 This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information to find out how you can volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. A White Tear On by Sarah Orange-Jouette. The woods were already filled with shadows one June evening. Just before eight o'clock, though a bright sunset still glimmered faintly among the trunks of the trees. A little girl was driving home her cow, a plodding, dilatory, provoking creature in her behavior, but a valued companion for all that. They were going away from whatever light there was and striking deep into the woods, but their feet were familiar with the path and it was no matter whether their eyes could see it or not. There was hardly a ninth summer through when the old cow could be found waiting in the pasture bars. On the contrary, it was her greatest pleasure to hide herself away among the huckleberry bushes, and though she wore a loud bell, she had made the discovery that it once stood perfectly still at wood knocking. So Sylvia had to hunt for her until she found her and call, Co-co, with never an answering moo, till her childish patience was quite spent. If the creature had not given good milk and plenty of it, the case would have seemed very different to her owners. Besides, Sylvia had all the time there was and very little use to make of it. Sometimes in pleasant weather it was a consolation to look upon the cow's pranks as an intelligent attempt to play hide and seek, and as the child had no playmate, she lent herself to this amusement with a good deal of zest. Though this chase had been so long that the wary animal herself had given an unusual signal of her whereabouts, Sylvia had only laughed when she came upon Mistress Mooli at the swamp side, and urged her affectionately homeward of the twig of birch leaves. The old cow was not inclined to wander farther. She even turned in the right direction for once as they left the pasture and stepped along the road at a good pace. She was quite ready to be milked now and seldom stopped to browse. Sylvia wondered what her grandmother would say because they were so late. It was a great while since she had left home at half past five o'clock, but everybody knew the difficulty of making this errand a short one. Mrs. Tilly had to chase the horn torment too many summer evenings herself to blame anyone else for lingering. She was only thankful as she waited that she had Sylvia, nowadays, to give such valuable assistance. The good woman suspected that Sylvia lured it occasionally on her own account. There never was such a child for straying about out of door since the world was made. Everybody said that it was a good change for a little maid who had tried to grow for eight years in a crowded manufacturing town. But as for Sylvia herself, it seemed as if she had never been alive at all before she came to live at the farm. She thought often with wistful compassion of a wretched geranium that belonged to a town neighbor. Afraid of folks, old Mrs. Tilly said to herself with a smile after she had made the unlikely choice of Sylvia from her daughter's house full of children and was returning to the farm. Afraid of folks, they said. I guess she won't be troubled no great with them, a foiled place. When they reached the door of the lonely house and stopped to unlock it, the cat came to purl loudly and grub against them. A deserted pussy indeed but fat with young robins. Sylvia whispered that this was a beautiful place to live in and she never should wish to go home. The companions followed the shady wood road, the cow taking slow steps and child very fast ones. The cows stopped long at the brook to drink as if the pasture were not half a swamp and Sylvia stood still and waited, letting her bare feet cool themselves in the shore water while the great twilight moth struck softly against her. She waded on through the brook as the cow moved away and listened to the thrushes with a heart that beat fast with pleasure. There was a stirring in the great boss overhead. They were full of little birds and beasts that seemed to be wide awake and going about their world or all saying goodnight to each other in sleepy twitters. Sylvia herself felt sleepy as she walked along. However, it was not much farther to the house and the arrow was soft and sweet. She was not often in the woods so late as this and it made her feel as if she were part of the gray shadows in the moving leaves. She was just thinking how long it seemed since she first came to the farm a year ago and wondering if everything went on in a noisy town just the same as when she was there. The thought of the great red-faced boy who used to chase and frighten her made her hurry along the path to escape from the shadows of the trees. Suddenly this little woods girl was horror-stricken to hear a clear whistle not very far away. Not a bird's whistle which would have a sort of friendliness but a boy's whistle determined and somewhat aggressive. Sylvia left the cow to whatever sad fate might await her and stepped discreetly aside into the bushes but she was just too late. The enemy had discovered her and called out in a very cheerful and persuasive tone. Hello little girl, how far is it to the road? Trumbling Sylvia answered almost inaudibly, how good ways. She did not dare to look boldly at the tall young man who carried a gun over his shoulder but she came out of her bush and again followed the cow while he walked alongside. I had been hunting for some birds. The stranger said kindly and I have lost my way and need a friend very much. Don't be afraid, he added gallantly. Speak up and tell me what your name is and whether you think I can spend the night at your house