Chapter III: Part 3

‘Why,’ said Mary, confused, ‘in America they have a great holiday to celebrate a _victory_. But here we celebrate a _defeat_. I don’t like it. _We_ ought to have a victory day too.’ And Mary began to describe the American Fourth of July, its flags and ice cream, its brass bands and processions and fireworks, until it seemed to the boys that the American children must live in a perpetual circus.

‘That’s grand,’ said Pavlo, ‘but every country doesn’t have the same history, and so they don’t have the same kind of fête days. Grandmother says the reason we keep Kossovo Day is because, although the Serbian _army_ was beaten, the Serbian _spirit_ was not. That burned brighter and stronger than ever in the day of defeat. And you can _be_ great, even if you don’t conquer and do grand things.’

‘Yes, that’s so,’ said Mary slowly; ‘I can see that Serbia _is_ great, and I’m going to be proud of Kossovo Day!’

That night Mary wrote a long letter to Mamie Barnes.

‘Dear Mamie,’ it began, ‘We had our Serbian Fourth of July to-day. I danced the _kola_ with the rest. It’s easy; there are no fancy steps. But it is too slow. The women looked lovely! They had strings of great gold coins on their heads and round their necks. Solid gold! And jackets of purple and orange, embroidered with silver and green. It was just like vaudeville. And they had ribbons fastened to their caps behind, four inches wide and covered with flowers. The sash ribbons in Benton’s store can’t touch them. They would make lovely doll’s dresses and pincushions and things for Christmas. But there weren’t any fireworks. Just think, they celebrate a _defeat_ here! At first I thought that was strange, but Peter’s grandmother says it’s because their _army_ and not their _soul_ was beaten. And it’s better to _be_ great than to do great things. I guess that’s harder, too, because if you’re going to _do_ something you can just go ahead and finish it, but if you’re going to _be_ something you’ve got to _be_ it all the time.

Your loving friend
MARY

P.S. I wish I could go around to Martin’s Drug store and get an ice-cream soda!’

THE FAIRY RING

It was a hot and thirsty day. In the hollow a curving wellsweep stood guard over a cottage with a thatch, which, like a rough cap, was pulled down to the two little eyes of the house. Behind it the hill rose sharply, steeped in sunshine.

A boy, leading a spotted cow, toiled up the slope, an empty basket slung over his shoulder. After him stumbled a girl with a chubby baby in her arms. They gained the top slowly and sat down under a beech that spread its horizontal branches close to the ground.

‘He gets more and more heavy every day,’ said the girl as she rolled the baby over on the grass. The boy grunted but said nothing. He was lying on his back gazing idly up into the tree while the spotty cow trailed her rope through the weeds. The girl rubbed her tired arms and fanned herself with her apron, scanning the ground with a practiced eye, for mushrooms.

‘Why, Stefano!’ she exclaimed in an awestruck voice, ‘just look at that!’

‘What?’ asked Stefano, sitting up sleepily. Ileana was pointing to something on the ground not far from the beech tree. A flash of intelligence came into the boy’s eyes. ‘A fairy ring!’ he exclaimed, ‘what luck!’

Among the dead leaves and short grass a circle of white toadstools had sprung up in the night. It was what the children called a ‘fairy ring.’ Whatever one wished for, as he stood inside it, was sure to come true.

Stefano sprang to his feet. ‘I’m going to wish,’ he cried, and carefully stepped over the edge of the circle. He laid his finger on his lips, thinking intently. Then he shut his eyes. ‘I’ve wished,’ he cried, exultantly, and leaped out again. ‘Now you go in, Ileana.’

Ileana was flustered by the great opportunity. ‘Oh! I can’t think,’ she said excitedly. ‘Yes, I know, now; I’ve got it!’ She stood with her bare feet close together, her hands behind her, and wished solemnly. Then she threw herself on the grass beside the baby. ‘It’s all about you,’ she whispered, kissing him. Stefano did not hear, but the baby caught one chubby foot in his hand and laughed delightedly.

‘You’d be surprised if you knew what I wished for,’ said Stefano.

‘What was it?’ asked Ileana, full of curiosity. ‘I shan’t tell.’

‘It’s something you’d never think of.’

‘Is it something to _do_ or something to _have_?’ queried Ileana.

‘Something to _do_, _right now_, to-day,’ said Stefano; ‘something you never did in your life.’

‘Oh, _please_, Stefano, tell me; go on, do!’

‘And I wished it for you, too, Ileana,’ said Stefano, tantalizingly.

‘Oh, how good of you, Stefano. What was it?’ Ileana was standing breathlessly in front of him now.

‘Well,’ he said, thinking only how pleased she would be, ‘I wished we might both ride in an automobile!’

‘Oh, Stefano!’ cried Ileana in dismay, ‘now you’ve told, and it won’t come true! How could you!’

‘What did you ask me for, then?’ cried Stefano angrily. ‘Now you’ve made me lose my wish while you’ve kept yours.’

‘Well, I won’t keep it,’ said Ileana generously; ‘I’ll tell you what it was. I wished that the baby could walk, so I shouldn’t have to carry him all the time.’

‘Stupid!’ cried Stefano scornfully. ‘How could you wish such a silly thing as that, and all for yourself, too, when you might have wished for a bag of gold and we could have bought everything in the world!’

