"Oh, do!" cried Lorraine.
The organ was unlocked, so Morland seated himself and began to improvise slow, dreamy, haunting music, that rose and fell through the little church like the murmur of the sea. Whatever faults of character the boy might have, his face was rapt when he played, and to Lorraine it seemed as if the very saints and angels in the stained-glass windows were looking and listening. Landry sat with parted lips and far-away blue eyes.
"He's always quiet when Morland is playing," whispered Claudia. "He loves music. I wish we could teach him. I've tried, but it's absolutely hopeless. He'd sit there all the afternoon, and I verily believe Morland would too, once he's started on that organ. We shall have to stop him if we want to go on with our walk. Morland! We're keeping Lorraine waiting!"
Morland came back from the clouds and closed the organ, Claudia beckoned Landry down from the gallery, and they stepped out again into the sunshine and the fresh salt breeze that blew up from the shore.
It was a beautiful path to Tangy Point, all along the edge of the cliffs, with great rugged rocks below, and the sea lapping gently on the shingle. Gulls flashed white wings against the autumn blue of the sky, and linnets twittered among the gorse bushes; here and there a few wild flowers lingered, and Claudia picked quite a summer-looking bouquet. The Point was a narrow spit of land crowned with a cairn, and here the young people climbed to get the view over the western sea.
"I believe all here under the water is the lost land of Lyonesse!" said Lorraine. "In King Arthur's days it was a prosperous place with cornfields and villages, and then the sea came and swallowed it all up. Fishermen say there's a castle and a church under the waves still, and that sometimes they can hear the bells ringing, but of course that's just imagination."
"Perhaps the mermaids live there!" laughed Claudia.
"You'd better send Lilith to look!"
"I say," said Morland, "there's a sort of a path down here. Are you game to come and explore?"
"Of course we are! It will be topping down on those sands. Leave your flowers here, Claudia; you can get them when we come back."