of affairs.

"He wants you to know what is in them," said Sara. "And if I
can tell it to you in an easy way and make you remember it, I should
think he would like that."

"He'll like it if I learn anything in any way," said rueful
Ermengarde. "You would if you were my father."

"It's not your fault that--" began Sara. She pulled herself up
and stopped rather suddenly. She had been going to say, "It's not
your fault that you are stupid."

"That what?" Ermengarde asked.

"That you can't learn things quickly," amended Sara. "If you
can't, you can't. If I can--why, I can; that's all."

She always felt very tender of Ermengarde, and tried not to let
her feel too strongly the difference between being able to learn
anything at once, and not being able to learn anything at all. As she
looked at her plump face, one of her wise, old-fashioned thoughts
came to her.

"Perhaps," she said, "to be able to learn things quickly isn't
everything. To be kind is worth a great deal to other people. If
Miss Minchin knew everything on earth and was like what she is now,
she'd still be a detestable thing, and everybody would hate her. Lots
of clever people have done harm and have been wicked. Look at
Robespierre--"

She stopped and examined Ermengarde's countenance, which was
beginning to look bewildered. "Don't you remember?" she demanded. "I
told you about him not long ago. I believe you've forgotten."

"Well, I don't remember all of it," admitted Ermengarde.

"Well, you wait a minute," said Sara, "and I'll take off my wet
things and wrap myself in the coverlet and tell you over again."

She took off her hat and coat and hung them on a nail against
the wall, and she changed her wet shoes for an old pair of slippers.
Then she jumped on the bed, and drawing the coverlet about her
shoulders, sat with her arms round her knees. "Now, listen," she
said.

She plunged into the gory records of the French Revolution, and
told such stories of it that Ermengarde's eyes grew round with alarm
and she held her breath. But though she was rather terrified, there
was a delightful thrill in listening, and she was not likely to
forget Robespierre again, or to have any doubts about the Princesse
de Lamballe.

"You know they put her head on a pike and danced round it," Sara
explained. "And she had beautiful floating blonde hair; and when I
think of her, I never see her head on her body, but always on a pike,
with those furious people dancing and howling."

It was agreed that Mr. St. John was to be told the plan they had
made, and for the present the books were to be left in the attic.

"Now let's tell each other things," said Sara. "How are you
getting on with your French lessons?"

"Ever so much better since the last time I came up here and you
explained the conjugations. Miss Minchin could not understand why I
did my exercises so well that first morning."

Sara laughed a little and hugged her knees.

"She doesn't understand why Lottie is doing her sums so well,"
she said; "but it is because she creeps up here, too, and I help
her." She glanced round the room. "The attic would be rather
nice--if it wasn't so dreadful," she said, laughing again. "It's a
good place to pretend in."

The truth was that Ermengarde did not know anything of the
sometimes almost unbearable side of life in the attic and she had not
a sufficiently vivid imagination to depict it for herself. On the
rare occasions that she could reach Sara's room she only saw the side
of it which was made exciting by things which were "pretended" and
stories which were told. Her visits partook of the character of
adventures; and though sometimes Sara looked rather pale, and it was
not to be denied that she had grown very thin, her proud little
spirit would not admit of complaints. She had never confessed that at
times she was almost ravenous with hunger, as she was tonight. She
was growing rapidly, and her constant walking and running about would
have given her a keen appetite even if she had had abundant and
regular meals of a much more nourishing nature than the unappetizing,
inferior food snatched at such odd times as suited the kitchen
convenience. She was growing used to a certain gnawing feeling in her
young stomach.

"I suppose soldiers feel like this when they are on a long and
weary march," she often said to herself. She liked the sound of the
phrase, "long and weary march." It made her feel rather like a
soldier. She had also a quaint sense of being a hostess in the
attic.

"If I lived in a castle," she argued, "and Ermengarde was the
lady of another castle, and came to see me, with knights and squires
and vassals riding with her, and pennons flying, when I heard the
clarions sounding outside the drawbridge I should go down to receive
her, and I should spread feasts in the banquet hall and call in
minstrels to sing and play and relate romances. When she comes into
the attic I can't spread feasts, but I can tell stories, and not let
her know disagreeable things. I dare say poor chatelaines had to do
that in time of famine, when their lands had been pillaged." She was
a proud, brave little chatelaine, and dispensed generously the one
hospitality she could offer--the dreams she dreamed--the visions she
saw--the imaginings which were her joy and comfort.

So, as they sat together, Ermengarde did not know that she was
faint as well as ravenous, and that while she talked she now and then
wondered if her hunger would let her sleep when she was left alone.
She felt as if she had never been quite so hungry before.

"I wish I was as thin as you, Sara," Ermengarde said suddenly.
"I believe you are thinner than you used to be. Your eyes look so
big, and look at the sharp little bones sticking out of your
elbow!"

Sara pulled down her sleeve, which had pushed itself up.

"I always was a thin child," she said bravely, "and I always had
big green eyes."

"I love your queer eyes," said Ermengarde, looking into them
with affectionate admiration. "They always look as if they saw such
a long way. I love them--and I love them to be green--though they
look black generally."

"They are cat's eyes," laughed Sara; "but I can't see in the
dark with them--because I have tried, and I couldn't--I wish I
could."

It was just at this minute that something happened at the
skylight which neither of them saw. If either of them had chanced to
turn and look, she would have been startled by the sight of a dark
face which peered cautiously into the room and disappeared as quickly
and almost as silently as it had appeared. Not quite as silently,
however. Sara, who had keen ears, suddenly turned a little and
looked up at the roof.

"That didn't sound like Melchisedec," she said. "It wasn't
scratchy enough."

"What?" said Ermengarde, a little startled.

"Didn't you think you heard something?" asked Sara.

"N-no," Ermengarde faltered. "Did you?" {another ed. has "No-
no,"}

"Perhaps I didn't," said Sara; "but I thought I did. It sounded
as if something was on the slates--something that dragged softly."

"What could it be?" said Ermengarde. "Could it be--robbers?"

"No," Sara began cheerfully. "There is nothing to steal--"

She broke off in the middle of her words. They both heard the
sound that checked her. It was not on the slates, but on the stairs
below, and it was Miss Minchin's angry voice. Sara sprang off the
bed, and put out the candle.

"She is scolding Becky," she whispered, as she stood in the
darkness. "She is making her cry."

"Will she come in here?" Ermengarde whispered back, panic-
stricken.

"No. She will think I am in bed. Don't stir."

It was very seldom that Miss Minchin mounted the last flight of
stairs. Sara could only remember that she had done it once before.
But now she was angry enough to be coming at least part of the way
up, and it sounded as if she was driving Becky before her.

"You impudent, dishonest child!" they heard her say. "Cook
tells me she has missed things repeatedly."

"'T warn't me, mum," said Becky sobbing. "I was 'ungry enough,
but 't warn't me--never!"

"You deserve to be sent to prison," said Miss Minchin's voice.
"Picking and stealing! Half a meat pie, indeed!"

"'T warn't me," wept Becky. "I could 'ave eat a whole un--but I
never laid a finger on it."

Miss Minchin was out of breath between temper and mounting the
stairs. The meat pie had been intended for her special late supper.
It became apparent that she boxed Becky's ears.

"Don't tell falsehoods," she said. "Go to your room this
instant."

Both Sara and Ermengarde heard the slap, and then heard Becky
run in her slipshod shoes up the stairs and into her attic. They
heard her door shut, and knew that she threw herself upon her bed.

"I could 'ave e't two of 'em," they heard her cry into her
pillow. "An' I never took a bite. 'Twas cook give it to her
policeman."

