Chapter II (1)

I watched the two strangers as they approached. When they reached the 'bus the man assisted the woman, in a somewhat formal yet indifferent way. She entered and took her seat nearly diagonally opposite to me. The man plunged his hand in his pocket, brought out a coin, and put it in the darkey’s hand, and stooping, for he was tall, entered the 'bus after her. It swayed a little perilously with his weight, and rocked quite a bit before he finally comfortably seated himself directly across from me.

The driver meanwhile had swung himself up on the high driver’s seat. He opened the peep-hole and looked down, then gathered the reins, and clucked to his horses, and the 'bus drove off.

If the town had interested me before, I forgot it now--forgot it quite in the attention, direct and indirect, which I gave to my fellow passengers.

The man was faultlessly dressed. Such clothes were not customary in that corner of the world. The neat derby, the band of which he was even now wiping with a lavender-edged silk handkerchief, was a thing foreign to those parts at that season, cheap straw hats being rather the rule. The tips of the fingers of a pair of new tan gloves were to be seen just looking out from the left breast-pocket of his well-buttoned light gray suit. I could see that he wore a white vest, and his shirt had a little hair-line of purple in it. His hands were large and very white and well kept, the fingers close fitted together. On one of them a conspicuous Mexican opal smouldered in a massive, very dark gold setting.

I have no words, even to this day, to describe the woman who sat a foot or two from him and to whom he addressed his remarks in an indifferently possessive manner.

She was slight; her hair was of a light brown, her eyes of a distinct orange color. Her face sloped delicately from the forehead, which was low enough to be beautiful, and high enough to suggest nobility of thought, down to the lovely line of chin. Her throat was slender and very white, rising from a turned-down Puritan collar. A Puritan cloak of dust-colored linen, with strappings of orange, fell away under the collar in soft and cool lines. Her brown veil had at its edge a line of orange color also. The brown was a shade lighter than her hair; the orange a shade darker than her eyes. The veil carried with it I cannot say what manner of ethereal graciousness, and fell into a wave or floating line of loveliness as she turned her head. Once, as we dipped into a shaded hollow and across a running stream, a little breeze of coolness came in at the windows. The veil, lifted by it, floated and clung like a living thing to her throat and lips, until her delicate hand put it away gently.

I watched her, very fascinated. She was a creature of another world. That she and the horse-radish woman could live on the same planet spoke volumes for the infinite scale of life.

At first these two new passengers spoke hardly at all. Once the man bent his massive figure to get a better look at the landscape from the window opposite him, and called the attention of his companion to some point in it.

'There! As I recollect it, the property is not unlike that, Louise. It rolls that way, I mean; and Felton’s line comes into it just as that snake fence comes across there. It is on the other side that the vein of coal is said to begin.'

Though she gave a courteous hearing, I had the impression that she was not really interested.

She watched the country with a kind of well-bred inattentive glance. For myself I could not take my eyes off her. I watched her with that hunger for beauty which is native to the heart of a child. Above all I watched her eyes. The strange, unusual color of them was in itself a kind of romance. She gave one the impression of being a woman unique; something rare and choice, not to be found again or elsewhere.

Once she turned her head and met my full gaze. I was embarrassed, but I need not have been. She set the matter right by addressing me with a gentle courtesy.

'Do you live out here?'

I shook my head. I meant to reply more fully in a moment when I had recovered myself; but the man spoke.

'Never heard of Thomas Felton, I suppose, did you? Used to live once in Owen County not far from here.'

I shook my head again and formed the word 'No.'

The woman gave him a gentle glance; nothing reproving, but he took it in the manner of reproof.

'Well, I did not know but she might have,' he explained. Then he settled back a little. 'Maybe some one else will get in later who does know. I thought them confoundedly stupid at the hotel. Didn’t seem anxious to give any information either. Nobody knows anything in a place like that.'

There was silence again. The fields at one side of the road climbed now, here and there. Low pastures rose to be foothills. Around one of these hills a rocky road appeared sloping down to the pike. Up the road, at a little distance, was a rustic archway like an entrance to a private property. Waiting by the side of the road, stood a figure strange to me, in the garb of some monastic order.

The woman did not notice him. Her glance was far off at the horizon at the other side. The man did. He regarded the stranger with a stolid bold curiosity. Then some idea of his own occurred to him, suddenly. As the 'bus stopped to take on this new passenger, the heavy man rose, to take advantage of its steadiness, no doubt, and stooping so as not to knock his derby against the ceiling of the vehicle, tapped imperatively on the lid of the little peep-hole, and when it was raised, spoke to the driver.

'This road leading up at the side here doesn’t happen to be the Chorley road, does it, that leads into Felton’s woods? They said there was a road at the foot of a hill that led into some timber lands belonging to a man named Felton.'

The driver did not understand. The question had to be repeated. While the man repeated it, the Franciscan--though I am not entirely sure he was of that order--opened the door of the 'bus. The woman turned her head now. I saw her orange-colored eyes grow wide and large as they noted him. With habitually bent head and regarding none of us, he entered. As he seated himself in the corner, he looked up, however, and his eyes met hers. I saw him start really violently. His color, which was a dark olive, with a too bright crimson under it at the cheek-bones, became suddenly ashy.

