It was in this turmoil of "whys" that Nigel's longing for the woods became desperate. He raised himself on his elbow, and stared out at them—Swites Wood, Summer Wood, and the woods of Ashplats and Hackenden. He found himself dreaming of their narrow, soaking paths, of their brown undergrowth, and carpet of dead leaves—he seemed to see the long rows of ash, with here and there a yellow leaf fluttering on a bough. He would go to the woods, he would find rest in their silent thickness.
He sprang out of bed and across the room, with what seemed one movement of his big, graceful body. He lifted his water-jug from the floor, and drank deeply—then he washed himself and put on fresh clothes. He felt clean and cool, and the mere physical sensation gave him new strength and dignity. He went quietly downstairs. Len was up and in the yard, Janet was in the kitchen—but neither saw him as he stole out of the house and up the lane.
He left it soon after passing Wilderwick, and plunged into a field. The grass was covered with frost-crystals, beginning to melt in the lemon glare of the sun. It was a strange, yellow dawn, dream-like, pathetic—a little wind fluttered with it from the east, and smote the hedges into ghostly rustlings. Nigel crept through the pasture as if he feared to wake some one asleep, and entered the first of his woods.
The rim was touched with flame—one or two fiery maples blazed out of the hedge against a background of yellow. Creeping through those golds and scarlets into the sober browns was symbolic. He went a few steps, then flung himself down upon the leaves. On the top they were dry, underneath he felt and smelt their gracious dampness.
The fires in his heart seemed to die. He felt bruises where Len had struck him, but they galled him no longer; the half-forgotten peace and liberty of other days was beginning to drift like a shower into his breast. Why could he not live always in the woods, instead of among people whom he hurt and who hurt him, though he loved them and they loved him? There was no love in the woods—love had passed out of them in September, leaving them very quiet, very peaceful, in a great brown hush of sleep. Love was what hurt in life—love and brains; take away these and you take away suffering. Oh, if love and thought could go together out of his life as they had gone out of the woods—and leave him in a great brown hush of sleep.
For nearly an hour he lay in the brake, hidden by golden tangles of bracken and stiff clumps of tansy. He had begun to drowse, and capture rags of happiness in dreams, when suddenly he heard a rustling in the bushes. Hang it all! He could not have peace, even in the woods. The rustling came nearer, and he heard the panting of a dog—with a mumbled oath he sat up in the fern.
"Oh!..."
Nigel's head and shoulders were not a reassuring sight to confront one suddenly on a lonely woodland walk, and though Tony did not scream her voice was full of alarm. At first Nigel did not recognise her, she stirred up in him merely impersonal feelings of annoyance, but the next moment he seemed to see her face in a glow of lamplight on East Grinstead platform. This was the lone girl-kid he had befriended—and thought no more of since then.
"I beg your pardon," he said hastily, scrambling to his feet, "I'm afraid I startled you."
"Oh, no"—she looked awkward and embarrassed. "You're Mr. Smith, aren't you?"