Sara stood in the middle of the room in the darkness. She was
clenching her little teeth and opening and shutting fiercely her
outstretched hands. She could scarcely stand still, but she dared
not move until Miss Minchin had gone down the stairs and all was
still.

"The wicked, cruel thing!" she burst forth. "The cook takes
things herself and then says Becky steals them. She doesn't! She
doesn't! She's so hungry sometimes that she eats crusts out of the
ash barrel!" She pressed her hands hard against her face and burst
into passionate little sobs, and Ermengarde, hearing this unusual
thing, was overawed by it. Sara was crying! The unconquerable Sara!
It seemed to denote something new--some mood she had never known.
Suppose--suppose--a new dread possibility presented itself to her
kind, slow, little mind all at once. She crept off the bed in the
dark and found her way to the table where the candle stood. She
struck a match and lit the candle. When she had lighted it, she bent
forward and looked at Sara, with her new thought growing to definite
fear in her eyes.

"Sara," she said in a timid, almost awe-stricken voice,
are--are- -you never told me--I don't want to be rude, but--are you
ever hungry?"

It was too much just at that moment. The barrier broke down.
Sara lifted her face from her hands.

"Yes," she said in a new passionate way. "Yes, I am. I'm so
hungry now that I could almost eat you. And it makes it worse to
hear poor Becky. She's hungrier than I am."

Ermengarde gasped.

"Oh, oh!" she cried woefully. "And I never knew!"

"I didn't want you to know," Sara said. "It would have made me
feel like a street beggar. I know I look like a street beggar."

"No, you don't--you don't!" Ermengarde broke in. "Your clothes
are a little queer--but you couldn't look like a street beggar. You
haven't a street-beggar face."

"A little boy once gave me a sixpence for charity," said Sara,
with a short little laugh in spite of herself. "Here it is." And she
pulled out the thin ribbon from her neck. "He wouldn't have given me
his Christmas sixpence if I hadn't looked as if I needed it."

Somehow the sight of the dear little sixpence was good for both
of them. It made them laugh a little, though they both had tears in
their eyes.

"Who was he?" asked Ermengarde, looking at it quite as if it had
not been a mere ordinary silver sixpence.

"He was a darling little thing going to a party," said Sara. "He
was one of the Large Family, the little one with the round legs-- the
one I call Guy Clarence. I suppose his nursery was crammed with
Christmas presents and hampers full of cakes and things, and he could
see I had nothing."

Ermengarde gave a little jump backward. The last sentences had
recalled something to her troubled mind and given her a sudden
inspiration.

"Oh, Sara!" she cried. "What a silly thing I am not to have
thought of it!"

"Of what?"

"Something splendid!" said Ermengarde, in an excited hurry.
"This very afternoon my nicest aunt sent me a box. It is full of
good things. I never touched it, I had so much pudding at dinner,
and I was so bothered about papa's books." Her words began to tumble
over each other. "It's got cake in it, and little meat pies, and jam
tarts and buns, and oranges and red- currant wine, and figs and
chocolate. I'll creep back to my room and get it this minute, and
we'll eat it now."

Sara almost reeled. When one is faint with hunger the mention
of food has sometimes a curious effect. She clutched Ermengarde's
arm.

"Do you think--you could?" she ejaculated.

"I know I could," answered Ermengarde, and she ran to the door--
opened it softly--put her head out into the darkness, and listened.
Then she went back to Sara. "The lights are out. Everybody's in bed.
I can creep--and creep--and no one will hear."

It was so delightful that they caught each other's hands and a
sudden light sprang into Sara's eyes.

"Ermie!" she said. "Let us pretend! Let us pretend it's a
party! And oh, won't you invite the prisoner in the next cell?"

"Yes! Yes! Let us knock on the wall now. The jailer won't
hear."

Sara went to the wall. Through it she could hear poor Becky
crying more softly. She knocked four times.

"That means, `Come to me through the secret passage under the
wall,' she explained. `I have something to communicate.'"

