[ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]

get married in the spring. He and I and Elspeth set to work to get the house all shining and polished
and ready for the wedding. And I worked hard at my embroidery. I had already made Sir Benjamin
a beautiful waistcoat, a pale blue one embroidered in yellow and crimson because those are the sun
colors that he likes, and now I started on another for our wedding. And I made my own trousseau
dresses and my wedding dress. And then, Maria, one spring evening just before our wedding day, I
did a very stupid thing."
"I can guess exactly what you did," said Maria. "By that time the little tower room was so
overflowing with pink geraniums that there was scarcely an inch of space where you could put
another pot, and so one day when Sir Benjamin was out riding you brought them all down and filled
the house with them."
"That's exactly what I did," said Loveday. "Especially I filled the parlor with them, for Old Parson
was coming to supper and I wanted to make it look as gay as I could. And I put on one of my
trousseau dresses--a pink one. And I decorated the supper table with pink flowers. Old Elspeth, had
she seen what I had done, would perhaps have told me not to, but she was not well and had gone to
bed early. Marmaduke Scarlet came and scolded me, but I hate being scolded, and so I would not
listen to him. And then Old Parson arrived for supper. And then, rather late, because he had been
delayed out riding, Sir Benjamin arrived, and saw what I had done."
"What did he say?" demanded Maria.
139
"He didn't say anything then," said Loveday, "because Old Parson was there. He played the
courteous host all the evening, but I could see that he was very angry. And I think Old Parson saw it
too, because to make things easier after supper he asked me to play and sing to them and I sang a
song that had been written by some Merry weather centuries ago, and that Sir Benjamin liked
because the girl in the song reminded him of me."
"Yes," whispered Maria to herself. "I know that song."
"But he didn't seem to like it that night," said Love day, "and when Old Parson had gone he told me
exactly what he thought of me. He has the Merryweather temper, you know, even though he is so
sunny and genial, and when he was a young man he could behave like a roaring lion. And he raged
and stormed that night until his anger nearly lifted the roof off. He said that I had insulted the
memory of his saintly mother and that I was not worthy to follow in her footsteps. And he said
other things that made me very angry, so that I said hard things too. Among other things I said that
his mother had not been a saint at all but a very wicked woman to be so severe with a little girl as
she had been with me over my love of pink. And no saint hates geraniums, I said.
Saints love all the flowers that God has made, especially the salmon pink geraniums of Cornwall,
because God never made lovelier flowers than those. And at that Sir Benjamin picked up all the
pots of geraniums within reach and flung them out of the window into the rose garden."
"And what did you do?" demanded Maria.
"I went up to my tower room and I took off the silk dress I had on and put on a walking dress. And I
wrote a little note to old Elspeth, my governess, saying that I was going away for ever but that I
would be quite safe and she wasn't to worry, and I slipped it under her bedroom door. And then
when it was quite dark and the house was quiet I took a big workbag that I had and I crept out of the
house and into the rose garden, and I gathered up out of the wreckage of their smashed pots all the
geranium plants that I could manage to find in the darkness and filled my bag with them, and then I
walked through the park and out through the tunnel and the big door and up the road that leads out
of the valley. I walked all night and when the dawn came I found myself out in a world that I did
not know at all, and it seemed like a foreign country to me, and I felt very strange and forlorn in it.
But I did not weaken or turn back. I followed the road to the market town and knocked at the door
of the first nice-looking house I came to and asked if they would take me as a maid servant. And
they did. And the son of the house, a young lawyer, fell in love with me on sight, and I married him
140
as soon as it could possibly be arranged, because he was kind and I liked him, and in my pride and
anger I wanted to put it beyond Sir Benjamin's power to get me back again."
"Did he try to get you back again?" asked Maria.
"Yes, he did. He and Old Parson and Elspeth did not rest until they had discovered where I was, and
Sir Benjamin sent Old Parson to tell me that he would forgive me and take me back again. But he
did not come himself. I expect he was still too hurt and proud and angry. And he did not send any [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]