Page:Quartette - Kipling (1885).djvu/52

 quick as a flash of sunlight, and seemed at times to be absolutely ubiquitous. If she were standing by the wheel and I turned to ask the lady nearest me who the pretty child was, when I looked again she would have gone. Perhaps the end of a blue sash vanishing round the door of the "companion" would tell me of her whereabouts; but most frequently I saw nothing. Though she was often with the other children, she did not seem to play with them, and I never saw one of them speak to her except Robbie; and when he did so she never answered him. I questioned the stewardess—a tall, gaunt woman who had seen "better days," and who, therefore, was aggressively equal and unpleasant in manner but she told me nothing. After I had described the child, she looked at me in a rather peculiar way and said: "Your cabin's No. 45, isn't it?" I said "Yes," and she answered brusquely: "Well, Mrs. Forbes's child is the only yellow-haired one that I know of—and it's a boy,—but I haven't got time to learn all the children's names. They are quite tiresome enough without that."

Still the child was a frequent visitor to my cabin. Almost every day I passed her as she was coming out of it, or turned when I was going on deck to see the little figure running into No. 45. She never touched any of my things; and Robbie's toys and picture-books had no attraction for her. I grew used to the presence of the golden head, though I was puzzled and vexed by the way in which she never spoke, and never answered my questions. Robbie, somewhat to my surprise, left off asking me about her; but I presently found out that the imaginative little fellow had invented a story to explain her silence. He had caught a slight cold which made him rather peevish and very sorry for himself, and one evening I was sitting by him, hoping he would soon go to sleep, when the curtain in front of the door was pushed aside, the blue eyes I knew so well peeped in for a moment, and then the curtain was dropped again.

"There's that little girl," I said. "I think she looked in to see if you were asleep, dear."

"I don't speak to her anymore," answered Robbie.

"Why not? Won't she speak to you?"

"No; faiwiz don't talk."

"You funny little boy," I said, laughing. "Do you think she is a fairy?"

"I knows she is, Muzzie."