“I am glad to hear it. I don’t like the crape fashion in the very least. It is a shame to cover up your face when it looks so pretty with the grey hair above it.”
“Ah, you must see a great change in me, John. My hair has got very grey during the last two years, and my sight is failing me too. I am quite the old woman already.”
“Not at all! Besides, you will be getting young again presently. You must wear glasses; they are an improvement to most people. And as for grey hair, what does that matter? Everybody knows that it means many things besides old age.”
“I am old, though, older than my years.”
“Poor little mother; you have had plenty to make you so; but you will soon feel better. Is not this a beautiful morning! And you cannot guess how glad I am to be at home with you. I used to read some poetry when I was away about ‘England’s primrose meadow paths,’ and try to remember what they looked like. It is a very agreeable change to see them. This is a cosy little wood.”
They were wending their way through the spinney, and the scent of the spring flowers was very sweet. The air, too, was full of music, for the birds were singing, and the chiming of the bells came nearer with every step they took. Now and then a thrush or blackbird sang to them as they passed, a squirrel sprang among the trees, and the rabbits scuttled across the path. The whole scene was so peaceful and lovely that John Dallington felt like taking his hat off in instinctive reverence for the beauty by which he was surrounded. He did not want to talk, and his mother seemed equally willing to be silent. Indeed, the finest sermon that could have been preached to the young man was finding its way into his heart as he walked toward the church that morning.
But when they emerged from the wood, and after crossing a meadow reached the high road, his thoughts were at once interrupted. The village of Darentdale was only a small one, and every individual in it knew that the young squire had come home to claim his own. There had been much talking of neighbours about him, and the liveliest interest was excited by his appearance. As he and his mother passed the scattered houses, faces peeped from the windows, and doors were softly opened to enable the occupants of the cottages to have a longer look at Mrs. Hunter and her son. Every one who passed glanced at the young man’s face, with an expression first of curiosity, and then of confidence and pleasure. In these days the villagers are not too much given to the “old-fashioned practice of saluting their betters”: they do not think that they have any; but on this Sunday morning all the women seemed inclined to remember their manners of the old style, and there was not a man who did not touch or raise his hat as they passed. It was all very agreeable to John Dallington, and the genial, hearty way in which he returned each salutation had the effect of at once favourably impressing his neighbours.
“He’ll do, won’t he? Eh!” said a man who was leaning over his garden gate.
“Oh, ah! he’ll do fine,” replied another, taking his pipe from his mouth for a moment. “He’s growed into a very likely lad, has he, and we shall do better with him nor we did with t’other.”
“That’s my ’pinion also. He looks like a fine young Englishman, though he have been a-living in foreign parts.”