There was just that one look between them. The next instant she had turned to the other, returning from his questions with the driver. He had not seen the look that I had noted.

The Franciscan now drew his eyes away from the woman’s face, fumbled in the skirt of his habit, and brought out a prayer-book which he opened with fingers that shook.

The heavy man seated himself, exactly opposite the woman, and beside me and within touch of the Franciscan. He addressed the woman.

'I just thought that that might be Chorley’s road. They said it ran up a slope. It wasn’t, though. I thought I’d like to get a sight of the timber. We may try to make him throw that in, in payment.'

He glanced around at the Franciscan, whose eyes were now entirely on his book; took him in, as it were; then let his glance glide off out one of the windows. After a sufficient time, a kind of courteous pause, he leaned forward a little, raised his derby the least bit, and said, 'Excuse me, but I suppose you live here?'

The Franciscan looked up, but answered nothing. The color came surging back suddenly into his face, which was haggard. There was a noncommittal look in his eyes, as though his lips were to say, 'I beg your pardon.'

'I supposed you lived here,' the other said, 'and I thought you might just happen to know a man named Felton. He came originally from Owen County. We are on here from New York. We are strangers and we know nothing of this country. You don’t happen to know'--

The Franciscan gave a gentle smile, raised one slim hand, which yet trembled visibly--a fine deprecating gesture.

'Pardon, m 'sieu!'

'Oh, I see.' The other touched his hat with a little motion of withdrawal and clumsy apology. 'I see. I didn’t know you were French. I don’t speak French myself. Wish I did! Excuse me. Excuse me.'

Here was an occasion! The adventure was turning squarely toward me. I knew French; I was proud of it and eager to offer my services. I could perfectly well act as translator, interpreter for these two. Moreover, it would give me that greatly to be desired thing, the attention of this beautiful woman. Yet I did not dare all this at once. I would wait a moment. How should I break into the conversation? A child of fifteen, however oldish, is shy. Would it be proper for me to say, 'Excuse me, but--?'

As I was thinking of it with a kind of tumult of pride and shyness, the man turned to the woman.

'Look here, Louise; that’s a fact! You speak French! Ask him if he knows Thomas Felton’s property. Tell him it’s Felton who lived over in Owen County and used to be a wealthy man.'

She turned her clear eyes to the Franciscan and spoke in a pure Parisian French.

'This man, my husband, wishes me to ask if you know a Thomas Felton who has property out here in this direction.' In the same tone exactly, she added, 'Do not let him suspect that you know me.'

'Let him think'--the reply came in pure French also--'that I speak no English. In this way you and I can converse together.'

Her wonderful orange-colored eyes quivered the least bit as she drew them away from the Franciscan and met the waiting eyes of her husband.

She spoke with perfect composure, however.

'He says he believes there was such a man hereabout some years ago.'

Her husband turned quickly as if he himself would further address the Franciscan; then, recollecting that he knew no French, he appealed to her again.

'Now Louise, look here. Try to get it straight. As I told you, there are two men of that name, a nephew and an uncle. It’s the uncle I want to get hold of. He is the man who owns the property we want. Ask this man how old this Felton is, this man he knows; I can tell by that.'

She turned again to the Franciscan, and spoke again in French. Indeed they spoke nothing else but that sweet and flowing language, a knowledge of which put me, without my will, in league with them.

'How do you happen to be here?' she questioned.

'I joined the order after I left you,' he said. 'That is, they simply allow me to live with them, chiefly on account of my name, I think; that, and, I think, as an act of mercy. As a kind of lay brother--it is simple. But, this man--he is your husband?'

'Yes, I have been married to him eight months.'

'In God’s name!' he said, but in a perfectly even conversational tone. 'And you have suffered. Of course you have suffered.'

They used throughout their conversation, as I have not indicated here, because it sounds forced in English, the familiar and gentle tutoiement, the thee-and-thouing of the French.

The husband, understanding nothing of what they said, was watching the two with interest; his small eyes were eager in his heavy face; he was waiting for his answer.

'Do not let us talk too long,' the Franciscan said, and turned with a faintly courteous smile, as though to include the heavy man in the conversation. 'Ask me some more questions,' he said to the woman; 'get him to ask some more questions, I mean. In that way we shall have a little time to talk together.'

She addressed her husband.

'He is not quite sure. He thinks, however, the man he has in mind has a gray beard.'

Her husband drew his large flat fingers down his heavy chin twice, as if stroking an imaginary beard of his own, thoughtfully; his eyes narrowed even more, very speculatively.

'I see, I see! Well now, like as not it’s the same one.' Then he put his hands on his knees and leaned forward as though really addressing himself to the business. 'Look here, Louise, you ask him if this man he knows ever had anything to do with a railway--a railway out West and coal lands out there.'

