"I quite believe you would!" said the Tenor, pausing to speak; after which he bent to his oars with a will, and the banks became a moving panorama to their vision as they pa.s.sed. Now they swept under a light iron bridge that crossed the river with one bold span, and connected a busy thoroughfare of the city with a pleasant shady suburb beyond. Then they wound round a curve, and on their left was a broad towing-path, and beautiful old trees, and a high paling made of sleepers shutting out the view; while on the right, those crowded dwellings of the poor which add so much to a picture, especially by moonlight, and so little to the loveliness of life, rose from the water"s edge and straggled up the rising ground, tumbling over each other in every sort of picturesque irregularity. Ahead of them, the river was landlocked by a wooded hill; and, also facing them, was an old round tower on the towing-path, above which the round moon shown in an empty indigo sky.
"Stop a minute, Israfil," said the Boy, "and turn your head, Who does it make you think of?"
"Old Chrome," the Tenor answered, looking over his shoulder. "It is perfect."
The river was quite narrow here, and on either side were long lines of pleasure-boats moored to the bank, and an occasional flat tied-up for the night, with its big brown sails, looking like webbed wings, hoisted to dry. Further on they met a barge coming up the river, and the Boy wished the man who was steering a polite good-night, and hoped he"d have a pleasant pa.s.sage and no bad weather; to which piece of facetiousness the bargee replied good-humouredly, having mistaken the boy"s contralto for a woman"s voice, an error of judgment at which the latter affected to rage, much to the amus.e.m.e.nt of the Tenor.
But they were out of the city by this time. On their right was a gentleman"s park, well-wooded, and sloping up from the river to a gentle eminence crowned by a crest of trees; on their left, across some fields, the villas of that pleasant suburb before mentioned studded the rising ground, appearing also among old trees, beneath which they and their quiet gardens nestled peacefully. There were trees everywhere--beech and laburnum and larch, horsechestnut and lime and poplar, as far as the eye could reach, and the latter, standing straight up in the barer spots, were a notable feature in the landscape, as were also the alder-cars and occasional osier beds dotted about in marshy places.
The pleasant suburb straggled out to an ancient village, past which a reach of the river wound, but the Boy kept the boat to the main stream.
They could see the village street, however, with the quaint church on the level; and light warm airs brought them odours of roses and mignonette from the gardens. It had been a long pull for a hot night, and the Tenor shipped his oars here, and threw himself back in the bow to rest. He lay looking up at the sky while they drifted back little by little with the tide. The balmy air, the lop-lop of the water against the boat, the rock and sway and sense of dreamy movement, and ever and anon the nightingales, made a time of soft excitement, such as the Boy loved.
"O Israfil!" he burst out; "isn"t it delicious just to be alive?"
He was lolling in the stern with his hat off, his legs stretched, out before him, and a tiller rope in each hand, the image of indolent ease.
"Yes, this is perfect," he added; "it is paradise."
"Not for you, I should think," said the Tenor, "without an Eve."
"Now, there you mistake me," the Boy replied. "If there be one thing I deprecate more than another it is the impertinent intrusion of _s.e.x_ into everything."
"You surprise me," the Tenor answered idly. "When I first had the pleasure of meeting you, love was a favourite topic of yours."
"Ah! at that time, yes," said the Boy. "You see I was merely pandering then to what I supposed to be your taste, in order to ingratiate myself with you; but you may have noticed that since I knew you better I have allowed the subject to drop--except, of course, when I wanted to draw you."
"That is true," said the Tenor upon reflection. "And yet you are the most sensuous little brute I know."
"Sensuous, yes; not sensual," said the Boy. "I take my pleasures daintily, and this scene satisfies me heart and soul; balmy air; moonlight with its myriad a.s.sociations; a murmurous mult.i.tude of sounds like sighs, all soothing; the silent drift and gentle rocking of the boat; and the calm human fellowship, the brotherly love undisturbed by a single violent emotion, which is the perfection of social intercourse to me. I say the scene is hallowed, and I"ll have no s.e.x in my paradise." The last words were uttered irritably, and he sat up as he spoke, thrust his hands into his pockets, and frowned at the silvery surface of the river. "Love!" he e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed. "Rot! It is not love they mean. But don"t let us desecrate a night like this with any idea that lowers us to the level of a beastly French novel reeking with sensuality."
