Mae Van Norman Long

“ Joey was sleeping peacefully indoors, watched over by Mrs. Olds, the doctor had just left, after assuring me that my lad would soon be convalescent, and Wanza and I walked on the river bank.
“Wanza,” I said, “is that a russet-backed thrush singing?”
“I think so, Mr. Dale.”
“His notes are wonderfully liquid and round, aren’t they?” I gave a sigh of pure happiness. “I feel like a ‘strong bird on pinions free,’ myself to-night. I feel emancipated—as though life were beginning all over for me. I am in love with life, Wanza. I want to awake to-morrow and begin life all over.” ”

“ She sprang outside with the lightness of a kitten followed by Joey, and I closed the door carefully at Mrs. Olds’ instigation, and followed her to the yew path.
The heavy-blossomed service bushes hedged the path like a flowered wall, silver shadows lay around us, but through the fretwork of tree branches we saw a mauve twilight settling down over the valley. The river was a twisting purple cord. In the violet sky a half-lit crescent moon was swimming like a fairy canoe afloat on a mythical sea. All objects were soft to the sight—thin and shadowy. ”

“ A canoe came slipping along in the shade of the willows. As I stared and stared, a voice hailed me, a voice compelling and shrill. Wanza sat, paddle in hand, the thick fair hair pleached low on her brows and bound with a crimson handkerchief, her young eyes disdainful, her lips sulky. When she met my eyes she frowned.
I swept my canoe close to hers. “Did you call me?” I asked, with marked respect.
She frowned still more deeply.
“Wanza,” I cried, with swift cajolery, “washed or unwashed your hair is wonderful. It is the color of corn silk, and your eyes are surely blue as the cornflowers. ”

“ She laughed, shut the oven door, straightened her fine shoulders and went to the window to cool her cheeks. I looked at her as she stood there, I saw her smile and wave her hand to Joey, who was performing sundry ablutions at the spring. She was wearing a collarless pink cotton frock, spotless and fresh as water and starch and fastidious ironing could make it; her face was as ardent as a flame, her eyes glowed deep and impassioned, her lips were smooth as red rose petals. Her mop of fine, blond curls was massed like a web of silk about her colorful face. ”

“ This morning the wood spaces were filled with visions of Haidee. She smiled at me from behind the clumps of bracken and huckleberry, her eyes beamed at me from the hearts of the flowers. The clouds were her garments, the blue sky her soul. As Dante walked dreaming of Beatrice so went I with Haidee ever before me.
Love is a rejuvenating precious thing. Even a hopeless love softens the fibres of one’s entire being, and straightens the warped soul of one. But I must not reach out toward Love! ”

“ Despite the depression that obsessed me my spirits rose as we went on, and by noon when we were well into the heart of the deep lush woods beyond Roselake, I am sure Joey could have had no cause to complain of the gravity of his companion. Surely there is balm for wounded souls in the solitude of the greenwood. We found a spot where bracken waved waist high, where moss was green-gold and flowers were sprouting on rocks, where the very air was dreamful. ”

“ We could see the river shining like silver gauze through the green latticed walls of the grove, and the sky above the steeples of the trees was amethyst and gray. The sun was low in the west, and the shadows lay purple along the wood aisles.
It was a magical May day. Hawthorn and serviceberry bushes waved snowy arms along the river bank and dropped white petals in the stream, the birch trees dangled long festoons of moss above the water, balm o’ Gileads shed their pungent perfume abroad, and the honeysuckle and wild clematis hung from the limbs of the slender young maples. ”

“ We went forward to the pine tree and sat down together beneath it. Wanza did not speak. I was enchanted because she did not. I could just dimly see her face. Her head was thrown back, and I knew her eyes were lifted.
The light began to spread over the east. Soon the mountain tops were touched with orange fire. [339] A cool breeze sprang up, and the young hemlocks on the hillsides swayed and tossed their fringes. But the pines in our grove stood immovable and black, and the wood vistas were unlit. I heard the river, and the babble of a rillet in a draw hard by. ”

