The Dreamer | Page 5

were ecstatic in their admiration of his pensive, clear-cut
features, his big, grey eyes and his nut-brown ringlets; of his charming
smile and the frank, pretty manner in which he gave his small hand in
greeting.
"Oh, but you should hear him recite and sing," the proud foster-mother
would say. "And he can dance, too."
She gave a large dinner-party just to exhibit the accomplishments of
her treasure--actually standing him upon the table when it had been
cleared, to sing and recite for the guests. Even her husband unbent so

far as to applaud vigorously the modest, yet self-possessed grace with
which the mite drank the healths of the assembled company--making a
neat little speech that his new mother had taught him.
The boy's young heart responded to the affection of the foster-mother
to a certain degree; but, mere baby though he was, his real heart lay
deep in the grave on the hill-top, where the earthly part of that other
mother was lying so still, so white, with the roses on her hair and the
frozen smile on her lips.
The churchyard on the hill was but a short distance away from his new
home, and as spring opened, became a favorite resort of nurses and
children. The negro "mammy" who had replaced Nurse Betty used
often to take him there, and often, as she chatted with other mammies,
her charge would wander from her side to the grave against the wall,
where he would stretch his small body full length upon the turf and
whisper the thoughts of his infant mind to the dear one below; for who
knew but that, even down under ground she might be glad to hear,
through her white sleep, her little boy's words of love and
remembrance--though never, nevermore she could see him on earth. He
would even imagine her replies to him, until the conversations with her
became so real that he half believed they were true.
At night, when bed-time came, he said his prayers at the knee of his
pretty new mother, who told him jolly stories and sang him jolly songs,
and patted him and soothed him with caresses which he found very
agreeable, and accepted graciously. But he always took the miniature
which had been his dying mother's parting gift to bed with him and he
was glad when the new mother kissed him goodnight and put out the
light and softly closed the door behind her; for it was then, with the
picture close against his breast, that the visions came to him--the
visions of angels making sweet music upon golden harps and among
them his lost mother, with her sweet face saddened but made sweeter
still by that thought of nevermore.
Oh, that wondrous word nevermore! Its music charmed him, its
hopelessness filled and thrilled him with a strange, a holy sorrow, in
which there was no pain.

With the lovely vision still about him, the picture still clasped to his
breast, he would sink into healthful sleep to wake on the morrow a
bright, joyous boy, alive to all the pleasures of the new day--delighting
in the beauties of blue sky and sunshine, of whispering tree and
opening flower, ready for sport with his play-fellows and his pets, and
full of all manner of merry pranks and jokes. For in the frame of this
small boy there dwelt two distinct personalities--twin brothers--yet as
utterly unlike as strangers and foreigners, thinking different thoughts,
speaking different languages, and dominating him--spirit and body--by
turns. One of these we will call Edgar Goodfellow--Edgar the gay, the
laughter-loving, the daring, the real, live, wholesome, normal boy; keen
for the society of other boys and liking to dance, to run, to jump, to
climb, even to fight. The other, Edgar the Dreamer, fond of solitude
and silence and darkness, for they aided him to wander far away from
the everyday world to one of make believe created by himself and filled
with beings to whom real people were but as empty shadows; but a
world that the death and burial of his beautiful and adored young
mother and the impression made upon him by those scenes, had tinged
with an eternal sadness which hung over it as a veil.
The life of Edgar the Dreamer was filled with the subtle charm of
mystery. It was a secret life. The world in which he moved was a secret
world--an invisible world, to whose invisible door he alone held the
key. Edgar the Dreamer was himself an invisible person, for the only
outward difference between him and his twin brother, Edgar
Goodfellow, lay in a certain quiet, listless air and the solemn look in his
big, dark grey eyes which his playmates--bored and intolerant--took as
indications that "Edgar was in one of his moods,"