"If you are waiting for that, you are going to be disappointed,"she replied, smiling, "for I've put my heart into the work, and Iwas born and patterned for a teacher; I always knew it.We're going to do English literature and a first book in Latin.""Are we?" He picked up the Latin grammar and ran his fingers lightly through the pages."I went a little way in this once," he said."I got as far as 'omnia vincit amor' and stopped.Tobacco conquered me instead."She caught up his gay laugh."Well, we'll try it over again," she returned, and held out the book.
An hour later, when the first lesson was over and he had gone back to his work, he carried with him a wonderful exhilaration--a feeling as if he had with a sudden effort burst the bonds that had held him to the earth.By the next day the elation vanished and a great heaviness came in its place, but for a single afternoon he had known what it was to thrill in every fiber with a powerful and pure emotion--an emotion beside which all the cheap sensations of his life showed stale and colourless.While the strangeness of this mood was still upon him he chanced upon Lila and Jim Weatherby standing together by the gate in the gray dusk, and when presently the girl came back alone across the yard he laid his hand upon her arm and drew her over to Tucker's bench beside the rose-bush.
"Lila, I've changed my mind about it all," he said.
"About what, dear?"
"About Jim and you.We were all wrong--all of us except Uncle Tucker--wrong from the very start.You musn't mind mother; you musn't mind anybody.Marry Jim and be happy, if he can make you so.""Oh, Christopher!" gasped Lila, with a long breath, lifting her lovely, pensive face."Oh, Christopher!""Don't wait; don't put it off; don't listen to any of us," he urged impatiently."Good God! If you love him as you say you do, why have you let all these years slip away?""But you thought it was best, Christopher.You told me so.""Best! There's nothing best except to be happy if you get the chance.""He wants me to marry him now," said Lila, lowering her voice.
"Mother will never know, he thinks, her mind grows so feeble; he wants me to marry him without any getting ready--after church one Sunday morning."Putting his arm about her, Christopher held her for a moment against his side."Then do it," he said gravely, as he stooped and kissed her.
And several weeks later, on a bright first Sunday in May, Lila was married, after morning services, in the little country church, and Christopher watched her almost eagerly as she walked home across the broad meadows powdered white with daisies.To the reproachful countenance which Cynthia presented to him upon his return to the house he gave back a careless and defiant smile.
"So it's all over," he announced gaily, "and Lila's married at last.""Then you're satisfied, I hope," rejoined Cynthia grimly, "now that you've dragged us down to the level of the Weatherbys and--the Fletchers? There's nothing more to be said about it, Isuppose, and you may as well come in to dinner."She held herself stiffly aloof from the subject, with her head flung back and her chin expressing an indignant protest.There was a kind of rebellious scorn in the way in which she carved the shoulder of bacon and poured the coffee.
"Good Lord! It's such a little thing to make a fuss about," said Tucker, "when you remember, my dear, that our levels aren't any bigger than chalk lines in the eyes of God Almighty."Cynthia regarded him with squinting displeasure.
"Oh, of course; you have no family pride," she returned; "but Ihad thought there was a little left in Christopher."Christopher shook his head, smiling indifferently."Not enough to want blood sacrifices," he responded, and fell into a detached and thoughtful silence.The vision of Lila in her radiant happiness remained with him like a picture that one has beheld by some rare chance in a vivid and lovely light; and it was still before him when he left the house presently and strolled slowly down to meet Maria by the poplar spring.
The bloom of the meadows filled his nostrils with a delicate fragrance, and from the bough of an old apple-tree in the orchard he heard the low afternoon murmurs of a solitary thrush.May was on the earth, and it had entered into him as into the piping birds and the spreading trees.It was at last good to be alive--to breathe the warm, sweet air, and to watch the sunshine slanting on the low, green hill.So closely akin were his moods to those of the changing seasons that, at the instant, he seemed to feel the current of his being flow from the earth beneath his feet--as if his physical nature drew strength and nourishment from that genial and abundant source.
When he reached the spring he saw Maria appear on the brow of the hill, and with a quick, joyous bound his heart leaped up to meet her.As she came toward him her white dress swept the tall grass from her feet, and her shadow flew like a winged creature straight before her.There was a vivid softness in her face--a look at once bright and wistful--which moved him with a new and strange tenderness.
"I was a little late," she explained, as they met before the long bench and she laid her books upon it, "and I am very warm.May Ihave a drink?"
"From a bramble cup?"
