The Rainbow

At which her cousin burst into a suppressed, chuckling laugh,

suddenly showing all his small, regular, rather sharp teeth, and

just as quickly closing his mouth again.

"Has he got such a remarkable voice on him then?" asked

Brangwen.

"No, it's not that," said Anna. "Only it tickled me--I

couldn't tell you why."

And again a ripple of laughter went down the table.

Will Brangwen thrust forward his dark face, his eyes dancing,

and said: "I'm in the choir of St. Nicholas."

"Oh, you go to church then!" said Brangwen.

"Mother does--father doesn't," replied the youth.

It was the little things, his movement, the funny tones of

his voice, that showed up big to Anna. The matter-of-fact things

he said were absurd in contrast. The things her father said

seemed meaningless and neutral.

During the afternoon they sat in the parlour, that smelled of

geranium, and they ate cherries, and talked. Will Brangwen was

called on to give himself forth. And soon he was drawn out.

He was interested in churches, in church architecture. The

influence of Ruskin had stimulated him to a pleasure in the

medieval forms. His talk was fragmentary, he was only half

articulate. But listening to him, as he spoke of church after

church, of nave and chancel and transept, of rood-screen and

font, of hatchet-carving and moulding and tracery, speaking

always with close passion of particular things, particular

places, there gathered in her heart a pregnant hush of churches,

a mystery, a ponderous significance of bowed stone, a

dim-coloured light through which something took place obscurely,

passing into darkness: a high, delighted framework of the mystic

screen, and beyond, in the furthest beyond, the altar. It was a

very real experience. She was carried away. And the land seemed

to be covered with a vast, mystic church, reserved in gloom,

thrilled with an unknown Presence.

Almost it hurt her, to look out of the window and see the

lilacs towering in the vivid sunshine. Or was this the jewelled

glass?

He talked of Gothic and Renaissance and Perpendicular, and

Early English and Norman. The words thrilled her.

"Have you been to Southwell?" he said. "I was there at twelve

o'clock at midday, eating my lunch in the churchyard. And the

bells played a hymn.

"Ay, it's a fine Minster, Southwell, heavy. It's got heavy,

round arches, rather low, on thick pillars. It's grand, the way

those arches travel forward.

"There's a sedilia as well--pretty. But I like the main

body of the church--and that north porch--"

He was very much excited and filled with himself that

afternoon. A flame kindled round him, making his experience

passionate and glowing, burningly real.

His uncle listened with twinkling eyes, half-moved. His aunt

bent forward her dark face, half-moved, but held by other

knowledge. Anna went with him.