"Amen, with all my heart," said the Tenor lazily. "But don"t introduce the disturbing element of violence either, dear Boy. Your sentiments may be refined, but the same cannot be said for the expressions in which you clothe them. In fact, to describe the latter, I don"t think _coa.r.s.e_ would be too strong a word."
"No, not coa.r.s.e," said the Boy, with his uncanny grin. "Vigorous, you mean, dear. But now shut up. I want to think."
"You don"t. You want to feel," said the Tenor.
The Boy threw his cap at him.
Then they resettled themselves, lolling luxuriously, the one in the bows, the other in the stern; and the Tenor"s soul was uplifted, as was the case with him in every pause of life, to the heaven of heavens which only could contain it; while the Boy"s roamed away to realms of poesy where it revelled amid blossoming rhymes, or rested satisfied on full blown verses, some of which he presently began to chant to himself monotonously.
"I like that," he broke off at last. "There is quite an idea in it--well worked out too; don"t you think so?"
"What is the thing?" the Tenor asked. "Who wrote it?"
"I wrote it myself," said the Boy.
The Tenor roused himself, and got out the oars, but sat resting on them with a far-away look in his dreamy eyes. He was bareheaded, and the moon played on his yellow hair, making it shine; a detail which did not escape the Boy, whose pleasure in the Tenor"s beauty never tired.
"I didn"t know you were a poet as well as a musician," the latter said at last.
"Ah! you have much to learn," the Boy answered complacently, then added--"I am extremely versatile."
"Jack of all trades," said the Tenor.
"Now, don"t be coa.r.s.e," said the Boy.
"Well, I hope that is not the best specimen of your powers in that line,"
the Tenor drily pursued.
"By no means," was the candid rejoinder; "but the most appropriate, seeing that I just made it for the occasion, which is not a great occasion, don"t you know."
"I"ve heard something very like it before," said the Tenor,
"Yes," said the Boy, with a gratified smile, ""that is the beauty of it.
There is no new-fangled nonsense about me. My verses always tremble with agreeable reminiscences. They set the sensitive sympathetic chords of memory vibrating pleasurably. You can hardly read anything I write without being reminded of some one or other of your best friends in the language.
I have written some verses which I can a.s.sure you were a triumph of this art." He made an artistic pause here, shook his head, and then e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed solemnly: "But, Lord! how I did rage when the fact was first pointed out to me!"
The Tenor got the boat round, and, with an occasional dip of the oars to keep it in mid-stream, allowed it to drift slowly back toward Morningquest.
"I am afraid you are precocious, Boy," he said at last. "Don"t be so if you can help it. The thing is detestable."
"I really think I shall be obliged to avoid you, Israfil," the Boy rejoined. "If I let you be intimate, you will be giving me good advice.
Look there!"
The Tenor turned hastily. But there was nothing wrong. It was only that they had reached a point from which they could obtain a view that pleased the Boy"s excitable fancy; a bend of the river, a glimpse of upland meadows, woods with the cathedral spire above them, and the square outline of the castle overhanging the city from its dominant site on the hill, and seeming to guard it as it slept.
The Tenor looked a little, then dipped his oars and rowed a stroke or two.
The Boy"s mood had changed. He was keenly susceptible to the refining influences of beautiful scenes. His countenance cleared and softened as he gazed, and the Tenor knew that he would jeer no more that night.
Presently they heard the city clocks striking the hour. Both listened, waiting for the chime. The Tenor rested on his oars, and after it had sounded, m.u.f.fled by distance, but quite distinct, he still sat so, gazing thoughtfully into the water.
"Boy, shall I tell you something?" he said at last.
The Boy gravely responded with a nod.
"It was not far from where we are now," the Tenor continued, "that I first heard the chime--oh, ever so many years ago!" and he brushed his hand back over his hair.
"You were a boy then?"
