It seemed to him incredible that departure should be so simple. When you are taking the most momentous step of your life, surely there should be dragons in the way! Here were no dragons. As he went down the High Street people smiled at him and waved hands. The town sparkled under the afternoon sun. It was market-day, and the old fruit-woman under the green umbrella, the toy-man with the clockwork monkeys, the flower-stalls and the vegetable-sellers, all these were here; in the centre of the square, sheep and pigs were penned. Dogs were barking, stout farmers in corduroy breeches walked about arguing and expectorating, and suddenly, above all the clamour and bustle, the Cathedral chimes struck the hour.
He hastened then, striding up Orange Street, past the church and the monument on the hill, through hedges thick with flowers, until he struck off into the Drymouth Road. With every step that he took he stirred child memories. He reached the signpost that pointed to Drymouth, to Clinton St. Mary, to Polchester. This was the landmark that he used to reach with his nurse on his walks. Further than this she, a stout, puffing woman, would never go. He had known that a little way on there was Rocket Wood, a place beloved by him ever since they had driven there for a picnic in the jingle, and he had found it all spotted gold under the fir-trees, thick with moss and yellow with primroses. How many fights with his nurse he had had over that! he clinging to the signpost and screaming that he would go on to the Wood, she picking him up at last and carrying him back down the road.
He went on into the wood now and found it again spotted with gold, although it was too late for primroses. It was all soft and dark with pillars of purple light that struck through the fretted blue, and the dark shadows of the leaves. All hushed and no living thing--save the hesitating patter of some bird among the fir-cones. He struck through the wood and came out on to the Common. You could smell the sea finely here--a true Glebeshire smell, fresh and salt, full of sea-pinks and the westerly gales. On the top of the Common he paused and looked back. He knew that from here you had your last view of the Cathedral.
Often in his school holidays he had walked out here to get that view. He had it now in its full glory. When he was a boy it had seemed to him that the Cathedral was like a giant lying down behind the hill and leaning his face on the hill-side. So it looked now, its towers like ears, the great East window shining, a stupendous eye, out over the bending wind-driven country. The sun flashed upon it, and the towers rose grey and pearl- coloured to heaven. Mightily it looked across the expanse of the moor, staring away and beyond Falk's little body into some vast distance, wrapped in its own great dream, secure in its mighty memories, intent upon its secret purposes.
Indifferent to man, strong upon its rock, hiding in its heart the answer to all the questions that tortured man's existence--and yet, perhaps, aware of man's immortality, scornful of him for making so slight a use of that--but admiring him, too, for the tenacity of his courage and the undying resurgence of his hope.
Falk, a black dot against the sweep of sky and the curve of the dark soil, vanished from the horizon.
Chapter VII
Brandon Puts on His Armour
Brandon was not surprised when, on the morning after Falk's escape, his son was not present at family prayers. That was not a ceremony that Falk had ever appreciated. Joan was there, of course, and just as the Archdeacon began the second prayer Mrs. Brandon slipped in and took her place.
After the servants had filed out and the three were alone, Mrs. Brandon, with a curious little catch in her voice, said: