CHAPTER VI
A DANGEROUS TRIP TO DERBY-TOWN
The next morning broke brightly, but soon clouds began to gather and a storm seemed imminent. We feared that the gloomy prospect of the sky might keep Dorothy and Madge at home, but long before the appointed hour John and I were at the Royal Arms watching eagerly for the Haddon coach. At the inn we occupied a room from which we could look into the courtyard, and at the window we stood alternating between exaltation and despair.
When my cogitations turned upon myself—a palpitating youth of thirty-five, waiting with beating heart for a simple blind girl little more than half my age; and when I remembered how for years I had laughed at the tenderness of the fairest women of the French and Scottish courts—I could not help saying to myself, "Poor fool! you have achieved an early second childhood." But when I recalled Madge in all her beauty, purity, and helplessness, my cynicism left me, and I, who had enjoyed all of life's ambitious possibilities, calmly reached the conclusion that it is sometimes a blessed privilege to be a fool. While I dwelt on thoughts of Madge, all the latent good within me came uppermost. There is latent good in every man, though it may remain latent all his life. Good resolves, pure thoughts, and noble aspirations—new sensations to me, I blush to confess—bubbled in my heart, and I made a mental prayer, "If this is folly, may God banish wisdom." What is there, after all is said, in wisdom, that men should seek it? Has it ever brought happiness to its possessor? I am an old man at this writing. I have tasted all the cups of life, and from the fulness of my experience I tell you that the simple life is the only one wherein happiness is found. When you permit your heart and your mind to grow complex and wise, you make nooks and crannies for wretchedness to lodge in. Innocence is Nature's wisdom; knowledge is man's folly.
An hour before noon our patience was rewarded when we saw the Haddon Hall coach drive into the courtyard with Dawson on the box. I tried to make myself believe that I did not wish Lady Crawford were ill. But there is little profit in too close scrutiny of our deep-seated motives, and in this case I found no comfort in self-examination. I really did wish that Aunt Dorothy were ill.
My motive studying, however, was brought to a joyous end when I saw Will Dawson close the coach door after Madge and Dorothy had alighted.
How wondrously beautiful they were! Had we lived in the days when Olympus ruled the world, John surely would have had a god for his rival. Dorothy seemed luminous, so radiant was she with the fire of life. As for Madge, had I beheld a corona hovering over her head I should have thought it in all respects a natural and appropriate phenomenon—so fair and saintlike did she appear to me. Her warm white furs and her clinging gown of soft light-colored woollen stuff seemed to be a saint's robe, and her dainty little hat, fashioned with ermine about the edge of the rim—well, that was the corona, and I was ready to worship.
Dorothy, as befitted her, wore a blaze of harmonious colors and looked like the spirit of life and youth. I wish I could cease rhapsodizing over those two girls, but I cannot. You may pass over it as you read, if you do not like it.
"Ye gods! did ever a creature so perfect as she tread the earth?" asked John, meaning, of course, Dorothy.