At first the letter only presented itself to his imagination as an easy
way of punishing Pauline's hysteria. It seemed to him the very weapon
that was wanted to 'give her a lesson,' and after dinner he went across
to the Rectory and announced his news in front of everybody, asking
everybody if they did not think he ought to go and talking
enthusiastically of oriental adventure until quite late. He sternly
refused to allow himself a moment alone with Pauline in which to talk
over the plan; and, even when they were left alone together in the hall
he kissed her good-night hurriedly and silently and rather guiltily.
When Guy was back at home and thought about his behaviour, he began to
wonder if he had committed himself to Persia too finally. The prospect,
except so far as it would affect Pauline, had not really sunk into his
mind yet, but now as he read the letter over he began to think that he
really would like to go. It might mean a separation of two years but it
would reconcile him to his father and it would assure his marriage at
the end of the time. Persia might easily be almost as interesting as it
sounded, and how remote from debts looked Baghdad. If last year he had
been able practically to settle to be a schoolmaster, how much more
easily could this resolution be taken. Dreamily he let his imagination
play round the notion of Persia, dreamily and rather pleasantly it would
solve so many difficulties and it held the promise of so much active
romance.
Next morning Mrs. Grey sent round to ask if Guy would come to lunch
early enough to have a talk with her first.
"Yes ... charming.... I really wanted us to have a little talk
together," she said in nervous welcome, as she led the way to her own
sitting-room that with its red lacquer and its screen painted with birds
of paradise hid itself away in a corner of the house. Ordinarily Guy
would have accepted it as a sign of the highest favour to be brought to
her small room, but this morning it seemed to imprison him.
"Yes ... charming ... a little talk," said Mrs. Grey; and Guy while he
waited for her to begin, watched the mandarins that moved in absurd
reduplications all about her armchair's faded green pattern.
"Of course it was rather a surprize to us all last night ... yes ... I
expect it was a surprize to you. And you really think you ought to go?"
"I'm getting rather discouraged about poetry," Guy confessed. "I'm
beginning to think that what I've written isn't much good and that if I
am ever going to write anything worth while, it will be because I've
learnt to be less self-conscious about it. If I went to Persia with Sir
George Gascony I should probably be kept fairly busy and if there was
any poetry left in me after that, well, it might be good stuff."
"But you've not seen yet what people think of what you have written ...
no ... you see the poems haven't been published yet, which is very
vexing ... and so I thought ... I mean the Rector thought that if there
was any difficulty he would like to help you to publish them ... yes ...
rather than go away to Persia ... you know ... yes ... poor little
Pauline was crying nearly all night and I don't think you ought to go
away suddenly like this ... no ... and we couldn't find an atlas
anywhere!"
"You think I ought not to go?" said Guy, and he realized as he spoke
that he was disappointed.
"I do think that after all these months of hoping for your poems to be a
success that you ought at least to try them first, and then afterwards
we can talk about Persia. I'm afraid you think I've been too strict
about Pauline ... perhaps I have ... yes ... and so I think that now
Spring is here you can go out every day ... yes ... charming ... now
that the weather is getting better...."
But now every day, thought Guy bitterly, there would be recriminations
between them.
"Of course if you think I ought not to go, I won't," he said. "I'll
write to Comeragh and refuse."
"I'm sure you're glad, aren't you?"
"Oh, rather."
"We all understood why you thought you ought to go, and now I've another
plan ... yes ... charming.... I'm going to send Pauline away for a month
... with Miss Verney ... yes ... charming, charming plan ... and you
must make arrangements at once about your poems ... and then perhaps you
could give them to Pauline for her birthday...."
"But I don't think the Rector ought to pay for them," Guy objected.
"The Rector wants to pay for them. But of course he won't say anything
about it, and you will have to make the arrangements yourself."
"You're all so good to me, and I feel such a fraud," said Guy.
"You'd better make arrangements with the man you sent them to first ...
and Pauline needn't know anything about it ... and I shan't say I've
persuaded you not to go to China ... or else she will be worried ...
she's looking rather pale ... I think two or three weeks by the seaside
... Lyme Regis perhaps or Cromer ... Lyme Regis, I think, because the
trains to Folkestone have been torn out ... yes ... charming, charming."
After lunch Guy told Pauline in the garden that he had decided not to
accept the post he had been offered, and she was so obviously overjoyed
at his decision, that he no longer had the heart to feel the slightest
disappointment.
"Guy, I've been so stupid," she told him. "I've depressed you without
any reason, but I will come back from Scarborough quite well."
Guy began to laugh.
"Oh, why are you laughing?"
"Dearest, because I cannot make out where you really are going."
"Scarborough, because Miss Verney has chosen Scarborough."
