Part 43 (2/2)
A rich odour of coffee, insinuating itself through the half open door, testified mutely to the fact that Aunt Amy was getting breakfast. It was later than usual. After breakfast it would be time to dress for church.
Every one in Coombe dressed for church. It was a sacred rite. One and all, they had clothes which were strictly Sabbatarian, known indeed by the name of Sunday Best.
Esther's Sunday best was a blue, voile, a lovely blue, the colour of her eyes when in soft shadow. It was made with a long straight skirt slightly high at the waist, round neck and elbow sleeves and with it went soft, wrinkly gloves and a wide hat trimmed with cornflowers. She knew that she looked well in it--and the doctor would be in church.
On this thought which flew into her mind like a swift swallow through an open window, her lethargy fled and in its place came nervous haste; a feverish impatience which brought her with a bound out of bed, flushed and eager. Philosophy is all very well but it never yet stilled the heart-beat of the young.
Aunt Amy looked up in mild surprise as she hurried into the kitchen in time to b.u.t.ter toast and poach the eggs.
”Why, Esther!” she said in her bewildered way. ”I thought--I didn't think that you would get up this morning.”
”Why? I am perfectly well, Auntie. Where is mother?”
”Oh, she's up! Picking flowers.”
Esther looked slightly surprised. It was not Mrs. Coombe's habit to rise early or to pick flowers, but before she had time to comment, Mary herself entered the kitchen with an armful of roses.
”Hurry with your breakfast, Jane,” she said, ”I want you to take these over to the doctor's office. I wonder you have not sent some to the poor man before this, Esther. Mrs. Sykes' roses never amount to anything.
Shall I pour the coffee? I suppose you felt that you did not know him well enough. But flowers sent in a neighbourly way would have been quite all right. If you weren't always so stiff, people would like you better.
I felt quite ashamed of your behaviour last night. Of course it wasn't necessary for you to stay in the room _all_ the evening, but it was simply rude to run away as you did. You needn't make Jane an excuse.
Jane could put herself to bed, for once.”
”I did--” began Jane, but catching sight of her sister's face, went no further. And Mrs. Coombe, who was always talkative when airing a grievance, paid no attention.
”If you are feeling huffy about the motor breaking down, you'll just have to get over it,” she went on. ”It couldn't possibly have been Dr.
Callandar's fault anyway.”
”I am quite sure that it wasn't.”
”Then don't sulk. He is rather fine looking, don't you think? Though as a boy he was almost ugly. It doesn't seem to matter in men--ugliness, I mean. And of course in those days he could not afford to dress; dress makes such a difference. I shouldn't be a bit surprised if his clothes are English made. That baggy look that isn't really baggy, you know.
When I knew him his people were quite poor. Only a mother and sister.
The father shot himself. People said suicide ran in that family. But Harry--Henry said that if it did, it was going to stop running. He said such odd things. I was staying with friends when I met him, at a church social. One meets all kinds at an affair like that. My friends didn't ask him to the party they gave for me. For although they were a very good family, the Chedridges, Henry was almost a hired man at that time, working for old Dr. Inglis, to put himself through college. His mother and sister never went out.”
”Were they both invalids?”
”Don't be clever, Esther! I mean socially, of course. Jane, run up to my dresser and look in the second drawer on the right hand side and bring down my small photo case. I think I have a photo somewhere, not a very good one, but enough to show how homely he was.... Amy, aren't you going to eat any breakfast this morning?”
Aunt Amy, who had been following her niece's unusual flow of talk with fascinated attention, returned with a start to her untasted egg. Esther tried to eat some toast and choked. In spite of all her resolutions she felt coldly and bitterly angry. That her mother should dare to gossip about him like that! That she should call him ”ugly,” that she should speak with that air of almost insolent proprietors.h.i.+p of those wonderful early years long, long before she, Esther, had come into his life at all, it was unendurable!
Do not smile, sophisticated young person. When you are in love you will know, only too well, this jealousy of youless years; this tenderness for photos and trifling remembrances of the youth of the one you love. You will envy his very mother, who, presumably, knew him fairly well in the nursery, and that first dreadful picture of him in plaid dress and plastered hair will seem a sacred relic.
In the meantime you may take my word for it, and try to understand how Esther felt as she bent, perforce, over the photo of a dark-browed lad whose very expression was in itself a valid protest against photography.
”Ugly, wasn't he?” asked Mrs. Coombe.
”Very,” said Esther.
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