"Yes, a lad like you--perhaps younger: I had been working in a colliery.
The work was too hard for me, and I was coming up the Morne on a barge, to try and get something lighter to do in one of the towns. We came up very slowly, and it was a hot day, and I idled about for hours, looking at the water over the side, and at the banks of the river as we pa.s.sed, but without thinking of anything. What I saw made me feel. I was conscious of various sensations--pleasure, wonder, amus.e.m.e.nt, and, above all, of a dreamful ease; but I could not translate sensations into words at that time; they suggested no ideas. There had been nothing in my life so far to rouse my mental faculties, and I was conscious without being intelligent, as I suppose the beasts of the field are. I must have been happy then, but I did not know it. As we approached Morningquest I heard the chime. It was very faint at first, for we were still a long way off; but the next time it sounded we were nearer; and the next it was quite distinct. And it seemed to me to mean something, so I asked the old bargee who was steering, and he told me. I could neither read nor write at that time, and I had never heard of Christ, but I loved music, and the idea of a great beneficent being who slumbered not nor slept, but watched over us all forever, took possession of my imagination, and I caught up the notes and words and sang them with all my heart. And when we got to the outskirts of the city, a gentleman who had been sitting on the towing-path, sketching the old houses on the opposite side of the river, heard me, and hailed the barge, and came on board. "Which is your sweet singer?" he asked, and the old fellow who was steering nodded toward me, and answered: "The lad there." And the gentleman said if I would go away with him he would have me taught music and make a great singer of me."
"And you went?"
"Yes," said the Tenor, with his habitual gesture.
"The gentleman was a bachelor," he resumed, "with few near relations. He was very rich, very liberal, and pa.s.sionately fond of art in all its branches. That was why he took me at first, but by and by he began to like me for myself. He had me educated as his own son might have been, and I loved him as if he had been my father. Oh, Boy, he was a good man! You never would have scoffed at religion and truth had you been brought up by him. I rested on his affection as securely as you rely on the obligation of your nearest of kin. I knew that, even if I had lost my voice or otherwise disappointed him, it would have made no difference. Once my friend he would always have been my friend. But I did not lose my voice, nor did I otherwise disappoint him, I trust." The Tenor paused a moment.
"He was always sure that I was gentle by birth," he resumed, "and all my tutors said I must have come of an educated race because I was so teachable. Everything in the new life came to me naturally. I never had any trouble. My friend tried hard to find my parents, but all that was known of me in the place I came from was that a collier, who lived alone in a little cottage, went home late one night and found me asleep on his bed. They thought I was only a few days old then, and had kept my clothes, which were such as a gentleman"s child would have worn, but there was no mark on any of them, nor any clue by which I could be identified, except the name, David Julian Vanetemple, scrawled on a sc.r.a.p of paper in a woman"s hand, an educated hand. The collier brought me up somehow, though Heaven alone knows how, considering my age and his own occupation. Do you know, Boy, one of the most weary things in life is the sense of an obligation you can never repay. If I could only have done something to prove my grat.i.tude to my first foster father! But there! I must not think of it. It is better to hope that all he did for me was a pleasure to himself at the time, though there must have been much more trouble than pleasure at first. But he was very kind, and I was very happy with him."
Here the Tenor, paused again for a while, and then resumed. "When I was old enough he took me down to the pit occasionally, but he would not let me work until I was much past the age at which the other boys began. He said I was not one of them; my build was different, and I was quite unfit for such rough labour; and so it proved, but I persevered as long as he lived. It was not very long, however, for he was killed one day by an explosion of gas down in the mine while trying to rescue some other poor fellows who had been blocked up in a gallery for days by a fall. His dog was killed at the same time. He liked to have his family with him, he said, and we were generally both beside him when he was at work. But he sent me off on an impossible errand to a neighbouring town that day. I did not suspect it at the time, but I know now that it was to keep me out of harm"s way. And so I was left quite alone in the world, and I thought the place where I had had a friend was more desolate than strange places with which I had no such tender a.s.sociations would be; and so I wandered away, and wandered about until I was found by my next friend on the barge, and the new life began for me."