Little Sister Snow Part 1

Little Sister Snow.

by Frances Little.

CHAPTER I

A quaint old j.a.panese garden lay smiling under the sunshine of a morning in early spring. The sun, having flooded the outside world with dazzling light, seemed to sink to a tender radiance as it wooed leaf and bud into new life and loveliness. It loosened the tiny rivulet from the icy fingers of winter, and sped it merrily on its way to a miniature lake, where shining goldfish darted here and there in an ecstasy of motion. It stole into the shadows of a great pine-tree, and touched the white wings of the pigeons as they cooed the song of mating-time. It gleamed on the sandy path that led to the old stone lantern, played into the eyes of Kwannon, the G.o.ddess of Mercy, and finally lost itself in the trees beyond.

Under a gnarled plum-tree, that for uncounted years had braved the snow and answered joyously the first call of spring, a little maiden stood and held out eager hands to catch the falling blossoms. The flowering-time was nearly done, and the child stood watching the petals twirl quickly down, filling the hollows and fashioning curious designs on the mossy gra.s.s.

The softest of breezes coming across the river, over the thick hedge, saucily blew a stray petal straight into the child's face. To Yuki Chan it was a challenge, and with outstretched hands and flying feet she gave chase to the whirling blossoms. Round and round the old tree, into the hedge, and up the sandy path she raced, her long sleeves spreading like tiny sails, her cheeks flushed to the same crimson as her flowery playmates. A sudden stillness in the air ended the romp.

Yuki Chan returned to her playground beneath the tree, and taking her captured petals from the folds of her kimono, began to count her trophies.

"Ichi, ni, san, ichi, ni, san," she rhythmically droned, three being the magical number that would bring good luck if the petals were properly arranged and the number repeated often enough.

But the monotony of repet.i.tion brought rest, and soon Yuki Chan, forgetting to count, made a bed of the fallen petals and turned her face toward the little straw-roofed house from which noises of busy preparation came.

It was a birthday. Not Yuki Chan's, for that came with the snow-time.

This was the third day of the third month, which in the long ago was set apart as the big birthday of all little girls born in the lovely island, and was celebrated by the Festival of Dolls.

Yuki Chan lay with her slim body stretched in the warmth of the sun.

In every graceful line was the imprint of high breeding; her white face, so unusual with her race, was stamped with the romance and tragedy of centuries; while her eyes, limpid and luminous, looked out at the world with eager, questioning interest.

Through the wide-open _shoji_ of the house she caught glimpses of her father and mother hurrying and holding consultations. She marked frequent visits to the old warehouse that held the household treasures, and the bringing out of bundles wrapped in yellow cloth.

The air brought her whiffs of cooking food, and the flower- and fish-men deposited a fair part of their stock on the porch. But Yuki Chan was banished from these joys of preparation because of naughtiness, and as she lay in the warm sunshine she thought of her recent wickedness. She smiled as she remembered how she had hid her father's pipe that he might work the faster, and broken the straps of her mother's wooden shoes, so that she could not go outdoors. She laughed softly when she thought of the stray cat which she had brought into the house and coaxed to drink milk while she, with skilful fingers and a pair of scissors, transformed her smooth fur into a wonderful landscape garden. Short work had made kitty's head slick and shiny, like a lake, with a stray bristle or two, which stood for trees. In the middle of her back stood Fuji, the great mountain, with numberless little Fujis to keep company. Many winding paths ran down kitty's legs to queer, shapeless shrines, and it was only when Yuki Chan had insisted on making a curious old pine-tree with twisted limbs of kitty's short and stubby tail that trouble ensued, and she had been requested by her mother to take her honorable little body to the garden.

Yuki Chan remembered her mother's beautiful smile of love as she gently chided her, and recalled the note of trouble in the kind voice.

Was the mother sorry because she had stuck out a very pink tongue at a cross-eyed old image that sat on the floor on the very spot that she wanted to step upon? Or was it--and Yuki Chan grew grave--that the last _go rin_ had been spent for the new dress she was to wear that day?

All her short life Yuki Chan had lived in a house of love, but no veil of affection, no sacrifice, could shield her from the knowledge of poverty. She had never seen her mother wear but one festival dress, yet her own little kimono was ever bright and dainty, and even the new brocade of the dolls' dresses stood alone with the weave of gold and tinsel.

A solemn thought, like a pebble dropped into water, caused circle after circle to trouble her childish mind. She did not quite understand, but she knew there was something she must learn. She had been naughty and weighed her mother's spirits. She had caused a grave look in her father's kind eyes, and had sent the household pets scattering with her mischief. Now she must be good--very good--else the fox spirit would come upon her, and she would go through life an unhappy soul. She would give more obedience to the honorable mother, whose every word had been a caress. It was as if for the first time the great book of life opened before her and, though unconscious of its meaning, the first word she saw spelled Duty.

The noises from the house grew fainter. The child, with blinking eyes, lay gazing straight above her. Overhead the branches overflowed into a canopy of crimson, which shut out the great real world and opened into a fairy world wherein only the untried feet of youth may tread and the fragile flowers of child-dreams bloom. The gates thereto are slight but strong, and only knowledge erects an impa.s.sable barrier.

The wind sang its lullaby through the blossoms of the tree, and sleep would soon have overtaken Yuki Chan had not a peculiar sound aroused her and caused her eyes to fly wide open. Once before she had heard it, and it had meant death to the big robin who lived in the branches above. The cry came from the mother bird this time and brought Yuki Chan to her feet.