and go out gunning early in the morning. Sylvia was more alarmed than before. Would not her grandmother consider her much to blame? But who could have foreseen such an accident as this? It did not seem to be her fault and she hung her head as if the stem of it were broken but managed to answer Sylvia with much effort when her companion again asked her name. Mrs. Tilly was standing in the doorway when the trial came into view. The cow could have allowed move by way of explanation. Yes, you'd better speak up for yourself, you old trial. Where'd she ducked herself away this time, Sylvia? But Sylvia kept an odd silence. She knew by instinct that her grandmother did not comprehend the gravity of the situation. She must be mistaking the stranger for one of the farmer lads of the region. The young man stood his gun beside the door and dropped lumpy game-bag beside it. Then he bade Mrs. Tilly good evening and repeated his way for her story and asked if he could have a night's lodging. Put me anywhere you like, he said. I must be off early in the morning, before day, but I am very hungry indeed. You can give me some milk at any rate, that's plain. Dear sakes, yes! You spawned the hostess whose long, slumbering hospitality seemed to be easily awakened. You might fare better if you went out to the main road a mile or so, but you're welcome to what we've got. All milk right off, you make yourself at home. You can sleep on husks or feathers, she proffered graciously. I raised them all myself. There's good pasturing for geese just blow here towards the mash. Now step round instead of plate for the gentleman Sylvie. And Sylvie promptly stepped. She was glad to have something to do, and she was hungry herself. It was a surprise to find so clean and comfortable a little dwelling in this New England wilderness. The young man had known the horrors of its most primitive housekeeping and a dreary squalor of that level of society which does not rebel at the companionship of hens. This was the best thrift of an old-fashioned farmstead, though on such a small scale that it seemed like a hermitage. He listened eagerly to the old woman's quaint talk. He watched Sylvie's pale face and shining gray eyes with ever-growing enthusiasm and insisted that this was the best supper he'd eaten for a month. And afterward the new-made friends sat down in the doorway together while the moon came up. Soon it would be buried time, and Sylvie was a great help at picking. The cow was a good milker, who a plaguey thing to keep track of, post-discossip frankly, adding presently that she had buried four children. So Sylvie's mother and her son, who might be dead, in California were all the children she had left. Dan, my boy, was a great hand to go gutting. She explained sadly. I never wanted for partridges their gray squirrels while he was to home. He's been a great wanderer, I expect, and he's no hand to write letters. There I don't blame him. I had seen the world myself that he had been so I could. Sylvie takes after him. The grandmother continued affectionately after him and his paws. There ain't a foot of ground she don't know her way over, and the wild creatures counter one of themselves. Squirrels she'll tame to come and feed right out of our hands, and all sorts of birds. Last winter she got the J-birds to banging here, and I believe she'd escanted herself of her own meals to have plenty to throw out amongst them, if I hadn't kept watch. Anything but crows I'd tell her I'm willing to help support. Though Dan he had attained one of them that did seem to have reasons same as folks, who's round here a good spell after you went away. Dan and his father they didn't hitch, but he never held up his head again after Dan had dared him and gone off. The guests did not notice this hint of family sorrows and his eager interest in something else. So Sylvie knows all about birds, does she? He exclaimed as he looked round to the little girl who sat very demurred but increasingly sleepy in the moonlight. I am making a collection of birds myself. I've been at it ever since I was a boy, as Tilly smiled. There are two or three very rare ones I've been hunting for these five years. I mean to get them on my own ground if they can be found. Do you cage them up? Asked Mrs. Tilly doubtfully in response to this enthusiastic announcement. Oh no, they're stuffed and preserved, dozens and dozens of them, said the ornithologist. And I have shot or snared every one myself. I caught a glimpse of a white deer on a few miles from here on Saturday and I have followed it in this direction. They have never been found in this district at all. The little white deer on it is. And he turned again to look at Sylvia with the hope of discovering that the grower bird was one of her acquaintances. But Sylvia was watching a hop-toed in a narrow footpath. You would know the deer on if you saw it. Stranger continued eagerly. A queer tall white bird with soft feathers and long thin legs and it would have a nest perhaps in the top of a high tree made of sticks, something like a hawk's nest. Sylvia's heart gave a wild beat. She knew that strange white bird and it once stolen softly near where it stood in some bright green swamp grass away over the other side of the woods. There was an open place where the sunshine always seemed strangely yellow and hot where tall knotting rushes grew and her grandmother had warned her that she might sink in the soft black mud underneath and never be heard of more. Not far beyond were the salt marshes just this side to see itself which Sylvia wondered and dreamed much about but never had seen whose great voice could sometimes be heard above the noise of the