Long ago, the Indians left the banks of the beautiful river, but the yellow flowers bloom on beside its clear waters; and the white children call them the “Orchid,” or “Lady’s Slipper,” or give them their real name, the “Indian Moccasins.”
III.
THE LITTLE GHOST WHO LAUGHED.
Dolores sat beside Aunt Polly, in the door of the cabin. The setting sun shone on her yellow curls, changing her into a veritable “Goldilocks,” peeped into her blue eyes, until she was obliged to shut them. It shone on Aunt Polly’s black face, causing it to glisten like black satin, and on her clean calico dress and white apron; for this was Sunday evening, and she was resting from her labors.
Across the fields, its light was reflected from the roof and chimneys of “The House,” as Aunt Polly called it; for there she had lived as a slave before the war, and to her it was the only house of importance in the neighborhood. Dolores watched the sun climb from the roof and chimneys to the gilded points of the lightning-rods, turning them to flashing spear points. Then it was gone; and she breathed a sigh.
Aunt Polly heard it. “What’s the mattah, honey girl?”
“I’m lonesome, Aunt Polly; won’t you tell me ’bout the little ghost girl up at the house?”
“Now, sugah, I have to be away from home all day to-morrow, and you’ll be here alone; that story will make you feel skeery.”
“I won’t be afraid. Besides, I’ll go to school, maybe.”
“Bless yo heart now, will you? Well, I’ll tell you then, ’cause yo goin’ to be so good. Well, honey, when I was a young girl, I lived up at The House; that was befo’ the wah. I was one of the house servants, sort of waitin’ maid, and table maid, too. Well, one stormy night, I was in the dinin’-room, settin’ the dinnah table. The rain and sleet was bangin’ aginst the windows, and it was growin’ mighty dark. I thought I’d go out and shut the shuttahs; I thought I’d run out the front doah, and close the pahlor shuttahs too. The lamp wasn’t lit in the hall yet, and as I went through, it seemed to me I saw somethin’ white curled up on the lower stair. I opened the front doah so that I could see bettah what it was, and then I turned and went to it, and there, cuddled all up in a heap, was a strange little girl. She had a little peaked white face and great blue eyes, and her hair was about the coloh of you-all’s. She had on a little white dress, and had somethin’ in her hands—looked like a man’s cap, and it was all torn and bloody; and there was blood on her dress.