The Black Cat (magazine)/Volume 6/Number 11/The Wayside Sphinx

by Mary Foote Arnold

The Wayside Sphinx.^[1]

by Mary Foote Arnold.

T does seem as if all the bad luck comes at once," Mrs. Seabrook complained. “First, the wheat crop failed last year; then I got down with the grip and it took every cent we had to buy medicine and pay the doctor's bill; next the barn burned down just after the insurance had run out; then, after we had raked and scraped to pay off the mortgage and thought we should be able to breathe freely once more, you had to break your leg and be laid up at harvest time; and now, with the Hill Farm to be bought for a mere nothing, we have to sit by and see some one else carry off the prize.” After setting forth this appalling array of disasters, Mrs. Seabrook leaned back in her chair and heaved a prodigious sigh.

"Why, mother, that bad luck didn't all come at once; it came gradually," said Ann, soothingly, though her eyes danced.

Mr. Seabrook, from his lounge in the corner, listened as to an oft-told tale. "It is hard lines, sure enough, wife; still, things might have been worse," he said.

"I should like to know how?" she asked, tartly.

"Don't you remember, mother," consoled Ann, "how you've said over and over that the mortgage was a stone around father's neck? And it's paid. And then you got well from the grip—Lucy White's mother died—father's leg is healing so that he will soon be able to work again; and you have me and father, and we all have one another."

"Goodness, child, how you do rattle on! Of course I know that we have much to be thankful for, but I do insist that we've had more than our share of misfortunes, with very little to encourage us." Having had the last word, Mrs. Seabrook departed for the kitchen.

Ann's needle flew in and out across the heel in her father's sock. "I declare, I believe I actually like to darn, and I thought I never should! I suppose it's all in knowing how; most anything can be made interesting if we'll only think so." Mr. Seabrook smiled indulgently. It was plain to see that Ann was the apple of his eye.

"Father," she asked presently, "do you think I ought to sympathize more with mother about our troubles?"

"I think," answered her father, thoughtfully, "that your mother needs to be cheered up and taken out of herself more than anything else; she has brooded over our misfortunes until her nerves are upset. You should help her in every way you can, because the hardest part comes on her."

"I do try, father; do you think I'm any comfort to her?"

"Of course you are; you're a first-class optimist."

"And what is that, please? Anything awful?"

"An optimist is one who looks on the bright side of things."

"Oh! Well, that is easy to do; the really hard thing is to look on the dark side. Sometimes, when mother gets unusually down on her luck—imagines we are on a short cut to the poor house with nobody to head us off—I try to be blue about it just to keep her company; but the first thing I know I am hoping for better things in spite of myself. Something inside of me seems to say that everything will come right if we just give it time."

"That is why you are such a comfort to your old dad."

Ann beamed on him affectionately, and, leaning over, deposited a kiss on the tip of his ear. "If anything could make me discouraged it would be that you can't have the Hill Farm when you've wanted it so long. It's queer, and I know you'll laugh at me, but I have a feeling that we'll manage it yet, some way. It doesn't do any harm to hope we'll get it, does it?"

"Wishing is first cousin to hoping, you know," laughed her father, "and if wishes were horses, beggars might ride."

Mrs. Seabrook now appeared in the doorway holding an empty bucket. "Ann, suppose you run down to Wilson's lot and try to find some blackberries for supper. Seems as if we had to skirmisli around to get enough to eat even, nowadays."

Ann sprang up with alacrity. "Just the thing, mother; I should love to go; I'm in the mood for blackberrying. And I know where there are some big, juicy, dead-ripe ones."

An hour later, the bucket well filled, Ann crawled through an opening in the fence that divided Wilson's lot from the roadway, and sat down on a big stone to rest. Just across the road was another large stone, similar to the one upon which she was sitting, except that it rested perpendicularly, its broad, flat surface being at the side instead of on top. The two were called the "halfway" stones, because they equally divided the distance between the town on the west and the bluff on the east. But the stone opposite Ann was different in still another particular, for a rude but unmistakable likeness of the great Egyptian Sphinx was cut into the side toward the road, while a curious ribbon-like band, which seemed to spring from the head of the sphinx, ran downward on the right of the picture until, doubling on itself, it waved irregularly across the stone and came to an end at the upper right-hand corner. Beneath this band, just before it ended at the edge of the stone, two minute arrows were engraved, one after the other, pointing outward.

Ann recalled the excitement, now nearly a year ago, that had attended the making of this picture. One hot afternoon, Mr. Pool, an artist who had spent several summers in the neighborhood, placed his camp chair in front of the stone (then as smooth as its mate across the way), impaled the handle of his big red umbrella in the earth beside it, and began to cut into the hard surface with steel instruments. This routine was repeated many afternoons, until curious onlookers assembled at his back, making remarks and asking questions. And though he worked in silence for the most part, the few answers he vouchsafed to the eager questioners were strictly to the point. He was chiselling a picture of the Sphinx; he worked in the afternoon, rather than in the morning when the particular spot where he sat was shaded from the sun, because the light in the afternoon was better suited to his purpose; and his reasons for cutting a picture on a stone at the roadside, rather than in a studio where he could be comfortable, concerned nobody but himself—unless, indeed, some person chose to make it his especial business.

