The Captives [21]
her aunts would love her she would improve much more rapidly. And then with her new independence she assured herself that if they did not love her she most certainly would not love them . . .
That night she sat opposite her aunt beside the fire. The house lay dead and empty behind them. Aunt Anne was so neat in her thin black silk, her black shining hair, her pale pointed face, a little round white locket rising and falling ever so slowly with the lift of her breast. There were white frills to her sleeves, and she read a slim book bound in purple leather. Her body never moved; only once and again her thin, delicate hand ever so gently lifted, turned a page, then settled down on to her lap once more. She never raised her eyes.
The fire was heavy and sullen; the wind howled; that old familiar beating of the twigs upon the pane seemed to reiterate to Maggie that this was her last evening. She pretended to read. She had found a heavy gilt volume of Paradise Lost with Dore's pictures. She read these words:
Beyond this flood a frozen Continent Lies dark and wilde, beat with perpetual storms Of whirlwind and dire hail; which on firm land Thaws not, but gathers heap, and ruin seems Of ancient pile; all else deep snow and ice, A gulf profound as that Serbonian bay Betwixt Damiata and Mount Casius old, Where armies whole have sunk; the parching Air Burns froze, and cold performs the effect of Fire.
Further again, words caught her eye.
Thus roving on In confused march forlorn, th' adventurous Bands With shuddering horror pale, and eyes aghast Viewed first their lamentable lot, and found No rest; through many a dark and drearie Vaile They passed, and many a Region dolorous. O'er many a frozen, many a fiery Alpe, Rocks, Caves, Lakes, Fens, Bogs, Dens and shades of death, A Universe of death, which God by curse Created evil, for evil only good Where all life dies, death lives, and nature breaks Perverse, all monstrous, all prodigious things, Abominable, inutterable, and worse Than Fables yet have feigned, or fear conceived, Gorgons, and Hydras, and Chimaeras dire.
She did not care for reading, most especially she did not care for poetry, but to-night she saw the picture. Up to the very bounds of the house this waste country, filled with beasts of prey, animals with fiery eyes and incredible names, the long stretch of snow and ice, the black water with no stars reflected in it, the wind.
A coal crashed in the fire; she gave a little cry.
"My dear, what is it?" said Aunt Anne. Then, with a little shake of her shoulders, she added: "There's a horrid draught. Perhaps you forgot to close the kitchen-door when you came away, Maggie dear."
Maggie flushed. Of course she had forgotten. She left the room, crossed the hall. Yes, there was the door, wide open. She locked it, the place was utterly cold and desolate. She closed the door, stood for a moment in the little hall.
"I don't care what's going to happen!" she cried aloud. So ended her life in that house.
CHAPTER III
THE LONDON HOUSE
It was strange after this that the start on the London journey should be so curiously unexciting; it was perhaps the presence of Aunt Anne that reduced everything to an unemotional level. Maggie wondered as she sat in the old moth-eaten, whisky-smelling cab whether her Aunt Anne was ever moved about anything. Then something occurred that showed her that, as yet, she knew very little about her aunt. As, clamping down the stony hill, they had a last glimpse at the corner of the two Vicarage chimneys, looking above the high hedge like a pair of inquisitive lunatics, Maggie choked. She pressed her hands together, pushed her hair from her face and, in so doing, touched her black hat.
"Your hat's crooked, Maggie dear," said her aunt gently. The girl's hot hands clutched the soft packet of sandwiches and a little black handbag that yesterday Aunt Anne had bought for her in the village. It was a shabby little bag, and had strange habits of opening when it was not expected to do so and remaining shut when something was needed
That night she sat opposite her aunt beside the fire. The house lay dead and empty behind them. Aunt Anne was so neat in her thin black silk, her black shining hair, her pale pointed face, a little round white locket rising and falling ever so slowly with the lift of her breast. There were white frills to her sleeves, and she read a slim book bound in purple leather. Her body never moved; only once and again her thin, delicate hand ever so gently lifted, turned a page, then settled down on to her lap once more. She never raised her eyes.
The fire was heavy and sullen; the wind howled; that old familiar beating of the twigs upon the pane seemed to reiterate to Maggie that this was her last evening. She pretended to read. She had found a heavy gilt volume of Paradise Lost with Dore's pictures. She read these words:
Beyond this flood a frozen Continent Lies dark and wilde, beat with perpetual storms Of whirlwind and dire hail; which on firm land Thaws not, but gathers heap, and ruin seems Of ancient pile; all else deep snow and ice, A gulf profound as that Serbonian bay Betwixt Damiata and Mount Casius old, Where armies whole have sunk; the parching Air Burns froze, and cold performs the effect of Fire.
Further again, words caught her eye.
Thus roving on In confused march forlorn, th' adventurous Bands With shuddering horror pale, and eyes aghast Viewed first their lamentable lot, and found No rest; through many a dark and drearie Vaile They passed, and many a Region dolorous. O'er many a frozen, many a fiery Alpe, Rocks, Caves, Lakes, Fens, Bogs, Dens and shades of death, A Universe of death, which God by curse Created evil, for evil only good Where all life dies, death lives, and nature breaks Perverse, all monstrous, all prodigious things, Abominable, inutterable, and worse Than Fables yet have feigned, or fear conceived, Gorgons, and Hydras, and Chimaeras dire.
She did not care for reading, most especially she did not care for poetry, but to-night she saw the picture. Up to the very bounds of the house this waste country, filled with beasts of prey, animals with fiery eyes and incredible names, the long stretch of snow and ice, the black water with no stars reflected in it, the wind.
A coal crashed in the fire; she gave a little cry.
"My dear, what is it?" said Aunt Anne. Then, with a little shake of her shoulders, she added: "There's a horrid draught. Perhaps you forgot to close the kitchen-door when you came away, Maggie dear."
Maggie flushed. Of course she had forgotten. She left the room, crossed the hall. Yes, there was the door, wide open. She locked it, the place was utterly cold and desolate. She closed the door, stood for a moment in the little hall.
"I don't care what's going to happen!" she cried aloud. So ended her life in that house.
CHAPTER III
THE LONDON HOUSE
It was strange after this that the start on the London journey should be so curiously unexciting; it was perhaps the presence of Aunt Anne that reduced everything to an unemotional level. Maggie wondered as she sat in the old moth-eaten, whisky-smelling cab whether her Aunt Anne was ever moved about anything. Then something occurred that showed her that, as yet, she knew very little about her aunt. As, clamping down the stony hill, they had a last glimpse at the corner of the two Vicarage chimneys, looking above the high hedge like a pair of inquisitive lunatics, Maggie choked. She pressed her hands together, pushed her hair from her face and, in so doing, touched her black hat.
"Your hat's crooked, Maggie dear," said her aunt gently. The girl's hot hands clutched the soft packet of sandwiches and a little black handbag that yesterday Aunt Anne had bought for her in the village. It was a shabby little bag, and had strange habits of opening when it was not expected to do so and remaining shut when something was needed