WHEREIN ELNORA VISITS THE BIRD WOMAN, AND OPENS A BANK ACCOUNT
Four o’clock the following morning Elnora was shelling beans. At six
she fed the chickens and pigs, swept two of the rooms of the cabin,
built a fire, and put on the kettle for breakfast. Then she climbed the
narrow stairs to the attic she had occupied since a very small child,
and dressed in the hated shoes and brown calico, plastered down her
crisp curls, ate what breakfast she could, and pinning on her hat
started for town.
“There is no sense in your going for an hour yet,” said her mother.
“I must try to discover some way to earn those books,” replied Elnora.
“I am perfectly positive I shall not find them lying beside the road
wrapped in tissue paper, and tagged with my name.”
She went toward the city as on yesterday. Her perplexity as to where
tuition and books were to come from was worse but she did not feel
quite so badly. She never again would have to face all of it for the
first time. There had been times yesterday when she had prayed to be
hidden, or to drop dead, and neither had happened. “I believe the best
way to get an answer to prayer is to work for it,” muttered Elnora
grimly.
Again she followed the trail to the swamp, rearranged her hair and left
the tin pail. This time she folded a couple of sandwiches in the
napkin, and tied them in a neat light paper parcel which she carried in
her hand. Then she hurried along the road to Onabasha and found a
book-store. There she asked the prices of the list of books that she
needed, and learned that six dollars would not quite supply them. She
anxiously inquired for second-hand books, but was told that the only
way to secure them was from the last year’s Freshmen. Just then Elnora
felt that she positively could not approach any of those she supposed
to be Sophomores and ask to buy their old books. The only balm the girl
could see for the humiliation of yesterday was to appear that day with
a set of new books.
“Do you wish these?” asked the clerk hurriedly, for the store was
rapidly filling with school children wanting anything from a dictionary
to a pen.
“Yes,” gasped Elnora, “Oh, yes! But I cannot pay for them just now.
Please let me take them, and I will pay for them on Friday, or return
them as perfect as they are. Please trust me for them a few days.”
“I’ll ask the proprietor,” he said. When he came back Elnora knew the
answer before he spoke.
“I’m sorry,” he said, “but Mr. Hann doesn’t recognize your name. You
are not a customer of ours, and he feels that he can’t take the risk.”
Elnora clumped out of the store, the thump of her heavy shoes beating
as a hammer on her brain. She tried two other dealers with the same
result, and then in sick despair came into the street. What could she
do? She was too frightened to think. Should she stay from school that
day and canvass the homes appearing to belong to the wealthy, and try
to sell beds of wild ferns, as she had suggested to Wesley Sinton? What
would she dare ask for bringing in and planting a clump of ferns? How
could she carry them? Would people buy them? She slowly moved past the
hotel and then glanced around to see if there were a clock anywhere,
for she felt sure the young people passing her constantly were on their
way to school.
There it stood in a bank window in big black letters staring straight
at her:
WANTED: CATERPILLARS, COCOONS, CHRYSALIDES, PUPAE CASES, BUTTERFLIES,
MOTHS, INDIAN RELICS OF ALL KINDS. HIGHEST SCALE OF PRICES PAID IN CASH
Elnora caught the wicket at the cashier’s desk with both hands to brace
herself against disappointment.
“Who is it wants to buy cocoons, butterflies, and moths?” she panted.
“The Bird Woman,” answered the cashier. “Have you some for sale?”
“I have some, I do not know if they are what she would want.”
“Well, you had better see her,” said the cashier. “Do you know where
she lives?”
“Yes,” said Elnora. “Would you tell me the time?”
“Twenty-one after eight,” was the answer.
She had nine minutes to reach the auditorium or be late. Should she go
to school, or to the Bird Woman? Several girls passed her walking
swiftly and she remembered their faces. They were hurrying to school.
Elnora caught the infection. She would see the Bird Woman at noon.
Algebra came first, and that professor was kind. Perhaps she could slip
to the superintendent and ask him for a book for the next lesson, and
at noon—“Oh, dear Lord make it come true,” prayed Elnora, at noon
possibly she could sell some of those wonderful shining-winged things
she had been collecting all her life around the outskirts of the
Limberlost.