Five quick knocks answered her.

"She is coming," she said.

Almost immediately the door of the attic opened and Becky
appeared. Her eyes were red and her cap was sliding off, and when she
caught sight of Ermengarde she began to rub her face nervously with
her apron.

"Don't mind me a bit, Becky!" cried Ermengarde.

"Miss Ermengarde has asked you to come in," said Sara, "because
she is going to bring a box of good things up here to us."

Becky's cap almost fell off entirely, she broke in with such
excitement.

"To eat, miss?" she said. "Things that's good to eat?"

"Yes," answered Sara, "and we are going to pretend a party."

"And you shall have as much as you want to eat," put in
Ermengarde. "I'll go this minute!"

She was in such haste that as she tiptoed out of the attic she
dropped her red shawl and did not know it had fallen. No one saw it
for a minute or so. Becky was too much overpowered by the good luck
which had befallen her.

"Oh, miss! oh, miss!" she gasped; "I know it was you that asked
her to let me come. It--it makes me cry to think of it." And she
went to Sara's side and stood and looked at her worshipingly.

But in Sara's hungry eyes the old light had begun to glow and
transform her world for her. Here in the attic--with the cold night
outside-- with the afternoon in the sloppy streets barely
passed--with the memory of the awful unfed look in the beggar child's
eyes not yet faded--this simple, cheerful thing had happened like a
thing of magic.

She caught her breath.

"Somehow, something always happens," she cried, "just before
things get to the very worst. It is as if the Magic did it. If I
could only just remember that always. The worst thing never quite
comes."

She gave Becky a little cheerful shake.

"No, no! You mustn't cry!" she said. "We must make haste and
set the table."

"Set the table, miss?" said Becky, gazing round the room.
"What'll we set it with?"

Sara looked round the attic, too.

"There doesn't seem to be much," she answered, half laughing.

That moment she saw something and pounced upon it. It was
Ermengarde's red shawl which lay upon the floor.

"Here's the shawl," she cried. "I know she won't mind it. It
will make such a nice red tablecloth."

They pulled the old table forward, and threw the shawl over it.
Red is a wonderfully kind and comfortable color. It began to make
the room look furnished directly.

"How nice a red rug would look on the floor!" exclaimed Sara.
"We must pretend there is one!"

Her eye swept the bare boards with a swift glance of admiration.
The rug was laid down already.

"How soft and thick it is!" she said, with the little laugh
which Becky knew the meaning of; and she raised and set her foot down
again delicately, as if she felt something under it.

"Yes, miss," answered Becky, watching her with serious rapture.
She was always quite serious.

"What next, now?" said Sara, and she stood still and put her
hands over her eyes. "Something will come if I think and wait a
little"--in a soft, expectant voice. "The Magic will tell me."

One of her favorite fancies was that on "the outside," as she
called it, thoughts were waiting for people to call them. Becky had
seen her stand and wait many a time before, and knew that in a few
seconds she would uncover an enlightened, laughing face.

In a moment she did.

"There!" she cried. "It has come! I know now! I must look
among the things in the old trunk I had when I was a princess."

She flew to its corner and kneeled down. It had not been put in
the attic for her benefit, but because there was no room for it
elsewhere. Nothing had been left in it but rubbish. But she knew she
should find something. The Magic always arranged that kind of thing
in one way or another.

In a corner lay a package so insignificant-looking that it had
been overlooked, and when she herself had found it she had kept it as
a relic. It contained a dozen small white handkerchiefs. She seized
them joyfully and ran to the table. She began to arrange them upon
the red table-cover, patting and coaxing them into shape with the
narrow lace edge curling outward, her Magic working its spells for
her as she did it.

"These are the plates," she said. "They are golden plates.
These are the richly embroidered napkins. Nuns worked them in
convents in Spain."

"Did they, miss?" breathed Becky, her very soul uplifted by the
information.

