It was too soon to think that. It was too upheaving.
He rose quickly to his feet, saying, half under his breath, but loud enough for her to hear, "It's odd--it's all odd."
And she knew what he meant.
IV
The bay at Bridnorth is inclosed by two headlands of sandy stone. That to the east rises irregularly with belts of pine wood and sea-bent oaks, opening later in heathered moors that stretch in broad plateaus, then sink to sheltered hollows where one farm at least lies hidden in its clump of trees.
It is always a romantic world, that land which lies to the cliff edge beside the sea. The man who farms it is forever at close grips with the elements. He wrestles with Nature as those inland with their screening hedgerows have little knowledge of. The hawthorn and the few scattered trees that grow, all are trained by the prevailing winds into fantastic shapes no hand of man can regulate. Sheep may do well upon those windy pastures, but the cattle, ever at hiding in the hollows, wear a weather-beaten look. Crops are hazardous ventures and, like the sower, scattering his grain, must plant their feet full firmly in the soil if they would stand until their harvest time against the winds that sweep up from the sea.
Up through the belt of pine wood and across the heathered moors, Mary came often those days with her friend. The views from countless places called for his brush. Once she had brought him there to show him her Devon, he sought the golf links no more. They never played their final match.
On the first two occasions of their excursions beyond Penlock Hill, he painted assiduously. Mary brought a book and read. Long whiles between her reading she watched him, smiling, when, with almost childish distress, he assured her he had done pictures that at least were worth glancing at in a portfolio, if not a permanent frame.
For either it was, as in the first instance, that the atmosphere of a strange country defeated him and tricked his sense of color, or his mind was bent on other things, but both days were fruitless of results. On each of these occasions, as before, he threw the sketches down, unfinished, and fretted at his lack of skill.
"This Devon of yours," said he, "has got more color than I can get out of my box. What really is the matter is that it has more color than I've got in my eyes. If it's not in your eyes, it's not in your box. You can't squeeze a green field out of a tube of oxide of chromium. Paint's only the messenger between you and Nature."