Delphi Complete Works of Thorne Smith (Illustrated), page 38
“Except me,” I said, and Natty was reduced to silence.
It was with these slight but essential formalities that I was received into the band of youthful beachcombers. They amused me, these seaside urchins, but in turn they insisted on being amused, and in spite of my earnest protests, they succeeded on the second day in launching me forth on a story the end of which was still nebulous in my mind.
“Tell us anything,” they insisted when I endeavored to escape on the plea of ignorance. “You must know something, some sort of a story. Make one up.”
The children were sprawled round me on the sand, their serious faces expectantly turned to mine. From a blue, cloudless sky the sun showered down on us wave upon wave of heat which a breeze blowing in from the sea caught in its cool embrace and tempered pleasantly. At our feet the surf sleepily rose and fell and high over head a scattering of sea gulls diligently searched the sky. As I turned my eyes from one face to another, the stolid patience of the expressions I encountered gave me to understand that further resistance was useless, and rather than risk the general condemnation of my implacable audience, I began with a brave show of confidence, “Well, children, it seems that there was an old deer—”
“When?” interrupted a voice.
“Very well,” I agreed hastily, realizing that I had sinned against both convention and good taste. “What I meant to say was, that once upon a time there was an old deer who lived in the forest with her little baby deer, of whom she was very proud. But one day the little deer strayed away from its mother’s side and was killed by a woodsman who lived in a clearing in the forest with his wife and their little daughter. Now when the old deer, whose name was Tonka, found out what the woodsman had done, she was so overcome with grief and rage that she decided to revenge herself on the woodsman by stealing his little daughter and killing her in the forest. So one day she stood for a long time watching at the fringe of the trees until at last the little girl came close to her and then Tonka led the child farther and farther away until she had it at her mercy in the deep woods. But when Tonka was about to kill the helpless little girl with her hoofs, the baby smiled up at her and the old deer, remembering her own baby, felt so sad and lonely she decided that instead of killing the woodsman’s daughter, she would adopt her in place of the little deer he had killed.
“Well, the years passed, and the child grew up to be a slim and beautiful young girl. Her hair was the color of a rusty cloud when it is kindled by the sun, and her eyes were deep blue and honest, like the sea on a calm day when the sky is high and filled with sunlight. The young members of the herd became her brothers and sisters and she learned how to speak their language, and Tonka was her mother. At night when the moon came out the girl would dance in the moonlight and the deer would stand round in a circle and look on. In the middle of the moon-flooded space and surrounded by the soft, glowing eyes of the deer, she would stand straight and slim, like a silver birch, and dance the Dance of the Trees. With her white arms extended above her head, she would sway from side to side in the clutch of a magic wind, then suddenly as though uprooted by the storm, she would leap high in the air and spin around with her hair whipping out behind her. Then she would stop abruptly and throwing herself down on Tonka’s flank she would lie there panting while the older deer told stories of when the forest was young and Pan played among the trees.
“Then one day the Lord of the North rode down the peaceful valley with his swift-footed hounds, and began to hunt the deer. Now this grim knight was so cruel and bloodthirsty that his castle was coated with ice and nothing would grow near it. No living creature ever ventured close to his home nor were there any bird notes in the air. Life was cold and dead at this place and none of the servants was ever known to smile.
“At last, when the Lord of the North came upon the deer, he sent his dogs in chase of them with a loud blast from his horn, and he himself on his coal-black steed, followed in pursuit. The herd broke and fled in a panic of fear, but the great dogs were soon among the stragglers and sprang upon the weakest of them all. The other deer swept on ahead, but the girl remained behind to fight for her little brother so that when the riders came upon them they captured both the deer and the girl, and carried them back to the knight.
