With a hey and a ho, and a hey nonino,
That o'er the green corn-fields did pass,
In the spring-time, the only pretty ring time…."
As You Like It.
Next morning Jean's eyes wandered round the dining-room as if looking for someone, but there was no one she had ever seen before among the breakfasters at the little round tables in the pretty room with its low ceiling and black oak beams. To Jean, unused to hotel life and greatly interested in her kind, it was like a peep into some thrilling book. She could hardly eat her breakfast for studying the faces of her neighbours and trying to place them.
Were they all Shakespeare lovers? she wondered.
The people at the next table certainly looked as if they might be: a high-browed, thin-faced clergyman with a sister who was clever (from her eye-glasses and the way her hair was done, Jean decided1 she must be very clever), and a friend with them who looked literary—at least he had a large pile of letters and a clean-shaven face; and they seemed, all three, like Lord Lilac, to be "remembering him like anything."
There were several clergymen in the room; one, rather fat, with a smug look and a smartly dressed wife, Jean decided must have married an heiress; another, with very prominent teeth and kind eyes, was accompanied by an extremely aged2 mother and two lean sisters.
One family party attracted Jean very much: a young-looking father and mother, with two girls, very pretty and newly grown up, and a boy like Davie. They were making plans for the day, deciding what to see and what to leave unseen, laughing a great deal, and chaffing each other, parents and children together. They looked so jolly and happy, as if they had always found the world a comfortable place. They seemed rather amused to find themselves at Stratford among the worshippers. Jean concluded that they were of those "not bad of heart" who "remembered Shakespeare with a start."
Jock and Mhor were in the highest spirits. It seemed to them enormous fun to be staying in a hotel, and not an ordinary square up-and-down hotel, but a rambling3 place with little stairs in unexpected places, and old parts and new parts, and bedrooms owning names, and a long, low-roofed drawing-room with a window at the far end that opened right out to the stable-yard through which pleasantries could be exchanged with grooms4 and chauffeurs5. There was a parlour, too, off the hall—the cosiest6 of parlours with cream walls and black oak beams and supports, two fireplaces round which were grouped inviting7 arm-chairs, tables with books and papers, many bowls of daffodils. And all over the house hung old prints of scenes in the plays; glorious pictures, some of them—ghosts and murders over which Mhor gloated.
They went before luncheon8 to the river and sailed up and down in a small steam-launch named The Swan of Avon. Jean thought privately9 that the presence of such things as steam-launches were a blot10 on Shakespeare's river, but the boys were delighted with them, and at once began to plan how one might be got to adorn11 Tweed.
In the afternoon they walked over the fields to Shottery to see Anne
Hathaway's cottage.
Jean walked in a dream. On just such an April day, when shepherds pipe on oaten straws, Shakespeare himself must have walked here. It would be different, of course; there would be no streets of little mean houses, only a few thatched cottages. But the larks12 would be singing as they were to-day, and the hawthorn13 coming out, and the spring flowers abloom in Anne Hathaway's garden.
She caught her breath as they went out of the sunshine into the dim interior of the cottage.
This ingle-nook … Shakespeare must have sat here on winter evenings and talked. Did he tell Anne Hathaway wonderful tales? Perhaps, when he was not writing and weaving for himself a garment of immortality14, he was just an everyday man, genial15 with his neighbours, interested in all the small events of his own town, just Master Shakespeare whom the children looked up from their play to smile at as he passed.
"Oh, Jock," Jean said, clutching her brother's sleeve. "Can you really believe that he sat here?—actually in this little room? Looked out of the window—isn't it wonderful, Jock?"
Jock, like Mr. Fearing, ever wakeful on the enchanted16 ground, rolled his head uncomfortably, sniffed17, and said, "It smells musty!" Both he and Mhor were frankly18 much more interested in the fact that ginger-beer and biscuits were to be had in the cottage next door.
They mooned about all afternoon vastly content, and had tea in the garden of a sort of enchanted cottage (with a card in the window which bore the legend, "We sell home-made lemonade, lavender, and pot-pourri "), among apple trees and spring flowers and singing birds, and ate home-made bread and honey, and cakes with orange icing on them. A girl in a blue gown, who might have been Sweet Anne Page, waited on them, and Jean was so distressed19 at the amount they had eaten and at the smallness of the bill presented that she slipped an extra large tip under a plate, and fled before it could be discovered.
It was a red-letter day for all three, for they were going to the theatre that night for the first time. Jean had once been at a play with her father, but it was so long ago as to be the dimmest memory, and she was as excited as the boys. Their first play was to be As You Like It. Oh, lucky young people to see, for the first time on an April evening, in Shakespeare's own town, the youngest, gayest play that ever was written!
They ran up to their rooms to dress, talking and laughing. They could not be silent, their hearts were so light. Jean sang softly to herself as she laid out what she meant to wear that evening. Pamela had made her promise to wear a white frock, the merest wisp of a frock made of lace and georgette, with a touch of vivid green, and a wreath of green leaves for the golden-brown head. Jean had protested. She was afraid she would look overdressed: a black frock would be more suitable; but Pamela had insisted and Jean had promised.
As she looked in the glass she smiled at the picture she made. It was a pity Pamela couldn't see how successful the frock was, for she had designed it…. Lord Bidborough had never seen her prettily20 dressed. Why did Pamela never mention him? Jean realised the truth of the old saying, "Speak weel o' ma love, speak ill o' ma love, but aye speak o' him."
She looked into the boys' room when she was ready and found them only half dressed and engaged in a game of cock-fighting. Having admonished21 them she went down alone. She went very slowly down the last flight of stairs (she was shy of going into the dining-room)—a slip of a girl crowned with green leaves. Suddenly she stopped. There, in the hall watching her, alone but for the "boots" with the wrinkled, humorous face and eyes of amused tolerance22, was Richard Plantagenet.
Behind her where she stood hung a print of Lear—the hovel on the heath, the storm-bent trees, the figure of the old man, the shivering Fool with his "Poor Tom's a-cold." Beside her, fastened to the wall, was a letter-box with a glass front full of letters and picture-cards waiting to be taken to the evening post. Tragedy and the commonplace things of life—but Jean, for the moment, was lifted far from either. She was seeing a new heaven and a new earth. Words were not needed. She looked into Richard Plantagenet's eyes and knew that he wanted her, and she put her hands out to him like a trusting child.
* * * * *
When Jock and Mhor reached the dining-room and found Richard Plantagenet seated beside Jean they were rapturous in their greetings, pouring questions on him, demanding to know how long he meant to stay.
"As long as you stay," he told them.
"Oh, good," Jock said. "Are you fearfully keen on Shakespeare? Jean's something awful. It gives me a sort of hate at him to hear her."
"Oh, Jock," Jean protested, "surely not. I'm not nearly as bad as some of the people here. I don't haver quite so much…. I was in the drawing-room this morning and heard two women talking, an English woman and an American. The English woman remarked casually23 that Shakespeare wasn't a Christian24, and the American protested, 'Oh, don't say. He had a great White Soul.'"
"Gosh, Maggie!" said Jock. "What a beastly thing to say about anybody! If Shakespeare could see Stratford now I expect he'd laugh—all the shops full of little heads, and pictures of his house, and models of his birthplace … it's enough to put anybody off being a genius."
"I was dreadfully snubbed in a shop to-day," said Jean, smiling at her lover. "It was a very nice mixed-up shop with cakes and crucifixes and little stucco figures, presided over by a dignified26 lady with black lace on her head. I remembered Mrs. Jowett's passion for stucco saints in her bedroom, and picked one up, remarking that it would be a nice remembrance of Stratford. 'Oh, surely not, madam,' said the shocked voice of the shop-lady, 'surely a nobler memory'—and I found it was a figure of Christ."
"Jean simply rushed out of the shop," said Jock, "and she hadn't paid, and I had to go in again with the money."
"See what I've got," Mhor said, producing a parcel from his pocket. He unwrapped it, revealing a small bust27 of Shakespeare.
"It's a wee Shakespeare to send to Mrs. M'Cosh—and I've got a card for
Bella Bathgate—a funny one, a pig. Read it."
He handed the card to Lord Bidborough, who read aloud the words issuing from the mouth of the pig:
"You may push me,
You may shove,
But I never will be druv
From Stratford-on-Avon."
"Excellent sentiment, Mhor—Miss Bathgate will be pleased."
