"You had better go," she said in a low, imperative whisper. "Ask them to show you into my room, and wait there for me."
I took no notice of her. My eyes were fixed upon Paul. I felt that he was going to speak to me; and he did.
"Adrea! Adrea!" he said slowly. "How is it that you are here? You did not come with him, did you? No! no! of course not. And yet, how is it that you are here?"
"I feared Father Adrian and his threats, and I was alone, quite alone, and—and I could bear it no longer. I was obliged to come."
His face grew a trifle more animated; I could see that he was recovering. The dumb stupor which had held his features rigid was passing away.
"Yes, I am glad you are here. I want to talk to you. I had some important business which kept me writing here all night, and must have fallen asleep. I will go and change my things and come back to you."
He looked down at his crumpled shirt-front and disordered tie, and then moved slowly towards the door. Lady de Vaux hesitated for a moment, with a dark frown upon her face, and then laid her hand upon his arm.
"Your explanation should surely have beenaddressed to me, Paul," she said coldly. "Who is this young lady?"
"She is a friend of mine," Paul answered, "and——"
"I heard you call her 'Adrea,'" Lady de Vaux continued. "May I ask whether it is indeed Miss Adrea Kiros?"
"I have told you that is my name, Lady de Vaux," I answered promptly. "You have possibly heard of me."
Lady de Vaux turned her back upon both of us, and left the room without a word.
"Love, blossoming in the roses, holds a dagger in her hands."
"Love, blossoming in the roses, holds a dagger in her hands."
We were alone, Paul and I, in that great, solemn room, full of pale, phantom-like lights and quivering shadows. He was standing a few yards away from me, with his head half averted, and his eyes full of a great, hopeless despair. In silence I approached him, and took his death-cold hand in mine.
"It is no matter," I whispered; "I do not care for your mother! Her words are nothing! I will not leave you—not till you tell me everything."
"Everything!" He echoed the word, and looked at me helplessly. "Everything! Tell you everything!"
Suddenly there was a change. The numbed, helpless look left his face, and his features were relaxed. He was himself again; a strong, brave man, only shaken by the storm.
"Adrea, forgive me! Did you think that I was going mad? I have had a terrible shock, and I have been up all night listening to a story which brings great suffering and misery upon me!"
His eyes had suddenly a far-away look in them, so sad that I felt the tears rush into mine. I pressed his hand to let him know that I understood; but I kept my face turned from him. Ah! love is a strange thing, indeed! If I had not cared, Paul, I could have sympathised with you so nicely, and made so many pretty speeches. But I love you, and it made me feel very strange and solemn. I had nothing to say; my heart was too full. Did you understand, I wonder? Will you ever understand? Paul, my love! my love! It is so sweet to say that over and over to myself in this dark chamber, where there is no one to hear me, or to see me looking so foolish. You make me feel so different, Paul! That is because you yourself are so different from all the men I know; from all the men I have ever seen.
We stood there, quite silent, for some moments. Then he drew a quick, stifled breath, and caught hold of my hands. "I cannot breathe in this place," he said, looking half fearfully around; "the very air seems tainted with that horrible story, and its ghosts are lurking in every corner!"
"Let me draw the curtains," I whispered. "The sunlight will banish them. You are dazed."
He held my hand tightly, and drew me towards the window. "Never mind the curtains! We will go out; out over the moor."
He was feverishly impatient to be gone, but I held him back. "Your clothes!" I reminded him. "And you have no hat!"
He looked down doubtfully at his disordered evening dress, and then released my hands. "Wait for me, here," he begged. "Promise that you will not go away; that nothing shall make you go."
I promised.
"See! I shall lock the door," he continued, as he reached the threshold. "No one can come in and disturb you!"
"Please to have some tea and a bath!" I begged. "I do not mind waiting. You will be ill, if you do not mind."
He was gone about half an hour. Once, some one came and tried the door, but I took no notice. At last I heard the key turn in the lock, and he entered. "Did you think that I was long?" he asked, coming up to me with a smile.
