Innocent : her fancy and his fact. Marie Corelli
what YOU are thinking about,—and lovers walk through the fields and lanes everywhere near us every year, and you never appear to see them or to envy them—"
"Envy them!" The girl opened her eyes wide. "Envy them! Oh, Cupid, hear! Envy them! Why should I envy them? Who could envy Mr. and Mrs. Pettigrew?"
"What nonsense you talk!" he exclaimed,—"Mr. and Mrs. Pettigrew are married folk, not lovers!"
"But they were lovers once," she said,—"and only three years ago. I remember them, walking through the lanes and fields as you say, with arms round each other,—and Mrs. Pettigrew's hands were always dreadfully red, and Mr. Pettigrew's fingers were always dirty,—and they married very quickly,—and now they've got two dreadful babies that scream all day and all night, and Mrs. Pettigrew's hair is never tidy and Pettigrew himself—well, you know what he does!—"
"Gets drunk every night," interrupted Robin, crossly,—"I know! And I suppose you think I'm another Pettigrew?"
"Oh dear, no!" And she laughed with the heartiest merriment. "You never could, you never would be a Pettigrew! But it all comes to the same thing—love ends in marriage, doesn't it?"
"It ought to," said Robin, sententiously.
"And marriage ends—in Pettigrews!"
"Innocent!"
"Don't say 'Innocent' in that reproachful way! It makes me feel quite guilty! Now,—if you talk of names,—THERE'S a name to give a poor girl,—Innocent! Nobody ever heard of such a name—"
"You're wrong. There were thirteen Popes named Innocent between the years 402 and 1724," said Robin, promptly,—"and one of them, Innocent the Eleventh, is a character in Browning's 'Ring and the Book.'"
"Dear me!" And her eyes flashed provocatively. "You astound me with your wisdom, Robin! But all the same, I don't believe any girl ever had such a name as Innocent, in spite of thirteen Popes. And perhaps the Thirteen had other names?"
"They had other baptismal names," he explained, with a learned air.
"For instance, Pope Innocent the Third was Cardinal Lothario before he
became Pope, and he wrote a book called 'De Contemptu Mundi sive de
Miseria Humanae Conditionis!'"
She looked at him as he uttered the sonorous sounding Latin, with a comically respectful air of attention, and then laughed like a child,—laughed till the tears came into her eyes.
"Oh Robin, Robin!" she cried—"You are simply delicious! The most enchanting boy! That crimson tie and that Latin! No wonder the village girls adore you! 'De,'—what is it? 'Contemptu Mundi,' and Misery Human Conditions! Poor Pope! He never sat on top of a hay-load in his life I'm sure! But you see his name was Lothario,—not Innocent."
"His baptismal name was Lothario," said Robin, severely.
She was suddenly silent.
"Well! I suppose I was baptised?" she queried, after a pause.
"I suppose so."
"I wonder if I have any other name? I must ask Dad."
Robin looked at her curiously;—then his thoughts were diverted by the sight of a squat stout woman in a brown spotted print gown and white sunbonnet, who just then trotted briskly into the hay-field, calling at the top of her voice:
"Mister Jocelyn! Mister Jocelyn! You're wanted!"
"There's Priscilla calling Uncle in," he said, and making a hollow of his hands he shouted:
"Hullo, Priscilla! What is it?"
The sunbonnet gave an upward jerk in his direction and the wearer shrilled out:
"Doctor's come! Wantin' yer Uncle!"
The old man, who had been so long quietly seated on the upturned barrel, now rose stiffly, and knocking out the ashes of his pipe turned towards the farmhouse. But before he went he raised his straw hat again and stood for a moment bareheaded in the roseate glory of the sinking sun. Innocent sprang upright on the load of hay, and standing almost at the very edge of it, shaded her eyes with one hand from the strong light, and looked at him.
"Dad!" she called—"Dad, shall I come?"
He turned his head towards her.
"No, lass, no! Stay where you are, with Robin."
He walked slowly, and with evident feebleness, across the length of the field which divided him from the farmhouse garden, and opening the green gate leading thereto, disappeared. The sun-bonneted individual called Priscilla walked or rather waddled towards the hay-waggon, and setting her arms akimbo on her broad hips, looked up with a grin at the young people on top.
"Well! Ye're a fine couple up there! What are ye a-doin' of?"
"Never mind what we're doing," said Robin, impatiently. "I say,
Priscilla, do you think Uncle Hugo is really ill?"
Priscilla's face, which was the colour of an ancient nutmeg, and almost as deeply marked with contrasting lines of brown and yellow, showed no emotion.
"He ain't hisself," she said, bluntly.
"No," said Innocent, seriously,—"I'm sure he isn't." Priscilla jerked her sunbonnet a little further back, showing some tags of dusty grey hair.
"He ain't been hisself for this past year," she went on—"Mr. Slowton, bein' only a kind of village physic-bottle, don't know much, an' yer uncle ain't bin satisfied. Now there's another doctor from London staying up 'ere for 'is own poor 'elth, and yer Uncle said he'd like to 'ave 'is opinion,—so Mr. Slowton, bein' obligin' though ignorant, 'as got 'im in to see yer Uncle, and there they both is, in the best parlour, with special wine an' seedies on the table."
"Oh, it'll be all right!" said Robin, cheerfully,—"Uncle Hugo is getting old, of course, and he's a bit fanciful."
Priscilla sniffed the air.
"Mebbe—and mebbe not! What are you two waitin' for now?"
"For the men to come back with Roger. Then we'll haul home."
"You'll 'ave to wait a bit longer, I'm thinkin'," said Priscilla—"They's all drinkin' beer in the yard now an' tappin' another barrel to drink at when the waggon comes in. There's no animals on earth as ever thirsty as men! Well, good luck t'ye! I must go, or there'll be a smell of burnin' supper-cakes."
She settled her sunbonnet anew and trotted away,—looking rather like a large spotted mushroom mysteriously set in motion and rolling, rather than walking, off the field.
When she was gone, Innocent sat down again upon the hay, this time without Cupid. He had flown off to join his mates on the farmhouse gables.
"Dad is really not well," she said, thoughtfully; "I feel anxious about him. If he were to die,—" At the mere thought her eyes filled with tears. "He must die some day," answered Robin, gently,—"and he's old,—nigh on eighty."
"Oh, I don't want to remember that," she murmured. "It's the cruellest part of life—that people should grow old, and die, and pass away from us. What should I do without Dad? I should be all alone, with no one in the world to care what becomes of me."
"I care!" he said, softly.
"Yes, you care—just now"—she answered, with a sigh; "and it's very kind of you. I wish I could care—in the way you want me to—but—"
"Will you try?" he pleaded.
"I do try—really I do try hard," she said, with quite a piteous earnestness,—"but I can't feel what isn't HERE,"—and she pressed both hands on her breast—"I care more for Roger the horse, and Cupid the dove, than I do for you! It's quite awful of me—but there it is! I love—I simply adore"—and she threw out her arms with an embracing gesture—"all the trees and plants and birds!—and everything about the farm