The Cruise of the Make-Believes Page 2

  CHAPTER II

  THE KING OF A LEAN KINGDOM

  ARCADIA STREET is noted--locally, at least--for its "gardens." By thisterm I would not have you understand that hidden away in that cornerof Islington are bowers of beauty, or that you may stroll at eventideunder the drooping branches of trees, what time the soft scents offlowers are wafted to your nostrils. Rather let it be said thatattached to each dingy house is a dingy plot of ground that is only a"garden" by courtesy--a place where the primeval instincts of man havefrom time to time urged him to dig in the earth, for the sole reasonthat it is earth, and in the mad hope to raise from it something thatno other London garden has yet accomplished. The moon that looks downon each slip of ground at night knows differently; she has seen thething being done for generation after generation, and finally given upin despair. Also the cats look on tolerantly, because they too know howit will end, and that the victory will be with them easily in the longrun.

  You may look into many such gardens, and may see for yourselves howbravely they began--with what high hopes. Here, for example, iswhat was once intended to be a summer-house; and it has long sincefallen into decay, and become a place where the shabby things thatare not wanted even in a shabby house have been tossed from time totime, and left to ruin. You will see creepers that started well,and intended great things, and clung quite bravely to walls; untilthe London atmosphere and neglect and one thing and another put anend to them. And you may see rows and rows of pots, wherein nothinggrows nor ever will grow, and wherein the very earth that fillsthem is of a consistency known nowhere else. Here and there, too, abit of trellis-work had been put up and painted; in Arcadia gardensit is generally found to be an easy hanging place for cloths anddoubtful-looking garments.

  In the gardens of Arcadia Street was one exception. That exception wasthe house, behind the front window of which, the wistful face of a girlhad looked out at Mr. Jordan Tant--that girl about whom he had heard somuch from his friend Gilbert Byfield. The house itself, poor and shabbythough it was, was neat and scrupulously clean; but the real triumph ofit lay in the garden. Not, perhaps, in the artistic sense, but ratherthat it was a garden of surprises--a place where it was impossible tosay what you might meet next, if you wandered carefully through itscircumscribed length, and took it seriously.

  Yet to anyone to whom the mere name of garden means so much, what apitiful place! For there was nothing really garden-like about it; itwas a place of rags and patches and pretences. The few pitiful plantsthat struggled out of the black-looking earth here and there seemedto do so not because they liked it, but because they had a desperatedesire to show what they could do, even against adverse fate, when theywere put to it. Half a dozen things that could not have been named evenby the most careful student in botany stood in pots under the kitchenwindow; and in front of these, spread out on the earth itself, was anold and very ragged carpet--a trap to the unwary, because of the manyholes it contained and the uneven surface it presented on the unevenground.

  With the idea of hiding the carpet as much as possible, and at the sametime of giving an air of luxury to the place, an ancient staggeringtable on three legs had been placed in the centre of it; and oneither side of this table a chair, long since set aside as being toodeplorable even for use in that house. It was a very mockery of atable, and the chairs were in a dreadful conspiracy with it to let downany unwary mortal who should attempt to sit upon them in their old age,unless he treated them with due caution and respect.

  Nor was this all; the garden held other treasures. Another ancientstrip of carpet, as ragged as its fellow, had been hung against a wallto form a species of background to a crazy box that stood against thatwall. Not that you would ever have called it a box; it had a dingy rugupon it, and that dingy rug made it, of course, a species of settle orottoman--an easy lounging place on summer nights. You had to sit downcarefully upon it, because it had a defective board, which gave wayunexpectedly and might let you through; but with care that was a faultthat might not be noticed. For the rest, the place contained a bulkyold plaster flower-pot, with some seedy-looking moss growing in it, andwith great cracks at the further side from the house.

  The kindly darkness was hiding the tawdriness of the place when alittle door at the end of the garden opened, and a little man camein. A man shabby like all the place; with an old frock-coat much toolarge for him hanging in scarecrow fashion from his thin shoulders,with trousers much too long for him lapping over carpet slippers frayedand worn, and with an old velvet smoking-cap, with three strands offrayed silk to represent a tassel, stuck on one side of his head. Amelancholy-looking little man, with a certain fierce sullenness uponhim, as though he quarrelled perpetually with the world at large. Heslammed the gate, and advanced into that sorry garden; made as if tokick the unwieldy cracked flower-pot, but thought better of it; andwent shambling towards the table set upon the ragged carpet.

