The Privet Hedge Part 13

Then her healthier instincts suddenly revolted. "It's nothing to me.

I aren't jealous of another girl getting married! I could be married myself to-morrow if that's all." But deep within her she felt it was not all; so rising abruptly she went out, not looking again at the chancel.

Miss Ethel came forth more deliberately, nodding to one here and there among the townspeople as she pa.s.sed under the porch into the cool evening, but her salutations were not acknowledged with the appearance of gratification or respect which she had seen accorded to her parents years ago--young people from shops and post-offices nodded off-handedly back, or at most gave a somewhat condescending "Good evening, Miss Wilson," feeling in their confident youth and independence that it was they who had done her the favour.

It was all so different; that constant burden of her thoughts---- And as she walked home through the end of the sunset, the forlorn restlessness of the cat turned out of its basket and forced to wander in cold, strange places seized upon her again. She could not formulate her unease excepting by that one phrase: it was all so different.

When she reached home, Mrs. Bradford looked up with a sort of solid expectancy: "Well, did you have a good sermon?"

"I suppose so. The Vicar was not there. The man we had explained to us that there was no heaven and no G.o.d, so I suppose he was very clever."

Mrs. Bradford stared, then relaxed comfortably into her cushions once more. "Oh, you mean he held those new views about religion," she said.

"I have just been reading a novel that has something about that in it.

Was he young? I always like a young preacher, because their voices are generally stronger and you can hear better."

Miss Ethel had gone to the window and now stood there, looking out.

The eyebrow which was affected a little by emotion or excitement gave a slight twitch occasionally and her lips were pressed close together.

She saw the little flag on the roof over the privet hedge hanging quiet on the still air, and it added to her sense of being conquered by those forces which had been creeping on steadily, bit by bit, until she could not ignore them any more than the new houses.

But she had never before felt it as she did to-night, looking up at that exquisite clear sky with the sickle moon rising. She was not well, tired with the walk and the service; and a most unwonted pressure of tears ached behind her eyes, though she fiercely fought against them.

"Ethel!" said Mrs. Bradford. "What are you standing there for? Why don't you go and take off your things for supper?"

"I am going." Miss Ethel controlled her voice to speak as usual.

"I'll just put the kettle on first, because Caroline won't be in for some time yet." And she began to cross the room, when suddenly, abruptly, she stopped short. Standing quite still in the midst of all those heavy chairs and tables that gleamed dimly in the falling dusk, she blurted out in a queer, strangled tone: "I hated that sermon. I don't think clergymen ought to be allowed to preach like that. They want to change G.o.d. They can't even leave G.o.d the same."

"You really do upset yourself about things so, Ethel," said Mrs.

Bradford fretfully. She wanted her supper. "What does it matter to you what other people think? You should just take no notice and go on in your own way, and believe what you always have believed--as I do."

Miss Ethel made some inarticulate reply, and went out to put on the kettle. Not for any earthly consideration would she have told her sister that that was exactly what she could not do: that because she listened carefully to sermons and read articles about religion the unchanging G.o.d was gradually giving place to a vague Power which nebulously adapted itself to the needs of a changing civilization.

The gas-ring spurted under the match in her hand, lighting up with a bluish light her pale, thin face. Her lips moved as she murmured to herself for comfort: "The _same_ yesterday, to-day and for ever." But she could not find anything to hold on to in that any more.

Then she heard an unexpected sound at the door, and the next minute Caroline came in, drawing off her gloves.

"I'll see to the hot water, Miss Ethel," she said.

"You are in early to-night," said Miss Ethel.

"Yes." Caroline paused. "Oh, I have been going to tell you that I shall----" But with the words nearly over her lips, she found herself unable to speak them. "Shall be late in to-morrow," she subst.i.tuted; for somehow she could not after all cut herself adrift from this house yet, though she came fresh from a conversation which had left her burning with annoyance.

She tingled still at the recollection of one girl saying to another in pa.s.sing: "That's Caroline Raby! What's she doing? Oh, she's in service." And at the memory of her own sharply-flung: "I'm not in service, then! I take tickets on the promenade and I'm going into an office after that."

But though it was evident that she was regarded by some as being in service, and though she felt no higher regard for it than anyone else who has just emerged from women's oldest and grandest profession, she could not bring herself to break the threads which held her to these two women--and to something beyond them which she would not realize.

But after she was in bed, she could see in the darkness the church window in the sunset, and the altar rails, and the clergyman standing as he would do when Wilson and Laura were married.

So the three women lay in bed, thinking their own thoughts, with the sea moaning--moaning--as it broke in a long even wave and withdrew on the soft sand; quite a different sound every day, though Miss Ethel had heard it for fifty-six years. But she was scarcely conscious of hearing it at all, though it had formed an accompaniment to every thought and action of her life during all those years.

But to-night--perhaps because it was so warm and still, and she had the window facing the sea wide open--she did really listen to the waves; and that sound might perhaps have comforted her, with its deep note of unhasting permanence, if the ears of her mind had also been open to hear. But she only felt its melancholy. It seemed to accentuate her forlorn sense of having nothing stationary to hold on to, not even an unchanging G.o.d.

