Daisy's Aunt by E. F. Benson

Author:E. F. Benson [Benson, E. F. (Edward Frederic)]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2009-05-31T04:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER XIV.

It was about half-past three in the afternoon of the next day, and house and garden alike wore a rather uncomfortable air of heat fatigue and somnolence. The blinds were down in all the windows that faced south and west, with the object, no doubt, of keeping them cool—a most desirable condition of things, but one, on the present occasion, but imperfectly realized. Nor were things much better to the east of the house, where ran the deep verandah in which they had sat and from which Daisy had strayed the evening before; for the heat came no longer from the honest and scorching rays of the sun, but through a thick blanket of grey cloud, which all morning had been gradually forming over and obscuring the sky. Southwards there was rather an ugly glare in the day, a tawny, coppery-coloured light that spread from low on the horizon, where clouds of thicker and more palpable texture were piled together—clouds with hard edges and angry lights in them. It was certain there was going to be a storm somewhere, and that would be no bad thing, for the air was horribly sultry, and quite distinctly needed clearing.

Daisy was always susceptible to atmospheric conditions, and she had gone upstairs after lunch to her room, on the plea, a fairly true one, of thunder-headache. Aunt Jeannie had been eager with sympathy, smelling-salts, and offers to read, but Daisy had quietly rejected all these, saying that it was merely a question of thunderstorm. When the storm broke she would be better; till then smelling-salts would not help her.

"It's quite darling of you, Aunt Jeannie," she had forced herself to say at the end, with a cordiality that was somewhat hard to put into her voice; "but, really, I would sooner be alone. It isn't a bad headache either—only just a thunder one."

There was a window-seat in her room, well lined with cushions, and looking over the river, and it was here that Daisy was rather uneasily reclining herself. She had first tried lying on her bed, but the room was too airless except close by the window to be tolerable. Partly that, partly (half an hour ago) the sound of voices outside, had made her come over here, and it was to see what was happening to those whom she had heard talking, as well as to get what air there was, that kept her here now.

A breath-holding immobility lay over river and garden; no quiver moved in the aspens or shook the leaf-clad towers of the elms and chestnuts. It was as if, instead of being clad in soft and sensitive foliage, they were cast in iron. No note of birds came from the bushes, no ripple broke the metallic hardness of the river, and the reflections of the loose-strife and tall grasses along its edges, and the clump of chestnuts on the little promontory at the corner of the garden, were as clear-cut and unwavering as if they had been enamelled on steel.

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