They talked for a while of the letters that each would write to the
other and of what a Summer should follow that short parting, when every
day they would be together and when perhaps even such days as those at
Ladingford might come again.
"And you won't worry about anything all this time you're away?" Guy
asked.
"I won't, indeed I won't."
Guy went home to find a telegram from Comeragh saying that Sir George
Gascony had got appendicitis and would not be going to Persia for a
month or two at least. Yet he did not mention this telegram at the
Rectory when next day he came to say good-bye to Pauline, because he was
anxious to preserve the idea of his having vainly attempted to do
something, and when he sat alone in his orchard the same afternoon, he
had an emotion of something very near to relief that for a while there
would be no more heart-searchings and stress, no more misgivings and
reproaches and despairs. He was perfectly happy, sitting by himself in
the orchard and staring at the blackthorn by the margin of the stream.
_April_
Miss Verney was so droll at Scarborough and enjoyed herself so much that
Pauline in her pleasure at the success of what the old maid called their
'jaunt' really was able to put aside for the present her own
perplexities. The sands were empty at this season and the Spa unpopulous
except for a few residents. The wind blew inland from a sparkling sea,
while Miss Verney with bonnet all awry sitting in a draughty shelter
declared that somehow like this she pictured the Riviera; and when the
weather was too bad even for Miss Verney's azure dreams Pauline and she
sat cosily among the tropic shells and Berlin wool of their lodgings.
Long letters used to come every day from Guy, and long letters had to be
written by Pauline to him; while perpetually Miss Verney tinkled on with
marine tales that if no doubt nautically inaccurate had nevertheless a
fine flavour of salt water.
"I remember I was sitting in the parlour window at Southsea when a
regiment.... I remember a Captain in the Royal Marines.... I remember
how anxious my father was that I should have been a boy."
"Oh, dear Miss Verney, you can't remember that."
"Oh, yes, he invariably spoke of me as the Midshipman, I remember. I
would then have been about eight years of age ... pray give my very kind
regards to Mr. Guy and say how well we are both looking and what a
benefit this fine air is to be sure, and don't forget our little
expedition to the theatre. You must tell Mr. Guy the story of the piece.
He will certainly enjoy hearing about that very nice-mannered convict
who ... ah dear! how my poor father used to revel in the play."
Miss Verney's conversation scarcely ever stopped, and while Pauline was
writing letters it was always particularly brisk, but she used to enjoy
the accompaniment as she would have enjoyed the twittering of a bird. It
seemed to inspire her letters with the equable gaiety that Guy was so
glad to think was coming back to her. His own letters were invariably
cheerful, and Pauline began to count the days to the time when she would
see him again. Easter had gone by, and the weather was so steadily fine
that it was a pity not to be together. He wrote of primroses awaiting
her footsteps in the forest, of blue dog-violets and cowslips in the
hollows of Wychford down, of all the birds that were now arrived in
England, of the cuckoo's first call and of the first swallow seen.
_Come back soon, my own, my sweet,_ he wrote. _Come back and let
this winter be all forgotten. I climbed up to the top of the church
tower to-day, and oh, the tulips in your garden and oh, the
emptiness of that garden notwithstanding! Come back, my Pauline,
for you'll see the iris buds in the paddock and you've no idea of
the way in which that river of ours sparkles on these April
mornings. I wish I could tell you how remote this Winter already
has grown. It has crept out of memory like a dejected nightmare at
breakfast. You are never to think again about the stupid things
I've said about religion: think only, my dearest, that I hope
always for your faith. It would be dishonest of me to say that I
believe now exactly as you believe, but I want to believe like
that. Perhaps I'm illogical in writing this: perhaps all the time I
do believe. Forget too what I said about Confession. I would almost
go myself to prove my penitence (to you!), but I just can't bring
myself to do that, because for me it really would be useless and
would turn me against everything you count as holy. Forget all that
has cast a shadow on our love. Count it all as my heedlessness and
be confident that I alone was to blame. I would write more, but
letters are such impossible things for intimacy. Some people can
pour out their souls on paper: I can't. That's really what my poems
suffer from. I have been working at them again since you were away,
and they have a kind of coldness, a sort of awkward youthful
reserve. Perhaps that's better than youthful exuberance, and yet I
don't know. One can prune the too prodigal growth, but one can't
always be sure of having the prodigality when one has the maturity.