‘I was in such a hurry,’ said Ileana contritely. ‘It was the first thing that came into my head. But let’s wish over again,’ she added brightly.

Eagerly they turned to the circle, but while they had been disputing the spotty cow had trampled it into the earth.

‘Now see what you’ve done!’ cried Stefano grimly. ‘And we might have had such a lucky day!’

‘But I didn’t do it,’ said Ileana indignantly. ‘The cow did it.’ She was really very hot and tired, and everything seemed to be going wrong.

‘Well, come on,’ said Stefano, beginning to feel ashamed of himself. ‘Perhaps we shall find another.’ He picked up his basket and whacking the cow on the flank, moved on. With a sigh Ileana gathered up the baby and followed. His little curls and bright eyes bobbed over her shoulder as she walked. Ileana was devoted to the baby. Every morning before she went to school she washed and dressed and fed him and then laid him in his swinging cradle, which hung from the ceiling just over the end of his mother’s bed. On holidays he was seldom out of her arms, though her slender, growing body often ached with the weight of him.

Following the footpath through the trees, Stefano and Ileana soon came upon Branko sitting among the mullen stalks making melancholy music with the _boojum_. The _boojum_ was a great wooden horn, so long that Branko had to sit and rest one end of it on the ground. Its notes were sad and heavy, a little like the bellow of a cow. Branko loved it and blew out his cheeks until they were crimson. Whenever he came to a brook or a spring he poured water through the _boojum_, to make it louder and sweeter. ‘Hello!’ he cried, as the children came in sight. ‘Where are you going?’

‘To pick plums, if you will take care of Gemma.’

‘All right,’ said Branko, ‘I will bring her down with the other cows.’

Stefano and Ileana spread themselves on the grass and told Branko about the fairy ring.

‘I’ve never seen one,’ said Branko wistfully; ‘what a chance!’

‘What would you wish for if you _did_ find one?’ asked Stefano.

‘I don’t know,’ said Branko slowly, ‘but I think I’d wish for a house.’

Branko was an orphan. He lived with the schoolmaster and swept the schoolhouse, besides ringing the church bells and guarding cattle on holidays. At noon he always went home with Stefano and Ileana, and shared their dinner of hot corn on the cob. The great copper dish of corn stood on the porch and whoever was hungry came and got some. But though Branko was welcome everywhere he had no home of his own. So now, sitting on the hilltop with Stefano and Ileana and looking down on the thatched cottages, each with its golden patch of corn or pumpkins and its haze of smoke, he felt that a home counted for more than anything else.

They could see the big house at the end of the village, its gardens and orchards, and below them the schoolhouse. Not every village in Roumania has its school, and the children were proud of theirs, though they wished the lady who lived in the big house, and who had built the school, would not come so often to see if they were really in the classroom.

Across the valley there was a gap in the bare hills, like a piece notched out. That was the Pass. On the other side of it lay a beautiful mountain country in which was the king’s palace; but beyond their own valley the children had never gone.

‘Well, come on,’ said Stefano, at last, ‘let’s look for plums.’

They came out on the highway, which was lined with plum trees thick with fruit. It lay on the ground in purple-blue patches, so that it was not necessary to shake the trees or to climb them in order to get a basketful.

The children could see the road as far as the Pass. It disappeared for long stretches, coming into view again close to them. Over it there was a slow but continual passing. Flocks of sheep went by on little tapping hoofs, and gleaming geese, unruffled by the heat. There were also wicker carts with small wooden wheels, drawn by black buffaloes that stretched their flat heads far beyond their bodies and lifted dumb, sad eyes to the hot sky. Women with distaffs or painted water-buckets passed, and the dust rose in clouds about their feet.

But what was that flash? Something bright, like a great star, had shot through the Pass and disappeared in a dip of the road.

The children had filled their basket and prepared to start for home. Ileana popped a plum into her mouth and picked up the sleeping baby.

Noiselessly two pairs of bare feet fell on the dust, and the sun wove halos around Stefano with his basket and Ileana with the baby over her shoulder. A mellow note sounded behind them. How different from that of the _boojum_! Could it be a horn, so soft and sweet? They turned to look, then scampered to the side of the road, as the wonderful blinding thing came toward them--an automobile, like something in a fairy tale, for it seemed to be of silver. Ileana, her eyes fastened on it, lost her footing, and as it flashed by them, fell headlong with the baby in her arms, into a bed of thistles. A shriek of indignation and fright went up from the baby. The car shot past them, stopped, then backed slowly.

‘Are they hurt?’ asked someone anxiously. A man jumped down from the front seat and came running toward them. Ileana scrambled to her feet and began patting and kissing the baby vigorously. All three of the children were scratched and frightened and covered with dust, but uninjured.

‘Where do you live?’ asked one of the ladies of Stefano, who stood his ground, gazing in stupefaction at the aluminum automobile.

Stefano pulled off his tall sheepskin cap and held it against his breast, for though the lady wore a bright knotted handkerchief over her head, as his mother did, she was different and he felt very shy. ‘We live in the village opposite the church,’ he said.

‘Help them in, Bonnat,’ said the elder of the two ladies, ‘we will take them home.’

