Page 59 - Adventures in shadow-land

nothing but huge vines climbing up the trees.

Here and there in the path lay huge stones, which
you might think at first sight were insurmountable,

obstructing their further progress; yet, if either
Eva’s foot touched them, or the hem of her white

dress brushed ever so lightly against them, they
would always fade away, like a shadow, into utter

nothingness, or else would roll slowly away to one
side, leaving the path clear. But when Aster saw
the stones he would cry, and say that they would

crush him if he passed them, and the only way in
which Eva could soothe him was by taking him

lip in her arms and carrying him past the stones,
while he hid his face, so as not to see them, in

her long, golden curls.
Every now and then, in spite of what he had

often told Eva,— that she, and she only, could
find and give him the flower which he had lost,—
Aster would declare to her that he saw it bloom­

ing in places where she saw nothing but nettles or

ugly weeds, but which he would always insist were
beds of the most beautiful flowers. These flowers,
he said, called to him to come and gather them;

while Eva thought that warning voices bade her