Howards End

mustn’t. I will direct you myself if it comes to that. I must get my hat. Now"—roguishly—"Mrs. Wilcox, don’t you move while I’m gone."
    Stunned, Margaret did not move from the best parlour, over which the touch of art nouveau had fallen. But the other rooms looked in keeping, though they conveyed the peculiar sadness of a rural interior. Here had lived an elder race, to which we look back with disquietude. The country which we visit at week–ends was really a home to it, and the graver sides of life, the deaths, the partings, the yearnings for love, have their deepest expression in the heart of the fields. All was not sadness. The sun was shining without. The thrush sang his two syllables on the budding guelder–rose. Some children were playing uproariously in heaps of golden straw. It was the presence of sadness at all that surprised Margaret, and ended by giving her a feeling of completeness. In these English farms, if anywhere, one might see life steadily and see it whole, group in one vision its transitoriness and its eternal youth, connect—connect without bitterness until all men are brothers. But her thoughts were interrupted by the return of Miss Avery’s niece, and were so tranquillising that she suffered the interruption gladly.
    It was quicker to go out by the back door, and, after due explanations, they went out by it. The niece was now mortified by innumerable chickens, who rushed up to her feet for food, and by a shameless and maternal sow. She did not know what animals were coming to. But her gentility withered at the touch of the sweet air. The wind was rising, scattering the straw and ruffling the tails of the ducks as they floated in families over Evie’s pendant. One of those delicious gales of spring, in which leaves still in bud seem to rustle, swept over the land and then fell silent. "Georgie," sang the thrush. "Cuckoo," came furtively from the cliff of pine–trees. "Georgie, pretty Georgie," and the other birds joined in with nonsense. The hedge was a half–painted picture which would be finished in a few days. Celandines grew on its banks, lords and ladies and primroses in the defended hollows; the wild rose–bushes, still bearing their withered hips, showed also the promise of blossom. Spring had come, clad in no classical garb, yet fairer than all springs; fairer even than she who walks through the myrtles of Tuscany with the graces before her and the zephyr behind.
    The two women walked up the lane full of outward civility. But Margaret was thinking how difficult it was to be earnest about furniture on such a day, and the niece was thinking about hats. Thus engaged, they reached Howards End. Petulant cries of "Auntie!" severed the air. There was no reply, and the front door was locked.
    "Are you sure that Miss Avery is up here?" asked Margaret.
    "Oh, yes, Mrs. Wilcox, quite sure. She is here daily."
    Margaret tried to look in through the dining–room window, but the curtain inside was drawn tightly. So with the drawing–room and the hall. The appearance of these curtains was familiar, yet she did not remember their being there on her other visit; her impression was that Mr. Bryce had taken everything away. They tried the back. Here again they received no answer, and could see nothing; the kitchen–window was fitted with a blind, while the pantry and scullery had pieces of wood propped up against them, which looked ominously like the lids of packing–cases. Margaret thought of her books, and she lifted up her voice also. At the first cry she succeeded.
    "Well, well!" replied some one inside the house. "If it isn’t Mrs. Wilcox come at last!"
    "Have you got the key, auntie?"
    "Madge, go away," said Miss Avery, still invisible.
    "Auntie, it’s Mrs. Wilcox—"
    Margaret supported her. "Your niece and I have come together."
    "Madge, go away. This is no moment for your hat."
    The poor woman went red. "Auntie gets more eccentric lately," she said nervously.
    "Miss Avery!" called Margaret. "I have come about the furniture. Could you kindly let me in?"
    "Yes, Mrs. Wilcox," said the voice, "of course." But after that came silence. They called again without response. They walked round the house disconsolately.
    "I hope Miss Avery is not ill," hazarded Margaret.
    "Well, if you’ll excuse me," said Madge, "perhaps I ought to be leaving you now. The servants need seeing to at the farm. Auntie is so odd at times." Gathering up her elegancies, she retired defeated, and, as if