they found themselves at the “black boar” at basingford, sitting round a green table under a may tree in the garden. the “black boar” was an ancient hostelry, all white plaster, black beams, and brown tiles, its sign swinging on a great carved bracket, its parlour full of pewter and brass. it had the pleasant smell of a farmhouse rather than the sour odour of an inn. everything was clean, the brick-floored passages, the chintz curtains at the windows, the oak stairs, the white coverlets on the solid mahogany beds. a big grandfather clock tick-tocked in the main passage. the garden at the back ended in a bowling-green that was remarkably well kept, its mown sward catching the yellow evening light through the branches of ancient elms.
they were having tea under the may tree, whose trusses of white blossom showered down an almost too sweet perfume. at the edge of the lawn was a border packed full of wallflowers, blood red and cloth of gold. it was sunny and windless. the tops of the tall elms were silhouetted against the blue.
“are you going to preach here?”
it was eve who asked the question, and joan gaunt who answered it.
“no. we are just private individuals on a walking tour.”
“i see. and that means?”
“someone on the black list.”
eve smothered a sigh of relief. from the moment of entering basingford she had felt the deep waters of life flowing under her soul. she was herself, and more than herself. a strange, premonitory exultation had descended on her. her mood was the singing of a bird at dawn, full of the impulse of a mysterious delight, and of a vitality that hovered on quivering wings. the lure of the spring was in her blood, and she was ready to laugh at the crusading faces of her comrades.
she pushed back her chair.
“i shall go and have a wash.”
“what, another wash!”
her laughter was a girl’s laughter.
“i like to see the water dimpling in the sunlight, and i like the old willow pattern basins. what are you going to do?”
joan had letters to write. lizzie was reading a book on “sex and heredity.”
eve left them under the may tree, washed her face and hands in the blue basin, tidied her hair, put on her hat with unusual discrimination, and went out to play the truant.
she simply could not help it. the impulse would brook no argument. she walked through basingford in the direction of fernhill. she wanted to see the familiar outlines of the hills, to walk along under the cypress hedges, to feel herself present in the place that she loved so well. for the moment she was conscious of no purpose that might bring her into human contact with fernhill. she wanted memories. the woman in her desired to feel!
her first glimpse of the pine woods made her heart go faster. here were all the familiar lanes and paths. some of the trees were her intimates, especially a queer dwarf who had gone all to tam-o’-shanter. even the ditches ran in familiar shadow lines, carrying her memories along. from the lodge gate she could see the top of the great sequoia that grew on the lawn before the fernhill house. it was absurd how it all affected her. she could have laughed, and she could have wept.
then a voice, a subtle yet imperious voice, said, “go down to the wilderness!” she bridled at the suggestion, only to remind herself that she knew a path that would take her round over the hill and down into the valley where the larches grew. the impulse was stronger than anything that she could oppose to it. she went.
the green secrecy of the wood received her. she passed along the winding path between the straight, stiff poles of the larches, the gloom of the dead lower boughs making the living green above more vivid. it was like plunging from realism into romance, or opening some quaint old book after reading an article on the workings of the london county council. eve was back in the world of beauty, of mystery and strangeness. the eyes could not see too far, yet vision was stopped by crowded and miraculous life and not by bricks and mortar.
the trees thinned. she was on the edge of the fairy dell, and she paused instinctively with a feeling that was akin to awe. how the sunlight poured down between the green tree tops. three weeks ago the bluebells must have been one spreading mist of lapis-lazuli under the gloom of the criss-cross branches. and the silence of it all. she knew herself to be in the midst of mystery, of a vital something that mattered more than all the gold in the world.
supposing lynette should be down yonder?
eve went forward slowly, and looked over the lip of the dell.
lynette was there, kneeling in front of the toy stove that eve had sent her for christmas.
an extraordinary uprush of tenderness carried eve away. she stood on the edge of the dell and called:
“lynette! lynette!”
the child’s hair flashed as she turned sharply. her face looked up at eve, wonderingly, mute with surprise. then she was up and running, her red lips parted, her eyes alight.
“miss eve! miss eve!”
they met half way, eve melting towards the running child like the eternal mother-spirit that opens its arms and catches life to its bosom. they hugged and kissed. lynette’s warm lips thrilled the woman in eve through and through.
“oh, my dear, you haven’t forgotten me!”
“i knew—i knew you’d come back again!”
“how did you know?”
“because i asked god. god must like to do nice things sometimes, and of course, when i kept asking him——. and now you’ve come back for ever and ever!”
“oh, no, no!”
“but you have. i asked god for that too, and i have been so good that i don’t see, miss eve, dear, how he could have said no.”
eve laughed, soft, tender laughter that was on the edge of tears.
“so you are still making feasts for the fairies?”
“yes, come and look. the water ought to be boiling. i’ve got your stove. it’s a lovely stove. daddy and i make tea in it, and it’s splendid.”
every thing was in readiness, the water on the boil, the fairy teapot waiting to be filled, the sugar and milk standing at attention. eve and lynette knelt down side by side. they were back in the golden age, where no one knew or thought too much, and where no one was greedy.
“and they drink the tea up every night?”
“nearly every night. and they’re so fond of cheese biscuits.”
“i don’t see any biscuits!”
“no, daddy brings them in his pocket. he’ll be here any minute. won’t it be a surprise!”
eve awoke; the dream was broken; she started to her feet.
“dear, i must be getting back.”
“oh, no, no!”
“yes, really.”
lynette seized her hands.
“you shan’t go. and, listen, there’s daddy!”
eve heard a deep voice singing in a soft monotone, the voice of one who hardly knew what he was singing.
she stood rigid, face averted, lynette still holding her hands and looking up intently into her face.
“miss eve, aren’t you glad to see daddy?”
“why, yes.”
a sudden silence fell. the man’s footsteps had paused on the edge of the wood. it was as though the life in both of them held its breath.
eve turned. she had to turn to face something that was inevitable. he was coming down the bank, his face in the sunlight, his eyes staring straight at her as though there were nothing else in the whole world for him to look at.
lynette’s voice broke the silence.
“daddy, she wanted to run away!”
eve bent over her.
“oh, child, child!”
her face hid itself for a moment in lynette’s hair.
she heard canterton speaking, and something in his voice helped and steadied her.
“lynette has caught a fairy. she was always a very confident mortal. how are you—how are you?”
he held out his hand, the big brown hand she remembered so well, and hers went into it.
“oh, a little older!”
“but not too old for fairyland.”
“may i never be too old for that.”
