Chapter 11

He didn't appear even to _want_ to scold, though it would have been easy to hint politely that it would be my own fault if we didn't get any dinner that night--or, perhaps, breakfast next morning. Instead of being cross with me, he blamed himself for being stupid enough to lose me. I exonerated him, and we were extremely nice to each other; but as we walked on and on, round and round, seeing no lights anywhere, or hearing anything except that wonderful sound of a great silence, I began to grow tired. I didn't mean, though, that he should see it. _I_ had enough to be ashamed of, without that, but he knew by instinct, and took my hand to draw it through his arm, telling me to lean as heavily as I liked. I held back at first, saying it wasn't necessary; and insisting, as I pulled away, his hand closed down on mine tightly. It was only for a second or two, because I gave up at once, and let him lay my hand on his arm as he wished. But, do you know, mother, I think I ought to tell you it felt quite differently from any other hand that ever touched mine.

Of course I haven't even shaken hands with many men since I've been grown up, though if you'd let me be a singer I shouldn't have thought any more about it than if I were President of the United States. One reads in novels of "the electricity in a touch," and all that; but there it generally means that you're falling in love. And I can't possibly be falling in love with Ellaline's Dragon, can I? I don't suppose that can be. It would be too stupid, and forward, and altogether unspeakable. But really, I do feel differently about him from any way I ever felt before toward anybody. I have always said that I'd rather be alone with myself than with anyone else except you, for any length of time, because I'm such good chums with myself, and enjoy thinking my own thoughts. But I _do_ like being with Sir Lionel. I feel excited and eager at the thought of being with him. And his fingers on mine--and my hand on his arm--and the touch of his sleeve--and a faint little, almost imperceptible scent of Egyptian cigarettes mixing with the woodsy smell of the night--oh, I don't know how to describe it to myself. So now you know as much as I do. But wouldn't it be dreadful if I should go and fall in love with Sir Lionel Pendragon of all other men in the world? In a few more weeks I shall be slipping out of his life forever; and not only that, but I shall be leaving a very evil memory behind. He will despise me. I shall have proved myself exactly the sort of person he abominates.

I didn't think all that, however, as he put my hand on his arm. I just felt the thrill of it; but instead of worrying, I was happy, and didn't care how tired and hungry I was, or whether we ever got anywhere or not. As for him, he was too polite to let me know he was bored, and all the time we were looking for the hotel the night was so beautiful, so wonderful, that we couldn't help talking of exquisite things, telling each other thoughts neither of us would have spoken aloud in daylight. It was quite dark now, except for a kind of rosy quivering of light along the horizon, and the stars that had come out like a bright army of fairies, with millions of scintillating spears.

I knew then, dearest, that he was no dragon, no matter what circumstantial evidence may have been handed down to Ellaline as a legacy from her dead mother. That is something to have divined by the magic of the forest, isn't it, after I've been puzzling so long? There is now not the least doubt in my mind. So if I should be silly and sentimental enough to fancy myself in love, it can't do any harm, except to make me a little sorry and sad after I've come home to you. It won't be anything to be _ashamed_ of, to have cared about a man like Sir Lionel; because I assure you I shan't behave foolishly, no matter how I may eventually feel. You can trust your Audrie for that.

It was too dark to tell the time by a watch, but we remarked to each other that they must have finished dinner long ago; and Sir Lionel hoped this wouldn't spoil the memory of my birthday for me.

"Oh, no," said I, before I thought, "it will make it better. I shall never, never forget this."

"Nor I," said he, in a pleasant, quiet tone.

Then he went on to tell me that he had a little birthday remembrance which all day he'd been wanting to give me. It was a ruby ring, because the ruby was July's stone, but I needn't wear it unless I liked. He hoped I wouldn't mind his having disobeyed me when I said I wanted nothing, because he wished very much to give it to me. And having lived alone, and ordered his own and other people's affairs for so long, had accustomed him to having his own way. Would I be kind to him, and accept his present?

