Meade L. T. - A London Baby: The Story of King Roy стр 7.

Yes, father, she said, you wor quite, quite right. God hAlmightys werry angry wid me. I dont know how Ill hever bear it. Little Roy aint in the house, father. When you put him in the bedroom he runned out by the other door, he ran inter the street. We ha searched hall the house over, and he aint there. My little Roy

is quite, quite lost.

Lost! echoed Warden. He sprang to his feet. Roy not in the house! Roy lost! Back over his memory came the picture of the lovely sleeping boy, of the real love and pride with which he had kissed him. His prize essay became as nothing to him. But swift through his hard, cold heart passed an arrow of intolerable pain. Roy, lost? he repeated. God help me! and I wor werry rough to the little chap.

They were the humblest words that had ever passed his lips. He rushed from the room, for he must find his son.

Chapter Six

Bless us! who hever his the little un? said the ragged woman who had come into the gin-palace with him. Wots yer name, my little dear, and wot hever do yer want?

Ittle Oy want Fate, said the boy in a clear high tone.

The woman laughed. Hark to the young un, she said, turning to her companions. Did yer hever hear the like o that afore? He says as he wants his fate. Pretty lamb, it ull come to him soon enough.

Oy want Fate Oy do want Fate, said the little child again.

The woman bent down and took his hand.

No, no, my dear, she said. You run away home, and never mind yer fate; it ull come hall in good time; and babies have no cause to know sech things.

Oy do want Fate, repeated the boy. Two other women had now come round him, and also a man.

It dont seem no way canny like, to hear him going on like that, said one of the group. And did yer hever see sech a skin, and sech air? I dont blieve a bit that hes a real flesh-and-blood child.

A coarse red-faced woman pushed this speaker away.

Shame on yer, Kate Flarherty; the child aint nothink uncanny. Hes jest a baby boy. Bless us! I ad a little un wid air as yaller as he. You ha got lost, and run away. Aint that it, dear little baby boy?

This woman, for all her red face, had a kind voice, and it won little Roy at once.

Will oo take me to Fate? he said; and he went up to the woman, and put his little hand in hers. She gave almost a scream when the little hand touched her; but, catching him in her arms, and straining him to her breast, she left the gin-palace at once.

Chapter Seven

had stolen little Roy away would now certainly bring him back. Warden was a carpenter by trade. He was engaged now over a job which was to be finished by a given time, and which would, when completed, pay him handsomely. He had engaged to have it done by this date, and he was a man who had never yet failed in his appointments. But for all that he came home that morning, and never thought of going out again to work. His whole heart, and soul, and energies were concentrated, waiting and listening for a little voice, for the sight of a dear golden head, the return of the blue-eyed boy who was his own, and whom now that he had lost, he knew, indeed, to be bone of his bone, flesh of his flesh. So near, so precious had little Roy become, that without him it would be agony to live. Warden went home, and saw on the floor some of the scattered fragments of his torn essay. The pieces he had been laboriously trying to put together when Faith had come to him with the news that little Roy had ran away, still lay on the table. In the grate were some burnt-out ashes; the room was untidy dusty. It had not been touched since last night. It was Faiths duty to make this room ready for breakfast; and, as a rule, Warden would have been angry with her for its present state of neglect; but this morning he said nothing, only when his eyes rested on the torn pieces of the essay he uttered a groan, and, stooping down, he picked them all up and put them in the grate. There he set fire to them. When they had been reduced to a few white ashes he sat down on the horse-hair sofa and wondered when Faith would appear. She came in presently from the inner room, and Warden roused himself to say, in a new and wonderfully kind tone:

I ha had rewards put up, and the detectives are on the watch. Well have him home werry soon, Faithy.

Faith did not make any answer. There was a queer, dull, almost stupid look on her face. She moved half-mechanically about the room, getting her fathers breakfast and pouring it out for him as if nothing had happened. When she gave him his cup of hot coffee, she even seated herself in her accustomed place opposite. Roys little empty chair was pushed against the wall. Faith moved her own so that her eyes should not rest on this symbol of the lost child.

Eat some breakfast, Faith, said her father; then he added, in a tone which he endeavoured to render cheerful, The little chap ull be back very soon, I guess. Do you hear me, Faith? I expect little Roy to be brought back almost immediately.

Yes, father, answered Faith. She raised her dull eyes to his face. He saw not a gleam of either hope or belief in them, and, unable to endure the despair of the little daughter whom he had never loved, he pushed back his chair and left the room. The moment he did so Faith breathed a slight sigh of relief. She left the breakfast-table, and, getting a chair, she mounted it and took down from a high shelf an old and dusty copy of the Bible. It was a copy she had seen in her mothers hands. She had watched her dying mother read in this old Bible, and smile and look happy as she read. Afterwards Faith had tried herself to read in the old book. But one day her father, seeing it lying about, and feeling that it reminded him of his wife, who never had it very far from her side, had put it up out of the childrens reach, and Faith had hitherto been too timid to dare to take it down; but there was nothing at all timid about the little girls movements to-day. An absorbing agony of grief and pain was filling her poor little heart to the utter exclusion of all lesser feelings. She fetched down the old Bible from its dusty hiding-place, because it had come back to her memory in the long hours of the wakeful night she had just gone through, that the Sunday teacher who had given her that sweet and peaceful lesson the day before had said that the Bible was full of stories about Jesus. If only she could find the place where he took the babies in His arms, and was so good and kind to them. Perhaps if she found the account of the story she might also learn how the mothers and the sisters for surely there must have been little sad orphan sisters like her in that group she might learn how they came to Jesus with the babies; she might find out how He was to be found now. Her teacher had said He was not dead. The neighbour down-stairs had said He was not dead. Then, if that was so, would not the very best thing Faith could do be to go to Him first herself, and tell Him that Roy was lost that he had gone quite, quite far away, and ask Him to help her to find him? She placed the Bible on the table, got a duster, and, tenderly removing its dust, opened it. It was a large book a book with a great, great deal of writing, and Faith wondered how soon she could find this particular story that she longed for. She could read very slowly, and very badly. She might