Читать книгу Far to Seek - Diver Maud - Страница 6

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"Those first affections,

Those shadowy recollections, …

Are yet the fountain-light of all our day;

Are yet the master-light of all our seeing."

—Wordsworth.

The blue rug under Roy's beech-tree was splashed with freckles of sunshine; freckles that were never still, because a fussy little wind kept swaying the top-most branches, where the youngest beech-leaves flickered, like golden-green butterflies bewitched by some malicious fairy, so that they could never fly into the sky till summer was over, and all the leaf butterflies in the world would be free to scamper with the wind.

That was Roy's foolish fancy as he lay full length, to the obvious detriment of his moral backbone—chin cupped in the hollow of his hands. Close beside him lay Prince, his golden retriever; so close that he could feel the dog's warm body through his thin shirt. At the foot of the tree, in a nest of pale cushions, sat his mother, in her apple-blossom sari and a silk dress like the lining of a shell. No jewels in the morning, except the star that fastened her sari on one shoulder and a slender gold bangle—never removed—the wedding-ring of her own land. The boy, mutely adoring, could, in some dim way, feel the harmony of those pale tones with the olive skin, faintly aglow, and the delicate arch of her eyebrows poised like outspread wings above the brown, limpid depths of her eyes. He could not tell that she was still little more than a girl; barely eight-and-twenty. For him she was ageless:—protector and playfellow, essence of all that was most real, yet most magical, in the home that was his world. Unknown to him, the Eastern mother in her was evoking, already, the Eastern spirit of worship in her son.

Very close to her nestled Tara, a vivid, eager slip of a girl, with wild-rose petals in her cheeks and blue hyacinths in her eyes and sunbeams tangled in her hair, that rippled to her waist in a mass almost too abundant for the small head and elfin face it framed. In temperament, she suggested a flame rather than a flower, this singularly vital child. She loved and she hated, she played and she quarrelled with an intensity, a singleness of aim, surprising and a little disquieting in a creature not yet nine. She was the despair of nurses and had never crossed swords with a governess, which was a merciful escape—for the governess. Juvenile fiction and fairy tales she frankly scorned. Legends of Asgard and Arthur, the virile tales of Rajputana and her warrior chiefs, she drank in as the earth drinks dew. Roy had a secret weakness for a happy ending—in his own phrase, "a beautiful marry." Tara's rebel spirit rose to tragedy as a flame leaps to the stars; and there was no lack of high tragedy in the records of Chitor—Queen of cities—thrice sacked by Moslem invaders; deserted at last, and left in ruins—a sacred relic of great days gone by.

This morning Rajputana held the field. Lilámani, with a thrill in her low voice, was half reading, half telling the adventures of Prithvi Raj (King of the Earth) and his Amazon Princess, Tara—the Star of Bednore: verily a star among women for beauty, wisdom, and courage. Many princes were rivals for her hand; but none would she call "lord" save the man who restored to her father the Kingdom snatched from him by an Afghan marauder. "On the faith of a Rajput, I will restore it," said Prithvi Raj. So, in the faith of a Rajputni, she married him:—and together, by a daring device, they fulfilled her vow.

Here, indeed, was Roy's 'beautiful marry,' fit prelude for the tale of that heroic pair. For in life—Lilámani told them—marriage is the beginning, not the end. That is only for fairy tales.

And close against her shoulder, listening entranced, sat the child Tara, with her wild-flower face and the flickering star in her heart—a creature born out of time into an unromantic world; hands clasped round her upraised knees, her wide eyes gazing past the bluebells and the beech-leaves at some fanciful inner vision of it all; lost in it, as Roy was lost in contemplation of his Mother's face. …

And this unorthodox fashion of imbibing knowledge in the very lap of the Earth Mother, was Lilámani Sinclair's impracticable idea of 'giving lessons'! Shades of Aunt Jane! Of governess and copy-books and rulers!

Happily for all three, Lady Roscoe never desecrated their paradise in the flesh. She was aware that her very regrettable sister-in-law had 'queer notions' and had flatly refused to engage a governess of high qualifications chosen by herself; but the half was not told her. It never is told to those who condemn on principle what they cannot understand. At their coming all the little private gateways into the delectable Garden of Intimacy shut with a gentle, decisive click. So it was with Jane Roscoe, as worthy and unlikeable a woman as ever organised a household to perfection and alienated every member of her family.