“When the knight saw what a beautiful creature they had brought to him from the woods, he had her placed in front of him on his horse and he ordered his men to strap the wounded deer behind him. Thus with his two prizes he rode away from the quiet valley up the bleak, winding passage leading to his castle. And when he finally reached his stronghold, a strange thing took place, for no sooner had the girl’s foot touched the frozen ground than the ice melted from the old stone walls and flowers sprang up from between the chinks in the stone. And the dead trees came back to life, golden blossoms covering their branches. There was the sound of a thousand silver wings in the air and a flock of gay plumed birds flew down on the place scattering songs about them. The sun came out from behind the clouds and the ground became springy under foot. It was a remarkable transformation and it seemed that even the cold heart of the Lord of the North was a little thawed, for he carried the girl into the castle and had her dressed in rich garments, and he put jewels in her hair and around her throat. Then he had his servants prepare a table for her on which there were fruits and rare dishes.”
“What sort of dishes?” asked Natty’s brother in a thick voice.
“Just rare dishes,” shouted several of his elders reprovingly.
Thoroughly engrossed now in the story, I continued, “But the girl would have none of the wonderful things until she had been permitted to bathe the wounds of her brother and to give him water to drink, for the poor little deer was very thirsty, his throat was parched, and he longed to go back to the forest from this strange and faraway place.
“The girl lived a long time at the castle, and as the days passed a gradual change took place in the knight. He no longer hunted the deer and his terrible bow hung neglected over the fireplace, while his great dogs dreamed of the hunt in their sleep and grew fat. The gentleness of the girl and her strange kinship with nature had a strong influence over this fierce man and caused him to grow kinder and more thoughtful, although there were still times when he looked longingly up at his bow. His fingers itched to hold it, and his ears ached to hear the thrilling twang of its string.
“Then the girl fell in love with the Lord of the North and they were married. To celebrate his wedding day, the knight allowed the little deer its liberty, and the girl gave it a message to take back to Tonka and her brothers and sisters in the forest. All went well with the girl and her husband until one day when he was alone he spied a deer on his lawn, and unable to resist the temptation, he seized his bow and quiver and shot an arrow at it. The arrow flew straight to its mark, wounding the deer in the leg, and the dogs raced across the lawn to capture it. But just in time the girl came running from the castle and with a word she stopped the dogs. Then she hastened to the deer and found that it was Tonka, who because of her love for the girl had come all the way to see her. When the girl heard the moans of the poor, wounded Tonka, her heart was filled with anger and she vowed never to return to the castle and live with her husband again. So that night when Tonka was able to walk, they faded away into the forest, while the Lord of the North, too proud to ask forgiveness, sat alone in his castle.
“The months passed and the girl once more took up her life with the herd and presently she became the mother of a beautiful baby girl. When Tonka saw the new baby her dim eyes kindled and she proudly nuzzled the little bundle. Then she called the girl over to her and spoke to her for a long time, telling her that no matter what might come to pass never to forget the deer and always to be their friend. Then old Tonka laid her head on the girl’s lap and with a little quiver of weariness, gave up forever her mothering of the herd.
“After the death of Tonka, a longing came over the girl to look on the face of her husband. So she took her baby and traveled back to the castle, where she hid herself among the rushes growing on the banks of a brook, and in this place she waited in the hope that he would soon come out on the lawn where she would be able to see what changes time had written in his face. But alone in his castle the Lord of the North was sitting in front of his fireplace thinking of his wife. When he raised his heavy eyes and saw the bushes waving in the distance, he imagined that the deer who had robbed him of her had come back to mock at his solitude and to triumph over him for having been able to call her back to the forest.
“Now the knight still loved the girl so much that he had not touched his bow since she had left him, but the thought that the deer were silently watching his misery was more than he could bear, so once more he seized his bow from above the fireplace and sent an arrow into the bushes. The dogs raced across the lawn and when the knight reached the spot, he found them licking the hands of the dead girl whose brown hair was floating On the current of the stream.