"Yes," said Mhor complacently28. "I thought she'd like a pig better than a Shakespeare one. She said she wondered Jean would go and make a fuss about the place a play-actor was born in. She says she wouldn't read a word he wrote, and she didn't seem to like the bits I said to her…. This isn't the first time, Richard Plantagenet, I've sat up for dinner."
"Isn't it?"
"No. I did it at Penrith and Shrewsbury and last night here."
"By Jove, you're a man of the world now, Mhor."
"It mustn't go on," said Jean, "but once in a while…."
"And d'you know where I'm going to-night?" Mhor went on. "To a theatre to see a play. Yes. And I shan't be in bed till at least eleven o'clock. It's the first time in my life I've ever been outside after ten o'clock, and I've always wanted to see what it was like then."
"No different from any other time," Jock told him. But Mhor shook his head. He knew better. After-ten-o'clock Land must be different….
"This is a great night for us all," Jean said. "Our first play. You have seen it often, I expect. Are you going?"
"Of course I'm going. I wouldn't miss Jock's face at a play for anything…. Or yours," he added, leaning towards her. "No, Mhor. There's no hurry. It doesn't begin for another half-hour … we'll have coffee in the other room."
Mhor was in a fever of impatience29, and quite ten minutes before the hour they were in their seats in the front row of the balcony. Oddly enough, Lord Bidborough's seat happened to be adjoining the seats taken by the Jardines, and Jean and he sat together.
It was a crowded house, for the play was being played by a new company for the first time that night. Jean sat silent, much too content to talk, watching the people round her, and listening idly to snatches of conversation. Two women, evidently inhabitants of the town, were talking behind her.
"Yes," one woman was saying; "I said to my sister only to-day, 'What would we do if there was a sudden alarm in the night?' If we needed a doctor or a policeman? You know, my dear, the servants are all as old as we are. I don't really believe there is anyone in our road that can run."
The other laughed comfortably and agreed, but Jean felt chilled a little, as if a cloud had obscured for a second the sun of her happiness. In this gloriously young world of unfolding leaves and budding hawthorns30 and lambs and singing birds and lovers, there were people old and done who could only walk slowly in the sunshine, in whom the spring could no longer put a spirit of youth, who could not run without being weary. How ugly age was! Grim, menacing: Age, I do abhor31 thee….
The curtain went up.
The youngest son of Sir Rowland de Boys, the young Orlando, "a youth unschooled and yet learned, full of noble device, of all sorts enchantingly beloved," talked to old Adam, and then to his own most unnatural32 brother. The scene changed to the lawn before the Duke's palace. Lord Bidborough bade Jean observe the scenery and dresses. "You see how simple it is, and vivid, rather like Noah's Ark scenery? And the dresses are a revolt against the stuffy33 tradition that made Rosalind a sort of principal boy…. Those dresses are all copied from old missals…. I rather like it. Do you approve?"
Jean was not in a position to judge, but said she certainly approved.
Rosalind and Celia were saying the words she knew so well. Touchstone had come in—that witty34 knave35; Monsieur le Beau, with his mouth full of news; and again, the young Orlando o'er-throwing more than his enemies.
And now Rosalind and Celia are planning their flight…. It is the Forest of Arden. Again Orlando and Adam speak together, and Adam, with all his years brave upon him, assures his master, "My age is as a lusty winter, frosty but kindly36."
The words came to Jean with a new significance. How Shakespeare knew … why should she mourn because Age must come? Age was beautiful and calm, for the seas are quiet when the winds give o'er. Age is done with passions and discontents and strivings. Probably those women behind her who had sighed comfortably because nobody in their road could run, whom she pitied, wouldn't change with her to-night. They had had their life. It wasn't sad to be old, Jean told herself, for as the physical sight dims, the soul sees more clearly, and the light from the world to come illumines the last dark bit of the way….
They went out between the acts and walked by the river in the moonlight and talked of the play.
Jock and Mhor were loud in their approval, only regretting that
Touchstone couldn't be all the time on the stage. Lord Bidborough asked
Jean if it came up to her expectations.
"I don't know what I expected…. I never imagined any play could be so vivid and gay and alive…. I've always loved Rosalind, and I didn't think any actress could be quite my idea of her, but this girl is. I thought at first she wasn't nearly pretty enough, but she has the kind of face that becomes more charming the more you look at it, and she is so graceful37 and witty and impertinent."
