The Well of Loneliness (6 page)

4

They killed not so very far from Worcester; it had been a stiff run, the best of the season. Colonel Antrim came jogging along to Stephen, whose prowess had amused and surprised him.

‘Well, well,’ he said, grinning, ‘so here you are, madam, still with a leg on each side of your horse—I’m going to tell Violet she’ll have to buck up. By the way, Philip, can Stephen come to tea on Monday, before Roger goes back to school? She can? Oh, splendid! And now where’s that brush? I think our young Stephen here takes it.’

Strange it is, but unforgettable moments are often connected with very small happenings, happenings that assume fictitious proportions, especially when we are children. If Colonel Antrim had offered Stephen the crown of England on a red velvet cushion, it is doubtful whether her pride would have equalled the pride that she felt when the huntsman came forward and presented her with her first hunting trophy—the rather pathetic, bedraggled little brush, that had weathered so many hard miles. Just for an instant the child’s heart misgave her, as she looked at the soft, furry thing in her hand; but the joy of attainment was still hot upon her, and that incomparable feeling of elation that comes from the knowledge of personal courage, so that she forgot the woes of the fox in remembering the prowess of Stephen.

Sir Philip fastened the brush to her saddle. ‘You rode well,’ he said briefly, then turned to the Master.

But she knew that that day she had not failed him, for his eyes had been bright when they rested on hers; she had seen great love in those melancholy eyes, together with a curiously wistful expression of which her youth lacked understanding. And now many people smiled broadly at Stephen, patting her pony and calling him a flier.

One old farmer remarked: ”E do be a good plucked un, and so be ‘is rider—beggin’ your pardon.’

At which Stephen must blush and grow slightly mendacious, pretending to give all the credit to the pony, pretending to feel very humble of spirit, which she knew she was far from feeling.

‘Come along!’ called Sir Philip. ‘No more to-day, Stephen, your poor little fellow’s had enough for one day.’ Which was true, since Collins was all of a tremble, what with excitement and straining short legs to keep up with vainglorious hunters.

Whips touched hats: ‘Goodbye, Stephen, come out soon again—See you on Tuesday, Sir Philip, with the Croome.’ And the field settled down to the changing of horses, before drawing yet one more cover.

5

Father and daughter rode home through the twilight, and now there were no dog-roses in the hedges, the hedges stood leafless and grey with frost rime, a network of delicate branches. The earth smelt as clean as a newly washed garment—it smelt of ‘God’s washing’, as Stephen called it—while away to the left, from a distant farm-house, came the sound of a yard-dog, barking. Small lights were glowing in cottage windows as yet uncurtained, as yet very friendly; and beyond, where the great hills of Malvern showed blue against the pale sky, many small lights were burning—lights of home newly lit on the altar of the hills to the God of both hills and homesteads. No birds were singing in the trees by the roadside, but a silence prevailed, more lovely than bird song; the thoughtful and holy silence of winter, the silence of trustfully waiting furrows. For the soil is the greatest saint of all ages, knowing neither impatience, nor fear, nor doubting; knowing only faith, from which spring all blessings that are needful to nurture man.

Sir Philip said: ‘Are you happy, my Stephen?’

And she answered: ‘I’m dreadfully happy, Father. I’m so dreadfully happy that it makes me feel frightened, ‘cause I mayn’t always last happy—not this way.’

He did not ask why she might not last happy; he just nodded, as though he admitted a reason; but he laid his hand over hers on the bridle for a moment, a large, and comforting hand. Then the peace of the evening took possession of Stephen, that and the peace of a healthy body tired out with fresh air and much vigorous movement, so that she swayed a little in her saddle and came near to falling asleep. The pony, even more tired than his rider, jogged along with neck drooping and reins hanging slackly, too weary to shy at the ogreish shadows that were crouching ready to scare him. His small mind was doubtless concentrated on fodder; on the bucket of water nicely seasoned with gruel; on the groom’s soothing hiss as he rubbed down and bandaged; on the warm blanket clothing, so pleasant in winter, and above all on that golden bed of deep straw that was sure to be waiting in his stable.

And now a great moon had swung up very slowly; and the moon seemed to pause, staring hard at Stephen, while the frost rime turned white with the whiteness of diamonds, and the shadows turned black and lay folded like velvet round the feet of the drowsy hedges. But the meadows beyond the hedges turned silver, and so did the road to Morton.