“And that night when the deer were gathered round the pool in the forest, the little stream brought down to them the story of the ending of their sister and they were sore at heart. But the sorrow that dwelt in the heart of the knight as he stood over the body of the dead girl, and held the little baby close to his rough coat, no one will ever know, for now he was all alone. This much we do know, and that is, that he broke his bow across his knee and never more killed a living thing. And he carried the girl back to the forest and buried her there with his own two hands.
“Sometimes even now, when the moon is full and the forest still, the deer come silently from the trees and stand in a sorrowful circle round her grave, just as they used to stand when white and slim, like a silver birch, the girl held her arms above her head and danced the Dance of the Trees.”
“An’ what became of the new baby?” a small voice asked after a short pause.
“Oh, the baby grew up to be a beautiful girl, as her mother had been before her, and she lived happily ever after with her father, the Lord of the North, who always remembering his wife, became so kind and gentle that he was loved by all the deer and they came to his door whenever they had need of a friend.”
A thoughtful silence settled down on the children. Their eyes were filled with the story. Natty drew a deep breath and said, “That was a good story. I wonder how she danced.... I’d liked to been there.”
* * * * *
THIS brief interlude in the unhappy drift of time comes back to me now like a friendly note from the past. I can still recall the feeling of relief that came to me when the children, after judicious consideration, agreed that with a few minor exceptions, my story had been well worthy of repetition. It was the concensus of opinion that the slaying of deer was a disgraceful sport in which they vowed never to indulge, and as most of them are by this time either fishermen or fishermen’s wives, I dare say their vows have been kept far better than many others they made later on in life.
When the day wore into dusk, I could tell that the imperious demands of hunger were causing the children to regard with secret favor the homes they outwardly professed to deplore. As the manifestations of their appetites became more acute, they diffidently abandoned their various occupations and furtively withdrew in quest of food. Only Natty and her brother were left, the latter with ill- concealed reluctance. The girl sat hunched in the sand, looking out across the darkening ocean. I wondered where her thoughts were straying. Probably her eyes were following the feet of a slim, white girl dancing alone in the moonlight. Presently a vague sigh escaped her and, unwinding her arms from around her knees, she arose and took her brother’s eagerly extended hand.
“I like that story,” she said, deliberately avoiding my eyes. “Sad stories are sort of nice. They seem like as if they might happen.”
Her small brother, now completely mastered by his greed, tugged manfully at her hands, but she resisted long enough to ask, “Are you comin’ back to-morrow?”
“Perhaps, Natty.”
She moved thoughtfully away, then stopped for a moment to call back through the darkness, “Good night.”
“Goo’ night,” contributed her brother, with an unmistakable note of relief in his husky little voice.
The beach became depressingly empty now that the children were gone.
CHAPTER XV
BUT WHEN TO-MORROW came I did not return to Natty and her friends. Wearied by two days of self-imposed inactivity, I decided to put into action a plan that had long been taking shape in my mind.
Once when I had been considering the dream, and the strange frequency of its return, the thought had occurred to me that if I could only reach the island and investigate it in the full light of day, I might be able to free myself forever from the terror it inspired in me. For several weeks past I had studied the marshes with this object in view, but the more I considered the island and tried to devise ways and means of reaching it, the slimmer seemed the chance for success in such an undertaking. Cut off from the rest of the world by several miles of false ground and tangled reeds, through which innumerable currents of water twisted, the island seemed as safe from the incursions of man as a coral reef tucked far away from the lanes of trade.
From my observations it appeared to me that the island stood in nearer to the opposite shore and that from there I might be able to find a less hazardous means of approach. As I had never viewed it from this angle, I made up my mind to journey to the mainland to investigate the possibilities of reaching the island from that side.