'You must give me time. Let me see! How does one say all that? My French is not so fluent as it once was. I shall have to get at it in a roundabout way. Have patience.'

'Take your time,' he said, leaning back, 'only get at it if you can. It’s important.'

She turned now to the Franciscan. But it was he rather who addressed her.

'But what are you going to do about this horrible marriage?'

'Nothing, nothing at all.'

'But, good God, it is desecration! It is like defiling the bread and wine of communion. Does this man kiss you?'

'He owns the better part of two railroads,' she said, with a kind of pitiful look in her eyes. 'He is here now to push to the wall--if he can--a man already overtaken by mischance and misfortune.'

'Why do you evade?' said the other. 'He does of course touch you, he owns you, along with the better part of two railroads. He fondles you at his pleasure. I would not have thought it possible. Not you; not you.'

'You forget,' she said, and still her voice kept the strangely even tone. 'My sister was ill, dying, I thought. I could give her everything by this means. I did give her everything. She is better now, as well as she will ever be. She could not bear poverty; it was killing her. She never could. She is better.'

'But at what horrible, what hellish cost!' he replied. 'She was selfish always, and complaining; one of the useless ones; and moreover, answer me, does one buy a cracked pitcher, doomed to be broken at any rate, with the most exquisite pearl in the world, priceless above ten sultans' ransoms? Were it not so horrible it would be ridiculous. Does one, I ask you, do a thing like that?'

She turned to her husband.

'He says he believes the man you ask about was once engaged in a large coal-mining deal in the West.'

'Yes,' said the heavy man eagerly, leaning forward again to listen to what he could not understand, but with as keen attention as though he comprehended fully.

'Wait and I will ask him more.'

Again she turned to the other.

'But you, you also have bought unworthy things at fearful cost?'

'What? In God’s name, what have I bought? I who renounced everything, who have nothing left in this world but the memory of your face and the certainty of death?'

'You bought for yourself the approval of what you may choose to call your conscience,' she said in the same almost monotonous, even voice. 'You bought freedom from the world’s censure, freedom from what the world would have said had you married me.'

He flung out a trembling hand. I thought it would have betrayed him.

'That! Will you bring up that old mad folly of yours? Would you hope to persuade me it was not my duty to renounce you? They told me I could not possibly get well. You see for yourself. You see now how I am changed. I shall last now, perhaps, six months. You had nothing. I had nothing. What would have become of you, not to speak of all the horror? It was clearly my duty. I leave it to any man.'

'Yes; always that. The opinion of others,' she said, but even still without emotion. 'I do not care for the opinion of a worldful. I accept the fact that you could not get well. I tell you it does not matter. It was for each other God made us; without any regard to circumstance.'

'A woman’s reason is not reason,' he said. 'Any man would tell you it was my duty to give you up. The world is not made as you would have it.'

'Listen,' she said. (She interrupted herself to glance with a smile at her husband, and said to him in English, 'I am trying to explain to him. He is a little dull. He does not understand.') 'Listen'--she spoke again to the other. 'Be reasonable. See it as it is. Do not cheat yourself into thinking this horrible failure of ours was a virtue. Review the facts with me and face them. These are they: we compromised with life, and in a cowardly fashion. I married, to buy my sister health, because I had not the courage to see her suffer. You renounced me and went away, so that you might have a certain peace of mind, and because you had not the courage to go counter to tradition and the world’s approval. What would the world have said--a man as ill as you were, to accept the life and devotion of a woman? It was that that tormented and swayed you. You left me, and went away to escape that. We both bought a certain worldly peace of mind, and a kind of conventional self-approval. And with what? With what did we buy these trifling things? What price did we pay for them? We bought them with the entire wealth and treasure God had given us--the most precious in his treasuries, beside which kings' ransoms are as nothing. We bought these trifles, these worthless baubles, with the priceless love we had for each other. He gave it to us in such ample measure, you remember. And what did we do with it? What have we to show for it now? In God’s world are there to be found, do you think, two such spendthrifts?'

'There! It is your old way,' he replied. 'You speak always in figures, like a poet. It is misleading. Deal only with the facts. I leave them to any one. I was to die of a lingering illness. I had no money. I had only a wealth of horrors to drag you through. A slow death it was to be. You would have had two years of that.'

'Two years,' she repeated. 'I have been married eight months; and I think those eight months have been twice eight years. And two years, two years together, you and I! But oh, if it had been one year only; if we had had but one year together! Only one year!' There was a kind of pleading in her voice. 'Only one year! It is as if one were to say "only springtime"--"only love,"--"only heaven,"--"only God!"'

'What does he say?' said her husband. Perhaps he was curious at the tone of her voice; or merely impatient at the length of their conversation.

'Tell him anything,' said the other, 'We must converse at any cost. Tell him anything you like; only do not cease to speak to me.'

She turned to her husband.

'He is quite interesting. He thinks he used to know this man when he was a child; that his father had some dealings with him in that very coal affair in Illinois. Let me question him a little more. I will tell you by and by. We must not seem to be too curious. Do not interrupt me; just let me lead him on. It may take a few moments.'

