Tree-Tops stood half-way up the hill, looking out across a terraced
garden. At the foot of the hill lay a plain, where hamlets nestled
beneath the wings of trees, and meadows washed about the shores of
yellow wheat-lands like green rivers in flood. In blue pastures, beyond
the edge of the horizon, white clouds wandered like browsing sheep.
The windows of Tree-Tops were latticed. The roof was thatched. It was
no more than a converted cottage. It blinked at you as though it wore
spectacles.
Behind it ran a Roman road, buried deep in the leaves of centuries. On
the brow of the hill was a legionaries' camp. To show where the road
ended a white cross had been cut, by turning back the sod from the
underlying chalk. Gathered about the camp in a half-circle, spreading
back for miles through uplands, was a beech-forest whose leaves
fluttered like green butterflies crucified on boughs of silver. Clouds
trailed slowly over it, or hung snared in its topmost branches.
Over the shoulder of the hill, immediately behind the Faun Man's house,
lay a golf-course with vivid squares of close-cropped turf from which
red flags waved angrily as poppies. Across the valley shone fields of
mustard, like sunlight falling in sudden patches.
The Faun Man puzzled Curious Corner. The village might have been named
in prophecy of his advent, with such extraordinary oddness did he
conduct his household. Like birds hopping in and out of a hedge,
his visitors came and went without knocking. Nobody tried to explain
anybody; no one at Tree-Tops thought explanation necessary.
The women were young and dashing; certainly they were not married to the
men. If they were wicked--which was never proved--they were decidedly
light-hearted.
By day they played golf and rode horseback. By night they sat in the
terraced garden, where fragrances wandered like old, sweet memories;
there, to the tinkling of banjos and mandolins, they sang till dusk had
brimmed the valleys and the moon sailed solitary. When their laughter
had grown tired, a light would spring up in a room beneath the thatch
where the Faun Man worked. Sometimes it would outstay the dawn. The
villagers watched these doings from a distance. They wagged their heads.
But if Tree-Tops had the reputation for being wild, there could be no
doubt that its master had money. He drove a four-in-hand from Oxford to
London. He rode a horse called Satan, which no one could manage; it had
killed two men already. And the money! He coined it with his pen--so it
was reported.
But the inhabitants of Curious Corner never guessed the motive of
all this frivolity: that the Faun Man wasn't really living--was only
distracting himself, till a woman with golden hair should nod, when life
would commence.
And the golden woman! Peter saw her often: in Oxford; when he cycled
out with Harry to Tree-Tops; during his vacations in London. He couldn't
believe what Harry told him--that she was cold and selfish. Everything
that she did was tender, from the caressing way she had of speaking to
the childish frankness with which she slipped her hand into his own
when she was happy. She made everyone love her and everyone forgive
her--everyone except Harry and Cherry. She had studied the art of
appearing adorable, so that what in others were faults in her took on
the glamour of attractions. She was so fond of the Faun Man--why didn't
she marry him? Peter didn't know. He gave it up--shrugged his shoulders.
Somewhere underground, as in his own life, the body of love lay buried.
In the stillness, did he listen, he could hear jealousy gnawing--gnawing
like a rat in the coffin of a dead princess. Once, in reading one of the
Faun Man's books, he came across a jotting in the margin, the thought of
which had no bearing on the text. It was as though thwarted longing had
cried aloud, suddenly becoming aware of its own tragedy. The sentence
read: “Life is slipping away from us. I have tried to make you love me.
And yet----.”
The bond of sympathy which existed between himself and the golden woman
increased in strength and knowledge. He could talk to her of so many
things concerning which he was silent to other people. Being in love, he
had to talk to someone. She was so wise in the advice she gave him. By
the patience with which she listened, she seemed to tell him that she
herself had endured the same indifference. How that could be he did not
understand. She encouraged him to make confession. It became a habit.
Perhaps the trust which he placed in her flattered her. It may have been
that his capacity for being so sheerly young tantalized her--she desired
above all things to be always young herself. Without doubt his implicit
faith in her goodness helped to silence her self-despisings.
But she was not above using their friendship as a means of provoking the
Faun Man. She would slip her arm about Peter's neck and say, “No chance
for you now, Lorie.”
Her lover's eyes would rest on her broodingly and film over, hiding his
thoughts, “Oh, well, I have Cherry.” Even though Cherry knew that it was
said in pretence, her face would grow radiant. It hurt Peter. He would
willingly have given the best years of his life to make her care for him
like that. It was then that he listened, and heard within himself the
gnawing of the rat of jealousy.
Cherry--he made no progress with her. She seemed to like him, and she
held him off. She avoided being left alone with him. In company there
were times when she treated him with intimacy--times when she ignored
him. While all his actions told her plainly that in his life she was the
supreme interest, she seemed to go out of her way to inform him, without
words, that in hers he was secondary. Then, when he had grown tired and
had almost determined to cure himself, she would do something unexpected
and considerate which kept him hoping. Only at parting did she allow
herself to appear glad of him. She had the power of chilling him with
her graciousness, while with her gray eyes she allured him. Cherry!
Cherry! Her name set all his world to music.
One day he found her alone at Tree-Tops. She had fallen asleep in the
bay-window, which looked out over the plain where the meadows flowed
smoothly and the wheat-fields ripened. The others had left her--had
gone over the shoulder of the hill to play golf. He had cycled out from
Oxford without warning. Climbing through the steep garden, busy with the
stir of birds and insects, he espied her curled up like a kitten among
the cushions, her eyes fast shut and her breath coming softly. He
stooped over her, tempted by the redness of her mouth. Her eyes
opened. She showed no embarrassment--made no attempt to brush away her
sleepiness. She did not move, but lay there meeting his gaze quietly.
He broke the silence. “Cherry, why do you always avoid touching me?
We're farther apart now than we were--were when we first met. I can't
surprise you any longer by telling you that I love you. And yet--and yet
to me it's still wonderful. Why do you always treat me as though I were
nothing?”
“Do I? I don't mean to.”
He sat down beside her and took her hand. “Shall I go away? If I went
away you might learn to miss me.”
She turned toward him gently. “Please, please, Peter, don't do that.”
“Then you do want me--you would miss me? I never know what you think of
me. You never tell me--never betray yourself.”
She let her fingers nestle in his hand. “There's only one Peter. Of
course I'd miss you. I don't need to tell you that. I like you very
much, Peter.”
He looked away across the unheeding country. “Like! Yes, but liking
isn't loving.”
Voices were heard and footsteps approaching. She sat up hurriedly,
smoothing out her dress. “I'd so much rather be friends. I'd be such a
good little friend to you, Peter, if you'd only be content with that.”
Content with that! He shook his head.
“Cherry, I couldn't.”
The Faun Man and the golden woman entered. They were laughing. “You
always treat me in public as if we were alone together. Really, Lorie, I
wish you----.”
Then she saw Peter seated close to Cherry. Her eyes saddened.