Part 11

The yellow-wheeled chaise is rocking--rocking, and all the branches are knocking--knocking. The sun in the sky is a flat, red plate, the branches creak and grate. She screams and cowers, for the green foliage is a lowering wave surging to smother her. But she sees nothing. The stake holds firm. The body writhes, the body squirms. The blue spots widen, the flesh tears, but the stake wears well in the deep, black ground. It holds the body in the still, black ground.

Two years! The body has been in the ground two years. It is worn away; it is clay to clay. Where the heart moulders, a greenish dust, the stake is thrust. Late August it is, and night; a night flauntingly jewelled with stars, a night of shooting stars and loud insect noises. Down the road to Tilbury, silence--and the slow flapping of large leaves. Down the road to Sutton, silence--and the darkness of heavy-foliaged trees. Down the road to Wayfleet, silence--and the whirring scrape of insects in the branches. Down the road to Edgarstown, silence--and stars like stepping-stones in a pathway overhead. It is very quiet at the cross-roads, and the sign-board points the way down the four roads, endlessly points the way where nobody wishes to go.

A horse is galloping, galloping up from Sutton. Shaking the wide, still leaves as he goes under them. Striking sparks with his iron shoes; silencing the katydids. Dr. Morgan riding to a child-birth over Tilbury way; riding to deliver a woman of her first-born son. One o'clock from Wayfleet bell tower, what a shower of shooting stars! And a breeze all of a sudden, jarring the big leaves and making them jerk up and down. Dr. Morgan's hat is blown from his head, the horse swerves, and curves away from the sign-post. An oath--spurs--a blurring of grey mist. A quick left twist, and the gelding is snorting and racing down the Tilbury road with the wind dropping away behind him.

The stake has wrenched, the stake has started, the body, flesh from flesh, has parted. But the bones hold tight, socket and ball, and clamping them down in the hard, black ground is the stake, wedged through ribs and spine. The bones may twist, and heave, and twine, but the stake holds them still in line. The breeze goes down, and the round stars shine, for the stake holds the fleshless bones in line.

Twenty years now! Twenty long years! The body has powdered itself away; it is clay to clay. It is brown earth mingled with brown earth. Only flaky bones remain, lain together so long they fit, although not one bone is knit to another. The stake is there too, rotted through, but upright still, and still piercing down between ribs and spine in a straight line.

Yellow stillness is on the cross-roads, yellow stillness is on the trees. The leaves hang drooping, wan. The four roads point four yellow ways, saffron and gamboge ribbons to the gaze. A little swirl of dust blows up Tilbury road, the wind which fans it has not strength to do more; it ceases, and the dust settles down. A little whirl of wind comes up Tilbury road. It brings a sound of wheels and feet. The wind reels a moment and faints to nothing under the sign-post. Wind again, wheels and feet louder. Wind again--again--again. A drop of rain, flat into the dust. Drop!--Drop! Thick heavy raindrops, and a shrieking wind bending the great trees and wrenching off their leaves.

Under the black sky, bowed and dripping with rain, up Tilbury road, comes the procession. A funeral procession, bound for the graveyard at Wayfleet. Feet and wheels--feet and wheels. And among them one who is carried.

The bones in the deep, still earth shiver and pull. There is a quiver through the rotted stake. Then stake and bones fall together in a little puffing of dust.

Like meshes of linked steel the rain shuts down behind the procession, now well along the Wayfleet road.

He wavers like smoke in the buffeting wind. His fingers blow out like smoke, his head ripples in the gale. Under the sign-post, in the pouring rain, he stands, and watches another quavering figure drifting down the Wayfleet road. Then swiftly he streams after it. It flickers among the trees. He licks out and winds about them. Over, under, blown, contorted. Spindrift after spindrift; smoke following smoke. There is a wailing through the trees, a wailing of fear, and after it laughter--laughter--laughter, skirling up to the black sky. Lightning jags over the funeral procession. A heavy clap of thunder. Then darkness and rain, and the sound of feet and wheels.

A Roxbury Garden

Hoops

Blue and pink sashes, Criss-cross shoes, Minna and Stella run out into the garden To play at hoop.

Up and down the garden-paths they race, In the yellow sunshine, Each with a big round hoop White as a stripped willow-wand.

Round and round turn the hoops, Their diamond whiteness cleaving the yellow sunshine. The gravel crunches and squeaks beneath them, And a large pebble springs them into the air To go whirling for a foot or two Before they touch the earth again In a series of little jumps.

