Part 13

He was up at the trap side before it came to rest, and as his eyes fell upon him Kit felt suddenly very old. This son of his was so lithe and strong, so full of life at its height, so healthy and fine-coloured and clean-drawn. There was nothing about him that was betrayed or made ashamed by the pure tones and line of marsh and sky. By comparison Kit felt himself and Bob to be broken and fusty like the trap, unbeautifully finished things blurring the exquisitely ending day. Not all the clean air and space could give them back that look, which belongs only to Nature and the young. They were blots on the landscape, he felt, an offence to the eye ... like an old boot flung away in a flowering hedge ... old bottles cast on the emptiness of the sands....

Thomas, however, was reaching up a hand, and there was nothing but hearty greeting in his face. He kept saying, “You’ve landed, dad—you’ve landed at last!” as if it was something brought about by a charm. He managed to spare Bob a jerk of the head, and then instantly turned to the older man again. Bob looked at them both with a somewhat curious stare—the brother that seemed so hearty and so glad, and the father that was out of himself to-night.

Kit said, “Ay, ay,” in a voice that was rather vague and tired, because now he was looking past Thomas at the gate. He had not noticed the gate when they first stopped, because of that withering picture of Thomas in his strength, but now he saw that it was not the gate he knew. It was either a new gate straight from the Hall works, or else it was the old one mended and put to rights. It was painted, too, which in any case would have made it strange, because it was many a long year since Kit had painted his gates. Perhaps he should have welcomed this first symbol of advance, but instead he felt coldly angry with the four-ruled thing, swinging so neatly on its stoup. He was accustomed to broken and jagged and hanging bars, made lovely in velvet greens by the brushes of wind and rain. Always, on coming home, he had seen the house through the bars, the painted colours of home through the ancient, mellow frame. Sunset he had seen through the old bars—long lines of yellow in a frosty sky, and the red ball of the sun dropping fierily over snow. He had seen pure morning and sepia afternoon, and the wild smokes of stormy dusks in spring, and the old gate had vignetted them softly, as the soft lines of the hedges framed the fields. But it was not possible to look at the house through this soulless square, cutting the scene like a knife with its hard blue lines. Now there came to him, as on the yacht, the sense of violent robbery at a journey’s end. Just here he had meant to stand and stare, to yield to the first ecstasy of sight, and this parvenu gate had come brutally between. He glared at it so fiercely that Thomas asked what was wrong, but Kit only said, “Nowt, nowt,” and allowed him to help him down. Bob looked at him from beside the horse’s head, watching with curious, half-shut eyes.

Thomas did not appear to notice that the other two scarcely spoke. He was so busy with his welcome, so full of a rather nervous pleasure and intense relief. He talked all the time he was helping the old man down, and after he had him safely on the ground. “You’ll be a bit stiff, likely, but you’re rarely lish.... Watch out for yon step, now—ay, yon’s it! You’ve brought fiddle along wi’ you?—ay, there it be. Catch hold of my arm, and we’ll get along to t’house.”

Agnes had been right in supposing that Bob would not come in. Thomas pressed him a little, but he shook his head, and turned the horse and climbed back into the trap. Once there, however, he did not drive away, but sat watching his father with that new knowledge in his face. Thomas thought he was hesitating, after all, and went back to him when he had led the old man through the gate, but Bob only bent a little over the wheel, and told him something in a lowered tone. Both remembered, as they looked at each other, another evening on the marsh....

Kit stayed where Thomas had planted him in the track, looking in front of him towards the mountains and the sea. Now he could look at the house without anything in between, and forget the shock of the gate that swung behind. The house, at least, seemed just as it had been, true to his trust and faithful to his dream. Just so it had looked a thousand days before, with the yew’s tall finger pointing to the sky. Even in his most absent moods he had never neglected the yew, but had managed to keep it smooth as a quill pen. He had liked to see its shadow fall clean against the house, the one thing black and sharp in his coloured, shifting life. Windows and roofs he saw, orchard and yard; garden and hedge and the white penthouse of the porch. The light lay over it all like the blessing of a hand, and when he came to it, it would bless him, too. Just for a moment, however, he watched it from afar, comparing it, inch by inch, with the picture in his heart. No, it had not failed him, in spite of his fear, and he was safe. The substance had not broken in his fingers and crushed the dream. A passion of thankfulness swept over him as he stood, and then, turning to look for Thomas, he saw the gate.

