On a
table in the centre of the room were evangelistic books with gilded
covers.
table in the centre of the room were evangelistic books with gilded
covers.
Yeats
They were
both children. At a school treat they watched the fire-balloon ascend,
and followed it a little way over the fields together. What friends
they became, growing up together, reading the same books, thinking the
same thoughts!
As he came to the door and pulled at the great hanging iron
bell-handle, the fire-balloon reascended in his heart, surrounded with
cheers and laughter.
III
He kept the servant talking for a moment or two before she went for
Miss Carton. The old rector, she told him, was getting less and less
able to do much work. Old age had come almost suddenly upon him.
He seldom moved from the fireside. He was getting more and more
absent-minded. Once lately he had brought his umbrella into the
reading-desk. More and more did he leave all things to his children--to
Mary Carton and her younger sisters.
When the servant had gone, Sherman looked round the somewhat gloomy
room. In the window hung a canary in a painted cage. Outside was a
narrow piece of shaded ground between the window and the rectory wall.
The laurel and holly bushes darkened the window a good deal.
On a
table in the centre of the room were evangelistic books with gilded
covers. Round the mirror over the mantelpiece were stuck various parish
announcements, thrust between the glass and the gilding. On a small
side-table was a copper ear-trumpet.
How familiar everything seemed to Sherman! Only the room seemed smaller
than it did three years before, and close to the table with the
ear-trumpet, at one side of the fireplace before the arm-chair, was a
new threadbare patch in the carpet.
Sherman recalled how in this room he and Mary Carton had sat in winter
by the fire, building castles in the air for each other. So deeply
meditating was he that she came in and stood unnoticed beside him.
'John,' she said at last, 'it is a great pleasure to see you so soon
again. Are you doing well in London? '
'I have left London. '
'Are you married, then? You must introduce me to your wife. '
'I shall never be married to Miss Leland. '
'What? '
'She has preferred another--my friend William Howard. I have come here
to tell you something, Mary.
both children. At a school treat they watched the fire-balloon ascend,
and followed it a little way over the fields together. What friends
they became, growing up together, reading the same books, thinking the
same thoughts!
As he came to the door and pulled at the great hanging iron
bell-handle, the fire-balloon reascended in his heart, surrounded with
cheers and laughter.
III
He kept the servant talking for a moment or two before she went for
Miss Carton. The old rector, she told him, was getting less and less
able to do much work. Old age had come almost suddenly upon him.
He seldom moved from the fireside. He was getting more and more
absent-minded. Once lately he had brought his umbrella into the
reading-desk. More and more did he leave all things to his children--to
Mary Carton and her younger sisters.
When the servant had gone, Sherman looked round the somewhat gloomy
room. In the window hung a canary in a painted cage. Outside was a
narrow piece of shaded ground between the window and the rectory wall.
The laurel and holly bushes darkened the window a good deal.
On a
table in the centre of the room were evangelistic books with gilded
covers. Round the mirror over the mantelpiece were stuck various parish
announcements, thrust between the glass and the gilding. On a small
side-table was a copper ear-trumpet.
How familiar everything seemed to Sherman! Only the room seemed smaller
than it did three years before, and close to the table with the
ear-trumpet, at one side of the fireplace before the arm-chair, was a
new threadbare patch in the carpet.
Sherman recalled how in this room he and Mary Carton had sat in winter
by the fire, building castles in the air for each other. So deeply
meditating was he that she came in and stood unnoticed beside him.
'John,' she said at last, 'it is a great pleasure to see you so soon
again. Are you doing well in London? '
'I have left London. '
'Are you married, then? You must introduce me to your wife. '
'I shall never be married to Miss Leland. '
'What? '
'She has preferred another--my friend William Howard. I have come here
to tell you something, Mary.
