WHEREIN MOTHER LOVE IS BESTOWED ON ELNORA, AND SHE FINDS AN ASSISTANT
IN MOTH HUNTING
Elnora awoke at dawn and lay gazing around the unfamiliar room. She
noticed that every vestige of masculine attire and belongings was gone,
and knew, without any explanation, what that meant. For some reason
every tangible evidence of her father was banished, and she was at last
to be allowed to take his place. She turned to look at her mother. Mrs.
Comstock’s face was white and haggard, but on it rested an expression
of profound peace Elnora never before had seen. As she studied the
features on the pillow beside her, the heart of the girl throbbed in
tenderness. She realized as fully as any one else could what her mother
had suffered. Thoughts of the night brought shuddering fear. She softly
slipped from the bed, went to her room, dressed and entered the kitchen
to attend the Emperors and prepare breakfast. The pair had been left
clinging to the piece of calico. The calico was there and a few pieces
of beautiful wing. A mouse had eaten the moths!
“Well, of all the horrible luck!” gasped Elnora.
With the first thought of her mother, she caught up the remnants of the
moths, burying them in the ashes of the stove. She took the bag to her
room, hurriedly releasing its contents, but there was not another
yellow one. Her mother had said some had been confined in the case in
the Limberlost. There was still a hope that an Emperor might be among
them. She peeped at her mother, who still slept soundly.
Elnora took a large piece of mosquito netting, and ran to the swamp.
Throwing it over the top of the case, she unlocked the door. She
reeled, faint with distress. The living moths that had been confined
there in their fluttering to escape to night and the mates they sought
not only had wrecked the other specimens of the case, but torn
themselves to fringes on the pins. A third of the rarest moths of the
collection for the man of India were antennaless, legless, wingless,
and often headless. Elnora sobbed aloud.
“This is overwhelming,” she said at last. “It is making a fatalist of
me. I am beginning to think things happen as they are ordained from the
beginning, this plainly indicating that there is to be no college, at
least, this year, for me. My life is all mountain-top or canon. I wish
some one would lead me into a few days of ‘green pastures.’ Last night
I went to sleep on mother’s arm, the moths all secured, love and
college, certainties. This morning I wake to find all my hopes wrecked.
I simply don’t dare let mother know that instead of helping me, she has
ruined my collection. Everything is gone—unless the love lasts. That
actually seemed true. I believe I will go see.”
The love remained. Indeed, in the overflow of the long-hardened,
pent-up heart, the girl was almost suffocated with tempestuous caresses
and generous offerings. Before the day was over, Elnora realized that
she never had known her mother. The woman who now busily went through
the cabin, her eyes bright, eager, alert, constantly planning, was a
stranger. Her very face was different, while it did not seem possible
that during one night the acid of twenty years could disappear from a
voice and leave it sweet and pleasant.
For the next few days Elnora worked at mounting the moths her mother
had taken. She had to go to the Bird Woman and tell about the disaster,
but Mrs. Comstock was allowed to think that Elnora delivered the moths
when she made the trip. If she had told her what actually happened, the
chances were that Mrs. Comstock again would have taken possession of
the Limberlost, hunting there until she replaced all the moths that had
been destroyed. But Elnora knew from experience what it meant to
collect such a list in pairs. It would require steady work for at least
two summers to replace the lost moths. When she left the Bird Woman she
went to the president of the Onabasha schools and asked him to do all
in his power to secure her a room in one of the ward buildings.
The next morning the last moth was mounted, and the housework finished.
Elnora said to her mother, “If you don’t mind, I believe I will go into
the woods pasture beside Sleepy Snake Creek and see if I can catch some
dragonflies or moths.”
“Wait until I get a knife and a pail and I will go along,” answered
Mrs. Comstock. “The dandelions are plenty tender for greens among the
deep grasses, and I might just happen to see something myself. My eyes
are pretty sharp.”
“I wish you could realize how young you are,” said Elnora. “I know
women in Onabasha who are ten years older than you, yet they look
twenty years younger. So could you, if you would dress your hair
becomingly, and wear appropriate clothes.”
