 The Golden Age by Kenneth Graham, Prologue, the Olympians. This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. Recorded by Aaron Hastings, New Braunfels, Texas, August 2007. It is opportune to look back upon old times and contemplate our forefathers. Great examples grow thin and to be fetched from the past world. Simplicity flies away and iniquity comes at long strides upon us. Sir Thomas Brown. Prologue. The Olympians. Looking back to those days of old, ere the gate shut behind me, I can see now that to children with a proper equipment of parents, these things would have worn a different aspect. But to those who's nearest were aunts and uncles, a special attitude of mine may be allowed. They treated us indeed with kindness enough as to the needs of the flesh, but after that with indifference, an indifference as I recognize the result of a certain stupidity, and therewith the commonplace conviction that your child is merely animal. At a very early age I remember realizing in a quite impersonal and kindly way the existence of that stupidity and its tremendous influence in the world. While there grew up in me, as in the parallel case of Caliban upon Setipus, a vague sense of a ruling power, willful and freakish, and prone to the practice of vagaries, just choosing so. As, for instance, the giving of authority over us to these hopeless and incapable creatures when it might far more reasonably have been given to ourselves over them. These elders are betters by a trick of chance, commanded in no respect, but only a certain blend of envy of their good luck, and pity for their inability to make use of it. Indeed it was one of the most hopeless features in their character when we troubled ourselves to waste a thought on them, which wasn't often. That having absolute license to indulge in the pleasures of life, they could get no good of it. They might dabble in the pond all day, hunt the chickens, climb trees in the most uncompromising Sunday clothes. They were free to issue forth and buy gunpowder in the full eye of the sun, free to fire cannons and explode mines on the lawn. Yet they never did any one of these things. No irresistible energy hailed them to church a Sundays, yet they went there regularly of their own accord, that they betrayed no greater delight in the experience than ourselves. On the whole the existence of these Olympians seemed to be entirely void of interests, even as their movements were confined in slow and their habits stereotyped and senseless, to anything but appearances they were blind. For them the orchard, a place elf-haunted, wonderful, simply produced so many apples and cherries, or it didn't when the failures of nature were not infrequently ascribed to us. They never set foot within firwood or hazel-cops, nor dreamt of the marvels hid therein. The mysterious sources, sources as of old Nile, that fed the duck pond had no magic for them. They were unaware of Indians, nor wrecked they anything of bison or of pirates with pistols, though the whole place swarmed with such portents. They cared not about exploring for robbers' caves, nor digging for hidden treasure. Perhaps indeed it was one of their best qualities that they spent the greater part of their time, stuffily indoors. To be sure, there was an exception in the curate, who would receive unblanching the information that the meadow beyond the orchard was a prairie studded with herds of buffalo, which it was our delight, moccasin'd and tomahawk'd, to ride down with those whoops that announced the senting of blood. He neither laughed nor sneered, as the Olympians would have done, but possessed of a serious idiosyncrasy, he would contribute such lots of valuable suggestion as to the pursuit of this particular sort of big game, that, as it seemed to us, his mature age and imminent position could scarce have been attained without a practical knowledge of the creature in its native lair. Then, too, he was always ready to constitute himself a hostile army or a band of marauding Indians on the shortest possible notice. In brief, a distinctly able man, with talents, so far as we could judge immensely above the majority. I trust he is a bishop by this time. He had all the necessary qualifications as we knew. These strange folk had visitors sometimes, stiff and colorless Olympians like themselves equally without vital interests and intelligent pursuits, emerging out of the clouds and passing away again to drag on an aimless existence somewhere out of our kin. Then brute force was pitilessly applied. We were captured, washed, and forced into clean collars, silently submitting as was our want with more contempt than anger. Anon with unctuous hair and faces stiffened in a conventional grin, we sat and listened to the usual platitudes. How could reasonable people spend their precious time so? That was ever our wonder as we bounded forth at last to the old clay-pit to make pots, or to hunt bears among the hazels. It was incessant matter for amazement how these Olympians would talk over our heads during meals, for instance, of this or the other social or political inanity, under the delusion that these pale fantasms of reality were among the importances of life. We Illuminati, eating silently, our heads full of plans and conspiracies, could have told them what real life was. We had just left it outside, and were all on fire to get back to it. Of course we didn't waste the revelation on them, but the futility of imparting our ideas had long been demonstrated. One in thought and purpose, linked by the necessity of combating one hostile fate, a power antagonistic ever, a power we live to evade, we had no confidence save ourselves. This strange anemic order of beings was further removed from us, in fact than the kindly beasts who shared our natural existence in the sun. The estrangement was fortified by an abiding sense of injustice, arising from the refusal of the Olympians ever to defend, retract, or admit themselves in the wrong, or to accept similar concessions on our part. For instance, when I flung the cat out of an upper window, though I did it from no ill feeling, and it didn't hurt the cat, I was ready after a moment's reflection to own I was wrong as a gentleman should. But was the matter allowed to end there? I tro not. Again, when Harold was locked up in his room all day with a battery upon a neighbor's pig, an action he would have scorned, being indeed on the friendliest terms with the porker in question. There was no handsome expression of regret on the discovery of the real culprit. What Harold had felt was not so much the imprisonment. Indeed, he had very soon escaped by the window with assistance from his allies, and had only gone back in time for his release as the Olympian habit. A word would have said all right, but of course that word was never spoken. The Olympians are all past and gone. Somehow the sun does not seem to shine so brightly as it used. The trackless meadows of old time have shrunk and dwindled away to a few poor acres. A saddening doubt, a dull suspicion, creeps over me. Et in Arcadia ego, I certainly did once inhabit Arcady. Can it be I too have become an Olympian? End of Prolog. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. Recorded by Aaron Hastings, New Bromphils, Texas, August 2007. The Golden Age by Kenneth Graham. A holiday. The masterful wind was up and out, shouting and chasing the Lord of the Morning. Popplars swayed and tossed with a roaring swish. Dead leaves sprang aloft and whirled into space, and all the clear-swept heavens seemed to thrill with sound like a great harp. It was one of the first awakenings of the year. The earth stretched herself, smiling in her sleep, and everything leapt and pulsed to the stir of the giant's movement. With us it was a whole holiday, the occasion a birthday, it matters not whose. Some one of us had had presents and pretty conventional speeches and had glowed with that sense of heroism and no less sweet than nothing has been done to deserve it. But the holiday was for all, the rapture of awakening nature for all, the various outdoor joys of puddles and sun and hedge-breaking for all. Colt-like I ran through the meadows, frisking happy heels in the face of nature laughing responsive. Above the sky was bluest of the blue, wide pools left by the winter's floods, flashed the color back, true and brilliant, and the soft air thrilled with the germinating touch that seemed to kindle something in my own small person, as well as in the rash primrose already lurking in sheltered haunts. Out into the brimming sun-bathed world I sped, free of lessons, free of discipline and correction for one day at least. My legs ran of themselves, and though I heard my name called faint and surel behind, there was no stopping for me. It was only Harold, I concluded, and his legs, though shorter than mine, were good for a longer spurt than this. Then I heard it called again, strangely, with a pathetic break in the middle, and I pulled up short, recognizing Charlotte's plaintive note. She panted up a non, and dropped on the turf beside me. Neither had any desire for talk. The glow and the glory of existing on this perfect morning were satisfaction-full and sufficient. Where's Harold? I asked presently. Oh, he's just plain muffin-man as usual, since Charlotte, with petulance, fancy wanting to be a muffin-man on a whole holiday. It was a strange craze, certainly, but Harold, who invented his own games and played them without assistance, always stuck staunchly to a new fad till he had worn it quite out. Just at present he was a muffin-man, and day and night he went through passages up and down surcases ringing a noiseless bell and offering phantom muffins to invisible wayfarers. It sounds a poor sort of sport, and yet, to pass along busy streets of your own building, forever ringing an imaginary bell and offering airy muffins of your own make to a bustling thronging crowd of your own creation, there were points about the game. It cannot be denied, though it seemed scarce in harmony with this radiant windswept morning. And Edward, where is he? I questioned again. He's coming along by the roads, and Charlotte. He'll be crouching in the ditch when we get there, and he's going to be a grizzly bear and spring out on us, only you mustn't say I told you, because it's to be a surprise. All right, I said magnanimously. Come on, and let's be surprised. But I could not help feeling that on this day of days even a grizzly felt misplaced and common. Sure enough, an undeniable bear sprang out on us as we dropped into the road. Then ensued shrieks, growlings, revolver shots, and unrecorded heroisms, till Edward condescended at last to roll over and die, bulking large and grim and unmitigated grizzly. It was an understood thing that whoever took upon himself to be a bear must eventually die, sooner or later, even if he were the eldest born. Else life would have been all strife and carnage, and the age of acorns would have displaced our hard-won civilization. This little affair concluded with satisfaction to all parties concerned. We rambled along the road, picking up the defaulting herald, by the way, muffinless now, and in his right in social mind. What would you do, as Charlotte presently, the book of the moment always dominating her thoughts until it was sucked dry and cast aside, what would you do if you saw two lions in the road, one on each side, and you didn't know if they was loose or if they was chained up? Do? shouted Edward valiantly. I should—I should— I should— his boastful accents died away into a mumble, don't know what I should do. I shouldn't do anything, I observed after consideration, and really it would be difficult to arrive at a wiser conclusion. If it came to doing, remarked herald reflectively, the lions would be all the doing there was to do, wouldn't they? But if they were good lions, rejoined Charlotte, they would do as they would be done by. Ah, but how are you to know a good lion from a bad one, said Edward? The books don't tell you at all and