The trouble was that she could not rest satisfied with this achievement. She was afflicted with a vehement desire—she called it a sense of duty—to organise the homes of her less capable relations. If they resented, they were written down ungrateful. And Nevil's ingratitude had become a byword. For Nevil Sinclair was that unaccountable, uncomfortable thing—an artist; which is to say he was no true Sinclair, but the son of his mother whose name he bore. No one, not even Jane, had succeeded in organising him—nor ever would.

So Lilámani carried on, unmolested, her miniature attempt at the forest school of an earlier day. Her simple programme included a good deal more than tales of heroism and adventure. This morning there had been rhythmical exercises, a lively interlude of 'sums without slates' and their poems—a great moment for Roy. Only by a superhuman effort he had kept his treasure locked inside him for two whole days. And his mother's surprise was genuine: not the acted surprise of grown-ups, that was so patent and so irritating and made them look so silly. The smile in her eyes as she listened had sent a warm tingly feeling all through him, as if the spring sunshine itself ran in his veins. Naturally he could not express it so; but he felt it so. And now, as he lay looking and listening, he felt it still. The wonder of her face and her voice, and all the many wonders that made her so beautiful, had hitherto been as much a part of him as the air he breathed. But this morning, in some dim way, things were different—and he could not tell why. …

His own puzzled thoughts and her face and her voice became entangled with the chivalrous story of Prithvi Raj holding court in his hill fortress with Tara—fit wife for a hero, since she could ride and fling a lance and bend a bow with the best of them. When Roy caught him up, he was in the midst of a great battle with his uncle, who had broken out in rebellion against the old Rana of Chitor.

"All day long they were fighting, and all night long they were lying awake beside great watch-fires, waiting till there came dawn to fight again. … "

His mother was telling, not reading now. He knew it at once from the change in her tone.

"And when evening came, what did Prithvi Raj? He was carelessly strolling over to the enemy's camp, carelessly walking into his Uncle's tent to ask if he is well, in spite of many wounds. And his uncle, full of surprise, made answer: 'Quite well, my child, since I have the pleasure to see you.' And when he heard that Prithvi had come even before eating any dinner, he gave orders for food: and they two, who were all day seeking each other's life, sat there together eating from one plate.

"'In the morning we will end our battle, Uncle,' said Prithvi Raj, when time came to go.

"'Very well, child, come early,' said Surájmul.

"So Prithvi Raj came early and put his Uncle's whole army to flight. But that was not enough. He must be driven from the kingdom. So when Prithvi heard that broken army was hiding in the depths of a mighty forest, there he went with his bravest horsemen, and suddenly, on a dark night, sprang into their midst. Then there was great shouting and fighting; and soon they came together, uncle and nephew, striking at each other, yet never hating, though they must make battle because of Chitor and the Kingdom of Mewar.

"To none would Suráj yield, but only to Prithvi, bravest of the brave. So suddenly in a loud voice he cried—'Stay the fight, nephew. If I am killed, no great matter. But if you are killed, what will become of Chitor? I would bear shame for ever.'

"By those generous words he made submission greater than victory. Uncle and nephew embraced, heart to heart, and all those who had been fighting each other sat down together in peace, because Surájmul, true Rajput, could not bring harm, even in anger, upon the sacred city of Chitor."

She paused—her eyes on Roy, who had lost his own puzzling sensations in the clash of the fight and its chivalrous climax.

"Oh, I love it," he said. "Is that all?"

"No, there is more."

"Is it sad?"

She shook her head at him—smiling.

"Yes, Roy. It is sad."

He wrinkled his forehead.

"Oh dear! I like it to end the nice way."

"But I am not making tales, Sonling. I am telling history."

Tara's head nudged her shoulder. "Go on—please," she murmured, resenting interruptions.

So Lilámani—still looking at Roy—told how Prithvi Raj went on his last quest to Mount Abu, to punish the chief, who had married his sister and was ill-treating her.