IV

They went arm-in-arm along the meadow path, the young and the old masters of Beautiful End. Thomas had always been a silent soul, but now he talked as if he would never stop. Every now and then he laughed as well, a satisfied, happy chuckle in his throat. Also he acted showman, which was hard to bear, and Kit said “Ay” and “Nay,” and looked the other way. He wished with all his heart that Thomas would stop pointing and hold his tongue. He did not want to be shown things; most passionately he did _not_. He could find what he wanted for himself, and see it as Thomas could never see it, if he tried for the rest of his life. There was no use in showing things at any time, if it came to that, because no two persons saw them just the same. Thomas was equally busy pointing out what was new, and introducing old friends, as it were, by the scruff of the neck. Thomas had been off at service from a lad, yet here he was teaching his father about the farm, although Kit had never ceased seeing it since he went away. Did he remember the three old trees in a clump, and how deep the river ran below the house? Glimpses of bay and moss ... his own fields ... things that were closer than breathing and nearer than hands and feet! He was ashamed of himself for being irritated and vexed, because, of course, Thomas was only meaning to be kind. It wasn’t every son who would do so much for a thriftless dad, and he didn’t know he was spoiling things at the start. He must just be allowed to talk himself to a stop, and then perhaps they would have a little peace. He would surely get tired of pointing, after a bit. There was nothing to do but say “Ay” and look away.

The meadow was altered, somehow, he said to himself, though just for the moment he was puzzled to say why. It had a smoother and greener look than he remembered it to have worn, though at the same time it seemed somehow rather bare. “There’s a deal less thistles than there used,” he said, when he understood, and Thomas laughed and nodded his head with pride.

“Ay, and there’ll be fewer still afore I’m through.” His eyes went keenly across the meadow and over the land, seeing things as his father would never see them, if he tried for the rest of his life. “I’ve not made a job of it yet, not by a deal, but there’s over much to take in hand right off. I just went for t’things as was worst, and t’others mun just make shift and bide their time. I’d ha’ liked to have had the whole place sided afore you come, but yon was a bigger bite than I could chew....”

There was a warm satisfaction in his voice in spite of his words, for he had done wonders already, as, of course, he knew. Already the farm had a look of care such as it had not worn for many a long year. He could not help feeling proud that it had changed its face even in so short a time, and was perfectly sure that his father would be proud as well. Kit, however, seemed scarcely to notice what he said, but was busy staring at the cattle under the hedge.

“What’s come to old Bonny?” he demanded, suddenly stopping short in the rough track. “You’ve never gone and parted with her, surely—a rare good cow like yon?”

“I never had her to part with,” Thomas said, with a look of surprise. “Bonny’s been dead a while back, father, if you come to think on. Even the best can’t last for ever, and Bonny had her spell.”

“It’s the first I’ve heard on it,” Kit replied in a vexed tone. He stared aggrievedly at the new stock, as if the blame of his disappointment was somehow theirs. “What d’ye think it was as took her off at the last?”

“Nobbut old age, I reckon!” Thomas said, with a laugh. “What, it was not so long afore you give up the farm! You’ve never gone and forgotten yon, I’m sure!”

“Ay, I reckon I have,” Kit said in a voice like a full stop, and stared for a while longer at the drowsy group, before he turned away and left them in the sun. He remembered now, of course, that Bonny was dead, and was deeply ashamed of his lapse and his daft talk. It was just that he had forgotten that things change, because in his dream of home there was never any change. Everything in it had been as stable as the stars, even such creatures of time as thistles and cows. But he couldn’t let Thomas think he was fretting after the past, so presently he made an effort to speak again. “Seemingly you’ve a decent bit o’ stock,” he said. “I reckon you’ve got an eye for the right stuff.”

Thomas had been conscious of a sudden chill, but this remark brightened him at once. “Happen I’ve not done that badly,” he answered as modestly as he could, longing to stop again for another stare. He wanted to drag his father across the field, and tell him the history of each separate beast, and how they had all been bargains beyond belief. But there was plenty of time for that, and the old man must be tired; besides, Agnes was waiting for them at the house.

“I’ve always meant to go in for right good stuff,” he said. “I always knew I’d be stock-proud if I got the chance. Farming’s like owt else—there’s nowt beats the best. A good roan’s my choice—you can’t do better than yon. Your old Bonny was a rare good cow, if nobbut she hadn’t been white.”

“She suited me well enough,” Kit said, in the tone that meant the subject was now closed, and Thomas remembered himself and hedged with shame. Agnes would have plenty to say, he felt sure of that, if he put the old man about before ever he reached the house! “There’s always changes,” he murmured, after a while, not knowing that he was echoing Marget and Bob. “Farm’s in the same spot, anyway, and the yew. Grass grows much the same colour, I’ll be bound; and there’s always the sea, as doesn’t change at all....”

Kit remembered Bob when they were halfway to the house, and turned to look for him, thinking him at their heels. But the track behind them was empty and the gate shut, and there was no more sign of Bob and his trap than if they had never been. The old man wanted to know why he had gone away, and Thomas looked shy at the question, and seemed vexed.

“Nay, I doubt he’s a bit put out about summat, is Bob. Happen he’s not best suited at you coming to us.... Any road, he wasn’t for coming up to the house, whatever I said. He said he’d be stopping a while at Low Moss End, and likely getting his tea along wi’ ’em an’ all....”

Kit remained standing still in the middle of the field, looking rather forlornly down the track. “Happen he’d a message or summat for ’em,” he observed. “They’re cousins o’ Marget’s, now I come to think on.” There was a lost sound in his voice, as if he had somehow been betrayed. “I never thought as he wouldn’t be coming up.”

Thomas had come to a stand, too, looking crestfallen and cast down. He had never imagined for a moment that his father would want Bob. One would have thought he had had enough of that family and to spare! “Is there owt you wanted to tell him?” he ventured at last. “I could happen slip down and fetch him as soon as I’ve had my tea.”

But before he had stopped speaking Kit had swung round, shaking his head and making for the house. Now he seemed to be running away from Bob, thrusting him into the distance that lay behind. He wondered why he had asked for his elder son, and why he had felt deserted when he saw the empty field. Bob was the last connecting link with what he had left, and he couldn’t be really free until Bob had gone. He ought to have felt exultant instead of afraid, but there was no trusting his wretched nerves to-night. He felt ashamed of himself again ... he was always feeling ashamed. He was the sort that would try to escape on the threshold of Paradise itself....

He breathed more easily when they reached the garden gate, because it did not seem possible that he could turn back now, and he saw with relief that the gate was still the same. It was painted, indeed, in the new shade of blue, but that did not prevent it from being the same gate underneath. He knew it to be the same by the missing spoke, which must have been missing for over twenty years. Thomas apologised for the spoke, but he paid no heed; he was so busy gloating over the fact that it wasn’t there.

