Page:History of Oregon Literature.djvu/677

 The last definitely heard of her she had been accepted as a princess of India, through an alleged marriage of Henri d'Orleans, the angel father of the diary. The opal is believed by many to have magical qualities. How appropriate if Opal came out of India, land of magic and mystery, of glitter and glamor, a perfect setting for the fairy world in which this master of make-believe always lived.

Opal wrote The Journal of An Understanding Heart, but she never had an affair of the heart, probably because hers was an understanding one. In her adolescent years Opal gathered geological specimens, and bugs and worms by the thousands, by the barrel. She garnered chrysalises by the bucketful and watched how God brought life to his fairies of the great outdoors. Somewhere, somehow, she gained a prodigious amount of knowledge about these things. Without having completed a high school course, this little maid of mystery presented herself at the University of Oregon, where entrance requirements were waived because of her knowledge of geology, astronomy and biology. She became an indifferent student.

Opal made friends quickly, but intimate association usually was short lived. However, she had an uncanny way of getting acquaintances to assist her financially.

After a year or two at college, during which she was the subject of many news stories, Opal decided to give her life to conducting nature classes for children and went to Los Angeles for that purpose. A woman she had met but once furnished the money for the trip.

The nature classes did not do so well. Opal there-