were not so sorry as they ought to have been.
It took some time to arrange the things on the stall, The carpet was spread over it, and the dark colours showed up the brass and silver and ivory things. It was a happy and busy afternoon, and when Miss Peasmarsh and the girls had sold every single one of the little pretty things from the Indian bazaar, far, far away, Anthea and Jane went off with the boys to fish in the fishpond, and dive into the bran-pie, and hear the cardboard band, and the phonograph, and the chorus of singing birds that was done behind a screen with glass tubes and glasses of water.
They had a beautiful tea, suddenly presented to them by the nice curate, and Miss Peasmarsh joined them before they had had more than three cakes each. It was a merry party, and the curate was extremely pleasant to everyone, ‘even to Miss Peasmarsh,’ as Jane said afterwards.
‘We ought to get back to the stall,’ said Anthea, when no one could possibly eat any more, and the curate was talking in a low voice to Miss Peasmarsh about ‘after Easter’.
‘There’s nothing to go back for,’ said Miss Peasmarsh gaily; ‘thanks to you dear children we’ve sold everything.’
‘There – there’s the carpet,’ said Cyril.
‘Oh,’ said Miss Peasmarsh, radiantly, ‘don’t bother about the carpet. I’ve sold even that. Mrs Biddle gave me ten shillings for it. She said it would do for her servant’s bedroom.’
‘Why,’ said Jane, ‘her servants don’t have carpets. We had cook from her, and she told us so.’
‘No scandal about Queen Elizabeth, if you please,’ said the curate, cheerfully; and Miss Peasmarsh laughed, and looked at him as though she had never dreamed that any one could be so amusing. But the others were struck dumb. How could they say, ‘The carpet is ours!’ For who brings carpets to bazaars?
The children were now thoroughly wretched. But I am glad to say that their wretchedness did not make them forget their manners, as it does sometimes, even with grown-up people, who ought to know ever so much better.
They said, ‘Thank you very much for the jolly tea,’ and ‘Thanks for being so jolly,’ and ‘Thanks awfully for giving us such a jolly time;’ for the curate had stood fish-ponds, and bran-pies, and phonographs, and the chorus of singing birds, and had stood them like a man. The girls hugged Miss Peasmarsh, and as they went away they heard the curate say:
‘Jolly little kids, yes, but what about – you will let it be directly after Easter. Ah, do say you will—’
And Jane ran back and said, before Anthea could drag her away, ‘What are you going to do after Easter?’
Miss Peasmarsh smiled and looked very pretty indeed. And the curate said:
‘I hope I am going to take a trip to the Fortunate Islands.’
‘I wish we could take you on the wishing carpet,’ said Jane.
‘Thank you,’ said the curate, ‘but I’m afraid I can’t wait for that. I must go to the Fortunate Islands before they make me a bishop. I should have no time afterwards.’
‘I’ve always thought I should marry a bishop,’ said Jane: ‘his aprons would come in so useful. Wouldn’t you like to marry a bishop, Miss Peasmarsh?’
It was then that they dragged her away.
As it was Robert’s hand that Mrs Biddle had walked on, it was decided that he had better not recall the incident to her mind, and so make her angry again. Anthea and Jane had helped to sell things at the rival stall, so they were not likely to be popular.
A hasty council of four decided that Mrs Biddle would hate Cyril less than she would hate the others, so the others mingled with the crowd, and it was he who said to her:
‘Mrs Biddle, we meant to have that carpet. Would you sell it to us? We would give you—’
‘Certainly not,’ said Mrs Biddle. ‘Go away, little boy.’
There was that in her tone which showed Cyril, all too plainly, the hopelessness of persuasion. He found the others and said:
‘It’s no use; she’s like a lioness robbed of its puppies. We must watch where it goes – and – Anthea, I don’t care what you say. It’s our own carpet. It wouldn’t be burglary. It would be a sort of forlorn hope rescue party – heroic and daring and dashing, and not wrong at all.’
The children still wandered among the gay crowd – but there was no pleasure there for them any more. The chorus of singing birds sounded just like glass tubes being blown through water, and the phonograph simply made a horrid noise, so that you could hardly hear yourself speak. And the people were buying things they couldn’t possibly want, and it all seemed very stupid. And Mrs Biddle had bought the wishing carpet for ten shillings. And the whole of life was sad and grey and dusty, and smelt of slight gas escapes, and hot people, and cake and crumbs, and all the children were very tired indeed.
They found a corner within sight of the carpet, and there they waited miserably, till it was far beyond their proper bedtime. And when it was ten the people who had bought things went away, but the people who had been selling stayed to count up their money.
‘And to jaw about it,’ said Robert. ‘I’ll never go to another bazaar as long as ever I live. My hand is swollen as big as a pudding. I expect the nails in her horrible boots were poisoned.’
Just then someone who seemed to have a right to interfere said:
‘Everything is over now; you had better go home.’
So they went. And then they waited on the pavement under the gas lamp, where ragged children had been standing all the evening to listen to the band, and their feet slipped about in the greasy mud till Mrs Biddle came out and was driven away in a cab with the many things she hadn’t sold, and the few things she had bought – among others the carpet. The other stall-holders left their things at the school till Monday morning, but Mrs Biddle was afraid someone would steal some of them, so she took them in a cab.
The children, now too desperate to care for mud or appearances, hung on behind the cab till it reached Mrs Biddle’s house. When she and the carpet had gone in and the door was shut Anthea said:
‘Don’t let’s burgle – I mean do daring and dashing rescue acts – till we’ve given her a chance. Let’s ring and ask to see her.’
The others hated to do this, but at last they agreed, on condition that Anthea would not make any silly fuss about the burglary afterwards, if it really had to come to that.
So they knocked and rang, and a scared-looking parlourmaid opened the front door. While they were asking for Mrs Biddle they saw her. She was in the dining-room, and she had already pushed back the table and spread out the carpet to see how it looked on the floor.
‘I knew she didn’t want it for her servants’ bedroom,’ Jane muttered.
Anthea walked straight past the uncomfortable parlourmaid, and the others followed her. Mrs Biddle had her back to them, and was smoothing down the carpet with the same boot that had trampled on the hand of Robert. So that they were all in the room, and Cyril, with great presence of mind, had shut the room door before she saw them.
‘Who is it, Jane?’ she asked in a sour voice; and then turning suddenly, she saw who it was. Once more her face grew violet – a deep, dark violet. ‘You wicked daring little things!’ she cried, ‘how dare you come here? At this time of night, too. Be off, or I’ll send for the police.’
‘Don’t be angry,’ said Anthea, soothingly, ‘we only wanted to ask you to let us have the carpet. We have quite twelve shillings between us, and—’
‘How dare you?’ cried Mrs Biddle, and her voice shook with angriness.
‘You do look horrid,’ said Jane suddenly.
Mrs Biddle actually stamped that booted foot of hers.