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 from it.It gaped now and, just as the cab climbed Cator Hill, it fell forward and flung the contents on to the floor.
Maggie, blushing, looked up expecting a reproof.She saw that her aunt's eyes were fixed upon the view; as upon the day of her arrival, so now.Her face wore a look of rapture.She drank it in.
Maggie also took the last joy of the familiar scene.The Vicarage, like a grey crouching cat, lay basking on the green hill.The sunlight flooded the dark wood; galleons of clouds rolled like lumbering vessels across the blue sky.
"It's lovely, isn't it?" whispered Maggie.
1
"I've always loved just this view.I've often walked here just to see it," Maggie said.
Aunt Anne sat back in her seat.
"It's been hard for me always to live in London.I love the country so.""So do I," said Maggie, passionately.
For a moment they were together, caught up by the same happiness.
Then Aunt Anne said:
"Why, your bag, dear! The things are all about the place."Maggie bent down.When she looked up again they had dipped down on the other side of the hill.
Maggie had only once in all her life been in a train, but on this present occasion she did not find it very thrilling.It was rather like being in anything else, and her imagination exercised itself upon the people in the carriage rather than the scenery outside.She was at first extremely self-conscious and fancied that every one whispered about her.Then, lulled by the motion of the train and the warmth, she slept; she was more deeply exhausted by the events of the last week than she knew, and throughout the day she slumbered, woke, and slumbered again.
Quite suddenly she awoke with a definite shock to a new world.
Evening had come; there were lights that rushed up to the train, stared in at the window, and rushed away again.On every side things seemed to change places in a general post, trees and houses, hedges and roads, all lit by an evening moon and wrapt in a white and wavering mist.Then the town was upon them, quite instantly; streets ran like ribbons into grey folds of buildings; rows of lamps, scattered at first, drew into a single point of dancing flame;towers and chimneys seemed to jump from place to place as though they were trying to keep in time with the train; a bell rang monotonously; wreaths of smoke rose lazily against the stars and fell again.
When at last she found herself, a tiny figure, standing upon the vast platform under the high black dome, the noise and confusion excited and delighted her.She rose to the waves of sound as a swimmer rises in the sea, her heart beat fast, and she was so eagerly engaged in looking about her, in staring at the hurrying people, in locating the shrill screams of the engines, in determining not to jump when the carriages jolted together, that her little black bag opened unexpectedly once more and spilled a handkerchief, a hand-mirror, a paper packet of sweets, a small pair of scissors, and a shabby brown purse upon the station-floor.She was greatly confused when an old gentleman helped her to pick them up.The little mirror was broken.
"Oh! it's bad luck!" she cried, staring distressfully at the old man.He smiled, and would have certainly been very agreeable to her had not Aunt Anne, who had been finding their boxes and securing a cab, arrived and taken Maggie away."You shouldn't speak to strange gentlemen, dear," said Aunt Anne.
But Maggie did not listen.It was characteristic of Anne Cardinal that she should secure the only four-wheeler in the station, rejecting the taxi-cabs that waited in rows for her pleasure.Had Maggie only known, her aunt's choice was eloquent of their future life together.But Maggie did not know and did not care.Her excitement was intense.That old St.Dreot life had already swung so far behind her that it was like a fantastic dream; as they rumbled through the streets, the cries, the smells, the lights seemed arranged especially for her.She could not believe that they had all been, just like this, before her arrival.As with everything, she was busy imagining the World behind this display, the invisible Circle inside the circle that she saw.
They came into the Strand, and the masses of moving people seemed to her like somnambulists walking without reason or purpose.She felt as though there would suddenly come a great hole in the middle of the street into which the cab would tumble.The noise seemed to her country ears deafening, and when, suddenly, the lighted letters of some advertisement flashed out gigantic against the sky, she gave a little scream.She puzzled her aunt by saying:
"But it isn't really like this, is it?"
To which Aunt Anne could only say:
