  Little Theo sat up in bed and looked out of the window. “It’s going to be a nice day; the little girl will be in the corn. We will play all day long. I must hurry; she doesn’t like to wait.” Presently, her breakfast eaten and her little tasks all finished, she was running as fast as her feet would carry her toward the wide fields of Indian corn. In a few moments the great blades were rustling above her head. They formed green arches, down whose long vistas the little girl eagerly peered. Soon, with a satisfied laugh, she ran with outstretched hands down the corn rows, and her voice came back chattering, laughing, asking and answering questions. Theo’s mother had often heard her speak of the little girl, or young lady, or old lady, who played or talked with her in the cornfield; but being a very busy woman, and having little time to give the child, she did not pay much attention. If she heeded at all, she thought some neighbor or her children had met the little girl while passing through the cornfield. To-day her attention had been aroused, and she began to wonder who it was that Theo was so eager to meet. So when Theo ran down to the cornfield, her mother followed closely. She saw her disappear in the corn, and marking the place, hurried after. She could hear the child’s voice close at hand, and another’s, that sounded sometimes like a human voice, and again like the wind sighing in the corn. After a short search, she saw at a distance her little daughter. But what was she doing? Clasping in her arms a group of cornstalks, and looking lovingly up among the green waving blades. But stay. Were they cornstalks? It surely was a beautiful young woman, dressed in trailing robes of green silk; her hair the color of corn silk, waving around her face and neck. The little girl playfully clasped her knees, while the lady, laughing, bent over her, swaying and bending as corn does in the wind. “Am I losing my senses, or am I bewitched?” wondered the mother. She was tempted to call her child to her, and take her away from the field, but she seemed so happy. Presently Theo sprang away from the corn, and called back, “You cannot catch me.” The wind suddenly blew the tossing corn-blades together. When it lulled again, she saw her little girl running down the row, and close in pursuit ran the young woman. No, stay. It was a child, following closely after Theo. On they ran, laughing, calling, and presently they came back, panting. Theo flung herself down to rest in the shade of the corn, and so did the little girl. But now, it was not a little girl, but an old woman who sat there. Her face, half hidden by her hood, was wrinkled and yellow. She had a long cloak, with the hood closely drawn over her head. Her clothing was made of some material the color of cornhusks, and was coarse and stiff. The little girl playfully clasped her knees. The little girl playfully clasped her knees. Theo rested her elbow on the old woman’s knee, and looked up into her face. “I almost think I like you best this way,” she said. “You make me think of such comfortable things,—gathering nuts and apples, and of pumpkin-pie, and—and—Christmas, and going to grandpa’s on Thanksgiving.” The old woman nodded and sighed. “Do you feel sad again?” Again she nodded. “About the corn-husking?” A nod. “But you know next summer will come, and you can begin all over again.” Just here Theo’s mother thought, “I must stop this; the child is talking either to a ghost or a witch. Theo,” she called, “come to me.” The child sprang up from her seat and came to her mother, rubbing her eyes. “Now, mamma, you’ve frightened her away; she won’t come back again to-day. She doesn’t like folks.” “Theo, who in the world are you talking about; and why do you race up and down the corn rows, laughing and chattering to yourself?” “Well, I’ll tell you, mamma; but first let us go to the house; she might not like to hear me.” Soon after, they were seated in the cool shaded parlor. The mother took the little girl on her lap. “Now, Theo, tell me,” she said. So the little child began. “Well, mamma, it began long ago, by me being so lonesome. I haven’t any one to play with, and one day I was out in the cornfield when the corn was just as high as me. And I spoke out loud, and I said, ‘Oh, dear, what shall I do for some one to play with me? I shall go distracted’ (I have heard you say that word, mamma)! And I said, ‘I wish a little girl would grow out of those cornstalks;’ and just as I said that, the stalks parted, and out stepped the nicest little girl. She was so pretty! She had such curling brown hair, and blue eyes, and her dress was of green silk; and when she laughed, her teeth looked like little grains of white corn, and she was rubbing her eyes, as though she had just waked up. And she knew me, mamma; she said, ‘Why, Theo, did you come to play with me?’ and pretty soon we were the best friends you ever saw. And every day we played and played; only she never would tell me where she lived, and she wouldn’t ever come home with me to play. But one day, when the corn had grown way high above my head, and the roasting ears were getting ripe, she changed all at once into such a pretty young lady. At first I cried, for I didn’t want to lose my little girl; but the young lady was so lovely, mamma, and she sang to me, and we talked; and so one day last fall, when the cornstalks were turning yellow, I found my young lady had changed into an old one. And I was afraid of her at first, she was so bent over, and was queer looking. But I got real well acquainted with her, and she told me stories about gathering nuts, and about squirrels and birds, and oh, lots of things, and I just love her now! “Well, I wanted to tell you, but you didn’t pay much ’tention when I talked to you; so, when husking time came, my poor old lady wrung her hands and cried, and told me good-bye, and I just couldn’t ’dure to see her go, and my dear cornfield torn down, and I have felt so lonesome. “Well, this summer, the little girl came back, when the corn was tall enough for us to play in; and now we know each other so well that she changes just for fun, from a little girl to a young lady, and then to an old one; and she keeps me uneasy, mamma, for I never know just when she will change. She told me once she was an Indian woman, and that she was civilized now,—and that’s all.” Theo ended with a sigh of relief that the story was told. The mother looked at the child long and curiously. “Well, I declare!” she said. But that night she said to Theo’s papa: “We must send Theo to school. The child’s head is filled with all sorts of nonsense; it’s time she was taught something sensible; and, if I were in your place, I would turn that cornfield into pasture-land, and invest in more cattle.” “I have been thinking of that myself,” he answered. By and by the mother asked, “John, was that cornfield ever used by the Indians as a burial place, or anything?” “I don’t know,” he answered musingly. “I used to plow up arrow-heads, and pipe-bowls of red sandstone, when I first broke the prairie sod. Why do you ask?” “Oh, just because,” she answered. |
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