Through the shower of blossoms, brought down by the mad fluttering of wings, she saw a tiny half-feathered thing struggling in the sharp claws of her lately acquired pet. With certainty of success, the cat let its victim weakly flutter an inch or two away, then reaching out a cruel paw drew it back. Twice repeated, the green eyes narrowed to slits, and Yuki Chan, horrified, saw big red drops slowly dripping from either side of the whiskered mouth. Terror held her for a moment as she heard the crunching of small bones, then white pa.s.sion enveloped her as she stole noiselessly from behind and closed her two small hands around the furry throat.

_"Baka!"_ she cried from between her clenched teeth. _"Baka_--to eat the baby birds! This day will I ask Oni to make you into a stone, which every foot will kick and hurt, and you can neither move nor cry.

You cruel, cruel beast!" In vain the cat struggled. Yuki Chan held it firmly at arm's-length while she decided what was to be its fate.

Looking sternly at the offender, her lips rounded into a long-drawn "s-o," the light of antic.i.p.ated revenge danced in her eyes. At last she knew what to do, O most honorable but very ugly cat! She would throw her into the ditch, where great crawling frogs with popping eyes would stick out long tongues; where flying things would sting, and creeping things would bite; where the great tide would come later and take her out to the big, big ocean, where there was neither milk to drink nor birds to eat.

At the thought of her furry playmate floating alone and hungry in the vast place which, to Yuki Chan, had neither beginning nor end, something of pity touched her heart, and she slightly loosened her grasp.

The cat gained a good breath and used it. In the fight for freedom a sharp claw was drawn down the child's arm, leaving a line of red in its course. Compa.s.sion took flight, and Yuki Chan, clutching anew, went swiftly down the path that led to the street, with a watchful eye on the lodge of the keeper of the gate.

The keeper was very old, and very cross, and lately had acquired a curious idea that little girls must ask his honorable permission to go in and out the gate. One day he actually threatened punishment, and Yuki Chan, in her scorn, invited him to cut off his head with a sword, that he might save his face. Now the way was clear.

She turned her head and b.u.mped her small body against the weight of the heavy gates until they swung slightly apart and permitted her to slip through.

So intent was her purpose to reach the ditch across the street that she did not see an approaching jinrikisha, and before she knew it she had been tumbled over and sent rolling to the side of the road. Still clutching the kitten, she sat up and rubbed the dust from her eyes.

Standing over her was the jinrikisha man, and beside him was his pa.s.senger, a young American boy, whose light hair and blue eyes held her spell-bound. He was brushing the dust from her kimono, and his foreign tongue made strange sounds.

"Say, kid," the boy was saying, as he transferred the dust from his hands to his handkerchief, "glad you're not hurt or got any bones cracked. Where's your mama, or your papa, or your nurse, to give you a spanking and keep you off the street?"

As he talked Yuki Chan grew fascinated watching his mouth, and forgot, for a moment, her direful intention. The cat, again taking advantage of her relaxed hold, began to tug for freedom, and a lively struggle ensued.

The boy, looking on, began to laugh, a laugh that began in his eyes, ran over his face and down into his throat, whence it came again in a shout of boyish merriment.

Yuki Chan, looking from him to the smiling jinrikisha man, grew crimson with anger. With a swift movement she ran toward the ditch.

Divining her purpose by the look in her eyes, d.i.c.k Merrit went gallantly to the rescue of the kitten. He was tall for his sixteen years, and his long strides more than matched the pattering steps of the slip of a girl who raced before him.

"No, you don't, kiddie," he cried; "your manicured cat is not going into the ditch, if we have to sc.r.a.p for it."

Merrit caught Yuki Chan in one arm, and again and again loosened her fingers from the struggling kitten.

"Iya, Iya!" the child screamed; but Merrit, as determined as she, held her firmly, and ended by lightly slapping first one little hand and then the other.

The child, thus coming into contact for the first time with physical force, relaxed her grasp and gazed in amazement at the boy's determined face.

"I guess your 'Iya' means no, little lady, and I say 'Iya' too," said Merrit, taking the cat into his arms and smoothing its uneven back.

"You are not going to put it into the ditch. Why don't you give it to me? I am getting up a collection of cats and things at the school, and I'd like to take this queer specimen along. Ask her if I can have it."

The jinrikisha man, who stood a smiling spectator, saw d.i.c.k Merrit's hand move toward his pocket, and was instantly alert and eager to settle the matter.

"Him ve'y bad girl," he said; "him make dead for catty. You give me ten sen, I take girl homely. You have much of catty."

But d.i.c.k declined all interference, and putting the cat inside his coat he stooped down and took one of Yuki Chan's unresisting hands.

Her sleeve fell back, and he saw the long red scratch.

"h.e.l.lo! The cat had an inning too, didn't she? I'd like to chuck her for hurting you, but I can't let you give her a bath in that dirty hole. Never mind, I'll take her home, and some day I'll bring you something. I bet you don't understand a word I'm saying, but I'll be hanged if I know how to make you."

Feeling rather helpless, d.i.c.k talked on, patting first Yuki Chan and then the cat.

The child stood speechless and looked deep into his eyes, not having entirely recovered from the shock of the first blow she had ever received.

"You'll be good, won't you?" he went on coaxingly, "not drown any more cats and things?"

Yuki Chan, with the intuition that only a child can have, suddenly bridged the gulf of strange language and understood. With the quick movement of a nestling bird, she bent forward and laid her cheek against the boy's shoulder. It was not only complete surrender, but allegiance to the conqueror.

d.i.c.k rose, red and confused. Then he climbed into the jinrikisha, trying to ignore the smiles of the man.

Yuki Chan, with her hands joined just below her sash, bent her body like a half-shut jack-knife.