A DISCOVERY
The morning broke as fair, as blue-skied, as sunny, as the previous day
had been gloomy, grey-skied, and wet.
The song of a golden-throated lark was the first sound that Antony heard,
as he woke to find the early morning sunshine pouring through the open
casement window. He lay very still, listening to the flood of liquid
notes, and looking at the square of blue sky, seen through the window.
Now and again an ivy leaf tapped gently at the pane, stirred by a little
breeze blowing from the sea, and sweeping softly across buttercupped
meadow and gorse-grown moorland. Once a flight of rooks passed across the
square blue patch, and once a pigeon lighted for an instant on the
windowsill, to fly off again on swift, strong wings.
He lay there, drowsily content. For that day at least, there was a
pleasant idleness ahead of him, nothing but his own wants to attend to.
The morrow would see him armed with spade and rake, probably wrestling
with weeds, digging deep in the good brown earth, possibly mowing the
grass, and such like jobs as fall to the lot of an under-gardener. Antony
smiled to himself. Well, it would all come in the day's work, and the
day's work would be no novel master to him. The open air, whether under
cloud or sunshine, was good. After all, his lot for the year would not be
such a bad one. He was in the mood to echo the praises of that
brown-feathered morsel pouring forth its lauds somewhere aloft in the
blue. Suddenly the song ceased. The bird had come to earth.
For a moment or so longer Antony lay very still, listening to the
silence. Then he flung back the bed-clothes, went to the window, and
looked out.
He looked across the tiny garden, and the lane, to a wild-rose hedge;
fragile pink blossoms swayed gently in the breeze. Beyond the hedge was a
field of close-cropped grass, dotted here and there with sheep. To the
left a turn in the lane, and the high banks and hedges, shut further view
from sight. To the right, and far below the cottage, across meadows and
the hidden village of Byestry, lay the sea.
It lay blue and sparkling, flecked with a myriad moving specks of gold,
as the sunshine fell on the dancing water. He had seen it at close
quarters last night, from the little quay, seen it smooth and grey, its
breast heaving now and then as if in gentle sleep. To-day it was awake,
alive, and buoyant. He must get down to it again. It was inviting him,
smiling, dimpling, alluring.
He made a quick but exceedingly careful toilet. Antony was fastidious to
a degree in the matter of cleanliness. Earth dirt he had no objection to;
slovenly dirt was as abhorrent to him as vice.
Josephus, who had slept in the parlour, accorded him a hearty welcome on
his descent of the narrow steep little stairs, intimating that he was
every whit as ready to be up and doing as was his master. The sunshine,
the blithesomeness of the morning was infectious. You felt yourself
smiling in accord with its smiles.
Antony flung wide the cottage door. A scent of rosemary, southernwood,
and verbena was wafted to him from the little garden,--clean,
old-fashioned scents, English in their very essence. Anon he had more
commonplace scents mingling with them,--the appetizing smell of fried
sausages, the aromatic odour of freshly made coffee. Josephus found
himself in two minds as to the respective merits of the attractions
without, and the alluring odours within. Finally, after one scamper round
the garden, he compromised by seating himself on the doorstep, for the
most part facing the sunshine, but now and again turning a wet black nose
in the direction of the breakfast table and frying-pan.
An hour or so later he was giving himself wholeheartedly to the grassy
and rabbitty scents dear to a doggy soul, as he scampered in the
direction of Byestry with his master. Occasionally he made side tracks
into hedges and down rabbit holes, whence at a whistle from Antony, he
would emerge innocent in expression, but utterly condemned by traces of
red earth on his black nose and white back.
There was a lazy Sundayish atmosphere about the village as Antony passed
through it, with Josephus now at his heels. Men lounged by cottage doors,
women gossiped across garden fences. The only beings with an object in
view appeared to be children,--crimp-haired little girls, and
stiffly-suited small boys, who walked in chattering groups in the
direction of a building he rightly judged to be a Sunday-school.
A little farther on, a priest was standing by the door of a small
barn-like-looking place with a cross at one end. Antony vaguely supposed
it to be a church, and thought, also vaguely, that it was the
oddest-looking one he had ever seen. He concluded that Byestry was too
small to boast a larger edifice.
On reaching the quay he turned to the right, walking along a cobbled
pavement, which presently sloped down to the beach and a narrow stretch
of firm smooth sand, bordered by brown rocks and the sea on one side, and
a towering cliff on the other. The tide was going down, leaving the brown
rocks uncovered. Among them were small crystal pools, reflecting the blue
of the sky as in a mirror. Sea spleenwort and masses of samphire grew on
the cliffs to his right. No danger here to the would-be samphire
gatherer; it could be plucked from the safety of solid earth, with as
great ease as picking up shells from the beach.
