On a beautiful midsummer morning Antonia Rose crept softly down the
broad old staircase of Greenriver and crossed the hall with so
fairy-light a tread that never a soul in the house could hear a
footstep.
It was very early, barely half-past five; but the glorious summer
morning was calling, calling insistently to Toni to come and share its
glories; and the call was not one to be disregarded, by Antonia at
least.
Not a thing stirred. In the gallery the Ten Little Ladies grew wan and
faded before the vitality of the daylight; and when, after some
difficulty, Toni unlocked the big hall door and let in a flood of
sunshine, they gave up the unequal contest and expired quietly.
Ah! What a world of beauty burst upon Toni's gaze as she stood,
thrilling delightfully with a sense of adventure, on the big stone steps
outside the great door.
A rush of perfume from the tall lilies greeted her first; followed by a
perfect shower of fragrance from the pink and creamy roses growing
beside the door. Other scents there were--a dozen of them--from the
flowers massed in glowing ranks in the beds; but the lilies and the
roses had it all their own way; and Toni laughed with delight as they
assailed her with their sweetness.
There was music, too, in this pearly dawn. In the trees the birds were
astir, twittering their songs of morning; and already the velvety brown
bees were beginning to hum their spinning chorus as they hovered here
and there among the tall flowers which stood in rows before the windows,
like marriageable maidens waiting for inspection.
Beyond the terrace lay the river, shining with that strange, ethereal
effect of silver which water has beneath the early morning sky; and away
beyond the river the thin, delicate mists of the night were rising like
vaporous ghosts, to dissolve in the fresh, clean atmosphere of dawn.
"Oh, how beautiful it all is! What a lovely world God made when He
made--this!" Toni stood on the steps with arms outstretched, like some
young priestess of a pagan faith welcoming the sun. "And why do we lie
asleep in stuffy beds when all the birds and flowers have been awake for
ages!"
She pulled the big door gently to behind her, and then ran through the
gardens and across the terrace to the big grey balustrade which kept the
boundary of the garden from the towing path beyond. Leaning her arms on
the stone she looked out over the shining river, and in fancy her spirit
roved here and there--to the violet-strewn mountain slopes of Italy
where she had passed her childhood ... to the wonderful, rocky coast of
Cornwall where her honeymoon had been spent.
At the thought of the Cornish seas she caught her breath. Those
marvellous green billows, foaming in the sunshine, dashing against the
cliffs with a sound like thunder; the gentler wavelets creaming over the
snow-white sands in lines of lotus-blue; the pools, deep and limpid,
where in the aquamarine water all kind of strange sea-creatures lived;
the jagged, tooth-like rocks springing from the depths of the ocean,
ready to destroy the passing ships; the still more wonderful
lighthouses, rising, some of them, like tall white needles into the
turquoise sky; the gulls, flashing grey and white in the sunshine; the
salt scent of the sea mingling with the pungent fragrance of the yellow
gorse, hot with the sun ... surely the Cornish coast was a very favoured
spot, and the Scilly Isles, to which passage could be taken in a queer,
cranky boat, were indeed the Fortunate Isles, cradled by the bluest,
most magical, most romantic waters in the world!
Thoughts of the ocean were indissolubly bound up with all Toni's
thoughts of her honeymoon. Acting on a hint from Barry, Owen had taken
his bride straight away from the Registrar's dingy office to Paddington,
thence to Cornwall; and he would never forget the sight of Toni's face
when first she saw the sea, lying purple and green beneath a stormy sky.
During the long journey she had said very little, shyness enveloping her
as in a mantle; but when the train began to run along the sea shore, so
that the whole expanse of ocean lay spread before the window, Toni's
face changed, her eyes sparkled, and she turned to Owen with a
spontaneous expression of delight.
