Kingfisher Days
Susan Coyne
Language: English
Pages: 53
ISBN: 0679311335
Format: PDF / Kindle (mobi) / ePub
One summer, in a hedge near her family’s cottage in Kenora, five-year-old Susan Coyne discovered an overgrown stone fireplace. Her father said it was the home of Uncle Joe Spondoolak, an elf who’d moved in after the cottage had burned down long ago. Susan, a fanciful child, decided to become keeper of the hearth, tidying it up and leaving little gifts for the elves: handfuls of wild strawberries, daisy chains, and a tiny birchbark canoe. Overnight the gifts would disappear. One morning, there was a tiny piece of carefully folded pink paper wedged in between the mossy stones: To Helen Susan Cameron Coyne: Greetings Her Majesty, Queen Mab, has instructed me to thank you for making a home for all her people. Thus began Susan’s correspondence with a precocious young fairy princess, Nootsie Tah, and her indoctrination into the world of the great and little people. The letters from Nootsie Tah continued, and that summer Susan developed two unique relationships: one with a proud princess from a mystical land, and the other with a gentle gardener with infinite wisdom and patience. These would sustain her throughout her life.
stone from one of the dates slipped from its chains and crashed to the floor, just missing Aguecheek. By six o’clock, there were piles of candy cooling everywhere in the kitchen and all the pots and pans had been washed and hung up in their places. I hope Queen Mab will have the party soon—the next full moon is so far away. Even Ariel, who, you know, feeds on honeydew like the bees, may be there. Yours sincerely, Nootsie Tah Princess I found some of Nancy’s paints in a drawer in her room
priceless jewels. It is given to me because of my work at Churchill and the excellent lessons I have given you. The chief superintendent of Erudition said that never before had one of my intelligence gone so far. Such friendly and almost flattering words are heartwarming. They make me forget Oaf and Loaf—almost. N.T It was mid-August. The days were hot and the air was motionless. The Boys were busy with sailing races. Nancy took over the dining room table, where she had a big sheet of
in the wall before the castle cat caught him. Queen Mab was very, very angry and threw another spell that would have turned Puck into a grasshopper but he dodged again and it hit the scribe Scripto, who was just coming in. It irks me, Susan, that I cant throw a spell over this man who refuses to write more than one page. I had so much to tell. N.T. We were digging and separating plants, preparing the garden for fall. “We have to go home soon, Mr. Moir,” I said. “Are you going too?” “We
out something more about Nootsie Tah: Where was she from the time she was hurried away from Sacsahuaman and her mother until she came out of nowhere last summer to teach you about fairies? I am asking your help now for I think—mind you I am not sure—that I have picked up her trail in England more than one hundred years ago. You may be able to follow it further, since the libraries in Toronto have so many more books than the Kingston libraries have. Two men, John Keats and his friend Charles
yellow birch tree to which I was attached—literally—as a child. When I was very small I was often put out to play on the grassy slope, tethered to this tree to avoid tumbling into the lake. When I returned home that day, I found a quantity of bark on the ground near my tree. With Paulina’s help, I made a little canoe out of the sweet-smelling papery stuff, pegging it together with twigs, and that night I left it on the fireplace. To: Miss Helen Susan Cameron Coyne From: Nootsie Tah, Princess