So Stefano and Ileana, with the whimpering baby and the basket of plums, were lifted into the wonderful machine. They sat on the edge of the seat, their little bare toes just touching the carpet. One of the ladies held out her hands to the baby, but he clung to Ileana. The car started with hardly a quiver. Down the road they darted, the familiar trees and houses flying past them. Stefano and Ileana, almost forgetting the other occupants of the car, held hands, their eyes wide with excitement.

‘We wished for it!’ exclaimed Ileana, at last unable to keep silence any longer. ‘We wished for it this morning, and now it’s come true!’

‘Wished for what?’ asked the lady.

‘To ride in an automobile. Stefano wished it in the fairy ring.’

‘What is your name?’ asked the lady, as she smiled down at her.

‘Ileana; I was named for a princess,’ she explained proudly.

‘That is my little girl’s name, too,’ said the lady, and Ileana noticed that her eyes were laughing. She was a beautiful lady, dressed as the women of Ileana’s village dress when they go to church. The sleeves and the front of her white linen blouse were richly embroidered; her skirt was a piece of striped woven stuff, red, pale yellow, and green, brought together in front and lapped over a white petticoat. Around her waist was a bright girdle, shot with threads of gold, and on her head was a flowered kerchief knotted at the back of her neck. From under it peeped crisp little curls of gold, and her eyes were blue, like chicory blossoms when the sun shines through them.

As the car swept into the village the people came running to their gates bowing and curtsying.

‘They are surprised to see us riding in an automobile,’ thought Stefano, and threw out his chest.

Their mother, washing clothes in the corner of the yard, looked up in consternation to see her dusty, disheveled children descending from the most wonderful car that had ever been seen in the village. Then, in a flash, the beautiful lady was gone, disappearing up the road that led to the big house.

‘Mother, mother, she gave us a ride! She was a nice lady! I got my wish!’ clamored the children, together.

But their mother rebuked them. ‘Don’t you know that that was the Queen?’ she said, ‘and you so dirty and bold!’

‘The Queen!’ they stammered. ‘But she wore a handkerchief over her head!’

‘And is that all you noticed? Would it make a queen of me to put on a crown?’

‘I told her I was named for a princess,’ said Ileana, ‘and all the time it was her own little girl, and she knew it!’ Then, catching a glimpse of the baby, ‘Oh, mother,’ she cried, ‘look at him!’ He stood between the doorstep and the rainwater tub, balancing himself on his little bare feet. Then he took a step forward, swerved, dipped, righted himself, took two steps more and clutched the edge of the tub triumphantly. His mother, forgetting the Queen, ran to catch him up and kiss him.

‘You see,’ said Ileana, wisely nodding at Stefano, ‘the fairy ring _did_ work. If only Branko had wished, too, he might have his house!’

‘You and Stefano wished for small things,’ said their mother, ‘but for the big things of life you must work as well as wish. It is through work that Branko will find his home.’

GREAT AMBER ROAD

The village ended where the forest began. Two great pine trees stood out like gate-posts, and between them the road ran into the depths of the wood. Along the road one summer morning came a herd of cows led by a small dog and followed by a boy in a white shirt embroidered in orange and black. He wore a round cap with a falcon’s feather stuck through the band, and under his arm he carried a violin. This was Jaroslav, the village cowherd, who every day, with the help of Flick, the dog, gathered the cows of the village, led them to pasture, and brought them back at milking-time. Presently dog, boy and cows passed between the great pines and disappeared into the shadow beyond, as if into an enchanted forest; but if you had waited half an hour you would have seen them emerge, high upon the mountain-side, into a clearing of smooth, green fields.

Here a spring ran into a grassy hollow and filled it with pools of cool water where the cows liked to stand on hot afternoons. From his perch on the hillside, Jaroslav could look over the tops of the pines, far down upon the roof of his own home. It was almost the last house in the village, made of stone covered with plaster, and painted by his mother in gay wreaths and patterns. The roof was of rough thatch on which grew patches of moss and pink flowers, which danced in the wind. The two white spots like flecks of silver were pigeons, cooing and spreading their coral feet on the moss.

The whole village was spread out below like something embroidered on a green cloth, and across it ran the thick silver thread of the river. On the farm by the bridge Jaroslav’s mother must be working in the fields. Lidka, his sister, was probably putting the house in order or washing the baby. Jaroslav looked for smoke from the chimney, but there was none. Perhaps Lidka was in the garden picking beans. Yes, there was something red moving. He sprang to his feet, and putting his hands to his mouth, gave a piercing cry, as he had so often done when he saw people moving about below. There was no sign that Lidka had heard him, and with a sigh Jaroslav settled down to his solitary day with Flick.

It was vacation; otherwise Jaroslav would have been in school. He was glad to be able to earn something during the holidays, and it was not hard work looking after the cows, though neither he nor Flick dared to drowse during the hot afternoons, for if a cow wandered among the rocks she might stumble and break a leg. Jaroslav spent a great deal of time with his violin, playing over all the tunes he had heard and composing new ones. The one he liked best he called a Hillside Song. It began with the sigh of the wind in the pines, then a bird’s song broke across it and died away. Again, the wind swept through the trees and brought the cling-clang of cow bells and the slipping march of cattle winding their way down the wood path. All this Jaroslav had tried to put into music. He had worked hard for weeks, and now he could play it smoothly.

