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Chapter 12 On Paths of Night · The Wind Boy

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  Chapter twelve of The Wind Boy by Ethel Cook Eliot. This LibriVox recording is
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  in the public domain. Chapter twelve, on paths of night. There was
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  no need of a lamp in the room to undress by, for the stars
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  had risen and the room was silvery with the shining. Gentian's night robe,
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  by starshine was even lovelier than it had been by lamp light. The stars
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  in it had a clearer radiance, and the blue quivered in a light all
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  its own. The minute that Gentian had slipped out of her clothes and into
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  this loveliness, she felt that she had become as light as the gown.
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  Light as a feather, she thought. But then she knew at once that
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  that was not right. She was long light than any feather, for a
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  feather must sometime flutter to the earth. But she felt that if she were
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  to leave the ground, she could stay in the air as long as ever
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  she liked. How wonderful, How wonderful, she thought. Of course,
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  she had climbed the air very lately in the clear country, but in that
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  crystal land it did not seem like such a marvelous thing to do. Here,
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  in her mother's little brown house right down here in the village where she
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  lived. To climb the air would be a different, a stranger thing.
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  Gentian got on to the one chair in the bedroom to gaze at herself in
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  her mother's high mirror. The night robe looked like a blue cloud fallen about
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  her, and the stars in it shone out softly, radiant, lighting her
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  hair and face. She clapped her hands, then softly she opened the door
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  and softly went out to the stairs and down. She stood in the doorway
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  of the sitting room, looking at her mother and Kay, a merry laugh,
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  ready to break on her lips when they should see her there in her
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  glimmering night robe. She wanted to watch the wonder grow in their eyes.
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  But Detro was bent above the statuette, her eyes narrowed while her hands worked
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  cleverly and quickly making the wind boys clustering curls. Her thoughts were all on
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  her work, and she had forgotten where she was, perhaps even who she
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  was. As for Kay, he sat beyond her, at the other side
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  of the table to get the lamp light too. His coppery head was bent
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  over his book, and his eyes following the pages never wavered. He was
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  far out at sea on a sailing vessel, lost in another world. Another
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  time, Gentian stood watching her mother and her brother for many minutes, but
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  they did not look up or feel that she was there. She could not
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  get Kay's attention, of course, without disturbing her mother. And now that
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  she saw how her mother was working with the intent narrowed eyes that Gentian knew
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  so well, she dared not disturb her. Her heart sank a little,
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  for she had longed to show them her handiwork. But after a little waiting
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  there, unnoticed in the doorway, she softly turned and went back up the
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  stairs again to her room. Well in the morning she could show them.
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  She would go to bed now, so she turned back the bedclothes, and,
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  after kneeling to say her bedtime prayer, got in at once. She
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  fell asleep, But it was not in the way she or any other little
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  girl usually falls asleep. The minute her head touched the pillow, she felt
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  herself slipping into sleep, as into deep water. Only, of course,
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  sleep did not take her breath away, as water will when your head goes
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  under. When her head went under in this water of sleep, her breath
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  came lighter and lighter, easier and easier, until it was not like breathing
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  at all. It was so light, And then she forgot everything she thought
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  of nothing, of course, she could never tell about that. That was
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  the very deepest sleeper person can know. And the next minute she was wide
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  awake. She had slept only the briefest while, but because it had been
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  so deep a sleep and so dreamless, that while had rested her more than
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  a whole night of just ordinary every night's sleep. Now she was suddenly wide
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  awake, wider awake than she had ever been in her life. Perhaps here
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  in her bed, with the starlight pouring in at the window, she sat
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  up. Only it was not like sitting up at all, for she came
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  up as lightly as the tulips had come up after the wind boy had run
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  over them. And then she noticed that every movement she made was made as
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  she thought it, as though her thoughts did the moving, and not her
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  body at all. That was delightful thinking it. She got out of bed
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  and went to the door. Why this is the way the clouds move and
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  the wind, she thought. She went down the stairs as a petal floats
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  from the cherry tree, and in a second she was standing on the grass
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  in the lamplight, just outside the sitting room window. She crossed her arms
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  on the sill and looked in. Oh, if they could only look up
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  and see her, now, how amazed they would be. The masker had
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  stood like this looking in, And just at first they might think she was
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  the masker. But right away they would know better, and Kay would laugh.