The other began now, without waiting for her to take up the conversation.

'But I tell you, you do not see the thing as it is. It would have been a criminal thing for a man doomed as I was, to link his life with a woman like you, frail, exquisite, young, beautiful, the very rose of the world. Is it permissible for a man to drag a woman with him to the scaffold, even for love? I leave it to any man.'

'Yes, to any man,'--her reply was quick on his,--'but you dare not leave it to a woman. Any man would tell you it is not permissible that one about to die should lay his hand in that of the woman he loves. And any man would grant you, that if the woman is his wife,--if that tradition has bound them,--then it is his right and her duty that they should share fatality, even though they have not the high calling of love. If this man who is my husband were stricken, you, even you, would expect me--'

The sentence broke and she left it as though there could be no need of making the truth plainer. Instead, she folded her hands tensely.

'But, oh, let us not argue. We have squandered God’s treasure, you and I. We have squandered it for the sake of convention, for old precedents, for men’s opinions; just as this man, my husband, buys railway shares and mining properties at the fearful price of his honor, his human kindness, his soul. You despise him and shrink from him. Truly, I cannot, except when he lays his hand upon me; for we are no better than he. That is the horrible part of it. We are all three spendthrifts, the three of us, here in this little space. But oh, what new folly! Only think of our spending these precious, precious moments in argument! Shall we never have done being wasteful!'

He fell in with her thought immediately.

'You love me still, then.'

'Yes, always.'

'Yet I have not the right, even now, to so much as touch your hand.'

'No; yet my hand lies in yours by the hour. These are things one cannot keep from God.'

'Do you know,'--his voice was even,--'I cannot help wondering if the little girl over there in the corner just might possibly understand.'

'No; I think not,' she said gently; 'besides, if she did, it would not matter.'

'No, perhaps not. I think she would say nothing. I notice that her eyes are shaped somewhat like yours. Some day some man will love her also.'

'Yes, without doubt. But it is of ourselves I would talk. If there is a heaven, there, there, you shall some day possess me!'

Her husband broke in now:--

'Are you finding out anything?'

'Yes, quite a little!' She smiled palely, then turned back to the other.

'How can you lie to him like that?' he said. 'And I also.'

'We waste time,' she urged. 'A carriage meets us at the next town. From there he and I are to drive over to the adjoining county. You and I have only a few moments more left at the most in this world together.'

'Yes.' His fingers interlaced tightly, resting in his lap. 'Let us not argue any more. You remember the night by the river, O my beloved?'

'As though it were the only night in the world.'

'I remember that at first I dared not even be near you; I sat on the bank a little away from you,' he continued; 'but by and by the moon came up and all around us was stillness and beauty; the sheep slept in the pasture; the hills were all cool with the light of the moon; I have not forgotten; I can never forget--I dared just to lay the tips of my fingers on the hem of your gown. You did not notice that. It was as though I had dared lay my hand on the garment of God, but sweeter, sweeter even than that.'

'Oh yes, I saw. I saw and felt. And it was exactly as if by that token God had chosen me among women, as he chose the Virgin; only, he chose me there in the moonlight, not for glory and suffering as he chose her, but just for love. He chose and called me for that. I was to love you; was chosen by that touch to love you; only you, among a thousand; only you in all the world of many men. And then, just then, the nightingale, like some little feathered angel of annunciation, broke into song in the trees near by.'

'Yes; and to me it was as if white fire were all about you--as about some altar; and I was afraid to touch you. I dared not. You were too beautiful, too glorious. The night was too still, too holy. And then, at last, I reached out my hand and dared, as if one were to try a miracle. I laid it on yours. And still I lived. And then, the whole scenery of earth and heaven shifted, after that--as you know. You leaned and kissed me. Everything was changed forever.'

'Yes; I know. After that there was nothing but the night and the silence, and thou and I. Even the nightingale did not sing.'

'Yes.'

'And since that night there has been no one else in the world but only thou and I. Other people, do they not seem like shadows, myriads of shadows, like the inconsiderable leaves of a forest that shall fade and fall and be renewed--but only leaves and shadows?'

'Only thou and I,' he assented, 'in the wide forest, in the woods of the world. And soon, soon, soon, I shall walk the woods no more.'

'Since you must go, do not be discomfited,' she replied; 'nor trouble at all this. If as a kind of lasting torment, to match my own, you were permitted, after death, to be near, to see this man kiss and possess me, you have but to remember the night by the river in the moonlight. You are but to remember that this is the only night in the world; that there are no others; that the rest are dreams; that no lips but yours have ever really touched mine.' Her voice was beautiful, rich; a kind of farewell in itself. 'You must promise me this.'

Her husband leaned forward a little impatiently.

'We are nearly there. Can’t you find out, Louise, what I want you to? The thing I want to know is whether he still has an interest in the coal lands. If he has it will be worth a good many thousands. Now do your best. Try.'

'But you must have patience,' she said, 'I am trying to find out something.'

'I cannot quite get it out of my head,' said the other, 'that we deserve to be damned for this. Does not your conscience misgive you?'

