"Hinting what?" Clare's voice was icy.
"That's what I can't make out. That's the maddening part of it. Do you think I'm such a failure? Do you think I'm not to be trusted? I get on with the children—they work well! Truly, Clare, I don't know why she dislikes me so. You'd think she was trying to worry me into leaving."
"You should have told me before," said Clare curtly, and changed the subject so abruptly that Alwynne feared she was angry, and wished that she had held her tongue.
She was right. Clare was angry. Clare had conveniently forgotten her little conversation with Henrietta on that panic-stricken summer day: was naturally surprised and indignant to find it bearing the fruit she had intended it to bear. This was what came of confiding in people! And Henrietta, she had no doubt, would be prepared to give chapter and verse for her surveillance, if Clare should, directly or indirectly, call it in question.... Henrietta would appear to have Clare in a cleft stick: and Alwynne was to suffer in consequence. Clare (a great deal fonder of Alwynne than she, or Alwynne, or any one save Elsbeth, guessed) laughed to herself, once, softly, and her eyes snapped. Wait a while, Henrietta ... wait a wee while!
Thoughtfully she approached the question of the counter-attack. That was inevitable, a sop to her own conscience. Besides, it would be amusing.... It was necessary, however, to decide upon the weapon.
It was a small matter—the refusal of a boarder for lack of space—that provided it. Quietly, she went to work.
For the first time, for her own departments had allowed her energy its outlet, she set herself to disentangle the lines on which the school was run. She found many knots. Half day, half boarding school, grown from a timid beginning into one of the most flourishing of its kind, it was, indeed, like the five hundred-year-old town in which it stood, a marvellous compound of ancient custom and modern usage. The "Seminary for Young Ladies" of the 'seventieswas three parts obliterated by the 'nineties High School regimen, on which, in its turn, was superimposed the cricket and hockey of the twentieth century's effemination of the public-school system; the whole swollen, patchwork concern held together by the personality of its creator, and its own reputation.
Clare nodded. It was obvious to her, that with the retirement of Miss Marsham, accomplished already in all save name, the school would fall to pieces. A pity ... it had a fine past ... was a valuable property still.... With a vigorous woman at its head, judiciously iconoclastic, no stickler for tradition, it would revive its youth.... She herself, for instance.... She toyed with the idea.
Miss Marsham was looking out for a successor.... She herself had been sounded.... Should she? She shook her head. Life was very pleasant as it was.... She knew that she hated responsibility as much as she liked power.... She sat on the school's shoulders, at present.... As head mistress the school would sit on hers.... No, thank you! She had better uses for her spare time.... There were books ... idleness ... Alwynne.... Imagine never having time to play with Alwynne!
Nevertheless it would be fascinating to plan out the reorganisation of the school ... and carry it out, for that matter. She could do it, she knew. She would get all pat and then have some talks—some suggestive talks—with Miss Marsham.... She, Clare, had some little influence.... And there was life in the old warhorse yet.... Anything that she could be persuaded to believe would benefit her school would have her instant sanction.... She would be nominally responsible, of course, and would give Clare, nevertheless, a free hand.... And Clare, sweeping clean, would sweep away whatever withstood her.... Henrietta would have little energy left for Alwynne when Clare had finished her spring-cleaning....
For the next few weeks, Clare spent nearly all her spare time at the school. She would stay to supper, and even, onoccasion, superintend "lights out." She would ask artless questions, and the matron and the young mistresses found her "so sympathetic when you really got her to yourself. So sensible, you know—always sees what you mean."
Finally, Clare shut herself up for a Saturday and a Sunday with a neat little note-book, and drew up plans and made some calculations. Then she went to see Miss Marsham. She went to see Miss Marsham several times.
The plan was certainly an excellent one.... Miss Marsham could not follow the details very well ... but that, of course, would be dear Clare's affair.... A great saving ... an immense improvement.... There would be changes, of course.... This idea of separate houses, for instance.... It would mean taking extra premises—but Clare was quite right, they were overcrowded—had had to turn away girls.... She quite agreed with Clare ... she had always preferred boarders herself; one had a freer hand.... With a mistress responsible for each house, though, what would there be left for Miss Vigers to do?... Yes—she might take over a house, of course.... But Miss Marsham paused uneasily. She anticipated trouble with Henrietta.
She was justified. Henrietta refused utterly to discuss the suggested alterations. Miss Marsham must excuse her; she had her position.... One house? after controlling the entire school's economy? She did not suggest that Miss Marsham could be serious—that was impossible.... Miss Marsham was serious? Then there was no more to be said....
She said a good deal, however, and at considerable length; ended, breathless, waspish, leaving her resignation in her principal's hands. Neither she nor Miss Marsham dreamed that it would be accepted.
But Clare Hartill, consulted by Miss Marsham, was puzzlingly relieved. Very delicately she congratulated her chief on being extricated from a difficult position; praised Miss Vigers's tact—or her sense of fitness. Unusual goodsense.... People so seldom realised their limitations, unprompted ... poor Miss Vigers was certainly no longer young ... hardly the woman for a modern house-mistress-ship.... Old fashioned ... in these days of degrees and college-training so much more was expected ... and after that affair in the summer no doubt she had lost confidence in herself.... Clare was sure that Miss Vigers had appreciated Miss Marsham's forbearance, but of course, she must know, in her own heart, that if she had taken proper precautions—it was her business to arrange for a mistress to be on duty, wasn't it?—the accident could not have happened. Poor little Louise! Oh, and of course, poor Miss Vigers too!... Well, it was for the best, she supposed ... and Miss Vigers seemed to feel that it was time for her to go.... Perhaps it was.... But they would all be sorry to lose her.... Clare really thought that she would like to get up a presentation from the school.... Now what did Miss Marsham consider appropriate?
So Henrietta found herself taken at her word. She left, passionately resentful, at the half-term; hoping, at least, to embarrass her employer thereby. (But Clare Hartill knew of such a nice suitable woman—Newnham.)
Henrietta Vigers was forty-seven when she left. She had spent youth and prime at the school, and had nothing more to sell. She had neither certificates nor recommendations behind her. She was hampered by her aggressive gentility. Out of a £50 salary she had scraped together £500. Invested daringly it yielded her £25 a year. She had no friends outside the school. She left none within it.
Miss Marsham presented her with a gold watch, decorously inscribed; the school with a handsomely bound edition of Shakespeare.
Heaven knows what became of her.
Said Clare to Elsbeth at their next meeting—
"I found out what the trouble was. Henrietta Vigers has been slave-driving her. I should have guessed before, but you know that sort of thing can go on in a school unnoticed."
"Oh, yes," said Elsbeth.
Clare shot a suspicious glance at her, but Elsbeth's face was impassive.
"But she'll be all right now. Miss Vigers is leaving us at half-term."
"So I hear."
Their eyes met. Clare flushed faintly.
"I couldn't have Alwynne bullied."
"I know exactly how you feel," said Elsbeth quietly. Then, with a direct glance, "Has Miss Vigers got another post?"
"I haven't enquired."
"You're a bad enemy," Elsbeth's tone was quaintly reflective, almost admiring.
"But a good friend, I hope?" Clare laughed.
"I hope so," said Elsbeth doubtfully, and Clare laughed again. It amused her to cross swords with Elsbeth. At times she felt, that had it not been for Alwynne—that bone of contention she could have liked her.
