A woman was taking her morning stroll in a lonely suburban street; a boy of four was with her. She was young and smart and she was smiling brightly; she was casting affectionate glances at her son, whose red cheeks beamed with happiness. The boy was bowling a hoop; a large, new, bright yellow hoop. He ran after his hoop awkwardly, laughed uproariously with joy, thrust forward his plump little legs, bare at the knee, and flourished his stick. He needn’t have raised his stick so high above his head—but what of that?

What happiness! He had never had a hoop before; how briskly it made him run!

And nothing of this had existed for him before; everything was new to him—the streets in early morning, the merry sun, and the distant din of the city. Everything was new to the boy—and joyous and pure.

II

A shabbily dressed old man, with coarse hands stood at the street crossing. He pressed close to the wall to let the woman and the boy pass. The old man looked at the boy with dull eyes and smiled stupidly. Confused, sluggish thoughts struggled within his almost bald head.

“A little gentleman!” said he to himself. “Quite a small fellow. And simply bursting with joy. Just look at him cutting his paces!”

He could not quite understand it. Somehow it seemed strange to him.

Here was a child—a thing to be pulled about by the hair! Play is mischief. Children, as every one knows, are mischief-makers.

And there was the mother—she uttered no reproach, she made no fuss, she did not scold. She was smart and bright. It was quite easy to see that they were used to warmth and comfort.

On the other hand, when he, the old man, was a boy he lived a dog’s life! There was nothing particularly rosy in his life even now; though, to be sure, he was no longer thrashed and he had plenty to eat. He recalled his younger days—their hunger, their cold, their drubbings. He had never had fun with a hoop, or other playthings of well-to-do folks. Thus passed all his life—in poverty, in care, in misery. And he could recall nothing—not a single joy.

He smiled with his toothless mouth at the boy, and he envied him. He reflected:

“What a silly sport!”

But envy tormented him.

He went to work—to the factory where he had worked from childhood, where he had grown old. And all day he thought of the boy.

It was a fixed, deep-rooted thought. He simply could not get the boy out of his mind. He saw him running, laughing, stamping his feet, bowling the hoop. What plump little legs he had, bared at the knee!...

All day long, amid the din of the factory wheels, the boy with the hoop appeared to him. And at night he saw the boy in a dream.

III

Next morning his reveries again pursued the old man.

The machines were clattering, the labour was monotonous, automatic. The hands were busy at their accustomed tasks; the toothless mouth was smiling at a diverting fancy. The air was thick with dust, and under the high ceiling strap after strap, with hissing sound, glided quickly from wheel to wheel, endless in number. The far corners were invisible for the dense escaping vapours. Men emerged here and there like phantoms, and the human voice was not heard for the incessant din of the machines.

The old man’s fancy was at work—he had become a little boy for the moment, his mother was a gentlewoman, and he had his hoop and his little stick; he was playing, driving the hoop with the little stick. He wore a white costume, his little legs were plump, bare at the knee....

The days passed; the work went on, the fancy persisted.

IV

The old man was returning from work one evening when he saw the hoop of an old barrel lying in the street. It was a rough, dirty object. The old man trembled with happiness, and tears appeared in his dull eyes. A sudden, almost irresistible desire took possession of him.

He glanced cautiously around him; then he bent down, picked up the hoop with trembling hands, and smiling shamefacedly, carried it home with him.

No one noticed him, no one questioned him. Whose concern was it? A ragged old man was carrying an old, battered, useless hoop—who cared?

He carried it stealthily, afraid of ridicule. Why he picked it up and why he carried it, he himself could not tell. Still, it was like the boy’s hoop, and this was enough. There was no harm in it lying about.

He could look at it; he could touch it. It would stimulate his reveries; the whistle and turmoil of the factory would grow fainter, the escaping vapours less dense....

For several days the hoop lay under the bed in the old man’s poor, cramped quarters. Sometimes he would take it from its place and look at it; the dirty, grey hoop soothed the old man, and the sight of it quickened his persistent thoughts about the happy little boy.

V

It was a clear, warm morning, and the birds were chirping away in the consumptive urban trees somewhat more cheerfully than usual. The old man rose early, took his hoop, and walked a little distance out of town.

He coughed as he made his way among the old trees and the thorny bushes in the woods. The trees, covered with their dry, blackish, bursting bark, seemed to him incomprehensibly and sternly silent. The odours were strange, the insects astonishing, the ferns of gigantic growth. There was neither dust nor din here, and the gentle, exquisite morning mist lay behind the trees. The old feet glided over the dry leaves and stumbled across the old gnarled roots.

The old man broke off a dry limb and hung his hoop upon it.

He came upon an opening, full of daylight and of calm. The dewdrops, countless and opalescent, gleamed upon the green blades of newly mown grass.

Suddenly the old man let the hoop slide off the stick. He struck with the stick, and sent the hoop rolling across the green lawn. The old man laughed, brightened at once, and pursued the hoop like that little boy. He kicked up his feet and drove the hoop with his stick, which he flourished high over his head, just as that little boy did.

It seemed to him that he was small, beloved, and happy. It seemed to him that he was being looked after by his mother, who was following close behind and smiling. Like a child on his first outing, he felt refreshed on the bright grass, and on the still mosses.

His goat-like, dust-grey beard, that harmonized with his sallow face, trembled, while his cough mingled with his laughter, and raucous sounds came from his toothless mouth.

VI

And the old man grew to love his morning hour in the woods with the hoop.

He sometimes thought he might be discovered, and ridiculed—and this aroused him to a keen sense of shame. This shame resembled fear; he would grow numb, and his knees would give way under him. He would look round him with fright and timidity.

But no—there was no one to be seen, or to be heard....

And having diverted himself to his heart’s content he would return to the city, smiling gently and joyously.

VII

No one had ever found him out. And nothing unusual ever happened. The old man played peacefully for several days, and one very dewy morning he caught cold. He went to bed, and soon died. Dying in the factory hospital, among strangers, indifferent people, he smiled serenely.

His memories soothed him. He, too, had been a child; he, too, had laughed and scampered across the green grass, among the dark trees—his beloved mother had followed him with her eyes.