'No; rather my honor. I have a hatred of deception. It is the only time in my life that I have deceived. And you?'

'I might do penance.'

He smiled, I thought. He drew the cord of his habit through his slim transparent fingers until one of the knots rested in his palms.

'You could not really mean anything so horrible! And your body, so slim, so beautiful, that I have loved!'

His voice, though it was low, rang also, now--quivered almost.

'You forget that the stripes might be sweet, my well-beloved,'--I could see that his lips trembled,--'something still suffered for your sake.'

She put her hand to her brow, a little lovely gesture, as though all this troubled her, perhaps dazed her; or perhaps it was some old recollection in his voice.

'How absurd we are! We shall be parting soon.'

'Yes,' he said, 'for always. What can I say to you that you will remember?'

'Only say that you can never forget the night by the river.'

'I can never forget it.'

Something in his words fell final, like a fate.

She turned now to her husband. The stage was already slowing up.

'Is this the county seat? I have found out quite a great deal. I will tell you more about the coal lands as we drive. He is an interesting man.'

Suddenly, from having been intently upon them, my attention became aware of a familiar sound, the thudding hundred-hoofed sound of an approaching herd; I had been so absorbed in the strange world of the other happening that I had not known of their approach. Almost suddenly they were about us, black and brown backs, spreading horns, broad wet noses, massive foreheads.

The driver looked down through the little hole reassuringly.

'Just wait till they get past. They’re on their way to the stockyards!'

We waited, the four of us, huddled together, with a strange kind of intimacy, it seemed, in the 'bus, while the trampling mass of driven dumb creatures surged and swayed around us, and finally struggled painfully by, each crowding the other, on their way to death. The woman watched them with eyes in which there met fear and pity.

With the last of the herd past, the driver was already opening the stage door. The woman’s husband rose, stooping.

'If you’ll allow me, I’ll get out first with these.'

He took the satchels and got out of the 'bus, heavily.

He turned to assist the woman. She did not give him her hand at once. The Franciscan drew back a little to let her pass. She paused the fraction of a moment and gave her hand to him.

'Good-bye.'

When she was beside the large man on the road, he also offered his hand to the Franciscan.

'Thank you; thank you very much indeed.'

He turned. 'Guess that’s our surrey over there, Louise.' The darkey driver of the surrey hurried toward him. 'Yes; take these.'

The woman followed him. She did not look back. He assisted her into the surrey and followed, himself, his weight bending it heavily to one side as he entered.

I saw them drive away, along a broad cross-road into the lovely rolling country, her brown veil floating a little, unknown to her, but like a living thing, with a little wild waving of its folds. The Franciscan I saw follow a road in another direction. The curve of it soon hid him. I did not see him again.

I remained in the 'bus. We were to stay only a little while at the county seat, for we were already late. New horses were put to the pole, and within twenty minutes we were driving over the same road by which we had come.

An old gentleman who, I think, was a lawyer returning from county court, was the only other occupant, and he was soon dozing. It was a strange ride back. When we came to Latonia the light was so altered as to make a new and lovely adventure of it. The sun was not yet set, but the sunlight had withdrawn to the tops of the tall trees. Below, the hotel lawn was cool, almost twilit, mysterious in shadows. It was there only a little while ago that I had first seen these two coming down the path to enter the 'bus. The last few hours had changed life for me entirely. Though I did not know it at the time, I know now that the two worlds of reality and of romance--before that distinct and separate in my mind and all untried--were forever mingled with each other now, for me, and were one with my own life. I shall never henceforth be able to see a herd of cattle on a dusty road without seeing those two in their last meeting; nor shall I ever see any who remind me of him or her without a sense of love and death and the inevitable.

* * * * *

This is a true story. I have never told it before. I have kept it locked away as something too cherished, too intimate to share with any one. There always seemed to me a finality about it beyond any story I could ever read. Yet I am telling it now, partly from a sense of honor, partly from a hidden hope; because it was not, after all, finished that day. She may still be living. This may chance to meet her eye. If so, I would have her know that the dark-eyed child who rode with them that day came in time, by that strange chance, so much more strange in life than in any story, to meet just what she had met: to meet Love, the glorious and radiant presence, only to find that there walked beside Love,--road-companions of the way,--Poverty, and one whose face had all the likeness of Death. And I would have her know that, because of that day, and because of the memory of her in my heart, so long cherished, I, at the chosen moment, laid my hand in that of the shining Presence,--despite those other presences,--to go with it, in what paths soever it might lead me.

It is so, I take it, life deals with us more largely than we know. Fools in our folly; spendthrifts though we may be, throwing priceless wisdom away to the winds, as these two had done; wasting our wealth and our substance of joy irretrievably; careless of God’s treasure intrusted to us; squandering gold worth the ransom of all the kings of the earth, and this for some trifling thing, some inconsiderable bauble; yet God, unknown to us, does most usually, no doubt, save from our wrecked fortunes and our lost argosies something--something precious still, and above price--with which, at a future day, with merciful largesse of wisdom and of love, some other soul may yet be blest and may yet be enriched, as it were by all the treasure of the earth.

