VI
A LONELY CANDIDATE
Nothing useless is, or low;
Each thing in its place is best:
And what seems but idle show,
Strengthens and supports the rest. —Longfellow.
Magnus strolled leisurely along, thinking first that he could show these cadets how to run, and then beginning to have grave doubts on the subject; and finally finding himself a seat under the trees, where he could look and listen in shady comfort. Eyes and ears had full occupation.
There was a busy note of preparation everywhere, and especially among the drums. Beating there, and then beating here; the sound caught up and echoed back from the grey rocks on the green hillside. Then came out uniforms of various sorts (Magnus personified the dress, not knowing the men) and proceeded to mark off a certain space on the green in front of him, setting a gay little banner at the four corners of a large, large square.
Then, at first slowly, but soon hurrying up from every point of the compass, a many-coloured crowd swarmed in and filled the seats—filled them presently so full that Magnus gave up his place to the next gauzy creature that came along. She fluttered down into the seat with much gratulation and no thanks, and Magnus gravely took his stand in the rear.
He had no lack of company, even there. Officers in various uniforms, civilians in all sorts of coats, and girls in all sorts of finery, stood beside and around him.
And now, also, there came straying in another small posse, whom Magnus instinctively knew as of his own kind. Yes, they must be candidates; partly, perhaps, because they could not possibly be anything else; no other class owned them. Yet how did he know that?—to whom all classes here were strange. What possible connection between that dapper little fellow in straw hat and black alpaca coat, and this young giant who wore a cloth cap and a fluttering linen duster? Or how was his next neighbour in a Derby and long frock coat like the fourth man, who wore brown trousers, a cutaway coat, and a wide-awake? Yet even Magnus could see that "candidate" was written on them all. So plainly, indeed, that he stepped further back and put himself behind the tree. Anybody who looked at him standing there—and some did look—saw a tall, well-made young fellow in a neat and perfectly unobtrusive suit of brown-grey cloth. Very dark hair and with a wilful curl that tossed it about every way. Excellent features, ignorant as yet of life's moulding touch; and a sweet, mobile mouth, set just now in very grave lines indeed, and so hiding one of the great charms of his face. For nobody could watch Magnus Kindred when he smiled or laughed, and not notice the clean look: the utterly pure and true lines into which those grave ones changed. For the rest, hands and feet were well shaped and in excellent order; and the whole bearing was both self-reliant and unconscious.
But it seemed as if the gayer grew the scene, the soberer grew that young face gazing out from behind the tree. For of all the lonely places, commend me to an unknown throng of pleasure-seekers, where everyone belongs to someone, is waiting for someone, or is waited for, and you belong to none. No eyes are watching for you, no heart stirs when you come in sight; and no one will miss you if you do not come at all.
So Magnus felt that day. The more people came, the more he was crowded almost from standing-room, the wider grew the heart distance between himself and the bright world about him. Gay girls, pretty girls, thronged the seats and the walk; Magnus only felt that none of them was Cherry, and every older woman that came by, decked in feathers and flowers and laces, sent his thoughts off with such a rush to his own dear mother, in her simplest go-to-meeting bonnet, that it was all the boy could do to stand there and give no sign. And at even the officers he looked askance, wondering which of them might possibly be "Tacs."