Spring, Hoops! Spit out a shower of blue and white brightness. The little criss-cross shoes twinkle behind you, The pink and blue sashes flutter like flags, The hoop-sticks are ready to beat you. Turn, turn, Hoops! In the yellow sunshine. Turn your stripped willow whiteness Along the smooth paths.

Stella sings: "Round and round, rolls my hoop, Scarcely touching the ground, With a swoop, And a bound, Round and round. With a bumpety, crunching, scattering sound, Down the garden it flies; In our eyes The sun lies. See it spin Out and in; Through the paths it goes whirling, About the beds curling. Sway now to the loop, Faster, faster, my hoop. Round you come, Up you come, Quick and straight as before. Run, run, my hoop, run, Away from the sun."

And the great hoop bounds along the path, Leaping into the wind-bright air.

Minna sings: "Turn, hoop, Burn hoop, Twist and twine Hoop of mine. Flash along, Leap along, Right at the sun. Run, hoop, run. Faster and faster, Whirl, twirl. Wheel like fire, And spin like glass; Fire's no whiter Glass is no brighter. Dance, Prance, Over and over, About and about, With the top of you under, And the bottom at top, But never a stop. Turn about, hoop, to the tap of my stick, I follow behind you To touch and remind you. Burn and glitter, so white and quick, Round and round, to the tap of a stick."

The hoop flies along between the flower-beds, Swaying the flowers with the wind of its passing.

Beside the foxglove-border roll the hoops, And the little pink and white bells shake and jingle Up and down their tall spires; They roll under the snow-ball bush, And the ground behind them is strewn with white petals; They swirl round a corner, And jar a bee out of a Canterbury bell; They cast their shadows for an instant Over a bed of pansies, Catch against the spurs of a columbine, Jostle the quietness from a cluster of monk's-hood. Pat! Pat! behind them come the little criss-cross shoes, And the blue and pink sashes stream out in flappings of colour.

Stella sings: "Hoop, hoop, Roll along, Faster bowl along, Hoop. Slow, to the turning, Now go!--Go! Quick! Here's the stick. Rat-a-tap-tap it, Pat it, flap it. Fly like a bird or a yellow-backed bee, See how soon you can reach that tree. Here is a path that is perfectly straight. Roll along, hoop, or we shall be late."

Minna sings: "Trip about, slip about, whip about Hoop. Wheel like a top at its quickest spin, Then, dear hoop, we shall surely win. First to the greenhouse and then to the wall Circle and circle, And let the wind push you, Poke you, Brush you, And not let you fall. Whirring you round like a wreath of mist. Hoopety hoop, Twist, Twist."

Tap! Tap! go the hoop-sticks, And the hoops bowl along under a grape arbour. For an instant their willow whiteness is green, Pale white-green. Then they are out in the sunshine, Leaving the half-formed grape clusters A-tremble under their big leaves.

"I will beat you, Minna," cries Stella, Hitting her hoop smartly with her stick. "Stella, Stella, we are winning," calls Minna, As her hoop curves round a bed of clove-pinks. A humming-bird whizzes past Stella's ear, And two or three yellow-and-black butterflies Flutter, startled, out of a pillar rose. Round and round race the little girls After their great white hoops.

Suddenly Minna stops. Her hoop wavers an instant, But she catches it up on her stick. "Listen, Stella!" Both the little girls are listening; And the scents of the garden rise up quietly about them. "It's the chaise! It's Father! Perhaps he's brought us a book from Boston." Twinkle, twinkle, the little criss-cross shoes Up the garden path. Blue--pink--an instant, against the syringa hedge. But the hoops, white as stripped willow-wands, Lie in the grass, And the grasshoppers jump back and forth Over them.

Battledore and Shuttlecock

The shuttlecock soars upward In a parabola of whiteness, Turns, And sinks to a perfect arc. Plat! the battledore strikes it, And it rises again, Without haste, Winged and curving, Tracing its white flight Against the clipped hemlock-trees. Plat! Up again, Orange and sparkling with sun, Rounding under the blue sky, Dropping, Fading to grey-green In the shadow of the coned hemlocks. "Ninety-one." "Ninety-two." "Ninety-three." The arms of the little girls Come up--and up-- Precisely, Like mechanical toys. The battledores beat at nothing, And toss the dazzle of snow Off their parchment drums. "Ninety-four." Plat! "Ninety-five." Plat! Back and forth Goes the shuttlecock, Icicle-white, Leaping at the sharp-edged clouds, Overturning, Falling, Down, And down, Tinctured with pink From the upthrusting shine Of Oriental poppies.