As she went down the long hall she noticed the professor of mathematics
standing in the door of his recitation room. When she passed him he
smiled and spoke to her.
“I have been watching for you,” he said, and Elnora stopped bewildered.
“For me?” she questioned.
“Yes,” said Professor Henley. “Step inside.”
Elnora followed him into the room and closed the door behind them.
“At teachers’ meeting last evening, one of the professors mentioned
that a pupil had betrayed in class that she had expected her books to
be furnished by the city. I thought possibly it was you. Was it?”
“Yes,” breathed Elnora.
“That being the case,” said Professor Henley, “it just occurred to me
as you had expected that, you might require a little time to secure
them, and you are too fine a mathematician to fall behind for want of
supplies. So I telephoned one of our Sophomores to bring her last
year’s books this morning. I am sorry to say they are somewhat abused,
but the text is all here. You can have them for two dollars, and pay
when you are ready. Would you care to take them?”
Elnora sat suddenly, because she could not stand another instant. She
reached both hands for the books, and said never a word. The professor
was silent also.
At last Elnora arose, hugging those books to her heart as a mother
clasps a baby.
“One thing more,” said the professor. “You may pay your tuition
quarterly. You need not bother about the first instalment this month.
Any time in October will do.”
It seemed as if Elnora’s gasp of relief must have reached the soles of
her brogans.
“Did any one ever tell you how beautiful you are!” she cried.
As the professor was lank, tow-haired and so near-sighted, that he
peered at his pupils through spectacles, no one ever had.
“No,” said Professor Henley, “I’ve waited some time for that; for which
reason I shall appreciate it all the more. Come now, or we shall be
late for opening exercises.”
So Elnora entered the auditorium a second time. Her face was like the
brightest dawn that ever broke over the Limberlost. No matter about the
lumbering shoes and skimpy dress. No matter about anything, she had the
books. She could take them home. In her garret she could commit them to
memory, if need be. She could prove that clothes were not all. If the
Bird Woman did not want any of the many different kinds of specimens
she had collected, she was quite sure now she could sell ferns, nuts,
and a great many things. Then, too, a girl made a place for her that
morning, and several smiled and bowed. Elnora forgot everything save
her books, and that she was where she could use them
intelligently—everything except one little thing away back in her head.
Her mother had known about the books and the tuition, and had not told
her when she agreed to her coming.
At noon Elnora took her little parcel of lunch and started to the home
of the Bird Woman. She must know about the specimens first and then she
would walk to the suburbs somewhere and eat a few bites. She dropped
the heavy iron knocker on the door of a big red log cabin, and her
heart thumped at the resounding stroke.
“Is the Bird Woman at home?” she asked of the maid.
“She is at lunch,” was the answer.
“Please ask her if she will see a girl from the Limberlost about some
moths?” inquired Elnora.
“I never need ask, if it’s moths,” laughed the girl. “Orders are to
bring any one with specimens right in. Come this way.”
Elnora followed down the hall and entered a long room with high
panelled wainscoting, old English fireplace with an overmantel and
closets of peculiar china filling the corners. At a bare table of oak,
yellow as gold, sat a woman Elnora often had watched and followed
covertly around the Limberlost. The Bird Woman was holding out a hand
of welcome.
“I heard!” she laughed. “A little pasteboard box, or just the mere word
‘specimen,’ passes you at my door. If it is moths I hope you have
hundreds. I’ve been very busy all summer and unable to collect, and I
need so many. Sit down and lunch with me, while we talk it over. From
the Limberlost, did you say?”
“I live near the swamp,” replied Elnora. “Since it’s so cleared I dare
go around the edge in daytime, though we are all afraid at night.”
“What have you collected?” asked the Bird Woman, as she helped Elnora
to sandwiches unlike any she ever before had tasted, salad that seemed
to be made of many familiar things, and a cup of hot chocolate that
would have delighted any hungry schoolgirl.
“I am afraid I am bothering you for nothing, and imposing on you,” she
said. “That ‘collected’ frightens me. I’ve only gathered. I always
loved everything outdoors, so I made friends and playmates of them.
