" He put down the cat with a kiss. "Good-bye,
Mimi," he said; "remember me, I beseech you!" and he hurried away.
Howard sat still for a minute or two, looking at the fire; then he
gave a laugh, got up, stretched himself, and went out for a walk.
Even so quiet a thing as a walk was not unattended by a certain
amount of ceremonial. Howard passed some six or seven men of his
acquaintance, some of whom presented a stick or raised a stiff hand
without a smile or indeed any sign of recognition; one went so far
as to say, "Hullo, Kennedy!" and one eager conversationalist went
so far as to say, "Out for a walk?" Howard pushed on, walking
lightly and rapidly, and found himself at last at Barton, one of
those entirely delightful pastoral villages that push up so close
to Cambridge on every side; a vague collection of quaint irregular
cottages, whitewashed and thatched, with bits of green common
interspersed, an old manorial farm with its byres and ricks,
surrounded by a moat fringed with little pollarded elms. The plain
ancient tower of the church looked gravely out over all. In the
distance, over pastoral country, rose low wolds, pleasantly shaped,
skirted with little hamlets, surrounded by orchards; the old
untroubled necessary work of the world flows on in these fields and
villages, peopled with lives hardly conscious of themselves, with
no aims or theories, just toiling, multiplying, dying, existing, it
would seem, merely to feed and clothe the more active part of the
world.
Pages:
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
26
27
28
29
30
31
32
33