"And Rabelaisian," added her companion. "It really is a very good show. There is a sort of youthful freshness about the acting38 that is very engaging. And every part is so competently filled. Jaques is astonishingly good, don't you think? I never heard the 'seven ages' speech so well said."
"It sounded," Jean said, "as if he were saying the words for the first time, thinking them as he went along."
"I know what you mean. When the great lines come on it's a temptation to the actor to draw himself together and clear his throat, and rather address them to the audience. This fellow leaned against a tree and, as you say, seemed to be thinking them as he went along. He's an uncommonly39 good actor … I don't know when I enjoyed a show so much."
The play wore on to its merry conclusion; all too short the Jardines found it. Jock's wrath40 at the love-sick shepherd knew no bounds, but he highly approved of Rosalind because, he said, she had such an impudent41 face.
"Who did you like best, Richard Plantagenet?" Mhor asked as they came down the steps.
"Well, I think, perhaps the most worthy42 character was 'the old religious man' who converted so opportunely43 the Duke Frederick."
"Yes," Jean laughed. "I like that way of getting rid of an objectionable character and enriching a deserving one. But Jaques went off to throw in his lot with the converted Duke. I rather grudged45 that."
"To-morrow," said Mhor, who was skipping along, very wide awake and happy in After-ten-o'clock Land—"to-morrow I'm going to take Peter to the river and let him snowk after water-rats. I think he's feeling lonely—a Scots dog among so many English people."
"Stark46's lonely too," said Jock. "He says the other chauffeurs have an awful queer accent and it's all he can do to understand them."
"Oh, poor Stark!" said Jean. "I don't suppose he would care much to see the plays."
"He told me," Jock went on, "that one of the other chauffeurs had asked him to go with him to a concert called Macbeth. When I told him what it was he said he'd had an escape. He says he sees enough of Shakespeare in this place without going to hear him. He's at the Pictures to-night, and there's a circus coming—"
"And oh, Jean," cried Mhor, "it's the very one that came to
Priorsford!"
"Take a start, Mhor," said Jock, "and I'll race you back."
Lord Bidborough and Jean walked on in silence.
At the garden where once had stood New Place—that "pretty house in brick and timber"—the shadow of the Norman church lay black on the white street and beyond it was the velvet47 darkness of the old trees.
"This," Jean said softly, "must be almost exactly as it was in Shakespeare's time. He must have seen the shadow of the tower falling like that, and the trees, and his garden. Perhaps it was on an April night like this that he wrote:
On such a night
To come again to Carthage."
They had both stopped, and Jean, after a glance at her companion's face, edged away. He caught her hands and held her there in the shadow.
"The last time we were together, Jean, it was December, dripping rain and mud, and you would have none of me. To-night—in such a night, Jean, I come again to you. I love you. Will you marry me?"
"Yes," said Jean—"for I am yours."
For a moment they stood caught up to the seventh heaven, knowing nothing except that they were together, hearing nothing but the beating of their own hearts.
Jean was the first to come to herself.
"Everyone's gone home. The boys'll think we are lost…. Oh, Biddy, have
I done right? Are you sure you want me? Can I make you happy?"
"Can you make me happy? My blessed child, what a question! Don't you know that you seem to me almost too dear for my possessing? You are far too good for me, but I won't give you up now. No, not though all the King's horses and all the King's men come in array against me. My Jean … my little Jean."
Jock's comment on hearing of his sister's engagement was that he did think Richard Plantagenet was above that sort of thing. Later on, when he had got more used to the idea, he said that, seeing he had to marry somebody, it was better to be Jean than anybody else.
Mhor, like Gallio, cared for none of these things.
He merely said, "Oh, and will you be married and have a bridescake? What fun!… You might go with Peter and me to the station and see the London trains pass. Jock went yesterday and he says he won't go again for three days. Will you, Jean? Oh, please—"
David, at Oxford50, sent his sister a letter which she put away among her chiefest treasures. Safely in his room, with a pen in his hand, he would write what he was too shy and awkward to say: he could call down blessings51 on his sister in a letter, when face to face with her he would have been dumb.