Now, looking back, it seemed to Toni that never for an instant had the
voice of the sea been out of her ears during all those wonderful days
and nights. Its song had helped her to bear herself properly during the
long hours alone with the man she had married. Again and again, when
embarrassment threatened to overcome her at this unusually prolonged
_tête-à-tête_, the sea whispered to her to take courage; and each night
she fell asleep to its murmured lullaby.
During the fortnight which they spent down in the genial West Country,
Owen gave himself up entirely to the service of his young wife. He
divined pretty well what she was feeling--guessed that her marriage,
after only three weeks' engagement, must have meant a complete upheaval
of her entire life; and the very fact that he did not love her gave an
added gentleness to his intercourse with her; for he could not rid
himself of a sensation that somehow she had been cheated in this
bargain, had been cajoled into giving the pure gold of love in return
for the counterfeit of mere liking.
True, he did not repent his marriage. Rather it seemed to him that it
might turn out successful after all; and since they spent the days
exploring the coast, which was new to both of them, there was plenty to
be said, an abundance of interesting subjects to discuss.
Only once--on the last night of their stay in Cornwall--was there the
slightest suspicion of a shadow between them; and Owen blamed himself
entirely for the occurrence.
It happened that Owen was suffering from a very severe headache--a not
uncommon complaint since his accident--and the afternoon post brought
him the proofs of an article required for the next number of the
_Bridge_. An urgent note from Barry accompanied the papers, begging for
an early revision; and after dinner Owen sat down to run through the
article in preparation for dispatch in the morning.
But his brain refused to work. His eyes felt as though each eyeball were
aflame; and his forehead was contracted with the severe pain which had
racked him all day, so that consecutive thought was almost impossible.
He tried, again and again, to do the work; but at length, so acute was
the agony in his eyes, he threw aside the papers with a groan.
Immediately Toni looked up from the magazine she was reading.
"May I help you?" She put the question rather timidly, and by way of
answer he tossed the bundle of proofs into her lap.
"Thanks awfully, dear. I simply can't see out of my eyes--neuralgia, I
expect. Do your best, won't you? You know how to read proof as well as I
do, now."
"Yes." So she did, for Barry had taught her thoroughly; and she had
applied herself to his lessons with every fraction of her intelligence.
What he had not taught her, however, was an extensive knowledge of the
master poets and their works; and Toni's ignorance betrayed her
hopelessly.
At the old-fashioned school she had attended, few poets were considered
fit for the girls' reading; Tennyson, of course, was included in the
pupils' studies, and Shakespeare, carefully edited, was a standby; but
of the works of Browning, Rossetti, Swinburne, Keats, Toni was
lamentably ignorant.
When, therefore, in the article before her she found a quotation from
one of Robert Browning's poems, followed almost immediately by a line
from one of the poet's wife's writings, she concluded, hastily, that the
printers were at fault, and cheerfully amended the latter initials to
the one magic R. In the same way she confused Keats and Yeats; and
finished by ascribing to Christina Rossetti one of Dante Gabriel's most
impassioned utterances; thus destroying whatever value the article might
have had, as a critical appreciation of the various writers' work.
Having completed her task Toni raised her eyes to look at her husband,
and found him lying back in his chair watching her with a very kindly
glance.
"Finished, little girl? That's good. I'll just initial it and send it
back." He took the sheets she handed him and raised his eyebrows at the
numerous corrections. "I say, they must be getting careless at the
office to let all these slips go through!" He ran his eye over the page,
more from force of habit than because he expected to find any more
corrections necessary; and suddenly Toni, watching, saw him frown.
"I say, Toni, you've made a mistake." He tried not to speak sharply, for
after all proof-reading is an art. "This line--'There may be Heaven,
there must be Hell'--that's Robert Browning all right; but the next
quotation is from the Sonnets to the Portuguese."
"Is it?" Toni did not understand.
"Well, Mrs. Browning wrote those, you know." He was busy repairing
Toni's mistake. "And the next is hers, too. And----" he was skimming
down the page "--why, you little goose, it was Dante Rossetti who wrote
'The Blessed Damosel.'"