When I learned that the moths die so soon, I saved them especially,
because there seemed no wickedness in it.”
“I have thought the same thing,” said the Bird Woman encouragingly.
Then because the girl could not eat until she learned about the moths,
the Bird Woman asked Elnora if she knew what kinds she had.
“Not all of them,” answered Elnora. “Before Mr. Duncan moved away he
often saw me near the edge of the swamp and he showed me the box he had
fixed for Freckles, and gave me the key. There were some books and
things, so from that time on I studied and tried to take moths right,
but I am afraid they are not what you want.”
“Are they the big ones that fly mostly in June nights?” asked the Bird
Woman.
“Yes,” said Elnora. “Big gray ones with reddish markings, pale
blue-green, yellow with lavender, and red and yellow.”
“What do you mean by ‘red and yellow?’” asked the Bird Woman so quickly
that the girl almost jumped.
“Not exactly red,” explained Elnora, with tremulous voice. “A reddish,
yellowish brown, with canary-coloured spots and gray lines on their
wings.”
“How many of them?” It was the same quick question.
“I had over two hundred eggs,” said Elnora, “but some of them didn’t
hatch, and some of the caterpillars died, but there must be at least a
hundred perfect ones.”
“Perfect! How perfect?” cried the Bird Woman.
“I mean whole wings, no down gone, and all their legs and antennae,”
faltered Elnora.
“Young woman, that’s the rarest moth in America,” said the Bird Woman
solemnly. “If you have a hundred of them, they are worth a hundred
dollars according to my list. I can use all that are not damaged.”
“What if they are not pinned right,” quavered Elnora.
“If they are perfect, that does not make the slightest difference. I
know how to soften them so that I can put them into any shape I choose.
Where are they? When may I see them?”
“They are in Freckles’s old case in the Limberlost,” said Elnora. “I
couldn’t carry many for fear of breaking them, but I could bring a few
after school.”
“You come here at four,” said the Bird Woman, “and we will drive out
with some specimen boxes, and a price list, and see what you have to
sell. Are they your very own? Are you free to part with them?”
“They are mine,” said Elnora. “No one but God knows I have them. Mr.
Duncan gave me the books and the box. He told Freckles about me, and
Freckles told him to give me all he left. He said for me to stick to
the swamp and be brave, and my hour would come, and it has! I know most
of them are all right, and oh, I do need the money!”
“Could you tell me?” asked the Bird Woman softly.
“You see the swamp and all the fields around it are so full,” explained
Elnora. “Every day I felt smaller and smaller, and I wanted to know
more and more, and pretty soon I grew desperate, just as Freckles did.
But I am better off than he was, for I have his books, and I have a
mother; even if she doesn’t care for me as other girls’ mothers do for
them, it’s better than no one.”
The Bird Woman’s glance fell, for the girl was not conscious of how
much she was revealing. Her eyes were fixed on a black pitcher filled
with goldenrod in the centre of the table and she was saying what she
thought.
“As long as I could go to the Brushwood school I was happy, but I
couldn’t go further just when things were the most interesting, so I
was determined I’d come to high school and mother wouldn’t consent. You
see there’s plenty of land, but father was drowned when I was a baby,
and mother and I can’t make money as men do. The taxes are higher every
year, and she said it was too expensive. I wouldn’t give her any rest,
until at last she bought me this dress, and these shoes and I came. It
was awful!”
“Do you live in that beautiful cabin at the northwest end of the
swamp?” asked the Bird Woman.
“Yes,” said Elnora.
“I remember the place and a story about it, now. You entered the high
school yesterday?”
“Yes.”
“It was rather bad?”
“Rather bad!” echoed Elnora.
The Bird Woman laughed.
“You can’t tell me anything about that,” she said. “I once entered a
city school straight from the country. My dress was brown calico, and
my shoes were heavy.”
The tears began to roll down Elnora’s cheeks.
“Did they——?” she faltered.
“They did!” said the Bird Woman. “All of it. I am sure they did not
miss one least little thing.”
Then she wiped away some tears that began coursing her cheeks, and
laughed at the same time.
“Where are they now?” asked Elnora suddenly.
