At which her cousin burst into a suppressed, chuckling laugh,
suddenly showing all his small, regular, rather sharp teeth, and
just as quickly closing his mouth again.
"Has he got such a remarkable voice on him then?" asked
Brangwen.
"No, it's not that," said Anna. "Only it tickled me--I
couldn't tell you why."
And again a ripple of laughter went down the table.
Will Brangwen thrust forward his dark face, his eyes dancing,
and said: "I'm in the choir of St. Nicholas."
"Oh, you go to church then!" said Brangwen.
"Mother does--father doesn't," replied the youth.
It was the little things, his movement, the funny tones of
his voice, that showed up big to Anna. The matter-of-fact things
he said were absurd in contrast. The things her father said
seemed meaningless and neutral.
During the afternoon they sat in the parlour, that smelled of
geranium, and they ate cherries, and talked. Will Brangwen was
called on to give himself forth. And soon he was drawn out.
He was interested in churches, in church architecture. The
influence of Ruskin had stimulated him to a pleasure in the
medieval forms. His talk was fragmentary, he was only half
articulate. But listening to him, as he spoke of church after
church, of nave and chancel and transept, of rood-screen and
font, of hatchet-carving and moulding and tracery, speaking
always with close passion of particular things, particular
places, there gathered in her heart a pregnant hush of churches,
a mystery, a ponderous significance of bowed stone, a
dim-coloured light through which something took place obscurely,
passing into darkness: a high, delighted framework of the mystic
screen, and beyond, in the furthest beyond, the altar. It was a
very real experience. She was carried away. And the land seemed
to be covered with a vast, mystic church, reserved in gloom,
thrilled with an unknown Presence.
Almost it hurt her, to look out of the window and see the
lilacs towering in the vivid sunshine. Or was this the jewelled
glass?
He talked of Gothic and Renaissance and Perpendicular, and
Early English and Norman. The words thrilled her.
"Have you been to Southwell?" he said. "I was there at twelve
o'clock at midday, eating my lunch in the churchyard. And the
bells played a hymn.
"Ay, it's a fine Minster, Southwell, heavy. It's got heavy,
round arches, rather low, on thick pillars. It's grand, the way
those arches travel forward.
"There's a sedilia as well--pretty. But I like the main
body of the church--and that north porch--"
He was very much excited and filled with himself that
afternoon. A flame kindled round him, making his experience
passionate and glowing, burningly real.
His uncle listened with twinkling eyes, half-moved. His aunt
bent forward her dark face, half-moved, but held by other
knowledge. Anna went with him.