Jalna: Books 1-4: The Building of Jalna / Morning at Jalna / Mary Wakefield / Young Renny (76 page)

“Of course you could.”

“I know I’d read badly.”

“But why?” Now he was laughing at her.

“I should be nervous.”

“Come now. Not with me. I’m the least critical person in the world. You say you’re not earning your salary. Here is a way to earn it. A benighted Colonial horse-dealer, sitting at your feet, yearning to hear Tennyson read.”

“Where shall we sit?” Mary asked, suddenly determined to do it.

“Come with me and I’ll show you the coolest spot hereabouts.”

He led the way across the lawn blazing in sunlight and along a path down into a ravine which by its deep shade and the sound of the stream that ran through it to the lake, gave an air of mystery to the place, so Mary thought and was constantly pleased by it. It was in truth cooler here. Philip took her hand as they descended the steep.

“Gather up your skirt,” he said. “There are brambles here.” His hand clasped hers firmly. She was conscious of the clasp of his hand through all her being.

On a mossy ledge he paused. The stream, green in the shadow, reflected the rushes, the boughs of the evergreens. A rustic bridge crossed it and under the bridge the shadow was deepest. Philip sank down at Mary’s feet with a sigh.

“What could be better than this?” he asked, looking up at her.

She sank beside him. “It’s heavenly. And so still. Except for the murmuring of the river.”

“It’s a very little river,” he said, “but I love it.”

“Jalna is beautiful.”

“It’s a pretty good place,” he agreed. “But we’ve talked about it before. Now I want to hear you read.” He settled himself expectantly, looking up into her face, his own dappled by a narrow spear of sunlight slanting through the leaves.

She opened the book. She was conscious of the trembling of her hands and feared her voice would do the same. To gain time she showed him the portrait of Lord Tennyson in the front, as she might have shown it to Renny.

“I think it is a noble face,” she said.

He agreed but he was admiring her slender white hands.

Presently she gathered herself together and began to read. It was easier than she had thought. He lay, resting on his elbow, very still. There was a comfort in his presence. Perhaps her voice encouraged the birds in that dim coolness, for they began to sing quietly all about.

Philip listened, but only half-attentive to the meaning, till he heard the words:

“‘No more subtle master under heaven

Than is the maiden passion for a maid,

Not only to keep down the base in man

But teach high thought, and amiable words

And courtliness, and the desire of fame

And love of truth, and all that makes a man.’”

He laid his hand on the page.

“Stop,” he said, “and then read that again.” She was confused. “That… which?” she stammered.

“You know.” He took his hand from the page and repeated the first line.

“Was I reading too fast?” she asked.

“No. I just wanted to hear it again.”

“Do you like it? Shall I go on?”

“Please, do.”

She re-read the passage and continued but less clearly. Her composure was shaken. Philip had picked up a small switch and was gently beating the ground with it as though to the rhythm of the poetry.

Neither saw Dr. Ramsey descending the opposite slope and he did not see them till he stood on the rustic bridge. If Mary’s composure had been shaken, his now suffered a tremor, as of an approaching earthquake. He could scarcely believe his eyes. Philip prone on the ground, at Miss Wakefield’s feet! She dressed, not as he had heretofore seen her but in some filmy garment, with elbow sleeves! Her body curved in a languishing attitude.

“Dear God!” muttered the doctor. “Has it come to this?”

He strode on across the bridge and mounted the path toward them with a sharp crackling of twigs. His foot dislodged a stone and it bounded down the slope and splashed into the stream. Now Philip and Mary became aware of his approach.

He was panting a little as he spoke. “I would not dream of interrupting you,” he said, “especially in such a pleasant occupation, but I had brought the volume of Robert Burns’ poems, I promised you, Miss Wakefield. Twice before I brought them but could not find you. Ah, I see you have other poetry to engross you. Never mind. I will take it away again.”

“Please, don’t,” cried Mary. “I want them very much.”

He all but threw the book into her lap.

Philip got to his feet. “Hot, isn’t it?” he said.

“Yes. It is exceedingly hot driving along dusty country roads on my rounds. You are fortunate, you and Miss Wakefield, in having no duties to perform.”

