Part 7 (2/2)
Jane tripped away obediently, her griefs a.s.suaged by the mere telling of them, and Esther pa.s.sed into the house by way of the veranda. It was a charming veranda, long and low, opening through French windows directly into the living room which, like itself, was long and low, and charming.
There is a charm in rooms which can be felt but not described. It exists apart from the furnis.h.i.+ngs and even the occupants; it is an essence, haunting, intangible--the soul of the room! only there are many rooms which have no soul.
Through the living room at the Elms vagrant breezes entered, loitered, and drifted out again, leaving behind them scents of sun-warmed flowers.
The light there was soft and green. The comfortable chairs invited rest; the polished rosewood table, the bright piano s.h.i.+ning in the brightest corner, the smooth old floor in whose rug the colours had long ceased to trouble, the general air of much used comfort, satisfied and refreshed.
Esther loved the room. Her first childish memory was of the rosewood table s.h.i.+ning like a pool in the lamplight and of her own wondering face reflected in it, with her father's laughing eyes behind. In every way it was a.s.sociated with the beginnings of things. The magic of all music began for her in the sweet, thin notes of the old square piano; the key to fairy land lay hidden somewhere in that shelf of well-worn books.
Yet to-night she entered with a hesitating step. It was obvious that she felt no pleasure in the cool greenness. The room was the same room but it was as if the expression on a well-known face had unaccountably changed and become forbidding. The girl sighed as she flung her hat upon a chair.
”Esther,” Jane's voice, somewhat obscured by the eating of the promised apple, came through the open window, ”are you sure about Timothy being in the Happy Hunting Grounds?”
”Of course, dear.”
”But he wasn't what you would call a Christian, Esther?”
”He was a good dog.”
”Can Timothy chase chickens there?”
”Probably.”
”And cats?”
”Certainly cats.”
”Is that what happens to bad cats when they die?”
Esther viewed this logical picture of everlastingly pursued cats with some dismay.
”N-o. I don't suppose it would be real cats.”
”But Tim wouldn't chase anything but real cats.”
”Jane, I wish you wouldn't talk with your mouth full.”
Being thus reduced to giving up the argument or the apple, Jane abandoned the former. It was clear that Esther was not in the mood for argument. The child's quick observation had not failed to note the lagging step, nor the quick sigh. She nodded her head as if in answer to some spoken word.
”Yes, I know. I feel like that, too. That's why I didn't come in before; that's why I'm not really in yet. It catches you by the throat and makes you breathe funny. What is it, Esther?”
”Why--I don't know, Jane. It's loneliness I think--missing Dad.”
The child shook her head. But whatever her objection might have been it was beyond her power of expression. She slid off the veranda step and wandered back into the garden. There was another apple in the pocket of her ap.r.o.n, and apples are great comforters.
Left alone, Esther with a resolutely cheerful air took down a blue bowl and proceeded to arrange therein the day's floral offerings. A sweet and crushed mixture they were, pansies, clove-pinks, mignonette, bleeding hearts, bachelors' b.u.t.tons, all short stemmed and minus any saving touch of green, but true love offerings for all that. Wordless gifts most of them, prim little bunches, hot from tight clasping in chubby hands, shyly and swiftly deposited on ”Teacher's desk” when the back of that divinity was turned. The blue bowl took kindly to them all, and as the girl's clever fingers settled and arranged the glowing chaos it seemed that with their crushed fragrance something of the lost spirit of the room came back. Just so had she arranged hundreds of times the sweet smelling miscellanies which had been her father's constant tribute from grateful patients.
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