The metaphors seem to be getting rather tied up, and you must be
bored by now with my chattering criticism._
_Your mother came to tea yesterday and brought Monica. Margaret is
rather in seclusion at present on account of Richard's arrival, I
fancy. She's obviously dreading other people's notice. It is rather
a self-conscious business, this waiting for the arrival of someone
whom everybody expects is going to play such an important part in
her life. If we were separated now for two years, it would be
different; but I can see that Margaret is dreadfully afraid that
now, having at last made up her mind to marry Richard, she may not
care for him as much as she did. He must be a fine fellow. I'm
looking forward tremendously to his coming. Monica was perfectly
delightful yesterday, and grew quite excited in her nun-like way
over the ultimate decoration of Plashers Mead. Dear me, what taste
you all have got, and what a very great deal you've taught me! You
must most of all forget that I ever said a word against your
sisters. They have really equipped me in a way with a point of view
toward art. I tried to tell Monica so yesterday afternoon. In fact
we got on very well together. In a way, you know, she almost
appreciates you more than Margaret does. You represent her hope,
her ideal of the world. Worldly one, I must say good-night. Tell
Miss Verney with my love that all her cats send their best respects
and compliments and that Bellerophon particularly requests that his
mistress will bring back whatever fish is in season at Scarborough.
Oh, the funniest thing I've forgotten to tell you! Miss Peasey was
chased by some bullocks across the big field behind the orchard!
She was too priceless about it when she got home._
Pauline began to think it was impossible for her ever to have had the
least worry in the course of her engagement. This was the first time she
had been parted from Guy for more than a week during the whole of a
year, and there was something very reassuring in such an opportunity to
regard him like this so disinterestedly, to find that the separation was
having the traditional effect and to be positive that she was going to
meet him again at the end of April more in love than ever. Nevertheless
she was always aware of being grateful for the repose from problems, and
she did once or twice play with the idea of having perhaps made a
mistake in objecting to his going abroad. It was on occasions of doubt
like this that Pauline would try to impress Miss Verney with what
existence had already meant to her.
"I'm feeling so old, Miss Verney."
"Old, my dear? Oh, that cannot be true," exclaimed her friend.
"Falling very much in love does make one feel old," Pauline declared.
"Let me see," Miss Verney went on, "let me try to remember how I felt.
My impression is _now_ that when I was in love I felt much younger that
I do at present, but perhaps that is natural, for it is very nearly
thirty years ago since William and I parted."
"Is he still alive?"
"Oh, yes, he is still alive, but I have never seen him and he must be
wonderfully altered. Sometimes I think of all the days that have gone by
since we parted. It seems so strange to think of our lives being able to
go on, when once it seemed to both of us that life could not go on at
all if we were not together. It seems so strange to think of him eating
his lunch somewhere at the same time that somewhere else I am eating my
lunch. Who knows if he ever thinks of me, who knows indeed?"
"If anything happened to prevent our marriage," began Pauline
thoughtfully, and then was silent.
Miss Verney opened wide her pale blue eyes.
"And what could happen?" she asked grandly.
"I've no business to imagine such a thing, have I?"
"None whatever," said Miss Verney decidedly.
But had Miss Verney's love affair been complicated by anything more than
merely natural difficulties? Guy's debts and unsuccess were nothing in
comparison with other elements of disaccord ... and then Pauline pulled
herself up from brooding and resolutely forced her mind to contemplate a
happy Summer. Had she not just now been congratulating herself upon the
disappearance of all worries in this sea-air?
The time at Scarborough drew to a close, and about a week before her
birthday came the news of Richard's arrival from India. She and Miss
Verney packed up and were home in Wychford two days before they were
expected.
"Richard, how lovely to see you again," Pauline cried. "And oh, Richard,
I'm sure you've grown. Don't you think he has grown?" she demanded of
everybody. "Richard, how clever of you to grow when you're
twenty-seven."
It was really like old times to go babbling on like this, while Richard
sat and smiled encouragingly and spoke never a word.
"Coming for a stroll?" he asked.
"Oh, but I ought to see Guy first," she said. "Richard, I hope you like
Guy."
He nodded.
"Do you think he looks like a poet?"
"Never seen a poet before," said Richard.
"Oh, but like your idea of a poet?"
"Never thought much about poets," said Richard. "So you aren't coming
for a stroll?"
"I will to-morrow, but I must spend the sunset with Guy."
Guy was waiting for her by the paddock, and they floated downstream out
of reach of people. In their own peninsula they kissed away the absence
of twenty-two days.
"You look much better," said Guy critically.
"I'm perfectly well."
"And happy?"
She answered him with her eyes.
"Why, Pauline, I believe you're quite shy of me!"
She blushed.
"I really am a little, you know," she whispered. "Did you like Richard?
Oh, Guy, I hope you did."
"Of course I did."
"And, Guy, you don't mind if I go for a walk with him to-morrow morning?
You see, I know he's longing to hear about Margaret and himself."
"But you'll come out with me in the afternoon?"
