If Winter Comes

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If Winter Comes

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Title: If Winter Comes
Author: A.S.M. Hutchinson
Release Date: November 24, 2004 [EBook #14145]
Language: English
Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
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BY A.S.M. HUTCHINSON
THE HAPPY WARRIOR

ONCE ABOARD THE LUGGER--
THE CLEAN HEART
IF WINTER COMES

IF WINTER COMES BY A.S.M. HUTCHINSON
BOSTON LITTLE, BROWN, AND COMPANY 1921
Published, August, 1921 Reprinted, August, 1921 (twice) Reprinted,
September, 1921 (four times) Reprinted, October, 1921
PRINTED BY C.H. SIMONDS COMPANY BOSTON, MASS.,
U.S.A.

"...O Wind, If Winter comes, can Spring be far behind?"
--SHELLEY

CONTENTS
PART ONE PAGE MABEL 1
PART TWO
NONA 77
PART THREE
EFFIE 187
PART FOUR
MABEL--EFFIE--NONA 317

PART ONE
MABEL

IF WINTER COMES
CHAPTER I
I
To take Mark Sabre at the age of thirty-four, and in the year 1912, and
at the place Penny Green is to necessitate looking back a little towards
the time of his marriage in 1904, but happens to find him in good light
for observation. Encountering him hereabouts, one who had shared
school days with him at his preparatory school so much as twenty-four
years back would have found matter for recognition.
A usefully garrulous person, one Hapgood, a solicitor, found much.
"Whom do you think I met yesterday? Old Sabre! You remember old
Sabre at old Wickamote's?... Yes, that's the chap. Used to call him
Puzzlehead, remember? Because he used to screw up his forehead over
things old Wickamote or any of the other masters said and sort of drawl
out, 'Well, I don't see that, sir.'... Yes, rather!... And then that other
expression of his. Just the opposite. When old Wickamote or some one
had landed him, or all of us, with some dashed punishment, and we
were gassing about it, used to screw up his nut in the same way and say,
'Yes, but I see what he means.' And some one would say, 'Well, what
does he mean, you ass?' and he'd start gassing some rot till some one
said, 'Good lord, fancy sticking up for a master!' And old Puzzlehead
would say, 'You sickening fool, I'm not sticking up for him. I'm only
saying he's right from how he looks at it and it's no good saying he's
wrong.'... Ha! Funny days.... Jolly nice chap, though, old Puzzlehead
was.... Yes, I met him.... Fact, I run into him occasionally. We do a
mild amount of business with his firm. I buzz down there about once a

year. Tidborough. He's changed, of course. So have you, you know.
That Vandyke beard, what? Ha! Old Sabre's not done anything
outrageous like that. Real thing I seemed to notice about him when I
bumped into him yesterday was that he didn't look very cheery. Looked
to me rather as though he'd lost something and was wondering where it
was. Ha! But--dashed funny--I mentioned something about that
appalling speech that chap made in that blasphemy case yesterday.... Eh?
yes, absolutely frightful, wasn't it?--well, I'm dashed if old Sabre didn't
puzzle up his nut in exactly the same old way and say, 'Yes, but I see
what he means.' I reminded him and ragged him about it no end.
Absolutely the same words and expression. Funny chap ... nice chap....
"What did he say the blasphemy man meant? Oh, I don't know; some
bilge, just as he used to about the masters. You know the man talked
some rubbish about how the State couldn't have it both ways--couldn't
blaspheme against God by flatly denying that all men were equal and
basing all its legislation on keeping one class up and the other class
down; couldn't do that and at the same time prosecute him because he
said that religion was--well, you know what he said; I'm dashed if I like
to repeat it. Joke of it was that I found myself using exactly the same
expression to old Sabre as we used to use at school. I said, 'Good lord,
man, fancy sticking up for a chap like that!' And old Sabre--by Jove, I
tell you there we all were in a flash back in the playground at old
Wickamote's, down in that corner by the workshop, all kids again and
old Puzzlehead flicking his hand out of his pocket--remember how he