"You can't be one without the other," she instructed her. "I don't pretend to be a saint. And you'll see how much better Alwynne will be next term."
But the spring term came, and Alwynne was no better. She flagged like a transplanted tree. She went about herbusiness as usual, but even Clare, not too willing to acknowledge what interfered with her scheme of things, realised that her efficiency was laborious, that her high spirits were forced, her comicalities not spontaneous, that she was in fact, not herself, but merely an elaborate imitation.
But where Elsbeth grew anxious Clare grew irritated. She spied a mystery. Some obscure, yet powerful instinct prevented her from probing it, but she was none the less piqued at being left in the dark. It annoyed her too, that Alwynne should be obviously and daily losing her health and good looks. Clare required above all vitality in her associates. It had been, in her eyes, one of Alwynne's most attractive characteristics. This changing Alwynne, whitened, quieted, submissive, the sparkle gone from her eyes and the snap from her tongue, was less to her taste. Alwynne, very conscious of her shortcomings and of Clare's irritation at them, grew daily more nervously propitiatory—ever a fatal attitude to Clare. It roused the petty tyrant in her. There were jarrings, misunderstandings, exhausting scenes and more exhausting reconciliations. Yet the two were always together. Clare, viciously adroit as she grew in those days in piercing the armour of Alwynne's peace, exacted nevertheless her incessant service. And never had Alwynne so strained every nerve to please her.
Elsbeth, guessing at the situation, could give thanks when influenza, sweeping over the school, claimed Alwynne as its earliest victim. Her turn had come. She nursed Alwynne through the attack, prolonged her convalescence, excluded all enquirers, censored messages and letters. When Alwynne grew better, and talked, restless yet unwilling, of fixing the date of her return, Elsbeth, lips firmly set, went out one afternoon to pay a call upon Miss Marsham, and returning, sat down to write a letter. She busied herself for the rest of that day and all the next over Alwynne's wardrobe, mending and pressing and freshening.
Alwynne protested.
"Elsbeth dear, do leave my things alone. I'll mend themsome time—honestly. They're all right. I wish you wouldn't fuss."
But Elsbeth fussed placidly on.
In the evening came letters for them both. Alwynne read hers hurriedly.
"Elsbeth, it's from Clare! She wants to know why I'm not coming back. What does she mean? Of course I'm coming back. Mademoiselle Charette is already, and she was ill after I was!"
Elsbeth sniffed.
"She was only in bed two days—Miss Marsham said so. You're not going back this term, Alwynne. I've seen Miss Marsham myself. I told her what the doctor said. I've arranged things. She agrees with me—you're not fit to. It's only a month to end of term. They can manage. You've simply got to have a change. So I wrote to Dene—to the Lumsdens, and Alicia's answer has just come. They're delighted to have you. I knew they would be, of course. They have asked us so often. Such a lovely place. Now, my dear, be a sensible child and don't argue, because I've made up my mind. It'll do you good to get away."
For in Alwynne's face astonishment had been succeeded by indignation. Elsbeth prepared herself resignedly to face a storm of protest, if not a blank refusal. To be arranged for as if she were a child—unconsulted—Clare—the school—the coaching—leaving Elsbeth alone—Dene—utter strangers—perfectly well—simply ridiculous. Elsbeth saw it all coming.
"My dear Elsbeth! What a preposterous——" began Alwynne. Then the weakness of convalescence swamped her. She sank back in her chair.
"Perhaps it will," said Alwynne wearily. "All right, Elsbeth! I'll go if you want me to. Anyway, I don't much care."
A week later Alwynne was sitting in a diminutive go-cart drawn by a large pony, and driven by a large lady with a wide smile and bulgy knees, with which, as the little cart jolted over the stony road, she unconsciously nudged Alwynne, imparting an air of sly familiarity to her pleasant, formal talk. This, Alwynne supposed, was Alicia. She liked her, liked her fat kind face, her comfortable rotundity, and her sweet voice. She liked her cool disregard of her own comical appearance, wedged in among portmanteaux and Alwynne and a basket of market produce, with an old sun-hat tied bonnet-fashion to shade her eyes, and her scarf ends fluttering madly, as she thwacked and tugged at the iron-mouthed pony.
She was more than middle-aged, a woman of flopping draperies and haphazard hookings, and scatter-brained grey locks, that had been a fringe in the days of fringes. She moved, as Alwynne noticed later, like a hurried cow, and tripped continually over her long skirts. Yet, in spite of her ramshackle exterior, she was not ridiculous. The good-men and stray children they encountered greeted her with obvious respect. Alwynne, comparing the keen eyes and their cheerful crowsfeet, with the chin, firm enough in its cushion of fat, guessed her the ruling spirit of the Dene household, and wondered why she had not married a vicar.
But Alicia, though Alwynne listened politely to her flow of talk, and answered prettily when she must, did not long occupy her attention.
She was in her own country again. She loved the country—woods, fields, hedges and lanes—as she loved no city or sea-town of them all. London, Paris, Rome—Swissmountains or Italian lakes—she would have given them all for Kent and Hampshire and the Sussex Weald. But Clare would never hear of a country holiday. Alwynne took deep breaths of the clean, kindly air, and wondered to herself that she had taken the proposal of her holiday so dully. She had not realised that she was going into the country—she had not realised anything, except that she was tired, and that Elsbeth would not leave her alone. She had shrunk painfully from the idea of meeting strangers, from the exertion of accommodating herself to them. But this good air made one feel alive again....
She stared over the pony's ears at the gay spring landscape.
"Those are the Dene fields," said Alicia, following her glance. "There are two Denes, you know—Dene Village and Dene Fields. There's a couple of miles between them. We are in the hollow, where the road dips, at the foot of Witch Hill."
"Witch Hill?"
Alicia flourished her whip at the sky-line. The fields were spread over the hillside in sections of chocolate and magenta and silver-green, with here and again a parti-coloured patch, where oats and dandelions, pimpernel and sky-blue flax choked and strangled on an ash-heap. From the slopes Witch Hill lifted a brow of blank white chalk, crowned and draped in woodland, lying against pillows of cloud, for all the world like a hag abed, knees hunched, and patchwork quilt drawn up to ragged eyebrows. Round her neck the road wound like a silver riband; looped, dipped, disappeared, for two unfenced miles—to flash into view but a parrot's flight away, and swerve, with a steep little rush, round a house with French windows thatched in yellow jessamine.
Alwynne's eyes lit up.
"What a good name! Who was she before she was turned into that?" She stopped, flushing. Alicia would think her stupid.
Alicia laughed pleasantly.
"Do you like fairy tales? You've come to the right place—the country-side's full of them. There's a fairy fort—Roman I suppose, really, and a haunted barn out beyond Dene Compton, besides Witch Hill and the Witch Wood just behind our house. There's a story, of course. I don't know it—you must ask Roger. He's always picking up stories."
"Roger?"
"My nephew, Roger Lumsden. Hasn't Elsbeth——?"
"Oh yes, of course."
"He's away just now. Look, now you can see the house properly."
"Behind the hill?" Alwynne had caught sight of a group of buildings crowning a secondary slope.
"No, no—that's the school, Dene Compton."
"A school?" Alwynne screwed up her eyes to look at it. "What a big place! Girls or boys?"
"Both."
"Oh! A board school!" Alwynne's interest flagged.
