Tumbleweed

PART ONE Wind

CHAPTER PAGE

I The Wind Child 3

II The Stranger-Boy 13

III When the Prince Came 29

PART TWO Fire

IV Being Herself 47

V The Pagan 70

VI The Fairy Gifts 98

VII Life With a Capital L 123

VIII The Operetta 141

IX In Love With Love 148

X Only After Death 159

XI Purple Blossoms 177

XII To the End of the World 199

PART THREE Wind

XIII The Little Yellow Book 225

XIV Sweetheart 238

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WIND

Jasper Petulengro — “There’s night and day, brother, both sweet things ; sun, moon, and \ stars, brother, all sweet things ; there’s likewise a wind on the heath . Life is very sweet, brother; who would wish to die?”

“Lavengro.”

Chapter I

The wind blew. The rushes at the water’s edge bent low as it passed but, like servile courtiers behind their monarch’s back, they straightened and leaned toward one another whispering. Here and there a flag lily, proudly purple, held its head erect though the force of the wind made it shiver along all its green length. The silver birches in their white waistcoats bowed gracefully but not too low lest their dignity be compromised.

The man who lay on the bank with his hands clasped under his head was unaware of the royal drama that silently filled the woodland. His eyes were on the 3 white clouds that were chasing across the sky to escape the dust with which the wind was powdering their curled edges.

The royal drama paused for a moment ; the orchestra began. Startled, the man raised himself on one elbow and looked toward the woods from which the weird music came.

“The wind bloweth Where it listeth ;

No man knoweth Whence it cometh,

Whither it goeth.”

High and clear the little verse came through the woods with a sweet impersonality in the voice as if an elf sang.

Justifying the unknown singer of its independence the wind burst through the thicket above the bank where the man lay. In the sudden rush that almost took his breath, he was scarcely aware for a moment that he was gazing at the figure of a little girl. He watched her in silence. She stood poised at the top of the little hill, the straight lengths of her green dress blown from her slender body, her short light hair ruffled, the rose of the wind in her cheeks. As the breeze struck her again she swayed and, to the man watching the strange blue fire kindle in her eyes, it seemed that she was about to be carried like a leaf into the air.

“The wind bloweth Where it listeth,”

the chant began again.

The man sat up suddenly, fearing to interrupt this strange ceremony, yet unwilling to let his elfin visitor be borne away on the wings of the wind.

The child looked at him quietly. When she had finished her song she said, “Did he knock you down?”

The man was surprised. “Who?” he asked.

“My father.”

Carman was puzzled. His voice was very gentle as he answered, though his little visitor did not seem to require such careful handling as the youngsters of white frocks, blue ribbons and yellow curls that he knew.

“No one knocked me down,” he said; “I just lay down because I wanted to. [But who is your father and who are you ?”

With a true sense of feminine importance the child answered his latter question first.

“I am Tumbleweed,” she said, “and the wind is my father.” There was a thrill in her voice when she said “the wind” that stirred Carman strangely. He had an odd sense of having been momentarily made aware of a great and pervasive personality. The moment passed and left him vaguely uncomfortable.

“Oh, come now,” he said a trifle impatiently, for he hated anything that was not at once evident to his understanding ; “you must have a real name and a real father. Why, every little girl has a real father.”

Tumbleweed drew herself up proudly. The impatience in his voice had brought

Startled, the man raised himself on one elbow

.

fire to her cheeks. Unwilling to be outdone by “ever y little girl” she said disdainfully : “ It is stingy and mean to havq only one father. I have a great many fathers. I have a Father-in-IIeaven who is my father when mother tells me not to forget. And they say that God is my father on Sundays. But on my own days the wind is my father and I love him best.” She raised one hot little cheek to the breeze that came fresh and sweet through the thicket.

There was something so reverential in her gesture, something so suggestive of Jeanne d’Arc listening to the voices that, instinctively, Carman took off his cap before it. A moment later he grinned sheepishly at the action as Tumbleweed sprang eagerly toward him.

“Oh, you’re a Wind Man, you’re a Wind Man,” she cried happily. “Why didn’t you tell me before that you knew my Father Wind ?”

