Page:The White Peacock, Lawrence, 1911.djvu/372

364 “You are in good time,” said I, “it is but half past nine.”

“It wouldn’t do to be late on a day like this,” he said gaily, “see how the sun shines. Come, you don’t look as brisk as a best man should. I thought you would have been on tenterhooks of excitement. Get up, get up! Look here, a bird has given me luck”—he showed me a white smear on his shoulder.

I drew myself up lazily.

“All right,” I said, “but we must drink a whisky to establish it.”

He followed me out of the fragrant sunshine into the dark house. The rooms were very still and empty, but the cool silence responded at once to the gaiety of our sunwarm entrance. The sweetness of the summer morning hung invisible like glad ghosts of romance through the shadowy room. We seemed to feel the sunlight dancing golden in our veins as we filled again the pale liqueur.

“Joy to you—I envy you to-day.”

His teeth were white, and his eyes stirred like dark liquor as he smiled.

“Here is my wedding present!”

I stood the four large water-colours along the wall before him. They were drawings among the waters and the fields of the mill, grey rain and twilight, morning with the sun pouring gold into the mist, and the suspense of a midsummer noon upon the pond. All the glamour of our yesterdays came over him like an intoxicant, and he quivered with the wonderful beauty of life that was weaving him into the large magic of the years. He realised the splendour of the pageant of days which had him in train.