I couldn't say no, under those stars and in that enchantment. So I answered that I would take the ring--knowing all the while I must soon hand it over to Ellaline.

"Shall I give it to you now?" he asked, "or will you wait till to-morrow?"

I did want to see it, though it was to be only borrowed! "Now," said I. Then he took a ring from some pocket, and tried to slip it over a finger of the hand on his arm.

"Oh, but that's the engaged finger," I burst out.

Silly of me! I might have let him put it on, and changed it afterward.

"I beg your pardon," said he, almost as if he were startled. "That will be a younger man's privilege some day, and then you will be taken away from me."

"You will be glad to get rid of me, I should think," I hurried to say, stretching out my other hand, and letting him slip the ring on the third finger.

"Should you think so?" he echoed. "I suppose you have the right to feel that, after the past. But don't feel it. Don't, child."

That was all, and I didn't answer. I couldn't; for what he had said was for Ellaline, not for me. Yet it made my heart beat, his voice was so sincere, and fuller of emotion than I'd ever heard it yet.

Just then, into our darkness a light seemed to flash. We both saw it together. I thought it might be the hotel, but Sir Lionel said he feared it was more probably the window of some remote cottage or charcoal-burner's hut.

We walked toward it, and that was what it was: a charcoal-burner's hut. Sir Lionel must have been disappointed, because he wanted to get me home, but _I_ wasn't. I was in such a mood that I was not ready for the adventure to come to an end.

The next bit of the adventure was exactly suited to the New Forest, and we couldn't have experienced it anywhere else.

The hut was a tiny, wattled shed, and the light we'd seen came through the low, open doorway. It was the light of a fire and a candle; and there was a delicious aromatic smell of wood smoke in the air. Sir Lionel explained, as we walked up to the place, that some of these huts were hundreds of years old, remnants of the time when debtors and robbers and criminals of all sorts used to hide in the forest under the protection of the malfays. As he spoke, we almost stumbled over some obstacle in the dark, and he said that very likely it was the hearth of a vanished cottage. People had the right to leave the hearth if their house were torn down, to establish "cottage rights"; and there were a good many such, still scattered through the forest, even in the gardens of modern houses; for no one dared take them away.

The charcoal-burner was "at home," and receiving. He was engaged in cooking eggs and bacon for his supper, and if you could only guess how good they smelled! Nothing smells as nice as eggs and bacon when you are hungry, and we were ravenous.

Most things as old as that charcoal-burner are in museums; and his eyes were so close together it seemed as if they might run into one when he winked. Also, he was deaf, so we had to roar to him, before he could understand what had happened. When he did understand, though, he was a thorough trump, and said we could have his supper if we "would be pleased to eat it." Bread and cheese would do for him. And we might have tea, if we could take it without milk.

But there were three eggs, and three strips of bacon, so we insisted that we must share and share alike, or we would have nothing. I made the tea, in a battered tin pot which looked like an heirloom, and we all sat at an uncovered kitchen table together, though our host protested. It was fun; and the old thing told us weird tales of the forest which made me conscious that I have a spine and marrow, just as certain wild music does. His name is Purkess; he thinks he is descended from Purkess, the charcoal-burner who found the body of William Rufus; and his ancestors, some of whom were smugglers and poachers, have lived in the forest for a thousand years. He was so old that he could remember as a child hearing his old grandfather tell of the days of the wicked, illegal timber-selling in the forest for the building of warships. Just think, grand oaks, ash and thorn, trees stanch as English hearts, sold for the price of firewood!

I sat at the table, watching the firelight play on my ring, which I hadn't seen till we got into the hut; and it is beautiful. I shall enjoy having it, though only for a little while, and shall regard it as a trust for Ellaline.

The charcoal-burner assured us we needn't worry; he would put us on the way home, and give us landmarks which, after he'd guided us a certain distance, we couldn't miss even at night.

When we'd finished our eggs and bacon, our tea and chunks of dry bread, Sir Lionel laid a gold piece on the table. Blind as he was, the old man wasn't too blind to see _that_, and he simply beamed.

"Bless you all the days of your life, sir, and your good, pretty lady!" he cackled.

That's the third time I've been taken for Sir Lionel's wife. The other times I didn't care, but this time, though I laughed, it was a _put on_ laugh, because of those dim questionings about myself floating in the background of my mind.

The descendant of poachers knew the forest, as he said, "with his eyes shut." He limped before us for nearly half a mile, along what he called a "walk"--a New Forest word--and then abandoned us to our fate, after describing the profile of each important tree which we must pass, and pointing out a few stars as guides. Then we bade each other good-bye for ever. He went back to gloat over his gold piece, and Sir Lionel and I went on together.

Somehow, we fell to talking of our favourite virtues, and without thinking, I said, "My mother's is gratitude."

"Gratitude," he repeated, as if in surprise, but he didn't seem to notice that I'd used the present tense. To make him forget my slip, I hurried on to say I thought mine was courage, in a man, anyhow. What was his, in a woman?

"Truth," he answered, with an instant's hesitation.

Luckily he couldn't see me blush in the dark. But the real Audrie was always decently truthful, wasn't she? It's only this Ellaline-Audrie that isn't free to be true.

"Only in women?" I asked, uncomfortably.

"Truth goes without saying in men--the sort of men one knows," said he.

"Don't you think women love the truth as much as men?" I persisted.

"No, I don't," he answered abruptly. Then qualified his "no," as if he ought to apologize for it. "But I haven't had much experience," he finished, a heavy, dull sound coming into his voice.

Well, dearest, that's all I have to tell you on this, my birthday night, except that we found our way back to the hotel safely, arriving about half-past ten, and only Emily was anxious about us. The other two were inclined to be frivolous; and Mrs. Senter noticed the new ring, which I had forgotten to take off my finger. Nothing ever escapes her eyes! I saw them light, and linger, but of course she didn't refer to the ring, and naturally I didn't.

I hadn't quite decided whether or not I should wear it "for every day," and had been inclined to think it would be better not, even at the risk of disappointing the giver. But I made up my mind, when Mrs. Senter looked so peculiarly at it, that I would brazen the thing out, and so I will.

"I envy you your adventure," she said, in what _I_ felt was a meaning voice, though Sir Lionel didn't appear to read under the commonplace surface.

I don't care if she does choose to be horrid. I don't see how she can hurt me. And as for Dick, he has done his worst. He has made me get them both asked for the tour. I should think that's enough.

We are going to stop at the Compton Arms for two or three days, running about in the car to see different parts of the forest, and coming "home" at night. I love that way!

The only thing I don't like in going from one hotel to another, is having all sorts of queer little birthmarks on my hankies and other things in the wash. Good-bye, Angel Duck.

Your Grown-up

Daughter.

Only think, I am now of age!

By the way, Sir Lionel, who expected his ward to be a little girl (thoughtless of him!), said to-night: "You're so old, I can't get used to you."

And I retorted, "You're so young, I can't get used to _you_."

I hope it didn't sound pert, to answer like that?

XIII

AUDRIE BRENDON TO HER MOTHER

_Lulworth Cove_, _July 30th_

Why aren't you with me, dearest, seeing what I am seeing?

It's all very well for you to write that my letters make a panorama pass before your eyes, and I'm flattered, but I want you. Although I am enjoying life, I'm more excited than happy, and I don't sleep well. I dream horrid dreams about Mrs. Senter and Dick Burden, and about Ellaline, too, but I always laugh when I wake up.

Thank you so much for telling me that you think I'm behaving pretty well, considering. But I wonder what you'll say in your next, after my last?

Every day since then I've been meaning to write, if only a short note, but we've had early starts and late stops; and then, from not sleeping at night, I'm often so tired when the end of the day comes that I feel too stupid to try and earn your compliments.

It is morning, and I'm writing out of doors, sitting on a rock, close by the sea. But before I begin to describe Lulworth, I must tell you a little about the glorious things of which I've had flying glimpses since the letter dated Compton Arms. This is our first all-night stopping place since we left Stony Cross "for good," but I've picked up many a marvellous memory by the way.