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  But what would her mother say to her, being out of alone in
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  the night. Well, Gentian knew very well that ordinarily her mother would not
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  like it at all, that she would never allow her to do such a
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  thing. But in this night robe that made her so light, in this
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  starry brightness, everything was different. Her mother would surely be wise enough to
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  see that. Why, in this starry brightness she was part of the night.
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  She was the sky itself and the night wind. She belonged out here.
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  Detra and Kay worked and read on and never dreamed that Gentian was out
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  there in the night looking in at them. After a little she turned away
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  and moved like a cloud across the little grass plot, through the hole in
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  the hedge, down the grassy paths to the stone steps that led up to
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  the tulip garden in the tulip garden in the grassy center where the wind Boy
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  had slept. Gentian sat with her arms wrapped about her knees. How alone
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  she was out here and far from her mother and Kay, back there under
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  the lamp light in the little brown house. And as she looked towards the
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  little brown house, she saw NaN's light wink out in the attic. Was
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  Nan in her starry brightness too? And would she come out into the soft
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  night? Gentian thought of the wind boy. Why had she and Kay Saturday
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  morning ran away to play with the Clear children and left him behind. Well,
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  she would not play with the Clear children again unless they would let him
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  play too. But they must find the masker tomorrow night at dusk. They
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  must do nothing but watch. And when they did catch it and the wind
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  Boy had torn off the mask, how splendid for them all it would be.
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  The wind boy would be happy again. He would look as though he
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  had looked that minute when he first awoke here at noon, while Gentian was
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  watching him. He would measure for silver sandals then, and the shoe man
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  would be glad he could go back to play with the Clear children and be
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  at home once more in the Clear land, and Genteeen and Kay would play
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  with him there, and with the others, and then too, Once the
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  wind boy was happy, Mother could make her statuette look happy too, and
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  ready to fly with all of him, for she would see him like that.
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  Once he was happy and free of all that mask business, she would
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  make glad of his wings, and she would get the light across his brow.
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  Well, perhaps the masker was hiding somewhere out here, perhaps in that
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  black shadow over there by the white birch at the edge of the garden.
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  Gentian looked hard, but could see nothing. So velvety black was the shadow.
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  Yes, the masker might very well be there, but she was not
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  a bit afraid at the thought. In her starry brightness, she could not
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  be afraid of anything so foolish and silly as that mask. Indeed, she
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  could not remember now how it was that such a silly thing had ever frightened
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  her. She turned her back on the velvet shadow, but her courage was
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  not needed. The masker was not lurking there. If the moonlight and starlight
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  could shifted through the leaves of the white birch, Gentian would have seen nothing
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  but tulips, red, yellow, purple white, with their petals closed in
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  the dew. Gentian now was looking towards the artist's house, and she thought
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  of Rosemarie alone asleep in her high nursery. How jolly it would be if
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  she and Kay could only have her as a playmate. But hadn't the artist
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  half promised it Saturday morning here in the tulip garden. If when he came
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  back he should have forgotten, Gentian decided to remind him. For out here,
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  in her starry brightness, she saw how horrid it must be for Rosemarie,
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  always alone. All the tulip gardens in the world, and automobiles and
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  pretty dresses and famous grandfathers couldn't make up to a little girl for being alone.
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  I will be bold and speak to the artist about it, she promised
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  herself. Then she looked off over the wood to the far away mountains.
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  They were as black and velvety as the shadow under the white birch. Nan
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  came from the mountains. Gentien remembered, perhaps she has gone back there now,
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  in her starry brightness, for a visit. I shall go and look
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  for her there. Then she rose and went toward the mountains. She went
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  right across the tulip beds, not bothering about the grassy paths, just as
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  the wind boy had done. But that was all right, for the tulips
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  did not even bend under her feet. I cannot tell you about her journey
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  through air and starlight toward the mountains, for I have never run along the
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  paths of night. Even genty and herself never found words to tell it in.
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  But she did come to the mountains, moving with her thought, and
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  stood at the very top of the tallest one, just above the spruce and
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  pine and birch trees, on a ragged ledge of bray must covered rock.
