CHAPTER XIV
I knewthat I could not be very far wrong when I said Bellwattle had guessed I was in love. It is so like a woman. They are incapable of climbing to the summit of any other conclusion save this; what is more, they reach it where no foothold for conjecture seems possible.
Who but a woman, from such slender facts as Bellwattle has acquired by dint of persevering curiosity, would ever imagine that I am in love? Thank God, I am not so utterly in need of the mere rudiments of understanding. I know the truth of all that she said to Cruikshank. Women must know me well indeed before they can come to such tender thought of me as to forget that I am ugly. It is true, moreover, that no woman has ever taken the trouble. Why then should I be such a fool as to plunge myself in love?
Yet, as I think over that statement of hers, true as it is, there comes back into my mind that evening on the cliffs when first we met Clarissa. In the look in Bellwattle's eyes, I said, I felt the touch of her hand; what is more, it was only a moment later that she stretched out her arm and held her fingers for an instant round my wrist. Had she forgotten how ugly I was then? It almost seemed so. Then why did she say that to Cruikshank? No—I do not understand women in the least.
Anyhow, she is wrong in all her deductions. I am not in love with Clarissa. It was not with love, when this morning Bellwattle came down the garden with a letter in her hand, it was not with love that I felt a dryness in my throat, or my pulses stopped and, with a sudden impetus, bounded on again.
I guessed it was the answer from Clarissa. Well—any fool might do that. She would not be bringing me a letter arrived by post. Therefore, my pulses quickened because I was on the eve of learning how my adventure was to progress. The cry of "Land Ahead!" thrills the sailor and sets his heart a-beating no more than did the sight of this letter to me. He may not know what land it is, just as I was ignorant of her answer; but that the answer had come and, to the sailor, that land is in sight, is quite enough to stir the blood and start it racing.
Bellwattle knew well who the letter was from. Her manner, her step, too, were of the lightest as she brought it down the garden to me. But there was that faint look of watchfulness about her which no woman, not even the cleverest, can shut out from her eyes. Could she have seen how my heart was beating, I am sure it would have added no more to her convictions. She knows I am in love, and there is no more to be said about it. No doubt she read my casual way of taking it as proof conclusive of my guilt. When, therefore, I slipped it unopened into my pocket then, quite at her ease, with no show of curiosity, but just to let her see that I must not suppose her completely without perception, she said:
"A little girl brought it from the Miss Fennells."
"It's from Miss Fawdry," said I.
I think that must have surprised her. She was not quite prepared to hear me admit it so casually as that. So surprised was she, in fact, to hear my admission, that she almost forgot to show surprise at hearing who it was from. But it came. It came tardily.
"From the little invalid?" said she, and her eye-brows lifted obediently to her voice. I am not so sure I did not love her myself just then.
I hid my smile, however, as I nodded my head.
"How funny!" she continued. "Fancy her writing! She's nice, isn't she?"
God bless all women!
"She's very nice," said I.
"I fancy she's too good for the man she's engaged to," she continued.
"Most women are that," said I.
She shook her head, and the smile in her eye was quite wonderful.
"Iwas engaged to Cruikshank once," said she.
I wonder what it is in men to inspire such a smile as that. I think I know why she said it though. Since the other day she has done a thousand little things to please him. She said that to please him then, even though he was not there. When, then, the moment of pleasure had passed—for it had pleased her too to say it—she came back without delay to her gentle inquisition.
"Did she tell you anything about herself the other evening?" she asked.
"What does a woman tell an utter stranger about herself in ten minutes?" I replied. "For the matter of that what does she tell him in ten years?"
She glanced at me sharply.
"Not much, certainly, to an utter stranger," said she.
I swear to Heaven, she believes I have met Clarissa before.
"Well, I take it," said I, "that even after ten years a man is little better than that. How long have you been married to Cruikshank?"
"Seven."
"And do you think he knows you any better to-day?"
I watched with a smile the little frown that came wrinkling to her forehead. This was not at all what she wanted to talk about. It did not interest her in the least. From the moment that I had mentioned Clarissa's name, she had hoped that I was about to confide in her the whole story. To that end she had taken the conversation most gently by the hand and was leading it persuasively as you lead a wilful child. But it had struggled free, and with my assistance had set off in an utterly unexpected direction. She was standing there, watching it, as it wandered out of sight. No wonder she was annoyed. For that matter, no wonder I smiled. I had done it, and nothing but force could bring it back again into the path where most she needed it. Now, force is no argument with a woman. She only makes use of it when everything else fails; then she breaks into tears or fans the storm of her anger till the clouds are heavy in her face, and the flashes of her eyes are more dangerous than any lightning.
