The Counterpane Fairy Part 13

"Why, no, Ellen, you can't be dreaming," said Teddy, "for I'm here too."

"Well, I don't know," said Ellen, "but I think I'm dreaming, because I've often dreamed this way before."

Teddy thought of this for a little while, but it was not pleasant to think that he was in a dream. After a while he said: "Ellen, don't you know, if you're lame you ought to go to a hospital? My mamma says so, and my papa says so too."

An ugly expression came into Ellen's face. "That's all you know about it," she cried. "You don't catch me going to a hospital. Why, I heard of a girl that went to a hospital and--"

She was interrupted by a soft burst of laughter, and looking about Teddy saw that he and she had floated right into midst of a group of little children, who were running along the rainbow bridge. They were all such pretty little children, with soft shining faces and bare feet, but they did not quite look like any children that Teddy had ever seen before.

Each little child carried in its hand a bunch of flowers, and they were such flowers as the little boy had never dreamed of. Some of them moved on their stalks, opening and closing their petals softly like the wings of b.u.t.terflies, some shone like jewels, and some seemed to change and throb as if with a hidden pulse of life.

Ellen, who had stopped floating, caught Teddy by the coat and hung back timidly when she saw the children, but Teddy spoke to the one nearest to him. "Where did you get your flowers?" he asked.

"From the garden at the other end of the rainbow," said the little child, smiling at him.

"Give me one?"

"Oh, no, I can't!" answered the child, staring at him with big eyes.

"They're for someone else."

"Whom are they for?"

"You can come along and see."

"Oh, say," whispered Ellen to Teddy, "let's go back!" But Teddy answered: "No, no! Come on and see where they're going." So Ellen reluctantly followed him, and they joined the other little children journeying along the rainbow.

The strange little children seemed very happy, and they laughed and talked together in their soft, clear voices, though Teddy could not always understand what they said. He could understand best the little boy to whom he had spoken first. Teddy asked him again where they were going, and this time the little boy (he seemed to be the captain of the band) told him that they were going down to the earth. He said that every week they had a holiday, and then they crossed the rainbow bridge, and carried the flowers from their flower-beds down to the little earth children.

"But what little children?" asked Teddy, curiously.

"Oh, you'll see!" answered the little boy, laughing, and then he began to talk with the others, and Teddy could no longer understand him.

It was not long after this that Teddy saw before him the end of the rainbow, and where should it go but right through the window of a great square yellow house, set back of a high wall and in the middle of a lawn.

"Oh dear! we can't get to the end of it after all," cried Teddy, and the next thing he knew the little children were walking through the window just as if nothing were there, and he and Ellen were following them.

"Where are we?" asked Ellen, looking about her, half frightened and yet curious.

"I can't think," said Teddy. "Seems as if I knew, but I can't think."

They were in a long, bare, clean room, and on each side of it were rows of little white beds, and in each bed lay or sat a little child. A few of the children were asleep, most of them were awake, but all looked pale and thin. Here and there at the sides of the beds grown-up people were sitting, sometimes showing the children pictures or books, and sometimes reading to them.

The children from the rainbow walked slowly up the aisle between the row of beds, and, strangely enough, no one seemed to look at them or pay the least attention, any more than if they had not been there, and at last Teddy began to believe that they could not see them.

Often the little strange children stopped to smooth a pillow or to softly stroke the cheek or hand of one of the little earth children.

Here and there one would linger behind the others, by some bed, and after a moment would lay its bunch of flowers on the pillow. Then the little child in the bed would turn its head and smile, even if it were asleep, and its face would shine as if with some inward happiness. The whole room seemed filled with the perfume of flowers, and Teddy wondered that no one paid any attention to it.

At last they came to a bed where a little child was lying fast asleep, and a woman was sitting beside the child and fanning it. Suddenly its eyes opened, and the moment they turned toward the rainbow children, Teddy knew that it saw them.

It lay looking for a moment and then it smiled and feebly tried to wave its hand. "What is it, dear?" asked the woman, bending over the child, but it paid no attention to her, for it was gazing at the rainbow children.

"Oh, he sees us! he sees us!" they cried, clapping their hands joyfully.

"He'll be coming across the rainbow soon."

Then the rainbow children gathered about the bed and began talking to the child, but Teddy could not understand what they said to it. The little child on the bed seemed to understand them though, and it smiled and tried to nod its head.

"Come soon! Come soon!" cried the little children, waving their hands to it as they moved away, and the eyes of the child on the bed followed them wistfully, as though it were eager to follow.

Teddy and Ellen still went with the other little children, and a moment after they were out on the rainbow bridge again, high up above the world, but they were alone, for the little strange children were gone.

Ellen stood still and drew a long breath. "Oh! wasn't that lovely?" she sighed. "I wonder where it was!"

"I know where it was!" cried Teddy suddenly. "I remember now, for I saw a picture of it in one of papa's magazines. That was a hospital, Ellen."

"A hospital!" cried the little girl.

"Yes, a hospital."

Ellen did not say anything for some time, but at last she drew another deep breath. "Well, if that's a hospital I shouldn't mind going to a place like that," she said.

The rainbow had faded away, and Teddy was back in the great high-post bedstead again, with the silk coverlet drawn up over his knees, and the Counterpane Fairy still sitting on top of the hill. Teddy lay looking at her for a while in silence. "Mrs. Fairy, was that a true story like the others?" he asked her at last.

"How should I know?" asked the fairy. "Do I look as though I knew anything about rainbow children? You'd better ask Ellen McFinney; maybe she can tell you."

"Well, I will," said Teddy. "I mean to ask her just as soon as ever I'm well."

He did not have to wait for that, however, for the very next day his mother told him that little Ellen had at last consented to be taken to the hospital, and that perhaps when he saw the little girl again she would be able to walk and run about almost like other children.

CHAPTER EIGHTH. HARRIETT'S DREAM.

TEDDY had begged mamma to ask Harriett to come over and play with him after school, but not to tell her that now he was no longer in bed, so when the little girl came running in she was very much surprised. "Why, Teddy, you're well again, aren't you?" she cried.

"Yes, now I'm well again," said Teddy "and mamma says we may each have a little sponge-cake, and she's going to let us blow soap-bubbles. Would you like to blow soap-bubbles, Harriett?"

"Yes, I guess so," said Harriett.

So mamma made them a bowl of strong suds, and brought out two pipes, and the children played together very happily for quite a time. Sometimes they threw the bubbles into the air and tried to blow them up to the ceiling; sometimes the children put their pipes close together, so that the bubbles they blew were joined in one lopsided globe.

Last of all they set the bowl on a chair, and kneeling beside it put their pipes into the suds, and blew and blew until quite a soap-bubble castle rose up and touched their noses with wet suds.

Teddy felt a little tired and soapy by that time, so mamma put all the things away, and read them some stories from Grimm's Fairy Tales.

After that Harriett said she must go home, and indeed it was almost supper-time, so mamma helped her put on her little hat and coat and kissed her good-bye.

Teddy was very tired by the time supper was over; he felt quite willing to be put to bed, and as soon as he was there he sank into a doze.