Squib and His Friends

by Evelyn Everett-Green

Yes, positively fifty! Fifty pages for Seppi to fill with drawings of his goats, his dog, perhaps even the outlines of the hills or the little picturesque water-troughs or bridges.

“I’m sure she won’t mind when I tell her about Seppi. I never draw. I don’t think I have time or know how. I’ll get Seppi to give me one of his drawings for her, and when I tell her all about him and how pleased he was, I’m sure she’ll be glad for him to have it.”

For the sketch-book had been given to Squib by an aunt of his, who had come to say good-bye at the Chase before they all went away. He had wandered into her room one day, as he had a way of doing, and this book was lying on the table. He asked its use, and was told that it was a sketch-book, and after they had talked a little more his aunt had said he might have it, and that perhaps he would be able to bring home a few little sketches of some of the things he had seen in Switzerland, or of the chalet in which he was going to live.

Of course Squib had been delighted with his new possession, and at the time had fancied he should draw a great deal. He was yet more sure of this when his aunt had given him a box of coloured chalks with beautiful fine points to help him with his picture-making. But somehow, since his arrival at the chalet, other interests had come uppermost, and Squib had really not thought of his sketch-book at all since he had unpacked it and put it carefully at the bottom of the cupboard, until reminded of it to-day.

Now as it lay open on his knee, and he drew out the box of chalks and looked lovingly at them—for they were very pretty—he felt a glow of pleasure in picturing the happiness they would give. It was just a little more difficult to think of parting with the chalks than with the book, but Squib would not let himself hesitate for a moment.

“You greedy boy!” he said aloud in a tone of stern admonition, “you know you have got so many things yourself you don’t know hardly what to do with them all; and Seppi has got almost nothing, and is lame, and can’t do anything but sit still all day and mind his goats. And you can’t draw a bit, hardly, and he can beautifully. You’re just to give him everything and not be a pig. I’m ashamed of you, I really am, thinking you’d like to keep those chalks yourself!”

And Squib shook his head quite fiercely at himself, and scrambled to his feet with sketch-book and chalks safe in his grasp. He made them up into a neat parcel and put them into his bag, and then went off to find Lisa and tell her all about Seppi.

Lisa knew Seppi quite well, and said that he was a very good little boy, and that his parents were very honest, hard-working people. Their name was Ernsthausen, and they had lived a long time in the valley. The father went off to the mountains to act as a guide during the summer, and the mother stayed at home and cultivated their bit of land with the aid of one son and daughter, whilst little lame Seppi minded the goats and did a little wood-carving sometimes, though there was not much sale for it up here, and so many people carved nowadays that it was not always easy to get money for such work.

Squib listened with great attention and interest, many plans coming into his head the while. Perhaps he would get Seppi to give him some lessons in carving and pay him for them. He would speak to mother about it sometime, when he knew Seppi better and had time to begin. He would like to carve above everything. He had already bought a good many charming little carved-wood animals at Interlaken to give to sisters and friends at home, but to be able to carve them for himself would be yet more attractive and delightful.

Next day Squib was off betimes to his new valley, which in his mind he had already christened the Vale of the Silent Watchers. There was a vein of poetry running through Squib’s nature, which helped him to enjoy the scenes about him as he could not otherwise have done, and those two silent peaks, with their crowns of everlasting snow, looking down on the smiling valley and shutting it in (as it appeared to him) at either end, had powerfully affected his imagination. His dreams that night had all been of mountain giants and snowy solitudes, and he awoke eager to talk more with Seppi about the ideas which came crowding into his head.