All of which mystified the questioners more than ever, as perhaps he intended that it should. For some of them had never even heard of the Sphinx, and, forthwith, there was much surreptitious consulting of encyclopedias. But they found only that the Sphinx was not a real person or thing, but a myth, a sort of riddle in itself; that its supposed image had been hewn out of the rock ages ago, and left on the sands of the desert, nobody knew why; and that it was a fad among artists to copy it in painting and sculpture. So most of the curious went their ways, shaking their heads sadly at the "crankiness" of the "mad artist."

It did seem as if the man were not quite sane, so determined was he to work on afternoons when the sun shone fiercest. In vain did Mrs. Merriweather, with whom he boarded, urge him with motherly kindness to take the cool of the morning for his work, reminding him that he was far from strong, and to run such risks was simply tempting Providence. But even she lost patience with him at last, and let him go his own way. So when he took to his bed on the completion of the picture, she was scarcely surprised, though she nursed him carefully. He grew weaker steadily, and died within a fortnight. The day before he died he called Mrs. Merriweather to his bedside and gave her a check for three hundred dollars on the Highville Savings Bank.

"This represents all the money I have in the bank," he said; "and when I am gone, and the necessary funeral expenses have been paid, keep what is left of it for yourself."

Mrs. Merriweather carried out these instructions faithfully, even generously; for she marked his grave with a neat headstone, bearing an appropriate inscription. Yet there were those who said that she was a good manager, and that the greater part of the three hundred dollars remained in her possession; also, that it was a pity that, as Mr. Pool had no near relatives, a part of the residue, at least, might not have gone to the new hospital in Highville.

After the artist's death there was a slight revival of interest in the picture on the half-way stone. Several persons professed to think that there was a "deeper" meaning to it than was apparent; something about bygone ages, or his own life, or his religious beliefs. But the practical minded laughed at these theories, and soon the Sphinx by the roadside was all but forgotten.

When Ann was sufficiently rested she rose from her seat on the stone, took up the bucket of blackberries, and was about to resume her walk homeward when her glance wandered to the field across the way. Then she gave a little gasp, and stood staring into the field for a full minute; and, finally, she set her bucket down again and said, weakly:

"Great hat!"

For there, outlined on the dark green earth, was a gigantic Sphinx, made by the shadows of an irregular cluster of trees and bushes; more than that, Silver Brook emerged from the shadow at the top of the great head, ran downward jon the east side, doubled on itself, wavered across the field, and was lost to view in the northeast corner, which corresponded exactly to the upper right-hand corner of the stone. Ann compared the shadow Sphinx with the stone one, giving way to little bursts of joy as the points of interest proved similar to one another. She ran into the field back and forth over the shadow, and followed the brook to the edge of the field.

"To think that I should be the one to guess it! Oh, how surprised and glad everybody will be!" And Ann laughed aloud out of the fulness of her heart. But, as she turned homeward, the thought came that, after all, she had learned nothing definite; that she had nothing to tell except that the picture on the stone was apparently a copy of the shadow on the ground. If there was a "deeper" meaning to it she had not fathomed it; she firmly believed that there was something more, though what it could be she did not even attempt to guess; but no one else would believe it unless she could prove it. So, though she was almost bursting with the secret, she determined to say nothing about the matter to any one until she had investigated it further.

It was not surprising that Ann should employ original methods in the performance of her duties that evening, though her vagaries were rather trying to Mrs. Seabrook's already overburdened nerves.

"I didn't mind her salting the blackberries so much," she told her husband, plaintively, "but she had no excuse for putting birdseed in the biscuit. I found a dab of flour in Blackwing’s feedcup afterward! And there she sat all through supper like one in a trance, her eyes as big as saucers. And after supper she kept dodging into the pantry and behind doors, so's I wouldn't see her laugh; and when I demanded an explanation, she only said: 'Oh, mother, don't ask me! I just can't help it!' And with that she burst out again."

Early the next morning, the breakfast work having been finished after a fashion, Ann once more crossed the fields toward the half-way stones. The sun was already high in the heavens, and no shadow Sphinx rested on the green turf. Ann had not expected to find it; she understood now why the artist had worked on the picture in the afternoon instead of in the morning. She knelt in front of the Sphinx picture and examined it critically, noting each detail of the curious figure, and tracing the ribbon-like band to the edge of the stone. Here she came upon the tiny arrows pointing outward. Surely, since the picture was an exact copy of the shadow and brook, with the exception of these arrows, might not they mean something of importance? She remembered that on maps the currents of streams were sometimes indicated by arrows; but in those cases the arrows pointed downstream, while here they pointed upstream. Slowly it dawned upon Ann that if the arrows were intended to convey any information, the point of interest must be in the direction which they indicated, which was toward the source of the brook. Acting upon this conviction, somewhat blindly, it is true, she followed the brook into the woodland beyond.

