CHAPTER XV
KING ARTHUR'S CASTLE
The first person whom Nan encountered on her return from Trenby Hall was Mrs. Seymour. The latter's eyebrows lifted quizzically.
"Well?" she asked. "How did it go?"
"It didn't 'go' at all!" answered Nan. "I was enveloped in an atmosphere of severe disapproval. In fact, I think Lady Gertrude considers I require quite a long course of training before I'm fitted to be Roger's wife."
"Nonsense!" Kitty smiled broadly.
"Seriously"—nodding. "Apparently the kind of wife she really wants for him is a combination of the doormat and fetch-and-carry person who always stays at home, and performs her wifely and domestic duties in a spirit of due subservience."
"She'll live and learn, then, my dear, when she has you for a daughter-in-law," commented Kitty drily.
"I think I'm a bit fed up with 'in-laws,'" returned Nan a trifle wearily. "I'll go out and walk it off. Or, better still, lend me your bike, Kitty, and I'll just do a spin to Tintagel. By the time I've climbed up to King Arthur's Castle, I'll feel different. It always makes me feel good to get to the top of anywhere."
"But, my dear, it's five o'clock already! You won't have time to go there before dinner."
"Yes, I shall," persisted Nan. "Half an hour to get there—easily! An hour for the castle, half an hour for coming back, and then just time enough to skip into a dinner-frock. . . . I must go, really, Kitten," she went on with a note of urgency in her voice. "That appalling drawing-room at Trenby and almost equally appalling dining-room have got into my system, and I want to blow the germs away." She gesticulated expressively.
"All right, you ridiculous person, take my bicycle then," replied Kitty good-humouredly. "But what will you do when you have to live in those rooms?"
"Why, I shall alter them completely, of course. I foresee myself making the Hall 'livable in' throughout the first decade of my married existence!"—with a small grimace of disgust.
A few minutes later Nan was speeding along the road to Tintagel, the cool air, salt with brine from the incoming tide, tingling against her face.
In less than the stipulated half-hour she had reached the village—that bleak, depressing-looking village, with its miscellany of dull little houses, through which one must pass, as through some dreary gateway, to reach the wild, sea-girt beauty of the coast itself. Leaving her cycle in charge at a cottage, Nan set out briskly on foot down the steep hill that led to the shore. She was conscious of an imperative need for movement. She must either cycle, or walk, or climb, in order to keep at bay the nervous dread with which her visit to Trenby had inspired her. It had given her a picture of Roger's home and surroundings—a brief, enlightening glimpse as to the kind of life she might look forward to when she had married him.
It was all very different from what she had anticipated. Even Roger himself seemed different in the environment of his home—less spontaneous, less the adoring lover. Lady Gertrude's influence appeared to dominate the whole house and everyone in it. But, as Nan realised, she had given her promise to Roger, and too much hung on that promise for her to break it now—Penelope's happiness, and her own craving to shut herself away in safety, to bind herself so that she could never again break free.
Her unexpected meeting with Peter the previous evening had shown her once and for all the imperative need for this. The clasp of his hand, the strong hold of his arms about her as he bore her across the stream, the touch of his lips against her hair—the memory of these things had been with her all night. She had tried to thrust them from her, but they refused to be dismissed. More than once she had buried her hot face in the coolness of the pillows, conscious of a sudden tremulous thrill that ran like fire through all her veins.
And that Peter, too, knew they stood on dangerous quicksands when they were alone together, she was sure. This morning, beyond a briefly-worded greeting at breakfast, he had hardly spoken to her, carefully avoiding her, though without seeming to do so, until her departure to Trenby Hall made it no longer necessary. She hoped he would not stay long at Mallow. It would be unbearable to meet him day after day—to feel his eyes resting upon her with the same cool gravity to which he had compelled them this morning, to pretend that he and she meant no more to one another than any two other chance guests at a country house.
Nan's thoughts drove her swiftly down the steep incline which descended towards the cove and, arriving at its foot, she stopped, as everyone must, to obtain the key of the castle from a near-by cottage. The old dame who gave her the key—accepting a shilling in exchange with voluble gratitude—impressed upon her the urgent necessity for returning it on her way back.
"If you please, lady, I've lost more than one key with folks forgettin' to return them," she explained.
"I won't forget," Nan assured her, and forthwith started to make her way to the top of the great promontory on which stands all that still remains of King Arthur's Castle—the fallen stones of an ancient chapel, and a ruined wall enclosing a grassy space where sheep browse peacefully.
Quitting the cottage and turning to the left, she bent her steps towards a footbridge spanning a gap in the cliff side and, pausing at the bridge, let her eyes rest musingly on the great, mysterious opening picturesquely known as Merlin's Cave. The tide was coming in fast, and she could hear the waves boom hollowly as they slid over its stony floor, only to meet and fight the opposing rush of other waves from the further end—since what had once been the magician's cave was now a subterranean passage, piercing right through the base of the headland.
