The Little White Horse (20 page)

‘I’ll show you how,’ said Old Parson. ‘Come to the church very early tomorrow morning, at the hour when the children are playing there, and you and I and the children will all go up to Paradise Hill together and give it back to God. But there’s another thing that you must do, Maria, and you must do it tonight.’

‘Yes?’ asked Maria.

‘Sir Benjamin makes a lot of money out of selling the wool that grows on the backs of those sheep of his that he keeps on Paradise Hill, but if the hill is to be given back to God then after tomorrow morning the wool is God’s wool, not Sir Benjamin’s. You must explain that to him.’

Maria looked at him a little doubtfully. ‘Couldn’t
you
explain it?’ she asked. ‘You could walk home with me now.’

‘I could not,’ said Old Parson firmly. ‘I shall be much occupied for the rest of the evening. Now you’d better go home, Maria, for it’s getting dark and you don’t want to be out by yourself in the park in the dark.’

Maria got up at once. She certainly did not. Alone in the dark was a state of affairs she did not relish with the Men from the Dark Woods about. When Old Parson had shut his front door behind her and she saw how much darker it had grown while she had been with him, she felt downright frightened. He might have come with her, she thought. He might have come with her to look after her . . . And what was that great shadow there, outside the gate? Was it one of Them? . . .

She gave a little stifled cry of fear, which changed midway to a cry of joy, as the supposed Man lifted a tail and waved it in the air, and she saw that the shadowy shape was Wrolf. She went down the garden path, patted his great head, and marvelled to think that once she had been afraid of him. And then together they went down the village street, and through the broken gate into the park.

That walk through the park with Wrolf was a thing that Maria never forgot. It was almost dark now, and had she
been alone she would have been afraid, but with Wrolf pacing along beside her, the embodiment of courage and strength, she felt as safe as houses. She walked slowly, the fingers of one hand twisted in his great furry ruff, and smelt the sweet scents of wet earth and flowers and moss, and lifted her head to watch for the first pricking forth of the stars in the sky above the treetops.

It was so still after the storm that she could hear a dog barking miles away and the rustle of birds going to bed. Now and then she looked up the shadowy glades on each side of her, but not with any sense of expectation, only to think how beautiful they were. She did not really expect to see the little white horse now, because she had looked for him so often and had never seen him again. Sometimes she wondered if she ever
had
seen him, or if what she had seen on the first night had been only a stray moonbeam.

No, it wasn’t because of anything that she saw that that walk home was so lovely. It was because of Wrolf. Since this afternoon there seemed a new and very strong bond between them. She thought he was pleased because of what she and Robin had decided to try to do. He wanted her to succeed and not to fail like the other Moon Maidens. He did not want her to have to leave Moonacre Manor. Perhaps he did not want to have to leave it himself? For it seemed that the tawny dog always had to go back to the pine-wood when the Moon Maiden quarrelled with her lover. It was as though he were a sort of picture of the fine qualities of Moonacre men — strong and brave, loving, warm and ruddy — so that when the Moon Maiden parted with her man she had to part with the tawny dog too.

And the little white horse, Maria thought suddenly, had all the Moon Maiden qualities, the white beauty, the shining purity, the still pride. Only the tawny dog and the little white horse had a perfection to which individual sun and moon Merryweathers would never attain . . . They were ideals . . . It was because of these thoughts that went through her head, as well as because Wrolf was so pleased
with her, that Maria so enjoyed that walk home.

It was not until they were in sight of the manor-house, and she saw a light shining out from her tower window, as though someone had lit a light there to guide her home, that she suddenly wondered whether Sir Benjamin and Miss Heliotrope were dreadfully anxious about her. She was very penitent, for she had not given a thought to them for hours.

‘Quick, Wrolf,’ she said, tugging at his ruff. ‘Hurry! Hurry!’

But Wrolf refused to be hurried, and gazing up into her face he gave her a reassuring look . . . He knew they were not anxious.

And when they reached the lighted hall the spectacle presented by Sir Benjamin and Miss Heliotrope, seated at the table in front of the fire devouring pork chops and onions, baked apples, and custard, while Wiggins and Serena lapped bread and milk from bowls set upon the hearth, was not one that suggested anxiety.