“ No, I shall not visit Hidden Lake this year. Perhaps next summer—but ‘To-morrow is a day too far to trust whate’er the day be.’ I shall never forget Joey or you, or your wonderful kindness and friendship. Good-bye, Mr. Fixing Man,—or not good-bye! au revoir. Oh, all the good wishes in the world I send to you and Joey—and Wanza. ”

“ Had I thought of Haidee so?
When I turned back to the cedar room, Mrs. Olds met me at the door with a whispered, “Joey is lucid—he is asking for you.” I crossed swiftly to the bed, knelt down and took my lad’s hand. He smiled at me in his old way, but his eyes went past me to Mrs. Olds. His voice was distinct as he ordered, “Go, get Wanza, Mrs. Olds, please.”
I heard Wanza’s step at that moment. She came softly forward and crouched beside me. “I am here, Joey,” she said in her rich young voice.
“That’s all right then! Wanza; if I don’t get well you got to marry Mr. David.” ”

“ Once upon a time—which is the way I begin my fairy tales to Joey—there was a certain foolish woman, whom we will call Haidee, who lived all alone in the heart of a forest. She was a very headstrong young woman, full of whims and insane impulses, or she never would have gone into the forest to live alone. But she loved Nature passionately and she had suffered and known heartache—and she felt that Nurse Nature could assuage pain. ”

“ Each day I say to myself I cannot bear another.”
“It’ll be the same wherever you are.”
“Perhaps so, Wanza,” I sighed. And then because I knew the tears were on her cheeks, I sprang to my feet, saying: “This may be our last day in the woods together, who knows? Come, let us try to forget—let us make the best of what we have.”
Wanza rose. She came close to me. When our eyes met she gave a cry: “If you go you may never come back!”
“Never fear. I have no home but Cedar Dale,” I replied, and I am afraid my voice was bitter. ”

“ One of those perfect days that come early in June when the woods are flower-filled, and the trees full-leaved. The air was tangy with smells, the honeysuckle and balm o’ Gilead dripped perfume, the clover was bursting with sweetness, and the wild roses were faintly odorous; all the “buds and bells” of June were dewy and clean-scented. The nutty flavor of yarrow was in the air—Achillea millefolium—the plant which Achilles is said to have used in an ointment to heal his myrmidons wounded in the siege of Troy. ”

“ It means wonderful things, lad. It means faring forth into the greenwood in a caravan in the rosy dawn of a summer day, finding the most alluring trail that leads to the most secretive of trout streams, lounging in the shade of spreading trees at noon time, eating a snack of bread and cheese, poring over a treasured book for an hour while you drowse back half dreaming to all the pleasant happenings of your youth. Then when it’s cooler faring on again, till the sun begins to drop behind the mountains and hunger seizes you by the throat—”
I broke off, catching sight of Joey’s rapt face. ”

“ HAIDEE ONCE, years ago, when I was a lad, in an old volume of poems in my father’s library I came across a steel engraving of a beautiful woman. She had a small head with raven black tresses bound smoothly about her brow with a fillet, but twisted back over her ears and ending in ringlets over her shoulders. She had big dark eyes, a tiny mouth, a slim white throat, and infinitesimally small hands and feet. Her name was Haidee. ”

“ They’s no one can cook like you, Wanza. Mr. David can’t live here alone when he’s old—he can’t live here alone no more—say you’ll come and take care of him. Why, you like the birds and the squirrels—you know you do, Wanza—and you like Mr. David, too. Will you, Wanza?” The soft wheedling accents wrung my heart.
At the girl’s head-shake he whispered to me, “You ask her, Mr. David.”
My hand groped for hers, closed over it, gripped it hard.
“If I ask her now—if she says yes, lad—it will be for your sake—all for your sake, Joey.” ”

“ Back of all the tears and the smiles and the mystery I read at last what they were saying. I read—and I was humbled and abashed. I knew the truth at last. Wanza loved me.
I saw clearly now, indeed. I recalled Father O’Shan’s words: “Be careful in your dealings with that child.” I had been blind, and a fool. [273] I blamed myself, and I hated myself. I stood stupidly staring into the face so near my own until with a sudden wrench Wanza jerked away from me, and ran on down the purpling wood-aisle before me, dashing the tears from her eyes as she fled. ”

