The story of Fifine

by Bernard Capes

So the callow calf-lover solaces his injured heart with dreams of stern qualities in himself realised too late by the unappreciative, of silent rebuke, and noble retort in the shape of self-sacrificing heroisms by fire and water, ending possibly in a quiet grave much bedewed by the tears of aching, hopeless self-reproach. I did not perhaps project my imagination to those extremes; but certainly I indulged it to the extent of shaming my sober years, so that in a minute, overtaken by the humour of the thing, I burst into a laugh and was myself again.

“I am going to hunt for broken pottery,” I said aloud—“nothing more nor less; and if in the process I get benighted on the mountain, well, it will be my own fault, and there’s an end of it.”

Up, then, I toiled, and the fog crept about me, drifting sluggishly down from the Camargue. It was thin as yet, and not more than enough to give an air of indefiniteness to the rocks above. Presently I came to a great bramble-grown bluff, twenty feet in height, up which I had the greatest difficulty in finding a way; but I achieved it at last, and, topping the ridge, found myself on the main plateau of the hill, an apparently limitless waste of dense bush.

Here, though I did not realise it, was the actual site of the Roman Camp, whence ordinarily a magnificent view of the valley and of the Château-crowned heights opposite was obtainable. Now I stood isolated in a little world of mist-encompassed green, littered all over with prone boulders, of differing, but mostly huge, dimensions.

Ploughing through the bush, I worked my way slowly on. It was a tedious process, but I could not venture to hurry it, as twilight was momentarily deepening the obscurity like mud disturbed on a river bottom, and any rash step on my part risked a wrench and sprain in one of the innumerable hidden fissures with which the whole surface of the under-rock was sewn. Many times, in spite of my caution, I slipped and half-lost my footing; many times trod suddenly on air, when I had thought firm ground was beneath me. And then, with a shock, I had started back, and was standing gaping. Right before me dropped a precipice, going down into unknown depths, and another step would have carried me clean over it.

It was only then that a sense of my rather impossible position began to penetrate me. But I was not going to give up without a struggle. Evidently I was on the wrong tack, and must bear away in a different direction. Gingerly I proceeded—only to be brought up in a few minutes on a like experience. Then I stood still and reflected. I had hopelessly lost my bearings; I did not know on what part of the hill I stood at that moment, and there was no distinguishing feature to guide me—only a tumbled confusion of rock and juniper heaving itself on all sides into swift obliteration. At the best, I knew, the descent on the north side was a long and a difficult one; under these circumstances, even if I could find and trace its course, it must prove hazardous beyond the worth of risking. I could see nothing for it but to camp beside some rock, and there await, as patiently as I might, the shifting of the mist, with or before the return of daylight.

No great hardship, after all, for a toughened vagabond, and no very new experience. I had slept on a hillside before now; I had run into a ditch, bicycling in the dark, and had slumbered where I had fallen from pure exhaustion. Here, save for the slight chill of the crawling vapour, all was cosy and secure—no wind, plentiful cover, and litter for one’s bedding ad infinitum. It was imperative only that I should bestow myself in comfort and safety while yet I could distinguish between air and matter. Very warily, turning from my latest peril, I trod a cautious path to where a massive boulder heaved itself out of the green, and, dropping under its friendly shelter, prepared to abide my destiny.

I had tried a shout or two first; but that, I knew, was a pretty forlorn hope. What other fool but myself would likely be abroad on the hills on such a night as this? Then, very surely as I sat, the gloom came in about me, until to have dared a step in that blinding investment would have been madness.

So there was nothing for it at last but to face the facts, and make the best I could of them. If I was conscious of any qualm on Fifine’s account, I quickly dismissed it as, if not unreasonable, immaterial. I was not the less in the hands of Fate because she knew nothing of my predicament; while, at the best or worst, my welfare had ceased to be a leading consideration with her. Carabas, no doubt, would find means to assuage her anxiety, if any such she felt on my behalf.

It was odd sitting there at freedom on the open hill, and yet feeling oneself as securely caged as though fettered to a stone shaft, like Bonivard, in a subterranean dungeon. After a time I got out the handful of figs remaining to me, with the flask, still two-thirds full, of brandy; and, having discussed that simple meal at leisure, lit my pipe, and lay smoking and sipping with an ample serenity. It was perfectly still; even the mist, born of the sun-baked levels, seemed to have a quality of warm steam in it, and flattered rather than discomforted. Gradually, after I know not how long an interval, drowsiness overcame me, and, sinking comfortably into my cosy eyrie, I slept.