POPPY OF SUNSET LAND.

Otago Witness, Issue 3743, 8 December 1925, Page 82

POPPY OF SUNSET LAND.

(Copyright.—Fob the Witness.) Peter was stretched on the hillside beside the log fire, staring at the ruddy gnomes that danced in the flame, or watching the trees whose slender branches swayed in the wind, and east' thin shadows down the slopes where longarmed figures seemed to twist and turn In fantastic dances, to the music of the little flower-bells that nodded so merrily In the grass. Already in the east, beyond the valley, great sombre cloud giants spread huge clutching fingers down towards the hills. Even a delicate crescent of a moon showed early in tho shy, as though eager to see Night spread his soft, dark, velvet coverlet over hillside and hollow. Lazily Peter turned his wee fair head toward the west. Far across the water the sun was setting, in no hurry to say good night so soon. The great golden bail of flame hung in the sky, and the shimmoriug pathway across the sea seemed a road that led right into the heart of Fairyland. Peter watched spellbound, his little lips parted in wonder at the sight that he knew so well, and yet seemed always different. All at once ho was walking along the golden road. The sun was gone. In place of the foamy piles of tinted sunset clouds, a pluln stretched before him, and there grew golden grain and the most wouderful poppies he had ever seen—as though the fairies had spread a deep carpet of green, and scattered thereon handfuls of gold and gleaming jewels. So many shades of red, and gold, and purple, and yellow, and cream, and blue there were that Peter stood gasping, wondering where one beautiful colour ended and the next began. From one side, among tho flowers came a laugli, a delicious tinkly laugh as though golden bubbles were floating together and breaking, and Peter turned round with a start. “Hello! Do you like my garden, Little Boy-From-thc-Fire?” laughed a little girl at him. Peter knew what her name would be before she told him. “You're Poppy!” he said, forgetting to be shy, “And I'm Peter!” t “ Y /5’ Im cal,e<l p «PPy of Sunset Land,” she answered. “Peter! Peter-Irom-thc-Hill! I like your name!" she told him. Peter liked her. She was tiny. too. but her skin was brown, her hair dark, and her eyes twinkled and shone as the sunbeams do in waters ruffled by the winds. And her tunic! Peter forgot his manners and stared.' It was as though made from tho shining petals of poppies of every colour imaginable, and looked like the wonderful field of flowers, or the sky at evening when the sun is sinking to rest. Poppy laughed again at him. “Come on, Peter!” she called. “Don't you want to see my special beauties, and play hide-and-seek among the grain?” Indeed he did! Never had he had sucii fun before, or ever seen such poppies a 3 she showed him, or ever heard before that the glorious colours in the evening sky come from the poppy-covered dresses of the Sunset Sprites, as they dance a merry farewell to their Golden Lord. “Gracious! Peter,” said Poppv at last. “I've forgotten to close the gates. I'm late now, and you must go.” She took him to the gates, golden inside and grey outside; they kissed in farewell, and Peter Set out across the golden road that in places now seemed dark and grey. He turned. Poppy of Sunset Land stood in the narrow Rtrip of colour that still showed between the great gates, and waved a crimson bloom in a last good-bye. Someone was gently shaking his shoulder. “Come on, Laddie, to tea,” liis Daddy was saying, “It's getting dark and nearly bedtime.” Peter looked across the waters to whero a tiny column of colour Rtained the darkening sky, and he seemed to see between the gates of grey the tiny figure of his elfin playmate, Poppy of Sunset Laud.