"Scarcely!" Alicia laughed. "Haven't you heard of Dene Compton? And you a school-mistress!"
Alwynne was politely blank.
"The thin end of the co-educational wedge. It's unique—or was, till a few years ago. There are several now, dotted about England. You ladies' seminaries should be trembling in your shoes."
"Boys and girls! What a mad idea! Yes, I believe Clare—I believe I did hear something about it. It's all cranks and simple lifers and socialists though, isn't it?"
"You'd better come up one day and see. I'll take you."
"Why, do you know them?"
"I teach there."
"You? Oh—I beg your pardon," cried Alwynne strickenly.
Alicia laughed.
"I'm accustomed to it. Jean will be delighted with anally. She pretends to disapprove. But Roger and I are generally too much for her."
"Is he a master, then?"
"Good gracious, no! But he has a lot of friends at the school. He ought to be interested—it's his land, you know. His people lived there for generations—the Lumsdens of Dene Compton. The head master has the old house, but the school itself is new—all those buildings you see. No, not those—" Alwynne's eyes were caught by a glitter of glass roofs—"those are Roger's houses. He's a gardener, you know. He lives for his bulbs and his manures."
The tiny cart rocked as the pony bucketed down the dip of the road and whirled it through the gates and up the short drive. Alwynne clutched the inadequate rail.
"He will do it," said Alicia resignedly. "He wants his tea. There's Jean. Mind the door."
She pulled up the rocketing pony as the ridiculous little door burst open and Alwynne and her baggage were precipitated on to the gravel.
A little woman ran out from the porch.
"Are you hurt? It always does that. I'm always asking Alicia to tell Bryce to take it to be seen to. Alicia—I shall speak to Roger if you don't. My dear, I hope you haven't hurt yourself. That pretty frock—but it will all brush off. And how is Elsbeth, and why didn't you bring her with you? Come in at once and have some tea. Alicia has driven round to the stables. It's Bryce's afternoon off."
Jean was a prim little red-haired woman, some years younger than Alicia, with brisk ways, and a clacking tongue. She had Alwynne in a chair, had given her tea, deplored her white looks, suggested three infallible remedies, recounted their effect on her own constitution and Alicia's and her nephew's, and, digressing easily, was beginning a detailed history of Roger's health since, at the age of five or thereabouts, he had come under her care, before Alwynne had had time to realise more than that the room was verycheerful, Jean very talkative, and she herself very, very tired. She could not help being relieved when Alicia returned. Jean, with her neat dress and knowledgeable ways and little air of apologising for her slap-dash elder, should, by all the rules, have been the more reliable of the cousins. Yet Alwynne turned instinctively to Alicia; and Alicia, spread upon a chair, fanning herself cyclonically with her enormous hat, did not fail her.
"Jean! The child's as white as a sheet. You can ask about Elsbeth to-morrow, and Roger will keep. Take her up to her room, leave her to unpack and lie down in peace and quiet, and come back and give me my tea. Supper's at seven, Alwynne. Take my advice and have a good rest. There are plenty of books—oh, yes, I know all about your likes and dislikes. Elsbeth's a talker too—on paper! Jean—if you're not down in five minutes, I'll come and fetch you."
Alwynne, half an hour later, curled comfortably upon a sofa, in front of a blazing fire, with a lazy hour before her and a Copperfield upon her knee, thought that Alicia was a perfect dear. And Jean? Jean, pulling out the sofa, poking the fire, pattering about her like a too intelligent terrier—Jean was a dear too.... They were a couple of comical dears.
And "The Dears" was Alwynne's name for them from that day on.
Alwynne settled down with an ease that surprised herself. Much as she loved the country, a country life would have bored her to death, Clare had often assured her, as a permanent state; but for a few weeks it was certainly delightful. She enjoyed pottering about the garden with Jean, and jogging into the village on her own account behind the obstinate pony, who, approving her taste in apples, allowed her to believe that she more or less regulated his direction and pace. She enjoyed the complicated smells of the village store, half post office, half emporium, and the taste of its gargantuan bulls'-eyes. She sent, in the first enthusiasm of discovery, a tinful heaped about with early primroses to Clare; but Clare was not impressed.
Clare disapproved strongly of Alwynne's holiday, needed her too much to allow it necessary. Her first letters were a curious mixture—half fretfulness over Alwynne's absence, half assurance of how perfectly well she, Clare, got on without her. Alwynne would have been exquisitely amazed could she have known how eagerly Clare awaited her bi-weekly budget. Alwynne was afraid her letters were dull enough. She apologised constantly—
Of course, Clare, this will seem very small beer to you—but little things are important down here. It's all so quiet, you see. I've been perfectly happy this morning because I found a patch of white violets in a clearing, and Jean and Alicia were just as excited when I told them at lunch: and we went off with a tea-basket afterwards, and dug violet roots for an hour, or more, and then spread our mackintoshes over a felled trunk and made tea. The ground wassopping, but it was fun. You'd love my cousins. They're as old as Elsbeth but full of beans, and they've travelled and are interesting—only they will talk incessantly about this nephew they've got. It's "Roger" this and "Roger" that—he seems to rule them with a rod of iron—can't do wrong! He comes back next week. I rather wonder what he'll be like. The Dears make him out a paragon; but I'm expecting a prig, myself! There are photographs of him all over the place. He's quite good-looking.
Of course, Clare, this will seem very small beer to you—but little things are important down here. It's all so quiet, you see. I've been perfectly happy this morning because I found a patch of white violets in a clearing, and Jean and Alicia were just as excited when I told them at lunch: and we went off with a tea-basket afterwards, and dug violet roots for an hour, or more, and then spread our mackintoshes over a felled trunk and made tea. The ground wassopping, but it was fun. You'd love my cousins. They're as old as Elsbeth but full of beans, and they've travelled and are interesting—only they will talk incessantly about this nephew they've got. It's "Roger" this and "Roger" that—he seems to rule them with a rod of iron—can't do wrong! He comes back next week. I rather wonder what he'll be like. The Dears make him out a paragon; but I'm expecting a prig, myself! There are photographs of him all over the place. He's quite good-looking.
But before Alwynne could tire of the lanes and village, of gardening with Jean, and hints of how Roger stubbed up roots and handled bulbs, Alicia had provided her with a new interest. She remembered her promise one morning and took her up to Dene Compton.
Alicia gave Italian lessons twice a week, and from her Alwynne had gleaned many quaint details of the school and its workings. What she heard interested her, though she was prepared to be merely, if indulgently, amused. She looked forward to the visit if only to get copy for a letter to Clare. Clare, too, liked to be amused.
The gong was clanging for the mid-morning break when Alicia, Alwynne in her wake, led the way into the main building, and waving her airily towards a mound of biscuits, bade her help herself and look about her for a while, because she, Alicia, had got to speak to—She dived into the crowd.
Alwynne, thus deserted, stood shyly enough in a roofed corner of the great brick quadrangle, munching a fair imitation of a dog-biscuit, and watching the boys and girls who swarmed past her as undisturbed by her presence as if she were invisible. At the boys she smiled indulgently as she would have smiled at a string of lively terriers, but of the girls she was sharply critical. They wore curious, and as she thought hideous, serge tunics: she jibbed at their utilitarian plaits: but she conceded a good carriage to most of them and was impressed by a certain pleasant fearlessnessof manner. A couple of men, Alicia, and a bright, emphatic woman in a nurse's uniform, wandered through the crowd, which made way courteously enough, but seemed otherwise in no degree embarrassed by their propinquity. Alwynne had a sudden memory of Clare's triumphal processions; compared them uneasily with the fashion of these quiet people.