Pamela, on hearing the news, rushed down from London to congratulate Jean and her Biddy in person. She was looking what Jean called "fearfully London," and seemed in high spirits.
"Of course I'm in high spirits," she told Jean. "The very nicest thing in the world has come to pass. I didn't think there was a girl living that I could give Biddy to without a grudge44 till I saw you, and then it seemed much too good to be true that you should fall in love with each other."
"But," said Jean, "how could you want him to marry me, an ordinary girl in a little provincial52 town?—he could have married anybody."
"Lots of girls would have married Biddy, but I wanted him to have the best, and when I found it for him he had the sense to recognise it. Well, it's all rather like a fairy-tale. And I have Lewis! Jean, you can't think how different life in London seems now—I can enjoy it whole-heartedly, fling myself into it in a way I never could before, not even when I was at my most butterfly stage, because now it isn't my life, it doesn't really matter, I'm only a stranger within the gates. My real life is Lewis, and the thought of the green glen and the little town beside the Tweed."
"You mean," said Jean, "that you can enjoy all the gaieties tremendously because they are only an episode; if it was your life-work making a success of them you would be bored to death."
"Yes. Before I came to Priorsford they were all I had to live for, and I got to hate them. When are you two babes in the wood going to be married? You haven't talked about it yet? Dear me!"
"You see," Jean said, "there's been such a lot to talk about."
"Philanthropic schemes, I suppose?"
Jean started guiltily.
"I'm afraid not. I'd forgotten about the money."
"Then I'm sorry I reminded you of it. Let all the schemes alone for a little, Jean. Biddy will help you when the time comes. I see the two of you reforming the world, losing all your money, probably, and ending up at Laverlaw with Lewis and me. I don't want to know what you talked about, my dear, but whatever it was it has done you both good. Biddy looks now as he looked before the War, and you have lost your anxious look, and your curls have got more yellow in them, and your eyes aren't like moss-agates now; they are almost quite golden. You are infinitely53 prettier than you were, Jean, girl…. Now, I'm afraid I must fly back to London. Jock and Mhor will chaperone you two excellently, and we'll all meet at Mintern Abbas in the middle of May."
One sunshine day followed another. Wilfred the Gazelle and the excellent Stark carried the party on exploring expeditions all over the countryside. In one delicious village they wandered, after lunch at the inn, into the little church which stood embowered among blossoming trees. The old vicar left his garden and offered to show them its beauties, and Jean fell in love with the simplicity54 and the feeling of homeliness55 that was about it.
"Biddy," she whispered, "what a delicious church to be married in. You could hardly help being happy ever after if you were married here."
Later in the day, when they were alone, he reminded her of her words.
"Why shouldn't we, Penny-plain? Why shouldn't we? I know you hate a fussy56 marriage and dread25 all the letters and presents and meeting crowds of people who are strangers to you. Of course, it's frightfully good of Mrs. Hope to offer to have it at Hopetoun, but that means waiting, and this is the spring-time, the real 'pretty ring-time.' I would rush up to London and get a special licence. I don't know how in the world it's done, but I can find out, and Pam would come, and David, and we'd be married in the little church among the blossoms. Let's say the thirtieth. That gives us four days to arrange things…."
"Four days," said Jean, "to prepare for one's wedding!"
"But you don't need to prepare. You've got lovely clothes, and we'll go straight to Mintern Abbas, where it doesn't matter what we wear. I tell you what, we'll go to London to-morrow and see lawyers and things—do you realise you haven't even got an engagement ring, you neglected child? And tell Pam—Mad? Of course, it's mad. It's the way they did in the Golden World. It's Rosalind and Orlando. Be persuaded, Penny-plain."
"Priorsford will be horrified," said Jean. "They aren't used to such indecorous haste, and oh, Biddy, I couldn't be married without Mr. Macdonald."
"I was thinking about that. He certainly has the right to be at your wedding. If I wired to-day, do you think they would come? Mrs. Macdonald's such a sportsman, I believe she would hustle57 the minister and herself off at once."
"I believe she would," said Jean, "and having them would make all the difference. It would be almost like having my own father and mother…."