"You must pretend it," said Sara. "If you pretend it enough,
you will see them."

"Yes, miss," said Becky; and as Sara returned to the trunk she
devoted herself to the effort of accomplishing an end so much to be
desired.

Sara turned suddenly to find her standing by the table, looking
very queer indeed. She had shut her eyes, and was twisting her face
in strange convulsive contortions, her hands hanging stiffly clenched
at her sides. She looked as if she was trying to lift some enormous
weight.

"What is the matter, Becky?" Sara cried. "What are you
doing?"

Becky opened her eyes with a start.

"I was a-'pretendin',' miss," she answered a little sheepishly;
"I was tryin' to see it like you do. I almost did," with a hopeful
grin. "But it takes a lot o' stren'th."

"Perhaps it does if you are not used to it," said Sara, with
friendly sympathy; "but you don't know how easy it is when you've
done it often. I wouldn't try so hard just at first. It will come
to you after a while. I'll just tell you what things are. Look at
these."

She held an old summer hat in her hand which she had fished out
of the bottom of the trunk. There was a wreath of flowers on it. She
pulled the wreath off.

"These are garlands for the feast," she said grandly. "They
fill all the air with perfume. There's a mug on the wash-stand,
Becky. Oh--and bring the soap dish for a centerpiece."

Becky handed them to her reverently.

"What are they now, miss?" she inquired. "You'd think they was
made of crockery--but I know they ain't."

"This is a carven flagon," said Sara, arranging tendrils of the
wreath about the mug. "And this"--bending tenderly over the soap
dish and heaping it with roses--"is purest alabaster encrusted with
gems."

She touched the things gently, a happy smile hovering about her
lips which made her look as if she were a creature in a dream.

"My, ain't it lovely!" whispered Becky.

"If we just had something for bonbon dishes," Sara murmured.
"There!"--darting to the trunk again. "I remember I saw something
this minute."

It was only a bundle of wool wrapped in red and white tissue
paper, but the tissue paper was soon twisted into the form of little
dishes, and was combined with the remaining flowers to ornament the
candlestick which was to light the feast. Only the Magic could have
made it more than an old table covered with a red shawl and set with
rubbish from a long-unopened trunk. But Sara drew back and gazed at
it, seeing wonders; and Becky, after staring in delight, spoke with
bated breath.

"This 'ere," she suggested, with a glance round the attic--"is
it the Bastille now--or has it turned into somethin' different?"

"Oh, yes, yes!" said Sara. "Quite different. It is a banquet
hall!"

"My eye, miss!" ejaculated Becky. "A blanket 'all!" and she
turned to view the splendors about her with awed bewilderment.

"A banquet hall," said Sara. "A vast chamber where feasts are
given. It has a vaulted roof, and a minstrels' gallery, and a huge
chimney filled with blazing oaken logs, and it is brilliant with
waxen tapers twinkling on every side."

"My eye, Miss Sara!" gasped Becky again.

Then the door opened, and Ermengarde came in, rather staggering
under the weight of her hamper. She started back with an exclamation
of joy. To enter from the chill darkness outside, and find one's
self confronted by a totally unanticipated festal board, draped with
red, adorned with white napery, and wreathed with flowers, was to
feel that the preparations were brilliant indeed.

"Oh, Sara!" she cried out. "You are the cleverest girl I ever
saw!"

"Isn't it nice?" said Sara. "They are things out of my old
trunk. I asked my Magic, and it told me to go and look."

"But oh, miss," cried Becky, "wait till she's told you what they
are! They ain't just--oh, miss, please tell her," appealing to
Sara.

So Sara told her, and because her Magic helped her she made her
almost see it all: the golden platters--the vaulted spaces--the
blazing logs--the twinkling waxen tapers. As the things were taken
out of the hamper--the frosted cakes--the fruits--the bonbons and the
wine--the feast became a splendid thing.

