Page 2 of Through Darkened Clouds

“I hope he’ll come visit us,” she said before turning to gather a few stems of dried lavender from a large vase. “We miss his gentle ways here, we do. Such a kind and sincere man. The new vicar…well, I ought not to make judgments, I suppose.”

Turning back to the visitor, she smiled and gestured with her head towards the stairs. “Come, I’ll show you to a room.”

He followed the plump, middle-aged woman up the worn wooden stairs that creaked with her every step. “And how is Miss Margaret?” she asked from above as she reached the turn in the stairs. “She’s not got married?”

“No,” he answered, grateful she could not see his face as his mouth twisted into a frown.

“Such a dear girl, to be sure. It was good to see her bonny face every summer. I must admit I am surprised that after being sent to London every year, she didn’t find herself a husband there. Ah well, I suppose she’s a comfort to her father at such a time. Poor lass—without her mother,” she said as they both reached the white-walled attic room. Lace-curtained windows let the light in on each far side. A slanted ceiling kept the walking space limited to the center, where Mr. Thornton could stand to his full height. A wide oak bed filled the middle, with simple dressers and a couple of needlepoint chairs set by the window. It breathed country freshness and simplicity.

She peered around the room to make sure all was in order. “Well now, we serve supper early here in the country. I’ll have a pot of stew ready for you at six o’clock. Is there anything you’ll be needing?”

“No, thank you,” he answered kindly, eager to be left to his own thoughts.

When she had gone, he stepped to the western window, where sunshine poured golden light onto the wooden floorboards. From here, he could see the stone footpath through the grass that wound to the front door and the expanse of green around which sat a few other houses.

What seemed most incredible to him was the utter silence, other than the sound of birds.

The extensive branches of an ancient oak obscured half the view out of the eastern window. Not another building was in sight in that direction, and no commotion of people could be heard outside. If he had ever been to such a place, he could not remember it. It was staggeringly peaceful.

He hung his frock coat on a hook on the wall and ventured out to explore the hamlet the Hales had called home.

Following a footpath, he ambled to the old stone church, nodding at a woman carrying a basket on her arm as she passed him going in the other direction. He stopped to read a few of the gravestone inscriptions—musing about the people who had lived and died in this simple place.

He went into the church and sat for a few quiet moments in the pew he guessed would have been Margaret’s. The carved oak pulpit stood well above the pews. A new respect for Mr. Hale fell over Mr. Thornton as he envisioned the soft-hearted reverend delivering his sermons with authority to his flock.

Beyond the church stood the structure he most longed to see—Margaret’s home. The vicarage was a grand dwelling of pale brick, set well apart from the church. Leafy vines climbed the walls, and several chimneys jutted into the sky. He wondered which window might have been hers, or if her room was situated at the back of the house.

From here, he followed the distant sound of gurgling water to the wooded shade of a brook. He took deep breaths; the scent of damp stone melded with the fragrance of the pale yellow primroses dotting the banks. The calm, constant murmur of the sparkling water stilled his soul with a measure of peace.

The top of the church poked above the tops of the trees in the distance. He imagined Margaret as a girl from the vicarage coming to this very spot. Smiling to himself, he wondered if she collected stones or brought flowers home to her mother. He crouched down to pick a few of the dainty blossoms and carefully pressed them into his pocketbook.

That evening, as he stood at the window, he gazed in amazement at the endless sparkling stars. How much he had missed such a view in Milton with its smoky skies. When he had lived as a draper’s shop boy in the outer regions, he recalled the brilliance of a clear night sky.

With such expansive skies and sublime stillness, he found his mind was free to range the depths and heights of what it was to exist in this world. Such surroundings beckoned him to higher thoughts—to examine what formed his core.

He felt he could almost be happy here. Even all alone. The calming beauty of the landscape and the slow pace of life filled his soul with a sense of enjoyment in living in the present. Here one might drop his ambitions and disappointments and let the reign of flowers and trees humble him to accept a simpler role, with a diviner relish of life.

Mr. Thornton put on his nightshirt in the shadowy dimness of a single candle and settled into the wide bed. As the scenes of the day flooded his mind, a strangely pleasant pain pulled within him—he loved Margaret more than ever now that he had seen the open spaces she had roamed and walked the very paths she had walked.

He leaned over to snuff out the candle and closed his eyes. He could not regret having come here. Although the yearning for her to be his own would never cease, he felt he was learning—however slowly—to transform that ache into a strong tenderness for all that was good in this world. She had given him this much: to have known what love was and how much it could engulf one’s entire world.

It had been a searing kind of comfort to feel closer to her. What he gleaned this day, he would cherish in the secret chambers of his heart.

Chapter one

Mr. Bell stepped out of the cab onto the bustling street outside Oxford Station. Clutching the carpetbag Willis had hastily packed for him only minutes ago, he propelled himself forward with dazed determination through the obstacles of carriages and people in his path. The scent of dampened stone and earth filled his nostrils as morning mists clung to the ancient masonry of spires and towers that proudly jutted heavenward. High overhead, gray clouds roiled and heaved lethargically, taking no heed of mortal schedules, imperious in their lingering indifference to the sun’s impatience to show its own splendor.

The brisk gait of his fellow pedestrians and the commotion of voices and rolling handcarts jarred his sensibilities, so at odds with the scene he had left behind. Willis had rushed him to the guest room with the staggering news. The impenetrable stillness and silence of death had permeated the room and unnerved his peace. Hale had fallen asleep and found his eternal rest.

It was only yesterday that he and Hale had talked of olden times, of people they had known, and of Margaret, well into the evening. He had thought the trip to Oxford was reviving Hale’s spirit.

Fate had been a malevolent trickster.

With a mental shudder, Mr. Bell dismissed the image of the cold form of his friend lying in bed as he queued at the ticket master’s booth. Upon speaking the necessary syllables to obtain a Milton ticket, he at last headed for the northern train. Climbing into the half-empty carriage, he took a seat removed from peering faces and sat with a heavy sigh as he laid his cane across his legs. He closed his eyes and felt the first gathering of tears as the train jolted and began to rumble on the first leg of his solemn journey.

Mr. Thornton scanned the Times with waning interest as the structures and scenes of the scholarly town passed outside the windows. The noise and disturbance of a few newly boarded passengers had settled into the pervading rhythmic jostle and clack of the train’s forward motion. Complacency, eagerness, dread—the various moods of those gathered in one place mingled in the air breathed by all. Here, all activity was suspended, as the trapped occupants waited for the next scene of human activity—anticipated or not. And with their bodies forced into stillness, those not attuned to the seething thoughts surrounding them found a rare atmosphere for silent reflection and contemplation.

Thus, being drawn into a contemplative mood, Mr. Thornton’s thoughts raced back to the tranquility of his day’s beginning. He had woken to the gentle chirping of birds. The simple musical serenade had been so wholly unlike the sounds of his regulated life in Milton that he had lain in bed for some time, absorbing it.