But everything had not failed her. If she had lost in her first endeavor, I am perfectly sure she felt confident of ultimate victory. The frown soon faded from her forehead and, in another moment, I found it hard to believe that I had secured a victory at all.
"Cruikshank's not a person who knows much about women in any case," said she at length. "I think you understand women better than any man I've ever met."
Well—there was my victory gone from me for ever. It was the delivering up of her sword, of course, but she had sharpened her dagger on it before she placed it in my hands.
"But Cruikshank understands flowers," she went on, "and they are better than any woman. Come and see the cottage I told you about with the bit of field he's going to make into a garden. Or—I'm sorry—perhaps you want to read your letter!"
"That can wait," said I. "I'd sooner see the cottage." At which, both knowing it to be a most excellent lie, we smiled each to the other and set off through the garden.
Up a narrow boreen, banked on each side by low walls of grass-sod and stone where grew violets and primroses in the company of moss and ladder fern, we made our way to Cruikshank's little cottage on the high land above Ballysheen. Here there are fields of young wheat, breaking in brilliant green through the stony, unpromising ground. There are fields of pasture, too, that stretch away to the sheer cliff's edge where the sheep browse and the gulls go circling all day long. So high are you there, that only a mere ribbon strip of the far sea is visible, but the muted sound of it as it swells upon the rocks, comes to your ears in a sonorous sibilant note, which grows and grows into the very music of the place. So swiftly do your ears become attuned to it, that soon you hear no sound of it at all; it is all one motive of the great, still symphony of Silence which Nature is forever playing on her thousand instruments of string and reed.
We had walked some distance without exchanging a word, when Bellwattle stopped and pointed to a small thatched roof that rose above a hollow in the undulating land.
"That's the place," said she.
I stood awhile and looked at it from there. It was the only habitation within sight. Great lines of gorse bushes clustered all around it, dipping down out of view into the hollow below. High above it in the clear air a kestrel hawk hung poised upon the wind and far away along the near line of the land's horizon a man was driving a team of horses with his harrow, while in his wake there followed a glittering white mass of hungry sea-birds, twisting and turning in the air like myriads of paper pieces tossing in the wind.
"Is it always like this?" I asked presently. "Always as big and broad and grand?"
"Always."
"What a brave blast of yellow there will be when the gorse is out!"
"But has color got sound?" said she.
"Sound! Why, when that gorse is all in blossom, it'll be like a thousand silver trumpets ringing their voices all day long."
"And the heather—when that's out? All this place is one mass of purple. What sound has that?"
I shook my head and laughed. It is the habit I have noticed in her before, that habit of taking one too literally when one's mood is serious.
"You're asking me more than I can tell you," said I. "I'm no expert in the classification of colors with the sound of instruments. You'll hear the note of it in your own heart if you listen well enough."
A pensive look came into her eyes. I thought she was trying to see the heather in bloom, to hear in the heart of her that deep warm note of sound which the wealth of its color plays into one's ears. She was endeavoring nothing of the kind; for suddenly she turned to me and, in the most ingenuous way in the world, she asked me why I had never married.
"In the name of God!" said I, "what's that got to do with it?"
"You ought to have married," she continued. "If women have heard you talk about things like that—the heather and the gorse—they must have wanted to marry you."
"I'll try to see the logic of that," I replied, laughing. "I'll try, during the next few days, and then I'll tell you why no woman has ever entertained such feelings of regard for me. Let's go on to the cottage."
Now, how is one to reconcile that with what she said to Cruikshank? I give it up. I shall make no further effort to understand her.
At the end of the boreen there was a gate. Its rusty hinges whistled the lilt of an air as I swung it open—that air which is a part of the great symphony we hear all round us. Then we were out in the open fields; the springy sea-turf was bending beneath our feet. Far on and away the rugged curves of the coast-line wound themselves to the horizon, with here and there a sleepy headland dipping its nose into the glittering sea. For a moment or two the sheep turned their heads to look at us, then, moving away with slowly wandering steps, they continued their browsing.
It was here I stood still again. The kestrel had dropped down the wind and was vanished out of sight. Only the gulls were left, sweeping their endless circles against the blue radiance of the sky. Here and there a frightened sand-martin, darting swiftly through the light, hurried over the edge of the cliff to his home, as though he knew a hawk were near at hand.