"Was it? I thought her name was Christina." Toni's voice faltered; for
though she did not yet realize the enormity of her offence, she knew
that Owen was annoyed by her stupidity.
"_Her_ name? Why, of course _her_ name was Christina; but this happens
to be his poem, you see."
"His? Whose?" Toni was flustered, or she would never have betrayed
herself so utterly.
"Whose?" Owen, his nerves strained almost to breaking point by his
bodily pain, spoke irritably, and Toni shrank miserably into her chair.
"Why, Toni, have you never heard of the poet Rossetti? Good Heavens,
child, don't you ever open a book?"
She said nothing, though the tears welled slowly into her eyes; and Owen
went on reading, finding still further evidences of his wife's lack of
acquaintance with the giants of literature as he read.
In an ordinary way he would have let her down gently. After all it is no
crime to confuse two poets of the same name; and to "correct" a
quotation by transposing two words into a more ordinary sequence is not
a very heinous offence; but to Owen, racked with pain, the whole affair
was an instance of the most flagrant ignorance, and he let fly one or
two biting sarcasms as he bent over the papers, which reduced Toni to a
state of trembling, impotent misery.
To do him justice Owen repented as soon as he had spoken, and when he
saw how he had hurt her, he threw aside the proof-sheets and devoted
himself to making amends for his harshness.
He succeeded finally in winning back something of her usual serenity;
but to both the incident was oddly discomposing; to Toni because for the
first time she saw the critic in the husband, and trembled to think how
often she must fall short of his high standard; to Owen because the
affair seemed to open up such vast tracts of ignorance in the woman who
was his wife, and showed, more clearly than ever before, the dividing
line between intellect and ordinary shrewdness.
For just one illuminating moment he saw Toni as she was; a pretty,
winning, half-educated little girl, to whom the world of art and
literature was a sphere apart, its shibboleths mere meaningless babble
in her ears, its greatest exponents but so many confusing names,
divorced from any enlightening personalities.
Where, he asked himself half desperately, was there any common meeting
ground for two beings so widely diverse as they, husband and wife though
they were? Surely they were as widely sundered as the poles....
And then the sight of Toni's face, her eyes filled with tears, her
childish mouth quivering, lighted a sudden flame in his heart which
consumed, for the time being, all doubts and petty vexations. After all,
she was only a child--and she loved him; and so he took her in his arms
and kissed away the tears with a remorseful tenderness which might well
pass--with an uncritical being like Toni--for love.
But Toni was not thinking of that dreadful episode on this brilliant
June morning. Rather she was trying to realize that she was the mistress
of this beautiful place, that Greenriver, with its grounds, its flowers,
its lofty rooms, was to be her home; and to the girl who had lived in
Winter Road, Brixton, Greenriver was indeed a revelation.
They had been home a week; and so far Owen had not left her for more
than a few hours, on the occasion of a business visit to London. The
weather had been superb; and they had spent several long afternoons on
the river, thereby missing, to Toni's great content, three or four
callers who had come to see what manner of woman Owen Rose had married.
That these calls must be returned Toni knew very well; but it must be
confessed she shivered at the prospect; more especially as Owen had told
her, laughingly, that she must not count upon his aid on those purely
social occasions.
As the thought of the terrible duty-calls flashed through her mind Toni
slipped down from her perch on the balustrade and made her way down to
the towing path beneath. She often walked beside the river in these
quiet morning hours, alone unless her dog Jock, an Airedale terrier of
unimpeachable ancestry and cheerful disposition, was at hand to
accompany her.
Jock had been presented to her by Barry as a wedding gift; and Toni, who
had never before been on an intimate footing with a dog, found his
companionship both delightful and stimulating. Although he was nearly
two years old Jock was a puppy at heart. He did his best to comport
himself as a full-grown dog should do: but had lapses into babyhood,
when a shoe carelessly left about seemed too tempting; or, after a muddy
walk, a soft satin cushion gave him an invitation to repose which could
not possibly be denied.