Carman was puzzled, but he was learning diplomacy*

“I’m not sure just what a Wind Man is,” he confessed. “Won’t you tell me? Perhaps I am.”

Tumbleweed sat down. There was infinite compassion on her small face, compassion mixed with the joy of attainment. Like a priest about to communicate the secret of all happiness, she began.

“You must be either a Wind Person or a Not.” No epithet of malignity could have been so scornful as Tumbleweed’s term of negation. Carman felt that to be a Not was to lose the kingdom of Heaven forever.

“But how can I tell?” he begged. “Look at me and see if I’m a Wind Person or a Not.”

Tumbleweed watched him gravely for a moment. Then she shook her head. “I can’t tell,” she said half petulantly. It was one of the annoyances of her life that she had to spend so much time discovering who were “Nots.” If only they were made to wear uniforms !

“But if you can’t tell by looking at me bow can you tell?” Carman persisted,; amused.

Tumbleweed was frankly puzzled. “I don’t know,” sbe admitted; “if you were little I could tell by tbe things you liked to play. But grown-ups are mostly all Nots. You ought to know yourself,” sbe added with a trace of accusation in her voice.

Carman bad a feeling that be was being judged and found wanting. An absurd desire to have this strange little girl appraise him as a Wind Person seized him. He sat and watched tbe wind-ruled woods.

Tbe child sprang to her feet. “I know,” she cried happily, “if you are a Wind Person you know my Father Wind. Do you see him there by tbe water?”

Carman shifted uneasily. His answer, when it came, was a surprise even to himself. “I see the rushes bowing down and the trees bending as he passes,” he said, “but I do not see him.” Then he added to himself— “I surely; must bq losing my wits.”

Tumbleweed was watching him strangely; she seemed to feel some lack of understanding in his words. ‘ 6 Everybody has to be that much of a Wind Person whether they want to or not,” she said disdainfully, ‘ 6 even the reeds that say bad things about him when he is gone. But,” her voice was growing more and more troubled, even a little angry as she saw how hard it was to make him understand — ‘but,” she began again, “you don’t have to see my Eather Wind with your eyes; you — you feel him here” — with her hand on her heart — “like you do your mother when you’re all alone at night.”

Carman saw her irritation and watched her, half-amused. “What was the song you were singing when you came?” he asked.

The elfin radiance flashed like a flame through Tumbleweed’s figure again and she sprang to her feet. “It’s a song about my father,” she said, “that the minister read last week. It’s my song that I sing to Mm when I’m glad. But,” a fine scorn was growing on her face, “the Nots sing a silly song. They say every few minutes that the nightie had a remus. Do you know what a remus is — and how could the nightie have one?”

Carman had to confess that he did not know what a remus was. He made no attempt to hide his laughter when she had finally made him understand the song to which she alluded by humming the music of Venite Adoremus.

She was startled by his laughter and uncertain as to the cause of it. She wondered if a remus was something the nightie ought not to have. Suddenly she felt the same wild resentment of his laughter that she always felt when she saw the reeds gossiping about the wind behind his back. A storm swept through her. She stamped her foot angrily.

“You’re a Not,” she cried, “and my father will blow you all down and away.”

She had disappeared through the thicket before Carman could stop her. He felt ill at ease. 6 6 I wonder if I am a Not, ’ 9 he said musingly to himself as he lay and watched all the stir of the woods, that stir of which he had never thought till Tumbleweed came. His mind, unused to fantasy, stretched out toward this new realm half fearfully like a child who reaches for a strange new toy. He dreamed a little confusedly of good and evil. Carmen was used to being on the winning side. He had never before had a suspicion that he might be a Hot. The child’s words had come upon him like some strange judgment. His sense of discomfort lessened as the wind brought to him from far away fragments of a chant :

“The wind bloweth

Where listeth ;

Ho knoweth

.cometh,

goeth.”

Chapter II

Tumbleweed edged closer and closer to her mother along the shiny; wooden bench in the waiting-room. She was very; tired for the train that was to bring her small cousins to visit her was late. During the hour she and her mother had been waiting she had exhausted the meager possibilities for amusement offered by the stove, the benches, the local map, and even the fascinating * 6 click — - click — click, click ” of the telegraph instrument in the office.