She watched a small girl dash panting to the loggia at the opposite side of the quadrangle, where a slight man in disreputable tennis-shoes, leaned against a shaft and observed the pleasant tumult. There was a moment's earnest consultation, and the small girl darted away again and disappeared down a corridor. The man resumed his former pose—head on one side, smiling a little.
Alwynne ventured out of her corner and caught at Alicia as she passed.
"Cousin Alice! I like all this. I'm glad you brought me. Who's that?" She nodded towards the man in tennis-shoes.
"The Head."
"The head-master?"
"Why not?"
"But—but—when Miss Marsham comes in—you can hear a pin drop——Is he nice?"
Alicia laughed.
"I'll introduce you."
She did.
"Well," said Alicia with a twinkle as they walked home together later, "what did you think of him?"
Alwynne flushed, but she laughed too.
"Cousin Alice—it was too bad of you. He just said 'How do you do?' and smiled politely. Then he said nothing at all for five minutes, and then he clutched at one of the girls and handed me over to her with another smile—an immensely relieved one—and drifted away. I've never been so snubbed in my life."
"You're not the first one. So you didn't like him?"
"Oh—I liked him," conceded Alwynne grudgingly.
They walked on in silence for a while.
"What's that?" Alwynne pointed to a large grey building half way down the avenue.
"The girls' house, Hill Dene. They sleep there; and have the needlework classes, and housewifery, I believe."
"Do they have everything else with the boys?"
"Practically."
"Does it answer?"
"Why not? Girls with brothers and boys with sisters have an advantage over the solitary specimens, everybody knows. This is only extending the principle."
Alwynne giggled suddenly.
"You know that girl he dumped me on to—she was showing me round, and we ran into some boys in the gym. I couldn't make out why, but she jolly well sent them flying."
"Out of hours, I expect."
"But the coolness of it, Cousin Alice! She was a bit of a thing—the boys were half as high again!"
"But not prefects."
"Oh, I see." Alwynne meditated. "Oh, Cousin Alicia, that girl asked me to go with them next Saturday for a tramp. Over Witch Hill. She and another girl and some boys. Imagine! they're going by themselves—without a master or a mistress or anything!"
"Why not?"
"We don't. We crocodile. Two and two, and two and two, and two and two. And I trot along at the side and see that they don't take arms. But of course, you can't control the day-girls. One of them asked two of the boarders out for the day one Sunday, at least her mother did, and we met them after church on the promenade, arm in arm—all three! I tell you, there was a row. They were locked up in their bedrooms for three days, and nobody might speak to them for the rest of the term. Miss Marsham said it was defiance and that they might remember they were ladies."
"I don't think they want 'ladies' here," said Alicia. "They're quite content if they produce gentlewomen. Your school must be peculiar."
"Oh, no," said Alwynne, opening her eyes. "There are dozens of schools like Utterbridge. I was at two myself when I was young. It's this place that's peculiar. It's like nothing I've heard of. I want to explore. He said I could. Yes, I forgot—he did say that—that I was to come up whenever I liked."
And for the next week Alwynne spent a good half of her days at Dene Compton. She clung to Alicia's skirts at the first, afraid of appearing to intrude. But she soon found that she might go where she would without arousing curiosity or even notice, though boys and girls alike were friendly enough when she spoke to them. Accustomed to her mistress-ship, she was half-piqued, half-amused to find herself so entirely unimportant.
But the great school fascinated her. It was scarce a third larger than her own in point of numbers, but the perfection of its proportions made it impressive. The arrangements for the children's physical well-being reflected the methods employed for their spiritual development. There was an insistence on sunlight and fresh air and space—above all, space. There was no calculation of the legal minimum of cubic feet: body and mind alike were given room in which to turn, to stretch themselves, to grow.
Gradually she realised that she had been living for years in a rabbit warren.
With her discoveries she filled many sheets of notepaper. But Clare's letters were nicely calculated to divert enthusiasm. Their tone was changing; they allowed Alwynne to guess herself missed. There was in them a hint of appeal: a suggestion of lonely evenings——Never a word of Alwynne's doings. Yet, by implication, description of her new friends and their outlook was dismissed as unnecessary. Clare, Alwynne was to realise, would smile pleasantly as she read, and think it all rather silly.
Elsbeth—so pleased that they are so kind to you at Alicia's school—was more genuinely uninterested. Dene Compton had been the home of a certain John Lumsden for Elsbeth. She did not care for descriptions of its metamorphosis. She wanted to hear about Dene, and her cousins, and how Alwynne was eating and sleeping, and if Roger Lumsden had come back yet. She asked twice if Roger Lumsden had come back yet. But Alwynne had an annoying habit of leaving her questions unanswered through eight closely written sheets. It was not only Clare who was very tired of co-education and Dene Compton.
But Elsbeth got her news at last, and was satisfied with it as Macchiavellis usually are, whose plots are being developed by unconscious and self-willed instruments. Alwynne, who in her spare time had discovered what spring in the country could mean, tucked in the news at the end of an epistle that was purely botanical——
... and cuckoo-pint and primroses and violets! Have you ever seen larches in bud? Oh, Elsbeth, why can't we live in the country? Every collection of buildings bigger than Dene Village ought to be razed by Act of Parliament. I expect the earth hates cities as I hated warts on my hands when I was little. Well, I must stop. Oh—the Lumsden man turned up a day or two ago. The Dears were in ecstasies, and he let himself be fussed over in the calmest way, as if he had a perfect right to it. I think he's conceited. I don't think you'd like him. He's back for good, apparently, but he won't worry me much. I'm only in at meals. The Dears are always busy and let me do as I like, and I either go up to Compton, or prowl, or take a rug and book into the garden. It's quite hot, although it's barely April—so you needn't worry. The garden is jolly, big and half wild: only "Roger" is beginning to trim it—the vandal! He's by way of being a gardener, you know. Great on bulbs and roses, I believe.By the wayishe a relation? Even The Dears are onlyvery distant cousins, aren't they? Because he will call me "Alwynne" as if he were. I call it cheek. I was very stiff, but he's got a hide like a rhinoceros. When I said "Mr. Lumsden," he just grinned. So now I say "Roger" very markedly whenever he says "Alwynne." I can't see what Jean and Alicia see in him; but of course I have to be polite. They are dears, if you like—are giving me a lovely time.I hope you're not very dull, Elsbeth dear. You must try and get out this lovely weather. Why not have Clare to tea one day? You'd both enjoy it. I heard from her yesterday—such a jolly letter!Heaps of love from Jean and Alicia—and you know what a lot from me.Alwynne.P.S.—I found these violets to-day on a bank behind the church. They'll be squashed when you get 'em, but they'll smell still.P.S.—The Lumsden man saw me writing, and said, would I send you his love, and do you remember him? I told him I'd scarcely heard you mention his name, so it wasn't probable—but he just smiled his superior smile. He reminds me of Mr. Darcy in P. and P. I can't say I like him.
... and cuckoo-pint and primroses and violets! Have you ever seen larches in bud? Oh, Elsbeth, why can't we live in the country? Every collection of buildings bigger than Dene Village ought to be razed by Act of Parliament. I expect the earth hates cities as I hated warts on my hands when I was little. Well, I must stop. Oh—the Lumsden man turned up a day or two ago. The Dears were in ecstasies, and he let himself be fussed over in the calmest way, as if he had a perfect right to it. I think he's conceited. I don't think you'd like him. He's back for good, apparently, but he won't worry me much. I'm only in at meals. The Dears are always busy and let me do as I like, and I either go up to Compton, or prowl, or take a rug and book into the garden. It's quite hot, although it's barely April—so you needn't worry. The garden is jolly, big and half wild: only "Roger" is beginning to trim it—the vandal! He's by way of being a gardener, you know. Great on bulbs and roses, I believe.
By the wayishe a relation? Even The Dears are onlyvery distant cousins, aren't they? Because he will call me "Alwynne" as if he were. I call it cheek. I was very stiff, but he's got a hide like a rhinoceros. When I said "Mr. Lumsden," he just grinned. So now I say "Roger" very markedly whenever he says "Alwynne." I can't see what Jean and Alicia see in him; but of course I have to be polite. They are dears, if you like—are giving me a lovely time.
I hope you're not very dull, Elsbeth dear. You must try and get out this lovely weather. Why not have Clare to tea one day? You'd both enjoy it. I heard from her yesterday—such a jolly letter!
Heaps of love from Jean and Alicia—and you know what a lot from me.
Alwynne.
P.S.—I found these violets to-day on a bank behind the church. They'll be squashed when you get 'em, but they'll smell still.
P.S.—The Lumsden man saw me writing, and said, would I send you his love, and do you remember him? I told him I'd scarcely heard you mention his name, so it wasn't probable—but he just smiled his superior smile. He reminds me of Mr. Darcy in P. and P. I can't say I like him.
Roger Lumsden had been home a week. Alwynne, save at meals, had seen little of him, and that little she did not intend to like. There was a memory of a passage of arms at their first meeting which rankled.
Roger had been inquiring when the Compton holidays began. Alicia hesitated—
"Let me see—the play's Tuesday week——"
"Wednesday week," put in Alwynne.
"Tuesday——"
"No, Wednesday," Alwynne persisted. "Because, you know, Mr. Bryant is so afraid that Gertrude Clarke won't be out of the 'San.' He says he can never coach up another Alkestis in the time. Besides, there isn't any one. He's been tearing his hair."
Alicia laughed.
"She knows more about it than I do, Roger! She's been half living there, haven't you, Alwynne?"
Roger turned to her with a smile and the first touch of personal interest that he had shown.
"Jolly place, isn't it? You teach, don't you? I wonder how it strikes you!"
But he was a stranger and Alwynne was nervous. She answered flippantly, as she always did when she was not at her ease—
"Oh, I can't get over their dresses! Appalling garments! Imagine that poor girl trying to rehearse Alkestis in a pea-green potato sack! It must be delicious. And their hair! Doesn't anybody ever teach them to do their hair?"
He eyed her thoughtfully, from her carefully dressedhead to her shining shoe-buckles, and shrugged his shoulders.
"Is that all you see?" said Roger dispassionately, and withdrew interest.
Alwynne grew hot with annoyance. Idiot! All she saw.... As if she had meant anything of the kind.... One said things like that.... One just said them.... Especially when one was nervous.... Taking a remark like that seriously.... Oh well, if he liked to think her a fool—let him! Silly prig!
She endeavoured to put him out of her mind. But his mere existence disturbed her. She was not accustomed to tobacco, for instance ... and it was disconcerting to find him in her favourite corner of the library or occupying the writing-table that no one had seemed to use but herself. He appeared to have forgotten that he had snubbed her and was unquenchably friendly. She found herself being pleasanter than she intended, but she made it a point of honour never to agree with him. That, at least, she owed herself.
She watched him furtively, alert for justification of her ill-humour. She told herself that it would be easier to be nice to him if everybody else did not fuss over him so.... It was ridiculous to see how Jean, especially, brightened at the sight of him.... He was good to her, certainly: she was argumentative, without being shrewd, but he never lost patience, as Alwynne, in secret was inclined to do. Even Alicia, so stoutly the head of her household, submitted every difficulty, from an unexpected legacy to a dearth of eggs. And he would sit down solidly and think the matter out. And his advice, from a flutter in rubber to pepper in the chicken pail, would be followed literally, and generally, Alwynne admitted, with success.
But she jibbed furiously when the sisters began to consult him about her personal affairs.
"Roger, don't you think that Alwynne——?"
But here Roger was invariably offhand and non-committal.Curiously, however, this attitude, correct as it was, did not appease Alwynne. But she was forced, at least, to admit that he could, on occasion, be tactful.
The last week of the term had begun. Alicia, at breakfast behind the coffee urn, was making her plans.
"It's a busy week. The Swains want us to go to lunch, Jean, only we haven't a day before Sunday, have we? At least—there's Tuesday; it's only the dress-rehearsal. I can get out of that. Alwynne can represent me." She nodded benevolently.
There was a slight pause. Roger, glancing up, stared openly. Alwynne had turned as white as paper. Her words came stickily.
"Cousin Alice, I can't. I mean—I'd rather—I don't want to go much, if you don't mind."
Alicia blessed herself.
"But, my dear! Why not? I thought you'd be looking forward——Oh, I suppose you've watched it so often, already."
"No—I haven't seen it; I'm afraid rehearsals bore me——" Alwynne broke off with an attempt at a light laugh.
"But you've been up to Compton so much," Alicia's tone was reproachful. "I should have thought you would have been sufficiently interested——"
"Oh, I am! Only—you see I've got letters to write—to Elsbeth——"
"Well, you've got all the week to write in! Are you so afraid of being bored? Compton wouldn't be flattered. We rather pride ourselves on our acting, you know! My dear, we're expected to go—must give the performers some sort of an audience to get them into training for the night. You ought to understand, of all people! Don't you ever give plays at your school?"
Alwynne was silent, but prompted by an instinct she could not have explained, she turned to Roger, stolid behind his eggs and bacon. She said nothing, but she looked athim desperately. He gave an imperceptible nod. He had been watching her intently.
"But, dear Alwynne——" Jean was chirruping her version of Alicia's remarks when Roger's calm voice interrupted—
"I say, Alicia! I thought you and Jean were coming with me! I can't go on the night itself. Of course you must come. Go to your lunch on Sunday—I'll look after Alwynne. But I'm not going up to Compton without you. Spoil all the fun."
"Of course, if Roger wants us——" began Jean quickly.
"Oh, I didn't want to miss it," retreated Alicia hastily. "I only thought the Swains——But of course Sunday would do."
"I met old Swain yesterday," said Roger, "travelled up to town with him. He was very full of his daughter's engagement."
"Engagement!" Alicia and Jean swooped to the news, like gulls to a falling crust. It kept them busy till breakfast was over.
And Roger returned to his eggs and bacon with never a glance at Alwynne.
Alwynne, half an hour later in her own room, fighting certain memories, arguing herself fiercely out of her weakness, had yet time to puzzle her head over Roger Lumsden. How quick he had been—and how kind.... Or had he noticed nothing? Had that adroit change of subject been accidental? That was much more likely.
She dismissed him from her mind. She wished she could dismiss all the thoughts that filled her mind as easily.
Alwynne was grateful enough to Roger, however, when Tuesday came and he set out for Compton, an aunt on either arm: but on Sunday she had to pay for her non-attendance. Hurrying down, a little late, to lunch, she was half-way through her usual apologies before she realised that neither Jean nor Alicia were in their places. Of course—they were going to the Swain's.... Their nephew, however, waitinggravely behind his chair, admitted her excuses with a little air of acknowledging them to be necessary that ruffled her at once, though she had promised herself to be pleasant. After all, she was staying, as she had told herself several times already, with Jean and Alicia. Once more she applied herself, quite unsuccessfully, to snubbing his air of host. Roger listened to her in some amusement; her ungracious ways disturbed him no more than the rufflings and peckings of an angry bird, and her charming manner to his aunts and occasional whim of friendliness to himself, had prevented him from pigeon-holing her definitely as a pretty young shrew. He was inclined to like her, for Jean and Alicia had confessed themselves absurdly taken with the girl, and he was accustomed to be influenced by their judgment; but the touch of hostility that usually showed itself in her manner to him puzzled as much as it amused him.
He enjoyed baiting her, yet he thought, carelessly, that it was a pity she should have inaugurated guerilla warfare. She looked as if she could have been pleasant company for his spare time if she had chosen. However, he would have little enough spare time, for the next few weeks, anyhow ... he had promised Jean to set to work seriously at the renovation of her garden.... He should be thankful for a visitor requiring neither escort nor attention.
Yet, naturally, her independence piqued him. He eyed her swiftly, as she sat at his right hand. She was a curious girl, he thought, to be so pretty and well-dressed, and yet so self-sufficing. Girls, apparently of her type, (he thought of his American cousins) usually needed a good deal of admiration to keep them contented.
She did not look altogether contented, though ... there were lines and puckers at the corners of her large eyes, that were surely out of place ... nineteen, wasn't she? She had had a breakdown, of course ... rather absurd, for such a child.... Jean had hinted a guess at some trouble.... A love affair, he supposed. That would account for her thorniness, her occasional air of absence and depression,that contrasted with her usual cheerfulness.... Yet that curious whim the other day—what had it meant? More than a whim, he imagined—her very lips had grown white.... He was quite sure that he had helped her out of a hole.... She might at least show a certain decent gratitude.... He wondered what she was thinking about, sitting there so silently ... she was generally talkative enough ... pretty quarrelsome, too. He supposed she was having a fit of the blues.... He had better talk to her, perhaps....
Alwynne, eating her wing of chicken, was merely and sheerly shy. She was garrulous enough with women, but she did not in the least know how to talk to men. Therefore and naturally she was full of theories. She had vague ideas that they had to be amused as babies have to be amused, but confronted with the prospect of a prolongedtête-à-tête, without Alicia or Jean to retire upon, she had nothing whatever to say. Yet she had been taught by Elsbeth to consider a lack of table-talk as a lack of manners, and was irritated with herself for her silence, and still more irritated with Roger for his.
She met his belated attempts at a conversation none too graciously—was bored by the boat-race, and would have nothing to say to the weather; though she thawed to his catalogue of copses and plantations in the neighbourhood, where certain wild flowers she had not yet discovered might be found.
But it was impossible for Alwynne to be silent long, and by the time they had adjourned to the drawing-room, the pair were talking easily enough. Roger did not find himself bored. He had, from the beginning, recognised that she was no fool, that her remarks owed their comicality to her phrasing of them, and that essentially they were shrewd, her acrobatic intellect swinging easily across the gaps in her education. The gaps were certainly there. He would marvel at her amazing ignorance, only to be tripped up byher unexpected display of authoritative knowledge. Gradually he began to analyse and discriminate, to see that she was naturally observant. Her remarks on life as she knew it, were as illuminating as original. She had humour and a nice sense of caricature. But when she, as it were, hoisted herself on the shoulders of the women about her, and from that level peered curiously at an outer, alien world, her insight failed her, her views grew distorted and merely grotesque. He thought he guessed the reason. She was no longer gazing, critical and clear-eyed, at known surroundings, but, still supported by the opinions of the women of her circle, was seeing what she had expected to see, what she had been told by them that she would see.
For all her air of modern girl, her independence, her store of book experience, she was comically conventual in her curiosities and intolerances, in her prim company manners and uncontrollable lapses into unconventionality. She had an air of not being at her ease; yet he guessed that it was merely the unaccustomed environment that disturbed her poise. He could see her handling surely enough a crowd of schoolgirls. He was equally certain that she ruled through sheer, easy popularity. She had dignity in spite of her whimsies, but he could not imagine her intimidating even a schoolgirl.
But most of all her attitude to himself amused him. She had a certain veiled antagonism of manner, that was allied to the antagonism of the small child to any innovation. She talked to him readily enough (and he, for that matter, to her) yet she was always on the defensive, inquisitive yet wary. He felt that if she had been ten years younger, she would have circled about him and poked.
A stray phrase explained her to him.
They had discussed the latest raid. At Alwynne's age and period all conversational roads led to the suffrage question, and he had found her re-hash of Mona Hamilton's arguments sufficiently entertaining. He guessed a plagiarismof the matter, but the manner was obviously her own. She was full of second-hand indignation over the conduct of a certain Cabinet Minister.
"He won't even see them!" she explained grievously. "Not even a deputation from the constitutional section! Just because some women are fools—and burn things——" The pause was eloquent. "It's so utterly unreasonable," declaimed Alwynne. "But of course men are unreasonable," said Alwynne, pensively reflective.
"Are they?"
"All I know are, anyhow."
He considered her ingenuous countenance—
"If it's not a delicate question—how many do you know?" said Roger softly.
She looked at him, mildly surprised.
"Hundreds! In books, that is."
"Oh—books! I meant real life."
"Surely a page of Shakespeare is more real than dozens of real people's lives."
"Side issue! I'm not to be deflected. How many men do you know, in real life, well enough to discuss the suffrage with?"
"I'm always kept at school the day the vicar comes to tea," she said suggestively.
"Who else?"
She saw his drift, but defended herself, smiling.
"The assistants are most intelligent at the circulating library."
"Who else?"
"There were music masters at school. I didn't meanyouwere unreasonable," she deprecated.
He began to laugh, openly, mischievously, delighting in her discomfiture.
"Anyhow, I know a lot about women," said Alwynne heatedly.
He eyed her respectfully.
"I'm sure you do. But we were talking of men. Andon the whole—you make me a polite exception—as a result of your wide knowledge, your complicated experience of Us—as a class—you consider that we are unreasonable?"
But he spoke into space. Alwynne had retired, pinkly, to a sofa and a novel. But he thought, as he settled to his own reading, that he heard a strangled chuckle. Alwynne, caught napping, always tickled Alwynne.
Over the top of his book, he considered her bent head approvingly. He liked her sense of fun. It was not every girl who could appreciate the smut on her own nose ... quite a pretty nose too ... indeed the whole profile was unexceptionable.... He noticed how well the patch of sky and the slopes of Witch Hill framed it ... and her hair ... it regularly mopped up the sunlight! He felt that he wanted to take the great heavy rope and twist it like a wet cloth till the gold dropped out on to the floor in shining pools.
He supposed she would be called a beautiful woman.... He had always looked upon a beautiful woman as an improbable possibility, like a millionaire or an archbishop—whom you might meet any day, but somehow never did.... Yet he was in the same house with one—and she his semi-demi cousin.... Yes—she was certainly beautiful....
Here Alwynne, who had not been entirely absorbed, looked up and caught his eye. Neither quite knew how to meet the other's unexpected scrutiny. Roger, less agile than Alwynne, stared solemnly until she looked away.
Alwynne gave a little inaudible sigh. She was boring him, of course.... It was pretty obvious.... Yet he had been quite nice all through lunch.... It was a pity.... She wondered if he wanted to read, or if she ought to go on talking? She racked her brains for something to say to him. It was not so easy to talk if he would not do his share.... She supposed she had talked too much about the suffrage.... Men never liked to be contradicted.... She glanced at him swiftly, and met his look once more, andonce more he stared, till her dropping lids released him. Then he lit his pipe.
She shrugged her shoulders.
She thought it very rude of him to leave off talking.... Silence was oppressive unless you knew people well.... It snubbed you.... Especially when you had been, as Alwynne feared she had, holding forth a trifle.... She supposed he had put her down as a talkative bore.... Elsbeth always said that strangers thought her enthusiasms were pose ... as if it mattered what strangers thought! She hated strangers.... She was always fantastic with new acquaintances.... It was the form her shyness took. If Roger chose to think she was posing.... It didn't affect her anyway.... She was only too glad to be able to read in peace.... Hang Roger!
She settled herself to her reading.
For five long minutes they both read steadily. But Alwynne's book was not interesting; she began to flutter the pages, her thoughts once more astray.
It was rather a shame of The Dears to desert her ... to leave her to entertain a strange man who didn't like her.... It made her look a fool.... She hated boring people.... If she bored their precious nephew as much as the book on her lap bored her!... She wondered why, with all the library to choose from, she had pitched on it. Of course, it was Roger's suggestion.... Well, she didn't think much of his taste.... Or perhaps he imagined it was the sort of stuff to appeal to her? She flung up her chin indignantly, to find his serious and critical eyes once more concerned with her. She met them with a raising of eyebrows—a hint of cool defiance. It was Roger's turn to retire into his book.
He was an odd sort of a man.... She wondered what Clare would think of him? As if Clare would bother her head.... But then he wasn't Clare's cousin. But Clare would be out in the woods after the wild hyacinths.... Somebody had said it was blue with them in the little woodbehind the house.... She must send Clare a boxful to-morrow ... or to-day? She supposed there was an evening post.... It was a pity to waste such a heavenly afternoon....
She stole yet another glance at Roger; he was evidently engrossed at last. It would not be rude? After all, what did it matter? He wasn't too polite himself! She drove her book viciously down the yielding side of the Chesterfield, swished to the open French window, and so out. The gravel crunched moistly beneath her thin shoes; she could feel every pebble. She glanced back into the drawing-room. All quiet. But by the time she had changed, the man might have come out.... She would change afterwards.... The smooth lawn sloped invitingly—beyond lay the rose walk and the wood, little Witch Wood that she had never yet explored, just because it was always at hand.
She picked up her silken skirts and took to her heels.
It was exactly half an hour later that Roger's book also grew dull to the point of imbecility. He shut it with a bang, stirred the sun-drowned fire, and knocked out his pipe against the shining dogs. Then he too walked out on to the terrace.
He wondered where the girl had got to. Then he frowned. Little half-moons dinted the wet yellow path and the stretch of grass beyond it. It was very careless, cutting up the turf like that.... If there was one thing he hated.... Of course she was town-bred ... could not be expected to realise the sacredness of a lawn.... But he must certainly tell her.... He might as well find her and tell her at once.... Then he laughed. Alwynne's high heels had betrayed her. The tracks led straight to the wood. So that was the lure.... He remembered saying that the hyacinths would probably be out....
He wondered if she knew her way.... It wasn't a large wood.... Perhaps he had better go and see ... and warn her off the lawn coming back? He hesitated. Hiseyes fell on Jean's forgotten bodge, lying by the border. If the hyacinths were out, she would need a basket.... She had not taken one.... Trust her to forget such a detail.... She would be glad of it though.... He tipped out the weeds into a neat pile and jumping the narrow bed, ran down in his turn, towards the wood.
Alicia and Jean, home to tea, were annoyed to find the fire out.
The gardener, rolling the lawn next day, thought as ill of hobnailed boots as of high French heels.
Alwynne left the garden behind her and crossed the stretch of grass, half lawn, half paddock, that lay between kitchen-garden and wood. It was fenced with riotous hedges, demure for the moment in dove-grey honeysuckle and star of Bethlehem, with no hint in their puritan apparel of the brionies and eglantines that were to follow. About the hedge borders the grass grew tall and rank, and, as she watched, the wind would stir it into a sea of emerald and the parsley-blossoms sway above it like snatches of drifting foam. Beyond the hedge shadow, "Nicholas Nye," the one-eyed donkey, reposed Celestially among the buttercups, which, making common cause with the afternoon sun, had turned his grazing ground into a Field of the Cloth of Gold.
For a moment she was minded to content herself with all the buttercups on earth to gather, and to go no further that day; but staring down the dazzling slope, her eyes rested once more upon the pleasant darkness of the goal for which she had been bound. Among the nearer tree trunks were stripes and chequerings of blue—the blue that is lovelier than the sea, the one blue in the world to the flower-lover. At once, indifferently, she left the buttercups to Nicholas Nye and hurried on and into the wood.
There were hyacinths everywhere, hyacinths by the million. It was as if the winds had torn her robes from the faint, spring sky, and had flung them to earth, and she now bent above them naked and shivering.
Alwynne wandered from patch to patch in an ecstasy of delight. As usual, her pleasure shaped itself into exclamations, phrases, whole sentences of the letters she would writeto Clare Hartill of her experiences. If only she could have Clare with her, she thought, to see and hear and touch and smell—to share the loveliness she was enjoying. Her thoughts flew to Italy, to their crowded month of beautiful sights together. She laughed—she would discard all those memories for love of this present vision.... If only Clare could see it.... She could never describe it properly ... adjectives welled up in her mind and dispersed again, like bubbles in a glass of water. The stalks and the hoarse ring of the hyacinth bells fascinated her. Clare was forgotten. She began to pick for the sake of picking.
The hot silence of early afternoon lay upon tree and bird and air. Alwynne, moving from blue clump to blue clump, grew ashamed of the rustle of her dress and the scrunch of twigs and soaked leaves beneath her feet, and trod softly; even her own calm breathing sounded too loudly for the perfect peace of the place and the hour.
She picked steadily, greedily—she had never before had as many flowers as she wanted, and there was inexpressible pleasure in filling her arms till she could hold no more; yet, some twenty minutes later, as she straightened herself at last, a little giddily, and looked about her over the pile of azure bells, there was no sign of bareness, for all she had gathered; she still stood to her knees in a lake of blue and green and gold.
She stretched herself lazily as she considered the flowers about her and wondered at their luxuriance. They were thicker and longer-stemmed than the mass of those she carried: the leaves were juicy and shining like dark swords: the last dozen of her armful had flecked her hands and dress with milky syrup. The ground, too, was black and boggy, and sucked at her feet as she moved. Suddenly she realised that the trees grew thick and close together—that the patches of sunlight were far apart—and that she had wandered farther into the wood than she had intended. She thought that she had picked enough, more than enough for Elsbeth as well as Clare; that it was time to be gettinghome. She had no idea of the hour.... It would not do to risk being late....
