XI
And so Brum passed at last over the shining, wonderful sea, feeling only the wind on his forehead and the salt in his nostrils. It was a beautiful day at the dawn of spring; the far-stretching sea sparkled with molten diamonds, and Zillah felt that the highest God's blessing rested like a blue sky over this strange pilgrimage. She was dressed with great taste, and few would have divined the ignorance under her silks.
"Mother, can you see France yet?" Brum asked very soon.
"No, my lamb."
"Mother, can you see France yet?" he persisted later.
"I see white cliffs," she said at last.
"Ah! that's only the white cliffs of Old England. Look the other way."
"I am looking the other way. I see white cliffs coming to meet us."
"Has France got white cliffs, too?" cried Brum, disappointed.
On the journey to Paris he wearied her to describe France. In vain she tried: her untrained vision and poor vocabulary could give him no new elements to weave into a mental picture. There were trees and sometimes houses and churches. And again trees. What kind of trees? Green! Brum was in despair. France was, then, only like England; white cliffs without, trees and houses within. He demanded the Seine at least.
"Yes, I see a great water," his mother admitted at last.
"That's it! It rises in the Côte d'Or, flows N.N.W. then W., and N.W. into the English Channel. It is more than twice as long as the Thames. Perhaps you'll see the tributaries flowing into it—the little rivers, the Oise, the Marne, the Yonne."
"No wonder the angels envy me him!" thought Zillah proudly.
They halted at Paris, putting up for the night, by the advice of a friendly fellow-traveller, at a hotel by the Gare de Lyon, where, to Zillah's joy and amazement, everybody spoke English to her and accepted her English gold—a pleasant experience which was destined to be renewed at each stage, and which increased her hope of a happy issue.
"How loud Paris sounds!" said Brum, as they drove across it. He had to construct it from its noises, for in answer to his feverish interrogations his mother could only explain that some streets were lined with trees and some foolish unrespectable people sat out in the cold air, drinking at little tables.
"Oh, how jolly!" said Brum. "But can't you see Notre Dame?"
"What's that?"
"A splendid cathedral, mother—very old. Do look for two towers. We must go there the first thing to-morrow."
"The first thing to-morrow we take the train. The quicker we get to the doctor, the better."
"Oh, but we can't leave Paris without seeing Notre Dame, and the gargoyles, and perhaps Quasimodo, and all that Victor Hugo describes. I wonder if we shall see a devil-fish in Italy," he added irrelevantly.
"You'll see the devil if you go to such places," said Zillah, who, besides shirking the labor of description, was anxious not to provoke unnecessarily the God of Israel.
"But I've often been to St. Paul's with the boys," said Brum.
"Have you?" She was vaguely alarmed.
"Yes, it's lovely—the stained windows and the organ. Yes, and the Abbey's glorious, too; it almost makes me cry. I always liked to hear the music with my eyes shut," he added, with forced cheeriness, "and now that'll be all right."
"But your father wouldn't like it," said Zillah feebly.
"Father wouldn't like me to read the Pilgrim's Progress," retorted Brum. "He doesn't understand these things. There's no harm in our going to Notre Dame."
"No, no; it'll be much better to save all these places for the way back, when you'll be able to see for yourself."
Too late it struck her she had missed an opportunity of breaking to Brum the real object of the expedition.
"But the Seine, anyhow!" he persisted. "We can go there to-night."
"But what can you see at night?" cried Zillah, unthinkingly.
"Oh, mother! how beautiful it used to be to look over London Bridge at night when we came back from the Crystal Palace!"
In the end Zillah accepted the compromise, and after their dinner of fish and vegetables—for which Brum had scant appetite—they were confided by the hotel porter to a bulbous-nosed cabman, who had instructions to restore them to the hotel. Zillah thought wistfully of her warm parlour in Dalston, with the firelight reflected in the glass cases of the wax flowers.
The cab stopped on a quay.
"Well?" said Brum breathlessly.
"Little fool!" said Zillah good-humouredly. "There is nothing but water—the same water as in London."
"But there are lights, aren't there?"
"Yes, there are lights," she admitted cheerfully.
"Where is the moon?"
"Where she always is—in the sky."
"Doesn't she make a silver path on the water?" he said, with a sob in his voice.
"What are you crying at? The mother didn't mean to make you cry."
She strained him contritely to her bosom, and kissed away his tears.
XII
The train for Switzerland started so early that Brum had no time to say his morning prayers; so, the carriage being to themselves, he donned his phylacteries and his praying-shawl with the blue stripes.
Zillah sat listening to the hour-long recitative with admiration of his memory.
Early in the hour she interrupted him to say: "How lucky I haven't to say all that! I should get tired."
"That's curious!" replied Brum. "I was just saying, 'Blessed art Thou, O Lord our God, who hath not made me a woman.' But a woman has to pray, too, mother. Else why is there given a special form for the women to substitute?—'Who hath made me according to His will.'"
"Ah, that's only for learned women. Only learned women pray."
"Well, you'd like to pray the Benediction that comes next, mother, I know. Say it with me—do."
She repeated the Hebrew obediently, then asked: "What does it mean?"
"'Blessed art Thou, O Lord our God, who openest the eyes of the blind.'"
"Oh, my poor Brum! Teach it me! Say the Hebrew again."
She repeated it till she could say it unprompted. And then throughout the journey her lips moved with it at odd times. It became a talisman—a compromise with the God who had failed her.
"Blessed art Thou, O Lord our God, who openest the eyes of the blind."
XIII
Mountains were the great sensation of the passage through Switzerland. Brum had never seen a mountain, and the thought of being among the highest mountains in Europe was thrilling. Even Zillah's eyes could scarcely miss the mountains. She painted them in broad strokes. But they did not at all correspond to Brum's expectations of the Alps.
"Don't you see glaciers?" he asked anxiously.
"No," replied Zillah, but kept a sharp eye on the windows of passing chalets till the boy discovered that she was looking for glaziers at work.
"Great masses of ice," he explained, "sliding down very slowly, and glittering like the bergs in the Polar regions."
"No, I see none," she said, blushing.
"Ah! wait till we come to Mont Blanc."
Mont