"David and Anthony called it 'ripping!'" affirmed Avelyn.
"And I was introduced to the Lord Bishop of Howchester!" triumphed Irma, with the glamour of the honour still dancing in her shining eyes.
CHAPTER XVI
Under the Pines
When spring came, bringing daffodils in the orchard, and primrose stars under the alder bushes in the meadow, and tiny green shoots on the hedges, and singing of larks and cawing of jackdaws and twitter of linnets, and all the other dear delights of the "return of Proserpine", Walden also celebrated a birthday. It was a year since the Watsons had obtained possession of their little property. To them all it had been a glad, golden, glorious year, full of fresh interests, new awakenings, and hitherto undreamed-of experiences. They had been living spiritually on a far higher plane; almost unconsciously the influence of hills and wide skies and dashing waters had passed into their lives and widened them. So much of what we are in our after years depends on the standard of happiness we form when we are quite young. If we learn to take Nature's hand and read in her book, she can teach us wonderful secrets, and lift our souls so that we can never again be really narrow, or vulgar, or petty, or commonplace. It is not the mere fact of living in the country that gives this inner vision. Too often country dwellers go about with closed eyes and sealed hearts to the meaning of the beauty around them; but to those who will listen to Mother Nature's many voices, there comes a wonderful refinement and purity of taste, quite irrespective of wealth or class distinctions, the mark of the spirit that is daily growing, overmastering the claims of the physical body, and fitting itself for something that as yet we only grasp at but cannot reach. God must love His children very dearly to send them such beautiful things as the April sunshine, and the light on the hills, and the white spray of the whirling waterfall, and the violets in the hazel coppice. They may spoil His earth for themselves, but the springtime comes again, and the little heartsease flowers will bloom, not only over those graves in France, but over deeper graves of fallen hopes and lost ideals.
Mrs. Watson reviewed the year at Walden as so much gain. To begin with, her primary object in the removal had been an entire success: Daphne, formerly pale, thin, and an object for anxiety, was now as radiant as a pink-tipped daisy, and pronounced by the specialist to be absolutely fit and sound. She spent most of her time out of doors, gardening and looking after her colony of fowls, and, though she might not be doing definite war work, felt that she was helping her country by the production of food-stuffs. Daphne had suddenly grown very pretty. Avelyn, who often looked at her critically, decided that point emphatically. It was a delicate, ethereal, elusive kind of beauty, due as much to expression as to straight features and smiling grey eyes. Daphne never came out well in a photograph—that was quite a recognized fact in the family; to appreciate her, you had to see her when she was excited, or gardening, with her hair rumpled.
The Walden birthday fell early in April, and the Watsons decided to celebrate it by having a Saturday picnic. Captain Harper promised to join them—he came up sometimes from the camp to Lyngates—and they also asked Pamela and her mother. Rather to their surprise, Mrs. Reynolds accepted the invitation. The poor lady was still somewhat crushed and depressed, but she seemed to be trying to bestir herself, and, for her daughter's sake, to make faint, almost pathetic efforts at friendship. She was shy and uncommunicative, but she evidently liked Mrs. Watson, and would cheer up a little in her presence, and venture a few remarks, and even a watery smile. The picnic was to be in the pine woods, so all met at the cross-roads by the pond as a common starting-point, and set forth together, armed with tea baskets.
It was a two-mile walk up hill, along a road that twisted at sharp angles and gave lovely views of the landscape below. Presently they reached the beginnings of the wood, and some pines rose like giant sentinels guarding an enchanted land. As they tramped on, the trees stood thicker, tall and straight as the masts of a ship, with a carpet of soft fallen needles underneath. All at once a gleam of water flashed, and they had reached the bourne of their journey, a little grey lake set in the midst of the wood, with heather and whinberry growing round its banks. There was a space of shingle down by the water, and here, after a grand hunt to collect sticks, they lighted a fire and boiled the kettle they had brought with them.
It was fun sitting round in a gipsy circle, even if the tea was rather weak and smoky, and the war cake was conspicuous by its lack of sugar and currants. Everybody could have eaten a great deal more than the ration, and the provisions disappeared down to the very last crumb. Afterwards the young folks started to explore the banks, and had a wild time scrambling over fallen tree trunks, jumping small streams, and pushing through thickets. At a particularly large fallen pine Avelyn struck, and demanded a rest. She and Pamela perched themselves on the top, and announced their intention of sitting still for at least ten minutes. The boys, who had been cutting walking-sticks from the hazels by the lake edge, consented to a halt, and settled down with their penknives, whittling away busily. Mrs. Watson and Mrs. Reynolds were washing up the tea-cups at the picnic place, and the sound of their voices echoed faintly over the water. Daphne and Captain Harper seemed temporarily lost.
"It's like home to be right amongst the pines!" said Pamela, looking with far-away eyes at the vista of red-brown trunks and green needles.