*

It was late when they reached the stables at last, and old Williams was waiting in the yard with a lantern.

‘Did you kill?’ he inquired, according to custom; then he saw Stephen’s trophy and chuckled.

Stephen tried to spring easily out of the saddle as her father had done, but her legs seemed to fail her. To her horror and chagrin her legs hung down stiffly as though made of wood; she could not control them; and to make matters worse, Collins now grew impatient and began to walk off to his loosebox. Then Sir Philip put two strong arms around Stephen, and he lifted her bodily as though she were a baby, and he carried her, only faintly protesting, right up to the door of the house and beyond it—right up indeed, to the warm pleasant nursery where a steaming hot bath was waiting. Her head fell back and lay on his shoulder, while her eyelids drooped, heavy with well-earned sleep; she had to blink very hard several times over in order to get the better of that sleep.

‘Happy, darling?’ he whispered, and his grave face bent nearer. She could feel his cheek, rough at the end of the day, pressed against her forehead, and she loved that kind roughness, so that she put up her hand and stroked it.

So dreadfully, dreadfully happy, Father,’ she murmured, ‘so—dreadfully happy—’

On the Monday that followed Stephen’s first day out hunting she woke with something very like a weight on her chest; in less than two minutes she knew why this was—she was going to tea with the Antrims. Her relations with other children were peculiar, she thought so herself and so did the children; they could not define it and neither could Stephen, but there it was all the same. A high-spirited child she should have been popular, and yet she was not, a fact which she divined, and this made her feel ill at ease with her playmates, who in their turn felt ill at ease. She would think that the children were whispering about her, whispering and laughing for no apparent reason; but although this had happened on one occasion, it was not always happening as Stephen imagined. She was painfully hyper-sensitive at times, and she suffered accordingly.

Of all the children that Stephen most dreaded, Violet and Roger Antrim took precedence; especially Roger, who was ten years old, and already full to the neck of male arrogance—he had just been promoted to Etons that winter, which added to his overbearing pride. Roger Antrim had round, brown eyes like his mother, and a short, straight nose that might one day be handsome; he was rather a thick-set, plump little boy, whose buttocks looked too large in a short Eton jacket, especially when he stuck his hands in his pockets and strutted, which he did very often.

Roger was a bully; he bullied his sister, and would dearly have loved to bully Stephen; but Stephen nonplussed him, her arms were so strong, he could never wrench Stephen’s arms backwards like Violet’s; he could never make her cry or show any emotion when he pinched her, or tugged roughly at her new hair ribbon, and then Stephen would often beat him at games, a fact which he deeply resented. She could bowl at cricket much straighter than he could; she climbed trees with astonishing skill and prowess, and even if she did tear her skirts in the process it was obviously cheek for a girl to climb at all. Violet never climbed trees; she stood at the bottom admiring the courage of Roger. He grew to hate Stephen as a kind of rival, a kind of intruder into his especial province; he was always longing to take her down a peg, but being slow-witted he was foolish in his methods—no good daring Stephen, she responded at once, and usually went one better. As for Stephen, she loathed him, and her loathing was increased by a most humiliating consciousness of envy. Yes, despite his shortcomings she envied young Roger with his thick, clumping boots, his cropped hair and his Etons; envied his school and his masculine companions of whom he would speak grandly as: ‘all the other fellows!’; envied his right to climb trees and play cricket and football—his right to be perfectly natural; above all she envied his splendid conviction that being a boy constituted a privilege in life; she could well understand that conviction, but this only increased her envy.

Stephen found Violet intolerably silly, she cried quite as loudly when she bumped her own head as when Roger applied his most strenuous torments. But what irritated Stephen, was the fact that she suspected that Violet almost enjoyed those torments.

‘He’s so dreadfully strong!’ she had confided in Stephen, with something like pride in her voice.

Stephen had longed to shake her for that: ‘I can pinch quite as hard as he can!’ she had threatened. ‘If you think he’s stronger than I am, I’ll show you!’ At which Violet had rushed away screaming.

