CHAPTER THE TWENTY-NINTH.
THE GOULIOT CAVES.
Olivia was very silent.
The coast of Sark shows some of the most fantastic workmanship of the sea, but the Gouliot Caves are its wildest and maddest freak. A strong, swift current sets in from the southwest, and being lashed into a giddy fury by the lightest southwest wind, it has hewn out of the rock a series of cells, and grottos, and alcoves, some of them running far inland, in long, vaulted passages and corridors, with now and then a shaft or funnel in the rocky roof, through which the light streams down into recesses far from the low porches, which open from the sea. Here and there a crooked, twisted tunnel forms a skylight overhead, and the blue heavens look down through it like a far-off eye. You cannot number the caverns and niches. Everywhere the sea has bored alleys and galleries, or hewn out solemn aisles, with arches intersecting each other, and running off into capricious furrows and mouldings. There are innumerable refts, and channels, and crescents, and cupolas, half-finished or only hinted at. There are chambers of every height and shape, leading into one another by irregular portals, but all rough and rude, as though there might have been an original plan, from which, while the general arrangement is kept, every separate stroke perversely diverged.
But another, and not a secondary, curiosity of this ocean-labyrinth is, that it is the habitat of a multitude of marine creatures, not to be seen at home in many other places. Except twice a month, at the neaptides, the lower chambers are filled with the sea; and here live and flourish thousands, upon thousands of those mollusks and zoophytes which can exist only in its salt waters. The sides of the caves, as far as the highest tides swept, were studded with crimson and purple and amber mollusca, glistening like jewels in the light pouring down upon them from the eyelet-openings overhead. Not the space of a finger-tip was clear. Above them in the clefts of the rock hung fringes of delicate ferns of the most vivid green, while here and there were nooks and crevices of profound darkness, black with perpetual, unbroken shadow.
I had known the caves well when I was a boy, but it was many years since I had been there. Now I was alone in them with Olivia, no other human being in sight or sound of us. I had scarcely eyes for any sight but that of her face, which had grown shy and downcast, and was generally turned away from me. She would be frightened, I thought, if I spoke to her in that lonesome place, I would wait till we were on the cliffs, in the open eye of day.
She left my side for one moment while I was poking under a stone for a young pieuvre, which had darkened the little pool of water round it with its inky fluid. I heard her utter an exclamation of delight, and I gave up my pursuit instantly to learn what was giving her pleasure. She was stooping down to look beneath a low arch, not more than two feet high, and I knelt down beside her. Beyond lay a straight narrow channel of transparent water, blue from a faint reflected light, with smooth, sculptured walls of rock, clear from mollusca, rising on each side of it. Level lines of mimic waves rippled monotonously upon it, as if it was stirred by some soft wind which we could not feel. You could have peopled it with tiny boats flitting across it, or skimming lightly down it. Tears shone in Olivia's eyes.
"It reminds me so of a canal in Venice," she said, in a tremulous voice.
"Do you know Venice?" I asked; and the recollection of her portrait taken in Florence came to my mind. Well, by-and-by I should have a right to hear about all her wanderings.
"Oh, yes!" she answered; "I spent three months there once, and this place is like it."
"Was it a happy time?" I inquired, jealous of those tears.
"It was a hateful time," she said, vehemently. "Don't let us talk of it. I hate to remember it. Why cannot we forget things, Dr. Martin? You, who are so clever, can tell me that."
"That is simple enough," I said, smiling. "Every circumstance of our life makes a change in the substance of the brain, and, while that remains sound and in vigor, we cannot forget. To-day is being written on our brain now. You will have to remember this, Olivia."
"I know I shall remember it," she answered, in a low tone.
"You have travelled a great deal, then?" I pursued, wishing her to talk about herself, for I could scarcely trust my resolution to wait till we were out of the caves. "I love you with all my heart and soul" was on my tongue's end.
"We travelled nearly all over Europe," she replied.
I wondered whom she meant by "we." She had never used the plural pronoun before, and I thought of that odious woman in Guernsey—an unpleasant recollection.
We had wandered back to the opening where Tardif had left us. The rapid current between us and Breckhou was running in swift eddies, which showed the more plainly because the day was calm, and the open sea smooth. Olivia stood near me; but a sort of chilly diffidence had crept over me, and I could not have ventured to press too closely to her, or to touch her with my hand.
"How have you been content to live here?" I asked.