Sometimes Jaroslav brought a book with him. He loved to read about the heroes of his own land. But having only one book, and that a heavy one, he preferred to keep it for Sundays, when he would read aloud to Lidka and her friends about the great deeds of Czech men and women. He pondered these stories as he sat alone until they became very real to him.

First, there was the story of Cech, the founder of the Bohemian kingdom. More than a thousand years before, he and his brother Lech had separated from the rest of their tribe because there was not grazing space for all their cattle. Through this very country they must have passed, and perhaps looked up at this very rock as they followed the course of the river with their thousands of cattle and horses, their families and household goods in ox-carts, seeking new homes. On and on they trekked westward, until they came to the mountain called ‘Rip,’ which rises like a cone from the plain.

But what most often filled Jaroslav’s mind was the story of the ‘Great Amber Road,’ an ancient route that hundreds of years before even Cech’s time ran from Pressburg straight up to the Baltic Sea. It had been little more than a trail for trappers and adventurers, at first, and led through dark forests full of wild beasts. But over it passed many traders in search of amber, in those days a strange, new treasure, found on the shores of the Baltic. Men risked their lives to get it, as they risk them now in wild countries for gold, and when they had found it they sold it at a great price to Roman and Greek merchants, who had it carved into ornaments and amulets, and often into cups and bowls, which were studded with jewels and used in the houses of princes.

Ages before Jaroslav’s time, barbaric people had broken loose across the country and stopped all trade. The Romans had disappeared and the Great Amber Road had been forgotten and stretches of it lost entirely. Nevertheless it must be there, if only one could find and follow it, and no doubt at the end there were still beds of the precious amber. Jaroslav longed to rediscover it, as men have longed to find the North Pole.

Flick spent most of the day chasing rabbits. There were hundreds of them in the fields and along the edge of the woods. Often they came down to the village and did great damage in the gardens by destroying the sugar beets, the lettuce and the cabbages. While Flick was romping after the rabbits, Jaroslav would grow restless, put down his violin and climb a tree. Then he would glance sadly down on the little house, the white pigeons on the roof, the garden, and the twisted plum tree. Before the war, life had been gay there. His father had made a good living by cutting and hauling timber. They had had a cow and a horse and even a cart. But their father had gone away with the army; the horse and the cow had been taken by the Austrians, and though they had been paid something for the cow, it was not enough to get another. Their mother had had to buy a goat, instead. There was far less milk than there used to be, and no butter at all. When the war was over their father came back from Russia, sick, and before the year was out he died.

It had been a very sad year, and it would have been much sadder except for the baby. It was Lidka who took care of him and the house, for their mother now had to work on a big farm, and was gone all day. When Jaroslav came down from the pastures, he weeded and spaded in the garden, because cabbages, potatoes and beans made a large part of their food.

Jaroslav and Lidka used often to talk of what they would do when they grew up. Jaroslav would have a trade and Lidka would make beautiful embroideries. Thus they would earn enough to make everything easy for their mother. They talked of the Great Amber Road, too, and tried to trace on the map where it must have run. For them the wealth of amber had the fascination that Captain Kidd’s treasure has had for American boys and girls. But it took a long time to grow up, and in the meantime it troubled Jaroslav that he could find no way of earning more than he did earn by guarding the village cows. On Saturday night, when he was paid for the week’s work, he never had more than six or eight crowns to take home. At such times he thought longingly of the Great Amber Road and the treasure that he felt sure lay at the end of it.

To-day was Saturday, and as he looked out over the sunny landscape he said to himself that there was no use in merely _dreaming_ of the Great Amber street. He must really start on his quest if he meant to succeed. ‘I’ll go to-morrow,’ he said, ‘while Mother and Lidka are at church. I can take the week’s wage with me, and when it is gone I will play for my meals.’

He had often noticed a faint streak of roadway between the hills, running north and south, which he felt would at least lead him in the direction in which he wished to go. Now he carefully noted certain landmarks and decided to find his way to them to-morrow.

That night he received nine crowns fifty, the most he had ever had for a week’s work, and he went home elated, rattling the handful of coins in his pockets.

He weeded and hoed in the garden until the great white moon seemed caught in the top of the pine tree, for he could not bear the thought that while he was away the slugs might make an end of the cabbages and potatoes.

Early the next morning Lidka and his mother went to church, leaving Jaroslav in charge of the baby. He took out his Sunday shirt of white linen and his vest of black cloth, embroidered with silver and green. Then he brushed his hair carefully. Flick sat thumping his tail. But the baby, who should have slept, waved his arms in the air and crowed in a frantic effort to lift his head from the pillow. Jaroslav took down his violin and rubbed it tenderly with his sleeve. Then he fell on his knees beside the cradle and began softly to play the Hillside Song.

The baby grew quiet and looked at Jaroslav with wide, dreamy eyes, but Jaroslav turned his head away. He could not look at the little fellow and think of leaving him.

The room was very still. Only the voice of the violin trembled in and out of the shadowy corners, and presently the baby dropped quietly to sleep.

