but dance away downward, like a lasher of glittering water.
Therefore, in this garden grew soft and gentle-natured plants, and flowers of delicate tint, that sink in the exhaustion of the sunglare. The sun, in almost every garden, sucks the beauty out of all the flowers; he stains the sweet violet even in March; he spots the primrose and the periwinkle; he takes the down off the heartsease blossom; he browns the pure lily-of-the-valley in May; and, after that, he dims the tint of every rose that he opens: and yet, in spite of all his mischief, which of them does not rejoice in him?
The bold chase, cut in the body of the hill, has rugged sides, and a steep descent for a quarter of a mile below the house – the cleft of the chalk on either side growing deeper towards the mouth of the coombe. The main road to the house goes up the coombe, passing under the eastern scarp, but winding away from it, here and there, to obtain a better footing. The old house, facing down the hill, stands so close to the head of the coombe, that there is not more than an acre or so of land behind and between it and the crest; and this is partly laid out as a courtyard, partly occupied by out-buildings, stables, and so on, and the ruinous keep ingloriously used as a lime-kiln; while the rest of the space is planted, in and out, with spruce and birch-trees, and anything that will grow there. Among them winds a narrow outlet to the upper and open Downs – not much of a road for carriage-wheels, but something in appearance betwixt a bridle-path and a timber-track, such as is known in those parts by the old English name, a “borstall.”
As this led to no dwelling-house for miles and miles away, but only to the crown of the hills and the desolate tract of sheep-walks, ninety-nine visitors out of a hundred to the house came up the coombe, so that Alice from her flower-garden, commanding the course of the drive from the plains, could nearly always foresee the approach of any interruption. Here she had pretty seats under laburnums, and even a bower of jessamine, and a noble view all across the weald, even to the range of the North Downs; so that it was a pleasant place for all who love soft sward and silence, and have time to enjoy that rare romance of the seasons – a hot English summer.
Only there was one sad drawback. Lady Valeria’s windows straightly overlooked this pleasant spot, and Lady Valeria never could see why she should not overlook everything. Beyond and above all other things, she took it as her own special duty to watch her dear granddaughter Alice; and now in her eighty-second year she was proud of her eyesight, and liked to prove its power.
“Here they come again!” cried Alice, talking to herself, or her rake, and trowel; “will they never be content? I told them on Monday that I knew nothing; and they will not believe it. I have a great mind to hide myself in my hole, like that poor rag-and-bone boy. It goes beyond my patience quite, to be cross-examined and not believed.”
Those whom she saw coming up the steep road at struggling and panting intervals, were her three good cousins from the rectory – Caroline, Margaret, and Cecil Hales; rather nice-looking and active girls, resembling their father in face and frame, and their excellent mother in their spiritual parts. The Anglican period of young ladies – the time of wearing great crosses, and starving, and sticking as a thorn in the flesh of mankind, lay as yet in the happy future. A parson’s daughters were as yet content to leave the parish to their father, helping him only in the Sunday-school; and for the rest of the week, minding their own dresses, or some delicate jobs of pastry, or gossip.
Though Alice had talked so of running away, she knew quite well that she never could do it, unless it were for a childish joke; and swiftly she was leaving now the pretty and petty world of childhood, sinking into that distance whence the failing years recover it. Therefore, instead of running away, she ran down the hill to meet her cousins; for truly she liked them decently.
“Oh, you dear, how are you? How wonderfully good to come to meet us! Madge, I shall be jealous in a moment if you kiss my Alice so. Cecil – what are you thinking of? Why, you never kissed your cousin Alice.”
“Oh yes, you have all done it very nicely. What more could I wish?” said Alice; “but what could have made you come up the hill, so early in the day, dears?”
“Well, you know what dear mamma is. She really fancied that we might seem (now there is so much going on) really unkind and heartless, unless we came up to see how you were. Papa would have come; but he feels it so steep, unless he is coming up to dinner; and pony, you know – Oh, she did such a thing! The wicked little dear, she got into the garden, and devoured £10 worth of the grand new flower, just introduced by the Duchess – ‘Dallia,’ or ‘Dellia,’ I can’t spell the name. And mamma was so upset that both of them have been unwell ever since.”
“Oh, Dahlias!” answered Alice, whose grapes were rather sour, because her father had refused to buy any; “flaunty things in my opinion. But Caroline, Madge, and Cecil, have you ever set eyes on my new rose?”
Of course they all ran to behold the new rose; which was no other than the “Persian yellow,” a beautiful stranger, not yet at home. The countless petals of brilliant yellow folding inward full of light, and the dimple in the centre, shy of yielding inlet to its virgin gold, and then the delicious fragrance, too refined for random sniffers, – these and other delights found entry into the careless beholder’s mind.
“It makes one think of astrologers,” cried Caroline Hales; “I declare it does! Look at all the little stars! It is quite like a celestial globe.”
“So it is, I do declare!” said Madge. But Cecil shook her head. She was the youngest, and much the prettiest, and by many degrees the most elegant of the daughters of the rectory. Cecil had her own opinion about many things; but waited till it should be valuable.
“It is much more like a cowslip-ball,” Alice answered, carelessly. “Come into my bower now. And then we can all of us go to sleep.”
The three girls were a little hot and thirsty, after their climb of the chalky road; and a bright spring ran through the bower, as they knew, ready to harmonize with sherbet, sherry-wine, or even shrub itself; as had once been proved by Hilary.
“How delicious this is! How truly sweet!” cried the eldest, and perhaps most loquacious, Miss Hales; “and how nice of you always to keep a glass! A spring is such a rarity on these hills; papa says it comes from a different stratum. What a stratum is I have no idea. It ought to be straight, one may safely say that; but it always seems to be crooked. Now, can you explain that, darling Alice? You are so highly taught, and so clever.”
“Now, we don’t want a lecture,” said Madge, the blunt one; “the hill is too steep to have that at the top. Alice knows everything, no doubt, in the way of science, and all that. But what we are dying to know is what came of that grand old astrologer’s business.”
“This is the seventh or eighth time now,” Alice answered, hard at bay, “that you will keep on about some little thing that the servants are making mountains of. My father best knows what it is. Let us go to his room and ask him.”
“Oh no, dear! oh no, dear? How could we do that? What would dear uncle say to us? But come, now tell us. You do know something. Why are you so mysterious? Mystery is a thing altogether belonging to the dark ages, now. We have heard such beautiful stories, that we cannot manage to sleep at night, without knowing what they are all about. Now, do tell us everything. You may just as well tell us every single thing. We are sure to find it all out, you know; and then we shall all be down on you. Among near relations, dear mamma says, there is nothing to compare with candour.”
“Don’t you see, Alice,” Madge broke in, “we are sure to know sooner or later; and how can it matter which it is?”
“To be sure,” answered Alice, “it cannot matter. And so you shall all know, later.”
This made the three sisters look a little at one another, quietly.