‘Safe home,’ said Sir Benjamin, but not as though he had doubted that she would be. And he was wearing his best waistcoat, she noticed, the one embroidered with yellow roses and crimson carnations, and his great ruby ring. People don’t bother to put on their best clothes when they are anxious.

‘You’re late, dear,’ said Miss Heliotrope, but not as though she minded.

In spite of the big tea she had eaten Maria found that her Merryweather appetite was still functioning quite nicely, and she was sorry to see that Sir Benjamin, who had been concentrating upon the pork and onions, had left very little for her to concentrate upon, and that Miss Heliotrope, before whose place the baked apples and custard had been set, was evidently not suffering from indigestion tonight. But she need not have worried, for the kitchen door now opened a crack and the heads of Marmaduke Scarlet and Zachariah the cat appeared one above the other in the aperture.

‘Should the young Mistress and the dog Wrolf deign once more to enter my humble apartment they will find within it two small collations designed respectively for the satisfaction of the inward cravings of a high-born young female and her faithful canine attendant,’ said Marmaduke.

Maria and Wrolf deigned, with speed. The kitchen, lighted by the glow of the great fire, was gloriously cosy. The canary, as yet uneaten by Zachariah, was singing lustily. On the table was set a roasted pigeon in a silver dish, an apple dumpling, and a pot of cream. On the floor was a huge mutton bone. Wrolf fell to without more ado, but Maria, though her supper smelled so delicious that it set her nose quivering like a rabbit’s, went first to the wide hearth and looked in the ashes.

Yes, there was another series of pictures drawn there. First came a picture of Serena, leaping along on three legs, her ears streaming behind her with the wind of her going, then came once again that outline of the sickle moon that stood for herself, and then the outlines of two small square solid houses such as a child draws.

Maria laughed out loud in delight. Serena had brought the message and Zachariah had written it on the hearth. ‘Serena says Maria is safe as houses.’

‘Oh, clever Serena!’ cried Maria. ‘And clever Zachariah!’

Zachariah walked round and round her in circles, his tail held as usual in three coils over his back, pressing against her skirts, and purred and purred and purred.

But the discovery of the pictures on the hearth was not the last of Maria’s discoveries that day. There was still one more to come.

When she had finished her delicious supper and gone back to the hall she found it empty, but candlelight shining from beneath the parlour door told her where
she would find everybody. And there they all four were, Wiggins and Serena sleeping before the fire and Sir Benjamin and Miss Heliotrope beside them, seated one on each side of the small table that usually stood against the wall with the chessmen and workbox upon it . . .

And they were playing chess . . . Those frozen chessmen were being used again at last. The little red dogs and white horses were prancing over the black and white squares, and the kings and queens and knights and bishops were all drawn up in battle array, and they were not frozen any more. In the glow of the firelight and candlelight they were made not of ivory but of opal and pearl. They were alive.

‘Oh!’ cried Maria in delight. ‘You’re using the chessmen again!’

Sir Benjamin looked up, and Maria saw that his face was redder than ever and that his brown eyes had a very startled expression in them, as though he were doing something that he had never expected to find himself doing again.

‘I haven’t played chess for more than twenty years,’ he said hoarsely. ‘I used to play chess with — well — that’s an old story.’

‘Whatever made you do it now?’ demanded Maria.

‘When we came into the room they looked so unused,’ said Sir Benjamin. ‘Not like the harpsichord, which looks somehow quite different since you came. Before I knew what I was saying, I had suggested to Miss Heliotrope that we should have a game.’

‘Where’s the workbox?’ demanded Maria. ‘The workbox that stood on the table beside the chessmen? That’s unused too. What have you done with the workbox?’

‘Was there a workbox?’ asked Sir Benjamin vaguely.

Miss Heliotrope gazed about her over the top of her spectacles. ‘I think I put it on the floor somewhere,’ she said.

‘On the floor!’ exclaimed Maria indignantly. Then she saw it down in the corner and pounced on it.
‘If you’re using the chessmen, I’m going to use the workbox,’ she said.

