canterton needed pictures of the italian gardens at latimer abbey, and since he had received permission to show the latimer gardens in his book, it devolved upon eve carfax to make a pilgrimage to the place. latimer, a small country town, lay some seventy miles away, and canterton, who knew the place, told eve to write to the george hotel and book a room there. the work might take her a week, or more, if the weather proved cloudy. canterton wanted the gardens painted in full sunlight, with all the shadows sharp, and the colours at their brightest.
the day before eve’s journey to latimer was a “wilderness day.” lynette had made eve promise to have a camp tea with her in the dell among the larches.
“daddy says you like sweet cakes.”
“daddy’s a tease.”
“i asked sarah, and she’s made a lot of lovely little cakes, some with chocolate ice, and some with jam and cream inside.”
“i shan’t come just for the cakes, dear.”
“no!”
“but because of you and your wilderness.”
“yes, but you will like the cakes, won’t you? sarah and me’s taken such a lot of trouble.”
“you dear fairy godmother! i want to kiss you, hard!”
they started out together about four o’clock, eve carrying the tea-basket, and lynette a red cushion and an old green rug. the heath garden on the hill-side above the larch wood was one great wave of purple, rose, and white, deep colours into which vision seemed to sink with a sense of utter satisfaction. the bracken had grown three or four feet high along the edge of the larch wood, so that lynette’s glowing head disappeared into a narrow green lane. it was very still and solemn and mysterious in among the trees, with the scattered blue of the sky showing through and the sunlight stealing in here and there and making patterns upon the ground.
they were busy boiling the spirit kettle when canterton appeared at the end of the path through the larch wood.
“queen mab, queen mab, may i come down into your grotto?”
lynette waved to him solemnly with a hazel wand.
“come along down, daddy bruin.”
he climbed down into the dell laughing.
“that is a nice title to give a parent. i might eat you both up.”
“i’m sure you’d find miss eve very nice to eat.”
“dear child!”
“how goes the kettle?”
“we are nearly ready. here’s the rug to sit on, daddy. miss eve’s going to have the red cushion.”
“the cushion of state. what about the cakes?”
“sarah’s made such lovely ones.”
eve’s eyes met canterton’s.
“it was ungenerous of you to betray me.”
“not at all. it was sheer tact on my part.”
tea was a merry meal, with both lynette and her father dilating on the particular excellences of the different cakes, and insisting that she would be pleasing sarah by allowing herself to be greedy. in the fullness of time canterton lit a pipe, and lynette, sitting next him on the green rug with her arms about her knees, grew talkative and problematical.
“isn’t it funny how god sends people children?”
“most strange.”
“what did you say, daddy, when god sent you me?”
“‘here’s another horrible responsibility!’”
“daddy, you didn’t! but wasn’t it funny that i was sent to mother?”
“lynette, old lady——”
“now, why wasn’t i sent to miss eve?”
canterton reached out and lifted her into his lap.
“bruin tickles little girls who ask too many questions.”
in the midst of her struggles and her laughter his eyes met eve’s, and found them steady and unabashed, yet full of a vivid self-consciousness. they glimmered when they met his, sending a mesmeric thrill through him, and for the moment he could not look away. it was as though the child had flashed a mysterious light into the eyes of both, and uttered some deep nature cry that had startled them in the midst of their playfulness. canterton’s eyes seemed to become bluer, and more intent, and eve’s mouth had a tremulous tenderness.
lynette was a young lady of dignity, and canterton was reproved.
“look how you’ve rumpled my dress, daddy.”
“i apologise. supposing we go for a ramble, and call for our baggage on the way back.”
both eve and canterton rose, and lynette came between them, holding each by the hand. they wandered through the wilderness and down by the pollard pool, where the swallows skimmed the still water. lynette was mute, sharing the half dreamy solemnity of her elders. the playfulness was out of the day, and even the child felt serious.
it was past six when they returned to the garden, and lynette, whose supper hour was due, hugged eve hard as she said good-bye.
“you will write to me, miss eve, dear.”
“yes, i’ll write.”
she found that canterton had not come to the point of saying good-bye. he walked on with her down one of the nursery roads between groups of rare conifers.
“i am going to walk to orchards corner. do you mind?”
“no.”
“i haven’t met your mother yet. i don’t know whether it is the proper time for a formal call.”
“mother will be delighted. she is always delighted.”
“a happy temperament.”
“very.”
they chose the way through the fir woods, and talked of the latimer abbey gardens, and of the particular atmosphere canterton wanted her to produce for him.
“oh, you’ll get it! you’ll get the very thing.”
“what an optimist you are.”
“perhaps i am more of a mystic.”
the mystery of the woods seemed to quicken that other mysterious self-consciousness that had been stirred by the child, lynette. they were in tune, strung to vibrate to the same subtle, and plaintive notes. as they walked, their intimate selves kept touching involuntarily and starting apart, innocent of foreseeing how rich a thrill would come from the contact. their eyes questioned each other behind a veil of incredulity and wonder.
“you will write to lynette?”
“oh, yes!”
there was a naive and half plaintive uplift of her voice towards the “yes.”
“little beech leaf is a warm-hearted fairy. do you know, i am very glad of this comradeship, for her sake.”
“you make me feel very humble.”
“no. you are just the kind of elder sister that she needs.”
he had almost said mother, and the word mother was in eve’s heart.
“do you realise that i am learning from lynette?”
“i don’t doubt it. one ought to learn deep things from a child.”
they reached the lane leading to orchards corner, and on coming to the white fence sighted mrs. carfax sitting in the garden, with the inevitable knitting in her lap. canterton was taken in and introduced.
“please don’t get up.”
mrs. carfax was coy and a little fluttered.
“do sit down, mr. canterton. i feel that i must thank you for your great kindness to my daughter. i am sure that both she and i are very grateful.”
“so am i, mrs. carfax.”
“indeed, mr. canterton?”
“for the very fine work your daughter is going to do for me. i was in doubt as to who to get, when suddenly she appeared.”
mrs. carfax bowed in her chair like some elderly queen driving through london.
“i am so glad you like eve’s paintings. i think she paints quite nicely. of course she studied a great deal at the art schools, and she would have exhibited, only we could not afford all that we should have liked to afford. it is really most fortunate for eve that you should be so pleased with her painting.”
her placid sing-song voice, with its underlining of the “sos” the “quites,” and the “mosts,” made canterton think of certain maiden aunts who had tried to spoil him when he was a child. mother and daughter were in strange contrast. the one all fire, sensitive aliveness, curiosity, colour; the other flat, sweetly foolish, toneless, apathetic.
canterton stayed chatting with mrs. carfax for twenty minutes, while eve sat by in silence, watching them with an air of dispassionate curiosity. mrs. carfax was just a child, and canterton was at his best with children. eve found herself thinking how much bigger, gentler, and more patient his nature was than hers. things that irritated her, made him smile. he was one of the few masterful men who could bear with amiable stupidity.
when he had said good-bye to her mother, eve went with him to the gate.
“good-bye. enjoy yourself. and when you write to lynette, send me a word or two.”
he held her hand for two or three seconds, and his eyes looked into hers.
“you will be delighted with latimer.”
“yes. and i will try to bring you back what you want.”
“i have no doubts as to that.”
she stood for a moment at the gate, watching his broad figure disappear between the green hedgerows of the lane. a part of herself seemed to go with him, an outflowing of something that came from the deeps of her womanhood.
“eve, dear, what a nice man mr. canterton is.”
“nice” was the principal adjective in mrs. carfax’s vocabulary.
“yes.”
“so good looking, and such nice manners. you would never have thought that he——”
“was in trade?”
“not quite that, dear, but selling things for money.”
“of course, he might give them away. i suppose his social position would be greatly improved!”
“i don’t think that would be quite feasible, dear. really, sometimes, you are almost simple.”
canterton was walking through the woods, head bent, his eyes curiously solemn.
“what i want! she will bring me back what i want. what is it that i want?”
he came suddenly from the shadows of the woods into the full splendour of the evening light upon blue hills and dim green valleys. he stopped dead, eyes at gaze, a spasm of vague emotion rising in his throat. this sun-washed landscape appeared like a mysterious projection of something that lay deep down in his consciousness. what was it he wanted? a vital atmosphere such as this—comradeship, sympathy, passionate understanding.