the lions ain't marked any different. Why, there aren't any good lions, said Harold hastily. Oh, yes, there are. Heaps and heaps contradicted Edward. Nearly all the lions in the story books are good lions. There was Andrew Cleese's lion and St. Jerome's lion and—and—and the lion and the unicorn—he beat the unicorn, observed Harold dubiously all around the town—that proves he was a good lion, cried Edward triumphantly. But the question is, how were you to tell him when you see him? I should ask Martha, said Harold, of the simple creed. Edward snorted contemptuously, then turned to Charlotte. Look here, he said, let's play at lions anyhow, and I'll run onto that corner and be a lion. I'll be two lions, one on each side of the road, and you'll come along and don't know whether I'm chained up or not, and that'll be the fun. No, thank you, said Charlotte firmly. You'll be chained up till I'm quite close to you, and then you'll be loose, and you'll tear me in pieces and make my frock all dirty, and perhaps she'll hurt me as well. I know your lions. No, I won't. I swear I won't, protested Edward. I'll be quite a new lion this time, something you can't even imagine. And he raced off to his post. Charlotte hesitated. Then she went timidly on, at step growing less Charlotte, the mummer of a minute, and more the anxious pilgrim of all time. The lion's wrath waxed terrible at her approach, his roaring fill to startle there. I waited till they were both thoroughly absorbed, and then I slipped through the hedge out of the trodden highway into the vacant meadow spaces. It was not that I was unsociable, nor that I knew Edward's lions to the point of satiety, but the passion and the call of the divine mourning were high in my blood. Earth to earth. That was the frank note, the joyous summons of the day, and they could not but jar and seem artificial, these human discussions and pretenses. When boon nature, reticent no more, was singing that full throated song of hers that thrills and claims control of every fiber. The air was wine, the moist earth smell, wine. The lark's song, the wafts from the cow shed at the top of the field, the pant and smoke of a distant train, all were wine, or song was it, or odor, or unity they all blended into. I had no words then to describe it, that earth effluence of which I was so conscious, nor indeed have I found words since. I ran sideways shouting, I dug lad heels into the squelching soil, I splashed diamond showers from puddles with a stick, I hurled clawed skywards at random, and presently I somehow found myself singing. The words were mere nonsense, irresponsible babble, the tune was an improvisation, a weary unrhythmic thing of rise and fall, and yet it seemed to me a genuine utterance, and just at that moment the one thing fitting, and right, and perfect. Humanity would have rejected it with scorn, nature, everywhere singing in the same key, recognized and accepted it without a flicker of dissent. All the time the hardy one was calling to me companionably from where he swung and bellowed in the treetops. Take me for guide today, he seemed to plead. Other holidays you have trampled in the track of the torrent you have dragged a weary foot homeward with only a pale, expressionless moon for company. Today, why not I, the trickster, the hypocrite? I, who whip round corners and bluster, relapse and evade, then rally and pursue, I can lead you the best and rarest dance of any, for I am the strong capricious one, the lord of misrule, and I alone am irresponsible and unprincipled and obey no law. And for me, I was ready enough to fall in with the fellow's humor, was not this a whole day? So we sheared off together arm in arm, so to speak, and with fullest confidence I took the jigging-thwart-wise course my chainless pilot laid for me. A whimsical comrade I found him ere he had done with me. Was it in jest or with some serious purpose of his own that he brought me plump upon a pair of lovers, silent, face-to-face, or a discreet, unwinking style? As a rule this sort of thing struck me as the most pitiful tomfoolery. Two calves rubbing noses through a gate were white and within the order of things, but that human beings, with salient interests and active pursuits beckoning them on from every side, could thus —well, it was a thing to hurry past, shame to faced, and think on no more. But this morning everything I met seemed to be accounted for, and set in tune by that same magical touch in the air, and it was with a certain surprise that I found myself regarding these fatuous ones with kindness instead of contempt, as I rambled by, unheeded of them. There was some reconciling influence abroad which could bring the like antics into harmony with bud and growth in the frolic air. A puff on the right cheek from my willful companion sent me off at a fresh angle, and presently I came within sight of the village church, sitting solitary within its circle of elms. From forth the vestry window projected two small legs, gyrating, hungry for foothold with larceny, not to say sacrilege, in their every wriggle, a godless sight for a support of the establishment. Though the rest was hidden I knew the legs well enough. They were usually attached to the body of Bill Saunders, the peerless bad boy of the village. Bill's coveted booty, too, I could easily guess at that. It came from the vicar's store of biscuits, kept, as I knew, in a cupboard along with his official trappings. For a moment I hesitated. Then I passed on my way. I protest I was not on Bill's side, but then neither was I on the vicar's, and there was something in this immoral morning which seemed to say that perhaps, after all, Bill had as much right to the biscuits as the vicar and would certainly enjoy them better, and anyhow it was a disputable point and no business of mine. Nature, who had accepted me for ally, cared little who had the world's biscuits, and assuredly was not going to let any friend of hers waste his time in playing policeman for society. He was tugging at me anew my insistent guide, and I felt sure as I rambled off in his wake that he had more holiday matter to show me, and so indeed he had, and all of it was to the same lawless tune. Like a black pirate flag on the blue ocean of air, a hawk hung ominous. Then, plummet-wise, dropped to the head row, wince their rows, thin and shrill, a piteous voice of squealing. By the time I got there a whisk of feathers on the turf, like scattered playbills, was all that remained to tell of the tragedy just enacted. Yet Nature smiled and sang on, pitiless, gay, impartial. To her who took no sides there was every bit as much to be said for the hawk as for the chaff inch. Both were her children, and she would show no preferences. Further on a hedgehog lay dead a thwart the path, nay, more than dead, decadent, distinctly, a sorry side for one that had known the fellow in more bustling circumstances. Nature might at least have paused a shed one tear over this rough-jacketed little son of hers, for his wasted aims, his cancelled ambitions, his whole career of usefulness, cut suddenly short. But not a bit of it. Jubilant as ever her song went babbling on, and life, and again, life and death, were its alternate burdens. And looking around, and seeing the sheep nibbled heels of turnips that dotted the ground, their hearts eaten out of them in frostbound days now over and done, I seemed to discern faintly a something of the stern meaning in her valorous chant. My invisible companion was singing also, and seemed at times to be chuckling softly to himself, doubtless at the thought of the strange new lessons he was teaching me, perhaps still in store. For when at last he grew weary of such insignificant earthbound company, he deserted me in a certain spot I knew, then dropped, subsided, and slunk away into nothingness. I raised my eyes and before me, grim and likened, stood the ancient whipping post of the village, its sides fretted with the initials of a generation that scorned its mute lesson, but still clipped by the stout rusty shackles that had tethered the wrists of such of that generation's ancestors as had dared to mock me. Had I been an infant stern, here was a grand chance for sentimental output. As things were I could only hurry homewards, my moral tale well between my legs with an uneasy feeling, as I glanced back over my shoulder, that there was more in this chance than met the eye. Outside our gate I found Charlotte alone and crying. Edward, it seemed had persuaded her to hide, in the full expectation of being duly found and ecstatically pounced upon. Then he had caught sight of the butcher's ride. Harold had further appeared greatly coveting tadpoles and top heavy with the eagerness of possession had fallen into the pond. This in itself was nothing, but on attempting to sneak in, by the back door he had rendered up his duckweed bedabbled person into the hands of an ant and had been promptly sent off to bed, and this on a holiday was very much. The moral of the whipping post was working itself out, and I was not in the least surprised when on reaching home I was seized upon accused of doing something I had never even thought of. And my frame of mind was such that I could only wish most heartily that I had done it. End of a holiday. In our small lives that day was eventful when another uncle was to come down from town and submit his character and qualifications abide unconsciously to our careful criticism. Previous uncles had been weighed in the balance and, alas, were ungrievously wanting. There was Uncle Thomas, a failure from the first. Not his disposition as malevolent, nor were his habits such as to unfit him for decent society, but his rooted conviction of his own, and of course his sense of the society, but his rooted conviction seemed to be that the reason of a child's existence was to serve as a but for senseless adult jokes, or what, from the accompanying Gophers of Dafter, appeared to be intended for jokes. Now, we were anxious that he should have a perfectly fair trial, so, in the toolhouse between breakfast and lessons, we discussed and examined all his witterisms one by one, calmly, critically, dispassionately. It was no good. We could not discover any salt in them, and, as only a genuine gift of humour could have saved Uncle Thomas, for he pretended to nought besides. He was reluctantly writ down at a hopeless imposter. Uncle George, the youngest, was distinctly more promising. His company, just cheerily round the establishment, suffered himself to be introduced to each of the cows, held out the right hand of fellowship to the pig, and even hinted that the pair of pink-eyed Himalayan rabbits unexpectedly from Townsenday. We were just considering weather in this fertile soil, and apparently accidental remark on the solid qualities of guinea pigs or ferrets might happily frost some and bring forth fruit when our governess appeared on the scene. Uncle George's manner at once underwent a complete and contemptible change. His interest in rational topics seemed like a fountain-sickening pulse to flag an ebb away, and though Miss Smedley's ostensible purpose was Selena for her usual walk, I can vouch for it that Selena spent her morning ratting, along with the Keeper's boy and me, while, if Miss Smedley walked with anyone, it would appear to have been with Uncle George. But despicable though his conduct had been, he underwent no hasty condemnation. This defection was discussed in all its bearings, but it seems sadly clear at last that this uncle must possess some innate badness of character and fondness for low company. We, who from daily experience knew Miss Smedley like a book. Were we not only too well aware that she had neither accomplishments nor charms, no characteristic in fact but an imbred viciousness of temper and disposition? True, she knew the dates of the English Kings by heart, but how could that prophet, Uncle George, who, having passed into the army, had ascended beyond the need for useful information? Our bows and arrows, on the other