Page 35 - To Dragma October 1929

OCTOBER, 1929 33

<Jl w a k e

A Short Story by F . W . B .

SOMEHOW it wasn't much fun since there was nobody to tell her
not to. Frederika gazed deep down into the dark waters of the cis-
tern and wondered.—But, no, she wouldn't have done that. Two of
Hubert's pigeons (squabs, he called them) sat on the edge nearby. Their
lovely purples and greens and blues shone like oily water in the sun.
They held their heads up proudly. Their funny little glassy eyes might
have come off her best high-button shoes. But they didn't sound happy
and she swung out on the scraping limb of a sycamore, wrapping her legs
about the trunk below. Slowly down, fingering the crackly, curling bark.
Was this the kind that Hiawatha used?

Maybe she was out in their nice Babes-in-the-Woods spot! So around
the house to the grassy hollow of the front lawn where they had always
oved to bury each other under rose petals. I t was such a soft place to lie
down on. —She must be very tired. Eight children were a lot. There
were birthday parties and Christmas trees and Easter-egg hunts and
clothes to mend and questions! Frederika had had just one glimpse of
nat little red face. She didn't care if he was her new brother, she hated
nim. And imagine his drinking milk right alongside of a little pickaninny
rom his niggah mamma!—She wasn't there. A horrible thought: Maybe

»ut there were still the gardens. Not between the rows of dark green
ec ge nor on the lovely slope beneath the mulberrv tree. Not among the
ustling cornstalks, a favorite hiding-place. The orchard! The peaches

woU °8 n e a n d the w e e d s w e r e talL There «m i h t ^ -s n a k e s She
know Peopte
~ ~C a l l but t h e n P e ° p k -w o u l d k n o w 'S h e d rather didn't

down" *?v!ds e e m e d a long time since last Monday when she had had to go

grev h a U t 0 " t h e chamber-" Mummy had sent for her and the

V o L ! ' - "S a i d Aren,t y o u happy, "d e a r ? but yt h e h a d n ' t spoken.

dark v i * P gw n i s things. And now She was peeking into the
erin

back w ° ° y ' abin.f Nobody there. Around in
ld A u n t Mar sc

She cli KT m y J a aa m ic Ginger bottles on the ground, and a ladder,

moed up and sat down by Mr. McCain whose kind mouth was