So it was arranged. They spent a hectic58 day in London which almost reduced Jean to idiocy59, and got back at night to the peace of Stratford. Pamela said she would bring everything that was needed, and would arrive on the evening of the 29th with Lewis and David. The Macdonalds wired that they were coming, and Lord Bidborough interviewed the vicar of the little church among the blossoms and explained everything to him. The vicar was old and wise and tolerant, and he said he would feel honoured if the Scots minister would officiate with him. He would, he said, be pleased to arrange things exactly as Jean and her minister wanted them.
By the 29th they had all assembled.
Pamela arriving with Lewis Elliot and Mawson and a motor full of pasteboard boxes found Jean just home from a picnic at Broadway, flushed with the sun and glowing with health and happiness.
"Well," said Pamela as she kissed her, "this is a new type of bride. Not the nerve-shattered, milliner-ridden creature with writer's cramp60 in her hand from thanking people for useless presents! You don't look as if you were worrying at all."
"I'm not," said Jean. "Why should I? There will be nobody there to criticise61 me. There are no preparations to make, so I needn't fuss. Biddy's right. It's the best way to be married."
"I needn't ask if you are happy, my Jean girl?"
Jean flung her arms round Pamela's neck.
"After having Biddy for my own, the next best thing is having you for a sister. I owe you more than I can ever repay."
Mhor here entered, shouting that the car was waiting to take them to the station to meet the Macdonalds, and Jean hurried away.
An hour later the whole party met round the dinner-table. Mhor had been allowed to sit up. Other nights he consumed milk and bread and butter and eggs at 5.30, and went to bed an hour later, leaving Jock to change his clothes and descend63 to dinner and the play, an arrangement that caused a good deal of friction64. But to-night all bitterness was forgotten, and Mhor beamed on everyone.
Mrs. Macdonald was in great form. She had come away, she told them, leaving the spring cleaning half done. "All the study chairs in the garden and Agnes rubbing down the walls, and Allan's men beating the carpet…. In came the telegram, and after I got over the shock—I always expect the worst when I see a telegraph boy—I said to John, 'My best dress is not what it was, but I'm going,' and John was delighted, partly because he was driven out of his study, and he's never happy in any other room, but most of all because it was Jean. English Church or no English Church he'll help to marry Jean. But," turning to the bride to be, "I can hardly believe it, Jean. It's only ten days since you left Priorsford, and to-morrow you're to be married. I think it was the War that taught us such hurried ways…." She sighed, and then went on briskly: "I went to see Mrs. M'Cosh before I left. She had had your letter, so I didn't need to break the news to her. She was wonderfully calm about it, and said that when people went away to England you might expect to hear anything. She said I was to tell Mhor that the cat was asking for him. And she is getting on with the cleaning. I think she said she had finished the dining-room and two bedrooms, and she was expecting the sweep to-day. She said you would like to know that the man had come about the leak in the tank, and it's all right. I saw Bella Bathgate as I was leaving The Rigs. She sent you and Lord Bidborough her kind regards…. She has a free way of expressing herself, but I don't think she means to be disrespectful."
"Oh yes, she told me about them. One she dismissed as 'an auldish, impident wumman wi' specs'; and the other as 'terrible genteel.' Both of them 'a sair come-down frae Miss Reston.' Now you are gone you are on a pedestal."
"I wasn't always on a pedestal," said Pamela, "but I shall always have a tenderness for Bella Bathgate and her parlour." She smiled to Lewis Elliot as she said it.
Jean, sitting beside Mr. Macdonald, thanked him for coming.
"Happy, Jean?" he asked.
"Utterly66 happy," said Jean. "So happy that I'm almost afraid. Isn't it odd how one seems to cower67 down to avoid drawing the attention of the Fates to one's happiness, saying, 'It is naught68, it is naught,' in case disaster follows?"
"Don't worry about the Fates, Jean," Mr. Macdonald advised. "Rejoice in your happiness, and God grant that the evil days may never come to you…. What, Jock? Am I going to the play? I never went to a play in my life and I'm too old to begin."
"Oh, but, Mr. Macdonald," Jean broke in eagerly, "it isn't like a real theatre; it's all Shakespeare, and the place is simply black with clergymen, so you wouldn't feel out of place. You know you taught me first to care for Shakespeare, and I'd love to sit beside you and see a play acted."
Mr. Macdonald shook his head at her.
