Austin and His Friends | Page 8

As soon as the envelopes were addressed, he slipped them into his coat pocket, and, rising, said he might as well go out and post them there and then.
"Do," said Aunt Charlotte, well pleased at Austin's sudden capitulation. "That is, unless you're too tired with your walk. Martha can always give them to the milkman if you are."
"Not a bit of it," said Austin hastily, as he swung himself out of the room. "I shall be back in time for dinner."
"He certainly is the very oddest boy," soliloquised Aunt Charlotte, as she settled herself comfortably on the sofa and went on clicking her knitting-needles. "Why he dislikes the MacTavishes so I can't imagine; nice, cheerful young persons as anyone would wish to see. It really is very queer. And then the way he suddenly gave in at last! It only shows that I must be firm with him. As soon as he saw I was in earnest he yielded at once. He's got a sweet nature, but he requires a firm hand. He's different, too, since he lost his leg--more full of fancies, it seems to me, and a great deal too much wrapped up in those books of his. I suppose that when one's body is defective, one's mind feels the effects of it. I shall have to keep him up to the mark, and see that he has plenty of cheerful society. Nothing like nice companions for maintaining the brain in order."
Thus did Aunt Charlotte decide to her own satisfaction what she thought would be best for Austin.

Chapter the
Third
He stood leaning against the old stone fountain on the straight lawn under the noonday sun. The bees hummed slumberously around him, sailing from flower to flower, and the hot air, laden with the scents of the soil, seemed to penetrate his body at every pore, infusing a sense of vitality into him which pulsed through all his veins. Austin always said that high noon was the supreme moment of the day. To some folks the most beautiful time was dawn, to others sunset, but at noon Nature was like a flower at its full, a flower in the very zenith of its strength and glory. He had always loved the noon.
"The world seems literally palpitating with life," he thought, as he rested his arm on the rim of the time-worn fountain. "I'm sure it's conscious, in some way or other. How it must enjoy itself! Look at the trees; so strong, and calm, and splendid. They know well enough how strong they are, and when there's a storm that tries to blow them down, how they do revel in battling with it! And then the hot air, embracing the earth so voluptuously--playing with the slender plants, and caressing the upstanding flowers. They stand up because they want to be caressed, the amorous creatures. How wonderful it is--the different characters that flowers have. Some are shrill and fierce and passionate, while others are meek and sly, and pretend to shrink when they are even noticed. Some are wicked--shamelessly, insolently, magnificently wicked--like those scarlet anthuriums, with their curling yellow tongues. That flower is the very incarnation of sin; no, not incarnation--what's the word? I can't think, but it doesn't matter. Incarnation will do, for the thing is exactly like recalcitrant human flesh. Lubin!"
"Yes, Sir?" responded Lubin, who was digging near.
"What are the wickedest flowers you know?" asked Austin.
"Well, Sir, I should say them as had most thorns," said Lubin feelingly.
"I wonder," mused Austin. Then he relapsed into his meditations. "How thick with life the air is. I'm sure it's populated, if we only had eyes to see. I feel it throbbing all round me--full of beings as much alive as I am, only invisible. People used to see them once upon a time--why can't we now? Naiads, and dryads, and fauns, and the great god Pan everywhere; oh, to think we may be actually surrounded by these wonders of beauty, and yet unable to talk to any of them! Nothing but wicked old women, and horrible young men in plaid knickerbockers and bowler hats, who worry one about odds and handicaps. It's all very sad and ugly."
"Aren't you rather hot, standing there in the sun, Sir, all this time?" said Lubin, looking up.
"Very hot," replied Austin. "I wonder what time it is?"
Lubin glanced up at the sundial. "Just five minutes past the hour, or thereabouts, I make it."
"Oh, Lubin, let's go and bathe!" cried Austin suddenly. "You must be far hotter than I am. There's plenty of time--we don't lunch till half-past one. How long would it take us to get to the bathing-pool just at the bend of the river?"
"Well--not above ten minutes, I should say," was Lubin's answer. "I'd like a dip myself more'n a little, but I'm not