Читать книгу Memoirs of a Fox-hunting Man - Siegfried Sassoon - Страница 7

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Although, in my mind’s eye, that first pony is clearly visible to me, I am not going to delay my already slow progress toward fox-hunting by describing him in detail. It will be sufficient if I quote Dixon, who called him ‘a perfect picture of a miniature hunter.’ His name was Rob Roy, and I thought him the most wonderful pony in the world. Nimble and lightly built, his courageous character never caused him to behave with more than an attractive friskiness. My devotion to him was therefore well justified. But as I sit here reconstructing my life from those remote beginnings, which are so difficult to recover in their authentic aliveness, I cannot help suspecting that I was, by nature, only half a sportsman. Dixon did his best for me as he patiently coaxed me toward my first fence (the idea of ‘jumping’ made me horribly nervous for fully twelve months after I became a proud owner of horseflesh), but there must have been moments when he had grave doubts about my future as a horseman.

When I began my rides on Rob Roy, Dixon used to walk beside me. Our longest expedition led to a place about three miles from home. Down in the Weald were some large hop-farms, and the hop-kilns were interesting objects. It was unusual to find more than two hop-kilns on a farm; but there was one which had twenty, and its company of white cowls was clearly visible from our house on the hill. As a special treat Dixon used to take me down there. Sitting on Rob Roy at the side of the road I would count them over and over again, and Dixon would agree that it was a wonderful sight. I felt that almost anything might happen in a world which could show me twenty hop-kilns neatly arranged in one field.

It is no use pretending that I was anything else than a dreaming and unpractical boy. Perhaps my environment made me sensitive, but there was an ‘unmanly’ element in my nature which betrayed me into many blunders and secret humiliations. Somehow I could never acquire the knack of doing and saying the right thing: and my troubles were multiplied by an easily excited and emotional temperament. Was it this flaw in my character which led me to console my sense of unhappiness and failure by turning to that ideal companion whose existence I have already disclosed? The fantasies of childhood cannot be analysed or explained in the rational afterthoughts of experienced maturity. I am not attempting to explain that invisible but unforgotten playmate of mine. I can only say that he was a consolation which grew to spontaneous existence in my thoughts, and remained with me unfalteringly until gradually merged in the human presences which superseded him. When I say that he was superseded I mean that he faded out of my inward life when I went to school and came in crude contact with other boys. Among them he was obliterated but not replaced. In my memory I see him now as the only friend to whom I could confess my failures without a sense of shame. And what absurd little failures they were!

At this moment I can only recall a single instance, which happened about eighteen months after the arrival of Rob Roy. By that time I was going for rides of six or seven miles with Dixon, and the ‘leading-rein’ was a thing of the past. I was also having jumping lessons, over a small brush-fence which he had put up in the paddock. One day, inflated with pride, I petitioned, rather shyly, to be allowed to go for a ride by myself. Without consulting my aunt Dixon gave his permission; he seemed pleased, and entrusted me with the supreme responsibility of saddling and bridling the pony without his help. I managed to do this, in my bungling way, and I have no doubt that I felt extremely important when I tit-tupped down to the village in that sleepy afternoon sunshine of thirty years ago. Rob Roy probably shared my feeling of independence as he shook his little black head and whisked his long tail at the flies. I was far too big a man to look back as we turned out of my aunt’s white gate into the dusty high road; but I can imagine now the keen sensitive face of Dixon, and his reticent air of amusement as he watched us go out into the world by ourselves. My legs were then long enough to give me a pleasant feeling of security and mastery over my mount.

“Here we are, Rob,” I remarked aloud, “off for a jolly good day with the Dumborough.”

And, in spite of the fact that it was a hot August afternoon, I allowed my imagination to carry me on into fox-hunting adventures, during which I distinguished myself supremely, and received the brush from the Master after a tremendous gallop over hill and vale. I must mention that my knowledge of the chase was derived from two sources: firstly, the things I had heard in my conversation with Dixon; and secondly, a vague but diligent perusal of the novels of Surtees, whose humorous touches were almost entirely lost on me, since I accepted every word he wrote as a literal and serious transcription from life.

Anyhow, I had returned home with the brush and received the congratulations of Dixon when my attention was attracted by an extra green patch of clover-grass by the roadside: I was now about a mile beyond the village and nearly double that distance from home. It seemed to me that Rob must be in need of refreshment. So I dismounted and intimated to him that he ought to eat some grass. This he began to do without a moment’s delay. But there was mischief in Rob Roy that afternoon. With one knee bent he grabbed and munched at the grass with his diminutive muzzle as though he hadn’t had a meal for a month. Nevertheless, he must have been watching my movements with one of his large and intelligent eyes. With characteristic idiocy I left the reins dangling on his neck and stepped back a little way to admire him. The next moment he had kicked up his heels and was cantering down the road in the direction of his stable. It seemed to me the worst thing that could possibly have happened. It would take me years to live down the disgrace. Panic seized me as I imagined the disasters which must have overtaken Rob Roy on his way home—if he had gone home, which I scarcely dared to hope. Probably his knees were broken and I should never be able to look Dixon in the face again. In the meantime I must hurry as fast as my dismounted legs could carry me. If only I could catch sight of that wretched Rob Roy eating some more grass by the roadside! If only I hadn’t let him go! If only I could begin my ride all over again! How careful I would be!

Hot and flustered, I was running miserably toward the village when I turned a corner and saw, to my consternation, the narrow, stooping figure of Mr. Star. His eyes were on the ground, so I had time to slow down to a dignified walk. I advanced to meet him with all the nonchalance that I could muster at the moment. The silver-haired schoolmaster greeted me with his usual courtesy, as though he had forgotten that he had been attempting to teach me arithmetic and geography all the morning. But I was aware of the mild inquiry in his glance. If only I’d been carrying my green butterfly-net instead of the rather clumsy old hunting-crop of which I was usually so proud! I have never been a clever dissembler, so I have no doubt that my whole demeanour expressed the concealment of delinquency. Mr. Star removed his black, wideawake hat, wiped his forehead with a red handkerchief, and genially ejaculated, “Well, well; what a gloriously fine afternoon we are having!”

As I was unable to say anything at all in reply, he continued, with gentle jocularity (running his eyes over the brown corduroy riding-suit which I was just beginning to grow out of), “And what have you done with your pony? You look almost as if you’d lost him.”

At this appallingly intuitive comment I gazed guiltily down at my gaiters and muttered abruptly, “Oh, I’m going to take him out after tea; I was just out for a walk.”

My voice died unhappily away into the dusty sunshine.... After tea! For all I knew, darling Rob Roy might be dead by then.... For two pins I could have burst into tears at that moment, but I managed to control my feelings: Mr. Star tactfully informed me that he must be getting on his way, and our constrained interview ended. Half an hour afterwards I slunk into the stable-yard with a sinking heart. Dixon’s black retriever was dozing with his head out of his kennel under the walnut tree. No one seemed to be about. I could hear the usual intermittent snorts and stampings from inside the stable. There were two stalls and a loose-box. My pony occupied the stall in the middle. My heart thumped as I peeped over the door, the upper half of which was open. Rob Roy was facing me; he was attached to the ‘pillar-reins,’ still saddled and bridled. I am certain that his face wore a look of amusement. A sense of profound relief stole over me.... A moment later the stable-boy came whistling out of the barn with a bucket. On seeing me he grinned derisively and I retreated toward the house in dignified silence. As I passed the kitchen window Mrs. Sosburn, the fat, red-faced cook, dropped the cucumber which she was peeling and greeted me with a startled squeal.

“Lawks, Master Georgie, whatever ’ave you bin up to? The mistress ’as been in an awful state about you, and Dixon’s gone down to the village to look for you. We thought you must ’ave broke your neck when the pony came trotting back without you.”

And the well-meaning woman bustled officiously out to make sure I hadn’t any bones broken, followed by the gaping kitchen-maid; a moment later the parlour-maid came helter-skelter out of the pantry, and I was inundated by exasperating female curiosity and concern.

“Gracious goodness! To think of him going off by himself like that, and no wonder he got thrown off, and the wonder is he wasn’t killed, and the pony too,” they chorused; whereupon my aunt’s head popped out of an upper window and they clucked like hens as they reassured her about my undamaged return.

Infuriated by all this feminine fussiness I pushed past them and scurried up the back stairs to the schoolroom, whither Aunt Evelyn immediately followed me with additional exclamations and expostulations. I was now not only humiliated but sulky, and had I been a few years younger my rudeness would have ended in my being smacked and sent to bed. As it was I was merely informed that unless I learnt to behave better I should never grow up into a nice man, and was left alone with my tragic thoughts....

Next morning I paid my customary visit to the stable with a few lumps of sugar in my pocket. Dixon was polishing a stirrup-iron at the door of the little harness-room; he stopped in the middle of a jaunty snatch of song to give me his usual greeting. All my embarrassment faded out of me. His impassive face made not the slightest reference to yesterday’s calamity and this tactful silence more than ever assured me of his infinite superiority to those chattering females in the kitchen.