Mrs. .Warner looked up from her magazine in surprise as Tumbleweed almost threw herself into her lap. A worried look crossed her face for a moment as she noticed the child’s flushed face.

“What is it, dear?” she asked gently.

“1 feel the dark — coming,” Tumbleweed answered with that soft prolongation of the “a” which hints at unknown terrors. The note of breathless mystery in her yoice thrilled through the lighted waiting-room.

A woman on the next bench stirred uneasily and turned to look questioningly at the little girl. Tumbleweed’s voice had that peculiar lilt that personifies, makes momentous with hidden meaning, all of which it speaks. The woman turned away with a shrug. She had half expected to see a prophet — instead she had seen only a little girl with her face hidden in her mother’s mu if.

Mrs. Warner rose.

“Come,” she said; “let’s go out on to the platform to wait. Mother’s girl mustn’t be a coward. We’ll go out into the dark.”

To her surprise Tumbleweed followed her willingly. As she bent to fasten the little girl’s coat she looked half wistfully] into the blue eyes. < ‘Tell mother, why you are afraid, dear,” she said.

“I’m not afraid now,” Tumbleweed answered gravely. “It was just in there where the lights were — and I couldn’t see the dark — I could only feel it — coming.” Tumbleweed’s words were faltering and Mrs. Warner was silent, awaiting the sudden burst of confidence with which her little daughter was prone to explain herself. A train rumbled away into the distance. The snow-decked country stretched out whitely on all sides, till it merged into darkness. Tumbleweed was silent for a moment, watching. Then, as the breeze reached her, she lifted her face, exulting in the joy of spontaneous expression.

“It’s like my cold bath, mother,” she said. “When I hear the water running in bed and think about it I’m afraid, but when it’s closed all over me, like the dark, I love it. Mother, let’s stay in the darkest place, shan ’t we ? I ’m not afraid. ’ ’

The swift lifting of Tumbleweed’s face made Mrs. Warner catch her breath. She knew the ritual significance of the characteristic little gesture. What was there about this little daughter of hers that made people suddenly realize the bonds in which they lived? Was it the trick words had of growing suddenly into symbolism and parable on Tumbleweed’s lips ? The mother had that odd sense that comes now and then to every close observer of children, the sense of being not the teacher but the taught. Would Tumbleweed always choose the darkest place, she wondered — above all, would she always be sure of — the other presence ? Mrs. Warner hesitated to name it, even to herself. Like her little daughter, she was very sure of its existence. She smiled as she watched Tumbleweed and the stationcollie chase each other up and down the platform. The next moment she sighed as she remembered her little daughter’s supreme faith in her naive classifications of the world. It seemed to her no such simple matter as it seemed to Tumbleweed. How was she ever to bring up this little girl of hers — alone ?

The approach of the train cut short the child’s frolic and the mother’s reflections. In a moment Aunt Ellen, with Julie and Baby Ted, had descended on them in the midst of cases and crowds. And with them was Billy, the stranger-boy whom one was to call cousin, forever and ever, just as if he belonged.

Billy was the first directly to address Tumbleweed when he spied her from where she had taken refuge behind her mother. It is a strange and awesome experience to meet three new children : lions and tigers could be no more terrifying. Besides, Tumbleweed was a little jealous of Billy. Billy had achieved a father. She wondered how a little girl could get a father when all her life people had answered her question just one way: “Your father’s in Heaven, dear.” A Father-in-

TUMBLEWEED.

Heaven really was a distinction in school • — still the other little girls said: “Our- Eather-which-art-in-Heaven, ’ ’ and then went home to real fathers. Tumbleweed’s Eather-in-Heaven was — was — • well — far away — not tickly whiskered like Uncle Joe. But then — Billy hadn’t had a mother either. Perhaps you had to have one!

With characteristic boyish directness Billy came straight to the point.

“What’s your name — your real one, not just cousin?”

After a moment’s hesitation he had his answer.

“Tumbleweed.”

‘ 4 Tumbleweed, ’ ’ he repeated ; 6 1 that ’s no name !” Billy had a genius for contradiction. Then, as the little girl only continued to stare at him with large angry eyes, he put his hands in his pockets and announced coolly: “I’m goin’ to call you

‘Wee’ because you are little and so are Julie and Baby Ted.”

