by Hugh Walpole
Katherine could not remember that there had ever been a year since her eighth birthday when she had missed “The Feast” at Rafiel. “The Feast” was held always on the 24th of March, unless that day were a Sunday: it had been held, old Dr. Pybus, the antiquarian of Pelynt, said, ever since Phoenician days. To Katherine the event was the crowning day of the spring. After the 24th there would be, of course, many cold, blustering days: nevertheless the spring, with primroses, violets, anemones thick in the four valleys that ran down to Rafiel, the sky blue with white clouds like bubbles, the stream running crystal-clear over the red soil, the spring was here, and “The Feast” was its crowning.
For the fishermen and their families “The Feast” meant a huge tea in the Schools, great bonfires on the Peak, and a dance on the fish-market, a drink at ‘The Pilchards,’ and, above all, for the younger men and women, love and engagements. It was on “The Feast” day that the young men of Rafiel asked the young women whether ‘they would walk out’, and the young women said ‘yes’ or ‘no’ according to their pleasure. On a fine night, with the bonfires blazing to the sky and showers of golden sparks like fire-flies over the quiet sea, there was no happier village in the world than Rafiel. In its little square harbour the stars, and the fires and the amphitheatre-shaped village looked down and the ghosts of the Phoenicians peered over the brow of the hill, sighed for the old times that they once knew, and crept at last, shivering, back into their graves.
This was to be the greatest “Feast” that Katherine had ever known, because Philip was, of course, to be with her. It was to be, for them both, the crowning of their love by the place, the soil, the good Glebeshire earth. To Katherine it seemed that if anything untoward happened on this day, it would be as though Glebeshire itself rejected them. She would confess to no one how solemn it seemed to her....
Uncle Tim was in charge of the party. Timothy Faunder had not, for many, many years missed a “Feast”; thither he went, his outward appearance cynical and careless as ever, but obeying, inwardly, more sacred instincts than he would acknowledge. He would be in charge of Katherine, Millie, Philip, Rachel — Henry did not care to go.
The 24th of March was wonderful weather. Uncle Tim, coming over from his house up the road, to luncheon, said that he had never seen a finer day. He said this to his sister Harriet, standing before the window of her little room, looking down upon the lawn that reflected the sunny shadows like a glass, looking down upon the clumps of daffodils that nodded their heads to him from the thick grass by the garden wall. Harriet was very fond of her brother; she had an intimate relationship with him that had never been expressed in words by either of them. She was a little afraid of him. She was sitting now writing notes. She did not pause as she talked to him, and sometimes she rubbed the side of her nose with her fingers in a puzzled way. She wrote a large sprawling hand, and often spelt her words wrongly.
This conversation was before luncheon.
“Well, Harriet,” Tim said. “How are you?”
She looked up for a moment at his big, loose, untidy body, his shaggy beard, his ruffled hair.
“Why do you never brush your hair, Tim? It’s such a bad example for Henry. And you’re standing in the light.... Thank you.... Oh — I’m very well. Why didn’t you come in last night, as you said you would?... Yes, I’m quite well, thank you.”
“I went walking,” said Timothy. “I do brush my hair, only I am not going to put grease on it for anybody ... How do you like the young man?”
Mrs. Trenchard nodded her head several times as though she were adding up a sum.
“He likes it here, I think, although of course it must be quiet for him— ‘And if Tuesday — isn’t convenient — suggest — another day — next week!’ ”
“So you don’t like him even so much as you expected to?”
“No.” She answered quite abruptly, spreading her large hand flat out upon the table as though, by her sudden pounce, she had caught a fly. “He’s weaker than I had fancied, and vainer.... More insignificant altogether.... Miss Propert, The Close, Polchester....”
“He’s weak, yes,” said Tim, staring down upon his sister. “But he isn’t insignificant. He’s weak because his imagination paints for him so clearly the dreadful state of things it would be if affairs went wrong. He wants then terribly to make them right. But he hasn’t the character to do much himself, and he knows it. A man who knows he’s weak isn’t insignificant.”
Mrs. Trenchard made no reply.
“Well, what are you going to do about it?” at last said Tim.
“Oh, he’ll marry Katherine of course.”
“And then?”
“And then they’ll live here.... ‘Dear Canon, I wonder whether ...’—”
“And then?”
“And then — why then it will be just as it is now.”
“Oh! I see!”
Timothy turned his back upon her, staring down upon all the green that came up like a river to the walls of the house. His eyes were grave, his back square, his hands locked tight. He heard the scratching of his sister’s pen — otherwise there was deep silence about them. He wheeled round.
“Harriet, look here! I’ve never — no, I think, never — asked you a favour.”
She turned in her chair and faced him, looking up to him with her wide, rather sleepy, kindly eyes — now a little humorous, even a little cynical.
“No, Tim — never,” she said.
“Well, I’m going to ask you one now.”
“Yes?” Her eyes never flickered nor stirred from his.
“It’s this. I like the young man — like him, for God knows what reason. I think I must myself once have seen the world as he does. I know I believed that it could be such a splendid world with such a little effort — if only everyone were nice to everyone. I understand young Philip — I believe that this is a crisis in his life and in Katherine’s. There are three possible endings to the engagement. He can marry her, carry her off and live his own life. He can marry her, not carry her off and live your life. The engagement can break down, and he disappear back to where he came from. You love Katherine, you are determined not to lose her, therefore you intend to make the first impossible. You see that Katherine is so deeply attached to him that it will break her heart if he goes — therefore the last is not to be. There remains only the second. To that you devote all your energies. You are quite selfish about it. You see only yourself and Katherine in the matter. You see that he is weak and afraid of you.... You will break him in, then turn him into the paddock here to graze for the rest of his life. It would serve you right if Katherine were to run away with him.”
“She won’t do that,” said Mrs. Trenchard quietly.
“Who knows? I wish she would, but she’s faithful, faithful, faithful down to the soles of her shoes.... Bless her!”
Mrs. Trenchard smiled. “Dear Tim. You are fond of her, I know.... There’s the luncheon-bell.”
“Wait a minute.” He stood over her now. “Just listen. I believe you’re wrong about Katherine, Harriet. She’s old-fashioned and slow compared with the modern girl — we’re an old-fashioned family altogether, I suppose. It’s the first time she’s been in love in her life, and, as I said just now, she’s faithful as death — but she’ll be faithful to him as well as to you. Let him have his fling, let him marry her and carry her off, go where he likes, develop himself, be a man she can be proud of! It’s the crisis of his life and of hers too — perhaps of yours. You won’t lose her by letting her go off with him. She’ll stick to you all the more firmly if she knows that you’ve trusted him. But to keep him here, to break his spirit, to govern him through his fear of losing her — I tell you, Harriet, you’ll regret it all your life. He’ll either run away and break Katie’s heart or he’ll stay and turn into a characterless, spiritless young country bumpkin, like thousands of other young fellows in this county. It isn’t even as though he had the money to be a first-class squire — just enough to grow fat (he’s rather fat n
ow) and rotten on. Worse than dear George, who at least has his books.
“And he isn’t a stupid fool neither ... he’ll always know he might have been something decent. If I thought I had any influence over him I’d tell him to kidnap Katie to-morrow, carry her up north, and keep her there.”
Mrs. Trenchard had listened to him with great attention; her eyes had never left his face, nor had her body moved. She rose, now, very slowly from her chair, gathered her notes together carefully, walked to the door, turned to him, saying:
“How you do despise us all, Tim!” then left the room.
After luncheon they started off. Philip, sitting next to Katherine in the waggonette, was very silent during the drive; he was silent because he was determined that it was on this afternoon that he would tell Katherine about Anna.
Without turning directly round to her he could see her profile, her dark hair a little loose and untidy, her cheek flushed with pleasure, her eyes smiling. “No, she’s not pretty,” he thought. “But she’s better than that. I can’t see what she’s like — it’s as though she were something so close to me and so precious that I could never see it, only feel that it was there. And yet, although I feel that she’s unattainable too — she’s something I can never hold completely, because I shall always be a little frightened of her.”
He made this discovery, that he was frightened, quite suddenly, sitting there on that lovely afternoon; he saw the shadows from the clouds, swooping, like black birds, down over the valley beneath him: far beyond him he saw a thread of yellow running beside the water of the stream that was now blue in the sunshine and now dark under the hill; there were hosts of primroses down there, and the hedges that now closed the carriage were sheeted with gold: when the hedges broke the meadows beyond them flowed, through the mist, like green clouds, to the hazy sea; the world throbbed with a rhythm that he could hear quite clearly behind the clap-clap of the horses’ hoofs— ‘hum — hum — hum — hum’ — The air was warm, with a little breath of cold in it; the dark soil in the ditches glistened as though, very lately, it had been frozen.
Riding there through this beautiful day he was frightened. He was aware that he did not know what Katherine would do when he told her. During his years in Russia he had grown accustomed to a world, inevitably, recklessly, voluble. Russians spoke, on any and ever occasion, exactly what was in their mind; they thought nothing of consequences whether to themselves or any other; their interest in the ideas that they were pursuing, the character that they were discussing, the situation that they were unravelling, was always so intense, so eager, so vital that they would talk for days or weeks, if necessary, and lose all sense of time, private feelings, restraint and even veracity. Philip had become used to this. Had Katherine been a member of a Russian family he would, two days after his engagement, have had everything out with them all — he would have known exactly where he stood. With the Trenchards he did not know anything at all; from the moment of his engagement he had been blindfolded, and now he felt as though in a monstrous game of “Blind Man’s Buff” he were pushed against, knocked on the elbows, laughed at, bumped against furniture, always in black, grim darkness. Since he had come down to Garth he had lost even Katherine. He felt that she was disappointed in some way, that she had never been quite happy since their journey together in the train. Well, he would put everything straight this afternoon. He would tell her about Moscow, Anna, all his life — tell her that he could not, after their marriage, live at Garth, that it would stifle him, make him worthless and useless, that she must show him that she definitely cared for him more than for her family....
He felt as though, with a great sweeping stroke of his arm, all the cobwebs would be brushed away and he would be free. He rehearsed to himself some of the things that he would say: “You must see, dear, that the family don’t like me. They’re jealous of me. Much better that we go away for a year or two — right away — and allow them to get used to the idea. Then we can come back.”
But what would she say about Anna? Did she know anything about men, their lives and affairs? Would her fine picture of him be dimmed? He hoped a little that it would. He wanted simply to love her, that she should understand him and that he should understand her, and then they two together (the world, Garth, the Trenchards blown to the wind) should —
“That’s Tredden Cove, that dip beyond the wood,” said Katherine. “We used to go there—”
Yes, he was frightened. He felt as though this afternoon would be the crisis of his life. (There had been already a great many crises in his life.) He was impatient; he wanted to begin, now, in the waggonette. He could imagine turning to her, saying: “Katie, darling, I want to tell you—”
He was conscious that Lady Seddon was watching him. “Jolly day, isn’t it?” he said. He thought to himself. “She hates me as the others do.”
They had come to the Cross-Roads. Jacob put on the drag, and they began, very slowly, to creak down a precipitous hill. The fantastic element in the affair that Philip had been expecting as a kind of reply to his own sense of his personal adventure seemed to begin with this hill. It resembled no ordinary hill; it plunged down with a sudden curve that seemed to defy the wheels of any carriage; on their right the bank broke sheer away far down to one of the Rafiel four valleys, vivid green now with tufted trees. There was no fence nor wall, and one slip of the wheels would have hurled the carriage over. At a turn of the road a cluster of white cottages, forming one figure together as though they had been a great stone flung from the hill-top by some giant, showed in the valley’s cup. At his sense of that remoteness, of that lifting wildness of the rising hills, at the beauty of the green and grey and silver and white, he could not restrain a cry.