There was no spring, no supple play to the joints; in fact, Snowy Peter had no joints. His young creators had left them out while constructing him.
At last he reached the wall of the house, and stood beneath the windows where the yellow light was burning. This had been the goal of his desires; but, alas, now that he had attained the coveted position he could not look in at the windows--he was far too short. Desperation lent him energy. A stout lattice was nailed against the house, up which in summer a flowering clematis twined and cl.u.s.tered. Seizing this, Snowy Peter began to climb!
Up one bar after another he slowly and painfully went, lifting his heavy feet and clinging tightly with his poor, stiff hands. His gun-stock snapped in the middle, his c.o.c.ked-hat sustained many contusions, even his nose had more than one hard knock. But he had the heart of a hero, whom neither danger, nor difficulty, nor personal inconvenience can deter, and at last his head was on a level with the nursery window-sill.
It was a pleasant sight that met his eyes. No one had slept in the nursery since Paul had grown big enough for a bed of his own; and though it kept its own name, it was in reality only a big, cheerful upstairs sitting-room, where lessons could be studied, meals taken, and Nurse Freeman sit and do her mending and be on hand always for any one who wanted her. Now that Mr. and Mrs. Kane were absent, the downstairs rooms looked vacant and dreary, and the children spent all their evenings in the nursery from preference. A large fire burned briskly in the ample grate. A kettle hissed and bubbled on the hob; on the round table where the lamp stood, was a row of bright little tin basins just emptied of the smoking-hot bread-and-milk which was the usual nursery supper. Nurse was cutting slices from a big brown loaf and b.u.t.tering them with nice yellow b.u.t.ter. There was also some gingerbread, and by way of special and particular treat, a pot of strawberry-jam, to which Paul at that moment was paying attention.
He had scooped out such an enormous spoonful as to attract the notice of the whole party; and just as Snowy Peter raised his white staring eyes above the sill, Reggie called out, "Hullo! I say! leave a little of that for somebody else, will you?"
"Piggy-wiggy," remarked Harry, indignantly; "and it"s your second help too!"
"Master Paul, I"m surprised at you," observed Nurse Freeman severely, taking the big spoonful away from him. "There, that"s quite enough,"
and she put half the quant.i.ty on the edge of his plate and gave the other half to Susan.
"That"s not fair," remonstrated Paul, "when I"ve been working so hard, and it"s so cold, and when I like jam so, and when it"s so awfully good beside."
"Jam! what is jam?" thought Snowy Peter. He pressed his cold nose closer to the gla.s.s.
"We all worked hard, Paul," said Elma, "and we all like jam as much as you do. May I have some more, Nursey?"
"I wonder how poor Snowy Peter feels all alone out there in the garden,"
said Susan Sunflower. "He must be very cold, poor fellow!"
"Ho, he don"t mind it!" declared Paul with his mouth full of bread-and-jam.
"Oh, yes, I do--I mind it very much," murmured Snowy Peter to himself; but he had no voice with which to make an outward noise.
"Won"t you come out and see him to-morrow, Nursey?" went on Susan. "He"s the best man we ever made. He"s quite beautiful. He"s got a pipe and a hat and curly hair and b.u.t.tons on his coat--I"m sure you"ll like him."
Snowy Peter reared himself straighter on the lattice. He was proud to hear himself thus commended.
"If he could only talk and walk, he"d be just as good as a live person, really he would, Nursey," said Elma. "Wouldn"t it be fun if he could!
We"d bring him in to tea and he"d sit by the fire and warm his hands, and it would be such fun."
"He"d melt fast enough in this warm room," observed Reggie, while Nurse Freeman added: "That"s nonsense, Miss Elma. How could a man like that walk? And I don"t want no nasty snow images in _my_ nursery, melting and slopping up the carpet."
Snowy Peter listened to this conversation with a painful feeling at his heart. He felt lonely and forlorn. No one really liked him. To the children he was only a thing to be played with and joked about. Nurse Freeman called him a "nasty snow image." But though he was hurt and troubled in his spirit, the warm bright nursery, the sound of laughter and human voices, even the fire, that foe most fatal of all to things made of snow, had an irresistible attraction for him. He could not bear the idea of returning to his cold post of duty beside the lonely Fort, and under the wintry midnight sky. So he still clung to the lattice and looked in at the window with his unwinking eyes; and a great longing to be inside, and to sit down by the cheerful fire and be treated with kindness, took possession of him. But what is the use of such ambitions to a snow-man?
Long, long he clung to the lattice and lingered and looked in. He saw the two little ones when first the sand-man began to drop his grains into their eyes, and noticed how they struggled against the sleepy influence, and tried to keep awake. He saw Nurse Freeman carry them off, and presently fetch them back in their flannel nightgowns to say their prayers beside the fire. Snowy Peter did not know what it meant as they knelt with their heads in Nursey"s lap, and their pink toes curled up in the glow of the heat, but it was a pretty sight to see, and he liked it.
After they were taken away for the second time, he watched Elma as she studied her geography lesson for the morrow, while Reggie did sums on his slate, and Paul played at checkers with Susan Sunflower. Snowy Peter thought he should like to do sums, and he was sure it would be nice to play checkers, and jump squares and chuckle and finally beat, as Paul did. Alas, checkers are not for snow-men! Paul went to bed when the game was ended, and Susan, and a little later the other two followed. Then Nurse Freeman raked out the fire and put ashes on top, and blew the lights out and went away herself, leaving the nursery dark and silent except for a dim glow from the ash-smothered grate and the low ticking of the clock.
