Martin Pippin in the Apple Orchard by Eleanor Farjeon (top 10 novels to read .TXT) 📗

"You now own surpassing wealth," said the Lad dejectedly, "and you have no more need to work."

But William would not even touch the stone. "Keep it," he said, "for you have befriended me for a week, and I have given you only the strength of my arms."

"Let it be so," said the Lad gently, and put the diamond in his belt. "I must not keep my Great-Aunt waiting. There's a cake in the larder."

So saying he went his way, and the King went his; which, as you may surmise, was to the bath and his clean clothes. He did not go into the larder, and an hour before sunset made the ascent of the hill, and for the third time stood like a conqueror upon the crest. And as he gazed over the lands below his heart throbbed with a passion for the earth that was half agony and half love, unless indeed it was the whole agony of love.

"Most beautiful earth!" he cried aloud, "only as you recede from me do I realize how necessary it is for me to possess you. How is it that when I possess you I know you not as I know you now? But oh! if you are so wonderful from these great hills, what must you be from the greater hills of air?" And he looked up, and saw the sun descending in the west. "Sweet earth," he sighed, "you would hold me when I should be gone, and never remind me that the moment to depart is due." And he stretched out his arms to her, sealed up his lips, and went into the Ring.

Once more he knelt between the giant beeches, and sank all thoughts in pious contemplation; till suddenly those still waters were convulsed as though with stormy currents, and a wild song beat through his breast, so that he could not believe it was the bird singing from a short distance: it was as though the storm of music broke from his singing heart--yes, from his own heart singing for some unexpressed fulfillment. He was barely conscious of going through the trees, with eyes shut tight against the outer world, but soon he was kneeling at the brink of the Pond, while the surge of joy and pain in the song broke on his spirit like waves upon a shore, or love upon a man and a woman--washed back, towered up, and broke on him again. At last on one full glorious phrase it ceased. And at that instant, deep in the Pond, he saw the full orb of the moon, and dipped his head.

Oh, when he lifted it, startled and illuminated, he saw on the further side of the Pond a woman standing. The moonlight bathed her form from head to foot, her hair was thrown behind her, and she stood facing him, so that in the cold clear light he could see her fully revealed: her strong tender face, her strong soft body, her strong slim legs, her strong and lovely arms. As white as mayblossom she was, and beauty went forth from her like fragrance from the shaken bough. So he knelt on his side and she stood on hers, both motionless, but gazing into each other's eyes, and his heart broke (even as it had broken at the bird's song) with a passion to take her in his arms, for it seemed to him that this alone would mend its breaking. Or if he might not do this, at least to send his need of her in a great cry across the Pond. And as his passion grew she slowly lifted her arms and opened them to him as though to bid him enter; and her lips parted, and she cried out, as though she were uttering the cry of his own soul:

"Beloved!"

All the joy and the pain, fulfilled, of the bird's song were gathered in that word.

Glorified he leaped up, his whole being answering the cry of hers, but before his lips could translate it he was gripped by a mighty agony, and sneeze after sneeze shook all his senses, so that he was utterly helpless. When he was able to look up again he saw the woman moving towards him round the Pond, and suddenly he clapped his hands over his eyes and fled towards the Ring, as though pursued by demons. Here he passed the remainder of the night, but in what sort of prayers I leave you to imagine; as also amid what ravings he passed his Sunday.

On Monday the Lad was again before him at the forge, and a crow's wing had looked milky beside his face. He did not raise his eyes as the King came in, but said:

"You look very ill." He said it furiously.

"I have had nightmares," said the King. "Pardon me if you can. I will get to work and make my final shoe."

But though he now had little more to learn in his craft, the Lad, when the shoe was made, picked it up in his pincers and flung it to the other end of the forge; yet the King now knew enough to know that few smiths could have made its equal. So he looked surprised; at which the Lad, controlling himself, said:

"When I pass your fourth shoe you will need no more masters--I forged a shoe like that one yonder when I was fifteen, and my father said of it, You will make a smith one day.'"

And on neither Tuesday nor Wednesday nor Thursday nor Friday could the King succeed in pleasing the Lad; the better his shoes the angrier grew his young master that they were not good enough. Yet between these gusts of temper he was gentle and remorseful, and once the King saw tears in his eyes, and another time the Lad came humbly to ask for pardon. Then William laughed and put out his hand, but, as once before, the Lad