Bleak moors, seamed by dark gullies, enclose Netherdale, and a river, leaping from the peat, breaks on whinstone ledges and plunges into alder-shaded pools. Where the valley widens, larch woods roll up the slopes and Netherhall and its oaks occupy a flat round which the water curves. The house is old and dignified, and belonged to Mrs. Alan Carson. The Carsons were ironmasters, but when Alan married he sold his foundry. For some time the business had not prospered, and Alan was glad to let it go. He was cautious and hesitating, and when he faced obstacles he went another way. As a rule, since his marriage, the way was Mrs. Carson’s way.
Four or five hours after Kit left the shipyard, he sat in the grass at Netherhall by Evelyn Haigh’s basket chair. He smoked a cigarette and sometimes he talked, but for the most part he was content to look about and study Evelyn. The picture was attractive. For a background, old oaks, tufted by shaggy moss, rolled down to the stream. The leaves were touched by the coppery gleams that mark the oak when summer is young, and blue shadows lurked among the trunks.
Evelyn’s clothes were white, but her shady hat and her belt were yellow. Her hair was black; her face was small, rather thin and finely molded. She was lightly built and her pose was graceful, but her mouth was firm and sometimes her look was calculating. Kit, however, did not notice things like that.
He rested his back against a tree and let himself go slack. The afternoon was hot, and but for the splash of the river, all was quiet.
“You look tired, Kit,” Evelyn remarked.
“I expect I’m lazy. All the same, at the office we were pretty strenuously occupied, and I was keen about the boiler. Now the boat has run her trial, I feel I’m entitled to relax, and when one wants to loaf I don’t know a better spot than Netherhall.”
Evelyn agreed. Slanted sunbeams pierced the shade and touched springing fern and the velvet grass where rabbits fed. Outside the thin wood, a lily-pool in the wide lawn reflected dazzling light, and the sun was on the old house’s front. The stone was stained by lichens, and yellow roses climbed the wall. One smelt flowers and heard the languid hum of bees.
“But the boat’s steaming fast was your triumph,” Evelyn resumed. “Then did you not get a reward?”
“I got fifty pounds a year extra pay and thought myself fortunate!”
“The company is not very generous,” said Evelyn, and laughed. “Sometimes I feel your part, like mine, is rather a joke. You labor at the shipyard for ridiculous pay, but when you visit at Netherhall you fish and shoot and drive expensive cars. Your aunt and my mother rule the dale, but when nobody is about we use stern economy. You don’t, Kit——” She stopped, and touching the little yellow jewel on her neck, resumed: “In fact, I feel you’re rashly extravagant.”
“To buy keen satisfaction is not extravagant, and when I see you wear my present I know the investment’s sound. Anyhow, Mrs. Haigh would not allow me to give you a ring.”
Evelyn blushed. Kit was not her acknowledged lover, and Mrs. Haigh declared that before they talked about his marrying Evelyn he must be able to support a wife.
“Mother is very firm, but I think we’ll let it go. Well, if you are not extravagant, you certainly are generous. You sister wanted a wrist-watch, and she has got the watch!”
“Oh, well. Not long since, a pal at the yard paid his debt, and since I didn’t expect to be paid, I thought I was entitled to use the money.”
“I don’t know if you’re logical, Kit. If you did not expect to be paid, why did you lend?”
“As a rule, I hate to be logical,” Kit rejoined. “You see, Tom’s pay is small and the girl he wanted to marry lost her post and could not get another. She had no home and her savings melted. Then relations in New Zealand sent money for her ticket and urged her to join them; but if she went it looked as if she must go for good....” Kit stopped and resumed in a thoughtful voice: “Sometimes one must take a plunge, and Mabel’s pluck was fine. She married Tom, and although their fight was hard, now he’s patenting a useful invention, I think their troubles are over.”
“Ah,” said Evelyn, “perhaps pluck is the greatest quality! So long as one is not afraid, one is not tempted to shabbiness; but after all, the risk your friends ran was daunting, and I’m not very brave.”
Kit’s mouth got tight. Evelyn’s color came and went, and he knew she was moved. She, like him, was young, and passion and adventure called. Perhaps, if he used a strong effort he might carry her away. For all that, Kit knew he must not do so. He did not see Evelyn happy at a flat like Blake’s, and to picture her saving the pennies for the stove was ridiculous. Besides, he had agreed that he must get a proper post.
“Oh, well,” he said, “I expect Tom’s luck was rather remarkable, and his plunge might have cost him and Mabel much. Besides, we agreed we would not be rash.”
