第42章

One of the brightest mornings of late summer shone upon her.The heather was at its purplest,the furze at its yellowest,the grasshoppers chirped loud enough for birds,the snakes hissed like little engines,and Elfride at first felt lively.Sitting at ease upon Pansy,in her orthodox riding-habit and nonde hat,she looked what she felt.But the mercury of those days had a trick of falling unexpectedly.First,only for one minute in ten had she a sense of depression.Then a large cloud,that had been hanging in the north like a black fleece,came and placed itself between her and the sun.It helped on what was already inevitable,and she sank into a uniformity of sadness.

She turned in the saddle and looked back.They were now on an open table-land,whose altitude still gave her a view of the sea by Endelstow.She looked longingly at that spot.

During this little revulsion of feeling Pansy had been still advancing,and Elfride felt it would be absurd to turn her little mares head the other way.Still,she thought,if I had a mamma at home I WOULD go back!

And making one of those stealthy movements by which women let their hearts juggle with their brains,she did put the horses head about,as if unconsciously,and went at a hand-gallop towards home for more than a mile.By this time,from the inveterate habit of valuing what we have renounced directly the alternative is chosen,the thought of her forsaken Stephen recalled her,and she turned about,and cantered on to St.Launces again.

This miserable strife of thought now began to rage in all its wildness.Overwrought and trembling,she dropped the rein upon Pansys shoulders,and vowed she would be led whither the horse would take her.

Pansy slackened her pace to a walk,and walked on with her agitated burden for three or four minutes.At the expiration of this time they had come to a little by-way on the right,leading down a slope to a pool of water.The pony stopped,looked towards the pool,and then advanced and stooped to drink.

Elfride looked at her watch and discovered that if she were going to reach St.Launces early enough to change her dress at the Falcon,and get a chance of some early train to Plymouth--there were only two available--it was necessary to proceed at once.

She was impatient.It seemed as if Pansy would never stop drinking;and the repose of the pool,the idle motions of the insects and flies upon it,the placid waving of the flags,the leaf-skeletons,like Genoese filigree,placidly sleeping at the bottom,by their contrast with her own turmoil made her impatience greater.

Pansy did turn at last,and went up the slope again to the high-

road.The pony came upon it,and stood cross-wise,looking up and down.Elfrides heart throbbed erratically,and she thought,Horses,if left to themselves,make for where they are best fed.

Pansy will go home.

Pansy turned and walked on towards St.Launces Pansy at home,during summer,had little but grass to live on.

After a run to St.Launces she always had a feed of corn to support her on the return journey.Therefore,being now more than half way,she preferred St.Launces.

But Elfride did not remember this now.All she cared to recognize was a dreamy fancy that to-days rash action was not her own.She was disabled by her moods,and it seemed indispensable to adhere to the programme.So strangely involved are motives that,more than by her promise to Stephen,more even than by her love,she was forced on by a sense of the necessity of keeping faith with herself,as promised in the inane vow of ten minutes ago.

She hesitated no longer.Pansy went,like the steed of Adonis,as if she told the steps.Presently the quaint gables and jumbled roofs of St.Launces were spread beneath her,and going down the hill she entered the courtyard of the Falcon.Mrs.Buckle,the landlady,came to the door to meet her.

The Swancourts were well known here.The transition from equestrian to the ordinary guise of railway travellers had been more than once performed by father and daughter in this establishment.

In less than a quarter of an hour Elfride emerged from the door in her walking dress,and went to the railway.She had not told Mrs.

Buckle anything as to her intentions,and was supposed to have gone out shopping.

An hour and forty minutes later,and she was in Stephens arms at the Plymouth station.Not upon the platform--in the secret retreat of a deserted waiting-room.

Stephens face boded ill.He was pale and despondent.

What is the matter?she asked.

We cannot be married here to-day,my Elfie!I ought to have known it and stayed here.In my ignorance I did not.I have the licence,but it can only be used in my parish in London.I only came down last night,as you know.

What shall we do?she said blankly.

Theres only one thing we can do,darling.

Whats that?

Go on to London by a train just starting,and be married there to-morrow.

Passengers for the 11.5up-train take their seats!said a guards voice on the platform.

Will you go,Elfride?

I will.

In three minutes the train had moved off,bearing away with it Stephen and Elfride.