  The fact that he caught his foot in a hole in the carpet, and almostprecipitated himself over the table, did not improve his temper. Heglared savagely about him, and gave his head a fierce rub with his capbefore seating himself gingerly on one of the chairs. Having done so,he pulled his frock-coat closer about him, and shivered in the warm andstifling air.

  "It's a conspiracy--that's what it is!" exclaimed the little man. "It'san infernal conspiracy against me from first to last!"

  The shadows were lengthening in the garden, and the little man wasrather a pathetic figure as he sat there, solemnly shaking his headand muttering to himself. Someone who had come to the back door ofthe house, and looked out upon him, hesitated for a moment, and thenstepped quickly out towards him. A young girl with a bright, eager,thin face; the girl who had looked through the window at Mr. JordanTant. She came quickly towards the man, and dropped her arm round hisshoulders, and whispered to him.

  "Father--you're home quite early," she said. "Will you have your coffeeout here?"

  He shook himself peevishly away from her embrace. "Coffee?" heexclaimed. "Who the devil wants coffee, Bessie? A man wants somethingstronger than coffee. Besides--what's the good of making a fuss aboutmy being home as early as this? You don't suppose I should have comehome but for a very good reason--do you?"

  The girl winced a little, and drew away from him. "I thought perhapsfor once you were glad to come home, father," she said timidly. "Andyou know I always like to think of us sitting out in the garden--underthe stars--and drinking our coffee. The best people do that every nightof their lives--after dinner."

  "After dinner!" he reminded her, raising a finger, and shaking it ather. "That makes all the difference in the world; I dare say anyonemight drink the stuff after a good dinner--just to oblige a friend. Butwhat is anyone to do--in what condition of mind do you imagine a man tobe--when his dinner has been a thing not of the stalled ox order--butof herbs? Besides--I'm upset--annoyed."

  "I'm sorry, father," said the girl softly. She tiptoed into the house,and softly called to someone within; came out again, and sat down atthe further side of the table, folding her hands upon it, and lookingat the shabby figure of the man on the other side of it.

  "What has gone wrong, dear?" she whispered; and at the question hesuddenly turned upon her, and opened the very floodgates of his wrathand misery.

  "Turned out--ejected--thrust to the door with gibes and laughter!" heexclaimed. "For how many years have I not, in a sense, been the veryprop and stay of that place--its chief ornament--the one being who inan impoverished and sordid neighbourhood has shed upon it the light ofwhat I may term real intellect. I ask you, Bessie--for how many years?"

  "For more years than I can remember, father," whispered the girl,turning away her head.

  "Exactly," he responded triumphantly. "It has been to me not a merehouse of refreshment--but a club--a place in which, by virtue of longusage, I had a species of proprietary right. They'll find their mistakeout, of course; they're bound to do that in time. The Arcadia Armswithout me degenerates into a mere low public-house--a pot-house; I hadsucceede
d in raising the place. I was a feature--almost an institution.And now a vulgar creature--without a coat, mark you, Bessie!--pointsto the door, and says that I'm not to be served again. Some talk of ascore--of a paltry sum that should have been paid long since."

  There was silence between them for a minute; it seemed as if, in thegathering darkness, the petty record of the years was being told overbetween them--so much to this account, and so much to that. The man inthe shabby frock-coat seemed to shrink and dwindle--to fall away fromwhat he would have appeared in her eyes, and to be the mean thing hereally was. When presently he went on with his tale, it was as thoughhe sought for excuses for himself, and blamed her in so doing.

  "That place was in a sense my last refuge; I held a position there Ihold nowhere else now. When the cares of the world pressed upon memore than usual, I was able to turn there; I had my seat in a specialcorner--and I was respected. It was known always and everywhere as'Mr. Meggison's place'; and only once in all the years has it beenusurped--and then the man was drunk. He was very properly turned out atonce, of course, and made to understand the enormity of his offence.And now--now, Bessie"--he turned to the girl, and feebly smote thecrazy table with his fist--"now they tell me I am not to go thereagain--they turn me out; I heard them laugh when the door banged behindme. Oh--a bitter world--a very bitter world, Bessie!"