woods and stormy nights. I can't think of anything I should like so much just to find that heron's nest. The handsome stranger was saying I would give ten dollars to anybody who could show it to me. He added desperately and I mean to spend my whole vacation hunting for it if need be. Perhaps it was only migrating or it had been chased out of its own region by some bird of prey. Mrs. Tilly gave a mazed attention to all this but Sylvia still watched the toad not divining she might have done in some calmer time where the creature wished to get to its hole under the doorstep and was much hindered by the unusual spectators at that hour of the evening. No amount of thought that night could decide how many wished for treasures ten dollars so lightly spoken of would buy. The next day the young sportsman hovered about the woods and Sylvia kept him company having lost her first fear of the friendly lad who proved to be most kind and sympathetic. He told her many things about the birds and what they knew and where they lived and what they did with themselves and he gave her a jackknife which he thought is great at treasures if she were a desert islander. All day long he did not once make her troubled or afraid except when he brought down some unsuspecting singing creature from its ball Sylvia would have liked him vastly better without his gun. She could not understand why he killed the very birds he seemed to like so much. But as the day won Sylvia still watched the young man with loving admiration. She had never seen anybody so charming and delightful. The woman's heart asleep in the child was vaguely thrilled by a dream of love. Some premonition of that great power stirred and swayed these young creatures which reversed the song woodlands with soft-footed silent care. They stopped to listen to a birdsong. They pressed forward again eagerly parting the branches. Speaking to each other rarely and in whispers the young man going first in Sylvia following fascinated a few steps behind with her grey eyes dark with excitement. She grieved because the longed for white her and was elusive but she did not lead the guest. She only followed and there was no such thing as speaking first. The sound of her own unquestioned voice would have terrified her. It was hard enough to answer yes or no when there was need of that. At last evening began to fall and they drove the cow home together and Sylvia smiled with pleasure when they came to the place where she heard the whistle and was afraid only the night before. Half a mile from home the farther edge of the woods where the land was highest a great pine tree stood the last of its generation. Whether it was left for a boundary mark or for what reason no one could say the wood shoppers who had felled its mates were dead and gone long ago and a whole forest of sturdy trees pines and oaks and maples had grown again. The stately head of this old pine towered above them all and made a landmark for seeing shore miles and miles away. Sylvia knew it well she'd always believed that whoever climbed to the top of it could see the ocean and the little girl had often laid her hand on the great rough trunk and looked up wistfully the stark paws of the wind always stirred no matter how hot and still the air might be below. Now she thought of the tree with a new excitement for why if one climbed at a break of day could no one see all the world and easily discover from whence the white hair on flew and mark the place to find the hidden nest? What a spirit of adventure what wild ambition what fancy triumph and delight and glory for the later morning when she could make known the secret it was almost too real and too great for the childish heart to bear all night the door of the little house stood open and the whipper whales came and sang upon the very step the young sportsmen and his old hostess were sound asleep but Sylvia's great design kept her broad awake and watching she forgot to think of sleep the short summer night seemed as long as the winter darkness and at last when the whipper whales seized she was afraid the morning would after all come too soon she stole out of the house and followed the pasture path through the woods hastened toward the open ground beyond listening with a sense of comfort and companionship the drowsy twitter of a half awakened bird whose perch she had jarred and passing alas of the great wave of human interest which flooded for the first time the little life should sweep away the satisfactions distance heart to heart with nature and the dumb life of the forest there was the huge tree asleep yet in the pale and moonlight and small and silly Sylvia began with utmost bravery to mount to the top of it with tingling eager blood coursing the channels of her whole frame with her bare feet and fingers pinched and held like bird's claws a monstrous ladder reaching up up almost to the sky itself first she mismount the white oak that grew alongside where she was almost lost among the dark branches and the green leaves heavy and wet with dew a bird flooded off its nest and a red squirrel ran to and fro and scolded pettishly the harmless housebreaker Sylvia felt her way easily she'd often climbed there and knew that higher still one of the oak's upper branches chaffed against the pine tree just where its lower boughs were set close together there when she made the dangerous pass from one tree to the other the great enterprise would really begin she crept out along the swaying oak limit last took the daring step across the old pine tree the way was harder than she thought she must reach far and hold fast the sharp dry twigs clawed and held her and scratched her like angry