hand, have been freely paced at his disposal, and a soldier should not have hesitated in his choice a moment. No, Uncle George had fallen from grace and was unanimously damned, and the non-arrival of the Himalayan rabbits was only another nail in his coffin. Uncle was therefore was just then a heavy and lifeless market, and there was little inclination to deal. Still, it was agreed that Uncle William, who had just returned from India should have a fair trial as the others, more especially as romantic possibilities might well be embodied in one who had held the gorgeous Easton Fee. Selina had kicked my shins, like the girl she eared, during a scuffle in the passage, and I was still rubbing them with one hand when I found that the Uncle on ab probation was half-heartedly shaking the other. A flurried elderly man, and on mistake of me nervous, he dropped our Guayini paws in succession and, turning very red, with an awkward simulation of heartiness. Well, how are you all, he said? Glad to see me, eh? As we could hardly, in justice, be expected to have performed an opinion on him at that early stage, we could but look at each other in silence, which guests served to relieve the tension of the situation. Indeed, the cloud never really lifted during his stay. In talking it over later, someone put forward the suggestion that he must, at some time or other, have committed a stupendous crime, but I could not bring myself to believe that the man, though evidently unhappy, was really guilty of anything, and I caught him once or twice looking at him with evident kindness, though seeing himself observed, he blushed and turned away his head. When at last the atmosphere was clear of this depressing influence, we met despondently in the potato cellar, all of us, that is, but Harold, who had been told off to accompany his relative to the station. The feeling was unanimous that as an uncle, William could not be allowed to pass. Selina roundly declared him a beast, pointing out he had not even got it a half-holiday, and indeed there seemed little to do but pass sentence. We were about to put it when Harold appeared on the scene, his red face, round eyes and mysterious demeanour hinting at an awful portence. Speechless he stood a space, then, slowly drawing his hand from the pocket of his knickerbockers, he displayed on a dirty palm one, two, three, four half-crowns. We could but gaze, trance, breathless, mute. He never had any of us seen in the aggregate so much bullion before. Then Harold told his tale. I took the old fellow to the station, he said, and as we went along I told him all about the station master's family, how I'd seen the porter kissing our housemaid, and what a nice fellow he was with no heirs or affectation about him, and anything I thought would be of interest, but he didn't seem to pay much attention. But walked along puffing his cigar, and once I thought, I'm not certain but I thought, I heard him say, well thank God that's over. When we got to the station, he stopped suddenly and said, hold on a minute, then he shoved these into my hand like an frightened sort of way, and said, look here youngster, these are for you and the other kids, buy what you like, make little beasts of yourselves, and you don't tell the old people mine now, cut away home, so I cut. A solemn hush fell on the assembly, broken first by the small Charlotte. I didn't know, she observed dreamily, that there were such good men anywhere in the world. I hope he'll die tonight, for then he'll go straight to heaven. But the repentant Selena bewailed herself with tears and sobs, refusing to be comforted, for that in her haste she had called this white-sold relative a beast. Tell you what we'll do, said Edward, the mastermind, rising as he always did to the situation, or christened the pie-ball pig after him, the one that hasn't got a name yet, and that'll show we're sorry for our mistake. I christened that pig this morning, how guiltly confessed. I christened it after the curate. I'm very sorry, but he came and bowed to me last night, after you others had all been sent to bed early, and somehow I felt I had to do it. Oh, but that doesn't count, said Edward Tastley, because we weren't all there. We'll take that christening off and call it Uncle William, and you can save up the curate for the next litter. And, the motion being agreed without a division, the house went into a committee of supply. End of Section 3 Recording by Sarah Harrison, Cambridge, England. Let's pretend, suggested Harold, that we are cavaliers and roundheads, and you be a roundhead. Oh, bother, I replied drowsily. We pretended that yesterday, and it's not my turn to be a roundhead anyhow. The fact is, I was lazy, and the calls to arms fell on indifferent ears. We three younger ones were stretched at length in the orchard. The sun was hot, the seas were hot, and the sun was hot. The sun was hot, the season merry June, and never, I thought, had there been such wealth and riot of butter-cups throughout the lush grass. Green and gold was the dominant key that day. Instead of active pretense, with its shouts and perspiration, how much better, I held, to lie at ease and pretend to oneself in green and golden fancies, slipping the husk and passing, a careless lounger, through a sleepy imaginary world all gold and green. But the persistent Harold was not to be fobbed off. Well, then, he began afresh, let's pretend we're knights of the round table, and, with a rush, I'll be Lancelot. I won't play unless I'm Lancelot, I said. I didn't mean it really, but the game of knights always began with this particular contest. Oh, please, implored Harold, you know when Edwards here I never get a chance of being Lancelot, I haven't been Lancelot for weeks. Then I yielded gracefully. All right, I said, I'll be Tristum. Oh, but you can't! cried Harold again. Charlotte has always been Tristum, she won't play unless she's allowed to be Tristum, be somebody else this time. Charlotte said nothing but breathed hard, looking straight before her. The peerless Hunter and Harper are a special hero of romance, and rather than see the part in less appreciative hands, she would even have returned, sadly, to the stuffy schoolroom. I don't care, I said, I'll be anything, I'll be Sir Kay, come on. Then once more in this country's story the male clad knights paced through the Greenwood Shaw, questing adventure, redressing wrong, and bandits five to one broke and fled discomfited to their caves. Then were damsels rescued, dragons disemboweled, and giants in every corner of the orchard deprived of their already superfluous number of heads. While Palamides the Saracen waited for us by the well, and Sir Brois sans-speet vanished in craven flight before the skilled spear that was his terror and his bane. Once more the lists were dyed in camelot and all was gay with shimmer of silk and gold. The horses, ash-staves, fluent splinters, and the firmament rang to the clash of sword on helm. The varying fortune of the day swung doubtful, now on this side, now on that, till at last Lancelot, grim and great, thrusting through the press unhorsed Sir Tristam, an easy task, and bestowed her threatening doom while the Cornish Knight, forgetting hard one fame of old, cried piteously, I tell you, and you're tearing my frock. Then it happened that Sir Kay, hurtling to the rescue, stopped short in his stride, catching sight suddenly, through apple-bows, of a gleam of scarlet afar off, while the confused tramp of many horses mingled with talk and laughter was born to our ears. What is it, inquired Tristam, sitting up and shaking out her curls, while Lancelot forsook the clanging lists and trotted nimbly to the hedge. I stood spellbound for a moment longer, and then with a cry of soldiers, I was off to the hedge, Charlotte picking herself up and scurrying after. Down the road they came, two and two, at an easy walk, scarlet flamed in the eye, bits jangled and saddled, squeaked delightfully, while the men, in a halo of dust, smoked their short clays like the heroes they were. In a swirl of intoxicating glory the troop clinked and clattered by, while we shouted and waved, jumping up and down, and the big jolly horsemen acknowledged the salute with easy condescension. The moment they were past, we were through the hedge and after them. Soldiers were not the common stuff of everyday life. There had been nothing like this since the winter before last, when on a certain afternoon bear of leaf and monochrome in its hue of sodden fallow and frost-nipped cops, suddenly the hounds had burst through the fence with their mellow cry and all the paddock was for the minute reverberant of thudding hoof and dotted with glancing red. But this was better, since it could only mean that blows and bloodshed were in the air. Is there going to be a battle? panted Harold, hardly able to keep up for excitement. Of course there is, I replied. We're just in time. Come on. Perhaps I ought to have known better, and yet the pigs and poultry with whom we chiefly consorted could instruct us little concerning the peace that in these latter days lapped this seagirt realm. In the school room we were just now dallying with the Wars of the Roses and did not legends of the countryside inform us how cavaliers had once galloped up and down these very lanes from their quarters in the village. Here now were soldiers unmistakable, and if their business was not fighting what was it? Sniffing the joy of battle we followed hard on their tracks. Won't Edward be sorry, puffed Harold, that he's begun that beastly Latin? It did indeed seem hard. Edward, the most martial spirit of us all, was drearily conjugating Ammo, of all verbs, between four walls, while Selina, who ever thrilled ecstatic to a red coat, was struggling with the uncouth German tongue. Age, I reflected, carries its penalties. It was a grievous disappointment to us that the troop passed through the village unmolested. Every cottage, I pointed out to my companions, ought to have been loop-holed and strongly held. But no opposition was offered to the soldiers, who indeed conducted themselves with a recklessness and a want of precaution that seemed simply criminal. At the last cottage a transitory gleam of common sense flickered across me and, turning on Charlotte, I sternly ordered her back. The small maiden, docile, but exceedingly dolerous, dragged reluctant feet homewards, heavy at heart, that she was to behold no stout fellow slain that day. But Harold and I held steadily on expecting every instant to see the enviring hedges crackle and spit forth the leaden death. Will they be Indians? inquired my brother, meaning the enemy. Or roundheads, or what? I reflected. Harold always required direct, straightforward answers, not faltering suppositions. They won't be Indians, I replied at last, nor yet roundheads. There haven't been any roundheads seen about here for a long time. They'll be Frenchmen. Harold's face fell. All right, he said. They'd be Indians. If they were going to be Indians, I explained, I don't think I'd go on, because when Indians take you prisoner they scalp you first and then burn you at a stake. But Frenchmen don't do that sort of thing. Are you quite sure? asked Harold doubtfully. Quite, I replied. Frenchmen only shut you up in a thing called the Bastille, and then you get a file sent into you in a loaf of bread and saw the bars through and slide down a rope and they all fire at you, but they don't hit you. And you run down to the seashore as hard as you can and swim off to a British frigate and there you are. Harold brightened up again. The program was rather attractive. If they try to take us prisoner, he said, we won't run, will we? Meanwhile the Craven foe was a long time showing himself and we were reaching strange outland country, uncivilized where in lions might be expected to prowl at nightfall. I had a stitch in my side and both Harold's stockings had come down. Just as I was beginning to have gloomy doubts of the proverbial courage of Frenchmen, the officer called