Jaroslav rose, went to the cupboard, got a large piece of bread and cheese and some cold potatoes. These he tied into a clean handkerchief. Then he took a long look about the room. There were the pendulum clock, the shelves crowded with gayly painted china, his mother’s distaff in the corner, the carved chairs and the green porcelain stove, and on a painted chest several rude little figures modeled in clay and faintly streaked with color. They were so old that no one knew who had made them. Some many-times great-grandmother or great-grandfather had fashioned them centuries and centuries before, and had placed them on the hearth to bring good luck to the family. They were called _dedky_, or forefathers. Though no one believed in them any more, yet no one would think of destroying them or giving them away. They belonged in the family. When Jaroslav grew up and married he would take them with him to his new home, and perhaps for a time he might keep them on the hearthstone. He looked at them curiously now. What if he should take them in his pocket? They might bring him good luck.--But no, they might also be broken or lost, and that would be dreadful! He did not know exactly why, but he felt that he would rather leave the _dedky_ safely at home and trust to his own luck.

He touched the money in his pocket and felt sure of success. Then it occurred to him that his mother would need the money more than ever if he were not there to earn something the next week. So he took it from his pocket and put it on the table. ‘I have my violin; I shall not need anything else,’ he said proudly.

On a piece of paper he wrote: ‘Dear Mother: Do not worry if I don’t come back for several days. It’s all right. You will be glad in the end that I went.’

He turned for his cap, and Flick sprang to the door. But when Jaroslav stopped for one last look at the baby be realized that he ought not to leave him alone. Flick must stay on guard. This was harder than leaving the money, for Flick and he always did things together, and Jaroslav had counted on his company as much as if Flick had been another boy. ‘Here, Flick,’ he said softly, ‘on guard!’ But Flick could not believe it. He waved his tail frantically, snorting and scratching the door. ‘No, no, Flick, come back!’ said his master, and Flick, puzzled, and crestfallen, crept back with drooping tail and stretched himself beside the cradle. Then Jaroslav picked up his violin and went out alone.

In a little while his mother and Lidka came home from church. The baby was safe in his cradle, but there was only Flick to greet them. Not until she found Jaroslav’s note did his mother know what to make of his absence.

‘He must have gone to Aunt Ancha for the festival at Buchlovy,’ she said to Lidka. She was rather vexed that Jaroslav should have run off like that, for she would have to tell the neighbors that he would not be there to take the cows out the next day, and they would be very cross about it. She made cherry dumplings, as usual on Sunday, but neither she nor Lidka had much appetite. After dinner, hearing that the miller was to drive in the direction of Buchlovy, she decided to go with him and bring Jaroslav back.

So, while the boy was plodding along the highway, his mother arrived at Buchlovy and learned that he had not been there.

‘He is probably walking slowly on account of the heat,’ said Aunt Ancha. ‘By the time you have rested and had a cup of coffee he will be here.’

About six o’clock Jaroslav came to a small town through which a river flowed. On one side of the river was a hill crowned with an old castle. By the river were factories, and since the people who worked in them were free on Sunday, the streets were full of life and movement.

Jaroslav had eaten his luncheon long ago and was hungry again, but he was too shy to play to the crowd. It was quite different from the quiet of the woods and fields, where the only listeners were the rabbits and the cows. But at last on a corner of the square he stopped and raised his bow bravely. The strains of the Hillside Song rose faintly above the clatter of the street, for the pavement was of cobbles, and people hurried by noisily. Jaroslav changed from the Hillside Song to dance tunes and folk-songs, but the crowd were going to a moving-picture show where there was a band and a gramophone, so no one paid any attention to the child fiddling on the corner. At last he stole away unnoticed, with big unshed tears in his eyes. He did not so much mind being hungry, but no one had cared for his song and that made him feel very lonely.

It was twilight on the road when he passed out of the town. He thought sharply of his mother and Lidka, of Flick and the baby, and all the dear familiar objects in the room. ‘I’ll walk all night, so that I can get back sooner,’ he thought, and quickened his pace and went bravely on. As darkness came down he began to feel very tired. His feet burned and his eyes were heavy with sleep. Besides, he had begun to have misgivings about his quest. The farther he got from home, the less real the quest seemed. Those of whom he asked directions had shaken their heads and said they knew nothing of the Great Amber Road.

In the blue distance a rapidly moving light appeared. It must be an automobile. There had been few automobiles during the war, but now and then one passed through the village, and Jaroslav had an almost terrified interest in them. He stepped aside into the bushes to see this one pass. Just before it reached him there was a report like the crack of a pistol; the great machine gasped and sighed helplessly, and then slowed down to a stop. Jaroslav stood in the shadow and watched breathlessly. He saw a man get out of the car, open a box at the side and take out a lantern. After lighting it, with much grunting and some angry muttering he proceeded to jack up a wheel and put on a new tire.

All this was of the most vivid interest to Jaroslav. He had never seen a man quite like this one, and he was a little afraid. The man looked like one who _knew_ things, and Jaroslav longed to go forward and ask him about the Great Amber Road and what he thought of the whole plan; but he did not know how to speak to this stocky, gray-haired figure in the linen duster. Nevertheless, when he saw the man begin to put up his tools, Jaroslav realized that if he did not make the effort he would soon have lost his chance forever. An idea came to him. Putting his violin to his shoulder, he began softly to play the Hillside Song. This seemed the right time and place for it, and Jaroslav put his whole soul into it.

At the first notes the man started and stood up. He neither moved nor spoke, but stared in the direction from which the sound came until it floated away over the lonely road to the dark woods.