For a while Nan loitered on the bridge, gazing at the wild beauty of the scene—the sombre cove where the inrushing waves broke in a smother of spume on the beach, and above, to the left, the wind-scarred, storm-beaten crag rising sheer and wonderful out of the turbulent sea and crowned by those ancient walls about which clung so much of legend and romance.
Perhaps the magic of old Merlin's enchantments still lingered there, for as Nan stood silently absorbing the mysterious glamour of the place, the petty annoyances of the day, the fret of Lady Gertrude's unwelcoming reception of her, seemed to dwindle into insignificance. They were only external things, after all. They could not mar the loveliness of this mystic, legend-haunted corner of the world.
At length, with a faint sigh of regret, she crossed the bridge and walked slowly up a path which appeared to be little more than a rough track hewn out of the rocky side of the cliff itself, uneven and strewn with loose stones. Nan picked her steps gingerly. At the top of the track her way turned sharply at right angles to where a narrow ridge—so narrow that two people could not walk it abreast—led to Tintagel Head. It was the merest neck of land, very steep on either hand, like a slender bridge connecting what the Cornish folk generally speak of as "the Island" with the mainland.
Nan proceeded to cross the narrow ridge. She was particularly surefooted as a rule, her supple body balancing itself instinctively. But to-day, for the first time, she felt suddenly nervous as she neared the crag and, glancing downward, caught sight of the sullen billows thundering far below on either side. Perhaps the events of the day had frayed her nerves more than she knew. It was only by an effort that she dismissed the unaccustomed sensation of malaise which had assailed her and determinedly began the ascent to the castle by way of a series of primitively rough-hewn steps. They were slippery and uneven, worn and polished by the tread of the many feet which had ascended and descended them, and guarded only by a light hand-rail that seemed almost to quiver in her grasp as, gripped by another unexpected rush of fear, Nan caught at it in feverish haste.
She stood quite still—suddenly panic-stricken. Here, half-way up the side of the steep promontory, the whole immensity of the surrounding height and depth came upon her in a terrifying flash of realisation. From below rose the reiterated boom of the baulked waves, each thud against the base of the great crag seeming to shake her whole being, while, whichever way she looked, menacing headlands towered stark and pitiless above the sea. She felt like a fly on the wall of some abysmal depth—only without the fly's powers of adhesion.
Very carefully she twisted her body sideways, intending to retrace her steps, but in an instant the sight of the surging waters—miles and miles below, as it seemed—sent her crouching to the ground. She could not go back! She felt as though her limbs were paralysed, and she knew that if she attempted to descend some incalculable force would drive her straight over the edge, hurtling helplessly to the foot of those rugged cliffs.
For a moment she closed her eyes. Only by dogged force of will could she even retain her present position, half crouching, half lying on the ill-matched steps. It almost seemed as though some power were drawing her, compelling her to relax her muscles and slide down, down into those awful depths. Then the memory of a half-caught phrase she had overheard flashed across her mind: "If you feel giddy, always look up, not down." As though in obedience to some inner voice, she opened her eyes and looked up to where, only a few battered steps above, she could see the door of the castle.
If she could only make it! Rising cautiously to her knees she crawled up one more step and rested a moment, digging her fingers into the crevices of the rock and finding a precarious foothold against a projecting ledge. Keeping her eyes fixed upon the door she scrambled up a few inches further, then paused again, exhausted with the strain.
Two more steps remained. Two more desperate efforts, while she fought the hideous temptation to look downwards. For an instant she almost lost all knowledge of what she was doing. Guided only by instinct—the instinct of self-preservation—her eyes still straining painfully in that enforced upward gaze, she at last reached the door.
With a strangled sob of relief she knelt up against it and inserted the big iron key, with numbed fingers turning it in the lock. The heavy door opened, and Nan clung to it with both hands till it had swung back sufficiently to admit her. Then, from the security of the castle itself, she pushed it to and locked it on the inside, as the old woman at the cottage had bidden her, thrusting the key into the pocket of her sports coat.
She was safe! Around her were the walls of the ancient castle—walls that seemed almost part of the solid rock itself standing betwixt her and that horrible abyss below! . . . Her limbs gave way suddenly and she toppled over in a dead faint, lying in a little crumpled heap at the foot of the wall.
It was very quiet up there within King Arthur's Castle. The tourists who, mayhap, had visited it earlier in the day were gone; no one would come again to-night to disturb the supreme stillness. The wan cry of the gulls drifted eerily across the sea. Once an enquiring sheep approached the slim young body lying there, stirless and inert, and sniffed at it, then moved away again and lay down to chew the cud.
