The Rainbow

Then, suddenly, after a fortnight, came an intimation from

Kingston-on-Thames. She was to appear at the Education Office of

that town on the following Thursday, for an interview with the

Committee. Her heart stood still. She knew she would make the

Committee accept her. Now she was afraid, now that her removal

was imminent. Her heart quivered with fear and reluctance. But

underneath her purpose was fixed.

She passed shadowily through the day, unwilling to tell her

news to her mother, waiting for her father. Suspense and fear

were strong upon her. She dreaded going to Kingston. Her easy

dreams disappeared from the grasp of reality.

And yet, as the afternoon wore away, the sweetness of the

dream returned again. Kingston-on-Thames--there was such

sound of dignity to her. The shadow of history and the glamour

of stately progress enveloped her. The palaces would be old and

darkened, the place of kings obscured. Yet it was a place of

kings for her--Richard and Henry and Wolsey and Queen

Elizabeth. She divined great lawns with noble trees, and

terraces whose steps the water washed softly, where the swans

sometimes came to earth. Still she must see the stately,

gorgeous barge of the Queen float down, the crimson carpet put

upon the landing stairs, the gentlemen in their purple-velvet

cloaks, bare-headed, standing in the sunshine grouped on either

side waiting.

"Sweet Thames, run softly till I end my song."

Evening came, her father returned home, sanguine and alert

and detached as ever. He was less real than her fancies. She

waited whilst he ate his tea. He took big mouthfuls, big bites,

and ate unconsciously with the same abandon an animal gives to

its food.

Immediately after tea he went over to the church. It was

choir-practice, and he wanted to try the tunes on his organ.

The latch of the big door clicked loudly as she came after

him, but the organ rolled more loudly still. He was unaware. He

was practicing the anthem. She saw his small, jet-black head and

alert face between the candle-flames, his slim body sagged on

the music-stool. His face was so luminous and fixed, the

movements of his limbs seemed strange, apart from him. The sound

of the organ seemed to belong to the very stone of the pillars,

like sap running in them.

Then there was a close of music and silence.

"Father!" she said.

He looked round as if at an apparition. Ursula stood

shadowily within the candle-light.

"What now?" he said, not coming to earth.

It was difficult to speak to him.

"I've got a situation," she said, forcing herself to

speak.

"You've got what?" he answered, unwilling to come out of his

mood of organ-playing. He closed the music before him.

"I've got a situation to go to."

Then he turned to her, still abstracted, unwilling.