Ainslee's Magazine, February 1913 — page 109: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

TREASURE OF THE HEART hound in leash, almost tremblingly eager to be gone; he had so many big deals on hand just then, and time is so precious. Gordon rushed back to his place, a tooth-and-nail foothold in the big struggle; and Amy stayed behind in her place—so quiet a place that she herself was utterly unaware how big it really was. For love is a power which spreads in ever-widening circles, and Amy’s, flowing outward and onward, swept many another into the calm cur- rent of its sweet and living waters. Most of her work lay among children; and it may have been through them that she gained her delicate perception, her exquisite intuition; for children com- municate the incommunicable; upon their fresh faces, as morning dew upon opening flowers, is the sign of the un- seen; in a child’s eyes the vision mirrors its last traces. When his little girl was born, Gordon wrote hurriedly to the homefolk. ‘The child was very delicate, he said. And he had, remembering another little girl, called the new baby ““Amy.” Gordon’s little girl! From the deep, deep well of Amy’s mother spirit, love almost felt the pressure of that soft small body against her breast; and it comforted her oddly to think that, per- haps, the slumbering soul of her little namesake might dimly divine it, and rest the softer for it. She sent, from time to time, little frocks so fairylike that Leila exclaimed over them. “Why, they’d cost a_ perfectly fabulous price!” she told Gordon. “The » designs are all original, the needlework the most lovely I’ve ever laid my eyes on. These old-maid women certainly can do wonders with a needle, poor things !”’ | She herself wrote to thank Amy. She was going abroad for her health, she said; besides, she hadn’t a decent frock left. She’d advise Amy, if she ever went abroad, to get just her din- ner frocks from Paquin’s, her tailored togs from London, but to be sure and buy all her lingerie in Vienna; they had it so much finer in Vienna! She hoped 99 to see Amy when she returned. And the nurses assured her that the baby was getting on as well as could be ex- pected; and oh, thank Amy again for those perfectly adorable little frocks! After that, there was a long, long silence. The June afternoon was soft and cloudy, with an occasional gentle sprinkling of rain to freshen the garden; doors and windows were wide open to the wet fragrance of the breeze. In her chair on the south porch the old aunt dozed peacefully, her knitting needles still loosely clasped in her re- laxed hands. In the old parlor, Amy played softly to herself those unreal and fairylike melodies of Chopin, which are glimmer- ing moonlight gates-upon the Road of Yesterdays. And then she lifted her eyes and saw the child standing in the open door, eagerly and yet gravely re- garding her. Instinctively Amy smiled; and the child smiled back, a dear and alluring smile, showing the tiny teeth. Its fair and fragile face was lighted by black- lashed eyes of softest gray, its hair was of palest gold, and a deep cleft marked its small chin; the dainty garments which clothed it were of the costliest simplicity. “Why, Baby! Where did you come from?’ Amy rose from the piano. The vaguely. “Oh, little runaway!” toward it as she spoke. With the skimming motion of the swallow’s flight, the child retreated. Down the polished and shadowed hall, out through the wet garden, among the showery roses, the spicy pinks, the little white-shod feet fled lightly; the little white figure vanished behind the old oak, beneath which she and Gordon had many a time “played house.” Just be- yond this oak the high, red-brick wall shut off the highway. “Baby!” called Amy _ coaxingly. “Baby!” But the child had vanished. Puzzled and confused, Amy returnéd to the house. Strange babies in costly child waved a small hand Amy moved ANUC NOOK (C@ (F@