gs on his
shoulders like Wild Star, and had only to spread them out to go beating
around the world. For a second the Wind Creature and the Earth Child
looked very much alike. And indeed, the only difference was that Wild
Star had to wait for the wind, and Eric need wait for no wind or no
season. His wings were _inside of his head_, but they were as strong as
Wild Star's. And he had only to spread them and lift them to go anywhere
he wanted.

Now he wanted to get back to Helma and tell her all about it. Wild Star
pointed him the shortest way, and off he ran, jumping the stream and the
moss beds beyond, and disappearing into the underbrush.

"I'll look for you next time the other side of the world!" Wild Star
shouted after him.

It was twilight when he reached home. Helma and Ivra were sitting on the
door stone, hand in hand. They made room for Eric. But he did not
snuggle up. He stayed erect, his face lifted towards the first dim
stars, and told Helma all about his wanting to go away from them out
through the Forest and across the sea, and all that Wild Star had said
about music and Earth People's lives. And he told her, too, of the
vision of success he had had when he caught Wild Thyme that first day by
her bushy hair.

Helma listened quietly, and said nothing for many minutes after he was
through. But at last she spoke, putting a hushing hand on Eric's
dreamful head.

"I understand," she said. "I knew you would want to go on sometime. And
I have a friend across there who will help us. He has a school for boys
and I got to know him very well behind the gray stone wall. He asked me
about the Forest and you children. And he said that Eric sometime would
surely want to go back to humans, and when he did he would help him. He
understands boys. It is to him you had better go, Eric, and when you are
really ready I will tell you how, and start you on your way."

Eric sighed with contentment, and leaned his head against Helma's
shoulder.

But Ivra stayed at her mother's other side, as still and silent as a
shadow. Soon the fireflies began their nightly dance in the garden. But
Ivra did not go darting after them as usual to make their dance the
swifter. And Eric's head was too full of dreams and his eyes too full of
visions of the sea to notice them at all.

CHAPTER XIX

MORE MAGIC IN A MIST

Indian summer had come round again before Eric really made up his mind to
go. The flowers were asleep in the garden,