Sweet and as dear as that you gave to me.
—William Theodore Peters.
CHANNOAH
BY EDWARD LUCAS WHITE
The garden had been overgrown these three years. As the house was tenantless nothing was ever trimmed or cut and the paths skinned over with the green of intrusive weeds. The shrubs expanded into masses of high dense leafage, the roses had run into long stems that covered the walls or wound under the tall wavy grass, the annuals had seeded themselves till they mingled in every bed, and the whole was a delightful wilderness, more flowery than any wood and more woodland than any garden. Milly and Jack regarded the place as their own special domain. The house belonged to Milly’s father and they were left to enjoy the garden unwatched and undisturbed. Because their fathers were partners in business they had made up their minds to marry when they grew up and they announced their intention with the preternatural seriousness of a boy of five and a girl of three. As they were really fond of each other they never wearied of being together and as a part of their precocious program they cared nothing for other playmates. The garden was theirs and they were each others’ and they lived in a community where children were little overseen or tended. So they spent day after day in games of their own invention, with no companion except a black kitten. Milly, who was proud of her French, had named it Channoah and would have been deeply grieved if anyone had insinuated that her pronunciation was far from Parisian. Channoah was able to do without his mother when they first began their games in the spring and was still a kittenish cat when the autumn merged into winter. He entered into their sports with almost a human interest and those long happy summer days made a background for both the boy and the girl, which loomed up behind all their future memories and where there were endless pictures of each other, in long processions, punctuated and divided by various postures and contortions of a coal-black kitten. As they grew older and their companionship continued they had passwords all for themselves and jokes that no one else entered into, all full of allusions to the same pet.
II.
It was a rather awkward boy who came home from college for his summer vacation. He had not seen his native place since the autumn before, and the letters which had told him he must remain at college, and which had disclosed most tenderly the fall in the family’s fortunes had been worded so carefully that he had not realized the full force of what had happened and had chafed at his exile as if it were not inevitable. The first sight he had of his mother waiting on the platform brought it all home to him. Her dress told more than any words could have conveyed. He made a brave effort to be bright and took care not to stare round him at the ugly walls of the cramped and unfamiliar house, nor to look too curiously at the furnishings. The gaps in the old belongings struck a chill to his heart, but he chattered away about the college life to which he was to return, and over their painfully frugal supper all were as cheery as old. The talk was a trifle nervous and there was an anxiety to let no pause occur, but nothing marred the warm greeting which had been made ready for him and the meal ended naturally. The afternoon of talk had exhausted most of what the greeters and the greeted had to ask and answer and after they left the table the boy slipped into the entry and was hunting for his cap among a litter of coats and capes, with a sick longing for the old hall-piece and a strong distaste for the plain little walnut hat-tree. The mother slipped out after him, shut the door noiselessly behind her and asked: