A companion of lesser perception might have faltered discouraged before his immobility. This one had the good sense to keep her eyes upon the shifting hedges.
"She tells us nothing, and lives like a nun, cloistered in her pathetic youth behind the walls of that crumbling old tomb. Mainwaring fills the town house with his friends, and there are queer stories afloat about him. He has never shown any interest in the child—looks upon its arrival as a duty mutually performed. There has been no public quarrel; no cruelty that we know of, and the rumours, however unsavoury, do not provide the evidence for divorce proceedings. In any case, Ferlie has joined the Church of Rome. Gave no explanation why; merely announced it as an accomplished fact. I saw a marble statue once, called 'Endurance.' It was in a private show, by an unknown man. A nude figure with hands extended to push back some invisible advancing foe. I bought it. There is terror in the face, lest the unknown power should crush completely; but there is also cold resistance and the strength of despair. I will show you the thing. You, who remember Ferlie as so poignantly alive...."
The speaker broke off for a moment.
"... But I must come to the incident which prompted my letter to you. I had gone unexpectedly to Black Towers, and only John greeted me in that mausoleum of a hall. He is a Ferlie product all right, but only just four. And ... one never knows.... The servants told me that Lady Greville-Mainwaring was at home but could not be disturbed. I asked if she were ill. They denied that and, politely resistant to further inquiries, supplied me with papers, afternoon tea, and, being well acquainted with my erratic habits, asked if I would stay the night. I said 'yes,' and turned my whole attention to John in the hope of discovering what his mother was doing.
"'No one could ever go up between five and six,' he informed me. 'But go up where, John?' I asked. With some difficulty I extracted the fact that Ferlie was in the West Tower. I knew there were unused rooms in the towers. I asked him what his mother did there between five and six, and he said she shut the door and 'just was quiet,' adding proudly that he took her up messages if it was important.
"I hated the sound of these proceedings which he evidently regarded as normal. 'This is important, John,' I said. 'We won't tell anybody else, but you take me up to Mother.' He demurred at first—thought the occasion did not justify that weary journey—but, at last, I persuaded him. The steps were high and dark and narrow. We might have been perambulating in Dante's Purgatory as we circled round and round. We stopped outside the door of a circular room. So strict were her orders that she had ceased to expect intrusion, and only a curtain hid her from us. I stood for some while behind it, listening to the silence. John, queer intense little soul that he is, sat down on the top step nursing his legs, for he was never very strong and I suppose they ached from the climb. And suddenly perched up at that height in the dark, relieved only by the spears of ghost-coloured light shooting through the slit windows behind us on the stair, I lost my nerve and felt that, dishonourable or not, I must know what Ferlie was doing. If she had turned into a witch in that setting I was not prepared to be surprised."
Miss Trefusis stopped to wipe from her face the dampness which had gathered there. She gave a little gasp and moistened her lips.
"Cyprian. I stood and peeped through the curtain folds at a room soaked in gold light. I thought I was demented until I realized that the rays of the western sun must touch this turret last of any room in the house, and then they struck through a round aperture glazed with orange glass. When no longer dazzled by the discovery I found Ferlie. The place was unfurnished save for a cushioned oak chair in which she was sitting, motionless as if she had been dead for years. On the palm of one opened hand lay a spherical object which retained at one spot a pin-point of reflected light like a minute star. On this it seemed to me Ferlie's eyes were fixed, and, even when throwing discretion to the winds, I went in to her she neither spoke nor stirred.
"I stooped low to her face and realized that she could not be aware of my presence. She was in some sort of a trance. Terrified, my first idea was to rush for help. Mercifully, I thought better of it. I did not know what kind of help was needed. I could only guess that Ferlie was self-hypnotized. But with what object? And had the thing been accidental, or deliberate. Not daring to pick up what she held in her hand I saw it was a small golden apple.
"I went back to John and asked him where the nearest doctor lived. We were some while whispering while I dug for information, and during that delay I heard Ferlie give a long sigh. Back I sped to her side. The apple had rolled into her lap and her body relaxed as I hovered round like a distracted hen. Then, to my joy, I perceived that she was realizing me. She did not seem astonished, and lifting her head spoke as if hardly out of a dream.