CHAPTER XI. BURY BLUFF
As Christian walked rapidly across the uneven turf towards the sea at midnight, his thoughts were divided between a schoolboy delight in the adventurous nature of his expedition and an uncomfortable sensation of surreptitiousness. He was not accustomed to this sort of work, and felt remarkably like a thief. If by some mischance his absence was discovered at the Hall, it would be difficult to account for it unless he played the part of a temporary lunatic. Fortunately his window communicated easily enough with the garden by means of a few stone steps, but visitors are not usually in the habit of leaving their bedrooms in order to take the air at midnight. Thinking over these things in his rapid and rather superficial way, he unconsciously quickened his pace.
The night was clear and starlit; the air soft and very pleasant, with a faint breath of freshness from the south-west. The moon, being well upon the wane, would not rise for an hour or more, but the heavens were glowing with the gentler light of stars, and on earth the darkness was of that transparent description which sailors prefer to the brightest moonlight.
Christian Vellacott had worked out most problems in life for himself. Taken as a whole, his solutions had been fairly successful—as successful as those of most men. If his views upon things in general were rather photographic—that is to say, hard, with clearly defined shadows—it was owing to his father's somewhat cynical training and to the absence of a mother's influence. Elderly maiden ladies, with sufficient time upon their hands to manage other people's affairs in addition to their own, complained of his want of sympathy, which may be read in the sense of stating that he neither sought theirs nor asked advice upon questions connected with himself. This self-reliance was the inevitable outcome of his life at home and at the office of the Beacon. Admirable as it may be, independence can undoubtedly be carried to an unpleasant excess—unpleasant that is for home life. Women love to see their men-folk a trifle dependent upon them.
Christian was in the midst of a problem as he walked across the tableland that stretched from St. Mary Western to the sea. That problem absorbed more of his attention than the home politics of France; it required a more careful study than any article he had ever penned for the Beacon. It gave him greater anxiety than Aunt Judy and Aunt Hester combined. Yet it was comprised in a single word. A single arm could encompass the whole of it. The single word—Hilda.
Leaving the narrow road, he presently struck the little pathway leading to the Cove. Suddenly he stopped, and stood motionless. There—not twenty yards from him—was the still figure of a man. Behind Christian the land rose gradually to some considerable height, so that he stood in darkness, while against the glowing sky the figure of this watcher was clearly defined in hard outline. Instinctively crouching down and seeking the covert of a few low bushes, Christian decreased the intervening distance by a few yards. The faint hope that it might prove to be a coastguard was soon dispelled. The heavy clothing and loose thigh-boots were those of a fisherman. The huge “cache-nez” which lay in coils upon his shoulders and completely protected the neck and throat, was such as is worn by the natives of the Côtes-du-Nord.
The sea boomed forth its melancholy song, far down in the black depths beyond. The tide was high, and the breeze freshening every moment. Christian could have crept up to the man's very feet without being detected. Lying still upon the short, dry grass, he watched for some moments.
From the man's clumsy attitude it was almost possible to divine his slow, mindless nature—for there is expression in the very turn of a man's leg as he stands—and it was easy to see that he was guarding the little path down the cliff to the Cove.
He had been posted there, and evidently meant to stay till called away.
There was only one way, now, to the Cove, and that was down the face of the cliff: the way that Christian had that very afternoon pronounced so hazardous. By day it was dangerous enough; by night it was almost an impossibility.