And the Pitfalls of Cupid.
Once more a shifting of sunny lights and purple shadows, of ever-varying colours, of small hamlets nestling by the water-side, each with its pier, its boats, and its many-hued little crowd, as they steamed down the Hardanger fjord towards Eide. Contempt for waterfalls was balanced by joy in the effort of reaching them, and, by dint of swearing to travel night and day until he overtook them again, Colonel Martyn obtained leave from his wife to go off to the Voringfos, and young Grey he dragged reluctantly with him. This threw the others of the party more together, and it seemed necessary for Wareham to offer his services to those who were bereft of their nominal protector. The mid-day meal was taken at the excellent “Mellands” at Eide; afterwards they strolled about in the meadows, and sat under hay-hurdles, in order to allow the great noonday heat to subside, before mounting the steep hill which lay between them and Vossefangen. Anne, indeed, vowed she would not walk, and chose a carriole, as a lighter conveyance; but Mrs Ravenhill and Millie soon jumped out of their stolkjaerre. And what a road it was! High up, a great waterfall hurled itself into a chasm of foam, and while the carriages crawled round zigzags, those on foot could cut off green corners, clambering ever higher into the sweet elastic air, until at the top they rested, breathless, until the cavalcade of patient ponies pulled slowly up, then merrily along the level road to Voss.
Voss is ugly, but friendly. It has a good inn and a well-known landlord, an ancient church with a brown timber spire, a few shops, and a little train, which leisurely trots backwards and forwards to Bergen. Between it and Stalheim lies one of the most beautiful roads in Norway, a road constantly changing, with every variety of river and lake, of waving sorrel-tinted grass, now red, now green, now grey, as the wind kisses it; of distant snowy heights, and nearer sterner hills; here and there a fall, a water-mill, a group of cottages with turf-roofs starred by ox-eyed daisies, and always before you the road running, white, into the far away.
No zigzagged hills, however, and no opportunities for talk except in the halts which come occasionally for the hardy ponies. And once, from Anne’s skydsgut, a little gill of eight or nine years old, with the usual white handkerchief over her head, there rose an agonised wail of “Toi, toi!” Wareham drove up rapidly. Anne’s portmanteau, which also formed the seat of her infant driver, hung threateningly over the edge; there was much hoisting and roping before it was restored to equilibrium.
“No more carrioles for me,” said Anne. “It is too dull. Think of not being able so much as to inveigh against the dust! Apparently it would cause a revolution in the country if you, for instance, were to drive by my side?”
“I don’t pretend to cope with a Norwegian pony and its skydsgut,” answered Wareham, laughing.
He said no more; but, after these words of hers, it might have been noticed that he contrived to keep sufficiently close to exchange remarks, if only in pantomime, and when they halted at Tvinde, it was he who was at hand to help her down from her dusty perch. There was, as usual, a fos to be visited.
“Not worth seeing,” announced Mrs Martyn. “Some one, I forget who, said so.”
“The more reason for going,” Anne insisted. She invited Wareham to accompany her, Mrs Martyn watching their departure with expressive lifting of her eyebrows.
“There is Anne at her usual pastime, making fools of the men,” she said to Mrs Ravenhill. “I thought she had had a lesson, and might be trusted for a time; but it’s in her, it’s in her! If there is no one else, she sets to work upon my husband. Fortunately he’s wood, not wax.”