The Dark Flower. John Galsworthy

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СКАЧАТЬ a man! … For all that, as he neared home he hastened, till he was actually running. Why had he stayed so long up there? She would be back—she would expect to see him; and that young beast of a violinist would be with her, perhaps, instead! He reached the hotel just in time to rush up and dress, and rush down to dinner. Ah! They were tired, no doubt—were resting in their rooms. He sat through dinner as best he could; got away before dessert, and flew upstairs. For a minute he stood there doubtful; on which door should he knock? Then timidly he tapped on hers. No answer! He knocked loud on his tutor's door. No answer! They were not back, then. Not back? What could that mean? Or could it be that they were both asleep? Once more he knocked on her door; then desperately turned the handle, and took a flying glance. Empty, tidy, untouched! Not back! He turned and ran downstairs again. All the guests were streaming out from dinner, and he became entangled with a group of 'English Grundys' discussing a climbing accident which had occurred in Switzerland. He listened, feeling suddenly quite sick. One of them, the short grey-bearded Grundy with the rather whispering voice, said to him: “All alone again to-night? The Stormers not back?” Lennan did his best to answer, but something had closed his throat; he could only shake his head.

      “They had a guide, I think?” said the 'English Grundy.'

      This time Lennan managed to get out: “Yes, sir.”

      “Stormer, I fancy, is quite an expert!” and turning to the lady whom the young 'Grundys' addressed as 'Madre' he added:

      “To me the great charm of mountain-climbing was always the freedom from people—the remoteness.”

      The mother of the young 'Grundys,' looking at Lennan with her half-closed eyes, answered:

      “That, to me, would be the disadvantage; I always like to be mixing with my own kind.”

      The grey-bearded 'Grundy' murmured in a muffled voice:

      “Dangerous thing, that, to say—in an hotel!”

      And they went on talking, but of what Lennan no longer knew, lost in this sudden feeling of sick fear. In the presence of these 'English Grundys,' so superior to all vulgar sensations, he could not give vent to his alarm; already they viewed him as unsound for having fainted. Then he grasped that there had begun all round him a sort of luxurious speculation on what might have happened to the Stormers. The descent was very nasty; there was a particularly bad traverse. The 'Grundy,' whose collar was not now crumpled, said he did not believe in women climbing. It was one of the signs of the times that he most deplored. The mother of the young 'Grundys' countered him at once: In practice she agreed that they were out of place, but theoretically she could not see why they should not climb. An American standing near threw all into confusion by saying he guessed that it might be liable to develop their understandings. Lennan made for the front door. The moon had just come up over in the South, and exactly under it he could see their mountain. What visions he had then! He saw her lying dead, saw himself climbing down in the moonlight and raising her still-living, but half-frozen, form from some perilous ledge. Even that was almost better than this actuality of not knowing where she was, or what had happened. People passed out into the moonlight, looking curiously at his set face staring so fixedly. One or two asked him if he were anxious, and he answered: “Oh no, thanks!” Soon there would have to be a search party. How soon? He would, he must be, of it! They should not stop him this time. And suddenly he thought: Ah, it is all because I stayed up there this afternoon talking to that girl, all because I forgot HER!

      And then he heard a stir behind him. There they were, coming down the passage from a side door—she in front with her alpenstock and rucksack—smiling. Instinctively he recoiled behind some plants. They passed. Her sunburned face, with its high cheek-bones and its deep-set eyes, looked so happy; smiling, tired, triumphant. Somehow he could not bear it, and when they were gone by he stole out into the wood and threw himself down in shadow, burying his face, and choking back a horrible dry sobbing that would keep rising in his throat.

      IX

      Next day he was happy; for all the afternoon he lay out in the shade of that same wood at her feet, gazing up through larch-boughs. It was so wonderful, with nobody but Nature near. Nature so alive, and busy, and so big!

      Coming down from the hut the day before, he had seen a peak that looked exactly like the figure of a woman with a garment over her head, the biggest statue in the world; from further down it had become the figure of a bearded man, with his arm bent over his eyes. Had she seen it? Had she noticed how all the mountains in moonlight or very early morning took the shape of beasts? What he wanted most in life was to be able to make images of beasts and creatures of all sorts, that were like—that had—that gave out the spirit of—Nature; so that by just looking at them one could have all those jolly feelings one had when one was watching trees, and beasts, and rocks, and even some sorts of men—but not 'English Grundys.'

      So he was quite determined to study Art?

      Oh yes, of course!

      He would want to leave—Oxford, then!

      No, oh no! Only some day he would have to.

      She answered: “Some never get away!”

      And he said quickly: “Of course, I shall never want to leave Oxford while you are there.”

      He heard her draw her breath in sharply.

      “Oh yes, you will! Now help me up!” And she led the way back to the hotel.

      He stayed out on the terrace when she had gone in, restless and unhappy the moment he was away from her. A voice close by said:

      “Well, friend Lennan—brown study, or blue devils, which?”

      There, in one of those high wicker chairs that insulate their occupants from the world, he saw his tutor leaning back, head a little to one side, and tips of fingers pressed together. He looked like an idol sitting there inert, and yet—yesterday he had gone up that mountain!

      “Cheer up! You will break your neck yet! When I was your age, I remember feeling it deeply that I was not allowed to risk the lives of others.”

      Lennan stammered out:

      “I didn't think of that; but I thought where Mrs. Stormer could go, I could.”

      “Ah! For all our admiration we cannot quite admit—can we, when it comes to the point?”

      The boy's loyalty broke into flame:

      “It's not that. I think Mrs. Stormer as good as any man—only—only—”

      “Not quite so good as you, eh?”

      “A hundred times better, sir.”

      Stormer smiled. Ironic beast!

      “Lennan,” he said, “distrust hyperbole.”

      “Of course, I know I'm no good at climbing,” the boy broke out again; “but—but—I thought where she was allowed to risk her life, I ought to be!”

      “Good! I like that.” It was said so entirely without irony for once, that the boy was disconcerted.

      “You are young, Brother Lennan,” his tutor went on. “Now, at what age do you consider men develop discretion? Because, there is just one thing always worth remembering—women have none of СКАЧАТЬ