"In answer to her cry he went; and climbing her palace walls in the night, he gave sharp punishment to that undeserving prince. But when penance was over, his noble nature was ready, like before, to embrace and be friends. Only that mean one, not able to kill him in battle, put poison in the sweets he gave at parting and Prithvi ate them, thinking no harm. So when he came on the hill near his palace the evil work was done. Helpless he, the all-conqueror, sent word to Tara that he might see her before death. But even that could not be. And she, loyal wife, had only one thought in her heart. 'Can the blossom live when the tree is cut down?' Calm, without tears, she bade his weeping warriors build up the funeral pyre, putting the torch with her own hand. Then, before them all, she climbed on that couch of fire and went through the leaping scorching flames to meet her lord——"

The low clear voice fell silent—and the silence stayed. The vague thrill of a tragedy they could hardly grasp laid a spell upon the children. It made Roy feel as he did in Church, when the deepest notes of the organ quivered through him; and it brought a lump in his throat, which must be manfully swallowed down on account of being a boy. …

And suddenly the spell was broken by the voice of Roger the footman, who had approached noiselessly along the mossy track.

"If you please, m'lady, Sir Nevil sent word as Lord and Lady Roscoe 'ave arrived unexpected; and if convenient, can you come in?"

They all started visibly and their dream-world of desert and rose-red mountains and battle-fields and leaping flames shivered like a soap-bubble at the touch of a careless hand.

Lilámani rose, gentle and dignified. "Thank you, Roger. Tell Sir Nevil I am coming."

Roy suppressed a groan. The mere mention of Aunt Jane made one feel vaguely guilty. To his nimble fancy it was almost as if her very person had invaded their sanctuary, in her neat hard coat and skirt and her neat hard summer hat with its one fierce wing, that, disdaining the tenderness of curves, seemed to stab the air, as her eyes so often seemed to stab Roy's hyper-sensitive brain.

"Oh dear!" he sighed. "Will they stop for lunch?"

"I expect so."

He wrinkled his nose in a wicked grimace.

"Bad boy!" said Lilámani's lips, but her eyes said other things. He knew, and she knew that he knew how, in her heart, she shared his innate antagonism. Was it not of her own bestowing—a heritage of certain memories—ineffaceable, unforgiveable—during her early days of marriage? But in spite of that mutual knowledge, Roy was never allowed to speak disrespectfully of his formidable aunt.

"You can stay out and play till half-past twelve, not one minute later," she said—and left them to their own delectable devices.

Roy had been promoted to a silver watch on his eighth birthday, so he could be relied on; and he still enjoyed a private sense of importance when the fact was recognised.

Left alone they had only to pick up the threads of their game; a sort of interminable serial story, in which they lived and moved and had their being. But first Tara—in her own person—had a piece of news to impart. Hunching up her knees, she tilted back her head till it touched the satin-grey hole of the tree and all her hair lay shimmering against it like a stream of pale sunshine.

"What do you think?" she nodded at Roy with her elfin smile. "We've got a Boy-on-a-visit and his mother, from India. They came last night. He's rather a large boy."

"Is he nine?" Roy asked, standing up very straight and slim, a defensive gleam in his eye.

"He's ten and a half. And he looks bigger'n that. He goes to school. And he's been quite a lot in India."

"Not my India."

"I don't know. He called it 'Mballa. That letter I brought from Mummy was asking if she could bring them for tea."

"Well, I don't want him for tea. I don't like your Boy-on-a-visit. I'll tell Mummy."

"Oh, Roy—you mustn't." She made reproachful eyes at him. "Coz then I couldn't come. And he's quite nice—only rather lumpy. And you can't not like someb'dy you've never seen."

"I can, I often do." The possibility had only just occurred to him. He saw it as a distinction and made the most of it. "Course if you're going to make a fuss——"

Tara's eyes opened wider still. "Oh, Roy, you are——! 'Tisn't me that's making fusses."

Though Roy knew nothing as yet about woman and the last word, he instinctively took refuge in the masculine dignity that spurns descent to the dusty arena when it feels defeat in the air.

