Then, suddenly, after a fortnight, came an intimation from
Kingston-on-Thames. She was to appear at the Education Office of
that town on the following Thursday, for an interview with the
Committee. Her heart stood still. She knew she would make the
Committee accept her. Now she was afraid, now that her removal
was imminent. Her heart quivered with fear and reluctance. But
underneath her purpose was fixed.
She passed shadowily through the day, unwilling to tell her
news to her mother, waiting for her father. Suspense and fear
were strong upon her. She dreaded going to Kingston. Her easy
dreams disappeared from the grasp of reality.
And yet, as the afternoon wore away, the sweetness of the
dream returned again. Kingston-on-Thames--there was such
sound of dignity to her. The shadow of history and the glamour
of stately progress enveloped her. The palaces would be old and
darkened, the place of kings obscured. Yet it was a place of
kings for her--Richard and Henry and Wolsey and Queen
Elizabeth. She divined great lawns with noble trees, and
terraces whose steps the water washed softly, where the swans
sometimes came to earth. Still she must see the stately,
gorgeous barge of the Queen float down, the crimson carpet put
upon the landing stairs, the gentlemen in their purple-velvet
cloaks, bare-headed, standing in the sunshine grouped on either
side waiting.
"Sweet Thames, run softly till I end my song."
Evening came, her father returned home, sanguine and alert
and detached as ever. He was less real than her fancies. She
waited whilst he ate his tea. He took big mouthfuls, big bites,
and ate unconsciously with the same abandon an animal gives to
its food.
Immediately after tea he went over to the church. It was
choir-practice, and he wanted to try the tunes on his organ.
The latch of the big door clicked loudly as she came after
him, but the organ rolled more loudly still. He was unaware. He
was practicing the anthem. She saw his small, jet-black head and
alert face between the candle-flames, his slim body sagged on
the music-stool. His face was so luminous and fixed, the
movements of his limbs seemed strange, apart from him. The sound
of the organ seemed to belong to the very stone of the pillars,
like sap running in them.
Then there was a close of music and silence.
"Father!" she said.
He looked round as if at an apparition. Ursula stood
shadowily within the candle-light.
"What now?" he said, not coming to earth.
It was difficult to speak to him.
"I've got a situation," she said, forcing herself to
speak.
"You've got what?" he answered, unwilling to come out of his
mood of organ-playing. He closed the music before him.
"I've got a situation to go to."
Then he turned to her, still abstracted, unwilling.