Page:Cornelia Meigs--The Pool of Stars.djvu/123

 of a shop to another, looking for some fitting gift to take home to Miranda, that he was suddenly startled by the sight of a pale face among all those dusky ones. It was not white, but yellow, and belonged to an old Chinaman, as dried up and withered as a mummy, who had somehow wandered, a rare thing in those days, to this African city and kept a little shop there among the Moors, Arabs and Berbers of Tripoli. His wares were different from the others and very new indeed to Humphrey's eyes, for just such carvings and silks did not often find their way to America. The old man invited the officer to come inside where more articles stood upon the narrow shelves and where Humphrey had almost decided upon the purchase of a beautifully carved ivory box for Miranda when he spied, in a niche opposite the tiny window, such a thing as he had never seen before. A little pine tree was growing in a pot, a real, living one, and a miniature of just such a tree, bent and twisted by the sea winds, that grew upon the hill above the Susquehanna at home. The art of stunting and pruning these tiny trees, developed in Japan perhaps, but known to some Chinese, was quite unheard of in the Western world so that Humphrey could scarcely believe his eyes when they told him it was green and growing and evidently kin to the giant ones in America.