The road I took was the same one I had followed on arriving from the city. So many things had happened and so many things had changed since first I had felt its dust. I now pictured myself as I had been on the day of my arrival, and the person I saw was almost a stranger to me. Various moods and events came drifting back to mind — the feeling of relief I had experienced when the train pulled out of the little station leaving me standing on the deserted platform; my rest in the quiet woods and the old man with whom I had shared the way; the first sight of the marshes; the carving on Elliott’s gate; Scarlet, nude on the black divan, and later the touch of her lips. The ribbon of memory slipped swiftly across my mind, and once more I was looking up from the water into Hilda’s deep blue eyes. In swift review there passed before me the happy days we had spent together before Elliott’s shadow had fallen between us. Again I saw her sitting white and motionless in the little sloop as the storm raged over the sea, and again I saw her extending a bruised arm with an expression of mute entreaty in her eyes. Wherever my eyes rested I saw her face and wherever my thoughts wandered she wandered with them. When first I had followed this road, I had been a fugitive from the city; now I was a fugitive from myself, from an intangible fear and a host of conflicting impulses.
After skirting a long stretch of meadowland enclosing the inland end of the marshes, I struck directly into the woods and continued through the trees and undergrowth until I had arrived at a point which I figured would bring me out opposite the island. I was not far off in my reckoning, for when I broke through the edge of the forest the island lay almost directly in front of me, and to my great disappointment, about two miles out from shore. The land in between was of the same insecure and treacherous character as that which lay on the other side. As my eyes ran over the intervening space I was forced to exercise all my powers of imagination to prevent my reason from convincing me of the hopelessness of the undertaking. I felt that I was now confronted by a problem more dangerous of solution than the blind fury of wind and wave I had faced alone in the storm. Beneath the suave tranquillity of the marshes there lay in wait an antagonist more deliberately cruel and watchful than the ocean when aroused. The snapping of a twig in the forest caused me to start violently, and by this involuntary reaction I was able to gain some indication of the nervous tension under which I must have been laboring as I studied that remote island in its picturesque setting of green. I glanced over my shoulder at the sun and saw that it was already nearing the spear points of the trees. Only a few more hours of daylight remained in the sky. This knowledge, arousing me from the state of lassitude into which I had fallen, sent me hurrying to the edge of the marshes, where I seized a stick from the undergrowth and began to test the submerged soil which, under a thin sheet of water, ran out from the shore for about two hundred yards. The ground was soft and muddy, but seemed sufficiently firm to bear the weight of my body. Had I found myself alone on a lost planet with unknown dangers surrounding me, I could not have experienced a feeling of greater trepidation than when I left the shore and waded out into the silence and insecurity of the marshes.
Green, slimy water closed over my shoe tops and mud molded itself to my feet. By carefully sounding ahead of me with the stick, I was able to reach a comparatively solid strip of land the end of which, a short distance away, was screened by reeds. As I approached this spot I became aware of a low singing in my ears, and a few mosquitoes struck against my hands and face. Once I was in the reeds the singing grew louder, and a swarm of insects, rising like dust from beneath my feet, vindictively attacked me. With my free hand I fought them off as well as I could, but as the reeds closed over my head my skin began to flame from stings.
The ground was now of a soggier nature, clotted here and there with pools of stagnant water. At every step my feet sank deep into the mud. As I continued, the reeds grew thicker, until finally I was forced to slacken my pace, not only because of the resistance of the growth, but also for fear of plunging into one of the many currents twisting like great, green snakes across my path. My body was bathed in sweat, and the intensely hot air pressing down on the marshes made breathing unpleasant. At times I almost lost control of myself from pain and irritation as the singing plague hummed tormentingly in my ears.
Nevertheless, I had successfully traversed about half the distance separating me from the island when I found myself standing on the brink of a stream so much wider than the others that in order to find a more favorable crossing I was forced to follow its bank. As far as I was able to judge the stream spanned the marshes in a series of great loops. With its steep muddy sides and the uncertain nature of its bed, it served as an effective barrier to further progress — an obstacle filled with all sorts of unpleasant possibilities. After following the bank for some distance, I found that it was taking me considerably off my course; and as there seemed to be no immediate prospect of the stream’s growing narrower, I decided that I should either have to abandon the enterprise or risk a crossing without further delay.
