Chapter THIRTEEN

Daniel did not wake up till late the next morning. He felt heavy and stupid, as if he had a cold. He rose and dressed himself, and went downstairs, but though the remains of breakfast still lay on the kitchen table, he could not eat, though he poured himself out a cup of lukewarm, bitter tea. He went over and sat by the fire, shivering. His body was definitely afflicted by the stress of his mind, seeking the easy way out through sickness ... bed, sleep, forgetting ... but Daniel was still alert enough to know that would not do--that however high he pulled the bedclothes over his head, the Crown would still stand across the road.

His mother came in to clear away the breakfast. He heard her bustling about, rattling plates and opening and shutting drawers.

“Well, you’re a nice lazy boy,” she said to him--“not down till ten o’clock, and then sitting over the fire and never offering to help your mother--no!”

He did not answer her.

“Sulky!” she cried to him over her shoulder. She had accused him of sulking more than once during the past fortnight.

But she could not goad him into action; he could not even trouble to hide his grief from her, nor the travail of his soul over its new problem--how he was to get away. Belle was lost to him for ever--he had never known till then how much of hope had filled the last two weeks. She was lost, and yet in a very short time he would have to endure her daily presence--if he did not get away ... somewhere ... far--farther than he could ever go ... away from himself as well as her.

“What’s the matter with the boy?”

She had come to the fireside, to lift the lid off a saucepan, and she saw him huddled and smitten.

“What’s the matter with the great boy?”

His whole being turned towards her, longed for her, cried to her....

“Mum!” ...

She looked startled--his thick voice and working face made her lose her usual critical manner. He saw her change and soften, and the last of his control was gone--he threw his arms round her as she knelt by the fire, and hid his face on her shoulder.

“Danny--what is it?--what’s the matter?”

She held him to her, rocking him gently--it was years since she had held him so. “What is it--tell mother, Dan.”

“Oh, mum ... you know.”

“It’s that Belle Shackford.”

“You’ve heard?”

“That she will marry Ernley Munk--yes. But it does not matter.”

“Oh, mother--my heart’s broken.”

“Nonsense--a fine boy like you--you’ll soon get another girl.”

She had him close in her arms, and she could feel how strong and plump he was--well made, his bones well covered, a fine man for any girl.

“But I don’t want anybody but my Belle.”

“You’ll forget her, child.”

“Oh, never. Oh, mother--I loved her ... and I thought she loved me.”

“Well, you’re well rid--she is _vagabond_. It never please me you not marry a good girl.”

“Mother, you mustn’t say that--don’t you miscall her.”

“Now don’t you speak rough to me.”

She was angry--she pushed him off her shoulder. They both stood up.

But he could not bear that she should lose her gentleness--he would humble himself to keep her tender. He came towards her and offered her a kiss.

“I wasn’t speaking rough--leastways, I didn’t mean to. I’m sorry, mother.”

She let him kiss her, and patted his hand, softening again. They sat down together on the horsehair sofa.

“Mother, I want to go away.”

“Away, boy--where? Why?”

“I can’t live here ... with Belle so close ... and with Ernley....”

“But where would you go?--and what shall I do without your week’s money?”

“You won’t have me to keep, and I’ll have to work wherever I go--so I can send you money.”

“You’re a great silly boy. Why should you go away?”

“I can’t bear to go on living here and seeing Belle married to Ernley.”

“You need not see her.”

“How can I help it, with her only across the road? ... Oh, mother, I must go away till I’ve got over this--I can’t stay--I must go ... I must, I must.”

He was getting almost hysterical, and, growing angry again, she forgot he was her grown-up son, and took him by the shoulders, shaking him till his sleek lick of hair fell into his eyes.

“You be quiet--you’re like a little boy--you deserve me to whip you.”

“I want to go away--I can’t bear Chris....”

“Chris--you shall not speak rough of Chris!--well, I tell you--you shall go away--for a bit of time. I will write to my brother Philip and ask him to have my silly boy to live with him a while.”

“In Sark?”

“That will be far enough--no?”

Sark--and he had thought of Brakey Bottom. For a moment dim memories stirred ... he saw himself playing with a lobster’s claw ... then came a swell of solemn seas....

“You were four years old when you came from Sark. Do you remember?”

“Not much.”

“It is my country--your country. It do you good to go back there for a bit. I write to my brother Philip. I have not written for ten year.”

“Perhaps he won’t have me.”

“Then you can’t go. But I will write--and he will have you. It is a good plan--perhaps if you go, you marry a Sark girl and no more be English. I am not English and wish my children were not.”

“I’ll never marry anybody but Belle.”

“Then you’ll marry nobody, since she’s to marry Ernley. There, there ... you shall go away across the sea and forget your trouble.”

He sat beside her on the sofa, stupid and bewildered. The saucepan on the fire boiled over and she sprang up to save it. He watched her little darting figure--yes, she was foreign, his little mother ... and so in a way was he, though he loved the valleys of the Ouse and the Cuckmere ... there was a queer, faint stirring in his heart for the land where he was born.

_PART II_

THE ISLAND