talons the pitch made her thin little fingers clumsy and stiff as she went around and around the tree's great stem higher and higher upward the sparrows and robins in the woods blow were beginning to wake and twitter to the dawn it had seen much lighter there a loft in the pine tree the child knew she must hurry if her project were to be of any use the tree seemed to lengthen itself out as she went up and to reach farther and farther upward it was like a great main mass to the voyaging earth it was truly heavy to maze that morning through all its ponders frame as it felt its determined spark of human spirit wending its way from higher branch to branch who knows how steadily the least twigs held themselves to advantageous light where he creature on her way the old pine must have loved its new dependent more than all the hawks and bats and moths and even the sweet voice of the gushes was the brave beating heart of the solitary grey-eyed child and the tree stood still and frowned away the winds the tune morning while the dawn grew bright in the east sylvia's face was like a pale star if one had seen it from the ground and the last thorny ball was passed just a trembling and tired but holy triumphant high in the treetop yes there was the sea with a dawning sun making a golden dazzle over it and toward the glorious east flew to hawks with slow moving pinions how low they looked in the air from that height when one had only seen them from before far up and against the blue sky their grey feathers were as soft as moths they seemed only a little away from the tree sylvia felt as if she too flying away among the clouds westward the woodlands and farms reached miles and miles into the distance here and there were church steeples and white villages truly it was a vast and awesome world the birds sang louder and louder alas the sun came up bewilderingly bright sylvia could see the white cells ships out at sea and the clouds that were purple and rose colored in yellow at first began to fade away where was the white heron's nest in the sea of green branches and was this wonderful sight and page into the world the only reward for having climbed to such a giddy height now look down again sylvia where the green marshes set among the shining birches and dark hemlocks there where you saw the white heron once you will see him again look look a white spot of him like a single floating feather comes up from the dead hemlock and goes larger and her guises comes close at last goes by the landmark pine with a steady sweep of wing an outstretched lender neck and crested head and wait wait do not move a foot or a finger little girl do not send an arrow of light and consciousness from your two eager eyes the heron is perched in a pine bar not far beyond yours and cries back to his mate on the nest and plums his feathers for the new day a child gives a long sigh a minute later when a company of shouting cat birds comes also to the tree and vexed by the fluttering and lawlessness the solemn heron goes away she knows a secret now the wild lights lender bird that floats in waivers and goes back like an arrow presently to his home in the green world beneath then Sylvia, well satisfied makes her perilous way down again not daring to look far below the branch she stares on ready to cry sometimes because her fingers ache her lame to feed slip wondering over and over again what a stranger would say to her and what he would think when she told him how to find his way straight to the heron's nest Sylvia, Sylvia called the busy old grandmother again and again but nobody answered a small husk bed was empty Sylvia had disappeared the guest waked from a dream and remembering his day's pleasure hurried to dress himself that it might sooner begin he was sure from the way the shy little girl looked once or twice yesterday that she had at least seen the white heron and now she must really be made to tell here she comes now paler than ever and her worn old frock is torn and tattered and smeared with pine pitch the grandmother and the sportsman stand at the door together and question her the splendid moment has come to speak of a dead hemlock tree by the green marsh but Sylvia does not speak after all the old grandmother fretfully rebukes her and the young man's kind appealing eyes are looking straight at her own he can make them rich with money he has promised it and they are poor now Sylvia is so well worth making happy and he waits to hear the story she can tell no she must keep silence what is it that suddenly forbids her and makes her dumb has she been nine years growing and now when the great world for the first time put out the hand to her was she trusted aside for a bird's sake the murmur of the pine's green branches is in her ears she remembers how the white heron came flying through the golden air and how they watched the sea in the morning together and Sylvia cannot speak she cannot tell the heron's secret and give its life away dear loyalty suffered a sharp pang as the guest went away disappointed later in the day could have served and followed him and loved him as a dog loves many a night Sylvia heard the echo and this whistle haunting the pasture path as she came home with the lord and cow she forgot even her sorrow with a sharp report of his gun the sight of thrushes and sparrows dropping silent to the ground their songs hushed in their pretty feathers stained in wet blood were the birds better friends than their hunter might have been who can tell whatever treasures were lost to her woodlands in summertime remember bring your gifts and graces and tell your secrets to this lonely country child end of a white heron by Sarah Orange-Jouette