Bernard Capes

“ And that dear Clerivault that so loved and desired her for thee. He knew what was right and honourable. How can I of myself ever make good to thee that bitter loss?’
‘My Joan,’ he said: ‘no loss to me in all the world could ever be like to that of losing thee; and no recovery so perfect. I am resigned to meeting Harlequin in Heaven: no Joan would have satisfied my endless longing but Joan on earth.’
A while they dwelt there in the bliss of kisses and soft speech; and then, at last, with a sigh, Brion rose and cried they must be going. ”

“ If reason could not explain a horror, it could master by facing it.
In and about the trees went the ghostly chase: one and the other, phantom and mortal, they took either side of a writhed trunk and met beyond. With a savage cry, Brion flung out his arms, and something dropped beneath them. He stooped, and his hands touched warm and throbbing flesh.
‘God’s ’slid!’ said the boy, taking his oath from Clerivault: ‘Say what art thou!’
He was panting, with set teeth: in the gloom and the wild flurry of his mood he could distinguish nothing clearly. ”

“ I think of all the lives that have been sacrificed to make it ours at the last, and that a curse may be on it.’
‘I think of the dear Providence, Brion, that brought us together to reach this very end, and of how it would be sin to cross its plain intentions; I think of a thousand kind things done to extenuate a thousand evils; and I think of my dear lord no longer wickedly accusing himself of being a pauper husband—as if love, like gingerbread ships, were the better for gilding—but rich as his love for his loving maid. ”

“ Yet he felt no doubt as to Joan’s reception: they would all love her for his sake, and not least his Uncle, to whom her gentle winsome presence would appeal like sunshine breaking out of long storm.
The afternoon was very still and hazy, with a curious vaporous closeness in it, which seemed to meet their faces in hot whiffs, as when one stands near a wind-swayed bonfire. Brion sniffed, raising his head.
‘What is that?’ said he. ‘Are they burning heather? My faith, it is sultry here; and the insects they so hum and drone, one might be in a wood instead of the open. ”

“ Why did she not come? All girls and women seemed to regard time as a jest. It had been the same with Mrs Angell: he had never known her once in all his life punctual to an engagement.
At last, a quarter of an hour late, she appeared. He heard the soft patter of Gritty’s hoofs on the turf outside, and the pair drew into sight. Even seen so, her figure dusk against the light, his mistress brought to Brion’s heart the thrill of delighted surprise she for ever conveyed. He never saw her afresh but she seemed a new thing to him, lovelier and more winsome than when last encountered. ”

“ After all, Joan was the rogue-knight’s daughter—which must seem to argue that the father could not be wholly base. How came it that so coarse a stock could yield so sweet a blossom? What a darling she was, and how great his good fortune in having lighted on her in his dreary life. She had transformed all that, converting his desert at a touch into a garden of Eden. Now the very loneliness of the place was beautiful, since it ensured their uninterrupted converse. As he went over the hill, his brain seeming wrapt in a luminous mist, he felt very happy, with a pure good happiness. ”