Clive's enforced idleness had secretly humiliated him and made him
restless. Athalie in her tender wisdom understood how it was with him
before he did himself, and she was already deftly guiding his balked
energy into a brand new channel, the same being a bucolic one.
At first he had demurred, alleging total ignorance of husbandry; and,
seated on the sill of an open window and looking down at him in the
garden, she tormented him to her heart's content:
"Ignorant of husbandry!" she mimicked,--"when any husband I ever heard
of could go to school to you and learn what a real husband ought to
be! Why _will_ you pretend to be so painfully modest, Clive, when you
are really secretly pleased with yourself and entirely convinced that,
in you, the world might discover a living pattern of model
domesticity!"
"I'm glad you think so--"
"_Think!_ If I were only as certain of anything else! Never had I
dreamed that any man could become so cowed, so spiritless, so
perfectly house and yard broken--"
"If I come upstairs," he said, "I'll settle _you_!"
Leaning from the window overlooking the garden she lazily defied him;
turned up her dainty nose at him; mocked at him until he flung aside
the morning paper and rose, bent on her punishment.
"Oh, Clive, don't!" she pleaded, leaning low from the sill. "I won't
tease you any more,--and this gown is fresh--"
"I'll come up and freshen it!" he threatened.
"Please don't rumple me. I'll come down if you like. Shall I?"
"All right, darling," he said, resuming his newspaper and cigarette.
She came, seated herself demurely beside him, twitched his newspaper
until he cast an ominous glance at his tormentor.
"Dear," she said, "I simply can't let you alone; you are so bland and
self-satisfied--"
"Athalie--if you persist in tormenting me--"
"I torment you? _I?_ An humble accessory in the scenery set for you?
I?--a stage property fashioned merely for the hero of the drama to sit
upon--"
"All right! I'll do that now!--"
But she nestled close to him, warding off wrath with both arms
clasping his, and looking up at him out of winning eyes in which but a
tormenting glint remained.
"You wouldn't rumple this very beautiful and brand new gown, would
you, darling? It was so frightfully expensive--"
"I don't care--"
"Oh, but you must care. You must _become_ thrifty and shrewd and
devious and close, or you'll never make a successful farmer--"
"Dearest, that's nonsense. What do I know about farming?"
"Nothing yet. But you know what a wonderful man you are. Never forget
that, Clive--"
"If you don't stop laughing at me, you little wretch--"
"Don't you want me to remain young?" she asked reproachfully, while
two tiny demons of gaiety danced in her eyes. "If I can't laugh I'll
grow old. And there's nothing very funny here except you and
Hafiz--Oh, Clive! You _have_ rumpled me! Please don't do it again!
Yes--yes--_yes!_ I do surrender! I _am_ sorry--that you are so
funny--Clive! You'll ruin this gown!... I promise not to say another
disrespectful word.... I don't know whether I'll kiss you or
not--_Yes!_ Yes I will, dear. Yes, I'll do it tenderly--you heartless
wretch!--I tell you I'll do it tenderly.... Oh wait, Clive! Is Mrs.
Connor looking out of any window? Where's Connor? Are you sure he's
not in sight?... And I shouldn't care to have Hafiz see us. He's a
moral kitty--"
She pretended to look fearfully around, then, with adorable
tenderness, she paid her forfeit and sat silent for a while with her
slim white fingers linked in his, in that breathless little revery
which always stilled her under the magic of his embrace.
He said at last: "Do you really suppose I could make this farm-land
pay?"
And that was really the beginning of it all.
* * * * *
Once decided he seemed to go rather mad about it, buying agricultural
paraphernalia recklessly and indiscriminately for a meditated assault
upon fields long fallow.
Connor already had as much as he could attend to in the garden; but,
like all Irishmen, he had a cousin, and the cousin possessed
agricultural lore and a pair of plough-horses.
So early fall ploughing developed into a mania with Clive and Athalie;
and they formed a habit of sitting side by side like a pair of birds
on fences in the early October sunshine, their fascinated eyes
following the brown furrows turning where one T. Phelan was breaking
up pasture and meadow too long sod-bound.
In intervals between tenderer and more intimate exchange of sentiments
they discussed such subjects as lime, nitrogen, phosphoric acid, and
the rotation of crops.
Also Athalie had accumulated much literature concerning incubators,
brooders, and the several breeds of domestic fowl; and on paper they
had figured out overwhelming profits.
The insidious land-hunger which attacks all who contemplate making two
dozen blades of grass grow where none grew before, now seized upon
Clive and gnawed him. And he extended the acreage, taking in woods and
uplands as far as the headwaters of Spring Pond Brook, vastly to
Athalie's delight.
So the October days burned like a procession of golden flames passing
in magic sequence amid yellowing woods and over the brown and spongy
gold of salt meadows which had been sheared for stable bedding. And
everywhere over their land lay the dun-coloured velvet squares of
freshly ploughed fields awaiting unfragrant fertilizer and the autumn
rains.
The rains came heavily toward the end of October; and November was
grey and wet and rather warm. But open fires became necessary in the
house, and now they regularly reddened the twilight in library and
living-room when the early November dusk brought Athalie and Clive
indoors.
