“there is a lady sweet and kind,
was never face so pleased my mind,
i did but see her passing by,
and yet i love her till i die,”
sang peter, in a pleasant tenor voice.
he was sitting by the window of his cottage, engaged—truth will out—in darning a pair of green socks. occasionally he lifted his head from his work and gazed through the window. it was intensely still outside; not a leaf, not a blade of grass was stirring. it was almost overpoweringly close and sultry. peter had set both door and window open in invitation to a non-existent breeze to enter.
from the north, where a great bank of ominous black clouds was piled, came a low, sinister rumble.
“it’s coming,” said peter aloud, looking through the window. “the storm, the tempest, the whole wrath of the furious elements will shortly be loosed upon us. the clouds are coming up with extraordinary rapidity, considering there’s no wind at all down here. up there it must be blowing half a gale. we’ll get rain soon.”
he returned to his darning.
“her gesture, motion, and her smiles,
her wit, her voice, my heart beguiles,
beguiles my heart, i know not why,
and yet i love her till i die,”
he sang, sticking his needle carefully in and out of the heel of the sock.
“and the green of the wool doesn’t match the green of the sock one little bit!” he said ruefully. “but, after all, no one looks at me; and i certainly can’t look at my own heels—at least, not without a certain amount of effort, so n’importe, as they say in france.”
“cupid is wingèd and doth range
her country, so my love doth change;
but change she earth, or change she sky,
yet will i love her till i die.”
peter cut the wool with his pocket-knife, and [pg 173]contemplated the sock with his head on one side. then he threw it on to the table. there was a little laugh in his eyes, not caused by the contemplation of the sock.
“i believe,” he said whimsically, “that that fellow—what was his name?—neil macdonald, was right after all, and that chaucer is—well, an old fraud. yet,” and a wistful look crept into his blue eyes, “i might have done much better if i’d gone on believing in him. yet, i don’t know. after all, peter, my son, isn’t the joy worth a bit of heartache!”
he got up from his chair and went towards the door. he could look over the hedge and up and down the lane from his position. a couple of big drops, large as half-crowns, had just fallen on his spotlessly white doorstep—peter was proud of his doorstep. they were followed by another and another. there was a flash, a terrific peal, and then with a sudden hiss came the deluge. straight down it fell, as if poured from buckets, and the lightning played across the sky and the thunder pealed.
“ouf!” said peter, drawing in a huge breath as the refreshing scent of the grateful earth came to his nostrils. “that’s really quite the very best smell there is, and worth all your eau-de-colognes, and your phulnanas, and—and your whatever you call ’em put together. it really is—” and then he broke off, for down the lane came running a woman, her head bent, the rain beating, drenching down upon her. peter was at the gate in a moment.
“come in here!” he called.
she paused, hesitated. peter saw her face. his heart jumped, and then started off klip-klopping at a terrible rate.
“i—” she began. a blinding flash of lightning, followed by a terrific peal right overhead, stopped the words.
“come at once!” said peter imperatively, sharply almost. “it’s not safe.”
she ran up the path, he following. in the shelter of the cottage she turned and faced him. the colour in her face was not, perhaps, quite to be accounted for by the rain and her own haste.
“you’re drenched,” said peter abruptly. “you can’t stay in those wet things a moment longer than absolutely necessary. with your permission, i shall go to your house and order your carriage to be sent immediately. but first—” he had put her a chair by the fireplace; he was on his knees applying a match to the pile of sticks and fir-cones already laid therein.
“but,” protested lady anne, “i cannot give my permission. you will yourself be soaked—drenched—if you venture out in this downpour.”
peter laughed lightly. “it will not be the first time, nor, i dare to say, the last. rain has but little effect on me.” he rose from his knees. the flames were twining and twisting from stick to stick in long tongues of orange and yellow and blue. there was a merry crackling, there were flying sparks.
peter crossed to the cupboard. from it he brought a black bottle and a wineglass.
“i have, alas! no brandy to offer you, but port wine will, i hope, prove as efficacious against a chill.” without paying the smallest heed to her protestations he poured her out a glass, which he held towards her. “drink it,” he said, in somewhat the tone one orders a refractory child to take a glass of medicine.
anne took the glass, meekly, obediently, with [pg 176]the faintest gurgle of laughter. “to your health!” she said as she sipped the wine.
peter’s heart beat hotly, madly. here was she, actually she in the flesh, toasting him in his own room. he poured out another glass.
“to you,” he said, and under his breath he added, “my lady, my star, my altogether divinity!” then he moved firmly to the door.
“i cannot allow you to go,” said anne quickly.
“alas!” said peter, smiling, “then i must forego your permission. in less than half an hour, in twenty minutes perhaps, your carriage will be here.” and he vanished into the sluice without.