CHILDREN WANTED

BY LUCY PRATT

THEY were sitting at the breakfast table when the morning mail came in. There was something for Mr. Henry Tarbell--there was always something for him; there was something for Mrs. Henry Tarbell--there was usually something for her. The only thing at all unusual was that there was something for Master Crosby Tarbell. It was rather a strange-looking document, too. Beside the address was a picture of a pony with a long, sweeping tail, and just under the pony were some words. Crosby was learning to read in a school which was proud of its 'phonetic method,' and he read the words slowly, with many little lip sounds to help him on.

'Would you like a pony for your vacation? You can have her free.'

His father’s glance fell on the picture.

'Hullo, where does all that come from?'

'It says I can have her free,' began Crosby, with a characteristic pause in the middle of his sentence, which always gave the effect of steadying the inclination to a slight tremble in his small, earnest voice; 'it says--I can have her free.' His face flushed. 'Can I--have her, father?'

'Where would you keep her?' inquired his father casually, opening a letter. 'In the kitchen?'

'No, in the--in the barn! They used to keep a horse there--before we lived here! I--I could keep her in the barn!'

'M--m, barn? I’m afraid she wouldn’t recognize it.'

'But there’s a stall there! A nice stall! _Couldn’t_ I have her?'

His father looked up again.

'What’s this? A prize contest? Oh, I see.' He smiled absently as he went on with his mail. 'Yes, it’s safe to say you can have her--if you can get her.'

Crosby’s face flushed slowly again, and his eyes looked very bright.

'If you can get her,' repeated his father, pushing his chair back and looking at his watch; 'but you can’t, Crosby. There isn’t a chance in a thousand that you could.' He put his watch in his pocket and looked at his wife. 'Well, I must go. Come on, old man. Better take your pony correspondence outside! Too good a day for the house.'

From the low porch-steps Crosby waved an absent good-bye, his eyes still on the pictured pony. As he tore away some yellow seals, a letter fell out, and he creased the big folder again and cautiously sat down on it so that it would not blow away. Then he spread the letter across his knees.

It was more than half an hour later that he looked up and drew a long breath of relief. It was the first really full-sized breath that he had taken since he began the letter--and he had just finished it. His eyes dwelt on the last sentences again, and as he pulled the folder from under him, they traveled back to the beginning.

'I have some good news for you!' It read more easily this time. 'What would make you happier than anything else you can think of? To have me tell you that you can have a pony of _your own?_' The characteristic, slow flush came into his cheeks. 'Well, that is just what I _am_ going to tell you! Because on the twentieth of August we are going to give away to some boy or girl, one of the prettiest little Indian ponies you ever saw. Her name is "Lightfoot," and _you can have her if you get started right away_. The thing is to start right out--'

Oh, he understood the rest perfectly! He was simply to get subscriptions for the _most delicious breakfast food that had ever been boxed for the public market!_ Its name? Buttercup Crisps! He was simply to get the names of people who were willing to put their names down for one order or more of Buttercup Crisps!

'Buttercup Crisps!' he whispered, and caught another deep breath at the mere sound of it, as he opened up the big folder. _'A Prize for Every Contestant!'_ It stared at him in huge letters, and his eyes traveled swiftly from the shining bicycle to the little mahogany writing-desk, to the violin, to the beautiful gold watch--then rested again gently, lingeringly, on THE PONY. Just once again his glance shifted to the sentence which seemed to shine out from all the others. _'Her name is "Lightfoot," and you can have her if you get started right away.'_

He gathered up all his papers and went in.

'Mother--' he began; but he found that he needed a steadying pause at the very beginning. 'Mother--can I go out--for a little while? I want to--do something.'

She looked at the folded sheets in his hand.

'O Crosby, that’s so foolish!' she protested. 'You know you couldn’t get that pony, no matter how hard you tried.'

'Well, can I go?' he repeated, sticking characteristically to the original question.

'Oh, yes, I suppose so. But I wouldn’t waste my time over _that_, if I were you. It’s too warm a day.'

He was already storing all the papers and pictures inside his waist for safe keeping, and as he marched steadily down town toward 'the centre,' he kept one hand of protection upon them and made out a careful plan of campaign. He must go to every house in town, beginning with the one right there, next the post-office. But it wasn’t a house. It was a store. Never mind, he would begin with the store. He felt very strange, though, as he stood before the counter, while the man behind it waited, flirting some string which hung down from a suspended ball, and evidently quite ready for business.

'Would you like,' began Crosby, his voice growing so faint that he had to swallow to get it back again; 'would you like--some Buttercup Crisps?'

'Like some _what?_' bawled the man.

Crosby had an idea that he might get arrested if he asked that again, at least if he didn’t make some variation, so he launched desperately into another construction.

'It’s something--to eat! For breakfast! Buttercup Crisps! It comes--in boxes.'

'Well, what about it?' questioned the man behind the counter distractedly.

'I--do you--do you want some?' continued Crosby bravely.

