第72章

An English spring!Why not an Irish one?or Jewish?The chair moved slowly ahead,past tufts of sturdy bluebells that stood up like wheat and over grey burdock leaves.When they came to the open place where the trees had been felled,the light flooded in rather stark.And the bluebells made sheets of bright blue colour,here and there,sheering off into lilac and purple.And between,the bracken was lifting its brown curled heads,like legions of young snakes with a new secret to whisper to Eve.Clifford kept the chair going till he came to the brow of the hill;Connie followed slowly behind.The oak-buds were opening soft and brown.Everything came tenderly out of the old hardness.Even the snaggy craggy oak-trees put out the softest young leaves,spreading thin,brown little wings like young bat-wings in the light.Why had men never any newness in them,any freshness to come forth with!Stale men!

Clifford stopped the chair at the top of the rise and looked down.The bluebells washed blue like flood-water over the broad riding,and lit up the downhill with a warm blueness.

'It's a very fine colour in itself,'said Clifford,'but useless for making a painting.'

'Quite!'said Connie,completely uninterested.

'Shall I venture as far as the spring?'said Clifford.

'Will the chair get up again?'she said.

'We'll try;nothing venture,nothing win!'

And the chair began to advance slowly,joltingly down the beautiful broad riding washed over with blue encroaching hyacinths.O last of all ships,through the hyacinthian shallows!O pinnace on the last wild waters,sailing in the last voyage of our civilization!Whither,O weird wheeled ship,your slow course steering.Quiet and complacent,Clifford sat at the wheel of adventure:in his old black hat and tweed jacket,motionless and cautious.O Captain,my Captain,our splendid trip is done!Not yet though!Downhill,in the wake,came Constance in her grey dress,watching the chair jolt downwards.

They passed the narrow track to the hut.Thank heaven it was not wide enough for the chair:hardly wide enough for one person.The chair reached the bottom of the slope,and swerved round,to disappear.And Connie heard a low whistle behind her.She glanced sharply round:the keeper was striding downhill towards her,his dog keeping behind him.

'Is Sir Clifford going to the cottage?'he asked,looking into her eyes.

'No,only to the well.'

'Ah!Good!Then I can keep out of sight.But I shall see you tonight.

I shall wait for you at the park-gate about ten.'

He looked again direct into her eyes.

'Yes,'she faltered.

They heard the Papp!Papp!of Clifford's horn,tooting for Connie.She 'Coo-eed!'in reply.The keeper's face flickered with a little grimace,and with his hand he softly brushed her breast upwards,from underneath.

She looked at him,frightened,and started running down the hill,calling Coo-ee!again to Clifford.The man above watched her,then turned,grinning faintly,back into his path.

She found Clifford slowly mounting to the spring,which was halfway up the slope of the dark larch-wood.He was there by the time she caught him up.

'She did that all right,'he said,referring to the chair.

Connie looked at the great grey leaves of burdock that grew out ghostly from the edge of the larch-wood.The people call it Robin Hood's Rhubarb.

How silent and gloomy it seemed by the well!Yet the water bubbled so bright,wonderful!And there were bits of eye-bright and strong blue bugle...And there,under the bank,the yellow earth was moving.A mole!It emerged,rowing its pink hands,and waving its blind gimlet of a face,with the tiny pink nose-tip uplifted.

'It seems to see with the end of its nose,'said Connie.

'Better than with its eyes!'he said.'Will you drink?'

'Will you?'

She took an enamel mug from a twig on a tree,and stooped to fill it for him.He drank in sips.Then she stooped again,and drank a little herself.

'So icy!'she said gasping.

'Good,isn't it!Did you wish?'

'Did you?'

'Yes,I wished.But I won't tell.'

She was aware of the rapping of a woodpecker,then of the wind,soft and eerie through the larches.She looked up.White clouds were crossing the blue.

'Clouds!'she said.

'White lambs only,'he replied.

A shadow crossed the little clearing.The mole had swum out on to the soft yellow earth.

'Unpleasant little beast,we ought to kill him,'said Clifford.

'Look!he's like a parson in a pulpit,'she said.

She gathered some sprigs of woodruff and brought them to him.

'New-mown hay!'he said.'Doesn't it smell like the romantic ladies of the last century,who had their heads screwed on the right way after all!'

She was looking at the white clouds.

'I wonder if it will rain,'she said.

'Rain!Why!Do you want it to?'

They started on the return journey,Clifford jolting cautiously downhill.

They came to the dark bottom of the hollow,turned to the right,and after a hundred yards swerved up the foot of the long slope,where bluebells stood in the light.

'Now,old girl!'said Clifford,putting the chair to it.

It was a steep and jolty climb.The chair pugged slowly,in a struggling unwilling fashion.Still,she nosed her way up unevenly,till she came to where the hyacinths were all around her,then she balked,struggled,jerked a little way out of the flowers,then stopped 'We'd better sound the horn and see if the keeper will come,'said Connie.

'He could push her a bit.For that matter,I will push.It helps.'

'We'll let her breathe,'said Clifford.'Do you mind putting a scotch under the wheel?'

Connie found a stone,and they waited.After a while Clifford started his motor again,then set the chair in motion.It struggled and faltered like a sick thing,with curious noises.

'Let me push!'said Connie,coming up behind.

'No!Don't push!'he said angrily.'What's the good of the damned thing,if it has to be pushed!Put the stone under!'

There was another pause,then another start;but more ineffectual than before.

'You must let me push,'said she.'Or sound the horn for the keeper.'

'Wait!'