"Why, of course."
"Then Richard may have the morning," said Guy. "And I hope you'll
arrange everything between him and Margaret so successfully that he
won't steal any more hours from me."
When Pauline had left Guy that evening she thought how strangely it had
been like meeting him for the first time all over again. Or rather it
was as if they had walked a long way down the wrong road and were now
beginning to walk somewhat tentatively along what she hoped was surely
the right road at last. Her duty was above all to help Guy with the
material burdens: she must never again let him think that his debts or
his prospects had any power to worry her. Merely most tactfully must she
try to keep him from extravagance, and, oh dear, how she hoped that he
had not bought her an expensive birthday present. It was too late to
say anything about it now, but if Guy had been wisely economical, how
happy she would be. How she hoped too that Richard had not brought home
from India a present that would annoy Margaret. Really it was a most
oppressive business, this week before her coming of age, for between
Guy's extravagance and Richard's ... well, it was really not so much bad
taste as Indian taste. She would love anything he gave her of course,
but perhaps he would consult beforehand with Margaret. Dear Richard, he
was so sweet and touching, and if only he had not brought her something
very elaborately carved. She met him next morning half way to Fairfield,
and two years were obliterated as she kept pace with his long stride
when they turned aside from the high road and tramped upward over the
grassy wold.
"Richard, isn't it very hot in India?"
He nodded.
"And didn't you ever get used to walking a bit more slowly in India?"
He laughed.
"You lazy little thing. I thought you and Aunt Verney had been in
training at Scarborough. Come on, let's sit down then."
They sat down, and Richard drew with his stick in the close turf.
"Is that your bridge?" Pauline asked with all the interest she could put
into her voice.
He laughed for a long time.
"Pauline, you villain, it's the beginning of Margaret's face!"
She clapped her hands.
"Oh, Richard, aren't I a villain? But, you know, it's not very
frightfully like anything, is it?"
"Pauline," he said suddenly in that sharp voice in which two years ago
he had entrusted his interests to her before he went away. "Pauline, is
Margaret going to marry me?"
"Why, of course she is, Richard."
"Has she spoken to you about me?"
"But you know she never speaks about her own affairs and that she can't
bear anybody else to speak of them to her."
"Then how do you know?" he asked.
"Well, perhaps because I'm so much in love with Guy," Pauline whispered.
"I don't see how that quite works. I'm a very dull sort of a chap after
that Guy of yours."
"But you're not at all," Pauline declared. "And if you take my advice
you won't think you're dull. You'll make Margaret marry you. Really I'm
sure that what she would like best is to be made to do something. You
see, she's a darling but she is just a very tiny little bit spoilt. You
mustn't be so patient with her. But, Richard dear, I know she loves you,
because she practically told Guy that she did."
"Guy?" he echoed looking rather indignant.
"Well, you must understand how sweet Margaret was to him about me. She
was so sympathetic, and really she practically brought about our
engagement. Oh, I do love her so, Richard, and I do want her to be happy
and I do know so dreadfully well that you are the very person to make
her happy."
"Pauline, you are a pink brick," he avowed.
And scarcely another word did he say for the rest of their walk.
Pauline went to Margaret's room that night and, after fidgeting all the
while her sister was undressing, suddenly plunged down beside her bed
and caught hold of her hand.
"Margaret, you're not to snub me, because I absolutely must speak. I
must beg you not to keep Richard waiting any longer. Do, my darling,
darling Margaret, do be kind to him and not so cold. He simply adores
you, and ... why, Margaret, you're crying ... oh, let me kiss you, my
Margaret, because you were so wonderful about Guy, and I've been a beast
to you and you must, you must be happy."
"If I could only love him as you love Guy," Margaret sighed between her
tears.
"You do really ... at least perhaps not quite as much. Oh, Margaret,
don't be angry with me if I whisper something to you: think how much you
would love him if you and he had ... Margaret, you know what I mean."
Pauline blew out the candle and rushed from the dark room; and lying
awake in her own bed, she fancied among the flowers of the Rectory such
fairy children for Margaret and herself, such fairy children dancing by
the margin of the river.
_May_
On the morning before Pauline's birthday Guy received a letter from
Michael Fane announcing abruptly his engagement and adding that on
account of worldly opposition he had been persuaded into a postponement
of his marriage for two months. Guy was rather ironically amused by the
serious manner in which Michael took so brief a delay, and he could not
help thinking how unreasonably impatient of trifles people with ample
private means often showed themselves. Michael wrote that he would like
to spend some of his probation at Plashers Mead and alluded to the
'luck' of his friend in being so near his Pauline.