'No, I don’t,' declared the man behind the counter with both strength and finality. '’Twouldn’t make any difference _what_ it came in! I’m so overrun now with these breakfast concoctions that there ain’t room left for anything else!'

'Yes, sir,' returned Crosby politely, and walked out to the street again.

It was not a very promising beginning, to be sure, but it was a relief to have that first dreadful plunge over. Perhaps it wouldn’t be so bad after that. And he marched on to the next house, which _was_ a house and not a store. A middle-aged colored woman, in an ample white apron, came to the door and stood smiling at him while he screwed his courage into words again.

'Would you like--would you like--to try a few Buttercup Crisps?' he asked, with a fleeting consciousness that he had made a really elegant effort.

'W’at’s dat, chile?' inquired the woman of color in kindly tones.

'Buttercup Crisps!' stammered Crosby. '_Crisps!_ A few--'

'One o' dese yere breakfus' fancies, I s’pose?' came the kindly encouragement. 'An’ it soun' good, too, doan’t it? But'--she lowered her voice to a note of confidential intimacy--'dey doan’t 'low me ter transac' no business at de do', chile, no matter _w’at_ yer offers. Dey wouldn’t trus' it!'

'Yes’m,' returned Crosby faintly, and walked down the steps.

It made him positively dizzy to think of asking that question again. But his hand rose mechanically to the folded papers under his waist, and once more a vision of a beautiful, long-tailed pony swept before his eyes.

'It said I could have her if I got started right away,' he reasoned steadily, 'and I have got started right away, so I--I guess I better keep right on.'

He looked so hot and tired when he came in to dinner, that his mother glanced at him questioningly.

'Why, Crosby, where _have_ you been? You look perfectly roasted. Is is so hot in the sun? Well, don’t go out again this afternoon until it’s cooler.'

'I’m not--so very hot,' he assured her.

But he thought, himself, that he wouldn’t go out again right away. He had been to a good many houses that morning, but for some reason he had not a real name to show for it. He had not seen the right people! Most of them had been servants, and of course they couldn’t have bought Buttercup Crisps--if they had wanted to. No--he must begin asking for 'the lady of the house.' And he must become more familiar with the literature of his folder. Its advertising value was his chief asset.

He set forth the next morning with new hope and confidence. And something very exhilarating soon happened. The very first 'lady of the house' who smiled down at him from her doorway, as he explained with conscientious, steadying pauses, the full meaning of his call, and then, pointing to the pictured pony, explained, with even longer steadying pauses, that he wanted to get her for a prize--why, that very first generous lady decided that she would give him her name for six boxes of Buttercup Crisps! Crosby fairly tottered with the monstrous significance of it. But as he drew more papers out from under his waist and found the page where subscribers' names were to be written, she glanced it hastily over.

'Yes, now I am to give you seventy-five cents,' she explained kindly, as she wrote her name, 'and it tells you in this little notice here that that counts you one point. It says, too, I see, that it takes six points to become a contestant.'

'Everybody gets a prize,' explained Crosby; and he unfolded the beautiful folder again with its large and frequent letters of assurance still staring joyously.

'Yes, but--' She looked down at his small, upturned face, and flushed with a kind of helpless shame,--'but don’t you see, dear child--it tells you here, in fine print, that it takes _six points_ to become a contestant?'

Crosby looked puzzled. 'Every contestant gets--a prize,' he repeated slowly. 'Does that mean that if you work--and get names--that perhaps you won’t get a prize either?'

'That’s just what it means, and I wouldn’t bother with it if I were you. You see it means so much work for you--and it’s so uncertain.'

'But the letter--was written to me,' explained Crosby. 'And the Pony Man says--I can’t lose!'

'Well, then he’s saying what isn’t so. Because you can lose very easily, and I’m very much afraid that you will. But if you want to keep trying,'--she just touched his cheek with her hands,--'I--I hope that you will be successful!'

He went down the steps with a troubled face, tying three silver quarters into the corner of his handkerchief. So he did not yet understand all those printed documents! He looked up and down the warm, tree-lined street, and sat down under the first tree, spreading them all carefully out upon the grass. When he got up and started on again, he still looked troubled, but there was, too, a look of patient determination about him--entirely characteristic. He understood it all now. He understood about the points.

At dinner-time his eyes looked very bright. He had six names on his list for varying and assorted orders of Buttercup Crisps! As he brought out all his money and showed it to his mother, she smiled at him and told him that he was wasting his time. But he looked back at her with bright, confident eyes, as he went out again, his precious papers still buttoned under his waist.

As his campaign went on with steadily growing success, he trudged off as regularly as possible every morning, back again at noon and again at night. His mother listened and smiled at explanations of wonderful progress, at the growing list of names, and occasionally his father half listened, and smiled too.