_Chapter XI_

_The Gala_

The Thorhaven season had pa.s.sed its height, and that August month, towards which all the efforts of the lodging-house keepers and tradespeople converged during the year, was nearly at an end, while on every fence and wall employed for bill sticking could be read in large letters: "A Great Gala Night will take place on Thursday, August the twenty-ninth. Splendid Illuminations. Continental Attractions.

Dancing on the Green from eight to ten-thirty."

The term Continental Attractions was the inspiration of Mr. Graham, who had recently visited the South of France on account of his wife's health--at least he gave that as his reason, though Mrs. Graham told all her friends confidentially that she would never have incurred so much trouble and expense if her husband had not shown symptoms of incipient bronchitis--and she equally believed herself to be speaking the truth. Anyway, there it was; and from the visit to Cannes resulted this idea of imparting a _joie de vivre_ to the Thorhaven Gala by means of paper streamers and air balloons. There had been some consideration of squeakers and false noses; but one or two members of the Promenade Sub-Committee raised the reasonable objection that the squeakers would interfere with the band, while the false noses---- Well, there was something indefinably loose about false noses which they could feel but could not describe in words. At any rate, they were not going to allow such things on their promenade.

There was a good deal of talk concerning the Gala in the town; so that those inhabitants who were familiar with ill.u.s.trated magazines and the lighter drama--and also possessed a sanguine temperament--no doubt went about picturing to themselves a still night with coloured lanterns hanging motionless against a deep blue sky, while a crowd of exuberant visitors disported themselves in pale garments and unusual att.i.tudes for the amus.e.m.e.nt of the Thorhaven people.

But the clerk of the weather was not going to have anything so incongruous as all that, and the 29th rose cold and grey--one of those summer days which are a premonition of autumn. A strongish wind blew from the west; leaves came whirling down on the road leading to the promenade, and the sky was grey-black with clouds scudding across; while beneath it, a rising sea showed a line of white breakers in the gloom--like the cruel teeth of a monster seeking something to devour.

Still the evening came with no sign of rain; the band stationed at the edge of the green played cheerful dances with a will, and it was no fault of theirs that the music sounded so lost and futile amid the roaring of the sea--rather as if a penny whistle were to be played in a cathedral while the organ was booming out solemn music among the springing arches. Perhaps the visitors and the Thorhaven people felt something of this themselves, for they put no real zest into their attempts at carnival, but they danced rather grimly in the cold wind, with little tussocks in the gra.s.s catching their toes and the fairy lamps which edged the lawn blowing out one after the other.

At the windiest corner, near the hall, was planted the respectable middle-aged woman who sometimes a.s.sisted in cleaning the church--though she was herself an ardent Primitive--and in her arms she held a struggling ma.s.s of air balloons which seemed most anxious to escape over the North Sea to those parts of Europe where carnival is more at home. But no one seemed to be buying from her excepting a few children, whose needs were soon satisfied. Then a worn-looking young man came up and purchased two balloons for his children at home, but after that the woman stood there alone again, with the balloons buffeting about her head.

At another point farther down the promenade, a boy suffering from a slight cold in his head offered for sale a tray of those snake-like paper missiles which can be shot out suddenly with startling effect.

But he seemed rather ashamed of his job and kept in the gloom as much as possible, now and then making a sale among the children, who ran in and out behind the more sheltered seats where their elders sat in winter coats.

Mr. Graham--as the originator of these attractions--felt exceedingly impatient, both with his fellow-townspeople and the visitors, as he sat watching. A chill air blew down the back of his neck and he was conscious of an incipient cold, which all added to his feeling of bitterness. "No earthly use trying!" he burst forth, rising abruptly from his seat. "English people don't know how to enjoy themselves, and it's no use trying to teach them."

He scowled first at the scene before him and then at his wife, who sat with Mrs. Bradford and Miss Ethel on a long wooden seat.

"You couldn't imagine the weather would be like this, dear," said Mrs.

Graham soothingly.

"The air will do us good," added Miss Ethel, a little pink about the nose, but wishful to be polite.

"Well, there's plenty of it," he said bitterly, grabbing his hat, which threatened to blow away.

It was plain that he jested with an anxious heart, thinking of what might be said of his venture at the next Council meeting. Those very offensive fellows who always were against him would, of course, make capital out of this. . . . Suddenly he braced himself up and strode away across the lawn. They _should_ frisk, if any influence of his could make 'em!

His wife looked after him sympathetically, then turned to Miss Ethel.

"That's right!" she said. "Arthur will soon put a little more spirit into them. You see he knows how it is done. I shall never forget the way he entered into the spirit of the thing that time when we were abroad. If you could have seen him going down the Plage with a sort of a rattle in his hand and his hat on one side---- But there's something in the climate, of course."

"I suppose there must be," said Miss Ethel, with an involuntary glance at the couples jigging solemnly about the gra.s.s in front of her.

They sat silent for a time, feeling colder and colder, but sparing Mrs.

Graham's feeling by remaining where they were. "Isn't that Caroline?"

said Mrs. Bradford, after a long pause.

"I dare say. She told me the arrangements were somewhat different this evening, and she was to come off duty at half-past nine," said Miss Ethel.

Then Mr. Graham came back and b.u.mped himself down so heavily on the wooden seat that the ladies felt a slight jar.

"No life!" he exclaimed. "No gaiety! No _joie de vivre_!" He paused, blowing his nose. "Well, this is the last time. I'll never attempt anything of the sort again."