out something, the men closed up and, breaking into a trot, the troops, already far ahead, vanished out of our sight. With a sinking at the heart I began to suspect we had been fooled. Are they charging? cried Harold, weary, but rallying gamely. I think not, I replied doubtfully. When there's going to be a charge the officer always makes a speech and then they draw their swords and the trumpets blow and—but let's try a short cut. We may catch them up yet. So we struck across the fields and into another road and pounded down that and then over more fields, panting, downhearted yet hoping for the best. And a thin drizzle began to fall. We were muddy, breathless, almost dead beat, but we blundered on, till at last we struck a road more brutally, more callously unfamiliar than any road I ever looked upon. Not a hint, nor a sign of friendly direction or assistance on the dogged white face of it. There was no longer any disguising it. We were hopelessly lost. The small rain continued steadily. The evening began to come on. Really there are moments when a fellow is justified in crying, and I would have cried too if Harold had not been there. That right-minded child regarded an elder brother as a veritable God and I could see that he felt himself as secure as if a whole brigade of guards hedged him round with protecting bayonets. But I dreaded sore lest he should begin again with his questions. As I gazed in dumb appeal on the face of unresponsive nature the sound of nearing wheels sent a pulse of hope through my being increasing to rapture as I recognized in the approaching vehicle the familiar carriage of the old doctor. If ever a God emerged from a machine it was when this heaven-sent friend, recognizing us, stopped and jumped out with a cheery hail. Harold rushed up to him at once. Have you been there? he cried. Was it a jolly fight? Who beat? Were there many people killed? The doctor appeared puzzled. I briefly explained the situation. I see, said the doctor, looking grave and twisting his face this way and that. Well, the fact is there isn't going to be any battle today. It's been put off on account of the change in the weather. You will have due notice of the renewal of hostilities. And now you'd better jump in and I'll drive you home. You've been running a fine rig both have been taken and shot as spies. This special danger had never even occurred to us. The thrill of it accentuated the cozy home-like feeling of the cushions we nestled into as we rolled homewards. The doctor beguiled the journey with blood-curdling narratives of personal adventure in the tented field he having followed the profession of arms so it seemed in every quarter of the globe. Time, the destroyer of all things beautiful subsequently revealed the baselessness of these legends but what of that? There are higher things than truth and we were almost reconciled by the time we were dropped at our gate to the fact that the battle had been postponed. End of Section 4 read on November 7, 2007 in Oceanside, California. Section 5 of The Golden Age This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org This reading by Kara Schellenberg The Golden Age by Kenneth Graham Section 5 The Finding of the Princess It was the day I was promoted to a toothbrush. The girls, irrespective of age, had been thus distinguished some time before. Why, we boys could never completely understand except that it was part and parcel of a system of studied favoritism on behalf of creatures both physically inferior and, as was shown by a fondness for tail-bearing, of weaker mental fiber. It was not that we yearned after these strange instruments in themselves. Edward, indeed, applied his to the scrubbing out of his squirrel's cage and for personal use when a superior eye was grim on him and told mine indifferently. But the nimbus of distinction that clung to them, that we coveted exceedingly. What more indeed was there to ascend to before the remote, but still possible, razor and strump. Perhaps the exultation had mounted to my head or nature and the perfect morning joined to him at disaffection. Anyhow, having breakfasted and triumphantly repeated the collect I had broken down one day, twas one without rhythm or alliteration, a most objectionable collect. Having achieved thus much the small natural man in me rebelled and I vowed, as I straddled and spat about the stable yard and feeble imitation of the coachman, that lessons might go to the inventor of them. It was only geography that morning anyway, and the practical thing was worth any quantity of bookish theoretic. As for me, I was going on my travels, and imports and exports, populations and capitals might very well wait while I explored the breathing coloured world outside. True, a fellow rebel was wanted, and Harold might as a rule have been counted on with certainty, but just then Harold was very proud. The week before he had gone into tables, and had been endowed with a new slate, having a miniature sponge attached we washed the faces of Charlotte's dolls, thereby producing an unhealthy pallor which struck terror into the child's heart, always timorous regarding epidemic visitations. As to tables, nobody knew exactly what they were, least of all Harold, but it was a step over the heads of the rest, and therefore a subject for self-agulation and, generally speaking, heirs, so that Harold, hugging his slate and his chains, was out of the question now. In such a matter, girls were worse than useless, as wanting the necessary tenacity of will and contempt for self-constituted authority. So eventually I slipped through the hedge, a solitary protestant, and issued forth on the lane what time the rest of the civilized world was sitting down to lessons. The scene was familiar enough, and yet this morning had different content at all seemed. The act, with its daring, tinted everything with new, strange hues, affecting the individual with a sort of bruised feeling just below the pit of the stomach that was intensified whenever his thoughts flew back to the ink-stained, smelly schoolroom. And could this be really me, or was I only contemplating from the schoolroom, aforesaid, some other jolly young mutineer faring forth under the genial sun? Anyhow, here was the friendly well, in its old place, halfway up the lane. Hither the yoke-shouldering village folk were wont to come to fill their clinking buckets, when the drippings made worms of wet in the thick dust of the road. They had flat wooden crosses inside each pail which floated on the top and, we were instructed, served to prevent the water from slopping over. We used to wonder by what magic this strange principle worked, and who first invented the crosses, and whether he got a peerage for it. But indeed the well was a centre of mystery, for a hornet's nest was somewhere hard by, and the very thought was fearsome. Wasps, we knew well and disdained, storming them in their fastnesses. But these great beasts, vestured in angry orange, three stings from which, so it was a bird, would kill a horse. These were of a different kidney, and their warning drones suggested prudence and retreat. At this time neither villagers nor hornets encroached on this stillness. Lessons, apparently, pervaded all nature. So, after dabbling a while in the well, what boy has ever passed a bit of water without messing in it, I scrambled through the hedge, avoiding the hornet haunted side, and struck into the silence of the cops. If the lane had been deserted, this was loneliness become personal. Here mystery lurked and peeped, here brambles caught and held with a purpose of their own, and saplings whipped in the face with human spite. The cops, too, proved vaster in extent, more direfully drawn out than one would ever have guessed from its frontage on the lane, and I was really glad when at last the wood opened and sloped down the streamlet brawling forth into the sunlight. By this cheery companion I wandered along, conscious of little but that nature, in providing store of water-rats, had thoughtfully furnished provinder of right-sized stones. Rapids also there were, telling of canoes and portages, crinkling bays and inlets, caves for pirates and hidden treasures. The wise dame had forgotten nothing, till at last, after what lapse of time I know not, my further course, though not the streams, was barred by some six feet of stout wired netting, stretched from side to side just where a thick hedge, arching till it touched, forbade all further view. The excitement of the thing was becoming thrilling. A black flag must surely be fluttering close by. Here was evidently a malignant contrivance of the pirates baffle our gun-boats when we dashed upstream to shell them from their lair. A gun-boat, indeed, might well have hesitated, so stout was the netting so close to the hedge, but I spied where a rabbit was wont to pass, close down by the water's edge, where a rabbit could go, a boy could follow, albeit stomach-wise and with one leg in the stream. So the passage was achieved, and I stood inside, safe but breathless at the sight. Gone was the brambled waste, gone the flickering tangle of woodland. Instead, terrace after terrace of shaven-sward, stone-edged, urn-cornered, stepped delicately down to where the stream, now tamed and educated, passed from one to another marble basin, in which on occasion gleams of red hinted at goldfish in among the spreading water lilies. The scene lay silent and slumbrous in the brooding noonday sun. The drowsing peacock squatted, humped on the lawn. No fish leapt in the pools, nor bird declared himself from the enviring hedges. Self-confessed it was here, then, at last the garden of sleep. Two things in those old days I held in a special distrust. Gamekeepers and gardeners. Seeing, however, no baleful apparitions of either nature, I pursued my way between rich flower-beds in search of the necessary princess. Conditions declared her presence patently as trumpets. Without this centre such surroundings could not exist. A pavilion, gold-topped, wreathed with lush jessamine, beckoned with a special significance over close-set shrubs. There, if anywhere, she should be enshrined. Instinct and some knowledge of the habits of princesses triumphed here indeed. There she was. In no trance to repose, however, but laughingly, struggling to disengage her hand from the grasp of a grown-up man who occupied the marble bench with her. As to age, I suppose now that the two swung in respective scales that pivoted on twenty. But children heed no minor distinctions. To them the inhabited world is composed of the two main divisions, children, grown-up grown people, the latter being in no way superior to the former, only hopelessly different. These two then belonged to the grown-up section. I paused, thinking at strange they should prefer a seclusion when there were fish to be caught and butterflies to hunt in the sun outside, and as I cogitated thus the grown-up man caught sight of me. Hello, Spratt, he said, with some abruptness. Where do you spring from? I came up the stream, I explained politely and comprehensively, and I was only looking for the princess. Then you're a water-baby, he replied, and what do you think of the princess now you've found her? I think she is lovely, I said, and doubtless I was right, having never learned to flatter. But she's wide awake, so I suppose somebody has kissed her. This very natural deduction moved the grown-up man to laughter, but the princess, turning red and jumping up, declared that it was time for lunch. Come along, then, said the grown-up man, and you too, water-baby, come and have something solid, you must want it. I accompanied them, without any feeling of false delicacy. The world, as known to me, was spread with food each several mid-day, and the particular table one sat at seemed a matter of no importance. The palace was very sumptuous and beautiful, just what a palace ought to be, and we were met by a stately lady, rather more grown-up than the princess, apparently her mother. My friend the man was very