"This year in Sark has saved me," she answered, softly.
"What has it saved you from?" I inquired, with intense eagerness. She turned her face full upon me, with a world of reproach in her gray eyes.
"Dr. Martin," she said, "why will you persist in asking me about my former life? Tardif never does. He never implies by a word or look that he wishes to know more than I choose to tell. I cannot tell you any thing about it."
I felt uncomfortably that she was drawing a comparison unfavorable to me between Tardif and myself—the gentleman, who could not conquer or conceal his desire to fathom a mystery, and the fisherman, who acted as if there were no mystery at all. Yet Olivia appeared more grieved than offended; and when she knew how I loved her she would admit that my curiosity was natural. She should know, too, that I was willing to take her as she was, with all the secrets of her former life kept from me. Some day I would make her own I was as generous as Tardif.
Just then my ear caught for the first time a low boom-boom, which had probably been sounding through the caves for some minutes.
"Good Heavens!" I ejaculated.
Yet a moment's thought convinced me that, though there might be a little risk, there was no paralyzing danger. I had forgotten the narrowness of the gully through which alone we could gain the cliffs. From the open span of beach where we were now standing, there was no chance of leaving the caves except as we had come to them, by a boat; for on each side a crag ran like a spur into the water. The comparatively open space permitted the tide to lap in quietly, and steal imperceptibly higher upon its pebbles. But the low boom I heard was the sea rushing in through the throat of the narrow outlet through which lay our only means of escape. There was not a moment to lose. Without a word, I snatched up Olivia in my arms, and ran back into the caves, making as rapidly as I could for the long, straight passage.
Neither did Olivia speak a word or utter a cry. We found ourselves in a low tunnel, where the water was beginning to flow in pretty strongly. I set her down for an instant, and tore off my coat and waistcoat. Then I caught her up again, and strode along over the slippery, slimy masses of rock which lay under my feet, covered with seaweed.
"Olivia," I said, "I must have my right hand free to steady myself with. Put both your arms round my neck, and cling to me so. Don't touch my arms or shoulders."
Yet the clinging of her arms about my neck, and her cheek close to mine, almost unnerved me. I held her fast with my left arm, and steadied myself with my right. We gained in a minute or two the mouth of the tunnel. The drift was pouring into it with a force almost too great for me, burdened as I was. But there was the pause of the tide, when the waves rushed out again in white floods, leaving the water comparatively shallow. There were still six or eight yards to traverse before we could reach an archway in the cliffs, which would land us in safety in the outer caves. Across this small space the tide came in strongly, beating against the foot of the rocks, and rebounding with great force. There was some peril; but we had no alternative. I lifted Olivia a little higher against my shoulder, for her long serge dress wrapped dangerously around us both; and then, waiting for the pause in the throbbing of the tide, I dashed hastily across.
One swirl of the water coiled about us, washing up nearly to my throat, and giving me almost a choking sensation of dread; but before a second could swoop down upon us I had staggered half-blinded to the arch, and put down Olivia in the small, secure cave within it. She had not spoken once. She did not seem able to speak now. Her large, terrified eyes looked up at me dumbly, and her face was white to the lips. I clasped her in my arms once more, and kissed her forehead and lips again and again in a paroxysm of passionate love and gladness.
"Thank God!" I cried. "How I love you, Olivia!"
I had told her only a few minutes before that the brain is ineffaceably stamped with the impress of every event in our lives. But how much more deeply do some events burn themselves there than others' I see it all now—more clearly, it seems to me, than my eyes saw it then. There is the huge, high entrance to the outer caves where we are standing, with a massive lintel of rocks overhead, all black but for a few purple and gray tints scattered across the blackness. Behind us the sea is glistening, and prismatic colors play upon the cliffs. Shadows fall from rocks we cannot see. Olivia stands before me, pale and terrified, the water running from her heavy dress, which clings about her slender figure. She shrinks away from me a pace or two.
"Hush!" she cries, in a tone of mingled pain and dread—"hush!"
There was something so positive, so prohibitory in her voice and gesture, that my heart contracted, and a sudden chill of despondency ran through me. But I could not be silent now. It was impossible for me to hold my peace, even at her bidding.
"Why do you say hush?" I asked, peremptorily. "I love you, Olivia. Is there any reason why I should not love you?"
"Yes," she said, very slowly and with quivering lips. "I was married four years ago, and my husband is living still!"