Derek

“ Derek in his swagger uniform. He stood drawn to his full height, a powerful figure. The wires of our mechanism showed at his wrists. They dangled at the back of his neck, mounting to that strangely fashioned electrode clamped to his head. Strange, awe-inspiring figure of a man!
We were momentarily alone under the colored lights of the trees. Hope murmured, "But they will see us—see you...."
Derek's face was grim, but at her words he laughed harshly. "See us! What matter?" He swung on me. "It forces our hand; we've got to come out in the open now! This murder—this king! ”

“ Derek scarcely heard their talk. An overwhelming weight of loneliness had fallen on him. Fawnie was gone. No more would she sit beside him watching the fire, with that mysterious, sombrous look that had sometimes almost frightened him; no more would her hair fall like a silken mantle over his shoulder, around his neck; and her arms hold him close against her—"as a matter of fac', darling, you are no better than Buckskin"—Oh, the sweetness of those arms! Their fragility—and their strength—those pouting lips. And she loved Jammery—He could not hear what those fellows were saying. ”

“ Derek turned a rather startled look on Felix.
“What he meant to say,” went on Felix, “was, that age and habit, vested interests, culture and security sit so heavy on this country's chest, that aspiration may wriggle and squirm but will never get from under. That, for all we pretend to admire enthusiasm and youth, and the rest of it, we push it out of us just a little faster than it grows up. Is that what you meant, Derek?” ”

“ Calm as he had appeared to the eye of Freddie and bravely as he had spoken, Derek, in the recesses of his heart, was afraid of his mother. There are men—and Derek Underhill was one of them—who never wholly emerge from the nursery. They may put away childish things and rise in the world to affluence and success, but the hand that rocked their cradle still rules their lives. As a boy, Derek had always been firmly controlled by his mother, and the sway of her aggressive personality had endured through manhood. ”

“ Derek bounded away once more, making manifest efforts to control himself before he spoke again.
"You know this subject is most distasteful to me, Lucilla," he said, severely.
"I know it is; and it's equally so to me. But I see what's going on, and you don't—there's the difference. What should a young man like you know about bringing up a school-girl? To see you intrusted with her at all makes me very nearly doubt the wisdom of the ends of Providence. She's a good little girl by nature, but your indulgence would spoil an angel." ”

“ Jammery
1. The more Derek watched Fawnie, the more he thought of her as the completest human being he had ever known. Her days were a circle of unthinking happiness, from the moment when she put her baby to her breast in the morning, to the time when she warmed her bare feet before the open fire, before she went to bed. She could not write; she could not read. Derek, after a few attempts at lessons, when her docility and utter lack of receptiveness almost put him asleep, gave it up. Why disturb that happy serenity? ”

“ From the platform, just beneath Derek, the guards were staring wonderingly up, awed, startled. To the right a wing of the building turned an angle. The castle tower was there: it rose perhaps a hundred feet higher than our balcony. On the railed platform-balcony girding its top I saw the figures of other guards standing, gazing down at Derek. The clanging bell up there was suddenly stilled.
I became aware of the king close behind me. His voice rang out: "What are you doing? How dare you?"
Derek whirled, "You fool! To what a pass you have come! Your people in arms against you...." ”

“ Then I felt Derek shove me violently aside. I half fell, but recovered myself at the balcony rail. Five of the crimson nobles were on the balcony. Derek confronted them. His aspect made them pause. They stood, with outstretched swords. The garden was silent; the crowd stared up. And in the silence Derek roared,
"Get back! All of you, go back inside! Back, or I'll kill you!"
In Derek's right hand he held the cylinder outstretched, leveled at the menacing nobles. ”

“ All these things combined to induce in Derek a mood bordering on ferocity. His birth and income, combining to make him one of the spoiled children of the world, had fitted him ill for such a series of catastrophes.
Breeding counts. Had he belonged to a lower order of society, Derek would probably have seized Jill by the throat and started to choke her. Being what he was, he merely received her with frozen silence and led her out to the waiting taxi-cab. It was only when the cab had started on its journey that he found relief in speech. ”