‘Hello, there!’ he cried in a strong voice, ‘come out here!’ He held the lantern at arm’s length and Jaroslav emerged timidly from the darkness into the circle of light. What the man saw was a very dusty, tired little boy with big circles round his eyes and damp dark hair falling over his forehead. ‘What do you want?’ he demanded shortly.

‘Sir,’ faltered Jaroslav, ‘are we on the Great Amber Road?’

‘Great-Grandmother!’ snorted the man, ‘we are on the road to Brno!’

‘Then I am not going north, after all,’ stammered Jaroslav, startled by the thought that he would have to begin his journey all over again.

‘Where do you want to go?’ asked the man.

‘To the Baltic.’

‘To the Baltic! What’s the matter, son?’ he asked, looking more closely, and then, seeing that the hand which held the violin trembled, he added kindly, ‘Jump up and tell me all about it.’

So Jaroslav, who had never been in an automobile, climbed in, awestruck, and sat down on the soft leather cushions. Instead of starting the car, the man lighted a cigar. ‘Run away from home, have you?’ he asked as he blew out the match. Then Jaroslav began at the beginning, and told of his father’s illness and death, of the loss of the cow, the birth of the baby, and the necessity of his earning enough to help his mother at once without waiting to grow up; of the amber treasure which seemed to him the only resource, and of the doubts of his ever finding it that had come to him as he walked that night.

‘Did you ever hear of the Great Amber Road, Sir?’ asked Jaroslav eagerly.

‘Oh, yes, I’ve heard of it,’ answered the man with a chuckle, ‘and I know lots of men who are walking up and down it wearing out shoe leather trying to get rich quick. But you keep off that road, son! What you need is to learn to do something well. The world doesn’t want amber cups nowadays, and in order to make money you must give people what they do want, whether it is bricks or hats or music.’

‘But I don’t know how to make anything,’ said Jaroslav sadly. ‘I would be willing to wait until I was grown up if only I could get a cow now.’

The man puffed silently for some time. Then he startled Jaroslav by asking abruptly, ‘Any rabbits where you live?’

‘Oh, yes,’ cried Jaroslav, ‘millions of them. They get into the gardens and they----’

‘That’s good,’ said the man, cutting him short. ‘Now, I’ll tell you what I’ll do. I have a hat factory in Brno, and I need all the rabbit skins I can get. I’ll buy the cow and you can catch rabbits for me until she’s paid for. I’ll take the skins on account. My agent goes through your part of the country twice a month and he will collect them. What do you think of that plan, son? Beats amber, doesn’t it?’

‘Can I really catch enough rabbits to pay for a cow?’ gasped Jaroslav. ‘Then I don’t need to go to the Baltic!’ he cried, shrilly, as the truth burst upon him. ‘I can go home!’ and seizing his cap he jumped wildly out of the car.

‘Hold on!’ shouted the man, astonished. ‘Where are you going?’

‘I’m going to walk all night so that I can begin catching rabbits to-morrow.’ Then, remembering that he had not thanked his friend, he began to stammer his happiness.

‘Get in,’ said the man tersely, ‘where do you think this car is going?’

As they sped through the night on that wonderful ride, the man told Jaroslav of a school in Brno where boys learned all sorts of trades, and not only to run cars like the one they were in, but even to make them. When Jaroslav got out on the edge of the village, and panted home in the starlight, his life had taken a definite turn.

But this story is not to tell of how the cow really arrived in two weeks’ time, or of how Jaroslav gradually paid for it in rabbit skins, or of how at last he went to the technical school in Brno. It is to tell only of his home-coming, of how he reached the house about the same time as his mother, coming from Buchlovy; of how she forgave him at sight of his radiant face; of how Lidka brought him the first summer apples in her apron, and of how, as he sat on the bench which was built around the porcelain stove, he told them of his great adventure. And all the while the baby slept, and Flick lay on the floor with his nose between his master’s feet, and the _dedky_ winked at one another in the candlelight.

_Note_: It is a fact that an ancient road led from Pressburg (now
the capital of Slovakia) to the Baltic. It was also called Great
Amber Road and was used chiefly by Wendish Traders. The swamp west
of Pressburg marked the No Man’s Land between Roman Pannonia and the
realm of Slavs.

THE LOST BROOK

When Masha came to visit her cousins in the mountains, Treska thought she had never seen such beautiful clothes as those that Masha wore, and Masha thought she had never seen so sad a village as the one in which Treska lived.

She herself came from a land bright with wheat fields, where the pink and white poppies grow shoulder high, and where the little plastered houses are painted gayly and have red tiled roofs.

Here a cold rain was falling, and the mist swept low over the forests of black fir. Masha did not know that the clouds hid beautiful mountains. She saw only their gray edges, caught and torn on the tops of the dark trees. The houses were all of wood, unpainted and built like log cabins, except that they had broad eaves and high shingled roofs. The battened chinking between the logs was whitewashed, so that looking down upon the village as the girls came over the hill it seemed like a collection of striped black-and-white boxes with pointed covers.

Once inside Treska’s house it was as cosy as possible, with geraniums in the windows, a pendulum clock, bright plates on the wall, and blue-and-red checkered coverings over the feather beds, which were piled nearly to the low-beamed ceiling. There were benches on two sides of the room, and a table set with soup plates. From the oven came the delicious smell of huckleberry buns, which Treska’s mother was baking in honor of Masha’s coming.

