Some fifteen or more years ago, the gardens of Chorley Old Hall were famous for their beauty. They still deserved to be famous, and the reason that they were so no longer, arose merely from the fact that they had become unknown, had sunk into obscurity, since no one but the actual inmates of the Hall, Doctor Hilary, and the gardeners themselves ever set eyes on them.

Yet Golding, being an artist at heart, cared for them for pure love of the work, rather than for any kudos such care might bring him. Had he read poetry with as great diligence as he read works on horticulture, he would possibly have declared his doctrine to be found in the words:—

Certain it is that the gardens under his care were as beautiful as gardens may be. Where trimness was desirable, they were as neat, as well-ordered, as stately as some old-world lady; where nature was allowed fuller sway, they luxuriated in a very riot of mad colour,—pagan, bacchanalian almost, yet in completest harmony, despite the freedom permitted.

Before the house, beyond a rose-embowered terrace, a wide lawn, soft as thickest velvet, terminated in two great yews, set far apart, a sundial between them, and backgrounded by the sea and sky. To right and left were flower borders brilliant in colour, against yew hedges. Still farther to the right was the Tangle Garden, where climbing roses, honeysuckle, and clematis roamed over pergolas and old tree stumps at their own sweet will and fancy. Beyond the yew hedge on the left was another garden of yews, and firs, and hollies. A long avenue ran its full length while white marble statues, set on either side, gleamed among the darkness of the trees. The end of the avenue formed a frame for an expanse of billowing moorland, range upon range of hills, melting from purple into pale lavender against the distant sky.

Behind the house was another and smaller lawn, broken in the middle by a great marble basin filled with crystal water, whereon rested the smooth flat leaves of water-lilies, and, in their time, the big white blossoms of the chalice-like flowers themselves. A little fountain sprang from the marble basin, making melodious music as the ascending silver stream fell back once more towards its source. Fantailed pigeons preened themselves on the edge of the basin, and peacocks strutted the velvet grass, spreading gorgeous tails of waking eyes to the sun. Beyond the lawn, and separated from it by an old box hedge, was an orchard, where, in the early spring, masses of daffodils danced among the rough grass, and where, later, the trees were covered with a sheet of snowy blossoms—pear, cherry, plum, and apple. A mellow brick wall enclosed the orchard, a wall beautified by small green ferns, by pink and red valerian, and yellow toadflax. Behind the wall lay the kitchen gardens and glass houses, which ended in another wall separating them from a wood crowning the heights on which Chorley Old Hall was situated.

Had Antony had a free choice of English gardens in which to work, it is quite conceivable that he had chosen these very ones in which fate, or Nicholas Danver’s conditions, had placed him. In an astonishingly short space of time he was taking as great a pride in them as Golding himself. It is not to be supposed, however, that, at the outset, Golding was over-pleased to welcome a young man, who had been thrust upon him from the unknown without so much as a by your leave to him. For the first week or so, he eyed the cheerfully self-contained young gardener with something very akin to suspicion, merely allotting to him the heavy and commonplace tasks which Antony had foreseen as his.

Antony made no attempt to impress Golding with the fact that his knowledge of fruit growing, if not of floriculture, was certainly on a level with his own. It was mere chance that brought the fact to light,—the question of a somewhat unusual blight that had appeared on a fruit tree. Antony happened to be in the vicinity of the peach tree when Golding was remarking on it to another gardener. Five minutes later, the second gardener having departed, Antony approached Golding. He respectfully mentioned the nature of the blight, and suggested a remedy. It led to a conversation, in which Golding’s eyes were very considerably opened. He was not a man to continue to indulge in prejudice merely because it had formerly existed in his mind. He realized all at once that he had found a kindred spirit in Antony, and a kind of friendship between the two, having its basis on horticulture, was the result. Not that he showed him the smallest favouritism, however. That would have been altogether outside his sense of the fitness of things.

There were moments when Antony found the situation extraordinarily amusing. Leaning on his spade, he would look up from some freshly turned patch of earth towards the old grey house, a light of humorous laughter in his eyes. Virtually speaking the place was his own already. The months ahead, till he should enter into possession, were but an accidental interlude, in a manner of speaking. He was already planning a little drama in his own mind. He saw himself sauntering into the garden one fine morning, with Josephus at his heels.

“Ah, by the way, Golding,” he would say, “I’m thinking we might have a bed of cosmos in the southern corner of the Tangle Garden.”

It would do as well as any other remark for a beginning, and he would like a bed of cosmos. He could picture Golding’s stare of dignified amazement.

“Are you giving orders?” he could imagine his querying with dry sarcasm.

“If you don’t mind,” Antony heard himself answering. “Though if you have any objection to the cosmos—” And he would pause.

Golding would naturally think that he had taken leave of his senses.

