Fortis imaginatio venerat casum.
CATHLEEN replied:
"I think you are hard on your mother. You love her too well to judge
her, but you read yourself into her. You do that with me too, and I am
sometimes alarmed when I think how I may disappoint you. But then I
trust you so completely. You give so much that what you give turns at
once into a gift from me to you, and that makes me give too. So it
goes on like rain and cloud and river. Don't try to upset your little
family. They won't like it. Keep all the upsetting for me. I love it
and need it constantly."
He was very happy with this letter, carried it in his pocket and
fingered it continually. Under its influence he ceased to chafe
against his surroundings, and made no further attempt to force himself
on his mother, and in her shy way she seemed to take pleasure in his
exuberance.
The Edinburgh attorney sent an advance of £100. He posted £20 to
Kilner, and besought him to leave Mitcham Mews and find a studio or go
down into the country. Another twenty he sent to Lotta for Ann. He
bought his mother an Indian shawl and provided Elsie with two dresses,
tailor-made. The children were taken to a toy shop and allowed to
select three treasures each. Little George hesitated for a long time
between a helmet and a whip, and finally chose the latter because his
small brother was no good as a soldier, but quite fair as a horse.
When René announced that he must go, George declared that they would
"make an evening of it," and they played bridge until ten, and then in
the parlor Mrs. Fourmy drew soft music from the old piano with its
yellow keys. Under her hand the beauty of the Moonlight Sonata seemed
faded, and René thought sadly that it was like the beauty of her life,
faded and gone to dust. And as she played he took down the old family
copy of Shakespeare, a vulgar edition spoiled with colored portraits
of actors and actresses. He opened it at random and his eyes fell on
these words:
Fear no more the heat o' the sun
Nor the furious winter's rages:
Thou thy worldly task hast done,
Home art gone and ta'en thy wages:
Golden lads and girls all must,
As chimney sweepers, come to dust.
And tears came to his eyes, and he was filled with love and
appreciation for these good kinsfolk of his who found such wealth in
their little happiness and were so easily consoled in their little
sorrows. And in the music it seemed that he and his mother could meet,
had found a language which both could understand, a song to unite
passionate acceptance and passionate denial in the peace of the soul.
George said he never did think much of classical music, and asked
Elsie to sing his favorite song: "Poppyland."