Antony Gray-Gardener Part 31

Antony was working in his front garden. It was a Sat.u.r.day afternoon, and a blazingly hot one. Every now and then he paused to lean on his spade, and look out to where the blue sea lay shining and glistening in the sunlight.

It was amazingly blue, almost as blue as the sea depicted on the posters of famous seaside resorts, posters in which a bare-legged child with a bucket and spade, and the widest of wide smiles is invariably seen in the foreground. Certainly the designers of these posters are not students of child nature. If they were, they would know that a really absorbed and happy child is almost portentously solemn. It hasn't the time to waste on smiles; the building of sand castles and fortresses is infinitely too engrossing an occupation. A smile will greet the antic.i.p.ation; it is lost in the stupendous joy of the fact. But as smiles are evidently considered _de rigueur_ by the designers of posters, and as the mere antic.i.p.ation will not allow of the portrayal of the Rickett's blue sea, destined to hit the eye of the beholder, smiles and sea have--rightly or wrongly--to be combined.

Antony gazed at the sea, if not quite as blue as a poster sea, yet--as already stated--amazingly blue. Josephus lay on a bit of hot earth watching him, his nose between his forepaws, and quite exhausted after a mad and wholly objectless ten minutes' race round the garden.

Antony turned from his contemplation of the sea, and once more grasped his spade. Presently he turned up a small flat round object, which at first sight he took to be a penny. He picked it up, and rubbed the dirt off it. It proved to be merely a small lead disk, utterly useless and valueless; he didn't even know what it could have been used for. He threw it on the earth again, and went on with his digging. But it, or his action of tossing it on to the earth, had started a train of thought. It is extraordinary what trifles will serve to start a lengthy and connected train of thought. Sometimes it is quite interesting, arriving at a certain point, to trace one's imaginings backwards, and see from whence they started.

The disk reminded Antony of the coppers he had tossed to the child at Teneriffe. From it he quite unconsciously found himself reviewing all the subsequent happenings. They linked on one to the other without a break.

He hardly knew he was reviewing them, though they so absorbed his mind that he was totally unconscious of his surroundings, and even of the fact that he was digging. His employment had become quite mechanical.

He was so engrossed that he did not hear a step in the road behind him.

Josephus heard it, however, and gave vent to a faint whine, raising his head from between his paws. The sound roused Antony, and he turned.

His face went suddenly white beneath its bronze. The d.u.c.h.essa di Donatello was standing at the gate, looking over into the garden.

"Might I come in and rest a moment?" she asked. "The sun is so hot."

Antony could hardly believe his ears. Surely he could not have heard aright? But there she was, standing at the gate, most evidently waiting his permission to enter.

He left his spade sticking in the earth, and went to unfasten the gate.

Without speaking, he led the way up the little flagged path, and into the parlour.

The d.u.c.h.essa crossed to the oak settle and sat down. Slowly she began to pull off her long crinkly doe-skin gloves. Antony watched her. He saw the gleam of a diamond ring on her hand. It was a ring he had often noticed.

A picture of the d.u.c.h.essa sitting at a little round table among orange trees in green tubs flashed suddenly and very vividly into his mind.

"It is very hot," said the d.u.c.h.essa looking up at him.

"Yes," said Antony mechanically.

"Am I interrupting your work?" asked the d.u.c.h.essa.

Antony started.

"Oh, no," he replied. And he sat down by the table, leaning slightly forward with his arms upon it.

"Do you mind my coming here?" she asked.

"I don't think so," said Antony reflectively.

A gleam of a smile flashed across the d.u.c.h.essa's face. The reply was so Antonian.

There was quite a long silence. Suddenly Antony roused himself.

"You'll let me get you some tea, Madam," he said.

Awaiting no reply, he went into the little scullery, where the fire by which he had cooked his midday meal was still alight. The kettle filled with water and placed on the stove, he stood by it, in a measure wishful, yet oddly reluctant to return to the parlour. Reluctance won the day. He remained by the kettle, gazing at it.

Left alone, the d.u.c.h.essa looked round the parlour. It was exceedingly primitive, yet, to her mind, curiously interesting. Of course in reality it was not unlike dozens of other cottage parlours, but it held a personality of its own for her. It was the room where Antony Gray lived.

She pictured him at his lonely meals, sitting at the table where he had sat a moment or so agone; sitting on the settle where she was now sitting, certainly smoking, and possibly reading. She found herself wondering what he thought about. Did he ever think of the _Fort Salisbury_, she wondered? Or had he blotted it from his mind, as she had endeavoured--ineffectually--to do? And then, with that thought, with the possibility that he had done so, her presence in the room seemed quite suddenly an intrusion. What on earth would he think of her for coming?

And what on earth did she mean to say to him now she had come?

The impulse which had led her down the lane, which had caused her to pause at the gate and speak to him, all at once seemed to her perfectly idiotic, and, worse still, intrusive and impertinent. What possible excuse was she going to give for it, in the face of her behaviour to him that afternoon on the moorland? Merely to have asked for shelter on account of the heat, appeared to her now as the flimsiest of excuses, and would appear to him as an excuse simply to pry upon him, to see his mode of living. He had not returned to the parlour. Doubtless his absence was a silent rebuke to her. She had thrust the necessity of hospitality upon him, but he intended to show her plainly that it was entirely of necessity he had offered it.

Her cheeks burned at the thought. She looked quickly round. Anyhow there was still time for flight. She picked up her gloves from where she had laid them on the settle, and got to her feet.

"The water won't be long in boiling, Madam," said Antony's voice.

He had come back quietly into the room. For a moment he glanced in half surprise to see the d.u.c.h.essa standing by the settle. Then he crossed to the dresser, and began taking down a cup, a saucer, and a plate.

The d.u.c.h.essa sat down again, drawing her hand nervously along her gloves.

She looked at him getting down the things and setting them on the table.

She watched his neat, deft movements. Antony took no notice of her; she might have been part of the settle itself for all the attention he paid her. His preparations made, he returned momentarily to the scullery to fill the teapot. Coming back with it he placed it on the table.

"Everything is ready, Madam," he said. Dale himself could not have been more distantly respectful.

The d.u.c.h.essa looked at the one cup, the one saucer, and the one plate.

"Aren't you going to have some tea, too?" she asked.

"Servants do not sit down with their superiors," said Antony.

The colour rose hotly in the d.u.c.h.essa's face.

"Why do you say that?" she demanded.

Antony lifted his shoulders, the merest suspicion of a shrug.

"I merely state a fact," he replied.

"I wish you to," she said quickly.

"Is that a command?" asked Antony.

"If you like to take it so," she replied.

Antony turned to the dresser. He took down another cup and plate and put them on the table. Then he stood by it, waiting for her to be seated.

"Sugar?" asked the d.u.c.h.essa. She was making a brave endeavour to steady the trembling of her voice.

"If you please, Madam," said Antony gravely.

The meal proceeded in dead silence.

"Mr. Gray," said the d.u.c.h.essa suddenly.