“Yes?”
“You were such a kid in those days; I thought you’d forgotten. As though either of us could forget. I was an ass.”
Jehane had turned her back and was looking out of the window. For the first time she envied Nan—Nan, the daughter of a country parson. It was too bad.
“Miss Usk.”
She glanced across her shoulder.
“We’re being intolerably rude, talking all about our own affairs. You see, once Nan was almost my sister. How old were you, Nan? Thirteen, wasn’t it? And I was eighteen. We’ve not met since then. My father died suddenly, you know. I had to step into his shoes—they were much too big for me. That was the end of Oxford and Cassingland.”
“We were going out on the river,” said Jehane. “Perhaps you’ll join us. I’ll sit very quiet and listen. You can talk over old times to your heart’s content.”
They piled his arms with cushions, and together set out through the glistening meadows to the barges. After the rain, the air was intensely still. Sounds carried far; from tall trees on the Broad Walk and from the uttermost distance came the fluty cry of birds, from the river the rattle of oars being banked, and from every side the slow patter of dripping branches. Like a canvas, fresh from an artist’s brush, colors in the landscape stood out distinct and wet—flowers against the gray walls of Corpus, trunks of trees with their velvety blackness and shorn greenness of the Hinksey Hills. Men in disreputable shorts, returning from the boats, passed them. Some ran; some sauntered chatting.
Barrington laughed shortly and drew a long breath. “Nothing to do but enjoy themselves. Nothing to do but grow a fine body and learn to be gentlemen. I missed all that. After the rush and drive, it’s topping to sink back.”
“You’re right; it is sleepy. One day’s just like the next. We stand as still as church-steeples. People come and go; we’re left. We exist for visitors to look at, like the Martyr’s Memorial and Calvary Tower.”