She moved forward uncertainly.
She had had a blessed afternoon: she had surrendered herself to the sounds and sights and smells of the spring, to the warmth of the sun and the touch of the wind, till every sense was drunken with pleasure. But her ecstasy had been impersonal and thoughtless: she had enjoyed too completely to have had knowledge of her enjoyment. With the return to realisation of place and time, her mood was changing. She was no longer of the wood, but in it merely; wandering in the dark heart of it, no dryad returned and welcome, but a stranger, one Alwynne Durand, in thin shoes and an unsuitable dress, with the wood's flowers, not her own, in her hands. Stolen flowers—their weight was suddenly a burden to her. She felt guilty, and had an odd, sudden wish to put them down tenderly at the foot of a tree, hide them with grasses and run for her life. She laughed at the idea as she looked for the path—what were flowers for, but picking? Yet she could not get rid of the feeling that she had been doing wrong, and that even now she was being watched, and would, in due time, be caught and punished, her stolen treasures still in her hands.
But wild flowers are free to all—and the wood was Roger Lumsden's wood! He had told her that he rented it.
She moved backwards and forwards, turning hurriedly hither and thither, trampling the hyacinths and stumbling on the uneven ground, unreasonably flurried that she could not find any path. She could not even track her own footsteps.
It was very strange, she thought, when she had penetrated so easily the depths of the wood, that the return should be so difficult. She had thought it a mere copse. She put her free hand to her eyes, scanning the wall of greenery in all directions. She fancied that at one point the trees grew less densely, and set out, scrambling over rough ground towards the faint light.
But in spite of her hurry she advanced slowly. The thin switches of the undergrowth whipped her as she pushed them aside, and the huge briars twisted themselves about her like live things. Twice the slippery moss brought her to her knees, and the faint light grew no stronger as she pressed forward. She began to feel frightened, though she knew the sensation to be absurd. It was impossible to be lost in a little wood, half a mile across.... It was merely a question of walking straight on till one emerged on open fields....
She told herself so, and tried to be amused at her adventure, and hummed a confident little tune as she plodded on, very careful not to look behind her. Her shoes, thudding and squelching in the wet mess of mould and green stuff, made more noise than one would have thought possible for one pair of feet, and woke the oddest echoes.
Of course, it was impossible that any one could be following her.... But the wood was so horribly silent that her own breathing and clumsy footfalls (there could be nothing else) counterfeited the noises of pursuit.... She could have sworn there was a presence at her elbow, in her rear, moving as she moved, stumbling as she stumbled. Twice she faced round abruptly, standing still—but she saw nothing but the wall of vegetation, motionless, silent, yet insistently alive. She felt that every tree, every leaf, every blade of grass, was watching her with green, unwinking eyes. There was nothing more in the wood than there had been a pleasant hour ago—less indeed, for she realised suddenly that the sun had gone in and that it was cold; yet she owned to herself at last that she was nervous, vaguely uneasy. Instantly, by that mere act of recognition, fright was born in her—unreasonable and unreasoning fright, that, in the length of a thought, pervaded her entire personality, crisping her hair, catching at her throat, paralysing her mind. The wood-panic had her in its grip—the age-old terror that still lies in wait where trees are gathered together,though the god that begot it be dead these nineteen hundred years.
She began to run.
It was impossible to pass quickly through the tangled undergrowth; but sheer fright gave her skill to avoid real obstacles, strength to crash over and through the mere wreckage of the wood. She turned and doubled like a hare, yet desperately, with the hare's terror of the sudden turn that might confront her with the presence at her heels. She could endure its pursuit, but she knew that its revelation would be more than she could bear. She was so far merely and indefinitely frightened, but to face the unknown would be to confront fear itself. And she was more frightened of fear than of any evil she knew. She could, she thought, meet pain or sickness, or any mere misery, with sufficient calmness, but the fear of fear was an obsession. She tore through the wood, shaken and gasping with terror of the greater terror she every moment expected to be forced to undergo; for almost the only clear thought remaining to her, in that onrush of panic, was the realisation that there was, at her elbow, in her heart, physical or metaphysical, she knew not which, some as yet veiled fact waiting to be revealed, in view of which her present agitation was trivial and meaningless.
She ran on, blind and blundering; yet her feet were so clogged by the weight of earth and wet, her thoughts by the sweat of the fear that was on them, that neither seemed to move for all her willing. And all the while, another part of her consciousness sat aloof, critical and detached, laughing at her for an excitable fool, analysing, in Clare's crispest accents, the illusions which were bewildering her, and wondering coolly that any girl of her age could so let her imagination run away with her.
She pulled herself together with an immense effort of will.
That was the truth.... It was her own imagination thatwas literally and physically running away with her, whipping her tired body into unnecessary exertion, flogging her into mad flight from this pleasant, harmless place, with its hideous and horrible suggestion of evil at hand.... But the evil was in her own mind.... There was nothing pursuing her, no vague ghost at her elbow.... The horror was in herself, to be faced, and fought, and trampled.... Running would not help her ... she would only carry her terror with her.... For an instant she had a lightning glimpse of the reasons of the Sadducean attitude to personality, and its desperate denials of future existence. She was suddenly appalled at the hideous possibility of existing eternally with her own undying thoughts for company. She wondered if there were really such a thing as soul suicide, and thought that, if so, many must have chosen to commit it.
Here her shifting, crowding thoughts blotted out the glimmer of understanding, as flies clustering on a window-pane can blot out light; yet the wordsuicideremained in her mind, disturbing, vaguely suggestive. It was connected with something terrible—she could not remember what—that in its turn was one with the vague horror at her elbow, that walked with the echo of her footsteps and panted with the echoes of her breaths, and yet was not real at all, but only in her mind.
She did not believe she should ever find her way out of the wood.... The hyacinths in her arms were so heavy—a queerly familiar weight: and the sun had gone in, which had, somehow, something to do with the trouble.... She felt the black depression of the winter months that she had left Utterbridge to escape settling down on her once more. She turned hopelessly to elude it, but it surrounded her like a fog, as indeed she half believed it to be. She supposed they had sudden fogs in the country, when the sun went in.... And the sun had gone in because she had picked all the hyacinths.... She remembered the story clearly enough now.... The sun had played at quoits with achild, and had thrown amiss, and killed it, and the purple blood had trickled down from the child's forehead.... So the sun had turned it into purple hyacinths.... But she, Alwynne, had been gathering all the hyacinths, and they were a heavy bunch, heavy as a dead child's body ... and in another minute they would be disenchanted, and she would be carrying a dead child's body in her arms....
She stood still, gazing down at the flowers, white and glassy-eyed with terror, wondering that she was still alive and not yet mad. For she knew that the fear she had feared was upon her at last. She dared not blink lest in that second the change should take place, and she should find Louise, long buried, in her arms. Because, of course, it was Louise who had been following her all the while.... Louise—who had committed suicide.... She was following Alwynne, because it was Alwynne's fault.... Clare had said so.... Well—at least she could tell Louise that she had meant no harm....
She waited, swayed back against a tree trunk, the flowers a dead weight over her arm. She held them gently, lest a rough movement should wake the horror they hid. With what was left of sanity she prayed.