“I think my hair puts me in the old woman class permanently,” said Mrs.
Comstock.
“Well, it doesn’t!” cried Elnora. “There is a woman of twenty-eight who
has hair as white as yours from sick headaches, but her face is young
and beautiful. If your face would grow a little fuller and those lines
would go away, you’d be lovely!”
“You little pig!” laughed Mrs. Comstock. “Any one would think you would
be satisfied with having a splinter new mother, without setting up a
kick on her looks, first thing. Greedy!”
“That is a good word,” said Elnora. “I admit the charge. I am greedy
over every wasted year. I want you young, lovely, suitably dressed and
enjoying life like the other girls’ mothers.”
Mrs. Comstock laughed softly as she pushed back her sunbonnet so that
shrubs and bushes beside the way could be scanned closely. Elnora
walked ahead with a case over her shoulder, a net in her hand. Her head
was bare, the rolling collar of her lavender gingham dress was cut in a
V at the throat, the sleeves only reached the elbows. Every few steps
she paused and examined the shrubbery carefully, while Mrs. Comstock
was watching until her eyes ached, but there were no dandelions in the
pail she carried.
Early June was rioting in fresh grasses, bright flowers, bird songs,
and gay-winged creatures of air. Down the footpath the two went through
the perfect morning, the love of God and all nature in their hearts. At
last they reached the creek, following it toward the bridge. Here Mrs.
Comstock found a large bed of tender dandelions and stopped to fill her
pail. Then she sat on the bank, picking over the greens, while she
listened to the creek softly singing its June song.
Elnora remained within calling distance, and was having good success.
At last she crossed the creek, following it up to a bridge. There she
began a careful examination of the under sides of the sleepers and
flooring for cocoons. Mrs. Comstock could see her and the creek for
several rods above. The mother sat beating the long green leaves across
her hand, carefully picking out the white buds, because Elnora liked
them, when a splash up the creek attracted her attention.
Around the bend came a man. He was bareheaded, dressed in a white
sweater, and waders which reached his waist. He walked on the bank,
only entering the water when forced. He had a queer basket strapped on
his hip, and with a small rod he sent a long line spinning before him
down the creek, deftly manipulating with it a little floating object.
He was closer Elnora than her mother, but Mrs. Comstock thought
possibly by hurrying she could remain unseen and yet warn the girl that
a stranger was coming. As she approached the bridge, she caught a
sapling and leaned over the water to call Elnora. With her lips parted
to speak she hesitated a second to watch a sort of insect that flashed
past on the water, when a splash from the man attracted the girl.
She was under the bridge, one knee planted in the embankment and a foot
braced to support her. Her hair was tousled by wind and bushes, her
face flushed, and she lifted her arms above her head, working to loosen
a cocoon she had found. The call Mrs. Comstock had intended to utter
never found voice, for as Elnora looked down at the sound, “Possibly I
could get that for you,” suggested the man.
Mrs. Comstock drew back. He was a young man with a wonderfully
attractive face, although it was too white for robust health, broad
shoulders, and slender, upright frame.
“Oh, I do hope you can!” answered Elnora. “It’s quite a find! It’s one
of those lovely pale red cocoons described in the books. I suspect it
comes from having been in a dark place and screened from the weather.”
“Is that so?” cried the man. “Wait a minute. I’ve never seen one. I
suppose it’s a Cecropia, from the location.”
“Of course,” said Elnora. “It’s so cool here the moth hasn’t emerged.
The cocoon is a big, baggy one, and it is as red as fox tail.”
“What luck!” he cried. “Are you making a collection?”
He reeled in his line, laid his rod across a bush and climbed the
embankment to Elnora’s side, produced a knife and began the work of
whittling a deep groove around the cocoon.
“Yes. I paid my way through the high school in Onabasha with them. Now
I am starting a collection which means college.”
“Onabasha!” said the man. “That is where I am visiting. Possibly you
know my people—Dr. Ammon’s? The doctor is my uncle. My home is in
Chicago. I’ve been having typhoid fever, something fierce. In the
hospital six weeks. Didn’t gain strength right, so Uncle Doc sent for
me. I am to live out of doors all summer, and exercise until I get in
condition again. Do you know my uncle?”
“Yes. He is Aunt Margaret’s doctor, and he would be ours, only we are
never ill.”
“Well, you look it!” said the man, appraising Elnora at a glance.
“Strangers always mention it,” sighed Elnora. “I wonder how it would
seem to be a pale, languid lady and ride in a carriage.”
“Ask me!” laughed the man. “It feels like the—dickens! I’m so proud of
my feet. It’s quite a trick to stand on them now. I have to keep out of
the water all I can and stop to baby every half-mile. But with
interesting outdoor work I’ll be myself in a week.”
“Do you call that work?” Elnora indicated the creek.
“I do, indeed! Nearly three miles, banks too soft to brag on and never
a strike. Wouldn’t you call that hard labour?”
“Yes,” laughed Elnora. “Work at which you might kill yourself and never
get a fish. Did any one tell you there were trout in Sleepy Snake
Creek?”
“Uncle said I could try.”
“Oh, you can,” said Elnora. “You can try no end, but you’ll never get a
trout. This is too far south and too warm for them. If you sit on the
bank and use worms you might catch some perch or catfish.”
“But that isn’t exercise.”
“Well, if you only want exercise, go right on fishing. You will have a
creel full of invisible results every night.”
“I object,” said the man emphatically. He stopped work again and
studied Elnora. Even the watching mother could not blame him. In the
shade of the bridge Elnora’s bright head and her lavender dress made a
picture worthy of much contemplation.
“I object!” repeated the man. “When I work I want to see results. I’d
rather exercise sawing wood, making one pile grow little and the other
big than to cast all day and catch nothing because there is not a fish
to take. Work for work’s sake doesn’t appeal to me.”
He digged the groove around the cocoon with skilled hand. “Now there is
some fun in this!” he said. “It’s going to be a fair job to cut it out,
but when it comes, it is not only beautiful, but worth a price; it will
help you on your way. I think I’ll put up my rod and hunt moths. That
would be something like! Don’t you want help?”
Elnora parried the question. “Have you ever hunted moths, Mr. Ammon?”
“Enough to know the ropes in taking them and to distinguish the
commonest ones. I go wild on Catocalæ. There’s too many of them, all
too much alike for Philip, but I know all these fellows. One flew into
my room when I was about ten years old, and we thought it a miracle.
None of us ever had seen one so we took it over to the museum to Dr.
Dorsey. He said they were common enough, but we didn’t see them because
they flew at night. He showed me the museum collection, and I was so
interested I took mine back home and started to hunt them. Every year
after that we went to our cottage a month earlier, so I could find
them, and all my family helped. I stuck to it until I went to college.
Then, keeping the little moths out of the big ones was too much for the
mater, so father advised that I donate mine to the museum. He bought a
fine case for them with my name on it, which constitutes my sole
contribution to science. I know enough to help you all right.”
“Aren’t you going north this year?”
“All depends on how this fever leaves me. Uncle says the nights are too
cold and the days too hot there for me. He thinks I had better stay in
an even temperature until I am strong again. I am going to stick pretty
close to him until I know I am. I wouldn’t admit it to any one at home,
but I was almost gone. I don’t believe anything can eat up nerve much
faster than the burning of a slow fever. No, thanks, I have enough. I
stay with Uncle Doc, so if I feel it coming again he can do something
quickly.”
“I don’t blame you,” said Elnora. “I never have been sick, but it must
be dreadful. I am afraid you are tiring yourself over that. Let me take
the knife awhile.”
“Oh, it isn’t so bad as that! I wouldn’t be wading creeks if it were. I
only need a few more days to get steady on my feet again. I’ll soon
have this out.”
“It is kind of you to get it,” said Elnora. “I should have had to peel
it, which would spoil the cocoon for a specimen and ruin the moth.”
“You haven’t said yet whether I may help you while I am here.”
Elnora hesitated.
“You better say ‘yes,’” he persisted. “It would be a real kindness. It
would keep me outdoors all day and give an incentive to work. I’m good
at it. I’ll show you if I am not in a week or so. I can ‘sugar,’
manipulate lights, and mirrors, and all the expert methods. I’ll wager,
moths are numerous in the old swamp over there.”
“They are,” said Elnora. “Most I have I took there. A few nights ago my
mother caught a number, but we don’t dare go alone.”
“All the more reason why you need me. Where do you live? I can’t get an
answer from you, I’ll go tell your mother who I am and ask her if I may
help you. I warn you, young lady, I have a very effective way with
mothers. They almost never turn me down.”
“Then it’s probable you will have a new experience when you meet mine,”
said Elnora. “She never was known to do what any one expected she
surely would.”
The cocoon came loose. Philip Ammon stepped down the embankment turning
to offer his hand to Elnora. She ran down as she would have done alone,
and taking the cocoon turned it end for end to learn if the imago it
contained were alive. Then Ammon took back the cocoon to smooth the
edges. Mrs. Comstock gave them one long look as they stood there, and
returned to her dandelions. While she worked she paused occasionally,
listening intently. Presently they came down the creek, the man
carrying the cocoon as if it were a jewel, while Elnora made her way
along the bank, taking a lesson in casting. Her face was flushed with
excitement, her eyes shining, the bushes taking liberties with her
hair. For a picture of perfect loveliness she scarcely could have been
surpassed, and the eyes of Philip Ammon seemed to be in working order.
“Moth-er!” called Elnora.
There was an undulant, caressing sweetness in the girl’s voice, as she
sung out the call in perfect confidence that it would bring a loving
answer, that struck deep in Mrs. Comstock’s heart. She never had heard
that word so pronounced before and a lump arose in her throat.
“Here!” she answered, still cleaning dandelions.
“Mother, this is Mr. Philip Ammon, of Chicago,” said Elnora. “He has
been ill and he is staying with Dr. Ammon in Onabasha. He came down the
creek fishing and cut this cocoon from under the bridge for me. He
feels that it would be better to hunt moths than to fish, until he is
well. What do you think about it?”
Philip Ammon extended his hand. “I am glad to know you,” he said.
“You may take the hand-shaking for granted,” replied Mrs. Comstock.
“Dandelions have a way of making fingers sticky, and I like to know a
man before I take his hand, anyway. That introduction seems mighty
comprehensive on your part, but it still leaves me unclassified. My
name is Comstock.”
Philip Ammon bowed.
“I am sorry to hear you have been sick,” said Mrs. Comstock. “But if
people will live where they have such vile water as they do in Chicago,
I don’t see what else they are to expect.”
Philip studied her intently.
“I am sure I didn’t have a fever on purpose,” he said.
“You do seem a little wobbly on your legs,” she observed. “Maybe you
had better sit and rest while I finish these greens. It’s late for the
genuine article, but in the shade, among long grass they are still
tender.”
“May I have a leaf?” he asked, reaching for one as he sat on the bank,
looking from the little creek at his feet, away through the dim cool
spaces of the June forest on the opposite side. He drew a deep breath.
“Glory, but this is good after almost two months inside hospital
walls!”
He stretched on the grass and lay gazing up at the leaves, occasionally
asking the interpretation of a bird note or the origin of an unfamiliar
forest voice. Elnora began helping with the dandelions.
“Another, please,” said the young man, holding out his hand.
“Do you suppose this is the kind of grass Nebuchadnezzar ate?” Elnora
asked, giving the leaf.
“He knew a good thing if it is.”
“Oh, you should taste dandelions boiled with bacon and served with
mother’s cornbread.”
“Don’t! My appetite is twice my size now. While it is—how far is it to
Onabasha, shortest cut?”
“Three miles.”
The man lay in perfect content, nibbling leaves.
“This surely is a treat,” he said. “No wonder you find good hunting
here. There seems to be foliage for almost every kind of caterpillar.
