This FreedomHutchinson, A. S. M. (Arthur Stuart-Menteth)
General
This Freedom
Hutchinson, A. S. M. (Arthur Stuart-Menteth)
Marriage -- Fiction; Women -- Social and moral questions -- Fiction
Now the discovery is by everybody simultaneously made and simultaneously
announced that Robert is already later in starting than he has ever been
(he always was) and immediately Rosalie would become witness of the last
and most violent skirmish in this devoted attendance. Everybody rushes
around hunting for things and pushing them on to Robert and pushing
Robert, festooned with them, towards the door. Where was his cap? Where
was his satchel? Where was his lunch? Where were his books? Who had seen
his atlas? Who had seen his pencil box? Who had seen his gymnasium belt?
Was his bicycle ready? Was his coat on his bicycle? Was that button on
his coat?
With these alarums at their height and the excursions attendant on
them at their busiest, another splendid male would enter the room
and immediately there was, as Rosalie always saw, a transference of
attendance to him and a violent altercation between him and the first
splendid male. This new splendid male is Rosalie’s other brother,
Harold. Harold was eighteen and him also the entire female population
of the rectory combined to push out of the rectory every morning. Harold
was due to be pushed off half an hour later than Robert, and as he was
a greater and more splendid male than Robert (though infinitely lesser
than her father) so the place to which he was pushed off was far more
mysterious and enthralling than the place to which Robert was pushed
off. A school Rosalie could dimly understand. But a bank! Why Harold
should go to sit on a bank all day, and why he should ride on a bicycle
to Ashborough to find a bank when there were banks all around the
rectory, and even in the garden itself, Rosalie never could imagine.
Mysterious Harold! Anna had told her that men kept money in banks;
but Rosalie had never found money in a bank though she had looked; yet
banks--of all extraordinary places--were where men chose to put their
money! Mysterious men! And Harold could find these banks and find this
money though he never took a trowel or a spade and was always shiningly
clean with a very high collar and very long cuffs. Wonderful, wonderful
Harold!
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
Reviews
Reviews
No reviews yet
Be the first to share your thoughts on this work.
Join the Discussion
Join the discussion
Sign in to leave a comment or review.
Sign InorCreate an account