“But that was a splendid adventure,” said Ruth, “and you were a wonder, Rose. We must tell Marmie.”
“If we can only remember. But we never do when she’s here, Ruth,” returned Rose, puzzling again over the freakish forgetfulness that came to them whenever they tried to recall for the benefit of others any of their many trips through the Magic Gate.
CHAPTER XV
The Little Quaker-City Maid
There are many miracles, only we become used to them in time, and forget their marvel. We look calmly at the tiny chick pecking its way out of the egg, a downy thing with bright black eyes and crowded full of lively motion where only a short while ago there was no more than a yolk and a white with shell to keep them together. We see a worm turn to a butterfly and go on unconcerned. We see a baby begin to walk and to talk, and we behave as though that were to be expected—and so it is, for we live in the midst of marvellous happenings, as I began by saying.
And here were Rose and Ruth in the thick of the miracle of spring. Only yesterday there was nothing much to speak of. Just a beginning, a hint, a mist over the trees, a green tinge to the grass. To-day ... what a transformation.
Blue-birds were twittering and flying, song-sparrows tuning up. The trees had brought out leaves and tassels and sweet-smelling fringes. Willows were burning with yellow and rose, windflowers nodded, and Marmie’s snowdrops and crocuses were all abloom along the south wall of the house. There was a delirious quality to the air, and bees hummed. One white butterfly teetered over the yellowest crocus.
The girls were wild for the school hours to pass—Marmie always taught them, for there was no school within reach—so that they could be out in it all. And Marmie let them take their luncheon and ride over to the little lake with their rods after trout.
“Be home by sunset, dears,” she had said, “and have a good time. There are many, many nice things in this old world, but being a child in spring is one of the best.”
They had a wonderful day of it, and each of them had caught plenty of fish, fine fellows that would make dandy eating for supper. Lunch had been delicious, and the spring day increasingly beautiful. Now, in the warm, mild afternoon, they felt delightfully lazy.
The ponies were cropping the grass, the fish were in the creel, and that was hung up on the limb of a tree, where it reached the water. Side by side the sisters lay, their heads resting on their saddles, drinking in the lovely day through every pore.