Soon the bed of the stream became narrower and the banks more irregular; tall trees hung over it, interlacing their branches from bank to bank, and wild grapevines drooped in graceful festoons, making natural swings. Ann had followed the same path many times before, but never with the sense of delightful expectancy that now possessed her. She could not have explained what she was looking for, but, sustained by her naturally buoyant temperament, she believed that she would clear up the mystery of the Sphinx picture; if not to-day, some other time. She might have to search for a week, or even longer, though how she could keep it to herself all that time was more of a riddle to her than the quest itself.

She pushed steadily upstream, keeping a sharp lookout for "clues," with occasional excursions into nearby thickets for berries to fill the bucket on her arm. When the noon hour came she dispatched her simple luncheon of brown bread and butter and blackberries, then scrutinized the brook for a clear place from which to get a drink. A little farther up, and across the stream, she spied some huge bowlders overhanging the bank; they were partly covered by vines, which were nourished by the abundant spring of water that gushed from their midst. Ann picked her way lightly across a fallen log and quenched her thirst at this natural fountain. Suddenly, her foot slipped, and, to save herself from falling, she caught at the vines, tearing them partly away. Stepping backward to regain her balance she saw something that set her heart to thumping furiously.

"Great hat!" she exclaimed once more.

Roughly scratched on the bowlder was the inevitable Sphinx, similar to the picture on the half-way stone, save that the ribbonlike band was not there and beneath the figure was the word "Finis." She had come by accident upon that for which she might have searched a lifetime without success!

Ann tore away the remaining vines, trod down the undergrowth at the base of the bowlders, and peered beneath them. A small natural shelf of rock projected outward a few inches. She cleared away the stones and dead leaves that clogged the opening and, thrusting in her hand, brought out a rusty tin can. The lid of the can was soldered on, and painted upon it in plain characters was:

"To be opened in the presence of a lawyer by the person finding it."

"Something definite at last!" murmured Ann, dizzily.

Some time afterward Ann entered the kitchen of her home and set the bucket of blackberries down beside her mother. "Here are some berries to make your mouth water, mother," she said.

"Well, get a crock and put them away."

"I'm so tired, mother; you do it."

At the tone of suppressed excitement, Mrs. Seabrook looked up. Ann's eyes were dancing, her cheeks were flushed, her breathing hurried; she looked anything but tired.

"You do act so queerly, Ann. Very well, I'll do it if you won't." She lifted the bucket, then set it down suddenly.

"It's as heavy as lead! Don't tell me that's all blackberries! Ann Seabrook, what's in this bucket—rocks?"

"Look and see for yourself, mother," and Ann danced into the next room and collapsed jojdully into a chair beside her father. Mrs. Seabrook followed, bringing the can, which she had dislodged from the bucket of berries. Then Ann told her story. Next she flew for Mr. Randolph, a lawyer friend of her father; and when she got back to the house, accompanied by Mr. Randolph, several neighbors, scenting something unusual, had come in. So the story was told again, after which the lid of the can was pried off with a hot poker, and Ann took from it a sealed envelope addressed to "The Person Finding this Can." Under the envelope was a chamois-skin bag, well filled with golden eagles and banknotes. The envelope contained a letter which ran as follows:

Having no kindred, and knowing that I am ill of an incurable disease, I take this means of disposing of my property.

It is my wish that the money in this can shall be divided into two equal portions, one portion to goto the Highville Hospital, the other to the finder of the can.

I am not mentally unbalanced, as some will imagine, but do this because I prefer to leave to chance that which I cannot decide for myself. There are, doubtless, some needy persons in this neighborhood, but I have no means of finding out who they are; it pleases me to think that some such person will find this, perhaps by his own ingenuity in following up the clues I have prepared. I know it is possible that a dishonest person may find it and appropriate the whole of the contents to himself, but I have faith in the integrity of the average human being, and take the risk.

Ezra Pool.

Witnesses:

Martha Merriweather,

Ellen Burke.

Thus it came about that many persons were made comfortable and happy by the contents of the old rusty can. For, though it did not contain a fortune, in the general acceptation of the term, it was sufficient to put the hospital on an independent footing, to enable Mr. Seabrook to pay off his indebtedness and buy the Hill Farm, and to give Ann an education.

Perhaps the person most disconcerted by the turn of events was Mrs. Merriweather, who bemoaned her own shortsightedness in not "smelling a mouse" on the occasion, some weeks before Mr. Pool's death, when he asked the signatures of herself and her handmaiden as witnesses to a "legal document".

1. Copyright, 1901, by The Shortstory Publishing Company. All rights reserved.