GRUMPY JOHN AND SPRING

Evening Post, Volume CX, Issue 83, 4 October 1930, Page 20

GRUMPY JOHN AND SPRING

(T^K RTJMPY JOHN sat in his rickety \jf armchair and rocked himself to and fro. Ilis brow was wrinkled and his keen" eyes were half closed, while his tangled hair looked more tangled than ever. Outside the sun was shining down on the happy little village, making tho whole atmosphere tinglo with the sccntti .of Spring, but to Grumpy John this was nonsense. "Did you ever hear of such rubbish?" he said to his old kettle, that happened to bo standing on the hearth. "They call this ,spring. Well, I can't sec it. The trees and tho roads and hills are just the same old shape ,and size." Ho picked up a crumpled newspaper and looked at it foolishly, In tho middle of the page was tho drawing of a girl Tritlt the dearest littlo face. - Grumpy John looked at it closely. "H'm," ho. grunted, "I wonder if Little Emily hag grown up anything like her." Ho glanced at the heading above the picture. "Well, I'm bothered!" he said again, "if this isn't the limit! Here it is in black and white— spring!" And this is what lie read:—

'•'Do you know? Do you? But of course you remember! One month— and—spring! 0, life is very beautiful, my'friend. Because sho is coming, she of tho love-lit, sweet, sweet eyes... in all her young, shining splendour. . ." and so on, till he had read the wholo of Paula Hanger's little piece in the Fairy King. "Well," he said, when he had finished, "not bad for a younj* one, but there'd be some sense in it if it said Little Emily was coming." Ho looked out of his dreamy window with its dusty grey curtains and cobwebby corners. He was thinking. . . In Mrs. Smith's garden ho could sco a wattle tree in full bloom,' in Mra. Green's a pust>y-willow was smiling at the world, but in his garden, what couli? he sec—ah, what could he?. Nothing like these lovely things; only • wild grass and weeds. Teais dropped from Grunipv John's eyes, the first tears ho had shed siuce Littlo Emily had gone away. Poor

Little Emily, how was she getting on? ho wondered. Was she happy with Aunt Helen, and was she still thinking of her old father? He rose from lis» chair and walked out into his neglected garden. % When Little Emily had left he had pulled up all his plants and thrown them into the mer." Littlo Emily had said that when she <>,imc back she wanted to sco the daffodils nodding to her when she opened the gate. He walked back along the path and his eye caught sight oi' Homcthing white among the glasses. With trembling lingers ho beat over and picked a delicate scented. narcissus. Grumpy John took it inside and finding an old cracked jar in tho cupboard, iillcd.it with -water arid put the flower in, placing the jar oa the window ledge. "I hope a Littlo Emily will come while it is alive," -he said as he prepared-himself som» dinner. • - . And she did. The very next., daywhen he was washing up his breakfast dishes, ho heard a light footstep on th» path. "She's come," he said in a whisper, as he walked with-unsteady;

steps to the door. He stopped and stared, for there she really stood, a girl of seventeen years, gay and laughing, plump and rosy. "Little Emily, is it you? You 'ye come back, but the daffoclils aren'l; nodding." "Yes," answered Emily, "I've come back, and I'm going to look after you, daddy dear. I'm going to cook and sew for you—but how grey and wrinkled you've grown! Aunt Helen is corning next spring and we'll have the daffodils nodding to welcome her. She has been so good and- kind to', me in. her dear house in Switzerland, but I'm going to enjoy life far, far more with my own daddy to look after, and our own cottage." The next day- the house -was smelling of sweet cleanliness and the weeds were nearly all thrown in the river. Grumpy John became the pleasantest man in the village while his old name was soon forgotten. ' "SAUCY a ALLYI.'"; (15) Wadcstown. C