kind, and introduced me as the captain, saying I had just run down from Aldershot. I didn't know where Aldershot was, but had no manner of doubt that he was perfectly right. As a rule, indeed, grown-up people are fairly correct on matters of fact. It is in the higher gift of imagination that they are so sadly to seek. The lunch was excellent and varied. Another gentleman in beautiful clothes, a lord, presumably, lifted me into a high-carved chair and stood behind it, brooding over me like a providence. I endeavored to explain who I was and where I had come from, and to impress the company with my own toothbrush and Harold's tables, but either they were stupid or is it a characteristic of fairyland that everyone laughs at the most ordinary remarks. My friend the man said good-naturedly, All right, water-baby, you came up the stream and that's good enough for us. The lord, a reserved sort of man, I thought, took no share in the conversation. After lunch I walked on the terrace with the princess and my friend the man, and was very proud, and I told him what I was going to be and he told me what he was going to be and then I remarked, I suppose you two are going to get married. He only laughed after the fairy fashion. Because if you aren't, I added, you really ought to. Meaning only that a man who discovered a princess living in the right sort of palace like this and didn't marry her there and then was false to all recognized tradition. They laughed again and my friend suggested I should go down to the pond and look at the goldfish while they went for a stroll. I was sleepy and assented but before they left me the grown-up man put two half-crowns in my hand for the purpose, he explained, of treating the other water-babies. I was so touched by this crowning mark of friendship that I nearly cried and thought much more of his generosity than of the fact that the princess ere she moved away, and kissed me. I watched them disappear down the path how naturally arms seemed to go round wastes in fairyland and then my cheek on the cool marble lulled by the trickle of water I slipped into dreamland out of real and magic world alike. When I woke the sun had gone in a chill wind set all the leaves a whispering and the peacock on the lawn was harshly calling up the rain. Unreasoning panic possessed me and I sped out of the garden like a guilty thing, wriggled through the rabbit-run and threaded my doubtful way homewards hounded by nameless terrors. The half-crowns happily remained solid and real to the touch but could I hope to bear such treasure safely through the brigand haunted wood? It was a dirty, weary little object that entered its home at nightfall by the unassuming aid of the scullery window only to be sent tea-less to bed seemed infinite mercy to him. Officially tea-less, that is, for as was usual after such escapades a sympathetic housemaid coming delicately by back-stairs stayed him with chunks of cold pudding and condolence till his small skin was tight as any drum. Then, nature asserting herself, I passed into the comforting kingdom of sleep where, a golden carp of fattest build I oared it in translucent waters with a new half-crown snug under right fin and left and thrust up a nose through water-lily leaves to be kissed by a rose-flushed princess. End of Section 5 Read on November 7, 2007 in Oceanside, California. Section 6 of The Golden Age This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain for more information or to find out how you can volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org recorded by Catherine Eastman August, 2007 The Golden Age by Kenneth Graham Section 6 Sawdust and Sin A belt of rhododendrons grew close down to one side of our pond and along the edge of it many things flourished rankly. If you crept through the undergrowth and crouched by the water's rim, it was easy if your imagination were in healthy working order to transport yourself in a trice to the heart of a tropical forest. Overhead the monkeys chattered parrots flashed from bow to bow strange large blossoms shone all round you and the push and rustle of great beasts moving unseen thrilled you deliciously. And if you lay down with your nose an inch or two from the water, it was not long ere the old sense of proportion vanished clean away. The glittering insects that darted to and fro on its surface became sea monsters dire. The gnats that hung above them swelled to albatrosses and the pond itself stretched out into a vast inland sea whereon a navy might ride secure and whence at any moment the hairy scalp of a sea serpent might be seen to emerge. It is impossible, however, to play at tropical forests properly when homely accents of the human voice intrude, and all my hopes of seeing a tiger chased by a crocodile while drinking vide picture books pasime, vanished abruptly and earth resumed her old dimensions when the sound of charlots prattles somewhere hard by broke in on my primeval seclusion. Looking out from the bushes I saw her trotting towards an open space of lawn the other side the pond chattering to herself in her accustomed fashion a doll under either arm and her brow knit with care. Propping up her double burden against a friendly stump she sat down in front of them as full of worry and anxiety as a chancellor on a budget night. Her victims who stared resignedly in front of them were recognizable as Jerry and Rosa. Jerry hailed from far Japan his hair was straight black, his one garment cotton of a simple blue and his reputation was distinctly bad. Jerome was his proper name from his supposed likeness to the holy man who hung in a print on the staircase though a shaven crown was the only thing in common twist western saint and eastern sinner. Rosa was typical British from her flaxen pole to the stout calves she displayed so liberally and in character she was of the blameless order of those who have not yet been found out. I suspected Jerry from the first there was a latent devilry in his slant eyes as he sat there moodily and knowing what he was capable of I sent it trouble in store for Charlotte Rosa I was not so sure about. She sat demurely and upright and looked far away into the treetops in a visionary world forgetting sort of way yet the prim purse of her mouth was somewhat overdone and her eyes glittered unnaturally. Now I'm going to begin where I left off said Charlotte regardless of stops and thumping the turf with her just excitedly and you must pay attention because this is a treat to have a story told you before you're put to bed well so the white rabbit scuttled off down the passage and Alice hoped he'd come back because he had a west kid on and her flamingo flew up a tree but we haven't got to that part yet you must wait a minute and where had I got to Jerry only remained passive until Charlotte had got well underway and then began to heal over quietly in Rosa's direction his head fell on her plump shoulders causing her to start nervously. Charlotte seized and shook him with vigor oh Jerry she cried piteously if you're not going to be good however shall I tell you my story Jerry's face was injured innocence itself blame if you like madam he seemed to say the eternal laws of gravitation but not a helpless puppet who is also an orphan and a stranger in the land now we'll go on began Charlotte once more so she got into the garden at last I've left out a lot but you there I'll tell you some other time and they were all playing croquet and that's where the flamingo comes in and the queen shouted out off with her head at this point Jerry collapsed forward suddenly and completely his bald pate between his knees Charlotte was not very angry this time the sudden development of tragedy in the story had evidently been too much for the poor fellow she straightened him out wiped his nose and after trying him in various positions to which he refused to adapt himself she propped him against the shoulder of the apparently unconscious Rosa then my eyes were opened and the full measure of Jerry's infamy became apparent this then was what he had been playing not for the fellow had designs I resolved to keep him under close observation if you'd been in the garden went on Charlotte reproachfully and flopped down like that when the queen said off with his head she'd have offed with your head but Alice wasn't that sort of girl at all she just said I'm not afraid of you you're nothing lack of cards oh dear I've got to the end already and I hadn't begun hardly I never can make my stories last out never mind I'll tell you another one Jerry didn't seem to care now he had gained his end whether the stories lasted out or not he was nestling against Rosa's plump form with a look of satisfaction that was simply idiotic and one arm had disappeared from view was it round her waist Rosa's natural blush seemed deeper than usual her head inclined shyly it must have been round her waist if it wasn't so near your bedtime continued Charlotte reflectively I'd tell you a nice story with a bogey in it but you'd be frightened and you'd dream of bogeys all night so I'll tell you one about a white bear only you mustn't scream when the bear says like I used to cause he's a good bear really here Rosa fell flat on her back in the deadest of faints her limbs were rigid her eyes glassy what had Jerry been doing it must have been something very bad for her to take on like that he scrutinized him carefully while Charlotte ran to comfort the damsel he appeared to be whistling a tune and regarding the scenery if I only possessed Jerry's command of feature I thought to myself half regretfully I would never be found out in anything it's all your fault Jerry said Charlotte reproachfully when the lady had been restored to consciousness was as good as gold except when you make her wicked I'd put you in the corner only a stump hasn't got a corner wonder why that is thought everything had corners never mind you'll have to sit with your face to the wall so now you can sulk if you like Jerry seemed to hesitate a moment between the bliss of indulgence in sulk's with a sense of injury furious summons of beauty waiting to be wooed at his elbow then carried away by his passion he fell sideways across Rosa's lap one arm stuck stiffly upwards as in passionate protestation his amorous countenance was full of entreaty Rosa hesitated wavered yielded crushing his slight shame under the weight of her full-bodied surrender Charlotte had stood a good deal but it was possible to abuse even her patience snatching Jerry from his lawless embraces she reversed him across her knee and then the outrage offered to the whole superior sacks in Jerry's hapless person was too painful to witness so I turned my head away the sound of brisk slaps continued to reach my tingling ears when I looked again Jerry was sitting up as before his garment, somewhat crumpled was restored to its original position but his pallid countenance was set hard knowing as I did only too well what a volcano of passion and shame must be seething under that impassive exterior for the moment I felt sorry for him Rosa's face was still buried in her frock it might have been shame it might have been grief for Jerry's sufferings but the callous Japanese never even looked her way his heart was exceeding bitter within him in merely following up his natural impulses on his head against convention and learned how hard a thing it was and the sunshiny world was all black to him even Charlotte softened somewhat at the sight of his rigid misery if you'll say you're sorry Jerome she said I'll say I'm sorry too Jerry only dropped his shoulders against the stump and stared out in the direction of his dear native Japan where love was no sin and smacking had not been introduced why had he ever left it he would go back tomorrow and yet there were obstacles another grievance nature in endowing Jerry with every grace of form and feature along with a sensitive soul had somehow forgotten the gift of locomotion there was a crackling in the bushes behind me with sharp short pants as of a small steam