The Untilled Field Part 41

"You want to go, Ned? And the desire to go is as strong in you as in the wild geese."

"Maybe; but I shall come back, Ellen."

"Do you think you will, Ned? How can you if you go to fight for the Boers?"

"There's nothing for me to do here. I want new life. It was you who said that I should go."

"For five years you have been devoted to Ireland, and now you and Ireland are separated like two ships."

"Yes, like two ships. Ireland is still going Rome-ward, and Rome is not my way."

"You are the ship, Ned, and you came to harbour in Ireland. But you and I are like two ships that have lain side by side in the harbour, and now--"

"And now what, Ellen? Go on!"

"It seemed to me that we were like two ships."

"That is the very thing I was thinking on the hills. The comparison of two ships rose up in my mind on the hill, and then I remembered a pa.s.sage." And when he had repeated it she said:--

"So there is no hope for us on earth. We are but segments of a starry curve, and must be content with our stellar friendship. But, Ned, we shall never be enemies on earth. I am not your enemy, and never shall be. So we have nothing to think of now but our past friendship. The memory of our past--is all that remains? And it was for that you left America after the Cuban war? There is our child. You love the little boy, don't you, Ned?"

"Yes," he said, "I love the little boy.... But you'll bring him up a Catholic. You'll bring him up to love the things that I hate."

"Let there be no bitterness between us to-night, Ned dear. Let there be only love. If not love, affection at least. This is our last night."

"How is that?"

"Because, Ned, when one is so bent upon going as you are it is better he should go at once. I give you your freedom. You can go in the morning or when you please. But remember, Ned, that you can come back when you please, that I shall be always glad to see you."

They went up-stairs and looked for some time on the child, who was sleeping. Ellen took him out of his bed, and she looked very pretty, Ned thought, holding the half-awakened child, and she kept the little quilt about him so that he might not catch cold.

He put his hands into his eyes and looked at his father, and then hid his face in his mother's neck, for the light blinded him and he wished to go to sleep.

"Let me put him back in his bed," Ned said, and he took his son and put him back, and he kissed him. As he did so he wondered how it was that he could feel so much affection for his son and at the same time desire to leave his home.

"Now, Ned, you must kiss me, and do not think I am angry with you for going. I know you are dull here, that you have got nothing further to do in Ireland, but it will be different when you come back."

"And is it possible that you aren't angry with me, Ellen, for going?"

"I am sorry you are going, Ned--in a way, but I should be more sorry to see you stay here and learn to hate me."

"You are very wise, Ellen. But why did you read that ma.n.u.script?"

"I suppose because G.o.d wished me to."

One thing Ireland had done for him, and for that he would be always grateful to Ireland--Ireland had revealed a n.o.ble woman to him; and distance would bring a closer and more intimate appreciation of her.

He left early next morning before she was awake in order to save her the pain of farewells, and all that day in Dublin he walked about, possessed by the great joyful yearning of the wild goose when it rises one bright morning from the warm marshes, scenting the harsh north through leagues of air, and goes away on steady wing-beats. But he did not feel he was a free soul until the outlines of Howth began to melt into the grey drift of evening. There was a little mist on the water, and he stood watching the waves tossing in the mist thinking that it were well that he had left home--if he had stayed he would have come to accept all the base moral coinage in circulation; and he stood watching the green waves tossing in the mist, at one moment ashamed of what he had done, at the next overjoyed that he had done it.

CHAPTER XIII

THE WAY BACK

It was a pleasure to meet, even when they had nothing to say, and the two men had stopped to talk.

"Still in London, Rodney."

"Yes, till the end of the week; and then I go to Italy. And you? You're going to meet Sir Owen Asher at Ma.r.s.eilles."

"I am going to Ireland," and, catching sight of a look of astonishment and disapproval on Rodney's face, Harding began to explain why he must return to Ireland.