  In all that he said she knew that there was an implied reproach forherself. For if Bessie Meggison had but passed into his hands certainshillings, this might never have happened; he might still have heldup his head at the Arcadia Arms--still have filled his old seat in acorner--still have called like a man for his glass to be filled. Inthat Bessie had failed; and she knew it now.

  "We have had a hard time, father," she said, dropping a light hand onthe fist with which he was beating the table. "People don't come andtake the lodgings as they used to do; the things are getting so poorand shabby that perhaps the more fashionable young men don't like it. Itry hard, father--but every shilling seems to be so important."

  "My dear Bessie, I am not aware that I have blamed you," he said alittle coldly, as he withdrew his hand and turned away his head. "Timewas when Fortune smiled upon me, and I was able to do work that broughtin money; that time is long since past. In a fashion, I may be said tohave retired; I am no longer actively engaged in commercial pursuits."

  "No, father--of course not," responded the girl cheerfully.

  "And you have often assured me that you are glad--and proud--glad andproud to be able to assist my declining years. It is not much that Iwant: I saunter out in the sun in the morning, and go down to my--myclub----"

  "The Arcadia Arms, father," she said gently.

  "I prefer to call it my club," he said, a little testily. "There I nodto an acquaintance or two--and I have my modest glass, and perhapssmoke a pipe, or even a mild cigar. In the afternoon, a stroll andperhaps another modest glass; in the evening a few more people gatherthere, and we are almost convivial. That's my programme; that's myday. For the rest, as you're aware, I occupy the cheapest bed inthe house--and I don't eat much. Therefore I do urge," he concludedfretfully, "that it is a shame that a man should be deprived of thelittle thing that gives him so much pleasure. I have been woundedto-night--sorely hurt and wounded, Bessie."

  "The coffee will be here directly, father," said the girl.

  "Coffee--served in cracked cups by a dingy maid--in a back-yard," hecried viciously. "There's nothing soothing or helpful or restful aboutcoffee--and I'm too old to pretend that this place is anything but theback-yard it really is."

  "It's better than any other garden in Arcadia Street," she said. "Andat a time like this, when--when you don't see things so distinctly--itlooks quite good. If you shut your eyes the least little bit, so thatyou can only just see out of them, you seem to be looking down longspaces--ever so far; and you can sit there under the wall, and thinkyou're anywhere--anywhere in the world except in Arcadia Street."

  "I have shut my eyes to a great many things far too long, Bessie," heexclaimed fiercely. "I have been inclined to forget at times who Ireally am, and the position I should have occupied. I let my childrendo as they like with me. Where, for instance, is your brother to-night?"

  "Aubrey always goes out in the evening," said the girl quickly. "Helikes his freedom, you know, father dear."

  "I know his freedom," said the man; "the freedom of every low billiardsaloon in the neighbourhood. No intellect about him, mind you; nodiscussing of matters of moment concerning the neighbourhood, and eventhe nation, with Aubrey. Oh dear, no; the knocking about of billiardballs is more in his line. Aubrey will never cut a figure in any resortof gentlemen. How much, for instance, did your precious brother receiveout of the funds of the house--my house, mark you! How much did hereceive this day?"

  "Aubrey had half a crown," said the girl, in a mere whisper.

  "Ye gods!" he exclaimed, starting to his feet. "He flaunts it with halfa crown all over London, and his poor old father is shown the door ina pot-house, because he can't pay his score. Bessie, I could not havebelieved that you would sink so low!"

  "Aubrey says that he must live," said the girl wistfully. "And he likesalways to feel that he is a gentleman."

  "Why doesn't he work?" exclaimed Mr. Meggison savagely. "He is youngand strong--why should he borrow half-crowns; why doesn't he earn 'eminstead? Things have come to a pretty pass when I--Daniel Meggison--amrefused necessary refreshment in order that my son should flaunt it onhalf-crowns. Bah!"

  "Somebody seems to be talkin' about me," said a voice from the doorwayof the house. "What's the row?"

  The youth who sauntered out, and stood with his hands in his pockets,looking from one to the other, was not of an inviting type. Shiftlessson of a shiftless father, he lacked even that father's poor dignity,and failed to carry himself so well as the older man. He stooped atthe shoulders, and his mean and narrow face was thrust forward, andbore an expression of knowingness, as though he asserted that there wasprecious little in this world you could teach him. A small billycockhat was thrust on the back of his head, and from between his lipsdrooped a cigarette; it was his proud boast that he was never to beseen without the latter.