Guy wrote a letter of congratulation, and then he put Michael's news out
of his mind in order to examine the two complete sets of the proofs of
his poems which had also arrived that morning. He was engaged in the
task of making rather a clumsy binding for them out of a piece of
stained vellum, when Richard Ford came round to Plashers Mead. Guy
welcomed him gladly, for besides the personal attraction he felt toward
this lean and silent engineer he perceived in the likelihood of
Richard's speedy marriage an earnest of his own. Somehow that marriage
was going to break the spell of inactivity, to which at the Rectory all
seemed to be subject and from which Guy was determined to keep Richard
free, even if it were necessary to shake him as continuously as tired
wanderers in the snow are shaken out of a dangerous sleep.
"I came round to consult with you about my present to Pauline
to-morrow," said Richard very solemnly. "I've brought round one or two
little things, so that you could give me your advice."
"Why, of course I will," said Guy.
"They're downstairs in the hall. I had some difficulty in explaining to
your housekeeper that I wasn't a pedlar."
In the hall was stacked a pile completely representative of the bazaar:
half-a-dozen shawls, the model of a temple, a carved table, some inlaid
stools, every sort of typical oriental gewgaw, in fact an agglomeration
that seemed to invite the smell of cheap incense for its effective
display.
"Godbold drove them over," Richard explained as he saw Guy's
astonishment. "Now look here, what's the best present for Pauline? You
see I'm not at all an artistic sort of chap, and I don't want to hoick
forward something that's going to be more of a nuisance than anything
else."
"It's really awfully difficult to choose," said Guy rather ambiguously.
Then he discovered a simple ivory paper-knife which he declared was just
the thing, having the happy thought that he would not cut the set of
proofs he was binding for Pauline, so that to-morrow Richard could have
the pleasure of beholding his gift put to immediate use.
"You've chosen the smallest thing of the lot," said the disappointed
donor. "You don't think a shawl as well?" he asked, holding up yards of
gaudy material.
"Well, candidly I think Pauline's too fair for that colour scheme, don't
you?"
"All right, the paper-knife. You don't mind if I leave these things here
till Godbold can fetch them away, and ... er.... I wish you'd choose
something for yourself. I've always taken a kind of interest in this
house, don't you know, and I've often thought about it in India."
"I'd like a gong," said Guy at once, and Richard was obviously gratified
by his quick choice, and still farther gratified when Guy suggested they
should sound it immediately outside the kitchen-door. Solemnly Richard
held it up in the passage, while Guy crashed forth a glorious clamour,
at the summons of which Miss Peasey came rushing out.
"Good gracious," she gasped. "I thought that dog Bob had jumped through
the window."
"This is a present for us from India," Guy shouted.
"Oh, that's extremely handsome, isn't it? Well now, I shall expect you
to be punctual in future for your meals. Dear me, yes, quite a variety,
I'm sure, after that measley bell."
The gong was given a prominent position in the bare hall, and Guy
invited Richard up to his own room. After the question of the presents
had been solved Richard was shy and silent again, and Guy found it very
hard to make conversation. Several times his visitor seemed on the point
of getting something off his mind, but when he was given an opportunity
for speech, he never accepted it. Desperate for a topic Guy showed him
the proofs of the poems and explained that he was binding them roughly
as his present to Pauline to-morrow.
"That's something I can't understand," said Richard intensely. "Writing!
It beats me!"
"Bridges would beat me," said Guy.
Richard looked quite cheerful at this notion and under the influence of
the encouragement he had received seemed at last on the point of getting
out what he wanted to say, but he could manage nothing more confidential
than a tug at his bristled fair moustache.
"When are you and Margaret going to be married?" Guy asked abruptly, for
of course he had guessed that it was Margaret's name which was
continually on the tip of his tongue.
"By Jove, there you are, I'm rather stumped," said Richard gloomily.
"You see the thing is ... well ... I suppose you know that when I
started off to India last June year, Margaret and I were sort of engaged
... at least I was certainly engaged to her, only she hadn't absolutely
made up her mind about me ... and of course that's just what you'd
expect would happen to a chap like me ... dash it all, Hazlewood, I'm
afraid to ask her again!"
"I don't think you need be," said Guy. "Of course we haven't discussed
you, except very indirectly," he hastily added, "but I'm positive that
Margaret is only waiting for you to ask her to marry her on some
definite day: on some definite day, Ford, that's the great thing to
remember."
"You mean I ought to say 'Margaret, will you marry me on the twelfth of
August, or the first of September?' That's your notion, is it?"
Guy nodded.
"By gad, I'll ask her to-day," said Richard.
"And you'll be engaged to-morrow," Guy prophesied.
"When are you and Pauline going to be married?"
