The Dark House | Page 6

to play with other children. He
was ignorant alike of their ways and their games, and, stiff with an
agonizing shyness, he bore himself before them arrogantly. It was
natural that they in turn hated him. Like young wolves they flaired a
member of a strange and alien pack--a creature who broke their
unwritten laws--and at first they had hunted him pitilessly, throwing
mud and stones at him, pushing him from the pavement, jeering at him.
But they had not reckoned with the Stonehouse rages. He had flung
himself on them. He had fought them singly, by twos and threes--the
whole pack. In single combat he had thrashed the grocer's boy who was
several inches taller and two years older than himself. But even against
a dozen his white-hot fury, which ignored alike pain and discretion,
made him dangerous and utterly unbeatable. From all encounters he
had come out battered, blood-stained, literally in shreds, but clothed in
lonely victory.
Now they only jeered at him from a safe distance. They made cruel and
biting references to the Stonehouse menage, flying with mock shrieks
of terror when he was unwise enough to attempt pursuit. Usually he
went his way, his head up, swallowing his tears.
But the Brothers Banditti belonged to him.
On the other side of the hill was a large waste plot of ground. A builder
with more enterprise than capital had begun the erection of up-to-date
villas but had gone bankrupt in the process, and now nothing remained
of his ambition but a heap of somewhat squalid ruins. Here, after
school hours, the Brothers met and played and plotted.
They had not always been Banditti. Before Robert's advent they had
been the nice children of the nicest people of the neighbourhood. Their
games had been harmless, if apathetic, and they had always gone home
punctually and clean. The parents considered the waste land as a great
blessing. Robert had come upon them in the course of his lonely
prowlings, and from a distance had watched them play hide and seek.

He had despised them and their silly game, but, on the other hand, they
did not know who he was and would not make fun of him and taunt
him with unpaid bills, and it had been rather nice to listen to their
cheerful voices. The ruins, too, had fired his imagination. He had
viewed them much as a general views the scene of a prospective battle.
And then--strangest attraction of all--there had been Frances Wilmot.
She was different from any other little girl he had ever seen. She was
clean and had worn a neat green serge dress with neat brown shoes and
stockings which toned with her short curly brown hair, but she did not
shine or look superior or disdainful. Nor had she been playing with her
companions, though they ran back to her from time to time as though in
some secret way she had led their game. When Robert had come upon
her she was sitting on the foundations of what was to have been a
magnificent portico, her arms clasped about her knees, and a curious
intent look on her pointed delicate face. That intent look, as he was to
discover, was very constant with her. It was as though she were always
watching something of absorbing interest which no one else could see.
Sometimes it amused her, and and then a flicker of laughter ran up
from her mouth to her grey eyes and danced there. At other times she
was sorry. Her face was like still water, ruffled by invisible winds and
mirroring distant clouds and sunshine.
Robert had watched her, motionless and unobserved, for several
minutes. It had been a very unhappy day. Christine had gone off in a
great hurry on some dark errand in the city connected with "raising
money" on a reversion and had forgotten to wash him, and though he
did not like being washed, the process did at least make him feel that
someone cared about him. Now at sight of this strange little girl an
almost overpowering desire to cry had come over him--to fling himself
into someone's arms and cry his heart out.
She had not sat there for long. She had got up and moved about--flitted
rather--so that Robert, who had never heard of a metaphor, thought of a
brown leaf dancing in little gusts of wind. And then suddenly she had
seen him and stood still. His heart had begun to pound against his ribs.
For it was just like that that in his dreams his mother stood, looking at
him. She, too, had grey eyes, serene and grave, penetrating into one's

very heart.
And after a moment she had smiled.
"Hallo!"
Robert's voice, half choked with tears had croaked back "Hallo!"