Masha was in holiday costume because she had come on the train. Treska looked her over with envy. She wore a white linen cap with a broad band of brocaded ribbon, and a frill of lace round her face. Her collar and full white sleeves were edged with black embroidery, and her bodice of crimson and green silk was trimmed with gold lace. There were bunches of yellow flowers on her short orange skirt, and with her dark blue apron heavily embroidered, and a golden and green ribbon tied about her waist and falling to the hem of her dress in front, she looked like a big bouquet.

Treska had fine clothes, too, but they were more sober in color and pattern than Masha’s, and she never wore them except on grand occasions. Rather shyly she opened the big painted chest, which stood against the wall, to show Masha her own pretty things--the gold beads and netted cap, worked with disks of bright silk, and the dark cambric handkerchief, which she wore over it when she went to church, and which was so long that it covered her flowered bodice like a shawl, and reached to her scarlet skirt and deep blue apron.

Though Treska went barefooted, her father was by no means a poor man. He owned large herds of cattle and flocks of sheep. During the summer months he lived in a shepherd’s hut across the valley, where he had a great sheepfold on the edge of the forest. Sometimes the whole family went to the hut and camped out there for days at a time. Treska loved that.

The next morning Masha’s aunt suggested that the two girls should go mushroom hunting for the day and spend the night at the hut. She gave them a lunch of black bread and smoked sheep’s-milk cheese and some poppy-seed cakes. They started off merrily, each carrying an earthen pot for strawberries.

It was a glorious day. Masha stood speechless at sight of jagged mountain peaks, glistening with snow in all their crevices. She had never seen anything so beautiful, so mysterious and terrible.

Below them spread the blue-black forests, reaching down to the fields where the patches of grain and corn and ploughed ground looked like a rag carpet spread over the hills. The fields were full of flowers and the mushrooms grew thickly among them along the edges of the wood.

The pack on Treska’s back began to fill out. At night the girls would sit by the fire and split the mushrooms and string them in festoons to dry.

Passing through the fields they met Janko, Treska’s brother, guarding sheep, and with him Suzanne, a little girl from their own Village.

‘Come on,’ called Treska. ‘We’re going up the hill to pick strawberries.’

Janko shook his head. ‘I can’t leave the sheep,’ he said, swinging his feet as he sat on the fence rail. He was a licensed shepherd now, and very proud of the brass badge, which he wore pinned to the front of his tunic with a long thorn.

But Suzanne joined them and together the three girls climbed slowly up to a high, cleared piece of land where the strawberries grew thick and red around the old gray stumps. Across the clearing slipped a little brook as clear as the sky, but so hidden that Masha nearly stepped into it before she saw it. Along its border forget-me-nots spread a faint blue network over the grass.

Stopping to take a drink, Masha was startled to see that the brook came suddenly to an end. It did not spread into a pool, for the grass was quite dry all about it, and there was no hole visible in the ground. The brook simply disappeared! Dipping her hand into the water, Masha felt it drawn gently downward, so it must be that the brook went underground.

‘Oh! girls,’ she cried, ‘come here! The brook has come to an end!’

‘I know,’ said Treska wisely; ‘it must have run into an underground river. They say there are such rivers in these mountains--perhaps lakes, too.’

‘Why, it’s like a fairy tale!’ cried Masha, her eyes bright with excitement. ‘To think of rivers and lakes and perhaps whole countries underground! I wish we could go down, too, with the brook.’

After a while they wandered slowly down the hill, the sun beating hot on their shoulders.

‘Let’s go into the woods and eat our lunch,’ said Treska.

A path, which came up through the forest, led toward deep shade, and they followed it. And then something happened that made them forget all about their lunch, for turning a bend in the path they came abruptly upon a tiny hut in the woods, and close to it, in a bare wall of rock, a deep black cavern.

‘A cave!’ they cried together.

Cautiously they turned toward the entrance. They saw a vaulted space like the porch of a church, and beyond it a high wooden gate, which stood ajar. Peering between the bars they could make out a long hallway in the rock, which vanished into darkness, but which had, as far as they could see, a walk of planks.

‘Why,’ said Treska, ‘this must be the famous cave in the mountain that people come to see. Suzanne, we ought to show it to Masha. I’m sure you’ve never seen anything like it, have you, Masha?’

Masha, who came from a flat and rockless country, never had.

‘But it’s too dark to go far,’ she objected, shrinking back.

‘Just to the end of this hall,’ coaxed Suzanne. ‘If there’s a gate and sidewalls there must be something beyond.’

The three girls slipped through the gate and pattered timidly into the darkness. A continuous dropping from the roof wet their shoulders as if they had been caught in a shower, and their bare feet were soon covered with mud in spite of the board walk. It was very cold. For a time the light from the mouth of the cave served to show them the rocky walls. Then they turned a corner and felt rather than saw that they had entered a vast room, for they were staring into a darkness thicker than that of night. It was warmer here, and the ground was firm and dry under their feet, but somewhere there was a dropping of water with never a splash. Except for the sound, a terrible silence seemed to close in on them.

At last Suzanne could bear it no longer.

‘Hello!’ she cried nervously.

And instantly from all sides came a chorus of voices: ‘Hello! hello! hello!’

