Lippa Part 13

'Well, I'm glad that's over, ain't you?' says Mrs Dalrymple, who is comfortably seated in a railway carriage, her husband opposite.

'Very,' replies Jimmy, looking unutterable things at her. 'I say though, how late you were. I thought you were never coming, and Helmdon had the fidgets.'

'It was exactly five minutes late,' says she, 'for George looked at his watch just before the carriage stopped, but do look at that woman, isn't she lovely?'

The train is stopping at one of the suburban stations, and the lady who has caught Lippa's attention is hurrying down the platform, trying to find a seat, holding a small child by the hand.

Jimmy pokes his head out of the window. 'By Jove,' he says, 'she is handsome. She's getting into a third cla.s.s, doesn't look like it, does she?'

'No,' says Lippa, and then they forget all about her, till on reaching their destination, they see her again.

'Hullo,' says Dalrymple, 'there's that woman again, I wonder who she is?' As they pa.s.s out of the station, she drops her umbrella, and Jimmy picking it up, restores it to her.

'Thank you,' she says, raising for a moment a pair of wonderful dark eyes to his face.

Lippa looks at her curiously, wondering what her life story is, and then they part, going in opposite directions.

Jimmy has a small house of his own, not far from C---- and only half-a-mile from the sea coast and quite close to 'The Garden of Sleep,'

and here it is that he brings Lippa to pa.s.s the first days of their married life, days of almost perfect happiness. But, in course of time, as they are going to live together for the rest of their lives they come to the wise conclusion that an overdose of solitude to begin with, would be tedious, to say the least of it.

'It wasn't as if we were going to stop here long,' says Lippa one day.

'When we go back to London we must set to work to be very economical, and that will give me heaps to do; I can't bear being idle, can you?'

'I am afraid, dear, that I rather like it,' replies Jimmy, 'but you're not going to worry yourself over making both ends meet, are you? I dare say it will be rather difficult, but if we let this place, it will help us a little, and you said you wouldn't mind.'

'Mind,' and Lippa rises and goes up to him, kneeling down at his side, 'I shan't mind anything now, Jimmy,' she says.

'What does the "now" imply,' asks he, 'that you did once mind, eh?'

'Yes, I did, when you used to look so gravely at me, when we met in the street, I think my heart was nearly breaking, you know you tried to think I was a flirt, and--'

'Never mind now, sweetheart, it was blind of me not to see through it all, and if you only could have guessed how I was longing to take you in my arms, to ask you why you sent me away, you would not have looked so cold, and--'

It is her turn to interrupt this time, which she does by kissing him.

'Do you know,' she says, 'you nearly made me forget what I was going to say--'

'Is it of great importance?' asks he.

'Yes, it is. Don't you think it would be nice to ask Mabel and the children down here, and we might all go back to London together. I know Teddy would like the sands here; and there is plenty of room; shall we?'

Jimmy says yes, although he would have preferred to remain alone for a little longer.

There is something so nice in knowing that the lovely little person who is always with him, is his very own to take care of and protect against everything, for all the years that lie before them. And he fears to be disturbed, in case it may all prove a dream, and burst like a bubble with the slightest contact of the outer world. But a week later Mabel arrives accompanied by Teddy and the baby; George and Paul, whom Lippa has also begged to come, turn up, and the lovely days that follow, when the sun creeps into their rooms in the early morning enticing them out, where the hedges are covered with sweet smelling honey-suckle and the fields are carpeted with brilliant red poppies, and a walk will take them to the 'Garden of Sleep,' where among the tombstones and long gra.s.s they can watch the sea sparkling in a golden haze, and listen to the waves as they break on the yellow sands; where the birds are ever trilling forth their songs without words; those days for ever are stored in the minds of some of them as the loveliest summer man could wish for.

CHAPTER XI

'Love pardons the unpardonable past.'--CHRISTINA ROSSETTI.

It is six o'clock. The tea things have been taken away, and the occupants of the little drawing-room are all apparently lazily enjoying themselves.

Mabel has the baby on her knee, her husband is dozing in an armchair, Jimmy is sitting half-in half-out of the window, Paul is reading, and Philippa is lying on the sofa.

'Lippa,' says Dalrymple, 'sing us something.'

'What would you like?' she answers, rising slowly.

'Anything,' he replies.

She runs her fingers over the keys and then sings 'The Garden of Sleep.'

Paul closes his book as she begins, looking at her earnestly.

Why does she sing that song, so close as they are to the real spot; and why does it say 'the graves of dear women,' the only one he knows buried there is a little child. He rises abruptly as the song is finished, and pa.s.ses through the French window into the garden. Philippa has begun something else. He pauses and listens.

'Why live when life is sad?

Death only sweet.'

Ah! thinks he, that is exactly it. What good is life to me!

The evening sun floods with a golden haze the road before him; he walks on, the distant sound of the waves coming up from the sands, and almost unconsciously he sings in a low voice,

'Did they love as I love When they lived by the sea?

Did they wait as I wait For the days that may be?'

And then, with a start he finds himself in 'The Garden of Sleep,' and just on the edge of the cliff, reaching over to pick some poppies is a child, a little girl with golden hair.

In an instant he is at her side, and without saying a word for fear of starting her, he catches her in his arms.

'Mummy, mummy, don't,' she cries, and then seeing that it is a stranger her anger is roused still more. 'Put me down, how dare lou touch me, me wants the flowers.'

'Now look here,' replies Paul. 'Do you know, you might have fallen over.

It is very dangerous to go so near the edge. If I get you the flowers, promise me you will go away,'--no answer--so he puts her down, he picks the flowers, and gravely hands them to her.

'Sank lou,' she says, taking them in her little fat hand, 'sank lou, but I could have gottened them meself.'

Paul smiles, wondering who she reminds him of.

'What's lour name?' she asks suddenly.

'Paul,' he replies, promptly, 'what is yours, and who are you with?'

'I doesn't know what's my name is,' she answers, gravely, 'Mummy always calls me Baby, I'm wif Mummy. Does lou know Mummy?'

'I do not think I have that pleasure,' says he, 'but I should like to speak to her,' thinking to reprove her for her carelessness in letting the child wander about so far away.