Читать книгу Yonder - E. H. Young - Страница 6

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Early on the Saturday morning when her father was expected to return, Theresa awoke and, quickly flinging off the bedclothes, sat up with a jerk. The busy fingers of the wind were tapping at the pane, calling her to come out and play, and from the bottom of the hill there rose a more imperative summons, the hooting of a steamer making her way out of the docks. It was high tide, and she smiled her pleasure, hugging her knees. Every day that sound was borne up to her on the hill, like a trumpet call to life. From the window of the bedroom which she shared with Grace she could see the ships, and she believed that cry of theirs was to give her greeting or farewell. The steamers spoke for themselves, but the sailing ships borrowed the voices of the tugs that took them down the river and even in the quiet and mystery of night they did not forget her. Lying awake, she would wave her hand to them, and as she stared at the square of dark sky framed in the window, she would fancy she looked upward from the deck of some sea-going ship, saw the sky streaked and crossed by the masts and yards above, or mistily, behind a waving flag of smoke. But that voice of the ships was more than the salute of friends; there were times when she heard it as a call, a command, or a sweet persuasion. It called her into the darkness of the night and the crash of storm, and then, for all she lay snug and safe in bed, she felt the wind buffeting her, tasted the salt on her lips; or, if the night were very still and warm, she thought she sailed under a sky of immeasurable blackness, pricked with stars. She heard the ship swishing through the water, black, too, as though mirroring the sky, heard the creaking sounds among the cordage and the spars, and the orders coming clear and loud into the darkness.

What a morning for going out to sea, with the wind fresh, the air smelling of all clean things, the sunlight gilding the world! Her eyes danced as she watched the clouds sailing past her window, driven by the lusty breeze; these were the boats of the sky—great galleons, little yachts, riding majestically or bobbing gaily across the blue.

She turned her head sharply to look at the sleeper by her side. "Grace!" she said, and shook her. "Grace! Wake up, you lazy thing! It's a fine day."

For answer, Grace's head was rolled from side to side, and her nose buried more deeply in the pillow.

"You're fat!" said Theresa, pricking a soft cheek with her forefinger; "fat, fat, fat!"

She flung herself on her back and looked at the ceiling. Across its rather dirty surface many cracks had spread themselves, and these furnished Theresa with the scene for an epic in which the adventures of a courageous family were described. The cracks represented roads, rushing rivers, and precipitous mountains, according to their shape and size, and all the weary way from the crack that began near the window to the safety of the damp stain by the door, that family had to travel. Each morning she led them a few miles across the waste and there was never a mile without excitement. There were storms at night when tents were blown down on their unhappy heads, and must be put up again with no light for guidance but the reason of a child of ten who alone remained unafraid; there were combined attacks on their camp by wolves and tigers, who seemed quite impervious to climate, when fires were lighted and each member of the party sat with a rifle across her knees; there were dust storms in the desert, and, not less swift and overwhelming, onslaughts by brigands clothed as Arabs and riding horses winged like Pegasus. Precipices must be scaled and swollen rivers crossed, but no life or battle was ever lost by this gallant company. They would reach their destination with little scathe, but so great was Theresa's interest that she could always preserve the necessary illusion and grow hot and cold with fear for them.

This morning she found she could not lose herself in these perils, for the boats were calling her too persistently; moreover, she must husband these adventures if they were to last until the dark mornings came, when the cracks would be invisible and she must rise by candlelight, so she gave Grace a parting thump and sprang out of bed.

As she stood at the window, she felt the delicious cold of the bare boards to her feet and the wind fluttering the frills of her nightgown. Holding her hands to her throat, she looked out on the untidy sloping garden with the old apple-tree at its foot. So close to the garden that, in the autumn, apples were found in its grass, the disused cemetery continued the descent, studded with grey, mossy stones and spreading willows—a place of ghosts—and, as if drawn thither by its eerie neighbourhood, a monumental stone-mason had his yard on the other side of the road at Theresa's right hand, a road running steeply to the busy street that edged the river and the docks. But if Theresa looked from her window, letting her eyes take flight over the river and the shipping and the level fields that lay on the further side, she saw a great stretch of meadow land which sought the clouds. It spread from left to right, for the whole width of her vision, and at night it seemed to stand up like a wall. The land behind that rampart seemed very far away, but not beyond her reach, and she meant to get there—not this morning, for the boats were calling to her, but on some day when spring flowers were appearing in the hedges.

She lowered her eyes to the shining intricacies of the waterways, the wide dock basins, the locks, the river and its arms, all spanned by bridges. She saw the masts of sailing ships rising from the midst of houses, like slender chimneys for these roofs of many colours and varying heights. There was dirty smoke issuing from tugs to throw a mourning veil over the water, there were shouts and whistlings and hootings, low-voiced warnings from the steamers, shrill shrieks of joy. "We're going! Look out!" they grunted, and then, on a cry, "We're free! We're free!" She could stay indoors no longer, and she pulled on her clothes.

When she reached the docks a sailing ship was in the river, following a little tug with a reproving grace, under which she hid her limitations from herself. There were men looking over her side and waving farewell with such attractive foreign gestures that Theresa stood close to the water's edge and gazed, with her hands tightly clasped behind her. The wind acted like a great fan on her hair, stirring it at its roots and flinging its long red fingers all about her head, thrumming, too, on her short skirts, lifting them with a twist, and whipping her tight-stockinged legs. She blinked the hair from her eyes or tossed it back with a movement of the head, and sometimes she held down her dress with strangely modest little hands, but she did all impatiently, worried by the necessity of remembering such things among the sights of these ocean-going ships, foreigners, and authoritative dockmen issuing orders.