engine and Rolo the black retriever just released from his chain by some friendly hand burst through the Underwood seeking congenial company I joyfully hailed him to stop and be a panther but he sped away round the pond upset Charlotte with a boisterous caress and seizing Jerry by the middle disappeared with him down the drive Charlotte raved, panting behind the swift-footed Avenger of Crime Rosa lay dishevelled bereft of consciousness Jerry himself spread helpless arms to heaven and I almost thought I heard a cry for mercy a tardy promise of amendment but it was too late the black man had got Jerry at last and though the tear of sensibility might moisten the eye no one who really knew him could deny the justice of his fate and of section six of The Golden Age section seven of The Golden Age this is a LibriVox recording all LibriVox recordings are in the public domain for more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org The Golden Age by Kenneth Graham section seven young Adam Cupid no one would have suspected Edward of being in love but that after breakfast with an overacted carelessness anybody who likes can feed my rabbits and he disappeared with a jauntiness that deceived nobody in the direction of the orchard in real and convulsions changed the map of Europe but the iron unwritten law prevailed that each boy severely fed his own rabbits there was good ground then for suspicion and alarm and while the lettuce leaves were being drawn through the wires Harold and I conferred seriously on the situation it may be thought that the affair was none of our business and indeed we cared little as individuals we were only concerned as members of a corporation, for each of whom the mental or physical ailment of one of his fellows might have far-reaching effects. It was thought best that Harold, at least open to suspicion of motive, should be dispatched to probe and peer. His instructions were, to proceed by a report, on the health of our rabbits in particular, to glide gently into a discussion on rabbits in general, their customs, practices, and vices, to pass thence by a natural transition to the female sex, the inherent flaws in its composition, and the reasons for regarding it, speaking broadly, as dirt. He was especially to be diplomatic, and then to return and report progress. He departed on his mission gaily, but his absence was short, and his return, discomfited and in tears, seemed to be token, some want of parts for diplomacy. He had found Edward it appeared, pacing the orchard, with the sort of set smile that mountain banks wear in their precarious antics, fixed painfully on his face, as with pins. Harold had opened well on the rabbit subject, but, with a fatal confusion, between the abstract and the concrete, had then gone on to remark that Edward's loppier dough, with her long hind legs and contemptuous twitch of the nose, always reminded him of Sabina Larkin, a nine-year-old damsel, child of a neighbouring farmer. At which point Edward it would seem, had turned upon, and savagely maltreated him, twisting his arm, and punching him in the short ribs, so that Harold returned to the rabbit-hutches preceded by long-drawn wails, a non-wishing with sobs, that he were a man, to kick his lovelorn brother, a non-lamenting, that ever he had been born. I was not big enough to stand up to Edward personally, so I had to console the sufferer, by allowing him to grease the wheels of the donkey-cart, a luscious street that had been specially reserved for me, a week past, by the gardener's boy, for putting in a good word on his behalf, with the new kitchen made. Harold was soon all smiles and grease, and I was not on the whole dissatisfied with the significant tint that had been gained as to the fawns at Eregomali. Fortunately means were at hand for resolving any doubts on the subject, since the morning was Sunday, and already the bells were ringing for church. Lest the connection may not be evident at first sight, I should explain that the gloomy period of church-time, with its enforced inaction, and its lack of real interest, was too within sight of all that the village held of Farrist, was just the one when a young man's fancies lightly turned to thoughts of love. For such trifling the rest of the week afforded no leisure. But in church well, there was really nothing else to do. True, knots and crosses might be indulged in, on fly-leaves of prayer-books, while the litany dragged at slow length along. But what balm or what solace could be found for the sermon? Surely the eye, wandering here and there, among the serried lanks, made bold, untrammeled choice among fair fellow-supplicants. It was in this way that, some months earlier, under the exceptional strain of the Athenian creed, my roving fancy had settled upon the baker's wife as a fit object for a lifelong devotion. Her ripe charms had conquered a heart which none of her bemusland, tintering juniors, had been able to subdue, and that she was already wedded, had never occurred to me, as any bar to my affection. Edward's general demeanour then, during the morning service, was safe to convict him. But there was also a special test for the particular case. It happened that we sat in a transept, and the larkings being behind us, Edward's only chance of feasting on Sabina's charms, was in the all-too-fleeting interval, when we swung round eastwards. I was not mistaken. During the singing of the Benedictus the impatient one made several false starts, and at last he slewed fairly round before, as it was in the beginning is now and ever shall be, was half finished. The evidence was conclusive, a court of law could have desired no better. The fact being patent the next thing was to grapple with it, and my mind was fully occupied during the sermon. There was really nothing unfair or unbrotherly in my attitude. A philosophic affection, such as my own, which clashed with nothing, was, I held, permissible. But the volcanic passions in which Edward indulged, about once a quarter, were serious interference with business. To make matters worse, next week there was a circus coming to the neighbourhood, to which we had all been strictly forbidden to go, and without Edward no visit and contempt of law and orders could be successfully brought off. I had sounded him as to the circus on our way to church, and he had replied briefly that the very thought of a clown made him sick. Morbidity could no further go, but the sermon came to an end without any line of conduct having suggested itself, and I walked home in some depression, feeling sadly that Venus was in the ascendant and in dire opposition, while Aurega, the circus-star, drooped declinent perilously near the horizon. By the irony of fate, Annalisa of all people, turned out to be the dare ex-machine, which thing fell out in this wise. It was that lady's obnoxious practice to issue forth of a Sunday afternoon, and on a visit of state to such farmers and cottagers as dwelt at hand, on which occasion she was wont to hail a reluctant boy along with her, from the fixed motives of propriety, and his soul's health. Much cuddling of brains, I suppose, had on that particular day made me torbid and unwary. Anyhow, when a victim came to be sought for, I fell an easy prey, while the others fled, scathe-less and whooping. Our first visit was to the Larkings. Here ceremonial might be viewed in its finest flower, and we conducted ourselves like Queen Elizabeth when she trod the measure, high and disposedly. In the low oak-peneled parlor, cake and currant wine were set forth, and after courtesy's and compliments exchanged, Annalisa, greatly condescending, talked the fashions with Mrs. Larking, while the farmer and I, perspiring with the usual effort, exchanged remarks on the mutability of the weather and the steady fall in the price of corn. Who would have thought to hear us that only two short days ago we had confronted each other on either side of a hedge? I, triumphant, evocative, derisive, he flushed, wroth, cracking his whip and volleying forth profanity, so powerful is all subduing ceremony. Sabina the while, demurely seated with a pilgrim's progress on her knee, and apparently absorbed in a brightly-coloured presentiment of Apolian straddling right across the way, eyed me at times with shy interest, but repelled all Annalisa's advances with a frigid politeness, for which I could not sufficiently admire her. It's surprising to me, I heard my aunt remarked presently, how my eldest nephew Edward despises little girls. I heard him tell Charlotte the other day that he wished he could exchange her for a pair of Japanese guinea-pigs. It made the poor child cry. Poor he's are so heartless! I saw Sabina stiffen as she sat, and her tip-tilted nose twitched scornfully. Now this boy here, my soul descended into my very boots, could the woman have intercepted any of my amorous glances at the baker's wife? Now this boy, my aunt went on, is more human altogether. Only yesterday he took his sister to the baker's shop, and spent his only penny buying her sweets. I thought it showed such a nice disposition. I wish Edward were more like him. I breathed again. It was unnecessary to explain my real motives for that visit to the baker's. Sabina's face softened, and her contemptuous nose descended from its altitude of scorn. She gave me one shy glance of kindness, and then concentrated her attention upon mercy knocking at the wicked gate. I felt awfully mean as regarded Edward, but what could I do? I was in Gaza, gagged and bound. The Philistines hammed me in. The same evening the storm burst, the bolt fell, and, to continue the metaphor, the atmosphere grew serene and clear once more. The evening service was shorter than usual. The vicar, as he ascended the pulpit steps, having dropped two pages out of a sermon case, unperceived by any but ourselves, either at the moment or subsequently when the hiatus was reached. So, as we joyfully shuffled out, I whispered Edward that by racing home at top speed we should make time to assume our bows and arrows, lay to side for the day, and play at Indians and buffaloes with anti-lysis fowls, already strolling roostwards, regardless of their doom, before that sedately stepping lady could return. Edward hung at the door wavering. The suggestion had unhallowed charms. At that moment Sabina issued primly forth, and, seeing Edward, put out her tongue at him in the most exasperating manner conceivable. Then passed on her way, her shoulders rigid, her dainty head held high. A man can stand very much in the cause of love—poverty, aunts, rivals, barriers of every sort. All these only serve to fan the flame. But personal ridicule is a shaft that reaches the very vitals. Edward led the race home at a speed which one of Valentine's heroes must have equalled but never surpassed. And that evening the Indians dispersed anti-lysis fowls over several square miles of country, so that the tale of them remaineth incomplete to this day. Edward himself, cheering wildly, pursued the big cock-in-china cock, till the birds sank, gasping under the drawing-room window, where at its mistress stood petrified. And after supper, in the shrubbery, smoked a half-consumed cigar he had picked up in the road, and declared to an ostrich in audience his final, his immittable, resolve to go into the army. The crisis was passed and Edward was saved. And yet, soon to lash or may, remmon. To me watching the cigar stump alternately pale and glow against the dark background of Laurel, a vision of a tip-tilted nose of a small head, poised scornfully, seemed to hover on the gathering gloom, seemed to grow and fade and grow again, like the grin of the Cheshire cat. Pathetically, reproachfully even, and the charms of the baker's wife, slipped from my memory, like snow-rees in thaw. After all, Sabina was no wise to blame. Why should the child be punished? To-morrow I would give them the slip, and stroll round by her garden, promiscuous like, at a time when the farmer was safe in the rickyard. If nothing came of it, there is no