Anne Severn and the Fieldings | Page 8

keys. Anne had to give up practising because she did
it so badly that it hurt Colin to hear her.
He wasn't in the least conceited about his playing, not even when
Jerrold stood beside him and looked on and said, "Clever Col-Col. Isn't
he a wonderful kid? Look at him. Look at his little hands, all over the
place."
He didn't think playing was wonderful. He thought the things that
Jerrold did were wonderful. With his child's legs and arms he tried to
do the things that Jerrold did. They told him he would have to wait nine
years before he could do them. He was always talking about what he
would do in nine years' time.
And there was the day of the walk to High Slaughter, through the
valley of the Speed to the valley of the Windlode, five miles there and
back. Eliot and Jerrold and Anne had tried to sneak out when Colin
wasn't looking; but he had seen them and came running after them
down the field, calling to them to let him come. Eliot shouted "We can't,
Col-Col, it's too far," but Colin looked so pathetic, standing there in the
big field, that Jerrold couldn't bear it.
"I think," he said, "we might let him come."
"Yes. Let him," Anne said.
"Rot. He can't walk it."
"I can," said Colin. "I can."
"I tell you he can't. If he's tired he'll be sick in the night and then he'll
say it's ghosts."

Colin's mouth trembled.
"It's all right, Col-Col, you're coming." Jerrold held out his hand.
"Well," said Eliot, "if he crumples up you can carry him."
"I can," said Jerrold.
"So can I," said Anne.
"Nobody," said Colin "shall carry me. I can walk."
Eliot went on grumbling while Colin trotted happily beside them.
"You're a fearful ass, Jerrold. You're simple ruining that kid. He thinks
he can come butting into everything. Here's the whole afternoon
spoiled for all three of us. He can't walk. You'll see he'll drop out in the
first mile."
"I shan't, Jerrold."
And he didn't. He struggled on down the fields to Upper Speed and
along the river-meadows to Lower Speed and Hayes Mill, and from
Hayes Mill to High Slaughter. It was when they started to walk back
that his legs betrayed him, slackening first, then running, because
running was easier than walking, for a change. Then dragging. Then
being dragged between Anne and Jerrold (for he refused to be carried).
Then staggering, stumbling, stopping dead; his child's mouth drooping.
Then Jerrold carried him on his back with his hands clasped under
Colin's soft hips. Colin's body slipped every minute and had to be
jerked up again; and when it slipped his arms tightened round Jerrold's
neck, strangling him.
At last Jerrold, too, staggered and stumbled and stopped dead.
"I'll take him," said Eliot. He forbore, nobly, to say "I told you so."
And by turns they carried him, from the valley of the Windlode to the
valley of the Speed, past Hayes Mill, through Lower Speed, Upper

Speed, and up the fields to Wyck Manor. Then up the stairs to the
schoolroom, pursued by their mother's cries.
"Oh Col-Col, my little Col-Col! What have you done to him, Eliot?"
Eliot bore it like a lamb.
Only after they had left Colin in the schoolroom, he turned on Jerrold.
"Some day," he said, "Col-Col will be a perfect nuisance. Then you and
Anne'll have to pay for it."
"Why me and Anne?"
"Because you'll both be fools enough to keep on giving in to him."
"I suppose," said Jerrold bitterly, "you think you're clever."
Adeline came out and overheard him and made a scene in the gallery
before Pinkney, the footman, who was bringing in the schoolroom tea.
She said Eliot was clever enough and old enough to know better. They
were all old enough. And Jerrold said it was his fault, not Eliot's, and
Anne said it was hers, too. And Adeline declared that it was all their
faults and she would have to speak to their father. She kept it up long
after Eliot and Jerrold had retreated to the bathroom. If it had been
anybody but her little Col-Col. She wouldn't have him dragged about
the country till he dropped.
She added that Col-Col was her favourite.
xi
It was the last week of the holidays. Rain had come with the west wind.
The hills were drawn back behind thick sheets of glassy rain. Shining
spears of rain dashed themselves against the west windows. Jets of rain
rose up, whirling and spraying, from the terrace. Rain ran before the
wind in a silver scud along the flagged path under the south front.
The wind made hard, thudding noises as if it pounded invisible bodies

in the