George MacDonald - Wilfrid Cumbermede

So saying he left me. I remained a long time in the armoury, and then returned to the library, where I seated myself in the same corner as before, and went on with my reading—lost in pleasure.

All at once I became aware that the light was thickening, and that I was very hungry. At the same moment I heard a slight rustle in the room, and looked round, expecting to see Mrs Wilson come to fetch me. But there stood Miss Clara—not now in white, however, but in a black silk frock. She had grown since I saw her last, and was prettier than ever. She started when she saw me.

‘You here!’ she exclaimed, as if we had known each other all our lives. ‘What are you doing here?’

‘Reading,’ I answered, and rose from the floor, replacing the book as I rose. ‘I thought you were Mrs Wilson come to fetch me.’

‘Is she coming here?’

‘Yes. She told me not to leave the library till she came for me.’

‘Then I must get out of the way.’

‘Why so, Miss Clara?’ I asked.

‘I don’t mean her to know I am here. If you tell, I shall think you the meanest—’

‘Don’t trouble yourself to find your punishment before you’ve found your crime,’ I said, thinking of my own processes of invention. What a little prig I must have been!

‘Very well, I will trust you,’ she returned, holding out her hand.—‘I didn’t give it you to keep, though,’ she added, finding that, with more of country manners than tenderness, I fear, I retained it in my boyish grasp.

I felt awkward at once, and let it go.

‘Thank you,’ she said. ‘Now, when do you expect Mrs. Wilson?’

‘I don’t know at all. She said she would fetch me for dinner. There she comes, I do believe.’

Clara turned her head like a startled forest creature that wants to listen, but does not know in what direction, and moved her feet as if she were about to fly.

‘Come back after dinner,’ she said: ‘you had better!’ and darting to the other side of the room, lifted a piece of hanging tapestry, and vanished just in time, for Mrs Wilson’s first words crossed her last.

‘My dear boy—Master Cumbermede, I should say, I am sorry I have not been able to get to you sooner. One thing after another has kept me on my legs till I’m ready to drop. The cook is as tiresome as cooks only can be. But come along; I’ve got a mouthful of dinner for you at last, and a few minutes to eat my share of it with you, I hope.’

I followed without a word, feeling a little guilty, but only towards Mrs Wilson, not towards myself, if my reader will acknowledge the difference—for I did not feel that I ought to betray Miss Clara. We returned as we came; and certainly whatever temper the cook might be in, there was nothing amiss with the dinner. Had there been, however, I was far too hungry to find fault with it.

‘Well, how have you enjoyed yourself, Master Wilfrid? Not very much, I am afraid. But really I could not help it,’ said Mrs Wilson.

‘I couldn’t have enjoyed myself more,’ I answered. ‘If you will allow me, I’ll go back to the library as soon as I’ve done my dinner.’

‘But it’s almost dark there now.’

‘You wouldn’t mind letting me have a candle, Mrs Wilson?’

‘A candle, child! It would be of no use. The place wouldn’t light up with twenty candles.’

‘But I don’t want it lighted up. I could read by one candle as well as by twenty.’

‘Very well. You shall do as you like. Only be careful, for the old house is as dry as tinder, and if you were to set fire to anything, we should be all in a blaze in a moment.’

‘I will be careful, Mrs Wilson. You may trust me. Indeed you may.’

She hurried me a little over my dinner. The bell in the court rang loudly.

‘There’s some of them already! That must be the Simmonses. They’re always early, and they always come to that gate—I suppose because they haven’t a carriage of their own, and don’t like to drive into the high court in a chaise from the George and Pudding.’

‘I’ve quite done, ma’am: may I go now?’

‘Wait till I get you a candle.’

She took one from a press in the room, lighted it, led me once more to the library, and there left me with a fresh injunction not to be peeping out and getting in the way of the visitors.

The moment Mrs Wilson was gone, I expected to see Clara peep out from behind the tapestry in the corner; but as she did not appear, I lifted it, and looked in. There was nothing behind but a closet almost filled with books, not upon shelves, but heaped up from floor to ceiling. There had been just room, and no more, for Clara to stand between the tapestry and the books. It was of no use attempting to look for her—at least I said so to myself, for as yet the attraction of an old book was equal to that of a young girl. Besides, I always enjoyed waiting—up to a certain point. Therefore I resumed my place on the floor, with the Seven Champions in one hand, and my chamber-candlestick in the other.

I had for the moment forgotten Clara in the adventures of St. Andrew of Scotland, when the silking of her frock aroused me. She was at my side.

‘Well, you’ve had your dinner? Did she give you any dessert?’

‘This is my dessert,’ I said, holding up the book. ‘It’s far more than—’

‘Far more than your desert,’ she pursued, ‘if you prefer it to me.’

‘I looked for you first,’ I said defensively.

‘Where?’

‘In the closet there.’

‘You didn’t think I was going to wait there, did you? Why the very spiders are hanging dead in their own webs in there. But here’s some dessert for you—if you’re as fond of apples as most boys,’ she added, taking a small rosy-cheeked beauty from her pocket.

I accepted it, but somehow did not quite relish being lumped with boys in that fashion. As I ate it, which I should have felt bound to do even had it been less acceptable in itself, she resumed—

‘Wouldn’t you like to see the company arrive? That’s what I came for. I wasn’t going to ask Goody Wilson.’

‘Yes, I should,’ I answered; ‘but Mrs Wilson told me to keep here, and not get in their way.’

‘Oh! I’ll take care of that. We shan’t go near them. I know every corner of the place—a good deal better than Mrs Wilson. Come along, Wilfrid—that’s your name, isn’t it?’

‘Yes, it is. Am I to call you Clara?’

‘Yes, if you are good—that is, if you like. I don’t care what you call me. Come along.’

I followed. She led me into the armoury. A great clang of the bell in the paved court fell upon our ears.

‘Make haste,’ she said, and darted to the door at the foot of the little stair. ‘Mind how you go,’ she went on. ‘The steps are very much worn. Keep your right shoulder foremost.’

I obeyed her directions, and followed her up the stair. We passed the door of a room over the armoury, and ascended still, to creep out at last through a very low door on to the leads of the little square tower. Here we could on the one side look into every corner of the paved court, and on the other, across the roof of the hall, could see about half of the high court, as they called it, into which the carriages drove; and from this post of vantage, we watched the arrival of a good many parties. I thought the ladies tripping across the paved court, with their gay dresses lighting up the Spring twilight, and their sweet voices rippling its almost pensive silence, suited the time and the place much better than the carriages dashing into the other court, fine as they looked with their well-kept horses and their servants in gay liveries. The sun was down, and the moon was rising—near the full, but there was too much light in the sky to let her make much of herself yet. It was one of those Spring evenings which you could not tell from an Autumn one except for a certain something in the air appealing to an undefined sense—rather that of smell than any other. There were green buds and not withering leaves in it—life and not death; and the voices of the gathering guests were of the season, and pleasant to the soul. Of course Nature did not then affect me so definitely as to make me give forms of thought to her influences. It is now first that I turn them into shapes and words.