Page:A Leaf in the Storm.djvu/97

90 As I went up one of these, bearing my share of the framework and the canvas of our play-house, with the reed-pipe and the old drum sounding merrily as ever before our tired steps, I heard a voice above me, the clear, high voice of a woman.

"How ugly he is, that one!" it cried with a laugh. "His face alone is a burlesque. He will make the very dogs in the streets die of laughter."

"Hush!" said a voice that was lower in tone and fuller. "Who knows? He may hear. And he looks so weary and so tired!"

The other voice laughed on in its cruel and saucy glee:

"Pooh! He is too ugly to live! Why does God make such creatures?"

And across the eyes the fragrance of lilac in full blossom struck me a cool, refreshing blow.

She who spoke last had broken a branch of the sweet spring flower and cast it down to me in merry scorn, so that it fell across the timber on which my hands were clasped. There was a little saffron-hued butterfly upon it, I remember, and one golden-brown bee. The bee paused a moment upon my wrist and then flew from me; the butterfly remained upon the blossoms.

I looked up. An old man, a gardener, who had chidden her and the bright creature who had