March, 1913 



THE GARDEN MAGAZINE 



99 



"Do you think so?" I asked. 



"Surely. And there will be saxifrage 

 on the rocks and bluets in your pasture — 

 great patches of them — deep blue in the 

 shadow, and almost white where they lie 

 in the sun all day." 



"And you think I can really go?" 



"I'm sure of it," she said. 



Chapter V 



I was quite ill again for a week or more 

 after that. I suppose it was the excite- 

 ment ; perhaps it was 

 my wild orgy of hor- 

 ticultural industry, 

 but neither Clarky 

 nor I changed our 

 plans for a moment. 

 When I couldn't talk 

 or listen or plan, I 

 laid still and thought 

 about the patches of 

 bluets in the starved 

 pasture grass, and of 

 blood-root opening 

 white and wonderful 

 above the dead 

 brown leaves. 



All this time next 

 door,Uncle Hermann 

 went happily on with 

 his gardening. He 

 was planting now, 

 so Clarky said — I 

 couldn't sit up to 

 watch him — and his 

 crocuses wer.e in 

 bloom and his daffo- 

 dils showing fine 

 green stalks. I 

 didn't much care to 

 see them, I wanted to 

 see the little things 

 come up in my own 

 garden. 



Over and over 

 again I planned it. 

 Now I would put hol- 

 lyhocks by the little 

 hlouse — great tall 

 ones that could look 

 in the windows, and 

 I made a path and 

 had daffodils on each 

 side in rows. I had 



roses ■ climbing -From your front windo 



roses over the door 

 — then I sat on the 



doorstep and admired the roses. Then I 

 changed it and I put the hollyhocks by 

 the path and the daffodils under the 

 windows and I trained the roses on the 

 house, to go under and around the win- 

 dows. All this was in my mind's eye, of 

 course; when you're ill you learn to amuse 

 yourself in your head until the make- 

 believe is almost as good as the actual. 



I didn't order anything yet — that is, 

 not any plants — but I did have some seed 

 packets. Clarky took my Visiting List 

 and ordered seeds of all the annuals I 



had down there. I used to lie and finger 

 the packets; spread them out on the 

 counterpane. There were — Centaurea, 

 Mignonette, Marigolds, Shirley Poppies, 

 Coreopsis — all the old ones I knew and 

 some new ones I didn't — such as Arctotis 

 grandis — that I got because it sounded 

 impressive. I read the directions on the 

 packets which seemed all alike "Sow out- 

 of-doors when danger from frost is past, 

 in a light rich soil." Then, in some of the 

 packets I poked little holes and shook out 

 a few of the seeds on the counterpane to 



?s you look down a long slope, to where the gate used 

 is almost at the edge of the forest." 



look at them, and I wondered where the 

 wonderful blue was hidden in the tiny 

 silvery shuttlecocks that were to be 

 corn flowers, where the gold lay in the 

 little spurs that were marigolds. Most 

 wonderful of all, was the infinitesimal 

 grain of life that is a poppy seed. How 

 can all the wealth of flower and stalk and 

 bud be hidden in anything so marvelously 

 small! Then I would look at the seeds, 

 and wonder how they'd get on together 

 in my garden and whether they'd like it. 

 As I held the seeds in" my hand the old 



fairy tales seemed very simple — I re- 

 membered that one of the Prince, who drew 

 hundreds of yards of fine-spun linen from a 

 nutshell and at last out there sprang a 

 beautiful maiden. Perfectly natural it 

 seemed beside the miracle of the poppy. 

 The folk who made the fairy-tales must 

 have known well the miracles of the plants, 

 I thought. 



And so April passed. The last week 

 came and the eve of our adventure. 



It was an adventure for Clarky. I saw 

 her look to the priming of her nitro- 

 glycerine syringe as 

 a soldier looks to his 

 gun and cartridge- 

 belt. Also, I caught 

 her scrutinizing me 

 with a keen, profes- 

 sional eye, and she 

 took my respiration 

 when she thought I 

 didn't know it; but 

 I did and I made it 

 as nice and even as I 

 could. 



I suppose the jour- 

 ney was something 

 of a risk, but I didn't 

 care in the least. 

 When you've been 

 ill long enough you 

 come to consider 

 your interior decora- 

 tions and internal 

 workings as wholly 

 the affair of the doc- 

 tor and the nurse; 

 not your concern at 

 all. They may do as 

 they like with them. 

 Even if there were a 

 good chance of shuf- 

 fling off the mortal 

 coil in this proposed 

 journey, I shouldn't 

 have cared. And 

 this wasn't morbid- 

 ness nor pessimism — 

 nothing but pure in- 

 difference. Still, I 

 realized that an exit 

 during the trip would 

 have been embarras- 

 sing for Clarky, but 

 there was little dan- 

 to be. The little house ger of it. Was I not 

 going to dig in a gar- 

 den bed and see the 

 trees come alive? Besides, I might come 

 alive myself, like those little plant bundles 

 we have stowed carefully back in their box 

 — who could tell? Anyway, it was a gor- 

 geous adventure. 



I felt as exultant as Columbus when at 

 last after all the tedious waiting, Queen 

 Isabella had equipped his squadron and 

 sent him off for the unknown seas. 



Clarky, I fancy, didn't feel much like 

 Columbus on the deck of the Santa Maria. 

 Spenser's Una would be nearer her state 

 of mind. Una when she set out for the 