‘Oh, don’t!’ gasped Masha.

And ‘Don’t! don’t! don’t!’ cried the walls.

‘Oh, let’s get out,’ whispered Suzanne.

And from the darkness came the startled whisper: ‘Get out! Get out!’

Caught in a nameless terror, the girls fled down the dark passage, panting for the sunlight, which they could see glimmering in the distance through the bars. As they ran their courage mounted until they threw themselves breathless and laughing against the gate. It held fast! They jerked. It was locked! Panic-stricken, they gazed at one another. Then they began to shake the gate and to scream frantically for help. There was no answer. The gate had been built to keep people out of the dangerous cave. It reached to the roof, and someone had locked it while the girls had been exploring.

‘Let’s go back to the end of the passage, where it is dry,’ said Treska sensibly. ‘There may be a party of people in the cave now, and if there is they must come out this way. Or others will come this afternoon.’

Treska tried hard to believe what she said, but how could she tell whether anyone would come that day or indeed for many days?

‘Of course those were only echoes back there, weren’t they?’ asked Masha fearfully.

‘Of course,’ said Treska.

At the end of the passage all huddled together to keep warm. In one direction they could look toward the patch of light; in the other, into the fathomless blackness of the cave. As their eyes grew used to the darkness, they could dimly make out the walls nearest them, all of white rock, clean and dry as if freshly cut.

Suddenly a sound deep in the cave caught their attention, and then a faint glow appeared, like a little cloud at a great distance. As it rapidly increased, the girls realized that a procession of people carrying lighted tapers was approaching. They came slowly along a ledge of rock so high above the girls that it seemed like an upper floor of the cave. The flickering candles lighted up glistening walls, sparkling pendants of rock and strange forms, which struggled out of the shadow; but the height of the cave was so vast that the top still hung in darkness. Was the whole mountain hollow, then, like a melon? The procession wound slowly down a slippery staircase of wood, the guide leading the way with a big torch.

Even Masha knew that it was a party of everyday people, wrapped in warm coats and furs, who had been visiting the far interior of the cave. As they came forward, holding their lighted tapers high, more and more of the wonders of the cave were revealed; gleaming columns, low-hanging arches and lofty vaulting grew out of the darkness like parts of a fairy palace.

Clinging together at the entrance, the three little girls gazed breathlessly at their undreamed-of surroundings, and Masha, spellbound, saw what looked like a little frozen brook. It flowed down the wall spreading out in beautiful seaweed forms along its edges as if carved in white stone, and from the tip of each leaf hung a drop as white as a pearl--hung and then, with a tiny sigh, fell into the shadows below.

‘The lost brook!’ gasped Masha. ‘There it is!’

In her excitement, she had forgotten the strange people, but her voice startled them, and the guide turned quickly, throwing the light of his torch full upon the girls. Shy as wood birds, they stood dumb, and took the scolding of the astonished guide without trying to explain. Nothing mattered now. They would be out in the sunlight in a few minutes, and they were thrilled at the revelation of the vast and beautiful room, on the threshold of which they had sat unknowingly but a little while before.

But as the people moved on, the children hurried with them, forgetting the frozen brook and their own dark hour in their haste to get back to their world in the sun.

They shot into the light and scampered like rabbits through the woods. The crickets were chirping in the grass and the birds in the forest, and the fir trees smelt like incense in the warm sunshine.

‘Why, we are sitting on top of the cave now,’ cried Masha, as they sat down to their lunch.

‘Oh! the poor little brook!’ she sighed. ‘I wish we could let it out.’

That evening Treska’s father made a fire on the earthen floor of the hut, and Janko brought water to fill the black pot, which hung above it. Masha and Treska peeled potatoes and spread mushrooms to toast on the hot stones. From the rafters hung bunches of red peppers and golden corn, and right over the fire, tied in a white cloth, was a big cheese in process of being smoked.

‘You mean to say that you have been inside the cave?’ cried Janko, enviously, when the girls had told him of their adventure. ‘Why, it costs fifteen crowns to enter, and I have never seen it!’

Masha told him of the lost brook, and of how they had found it again inside the cave.

‘We heard the dropping of its tears long before we saw it,’ she said. ‘I suppose it went down to explore, just as we did, and couldn’t get out.’

‘Oh, no, it didn’t,’ answered Janko stolidly. ‘It was just running across the field trying to get down to the big stream in the valley when it came to the hole and fell in. But,’ he added kindly, seeing Masha’s face fall, ‘if you feel so badly about it, we’ll go up there to-morrow and turn the course of the brook.’

Masha sprang to her feet.

‘Why, what a splendid idea, Janko!’ she cried. ‘How did you ever think of it?’

Janko glowed. ‘That’s what we’ll do,’ he said, grandly, ‘I’ll drive the sheep up there to pasture, and we’ll build a dam and make the brook run down hill on the outside instead of on the inside.’

And then, because the hut was so small, they all rushed outside, and joining hands, danced wildly in the starlight while the potatoes bobbed in the pot and the sheep bleated drowsily from the fold and the shadows of the forest crowded closer and closer around them.

_Note_: Masha and Treska were Czecho-Slovak girls. Masha lived in
Southern Moraira, Treska in the Carpathians of northern Slovakia.

MICHAEL MAKES UP HIS MIND