Evelyn gave him a strange look, and he doubted if she altogether approved his resignation. To know he had taken the proper line was not much comfort. Then Evelyn smiled.
“What did you buy for yourself? Since you got the money, I expect you bought something,” she said in a careless voice.
Kit played up. “I bought a fiddle bow at a second-hand shop. A pretty good example of a fine old maker’s workmanship. In fact, I think the dealer didn’t know the treasure he had.”
“Then, you did not enlighten him?” said Evelyn, and laughed. “I like to feel you can sometimes conquer your scruples. But suppose the dealer was cleverer than you thought? Don’t they fake old fiddle bows?”
“I’m a shipyard draftsman, and you don’t cheat a fellow who uses scientific tools.”
“It’s possible,” Evelyn agreed. “At all events, I imagine one does not cheat your Uncle Jasper.”
Kit looked up. An old gentleman crossed the grass and stopped a few yards off. Jasper Carson was tall and thin. His hair and brows were white, and his face was lined. His dress was careless and his look, as a rule, ironically humorous, but one got a hint of force. He gave Evelyn a rather baffling smile and said to Kit:
“Loafing after your recent efforts?”
“My efforts were pretty strenuous, sir. Then, on a summer afternoon, loafing has some charm.”
Jasper’s glance rested on Evelyn. His look was inscrutable, but Kit thought hers got harder, as if she knew him antagonistic.
“In the circumstances, perhaps it’s justifiable. You may think my statement strange, Miss Haigh, but long ago I was romantic, and when the days were golden we studied Tennyson. His verses harmonized with old English houses and ancestral trees, but the oaks at Netherhall are not the Carsons’ oaks and will certainly not be Kit’s. Harry’s claim is first and his type’s the landlord type.”
Evelyn sensed a sneer. Harry Ledward was Mrs. Carson’s relation.
“Tennyson is out-of-date, and we are modern,” she rejoined. “Kit talked about a steamship boiler and I was not bored.”
“Kit’s an optimist,” Jasper remarked, and turned to his nephew. “The Mariposa made a first-class trial run, but perhaps you ought to wait until the other boat has steamed across the measured marks.”
“I’m not anxious. The other boat’s no doubt a good boat, but she has not our boiler. In the meantime, it’s not important, and although you banter me about loafing, it doesn’t look as if you were very much engaged.”
“Netherhall is soothing,” Jasper agreed. “Still I’m not altogether slack. Sometimes I ponder and sometimes I plan.”
He went off, and Kit’s eyes twinkled. “Jasper’s plans work, and his obvious duty is to plan for me. All the same, if he wants to send me to Canada, I doubt if I’ll go. He has much to do with Canadian engineering and bridge-building works, but I’m satisfied to stop in the Old Country.”
“He’s your friend; I doubt if he is mine,” said Evelyn. “I like Alan Carson better.”
“Alan is a very good sort, but when you doubt Jasper you exaggerate. All who know you are your friends.”
“I wonder——” said Evelyn in a thoughtful voice. “But, if you’re not too languid, let’s go to the waterside and see where the big trout rise.”
Kit got up and they went to the river, but he felt the tranquillity he had enjoyed was gone. Although he declared Evelyn exaggerated, Jasper had disturbed the brooding calm.
In the evening Kit leaned against the terrace wall and tuned a violin. The long drawing-room window was open, and his sister, Agatha, struck a note on the piano. The evening was hot and the light had begun to go. One smelt wet grass and flowers touched by dew. In the gloom the river throbbed.
Evelyn, Mrs. Haigh, and Mrs. Carson occupied a bench. Mrs. Haigh was short, alert and resolute. Her lips were thin, and when she pondered her mouth got tight. Although she was rather important at Netherdale, she was not rich. Mrs. Carson was tall and dignified. She sprang from old land-owning stock; Netherhall was hers, and she ruled her husband. Alan Carson, on the terrace steps, smoked a cigar. His skin was red, he was rather fat, and dully urbane. Since his marriage he was satisfied to potter about his wife’s small estate.
“The Spanish fellow’s music,” said Kit, going to the window. “Try to follow me; I mayn’t stick to the score.”
Agatha struck a few notes and Kit’s bow touched the strings. He used double stops and the strange chords disturbed Evelyn. When the chords melted in melancholy arpeggios she set her mouth. She felt the man who stopped the strings was a man she did not know, and she liked to think she knew her lover. She was very quiet. All were quiet, for Kit’s playing on the terrace was justified. The music was not for the Victorian drawing-room, but it harmonized with the dark woods and throbbing river. By and by Kit turned to the others and laughed.