He strode up the path and left them.

“You’d never think he was seventy, would you?” remarked Philip looking after him.

F
OUR SUCCESSIVE
S
UNDAY
mornings Mary had gone to the little country church with Philip Whiteoak, and his children. As she had sat in the family pew with Renny on her right and Meg on her left and watched the people of the neighbourhood enter and take their long-accustomed places she had experienced a feeling of completeness she never before had known. In London she often had stolen out quietly on a Sunday morning so as not to disturb her father and gone to the Service. But it had been to a church in a great city where she was surrounded by strangers. Now, in the intimacy of this small but solid building, with faces with which she was growing familiar about her, she found a deep satisfaction, not so much in religion, as in a new gladness in herself.

Philip did not sit with Mary and the children but went into the vestry with Mr. Pink whose father had been rector before him, and donned a surplice. He had assisted the rector by reading the lessons. Now Mary had the opportunity to look at him unobserved, to compare him with the portrait of his father, to Captain Whiteoak’s disadvantage, to compare him with all the attractive men she ever had known, to their disadvantage. Even the slight impediment in his speech only increased her pleasure
in the reading, giving her, for the moment, a kind of protective maternal feeling toward him.

On the fifth Sunday the hymn “Eternal Father, Strong to Save” was sung, and to judge by the heartiness which Mr. Pink who had a deep bass, and the choir and the congregation threw into it, all had an earnest desire to draw the attention of the Almighty to the fact that five members of the Whiteoak family, including Sir Edwin Buckley, were en route for Jalna. On either side of Mary the children raised their clear pipes. She noticed that both pronounced peril — “peryil.” Meg knew all the words but Renny only the first verse. After singing it he was silent till the last line of each successive verse when his penetrating treble joined hers in — “For those in peryil on the sea.” Mary was thankful that there were only four verses to the hymn. If there had been one more she was sure she would have disgraced herself by giving way to laughter. For some reason her emotions, gay or sad, were near to the surface in those days. She could not understand herself, for at times she would laugh almost uncontrollably at ridiculous nothings with the children which she knew was bad for discipline, and at other times, usually at night, she would discover that, for no reason at all, her eyes were full of tears.

As the time of arrival drew near, two women could scarcely have been more in their element than Mrs. Nettleship and Eliza. From morning till night they fought with dirt and disorder in a frenzy of preparation. Mary felt that never before had she known what real cleanliness could be. Carpets were taken outdoors and beaten, rugs were shaken, walls were wiped down, windows polished till they might not have been there, so transparent were they, brass and silver glittered. The drawing-room which had been swathed in dust covers because Philip used only the library, now was discovered as a handsome room. Mary stood in it alone, absorbing its unknown atmosphere, the faint smell of an Indian rug, the upholstery, the cushions on the sofa where unknown heads had lain, thinking what thoughts? The china figures on the mantelshelf, the jade monkey and the ivory elephants in the cabinet,
all looked at her with an unfriendly air, as though by no possible means could they have any connection with her. There was music on the piano. The air was full of its far-off vibration. Soon the piano would come to life again but not for her, though later on she was supposed to give Meg music lessons. The ormolu clock had been wound and in its ardent ticking seemed anxious to make up for lost time. A bunch of roses, pressed tightly into a vase, already drooped a little as though unable to withstand the steady advance of the returning personalities.

All day the children were beside themselves from excitement. They could talk or think of nothing but the presents that would be brought to them. There was no use in trying to curb them. Mary wandered about, longing to hide herself somewhere in the woods but it was steadily raining, a sweet-smelling gentle rain following a night of electrical storms. Mary did not see Philip all day. She felt lost. She wandered about, looking in at the four bedrooms which had been prepared; Mrs. Whiteoak’s with its rich-coloured bedspread, the other three with snow-white counterpanes and huge, stiffly starched pillow shams. Even the spaniels were excited. The puppy, Jake, ran snuffling into each of the freshly prepared rooms and lifted his leg against a leg of the four-poster that was to be occupied by Sir Edwin and Lady Buckley.

