The Splendid Fairing

by Constance Holme

There was more life, also, on the open road,--cycles and traps, and people walking in twos and threes; motor-cars, too, at which Simon never so much as glanced aside, though now they were really beginning to look like ghosts in the sinking light. Even when there was nobody on the road there was still the sense of being part of an unseen train, the link which binds traveller to traveller on every principal highway in the land, but especially on those which run north and south. The link strengthens and the thrill deepens as the day lengthens and the hours go on. Each wonders instinctively to what home the other is hastening before he is overtaken by the dark. From each to each at the hour of dusk passes the unconscious Godspeed uniting all who are drawing together towards the adventure of the night.

And, for Simon and Sarah, as for all, either man or beast, even in this bitter hour, there was the comfort of the road that goes home. There is always a lamp set high in the house to which one returns, even though it be poor and empty and dark. The greatest sorrow awaiting one at the end is not really a sorrow until one steps inside. The ease of the road home is the ineffable ease of the mind. Stout hearts and limbs may carry us out, and barely suffice to stagger us back, but the running and leaping mind can comfort the body on. There is always a lamp set high at the end of the road that is going home....

Not until they had lost it would they realise the perpetual consolation of that long-accustomed road. Times without number they had travelled it, seething with anger and hate, and yet always they were the richer for having passed that way. Simon, busily thinking of Blindbeck and all the advantages of the wealthy farm, did not know that he was putting his real wealth from him with every thought. Yet he would know it all the rest of his life when he drove a road that was not consecrated by the years, when the folk that hailed them in passing were not part of a lifelong chain; when the turns of the road were no longer pictures and books, with each house where it should be and would be for all time; when he stopped at a gate in the dusk and knew it was not his; when he entered a meaningless building at last and knew it was not home....

But just for the moment he was thinking neither of the immediate present nor of the greater part of his long-reaching past. His mind, unusually stimulated by the day's events, swung easily to and fro between the future at Blindbeck and the far-off boyhood which he had spent with Will. Blindbeck had never been his home in any sense, but his call to Blindbeck was nevertheless the call of the past. They would renew their youth for each other, the two old men, and forget when they were together that they were old. They turned instinctively to each other, as all turn to those who can recreate for them the young beginnings of their lives. On the marsh Simon always felt immeasurably old, weighted as with an actual burden by the years. He saw himself looking behind him at them as at monsters created in his pride, which now and for ever were out of his control. With Will beside him, they would lie in front as they used to do, rolling meadowlands still untouched by the plough of time. Because they had been young together it would be impossible for them to be really old. Because they had been young together they could took smiling, shoulder to shoulder, into the unbelievable grave.

Not that his longing had any such definite frame of thought as this, though he was aware that in it had lain the motive which had fixed his mind. He only moved towards its fulfilment as all untutored souls move naturally towards release from strain. He scarcely remembered Sarah after their talk had come to an end that was hardly an end, like an unravelled cord of which no one troubles to count the untwisted strands. That mighty leap which he was taking across the years carried him well above both Sarah's and Geordie's heads. The school-years, the climbing, running, hungry years were more distinct to him than the heavy, responsible years of marriage and middle life. He saw himself and Will running after the hounds, paddling in calm lakes of gold-shot evening tides, skating by slowly rising moons. He saw a raw lad going shyly but stolidly to his first place, already a man in the awed estimation of the brother left behind. He heard the clink of the first money he had ever earned, which had gone straight from his pocket into the family purse. He had handed it over without a twinge of regret, and his empty hands had continued to thrill with pride. Later, he had begged a couple of shillings for himself and Will, and had never thought of the money then or since but as a gift....

They came at last to the dangerous, right-angled turn which dropped them down to the marsh, and as the horse began to jerk itself down the hill a car passed slowly above them along the open road. Although the day still lingered, the tail-light was already lit, as if the car were setting out on a journey instead of going home. Yet it went slowly and almost reluctantly, like a man who looks over his shoulder all the while. It was as if it was only waiting its opportunity to turn itself in its tracks. But all the time it was drifting gradually away, and the red light, that could hardly as yet impress itself on the dusk, seemed to hesitate for a moment at a curve of the road, and then, as if a hand had been clapped in front of it, was suddenly gone.

The drop from the highway was like being dropped from a cliff, so distinct was the change to the loneliness of the marsh. The link was broken which made them members of a purposed line, leaving them mere strayed wanderers of whom nobody was aware. The few farmhouses, lifeless-looking in the deadened light, stared always towards great distances over their puny heads. The few trees sprang up before them, suddenly strange, acquiring an almost violent personality against the meaningless scene.

The straight miles dragged reluctantly past their heavy wheels, and on the unending road they seemed to go forward without purpose and to be set on a journey that had no goal. When at length the stretches of meadow and cropped land gave place to the pale-coloured desert of the sand, there seemed no possible reason why one should cease and the other begin. Away out behind the mist there was a living, moving tide, but here on the marsh there was no consciousness of tide. Things just stopped, that was all, and from the garden became the waste, just as the growth and renewal of life had stopped for the old pair, leaving nothing but desolation before their feet.

Yet still the earth was with them, and Simon turned his eyes again and again to its vague outlines with relief. Across the bay the cone of the Knott still held to its tangibility and form, protesting against the swamping hand of night. The crown of it, fitted with wood as closely as with a cap, was darker against the sky than the shadowy slopes on which the houses climbed. And, nearer inland still, on the low edge of shore that was like a trail of smoke on the farther side of the sands, a blur of formless yet purposeful grey showed where the tiny hamlet of Sandyeat clustered about the 'Ship.'

Sandholes was in sight now, and the horse quickened its pace, triumphing over the last few wearisome yards. As they approached the house, with its white face set on a body of looming buildings behind, they had as always a mingled sensation of sadness and relief. Not that the place was sad to them because of its dreary emptiness set amongst formless fields. In the course of years it had become for them merely an atmosphere, not a thing of sight. They were only depressed by it because for them it was the heart of failure and loss. And in the same way they were relieved by it, dignified, sanctuaried and consoled, because this was their hiding-place against the world, and here the heart of their few memories of joy.