But I suppose you have to exchange for northern species and Pacific
Coast kinds?”
“Yes. And every one wants Regalis in trade. I never saw the like. They
consider a Cecropia or a Polyphemus an insult, and a Luna is barely
acceptable.”
“What authorities have you?”
Elnora began to name text-books which started a discussion. Mrs.
Comstock listened. She cleaned dandelions with greater deliberation
than they ever before were examined. In reality she was taking stock of
the young man’s long, well-proportioned frame, his strong hands, his
smooth, fine-textured skin, his thick shock of dark hair, and making
mental notes of his simple manly speech and the fact that he evidently
did know much about moths. It pleased her to think that if he had been
a neighbour boy who had lain beside her every day of his life while she
worked, he could have been no more at home. She liked the things he
said, but she was proud that Elnora had a ready answer which always
seemed appropriate.
At last Mrs. Comstock finished the greens.
“You are three miles from the city and less than a mile from where we
live,” she said. “If you will tell me what you dare eat, I suspect you
had best go home with us and rest until the cool of the day before you
start back. Probably some one that you can ride in with will be passing
before evening.”
“That is mighty kind of you,” said Philip. “I think I will. It doesn’t
matter so much what I eat, the point is that I must be moderate. I am
hungry all the time.”
“Then we will go,” said Mrs. Comstock, “and we will not allow you to
make yourself sick with us.”
Philip Ammon arose: picking up the pail of greens and his fishing rod,
he stood waiting. Elnora led the way. Mrs. Comstock motioned Philip to
follow and she walked in the rear. The girl carried the cocoon and the
box of moths she had taken, searching every step for more. The young
man frequently set down his load to join in the pursuit of a dragonfly
or moth, while Mrs. Comstock watched the proceedings with sharp eyes.
Every time Philip picked up the pail of greens she struggled to
suppress a smile.
Elnora proceeded slowly, chattering about everything beside the trail.
Philip was interested in all the objects she pointed out, noticing
several things which escaped her. He carried the greens as casually
when they took a short cut down the roadway as on the trail. When
Elnora turned toward the gate of her home Philip Ammon stopped, took a
long look at the big hewed log cabin, the vines which clambered over
it, the flower garden ablaze with beds of bright bloom interspersed
with strawberries and tomatoes, the trees of the forest rising north
and west like a green wall and exclaimed: “How beautiful!”
Mrs. Comstock was pleased. “If you think that,” she said, “perhaps you
will understand how, in all this present-day rush to be modern, I have
preferred to remain as I began. My husband and I took up this land, and
enough trees to build the cabin, stable, and outbuildings are nearly
all we ever cut. Of course, if he had lived, I suppose we should have
kept up with our neighbours. I hear considerable about the value of the
land, the trees which are on it, and the oil which is supposed to be
under it, but as yet I haven’t brought myself to change anything. So we
stand for one of the few remaining homes of first settlers in this
region. Come in. You are very welcome to what we have.”
Mrs. Comstock stepped forward and took the lead. She had a bowl of soft
water and a pair of boots to offer for the heavy waders, for outer
comfort, a glass of cold buttermilk and a bench on which to rest, in
the circular arbour until dinner was ready. Philip Ammon splashed in
the water. He followed to the stable and exchanged boots there. He was
ravenous for the buttermilk, and when he stretched on the bench in the
arbour the flickering patches of sunlight so tantalized his tired eyes,
while the bees made such splendid music, he was soon sound asleep. When
Elnora and her mother came out with a table they stood a short time
looking at him. It is probable Mrs. Comstock voiced a united thought
when she said: “What a refined, decent looking young man! How proud his
mother must be of him! We must be careful what we let him eat.”
Then they returned to the kitchen where Mrs. Comstock proceeded to be
careful. She broiled ham of her own sugar-curing, creamed potatoes,
served asparagus on toast, and made a delicious strawberry shortcake.
As she cooked dandelions with bacon, she feared to serve them to him,
so she made an excuse that it took too long to prepare them, blanched
some and made a salad. When everything was ready she touched Philip’s
sleeve.