"Girls don't never fuss—do they?" he queried suavely. "Let's get on with the Game and not bother about your Boy-of-ten."

"And a half," Tara insisted tactlessly, with her sweetest smile. But when Roy chose to be impassive pin-pricks were thrown away on him.

"Where'd we stop?" he mused, ignoring her remark. "Oh—I know. The Knight was going forth to quest the Elephant with golden tusks for the High Tower Princess who wanted them in her crown. Why do Princesses always want what the knights can't find?"

Tara's feminine intuition leaped at a solution.

"I 'spec it's just to show off they are Princesses and to keep the Knights from bothering round.—So away he went and the Princess climbed up to her highest tower and waved her lily hand——"

In the same breath she, Tara, sprang to her feet and swung herself astride a downward sweeping branch just above Roy's head. There she perched like a slim blue flower, dangling her tan-stockinged legs and shaking her hair at him like golden rain. She was in one of her impish moods; reaction, perhaps—though she knew it not—from the high tragedy of that other Tara, her namesake, and the great greatest-possible grandmother of her adored 'Aunt Lila.' Suddenly a fresh impulse seized her. Clutching her bough, she leaned down and lightly ruffled his hair.

He started and looked reproachful. "Don't rumple me. I'm going."

"You needn't, if you don't want to," she cooed caressingly. "I'm going to the tipmost top to see out over the world. And the Princess doesn't care a bean about the Golden Tusks—truly."

"She's jolly pleased with the knight that finds them," said Roy with a deeper wisdom than he knew. "And you can't be stopped off quests that way. Come on, Prince."

At a bend in the mossy path, he looked back and she waved her lily hand.

To be alone in the deep of the wood in bluebell time was, for Roy, a sensation by itself. In a moment, you stepped through some unseen door straight into fairy-land—or was it a looking-glass world? For here the sky lay all around your feet in a shimmer of bluebells: and high overhead were domes of cool green light, where the sun came flickering and filtering through millions of leaves. Always, as far as he could remember, the magical feeling had been there. But this morning it came over him in a queer way. This morning—though he could not quite make it out—there was the Roy that felt and the Roy that knew he felt, just as there had suddenly been when he was watching his mother's face. And this magical world was his kingdom. In some far-off time, it would all be his very own. That uplifting thought eclipsed every other. …

Lost in one of his dreaming moods, he wandered on and on, with Prince at his heels. He forgot all about Tara and his knighthood and his quest; till suddenly—where the trees fell apart—his eye was arrested by twin shafts of sunlight that struck downward through the green gloom.

He caught his breath and stood still. "I've found them! The Golden Tusks!" he murmured ecstatically.

The pity was he couldn't carry them back with him as trophies. He could only watch them fascinated, wondering how you could explain what you didn't understand yourself. All he knew was that they made him feel 'dazzled inside,' and he wanted to watch them more.

It was beautiful out in the open with the sunshine pouring down and a big lazy white cloud tangled in tree-tops. So he flung himself on the moss, hands under his head, and lay there, Prince beside him, looking up, up into the far blue, listening to the swish and rustle of the wind talking secrets to the leaves, and all the tiny mysterious noises that make up the silence of a wood in summer.

And again he forgot about Tara and the Game and the silver watch that made him reliable. He simply lay there in a trance-like stillness, that was not of the West, absorbing it all, with his eyes and his dazzled brain and with every sentient nerve in his body. And again—as when his mother smiled her praise—the Spring sunshine itself seemed to flow through his veins. …

Suddenly he came alive and sat upright. Something was happening. The Golden Tusks had disappeared, and the domes of cool green light and the far blue sky and the lazy white cloud. Under the beeches it was almost twilight—a creepy twilight, as if a giant had blown out the sun. Was it really evening? Had he been asleep? Only his watch could answer that, and never had he loved it more dearly. No—it was daytime. Twenty past twelve—and he would be late——

A long rumbling growl, that seemed to shudder through the wood, so startled him that it set little hammers beating all over his body. Then the wind grew angrier—not whispering secrets now, but tearing at the tree-tops and lashing the branches this way and that. And every minute the wood grew darker, and the sky overhead was darkest of all—the colour of spilled ink. And there was Tara—his forgotten Princess—waiting for him in her high tower; or perhaps she had given up waiting and gone home.

