In the twig high-chair slept Peggy, the rag doll, her arms dangling, her whole attitude one of peaceful repose.
Boy crept in and shamefacedly swept the cob-webs from her poor little face. Then he sat down on the stump-chair, and, laying his arms on the table, rested his head upon them.
In the open the clouds scudded low above the trees, and it began to snow. Boy arose and walked about the little house, his eyes searching it for the small trinkets the girl had treasured there. A bunch of dead flowers rustled in the cracked cup on the bark shelf. They were tied with a gorgeous bit of red flannel, which, he remembered, Gloss had been careful to explain was watered silk. Boy smiled and pressed the knot between his fingers.
On the floor lay a home-woven straw hat. Its decorations, too, were of woodland flowers faded to ashes and scentless. Boy caught it up and held it at arm’s length; then he threw it from him and sprang out into the darkening wood again.
He hurried on, passing the tree-swing where he and the girl had played so many summers. He passed through the hickory grove where they had garnered the nuts for the winter’s cracking; through this and into the heavier timber and deeper shadow where the light was very dim and forest whispers stirred and vibrated. A fox glided across his path, switching into a clump of hazel-bushes. A cock grouse, drumming upon a decayed log, arose on thundering wing to dip into a clump of trees far to the left. Farther into the wood the cluck of a wild turkey sounded. Boy heeded none of these things. On and on he strode,—his an aimless goal; his one desire, to come up with that something urging and elusive,—something he feared though treasured and could not understand.
Later, he stood in the low-lying wilderness of the Elm Swamp. And there, perhaps, his great Mother pityingly solved for him the problem of a new unrest. There where day’s light wavered faintly like foggy starlight, his soul shook off its brooding, and the old glad fearless light came back to his eyes.
“No, we ain’t girl and boy no more,” he whispered; and lifting his arms high he laughed.
What he had received from the forest soothed his spirit as the starry snowflakes, falling on his upturned face, soothed his burning flesh.
At mid-day the setter crept back to his old place by the ash-leach and lay down. A little later Boy came up the path. He stooped down and patted the dog’s head, and noting his tangled hair, laughed softly.
“Joe, old pup, I thought it was me who had to roam among the briers and the burrs, but I see you’ve been there, too.”