  "The row is this," exclaimed the old man, "that I want to know when youare going to take your proper position in the world--and do your properwork?"

  "Don't you worry about me, dad," replied the son; "I shall be there allright when the work comes along. Always provided, mind you," he addedas an afterthought, "always provided that the work suits me, and is ofa sort that a gentleman can take up. No hole-and-corner jobs for me; Iknow what I want, and I mean to get it."

  "You have already obtained from your sister here to-day a sum of moneyfar in advance of your needs or your deserts," said old Meggison,wagging his head at him. "Pray what do you want with half-crowns?"

  "Father--you shall have all the money you want as soon as I get anymyself," pleaded the girl in a low voice. "Surely there is no need forquarrelling."

  "I am not quarrelling; my dignity does not permit me to quarrel," saidDaniel Meggison, shaking his arm free of her touch. "But I trust that Iknow what is due to me as that boy's father; I hope I know my duty."

  "Hope so, dad, I'm sure," said the youth, as he turned away. "Can'tsee for the life of me what you're upset about. You've had your bit attimes; you've been kept going, same as I have--haven't you?"

  "My 'bit,' as you term it, is what is justly due to me as the head ofthis house," exclaimed the elder man.

  "I wasn't aware that you were the head of the house," said the youth."If it comes to that, Bess is the only one that does anything for whatI'm pleased to call a rotten family. I'm not saying, mind you, thatshe does what she might, or that she looks up the lodgers for what'sdue with that business instinct she should; I'm only sayin' that shedoes what a mere girl can do tolerably well. More than that, she knowsthat her brother, bein' a gentleman, can't go about London with emptypockets."

  "What about my pockets?" demanded Daniel Meggison, plun
ging his handsinto them. "Who thinks of my wants--my simple ordinary little wants?Who deems it necessary even to know that I have that refreshment thatis not denied to the lowest of the beasts?"

  "The lowest of the beasts drink water," said Aubrey, with a chuckle."And I never heard of you doin' that."

  While Bessie stood looking helplessly from one to the other, and whilea savage retort rose to the lips of old Meggison, the door leading fromthe house was opened, and a little servant-maid appeared. A precise andprim little maid, who, having come from some institution but a littletime before, had felt ever since that she was seeing life as she hadnever hoped to see it; to her, indeed, the sorry garden was a place ofdelight. She came out now almost with eagerness, bringing that despisedcoffee on a battered tray, and set it on the rickety table. And at thesame time announced some startling news.

  "Oh, if you please, miss, a gent an' a lidy--name o' Stocker--waswaitin' in the passage----"

  "Hall!" thundered Mr. Daniel Meggison, so savagely that the childalmost knocked over the coffee-pot. "How many times, Bessie, have Itold you that the domestics are to be instructed to give proper namesto the apartments in the house."

  "You will be more careful in future, Amelia, won't you?" suggestedBessie mildly. She turned to her father, and spoke wistfully. "PerhapsAunt Julia and Uncle Ted had better come out here--in the garden," shesuggested.

  "I will not see them," said Mr. Meggison. "I am in no mood to seeanyone; I should probably insult my sister, to begin with. I dislikeher as much as I dislike her absurd prosperity."

  "Don't ask me to meet 'em," said Aubrey, making for the little gate inthe wall. "Aunt Julia always asks a chap what he's doin'--as thoughearnin' your livin' was about the only blessed thing you'd got to do inthis world."

  "I'd be glad if you'd stop and see them, Aubrey," pleaded Bessie; thento her father she added slyly--"It will be so much more dignified ifyou stop and meet them, father."

  "Perhaps it will; I will put up with them on your account, my child,"said Mr. Meggison. "Aubrey--I command you to stay."

  "Your commands don't affect me the least little bit," said Aubreycoolly, shifting his cigarette to the other corner of his mouth. "Buton Bessie's account I don't mind lettin' myself be seen. Amelia--trot'em out!"

  Bessie Meggison having some idea of how these things should be done,from certain accounts she had read, or from certain things she hadheard, immediately got behind the crazy table, the better to presideover that pouring out of coffee. She bravely shut her eyes to the factthat the cups did not match, and that the saucers were either too largeor too small, or that the coffee-pot was a mere tin affair, blackenedall up one side from contact with the fire. She waited in that proudposition the coming of the unexpected guests.

