Hazel

“Granny, please help me to weave once more,” said Hazel, “and I’ll have a good big piece of cotton cloth.”

Ever since Hazel had spun the cotton she had wanted to weave it, but her grandmother’s loom was too large for her to handle. Granny had solved the difficulty by saying they could do it together, Hazel throwing the shuttle while she pushed the frame. In this fashion they had woven their cloth. “It’s your work, honey,” Granny had insisted. “You’re doing the weaving, not me.”

“Isn’t it hot!” Hazel said, after they had worked for an hour. “April in the South is as warm as June at home. Is it hotter than this in the summer?”

“I expect it is,” said Granny, looking at the child’s moist curls. “Don’t do any more now.”

They went out on the porch to get cool.

“I’ve thought a great deal about my weaving,” said Hazel, very seriously, “and, Granny, I’ve decided to cut some of the cloth into wash-rags so that I can make presents to a number of my friends. I can hem them, can’t I?”

“Yes, dearie.”

“And then I shall make ten pieces at least. Granny, who is that coming down the road?”

Granny stood up and saw a young white lady coming toward them on horseback, who pulled up her horse as she reached the porch.

“Does Hazel Tyler live here?” she asked.

“Yes,” Hazel replied, going out to her, “I am Hazel Tyler.”

“I know your minister,” said the young lady, smiling, “and he asked me to come to see you.”

Hazel’s heart swelled with pride. The young lady dismounted, tied her horse, and then, declining to go indoors, sat on the steps with them.

“I am afraid you won’t like my errand, Mrs. Tyler,” the new-comer said, “but I have come to ask Hazel if she wishes to go home with me.”

“You couldn’t have come on a less welcome errand to me,” said Granny sadly, “but the hot days is coming, and I suppose the child must go North again.”

The young lady, whose name was Miss Davis, then explained that she came from Boston, that she taught in the Jonesville school, and that she should return to her home the middle of May. “And if that will be convenient for Hazel,” she concluded, “she can go by rail all the way with me.”

“If my mother tells me it is what she wants me to do,” Hazel said, “of course I would love to travel with you.”

“I think from your minister’s letter, that you will hear shortly from your mother,” answered Miss Davis, and went into the details of the journey.

Hazel learned that if she were in company with a white person she might ride in the Pullman car and sleep in the fascinating bed that pulled down from the top. She would only be traveling two days, and her mother would be at the end of the journey. But Granny! She did not want to look in her direction as she talked with Miss Davis.

“Wasn’t she pretty?” she asked the old woman as their visitor trotted down the road.

“I didn’t see as she was well-favored,” Granny answered.

Hazel put her arms about her grandmother’s neck. “I don’t leave for three weeks,” she said, “and I’m coming back again. Why, Granny, I truly do love the South. At least, the part where you are.”

“You dear baby,” was Granny’s only answer.

When Scip heard the news among the pines that afternoon, he started as though Hazel had struck him.

“Who going to take you?” he asked.

Hazel explained about Miss Davis, and the comfort of the train. Scipio could find no fault, but remained silent watching a redbird that hopped fearlessly about among their books on the ground. They had made a pet of this cardinal, scattering food for him, and making bird sounds in conversation which Hazel insisted he could understand. When she had finished talking, the bird flew to a bough near them and began his clear, sweet song.

“He is asking you to stay,” Scip said.

He felt like crying.

“I’m going to my mother, Scip,” Hazel said softly.

After a little pause she went on: “I’ll write letters to you. See, I’ll make you a plain copy of written letters. I’ll make it very plain. You’ve only learned to print, Scip, but these next three weeks you must learn about writing.” And glad to have something definite to do, the little teacher turned to her task with earnest persistence and the matter of departure was not spoken of again.

But it hung over the three weeks. The mocking bird’s morning song now had a note of sadness. “You’re going away,” he said. The hen was reproachful as she showed her chickens. “You won’t see them grow up,” she clucked. Pussy Lucy purred, “You can’t play with me when I get to be a cat.” And even the pigs grunted, “Why do you leave our babies now that they are so cunning?” for spring had glorified the pigs that fathered and mothered dear little offspring.

“There are so many things to say good-bye to,” Hazel said to Granny one night.

As for Granny, she was openly heart-broken. “You’s been the light of this house,” she said, “and the sun done drop out of my sky when you leave me. But I don’t blame your mother for calling you, not one speck.”

The first of May, Hazel began to pack her trunk. But there were certain possessions that went in and out with her changing mood. What books should she leave for Scip?

Scip had nothing to read. That she knew, and meant to leave him some of her little library, but how much?

She had six books which she kept on a shelf in her room. The first was a New Testament given her by her father. Of that there was no question; it was hers for ever and ever. The second was a simple reader that she fortunately had brought and had used in her lessons. Of course, that would go to Scip. The third was the dictionary. Scip should have that, for Mother would be glad to give it to him. The fourth was “What Katy did,” a girl’s book, that she knew Scip wouldn’t care for; it could go in the trunk. The fifth and sixth were the Jungle Book, and Child Life, the Christmas gift of her minister.

When the first week of May came to an end, it seemed probable that the Jungle Book would remain on the shelf. Scipio did not fully appreciate it—it was evident he thought some of the conversation silly—but he liked the pictures, especially the one of the tiger. Hazel adored the Jungle Book, but, though she knew she should not count on this, she guessed shrewdly that when Mr. Perkins learned of her generosity he would give her another copy. But Child Life was different. And for many days it seemed that Child Life would remain in the trunk.

Hazel was an only child, and she had had few serious calls upon her generosity. Pretty things had been given her, and she had been genuinely grateful, but she had come imperceptibly to regard them as her right. Never in her life had she given away anything for which she deeply cared. And she cared deeply for this book of poems. But Scip cared for them, too, and knew some of them almost by heart. Such a book would help him in his reading very much.

She had told Granny about the Boston library, where you could get any book in the world. Of course, it would have Child Life. But it was one thing to get a book for two weeks from a library, and another to have it on your book shelf every month of the year for your very own. And then, this book had her name in it, written by her minister. She hugged it close. It would not be right to give away the minister’s present. And feeling a little like a hypocrite she put it back in the trunk.

That afternoon she impressed upon Scipio that he must write to her. She had spoken of it before, but he had said nothing. “You really must write, Scip. You can print now quite nicely, you know. It will be good practice for you, and I shall want to hear. You will, won’t you?”

Scipio shook his head.

Hazel felt disappointed and angry. “You must, Scip. Why won’t you?”

He gave his reason. “I ain’t got no money, and they won’t give stamps at the store.”

When she went home Hazel took Child Life out of the trunk and put it, almost savagely, on her table. “It’s a wicked shame,” she said to herself. “He works and works and he can’t have one single thing.” She took her pen, dipped it in the ink, and turning to the title page wrote under her own name, “To Scipio Lee.”

When she was done she looked at it hard and winked the tears from her eyes. Then she placed it on the shelf with the primer and the dictionary and the Jungle Book.

“Granny, will you write to me when I leave here?” she asked that night as they sat on the porch.

“Yes, sugar; but you mustn’t be surprised at my kind of writing. Colored children weren’t taught to read and write in slavery days, but your father he learned me. When he were about twelve he began. ‘It may be I done leave home and mammy by and by,’ he said, ‘and I wants to get letters from my mother.’ So he worked with me every day like you work with Scip.”

“I remember the letters you wrote. Father loved them. I would understand what they were about now. So you’ll surely write me,” she went on persistently.

“Yes, honey.”

“Then, Granny, will you let Scip put his letters inside of yours, because he hasn’t money to buy stamps?”

“I sure will, you dear child.”

It had been arranged that Miss Davis should call for Hazel the Monday morning after her school closed and should take her to the station. She was to come at ten o’clock. The day before, Sunday, Scipio, on Granny’s and Hazel’s urgent invitation, took supper with them. The boy felt more conscious of his ill-kept clothes within doors than when with Hazel in the woods, but she had been persistent and he had come. She took him into her room and showed him the shelf with its four books.

“I give them to you,” she said solemnly, and put them in his arms.

He looked bewildered. “You ain’t leaving all these for me?” he asked.

She nodded, “Yes, they’ve got your name in them.”

“I can’t have ’em,” he said, almost crying. “I ain’t any place to keep ’em. The boys is worse than ever now you don’t let me lick ’em.”

Hazel was dumb for a moment. Then she called Granny to her.

The old woman appeared in the doorway and the situation was explained to her.

“Could Scip keep the books here on this shelf?” Hazel asked. “Then they would be quite safe.”

“Why, in course,” Granny replied heartily. “And maybe he’ll read aloud sometimes to me. We could make them out together.”

“I’m going to know how to read,” Scip said resolutely. “I never had nothing to read before, but now I’ve got books and a dictionary.”

Hazel read to them for a long time that evening; it was easier than to talk. She read the favorite poem of each; for Granny, “The Hen with One Chicken,” who thought she was so much busier than the ducks and turkeys with their broods; for Scip, “The Night with a Wolf,” “The Captain’s Daughter,” and the one she, too, liked so much, of the little girl in the woods.

And the little girl’s answer:

“Do you know,” Hazel said confidentially, “I used to be a little frightened in the woods, but I never am now. I think of the poem and I have Scip’s stick!”

“I’m coming again,” she said to Scip as he went down the porch to his home. “I’m coming again,” and she repeated it often to Granny before she went to bed.

Miss Davis arrived in a carriage the next morning on the front seat with the driver, her trunk behind. Hazel’s was placed beside it, and then the child turned to say good-bye.

Scipio was there with Theora and Tom hanging shyly to their big brother. He was very gentle with them. Hazel kissed both the children good-bye, and put out her hand to Scip.

He took it and said softly, “Good-bye, Sister.”

Granny held her close and could not let her go. “You’s been the light of my house,” she said. “Tell your mother I bless her for letting me have you. And I send you back to her sound and well, honey. She’ll be full of happiness. But we-all ’ll miss you sorely.”

Hazel could only give her one more hug. Then she scrambled to the seat between the driver and Miss Davis, and the horse started off.

When she looked back she saw Granny standing in the road, her hand on Scipio’s shoulder.