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Chapter XI
I Dream

Uncle Stephen's party dispersed next day, which was just as well, for the weather changed suddenly and a gale blew up. Great winds swept the countryside; clouds of dust went eddying, whirling down the roads; trees broke before the fury of the blast; stacks were torn and fences destroyed. The heat was almost unbearable, and we were glad to keep in the shelter of the creepers on the veranda. In the evening we strolled down to the river, and watched the waters rolling past in one great, yellow flood. The islands had all disappeared, and huge logs came floating down from the hills, borne like sticks on the torrent.

I know that the uncles anticipated a flood, for the stop banks were strengthened, and the sheep brought in from the low-lying land; but though the river tore at its banks like a fierce, live creature, no harm was done, and Uncle John said he thought the worst was over.

"It will be all right now," he told Uncle Dan. "That is, of course, if it doesn't rain. Dan, we must do something up at the cross-roads,

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The water was all round the old cottage yesterday."

"It would be a good thing if the old place did go," Uncle Dan remarked. "It's falling to pieces. One good flood would do the trick."

Next day, however, the weather changed; the wind died down, and the air was fresh and cool. Nan was with us still. She had stayed for a day or two after the other children went home, and when the storms came Uncle John kept her with us. We thought, when we saw Patrick riding down the drive on that first cool day, that he had come for her, but we soon found that he was on his way to the city. Mr Campbell had taken some sheep over to Killarney, and Nan was to meet him and ride home with him.

"And how is the little — ah — Crayfish? " Patrick asked, smiling at Pipi.

He spent the day with us, but as he put in the time discussing alpine flowers with Uncle Stephen he did not worry us much. We saw him at lunch, however, and it was when he was eating roast beef and salad—his second helping—that suddenly and most unexpectedly he began to wake up. All at once he seemed to notice that Nan was different from the rest of us, that she was shabby and shy and untaught. It wasn't pleasant for Nan when he did come out of his sleep, for he kept on looking at her in a surprised sort of way, as if he were page 129seeing her for the first time. Once he said uneasily:

"Sit up, Nan! "

We all sat up too. Rob looked furious; Jan tried to divert every one's attention by knocking over a glass of water; and Pipi's manners grew so atrocious that Uncle John simply had to take notice of them.

"I can behave much worse'n that, though," she told me complacently afterward. "And if ever Nan's brother looks at her like that again I'll pick up my chop an' gnaw it like Tiny Pat. And I'll lick all round my lips afterward," she added reflectively.

"He's a conceited idiot," Rob said furiously. "Poor kid. It's not her fault. Where is she now, Jan? "

"She went to brush her hair. He told her to. I'd like to brush his. I'd brush it so hard he'd be bald in half an hour," Jan finished, with emphasis.

"Let's go to her," I suggested.

In the bedroom Nan, with Pipi to help her, was brushing away at her unruly mop. I looked at her, and found it hard to speak; something hot and angry was choking me. Poor Nan—no father, no mother, only a brother, who looked at her sourly, and told her to brush her hair. The brushing, however, wasn't affecting it much, in spite of Pipi's efforts.

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"It's the sort of hair that won't lie down," Nan said, sadly.

"I like that sort," remarked Pipi.

Jan crossed the room, and took the brush.

"I'll do it for you. What pretty hair you have, Nan. I love curly hair." It was wonderful how gentle harum-scarum Jan could be. "It's the prettiest hair I ever saw."

"It won't lie flat." Nan gave her head a disgusted shake. "I've a good mind to cut it all off."

"Oh, don't," I began, and then I looked at Jan, and my heart sank. Jan was eyeing Nan contemplatively, and there was a look in her eyes which warned me. "Don't—don't cut it off," I implored.

"I could bob it," said Jan, dreamily, "like Ngaire's. I believe it would look beautiful, and it's as easy as easy."

"Ngaire's looks nice."

