Sir Harry: A Love Story

by Archibald Marshall

He shook his thoughts from him as he came out of the wood and galloped again on the crisp turf of the hilltop, between the gorse and the heather and the outcropping rocks.

He was on high ground here. The rain had ceased, though the wind was buffeting him so furiously that he had to keep his head down as he rode, and even the mare was soon submissive to being pulled down to a trot and then to a walk. The light was stronger now and the clouds driven along by the wind seemed to be higher; there was no sign of a break in them, but there was the feeling that at any time they might be rent asunder and let through a shaft of sunlight. The mist had all gone, and the sea lay, a grey, turbulent expanse, apparently near at hand, though at its nearest point it was still some two miles distant.

The sight of the sea always had a calming effect upon Harry, whether it lay blue and calm or was lashed to angry motion. It was his outlook into the world beyond the bounds of his home. When he had least felt himself circumscribed something had yet urged him now and then to ride to the shore and to let his spirit go out across the boundless waters. And now, as he saw the great spaces of sea and sky in front of him his thoughts lightened. As his physical world had this wide outlet into the greater world beyond it, so his life, bound hitherto within limits that he was outgrowing, would soon open into something wider and freer. And just as he would return to the sheltered haunts of his home, loving it all the more for his glimpse of the unsheltered sea, so with the life which had been so happy there. It was coming to an end for him, but was all the more to be treasured on that account as long as it lasted.

He came to a break in the rocky cliff which led down to a little sandy bay, on the edge of which was what had once been a fisherman's cottage. The cliff had broken away in front of it and it had been abandoned as dangerous some years before. Only its walls were standing, but there was a place among the ruins in which he could tie up his horse if he wanted to walk by the sea. He did so now, and went down to the sands, followed by the dogs. The sun came out as he did so, and great masses of clouds were torn asunder and piled up to be rolled away before the wind, instead of forming a thick curtain between him and the sky.

He shouted for joy at the lifting of the grey oppression, and became a boy again as by a sudden impulse he stripped to bathe and ran over the sands to meet the shock of the great waves that were rolling up them.

CHAPTER IX

ON THE MOOR

As he rode towards home an hour or two later, Harry felt as if all the stains upon life had been washed away, just as the wind and rain had scoured the heavens of their dark load of cloud. The sun, now declining towards the west, shone in a sky of clean blue; the wind was dropping every minute, but was still fresh as he cantered across the moor. He rode with his head up, singing blithely, and drinking in through all his senses the sparkling glory of a world set free from the tyranny of storm and gloom.

He had thought out nothing to a definite conclusion, and yet the perplexities which had surrounded him as he started out on his ride seemed to have disappeared. The war, which had affected him so little, now lay in the background of his mind as a real and a very big thing, and it seemed to him fixed and certain that somehow and at some time it would profoundly affect his life; but at present he had nothing to do but to await what should be coming to him. His place at Royd must also undergo a change, and that, too, would come, in its time, as it would come. Whatever should happen, he was ready for it, and his mind was free and happy, but also strangely expectant. He was in the current of some power outside himself, but in complete harmony with it, and at the same time in free possession of himself, just as he had lately exulted in his youth and strength as his body had been borne on the motion of the mighty waters. Ever since that night of still and unearthly beauty, when the vision had come to him of a living power in nature for a sign of which he had yearned, he had thought of himself as controlled by strong yet gentle and beneficent forces, which, if he yielded himself to them, would lead him along paths that he would best fulfil himself in treading. The feeling was stronger at some times than others. It had never been so obscured as it had been a few hours earlier, but now, in the sun and the wind, it was very strong. He felt himself calmed and uplifted in spirit, as if by a tangible communion with the guiding influences. They seemed to be telling him, or to have told him, that his shadowed mood need never have been; that they had something in store for him, some experience, some happening, which would give him renewed faith in their guidance. There was a sense almost of being indulged, by an assurance out of the common run.

But his mood was as far as possible from being analytical, as he rode on singing and calling to his dogs, which sprang round him rejoicing as he did in the exhilaration of quick motion and the strength and poise of muscle and sinew. His mind had cleared, and he was free to give himself up to the joy of living, all the more keenly for the whisper that had come to him of something new and exciting in preparation for him.