There are a thousand beauties of the night, as there are varied shades
in the qualities of light and colour, many of them so subtly blended, so
dependent on sympathetic conditions, that they are not revealed to every
one equally. Beauty is interpreted according to the mood and
temperament of the individual. There is beauty in a brick wall when the
mind is in harmony with its subject; there is beauty in ugliness where
ugliness is not divorced from the soul; there is beauty in everything
when youth stands on the threshold of its wonder world and gazes into
the shining distances that disclose romance. Romance coruscates in
shining distances, like the splendid bewilderment of the Northern
Lights: one cannot reach out and grasp these wonders--to take hold of
romance is to lose it; to attempt to decrease the distance is to dull
the golden vista and distort the fine sense of proportions. As well
attempt to bottle material fact with imagination; fermentation would
inevitably set up and the result be catastrophe.
With feet planted lightly on the slippery rocks, and a strong hand
holding her hand to steady her progress over the wet weed, Brenda looked
out across the expanse of darkening ocean that flowed away to the
horizon, beyond it, till it flung its spent waters upon the quiet shores
on the other side of the world, and her eyes were big, and filled with
the wondering content that is born of happiness. All the beauties that
were in the night were revealed to her. The sensuous warmth enfolded
her like the embrace of a lover; the sound of the sea was magic music in
her ears, and the salt breath of the spray, which tightened the tendrils
of her hair into ringlets, pressed with the flavour of salt kisses on
her lips, acrid kisses, moist and stimulating, that stung the lips they
caressed. And behind and above her towered the dark mystery of the
land, the frowning heights of grey rock that defied the sea's advance
and guarded that vast hinterland so jealously hidden behind the
mountain-girt shores.
She came to a halt abruptly, and stood still, and looked down at the sea
which bubbled at her feet in the interstices of the rocks, and made a
soft splashing sound amongst the weed. She was not observing things
consciously; her mind was intent on the man beside her, busy with the
moment, and, despite the moment's happiness, oppressed with the sense of
finality which the impending parting conveyed. She desired to be a
bright and cheerful companion, and instead she was proving, she feared,
rather dull. The warm, firm clasp of his hand somewhat confused her
ideas. The baldest commonplace was all the utterance she found it
possible to make.
"To-morrow at this time you will be in the train," she remarked
suddenly, snapping the silence which was beginning to embarrass her.
"Yes," he answered. "Awful bore, isn't it? The heat will be
intolerable. I shall be cursing fate, and wishing myself back here...
on this rock with you. It's good, isn't it? Lift your face and feel
the breeze on your cheek. It's like a breath--nature's cool sweet
breath. And that jolly little duck of the sea between the rocks...
Will you come here again afterwards?"
"No," she replied, and did not give, nor did he ask for, a reason. "We
go back in a week," she added.
"And then the holiday comes to an end?"
"Yes."
"Well, my play time is finished too. I thought it would last longer,
but necessity demands that I should earn a living. Why wasn't I born a
Kaffir? No Kaffir need work unless he wants to. He settles down on
another man's land, and eats another man's mealies, and makes pretence
of being useful in return. It's an enviable existence."
"Oftener he lives by his wife's exertions," she said.
"There are white Kaffirs who do that," he rejoined--"plenty of them
across the water. I don't fancy civilisation can reproach him there. I
rather like the coloured man. Do you?"
"Custom is everything; I'm used to him," she said. "I'm South African,
you know--born in the Colony. I have never been home."
It occurred to him as odd that she should speak of a country she had
never seen as "home." He had noticed this peculiarity frequently since
he had arrived in the country. To the Colonial of British extraction
England was always home. It conveyed a sense of unwilling exile that
struck like a reproach at the golden welcome of this radiant land which
men of many nations have suffered and died for, and women also in the
days of the early pioneers. The sting of ingratitude lay in the idea.
"Home, as you call it, is but another lump of mother earth set down
under colder skies," he said. "And our skins over there aren't all
white although they ought to be. I like new countries. If I possess
the indolence of a Kaffir, the push and the enterprise of youth appeals
to me. A young country is unspoilt; it offers immense possibilities.
And the route isn't mile-stoned with precedents which may not be
ignored. Incidentally, there are greater facilities for getting on
without interest, and sometimes with an infinitesimal degree of energy."
"No," she contradicted; "it is seldom the lazy man who gets on out
here."
"Don't discourage me," he pleaded, and turned a smiling face towards
her, and looked deep into her eyes. "I'm for taking the smooth path all
the way. Why not? Why make such a business of living? It ought to be
quite a simple thing."
He was standing very close to her, still holding her hand which he
pressed against his side. Her face in the deepening dusk showed misty
and uncertain of outline, and the eyes meeting his in the dimness were
just dark shadows glowing in their white setting; but he knew that the
soft pensive look was in them which he liked to see there had the light
been sufficient to reveal it.
"I wonder if I might kiss you?" he said, and bent forward in the warm
dusk and found her lips.
"It was sweet of you to allow that," he said. "A little kindness is a
touch of heaven to a lonely man."
He was not to know how much more that kiss signified to the girl than it
did to him. No man had ever kissed her before that night. She did not
then respond to the caress, but she accepted it. As his lips descended
warmly upon her mouth she felt her face grow hot, and was grateful to
the darkness for hiding her confusion; her heart gave a bound and
started racing at a great rate; it seemed to her that, standing so
close, he must hear it pounding inside her chest.
