after the disaster of the fair ellen, billy promised his mother to bar explosives from his play, a promise made readily, for “betsey has been giving it to me good an’ plenty for leaving that door open,” he explained to her. thus the alaska trade which the boys intended the fair ellen to wrest from seattle, thereby transferring some of her prosperity to california’s stricken seaport, remained with the northern metropolis; and they sought other outlet for their energies.
billy organized a real estate syndicate, and sold lots to the gang, “with or without liability to assessment, as the purchaser prefers.” a board of trade was organized to which all promised to defer, except jimmy, who smiled in disdain. he leased the railroad and did a thriving carrying trade, timber for fencing and warehouses, dirt for filling, and so on; and was fast becoming “the millionaire of the crowd,” when the “board” met and decided he should cut his tariff in half or leave the syndicate; and as jimmy was heartily interested in the game, he accepted their decision and no longer smiled at the board of trade.
max, whose father was a gardener, knew wizard’s tricks with seeds and soils; and as farmer and forester to the syndicate, gave his knowledge right and left with happy importance. he taught the girls how to plan and plant their flower beds, and started the boys on a career of vegetable-raising that made them feel rich before they began; talked trees to harold and other farmer boys, and astonished his father by the questions he asked and the work he did.
“i haf learn for gifing avay already, but i feel more as rich dan if they haf gif to me. how ist dat?” max asked himself, not knowing, this little german lad so lately come to america, that he had discovered one of the profoundest secrets of the universe.
to his mother and sister billy seemed changed. he stuck closer to his books. his teacher told them the boy stood at the head of his class. “jimmy dorr may be a rival if he feels like work, which isn’t probable. jean’s accident last year put her behind, otherwise the boys would have to work much harder if either excelled her.” yet even these welcome words did not account for some things the mother quietly observed; billy’s growing promptness, better attention, and memory for matters outside of play. he was more silent, too; and there was less hammering and whistling in the shop.
“billy, i don’t like the look of your eyes; you’re reading too much at night,” his mother said one evening when he was helping with the dishes. “you must go to bed earlier.”
may nell had learned to use the towel; and the two children usually “did” the dishes at night; but now she was away with edith at the opera house, and mother and son were alone in the kitchen.
billy had been reeling off stanzas of his favorite “lady of the lake,”—“by the yard,” mrs. bennett said, acting it as he recited, somewhat retarding the work and endangering the dishes. now he dropped his towel, caught up his mother and raced with her around the room. he was so strong that she was almost helpless in his grasp.
“you little bit of a woman! do you think i’ll mind you? i’m roderick dhu of benvenue, the bravest chief of all the crew! i’m captain kidd, the pirate bold, whose treasure, hid, lies yet in mould. i’m the strong man, the bad—”
a lot more nonsense he rattled off, squeezing and kissing her till she was breathless with laughter.
“now you’re fair ellen and i’m defending you at goblin cave!” he thrust her behind him, held her tight with one arm, while he flourished the carving knife and called on clan alpine’s foes to appear.
but the moment of frolic passed, and he turned to her with shining face. “you’re the only mother i ever had—so far as i know—” his eyes danced; “anyway, you’re the only one in sight, an’ a heap too good for this guy; i guess—i’ll—i’ll mind.”
his mood grew more thoughtful. he put the dishes away quietly, and neither spoke again till the work was finished. then he went and kissed her on the cheek. “it’s good to have you all to myself, little mother; to be just chums once more.”
she put back his tumbled hair, looked long into his eyes, realizing with a shock that she was looking up. her little boy was gone.
“but i don’t wish may nell away, mother, do you?”
“no, my son.” the answer was more sincere than a few weeks before she could have believed possible. the coming of the child had taken from her life many hours of association with billy, sweet as only mothers know; yet may nell’s influence had softened and refined billy, enlarged his vision.
he tidied himself, bade his mother good-bye, and followed the girls to rehearsal.
sometimes all the small meanness of everyday life is swept away by a great calamity, and the world forgets to hate, and opens its great heart of love. such an event came through the catastrophe in san francisco. it inclined every ear, moistened every eye. from all the world’s pocketbook came the golden dollars; from every soul the longing to do; and when it was done, disappointment because it was so little.
vina was no exception. ball games, church collections, children’s mite societies, girls sewing, boys running errands, each and all helped with the relief work.
when edith planned to turn her pupils’ recital into a great spring festival, for the benefit of the sufferers, all the town applauded, and asked how it could help.
edith worked very hard. she called her operetta “the triumph of flora.” the words were her own, written hurriedly and set to familiar though classic airs. yet many of the daintiest, most tripping melodies she wrote herself. the sorrows of humanity had winged her brain and dipped her pen in harmonies, that she might assuage them.
all went well with the preparation; and on a glorious spring night in the full moon, the town and countryside jammed the opera house “to its eyebrows,” billy said, looking through the peephole in the curtain to the high window seats crowded with boys.
the operetta opened with a weird winter scene, when the sower (harold) sowed his grain, and the gnomes and elves set upon him; and evoked storm king (jimmy), wind (bess), and frost (jackson). he was the comedy of the little drama; and dressed all in black, covered with silver spangles and diamond dust, he made a joke that the wine-growers appreciated, for it is the black frosts of april they fear.
after these followed jean as rain. wherever she passed the singers bowed their heads and sang more softly, and frost retreated in haste.
billy was the sun, dressed in a pale yellow tunic, and crowned with a fillet of sun-bursts cut from gilt paper. he came but a little way on the stage from the south for each of his short solos; and the others pelted him back. especially did he hide from rain behind cloud, a tall girl in a small ocean of gray tulle.
