“This is the sunshine spot,” he said. “It is bathed in morning light,
and sheltered by afternoon shade. Singing Water is across the drive
there to talk to you always. It comes pelting down so fast it never
freezes, so it makes music all winter, and the birds are so numerous
you'll have to go to bed early for they'll wake you by dawn. I noticed
this room was going to be full of sunshine when I built it, and I craved
only brightness for you, so I coaxed all of it to stay that I could.
Every stroke is the work of my hands, and all of the furniture. I hope
you will like it. This is the room of which I've been telling you, Ruth.
Go in and take possession, and I'll entreat God and all His ministering
angels to send you sunshine and joy.”
He opened the door, guided her inside, closed it, and went swiftly to
his work.
The Girl stood and looked around her with amazed eyes. The floor was
pale yellow wood, polished until it shone like a table top. The casings,
table, chairs, dressing table, chest of drawers, and bed were solid
curly maple. The doors were big polished slabs of it, each containing
enough material to veneer all the furniture in the room. The walls
were of plaster, tinted yellow, and the windows with yellow shades were
curtained in dainty white. She could hear the Harvester carrying the
load from the wagon to the front porch, the clamour of the barn yard;
and as she went to the north window to see the view, a shining peacock
strutted down the walk and went to the Harvester's hand for grain, while
scores of snow-white doves circled over his head. She stepped on deep
rugs of yellow goat skins, and, glancing at the windows on either side,
she opened the door.
Outside it lay a porch with a railing, but no roof. On each post stood a
box filled with yellow wood-flowers and trailing vines of pale green.
A big tree rising through one corner of the floor supplied the cover. A
gate opened to a walk leading to the driveway, and on either side lay
a patch of sod, outlined by a deep hedge of bright gold. In it saffron,
cone-flowers, black-eyed Susans, golden-rod, wild sunflowers, and jewel
flower grew, and some of it, enough to form a yellow line, was already
in bloom. Around the porch and down the walk were beds of yellow
violets, pixie moss, and every tiny gold flower of the woods. The Girl
leaned against the tree and looked around her and then staggered inside
and dropped on the couch.
“What planning! What work!” she sobbed. “What taste! Why he's a poet!
What wonderful beauty! He's an artist with earth for his canvas, and
growing things for colours.”
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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