LETTY SINGS A LULLABY
After the lemonade had all been drunk and most of the cakes eaten—for
not even Christopher’s best efforts could quite empty the many
plates—Letty offered to go back to her storytelling. She sat down on the
grass with her back against a tree trunk and the twins curled themselves
up contentedly on each side. Little Anna Parsons sat silent at her feet.
“Why are your stories always about people or fairies who sing
beautifully?” asked Christopher unexpectedly, after Letty had related
two or three tales of her own invention. “Do you sing, Letty?”
“I should like to. Oh, how I should like to!” sighed Letty, clasping her
hands.
“Sing something to us now,” commanded Jane.
“I only know one or two songs,” replied Letty shyly, “and they are old
songs. I think you children must know them already. I was never taught
to sing,” she added quickly.
“Neither were we, except in Sunday-school, but we’ll sing for you, if
you like,” said Christopher politely. “Sit up, Jane, and we’ll give her
‘Onward, Christian Soldiers.’”
“I think Letty’d like ‘There’s a Work for Me and a Work for You’
better,” objected Jane. “Her stories always have something about doing
things in them.”
“Well, don’t the Christian Soldiers do things? They conquer the world
and all that sort of thing. I like that song because you can make such a
jolly lot of noise over it. It’s a regular shouter.”
“Boys always like to make a noise,” said Jane to Letty with an
apologetic air. “But they are not the nicest kind of songs. I like
lullabies and such things. Letty, don’t you know a lullaby? I guess you
used to have to sing them to Mrs. Drake’s baby, didn’t you?”
Tears filled Letty’s eyes at the memory Jane’s words called up, of the
cuddly, drowsy baby she had hushed to sleep so often.
“Yes, I used to sing Mrs. Drake’s baby to sleep. Shall I sing you that
song?” she asked.
Once, on the memorable occasion of which she had told Mrs.
Hartwell-Jones, Letty’s brother had taken her to a concert. One of the
songs was DeKoven’s “Winter Lullaby.” The soft, crooning cadence of the
song had thrilled Letty’s heart and she had listened with rapture. The
song had been repeated in response to an encore and so, by careful
attention, she had managed to memorize the words of the two verses. She
sang it now to the children and as she began, grandmother and Mrs.
Hartwell-Jones suddenly ceased their talk and sat listening.
A WINTER LULLABY
“The valley is going to sleep, the birds in their nest are still
And the maple branches bend and break, over the leafless hill:
And the pitying sky looks down, and whispers to the snow,
Let us cover the hills so bare and brown, where the flowers used to grow;
And she croons a lullaby, through the hush of the storm—
Sleep, sleep in your cradle deep, sleep, sleep in your cradle deep
And I will keep you warm, so sleep, sleep, sleep!
“The valley is going to wake, the birds in their nest will sing
And the maple branches bud and break, into the leaves of spring,
And the gleaming vale shall hear another lullaby,
And zephyrs will whisper it into her ear, out of the heart of the sky:
Another lullaby, tuned to the heart of the stream,—
Wake, wake for your robin’s sake, wake, wake for your robin’s sake;
And tell the sky your dream, so wake, wake, wake!”
When she had finished grandmother exclaimed in a low voice:
“Why, Mrs. Hartwell-Jones, how charming. What if you have discovered a
genius!”
Tears came into Mrs. Hartwell-Jones’s eyes.
“So it seems to you, too, that she has a good voice?” she murmured
eagerly. “I have wondered, and am most impatient to take her to the city
to have her voice tried. I have heard her singing to herself now and
then and although I know nothing about voice culture, I thought one or
two notes appeared to have an unusual quality. And, dear Mrs. Baker, I
shall never forget that it was really Jane who discovered Letty for me;
her sweet kindliness for a ‘little sister in heaven.’ The child’s coming
has made a great difference in my life already.”
“What is the song all about?” demanded Christopher of Letty, sitting
upright in his curiosity. “What was the dream?”
“I don’t know what the dream was, but——”
“Why don’t you know? There must have been some sort of a dream, because
the song says, ‘and tell the sky your dream.’ And who was talking,
anyway?”
“Why, the sky was talking to the earth, I think.”
“And did the whole earth dream? And why did the sky want the earth to
wake up and tell its dream to the sky? Why didn’t it say, ‘and tell me
your dream’? And why in the world don’t they tell what the dream is? I
think it’s a silly song, anyhow.”
“Kit Baker, you are a rude boy!” exclaimed his sister indignantly. “It
isn’t a story, it’s a song. And songs don’t have to mean much, do they,
Letty, as long as they are pretty.”
“Well, I think there ought to be another verse, telling the dream. Can’t
you make up another verse as you go along, Letty? Seems to me I just
must know what that dream was.”
“I guess there were lots and lots of dreams,” said Jane musingly. “All
the flowers and birds dreamed. I could make up one dream; that an ugly
little flower dreamed it was a lovely pink tulip, all pale and wide-open
and satiny.”
“Huh, I’d rather be a red one, with yellow streaks down the middle.
They’re lots showier and they live longer, too. The gardener that was
putting our bulbs out last fall told me so.”
“But they’re beastly ugly. People don’t dream about being something
ugly, even if it is strong and healthy. I’d rather not live so long, if
I could only be so beautiful that people just had to stop and look at
me. Wouldn’t you, Letty?”
“I don’t think looks matter so much,” said Letty practically, “if you
keep your soul all nice and clean inside you. Then it shines out through
your eyes and your smiles and makes you beautiful that way. Even
cripples are beautiful if their souls are clean. My Sunday-school
teacher, dear Miss Reese, told me that once. She was beautiful—very
beautiful, and until then I had thought it was because she had nice
white skin, pink cheeks, dimples and a pretty silk dress. But after she
told me that, I knew it was just her angel soul looking out through her
eyes.”
“What color were her eyes?” asked Christopher. “And could cross-eyed
people look beautiful? I don’t see how they could on the outside, even
if their souls were ever so clean.”
Grandmother and Mrs. Hartwell-Jones, who could not help overhearing this
conversation, smiled at each other. Just then Joshua drove up in the
carriage and everybody knew that it was time to go home.
“I understand that Sally has a birthday day after to-morrow,” said Mrs.
Hartwell-Jones to Jane.
“Oh, yes, Mrs. Hartwell-Jones, she will be three years old,” replied
Jane, with all the pride of a doting mamma. “Uncle Gus gave her to me
when I lost my first tooth. The fairies gave me a big silver dollar for
the tooth, too. I wrapped it up in tissue-paper and put it under my
pillow and they took it away in the night and left a shining silver
dollar.”
“The blessed fairies! Now suppose you let me give Sally a birthday
party? It would give Letty and me such pleasure to arrange it.”
Jane glowed with delight and accepted in both Sally’s name and her own,
with alacrity. Christopher pricked up his ears. A doll’s birthday party
did not appeal to him, even with the inducement of the “party.” Why
would not that day be the very opportunity for his excursion with Billy
and Jo Perkins?
“Please let the children come early, Mrs. Baker,” Mrs. Hartwell-Jones
said to grandmother, “so that we may have a long afternoon together. Or,
if you wish, Letty could drive out after them in the pony carriage.”
“Oh, thank you, I can send them quite easily. There is always some one
driving into the village. But are you sure that you want them again so
soon? You must not let them bother you.”
Grandmother did not want the twins to become a nuisance to any one,
although in her secret heart of grandmother-hearts, she did not see how
any one could see too much of Jane or Christopher.
Christopher said his good-bye very politely but very briefly.
“Please, grandmother,” he said, “will you wait for me a minute? I’ve got
to speak to Bill Carpenter about some very important business.”
He bolted around the corner of the house and Jane’s lip quivered. She
felt suddenly offended. What important business could Christopher have
that he had not confided to her?
After their guests had gone, Mrs. Hartwell-Jones drew Letty down to a
low stool beside her chair and said:
“My dear, has any one ever told you that you sing very well?”
Letty flushed crimson with surprise and delight.
“Oh, do I?” she cried. “I’d rather be able to sing than anything in this
wide, wide world! It is so wonderful! But nobody ever told me I could
sing. I have never had any lessons, you know.”
“And did you never sing to any of your teachers, in school or
Sunday-school?”
“There was never any singing at school, except among a few of the bigger
girls who took private lessons. And at Sunday-school I did not care for
the singing much. They sang ‘regular shouters’ as Kit calls them,” she
laughed.
“But sometimes in church—the church I told you about, where the little
boys sang—I used to join in a little, sometimes. Once they were singing
such a beautiful hymn. It was in the afternoon when there were not very
many people in the church and the music was so lovely, all high and
sweet and soft! I forgot for a minute where I was and sang out quite
loud. The organist turned right around and looked at me. It frightened
me terribly for I thought perhaps it was against the rules for any one
but the small boys to sing and that some one might come and put me out.
Indeed, I was afraid to go to church again for three or four Sundays,
and when I did I always kept at the back of the church and did not sing
again. But it could not have been against the rule, for a great many
people joined in the singing and the organist did not look at them at
all.”
Mrs. Hartwell-Jones did not tell her, what was so evident to herself,
that the organist had been attracted, not by the child’s loud singing,
but by the quality of her voice.
“Would you like to take singing lessons when we go back to town?” she
asked presently.
“Oh, Mrs. Hartwell-Jones, would it be possible?”
“Not only possible, but it could be done very easily, my child. We shall
talk about it some other time. Now, I have some plans to suggest for
Sally’s birthday party. We must invite Anna Parsons and there must be a
cake.”
“With candles,” agreed Letty, bringing her mind away from the singing
with difficulty.
“I should like to make Sally a present, too,” went on Mrs.
Hartwell-Jones. “Do you suppose we could buy a toy bed at the ‘store’?
It would be nice to make a pretty bed for Sally to rest in when she
comes to spend the afternoon.”
“And I could make the bedclothes. I love to sew,” cried Letty. “My
mother taught me; hemming, overcasting—a great many things.”
“You must have had a very good, sweet mother, Letty.”
“Oh, yes!” breathed the girl, and her brown eyes filled suddenly with
great tears.
The tears came to Mrs. Hartwell-Jones’s eyes, too, and she caught Letty
to her arms in a long, close embrace.
“You have no mother and I have no little girl!” she whispered brokenly.
That evening Mrs. Hartwell-Jones wrote a very long letter to the lawyer
in the city who had always managed her business for her. She glanced
often at Letty as she wrote, but the little girl, busy over a puzzling
problem in arithmetic, did not even dream of the wonderful ways in which
that letter would change her life.