“ When you receive this Joey will be with you—there in the old place that he loves so dearly. And you—how you will rejoice to have your lad again. Bless you both! David Dale, I shall not visit Hidden Lake this summer,—I have learned much in these past months. Do you not know your own heart yet? I have read carefully, searchingly all the letters you have written me this past winter, and I find Wanza, Wanza, between the lines. She is the true mate for you—can you not see this? Do you not feel it? Do you not know you love her—as she loves you? ”

“ FATE’S FINAL JAVELIN THAT night in my lonely cabin I fell ill, and burned with fever, and shook with ague so that I was unable to drag myself about the cabin, but lay all the next day and the next in my bunk. The following day my fever left me magically; and late in the afternoon I arose, fed and curried my half-starved cayuse and, mounting, rode away beneath the berry-reddened yews to the trail that led to Haidee. ”

“ I whipped the stream carefully for half an hour and succeeded in landing a half dozen trout. They made a meal fit for a king. And afterward Joey and I lay on the grass half dozing and watching a pair of violet-green swallows that had a nest in a hole in a cottonwood tree on the bank of the stream.
“Don’t they like bird houses?” asked the small boy.
“They do,” I replied. “They will welcome almost any tiny opening. They will go through a hole in any gable or cornice. They are industrious and painstaking; they have courage and patience. It is fine to have courage and patience, Joey.” ”

“ Trills on one hand, deep throaty mellow carolings on the other. The thrush, the warbler, the sparrow joined in a mighty chorus.
“What a magnificent orchestra,” Haidee cried. “The birds are holding high carnival.”
The pearl-like, throbbing symphony grew sweeter and sweeter. We sat spellbound drinking in the enchantment with hungry ears. Suddenly I cried:
[168] “Look! There is a lazuli-bunting.”
I pointed to the feathered blue beauty that was winging its way to a nearby maple.
“Lazuli-bunting?” Haidee echoed. “What a cosy name. I suppose the baby birds are called baby buntings, Joey.” ”

“ Because the hour of Haidee’s convalescence when I could greet her face to face, was postponed from day to day, and because my thoughts were full of her, I was glad to answer this letter. But after all I told Janet Jones very little of Haidee, except that she was my guest, and that Joey and I called her our Wonder Woman, and that my own name for her was Haidee.
Each day that followed was well rounded out with work. The workshop proved to be a veritable house of refuge to Joey and me, whither we fled to escape Mrs. Olds’ whining voice and bickering, and the big man’s unsavory language. ”

“ We have had some rather interesting arguments during our jovial evenings with Captain Grif. At first I thought you were a genius. But I know you better now. I have studied you. You’re normal, splendidly balanced, healthy, resistant. You’re clever and plodding—you’ll make good. But you are not a genius. I like you immensely. Certain things I have gathered from Wanza make me feel that at times you need a friendly hand—that you are breasting treacherous currents, even now. Come, Dale, I’d be your friend. ”

“ He was not the Cedar Dale elf I had known. What had changed him so?
I went forward and Joey cried out and hurled himself into my arms. Haidee stood up and drew the lad to her with a nervous motion.
“Joey,” I said, “run away and see what Jingles is barking at so furiously. A fat rabbit has just escaped him.”
Joey bounded away shrieking with excitement. I studied Haidee deliberately as her eyes followed the childish figure. Her eyes were brooding and solemn and sweet as she watched, but there was a shadow on her brow. ”

“ A Vigor’s wren was building a nest in the pergola, and a calliope humming-bird’s nest hung on a pine limb near the kitchen door, not more than eight feet above the ground. I could scarcely wait for Joey to see the latter. The hours I spent at Hidden Lake were filled with strange anticipations, and unanswered questions and grim wonderment.
[331] But Fate had a surprise in store for me.
One day as I stood looking at the humming-bird’s nest a man approached the cabin from the wood path beyond the garden. He was a hard-faced man, a grizzled, uncouth figure of a man. ”

“ The nurse proved to be a sandy-haired, long-nosed pessimist, a woman of fifty, capable, but so sunk in pessimism that Joey’s blandishments failed to win her, and Jingles stood on his hind legs, and pawed his face in vain. ”