CHAPTER XV
SPRING WANDERING
"There goes another," said Helma as she stood in the door the very nextmorning after her return. "The littlest Forest Child that was, and allby himself. He seems rather small to go spring-wandering alone."
"He likes to go alone," Ivra answered. She was setting the table forbreakfast, and Eric was helping her. "'Most always he's playing orwandering off by himself somewhere."
Helma stood watching the little fellow until he had vanished amid thedelicate green of the forest morning. Then she tossed back her hair witha shake of her head and cried gayly, "Let's go wandering ourselves,pets. It's good to be home, but we have all our lives for that now.Let's adventure!"
The children were overjoyed. They did not want to wait for breakfast.But Helma thought they had better, for no one knew where, when or howtheir next meal would be. Of course, though, it was hard to eat. Youknow yourself how you feel about food when you are going on anadventure. However the bowls of cereal were swallowed somehow. Then thestoutest sandals were strapped on, and the three were ready to set out.
First they went to Nora's farm and before they had waited many minutesin the shadow of the trees on the edge of the field Nora came from thedoor carrying their jug of milk. They ran to meet her and tell her notto leave any more milk until they should come back. How glad the oldwoman was to see Helma. "I thought spring would bring you," she said."Spring frees everything."
Then Helma, Ivra and Eric were off for their spring wandering. It seemedas though every one else was wandering, too, for they could hardly walka mile without meeting some friend or stranger Forest Person. All gavethem greeting, whether stranger or friend, and all looked very glad thatHelma was in the forest again, for good news travels fast there, andeven the strangers knew of her home-coming.
In a secret wooded valley, walking softly to hear the birds and thethousand little other songs of earth, they suddenly came upon a strangeand thrilling sight. A party of little girls and boys all in brightcolored frocks, purple, orange, green, blue, yellow, were putting thefinishing touches on an air-boat they were making. It was built ofdelicate leaved branches and decorated with wild flowers. A great anchorof dog-tooth violets hung over the sides and kept it on the ground.
When they saw Helma and the children coming so silently toward them theyjumped into the boat and crowded there looking like a bunch of largerspring flowers. Then they drew in the anchor rapidly. But the littlegirl sitting high in the back, the one in the torn yellow dress and withblowing cloud-dark hair, cried, "Oh, no fear, it's Ivra and her motherand the clear-eyed Earth Child. Want to come, Ivra? We're off springwandering among the white clouds."
Ivra shook her head and called, "Not unless three of us can come."
"Too full for that," called down the yellow-frocked one, for now theboat had lifted softly almost to the tree tops. "Your Earth Child wouldweigh us down. So hail and farewell. Good wandering!"
So the three on the ground stood looking up and waving and calling back,"Good wandering!" until the green boat had drifted away and away and waslost in the spring sky. But for a long time after, there floated down tothem in the valley far laughter and glad cries.
The spring nights were cold, and so at twilight they made themselves ashelter of boughs. They slept as soon as it was night and woke and wereoff at the break of dawn. Helma carried sweet chocolate in her pockets,and forest friends and strangers offered them from their store all alongthe way. Sometimes when they were tired or warm with walking they wouldclimb into the top of some tall tree, and there swinging among the coolnew leaves, Helma began telling them her World Stories again, while thechildren looked off over the trembling forest roof and watched forhoming birds.
But when the hemlock and fir trees began to crowd out the maples andoaks, Helma said quietly one day, "We are nearing the sea." "The sea,"cried Eric almost wild with sudden delight. "Shall we see it? Shall weswim in it? Oh, I have never seen it!"
"Oh, I saw it from Spring's shoulder," Ivra cried--she really thoughtshe had--"But mother, mother, what a wonderful surprise you had for us!"
They began to run in their eagerness. But Helma held them back. "It's aday's journey yet," she said. And so they walked as patiently as theycould down a long, long slope through dark firs and hemlocks.
It was noon of the following day when they finally came to the sea. Theyhad struggled through a thick undergrowth of thorned bushes where thegreat arms of the firs shut out everything ahead. Then suddenly theywere out of it, in the open, on the shore with the waves almost lappingtheir toes. It was high tide. The blue sea stretched away to the bluesky.