"Come on, Prince," he said, "we must run!"

The sound of his own voice was vaguely comforting: but the moment he began to run, he felt as if some one—or Something—was running after him. He knew there was nothing. He knew it was babyish. But what could you do if your legs were in a fearful hurry of their own accord? Besides, Tara was waiting. Somehow Tara seemed the point of safety. He didn't believe she was ever afraid——

All in a moment the eerie darkness quivered and broke into startling light. Twigs and leaves and bluebell spears and tiny patterns of moss seemed to leap at him and vanish as he ran: and two minutes after, high above the agitated tree-tops, the thunder spoke. No mere growl now; but crash on crash that seemed to be tearing the sky in two and set the little hammers inside him beating faster than ever.

He had often watched storms from a window: but to be out in the very middle of one all alone was an adventure of the first magnitude. The grandeur and terror of it clutched at his heart and thrilled along his nerves as the thunder went rumbling and grumbling off to the other end of the world, leaving the wood so quiet and still that the little hammers inside seemed almost as loud as the plop-plop of the first big raindrops on the leaves. But, in spite of secret tremors, he wanted tremendously to hear the thunder speak again. The childish feeling of pursuit was gone. His legs that had been in such a fearful hurry, came to a sudden standstill; and he discovered, to his immense surprise, that he was back again——

There lay the rug and the cushions under the downward sweeping branches with their cascades of bright new leaves. No sign of Tara—and the heavy drops came faster, though they hardly amounted to a shower.

Flinging down bow and arrows, he ran under the tree and peered up into a maze of silver grey and young green. Still no sign.

"Tara!" he called. "Are you there?"

"'Course I am." Her disembodied voice had a ring of triumph. "I'm at the tipmost top. It's rather shaky, but scrumshous. Come up—quick!"

Craning his neck he could just see one leg and the edge of her frock. Temptation tugged at him; but he could not bear to disobey his mother—not because it was naughty, but it was her.

"I can't—now," he called back. "It's late and it's raining. You must come down."

"I will—if you come up."

"I tell you, I can't!"

"Only one little minute, Roy. The storm's rolling away. I can see miles and miles—to Farthest End."

Temptation tugged harder. You couldn't carry on an argument with one tan shoe and stocking and a flutter of blue frock, and he wanted badly to tell about the Golden Tusks. Should he go on alone, or should he climb up and fetch her——?

The answer to that came from the top of the tree. A crack, a rustle and a shriek from Tara, who seemed to be coming down faster than she cared about.

Another shriek. "Oh, Roy! I'm stuck! Do come!"

Stuck! She was dangling from the end of a jagged bough that had caught in her skirt as she fell. There she hung ignominiously—his High Tower Princess—her hair floating like seaweed, her hands clutching at the nearest branches that were too pliable for support. If her skirt should tear, or the bough should break——

"Keep stuck!" he commanded superfluously; and like a squirrel he sped up the great beech, its every foothold as familiar to him as the ground he walked on.

But to release her skirt and give her a hand he must trust himself on the jagged bough, hoping it would bear the double weight. It looked rather a dead one, and its sharp end was sticking through a hole in Tara's frock. He set foot on it cautiously and proffered a hand.

"Now—catch hold!" he said.

Agile as he, she swung herself up somehow and clutched at him with both hands. The half-dead bough, resenting these gymnastics, cracked ominously. There was a gasp, a scuffle. Roy hung on valiantly, dragging her nearer for a firmer foothold.

And suddenly down below Prince began to bark—a deep, booming note of welcome.

"Hullo, Roy!" It was his father's voice. "Are you murdering Tara up there? Come out of it!"

Roy, having lost his footing, was in no position to look down—or to disobey: and they proceeded to come out of it, with rather more haste than dignity.