The carriage was to go to the village railway station to meet the local train which connected, though not very efficiently, with the train from Montreal. Both were late, and the evening was drawing in when the sound of horses’ hoofs told of the arrival. Renny’s cheeks were hot from excitement, Meg hopped ceaselessly from one foot to the other. Both wore their Sunday clothes. Mary too had put on one of her best dresses, a pale pink chambray, with a flounce on the skirt and frills on the elbow sleeves. She had taken pains with her hair which responded in delightful puffs and little curls.

When Philip had encountered her just before leaving to drive to the station he had started back in consternation. He should have warned her not to dress up like that! By Jove, what would his mother
and the Buckleys think? But — after all, she’d been engaged in England. He’d had nothing to do with it. Mary exclaimed, excitedly, quite ready to be thrown into panic:

“Is anything wrong, Mr. Whiteoak?”

“No, no” — he smiled reassuringly — “I thought I saw a spider. But I was mistaken.”

“On
me
?”

“Yes. But I was mistaken. I’m in quite a rush. I’m on my way to the station.” But he lingered. Suddenly he regretted the coming of all these relatives — even his mother. It had been very pleasant, he and Miss Wakefield alone with the children. Her presence had been charming to return to. He had scarcely realized how charming. And he had never seen her look quite so lovely as at this moment — when he was about to lose her, he almost had thought. Well, certainly, things would never be the same again. Looking back over the past month he regretted lost opportunities to be alone with Mary. There had been no more reading aloud of poetry since the day when Doctor Ramsey had come upon them in the ravine. That was a week ago. But — if he chose — surely he might be read to! Who was to stop him being read to, he’d like to know? He looked truculently at Mary.

“Yes?” she enquired, her whole body expressing interrogation.

“I was just thinking.”

“Rather stern thoughts,” she suggested. She found it so hard not to be too familiar with him.

Now he smiled. “They were about you, Miss Wakefield.”

“I hope I have not given you cause to frown.”

“Some day I’ll tell you,” he answered. “But now I must be off. Picture my family kicking their heels in the railway station. By Jove, they’ll never forgive me!”

Mary looking after him thought, — “When he says ‘his family,’ he means his
mother
. She must be an odious old lady. I’m beginning to dislike her.”

She drew a deep breath of nervous tension. All the rooms in the house were alive now, conscious of her, antagonistic to her. She
belonged nowhere, not even in her own bedroom. The children ran past her, as though they did not see her.

“Are you tidy?” she called after them. “Are your hands clean?”

They gave derisive laughs and ran on.

Jake came panting and snuffling along the passage. He ran into the room prepared for the Buckleys and again lifted his leg against the leg of the four-poster. Again no one saw him.

Mary descended the stairs and found Eliza lighting an ornate brass oil lamp in the drawing-room. Eliza was always pleasant when Mrs. Nettleship was not about. Now she remarked:

“It seems early for lighting the lamp but Mrs. Whiteoak does like to see things cheerful-looking when she comes home.”

“No rooms could look brighter or more polished than these,” said Mary. She raised her eyes to the crystal chandelier. “Every prism glitters.”

Eliza was pleased. “I took each one off and cleaned it separately. Mrs. Whiteoak always has a good look at it when she comes home. When she has a party we light all the candles in it. And, of course, on her birthday.”

Jake lollopped down the stairs and looked into the drawing room. He raised himself on his hind legs and stood against Mary. Mrs. Nettleship came from the basement. She gave Mary and Jake looks of equal disapproval.

“I won’t have that dog about my clean rooms,” she declared and clapped her hands vindictively at the spaniel.

He uttered a yelp of horror, flinging himself past Mary and almost knocking her down. He rushed through the open front door, still yelping. Outside he spied his decorous parents and flung himself at them for protection. First he tried to push himself inside his sire’s body, then, failing that, his mother’s. Mrs. Nettleship slammed the door after him.

Nearly an hour dragged itself by. Again and again Mary took her watch from where it was tucked inside her belt and looked at its laggard face. Her own face burned. Now the lamps were needed, for it was almost dark.