



Produced by Avinash Kothare, Tom Allen, Charles Franks and
the Online Distributed Proofreading Team. HTML version by
Al Haines.










THE CHILDREN'S PILGRIMAGE

BY

MRS. L. T. MEADE






THE CHILDREN'S PILGRIMAGE






FIRST PART.

"LOOKING FOR THE GUIDE."



  "The night is dark, and I am far from home.
  Lead Thou me on"




CHAPTER I.

"THREE ON A DOORSTEP."


In a poor part of London, but not in the very poorest part--two
children sat on a certain autumn evening, side by side on a doorstep.
The eldest might have been ten, the youngest eight. The eldest was a
girl, the youngest a boy. Drawn up in front of these children, looking
into their little faces with hungry, loving, pathetic eyes, lay a
mongrel dog.

The three were alone, for the street in which they sat was a
cul-de-sac--leading nowhere; and at this hour, on this Sunday evening,
seemed quite deserted. The boy and girl were no East End waifs; they
were clean; they looked respectable; and the doorstep which gave them a
temporary resting-place belonged to no far-famed Stepney or Poplar. It
stood in a little, old-fashioned, old-world court, back of Bloomsbury.
They were a foreign-looking little pair--not in their dress, which was
truly English in its clumsiness and want of picturesque coloring--but
their faces were foreign. The contour was peculiar, the setting of the
two pairs of eyes--un-Saxon. They sat very close together, a grave
little couple. Presently the girl threw her arm round the boy's neck,
the boy laid his head on her shoulder. In this position those who
watched could have traced motherly lines round this little girl's firm
mouth. She was a creature to defend and protect. The evening fell and
the court grew dark, but the boy had found shelter on her breast, and
the dog, coming close, laid his head on her lap.

After a time the boy raised his eyes, looked at her and spoke:

"Will it be soon, Cecile?"

"I think so, Maurice; I think it must be soon now."

"I'm so cold, Cecile, and it's getting so dark."

"Never mind, darling, stepmother will soon wake now, and then you can
come indoors and sit by the fire."

The boy, with a slight impatient sigh, laid his head once more on her
shoulder, and the grave trio sat on as before.

Presently a step was heard approaching inside the house--it came along
the passage, the door was opened, and a gentleman in a plain black coat
came out. He was a doctor and a young man. His smooth, almost boyish
face looked so kind that it could not but be an index to a charitable
heart.

He stopped before the children, looking at them with interest and pity.

"How is our stepmother, Dr. Austin?" asked Cecile, raising her head and
speaking with alacrity.

"Your stepmother is very ill, my dear--very ill indeed. I stopped with
her to write a letter which she wants me to post. Yes, she is very ill,
but she is awake now; you may go upstairs; you won't disturb her."

"Oh, come, Cecile," said little Maurice, springing to his feet;
"stepmother is awake, and we may get to the fire. I am so bitter cold."

There was not a particle of anything but a kind of selfish longing for
warmth and comfort on his little face. He ran along the passage holding
out his hand to his sister, but Cecile drew back. She came out more
into the light and looked straight up into the tall doctor's face:

"Is my stepmother going to be ill very long, Dr. Austin?"

"No, my dear; I don't expect her illness will last much longer."

"Oh, then, she'll be quite well to-morrow."

"Perhaps--in a sense--who knows!" said the doctor, jerking out his
words and speaking queerly. He looked as if he wanted to say more, but
finally nodding to the child, turned on his heel and walked away.

Cecile, satisfied with this answer, and reading no double meaning in
it, followed her brother and the dog upstairs. She entered a tolerably
comfortable sitting-room, where, on a sofa, lay a woman partly dressed.
The woman's cheeks were crimson, and her large eyes, which were wide
open, were very bright. Little Maurice had already found a seat and a
hunch of bread and butter, and was enjoying both drawn up by a good
fire, while the dog Toby crouched at his feet and snapped at morsels
which he threw him. Cecile, scarcely glancing at the group by the fire,
went straight up to the woman on the sofa:

"Stepmother," she said, taking her hand in hers, "Dr. Austin says