“Under the impression you’re master here, perhaps?” Golding might say. Anyhow those were the words Antony put into his mouth.

“I just happen to have that notion,” Antony would reply pleasantly.

“Since when?” Golding ought to ask.

“The notion,” Antony would reply slowly, “has been more or less in my mind since a year ago last March. I am not sure whether the fact dated from that month, or came into actuality this morning.”

There his imagination would fail him. There would be an interim. Then the scene would conclude by their having a drink together, Golding looking at Antony over his glass to utter at slow intervals.

“Well, I’m jiggered.”

It was so possible a little drama, so even probable a little drama, it is small wonder that Antony found himself chuckling quietly every now and then as he considered it. The only thing was, that he wanted it to hurry up, and that not solely for his own sake, nor for the sake of his secret hopes, nor for the sake of watching Golding’s amazed face during the enactment of the little drama, but quite largely for the sake of the big grey house, which lay before him.

It looked so terribly lonely; it looked dead. It was like a flower-surrounded corpse. That there actually was life within it, he was aware, since he had once seen a white-haired man at a window, who, so a fellow-gardener had informed him on being questioned later, must have been the old butler. He and his wife had been left in charge as caretakers. All the other indoor servants had been dismissed by Doctor Hilary on his return from that fateful journey from London. Somehow the man’s presence at the window had seemed but to emphasize the loneliness, the odd corpse-like atmosphere of the house. It was as if a face had looked out from a coffin. Antony never had nearer view of either the butler or his wife. Tradespeople called for orders, he believed; but, if either the man or woman ever sought the fresh air, it must be after the work in the gardens was over for the day.

Antony liked to picture himself restoring life to the old place. Now and again he allowed himself to see a woman aiding him in the pleasant task. He would picture her standing by the sundial, looking out towards the sparkling water; standing by the marble basin with white pigeons alighted at her feet, and peacocks strutting near her; walking among the marble statues, with a book; passing up the wide steps of the solitary house, taking with her the sunshine of the garden to cheer its gloom.

His heart still held hope as its guest. He had put the thought of that possible emergency from him on the same afternoon as he had decided on his course of action, should it arise. He never crossed bridges before he came to them, as the saying is. He might recognize their possible existence, he might recognize the possibility of being called upon to cross them, even recognize to the full all the unpleasantness he would find on the other side. Having done so, he resolutely refused to approach them till driven thereto by fate.

He found a delight, too, in his little English cottage, in his tiny orchard, and tinier garden. Each evening saw him at work in it, first clearing the place of weeds, reducing it to something like order; later, putting in plants, and sowing seeds. Each Sunday morning saw him walking the lonely beach with Josephus, and, when Mass was over, seeking the little church where the Duchessa had formerly worshipped, and would worship again. Added to the quite extraordinary pleasure he felt in sitting in her very chair, was strange sense of peace in the little building. Father Dormer became quite accustomed to seeing the solitary figure in the church. Of course later, Antony knew, it might be desirable that these visits should cease, but till the end of June, at all events, he was safe.

On Saturday and Sunday afternoons and evenings he took long walks inland, exploring moorland, wood, and stream, and recalling many a childish memory. He found the pond where he had endangered his life at the instigation of the fair-haired angel, whose name he could not yet recall. The pond had not shrunk in size as is usual with childhood’s recollections; on the contrary it was quite a large pond, a deep pond, and he found himself marvelling that he had ever had the temerity to attempt to cross it on so insecure a bark as a mere log of wood. Possibly the angel had been particularly insistent, and, despite the fact that he was a good many years her senior, he had feared her scorn. He found the wood where he and she had been caught kneeling by the pheasant’s nests. It had been well for him that the contents had not already been transferred to his pockets. The crime had been in embryo, so to speak, performed, by good chance, merely in intention rather than in deed.

Now the wood was a mass of shimmering bluebells, and alive with the notes of song birds. Antony would lie at full length on the moss, listening to the various notes, dreamily content as his body luxuriated in temporary idleness. As the afternoon passed into evening the sound of a church bell would float up to him from the hidden village. He had discovered by now another church, on the outskirts of the village, an old stone edifice dating from long before the times of the so-called reformation. It never claimed him as a visitor, however: it held no attraction for him as did the little barn-like building on the quay. The sound of the bell would rouse him to matters present, and he would return to his cottage to prepare his evening meal, after which he sat in the little parlour with pipe and book.

Thus quietly the days passed by. May gave place to June, with meadows waist high in perfumed grass, and hedges fragrant with honeysuckle, while Antony’s thoughts went more frequently out to Woodleigh and the Duchessa’s return.

He had seen the little place from the moorland, looking down into it where it lay in a hollow among the trees. He had seen the one big house it boasted, white-walled and thatch-roofed, half-hidden by climbing roses. Before many days were passed the Duchessa would be once more within it.