If You Touch Them They Vanish Part 8

And among themselves they were encouraged to raise up questions and bring them to their elders for simple and instructive answers. And the punishment for lying to children and frightening them with mysteries was very terrible.

Upon his second long excursion the Poor Boy and his jolly companions (except w.a.n.gog, who was taciturn) came to the end of the Poor Boy's lands, a coast of granite sheathed with ice, and beyond, great broken cakes of ice heaving slowly with groans and grinding roars upon the tranquil winter ocean.

Back of the granite barriers the river spread right and left, and then went out to sea in a deep and narrow stream, curiously free from ice.

Indeed, there was but little ice in the main basin, and a kind of steam hung over it so that the Poor Boy was compelled and delighted to conclude (with the aid of his companions) that the river toward its mouth must be swollen by warm springs.

"I wonder if ships couldn't come in all the year round?"

He was going to wonder about other things, when the taciturn w.a.n.gog grunted and pointed to where the smoke of a steamer lay black along the horizon, and after that, to them closely watching, little by little her black hull rose from the grays and whites and greens of the ice.

She proved to be many kinds of a ship, in rapid succession, but last of all she was a yacht, huge and black and glittering with much bra.s.s. She was owned by a great statesman, who, with nothing but his country's welfare at heart, had been accused of high treason, and who, having heard of the Poor Boy's asylum for unfortunates, was making for it as fast as he could.

She came slowly between the headlands and to anchor at last with a splendid splash that glittered in the sun like diamonds....

It was very disappointing. If the Poor Boy, searching a more than half-emptied knapsack, was ever to get home to his own house he must postpone his visit to--Lord Harrow's (yes, that was the name forever and ever) yacht. Why had the Poor Boy and his companions wasted so much time over an empty harbor, when they might just as well have had the yacht arrive in the early morning, giving time for visits, explanations, and lunch?

The Poor Boy began to stamp his feet. There was no sensation in them, and he found that they were frozen. He had come too far, he had exposed himself too much--the sea with its burden of ice groaned and clashed.

His companions, so jolly but now (except w.a.n.gog, who was taciturn), looked pityingly upon him and began to fade. They vanished. He was all alone. A shrill wind was rising, dusk was descending. He stood and stamped his feet, and two plans fought in his head for recognition and acceptance.

He could board Lord Harrow's great black yacht and be welcomed into the light and the warmth of the great satin-wood saloon with its open fireplace and its Steinway grand. Lord Harrow's daughter, that lovely girl, would minister to him, and Warinaru, the steward, would bring him hot grog in cut crystal, upon a heavy silver tray of George the First's time. They would give him the best state-room, the green and white--white for winter, green for summer--and he would sleep--such a long sleep--with no dreams in it, no worries, no memories--no awakening!

That was one plan--a delightful plan. So easy of accomplishment! He had but to sit in the snow and wait; Lord Harrow would see him and send a boat. No. Lord Harrow's daughter should be the first.... No ... No. How foolish! Don, the spaniel, begins to whine and fret, to put his paws on the bulwarks and bark toward a spot on the sh.o.r.e.

A boat is lowered; Don, the spaniel, leaps in--they row, following the point of his nose, and the Poor Boy is found just in the nick of time....

But the other plan, which was not delightful, was best.

"I told old Martha," the Poor Boy murmured, "to look for me at such a time. Why break her heart for a pair of bright eyes and a gla.s.s of hot grog? Why not keep my word? It's only two or three days of torture."

He turned from the river and ran upon his skis, stamping at each step, until he found shelter from the wind. His feet began to tingle and he knew that they were not frozen. But by the time he had a fire going they were numb again.

Between the Poor Boy and his old Martha was not two or three days of torture, but four. During part of the time snow fell, and wind flew into his face from the north.

Late on the fourth day he climbed the cliff upon which his house stood, not because it was the cliff upon which his house stood, but because it was an obstacle in his way. His house might be a month's journey beyond, for all he knew.

At the top of the cliff, among the pines was a young woman. She was by no means the first he had seen that day. But her face was clearer than the other faces had been, and when she darted behind a tree and tried to escape without being seen or spoken to, he ran after her, not knowing why he ran nor why he called her Joy--Joy--Joy! And he did not understand why she in her turn kept calling, "Martha--Martha--come quick--come quick!"

He knew best that she suddenly stopped running, and turned and waited for him, and that as he fell forward she caught him in her arms and began to drag him toward a bright light.

It was a most vivid hallucination. And when he woke in his bed, so warm and all, and Martha bending over him, the first thing he told her--smiling sleepily--was that he had mistaken her for Miss Jocelyn Grey.

"It was the realest sort of an hallucination," he said, "she caught me as I was falling--and of course she was you."

[Ill.u.s.tration: She suddenly stopped running, and turned and waited for him.]

"How do you feel, Deary? We--I had a devil of a time with ye."

But the Poor Boy's mind was still upon the vision of Miss Grey.

"I saw her," he said, "and there was a look in her eyes that told me she'd _never_--_never_ believed I'd done it.... And I was so glad, I tried to run to her for comfort, and all the time she was you. It was all so real--so real. It was a lot realer than some things that really did happen to me yesterday--yesterday morning, before I began to get snow-foolish."

"'Twas the day before yesterday ye came home," said Martha. "And all yesterday ye raved like a lunatic until night, when ye fell asleep, and I knew that all was well."

"Have you sat up with me all the time?"

"Ye forget I have an old female to help me. We took turns."

"You must thank her for me, Martha."

"I'll do that."

"Tell her I am grateful to her, and I think we should give her quite a lot of money, don't you?"

IX

The Poor Boy could not get Miss Jocelyn Grey out of his head, nor that look which she had had of belief in him. The episode was a rejuvenation, and there were days when he was steadily joyful from morning to night.

He was having luncheon one day, and he said to Martha:

"I never knew what Miss Joy believed. But ever since I saw--thought I saw her--that time--I've been as sure as sure that she knew justice had miscarried."

"I'm for thinking you're right," said old Martha.

"But if she believed in me, why didn't she write and say so? We were such good friends until we had a sort of misunderstanding."

"You never told me about that."

"Oh, it was silly. We were both staying with the Brettons; and one day Miss Joy turned her ankle and I wanted to carry her back to the house, and she wouldn't let me. Every step she took hurt her a lot, and me more. I was a spoiled boy. I always did what I wanted to do. It seemed to me that I wanted to carry her more than anything I'd ever wanted to do. And she wouldn't let me. So we managed to misunderstand each other very thoroughly, and then things began to happen--things began to happen."

The Poor Boy sighed. Then he looked up with a smile and a blush.

"I've always thought," he said, "that if she had let me carry her, I would have asked her to marry me. Anyway, it's the nearest I ever came to asking any one."

"And not very near," said Martha, "since she wouldn't be bothered with a lift."

"She was a good kid," said the Poor Boy. And then, more than half to himself: "I think I'll have her up for a visit."

"Fwaat!" exclaimed Martha.

"I'll have her stay with some of my make-believe people," he said.

"She'll be the first person to come here that I ever knew before. She shall stay with--with? I have it, she's a guest of Lord Harrow's daughter, and they've just moved into Harrow Hall. That's the new Georgian House, on Lilly Pond...."

"When I was in New York I saw Miss Joy."