“Best have something to eat, lad, before you get too hungry,” she said.
“Please hurry!” he begged laughingly as he held a plate toward her to
be filled. “I thought I had enough self-restraint to start out alone,
but I see I was mistaken. If you would allow me, just now, I am afraid
I should start a fever again. I never did smell food so good as this.
It’s mighty kind of you to take me in. I hope I will be man enough in a
few days to do something worth while in return.”
Spots of sunshine fell on the white cloth and blue china, the bees and
an occasional stray butterfly came searching for food. A rose-breasted
grosbeak, released from a three hours’ siege of brooding, while his
independent mate took her bath and recreation, mounted the top branch
of a maple in the west woods from which he serenaded the dinner party
with a joyful chorus in celebration of his freedom. Philip’s eyes
strayed to the beautiful cabin, to the mixture of flowers and
vegetables stretching down to the road, and to the singing bird with
his red-splotched breast of white and he said: “I can’t realize now
that I ever lay in ice packs in a hospital. How I wish all the sick
folks could come here to grow strong!”
The grosbeak sang on, a big Turnus butterfly sailed through the arbour
and poised over the table. Elnora held up a lump of sugar and the
butterfly, clinging to her fingers, tasted daintily. With eager eyes
and parted lips, the girl held steadily. When at last it wavered away,
“That made a picture!” said Philip. “Ask me some other time how I lost
my illusions concerning butterflies. I always thought of them in
connection with sunshine, flower pollen, and fruit nectar, until one
sad day.”
“I know!” laughed Elnora. “I’ve seen that, too, but it didn’t destroy
any illusion for me. I think quite as much of the butterflies as ever.”
Then they talked of flowers, moths, dragonflies, Indian relics, and all
the natural wonders the swamp afforded, straying from those subjects to
books and school work. When they cleared the table Philip assisted,
carrying several tray loads to the kitchen. He and Elnora mounted
specimens while Mrs Comstock washed the dishes. Then she came out with
a ruffle she was embroidering.
“I wonder if I did not see a picture of you in Onabasha last night,”
Philip said to Elnora. “Aunt Anna took me to call on Miss Brownlee. She
was showing me her crowd—of course, it was you! But it didn’t half do
you justice, although it was the nearest human of any of them. Miss
Brownlee is very fond of you. She said the finest things.”
Then they talked of Commencement, and at last Philip said he must go or
his friends would become anxious about him.
Mrs. Comstock brought him a blue bowl of creamy milk and a plate of
bread. She stopped a passing team and secured a ride to the city for
him, as his exercise of the morning had been too violent, and he was
forced to admit he was tired.
“May I come to-morrow afternoon and hunt moths awhile?” he asked Mrs.
Comstock as he arose. “We will ‘sugar’ a tree and put a light beside
it, if I can get stuff to make the preparation. Possibly we can take
some that way. I always enjoy moth hunting, I’d like to help Miss
Elnora, and it would be a charity to me. I’ve got to remain outdoors
some place, and I’m quite sure I’d get well faster here than anywhere
else. Please say I may come.”
“I have no objections, if Elnora really would like help,” said Mrs.
Comstock.
In her heart she wished he would not come. She wanted her newly found
treasure all to herself, for a time, at least. But Elnora’s were eager,
shining eyes. She thought it would be splendid to have help, and great
fun to try book methods for taking moths, so it was arranged. As Philip
rode away, Mrs. Comstock’s eyes followed him. “What a nice young man!”
she said.
“He seems fine,” agreed Elnora.
“He comes of a good family, too. I’ve often heard of his father. He is
a great lawyer.”
“I am glad he likes it here. I need help. Possibly——”
“Possibly what?”
“We can find many moths.”
“What did he mean about the butterflies?”
“That he always had connected them with sunshine, flowers, and fruits,
and thought of them as the most exquisite of creations; then one day he
found some clustering thickly over carrion.”
“Come to think of it, I have seen butterflies——”
“So had he,” laughed Elnora. “And that is what he meant.”