‘Certainly, my dear,’ said Sir Benjamin. But he was intent on the game, and she doubted if he had heard what she said. Nevertheless, she had his permission, the permission to open the workbox that had not been given her the other day. She carried it over to the window-seat, sat down and held it for a little while in her lap, sniffing the lovely faint scent of the cedarwood. Then she lifted the lid and looked inside.

The box was lined with quilted ivory satin, and fastened against the inside of the lid by loops in the satin were a beautiful little silver thimble and a pair of scissors. Inside the box was a half-finished piece of embroidery, neatly folded. Maria took it out and unfolded it, and it was a waistcoat of white satin embroidered with white moon-daisies with yellow centres like little suns, each daisy backed by green leaves so that it showed up against the white satin. It was nearly finished. There were only a few leaves not yet completed.

Maria set the workbox on the seat beside her, and spread the waistcoat out on her lap. Then she looked across at Sir Benjamin, sitting opposite her, too absorbed in his chess to notice what she was doing. The candlelight gleamed upon the beautiful embroidered waistcoat he was wearing. Maria looked from one piece of work to the other. The flowers were different, but the design was the same. One could not doubt that the same hand had worked them both — and — and — yes — the same stitches had been used in the embroidery of the flowers upon the lavender bags that Loveday had made for Miss Heliotrope . . . Loveday had worked both these waistcoats.

Maria sat very still, thinking very hard. The waistcoat in her lap looked, she thought, as though it had been made of the same satin as the wedding dress that she had been wearing only that afternoon. It looked as though it, too, had been made for a wedding. Moon-daisies with centres
like yellow suns. Moon and sun.

Suddenly she remembered something Marmaduke Scarlet had said on the day she had first visited him in the kitchen and he had praised Miss Heliotrope. ‘A distinct improvement upon the other duenna who resided here once before with the other young mistress.’

And then she remembered what Loveday had said about old Elspeth, who had once lived at the manor-house, but had quarrelled with Marmaduke and refused to live there any more. Sir Benjamin had made her porteress, and then she had quarrelled with him too. But she must have been friends with Loveday, for Loveday had known when she died and had taken her place in the gatehouse inside the hill.

Maria suddenly saw it all. Her curiosity was satisfied. Loveday as a girl had lived here with her governess, even as she, Maria, was living here now with hers. And Loveday and her governess had driven about in the little pony-carriage. And Loveday had ridden Periwinkle and loved Wrolf. And she would have married Sir Benjamin, but they quarrelled, and she went away. Maria remembered that Old Parson, when she had breakfast with him, had talked about the tune that Maria had liberated from the harpsichord, and said: ‘It must have been the last one she played before she shut the harpsichord. Yes, I remember that she played it that night. It was her last night at the manor. That was twenty years ago.’

Maria had not known then who he was talking about. It was Loveday, of course. Loveday and Sir Benjamin had quarrelled that night and Loveday had gone away to the town beyond the hills and married the lawyer, Robin’s father, instead . . . And Wrolf had gone back to the pine-woods . . . But she loved this valley so much that when her husband died she had to come back to it.

But she had been too proud to let Sir Benjamin know she had come back, too proud to try to make it up. What had Sir Benjamin and Loveday quarrelled about, Maria wondered? Whatever it was, it was time they made it
up, now that Sir Benjamin’s and Marmaduke’s dislike of women had been slightly mollified by the good behaviour of herself and Miss Heliotrope.

‘I must make them make it up,’ said Maria to herself with great determination.

But first there was Paradise Hill to give back to God. That was the next thing. Maria folded up the waistcoat and put it away, tucked the workbox under her arm, and went quietly towards the tower stairs. For she must go to bed early because she had to be up early in the morning for her next adventure. There was, however, one more thing that must be done before bed.

With her hand on the latch of the tower door she said in commanding tones, ‘Sir Benjamin! Sir!’

Her relative looked up, considerably startled, for never before had he been addressed in his own house in quite such a royal manner.

‘Sir Benjamin,’ said Maria, ‘you have no right to the money that you get from selling the wool that is sheared from the backs of the sheep you keep on Paradise Hill.’

‘Indeed, Maria!’ ejaculated Sir Benjamin. ‘And why not, pray?’