He was a lovable creature, however, and a perfect gentleman as regards
cats--a very desirable trait in an animal belonging to Toni, who loved
all cats and would certainly have quarrelled with any dog who waged war
upon the furry tribe.
To her satisfaction Jock came bounding over the terrace to follow her as
she stepped on to the towing path; and together they strolled by the
river in the fresh morning air, Toni gazing half-absently towards the
distant hills, Jock keeping one eye and ear anxiously cocked in
anticipation of any unwary rat who should show himself upon the
river-bank.
Although Willowhurst was comparatively far from town there were a good
many visitors on the river during the summer months. There was a perfect
reach for punting just here, and many people came down to occupy the
bungalows built on the opposite bank to that on which Greenriver stood.
To Owen these little summer dwellings were in the nature of an eyesore.
Fond as he was of his own beautiful house he would have liked to keep
the neighbourhood free from this essentially modern phase of river-life;
but to Toni the gay little bungalows had a charm of their own. They were
all specially spick and span just now, having been newly painted and
garnished with flowers for the season; and Toni looked across the river
with frank interest at the Cot, the Dinky House, the Mascot, and the
rest of the tiny shanties. She liked the houseboats, too, with their
gaily-striped awnings, their hanging baskets filled with gaudy pink
geraniums and bright lobelia. Their primly-curtained little windows
amused her; and in the evenings she would lure Owen out on to the
terrace to look down the river to where the Chinese lanterns hung on
their poles like globes of magic light against the darkening sky.
Toni and Jock had strolled about a quarter of a mile down the path when
they were brought sharply to a halt by the sound of a deep bark from the
other side of the water; and looking across they found they were not the
only waking creatures in this apparently sleeping world.
In one of the little gardens opposite to where they stood were a couple
of friends like themselves; but in this case the human being was a man
in his shirt sleeves, and the canine was a singularly beautiful white
wolfhound, who stood, at the moment, barking defiance at the intruders
on the opposite bank.
Jock, whose natural pugnacity was always easily aroused, returned the
compliment with the most evident sincerity; but the Borzoi, having flung
down the gage of battle and asserted her dignity, retired gracefully
from the contest, and walking daintily up to her master rose and placed
her slender paws on his shoulders, an action which said plainly that
honour was satisfied.
The animal was so striking-looking, from her long, graceful head to her
plumy tail, that Toni could not resist a second look; and the dog's
master had a good view of the girl whom he guessed to be the young
mistress of Greenriver, the house which he had often admired as he
passed by in his boat during the summer days.
As she stood, gazing almost childishly across the intervening water, she
looked barely more than a schoolgirl; and her short skirt and simple
white blouse aided the illusion. It was only the sight of the coils of
black hair which bound her head, and the gleam of the gold wedding-ring
on her finger, which placed her definitely in the category of womanhood;
and the man who watched her felt a strange sensation of something like
pity for the girl launched so early on the sea of matrimony, a sea whose
perils he, of all men, had cause to dread.
But suddenly Toni became aware of the indecorousness of her conduct. It
was the height of discourtesy to stand staring; and with a blush she
called Jock and turned hastily away to retrace her steps.
The man and the dog watched her go; and only when she was nearly out of
sight did they turn back and re-enter the little white bungalow which
was known locally as the Hope House.
At breakfast Owen asked Toni kindly if she felt inclined for a day on
the river.
"I thought we might take our lunch and go quite a long way," he said.
"I'm afraid this must be our last holiday jaunt for a little time. I
shall have to be busy after this."
"Will you?" She looked a trifle wistful; and Owen was sorry for her.
"Well, I daresay I can manage a day off now and then. To-morrow's
Thursday, isn't it? I must be up in town then, and I'm afraid I shall be
late home. There's a dinner I rather wanted to attend, but it would mean
a long evening alone for you."