The golden disc of the sun dropped steadily lower in the sky. . . .
* * * * * *
"Nan's very late."
Mrs. Seymour made the statement rather blankly. Dinner had been announced and the house-party were gathered together in the hall round the great hearth fire. The summer day had chilled to a cool evening, as so often happens by the sea, and the ruddy flames diffused a cheery glow of warmth.
"Perhaps Lady Gertrude is keeping her to dinner," said Lord St. John. "It's very probable." As he spoke he held out his hands to the fire—withered old hands that looked somehow frailer than their wont.
Kitty shook her head.
"No. She—I don't think she enjoyed her visit overmuch, and, when she came back she went out cycling—to 'work it off,'" she said.
"Where did she go?" inquired Penelope.
"To Tintagel. I told her she wouldn't have time enough to get there and back before dinner. Never mind. We'll begin, and I'll order something to be kept hot for her."
Accordingly they all adjourned to the dining-room and dinner proceeded in its usual leisurely fashion, although the gay chatter that generally accompanied it was absent. Everyone seemed conscious of a certain uneasiness.
"I wish young Nan would come back," remarked Barry at last, looking up abruptly from the fish he was dissecting. A shade of anxiety clouded his lazy blue eyes. "I hope she's not come a cropper down one of these confounded hills."
He voiced the restless feeling of suspense which was beginning to pervade the whole party.
"What time did she start, Kit?" he went on.
"About five o'clock, I should think, or soon after."
"Then she'd have had loads of time to get back by now."
The general tension took the form of a sudden silence. Then Peter
Mallory spoke, very quietly:
"She didn't propose going up to the castle, did she?" In spite of its quietness his voice had a certain clipped sound that drove home the significance of his question.
"Yes, she did." Kitty tried to reassure herself. "But she's as surefooted as a deer. We all went up the other day and Nan was by far the best climber amongst us."
Almost simultaneously Peter and Barry were on their feet.
"Something may have happened, all the same," said Barry with concern.
"She might have sprained her ankle—or—or anything."
He turned to the servant nearest him.
"Tell Atkinson to get the car round and to be quick about it."
"Very good, sir." And the man disappeared on his errand.
In a moment the thought that a possible accident might have befallen Nan broke up the party. Kitty and Penelope hurried off in quest of rugs and sandwiches and brandy—anything that might be of service, while the men drew together, conversing in low voices while they waited for the car.
"You'll find her, Barry?" St. John's voice shook a little. "You'll bring her back safe?"
"I'll bring her back." Barry laid kindly hands on the old man's shoulders which had seemed suddenly to stoop as though beneath a burden. "Don't worry. I expect she's only had some trifling mishap. Burst a tyre probably and is walking back."
St. John's look of acute anxiety relaxed a little.
"I hope so," he muttered, "I hope so."
A servant opened the door.
"The car's waiting, sir."
"Good." Barry strode into the hall, Mallory following him.
"Barry, I must go with you," he said hoarsely.
In the blaze of the electric light the two men looked hard into each other's faces. Then Barry nodded.
"Right. I'll leave the chauffeur behind and drive myself. We must have plenty of room at the back in case Nan's hurt." He paused, then held out his hand. "I'm damned sorry, old man."
"I suppose Kitty told you?"
"Yes. She told me."
"I think I'm rather glad you know," said Peter simply.
Then, hurrying into their coats, the two men ran out to the car and a moment later they were tearing along the road, their headlights blazing like angry stars beneath the calm, sweet light of the moon overhead.
The old dame who kept the keys of the castle rose from her supper as the honk, honk of a motor-horn broke on her startled ears. People didn't come to visit the castle at this time of night! But the purr of the engine outside her cottage, and the long beams of light flung seawards by the headlights, brought her quickly to the door.
"We want a key—for the castle," shouted Barry, while to expedite matters Peter sprang out of the car and went to the floor of the cottage.
"The key!" he cried out.
She extended her hand, thinking he had brought one back.
"Ah, I knew I'd missed one," she said. She shook a lean forefinger at him reprovingly: "So 'twas you run off with it! I'm obliged to you for bringing it again, sir. I couldn't rightly remember whether 'twas a young lady or gentleman who'd had it. There's so many comes for a key and—"
"It was a lady. She's up there now, we think. And I want another key to get in with. She may have been taken ill."
Peter's curt explanation stemmed her ready stream of talk abruptly. Snatching the key which she took down from a peg on the wall he returned to the car with it. Barry was still sitting behind the steering wheel. He bent forward, as Peter approached.
"You go," he said, with a bluntness that masked an infinite understanding. "There's the brandy flask"—bringing it out of a side pocket. "If you want help, blow this hooter." He had detached one of the horns from the car. "If not—well, I shall just wait here till you come back."