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  The village. Looking back and down on it was just a few pinpoints of
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  light, but the sky was close. Oh, I want to know all
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  about the stars, Gentian thought. Perhaps Nan can tell me. I shall
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  ask her to morrow or to night if I find her hair. How many
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  many worlds there must be. I want to go to all of them and
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  live in all of them, one after another. Sometime above the mountain top,
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  just beyond, a light that was not starlight, suddenly caught her glance.
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  It was moving towards her along the paths of air. Her eyes smiled,
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  for she thought it might be Nan, coming in her starry brightness,
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  she said, waiting, watching slowly, it came toward her through the starlight
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  and the blue, And when it had come quite near, she saw that
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  although it was some one, it was not Nan. It was much too
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  tall, and she knew that Nan, even in her starry brightness, could
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  never have just this clear, steady radiance. Gentian, standing there on her
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  stony ledge on the mountain top, became stiller than she had ever been in
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  her life before, Yes, stiller than deep. Still, her breath stopped,
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  her heart beat softly. It was as though she hardly lived. She
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  stood straight and still with folded hands, and her eyes stayed open only because
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  she dared not move her lids to cover them. The being passed very near
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  her mountain top, moving slowly as to unheard holy music. He passed by,
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  but as he passed, he turned his face and looked down at Gentean,
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  standing still and small on the mountain top. At his look, she
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  covered her eyes with her hands and sank down on the moss covered rock.
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  She lay curled there, remembering brightness and beauty lost in awe. But the
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  face itself she never remembered, for it was not a face for a human
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  child to see. When at last she looked up again, the bright being
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  had passed by and was gone. It had passed behind the farthest mountain.
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  For a minute. Gentian wanted to follow, to catch a glimpse again,
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  if only from far off. She took a step out into the air,
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  but something stopped her. Perhaps it was the memory of her mother and Kay,
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  and her father out there searching for them somewhere in the world. Whatever
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  it was, it turned her about sharply and sent her running fleetly along the
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  paths of night toward the pin points of light that were the village and home.
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  When she reached the tulip garden and floated down on the grassy center,
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  she saw that the little brown house was dark. Mother must have finished with
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  the wind boy and Kay with his book, and both have gone to bed.
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  But where mother think Gentian had vanished to. When she saw her bed
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  empty, Gentian had not thought of mother's being frightened by her adventure. She
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  ran up the air and across to her mother's open window. When she stood
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  in the still shadowy room, she was glad to be there. How it
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  had happened that Dettra when she came to bed, had failed to notice that
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  Gentian was not there in her own little cot I cannot tell you, but
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  she had not noticed surely, or she would not be sleeping peacefully now.
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  Gentian listened to her, even gentle breathing. I can never sleep in this
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  starry brightness, she thought, as she stood glimmering in the room. It
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  is too wonderful for just the little girl. So quietly, not to disturb
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  her sleeping mother, she slipped it off, and, feeling for her plain
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  little cotton nightgown on its peg in the dark closet, she put it on
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  instead. Then, still moving very softly, she folded up the starry brightness
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  and put it away in the lowest empty drawer of her chest. When she
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  closed the drawer, she felt that she was closing a door into the sky.
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  But it was so still in the house, and she was so strange
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  and lonely. She could not get into her own bed now and go to
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  sleep. The memory of the brightness and the beauty of that face that had
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  turned toward her on the mountain top, and the way she had almost gone
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  after it beyond the mountains, was too keen. Softly uncertainly. She stole
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  across and stood beside her mother's bed in the farthest shadow in the room.
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  She bent and touched her mother's cheek with her own. Who is that,
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  Deetra asked, in a half asleep voice. Who it's Gentian. Gentian whispered
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  and crept in beside her. Deetra turned and folded an arm about her little
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  girl. Why you are cold, she whispered, snuggle close, Oh,
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  may I stay and sleep here? Yes? But why I thought you were
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  so fast asleep? No, I was out in the night. It was
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  so big, and then came the angel. I wanted you. Dettera smiled
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  sleepily at herself in the dark. What strange dreams you have? She murmured.
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  Then she lay thinking about her little girl and wondering about her for a
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  long time. But Gentian had fallen asleep almost at once, folded happily in
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  her mother arms. End of chapter twelve.