Just when we were trying to keep a stiff upper lip before him,and whistling as hard as ever he had,to brace our courage,a letter came for mother from the head of the music school Shelley attended,saying she was no longer fit for work,so she was being sent home at once,and they would advise us to consult a specialist immediately.Mother sat and stared at father,and father went to hitch the horses to drive to Groveville.
There's only one other day of my life that stands out as clearly as that.The house was clean as we could make it.I finished feeding early,and had most of the time to myself.I went down to the Big Hill,and followed the top of it to our woods.Then I turned around,and started toward the road,just idling.If I saw a lovely spot I sat down and watched all around me to see if a Fairy really would go slipping past,or lie asleep under a leaf.I peeked and peered softly,going from spot to spot,watching everything.Sometimes I hung over the water,and studied tiny little fish with red,yellow,and blue on them,bright as flowers.The dragonflies would alight right on me,and some wore bright blue markings and some blood red.There was a blue beetle,a beautiful green fly,and how the blue wasps did flip,flirt and glint in the light.So did the blackbirds and the redwings.That embankment was left especially to shade the water,and to feed the birds.Every foot of it was covered with alders,wild cherry,hazelbush,mulberries,everything having a berry or nut.There were several scrub apple trees,many red haws,the wild strawberries spread in big beds in places,and some of them were colouring.
Wild flowers grew everywhere,great beds were blue with calamus,and the birds flocked in companies to drive away the water blacksnakes that often found nests,and liked eggs and bird babies.When I came to the road at last,the sun was around so the big oak on the top of the hill threw its shadow across the bridge,and I lay along one edge and watched the creek bottom,or else I sat up so the water flowed over my feet,and looked at the embankment and the sky.In a way,it was the most peculiar day of my life.I had plenty to think of,but I never thought at all.I only lived.I sat watching the world go past through a sort of golden haze the sun made.When a pair of kingbirds and three crows chased one of my hawks pell-mell across the sky,I looked on and didn't give a cent what happened.When a big blacksnake darted its head through sweet grass and cattails,and caught a frog that had climbed on a mossy stone in the shade to dine on flies,I let it go.Any other time I would have hunted a stick and made the snake let loose.To-day I just sat there and let things happen as they did.
At last I wandered up the road,climbed the back garden fence,and sat on the board at the edge of a flowerbed,and to-day,I could tell to the last butterfly about that garden:what was in bloom,how far things had grown,and what happened.Bobby flew under the Bartlett pear tree and crowed for me,but I never called him.I sat there and lived on,and mostly watched the bees tumble over the bluebells.They were almost ready to be cut to put in the buttered tumblers for perfume,like mother made for us.Then I went into the house and looked at Grace Greenwood,but I didn't take her along.Mother came past and gave me a piece of stiff yellow brocaded silk as lovely as I ever had seen,enough for a dress skirt;and a hand-embroidered chemise sleeve that only needed a band and a button to make a petticoat for a Queen doll,but I laid them away and wandered into the orchard.
I dragged my bare feet through the warm grass,and finally sat under the beet red peach tree.If ever I seemed sort of lost and sorry for myself,that was a good place to go;it was so easy to feel abused there because you didn't dare touch those peaches.
Fluffy baby chickens were running around,but I didn't care;there was more than a bird for every tree,bluebirds especially;they just loved us and came early and stayed late,and grew so friendly they nested all over the wood house,smoke house,and any place we fixed for them,and in every hollow apple limb.
Bobby came again,but I didn't pay any attention to him.
Then I heard the carriage cross the bridge.I knew when it was father,every single time his team touched the first plank.So Iran like an Indian,and shinned up a cedar tree,scratching myself until I bled.Away up I stood on a limb,held to the tree and waited.Father drove to the gate,and mother came out,with May,Candace,and Leon following.When Shelley touched the ground and straightened,any other tree except a spruce having limbs to hold me up,I would have fallen from it.She looked exactly as if she had turned to tombstone with eyes and hair alive.She stopped a second to brush a little kiss across mother's lips,to the others she said without even glancing at them:"Oh do let me lie down a minute!The motion of that train made me sick."Well,I should say it did!I quit living,and began thinking in a hooray,and so did every one else at our house.Once I had been sick and queened it over them for a while,now all of us strained ourselves trying to wait on Shelley;but she wouldn't have it.She only said she was tired to death,to let her rest,and she turned her face to the wall and lay there.Once she said she never wanted to see a city again so long as she lived.When mother told her about Laddie and the Princess to try to interest her,she never said a word;I doubted if she even listened.
Father and mother looked at each other,when they thought no one would see,and their eyes sent big,anxious questions flashing back and forth.I made up my mind I'd keep awake that night and hear what they said,if I had to take pins to bed with me and stick myself.
Once mother said to Shelley that she was going to send for Dr.
