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
The next day was Sunday. Anna said she would not go to Church as she had
a headache. Rosalie had been invited to spend the day with the little
girl of Colonel and Mrs. Measures and she had lunch and tea there and
then came home. The path from the gate to the house was bounded by a
thick hedge. On the right was the rectory paddock and through the hedge
Rosalie saw that something very strange was going on in the paddock.
Away in the corner where there was a little copse with a pond in the
middle was a crowd of people, some men from the village and her mother
and Robert and some others. Whatever was it? While she peered, Harold
came running out of the group towards the house. His coat was off,
and his waistcoat; and his shirt and trousers looked funny and he ran
funnily. He came near Rosalie and she saw that he was dripping wet.
Had he fallen in the pond? Then two men came round from the back of the
house carrying something, and Harold ran to them and they all ran with
the thing to the pond. It looked like the door of the shed they were
carrying. Rosalie scrambled through the hedge and ran towards the pond.
Some one called out “Here’s Rosalie.” Hilda came out from among the
people and waved her arms and called out, “Go back! Go back! You’re not
to come here, Rosalie! You’re not to come here!” Rosalie stood still.
People were stooping. They had the door on the ground and Harold and
a man were stooping and walking backwards over the door, carrying
something. Presently there was more stooping, and then Harold and Robert
and three men were carrying the door between them and walking as if
the door were very heavy. Whatever was happening? Hilda came running to
Rosalie. She was crying. “Rosalie, you’re to keep away. You’re not to
come into the house yet. I’ll tell you when you can come. Go and stay in
the garden till I tell you.”
Rosalie wandered about by the drive. Whatever was the matter? Robert
appeared with his bicycle. Harold came out after him. “Go to Ashborough
station with it, you understand. See the station master. Tell him
it must be sent off at once. Tell him what has happened.” Robert was
sniffling and nodding. Away went Robert, bending over the handle bar of
his bicycle, riding furiously.
Evening began to come on. Rosalie was wandering at the back by the
stables when Hilda came out through the kitchen door. “Rosalie, I’ve
been looking for you. Rosalie, Anna is--dead.”
They went in through the kitchen. On the big kitchen clothes rail before
the fire were clothes of Anna’s. They were muddy and sopping wet and
steam was rising off them.
Rosalie ran to her mother to cry.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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