Читать книгу The End of the House of Alard онлайн

41 страница из 99

In Stella's home this Christmas there would be both religion and children, the latter being represented by her father and herself. Last night when he called at Hollingrove—Dr. Mount's cottage on the road between Leasan and Vinehall—to ask her to meet him here today at Starvecrow, he had found her decorating a Christmas tree, to be put in the church, of all places. She had asked him to stop and go with her and her father to the Midnight Mass—"Do come, Peter—we're going to make such a lovely noise at the Gloria in Excelsis. Father Luce has given the boys trays to bang this year." But Peter had declined, partly because he disapproved of tray-banging as a means of giving glory to God, but mostly because he was hurt that Stella should prefer going to church to being with him at Starvecrow.

She had made a grave mistake, if only she'd known it—leaving him here by himself today, with his time free to think about her, and memories of her dark side still fresh in his mind. For Stella had her dark side, like the moon, though generally you saw as little of it as the moon's. In nearly all ways she was Peter's satisfaction. He loved her with body and mind, indeed with a sort of spiritual yearning. He loved her for her beauty, her sense, her warmth, her affectionate disposition which expressed itself naturally in love, her freedom from affectation, and also from any pretensions to wit or cleverness, and other things which he distrusted. But for two things he loved her not—her religion and her attitude towards his family.