"It's like a real party!" cried Ermengarde.

"It's like a queen's table," sighed Becky.

Then Ermengarde had a sudden brilliant thought.

"I'll tell you what, Sara," she said. "Pretend you are a
princess now and this is a royal feast."

"But it's your feast," said Sara; "you must be the princess, and
we will be your maids of honor."

"Oh, I can't," said Ermengarde. "I'm too fat, and I don't know
how. You be her."

"Well, if you want me to," said Sara.

But suddenly she thought of something else and ran to the rusty
grate.

"There is a lot of paper and rubbish stuffed in here!" she
exclaimed. "If we light it, there will be a bright blaze for a few
minutes, and we shall feel as if it was a real fire." She struck a
match and lighted it up with a great specious glow which illuminated
the room.

"By the time it stops blazing," Sara said, "we shall forget
about its not being real."

She stood in the dancing glow and smiled.

"Doesn't it look real?" she said. "Now we will begin the
party."

She led the way to the table. She waved her hand graciously to
Ermengarde and Becky. She was in the midst of her dream.

"Advance, fair damsels," she said in her happy dream-voice, "and
be seated at the banquet table. My noble father, the king, who is
absent on a long journey, has commanded me to feast you." She turned
her head slightly toward the corner of the room. "What, ho, there,
minstrels! Strike up with your viols and bassoons. Princesses," she
explained rapidly to Ermengarde and Becky, "always had minstrels to
play at their feasts. Pretend there is a minstrel gallery up there
in the corner. Now we will begin."

They had barely had time to take their pieces of cake into their
hands--not one of them had time to do more, when--they all three
sprang to their feet and turned pale faces toward the door--
listening--listening.

Someone was coming up the stairs. There was no mistake about
it. Each of them recognized the angry, mounting tread and knew that
the end of all things had come.

"It's--the missus!" choked Becky, and dropped her piece of cake
upon the floor.

"Yes," said Sara, her eyes growing shocked and large in her
small white face. "Miss Minchin has found us out."

Miss Minchin struck the door open with a blow of her hand. She
was pale herself, but it was with rage. She looked from the
frightened faces to the banquet table, and from the banquet table to
the last flicker of the burnt paper in the grate.

"I have been suspecting something of this sort," she exclaimed;
"but I did not dream of such audacity. Lavinia was telling the
truth."

So they knew that it was Lavinia who had somehow guessed their
secret and had betrayed them. Miss Minchin strode over to Becky and
boxed her ears for a second time.

"You impudent creature!" she said. "You leave the house in the
morning!"

Sara stood quite still, her eyes growing larger, her face paler.
Ermengarde burst into tears.

"Oh, don't send her away," she sobbed. "My aunt sent me the
hamper. We're--only--having a party."

"So I see," said Miss Minchin, witheringly. "With the Princess
Sara at the head of the table." She turned fiercely on Sara. "It is
your doing, I know," she cried. "Ermengarde would never have thought
of such a thing. You decorated the table, I suppose--with this
rubbish." She stamped her foot at Becky. "Go to your attic!" she
commanded, and Becky stole away, her face hidden in her apron, her
shoulders shaking.

Then it was Sara's turn again.

"I will attend to you tomorrow. You shall have neither
breakfast, dinner, nor supper!"

"I have not had either dinner or supper today, Miss Minchin,"
said Sara, rather faintly.

"Then all the better. You will have something to remember.
Don't stand there. Put those things into the hamper again."

She began to sweep them off the table into the hamper herself,
and caught sight of Ermengarde's new books.

"And you"--to Ermengarde--"have brought your beautiful new books
into this dirty attic. Take them up and go back to bed. You will
stay there all day tomorrow, and I shall write to your papa. What
would he say if he knew where you are tonight?"

Something she saw in Sara's grave, fixed gaze at this moment
made her turn on her fiercely.

"What are you thinking of?" she demanded. "Why do you look at
me like that?"

