“You gave me a garden,” laughed the Piper, “when I had no garden of my own, so why should I not get the white stuff for you?  ’T was queer, the day I got it,” he went on, chuckling at the recollection, “for I did not know its name.  Every place I went, I asked for white stuff, and they showed me many kinds, but nothing like this.  At last I said to a young girl:  ’What is it that is like a cloud, all white and soft, which one can see through, but through which no one can be seen—­the stuff that ladies wear when they are so beautiful that they do not want their faces seen?’ She smiled, and told me it was ‘chiffon.’  And so—­” A wave of the hand finished his explanation.

After an interval of silence, the Piper spoke again.  “There are chains that bind you,” he began, “but they are chains of your own forging.  No one else can shackle you—­you must always do it yourself.  Whatever is past is over, and I’m thinking you have no more to do with it than a butterfly has with the empty chrysalis from which he came.  The law of life is growth, and we cannot linger—­we must always be going on.

“You stand alone upon a height,” he said, dreamily, “like one in a dreary land.  Behind you all is darkness, before you all is darkness; there is but one small space of light.  In that one space is a day.  They come, one at a time, from the night of To-morrow, and vanish into the night of Yesterday.

“I have thought of the days as men and women, for a woman’s day is not at all like a man’s.  For you, I think, they first were children, with laughing eyes and little, dimpled hands.  One at a time, they came out of the darkness, and disappeared into the darkness on the other side.  Some brought you flowers or new toys and some brought you childish griefs, but none came empty-handed.  Each day laid its gift at your feet and went on.

“Some brought their gifts wrapped up, that you might have the surprise of opening them.  Many a gift in a bright-hued covering turned out to be far from what you expected when you were opening it.  Some of the happiest gifts were hidden in dull coverings you took off slowly, dreading to see the contents.  Some days brought many gifts, others only one.

“As the days grew older, some brought you laughter; some gave you light and love.  Others came with music and pleasure—­and some of them brought pain.”

“Yes,” sighed Evelina, “some brought pain.”

“It is of that,” went on the Piper, “that I wished to be speaking.  It was one day, was it not, that brought you a long sorrow?”

“Yes.”

“Not more than one?  Was it only one day?”

“Yes, only one day,”

“See,” said The Piper, gently, “the day came with her gift.  You would not let her lay it at your feet and pass on into the darkness of Yesterday.  You held her by her grey garments and would not let her go.  You kept searching her sad eyes to see whether she did not have further pain for you.  Why keep her back from her appointed way?  Why not let your days go by?”