"It keeps so tidy, too," Jan said. "Would you like me to bob yours, Nan? "

"Like Ngaire's? "Nan was plainly taken with the idea, and Jan enthusiastic. Like a lamb led to the slaughter Nan was seated in a big chair on the side veranda, and Jan, preparing for execution, stood over her, waving a huge pair of scissors.

She began cheerfully enough, helped with much advice from Pipi; Jock, who had joined the party, had also something to say on the subject, but soon an ominous silence settled over us all. Each clip brought the horror of the situation home to us. Only Nan was cheerful—she could not see herself.

"How does it look? "she asked, and we did not like to tell her that she resembled nothing so much as the picture of Shockheaded Peter in Pipi's old picture-book.

Jan gave a desperate clip.

"All right. See, Ngaire, does it want cutting a little more to the left? "

"A—little," I answered.

"Oh! that was my ear."

"Sorry," said Jan, clipping away feverishly. "When old Tom cuts my hair he gets a basin, and puts it on my head. My hat! she does look funny," remarked Jock.

Nan lifted a face on which was a dawning horror. Jan, with presence of mind, clapped on a basin, hastily procured by Pipi, and the victim's head disappeared within its capacious interior.

"You needn't fit her in like a pudding," Jock said, with a grin. "You hold it on, and cut round," he instructed Jan kindly.

The result was just a little more terrible than page 132before. Nan looked even worse than Shockheaded Peter, and we could only gaze at her in horrified surprise. But I saw Jan's lips tremble.

"How does it look? "Nan asked again, and put up her hands and touched her shorn head gently.

Jan looked guilty.

"Very—nice," she answered, and gave a few last desperate clips, that threatened to rob Nan of every feature.

"She'll be bald if you cut any more," Pipi said solemnly.

Jan looked at Nan; she looked at us; her lips quivered again. I knew it was going to happen, and when she dropped the scissors and fell in a giggling, disgraced heap on the veranda I was not surprised. She had robbed Nan of her hair, and the only wonder was that she hadn't taken her nose, and her ears too—they had had more than one near shave—and now she sat down and laughed—laughed! —at the result of her work.

"I—d-d-don't want to," she spluttered helplessly. "But you l-look so f-f-funny."

"You ought to be ashamed of yourself," Pipi admonished her sternly. "It doesn't look so awful bad, Nan."

"I've seen people look worse. Once a girl had to be shaved. She was funny—all bald like an egg," I added, trying to comfort Nan.

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It was Nan herself who saved the situation. She picked up the hand-mirror Jan had thoughtfully provided at the beginning of the ceremony, and then hidden away when she saw how things were turning out. Nan looked at herself; her lips quivered as Jan's had done; then suddenly she began to laugh, and Nan's laughter is so pretty, like a little stream falling over pebbles in a creek bed. She sat down beside Jan—the shearer and the shorn side by side—and even Pipi relented, and giggled too, though she spoke sternly to Jan.

"It isn't really funny," she said. "Not for Nan."

Uncle Stephen didn't think it was funny either; indeed, even Jan sobered when she saw him. He came round the corner of the veranda, and when he caught sight of Nan he gasped. He turned straight to Jan. She said the way he picked the culprit without asking any questions was really quite uncanny.

"You foolish child," he said. "What have you been doing? "

Jan giggled; she really did. She hadn't got over it yet.

"B-b-bobbing Nan's hair," she answered.

Nan laughed too, but Uncle Stephen was really angry; he said it was about time Jan began to cultivate common sense. Meanwhile all that could be done was to turn Nan over to old Tom, who was quite an artist in his way, and who gasped page 134when he beheld the result of Jan's hair-dressing operations. He did not put a basin over Nan's head, as he had over Jock's, but he clipped here, and he clipped there, and though it was not a buster-cut, the effect was really pretty.

"It looks awful nice—not a bit like Shockheaded Peter," Pipi remarked.

Late that afternoon Patrick Wayne departed on his way to the city, and Pipi and I accompanied Nan to the cross-roads, where she was to meet Mr Campbell. We drew up at the old cottage and waited for him.

Morrison's cottage was a sad old place. An Englishman had once lived there, but he had moved away and gone back to England years ago when his wife and children died. Gradually the old house fell into ruins. The timbers were broken, and the doors and windows gone. But the trees that Mr Morrison had planted blossomed year by year, and showered the old place with white flowers in the spring.

Mr Campbell was not yet in sight, so we dismounted, and stood leaning against the broken old fence, talking, and gazing down the road for the first sign of Mr Oh Aye. Nan saw him first, and as it was growing late Pipi and I set off homeward again. The uncles like us to be in time for meals. Jan said they made a fetish of punctuality, and it wasn't well to pander to their weak-page 135nesses. But she pandered just as much as we did. Uncle John saw to that.

We left Nan standing by the gate, and rode home through the hot, still air, The weather had become suddenly oppressive again; the rain had ceased, but black clouds hung like a pall over the sky. Away in the west one little river of gold had cleft a path through the overhanging bank of grey, but soon the clouds hid it from view.

"There's going to be a storm," Uncle Dan said. "Glad I'm in before it begins."

He hadn't so much to be thankful for if he had only known.

We were at tea when the first flash of lightning ran blindingly through the room, and the first clap of thunder echoed around. Then the rain began to fall—great heavy drops that sounded like the clatter of stones on the roof. At first we could not hear ourselves speak, and it was only when it had quietened down a little that Pipi remarked feelingly:

"Poor Nan. She won't be home for ages yet." The rain fell steadily all the evening and the wind sprang up and went raging and shrieking round the house. Pipi and I lay in bed, shivering and listening to it. At first I could not close my eyes, but gradually I grew accustomed to the weirdness of it, and fell into a troubled sleep. And as I slept I dreamed a dream.

I thought I was standing on the roadside by page 136Morrison's old cottage. The pear-trees were all in blossom, and in the doorway, holding out her hands to me, stood Nan. Yet I could not reach her, for all round the house raged a torrent of yellow water, like the waters of the river when it was high. I wakened, damp with terror, to find myself in my own snug little bed, with Jan and Pipi asleep in their stretchers beside me.

I rubbed my eyes; I pinched my arm; but I could not throw off the effect of my dream. The rain was still falling—I could hear it on the roof— but loud above everything rose a menacing roar— the cry of the river in flood.

I think it was that sound which brought me, still heavy with sleep, down the passage and into the room where the boys slept. Rob was not in bed; it was really quite early, though it seemed the middle of the night.

"It's Nan," I cried. "Rob, she's in the cottage, and the river's coming up, and she'll be drowned. Rob, we must get her out. We must! "

I think I was crying then, but Rob is not like most brothers. He did not laugh at me; he listened quietly. Then he said:

"We'll get Dan. S-s-sh, kiddy. Nan's all right, but it would be as well to see."

He went into Uncle's room, and soon the two came out together. Uncle was really kind when he found me huddled up in the passage waiting for him.

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"Run back to bed, kiddy," he said. "It's all right. I expect Nan arrived home ages ago. There's no reason in the world why she should be in the cottage at this hour of the night. You said you left her there? "

"Yes. She was waiting for Mr Oh Aye. But she didn't go with him. I know she didn't. I—I dreamed it, please, Uncle."

"We'll go," Uncle said to Rob. "Quietly, we don't want to disturb anyone. It's all imagination, of course, but just to satisfy this young lady we'll leave our nice, warm beds, and ride into the storm. Skip back to bed, Ngaire, and don't wake Jan. Heavens! we don't want her lending a hand. That would be the last straw."

They would not take me, but I saw them make their way, very quietly, out of the back door into the fury of the night. Still, I do not think it was only to satisfy me that Uncle went. I think it was to satisfy himself too.

Then I went back to bed, to lie awake, listening to the fall of the rain and the rush of the river, which did not seem so fearful now. Soon I closed my eyes, and fell into a peaceful sleep, with no disturbing dreams of little brown-haired girls shut in by swirling waters round the old house.

Next morning we learned that Morrison's cottage had been swept away in the night.