“and now,” he said, as he set off at a half-canter down the lane, “if she does glance round the room and find it sleeping-apartment as well as sitting-room, she will, i trust, be less embarrassed. for heaven knows whether in some particulars she may not bow to old dame grundy’s decrees. bless her!” and it is to be conjectured that it was not on mrs. grundy’s head that peter’s blessing was invoked.
anne, left to solitude, a blazing fire, and a glass of port, sat for a moment or so deep in thought. who was this man, with his little imperative ways, his abrupt speech, hiding, she was well aware, a certain embarrassment? he was well-born, there was no doubt about that fact. his voice, in spite of its abruptness, had the pleasant modulation of breeding. his hands—she had noticed his hands—were long-fingered, flexible, and brown. they were also well kept. who was he? but who was he?
the fire offering her no solution, she finished her glass of port, and, kneeling down by the hearth, let the warmth of the flames play upon her wet blouse. she unpinned her hat and shook the rain from it. the drops sizzled as they fell among the flames and glowing sticks. she put her hat on the ground beside her and turned towards the room. she scrutinized it with interest. it was barely furnished but spotlessly clean. against the farther wall she saw a truckle-bed covered with a blanket of cheerful red and blue stripes; she saw a cupboard on which were tea-things; a table; two chairs; and the chair on which she had been sitting. and that was all.
then on the table she saw lying a pair of green socks; softly green they were, and somewhat faded, and beside them was a card of green—virulently green—mending wool.
“o-oh!” said anne, with a little shudder. but after a moment she rose from her knees in order to examine them closer. one sock had a patch of virulent green in the heel, a neat darn enough.
“long practice,” said anne, with a little shake of the head. in the other was a hole—quite a good-sized hole.
for a moment anne hesitated, then, with a little smile, took up the card of excruciatingly green wool and broke off a strand. she threaded the needle she found stuck into the wool, and fitted the sock on her hand.
“i owe him,” said anne, “some small payment for the shelter.” and she laughed, seating herself again in the armchair. neatly, deftly, she drew the wool in and out across the hole, her ears alert to catch the sound of returning steps, or of carriage-wheels. the needle moved swiftly and with dexterity.
what is one to make of her? lady anne garland—the proud, the much-courted, the to the world always aloof and sometimes disdainful lady anne garland—sitting in a meagrely furnished little room by a fire of sticks and fir-cones, darning the green sock of a vagabond piper! and infinitely more incomprehensible is the fact that he—this man on whom she had only twice before set eyes—was causing her to think of him in a manner not at all good for the peace of her own soul; especially as—and here a distinct confession must be made—she was already quite more than half in love with a man she had never even seen—the writer of books and letters, robin adair.
human nature is a complex and curious thing, though by those who, having read thus far, hold the key to the riddle her nature may perhaps be understood.
ten minutes later and a neat darn had replaced the gaping hole. finding no implement handy with which to cut the wool she broke it, then placed the sock, the wool, and the needle again upon the table in much the same position they had previously occupied.
she got up from her chair and crossed to the window. the rain was still coming down in torrents, and the lightning was still frequent, but the thunder was muttering now at a distance.
once more she looked back into the room. what a queer little room it was, and how entirely peaceful! why did the villagers imagine it to be haunted? could anything be more restful, more reposeful? and how very homely it looked in spite of its somewhat bare appearance! and then she stopped in her reflections, for the sound of wheels had struck upon her ear. a moment later the carriage came in sight down the lane. on the box, mackintoshed and stately, were both coachman and footman.
anne laughed. “it really was unnecessary for them both to come,” she said to herself. and then peter was out of the carriage and up the path to the door.
“it is here,” he said.
anne came forward. “i am more than grateful,” she said. “and you must be terribly wet.”
“oh, i shall dry again,” he said carelessly.
“it was very good of you,” said anne.
“it was a pleasure,” said peter, “to drive in a carriage.”
“oh!” said anne demurely.
“and—” he continued, and stopped. but in his heart he added, “to do any mortal thing for you, dear lady!” but these speeches had a way of remaining in his heart without reaching his lips.
he unfurled an umbrella which he had purloined up at the house.
“the rain is not quite so furious now,” he said as he opened it.
“oh, my hat!” said anne. she was at the hearth and back beside him in an instant. but in the transit she had glanced for a moment at the green socks on the table.
peter, holding the umbrella carefully over her, conducted her down the path. the footman was standing by the carriage door. anne held out her hand.
“a thousand thanks!” she said.
peter gripped her hand hard. “i was delighted to be of the smallest service,” he assured her.
the footman shut the door; peter handed him the umbrella and he mounted with it to the box. the carriage, which had already turned, drove up in the direction of the white house on the hill.
peter stood looking after it till it was out of sight, then went back into the cottage. he divested himself of his extremely wet coat and hung it on the back of a chair by the fire. not the armchair; that he gazed at almost reverently, for had not she sat in it! then he went to the table and took up the socks. arrested suddenly by something he saw, he examined them both carefully.
“i am sure,” said peter aloud, “that i only mended one sock, and now both—” he looked at a darn carefully. “oh, oh!” said peter, a light of illumination in his eyes. it was, however, almost incredible; he could hardly believe his senses. he lifted the sock nearer his face. a faint hint of lavender came to him. “oh!” said he again; “the darling, the adorable darling!”
peter crossed to his cupboard; he placed the sock carefully inside a sheet of clean manuscript paper and put it on a shelf.
then he sat down in the armchair by the fire, filled and lit his pipe, and fell into an abstracted reverie, which lasted fully half an hour.