I shook my head; my eyes were full of tears, and there was a lump in my throat. I could not speak. He had changed all his clothes, and was carefully dressed in a brown tweed shooting suit and gaiters, but the correctness and order of his external appearance seemed only to emphasize the ravages which one single night's suffering had wrought upon his strong, handsome face.Hard, cruel lines had furrowed their way across his forehead, and under his eyes were deep black marks. His bronze cheeks were white and sunken, and a bright red spot burned on one of them. But it was a change of which the details could give no idea. His face had caught the inflection of his inward agony, and retained it. It was there, if not for the world to see, at any rate terribly evident to me, to those who loved him.
He was quite calm now, however. It was as though the fires of suffering had burnt themselves out, leaving behind them a silent, charred desolation. He took my arm, and together we left the room, passing through the high French windows and along an open terrace until we reached the gardens. We turned down a broad walk bordered by high yew hedges, at the bottom of which was a little gate leading into the park. The air was fragrant with the perfume of violets, and early stocks and hyacinths, mingled every now and then with a more delicate perfume from the greenhouses on the other side of the red-brick wall. How beautiful it all seemed, in that sweet, dancing sunlight!—the songs of the birds, the blossoming fruit-trees, and pink-budded chestnuts, the scents which floated about on the soft west breeze, and the constant humming of bees and other winged insects. Only in England could there have been so sudden a changefrom the grey mists and leaden skies of yesterday. Even in that moment of extreme tension I could not help an exclamation of admiration as we came to an end of the gravelled walk, and Paul held open for me a little iron gate.
"How beautiful your home is!" I cried. "How you must love it!"
A look almost of agony passed across his face. It came and went in a moment. "Yes! I love it!" he answered, "but it is not my home. Henceforth I have no home. I may well be thankful that I have even a name!"
I looked at him, waiting for an explanation, but he walked on in silence. It was not until we were half-way across the park that I spoke. "I do not understand!" I said softly. "Will you not tell me something of your trouble?"
"I would that I could, Adrea!" he answered. His voice was so gentle, and yet his face was so stern. "But no, I cannot. It is a secret. It is only a blotted page of our family history made clear to me. But it alters everything!"
"Does it make you poorer?" I asked falteringly.
He looked down in my eyes bravely; but his voice shook as he answered: "If it be true—as I scarcely doubt—it takes from me everything: my money, myhome, my future. It brings everything but disgrace upon us, Adrea, and even that must touch our name. Even though the living are spared, the memory of the dead must suffer!"
I felt the tears flowing down my cheeks, but I dashed them away. "I do not understand. I——"
"Of course not! and I cannot explain. Yet it is simple! I have an elder brother, of whom I never heard, to whom everything belongs. I am going to find him!"
"Where is he?" I cried. He shook his head. "That I cannot tell. Father Adrian knows, but he will not speak. I am going in search of him myself. I am going to Cruta!"
To Cruta! The name rang in my ears, and earth and trees and sky seemed reeling before me. Then I clutched him by the arm, and cried out hysterically,—
"You shall not go there! The place is horrible! You shall not go!"
He stood still, and looked at me in wonderment. We had crossed the park now, and were on the edge of the bare moorland. His figure alone stood out in solitary relief against the sky. I was half mad with fear and dismay. He did not understand. How could he?
"It is at Cruta that I can learn all that there still is for me to learn," he said. "I shall start for there to-night."
Oh! it was horrible! What could I say? How was I to stop him? How much dare I tell? I caught hold of his hands, and held them tightly.
"Paul, I want to ask you something! When you heard from the convent that relations had claimed me and taken me away, and then, a year afterwards, you found me there—in London—a dancing girl, what did you think?"
He answered me at once and without hesitation. "I thought that you had misled the Lady Superior,—that you were weary of your life there, and had run away."
