Horace Annesley Vachell

“ CHAPTER IV LE PAYS DU TENDRE During the month that followed, Fancy was very happy. Time stands still for true lovers. Past and future seem immensely remote; the present, with its rosy hours, holds captive the happy prisoners. Alfred, it is true, had not yet put his fate to more than the touch. He had encircled a slender waist with a reassuringly strong arm—no more. Being a Yellam and a carrier, he disdained haste. Fancy was well content to stroll arm in crook towards the altar. Indeed, upon more than one occasion she had checked Alfred when about to explode into speech. ”

“ Hamlin held his tongue.
"She's taking this hard, but not a word does she say, not one. She thinks, I know, that God Almighty has forsaken her, pore soul. Such a mort o' trouble as she's had, too. My going seems the last straw. 'Twouldn't be so bad, if all the young men had gone first."
"I can imagine what she feels, Alfred. This is a time of sore trial to all of us, and, perhaps, the strongest suffer most. I will do what I can to comfort her, but I can do so little. In all my life I have never felt before how cheap mere words are. ”

“ A picturesque, old German virtuoso consents to take for his pupil a handsome youth who proves to have an aptitude for technique, but not the soul of an artist. The youth cannot express the love, the passion and the tragedies of life as can the master. But a girl comes into his life, and through his passionate love for her, he learns the lessons that life has to give—and his soul awakes. ”

“ Hamlin, in common with most sincere reformers, divided the world into two classes—the helpers and hinderers. Between these lay, of course, a No Man's Land, where each class wandered aimlessly; the helpers, like the Squire, became hinderers and hinderers, like Uncle, might become, unexpectedly, helpers. Fancy, he acclaimed as a helper in or out of the debateable territory. Insensibly, her refinement and modesty would raise the tone in his kitchen, and radiate purer beams from a house hospitably accessible to all his congregation. ”

“ Thoughts of hunting distracted the Parson as he strode back to his lonely Vicarage. What a master passion it was in everybody! The Squire hunted foxes in all weathers, regardless of weather conditions. Nothing stopped him but a hard frost. His Parson hunted men and women, a more arduous chase, hounding them out of covers where dirt, ignorance, poverty and vice hid them from view. A hard frost, such as had settled on Susan Yellam, stopped him. Others hunted fame, money, position, just as ardently. ”

“ He could not measure the stride about to be taken, provided militarism was crushed. He wondered constantly, with ever-increasing apprehension, whether love would triumph in the end, as he prayed that it might, creating a new world concerned with the happiness of the many, a world purged of the old insensate vanities and acrimonies.
Mrs. Yellam received him, as usual, a shade more formally, perhaps, with a slight tightening of her lips. ”

“ Alfred led the way to a hurdler's hut, a rough shed, where the lovers sat down upon a heap of dry chips. A delicious smell of bark filled the air. George Mucklow had worked here often, before he was dragooned into the Army. With the smell of bark, dominating it, rose the odour of damp earth, always so significant, bearing its double message. From earth we have come; to it we must return. Fancy's sensitive nose could detect yet another odour. ”

“ Captain Davenant read the Lessons as if he were declaiming the Riot Act. The good man believed that the young men present were shirking hounds to be rated and whipped up to their Master. Under the lash of his rasping voice, even Mrs. Yellam, louder in fervent response than usual, winced and frowned. The Parson, in his three-decker, wondered whether a discreet hint would serve to tone down the zeal of this militant Christian, who positively wallowed in the slaughters and comminations of the Old Testament. ”

“ To men and women who work desperately hard throughout the week, the silences of Sunday steal unawares, lapping them to a rest which is real refreshment. Fancy, for example, loved to stroll beside Alfred, feeling his sturdy arm about her waist, and knowing from its convincing pressure that his thoughts were dwelling upon her as hers dwelt upon him, revelling in a future which would bring them closer together. ”

“ In every heart, however worn and tired, there lingers a subtle fragrance of youth which thought of youth releases. The sad fact that many of the elder people were mourning may have tempered what speech he addressed to them, and many of them were aware of this, shifting uneasily in their pews as they remembered similar words spoken in the same place by the same man twenty years back.
Once more, Mrs. Yellam walked home in silence. Fancy, engrossed by her own thoughts, did not speak till they entered the cottage. ”

“ Upon Christmas Eve Fancy's ordeal began.
Hamlin hoped and believed that tiny hands would melt the ice in an old woman's heart. Everybody knew that Susan Yellam loved children, and that her rather grim face inspired no terrors in them. She kept the large green bottle full of bull's-eyes, simply because it lured pattering feet to her door. If they trotted up too often, rebukes, not bull's-eyes, were forthcoming. A sure way to her favour, as little girls soon discovered, was to ask for a flower out of the garden. ”

“ Hamlin never passed him without reflecting that death would release an imprisoned soul destined, perhaps, to an undreamed-of development hereafter, the greater because it had been denied expression on earth. And, inversely, when he met, as he did occasionally, men pre-eminent in science, or art, or industry, he seemed to see clearly the man standing sharply apart from his work, often a very ordinary person, undistinguished save for the amazing fact that he had been selected, out of millions, to accomplish something vital to the progress of the world. ”

“ The first effect of the war upon Fancy, apart from her sisterly anxieties, was a tightening of the bond between master and maid. Mr. Hamlin held strong democratic opinions, a source of friction between himself and Sir Geoffrey Pomfret. He desired ardently a more equable distribution, not merely of wealth, but of health and intelligence. He believed absolutely in the equality of souls before God, and he recognised with ever-increasing satisfaction the potentialities of bodies and minds, if taken in hand early in life. ”

“ Hate impoverishes souls and bodies. A man under the influence of violent passion is physically the worse. Any doctor will tell you that. A nation convulsed by hate is physically weaker. Violence is not strength. It may appear to be so for a brief time. In a stand-up fight, between two men, the man who loses his temper is likely to lose the victory. At this moment, a gospel of hate is convulsing our enemies. We may, and must, hate what they have done, the atrocious crimes perpetrated by and for Authority, but let us beware of hating, as they hate, because such rancour eats away the soul. ”

“ Alfred, as a trencherman, was no degenerate son of such a sire.
When she reached the bend of the road, which skirts the placid Avon, she saw her cottage and smiled pleasantly. It was thatched, and on that account beloved by elderly spinsters who drew in water-colour, and frowned upon by sanitary inspectors. The thatch, a masterpiece of craftsmanship, surmounted whitewashed walls held together by stout oak beams black as the Ace of Spades. Generations of Yellams had lived and died in this cottage. ”