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The Land Of Heart’s Desire
by
“Indeed, yes,” she reassured them; “this is Central Park.”
“It has looks off the country,” Eva commented.
“Because it is a piece of the country,” the lady explained.
“Then we dassent to go, the while we ain’t none of us got no sickness,” cried Eva forlornly. “We’re all, all healthy, und the country is for sick childrens.”
“I am glad you are well,” said the lady kindly; “but you may certainly play in the park. It is meant for all little children. The gate is near. Just walk on near this wall until you come to it.”
It was only a few blocks, and they were soon in the land of their hearts’ desire, where were waving trees and flowering shrubs and smoothly sloping lawns, and, framed in all these wonders, a beautiful little water-lake all dotted and brightened by fleets of tiny boats. The pilgrims from the East Side stood for a moment at gaze and then bore down upon the jewel, straight over grass and border, which is a course not lightly to be followed in park precincts and in view of park policemen. The ensuing reprimand dashed their spirits not at all and they were soon assembled close to the margin of the lake, where they got entangled in guiding strings and drew to shore many a craft, to the disgust of many a small owner. Becky Zalmonowsky stood so closely over the lake that she shed the chatelaine bag into its shallow depths and did irreparable damage to her gala costume in her attempts to “dibble” for her property. It was at last recovered, no wetter than the toilette it was intended to adorn, and the cousins Gonorowsky had much difficulty in balking Becky’s determination to remove her gown and dry it then and there.
Then Ignatius Aloysius, the exacting, remembered garrulously that he had as yet seen nothing of the rubber-neck-boat-birds and suggested that they were even now graciously “hollering like an’thing” in some remote fastness of the park. So Patrick gave commands and the march was resumed with bliss now beaming on all the faces so lately clouded. Every turn of the endless walks brought new wonders to these little ones who were gazing for the first time upon the great world of growing things of which Miss Bailey had so often told them. The policeman’s warning had been explicit and they followed decorously in the paths and picked none of the flowers which, as Eva had heard of old, were sticking right up out of the ground. And other flowers there were dangling high or low on tree or shrub, while here and there across the grass a bird came hopping or a squirrel ran. But the pilgrims never swerved. Full well they knew that these delights were not for such as they.
It was, therefore, with surprise and concern that they at last debouched upon a wide green space where a flag waved at the top of a towering pole; for, behold, the grass was covered thick with children, with here and there a beneficent policeman looking serenely on.
“Dast we walk on it?” cried Morris. “Oh, Patrick, dast we?”
“Ask the cop,” Nathan suggested. It was his first speech for an hour, for Becky’s misadventure with the chatelaine bag and the water-lake had made him more than ever sure that his own method of safe-keeping was the best.
“Ask him yerself,” retorted Patrick. He had quite intended to accost a large policeman, who would of course recognize and revere the buttons of Mr. Brennan pere, but a commander cannot well accept the advice of his subordinates. But Nathan was once more beyond the power of speech, and it was Morris Mogilewsky who asked for and obtained permission to walk on God’s green earth. With little spurts of running and tentative jumps to test its spring, they crossed Peacock Lawn to the grateful shade of the trees at its further edge and there disposed themselves upon the ground and ate their luncheon. Nathan Spiderwitz waited until Sadie had finished and then entrusted the five gleaming pennies to her care while he wildly bolted an appetizing combination of dark brown-bread and uncooked salmon.