The next morning was his regular day at the office. But an obscure reluctance kept him from going back to New York. When he got there Eric Rauch would ask him for his next article, of which he hadn’t written the first line, the subject of which he hadn’t yet chosen. And Tarrant would call him in to his sanctum, and want to know if they couldn’t announce the title of his next short story while “Unclaimed” was fresh in people’s minds. And he hadn’t even settled on a subject for his story either—there were so many to choose from, and none that he felt ready to tackle. Poetry … poetry was what he was full of now. …
He got up early from Laura Lou’s side, flung open the window, and leaned out quaffing the wintry gold and scarlet of the sunrise. The sky looked immeasurably far-off, pure and cold above the hills; but against their edge the gold and scarlet bubbled up in plumy clouds like the down from a fabulous bird’s breast. What had the city to give compared with that? Vance recalled the summer sunrise seen from Thundertop with Halo Spear. Then he had stood so high that he had seen the new day flood the earth below him in all its folds and depths and dimmest penetralia; and beauty had brimmed his soul with the same splendour. But now he could only look out through the narrow opening of a cottage window to a patch of currant bushes and a squat range of hills behind which the sun seemed imprisoned—as he himself was imprisoned by fate. Fate? Nonsense—by his own headlong folly. Only, when the sirens sang, could a fellow help listening? And how could he distinguish between the eternal beauty and its false images, the brief creatures it lit up in passing? Something whispered: “Create the eternal beauty yourself—then you’ll know …” and he shut the window and turned back into the low-ceilinged room where his life belonged.
But life was not always such a baffled business. The second night after Vance’s return there was a belated snowfall, and the next morning when he opened the shutters he looked out on a world of white ablaze under a spring sun. It was a Saturday, thank heaven, and there could be no question of going to the office. For forty-eight hours he and Laura Lou could range as they willed through this new world. The winter, so far, had been harsh but almost snowless; now, in early March, with the smell of buds in the air, Vance was seeing for the first time the magic of a snowstorm on the Hudson. If only they could climb to Thundertop! Was it possible, he wondered? The snow was not so deep, after all; it would be melting soon, under such a sun. What did Laura Lou think? She thought as he did: anything that seemed possible to him always seemed so to her. She had never before regarded a snowstorm as something to be admired, but merely as an opportunity for fun; staying away from school, sleighing, snowballing, and coasting. But now that he pointed out its beauties he could see she was ashamed of having looked upon them as created for her own amusement—as if she had stripped the hangings from a sanctuary to dress herself up in. Vance was touched by her compliance, her passionate eagerness to see what he saw, hear what he heard—and then, in spite of himself, irritated by her inability to be more than his echo. But today the glory was so searching and miraculous that he was sure she must feel it. “Come, wrap up warm and we’ll take some hot coffee and sandwiches, and see how high we can scramble up the mountain.” Mrs. Tracy had gone off to spend a night with Upton, and they had the freedom of the little house, and felt like lovers honeymooning again. Laura Lou filled the thermos with boiling coffee, made some sandwiches with the cold meat Mrs. Tracy had left for dinner, and got into her rubber boots and her thickest coat. Vance wanted to hire their neighbour’s cutter; but Laura Lou was frightened lest her mother should hear of this extravagance, so they set out on foot, laughing and swinging their joined hands like schoolchildren. The snow was soft—too soft for easy walking. But Vance’s feet were winged, as they had been when he first saw the sea; and Laura Lou sprang on after him, exulting and admiring. “Oh, Vanny—do look! Isn’t it just like powdered sugar? Or one of those lovely Christmas cards with the stuff that sparkles?” Luckily he hardly heard her, saw only the radiant oval of her face under the shaggy knitted cap pulled down over crimson ear-tips.
The snow clung downy to the hemlocks, rolled blinding white over meadow and pasture, gloomed indigo blue on the edges of the forest, flashed with prismatic lights where a half-caught brook fringed it with icicles.
