Part 2 (1/2)
He seems lost in contemplation.
”I have found her at last,” he says, speaking his thoughts aloud.
”Who?” asks Eleanor under her breath.
”The Ideal Woman!” he replies.
The girl looks perplexed--she does not understand the phrase. New Women and rational costumes have not yet penetrated to the depths of Copthorne, so their counter-poising ideal is to her an unknown quant.i.ty.
Eleanor's ignorance of modernity const.i.tutes a special charm in his eyes. How sweet a privilege to build up this uncultured soul, to mould her impressionable spirit! Philip is enamoured of the idea, he sees such vast possibilities stretching out before him. Eleanor differed so widely from the women of his set. Perhaps the weaker s.e.x are made variously that the mind of desultory man, studious of change, and pleased with novelty, may be indulged.
”How long have we known each other?” he asks.
”About three hours,” she answers promptly.
”How deep can one go below the surface in one hundred and eighty minutes?”
Eleanor seems bewildered; she is at a loss for words.
”Have I only been with you so short a time?” he says incredulously.
”Can it be possible?”
”Does it seem long?” she asks looking down shyly. ”Have I wearied you, Mr. Roche?”
His smile rea.s.sures her.
”It does not seem _long_, only _full_ to the brim. To every second a fresh thought, an inch deeper into the unknown.”
”I have never met anyone before,” she declares frankly, ”who spoke to me like that.”
Then with a swift ”Good night” Eleanor breaks away and vanishes among the shadows.
”A wife,” says Philip to himself, ”is something between a hindrance and a help. Is this the turn of the tide?”
A nightingale broke into song. ”Yes!” it cried; ”yes--yes--yes!”
CHAPTER II.
”IMPARADIS'D IN ONE ANOTHER'S ARMS.”--_Milton_.
Eleanor is busy in the morning sunlight, brightening the pewter dinner service, the pride of the Grebby family, pa.s.sed down from generation to generation, and priceless in her eyes. She can hear the preparations without for an early start to the neighbouring market. Her mother is loading a cart of vegetables, while her father ”shoos” the cackling geese into wicker pens, and harnesses ”Black Bess” the steady old mare, who is almost one of themselves. And Eleanor is glad that the market (a weekly centre of attraction to the old village) will leave her in peaceful solitude.
She breaks out into a glad song, which mingles with the twittering of birds:
”There was a jolly miller once, Lived on the River Dee.”
”Eleanor, Eleanor, give me a hand with these vegetables,” cries her mother's voice. There is a thud, and a whole sack of potatoes fall pell-mell into the yard, still muddy from yesterday's rain.