After a long silence, I turned to Bellwattle and confessed that she was right.
"Right? About what?" she asked.
"All that you have said when you talked about living in cities—compared to this. This is where to live—fair weather and foul, this is the only sort of place to solve the riddle."
"What riddle?"
"Of why it should be that we must live at all. In a place like this, everything answers it. You're quite right; it's not worth living when you only live to forget that you're alive. Here everything calls to you to remember. 'Remember' is the word. Being conscious is only a stock phrase. People use it in little art circles in London. 'Remember' is the word. Listen to that gull—that's calling to you; listen to the sea—every time a wave breaks, it's the world drawing in its breath. Pavements and houses aren't alive like that. I try in London sometimes to think that the houses talk to each other—but how can they talk if they never draw a breath! Look at the sky! Look at the sea! You're absolutely right—it's impossible to forget here. I'd give all I know to live in that little cottage there in the hollow and remember the whole day long, the whole year round. But—"
"But what?"
She laid her hand on my arm again.
"It's not to be thought of," said I.
"But Cruikshank does it," said she. "Why shouldn't you? Is the cottage too small for your fifteen hundred a year? It has four rooms in it. We'd let you have it. You could make the garden instead of Cruikshank. Things would grow in that hollow—I'm sure they would. Why is it not to be thought of?"
I had the temerity to lay my hand on hers, which still was resting on my arm.
"Cruikshank does it," said I; "but then, have you forgotten—"
"Forgotten what?"
"'It is not good for man to live alone.'"
She looked at me long and earnestly. I could see it in her eyes that she would offer to help me by every means within her power. But the futility of it must have been as apparent to her as it was to me, for though her eyes were full of eloquence, she said nothing.
"Now do you understand why I live in London?" I continued. "Why I find company and humanity in crowds? Nearly every morning I sit in the Park and make up stories about the different people who pass by." Suddenly, again, I thought of my electrician and his little nursery maid. "Sometimes," I added, "they make them up for me. I have nothing to do but sit there and look on. It's better than theatres or restaurants. You mustn't think I find them the only resources of life in a city. Certainly restaurants are my theatres sometimes. The whole business is very much like a 'Punch and Judy' show. You can set it up at the corner of any street you like. When you come over to London—if you ever do—I'll take you round and show you some of my little theatres. They are all over the place. Charing Cross Gardens when the band plays—that's one of the best I know; or any A.B.C. shop at lunch time."
I looked at her and laughed. I could not help it. Her face was so serious.
"Well—now do you see?" I concluded; "when you're alone, forgetting is probably the best thing to do, and some ways of doing it are better than others."
For a moment she answered my look, then my laughter, after which, a notion suddenly seizing her, she left me.
"I'm just going into the cottage," said she. "No—you stay there. Sit down on the grass and read your letter," and she was gone.
My obedience was not implicit. I did not sit down. Instead I walked to the cliff's edge, and there, with all the steep fortresses of rock below me, shelving down battlement by battlement to the sea, I took Clarissa's letter from my pocket and read it.
They may have taught her many things, those two old maiden aunts, but they have not yet taught her to write or spell. It was the quaintest letter I think I have ever seen.
"Dear mister Bellairs," it ran. And how it ran! A spider's legs dipped well in ink would scarcely run more wild."Theer is a place out on the clifs ware I went wunse with him. I shall be theer on friday at twelve o'clock. the miss Fennells are going into yawl it is past the furst hed of the clifs. Clarissa."
"Dear mister Bellairs," it ran. And how it ran! A spider's legs dipped well in ink would scarcely run more wild.
"Theer is a place out on the clifs ware I went wunse with him. I shall be theer on friday at twelve o'clock. the miss Fennells are going into yawl it is past the furst hed of the clifs. Clarissa."
That was all; but it was enough. It was more than enough. I had not hoped for so much. And yet, as I thought of her readiness to comply with my request, I realized how greatly it proved her love for that worthless young cub in London. For her, a prisoner, she was risking much, just to hear word of him.
"Will she ever listen to what I have to tell her?" said I, and, hearing my voice, Dandy came out of a rabbit-hole and looked up into my face.
"There's a rabbit hiding down there," said he.
"I don't care a damn about your rabbit," I exclaimed. "Will she listen to me—that's what I want to know?"