The Sand Sifter Read online

  “So what was it?” Andrew asked.

  “Well now, I asked the young man the same question. And he told me a very strange tale. You see, one day he had come upon a group of boys on the beach. They were all yelling and laughing and waving sticks, and banging down on something, there in the sand. He saw that it was a giant sea turtle, and the poor creature was suffering terribly. So the man scared off those boys, and carried the turtle to the sea. He set him down gently in the water, and watched as the turtle swam away. Well now, he didn’t think too much about it until the next day. Then, as he was swimming in the waves, he felt something strange happening.”

  The old man paused for a moment, as if remembering. He scooped up another sieveful of sand, then continued the sifting and the story. “Something very strange, as though a lightness were passing over him. He couldn’t feel the weight of his body anymore, and it seemed as if something were carrying him through the waves. He also noticed that he was getting farther and farther away from shore.”

  “I know,” Jessica said suddenly. “I know! The sea turtle is there and he’s riding the turtle!”

  “Well, my oh my!” exclaimed the old man. “Who’s telling the stories around here! You are absolutely right! The turtle is there, and it’s taking the man to the kingdom beneath the sea.”

  “As a reward?” asked Carey.

  “As a reward,” replied the old man. “Down, down, down they went, down to the bottom of the sea. And strange as it seems, that man could breathe under the water!”

  “And was there treasure in the kingdom?” asked Andrew eagerly.

  “Ah, yes! Glittering sea-green emeralds, and sapphires the colour of the sky. And rubies that would tear your heart, so lovely they were. Rubies of a thousand sunsets! Why, every jewel under the sun was there under the sea! But the most beautiful of all were the pearls, gleaming pure and white, shimmering with light.” The old man’s eyes sparkled at the thought of it. “And what do you suppose that man did?”

  “Grabbed a handful and went back to land! That’s what I’d do!” said Carey.

  “I’d fill up all my pockets first,” said Andrew.

  “I’d just want to stay there forever and ever!” said Jessica.

  “There she goes again! said the old man with a wink. “Why that’s what that young man did—well, for a long while anyway. He stayed in the kingdom beneath the sea. And he fell in love with the Sea Ring’s daughter and he stayed there, surrounded by riches and happy as a clam.”

  “Happy as a clam!” Andrew laughed. “I bet they were happy clams, with all their pearls!”

  “No silly,” said Jessica. “It’s oysters that have pearls, not clams. Even I know that.”

  “But you know,” continued the old man, “even though he had the love of his princess and all the jewels he could ever imagine, he was missing something. It started as a kind of tug, a gentle tug, but then it got stronger and more forceful until he could ignore it no longer. And that force was the land, pulling him back. He had to get back to the land. Now his princess told him that once he left the kingdom under the sea he could never return. Still, he insisted. So his brokenhearted princess called the turtle to take him home. But before he left she gave him a little box. And she said, “Take this to remember me, but don’t ever open the box.”

  “How could he stand it?” Andrew wondered. “Wasn’t he the least bit… inquisitive?”

  “Well yes, he was. And it was a painful decision for him to make. But he promised, and the turtle came, and off they went back to the land.

  And when he got back, why, he noticed that everything had changed! The beach had changed, his village had changed, the forest had changed—why the forest was gone completely! Now there were fields and houses where there used to be trees. And he walked to the village, looking for his house. And he couldn’t find it anywhere. And the people all had changed! He couldn’t believe it! He had only been gone a short time! And after awhile he came across an old fellow that had a familiar look about him, and he described his parents, and his old home, and asked could he explain what had happened. And now that old man looked at him in fright, as if he had seen a ghost. And he said, why all that’s been gone for 300 years!”

  “300 years!” exclaimed Jessica. “What a shock!”

  “That’s one way of putting it!” the old man said.

  “So what did he do?” asked Carey.

  “Well, he was greatly perplexed, as you can imagine. So he took his little box and he walked across the sandy beach and came to a big rock. And there he sat, wondering what to do.”