Hither they came, the fire-lit hearth their trysting place after they
had exchanged their rain-drenched clothes for something dry; and there
they curled up on the wide sofas and watched the swift darkness fall,
and the walls and ceiling redden.
It was an hour which Athalie had once read of as the "Children's Hour"
and now she understood better its charming significance. And she kept
it religiously, permitting herself to do nothing, and making Clive
defer anything he had to do, until after dinner. Then he might read
his paper or book, and she could take up her sewing if she chose, or
study, or play, or write the few letters that she cared to write.
Clive wrote no more, now. In this first year together they desired
each other only, indifferent to all else outside.
It was to her the magic year of fulfilment; to him an enchanted
interlude wherein only the girl beside him mattered.
Athalie sewed a great deal on odd, delicate, sheer materials where
narrowness and length ruled proportions, and where there seemed to be
required much lace and many little ribbons. Also she hummed to
herself as she sewed, singing under her breath endless airs which had
slipped into her head she scarce knew when or how.
An odd and fragrant freshness seemed to cling to her making her almost
absurdly youthful, as though she had suddenly dropped back to her
girlhood. Clive noticed it.
"You look about sixteen," he said.
"My heart is younger, dear."
"How young?"
"You know when it was born, don't you? Very well, it is as many days
old as I have been in love with you. Before that it was a muscle
capable merely of sturdy friendship."
One day a packet came from New York for her. It contained two rings,
one magnificent, the other a plain circlet. She kissed him rather
shyly, wore both that evening, but not again.
"I am not ashamed," she explained serenely. "Folkways are now a matter
of indifference to me. Civilisation must offer me a better argument
than it has offered hitherto before I resign to it my right in you, or
deny your right to me."
He knew that civilisation would lock them out and remain unconcerned
as to what became of them. Doubtless she knew it too, as she sat there
sewing on the frail garment which lay across her knee and singing
blithely under her breath some air with cadence like a berceuse.
* * * * *
During the "Children's Hour" she sat beside him, always quiet; or if
stirred from her revery to a brief exchange of low-voiced words, she
soon relapsed once more into that happy, brooding silence by the
firelight.
Then came dinner, and the awakened gaiety of unquenched spirits; then
the blessed evening hours with him.
But the last hour of these she called _her_ hour; and always laid
aside her book or sewing, and slipped from the couch to the floor at
his feet, laying her head against his knees.
* * * * *
Snow came in December; and Christmas followed. They kept the mystic
festival alone together; and Athalie had a tiny tree lighted in the
room between hers and Clive's, and hung it with toys and picture
books.
It was very pretty in its tinsel and tinted globes; and its faint
light glimmered on the walls and dainty furniture of the dim pink
room.
Afterward Athalie laid away tinsel and toy, wrapping all safely in
tissue, as though to be kept secure and fresh for another
Christmas--the most wonderful that any girl could dream of. And
perhaps it was to be even more wonderful than Athalie had dreamed.
* * * * *
December turned very cold. The ice thickened; and she skated with
Clive on Spring Pond. The ice also remained through January and
February that winter; but after December had ended Athalie skated no
more.
Clive, unknown to her, had sent for a Shaker cloak and hood of
scarlet; and when it arrived Athalie threw back her lovely head and
laughed till the tears dimmed her eyes.
"All the same," he said, "you don't look much older in it than you
looked in your red hood and cloak the first day I ever set eyes on
you."
"You poor darling!--as though even you could push back the hands of
Time! It's the funniest and sweetest thing you ever did--to send for
this red, hooded cloak."
However she wore it whenever she ventured out with him on foot or in
the sleigh which he had bought. Once, coming home, she was still
wearing it when Mrs. Connor brought to them two peach turnovers.
A fire had been lighted in the ancient stove; and they went out to the
sun-parlour,--once the bar--and sat in the same old arm-chairs exactly
as they had been seated that night so long ago; and there they ate
their peach turnovers, their enchanted eyes meeting, striving to
realise it all, and the intricate ways of Destiny and Chance and Fate.
* * * * *
February was a month of heavy snows that year; great drifts buried the
fences and remained until well into March. April was April,--and very
much so; but they saw the blue waters of the bay sometimes; and
dogwood and willow stems were already aglow with colour; and a
premature blue-bird sang near Athalie's garden. Crocuses appeared
everywhere with grape hyacinths and snow-drops. Then jonquil and
narcissus opened in all their loveliness, and soft winds stirred the
waters of the fountain.
May found the garden uncovered, with tender amber-tinted shoots and
exquisite fronds of green wherever the lifted mulch disclosed the
earth. Also peonies were up and larkspur, and the ambitious promise of
the hollyhocks delighted Athalie.
Pink peach buds bloomed; cherry, pear, and apple covered the trees
with rosy snow; birds sang everywhere; and the waters of the pool
mirrored a sky of purest blue. But Athalie now walked no further than
the garden seat,--and walked slowly, leaning always on Clive's arm.
In those days throughout May her mother was with her in her room
almost every night. But Athalie did not speak of this to Clive.