The Little House in the Fairy Wood | Page 3

firm steps, he went by the factory door, and then around under its windows to the wood at the back.
It was Indian Summer. That was why the golden leaves were showering in a mist, and why the sun was so warm.
Eric dropped his ragged coat and cap on the edge of the wood,--it was so warm,--and went in.
A little girl had been watching him from her place at one of the factory windows where she was sorting cans. She had seen him before, working at the factory, day after day, and they had played together sometimes in the noon half hour. Now she wondered what he was doing out there. Had they sent him, perhaps, to do a different kind of work that could only be done in the woods? But as he walked away in under the trees farther and farther, the golden mist that was over the wood drew in about him; and although she leaned far forward over the cans at a great risk of knocking over dozens and setting them rolling,--he was lost in it. It had dropped down behind him like a curtain.
CHAPTER II
THE BRIGHT HOUSE
Eric knew nothing of the little girl and her thoughts. He was walking in a golden mist, but he could see quite perfectly, and even far ahead down long tree aisles. At first the trees did not grow very close together, and there was little underbrush. Several narrow paths started off in different directions,--straight little paths made by people who knew where they were going. But Eric did not know where he was going, so he struck off in a place where there was no sign of a path. Soon the trees drew closer and closer together, until their branches locked fingers overhead and shook the yellow leaves down for each other. The leaves showered softly and steadily. Eric's feet rustled loudly in them.
Soon he stopped and took off his worn shoes and stockings. He left them where he took them off and went on, barefoot. Now that he was only in his shirt and trousers he began to run and leap. He leapt for the drifting leaves, and he ran farther and farther into the happy stillness.
The trees crowded and crowded, and the mist of leaves grew brighter and brighter. No birds sang, for they had all flown away for the winter, and there were no flowers. But the drifting leaves hid the bareness, and magic covered everything.
After Eric had run and leapt and waded in the crackling pools of leaves for a long time, he grew hungry. "But there is no food here," he thought; "and anyway it doesn't matter. It's much better to be hungry here than in the dirty streets."
He decided to go to sleep and forget about it. So he lay down in the leaves. They fell over him, a steady, gentle shower, and he slept long, and without dreaming anything.
But when he woke he was cold. And worse than that, the golden mist had faded. It was almost twilight. The light was cold and still and gray. While he slept Indian Summer had vanished and its magic with it.
Now no matter how fast Eric ran, or how high he jumped, he was chilly through and through. But he did not think of trying to find the way out of the wood. The streets would be as cold as the forest, and never, never, never, if he starved and froze, was he going back to that house in the village where he had lived but never belonged. So he went on until the gray light faded, and the soft rustle of falling leaves changed to the noise of wind scraping in bare branches. When he was very cold, and ready to lie down and sleep again to forget, he came quite suddenly on an opening in the trees. In the dim light he saw a little garden closed in with a hedge of baby evergreens. The wind was rustling through the stalks of dead flowers in the garden. But in the middle of it was a little low house, and the windows and doors were glowing like new, warm flowers.
Yes, it was a house and a garden away there in the wood, but no path led to it through the forest, and there was a strangeness about it as about no house or garden Eric had ever seen.
Although no path led through the wood to the house, a path did run through the garden to the low door stone. Eric went up it and stood looking in at the door, which was open.
The glow of the house came from a leaping, jolly fire in a big stone fire-place, and from half a dozen squat candles set in brackets around the walls. It was the one