Sue left them hard at it and busied herself with preparations for supper. She was surprised to find her hands trembling as she took the dishes from the shelf. How happy I am! she thought suddenly and stood there for a moment with one hand pressed to her bosom, where her heart was beating fast. How happy she was—yet what was there to cause such a turmoil of happiness within her?
When she returned to the kitchen with her tray, Darnay was talking hard, and Bulloch, sitting forward in his chair, was listening intently to the flow of words.
“…never a Scottish painter yet who had the insight to paint the soul of Scotland,” Darnay was declaring. “You must look outside your own land for a man to do justice to the Scottish scene.”
“But a Scotsman must surely understand his own land better than another.”
Darnay laughed. “Does a chicken inside an egg know what the egg looks like?”
“No, no!” cried Bulloch. “It’s not a fair comparison, that. Who knows the house best, Mr. Darnay? I’m thinking it’s the person who lives in it.”
“Perhaps he knows it so well that he doesn’t see it anymore—that is possible, you know.”
“Raeburn—” began Bulloch doubtfully.
“For portraits, yes, I’ll give you Raeburn,” Darnay interrupted with a generous wave of his hand. “He was influenced by Reynolds, of course, and perhaps a little by Velasquez, but you can have Raeburn. He painted his own people well, I’ll agree. He saw them and painted them.”
“What are ye meaning by that?” Mr. Bulloch inquired. “When ye say ‘he saw them.’”
“Raeburn was dignified and simple and these qualities belong to your race. Compare him with Rubens—a much greater painter but a less worthy man. Rubens loved life and enjoyed it. Even if we knew nothing about the man we could deduce these facts from his work. His women are plump and rotund, zestful and rosy, with pleasant curves and comfortable bosoms; compare them with the thin anemic ladies of Burne Jones and the coldness of Botticelli’s saints.”
“Ye mean a painter paints in his own nature,” said Bulloch slowly.
“He can only paint what he sees and he can only see what he is capable of seeing.”
At supper Darnay tried to control his tongue—which was apt to run away with him in the company of a sympathetic listener—and to allow Miss Bun and her grandfather a fair share of the conversation, but Sue did not want to talk. She could have talked to either of her companions separately, but she could find nothing suitable for them both together. Her position was difficult and she was glad when supper was finished and Darnay, who had already informed Mr. Bulloch that he was making some studies of “Miss Bun,” suggested a visit to the studio.
Mr. Bulloch followed his host into the studio with mixed feelings. He was bewildered by Darnay, for the man was entirely different from what he had expected. The man had definite—if somewhat unconventional—ideas upon religious matters and could back his arguments with incidents from “The Book” and this was not Mr. Bulloch’s preconceived idea of an artist. He remembered suddenly the reason for which he had come to Tog’s Mill and found it more distasteful than ever. Mr. Darnay was a real gentleman in the highest sense of the word; he was blade straight, and Sue was perfectly safe with him (Bulloch was sure of it). But Bulloch saw another danger that was almost as fearsome—supposing Sue were to fall in love with the man; that would be a nice kettle of fish! The two of them were very much in harmony, he could see, and their expression when they looked at each other was kindly and understanding, more like the kindly look of folk long married than a lover’s glance, but—Dear sakes! thought Mr. Bulloch, horrified to find where he was heading. Dear sakes, what am I thinking about! The man’s far above Sue as the stars, and married to boot. I’ll need to take care what I say to Susan or she’ll have the whole thing out of me before I know.
He was hoping that the pictures of Sue would help to solve the problem (for hadn’t Darnay said that a painter must paint what he sees?), and he scarcely dared to raise his eyes and look at them in case Darnay had painted her in the Rubens manner: “zestful and rotund” with a “comfortable bosom.” If Darnay had seen her like that he would need to speak—no matter what it cost him he would need to take Sue straight home.
“Well,” said Darnay, “there you are, Mr. Bulloch. It isn’t a good light, of course.”
“Well!” said Mr. Bulloch. “Well, I never!”
“You like it?”
“It’s Sue,” declared her grandfather. “It’s—well, it’s just Sue. I can see her breathing, almost.”
“You think it good?” Darnay inquired casually, trying to hide the absurd pleasure he felt at the old man’s astonishment and delight.
“Man, it’s wonderful!” cried Bulloch. “It’s the cleverest thing—I’ve seen her look like that a hundred times! I’ve seen her turn her head and raise her chin—she was affronted, eh?”
Darnay laughed. “I’m afraid I annoyed her on purpose,” he admitted.
“Vairy reprehensible!” declared Mr. Bulloch with a twinkle in his eye. “But maybe the end justifies the means.”
“How d’you like the other one?” Darnay asked.
“The other? It’s a wondering look, Mr. Darnay. I’ve not seen her like that somehow—Sue’s too practical for dreams.”
“I saw her like that.”
“I’m not saying ye didn’t. I’m only saying it’s not the Sue I know,” began Mr. Bulloch, and then he paused suddenly. This was not the Sue he knew, but Mr. Darnay knew her like that—knew her with that wondering, rapt look transfiguring her small determined face. I’ll need to say it, he thought and added aloud and somewhat abruptly, “We’re wanting Sue home, Mr. Darnay.”
“You’re what?”
“We’re wanting her home,” repeated Mr. Bulloch and left it at that.
For a moment, Darnay was silent, and then he said, “Well, of course—Miss Bun must do as she pleases. I mean—”
“But it’s not Sue,” explained her grandfather. “It’s ourselves—wanting her. She would not be pleased if she knew I had spoken about it.”
“I think you must decide that yourselves,” Darnay said, and all at once he was a thousand miles away.
Bulloch knew he had been put in his place, and perhaps he deserved it, for he had been admitted to Mr. Darnay’s friendship and had presumed upon it. He saw now that he should never have approached Darnay behind Sue’s back. He would have liked to apologize for his error of judgment, but it was not in his nature to apologize: he was too proud, too independent to own himself in the wrong.
Bulloch stood there for a moment without speaking, and then he felt Darnay’s hand on his shoulder. “I’m glad you like the portraits, Mr. Bulloch,” Darnay said in a friendly voice. “I’d like to give you that one if you will accept it.”
“But, Mr. Darnay—”
“It’s just a study, you see, and when I’ve finished my picture I shan’t want it, so if you’d care to have it—”
“But I couldn’t!” cried Bulloch in dismay. “I couldn’t take it—unless—unless ye’d let me pay for it. I couldn’t accept it from ye.”
“And I couldn’t sell it,” declared Darnay, smiling and shaking his head. “It’s just a study, and I don’t in the least know what it’s worth—precious little really. Perhaps you’d allow me to give it to Miss Bun’s grandmother—how would that do?”
It made very little difference, Bulloch thought. He was most uncomfortable, and his discomfort was augmented by the knowledge that Darnay had no intention of heaping coals of fire upon his head. Darnay was impulsive and his offer was spontaneous and genuinely kind, but it put Mr. Bulloch in a very awkward position—there was not a doubt of that. It complicated the whole situation, so that he could see no way of escape. To refuse the picture would be ungrateful and boorish, and yet, if they accepted it, how could they drag Sue away? He saw quite clearly that even if they didn
’t accept it there was no certainty of being able to drag Sue away.
“Well, it’s good of ye, Mr. Darnay,” said Bulloch at last. “The truth is I’m at a loss what to say. I’m thinking yon picture of Sue is valuable whether it’s a study or a portrait or whatever ye call it. Mrs. Bulloch—well—I’ll see what she says. I’m sure she’ll think the same as me.”
“She won’t if you put it to her the right way,” Darnay assured him.
And that, as Bulloch found, was exactly the trouble, for no matter how carefully he explained the whole thing to Susan—and as a matter of fact he knew all the time that he was explaining it far too much and far too carefully—he could see that Susan thought he had been “won over” by Mr. Darnay: fed on the fat of the land, cosseted with good talk, and bribed with the picture he had so admired.
“A man need not be good for all he can quote the Scriptures,” said Mrs. Bulloch at last with a sigh. “Look at David himself! I’d not have trusted Sue alone in a house with David five minutes.”
There was nothing more to be said.
Chapter Twelve
Darnay began to appreciate his housekeeper more highly now that there seemed a chance of losing her—and he began to realize how comfortable he was. He was comfortable with Miss Bun not only in the sense of being well fed and well looked after, but also in mind and spirit. She was exactly the sort of person he needed, a parcel of complements to his own nature. He needed her practical common sense, for it made him feel safely anchored to the earth, and he needed her admiration that, though perfectly obvious, was never merely silly. She had a flavor all her own, and Darnay knew that he would never find anybody else who suited him so well. It never crossed his mind that the girl’s reputation might suffer through being alone with him in the house. His mind was keen and flexible, but he had the egotism of the peculiarly gifted, and the very brilliance of his vision blinded him to the small worldly problems of his neighbors.
Sue could have eased his mind if she had known what was troubling him, for she had not the slightest intention of leaving Tog’s Mill. It was good for her to be here and she had never been so happy since her mother died. Looking back at her childhood, Sue saw it as a mosaic of small unrelated pictures, or of pictures related only by one figure—her mother’s—which could be seen in them all. Herself, the small Sue, seemed different in each picture—sometimes bold, sometimes shy, sometimes happy. She scarcely knew which of the pictures were real memories and which were only stories kept green by her mother, for Mary had been so proud of her small daughter that she loved to tell stories about Sue’s cleverness. Sue had worshipped her mother—there was nobody like her, there never could be. Mary had made life seem like a song, an old familiar song, a safe lullaby. She had danced through life, but her very lightheartedness had made life safe. When Mary died the unthinkable had happened and life became dangerous and grim. It became grim in reality, for Will Pringle was strange and moody after the death of his wife; sometimes he was silent for days on end and, at other times, sarcastic and cynical. Sue, struggling with the house—which in her mother’s lifetime seemed to run itself—had been an easy victim, and even when she had gained the mastery of housekeeping, she was not safe from his caustic tongue.
All that was changed now, and Sue had come out of the shadow into warm sunshine. Darnay, though he might ignore her when entranced with his work, was as frank and open as the day and had nothing but praise for his housekeeper.
“You do too much,” he told her. “Honestly, you do. Who minds a little dust in the corners! The house is old and far too big—let the dust lie quietly and peacefully. All I want is my bed made and an occasional meal.”
It was perfectly true. Darnay was the most easily pleased man in the world, but Sue had been trained to fight dust—the battle was bred in her bone—and it was quite impossible for her to obey his command and let the dust lie. Besides, she loved the work and went about it with a glow at her heart, for no task, however monotonous or hard, is menial when one serves a king.
The new happy atmosphere and the daily contact with Darnay’s mind were doing strange things to Sue. She felt the stirring of growth, not consciously but more as a plant must feel its ripening. The river was a thread of melody, running through her life as a thread runs through beads, binding it into a harmonious whole. She heard it all day as she went about the house, but it was at night that she was most conscious of its song. Sometimes in the stillness the sound of the river would change with the rise in the level of its waters and she would hear it swell from a trickle, which splashed over the old wheel, into a turbulent roar like a giant, suddenly enraged—or she would go to sleep with the roar of a rainstorm in her ears and wake to find it past.
* * *
Sue had not forgotten her desire to know more about the birds that frequented the place, and Darnay was quite ready to instruct her in their names and habits. In the little patch of garden outside the kitchen window there were dozens of birds that came daily for a largesse of crumbs: tits and wrens and chaffinches and countless numbers of sparrows and a cheeky robin that was Sue’s especial friend. They would hop from twig to twig upon the branches of an old gnarled apple tree or shelter in the beech hedge that still retained its copper-colored leaves.
“How nice it will be when we have apples!” said Sue one day, when they were leaning out of the kitchen window watching the birds.
“Apples!” exclaimed Darnay. “Oh, we shan’t have any apples from that tree. It’s too old. See how gnarled and twisted the branches are, and the little twigs are like an old man’s fingers. If I were a proper gardener, I should cut it down.”
“I’m glad you’re not a proper gardener,” Sue declared.
“The hedge is nice.” He continued:
“…deep in brambly hedges dank
The small birds nip about and say
Brothers, the Spring is not so far away…
“But they are wrong, of course,” he added, “for spring is still a long way off. They’ve got to weather the storms of winter first, poor little beggars!”
“Poetry,” said Sue.
“Yes, poetry,” he replied, smiling. “No, I can’t remember any more. I’ve got a scrap bag mind, Miss Bun. Just a little bit of this and a little bit of that—not big enough scraps to be of any use except, perhaps, to make a patchwork quilt.”
Sue was silent. A patchwork quilt made of poetry was a strange idea. A few weeks ago she would have said it was nonsense, but she had learned to see things in his way now.
“Do you like poetry?” Darnay inquired.
“We had it at school,” said Sue thoughtfully. “‘The Lady of Shalott’ and all that. I didn’t mind it, but it was an awful waste of time getting it off by heart.”
“What about Burns?” he asked.
“Oh, that’s different—it’s music,” Sue told him.
“And ‘The Lady of Shalott’ is a picture,” Darnay declared. “It’s a sort of medieval decoration—a frieze in scarlet and blue and gold. You can see the knights riding by and the barge drifting down the river between the green waving reeds.”
“Go on, I like it,” Sue said.
“Here’s another poem that makes a picture. A modern one this time.
“O fat white woman whom nobody loves,
Why do you walk through the fields in gloves?”
“I can’t remember any more,” he continued. “I told you I had a scrappy mind, but there you are. It’s a problem picture, of course: Why does she?”
“There might be lots of reasons,” Sue said, a trifle breathless with following his flights of fancy.
“I can’t think of any,” Darnay declared. “No, not one. Give me three good reasons why she should do such an odd thing and I’ll paint her for you, Miss Bun.”
She thought hard, for she wanted the picture desperately. “Maybe she was on her way to church,” she said at last.
“Or she might have been going to tea with the minister’s wife,” cried Sue eagerly. “That’s two reasons, Mr. Darnay.”
“Hold on! It was in England, you know.”
“The vicar’s wife, then.”
“I suppose I must let you have that,” Darnay said doubtfully. “It isn’t really very fair because your two reasons are much the same. She was ‘dressed up’ in both cases, wasn’t she? What’s your third reason?”
“It’s dressed up too. She was the vicar’s wife and she was going to call on the parish.”
“No,” he cried indignantly. “No, Miss Bun. You forget that nobody loved her. Do you mean to tell me that the vicar—a man of God—didn’t love his wife after promising to love and cherish her until death did them part?”
Sue shook her head. “I’d forgotten that. Wait a minute, Mr. Darnay. Somebody had given her the gloves for her birthday and she was so taken up with them that she just had to put them on.”
“Nobody loved her,” declared Darnay firmly. “Nobody loved her, so nobody gave her gloves for her birthday.”
“She was vain, then,” cried Sue in desperation. “She put stuff on her hands to make them white and gloves over the top. She was going out to an evening party and wanted her hands to look nice. Will that do?”
“It’ll do,” he said grudgingly. “I don’t believe a word of it, really, but it’s very ingenious. Come see me paint her picture, Miss Bun?”
Sue followed him into the studio and watched with interest. He took a small wooden panel that was already prepared and set it on the easel near the north light. Then he began to paint.
The picture took shape before Sue’s eyes: a field starred with flowers, a hedge, and a far-off clump of dark trees, and, in the foreground, the plumpish lady whom nobody loved, dressed in white and leaning against a stile. The face was turned away and half hidden by the hat, but there was dejection in every line of the figure and hopelessness in the droop of the fat white hands.
The Baker’s Daughter Page 8