After perhaps three weeks of it, there came a day when Crosby’s most confident hope, at all times unwavering, became a thing which seemed to soar away with him into a kind of pony heaven, where he heard only the word 'Lightfoot,' and saw only one beautiful animal with a long, sweeping tail, because it kept flashing so continuously before his eyes. That was the day when he was obliged to send for a new subscription blank. That was the day when his hope, if it had ever in the past wavered even unconsciously, became a thing of absolute fixedness. And when there were seven new names on the new blank, and his little bag of money was so fat and heavy that he doubted whether it would hold any more, anyway, he had a conference with his mother about dates, and decided that it was time--it was the _day_ to send everything--all the returns--to the Pony Man.

She helped him, with the same smile of forbearance, about the money-order, made out with such dashing effect by the man at the post-office, and together they got off an impressive-looking envelope full of impressive-looking matter. It gave just the last touch of safety and surety to it all to have his mother helping, and Crosby looked up at her with shining eyes.

'You can ride in the pony-cart,--after the pony comes,--can’t you?'

It took longer pauses than usual to keep things steady that time, and her glance wandered to his bright eyes.

'Would you be very much disappointed if it didn’t come?'

A puzzled reproach crept over his face. She felt guilty of an unwarrantable suspiciousness of nature as he looked back at her--and then hurried off to the old stall in the barn. It seemed so strange not to have to think about names any more. He could give all his time to the barn now. He wished that it was a nicer one, but with a little well-spent labor he thought he might make it very presentable, after all.

It was the next morning, after he had been working there with a fixed, concentrated pucker between his eyes for almost three hours, that a small boy from the next house appeared.

'Say, Crosby.' he began, 'there’s a lady lives up there on the hill road--you know, after you’ve crossed the long bridge and turned up on the hill road?' Crosby nodded. 'Well, there’s a lady lives up there says she’ll be glad to help you. You know, for the pony you’re trying to get. I was telling her about it yesterday, and she said she didn’t know anything about the breakfast food, but she’d be glad to help you just the same.'

'But I’ve sent the names already,' explained Crosby, looking perplexed with fortune’s almost immoderate favors.

'Well, send hers alone. Can’t you do that?'

Crosby meditated. 'What house did you say she lived in?'

'It’s the only house up there on the hill road. You know! The big, white house. You couldn’t miss it.'

'I guess I better go up there then.'

He glanced out to the street, where the sun simmered on the white, hot road, and wiped some little beads of perspiration from his forehead. Then he walked slowly out through the yard.

When, what seemed a long time afterwards, he dragged himself in from the simmering, white street again, his legs pulling listlessly behind him, he even forgot, for the time being, what the walk had all been about, and sat down vacantly on the cool step in the shade, his cheeks burning a deep, dull red. Then he remembered and pulled himself up again. And that evening another letter started on its way to the Pony Man.

The next morning he waked up with a confused consciousness that something important was hanging over him. Gradually it came back quite clearly. It was the twentieth. And then, for the first time, he became aware of facing a quite unheralded question of challenge. _Was there any doubt about the pony’s coming?_ His long list of subscription names flashed before his eyes, his big, shining pile of money, his mother’s smile, the post-office man’s 'whew!' of admiration before he made out the money-order, the promises in the letter if he began 'right away' and worked--and he had worked all the time ever since! There was but one possible answer to that question. The pony would come--to-day--before night.

He stumbled gayly down the stairs as he thought of all that he was going to do that morning in the barn. It was such a strange, rickety little affair, that barn; it did seem to look so much more like a shed than anything else, that he was continually haunted by his father’s words: 'Barn? I’m afraid she wouldn’t recognize it.' But he could make it clean, anyway, if it wasn’t new. He looked up at the battered manger, from his kneeling position on the floor, as he scrubbed with soap and water, and wondered what he could do about that. Something he was sure. Why, there were plenty of ways to do things if you only had sense. He thought he must be mistaken when he heard his mother calling him to dinner; but then, when he stopped and looked around, he felt a tired glow of satisfaction. The walls and floor of the old stall had not changed color, as he had hoped they would by washing, but they looked damp, and clean, too. Across the battered front of the manger was tacked a shining but crooked piece of clean, brown paper, and inside was a fresh little pile of grass and three large, round ginger-cakes beside it. But Crosby’s eyes traveled most lovingly to a small row of implements which hung down from the wall, at one side, from nails which he had pounded in. Of course ponies had to be groomed, and he looked up proudly at the small, clean brush, hanging by a string and suggestive no longer of the sink; at the worn whisk-broom next; at the broken comb; and finally at a little, shrunken last winter’s glove, with its fingers cut off evenly, which completed the line. He would wear that glove when he did his daily grooming.

'I’ll finish everything after dinner,' he meditated, and went in.

When he came back, a saucer of milk trembled dangerously in one hand, and with a faint, half-conscious smile flickering about his mouth, he put it down on the floor in the corner.

'She’ll be thirsty when she gets here,' he reasoned; and then, half apologetically, he glanced down at a big, loose bunch of summer goldenrod, supported by the other hand. Standing high on his toes, he propped it very jauntily over a time-worn beam just opposite the door. 'To look nice when she comes in,' he whispered; and then he cast round a final look, sighed a tired sigh of satisfaction--and went out and closed the door.