“ There might be a guard, Derek. What will you do?"
He laughed. "I can handle this mob. Disperse it! You'll see! And handle the king." He laughed again grimly. "There is no Blanca to choose now."
The tunnel went round a sharp angle and began steeply ascending. Derek stopped.
"How much further, Hope?"
"Not far," she whispered.
We crept forward. The tunnel was more like a small corridor now. Beyond Derek's crouching figure, in the dimness I could see a doorway. Derek turned and gestured to us to keep back. A palace guard was standing there. His pike went up.
"Who are you?"
"A friend." ”

“ Derek retreated again to the fireside, alarmed by a language suspiciously like that he had heard on other occasions concerning the motherless condition of his child. Was it going to turn out that all women were alike? There had been minutes during the last half-hour when, as he looked into Diane's face, it seemed to him that here at last was one as honest as air and as straightforward as light. But no experienced woman of the world, as she declared herself to be, could forget that this was a ludicrously delicate topic with a widower. ”

“ Derek lounged on the brocaded sofa and smoked, while the eyes of those who had built and cherished Grimstone looked soberly down from the walls.
In a pause of the music Derek said: "Oh, I say, Edmund, I have a Christmas present for you. Shall I give it to you now or shall you wait till tomorrow?"
Edmund swung around on the stool and faced him. "I think I'll wait. I have something for you too. Only a trifle. Not at all what I should have liked, but you know how it is with me. I'm always hard up." ”

“ Derek loved to watch her. He became more and more contented. And yet—he was never ten minutes alone without beginning to dream about Grace Jerrold. He would picture what his life might have been had he married her. He could not forget her. He thought it strange that he should be living in comparative content with one woman, while his mind dwelt with another.
2. One foggy morning in mid-December Derek was confronted in the lane by the figure of a man who stepped suddenly from the shelter of a little clump of cedars. It was Jammery.
"Good morning, Mr. Vale," he said in his soft voice. ”

“ Derek told his brother of all his ambitions for Grimstone, and impressed him with the knowledge of farming he had gained in the past months. They went to the kitchen where the collie lay, stretched on his mat beside the cooking stove. Plates of apple-parings on the table reminded them of Phœbe's eyelids and the apple-pips. They laughed, and then suddenly began to scuffle. Around the kitchen they strained and heaved getting more in earnest every moment. At last Derek bent Edmund across the table and, holding his head down, administered some hearty thumps. ”

“ Derek at once introduced Edmund to Miss Carss, the handsome daughter of the head gardener at Durras, who was too proud to dance with any of the Mistwell lads, or any of Vale's men, except Windmill. She had been brought by Hobbs, who looked rather horsey in a check suit, red tie, and hunting-crop tie pin. Derek took as his partner the plump daughter of a fisherman, Nan Hinton. ”

“ It had been the one jarring note in the sweet melody of her love-story, this apprehension of Derek's regarding his mother. The Derek she loved was a strong man, with a strong man's contempt for other people's criticism; and there had been something ignoble and fussy in his attitude regarding Lady Underhill. She had tried to feel that the flaw in her idol did not exist. And here was Freddie Rooke, a man who admired Derek with all his hero-worshipping nature, pointing it out independently. She was annoyed, and she expended her annoyance, as women will do, upon the innocent bystander. ”

“ She was calm now, even playful, because the storm was easing, and she felt protected by Derek's presence. The cake and tea tasted very good to Derek, for he had eaten nothing since his breakfast the morning before. His spirits rose, and when Fawnie clapped her hands as a glimmer of sunlight gained the room, he smiled at her as at a child and said.
"Going to be a good girl?"
"You bet," she replied nodding her head emphatically. "And Phœbe's got to mind the baby and call me Mrs. Vale every time she speaks to me, and not laugh at my clothes. Kin I buy some new clothes right away, Durek?" ”