Eric's legs gave way under him, and he knelt on the white sand, justlooking and looking at the bigness of it, the splendor of it, the colorof it, and listening to the music of it. Ivra ran right out into thefoam brought in by the breakers, up to her waist, where she splashed thewater with her palms until her hair and face were drenched with saltspray. Helma stood looking away to foreign countries which she couldalmost see.
But they were not left long to themselves. The heads of a little girland boy and a young woman appeared over the crest of a great wave, andthe three were swept up to the shore. They grabbed Ivra and drew heralong with them as they passed, laughing musically. Ivra did not like itat first, and sprang away from them the minute she could shake herselffree. But when she saw their merry faces and heard them laugh, shereturned shyly.
The children were about Eric's and Ivra's ages, and the young woman wastheir mother. The children's names were Nan and Dan, and the woman'sname was Sally. But though they had Earth names they were of thefairy-kind,--called in the Forest "Blue Water People."
Just peer into a clear pool or stream, almost any bright day, and youwill be pretty sure to see one of them looking up at you. They are thesauciest and most mischievous of all fairies. Only stare at them alittle, and they will mock you to your face with smiles and pouts, andwill not go away as long as you stay. For they have no fear of you orany Earth People. They follow their streams right into towns and cities,under bridges and over dams. You are as likely to find one in your citypark as in the Forest.
Helma spoke to Sally, while the children eyed each other curiously. Shesaid, "How happy you Blue Water People must be now Spring has freed youat last!"
Sally dropped down on the beach, her dark hair flung like a shadow onthe sand. Her laughing face looked straight up into the sky. Shestretched her arms above her head.
"He came just in time. Another day--and we would have had to breakthrough the ice ourselves. Truly. We've never had such a long winter.Why, a _month_ ago we began to look for Spring. We lay with our facespressed against the cold ice for hours at a time, watching. We couldjust see light through, and shadows now and then."
"And then I saw him first," cried Dan, who was listening to his mother.
"No, I!" cried Nan.
"No, no," Sallv laughed. "I heard him, singing, a long way off. And Icalled you children away from your game of shells. When his foot touchedthe ice we danced in circles of joy, and tapped messages through to himwith our fingers. The ice vanished under his feet, and our stream rushedhither away to the sea. We came with it, and waved him hail and farewellas we poured down. Who can stop at home in spring-time? And we had beenice-bound so long!"
"And now we're here," boasted Dan, "I'm going to swim across the seato-morrow,--or the next day!"
"You're too little for that. Calm water is best, or little rushingstreams," warned Sally.
"What is it like across the sea?" asked Eric. "Another world?"
"I'll tell you about it in the next story," promised Helma. "And thenwhen I have told you, Eric, you may want to go across yourself and seethe wonders."
Eric drew a deep breath. "Yes, you and Ivra and I. In a boat." Hepointed to a white sail far out stuck up like a feather slantwise in thewater.
Ivra clapped her hands.
But Helma shook her head. "When you go, it must be alone, Ivra and Ibelong to the Forest."
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"Why, then I don't want to go, ever." Eric shook the thought from himlike water.
"Well, let's swim across now," Dan shouted, and ran into the waves,falling flat as soon as he was deep enough and swimming fast away. Theother children followed him, ready for a frolic. You or I would havefound that water very cold, but these were hardy children; and one ofthem all winter had made comrades of the Snow Witches, remember.
They waded out to the surf and plunged through it, head first. They tookhands and floated in a circle beyond, rising and falling in the evenmotion of the rollers. Nan was very mischievous, and soon succeeded inpushing Eric out, under where the waves broke. When he looked upsuddenly and saw the great watery roof hanging over him, he wasterrified but he did not scream. People who comraded with Ivra could notdo that. He shut his eyes tight, and then thundering down came thewater-roof, and a second after, up bobbed Eric like a cork, choking andsputtering. They were laughing at him, even Ivra. The minute the saltwater was out of his eyes he laughed, too, and tried to push Nan intothe surf. But she was too quick for him, and slipped away, farther outto sea.