"Are you tempting69 your old minister, Jean? I've lived for sixty-five years without seeing a play, and I think I can go on to the end. It's not that it's wrong or that I think myself more virtuous70 than the rest of the world because I stay away. It's prejudice if you like, intolerance perhaps, narrowness, bigotry—"
"Well, I think you and Mrs. Macdonald are better to rest this evening after your journey," Pamela said.
"Wouldn't you rather we stayed at home with you?" Jean asked. "We're only going to the play for something to do. We thought Davie would like it."
"It's Romeo and Juliet," Jock broke in. "A silly love play, but there's a fine scene at the end where they all get killed. If you're sleeping, Mhor, I'll wake you up for that."
"I would like to stay with you," Jean said to Mrs. Macdonald.
"Never in the world. Off you go to your play, and John and I will go early to bed and be fresh for to-morrow. When is the wedding?"
"At twelve o'clock in the church at Little St. Mary's," Lord Bidborough told her. "It's about ten miles from Stratford. I'm staying at the inn there to-night, and I trust you to see that they are all off to-morrow in good time." He turned to Mr. Macdonald. "It's most extraordinarily71 kind, sir, of you both to come. I knew Jean would never feel herself properly married if you were not there. And we wondered, Mrs. Macdonald, if you and your husband would add to your kindness by staying on here for a few days with the boys? You would see the country round, and then you would motor down with them and join us at Mintern Abbas for another week. D'you think you can spare the time? Jean would like you to see her in her own house, and I needn't say how honoured I would feel."
"Bless me," said Mrs. Macdonald. "That would mean a whole fortnight away from Priorsford. You could arrange about the preaching, John, but what about the spring cleaning? Agnes is a good creature, but I'm never sure that she scrubs behind the shutters72; they're the old-fashioned kind, and need a lot of cleaning. However," with a deep sigh, "it's very kind of you to ask us, and at our age we won't have many more opportunities of having a holiday together, so perhaps we should seize this one. Dear me, Jean, I don't understand how you can look so bright so near your wedding. I cried and cried at mine. Have you not a qualm?"
Jean shook her head and laughed, and Mr. Macdonald said:
"Off with you all to your play. It's an odd thing to choose to go to to-night—
As this of Juliet and her Romeo.'"
Mrs. Macdonald shook her head and sighed.
"I can't help thinking it's a poor preparation for a serious thing like marriage. I often don't feel so depressed74 at a funeral. There at least you know you've come to the end—nothing more can happen." Then her eyes twinkled and they left her laughing.
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| adj.决定了的，坚决的；明显的，明确的 | |
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aged
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| adj.年老的，陈年的 | |
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rambling
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| adj.[建]凌乱的，杂乱的 | |
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grooms
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| n.新郎( groom的名词复数 )；马夫v.照料或梳洗（马等）( groom的第三人称单数 )；使做好准备；训练；（给动物）擦洗 | |
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chauffeurs
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| n.受雇于人的汽车司机( chauffeur的名词复数 ) | |
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cosiest
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| adj.温暖舒适的( cosy的最高级 )；亲切友好的 | |
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inviting
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| adj.诱人的，引人注目的 | |
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luncheon
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| n.午宴，午餐，便宴 | |
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privately
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| adv.以私人的身份，悄悄地，私下地 | |
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blot
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| vt.弄脏（用吸墨纸）吸干；n.污点，污渍 | |
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adorn
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| vt.使美化，装饰 | |
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larks
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| n.百灵科鸟（尤指云雀）( lark的名词复数 )；一大早就起床；鸡鸣即起；（因太费力而不想干时说）算了v.百灵科鸟（尤指云雀）( lark的第三人称单数 )；一大早就起床；鸡鸣即起；（因太费力而不想干时说）算了 | |
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hawthorn
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| 山楂 | |
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immortality
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| n.不死，不朽 | |
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genial
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| adj.亲切的，和蔼的，愉快的，脾气好的 | |
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enchanted
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| adj. 被施魔法的，陶醉的，入迷的 动词enchant的过去式和过去分词 | |
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sniffed
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| v.以鼻吸气，嗅，闻( sniff的过去式和过去分词 )；抽鼻子（尤指哭泣、患感冒等时出声地用鼻子吸气）；抱怨，不以为然地说 | |
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frankly
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| adv.坦白地，直率地；坦率地说 | |
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distressed
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| 痛苦的 | |
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prettily
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| adv.优美地；可爱地 | |
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admonished
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| v.劝告( admonish的过去式和过去分词 )；训诫；（温和地）责备；轻责 | |
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tolerance
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| n.宽容；容忍，忍受；耐药力；公差 | |
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casually
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| adv.漠不关心地，无动于衷地，不负责任地 | |
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Christian
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| adj.基督教徒的；n.基督教徒 | |
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dread
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| vt.担忧，忧虑；惧怕，不敢；n.担忧，畏惧 | |
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dignified
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| a.可敬的，高贵的 | |
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bust