harm done. And if on the contrary, that is the end of Section 7. It was much too fine a night to think of going to bed at once. And so, although the witching hour of nine p.m. had struck, Edward and I were still leaning out of the open window in our night-shirts, watching the play of cedar-brant shadows on the moonlit lawn, and planning schemes of fresh devoury for the sun-shiny morrow. From below, strains of the jockened piano declared that the Olympians were enjoying themselves in their listless, impotent way. For the new curate had been bidden to dinner that night, and was at the moment unclearly proclaiming to all the world that he feared no foe. His discordant vociferations, doubtless started a train of thought in Edward's mind. For the youth presently remarked apropos of nothing that had been said before, I believe the new curates rather gone on Aunt Maria. I scouted the notion. Why, she's quite old, I said. She must have been some five and twenty summers. Of course she is, replied Edward scornfully. It's not her. It's her money he's after, you bet. I didn't know she had any money. I observed timidly. Sure to have, said my brother with confidence. Heaps and heaps. Silence ensued. Both our minds being busy with the new situation thus presented. Mine, in wonderment at this flaw that so often declared itself in enviable natures, of fullest endowment. In a grown-up man and a good cricketer, for instance, even as this curate. Presence, apparently, in the consideration of how such a state of things, supposing it existed, could be best turned to his own advantage. Bobby Ferris told me, began Edward in due course, that there was a fellow spooning his sister once. What's spooning? I asked meekly. Oh, I don't know, said Edward indifferently. It's—it's—it's just a thing they do, you know. And he used to carry notes and messages and things between them, and he got a shilling almost every time. What, from each of them? I innocently inquired. Edward looked at me with scornful pity. Girls never have any money. He briefly explained. But she did his exercises, and got him out of rouse, and told stories for him when he needed it, and much better ones than he could have made up for himself. Those are useful in some ways, so he was living in clover, when unfortunately they went and quarrelled about something. I don't see what that's got to do with it, I said. Nor don't I, rejoined Edward, but anyhow the notes and things stopped, and so did the shillings. Bobby was fairly cornered, for he'd bought two ferrets on tick, and promised to pay a shilling a week, thinking the shillings were going on forever, silly young ass. So when the week was up, and he was being done for the shilling, he went off to the fellow and said, Your broken-hearted belly implores you to meet her at sundown by the hollow oak, as of old. Be it only for a moment. Do not fail. He got all that out of some rotten book, of course. The fellow looked puzzled and said, What hollow oak? I don't know any hollow oak. Perhaps it was the royal oak, said Bobby promptly, because he saw he had made a slip through trusting too much to the rotten book. But this didn't seem to make the fellow any happier. I should think not, I said. The royal oak's an awful low sort of pub. I know, said Edward. Well, at last the fellow said, I think I know what she means. The hollow tree in your father's paddock. It happens to be an elm, but she wouldn't know the difference. All right, say I'll be there. Bobby hung about a bit, for he hadn't got his money. She was crying awfully, he said. Then he got his shilling. And wasn't the fellow riled? I inquired. When he got to the place and found nothing? He found Bobby, said Edward indignantly. Young Ferris was a gentleman every inch of him. He brought the fellow another message from Bella. I dare not leave the house. My cruel parents amure me closely if only you knew what I suffer, your broken-hearted Bella, out of the same rotten book. This made the fellow a little suspicious, because it was the old Ferris's who had been keen about the thing all through. The fellow, you see, had tin. But what's that got to—? I began again. Oh, I don't know, said Edward impatiently. I'm telling you just what Bobby told me. He got suspicious, anyhow, but he couldn't exactly call Bella's brother a liar, so Bobby escaped for the time. But when he was in a hole next week, over a stiff French exercise, he tried the same sort of game on his sister. She was too sharp for him, and he got caught out. Somehow women seem more mistrustful than men. They're so beastly suspicious by nature, you know. I know, said I. But did the two—the fellow and the sister—make it up afterwards? I don't remember about that, replied Edward indifferently. But Bobby got packed off to school a whole year earlier than his people meant to send him, which was just what he wanted, so you see it all came right in the end. I was trying to puzzle out the moral of this story. It was evidently meant to contain one somewhere, when a flood of golden lamplight mingled with the moon rays on the lawn. And Aunt Maria and the new curate strolled out on the grass below us, and took the direction of a garden-seat that was backed by a dense laurel shrubbery, reaching round in a half-circle to the house. Edward meditated moodily. If we only knew what they were talking about, said he, you'd soon see whether I was right or not. Look here, let's send the kid down by the porch to reconnoiter. Harold's asleep, I said. It seems rather a shame. Oh, rot! said my brother. He's the youngest, and he's got to do as he's told. So the luckless Harold was hauled out of bed and given his sailing orders. He was naturally rather vexed at being stood up suddenly on the cold floor, and the job had no particular interest for him. But he was both staunch and well disciplined. The means of exit were simple enough. A porch of iron trellis came up to within easy reach of the window, and was habitually used by all three of us, when modestly anxious to avoid public notice. Harold climbed deftly down the porch like a white rat, and his nightgown glimmered a moment on the gravel walk ere he was lost to sight in the darkness of the shrubbery. A brief interval of silence ensued, broken suddenly by a sound of scuffle, and then a shrill long-drawn squeal as of metallic surfaces in friction. Our scout had fallen into the hands of the enemy. Indolence alone had made us devolve the task of investigation on our younger brother. Now that danger had declared itself, there was no hesitation. In a second we were down the side of the porch and crawling Cherokee-wise through the laurels to the back of the garden-seat. Pideus was the sight that greeted us. Aunt Maria was on the seat, in a white evening frock, looking for an aunt really quite nice. On the lawn stood an incensed curate, grasping our small brother by a large ear, which judging from the row he was making seemed on the point of parting company with the headed adorned. The gruesome noise he was emitting did not really affect us otherwise than aesthetically. To one who has tried both, the wail of genuine physical anguish is easy distinguishable from the pumped-up admisracordium blubber. Harold could clearly be recognized as belonging to the latter class. Now, you young! Welp, I think it was, but Edward stoutly maintains it was devil, said the curate sternly. Tell us what it is you meant by it. Well, let go of my ear, then, shrilled Harold, and I'll tell you the solemn truth. Very well, agreed the curate, releasing him. Now go ahead, and don't lie more than you can help. We abode the promised disclosure without the least misgiving, but even we had hardly given Harold due credit for his fertility of resource and powers of imagination. I had just finished saying my prayers. Began that young gentleman slowly. When I happened to look out of the window, and on the lawn I saw a sight which froze the marrow in my veins. A burglar was approaching the house with snake-like tread. He had a scowl and a dark lantern, and he was armed to the teeth. He listened with interest. The style, though unlike Harold's narrative notes, seemed strangely familiar. Go on, said the curate grimly. Pausing in his stealthy career, continued Harold, he gave a low whistle. Instantly the signal was responded to, and from the adjacent shadows two more figures glided forth. The miscreants were both armed to the teeth. Excellent, said the curate. Proceed. The robber chief, pursued Harold, warming to his work, joined his nefarious comrades, and conversed with them in silent tones. His expression was truly ferocious, and I ought to have said that he was armed to the teeth. There never mind his teeth. Interrupted the curate rudely. There's too much jaw about you altogether. Hurry up and have done. I was in a frightful funk, continued the narrator, warily guarding his ear with his hand. But just then the drawing-room window opened, and you and Aunt Maria came out, I mean, emerged. The burglars vanished silently into the laurels with horrid implications. The curate looked slightly puzzled. The tale was well sustained, and certainly circumstantial. After all, the boy might have really seen something. How was the poor man to know, though the chaste and lofty diction might have supplied a hint that the whole yarn was a free adaptation from the last penny dreadful lent us by the knife and boot boy? Why did you not alarm the house? He asked. Because I was afraid, said Harold sweetly, that perhaps they might not believe me. But how did you get down here, you naughty little boy? Put in Aunt Maria. Harold was hard-pressed, by his own flesh and blood, too. At that moment Edward touched me on the shoulder and glided off through the laurels. When some ten yards away he gave a low whistle. I replied by another. The effect was magical. Aunt Maria started up with a shriek. Harold gave one startled glance around, and then fled like a hare, made straight for the back door, burst in upon the servants at supper, and buried himself in the broad bosom of the cook, his special ally. The curate faced the laurels hesitatingly. But Aunt Maria flung herself on him. Oh, Mr. Hodgets! I heard her cry. You are brave. For my sake do not be rash. He was not rash. When I peeped out a second later the coast was entirely clear. By this time there were sounds of a household timidly emerging. And Edward remarked to me that perhaps we had better be off. Retreat was an easy matter. A stunted laurel gave a leg up onto the garden wall, which led in its turn to the roof of an outhouse, up which, at a dubious angle, we could crawl to the window of the box-room. This overland route had been revealed to us one day by the domestic cat. When hard pressed in the course of an otter-hunt, in which the cat, somewhat unwillingly, was fulfilling the tidal role, it had proved distinctly useful on occasions like the present. We were snug in bed, minus some cuticle from knees and elbows, and Harold, sleepily chewing something sticky, had been carried up in the arms of the friendly cook ere the clamor of the burglar hunters had died away. The curate's undaunted demeanor, as reported by Aunt Maria, was generally supposed to have terrified the burglars into flight, and much kudos accrued to him thereby. Some days later, however, when he had dropped into afternoon tea, and was making a mild curatorial joke about the moral courage required for taking the last piece of bread and butter, I felt constrained to remark dreamily, and as it were to the universe at large, Mr. Hodgets, you are brave. For my sake, do not be rash. Fortunately for me, the vicar was also a caller on that day, and it was always a comparatively easy matter to dodge my long-coded friend in the open. End of Section 8 Section 9 of The Golden Age. This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to find out how you can volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. Recorded by Catherine Eastman, October 2007. The Golden Age by Kenneth Graham. Section 9. A Harvesting. The year was