BIRDS' SONG.

Auckland Star, Volume LXVI, Issue 122, 25 May 1935, Page 9 (Supplement)

BIRDS' SONG.

By AGNES L. WINSKELL

In publishing this short story, we introduce to the readers of these pages a young New Zealand writer, Agnes L. Winskell, whose stories are well known among the boys and girls of this country.

WHEN Mr. Mayfair died, Anne and her mother could no longer afford to live in the big house in town. So they moved as soon as possible to the little house they had, far, far away in the country. But Anne did not want to go. She liked the big city, loved to hear the honk-konk of the motor lionis, and the gay ring of the train bells as the great vehicles came sliding down the hill at frightening speed. Anne liked to go down and look at the big shops, see the windows sparkling and shining, and looking so jolly ai*d gay. Everything was so noisy in the city, and Anne loved noise. All the people were laughing and talking, too, especially on Friday nights, just after the hooter had screamed shrilly above the roar of the traffic. They hurried to and fro, here and there, darting into the big shops,- pushing their way through the bustling throng, and coining out again with exciting big and little pnrcels, wrapped carefully in new brown paper. Anne -would stand in the wide doorways a,nd make gucssee as to what the thrilling little packages contained. Then, when she tired it •was fun to jvutcli the people in the trams, see the.,men, clutching hastily at their hate, racing madly after a car swiftly departing, and somehow gaining a precarious foothold aboard before it was quite gone. Merry laughing people in a big merry city. Anne wondered how she could ever leave it. "But it's the dearest little cottage, Anne," her mother said comfortingly. "A little wild and rambling, perhaps, as it's been empty so long, but there's a summer house, and a stream at the bottom of the garden. I'm sure you'll love, it when you get there." Anne wondered, and tried to picture it, as she sat in the rickety old truck that was carrying the furniture to their new home. Perhaps, after all, it would be nice. Perhaps, it would be like the cottage in her picture book, now packed carefully at the bottom of the big trunk. The cottage with the climbing roses and the ivy vines above the door. And flowers of every kind and colour growing gloriously free and untrained. Perhaps they would grow right down to the water's edge, and there might be— just might be —ducks swimming in the stream. But Anne, unfortunately, had forgotten that nobody had lived in their little house for a long time. She started out of her reverie as the truck drew into the side of a rough, narrow road, and jerked bumpily to a stop.

Anne looked about her quickly. Why they were stopping she could not understand. To the right was an old—a very old—house, half hidden from view by a mass of trees and uncultivated shrubs. But there was nothing else to see. Only rolling, green hills that dipped and rose again, until they stood in clear outline against the sky. Anne's eyes were wide and disbelieving. This was the place? It couldn't be! But yet she knew it was. And, scrambling elowly down from the, truck, she followed her mother. Anne could not hide her disappointment. She stood in the gateway and stared with sulky eyes up the cobbled pathway buried beneath the weeds. There were three steps leading on to the verandah, and one was cracking and collapsing. Anne, walking slowly up the path, did not even think to look for the climbing roees and the ivy vines. She just knew, inside of her, that they would not be there. Inside the house, the rooms were dark and uninviting. Anne peered into the hall and hated the close," musty smell. She wanted to cry, oh! so badly. She could feel the tears welling up into her eyes, and her mouth was twitching uncontrollably at the corners. And, sitting under the trees, wiping her eyes with her clean, white handkerchief, Anne suddenly realised that there were birds in the trees. The realisation came to her just like that, and Anne, despite her sadness, nearly laughed. Of course, there were birde in the trees! How silly she was! It was just that she'd neither noticed nor heard them before, so absorbed had she been in her thoughts. The birds were singing. Some with a lovely, rippling melody, and others with a sweet musical twitter. Anne forgot her tears and sat very still, listening, in case they should fly away. Three morninge during the next week Anne woke very early—much earlier than she had ever done before. It may have been the birds' song that disturbed her, for she woke each time with their strident symphony ringing in her cars. The. first morning Anne slipped quickly from between the cool, white sheets, and, sure enough, she could see the little feathered songsters fluttering from bough to bough. Every now and then one would rise above the highest branches, and wing its way through the flaming eastern sky. But the second and third times she just lay quietly and listened. The music must have lulled her to