"I don't mind." She smiled reassuringly. "I've got Jock to keep me
company and there are plenty of people in the house."
"Well, Andrews is a pretty sturdy young chap, and of course there are
three or four women. There's the telephone, too, you know, so you really
needn't be nervous--especially now, when the river is as full of traffic
as Bond Street!"
"I'm not a bit nervous," she said. "I ... I was just wondering----"
She broke off, flushing, and Owen felt an unwonted curiosity as to her
meaning.
"Well?" He spoke kindly, but Toni seemed unable to proceed.
"I was thinking ... I mean ..." Suddenly impatient of her own cowardice
she took her courage in both hands and spoke bravely. "I was wondering
whether you would allow me to ask Fanny--my cousin--down for the
afternoon. You see, if you are away----"
"Why, of course, dear!" Owen spoke the more heartily because he felt a
slight compunction at the thought of her relations. "Ask your cousin by
all means. You must remember that this is your house, Toni, and you need
not ask my leave to invite your friends."
"Thank you." She was looking down as she spoke, but her cheeks were
scarlet. "I will ask her then ... but ..." suddenly her words came with
a rush "... I know my people aren't like yours ... I couldn't let them
meet your friends ... I mean--I'll ask them when you are not at home,
and then----"
"Don't be a goose, Toni!" Owen hoped his voice betrayed nothing. "Your
people are my people now, you know, and I don't want you to get any
silly ideas into your head at the start."
She stretched out her hand impulsively and laid it on his arm.
"Owen, you're too good to me. I know so well that we belong to different
worlds, but ... if you mean that----"
"Of course I mean it." He rose as he spoke and patted her shoulder.
"Don't be a little silly--and now run away and write to your cousin at
once. If she can't come to-morrow, suggest Friday."
"Oh, she couldn't come then," returned Toni naïvely. "You see the shop
closes on Thursday afternoon, and it's Fanny's only free day."
"I see." Somehow the little explanation, with its picture of a different
life from that to which he was accustomed, struck a chill to Owen's
heart; but he hid his discomfort cleverly and bade Toni write her letter
without delay.
* * * * *
Miss Gibbs accepted the invitation joyfully; and on Thursday morning
Owen went off to town, after bidding Toni keep her cousin to dinner if
possible.
"She can take the nine-fifteen to town," he said. "I have the car, but
if she can stay, telephone for a taxi from the station to be here at
nine. You won't be lonely, Toni?"
"Not a bit!" Indeed she was thrilling with pleasure at the idea of
entertaining her cousin in her new home. "I've lots to see to. What a
pity Mrs. Blades is ill to-day."
"Yes, her usual bronchitis, I suppose. She'll be all right in a day or
two." Owen was hunting for a paper as he spoke. "Confound it, where is
that manuscript, Toni? You know the one--that article on Alfred Noyes."
"It's here." Toni handed him the paper he required.
"Thanks awfully. You're a first-rate little secretary, Toni! I guess we
shall miss you at the office!"
He did not observe the rather wistful look which swept over her face at
the half-careless praise. At that moment Toni felt she would have asked
nothing better than to jump into the car and journey up to town with
Owen to take her old place behind the typewriter in Owen's room. She
hated to see him leaving her, longed to beg him to stay; but something
stronger than personal longing held her back. A wife, she told herself,
must be a help, not a hindrance; and since Owen saw fit to leave her, to
carry on the work in which she had now no place, her duty, plainly, was
to remain at home and keep everything in her little world in order for
his return.
Besides, it was a glorious day, the sun was shining, the flowers dancing
in the breeze; and Fanny would be with her during the afternoon. It was
a day created for gladness, for rejoicing, and Toni, made wise by love,
banished wistfulness from her eyes and returned Owen's kiss with a gay
word of farewell.
But she stood looking after him as the car whizzed down the avenue; and
the smile which touched her lips was just a little sad.