in its yellowing time, and the face of nature a study in old gold. A field, or semi, with garbs of the same. It may be false heraldry, nature's generally is, but it correctly blazons the display that Edward and I considered from the rickyard gate. Harold was not on in this scene, being stretched upon the couch of pain, the special disorder stomachache as usual. The evening before, Edward, in a fit of unwanted amiability, had deigned to carve me out a turnip lantern. An art and craft he was peculiarly deft in. And Harold, as the interior of the turnip flew out in scented fragments under the hollowing knife, had eaten largely thereof, regarding all such Jetsam as his special perquisite. Now he was drearing his weird, with such assistance as the chemist could afford. But Edward and I, knowing that this particular field was to be carried today, were reveling in the privilege of riding in the empty wagons from the rickyard back to the sheaves, once we returned toilfully on foot, to career it again over the billowy acres in these great galleys of a stubble sea. It was the nearest approach to sailing that we inland urchins might compass, and hence it ensued that such stirring scenes as Sir Richard Grenville on the Revenge, the smoke-wreathed battle of the Nile, and the death of Nelson, had all been enacted in turn on these dusty quarter-decks as they swayed and bumped a field. Another wagon had shot its load, and was jolting out through the rickyard gate as we swung ourselves in, shouting over its tail. Edward was the first up, and, as I gained my feet, he clutched me in a death-grapple. I was a privateersman, he proclaimed, and he, the captain of the British frigate Terpsichore, of, I forget the precise number of guns. Edward always collared the best parts to himself. But I was holding my own gallantly when I suddenly discovered that the floor we battled on was swarming with earwigs. Shrieking I hurled free of him, and rolled over the tailboard onto the stubble. Edward executed a war-dance of triumph on the deck of the retreating galleon. But I cared little for that. I knew he knew that I wasn't afraid of him, but that I was, and terribly, of earwigs, those mortal bugs of the field. So I let him disappear, shouting lustily for all hands to repel borders, while I strolled inland down the village. There was a touch of adventure in the expedition. This was not our own village, but a foreign one, distant at least a mile. One felt that sense of mingled distinction and insecurity, which is familiar to the traveller, distinction in that folk turned the head to note you curiously. Insecurity, by reason of the ever-present possibility of missiles on the part of the more juvenile inhabitants, a class eternally conservative. Elated with isolation, I went even more nose-in-air than usual, and, even so, I'm used, might Mungo Park have threaded the trackless African forest, and here I plumped against a soft but resisting body. Recalled to my senses by the shock, I fell back in the attitude every boy under these circumstances instinctively adopts, both elbows well up over the ears. I found myself facing a tall elderly man, clean-shaven, clad in well-worn black, a clergyman, evidently, and I noted at once a far away look in his eyes as if they were used to another plane of vision, and could not instantly focus things terrestrial being suddenly recalled there too. His figure was bent in apologetic protest. I ask a thousand pardons, sir," he said, I am really so very absent-minded. I trust you will forgive me. Now, most boys would have suspected chaff under this courtly style of address. I take infinite credit to myself for recognizing at once the natural attitude of a man to whom his fellows were gentlemen all, neither Jew nor Gentile, clean nor unclean. Of course I took the blame on myself, adding that I was very absent-minded too, which was indeed the case. I perceive, he said pleasantly, that we have something in common. I, an old man, dream dreams, you, a young one, see visions. Your lot is the happier. And now? His hand had been resting all this time on a wicked gate. You are hot, it is easily seen. The day is advanced. Fear, though, is a zodiacal sign. Perhaps I may offer you some poor refreshment if your engagements will permit. My only engagement that afternoon was an arithmetic lesson, and I had not intended to keep it in any case. So I passed in, while he held the gate open politely, murmuring, Venit Hesperus itte capelle, come, little kid. And then, apologizing abjectly, for a familiarity which, he said, was less his than the Roman poets. A straight-flagged walk led up to the cool-looking old house, and my host, lingering in his progress at this rose-tree and that, forgot all about me at least twice, waking up and apologizing humbly after each lapse. During these intervals, I put two and two together, and identified him as the rector, a bachelor, eccentric, learned exceedingly, round whom the crust of legend was already beginning to form, to myself an object of special awe, in that he was alleged to have written a real book. Heaps of books, Martha, my informant said, but I knew the exact rate of discount applicable to Martha's statements. We passed eventually, through a dark hall, into a room which struck me at once, as the ideal I had dreamed but failed to find. None of your feminine fripperies here, none of your chair-backs and tidies. This man, it was seen, groaned under no aughts. Stout volumes in calf and vellum lined three sides. Books sprawled or hunched themselves on chairs and tables. Books diffused the pleasant odor of printer's ink and bindings, topping all a faint aroma of tobacco, cheered and heartened exceedingly, as under foreign skies the flap and rustle over the wayfarer's head of the Union Jack, the old flag of emancipation. And in one corner, book piled like the rest of the furniture, stood a piano. This I hailed with a squeal of delight. Want to strum? inquired my friend, as if it was the most natural wish in the world. His eyes were already straying towards another corner, where bits of writing-table peeped out from under a sort of alpine system of book and fool-scap. Oh, but may I, I asked in doubt, at home I'm not allowed to, only beastly exercises. Well, you can strum here at all events, he replied, and murmuring absently, aje di clatinum barbite carmen. He made his way mechanically guided, as it seemed, to the irresistible writing-table. In ten seconds he was out of sight and call. A great book open on his knee, another propped up in front, a score or so disposed within easy reach, he read and jotted with an absorption almost passionate. I might have been in Boesha for any consciousness he had of me. So with a light heart I turned to and strummed. Those who painfully and with bleeding feet have scaled the crags of mastery over musical instruments have yet their loss in this, that the wild joy of strumming has become a vanished sense. Their happiness comes from the concord and the relative value of the notes they handle. The pure, absolute quality and nature of each note in itself are only appreciated by the strummer. For some notes have all the sea in them, and some cathedral bells, others a woodland-joyance and a smell of greenery. In some, fawns dance to the merry reed, and even the grave centaurs peep out from their caves. Some bring moonlight, and some the deep crimson of a rose's heart. Some are blue, some red, while others will tell of an army with silken standards and march music. And throughout all the sequence of suggestion, up above, the little white men leap and peep and strive against the imprisoning wires, and all the big rosewood box hums as it were full of hiving bees. Spent with the rapture, I paused a moment and caught my friend's eye over the edge of a folio. But as for these Germans, he began abruptly, as if we had been in the middle of a discussion, the scholarship is there, I grant you, but the spark, the fine perception, the happy intuition, where is it? They get it all from us. They get nothing whatever from us, I said decidedly, the word German, only suggesting bands, to which Aunt Eliza was bitterly hostile. You think not? He rejoined doubtfully, getting up and walking about the room. Well, I applaud such fairness and temperance in so young a critic. They are qualities, in youth, as rare as they are pleasing. But just look at shrumpfiest, for instance, how he struggles and wrestles with a simple gar in this very passage here. I peeped fearfully through the open door, half dreading to see some sinuous and snark-like conflict in progress on the mat. But all was still. I saw no trouble at all in the passage, and I said so. Precisely, he cried, delighted, to you who possess the natural scholars' faculty in so happy a degree, there is no difficulty at all. But to this shrumpfiest, but here, luckily for me, in came the housekeeper, a clean-looking woman of stade aspect. Your tea is in the garden, she said, as if she were correcting a faulty emendation. I've put some cakes and things for the little gentleman, and you'd better drink it before it gets cold. He waved her off, and continued his stride, brandishing an aorist over my devoted head. The housekeeper waited unmoved, till there fell a moment's break in his descant, and then, you'd better drink it before it gets cold. She observed again impassively. The wretched man cast a deprecating look at me. Perhaps a little tea would be rather nice, he observed feebly, and to my great relief he led the way into the garden. I looked about for the little gentleman, but failing to discover him, I concluded he was absent-minded too, and attacked the cakes and things with no misgivings. After a most successful and most learned tea, a something happened, which, small as I was, never quite shook itself out of my memory. To us at Parley, in an arbor over the high road, there entered, slouching, into view, a dingy tramp sat alighted by a frowsy woman and a pariah dog, and, catching sight of us, he set up his professional wine. And I looked at my friend with the heartiest compassion, for I knew well from Martha it was common talk, that at this time of day he was certainly and surely penniless. Morn by morn he started forth with pockets lined, and each returning evening found him with never a sue. All this he proceeded to explain at length to the tramp, courteously and even shame-facetly, as one who was in the wrong. And at last the gentleman of the road, realizing the hopelessness of his case, set to and cursed him with gusto, vocabulary, and abandonment. He reviled his eyes, his features, his limbs, his profession, his relatives, and surroundings, and then slouched off, still oozing malice and filth. We watched the party to a turn in the road, where the woman, plainly weary, came to a stop. Her lord, after some conventional expletives demanded of him by his position, relieved her of her bundle, and caused her to hang on his arm with a certain rough kindness of tone. And in action even a dim approach to tenderness, and the dingy dog crept up for one lick at her hand. See, said my friend, bearing somewhat on my shoulder, how this strange thing, this love of ours, lives and shines out in the unlikeliest of places. You have been in the fields in early morning, barren acres all, but only stoop, catch the light thwart-wise, and all is a silver network of gossamer. So the very filaments of this strange thing underrun and link together the whole world. Yet it is not the old imperious God of the fatal bow, Eros anikate machan, not that, nor even the placid, respectable storgy, but something still unnamed, perhaps more mysterious, more divine. Only one must stoop to see it, old fellow, one must stoop. The dew was falling, the dusk closing, as I trotted briskly homewards down the road. Lonely spaces everywhere, above and around. Only hisperus hung in the sky, solitary, pure, ineffably far-drawn and remote, yet infinitely heartening somehow in his valorous isolation. End of Section Nine of The Golden Age by Kenneth Graham