"I was wondering," answered Sara, as she had answered that
notable day in the schoolroom.

"What were you wondering?"

It was very like the scene in the schoolroom. There was no
pertness in Sara's manner. It was only sad and quiet.

"I was wondering," she said in a low voice, "what my papa would
say if he knew where I am tonight."

Miss Minchin was infuriated just as she had been before and her
anger expressed itself, as before, in an intemperate fashion. She
flew at her and shook her.

"You insolent, unmanageable child!" she cried. "How dare you!
How dare you!"

She picked up the books, swept the rest of the feast back into
the hamper in a jumbled heap, thrust it into Ermengarde's arms, and
pushed her before her toward the door.

"I will leave you to wonder," she said. "Go to bed this
instant." And she shut the door behind herself and poor stumbling
Ermengarde, and left Sara standing quite alone.

The dream was quite at an end. The last spark had died out of
the paper in the grate and left only black tinder; the table was left
bare, the golden plates and richly embroidered napkins, and the
garlands were transformed again into old handkerchiefs, scraps of red
and white paper, and discarded artificial flowers all scattered on
the floor; the minstrels in the minstrel gallery had stolen away, and
the viols and bassoons were still. Emily was sitting with her back
against the wall, staring very hard. Sara saw her, and went and
picked her up with trembling hands.

"There isn't any banquet left, Emily," she said. "And there
isn't any princess. There is nothing left but the prisoners in the
Bastille." And she sat down and hid her face.

What would have happened if she had not hidden it just then, and
if she had chanced to look up at the skylight at the wrong moment, I
do not know--perhaps the end of this chapter might have been quite
different--because if she had glanced at the skylight she would
certainly have been startled by what she would have seen. She would
have seen exactly the same face pressed against the glass and peering
in at her as it had peered in earlier in the evening when she had
been talking to Ermengarde.

But she did not look up. She sat with her little black head in
her arms for some time. She always sat like that when she was trying
to bear something in silence. Then she got up and went slowly to the
bed.

"I can't pretend anything else--while I am awake," she said.
"There wouldn't be any use in trying. If I go to sleep, perhaps a
dream will come and pretend for me."

She suddenly felt so tired--perhaps through want of food--that
she sat down on the edge of the bed quite weakly.

"Suppose there was a bright fire in the grate, with lots of
little dancing flames," she murmured. "Suppose there was a
comfortable chair before it--and suppose there was a small table
near, with a little hot--hot supper on it. And suppose"--as she drew
the thin coverings over her--"suppose this was a beautiful soft bed,
with fleecy blankets and large downy pillows. Suppose-- suppose--"
And her very weariness was good to her, for her eyes closed and she
fell fast asleep.

She did not know how long she slept. But she had been tired
enough to sleep deeply and profoundly--too deeply and soundly to be
disturbed by anything, even by the squeaks and scamperings of
Melchisedec's entire family, if all his sons and daughters had chosen
to come out of their hole to fight and tumble and play.

When she awakened it was rather suddenly, and she did not know
that any particular thing had called her out of her sleep. The truth
was, however, that it was a sound which had called her back--a real
sound--the click of the skylight as it fell in closing after a lithe
white figure which slipped through it and crouched down close by upon
the slates of the roof--just near enough to see what happened in the
attic, but not near enough to be seen.

At first she did not open her eyes. She felt too sleepy and--
curiously enough--too warm and comfortable. She was so warm and
comfortable, indeed, that she did not believe she was really awake.
She never was as warm and cozy as this except in some lovely
vision.

"What a nice dream!" she murmured. "I feel quite warm.
I--don't- -want--to--wake--up."

Of course it was a dream. She felt as if warm, delightful
bedclothes were heaped upon her. She could actually feel blankets,
and when she put out her hand it touched something exactly like a
satin-covered eider-down quilt. She must not awaken from this
delight--she must be quite still and make it last.

