The Head of the House of CoombeBurnett, Frances Hodgson
General
The Head of the House of Coombe
Burnett, Frances Hodgson
England -- Social life and customs -- Fiction
It was while she watched them that she heard footsteps on the gravel
walk which stopped near her and made her look up to see who was at her
side. A big boy in Highland kilts and bonnet and sporan was standing by
her, and she found herself staring into a pair of handsome deep blue
eyes, blue like the waters of a hillside tarn. They were wide, glowing,
friendly eyes and none like them had ever looked into hers before. He
seemed to her to be a very big boy indeed, and in fact, he was
unusually tall and broad for his age, but he was only eight years old
and a simple enough child pagan. Robin’s heart began to beat as it did
when she watched the Lady Downstairs, but there was something different
in the beating. It was something which made her red mouth spread and
curve itself into a smile which showed all her small teeth.
So they stood and stared at each other and for some strange, strange
reason—created, perhaps, with the creating of Man and still hidden
among the deep secrets of the Universe—they were drawn to each
other—wanted each other—knew each other. Their advances were, of
course, of the most primitive—as primitive and as much a matter of
instinct as the nosing and sniffing of young animals. He spread and
curved his red mouth and showed the healthy whiteness of his own
handsome teeth as she had shown her smaller ones. Then he began to run
and prance round in a circle, capering like a Shetland pony to exhibit
at once his friendliness and his prowess. He tossed his curled head and
laughed to make her laugh also, and she not only laughed but clapped
her hands. He was more beautiful than anything she had ever seen before
in her life, and he was plainly trying to please her. No child creature
had ever done anything like it before, because no child creature had
ever been allowed by Andrews to make friends with her. He, on his part,
was only doing what any other little boy animal would have
done—expressing his child masculinity by “showing off” before a little
female. But to this little female it had never happened before.
It was all beautifully elemental. As does not too often happen, two
souls as well as two bodies were drawn towards each other by the Magnet
of Being. When he had exhibited himself for a minute or two he came
back to her, breathing fast and glowing.
“My pony in Scotland does that. His name is Chieftain. He is a Shetland
pony and he is only that high,” he measured forty inches from the
ground. “I’m called Donal. What are you called?”
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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