Читать книгу The Vision Splendid (D. K. Broster) (Literary Thoughts Edition) - D. K. Broster - Страница 20

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The Rector breakfasted alone next morning. Miss Horatia was very tired; she might not be down till the afternoon; she would sleep if she could. Recognising this as an indication that she did not wish for a visit from him, Mr. Grenville with a heavy heart tried, in succession, to tackle his next Sunday's sermon, to furbish up an old one, to read the violent article on Clerical Farmers in the last number of the Gentleman's Magazine, to compose an answer to it, and to rearrange some of his coins. In the afternoon he had to attend a meeting of magistrates at a distance. He wondered if he should see Horatia before he started. Never before had a dance kept her in bed next morning.

Just as the gig came round for him she appeared, wearing a hat and carrying a basket. All traces of last night's emotion had vanished.

"Good morning, or rather, good afternoon, dear Papa," she said very cheerfully, kissing him. "Am I not late? But I was so tired last night. Where are you going to? Oh, I had forgotten. I am going to old Mrs. Dawes; and if there are any blackberries ripe I shall take her some. She says they are good for the rheumatics. I don't believe her. Good-bye, darling...."

The wheels of the gig grated on the drive, and Mr. Grenville turned round to wave a farewell, but without his usual smile. He looked worried, poor dear. How could she best efface the memory of last night's self-betrayal from his mind? Obviously best by a cheerful, a very cheerful demeanour, such as she had already attempted. She had forgotten in truth that her father was going to this meeting; there was then no need for her to leave the house this afternoon – her motive in so doing being to gain a little respite before he should question her, as he very well might. But since she had told him that she was going, go she would. As well begin the usual life at once. Mrs. Dawes would detail her symptoms at length, and that would serve as a temporary distraction.

This indeed the old dame did with much thoroughness and repetition, after which she seemed disposed for general conversation.

"That there French count, Miss; a likely young gentleman, I hears; he be gone from these parts now, bain't he?"

"I believe so," said Horatia. "But you were telling me about your grandson?"

"John, he seed him riding droo the village on Mr. 'Ungerford's 'orse," pursued Mrs. Dawes, not to be turned aside. "He ride proper, John says; and he wur surprised fit to bust hisself, John wur."

"Why?"

"The Count being a foreigner, Miss, and a Papist. I don't hold with no foreigners; a bloody-minded set, I calls 'em. Look at that Bonyparty as cut off the 'eads of the King and Queen of France. I mind how the year that you was born, Miss 'Oratia..."

It was nearly six o'clock when Horatia emerged from Mrs. Dawes' cottage. She was surprised to find the invasion of twilight already begun, and an enormous yellow moon looking at her through the tree-trunks. Yet she was in no haste to return home, but loitered along the road, picking a few blackberries as she went. One or two villagers passed her, and their evening salutations rang heartily on the still air. "Rector, he'll be having a rare treat to-morrow," was the comment of one, but Horatia overheard Whitehead, the smith, a melancholy personage, who passed at the same time, opine that, "them berries was mortal bad for the innards, and did get in atween a man's teeth like so much grit."

After him there was silence; only a few far-away sounds from the village reached her. The grass at the edge of the road was already damp. It was time to return.

In the Rectory the lamps would be lighted; her father would be back, and he, who always heard her step, would come out of his study and say, "Well, my dear, and how is Mrs. Dawes?" It would be chilly enough to have a fire after supper, and she would sit with him, and talk to him; or, if he had not finished his letters, she would go on with the last series of The Tales of a Grandfather. And Dash, on the hearthrug, would whimper in his sleep because he had dreams of rabbits which he never caught....

And it would be the same to-morrow, and the next day. Once she had loved it – that other Horatia only a few days dead, who seemed so strange to her now, had chosen it. Now ... how should she bear it! how should she bear it!

She moved on very slowly. Strange, dim scents came out of the hedgerows; a bird fluttered in an elder-bush. How early the moon was rising! The sky just overhead seemed still the sky of day. It was pain, this peace and beauty ... and it was not peace. The quiet country lane, the pure, still sky, were all athrill with expectation.

Or was it she herself? But what had she to expect? Nothing – nothing again, for ever.

... So they had noticed how well he rode – foolish, oddly comforting reflection. She thought how he had passed her on Tristram's horse that afternoon – only a fortnight ago – how he had ridden into her life, and out of it again. That was a romantic phrase and delightful to read in a book, but in real life it had no glamour; the fact enshrined in it was too bitingly real. Unwanted, unsummoned, there came into her head –

"It was a' for our rightfu' King

We left fair Scotland's strand;

It was a' for our rightfu' King

We e'er saw Irish land,

My dear –

We e'er saw Irish land.

"He turn'd him right and round about

Upon the Irish shore;

And gae his bridle-reins a shake,

With, Adieu for evermore,

My dear –

With, Adieu for evermore!"

And on the heels of the lines, a mocking commentary, came floating Sir Walter's version –

"A lightsome eye, a soldier's mien,

A feather of the blue,

A doublet of the Lincoln green –

No more of me ye knew,

My Love!

No more of me ye knew!"

Yes, that was all she had known ... O, how foolish, foolish she was – a silly sentimental girl of the kind that she most despised! Yet, if only she had never seen him!

And at that moment Armand de la Roche-Guyon came round the corner of the road.

Horatia stood still, petrified. It was as if her thoughts had taken body, for he was gone – how could he be here ... walking rapidly towards her like this, bareheaded – flesh and blood. Before her heart had recovered its broken pulsations he was up to her.

"What, are you not gone?" she faltered.

"They told me you had walked this way," he said rapidly in his own tongue. "I have been to the Rectory; you were not there. I could not go – mon Dieu, I could not go.... Give me your basket; let us go back by the field path; it is close here."

She gave him the basket without a word, suffocated by the tumult in her heart, and dominated by the change in him, by the ardour and purpose which radiated from him, making him seem taller and even more desirable. He had the air of a young conqueror; but he was unsmiling, which was rare. Now she knew what the night had been trying to tell her....

They came in a moment to the gap in the hedge, by the oak-tree, an unauthorised way of attaining the field-path. It seemed right that he should know of it, though little less than a miracle. He held aside the twigs and brambles so that she could pass. And when she had stepped through everything was clear to her, and she knew that in entering the shorn September field, lit with its low yellow moon, she had come into another country, dazzlingly strange, but her inheritance, her home. She half turned, and was caught in Armand's arms, her lips to his; and thus, beneath a tree, in the gloaming, like any village girl, did Horatia Grenville, who cared not for love, give and receive her first kiss.

Behind her, for a wonder and a benediction, hung the great luminous shield of the harvest moon, and the scattered blackberries lay among the leaves and stubble, like a sacrifice to joys unfathomed.