I walked through the orchards, where wet apples gleamed like jewelled
fruit wrought in ruby and emerald, where yellow plums hung like waxen
fruit, and the late pears like amber ornaments. I walked through little
spinneys where the wet gold made your eyes ache. I saw the red fields
waiting for ploughing and fields heavy with the late crops through the
rain like a soft coloured map: and I saw the sea, queer and grey as an
aged woman, through the trees--and as far as I could see it all belonged
to the Cromers, and the words of an old poem came to me, something about
"a goodly heritage, bound by the sea and netted by the skies."
I stopped to speak to a little child, and it answered me in the soft
up-and-down of the Devonshire dialect; and I knew I could have been
happy with Cheneston here--not with the satisfied happiness of those who
possess a chippendale drawing-room suite, a parlourmaid, and a car, but
happy as those who inherit the earth. I could have been happy with a
glorious, keen, swelling happiness.
I turned home. It smelt as fresh as if all the earth had been newly
turned that morning, and as I turned a sunbeam struggled through and
flickered uncertainly.
I found a letter waiting for me--two letters, one from mother and one
from Grace Gil pin.
Mother's was characteristic. She hoped Mrs. Cromer was a nice woman and
approved of me. Were the estates extensive? Had Cheneston a big rent
roll? The end was typical. "I cannot see what you gain by postponing
your marriage. It cannot enhance your value in Cheneston's eyes. It is
always as well to remember that the world is full of girls, and an
engaged man is not regarded in the same light as an engaged girl. I
shall be very glad to hear that you have come to some sensible decision.
Your father writes that he has struck an expensive mess, and that he has
not been lucky at bridge lately. He is playing "pirate"--it has
superseded auction; try to learn it if you can, social assets are never
to be despised."
Pirate at Cromer Court! I smiled.
I sat down on an old oak chest in the tiled hall and opened Grace
Gilpin's letter. The sun was shining brilliantly now; the twinkling
raindrops that fringed the windows and hung glistening on the strands of
jasmine were reflected on the red tiles in wriggling little shadows,
like tadpole ghosts. I took off my wet mackintosh and my little
sou'wester, and fluffed up my hair with my fingers.
Grace's letter was very much to the point.
"Walter Markham is home wounded. He is at Lynn Lytton Hospital, Long
Woodstock, Near Manchester. What are you going to do about it, Pam?"
Well, what was I going to do about it?
What _could_ I do about it--except pray that Cheneston didn't get to
know until he didn't want me any more.