at the close of the act, in the far, high distance, the goddess, flora, appeared on a hill-crest. this was edith herself, arrayed in a filmy gown of pale green, garlanded with snow-drops and buttercups. high, far, and faint came her song of the dawn of spring. but the gnomes and the elves, storm, wind, frost, and rain, roared and howled; and flora, affrighted, fled from view.
the curtain fell on the first act and the house rocked with the noise. it is probable the audience, predetermined to be pleased, would have approved anything offered; but so far it was more beautiful than had been expected.
the second act brought a conflict between elves and gnomes, and the fairies, when first the earth sprites were victorious, but at last the fairies. may nell was the fairy queen, and enchanted all with her beauty, her dancing and singing, and her acting, which was sweetly childish as well as clever.
flora came into view, clad in palest pink, and wreathed with almond blossoms. wherever she stepped the ground was white with almond snow. gnomes and elves peeped from behind gray rocks and tree-trunks, but fled as she came near, following the ever-beckoning fairies.
sun, dressed this time in bright yellow satin, and crowned with yellow gems, was surrounded by fairies, and came more and more boldly forward. he beckoned to flora, menaced the earth sprites, and threatened storm, wind, and frost; and at the close was rewarded by flora’s rejoicing cry,
“i come! i come at thy call, o sun!
thy high commands shall quick be done.”
the curtain fell a second time to still heartier applause; and the long wait between the acts was forgotten in discussion and approval. the richest people in town had aided edith with her costuming and properties, that thus every penny of the receipts might be saved for the great purpose. they had brought out all their stores of rich fabric, fine lace, jewels, and ornaments, for the small mummers; and the effect was entrancing.
the last act exhausted the possibilities of the theatre in light effects and sylvan scenery; and the curtain rose on a gorgeous scene. but oh, horror! in the middle of the stage the scene-shifters had left the ugly truck that moved storm king’s reservoir of ice and snow. when used in previous acts, bed and wheels had been hidden by moss, the tank had been covered by his mantle, and the entire mechanism, moving as he moved, had seemed a part of himself. now its secret was disclosed and it was ridiculous.
edith in white, half smothered in blush roses, with the fairies and their queen, stood ready in the wings. billy was also waiting his cue. this time he was to be pulled swiftly in on invisible wheels. over his satin tunic was a network of glittering mock gems that must have included every yellow bead and spangle in vine county. from his shoulders floated a cloud of yellow, diamond-dusted tulle; and the crown of gems surrounded a cluster of small lights, a device billy himself had figured out with the aid of the electric light man.
“oh, billy, billy! my beautiful opera is ruined!” edith wailed, as she heard the jeers of the small boys in the audience.
“no, it isn’t, sister! i’ve thought of a way out. keep the kids straight here—i’ll be back in a minute.”
this act opened with a hidden chorus that lasted two or three moments, the fairies on the one hand inviting the elves and gnomes to join them; the others responding. while this was in progress billy rushed to the boys’ dressing room and talked furiously but straight to the purpose.
“say, fellows, business now, and no questions asked. there’s a hitch on the stage. storm, wrap that cloak round you—don’t wait for fixings—and get to your place in the wings, quick! when i say ‘go,’ take rain’s hand, crouch low, run to the centre, and between you yank that snow tank off the stage. sabe?”
across to the girls’ side he flew. he knew jean. she would manage somehow, no matter what the difficulty. and he did not trust her without reason. she was already in her shining misty robe that was to change her from rain to dew; but she caught the gray mantle, covered herself with it as she ran, and was in the wings almost as soon as billy.
he placed them before him, rain and storm, took his great golden horn of plenty under his arm, stepped on the wheeled board, signalled the super, and rolled on, driving the crouching pair in front of him with pelting showers’ of rose leaves, and landing at his station just as the chorus filed in. the gray pair threw their shrouding mantles over the truck, and still crouching pushed it out of sight; and the spectators, believing they had laughed in the wrong place, cheered vociferously, and never knew the difference.
rain dropped her gray mantle behind a tree, and reappeared with her chalice of diamond-dust dew, to touch the fairy chorus to shimmering beauty. the gnomes, their queer masks and hunched shoulders showing grotesquely under their gray garb, joined the fairies’ dance. wind came floating in as summer breeze. storm was transformed to the slave of the sower; while black frost was perched high up at the rear, grinning from the top of the mountain.
the sun called to flora, and she appeared by his side. in front of them knelt the sower,crowned with leaves. the sun bestowed upon him a cornucopia overflowing with cherries; flora laid on his other arm long sprays of roses.
the fairies, gnomes, and elves, danced, sang, and retired; elves and gnomes crouching close against trees and rocks, the fairies withdrawing only to reappear one by one as the music went on, here and there, high in the trees; and each had a tiny light on her brow. but just over flora and sun, poised and upheld by invisible wires, stood the queen of the fairies, crown, wand, and shoulders fire-tipped, her arms waving, her filmy draperies continually fluttering, fanned by an artificial breeze. over all fell a rain of rose leaves.
the scene ended in a crash of music; the curtain fell to a house wild with cheering. edith and the principal performers were called again and again before the curtain. it was a generous, appreciative audience, giving its heartiest approval by rising.
late that night when billy’s mother followed him to the fo’castle, he asked, “are you pleased with it, little mother?”
“it was all splendid; and, billy, i never dreamed it was in you! sister’s operetta would have been a failure if it hadn’t been for you.”
“and jean and jimmy, too.”
she stooped and kissed him.
“that’s good enough for me, then,” he said, sleepily. and no one ever heard him mention again his unexpected addition to the scene.