Guy looked up quickly to see if the solid Richard were laughing at him,
but there was nothing in those steel-blue eyes except the most
benevolent enquiry.
"That's the question," said Guy. "Writing is not quite such a certainty
as bridge-building."
"You mean there's the difficulty of money? By Jove, that's bad luck,
isn't it? Still, you know, I expect that having the good fortune to have
Pauline in love with you ... well, I expect, you've got to expect a bit
of difficulty somewhere, you know. You know, Pauline was...." he stopped
and blinked at the window.
"Pauline's awfully fond of you," Guy said encouragingly.
"Hazlewood, that kid's been ... well, I can't express myself, you know,
but I'd ... well, I really can't talk about her."
"I understand though," said Guy. "Look here, you'll stay and have lunch
with me, and then we can go across to the Rectory afterwards."
Emotional subjects were tacitly put on one side to talk of the birds and
butterflies that one might expect to find round Wychford, of Miss Verney
and Godbold and other local characters, or of the prospects of the
cricket team that year. After lunch Guy put the unbound set of proofs in
his pocket and, launching the canoe, they floated down to the Rectory
paddock. Mrs. Grey and the girls were all in the garden picking purple
tulips, and Guy taking Pauline aside told her on what momentous quest
Richard was come, suggesting that he should occupy the Rector's
attention, while Pauline lured away her mother and Monica.
The Rector was sitting in the library hard at work, rubbing the fluff
from the anemone seeds with sand.
"And what can I do for you, Sir?" he asked.
"I thought you'd like to see the proofs of my poems," said Guy.
He laid the duplicates on the dusty table and tried to thank his patron
for what he had done. The Rector waved a clay pipe deprecatingly.
"You must thank Constance ... you must thank my wife, if you thank
anybody. But if I were you I shouldn't thank anybody till you find out
for certain that she's done you a service," he recommended with a
twinkle.
Guy laughed.
"Worrall doesn't want to publish until the Autumn."
The Rector made a face.
"All that time to wait for the verdict?"
"Time seems particularly hostile to me," Guy said.
"You'll have to tweak his forelock pretty hard."
"That's what I've come to consult you about. Do you think I ought to go
to Persia with Sir George Gascony? Mrs. Grey thought I oughtn't to take
so drastic a step until I had first tested my poems in public. But I've
been reading them through, and they don't somehow look quite as
important in print as they did in manuscript. I can't help feeling that
I ought to have a regular occupation. What do you really advise me to
do, Mr. Grey?"
The Rector held up his arms in mock dismay.
"Gracious goodness me, don't implicate a poor country parson in such
affairs! I can give you advice about flowers and I can pretend to give
you advice about your soul, but about the world, no, no."
"I think perhaps I'll get some journalistic work in town," Guy
suggested.
"Persia or journalism!" commented the Rector. "Well, well, they're both
famous for fairy tales. I recommend journalism as being nearer at hand."
"Then I'll take your advice."
"Oh, dear me, you must not involve me in such a responsibility. Now, if
you were a nice rational iris I would talk to you, but for a talented
young man with his life before him I shouldn't even be a good quack.
Come along, let's go out and look at the tulips."
"You _will_ glance through my poems?" Guy asked diffidently.
The Rector stood up and put his hand on the poet's shoulder.
"Of course I will, my dear boy, and you mustn't be deceived by the
manner of that shy old boor, the Rector of Wychford. Do what you think
you ought to do, and make my youngest daughter happy. We shall be having
her birthday before we know where we are."
"It's to-morrow!"
"Is it indeed? May Day. Of course. I remember last year I managed to
bloom Iris Lorteti. But this year, no! That wet May destroyed Iris
Lorteti. A delicate creature. Rose and brown. A delicate lovely
creature."
Guy and the Rector pored over the tulips a while where in serried
borders they displayed their sombre sheen of amaranth and amethyst: then
Guy strolled off to hear what was the news of Margaret and Richard.
Pauline came flying to meet him down one of the long straight
garden-paths.
"Darling, they are to be married early in August," she cried.
He caught her to him and kissed her, lest in the first poignant
realization of other people's joy she might seem to be escaping from him
utterly.
Guy had a few minutes with Margaret before he went home that evening,
and they walked beside the tulip borders, she tall and dark and
self-contained in the fading light being strangely suited by association
with such flowers.
"Dear Margaret," he said, "I want to tell you how tremendously I like
Richard. Now that sounds patronizing. But I'm speaking quite humbly.
These sort of Englishmen have been celebrated enough perhaps, and lately
there's been a tendency to laugh at them, but, my God, what is there on
earth like the Richards of England? Margaret, you once very rightly
reproved me for putting Pauline in a silver frame, do let me risk your
anger and beg you never to put yourself in a silver frame from which to
look out at Richard."