Violet was already full of feminine poses; she loved dolls, but not quite so much as she pretended. People said: ‘Look at Violet, she’s like a little mother; it’s so touching to see that instinct in a child!’ then Violet would become still more touching. She was always thrusting her dolls upon Stephen, making her undress them and put them to bed. ‘Now you’re Nanny, Stephen, and I’m Gertrude’s mother, or you can be mother this time if you’d rather—Oh, be careful, you’ll break her! Now you’ve pulled off a button! I do think you might play more like I do!’ And then Violet knitted, or said that she knitted—Stephen had never seen anything but knots. ‘Can’t you knit?’ she would say, looking scornfully at Stephen, ‘I can—Mother called me a dear little housewife!’ then Stephen would lose her temper and speak rudely: ‘You’re a dear little sop, that’s what you are!’ For hours she must play stupid doll-games with Violet, because Roger would not always play real games in the garden. He hated to be beaten, yet how could she help it? Could she help throwing straighter than Roger?

They had nothing whatever in common, these children, but the Antrims were neighbours, and even Sir Philip; indulgent though he was, insisted that Stephen should have friends of her own age to play with. He had spoken quite sharply on several occasions when the child had pleaded to be allowed to stay at home. Indeed he spoke sharply that very day at luncheon:

‘Eat your pudding please, Stephen; come now, finish it quickly! If all this fuss is about the little Antrims, then Father won’t have it, it’s ridiculous, darling.’

So Stephen had hastily swallowed her pudding and escaped upstairs to the nursery.

2

The Antrims lived half a mile from Ledbury, on the other side of the hills. It was quite a long drive to their house from Morton—Stephen was driven over in the dog-cart. She sat beside Williams in gloomy silence, with the collar of her coat turned up to her ears. She was filled with a sense of bitter injustice; why should they insist on this stupid expedition? Even her father had been cross at luncheon because she preferred to stay at home with him. Why should she be forced to know other children? they didn’t want her nor she them. And above all the Antrims! that idiotic Violet—Violet who was learning to ride side-saddle—and Roger strutting about in his Etons, and bragging, always bragging because he was a boy—and their mother who was quite sure to patronize Stephen because being grown-up made her put on a manner. Stephen could hear her infuriating voice, the voice she reserved for children: Ah, here you are, Stephen! Now then, little people, run along and have a good feed in the schoolroom. There’s plenty of cake; I knew Stephen was coining; we all know Stephen’s capacity for cake!’

Stephen could hear Violet’s timorous giggle and Roger’s guffaw as they greeted this sally. She could feel his fat fingers pinching her arm; pinching cruelly, slyly, as he strutted beside her. Then his whisper: ‘You’re a pig! You eat much more than I do, mother said so today, and boys need more than girls!’ then Violet: ‘I’m not very fond of plum cake, it makes me feel sicky—mother says it’s indigestion. I could never eat big bits of plum cake like Stephen. Nanny says I’m a dainty feeder.’ then Stephen herself, saying nothing at all, but glaring sideways at Roger.

The dog-cart was slowly climbing British Camp, that long, steep hill out of Little Malvern. The cold air grew colder, but marvellously pure it was, up there above the valleys. The peak of the Camp stood out clearly defined by snow that had fallen lightly that morning, and as they breasted the crest of the hill, the sun shone out on the snow. Away to the right lay the valley of the Wye, a long, lovely valley of deep blue shadows; a valley of small homesteads and mothering trees, of soft undulations and wide, restful spaces leading away to a line of dim mountains—leading away to the mountains of Wales, that lay just over the border. And because she loved this kind of English valley, Stephen’s sulky eyes must turn and rest upon it; not all her apprehension and sense of injustice could take from her eyes the joy of that seeing. She must gaze and gaze, she must let it possess her, the peace, the wonder that lay in such beauty; while the unwilling tears welled up under her lids—she not knowing why they had come there.

And now they were trotting swiftly downhill; the valley had vanished, but the woods of Eastnor stood naked and lovely, and the forms of their trees were more perfect than forms that are made with hands—unless with the hands of God. Stephen’s eyes turned again; she could not stay sulky, for these were the woods where she drove with her father. Twice every spring they drove up to these woods and through them to the stretching parkland beyond. There were deer in the park—they would sometimes get out of the dog-cart so that Stephen could feed the does.