At the sound of his name Baby Ted looked up from the serious business of swinging his Teddy Bear.

“Callth — thu — Wee,” he mocked with an adorable little smile, — the mischief dancing in his eyes. Baby Ted was very lazy about pronouncing words correctly; in his little life he had found small need for words. The possessor of such a smile has an instinctive and universal language.

With Baby Ted’s smile Tumbleweed’s anger passed. But she knew with puzzling certainty that she must not speak of her Father Wind before Billy. He might be stuck-up on account of having Uncle Joe. As they walked through the darkness the exciting sense of having been mastered left her somewhat. With a tired little movement she lifted her head. But she flushed when she felt Billy’s eyes upon her and refused to answer when he asked her what she was doing. As she watched Billy she had a return of the sensation she had felt at the station. She could not have told what it was she felt coming — but it had all the discomfort of the unknown.

The wind seemed to be hunting for something as it made its way around the house, now raising its voice in almost articulate questioning, then sinking to a scarcely perceptible call. Tumbleweed shook her head and shrank farther back into the corner where she was hiding. The wind, with true sportsmanlike spirit, passed as if the little figure were invisible.

Tumbleweed’s “Cousin Billy” was it, and Billy was impatient. His searching figure was plainly visible from the corner where Tumbleweed crouched breathless. But in the days since Billy had come Tumbleweed had grown used to being breathless. People always were breathless where Billy was concerned.

Tumbleweed stood up with a shiver of delight as Billy’s “ 6 King’s Ex.’ for Wee” reached her. She ran quickly to the big flag-pole on the rise of ground in front of the house where the other children were gathered. Their shadows, sharp and black on the snow, attracted her attention.

“Oh, let’s play the shadow-tag game,” she called; “that’s the most fun!”

“No, it isn’t.” Billy contradicted from force of habit, then, curiosity overcoming him, he added : i i What is it ? ”

Tumbleweed regarded him uncertainly for a moment. “It’s partly a thinkgame,” she confessed; “so maybe you wouldn’t like it. It’s just tag, that’s all, only instead of touching a person you try to step on his shadow.”

The swift-moving shadows darted back and forth as the children ran ; the excitement and the mystery of the game grew on them. Tumbleweed and Billy tried to outrun their shadows, to capture them by sudden feints and turns, to make them grow larger and smaller at will. Tumbleweed bad almost forgotten that they were playing tag. She had paused, in fascinated wonder, to watch Julie’s shadow, for J ulie had been to dancing school and was bowing and curtsying for the joy of watching the graceful black shadow imitate her.

“Oh, Julie, teach me,” Tumbleweed begged, stretching out her arms. She did not notice Billy creeping up behind her till his shadow fell across hers. Then she made one w r ild leap to escape, but the boy’s sturdy boots were pounding the darkened snow where her shadow lay.

As if the reinforced heels had been stamping her own little body into the ground Tumbleweed cried out.

“Oh, Billy, you naughty, naughty bad boy. You’re a wicked, wicked Not and I hate you! You’ve spoiled my beautiful, beautiful shadow so she can never dance again like Julie’s. She’s all dead!” Tumbleweed dropped on her knees beside tlie trampled snow, crying. Tlie other children stood embarrassed for a moment before her sudden outburst.

Swift-piling winter clouds blotted out the sun. Billy thrust his hands into his pockets and gave a low whistle to show his unconcern. A startled look crossed Julie’s face.

“.Why, my shadow’s gone, too,” she said, “and so are Billy’s and Baby Ted’s.”

“Of course,” Tumbleweed answered simply — “they’ve gone to carry my poor little hurt shadow to Shadow Land. My little shadow is dead,” Tumbleweed repeated. She was beginning to enjoy the novel situation. The idea of death has always a curious attraction for childhood.

“Let’s bury her,” Julie suggested.

Glad of any excuse to burrow in the soft snow, they piled armful after armful over the trampled spot where Tumbleweed’s shadow had laid down its life. But Billy watched from a distance, his curious eyes on Tumbleweed’s changeful face.

TUMBLEWEED.

When Julie and Ted were on the far side of the yard he followed her up the ladder to the little tree platform where she was pulling dead leaves from the branches to serve as flowers for the grave.