"You do rather understand me, don't you?" she said offering him her
hand.
"Help Pauline and me," he begged.
"Haven't I always helped you?"
"Not always, but you will now that you yourself are no longer uncertain
about your future. The moment you find yourself perfectly happy you'll
be longing for everyone else to be the same."
"But how haven't I helped you?" she persisted.
"It would be difficult to explain in definite words. But I don't think
my idea of your attitude toward us could have been entirely invented by
my fancy."
"What attitude? What do you mean, Guy?"
He shook his head.
"My dear, if you aren't conscious of it, I'm certainly not going to
attempt to put it into words and involve myself in such a net."
"How tantalizing you are!"
"No, I'm not. If you have the least inclination to think I may be right,
then you know what I mean and you can do what I ask. If you haven't the
least notion of what I mean, then it was all my fancy and I'm certainly
not going to give my baseless fancies away."
"This is all too cryptic," she murmured.
"Then let it remain undeciphered," he said smiling; and he led the
conversation more directly toward their marriage and the strangeness of
the Rectory without Margaret.
Richard spent the night at Plashers Mead, and Guy heard the halting
account of two years' uncertainty, of the bungalow that had been taken
and embowered against Margaret's coming, and of the way in which his
bridge had spanned not merely the river, but the very ocean, and even
time itself.
Pauline's birthday morning was cloudless, and Guy, though to himself he
was inclined to blame the action as weak, went to church and knelt
beside her. Then afterward there was the scene of breakfast on the lawn
that already with only this first repetition wore for him an immemorial
air, so that he could no longer imagine a May Day that was not thus
inaugurated. The presentation of his poems in proof had not a bit less
wonderful an effect than he had hoped, for Pauline could never finish
turning over the pages and loving the ludicrously tumbledown binding.
"Oh, it's so touching! I wish they could all be bound like this. And how
I adore Richard's paper-knife."
The four lovers disappeared after breakfast to enjoy the flashing May
Day, and Monica left alone with her mother looked a little sad, she,
the only one of those three lovely daughters of the Rectory still
undisturbed by the demands of the invading world.
May that year was like the fabled Spring of poets; and Guy and Pauline
were left free to enjoy the passionate and merry month as perhaps never
before had they enjoyed any season, not even that dreamed away fortnight
at Ladingford last year. They had ceased for a while with the engagement
of Richard and Margaret to be the central figures of the Rectory whether
for blame or commendation, and desiring nothing better than to be left
without interference they were lost in apple-blossom to every-day
existence. Guy with the prospect of his poems' appearing in the Autumn
felt that he was justified in forgetting responsibilities and, having
weathered the financial crisis of the March quarter, he had now nothing
to worry him until Midsummer. That was the date he had fixed upon in his
mind as suitable for making a determined attempt upon London. He had
planned to shut up Plashers Mead and to take a small room in Chelsea
whence he would conquer in a few months the material obstacles that
prevented their marriage. The poems now that they were in print seemed a
less certain talisman to fame; but they would serve their purpose,
indeed they had served their purpose already, for this long secluded
time would surely counterbalance the too easy victories of journalism.
He would surely by now have lost that spruce Oxford cleverness and might
fairly expect to earn his living with dignity. The least success would
justify his getting married, and Pauline would enjoy two years spent
high in some London attic within the sound of chirping sparrows and the
distant whispers of humanity. They would perhaps be able to afford to
fly for magic weeks to Plashers Mead, pastoral interludes in that
crowded life which lay ahead. How everything had resolved itself
latterly, and how this gift of glorious May should be accepted as the
intimate and dearest benefaction to their love. He and Pauline were
together from earliest morn to the last minute of these rich and shadowy
eves. They wreathed their boat with boughs of apple-blossom and went
farther up the river than they had ever gone. The cuckoo was still in
tune, and still the kingcups gilded all that hollow land: there was not
yet the lush growth of weeds and reeds that indolent June would use to
delay their dreaming progress: and still all the trees and all the
hedges danced with that first sharp green of Spring, that cold and
careless green of Spring.
Then when the hawthorn came into prodigal bloom, and all the rolling
country broke in endless waves of blossom, Pauline in her muslin dress
seemed like an airy joy sustained by all these multitudinous petals,
dancing upon this flowery tide, this sweet foam of May.
"My flower, my sweet, are you indeed mortal?" he whispered.
The texture of her sleeve against his was less tangible than the light
breeze that puffed idly from the South to where they sat enraptured upon
the damasked English grass. Apple-blossom powdered her lap and starred
her light brown hair, and around them like a Circean perfume drowning
the actual world hung the odorous thickets of hawthorn.
