IN PURSUIT
“First of all,” said Nimbus, “we must find the Rays. Then we’ll go down
to the Meteor farm and put all the Meteors who are off watch or on part
time, to work doing scout duty.”
“Who are the Rays?” asked Billy.
“They are the Sun’s private messengers. They do all his regular work
for him, such as making things grow, and arranging the weather, and
building the bridges----”
“Bridges?” Billy inquired.
“Yes, rainbow bridges. How could we fairies get over the ocean if it
wasn’t for them?”
“You might go on enchanted trolley cars,” suggested Billy.
“Yes, we might, if trolley cars grew on trees in jungles like monkeys,
but they don’t.”
Billy thought it best to make no more suggestions.
“The Rays,” continued Nimbus, “are named Violet, Indigo, Blue,
Green, Yellow, Orange and Red. Get them all together and they make a
beautiful, clear, white light, and we’ll need such a light to find the
Equator.”
There was a rustling of the trees behind them and a sad voice called
out: “I wish you’d take me with you. I’m afraid to stay alone.”
Billy looked quickly around and saw the Evening Star standing at a
little distance, looking very pretty indeed in the soft light that
seemed to sift out of her white frock.
“Oh, nonsense!” said Nimbus. “We’ve men’s work here. You don’t want to
go anyway!”
Two bright tears stood in the Evening Star’s eyes and glistened in the
glow that surrounded her. Nimbus clapped his hands in delight.
“There you are, you fellows!” he shouted; “come out of that.”
“Who?” cried Billy.
“The Rays--all of them. Don’t you see them hiding in those teardrops?
Come, come. No more delay! I’ve important work for you.”
As he spoke, there suddenly appeared before him seven lively little
chaps, each clad from head to foot in his own prismatic color, and all
dancing excitedly about the ground.
“Go tell the old man that the Equator has got away,” commanded Nimbus.
“And then come back here and make us a searchlight. If he isn’t back
here where he belongs by to-morrow there’s no telling what will happen.”
Without a word the Rays suddenly united in a brilliant shaft of white
light and whisked away over the treetops.
As they vanished Billy thought he heard a sob, and glancing about, saw
the Evening Star sitting in the branches of a low palm and crying as if
her heart would break.
“Oh, I’m afraid! I’m afraid!” she wailed. “If the Equator should come
back and find me here when you’re gone he’ll turn me into a Comet; I
just know he will!”
Nimbus’s face grew serious at this.
“There is danger of that,” he said. “Yes, he would be just about
contemptible enough to do that very thing.”
“But how could he?” inquired Billy, his bewilderment steadily
increasing.
“Easiest thing in the world. He has only to set fire to her hair,
and it would stream out behind her in a fan of flame. Then she’d be
so frightened that she’d go wandering off through space and become a
Comet.”
“Then,” said Billy, “I think we had better take Miss Evening Star with
us, don’t you? Unless her father, Mr. Sun, can look after her.”
Nimbus frowned at Billy impatiently.
“My dear boy,” he said, “don’t you know that the Sun never does any
night work of any kind? Besides, just now he’s busy on the other side
of the world. Yes, we’ll take her with us.”
So Nimbus and the Evening Star and Billy went off to the yard where the
Meteors off duty and on part time were assembled.
The inclosure, which was walled in by four fogs, was full of them,
jumping hurdles, playing marbles, or racing around after each other.
So busy were they at their sport that it was not until Nimbus had
shouted himself hoarse that they paid the slightest attention to him.
At last, however, one of them heard him and shot over to see what he
wanted.
“I don’t believe,” said Nimbus, “that you Meteors could hear the rings
of Saturn if they rang all at once. Did you know that the Equator had
escaped?”
“Goodness, no!” said the Meteor, and instantly shot about among his
fellows spreading the dreadful news.
They left off playing immediately, and all lined up before Nimbus for
orders.
“You must go find the Equator,” said the Fairy authoritatively. “The
Rays have gone to notify the Sun. Ten of you will come with us. The
other six million will scatter about the universe and look for him. Let
me know the instant you see him, and stop him if he starts to come back
to the Earth.”
“Yes, sir,” said the Meteors in a breath. With a great crackling noise
they shot away into the void, each taking a different direction so that
their going looked like a splendid shower of rockets on the night of
the Fourth of July.
[Illustration: “With a great crackling noise they shot into the void”]
“I suppose,” said Nimbus, “that the next thing to do is to build a
tower so we can see what is going on in the sky.”
“We have nothing to build it of,” said Billy.
“We could make it of Moonbeams if there were any Moon,” replied Nimbus.
“But there isn’t,” said the Evening Star, “so we’d better find a hill
to climb.”
“I saw a beautiful hill as we were coming here,” said Billy. “It had a
white top, and stood out ever so high over the others.”
“That was a volcano,” said Nimbus. “It’ll be just the place for us.”
“Let’s be starting, then,” said Billy.
So the whole party set out through the trees for the volcano, and in an
hour or two were standing on a great lava field looking up at the dark
sky, which seemed fairly alive with fiery-tailed meteors hurrying here,
there and everywhere on their search for the Equator.
Billy had just settled himself with his back against a comfortable
boulder when he noticed right over his head an object which resembled
a great, luminous doughnut. “I wonder what that is,” he said, pointing
upward.
The Evening Star, quite exhausted with the tramp up the mountain, had
been sitting with her bright face in her hands. At Billy’s words she
glanced up, and a terrified scream brought Nimbus to his feet.
“There he is!” shouted Nimbus excitedly. “He’s coming this way, and we
can never capture him.”
“There who is?” asked Billy.
“The Equator!” said Nimbus.
ON THE PASSIVE VOLCANO