“Why did you call me a Not, Wee ; what did you mean?” he asked coaxingly. “You have got a secret, I know you have. Come on, tell me.”

Tumbleweed set her lips stubbornly.

“I know something I won’t tell,” she began, then a little “Oh” escaped her, for Billy had backed down to the ground and with a swift movement taken the ladder away. She was a prisoner in the tree.

He danced merrily around the trunk. “Tell me your secret and I’ll let you down, Wee,” he called. “You can’t come down till you do.”

Tumbleweed winked back the angry tears.

“I’ll never, never tell if I freeze and starve,” she called — “and you’re just a great big, a great big billy.” She was

THE STRANGER-BO^ trying to say ‘ ‘ bully. ’ 9 Then she sat down and swung her feet with rhythmic and maddening disregard of the leading questions from below.

.Very soon she was left alone. It was cold in the tree. Tumbleweed’s conviction as to the necessity of keeping her secret from Billy was stronger than ever. Besides she could never have made him understand this Father Wind of hers — this father who had come to her to take the place of her Eather-in-Heaven. She didn’t understand it herself. But, clearly, something must be done; she was cramped and cold and she couldn’t live in the tree.

Suddenly she leaned out from the bare branches.

“ Billy, oh, Billy,” she called softly.

He came reluctantly. The western sky was glowing with the pink and lavender of a clouded mid-winter sunset. Tumbleweed pointed to it.

“Look!” she whispered.

Billy turned quickly toward the radiant West, gave one long stare, then looked up at his little prisoner.

“I don’t see anything but the sun and the trees, Wee,” he said. Erom the disappointment in his voice it was evident that he had expected at least a giraffe or a giant. “You’re a funny kid,” he added, as he looked curiously at her rapt face.

“I’m not a funny kid,” Tumbleweed flashed back. “But you’re just a great stupid boy, not to know what’s happening when the sky is pink like that. Of course, if you don’t w r ant to hear the secret — ” Tumbleweed paused with a fascinating hint of moreness in her voice. She watched him craftily, her heart beating very fast. If her little ruse should fail — . But Julie came to her rescue.

“What’s happening, Wee; please tell us, ’ ’ she begged. “ Is it a story ? ’ ’ Tumbleweed looked at Billy who was stealing another curious glance at the sky.

6 1 When you bring tbe ladder and let me put both feet on it I’ll tell you,” she promised.

The ladder was brought but Billy’s stern young arm forbade her descent. As Tumbleweed hesitated half-way down, Julie stretched a coaxing red mitten toward her. Tumbleweed, as though giving her secret one farewell hug before she let it go, paused, then she said grandly:

“ When the sky’s pink it is Santa Claus makin’ Christmas candy.”

Billy was obviously disappointed but Julie and Baby Ted, even Tumbleweed herself, watched the glowing sky with the delicious faith and wonder of childhood in their upturned faces. Baby Ted broke the silence.

“Wanth thome tandy now,” he said.

Tumbleweed smiled with the quaint maternity of a very little girl.

“Not till Christmas, Baby Ted,” she said, “then we’ll have lots and lots of pink candy and a beautiful shiny tree.”

Later, she crept out of bed and leaned out of the window in her little white nightie. She looked very uncomfortable, like a culprit about to confess.

“I just wanted to say,” she remarked impersonally, with downcast eyes, “that I didn’t tell Billy the wind secret. I just told him part of a wind thought.” Then, with a deep sigh, she snuggled back to bed. Confession is undoubtedly good for the soul, but the stain of one’s first compromise is not to be lightly wiped away with mere words.

Chapter III Ihen The Prince Came

Tumbleweed looked wearily around the Christmas dinner table. Her mother was talking, and it would never do to interrupt her to ask to be excused. The little girl waited several moments but no pause came, so she slipped from her chair and walked quietly into the adjoining Christmas-tree room.

As she pushed aside the hangings, Tumbleweed closed her eyes and wrinkled her nose. Then, smiling broadly, with little outstretched, groping hands, she made her way across the room to the tree, drawn by the faint delicious odor of balsam which every forest haunter loves.

The sheer, barbaric splendor of its silver and red and green and gold made her 29 heave a little blissful sigh as she laid halfreverent fingers on a cone-laden bough.