“ Derek said, laughing.
"Weel, I micht have done worse. I'd sooner be mysel', for instance, than Chaird yonder, goin' off to the Methodist Chapel wi' his fat wife, and eight yellow-faced bairns."
Derek had a glimpse of a waggonette, packed with his neighbour's family and drawn by the yellow-maned horses. Newbigging gave a sly smile. He said:
"I suppose you'll be wantin' me to get the dogcart for ye? There'll be no time to spare."
"Thanks; no," said Derek. "But I suppose you and the other Scots are going. You're a nation of churchgoers, aren't you?" ”

“ They have done wonderful things and we are now prepared to take back what was taken from Derek—and more. His life we can not restore—Heaven rest him—but his kingdom we can. And to his son it shall be returned. ”

“ That it was not an amusing conversation would have been clear from the agitation of Derek's manner as he strode up and down the room, as well as from the rigidity with which his cousin, usually a limp person, held herself erect, in the attitude of a woman who has no intention of retiring from the stand she has taken.
"You force me to speak more plainly than I like, Derek," she was saying, "because you make yourself so obtuse. You seem to forget that years have a way of passing, and that Dorothea is no longer a very little girl." ”

“ She still held the nest as though it were a treasure. Derek suddenly remembered his conversation with Fawnie among the raspberry canes about a goldfinch's nest.
"Can I help?" he asked.
"That's the trouble. I'm crying because father has asked you to help. I begged him not to. But he has. When I saw you two talking—and your expressions—I knew."
"You know too," he said, gently, "that it gives me real pleasure to help your father. And it will make it easier for me to ask his help some day. Think how gladly he would give it."
"Oh, but you don't understand! Things are going very badly with us. ”

“ Tell her to come here if she wants to see me."
"She don' want the old woman and Phœbe to hear. She says there'll be a lot of trouble if you don' come."
"Very well," said Derek, "but if she thinks I will pay any more for the picking she's mistaken."
Phœbe brought the milk and Derek set out through the orchard with the children. It was dusk, and a lantern had been lighted in the old part of the shack. A red shaft of light through the open door pierced the dimness of the orchard like the gleam of a baleful eye. Under the trees the air was intensely sultry. ”

“ I don't know what that work will prove to be—but, Derek, we've got to find out. It may be that we shall do it together. It may be that my work is just to be with you. And it may be that it isn't that you won't want me. Ah! yes, dear," as he made a quick, impatient movement. "There is always the possibility. I want you to go and find out, Derek, and I want you to make sure that you really want me—that it isn't just six months in Flanders. Also," she added after a pause, "I want to be quite sure about myself." For a while Vane stared out to sea in silence. ”

“ Derek followed her and looked down. "You know," he said, "I'm perfectly aware of what you're up to. And it's no use. You never bring anything out. I don't believe there's anything to bring. That empty nest was an omen for you. Better give up trying and just be ornamental." She looked out at him, her head delicately poised, with the cold, aloof regard of a snake.
A meadow lark rose from its nest in the meadow beyond. Turning his eyes to watch its flight Derek saw Grace Jerrold kneeling bareheaded by the rill. ”

“ Derek picked him up. "He's positively indecent," he said. "I suppose I ought to wring his neck. He'll never be any good."
"Give him to Lisgar. The ole woman'll put him in the pot."
That settled it. Derek carried him to the kitchen and made Phœbe wrap him in warm flannel, and give him a little milk. Soon he looked out brightly enough from his wrapper and opened his beak for more milk.
"Snailem found three poults behind the apple-house, flattened right out by the rain, dead as door nails," said Phœbe.
"Better dead," muttered Snailem, shifting his tobacco, "better dead than livin' to be et." ”

“ The field dipped sharply to a stream, and at the crossing Derek came suddenly on the little 'dot-here dot-there' cowherd, who, at Derek's greeting, gave him an abrupt “Good day!” and went on with his occupation of mending a hurdle. Again that miserable feeling beset the boy, and he hastened on. A sound of chopping guided him. Near the edge of the coppice Tom Gaunt was lopping at some bushes. At sight of Derek he stopped and stood waiting, his loquacious face expressionless, his little, hard eye cocked. ”