  “And that’s where you found him, right?” asked Jessica.

  “Yes indeed. And he told me his troubles—how he could never go back to his princess, but could never live here, since everything and everyone he’d love on the land was gone.” Thoughtfully the old man sifted his sand. “And so I said to him, why don’t you open the box? Maybe that will help you decide.”

  “But he promised!” Jessica was outraged.

  “Yes, he’d promised, but he was in a such a sad state he opened the box. And there was nothing in the box but SAND!” The old man paused dramatically. “And he poured out the sand, just like this!”

  The old man took a handful of golden-red sand and they watched, entranced, as the tiny grains trickled through his fingers. “And as the grains of sand fell to the ground, why time itself just fell from that young man’s face. And before my very eyes his youth disappeared forever! The sands of time changed him to an old, old man. And he got his wish and returned to the land alright, but not in the way he’d wanted.”

  The children watched the sand trickling through the old man’s fingers, then stared at his face, afraid the same thing might happen— there before their eyes.

  But the old man caught their look, and laughed. “Don’t you worry! Nothing like that’s going to happen to me! I’m the sifter of sands, remem- ber?” Then he gave them a wink, and shooed them gently out the door.

  “What did you think? I was right, wasn’t I?” Jessica asked as they were walking home.

  “Well, I still don’t believe he makes the sand. But he tells good stories,” Andrew said. He wouldn’t admit his sister was right, not in a thousand years.

  “In that story, did he mean the man died?” asked Jessica.

  “Of course!” Andrew said. “Don’t you under-stand anything? What do you think would happen to someone who instantly turned 300 years old?”

  “So…if he hadn’t opened the box, he would have stayed young forever?”

  “Right! That’s what you get when you rescue a sea turtle. So keep your eyes open, Jess!”

  And she did, all the way home across the sandy beach. But she didn’t see a single one. Nor any footprints, either. And even though she didn’t exactly understand the word, she thought she was feeling perplexed.

  6

  Andrew didn’t mean to spoil things. It just kind of slipped out. After all, he hadn’t promised Jessica he wouldn’t tell anybody. And Carey had said there were a few other people who knew, so it wasn’t as if he were giving a big secret away. And in all the times they’d been to the dunes, never once had the old man told them not to tell. So.

  It happened in the Boys Only Fort, when he and a couple of friends were talking about dreams.

  “I never have dreams,” said Rob. “Or if I have them, I never remember when I wake up.”

  “I usually remember mine,” said Nathan. “The other night I had this really cool dream. There was this whale riding on two dragons and it got really angry and changed into this gigantic bird, and its wings were so huge the whole sky turned black. And the wings were getting closer and closer, and beating in my face, and finally I woke up!”

  “And the wings made thunder, right?” asked Andrew.

  “Yeah! Hey, how did you know?”

  “’Cause that’s one of the old man’s stories.”

  “What old man?” asked Rob.

  Well, Andrew had put his foot in his mouth al
right, and it was too late to back out now. He might as well make the most of it. “The old man who sifts sand and tells stories, out on the dunes. Haven’t you heard about him?”

  “No!” the boys exclaimed. “Tell us!” Andrew felt quite pleased, seeing as how he knew something they didn’t. Especially being a newcomer and all.

  “What! You’ve lived here all your lives and never seen the sand sifter? That’s amazing!” And he told them about the old man who sifted the sand, with every pile in its proper place, and every grain holding a story.

  “Can we go out there with you?” asked Nathan. “Sure! I go almost every afternoon, usually with Jess and Carey. Meet me on the beach after lunch, and we’ll go!”

  “Will he mind?” wondered Rob.

  “No,” Andrew assured them. Anyway, it was too late now if he did.

  After they’d gone, he realized he probably should have told them to keep it a secret. But it was too late now, and that was that.

  Now the old man was surrounded by children, as well as his pails and piles of sand. First there had been Carey and Jessica, then Andrew, then Andrew’s friends, then all of their friends. For nobody was keeping it a secret anymore.

  Every afternoon they met at the cabin in the dunes. Waited quietly while he brushed the sand from their feet and swept it into a pile to be sifted. Then, taking his sieve, he would begin. Sifting, sifting, every grain holding a story, woven into words by the sand sifter.

  He spoke of man-eating giants that stalked the woods, and ice witches who dwelt in caverns of snow. He thrilled them with tales of hideous ogres and monstrous demons, of scaly sea serpents and gruesome goblins.

  And they shivered with fear and delight, and kept coming back for more.

  “Why do we always go in the afternoon?” Andrew wondered one day. He had buried Jessica in the sand, and except for her head sticking up she looked very much like a miniature dune. Now Andrew was idly letting grains of sand trickle through his fingers, building up hills over her toes.

  “I don’t know.”

  “Well, that’s what I mean. There’s no reason. Let’s go at night for a change.”

  “We’re not allowed to go out at night.”

  “I know, but look— we’ll pretend to go to bed, and then sneak out. I’ve done it before.”

  “Really?” Jess sat right up, shaking the mountain of sand away. What was even more amazing than Andrew sneaking out at night was that he was telling her about it. “Do you really?”

  “Sure. I go out to the fort sometimes, or down to the beach.”

  “Wow!” sighed Jessica, impressed.

  “So that’s what we can do. You just sneak into my room, then we climb out the window. It’s not that high up. I’ll bring a flashlight.”

  “O.K.!” beamed Jessica. “And you don’t have to worry, Andrew, I won’t tell, ever.”

  “I know that. You’re dead if you do, right?” “Right!”

  And that was that.

  7

  In the dunes, Andrew shone his flashlight around until it lit up the outline of the sand sifter’s home. Then he switched the light off. It was very dark. Except for the stars and a sliver of a moon there was no light at all. And from the sand sifter’s home not even the flicker of a candle.

  “Funny there isn’t any light in there,” said Andrew.

  “Maybe he’s asleep,” whispered Jessica. “We better not wake him up.”

  “He can’t be asleep yet, it’s not that late. C’mon, we’ll go and see.”

  Silently they slipped across the sand to his home. The door was open, as always.

  “Hello!” Andrew called softly.

  No answer.

  “Let’s go in,” he said.

  Silently they slipped inside.

  Not a sign of him anywhere, except for his pails and piles of sand.

  “I think a couple of his pails are gone,” said Andrew. “I know he had a shiny one, and it’s gone.”

  “He’s probably out collecting sand somewhere,” said Jessica.

  “Not in the dark!”

  Andrew shone his flashlight around the room. “It’s strange, isn’t it?”

  “What?” asked Jessica.

  “Well, you never see him anywhere in the village, or on the beach. And nobody else has seen him. Never anywhere except here.”

  “So? Maybe he likes to keep to himself.” Especially now that there’s always a crowd, she added to herself. “Andrew, I think we better go. I don’t like being here when he’s out.”

  The mountains of sand glittered eerily when caught by the flashlight’s beam. They appeared huge and watchful, like sentinels guarding the old man’s home. The sands of time, guarding the past. Jessica shivered. “C’mon, Andrew.” She walked outside. There were no footprints in the sand, except for their own.

  “And you know what else?” Andrew asked as they were walking home. “You never see him eating or drinking. There’s never a sign of any food. Or any water. Have you ever noticed that?”

  “No, not really,” Jessica admitted.

  “So what does he eat?” Andrew wondered. “He’s got to eat.”

  “I don’t know. Sandwiches?” Jessica laughed.

  “Very funny, Jess.”

  “I know!” she giggled happily. It had been a great adventure, sneaking out to the dunes at night. And she had made a good joke. She didn’t care what the sand sifter ate, as long as he kept telling stories.

  Every night it was the same. His home silent and still and empty, except for the sentinels of sand. And not a sign of the old man.

  But every afternoon, there he’d be, sifting sand and telling stories. And the pails that had been missing in the night would be there the next day, in their proper place, as always. And always the piles of sand, sometimes larger, some-times smaller.

  “He’ll never ever sift it all,” said Andrew. “Doesn’t he ever get tired? Doesn’t he ever sleep?”

  “I don’t know,” said Jessica.

  “It’s funny, isn’t it? How nobody ever asks him questions. Just ordinary questions, I mean. We don’t really know anything about him.”

  “No, we don’t.” Jessica agreed. “And it doesn’t even matter, does it?”

  8

  After a while it seemed that every child in the village was there, and the sand sifter’s tumble-down home was fairly bulging. And the ones that couldn’t fit inside sat and listened outside, while the old man told the stories and sifted the sand.

  “Maybe he doesn’t mind,” Jessica thought. “He never says. He never tells anybody to go away. So maybe he doesn’t mind.”

  It wasn’t the same anymore. Carey didn’t care. Andrew didn’t care. But Jessica was sorry. Even though he hadn’t changed. One person or twenty or fifty— why, it wouldn’t bother the sifter of the sand. He had his job to do, and that was that. Still, he always gave a wink to Jessica, as if he were telling the story specially for her. That’s how she felt about it, anyway. And besides, once he started spinning his tale, why, it didn’t matter at all who was there! Why, the crowd was just as hushed as could be, and all you could hear was the old man’s voice and the sand, sifting, sifting. She was woven into the magic and transported—it was as simple as that!

  Today he was sifting pale-blue grains of quartz, and as they filtered through the sieve the light caught them and they shone, lustrous and translucent. And he told of how the sun came to be, and the moon, and all the stars. He told of dragons that breathed clouds and made rain, and of enormous eagles that lifted their wings in anger, causing lightning to streak across the sky.

  And he spoke of the sand. “Now all these grains of sand hold a story,” he said. “And do you think you could ever tell them all? And do you think you could ever count them all?”

  “No!” exclaimed the children.

  “No indeed—and only a fool would ever try! Why, grains of sand are like the thoughts and dreams of all the people on earth. You could never, ever, know them all!”

  “But you d
o, don’t you?” said Jessica.

  “Why of course!” he said with a wink. “I’m the sifter of sands!”

  9

  The summer ambled on and soon it was autumn, a time for endings. And when a mist rolled in from the sea chilling the dunes, Jessica was afraid the stories would end. They didn’t. But something different happened.

  “See this?” The old man had finished his story, and held up a stone that had somehow got mixed up with the grains of sand. It was the colour of honey, warm as a golden afternoon. And around its centre was a ring of blue. “This is a wishing stone. You can tell a wishing stone because it has a ring around it. Now, the ring doesn’t have to be right in the centre like this one. But it does have to be unbroken. It can be any old stone— it doesn’t have to be an agate, like this one.” He held it so the light could shine through. “Of course, if it is an agate, then you’ve got a better chance of your wish coming true.

  Now suppose I stop sifting for a time and make a wish on this stone! Why, I could wish for all this sand to turn into gold! Or I could wish for it all to disappear! Or I could wish for something else, something unexpected.” He looked and looked at the eager faces, at all those children waiting and wondering. And the intensity of that look made them shiver.

  Then he spoke, and his words made their hearts stand still. “Why, I wish you would all turn into grains of sand, so I could sweep you into a pile for sifting!”

  Well, it seemed for an instant that the sands of time had stopped running altogether, so frozen in fright did all those children feel. And they all just stared at the old man, or at that wishing-stone, terrified to look at each other in case they saw a pile of sand! And it was so, so silent you could almost hear the stories in those grains of sand just bursting to get out!

  Then the old man winked, and chuckled. “Come now— what’s the matter with you? You don’t believe everything you hear, do you?”