Eepersip saw no more of the Brunios or her parents, and she decided that they had given up chasing her and Snowflake for the winter—a winter which she and her two friends spent undisturbed, playing with the leaves and shadows.
It was spring—spring before the third summer that Eepersip was to spend wild—and the golden sun melted away the last patches of snow from off the bare rocks and from round the pool, where it had lodged between them. It was warm, although a wind was blowing—the delicious wind of spring. This marvellous spring air made her blood course quickly. She felt extremely happy and dancy. Her body seemed to her lighter than ever, in spite of its strength. Her spirit was so joyous that she could not express it in action; she had to let part of it out in song. But song, however light and happy, could not quite express Eepersip’s feeling. She danced, and she sang, and she leaped aloft for joy.
As the season advanced, she crowned herself with sweet-smelling flowers, and the butterflies came and lit on them. She went up the pool wearing her fluttering crown, and there she saw the flowers that had come to bloom. There was iris, purple and gold—huge blossoms which reminded Eepersip of the ocean as she had seen it, so far away, on the first day of her wandering. In a soft bed of green moss she found a little pink-and-white flower that she didn’t know, bell-shaped and very fragrant. There were wild-rose-buds there, too, and never had Eepersip seen so many butterflies as were on those roses. They bordered the tiny beach, mingled with the tenderly uncurling green ferns. The delicate red leaf-buds on the maple-trees were now developing into tiny emerald leaves. And there were ever so many other treasures of Nature there.
Eepersip played little happy games with all the creatures of the field. One game she played with the crickets. A cricket would be hiding in a certain place, and when Eepersip danced by he would buzz out of the grass into her face; she would pretend to be startled and would run from the spot. She played another game with the grasshoppers. One would be hiding, and Eepersip would come dancing by with her eyes shut. Then the grasshopper would whirr out of the grass and alight on her hand. When she opened her eyes she would shake her hand and try to get rid of him, all in fun, of course. Then sh e played two lovely games with the happy butterflies. She would let a butterfly alight on her hand, to which she would then give a violent jerk, so that the butterfly was sent sailing into the air; then, without a motion of the wings, he would come sailing back to Eepersip’s hand. This they would do again and again. When she tired of this game, Eepersip would crown herself with the sweetest flowers she could find, and then flocks of butterflies would try to alight on her wreath as she danced. There were never enough flowers for all of them; some were always fluttering around Eepersip’s head, trying to find a nestling-place, and others were safely folded in the blossoms.
One of the thrilling hours of Eepersip’s happy life that summer was when she lay in the meadow watching the sky and all the swallows circling. Snowflake and Chippy were frolicking gayly in the short, dry grass, chasing leaves. Now Chippy snuggled up to Eepersip. Snowflake kept on playing; she was crouched on her little white belly, playing with a dry brown leaf, and when it drifted beyond her reach she would spring after it. Eepersip watched her in a dreamy way. Now Snowflake cast the dead leaf away, having torn it to shreds, and played with other things. Sometimes she would rear herself up into the air; at other times she would run with little tripping steps over to Eepersip, as if something had frightened her; again she would rush round and round Eepersip in a wide circle, and finally she would settle down to play with another dead leaf. It made Eepersip glad to hear the kitten’s little pattering feet on the grass; she knew how madly Snowflake was frolicking, but she did not share in the play—instead, with a dreamy happiness, she watched the sky.
Another day in this summer was even happier. It was in July, and Eepersip was lying in a part of the meadow where there weren’t many deer, so that the grass was long, soft, and green instead of stiff and short. Snowflake and Chippy were frolicking around in it, but again Eepersip was not thinking of them. She wast thinking the swallows that flew over her, and the way the sun shone on their breasts, making them glitter like silver. The crickets were chirping, and the grasshoppers were accompanying them, and they were both very happy. The frogs croaked bass songs from the pool—the cool, green frogs! The birds were singing merrily, and the butterflies passed over Eepersip’s head in flocks—butterflies of white and purple and blue and yellow, little ones of copper-green, and big ones of orange and red. Some of them flew with short, quick flirts of the wings, others with long strokes which swept them through the air. The gauzy dragonflies, too, flew over her. Everything thrilled Eepersip’s happy, tireless eyes.
The bees hummed their way low over the long green grass, and Chippy and Snowflake leaped high in the air when they passed. Eepersip had taught the two little animals not to catch the creatures of the field, and before long all the birds loved Snowflake—something that few kittens have yet attained. But Snowflake and Chippy liked to pretend to catch the bees, and sometimes they went so far as to hold them: on the ground with their paws, very gently, not hurting them at all. Snowflake and Chippy lay in the grass, reaching and touching anything that took their fancy. When the wind blew they would leap up at the clover-blossoms that nodded. They played hide-and-seek, leaping over the grasses and chasing each other in and out of their hiding-places. The long grass offered a splendid place of concealment. Chippy would scurry behind a big sheltering tuft, seeming to Snowflake to have vanished in mid-air. Snowflake would poke about and run in such bewildering circles that it tired them looking at each other. Soon they would get so mixed up that they wouldn’t know which of them was supposed to be hiding, and it often happened that they were both hiding at the same time, or both searching.
This was for Eepersip the happiest of that summer’s hours in the field. Something fresh and fragrant in the air made breathing a delight; it almost lifted her off the ground, and she let forth a glorious burst of song.