After some half hour's walking, Antony turned a corner, bringing him to a
yet lonelier beach. Looking back, he found Byestry shut from his
view,--the cliffs behind him, the sea before him, the sky above him,
stretches of sand around him, and himself alone, save for Josephus, and
sea-gulls which dipped to the water or circled in the blue, and jackdaws
which cried harshly from the cliffs.
He sat down on the sand, and began to fill his pipe. It was
extraordinarily lonely, extraordinarily peaceful. There was no sinister
note in the loneliness such as he had experienced in the vast spaces of
the African veldt, but a reposefulness, a quiet rest which appealed to
him. The very blueness of the sky and sparkle of the sunshine was tender
after the brazen glitter of the African sun. Turning to look behind him,
he saw that here the cliff was grass-covered, sloping almost to the
beach, and among the grass, hiding its green, were countless bluebells, a
sheet of shimmering colour. Two lines of Tennyson's came suddenly into
his mind.
And the whole isle side flashing down with never a tree
Swept like a torrent of gems from the sky to the blue of the sea.
The island of flowers and the island of silence in one, he felt the place
to be, and no fear of fighting, with himself as sole inhabitant. So might
the islands have been after Maeldune had renounced his purpose of
revenge, after he had returned from the isle of the saint who had spoken
words of peace.
He lost count of time. A pleasant waking drowsiness fell upon him, till
at length, seeing that the sun had reached its zenith, he realized that
it must be noon, and began to consider the advisability of retracing his
steps.
He got to his feet, whistling to a white speck in the distance, which he
rightly judged to be Josephus, and set out on his homeward route.
* * * * *
The village appeared deserted, as he once more reached it. Doubtless the
Sunday dinner, which accounts so largely for Sunday sleepiness, was in
progress.
Coming to the small barn-like-looking building which he had noticed
earlier in the morning, and seeing that the door was open, he looked in.
The air was heavy with the scent of incense. It needed only a moment's
observation to tell him that he was in a Catholic church. A curtained
tabernacle stood on the little altar, before which hung a ruby lamp. The
building was too small to allow of two altars, but at one side was a
statue of Our Lady, the base surrounded with flowers, since it was the
month of May. Near the porch was a statue of St. Peter.
Antony looked curiously around. It was the third time only that he had
entered a Catholic church, the second time being at Teneriffe with the
Duchessa. Ordering Josephus to stay without, he walked up the little
aisle, and sat down in one of the rush-seated chairs near the sanctuary.
He hadn't a notion what prompted the impulse, but he knew that some
impulse was at work.
He looked towards the sanctuary. Mass had been said not long since, and
the chalice covered with the veil and burse was still on the altar.
Antony hadn't a notion of even the first principles of the Catholic
faith, not as much as the smallest Catholic child; but he felt here, in a
measure, the same sense of home as he knew the Duchessa to have felt in
the church at Teneriffe. Oddly enough he did not feel himself the least
an intruder. There was almost a sense of welcome.
From looking at the altar he looked at the chairs, and the small oblong
pieces of pasteboard fastened to their backs. He looked down at the piece
which denoted the owner of the chair in which he was sitting. And then he
found himself staring at it, while his heart leaped and thumped madly. On
the pasteboard four words were written,--The Duchessa di Donatello.
He gazed at the words hardly able to believe the sight of his own eyes.
What odd coincidence, what odd impulse had brought him to her very chair?
It was extraordinary, unbelievable almost. And then another thought
flashed into his brain, making his heart stand still.
A door to the left opened, and a priest came out. He looked momentarily
at Antony, then went into the sanctuary, genuflected, took the covered
chalice from the altar, genuflected again, and went back into the
sacristy, leaving the door partly open.
Antony got suddenly to his feet. He went towards the sacristy. The
priest, hearing the sound of steps, opened the door wide.
"Excuse me," said Antony, "but can you tell me where Woodleigh is?" His
Irish brogue was forgotten.
"Certainly," replied the priest. "It is about two miles from here,
inland." He looked rather curiously at the man, who, though labourer by
his dress, yet spoke in an obviously refined voice. He waited, perhaps
expecting some further question.
"That was all I wanted to know," said Antony. "Thank you." He turned back
into the church.
Father Dormer looked after him. There was a puzzled look in his eye.
Antony came out of the church and into the sunlight. He called to
Josephus, who was busy with the investigation of a distant smithy, and
turned up the street, walking rather quickly.