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| vt.打破；vi.爆裂；n.半身像；胸部 | |
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complacently
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| adv. 满足地, 自满地, 沾沾自喜地 | |
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impatience
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| n.不耐烦，急躁 | |
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hawthorns
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| n.山楂树( hawthorn的名词复数 ) | |
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abhor
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| v.憎恶；痛恨 | |
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unnatural
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| adj.不自然的；反常的 | |
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stuffy
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| adj.不透气的，闷热的 | |
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witty
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| adj.机智的，风趣的 | |
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knave
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| n.流氓；（纸牌中的）杰克 | |
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kindly
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| adj.和蔼的，温和的，爽快的；adv.温和地，亲切地 | |
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graceful
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| adj.优美的，优雅的；得体的 | |
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acting
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| n.演戏，行为，假装；adj.代理的，临时的，演出用的 | |
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uncommonly
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| adv. 稀罕(极，非常) | |
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wrath
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| n.愤怒，愤慨，暴怒 | |
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impudent
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| adj.鲁莽的，卑鄙的，厚颜无耻的 | |
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worthy
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| adj.(of)值得的，配得上的；有价值的 | |
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opportunely
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| adv.恰好地，适时地 | |
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grudge
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| n.不满，怨恨，妒嫉；vt.勉强给，不情愿做 | |
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grudged
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| 怀恨（grudge的过去式与过去分词形式） | |
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stark
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| adj.荒凉的；严酷的；完全的；adv.完全地 | |
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velvet
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| n.丝绒，天鹅绒；adj.丝绒制的，柔软的 | |
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willow
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| n.柳树 | |
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waft
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| v.飘浮，飘荡；n.一股；一阵微风；飘荡 | |
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Oxford
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| n.牛津（英国城市） | |
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blessings
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| n.（上帝的）祝福( blessing的名词复数 )；好事；福分；因祸得福 | |
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provincial
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| adj.省的，地方的；n．外省人，乡下人 | |
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infinitely
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| adv.无限地，无穷地 | |
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54
simplicity
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| n.简单，简易；朴素；直率，单纯 | |
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55
homeliness
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| n.简朴，朴实；相貌平平 | |
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56
fussy
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| adj.为琐事担忧的，过分装饰的，爱挑剔的 | |
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hustle
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| v.推搡；竭力兜售或获取；催促；n.奔忙(碌) | |
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hectic
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| adj.肺病的；消耗热的；发热的；闹哄哄的 | |
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59
idiocy
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| n.愚蠢 | |
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60
cramp
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| n.痉挛；[pl.](腹)绞痛；vt.限制，束缚 | |
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61
criticise
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| v.批评，评论；非难 | |
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62
solitary
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| adj.孤独的，独立的，荒凉的；n.隐士 | |
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63
descend
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| vt./vi.传下来，下来，下降 | |
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64
friction
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| n.摩擦，摩擦力 | |
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65
lodgers
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| n.房客，租住者( lodger的名词复数 ) | |
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utterly
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| adv.完全地，绝对地 | |
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67
cower
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| v.畏缩，退缩，抖缩 | |
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68
naught
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| n.无，零 [=nought] | |
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69
tempting
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| a.诱人的, 吸引人的 | |
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70
virtuous
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| adj.有品德的，善良的，贞洁的，有效力的 | |
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71
extraordinarily
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| adv.格外地；极端地 | |
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shutters
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| 百叶窗( shutter的名词复数 )； （照相机的）快门 | |
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woe
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| n.悲哀，苦痛，不幸，困难；int.用来表达悲伤或惊慌 | |
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depressed
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| adj.沮丧的，抑郁的，不景气的，萧条的 | |
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