Some time after she departed, when the lights in the other windows had all been extinguished and the house was as dark inside as the night was outside, Snowy Peter raised his hand and pushed gently at the sash. It was not fastened, and it opened easily and without much noise. Then a heavy leg was thrown over the sill, and stiffly and painfully the snow soldier climbed into the room. He wanted to feel what it was like to sit in a chair beside a table as human beings sit, and he was extremely curious about the fire.
Alas, he could not sit! He was made to stand but not to bend. When he tried to seat himself his body lay in a long inclined plane, with the shoulder-blades resting on the back of the chair, and the legs sticking out straight before him,--an att.i.tude which was not at all comfortable.
The chair creaked beneath him and tipped dangerously. It was with difficulty that he got again into his natural position, and he trembled with fear in every limb. It had been a narrow escape. "A fine thing it would have been if I had fallen over and not been able to get on my feet again," he thought. "How that terrible old woman would have swept me up in the morning!" Then, cautiously and timidly, he put his finger into the nearly empty jam-pot, rubbed it round till a little of the sweet, sticky juice adhered to it, and raised it to his lips. It had no taste to him. Jam was a human joy in which he could not share, and he heaved a deep sigh.
Drops began to stand on his forehead. Though there was so little fire left, the room was much warmer than the outer air, and Snowy Peter had begun to melt. A great and sudden fear took possession of him. As fast as his heavy limbs would allow, he hastened to the window. It was a great deal harder to go down the lattice than to climb up it, and twice he almost lost his footing. But at last he stood safely on the ground.
The window he left open; he had no strength left for extra exertion.
With increasing difficulty he stumbled across the lawn to his old position beside the gateway of the fort. A sense of duty had sustained him thus far, for a sentry must be found at his post; but now that he was there, all power seemed to desert his limbs. Little Susan"s warm fingers had perhaps put just so much life into him, and no more, as would enable him to do what he had done, as a clock can run but its appointed course of hours and must then stop. His head turned no longer in the direction of the house. His eyes looked immovably forward. The straight stiff hand held out the broken gun. Two o"clock sounded from the church steeple, three, four. The earliest dawn crept slowly into the sky. It broadened to a soft pink flush, a sudden wind rose and stirred, and as if quickened by its impulse up came the yellow sun. Smoke began to curl from the house chimneys, doors opened, voices sounded, but still Snowy Peter did not move.
"Why, what is this?" cried Nurse Freeman, hurrying into the nursery from her bedroom, which was near. "How comes this window to be open? I left the fire covered up a purpose, that my dears might have a warm room to breakfast in. It"s as cold as a barn. It must be that careless Maria.
She"s no head and no thoughtfulness, that girl."
Maria denied the accusation, but Nurse was not convinced. "Windows did not open without hands," she justly observed. But what hands opened this particular window Nurse Freeman never, never knew!
Presently another phenomenon claimed her attention. There on the carpet, close to the table where the jam-pot stood, was a large slop of water.
It marked the spot where the snow-man had begun to melt the night before.
"It"s the snow the children brought in on their boots," suggested Maria.
"Boots!" cried Nurse Freeman incredulously. "Boots! when I changed them myself and put on their warm slippers!" She shook her head portentously as she wiped up the slop. "There"s something _on_accountable in it all,"
she said. So there was, but it was a great deal more unaccountable than Nurse Freeman suspected.
When the children ran out, after lessons, to play in their fort, their time for wonderment came. How oddly Snowy Peter looked,--not at all as he did the day before. His figure had somehow grown rubbed and shabby.
The b.u.t.tons were gone from his coat-tails. The gun they had taken such pains with was broken in two. _Where was the other half?_"
"What"s that on his finger?" demanded Elma. "It looks as if it were bleeding."
It was the juice of the strawberry-jam! Paul first tasted delicately with the tip of his tongue, then he boldly bit the finger off and swallowed it.
"Why, what made you do that?" asked the others.
"Jam!" was the succinct reply.
"Jam! Impossible. How could our snow-man get at any jam? It couldn"t be that."
"Tastes like it, any way," remarked Paul.
"I can"t think what has happened to spoil him so," said Elma, plaintively. "Do you think a loose horse can have got into the yard during the night? See how the snow is trampled down!"
"Hallo, look here!" shouted Reggie. "This is the queerest thing yet.
There"s the other half the gun sticking out half-way up the clematis frame!"
"It must have been a horse," said Elma, who having once settled on the idea found it hard to give it up. "It couldn"t be anything else."
"Oh, yes, it could. It was no horse. It was me," said Snowy Peter in the depths of his being, where a little warmth still lingered.
"He"s very ugly now, I think; see how he"s melted all along his shoulder, and his hair has got out of curl, and his nose is awful,"
p.r.o.nounced Susan Sunflower. "Let"s pull him to pieces and make a nicer man."
"Oh, oh!" groaned Snowy Peter, with a final effort of consciousness. His inward sufferings did not affect his features in the least, and no one suspected that he was feeling anything. Paul knocked the pipe out of his mouth with a snow-ball. Harry, with a great push, rolled him over. The crisp snow parted and flew, the children hurrahed; in three minutes he was a shapeless ma.s.s, and n.o.body ever knew or guessed how for a few brief hours he had lived the life of a human being, been agitated by hope and moved by desire. So ended Snowy Peter; and his sole mourner was little Susan, who remarked, "After all, he _was_ nice before he got spoiled, and I wish Nursey had seen him."
THE DO SOMETHING SOCIETY.