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Nor do the long-drawn notes of the nightingale, nor even the jolly cuckoo, nor the tree pipit, no, nor even the soft coo of the turtle-dove and the smell of the May flower. It is too silent even now: there are the leading notes; but the undertone the vibration of the organ is but just beginning.
I cried afresh to think I should never go again to the corner where I always found the earliest violets; and then I cried to think that the nightingale would soon be back, and how that very morning, when I opened my window, I had heard the cuckoo, and could tell that he was calling from just about Mary's Meadow.
The remembrance put another thought into her mind. "Cuckoo, cuckoo," she said softly, "couldn't you help us?" Then she stood still and listened, holding Phil's cold little hands in her own. She was not disappointed. Presently, in the distance, came the well-known cry, "cuckoo, cuckoo," so soft and far away, but yet so clear. Phil clapped his hands. "He's calling us," he cried joyfully.
So she did try very hard. And she didn't speak to the cuckoo when he came out to say it was four o'clock. She was busy, and he was busy. She felt it was better to wait till he gave her some sign of being ready to talk to her again. For fairies, you know, children, however charming, are sometimes rather queer to have to do with.
Then the king and queen placed themselves in the centre, and round and round in moving circles twisted and untwisted the brilliant bands of butterflies. "It's like a kaleidoscope," said Griselda; "and now it's like those twisty-twirly dissolving views that papa took me to see once. It's just like them. Oh, how pretty! Cuckoo, are they doing it all on purpose to please me?"
Hath not the cuckoo a harsh note, and yet she tells us of green buds and springing flowers? What if thy language be that of the stoled priest, is it not the same which binds hearts and hands together at the altar? And what though thou delayest to render up thy treasures, are not all pleasures most sweet, when enhanced by expectation?
Involuntarily she sat up and extended her thin arms almost as if in a beckoning gesture. As she did so the front door bell rang. Cuckoo was startled and felt as if it rang for her. But that was unlikely; and there were other lodgers of her kind in the house. No doubt it was a visitor for one of them. Mrs. Brigg went in weary procession along the passage and opened the door.
I suppose so," he hesitated. "By the way, is there among these vagrant memories of Circassians, Greeks, and Italians anything chosen by Cuckoo Bright?" Julian started violently. "Cuckoo Bright," he exclaimed, "what do you know of her?" As he spoke Valentine strolled into the room dressed for dinner.
I should think not." "And he wants me to go?" Certainly she was impressed and flattered. "Yes, very much." Julian found himself again wondering, with Cuckoo, mightily at Valentine's vagary of desire. She touched his hand with her long, thin fingers. "You'll stay with me all the time?" "Why, of course." "You won't leave me? Not alone with him, I mean." "No; don't be so absurd."
Listen, Phil," said the cuckoo, and without opening his eyes a change passed over the little boy's face. Griselda could see that he was listening to hear her message. "He thinks he's dreaming, I suppose," she said to herself with a smile. Then she whispered softly "Phil, dear, don't come to play with me to-morrow, for I can't come. But come the day after. I'll be at the wood-path then."
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