“They are widely scattered, but none of them have attained heights out
of range. Some of the rich are poor, and some of the poor are rich.
Some of the brightest died insane, and some of the dullest worked out
high positions; some of the very worst to bear have gone out, and I
frequently hear from others. Now I am here, able to remember it, and
mingle laughter with what used to be all tears; for every day I have my
beautiful work, and almost every day God sends some one like you to
help me. What is your name, my girl?”
“Elnora Comstock,” answered Elnora. “Yesterday on the board it changed
to Cornstock, and for a minute I thought I’d die, but I can laugh over
that already.”
The Bird Woman arose and kissed her. “Finish your lunch,” she said,
“and I will bring my price lists, and make a memorandum of what you
think you have, so I will know how many boxes to prepare. And remember
this: What you are lies with you. If you are lazy, and accept your lot,
you may live in it. If you are willing to work, you can write your name
anywhere you choose, among the only ones who live beyond the grave in
this world, the people who write books that help, make exquisite music,
carve statues, paint pictures, and work for others. Never mind the
calico dress, and the coarse shoes. Work at your books, and before long
you will hear yesterday’s tormentors boasting that they were once
classmates of yours. ‘I could a tale unfold’——!”
She laughingly left the room and Elnora sat thinking, until she
remembered how hungry she was, so she ate the food, drank the hot
chocolate and began to feel better.
Then the Bird Woman came back and showed Elnora a long printed slip
giving a list of graduated prices for moths, butterflies, and
dragonflies.
“Oh, do you want them!” exulted Elnora. “I have a few and I can get
more by the thousand, with every colour in the world on their wings.”
“Yes,” said the Bird Woman, “I will buy them, also the big moth
caterpillars that are creeping everywhere now, and the cocoons that
they will spin just about this time. I have a sneaking impression that
the mystery, wonder, and the urge of their pure beauty, are going to
force me to picture and paint our moths and put them into a book for
all the world to see and know. We Limberlost people must not be selfish
with the wonders God has given to us. We must share with those poor
cooped-up city people the best we can. To send them a beautiful book,
that is the way, is it not, little new friend of mine?”
“Yes, oh yes!” cried Elnora. “And please God they find a way to earn
the money to buy the books, as I have those I need so badly.”
“I will pay good prices for all the moths you can find,” said the Bird
Woman, “because you see I exchange them with foreign collectors. I want
a complete series of the moths of America to trade with a German
scientist, another with a man in India, and another in Brazil. Others I
can exchange with home collectors for those of California and Canada,
so you see I can use all you can raise, or find. The banker will buy
stone axes, arrow points, and Indian pipes. There was a teacher from
the city grade schools here to-day for specimens. There is a fund to
supply the ward buildings. I’ll help you get in touch with that. They
want leaves of different trees, flowers, grasses, moths, insects,
birds’ nests and anything about birds.”
Elnora’s eyes were blazing. “Had I better go back to school or open a
bank account and begin being a millionaire? Uncle Wesley and I have a
bushel of arrow points gathered, a stack of axes, pipes, skin-dressing
tools, tubes and mortars. I don’t know how I ever shall wait three
hours.”
“You must go, or you will be late,” said the Bird Woman. “I will be
ready at four.”
After school closed Elnora, seated beside the Bird Woman, drove to
Freckles’s room in the Limberlost. One at a time the beautiful big
moths were taken from the interior of the old black case. Not a fourth
of them could be moved that night and it was almost dark when the last
box was closed, the list figured, and into Elnora’s trembling fingers
were paid fifty-nine dollars and sixteen cents. Elnora clasped the
money closely.
“Oh you beautiful stuff!” she cried. “You are going to buy the books,
pay the tuition, and take me to high school.”
Then because she was a woman, she sat on a log and looked at her shoes.
Long after the Bird Woman drove away Elnora remained. She had her
problem, and it was a big one. If she told her mother, would she take
the money to pay the taxes? If she did not tell her, how could she
account for the books, and things for which she would spend it. At last
she counted out what she needed for the next day, placed the remainder
in the farthest corner of the case, and locked the door. She then
filled the front of her skirt from a heap of arrow points beneath the
case and started home.