He hurried between the box borders along the path, and all the sweet scents of the garden came to him, and the homely, well-known odours of the farm. There was lavender somewhere, wallflower, mignonette; sweet briar, faint salt from the far sea, and the scent of the ready grass asking for the scythe. Now he was close to the whitewashed porch, with its stone seats and its arch of rose, and the little beds at its feet that were full of snowdrops in the spring. Then he was inside the porch, in the stream of gold that went swimming through the door, and felt himself shabby and poor in the purity of the light. He was like a threadbare tramp, he thought to himself, being carried up to Heaven in a chariot of fire.... The kitchen seemed dim and narrow to him after the open marsh, or else his eyes were weakened by weariness and sun. Nothing came out or spoke to him as he stood, waiting for the first tremendous swelling of joy. In the old days the peace of the house had been so free that it had never hidden itself until he was inside. It had come out to meet him before he reached the porch, like a child that runs to a father coming home. To-night the kitchen was empty and very quiet, but it was an aloof stillness, self-absorbed ... detached. The voice of the grandfather’s clock in the silence spoke as if speaking only to itself. He, too, now that he was under the roof, felt curiously detached. Only half of him, he felt, was in the house; the other—the dreaming half—was left outside. But still he hoped and stood, waiting for the uprising of his heart, and Thomas, respectfully sympathetic, waited too. Perhaps it was because of Thomas that the magic would not work. Suddenly he began to feel self-conscious under his son’s eyes, and the fear that was fear of a fear came drifting back. Shrinking, he took a hasty plunge through the kitchen door, and caught his foot on a flag as he went in.

Thomas, following, found him just inside, puzzling and staring worriedly at the floor. “Summat catched my foot,” he was saying repeatedly with a pained surprise. He bent down to the flag as if wishing to test it with his hand as well as his feet. “I never mind catching my foot afore,” he said. It was just as if he couldn’t believe he had done the thing, as if his boots had been bound to know the flag—the same old boots—all patched—that he had been wearing when he left. But he and the boots had forgotten because they were old, and the flag had forgotten the memory of his tread. It did not do to fret about these things, because perhaps they always happened to folks who went away. Marget, at least, would have told him so, he knew. Nevertheless, the trivial little mischance weighed upon his mind. It was like some base betrayal on the part of ancient friends.

“You’re a bit shaky, likely,” Thomas said, dumping the bundle on the nearest chair. He blinked his eyes a moment because of the sun, and then he began to look about for his wife. He couldn’t persuade himself at first that she wasn’t there, because this was the great moment of which she had talked. He had almost expected to meet her in the field, or at least to discover her waving from the porch. Failing that, they would find her when they got inside, ready with welcome for a tired old man. Here they were, however, at the journey’s end, only to find her vanished off the earth. Not only was she not in the kitchen as he had thought, but he had a terrible feeling that she wasn’t even in the house. There was no stir in the air of the kitchen as though somebody had just run out. The silence of it was settled and whole, and seemed to flow away into unstirred deeps beyond. Just for a moment he felt his old loneliness crush back, thinking her shut away from him where he could not go. Then he roused himself and went to the stair and called, and Kit stopped staring at the flag and shuffled into the room. There he stood and waited, as he had learned to wait, with his careless-careful fingers clasping fiddle and bow. The kitchen still seemed dim and rather strange, and nothing spoke to him out of it that he knew. The sun sent pointers of light across the room, picking out tables and chairs he had never seen.

Thomas shouted and said she wouldn’t be far; and shouted again and said she wouldn’t be long. This sudden check at the very start seemed to have thrown all their pleasant planning out of gear. The great occasion couldn’t begin until Agnes was in place, and as far as he could discover she was gone for good. He thought, as he waited and fretted, that things were going amiss ... right from the earliest moment they were going amiss....

He said over and over again that she wouldn’t be far, just as Kit had repeated his speech about the flag. They were like helpless, stranded actors dropping cues that there was nobody left in the theatre to pick up. Then Thomas bellowed again in the midst of a last excuse, and they heard a door fling open above them and afterwards slam. There was a running and flutter and clatter on the stair, and Agnes came flying past him into the room.

She went straight across to the guest and took his hand, her face warm with welcoming smiles, and her voice full of self-reproach. “Eh, now, to think I missed you after all!” she said; “an’ me that set on being on the spot! I never thought you’d catch me unbeknownst. I was nobbut giving a look to things upstairs.... Ay, well, you’re welcome, I’m sure ... you are that. We’re right glad, Thomas and me, to have you come....”

