The Trespasser

Siegmund woke with wonder in the morning. 'It is like the magic tales,'

he thought, as he realized where he was; 'and I am transported to a new

life, to realize my dream! Fairy-tales are true, after all.' He had slept very deeply, so that he felt strangely new. He issued with

delight from the dark of sleep into the sunshine. Reaching out his hand,

he felt for his watch. It was seven o'clock. The dew of a sleep-drenched

night glittered before his eyes. Then he laughed and forgot the night.

The creeper was tapping at the window, as a little wind blew up the

sunshine. Siegmund put out his hands for the unfolding happiness of the

morning. Helena was in the next room, which she kept inviolate. Sparrows

in the creeper were shaking shadows of leaves among the sunshine;

milk-white shallop of cloud stemmed bravely across the bright sky; the

sea would be blossoming with a dewy shimmer of sunshine.

Siegmund rose to look, and it was so. Also the houses, like white, and

red, and black cattle, were wandering down the bay, with a mist of

sunshine between him and them. He leaned with his hands on the

window-ledge looking out of the casement. The breeze ruffled his hair,

blew down the neck of his sleeping-jacket upon his chest. He laughed,

hastily threw on his clothes, and went out.

There was no sign of Helena. He strode along, singing to himself, and

spinning his towel rhythmically. A small path led him across a field and

down a zigzag in front of the cliffs. Some nooks, sheltered from the

wind, were warm with sunshine, scented of honeysuckle and of thyme. He

took a sprig of woodbine that was coloured of cream and butter. The

grass wetted his brown shoes and his flannel trousers. Again, a fresh

breeze put the scent of the sea in his uncovered hair. The cliff was a

tangle of flowers above and below, with poppies at the lip being blown

out like red flame, and scabious leaning inquisitively to look down, and

pink and white rest-harrow everywhere, very pretty.

Siegmund stood at a bend where heath blossomed in shaggy lilac, where

the sunshine but no wind came. He saw the blue bay curl away to the

far-off headland. A few birds, white and small, circled, dipped by the

thin foam-edge of the water; a few ships dimmed the sea with silent

travelling; a few small people, dark or naked-white, moved below the

swinging birds.

He chose his bathing-place where the incoming tide had half covered a

stretch of fair, bright sand that was studded with rocks resembling

square altars, hollowed on top. He threw his clothes on a high rock. It

delighted him to feel the fresh, soft fingers of the wind touching him

and wandering timidly over his nakedness. He ran laughing over the sand

to the sea, where he waded in, thrusting his legs noisily through the

heavy green water.