The month glided along until the time of ragged robins came round again,
and as if these flowers were positively of ill omen to Guy and Pauline,
Mrs. Grey suddenly took it into her head again that they were seeing too
much of each other.
"I said you could see Pauline every day," she told Guy. "But I did not
say all day."
"But I shall be going away soon," he said, "and it seems a pity to lose
any of this lovely month."
"I'm sure I'm right ... and I did not know you had really decided to go
away.... I'm sure, yes, I'm positive I'm right.... Why don't you be more
like Margaret and Richard ... they aren't together all day long ... no,
not all day."
"But Pauline is so different from Margaret," Guy argued.
"Yes, I know ... that's the reason ... she is too impulsive.... Yes,
it's much better not to be together all the time.... I'm glad you've
settled to go to London ... then perhaps you can be married next
year...."
A rule came into force again, and Guy began to feel the old exasperation
against the curb upon youth's leisure. Rather unjustly he blamed
Margaret, because he felt that the spectacle of her sedate affection
made his for Pauline appear too wild and Pauline herself beside Margaret
seem completely distraught with love.
It pleased Guy rather, and yet in a way it rather annoyed him that
Michael Fane should choose this moment to announce his intention of
spending some time at Plashers Mead. Perhaps a little of the doubt was
visible in his welcome, because Michael asked rather anxiously if he
were intruding upon the May idyll: Guy laughed off the slight
awkwardness and asked why Michael had not yet managed to get married.
They talked about the evils of procrastination, but Guy could not at all
see that Michael had much to complain of in a postponement of merely two
months. His friend, however, was evidently rather upset, and he could
not resist expatiating a little on his own grief with what Guy thought
was the petulance of the too fortunate man. The warm May nights lulled
them both and they used to pass pleasant evenings, leaning over the
stream while the bats and fern-owls flew across the face of the
decrescent moon; yet for Guy all the beauty of the season was more than
ever endowed with intolerable fugacity.
Pauline with Michael's arrival began to be moody again; would take no
kind of interest in Michael's engagement; would only begin to see again
the endless delays that hung so heavily round their marriage. Michael
was not at all in the way, for he spent all the time writing to his
lady-love, of whom he had told Guy really nothing; or he would sit in
the lengthening grass of the orchard and read books of poetry, the pages
of which used to wink with lucid reflections caught from the leaves of
the fruit-trees overhead.
Guy looked over his shoulder and saw that he was reading The Statue and
the Bust:
_So weeks grew months, years; gleam by gleam_
_The glory dropped from their youth and love,_
_And both perceived they had dreamed a dream;_
"That poem haunts me," exclaimed Guy with a shudder.
_Where is the use of the lip's red charm,_
_The heaven of hair, the pride of the brow,_
_And the blood that blues the inside arm--_
_Unless we turn, as the soul knows how,_
_The earthly gift to an end divine?_
"And yet I can't stop reading it," he sighed.
_How do their spirits pass, I wonder,_
_Nights and days in the narrow room?_
_Still, I suppose, they sit and ponder_
_What a gift life was, ages ago,_
_Six steps out of the chapel yonder._
On this Summer morning the words wrote themselves in fire across his
brain.
"They light the way to dusty death," he muttered over and over again,
when he had left Browning to Michael and flung himself face downward in
the orchard grass.
In despair of what a havoc time was making of their youth and their
love, that very afternoon he begged Pauline to meet him again now in
these dark nights of early Summer, now when soon he would be going away
from her.
"Going away?" she echoed in alarm. "I suppose that's the result of your
friend's visit."
Guy, however, was not going to surrender again, and he insisted that
when a month had passed he would indeed be gone from Plashers Mead. It
was nothing to do with Michael Fane: it was solely his own determination
to put an end to this unprofitable dalliance.
"But your poems? I thought that when your poems were published
everything would be all right."
"Oh, my poems," he scoffed. "They're valueless!"
"Guy!"
"They're mere decoration. They are trifles."
"I don't understand you."
"I care for nothing but to be married to you. For nothing, do you hear?
Pauline, everything is to be subordinate to that. I would even write and
beg my father to take me as a junior usher at Fox Hall for that. We must
be married soon. I can't bear to see Richard and Margaret sailing along
so calmly and quietly toward happiness."
In the end he persuaded her to make all sorts of opportunities to meet
him when no one else knew they were together. Even once most recklessly
on a warm and moonless night of May's languorous decline to June he took
her in the canoe far away up the river; and when they floated home dawn
was already glistening on the banks and on the prow of their ghostly
canoe. Through bird-song and rosy vapours she fled from him to her
silent room, while he stood in a trance and counted each dewy footstep
that with silver traceries marked her flight across the lawn.