But she could not--even though she kept her eyes closed tightly,
she could not. Something was forcing her to awaken--something in the
room. It was a sense of light, and a sound--the sound of a
crackling, roaring little fire.

"Oh, I am awakening," she said mournfully. "I can't help it--I
can't."

Her eyes opened in spite of herself. And then she actually
smiled--for what she saw she had never seen in the attic before, and
knew she never should see.

"Oh, I haven't awakened," she whispered, daring to rise on her
elbow and look all about her. "I am dreaming yet." She knew it must
be a dream, for if she were awake such things could not-- could not
be.

Do you wonder that she felt sure she had not come back to earth?
This is what she saw. In the grate there was a glowing, blazing
fire; on the hob was a little brass kettle hissing and boiling;
spread upon the floor was a thick, warm crimson rug; before the fire
a folding-chair, unfolded, and with cushions on it; by the chair a
small folding-table, unfolded, covered with a white cloth, and upon
it spread small covered dishes, a cup, a saucer, a teapot; on the bed
were new warm coverings and a satin-covered down quilt; at the foot a
curious wadded silk robe, a pair of quilted slippers, and some books.
The room of her dream seemed changed into fairyland--and it was
flooded with warm light, for a bright lamp stood on the table covered
with a rosy shade.

She sat up, resting on her elbow, and her breathing came short
and fast.

"It does not--melt away," she panted. "Oh, I never had such a
dream before." She scarcely dared to stir; but at last she pushed
the bedclothes aside, and put her feet on the floor with a rapturous
smile.

"I am dreaming--I am getting out of bed," she heard her own
voice say; and then, as she stood up in the midst of it all, turning
slowly from side to side--"I am dreaming it stays--real! I'm dreaming
it feels real. It's bewitched--or I'm bewitched. I only think I see
it all." Her words began to hurry themselves. "If I can only keep on
thinking it," she cried, "I don't care! I don't care!"

She stood panting a moment longer, and then cried out again.

"Oh, it isn't true!" she said. "It can't be true! But oh, how
true it seems!"

The blazing fire drew her to it, and she knelt down and held out
her hands close to it--so close that the heat made her start back.

"A fire I only dreamed wouldn't be hot," she cried.

She sprang up, touched the table, the dishes, the rug; she went
to the bed and touched the blankets. She took up the soft wadded
dressing-gown, and suddenly clutched it to her breast and held it to
her cheek.

"It's warm. It's soft!" she almost sobbed. "It's real. It must
be!"

She threw it over her shoulders, and put her feet into the
slippers.

"They are real, too. It's all real!" she cried. "I am not--I
am not dreaming!"

She almost staggered to the books and opened the one which lay
upon the top. Something was written on the flyleaf--just a few
words, and they were these:

"To the little girl in the attic. From a friend."

When she saw that--wasn't it a strange thing for her to do-- she
put her face down upon the page and burst into tears.

"I don't know who it is," she said; "but somebody cares for me a
little. I have a friend."

She took her candle and stole out of her own room and into
Becky's, and stood by her bedside.

"Becky, Becky!" she whispered as loudly as she dared. "Wake
up!"

When Becky wakened, and she sat upright staring aghast, her face
still smudged with traces of tears, beside her stood a little figure
in a luxurious wadded robe of crimson silk. The face she saw was a
shining, wonderful thing. The Princess Sara--as she remembered
her--stood at her very bedside, holding a candle in her hand.

"Come," she said. "Oh, Becky, come!"

Becky was too frightened to speak. She simply got up and
followed her, with her mouth and eyes open, and without a word.

And when they crossed the threshold, Sara shut the door gently
and drew her into the warm, glowing midst of things which made her
brain reel and her hungry senses faint. "It's true! It's true!" she
cried. "I've touched them all. They are as real as we are. The
Magic has come and done it, Becky, while we were asleep--the Magic
that won't let those worst things ever quite happen."