Then began a game of water tag. Eric, because he was not such a goodswimmer as the others, was It most of the time. But Ivra had to take afew turns as well. It was impossible to catch the other two. They movedin the water as reflected light moves along a wall, not really swimmingat all, but flashing from spot to spot.
Helma and Sally lay on the sand in the spring sunshine and talked abouttheir children.
"Nan and Dan tear their clothes so," sighed Sally, "I could spend all mytime mending."
"I must make little Eric some new clothes," said Helma. "I hope I havecloth enough at home."
"Nan is naughty, but she is a darling," laughed Sally as Eric was pushedunder the surf.
Helma waited to see that he came up smiling and then said, "Ivra andEric never quarrel. They play together from morn till night like twosquirrels."
. . . They all had lunch together on the shore. The Blue Water Childreninstead of eating smelled some spring flowers which Sally had found.That is the way they always take their nourishment. Helma turned somelittle cakes of chocolate out of her pockets, and though at first itseemed like a small luncheon, when it was all eaten they felt satisfied.
All the afternoon the children played up and down the beach. They founda smooth round pink sea-shell which they used for a ball. Eric was thebest at throwing. It made him happy and proud to excel in something atlast. He taught them how to play base ball, which he had once watchedMrs. Freg's boys playing on Sundays in the back yard. They used a pieceof drift wood for a bat, and when the shell got accidentally batted intothe sea the Blue Water Children fielded it like fishes.
When they were tired of ball, the Blue Water Children drew lines on thesand for "hop scotch,"--a game they had sometimes watched city childrenplaying in a park,--and taught Ivra and Eric about that.
Then they built a castle of sand, and walled it in with sea shells.Helma showed them how to make the moat and the bridge, and Sally and shetook turns and made up a story about the castle and told it to them.
Towards evening some Earth People came by, near to the shore, in alittle steam launch. There were men and women and several children init. They crowded into the side of the boat towards the shore to starecuriously at Helma and Eric. They could not see the others, of course.Helma with her free, bright hair and bare feet looked very strange tothem. And they could not understand what Eric was doing with his armsheld straight out at each side. He was between Dan and Nan, holdingtheir hands, and standing to watch. But the Earth People looked rightthrough the Blue Water Children, or thought they were shadows perhaps.
One of the men put his hands to his mouth like a megaphone and called toHelma, asking her if she did not want to be picked up. They thought herbeing there in that wild place with a little boy, alone, and barefooted,very singular. They thought she might have been shipwrecked. But Helmashook her head, and so they had to take their wonder away with them. Theboat swept by.
Ivra ran out into the waves waist deep to watch the strange thing. Shehad never seen a steam launch before, or anything like it. A baby, heldin his nurse's arms, caught sight of her and waved tiny dimpled hands,calling and cooing. She saw his sparkling eyes, his light fuzzy hair,his little white dress and socks. She ran farther into the water, wavingback to him and throwing him dozens of kisses. But no one else in theboat saw her, and after a minute the baby's attention turned to a seagull flying overhead.
Ivra returned to shore, her face shining. There had been no doubt ofit--the baby had seen her at once, and had had no doubts. He had laughedand reached his hands to her. The little Fairy Child almost huggedherself with delight. . . .
They built themselves shelters of drift wood when night fell. Eric's wasjust large enough for him to crawl into and lie still. One whole side ofit was open to the sea. Soft fir boughs made his bed, and Helma had lefta kiss with him. But he did not sleep for a long while. He lay on hisside looking out over the star-sprinkled water and up at thestar-flowering sky. And he could not have told how or from where thecommand had come, but he knew as he looked that he must cross that seaand go into the new world beyond it and see all things for himself.World Stories were good. But they were not enough.
How he was to go, or how live when he got there--he did not once thinkof that. Just that he _was_ to go filled his whole mind. He forgot thathe had said he would not go without Helma and Ivra. He did not think ofthem at all. He just lay still listening to the sea's command to gobeyond and beyond.