  Mrs. Stocker came first, looking about her with the high dignity ofone who moves in a very different sphere, and who has condescendedfor once, in a spirit of Christian virtue, to step down among beingsless fortunate. She was a large lady, holding herself very erect; thesort of person with whom you could not under any circumstances havecracked a jest. Life was a simple and a respectable thing with her; aserious matter, that could but lead in due course to a very proper andbecomingly elaborate funeral. Women had been known to do remarkablethings, and to get their names into books and newspapers; not so JuliaStocker. "From the moment Edward Stocker claimed my hand, I knewexactly what was going to happen to me, and I acted accordingly," washer invariable summary of the course of her life. Incidentally it maybe mentioned that Mr. Edward Stocker had "a little property" and thatMrs. Stocker looked after it. Which is to say that Mr. Stocker was amild good-tempered little man, with a partiality for convivial goodcompany into which he rarely got.

  The lady came out of the house now, looking about her somewhatdisdainfully. She took Bessie's outstretched hand, and, still with hereyes searching the bare and shabby yard, touched the girl's cheek fora moment with lips that had no softness about them; performed the sameceremony with her brother Daniel; and stared at Aubrey Meggison. "Ihave come, brother," she said, in a voice that was in itself almostdirge-like, "to see how you are getting on."

  "Very kind of you--but I'm not getting on at all," said Meggison,furtively rubbing the place on his cheek where her lips had been withhis knuckles. "More than that, I don't expect to."

  "Perhaps I should have said that _we_ have come--Edward and myself--toinquire about you; for of course without Edward I never attempt todo anything. In my opinion the woman should always be dependent uponthe man, and guided by him. Consequently, if Edward tells me that hedesires that I should call and inquire about my relatives, I do so,however distasteful it may be to me personally. Edward--where are you?"

  Mr. Stocker came from the house at that moment, holding his hat in hishand, and looking about him as though he felt he was in some place ofhistoric interest. He saw Bessie's hand, and after looking at it fora moment or two, as though not quite certain what it was, or how itconcerned him, decided to grasp it; and having done so looked up atthe girl, and smiled in rather a pleased way. But he dropped the handguiltily on hearing his wife's voice.

  "Edward!--why are you loitering? Where are you?"

  "Here, my dear," said Mr. Stocker, coming round the table, and stilllooking about him as though marvelling at the place in which he foundhimself. "Charming spot, this!"

  "Charming fiddlesticks!" exclaimed Mrs. Stocker, sitting carefully on achair. "A mere back-yard--with nothing in it but rags and rubbish anddraughts. Surely you people don't live out here?" she asked, glaringround upon them.

  "We like to come here in the evening, aunt; it's very pleasant then,"said Bessie. "Will you have some coffee, Aunt Julia?"

  "No, I will not have some coffee--especially in the open air," saidMrs. Stocker. "Nor will your uncle Edward have coffee," she added,noting a tendency on the part of that gentleman to reach for one of thecups; "it always disagrees with him. Not, of course, that I would wishfor a moment to interfere with your enjoyment, Edward--but I think Iknow what is best for you."

  Mr. Stocker sighed and turned away; found his way up to that improvisedseat against the wall; and, with that luck that usually attends suchmen, discovered the loose board and almost went through; he wasfrantically readjusting his balance when Daniel Meggison, as thoughby the merest chance, strolled up to him and dropped a hand on hisshoulder, and smiled in a friendly way.

  "Glad to see you, Ted--always glad to see you," he said, keeping a waryeye upon Mrs. Stocker the while, and lowering his voice suddenly anddramatically. "You don't happen to have change for half a sovereign, Isuppose?"

  Mr. Stocker slipped his hand into his pocket, and brought out a smallgold coin. "I don't think I have," he began in a whisper; and thendiscovered, something to his amazement, that by a species of conjuringtrick the coin had disappeared from his hand and was entering thepocket of Mr. Daniel Meggison, who was beaming upon him.

  "It doesn't matter--one coin's easier to remember," said Meggison. "Youshall have it back--certainly within a week. You're a man to know, sir."