“Beautifullest wonder,” she said softly ; “I felt you calling me, so I came.”

Her devouring eyes swept its whole gorgeous height again.

“Don’t shine so — so hard — ” she begged with a little catch in her voice. “You, you 'prick me; you make me feel needly in my heart.”

She turned quickly, on the defensive, as she heard footsteps behind her. But it was only Baby Ted. He had followed her, unnoticed, from the table. She took the little trusting hand he held out and led him close to the tree. In a moment he was pointing excitedly at the candles with their half-burned wicks.

“ Yight gee-gees, Wee,” he begged.

' Tumbleweed pretended not to understand. She had already adopted that deceitful, grown-up habit of extricating herself from an equivocal situation. She knew perfectly well that “yight gee-gees”

meant 1 c light the glitters. ’ 9 Baby Ted had immediately adopted her baby name for: the candles.

Tumbleweed closed her eyes to shut out the sight of his little pleading face. But temptation has more than one avenue of approach, and, failing of the direct means, invariably makes use of the subtler material of the brain. Tumbleweed’s lids could not shut out the memory of the breathless loveliness of the Christmas tree shimmering in candle-light as she had seen it that morning. A moment later she was touching each half-burned wick into flame.

The shining beauty of it held Tumbleweed enthralled. But Baby Ted had spied the long strings of pink candy with which the tree was festooned. By some swift train of association he remembered Tumbleweed’s words of the sunset and, concluding this was the candy of which she had spoken, he reached an eager little hand for it.

Tumbleweed glanced uncomfortably at the tree. She wished Ted had not mentioned her traitorous sharing of the secret before this messenger from the sun- and wind-ruled forest. Then, glancing at the baby, she laughed with strange excitement in her voice. The moment of her penance was upon her.

Later, when the smell of burning cloth brought the frightened grown-ups from the dinner table, Baby Ted, scorched but happy, was playing in a snow pile beside the front door. But Tumbleweed was lying strangely silent, by his side, her hair still smoldering, her hands cruelly burned where she had torn away the baby’s clothing. There was no recognition in her dull blue eyes when Mrs. Warner bent frantically over her.

“Baby — Wee — darling,” she cried, — “why didn’t you come to mother? Oh, what made you come out here?”

Tumbleweed’s heavy eyes lifted.

“My father,” she said, and her voice had a faint echo of its usual lilt; “my father blew the fire out.” Then she crumpled like a withered flower in her mother’s arms.

In the days that followed Billy was excluded from the sick-room because his presence excited Tumbleweed. But Julie and Baby Ted grew very dear to the little invalid during her long weeks of convalescence. The little girls formed that peculiarly intimate friendship which probably comes to each child but once. Tumbleweed said and solemnly believed that she could never have any other friend — and Julie found her heart’s desire in Wee. Haloed days, alight with the wonder of one’s first exploration in another soul, were theirs !

Late one afternoon when Tumbleweed was almost well, she and Julie were sitting before the fire. Julie had been reading from a wonderful book of fairy-tales and the two children were poring over the picture of a beautiful princess, high on the back of a gallant white horse behind her rescuer prince. Suddenly Tumbleweed raised her head and looked at her little companion. The firelight shed an unwonted splendor over Julie’s eager face and softened her vivid coloring into real beauty.

“ Julie,” Tumbleweed spoke slowly, with the mystery note in her voice ; “you’re most beautiful enough to be a princess — maybe you are.”

Julie’s radiant color deepened as she laughed.

“Let’s both be princesses,” she cried generously. “Oh, let’s dress up while mother and auntie are gone. I’ll wear my play costume and find something for you!”

She was gone and back like a flash, arms piled high with finery, while Tumbleweed sought eagerly for her best slippers and silk stockings. Julie preened before the mirror in her dainty little costume, now pinning a curl high, now retying a bow. But Tumbleweed was absorbed in the strange thrill of her trailing skirts and the shimmering beauty of her mother’s best scarf which she had taken from its soft tissue wrappings. She did not even glance at the mirror. Up and down they trailed, reveling in their unusual garb. Then Tumbleweed sat on the steps watching Julie’s gay little figure as she danced down the hall.