The Gnomemobile. Upton Sinclair
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person I have ever spoken to. I have never been allowed to speak to one.”
“Who is it that forbids you?”
“Glogo.”
“And who is Glogo?”
“He is my grandfather.”
“And what is the matter that you cannot speak to big people?”
“He says they are all murderers.”
“Oh, surely not!”
“They murder the trees. They destroy the forests, and that is the end of life.”
Elizabeth pondered. “I suppose it does seem that way, when you come to think of it,” she said. “But please believe me, I have never hurt even the smallest tree. And as for the big ones—how could I, if I wanted to?”
“You will be bigger some day, will you not? You are not a grown-up person. How old are you?”
“I am twelve.”
“How strange to think that you should be so big, and only twelve years old!”
“They call me small for my years. How old are you?”
“I just had my hundredth birthday last week.”
“And yet you do not look at all old!”
“Glogo is more than a thousand years old.”
“Oh, how wonderful! He must be as old as these trees.”
“These trees were here before Glogo’s grandfather. No one knows how old they are.”
Elizabeth looked at the trees again. So they really were as old as they seemed! Her eyes followed the giant columns, turning red as they ascended—up, up, to the very top of the world. There were spreading branches, and a roof of green, so far away that one could not see what it was made of. There was flickering sunlight, red, green, golden, all magically still, enchanted. Her eyes came down the trunk again, to the great base, fire-scarred, torn by lightning, patiently repaired with new buttresses, outworks of bark a foot deep. Just beyond was a shattered stump, with new trees growing out of it; and beyond that a column which had fallen a thousand years ago, and lay proof against every form of decay, with only a light crown of ferns along the ridge.
“This is really a most interesting forest,” she said, “and I am glad to learn about it. Would you mind telling me what you are?”
“Grandfather says that we are gnomes.”
“I have read about gnomes, but I did not know they were real.”
“I am quite real,” said the gnome.
“I am sure you are very kind and well-bred people. Are there many of you?”
“So far as I know there are only two, Glogo and me.”
“Oh, dear me! What has become of the rest?”
“That I do not know. They have disappeared, one and then another; we do not know where they have gone. Glogo says it is because men have cut down the forests.”
“That is truly terrible. I never thought about it.”
“Glogo is very sad,” continued the gnome. “He is sad about many things, and does not tell me the reasons. I have been much worried about him. For a long time I have thought that I should ask some big person for advice. Could you help me?”
“You must understand,” explained Elizabeth, “that I am only a child and do not know very much. But I will tell you anything I can.”
“Have you ever heard of a person sitting by himself all the time, and looking mournful, and not wanting to eat?”
“Yes, I have,” said Elizabeth. “It was that way with my Aunt Genevieve. They had to get all kinds of doctors to advise her. What they call specialists.”
“And what did they say?”
“They called it neurasthenia.”
“I don’t think I could say a word like that,” said the gnome.
“It’s a way the doctors have,” said Elizabeth. “They make up such long words, it frightens you.”
“What did they do about your aunt?”
“They did all kinds of things: mud baths, and massage, and baking with electricity, and pills, but it didn’t do much good. In the end they told her that she must have a change of scene. Mama said it was because they were tired of her.”
“Did the change help her?”
“We don’t know. She’s in Europe now. She sends us postcards.”
“I wonder if it would help Glogo to have a change of scene. We have been in all the forests around here.”
“I should think that in a thousand years he would have come to know the forests, and everything in them. Maybe he needs a change of diet. What do you eat?”
“We live on fern seed.”
“And what do you drink?”
“We drink honeydew from the flowers.”
“My, how interesting! It sounds awfully nice; but doesn’t it take a lot of time to gather enough fern seed and honeydew?”
“We gnomes have plenty of time.”
“Maybe a change of diet would help Glogo. Maybe it would do him good to see the world.”
“How could it be done?” asked the gnome anxiously.
The amateur doctor stood in thought. “Let me tell you about my Uncle Rodney,” she said. “We are going to visit him and his father—that is, my grandfather—in a big city called Seattle. Maybe you don’t know what a city is; it is a place where a great many people live. Rodney is older than I am, but not so very old; he has been to college, and knows a great deal more than I do. Also he is kind and good; he has never cut down any trees, so perhaps Glogo would not mind meeting him.”
“I don’t know,” said the gnome. “It would be hard to arrange.”
“Rodney—I call him that, he says that ‘uncle’ makes him feel so old—is very good fun. I mean, he says such funny things, he would keep Glogo happy. Another thing, he has some money, and I haven’t.”
“What is money?”
“Well, it is hard to explain. It is what you get things with—I mean among us people. You would have to have money if you were going to take Glogo to see the world.”
The gnome pondered all these ideas. “Would Rodney come to see Glogo?” he inquired.
“I am sure he would. He has probably never met a gnome, and would be much interested.”
“I will tell you what I think. It will be better not to say anything to Glogo. He might be very angry; he might go away into the forest, and never be seen again. Let us get Rodney to come and talk it over with me, and we will then find some way for Glogo to meet Rodney by accident.”
“Oh, that will be fine!” exclaimed the girl.
“When do you think he will come?”
“We expect to get to the city tomorrow. I will talk to Rodney, and we will come, three days from today. If we do not, it will be because he is away, or sick, or something.”
“You will surely come?”
“Oh, yes, indeed. It is most interesting. It is really educational. Even Mama would admit it—that is, she would if she could believe it. I don’t think I shall tell Mama; she says I am imaginative, and would think that I have made you up, and scold me about you.”
Elizabeth stopped, as if she thought it was not quite proper for a little girl to know so much about her mother.
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