  Mrs. Stocker was speaking in her loud and strident tones. "I should notbe doing that duty that is imposed upon me by the mere fact of beinga woman and a Stocker, did I not speak my mind. I come here, and Ifind you all drifting on in exactly the same way that you have alwaysdone--in a shabby and shiftless manner, that seems to belong to youand Arcadia Street. Don't interrupt me; there is only one being on thisearth that has a right to interrupt me--and he dare not do it." Sheglared round upon Mr. Stocker as she spoke.

  "We are very happy, Aunt Julia," said Bessie, who was delicatelysipping some of the half-cold stuff known to Amelia as coffee. "Fatherhas been a little unfortunate over the matter of finding employment."

  "A misfortune that has dogged him nearly all his life," snapped Mrs.Stocker. "In what direction are you looking, brother?"

  "In all directions, my dear Julia," said Meggison, in a jubilanttone that sprang from the fact that he had unexpected money in hispocket. "I may be said to say to the wor
ld--'Give me work; help me todiscover work; give me some hard task, with appropriate pay attached toit--and then see what I'll do!' I appeal to Bessie: am I not for evercondemning the state of the labour market?"

  "I have heard you speak of it often, father," said the girl.

  "And what, for example, is Aubrey doing?" demanded Mrs. Stocker,turning suddenly on that youth. "What are his prospects?"

  "What he's doing at the present time is this," said the youth, openingthe door at the end of the garden--"he's goin' out. And the prospects,as far as you're concerned, are that you won't see him again thisevenin'. I'm goin' to have a hundred up at the Arcadia Arms. Goodnight!"

  As he was swinging out of the door Mr. Daniel Meggison seized his arm,and held him for a moment. "How dare you address a relative in such afashion, sir!" he cried. "Above all, how dare you suggest that you willwaste money upon such a pursuit. Your aunt is right; you should by thistime have decided what work you will seize upon in the world. There aremany maxims I might employ in such a case as yours--but I----"

  "I wouldn't trouble, if I was you," said Aubrey, shaking himself free."As I've said before, I'm ready for anything in the way of work, if Ican only see it before me, and know what I've got to look forward to.If it isn't there, don't blame me."

  He went out of the door, slamming it behind him; his father, in asudden access of virtue, pulled open the door, and called after himdown the narrow alley which ran at the back of the houses--"Understand,I will not permit you to frequent any such place as the Arcadia Arms--amere ordinary pot-house----"

  His voice died away, and he contented himself by shaking a fist in thedirection of the retreating youth. He slammed the door, and turnedagain to his sister.

  "I think that I shall be compelled to go out myself, Julia," he said,while his fingers lovingly caressed that small gold coin in his pocket."I must really look in at my club."

  "Club? I didn't know you had one," said the lady, rising. "However, wewon't detain you; so soon as I know that Edward commands me to returnhome I shall be quite willing to leave Arcadia Street."

  Mr. Daniel Meggison took the hint at once, and hurried into the house;a minute or two later he might have been observed shuffling down thestreet in the direction of the Arcadia Arms, having exchanged hissmoking-cap for a grimy grey felt that was stuck jauntily on the sideof his head. Mrs. Stocker, having brought Mr. Stocker to his feetby the simple expedient of turning to look at him, shook hands withBessie, and gave that young lady at parting a few words of much-neededadvice.

  "Call things by their right names, my child," she said sternly. "Agarden's a garden--and a yard's a yard; this is a yard, and an untidyone at that. Don't pretend; when you haven't got enough to eat, don'teke it out with coffee badly served that nobody wants. Come out of yourdreams, and wake up to the realities of life. Don't forget, wheneveryou feel inclined to think that you are any better off than you reallyare, or have anything to be grateful for, that you're a mere ordinarycommonplace girl--or woman, if you like it better--and that yourmission in life is to slave from morning to night for people that don'tcare a button about you. My advice to you is: clear away this rubbish,and keep chickens or something of that sort. Good night."

  It is probable that Mr. Stocker would have said something morecheering, but for the fact that at the very moment he had graspedBessie's hand Mrs. Stocker looked back from the doorway, and called tohim; he departed hurriedly and obediently. The girl looked at the sorryarray of cups and saucers, and then at the poor wilderness about her;all in a moment it seemed poor and mean and childish. She sank down onto that box that was covered by the dingy old rug, and covered herface with her hands.

  The shadows were falling all about her, and the Princess next door, asGilbert Byfield had called her, was crying softly to herself.