If he observed her emotion he did not remark on it. The touch of the
cool unresponding lips with the salt flavour of the sea upon them moved
him unaccountably; but some quality that was compounded of the audacity
and sensitiveness of youth, nicely balanced with the discretion of a
more matured mind, decided him to ignore the little episode until he had
further determined its importance in relation to events. It was never
wise to precipitate things.
"Let's get off the rocks," he said. "There's our little strip of sand
waiting for us up yonder. The moon will be later to-night. But it
doesn't matter, does it? We're in no hurry. And anyway we should never
get back in the dark without coming to grief."
He tucked his hand under her arm and assisted her over the rocks. She
slipped once, and clutched at him desperately, and nearly upset his
balance as well as her own. When with difficulty he maintained his
ground and succeeded in holding her up, they remained for a moment or
two with his arms about her and laughed recklessly over the averted
mishap.
"You're so strong," she said.
"It's just luck," he observed, "that we aren't playing at mixed bathing
instead of standing high and dry. There's a certain excitement in
walking on the rocks. I'm enjoying this."
Brenda was enjoying it also; she felt rather sorry when they reached the
sand and sat down, and, there being no longer a reason for the
attention, he released her hand.
"I want you, if you will," he said presently, "to give me some address
that will find you after you leave here. I want to write to you--if I
may."
She was silent for a space. He was lying on the sand beside her,
looking up into her face; while she hesitated she looked down at him.
"I thought it was a case of ships that pass in the night," she said.
"No," he answered quietly; "I never intended it should be that."
"I can give you Mrs Graham's address," she said, after a further pause.
"But that, of course, is only temporary."
"How about your home address?" he suggested.
"I haven't one," she answered, and started to play with the sand. "We
broke that up when my father... He was unfortunate," she finished in a
flattened voice.
"I'm sorry," he said simply. He felt that he had blundered upon a
painful subject; the father was evidently one of those people whom their
relations prefer to ignore. "I'll have Mrs Graham's address anyhow,
and follow up the changes. This friendship has got to develop, you
know. It wouldn't be fair to me if you drew bade now after extending
the hand of good-fellowship."
"Oh! I'm not drawing back," she said, and ceased fidgeting with the
sand and sat nursing her knees, and watching the moving blackness below.
"I've derived much pleasure from the friendship. It's been... Well,
there have been perfect moments..."
"To-night?" he questioned.
"To-night--yes."
Her voice dropped to a whisper in making the admission; she spoke with
an effort; there was a suggestion of a great deal which she might have
said but determinedly repressed in her manner. The darkness crept
closer and hid the blush that warmed her face.
"It's rotten having to go to-morrow," he said. "I'm sorry I have to go.
I've enjoyed this week--oh! more than I have enjoyed anything since
landing. I would have liked to have seen the holiday out with you.
Perhaps some day..."
He broke off and dropped back on the sand and lay staring up at the
stars.
"It's a rotten nuisance, anyway," he finished.
It was later than they had supposed when eventually they rose to retrace
their steps; in the enjoyment of the present they lost count of time;
and it was with something akin to dismay that Brenda learnt on
consulting his watch by the light of the moon that it was approaching
eleven o'clock. It would complicate matters if the others got home from
their walk before her.
"We'll have to hurry," she said.
"It's so simple to hurry over the rocks, isn't it?" he returned with
grim humour. "What, after all, can any one say if you are late?"
She did not explain that it was not hard words she feared, but the loss
of her post and character, two important matters to a girl dependent on
her own efforts.
"Please," she said, "let us be as quick as possible."
And so the return journey was made with none of the pleasant lingerings,
the pauses to admire beauties that sprang unexpectedly to the gaze, the
brief halts for agreeable wrangling or more intimate talk, the longer
pauses when they did not talk but stood side by side and gazed out to
sea in a sympathetic silence that needed no expression; these pleasures
had to be foregone in the effort to overtake time.
The necessity for haste irked Matheson; the girl at his side was
conscious of his irritation and distressed because of it.
"It is such a pity," she said, as they emerged upon the road, "to have
to spoil things."
He caught the note of apology in her voice, its half breathless appeal
to his forbearance, and his irritation vanished in a smiling
satisfaction.
"By Jove!" he cried, nearly breathless too. "I never believed you'd
keep the pace up. Let's put the brake on a bit. It can't make a
difference of more than five minutes either way now. I can't talk,
scampering along like this."
When they reached the road where she was staying, instead of parting at
the corner, he accompanied her, as he had on the first morning, to the
side gates. Before opening the gate he drew her into the shadow of the
oleanders against the fence, and, having looked cautiously up the road
and down, and ascertained that no one was within sight, he slipped his
hands behind her shoulders and held her for a moment and looked into her
eyes.
"It's good-bye this time," he said, and hung on a significant pause.
She remained very quiet and still under his hands, and made no response.
"You let me kiss you on the beach," he said, "but..." He bent his face
towards hers. "Won't you kiss me?" he asked.
For a moment she hesitated; then she lifted her face swiftly, and her
lips met his, shyly and a little shamefully, in a caress which brushed
his eager lips as lightly as one of the pink petals that fell, fragrant
and unheeded, about them. She broke away from him; and he turned
without a word and opened the gate and looked after her as she slipped
through and sped up the path, a slim white figure, with the moonlight
splashed upon her hair and face.
The night had not been without its perfect moments for him too.