sleep again, for when she awoke once more a sweet, appetising smell was forcing its way under her door, and mother was cooking bacon for breakfast. Anne found that the little house could be made to look quite nice Now that the scrubbing and polishin" was done, the carpets laid and the new cretonne curtains were blowing at the windows, it looked almost as pretty as the cottage in her picture book. Anne was I surprised that she could feel so happy. Except for one thing. She was lonely sometimes, lonely for a friend. She had had so many in the big _ city, but here—here there were no children at all, save for the little girl of about Anne's age who lived at the small, white cottage about half a mile up the road. Biit on the day that Anne had passed and seen her, the other had made no attempt at friendliness — just raised her head quickly at the approaching footsteps and then acted as though Anne had not been there. Anne was sorry. She would have liked to have known the girl whose wide, appealing eyes had been raised for that one moment. But Anne had not- seen her again for a long time. Once Anne thought she saw her in their own garden; thought she recognised the blue gingham dress ehe wore. • But, she told herself, it was absurd, and .besides, when she looked she found nobody there at all. Anne went past the white house again and again in an attempt *o glimpse the elusive little figure. But she never did. She wondered if she would knock on the door and make friends, but there was something about the place that stayed her intention. The little house was always so quiet. There was never any noise there. And the green, carefully-cut lawn spread itself in a prim, unfriendly way before it. So Anne came home yet once again without having gone even a tiny bit further in her*search for a. friend. She hesitated at the gate and looked at their little cottage, freshly painted with cream and green. There .was a brand new step in the place of the old, rotting one. Anne almost loved the house now. She pushed - open the gate and it gave its usual protesting squeak. There was a startled gasp near at hand, and a figure drew in behind a protecting bush, a figure of a girl in a blue gingham dress! Anne, recovering quickly from her surprise, darted into the shrubbery. Here was her chance, a chance she did not mean to let slip by. But although Anne chatted in a quick, friendly way' it was fully half an hour before she drew the other from her shell. She was a quiet, unapproachable girl. There was something strangely pathetic in her manner. Even Anne herself, after a while, became embarrassed. "But what's your name?" she inquired eagerly at last. "Mine's Anne Mayfair!" "Margaret Finn." There was a long silence, which Anne did not try to break. She told herself that her

new friend was merely shy. The birds' song increased in volume. Then: "I'll have to go." It was Margaret speaking. "Mother will be worrying about me." "You'll come in the morning? Please!" Margaret nodded slowly, and consented 0 somewhat hesitantly. She was glad, she said shyly, that Anne did not mind. "My coming here, I mean," ehe explained. "I used to come before, when the house was empty. ,. The confidential tone cheered Anne. She had found a friend! "Mind!" she echoed in eurpriae. "Of course not! We'd love to have you, mother and I." "I'm so glad,". Margaret murmured softly, and a glow of happiness flushed her face, replacing the former pallor. "I've been stealing in since you came, thinking that you might." "Silly!" Anne chided gaily. "Is it the birds you like? I do, too. They wake me in the mornings sometimes. And, listen, the one singing now—" She paused, and, yes, there was one whose song was louder than the rest. "Isn't ho a beauty? I've seen him a dozen tintes," Anne finished enthusiastically. "I'm sure lie is." Anne looked quickly at her friend. The grey eyee looked towards her suddenly, and, though wide and beautiful, they seemed expressionless. "I've often though he must be. But I couldn't tell, because —because I cannot see!" The meaning of the words was beating into Anne's horrified brain furiously. Margaret could not see! She was—Mind! No wonder, then, at her reserve. "You'll describe him for me?",' Margaret was asking. And Anne pulled herself together and said, "Yes, of course, Margaret. And, Margaret"— earnestly, sincerely—"l'm terribly sorry." But Margaret had left her eide. "Oh, thanks, Anno!" she was crying as she ran forward, stumbling, groping with her hands. "Come over here, under the tree where he's singing—oh!—" Anne, reaching out With a restraining hand, was too late. Margaret caught her foot unsuspectingly in the protruding root and went down, her head striking hard against the tree trunk as she fell. Anne stood for a moment in stunned silence. Then she called"wildly for her mother. It was a month before Margaret came to play in Anne's garden again. But when she came at last, she was able to see as well ae any the little' house with the cream and green paint! And the bird with the loudest, sweetest song! "That jar on the head was just the thing she needed," the doctor had, said eurprisingly on that eventful night. "I have alwaye thought that a shock like the one that took her sight from Ijer would most likely restore it." He had turned then and patted the fair head. "Now, little lady, good luck!" And Anne, her warm hand clasped tightly with Margaret's own, had breathed softly the same glad wish.