Beyond
the wall of the garden the tramp of their feet was heard, a vision of the
tops of their passing weapons was seen. The orchestra played the fragment
of a march. Cuckoo sipped her brandy and soda, and gazed sometimes at the
stage indifferently, often at the audience eagerly, and then at Julian.
When her eyes were on Julian's face a light came into them that made her
expression young, and even pure. A simplicity hovered about her lips, and
a queer dawning of something that was almost refinement spoke in her
attitude. But if she chanced to meet the eyes of Valentine her face was
full of fear.
And now the last great scene of the pageant approached, and the two
schoolboys leant forward in their stalls in a passion of greedy
excitement. Julian happened to see them, and instead of smiling at their
frankly lustful attitudes with the superiority of the drilled man over
the child, he was conscious of an eager sympathy with their vigour of
enjoyment and of desire. His nature retrograded and became a schoolboy's
nature, with the whole garden of life flowering before its feet. Suddenly
there came to him the need of touching something human. He stole his arm
closely around Cuckoo's waist. She glanced at him surprised.
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