She still had hold of the hand which he left limply in her clasp, and he looked at her smiling face and said “Thank you,” and smiled too. The kindliness of her welcome warmed his heart, though it was not the welcome he wanted from the house. It was like the welcome from the cottages in the row, which was pleasant and comforting but had nothing to do with home. Agnes was mistress of the place, but she was a stranger, too, and no stranger could give you the real feeling of home. She had never been in the house when he went in his dream, and now that she spoke in the dream it was bound to seem strange. But she was pleasant to look at, and homely, and very kind, and she would grow to be part of the real things after a while. So when she continued to smile he smiled again, and Thomas smiled joyfully over by the stair. Perhaps there was just a touch of self-satisfaction in the smile, because he was thinking of Marget’s welcome home. Anyhow, they had done the old man better than that, even if Agnes had been off the spot! He forgot, as he watched, that he had been afraid, that things had seemed to be going utterly wrong. He only remembered that they were perfect now—the house, the weather, and the kindly wife. Certainly, it would be queer if his father wasn’t content ... but then he was positive he would be content....

Agnes was sure of it, at least, sure as triumphant angels gathering tired souls into heaven. Now she was laughing and repeating her first speech—it was curious how they repeated themselves to-night. Then she flew to the hearth and set the kettle back to boil, afterwards swinging round to put the visitor into his chair.

“Set you down, Father, and I’ll make the tea. You’ll be wanting your tea, I reckon, after yon drive. Now, then, Thomas, shove it nearer the fire, and don’t stand poping like a pig at a punch! There you be, Father ... champion ... now you’ll do. Shall I put fiddle down for you, by the way?”

He looked at her as she stood in front of him, holding out her hand, and a look of anxious terror crossed his face. It was true that she looked like the lasses who had loved the fiddle in the past, but that was before he had learned to be afraid. Still, this was home, and to refuse was to be false to the dream from the very first, because home was a place where every man’s foolishness was safe. “You’ll mind what you’re at?” he pleaded, searching her with his eyes, and she nodded her head wisely, and for the first time did not smile. Taking it gently, she set it on a table near, and there was no tremor of nervousness from the strings. She nodded again as she turned away, as though the fiddle was a secret that they shared....

“I’m feared to let it out o’ my sight,” Kit explained in an apologetic tone. “Marget was that set on shoving it in the fire.”

“Ay, well, it’ll be safe enough here,” Agnes said. “It’ll be safe as the Bible and precious as bright gold.” She went to a brass-handled drawer and whipped out a snowy square of a cloth which she laid across the strings. “Thomas mun make you a box for it,” she went on; “a nice warm box as’ll keep it out o’ the damp.”

Thomas said he would start on it first thing, in a tone that meant he was glad of something to say. Of course he was quite sure now, as Agnes was sure, but as yet he could not copy her conversational ease. “A grand warm box’ll be just the ticket,” he said. “It’ll be better and snugger a deal when it’s gitten a box.”

Kit said they were right kind, and settled himself in his chair, staring in front of him at the shining hearth. He did not like to say that he would not have the box, and that he hated to see the fiddle covered up. The white cloth looked for all the world like a little shroud, and the box would be only a coffin in his eyes. He did not mean to have the box whatever they said, but it wouldn’t be manners to tell them so right off. There seemed no letting him and his fiddle alone, though all that folks could do for him was to let him alone. It was just the way Thomas had bothered him in the field, showing him things he didn’t want to see. Well, he would slip away from them later on, but now he must mind his manners and let be.

He roused himself with a little attempt at cheer. “Ay, well, I’ve landed at last!” he said, with a smile. “I never thought I’d see the old spot again.”

Thomas and Agnes gave him a double beam. “It’s a sight for sore eyes to see you here, I’m sure!”

“Marget wasn’t best pleased at me coming away,” the old man said. “She’s had a deal to say about it, these last few week.”

“And wi’ the rough side of her tongue for it, I’ll swear!” Thomas laughed. “I heard tell she was taking on and terble wild. Ay, well, you’ll have none o’ that wi’ Agnes, don’t you fret.”