"The rest of your life is quite clear," said Rodney. "You knew from the beginning that Paris was the source of all art, that everyone here who is more distinguished than the others has been to Paris. We go to Paris with baskets on our backs, and sticks in our hands, and bring back what we can pick up. And having lived immersed in art till you're forty, you return to the Catholic Celt! Your biographer will be puzzled to explain this last episode, and, however he may explain it, it will seem a discrepancy."

"I suppose one should think of one's biographer."

"It will be more like yourself to get Asher to land you at one of the Italian ports. We will go to Perugia and see Raphael's first frescoes, done when he was sixteen, and the town itself climbing down into ravines. The streets are lonely at midday, but towards evening a breeze blows up from both seas--Italy is very narrow there--and the people begin to come out; and from the battlements one sees the lights of a.s.sisi glimmering through the dusk."

"I may never see Italy. Go on talking. I like to hear you talk about Italy."

"There are more beautiful things in Italy than in the rest of the world put together, and there is nothing so beautiful as Italy. Just fancy a man like you never having seen the Campagna. I remember opening my shutters one morning in August at Frascati. The poisonous mists lay like clouds, but the sun came out and shone through them, and the wind drove them before it, and every moment a hill appeared, and the great aqueducts, and the tombs, and the wild gra.s.ses at the edge of the tombs waving feverishly; and here and there a pine, or group of pines with tufted heads, like Turner used to draw.... The plain itself is so shapely. Rome lies like a little dot in the middle of it, and it is littered with ruins. The great tomb of Cecilia Metella is there, built out of blocks of stone as big as an ordinary room. He must have loved her very much to raise such a tomb to her memory, and she must have been a wonderful woman." Rodney paused a moment and then he said: "The walls of the tombs are let in with sculpture, and there are seats for wayfarers, and they will last as long as the world,--they are ever-lasting."

"Of one thing I'm sure," said Harding. "I must get out of London. I can't bear its ugliness any longer."

The two men crossed Piccadilly, and Harding told Rodney Asher's reason for leaving London.

"He says he is subject to nightmares, and lately he has been waking up in the middle of the night thinking that London and Liverpool had joined. Asher is right. No town ought to be more than fifty miles long.

I like your description of Perugia. Every town should be walled round, now we trail into endless suburbs."

"But the Green Park is beautiful, and these evening distances!"

"Never mind the Green Park; come and have a cup of tea. Asher has bought a new picture. I'd like to show it to you. But," said Harding, "I forgot to tell you that I met your model."

"Lucy Delaney? Where?"

"Here, I met her here," said Harding, and he took Rodney's arm so that he might be able to talk to him more easily. "One evening, a week ago, I was loitering, just as I was loitering to-day, and it was at the very door of St. James's Hotel that she spoke to me."

"How did she get to London? and I didn't know that you knew her."

"A girl came up suddenly and asked me the way to the Gaiety Theatre, and I told her, adding, however, that the Gaiety Theatre was closed.

'What shall I do?' I heard her say, and she walked on; I hesitated and then walked after her. 'I beg your pardon,' I said, 'the Gaiety Theatre is closed, but there are other theatres equally good. Shall I direct you?' 'Oh, I don't know what I shall do. I have run away from home....

I have set fire to my school and have come over to London thinking that I might go on the stage.' She had set fire to her school! I never saw more winning eyes. But she's a girl men would look after, and not liking to stand talking to her in Piccadilly, I asked her to come down Berkeley Street. I was very curious to know who was this girl who had set fire to her school and had come over to London to go on the stage; and we walked on, she telling me that she had set fire to her school so that she might be able to get away in the confusion. I hoped I should not meet anyone I knew, and let her prattle on until we got to the Square. The Square shone like a ball-room with a great plume of green branches in the middle and every corner a niche of gaudy window boxes.

Past us came the season's stream of carriages, the women resting against the cushions looking like finely cultivated flowers. The beauty of the Square that afternoon astonished me. I wondered how it struck Lucy. Very likely she was only thinking of her Gaiety Theatre!"

"But how did you know her name?"