PATCHWORK PIECES

Otago Witness, Issue 3958, 21 January 1930, Page 7

PATCHWORK PIECES

By

Eileen Service.

( Special for the Otago Witness.) CXXXVIII.—THE HILL. The black wizard saw the hill first. He > was riding by on his horse one morning j when he noticed a little lane leading to j the right; and after he had followed | it for a while, and turned oil to where a gap in the hedge invited him, he found j the hill lying still and peaceful in the i sunshine. Below, lie could sec the city, i the harbour, and the ocean. But he j Could not be seen from any of these | places, because the hill was so secret and ; hidden that nobody thought of its being ; there. The wizard stood for a long time star- | ing about him, while his horse cropped ' the grass at his feet, and the gulls, , making for their home on the cliffs, tlew : over his head on their sharp wings. His brows nearly met, so fieicely did he frown, and he kept biting his lip as if in rage. Suddenly, he leaped back into the saddle and turned away. But first he made a resolution: that by and by he would return to the hill and use it as a place where he might practise his spells. The hill heard the resolution. 1 think it shivered as the words were uttered, though, of course, it might have been only the wind passing and causing its tussocky grass to move. And 1 think it grew suddenly frightened, though again, that might have been only a cloud covering the sun and sending a shadow where a moment before there had been brightness. Then the wizard put spurs to his horse, and galloped away, and soon there was not even the echo of hoof-beats to tell that he had been there that morning. Xow there was a poet named Cedric, who loved a lady named Jessamine, but who, being poor, did not dare to declare his love. lie thought, “ What will she want with me when I have neither land nor money?” and remembering all the rich men who were suitors for her hand, he had no heart to approach her. One of the rich men rode a horse, and had a dark and scowling face. But, though Cedric hated him, he did not know him for a wizard, so he tolerated him as well as he could while wishing that he had some of his gold for himself.

“ Being poor is a sad game," Cedric decided. “To be rich is considerably more pleasant.” He determined at that to go away and think of a poem, so that perhaps he might be able to sell it to somebody and become wealthy. He followed a little lane. How he found it in the first place he did not know, but probably his feel carried him to it when he was walking with head down thinking of Jessamine, and when he looked up there lie was.

“ But I don’t want to be in a lane,” he said. “ I want to be somewheie where I can lean against a tree, and toil a little, and think.” So when he saw the gap in the hedge he went through. The hill seemed to be lying on its back, holding up its chin to let the air kiss it, and stretching out its arms to feel the sun. Such a lazy, happy, innocent hill it looked, so warm and sheltered, so pretty and private.

“ Why!" said Cedric, “Here’s a bonny place! And I didn't know till this minute that it existed.” He stood, as the wizard had stood, looking at the city and the sea below him. A look of delight came into his eyes. “Why.” he said again. “It's abso-

lutely perfect. I'll sit down here and write a poem, and then see if 1 can become rich." He stretched himself beside a gum tree and moved his head against the bark. Then he lolled over and began to think.

Did the hill help him? Was it quite fair? Could he really say he did it by himself? I cannot answer that because 1 don't know, but I can say that the hill seemed somewhat glad to see him. Of course, it might have been the wind again, or the fact that all the clouds had gone and there was no chance of there being any shadows. But the hill seemed to be quivering for joy. and its face was s<> bright and sunlit that you could almost imagine you saw it smiling. What happened? Just this: Cedric made a poem. And the poem was all about the hill and the people who lived there. But there were no people? No, not then. But Cedric seemed to think there were. He would be looking at a rise with a tree behind it, and there he would see a troop of girls dancing in a ring and laughing; or he would be looking at a hollow lined with leaves, and there he would see a crowd of boys. Everywhere there were chiidten. tumbling. leaping, singing, till soon there was not a space to be seen; eveiy inch of ground held a child.

He was so dazzled that he could scarcely see. His lingers shook, and be grew frightfully inky. But he wrote about them al!—page after page—a rippling. lilting, lovely poem, which he called “ The Hill." At sunset he put his pen away. And as he walked towards the lane, with his brain in a whirl and his cheeks burning, all the children he had written about seemed to be more alive than ever, and to be standing l»e--hind him, between him and the sea, clapping their hands and jumping for delight.

Cedric went back to the town. He took the poem to an editor and said. “Any good' and the editor said solemnly :

“My friend, you're a made mail!’’ and shook him by the hand and congratulated him.

“ Then 1 can begin to think about marrying Jessamine?” Cedric suggested. “ I was too poor before.” And the editor said: “Poor? Why this will make you the richest man in the country! And marry? 1 should think you could—twenty Jessamines!”

So Cedric went to begin the wooing which, up till that moment, he had been too shy to attempt. Came a night when the black wizard was riding up the lane in the moonlight. Things were going so badly that he felt he really must make some spells. Otherwise, how was he to influence that flighty Jessamine who, in spite of his money, in spite of his lands, would have nothing to do with, him?

But when lie reached the hill he was met by a host of children.

“Go back!’ they cried, “Go hack, go back.” They waved their hands in his face and stamped their feet. “Go back,! wicked man.” “ Baek?” sneered thewizaid. “ What is-! the meaning of this? I set this hill aside for mv own. 1 decided to use it for mv spells'.” “ But von left it empty,” t lie children answered. “You went away and somebody else came. And he made us, and this is our hill. You cannot come here now.” The wizard went dark with fury. In fact, so angry did he grow that the moon was ashamed at so ugly a sight and refused to look any longer. The hill became hidden in shadow. It seemed to draw itself away. And the wizard, muttering a curse, returned to the town. The children were right. lie had left the hill empty. If he had wanted to use it he should have peopled it with spells of his own. Now somebody else had gone before him and made it so that he could never go there again. Weil, he would have to think of another way of doing things. He would have to take Jessamine by force. But when he arrived at her house, he found her gone, for young Cedric had married her an hour before and taken her away on her honeymoon. Of course they went to live at the hill. Cedric built a house there overlooking the sea, and made it so that only his friends could find it. for he did not want it to become too public. And as the years passed, the story of his poem became true, for children came to play there, sturdy boys and rosy girls, and when they came they brought their companions. so that every inch of ground held a child.

The wizard? He went to Rotorua and jumped in to a geyser, where he was burnt to death.

And the hill? As it thanked its fate that the wizard had said no spells- that dav. and that the next, man who had

visited it had been Cedric the poet, it. grew bonnier and bonnier, happier and happier, till there was not a fairer hill an vw here.