Roy, swinging from a high branch for his final jump—a bit of pure bravado because he felt nervous inside—discovered, with mingled terror and joy, that his vagrant foot had narrowly shaved Aunt Jane's neat hard summer hat: Aunt Jane—of all people—at such a moment, when you couldn't properly explain. He half wished he had kicked the fierce little feather and broken its back——

He was on the ground now, shaking hands with her, his sensitive clean-cut face a mask of mere politeness: and Tara was standing by him—a jagged hole in her blue frock, a scratch across her cheek, and her hair ribbon gone—looking suspiciously as if he had been trying to murder her instead of doing her a knightly service.

She couldn't help it, of course. But still—it was a distinct score for Aunt Jane, who, as usual, went straight to the point.

"You nearly kicked my head just now. A little gentleman would apologise."

He did apologise—not with the best grace.

"My turn next," his father struck in. "What the dickens were you up to—tearing slices out of my finest tree!" His twinkly eyes were almost grave and his voice was almost stern. ("Just because of Aunt Jane!" thought Roy.)

Aloud he said: "I'm awfully sorry, Daddy. It was only … Tara got in a muddle. I had to help her."

The twinkle came back to his father's eyes.

"The woman tempted me!" was all he said; and Roy, hopelessly mystified, wondered how he could possibly know. It was very clever of him. But Aunt Jane seemed shocked.

"Nevil, be quiet!" she commanded in a crisp undertone; and Roy, simply hating her, pulled out his watch.

"We've got to hurry, Daddy. Mother said 'not later than half-past.' And it is later."

"Scoot, then. She'll be anxious because of the storm."

But though Roy, grasping Tara's hand, faithfully hurried ahead because of mother, he managed to keep just within earshot; and he listened shamelessly, because of Aunt Jane. You couldn't trust her. She didn't play fair. She would bite you behind your back. That's the kind of woman she was.

And this is what he heard.

"Nevil, it's perfectly disgraceful. Letting them run wild like that; damaging the trees and scaring the birds."

She meant the pheasants of course. No other winged beings were sacred in her eyes.

"Sorry, old girl. But they appear to survive it." (The cool good-humour of his father's tone was balm to Roy's heart.) "And frankly, with us, if it's a case of the children or the birds, the children win, hands down."

Aunt Jane snorted. You could call it nothing else. It was a sound peculiarly her own, and it implied unutterable things. Roy would have gloried had he known what a score for his father was that delicately implied identity with his wife.

But the snort was no admission of defeat.

"In my opinion—if it counts for anything," she persisted, "this harum-scarum state of things is quite as bad for the children as for the birds. I suppose you have a glimmering concern for the boy's future, as heir to the old place?"

Nevil Sinclair chuckled.

"By Jove! That's quite a bright idea. Really, Jane, you've a positive flair for the obvious."

(Roy hugely wanted to know what a "flair for the obvious" might be. His eager brain pounced on new words as a dog pounces on a bone.)

"I wish I could say the same for you," Lady Roscoe retorted unabashed. "The obvious, in this case—though you can't or won't see it—is that the boy is thoroughly spoilt, and in September he ought to go to school. You couldn't do better than Coombe Friars."

His father said something quickly in a low tone and he couldn't catch Aunt Jane's next remark. Evidently he was to hear no more. What he had heard was bad enough.

"I don't care. I jolly well won't," he said between his teeth—which looked as if Aunt Jane was not quite wrong about the spoiling.

"No, don't," said Tara, who had also listened without shame. And they hurried on in earnest.

"Tara," Roy whispered, suddenly recalling his quest. "I found the Golden Tusks. I'll tell it you after."

"Oh, Roy, you are a wonder!" She gave his hand a convulsive squeeze and they broke into a run.

The "bits of blue" had spread half over the sky. The thunder still grumbled to itself at intervals and a sharp little shower whipped out of a passing cloud. Then the sun flashed through it and the shadows crept round the great twin beeches on the lawn—and the day was as lovely as ever again.

And yet—for Roy, it was not the same loveliness. Aunt Jane's repeated threat of school brooded over his sensitive spirit, like the thundercloud in the wood that was the colour of spilled ink. And the Boy-of-ten—a potential enemy—was coming to tea. …

Yet this morning he had felt so beautifully sure that nothing could go wrong on a day like this! It was his first lesson, and not by any means his last, that Fate—unmoved by 'light of smiles or tears'—is no respecter of profound convictions or of beautiful days.