“Well? Do you like it?”
“I do not,” said Mrs. Carson. “What did you play?”
“A Spanish muleteer’s song, but I expect the air was known in the desert before the Moors conquered Spain and the singers were vagabond Bedouin. The people who built Netherhall and planted the oaks would not have much use for music like that.”
“I expect that is so,” Mrs. Carson agreed, and added meaningly: “Your business is to build ships.”
“Oh, well,” said Kit, “the strongest ships we build are soon out of date, but Netherhall has stood for three hundred years. In the morning the Bedouin strikes his tent and drives his camels to another well. The muleteer loads up his wine-skins and takes the road. He has no house; I dare say the mules are a moneylender’s, and all he owns he wears. All the same, he sings and sometimes he dances....” He signed his sister. “Let’s try the Sevillana.”
Agatha touched the piano and Kit began to play. He plucked the strings, and when he used the bow the double stops rang like harmonized guitars. Evelyn felt moved to dance and calm was rather hard. The music was exotic and marked by a touch of melancholy, but it fired her blood. As a rule, she hated to be moved, and she wanted Kit to stop. By and by he did so and carried his violin to the drawing-room.
“Thank you, Agatha; they have had enough,” he said, and laughed a careless laugh. “I don’t know about my playing, but the bow I bought is good. A straight stick and a fine spring; the old Frenchman knew his job.”
Agatha Carson came down the iron steps. She was tall and went quietly, but she was sister at a famous hospital, and her calm carried a hint of command.
“Your composer’s mood is strange, Kit,” she said.
“I expect his mood was his ancestors’ mood and they were romantic vagabonds. You get a sense of a sombre background, but it did not bother them. They owned nothing; so long as they could sing and dance, they did not want much. Perhaps their philosophy was sound.”
“It is not our philosophy, and poverty is not a joke,” Mrs. Haigh remarked.
“To see the joke implies some pluck,” Kit agreed. “Spaniards and Moors are fatalists; but I expect you feel one ought to be resigned. One ought to fight for all one can get?”
“The Anglo-Saxons are gatherers and builders,” Mrs. Carson observed. “Our aim is permanence and stability. The things we get we make better. For example, Netherdale was a dreary bog, but we turned the floods by dykes; we drained and planted and built——”
“Your work stands,” said Jasper Carson. “Netherdale’s a noble monument, but it cost three hundred years’ effort. Something of a job!”
Evelyn looked up, for she had not heard Jasper arrive. He leaned against the wall and smiled, but she knew his humor was generally stern.
“Sometimes the Anglo-Saxons used another plan; they took the goods others gathered,” he resumed. “At the beginning Frisians and Danes sharpened their battle-axes and drove the long galleys for the Humber and the Wash. In later days their descendants steered for the Spanish Main. The tradition is, Netherhall folk bought ships, and although they carried little abroad, they brought rich cargoes back. Perhaps Kit is their type; I doubt if he’s a gatherer.”
“Kit does not spring from Netherhall stock,” said Mrs. Carson.
“It is rather evident,” Jasper agreed.
Alan looked up, as if he were annoyed. “All the same, he’s my nephew and when he’s not at the ship-yard Netherhall’s his home.” He gave Kit a friendly touch. “You know that, my lad!”
“I have known it since I knew you, sir.”
“Oh, well,” said Alan, “when people philosophize I get bored and I think I’ll go for a drink. Are you coming, Jasper?”
Jasper remained, and by and by Mrs. Haigh and Mrs. Carson went to the house.
“Alan is not a philosopher; he’s a country gentleman,” Jasper remarked and gave Agatha a smile. “Mrs. Carson’s rules are not yours and Kit’s?”
“Ah,” said Agatha, “some get, but some must give.”
“At the shipyard one does not get much,” said Kit. “Unless they soon promote me, I think I’ll start off with my fiddle, like the old minstrels.”
“Your talent for music was your mother’s gift,” Jasper remarked. “The Carsons hammer iron, and to use the hammer hardens one. Perhaps Agatha has inherited something of the vein; I don’t yet know about you.”
He and Agatha went off, and Evelyn knitted her brows.
“You are rather puzzling, Kit, and your uncle’s very queer.”
“He’s a grim old fellow, but we won’t bother about him,” Kit replied and put his arm round her.
“Oh, Kit, you ought not——” said Evelyn, and looked about.
Kit said nothing. He laughed and kissed Evelyn.