The House of Egremont

by Molly Elliot Seawell

“Look, Roger, look! was ever anything so lovely, so quaint, so delicious? Oh, this place was meant for happiness!”

When she called him Roger, a look of victory came into his eyes, and he took her hand; he drew her to a window-seat, where they sat down together and looked into each other’s eyes as they had often longed and never dared to before. And presently they averted their eyes and gazed down upon the bright, unquiet water. The roses, which rioted over everything, had dared to cross the bridge from either side, and a great bold red one audaciously climbed into the very window where they sat, and smiled into the two happy faces there. The birds were singing rapturously; the old place had been so quiet and deserted that the birds felt they owned it, but they did not resent the intrusion of another pair of lovers,—it was the mating time of all. The old room itself was charming. Roger called Michelle’s attention to a shelf full of old books; and recognizing a dear friend from whom he had long been parted, he rose and fetched the volume to her. It was Ronsard,—Ronsard, whose poems Roger had recited to her in that never-to-be-forgotten journey,—Ronsard, whose songs he had sung to his guitar. They turned the old, yellow leaves, in quaint black-letter print and antique French, reading a little to each other now and then. There was one little poem about love, and youth, and a sunny sky being all that one could ask in this life. Roger read this to Michelle, and saw her eyes grow dark, and a flush mount to her pale cheek, just as he had seen five years before; and then, suddenly, he burst out with the story of that other volume of Ronsard, which he had thrown on the campfire in the Low Countries.

“I burnt it trying to forget you,” he said.

“But you did not forget me,” Michelle replied softly.

It was very wrong. They had begun to have a suspicion that God had nothing in particular to do with their determination to spend that day together,—but it was only a single day. There could be no great harm in one day of each other’s society,—so they argued to themselves. Never had they had one whole day of each other’s society, and Fate would not soon again be so kind to them. Fate had by that time taken the place of God in the affair. Truly, it was neither God nor Fate, but the devil.

At noonday Marianne gave them a dinner of herbs, which both of them relished as the most delicious meal they had ever eaten, for the same reason that Solomon gave on a similar occasion—there was love therewith. In the afternoon they walked about the small, overgrown, and deserted park and gardens. The place was at all times lonely and secluded, but it had likewise been deserted for many years, and so it gave them a heavenly sense of aloneness. They watched from a moss-grown bench under a great clump of myrtle trees the sun set and the moon rise, and a wind like velvet softly moved the tender leaves. There were roses all about them, and a nightingale sang in the hedge close by. It was late before they returned; but there was no one to question them or make them afraid. They had both dreamed continuously, during five years past, of the bliss of being together. One day of it had far surpassed all their expectations.

The next morning a soft and silvery rain was falling upon the grateful earth. It was impossible to start in such weather,—so said Roger; and Michelle, averting her eyes, said, Yes; it was impossible. Nevertheless, when the sun flickered out, turning the silver rain to gold, they must both go out in the park to see the lovely, dreamlike beauty of the raining and the shining. Toward afternoon a storm came up, and there was heavy thunder and sharp lightning. Michelle was frightened, and cowered on a moth-eaten sofa in one of the remote saloons. Roger sat by her, comforting her, and gently laughing at her terror. The storm continued until evening, when it settled into a steady downpour. It grew cold, and old Pierre made them a morsel of fire in the fireplace of the little room over the bridge, and brought them a couple of candles, and laid their supper on a round table close to the fire.

The little river was now roaring, swollen by the rain, under their feet.

“There will be no travelling to-morrow,” Roger ventured. “The roads will be very heavy. The horses are scarce rested enough to take the road, and, no doubt, all the bridges are washed away.”

Most of this was a lie, and Roger remembered the old saying: “Sin has many tools, but a lie is the handle which fits them all.” Yes, he was lying, and he knew it—and Michelle knew it; but she wished to hear just such lies as that.