People who haven't seen the New Forest haven't seen England.

I had no idea what it was like till we stayed there. I knew from guide-books that there were thousands of acres of woodland still, though much had been "deforested"; but I didn't know it hid many beautiful villages, and even towns. It's a heavenly place for motoring, but I'm not sure it wouldn't be even better to walk, because you could eke out the joy of it longer. I should like a walking honeymoon (a whole round moon) in the New Forest--if it were with just the right man.

Oh, I mustn't forget to say I'm glad I didn't see Rufus's Stone by daylight. Mrs. Senter and Dick went the morning after I wrote to you, but I wouldn't go again, because I didn't want to lose the enchanted picture in my mind. She laughed when I refused. I could have slapped her. But never mind.

When they came back they were disgusted, and said there was a ginger-beer woman and a man with the game of "Aunt Sally," and a crowd of cockney excursionists round them and the Stone. Talk of malfays!

Sir Lionel had made out an itinerary for the day, and we were to start for Lyndhurst, Beaulieu Abbey, Lymington, Brockenhurst, and Mark Ash, all of which we were to visit before evening, coming back by way of Lyndhurst again, and stopping there for tea. But before we got off, such a comic thing happened.

I didn't think to mention it in a letter, but one day we passed a motor-car that was having tire trouble by the side of the road. The chauffeur was rolling on a new tire, with a curious-looking machine, in which Young Nick was passionately interested, as he'd never seen one before. Sir Lionel explained that it was an American tool, not very long invented, and said to be good. He added, in an evil moment, that he wished he'd thought to buy one like it before leaving London, as probably the thing couldn't be got in the Provinces.

Well, just as we were about to spin away in great style from the Compton Arms, one of our tires sighed, and settled down for an unearned rest. But instead of looking black-browed and murderous, as he did when the same thing occurred before, Nick smiled gleefully. He jumped down, and without a word produced a machine exactly like the one his master admired a few days ago.

"Where did you get that?" asked Sir Lionel.

"Last night, sahib," returned Nick, imperturbably. (He can speak quite good English.)

"What! Since we had our trouble?"

"Yes, sahib." An odd expression now began to play among Nick's brown features, like a breeze over a field of growing wheat.

"How's that? There's no shop."

"The sahib says true. I found this thing."

"Where?" sharply.

"But a little way from here. In the road."

"You rascal," exclaimed Sir Lionel. "You stole it."

Young Nick made Buddha eyebrows and a Buddha gesture. "The sahib knows all. But if I did take it? Those men, they were going again to the big city. We away. They never miss this. They buy another. It is better we have it."

Trying to look very angry, though I knew he was dying to laugh, Sir Lionel reproached Nick for breaking a solemn promise. "You swore you'd never do such a thing in England if I brought you with me. Now you've begun again, the same old game. I shall have to send you back, that is all."

"Then I die, and _that_ is all," replied Young Nick, calmly.

The end of the story is, that Sir Lionel found out the names of the men, who had spent the night at the Compton Arms, and had written their address in the visitors' book. He sent the tool to them, with an explanation which I should have loved to read. And it appears that, though Nick is honest personally, he is a thief for the car, and in Bengal took anything new and nice which other motors had and his hadn't.

Now, Mrs. Norton is afraid that, if Sir Lionel scolds him much, he will commit hari-kari on the threshold of the hotel, which would be embarrassing. And it does no good to tell her that hari-kari is a Japanese or Chinese trick. She says, if Nick would not do that he might do something worse.

Gliding over the perfect roads of the Forest, Apollo seemed actually to float. I never felt anything so delicious, and so like being a goddess reclining on a wind-blown cloud. No wonder motorists' faces, when you can see them, almost always look madly happy. So different from "hay motorists," as The Blot says. _They_ generally look grumpy.

The little wild ponies were one of the Forest's surprises for me. We met lots of them, mostly miniature mothers giving their innocent-faced, rough babies an airing; delightful beastkins. And I almost liked Mrs. Senter for having a cousin who owns one of these ponies as a pet, a dwarf one, no bigger than a St. Bernard dog. It wears a collar with silver bells, follows her everywhere, thinks nothing of curling up on a drawing-room sofa, and once was found on its mistress's bed, asleep on a new Paris hat.

The enticing rose-bowered cottages we passed ought to have told me that we were back in Hampshire again, if the New Forest hadn't seemed to a poor little foreigner like a separate county all by itself. It would be no credit to a bride to clamour for love in such a cottage, and turn up her nose at palaces. She might be married at the beautiful church of Lyndhurst (a most immediate jewel of a church, with an exquisite altar-piece by Lord Leighton, a Flaxman, and a startlingly fine piece of sculpture by an artist named Cockerell), then, safely wedded, plunge with her bridegroom into the Forest, and be perfectly happy without ever coming out again. I wish I had had the "Forest Lovers" to re-read while we were there. I think Maurice Hewlett must have got part of his inspiration in those mysterious green "walks" which lead away into that land where fairy lore and historic legend go hand in hand.

Lyndhurst, which King George III. loved, is pretty, but we didn't stop to look at it, because we were coming back that way. After seeing the church which, though modern, I wouldn't have missed for a great deal, we spun on to Beaulieu Abbey, the home of a hero of motoring. There we saw a perfect house, rising among trees, and sharing with the sky a clear sheet of water as a mirror. Once this was a guest-house for the Abbey; now it's called the Palace House, and deserves its name. Its looking-glass is really only a long creek, which spills out of the Solent, but it seems like a lake; and you've only to walk along a meadow path to the refectory of the old abbey. From there you go through a mysterious door into the ruined cloisters, which used to belong to the Cistercians--the "White Monks." King John provided money for the building; which proves that it's an ill wind which blows no one any good, because the stingy, tyrannical old king wouldn't have given a penny to the abbots if they hadn't scourged him in a nightmare he had. I shan't soon forget the magnolia and the myrtle in the quadrangle, and if I were one of the long-vanished monks, I should haunt the place. There couldn't be a lovelier one.

From Beaulieu we went to Lymington, a quaint and ancient town, with a picturesque port. Everything there looked happy and sleepy, except the postillions on the Bournemouth coach, which was stopping at the hotel where we had an early lunch. They were wide awake and jolly, under their old-fashioned, broad-brimmed beaver hats.

After Lymington, we skimmed through the Forest, hardly knowing or caring whither, though we did manage to find Brockenhurst, and Mark Ash, which was almost the finest of all with its glorious trees. Our one wish was to avoid highways, and Sir Lionel was clever about that. The sweetest bit was a mere by-path, hardly to be called a road, though the surface was superb. Young Nick had to get down and open a gate, which led into what seemed a private place, and no one who hadn't been told to go that way would have thought of it. On the other side of the gate it was just another part of forest fairyland, whose inhabitants turned themselves into trees as we, in our motor-car, intruded on them. I never saw such extraordinary imitations of the evergreen family as they contrived on the spur of the moment. It was a glamorous wood, and throughout the whole forest I had more and more the feeling that England isn't so small as it's painted. There are such vast spaces not lived in at all, yet haunted with legend and history. One place we passed--hardly a place, it was so small--was called Tyrrel's Ford; and there Sir Walter Tyrrel is said to have stopped to have his horse's shoes reversed by a blacksmith, on his flight to the sea, after killing the Red King. Or no, now I remember, this was next day, between Ringwood and Christchurch!

When we were having tea at Lyndhurst on our way back, at a hotel like a country house in a great garden, we found out that it once had been the home of your forty-second cousin, the Duc de Stacpoole, who came to England with Louis Philippe. There's his beautiful tapestry, to this day, in the dining-room, and his gorgeous magnolia tree looking wistfully into the window, as if asking why he isn't there to admire its creamy flowers, big as fat snowballs.