Talbot's eyes have sprung to the speaker. Yes, of course it is Freddy
Ducane. But after all there is nothing very wonderful in that; for has
not he already known Freddy to be pursuing his studies in Oxford? But
who is it whom Freddy has addressed as 'dear'? As to that, Talbot is not
long left in doubt. Close behind young Ducane, as though afraid of being
separated from him by the press, two girls are eagerly following. There
are two in reality, but Talbot sees only one. She is not asleep after
all; not dreaming of Prue, or of any one else. She is here, wide awake,
on the top of Magdalen Tower, not three feet from him, and with her
great blue eyes plunged into his. There are some moments in looking back
upon which afterwards one wonders how it came about that they did not
kill one.
Sometimes, in the retrospect of after-days, Talbot marvels what he could
have been made of, not to have fallen dead at her feet on the top of
that giddy tower out of sheer joy. He has but just realised her
presence, when five grave strokes beat the air. The clock is telling
that it is five, the immemorial hour at which the May-Day hymn is wont
to soar heavenwards. In a moment a hush has fallen upon the buzzing
crowd. Off goes every college cap. All eyes look eastward to where the
vanquishing sun has now fairly emerged from night and mist, and sweetly
and softly upsails to heaven the ancient monkish hymn:
'Te Deum Patrem colimus,
Te laudibus prosequimur;
Qui corpus ciborificis,
Coelesti mentem gratia.'
The harmony has swelled up skywards, and again died into silence; and no
sooner has it ceased than the great bells imprisoned in the belfry below
take up the tale. Standing so immediately above them, they do not sound
like bells, rather like some loud vague booming music; and to that loud
booming music the meeting of Talbot and Margaret is set.
'Talbot!' Freddy has cried cordially, on catching sight of him; 'my dear
fellow, I am delighted to see you! Peggy, Prue, are you awake enough to
realise that this is Talbot? Who on earth would have expected to find
you up here?'
And Prue's little voice has echoed, 'Who indeed?' and Peggy has said
nothing; but the touch of her hand in his--the thirsty aching dream of
so many empty months--is a reality; and for him too the day is breaking,
not less genuinely than is the real day so superbly opening--
'Nor dim nor red, like God's own head,
The glorious sun uprist.'
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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