Part 36 (1/2)
”And on the woods and on the deep The smile of heaven lay.
It seemed as if the day were one Sent from beyond the skies, Which shed to earth above the sun A light of Paradise.”
There is an ”inviolable quietness” in all the air.
Some late roses have grown, and cl.u.s.ter round Lilian's window; stooping out, she kisses and caresses them, speaking to them as though they were (as indeed they are) her dear friends, when nurse's voice recalls her to the present, and the inner room.
”La, my dear,” says Mrs. Tipping, ”it is only four days since I washed it before.”
”Never mind, ninny; wash it again. To-day is so delicious, with such a dear little breeze, and such a prodigality of sun, that I cannot resist it. You know how I love running through the air with my hair wet, and feeling the wind rus.h.i.+ng through it. And, nurse, be sure now”--coaxingly--”you put plenty of soda in the water.”
”What, and rot all your pretty locks? Not I, indeed!” says nurse, with much determination.
”But you must; you will now, won't you?” in a wheedling tone. ”It never stands properly out from my head unless it is full of soda.”
”An' what, I wonder, would your poor mamma say to me if she could see me spoiling your bonny hair this day, an' it the very color of her own? No, no; I cannot indeed. It goes against my conscience, as it were. Go get some one else to wash it, not me; it would sadden me.”
”If you won't wash it, no one else shall,” pouts Lilian. And when Lilian pouts she looks so lovely, and so naughty, and so irresistible, that, instead of scolding her for ill-temper, every one instantly gives in to her. Nurse gives in, as she has done to her little mistress's pout ever since the latter was four years old, and forthwith produces soap and water and plenty of soda.
The long yellow hair being at length washed, combed out carefully, and brushed until it hangs heavily all down her back, Lilian administers a soft little kiss to her nurse as reward for her trouble, and runs delightedly down the stairs, straight into the open air, without hat, or covering of any kind for her head.
The garden is listless and sleepy. The bees are silent, the flowers are nodding drowsily, wakened into some sort of life by the teasing wind that sighs and laughs around them unceasingly. Lilian plucks a blossom here and there, and scatters far and near the gaudy b.u.t.terfly in very wantonness of enjoyment, while the wooing wind whistles through her hair, drying it softly, lovingly, until at last some of its pristine gloss returns to it, and its gold s.h.i.+nes with redoubled vigor beneath the sun's rays.
As she saunters, reveling--as one from Fairyland might revel--in the warmth and gladness of the great heathen G.o.d, she sings; and to Guy in his distant study the sound and the words come all too distinctly,--
”Why shouldn't I love my love?
Why shouldn't he love me?
Why shouldn't he come after me, Since love to all is free?”
Beneath his window she pauses, and, finally, running up the steps of the balcony, peers in, full of an idle curiosity.
Sir Guy's den is the most desirable room in the house,--the coziest, the oddest, the most interesting. Looking at it, one guesses instinctively how addicted to all pretty things the owner is, from women down to less costly _bijouterie_.
Lovely landscapes adorn the walls side by side with Greuze-like faces, angelic in expression, unlike in appearance. There are a few portraits of beauties well known in the London and Paris worlds, frail as they are fair, false as they are _piquante_, whose garments (to do him justice) are distinctly decent, perhaps more so than their characters. But then indecency has gone out of fas.h.i.+on.
There are two or three lounges, some priceless statuettes, a few bits of _bric-a-brac_ worth their weight in gold, innumerable yellow-backed volumes by Paul de k.o.c.k and his fellows, chairs of all shapes and sizes, one more comfortable and inviting than the other, enough meerschaum pipes and cigarette-holders and tobacco-stands to stock a small shop, a couple of dogs snoozing peacefully upon the hearth-rug, under the mistaken impression that a fire is burning in the grate, a writing-table, and before it Sir Guy. These are the princ.i.p.al things that attract Lilian's attention, as she gazes in, with her silken hair streaming behind her in the light breeze.
On the wall she cannot see, there are a few hunters by Herring, a copy of Millais' ”Yes or No,” a good deal of stable-ware, and beneath them, on a table, more pipes, cheroots, and boxes of cigars, mixed up with straw-covered bottles of perfume, thrust rather ignominiously into the corner.
A shadow falling across the paper on which he is writing, Guy raises his head, to see a fairy vision staring in at him,--a little slight figure, clothed in airy black with daintiest lace frillings at the throat and wrists, and with a wealth of golden hair brought purposely all over her face, letting only the laughing sapphire eyes, blue as the skies above her, gleam out from among it.
”Open the door, O hermit, and let a poor wanderer in,” croons this fairy, in properly saddened tones.
Rising gladly, he throws wide the window to her, whereupon she steps into the room, still with her face hidden.
”You come?” asks he, in a deferential tone.
”To know what you are doing, and what can keep you in-doors this exquisite day. Do you remember how late in the season it is? and that you are slighting Nature? She will be angry, and will visit you with storms and drooping flowers, if you persist in flouting her. Come out.
Come out.”