I shook my head. "I knew that you thought so and I never denied it. But it was not so! I was not unhappy at the convent, but one day I was sent for and bidden prepare for a journey. Some relatives had sent for me, and I was to go. And to where? It was to Cruta! Paul, it was old Count of Cruta who claimed me. I cannot tell you anything of the time I spent there, shut up in the gloomy castle; it was horrible beyond all words. Even the memory of it makes me shudder. If only I could tell you! But I must not! I can tell you this, though. In less than six months I felt myself going mad; and one night I stole down to the beach and unfastened a small boat and rowed away, scarcely caring what happened to me so that I could but escape from that awful place. It was a desperatechance. I was out all day without food or water, rowing and drifting until Cruta lay like a speck in the distance. Then by chance I was picked up by an English yacht, and they brought me to London. I arrived there helpless and miserable, and, ah! how lonely! I dared not go back to the convent for fear I should be sent back to Cruta. There was only you. I went to your bankers, and they told me that you were abroad—on the Continent. By chance they asked me there my name, and by chance again I told them it truthfully. They told me that they had money for me there. I had only to sign a receipt, and they gave me more than I asked for—ten times more. Then I remembered the address of an English girl who had been at the convent with me, and she gave me a home for a time. It was through her dancing mistress that I became—a dancing girl. I have told you this, Paul, because I want you to promise me not to go to Cruta. It is an evil place. They are mad there. Promise me!"
He looked at me gravely and very tenderly; but his tone was firm. "Adrea, it is necessary that I go there," he said. "I cannot rest for a moment until I know for certain whether a story which I have just been told is a true one. The proof lies in Cruta! It is no whim which is taking me there! I must go!"
My heart was sick with dread. Yet what could Ido? I said nothing; only I covered my face with my hands and wept.
"Adrea, you are a foolish child!" he said, bending over me. "What is there for me to fear at Cruta? Look up and tell me!"
I shook my head. "You would not heed me," I answered sadly. "I dare not tell you. But there is one thing," I added hastily. "Will you do it for me simply because I ask you?"
"If it be possible, yes!"
I stood still on a little hillock, and faced him eagerly. "Then do not go to Cruta until to-morrow!" I begged. "It will make no difference to you."
"And what difference will it make to you, he asked, perplexed.
"Never mind! promise!" He hesitated for a moment, with a frown on his forehead, and his face turned seaward.
"Well! I will promise then!"
I caught hold of his hand, and held it tightly. "You are very good to me!" I said. "Allons!let us move onward!"
We had reached the Hermitage, and I had spoken scarcely a single word of comfort. An icy coldness seemed to have stolen into my heart. I had ceased to think of Paul, or of my love. There was somethingelse; another passion which made me blind. Yet I let him come in with me, and yielded myself up for a while to the dream of loving and being loved by him. While I lay in his arms, with my head upon his shoulder, and every now and then felt his light, caressing touch upon my face,—why then, the world for me was bounded by that little room, and I had no thoughts which travelled outside it. But it lasted only while he was with me. When he stood up, and said that he must go, I did not seek to keep him.
"Shall I come again?" he asked, as we stood hand in hand before the door.
I shook my head. "Not to-night love! I shall be better alone. I am weary, and I have my things to collect."
I knew he would be surprised. He withdrew his hand, and manlike, was almost angry. "I forgot. You will leave here, I suppose!"
I shrugged my shoulders. "What should keep me, Paul? I could not live here alone. Every stone and tree would be full of barren memories. No! to-morrow I go to London. I have sent all the servants away to-day, except Gomez. You will be with me early!"
"I will be outside your window before you are up!" he promised with a touch of gaiety in his tone. "See that Gomez has breakfast for two!"
He passed down the avenue, and out of sight. I closed the door with a little shudder and turned round. Gomez was by my side. Through the gloom I could see that his dark eyes were full of fire, and his olive features were set and grim.
"What do you want Gomez?" I asked quickly.
He drew close to my side. "The priest," he muttered, "has he—has he dared——"
His breath was coming quickly. He spoke English but slightly, and in the excitement the words seemed to stick in his throat.
I interrupted him. "He has told Mr. de Vaux some strange, horrible story. What do you know of it?"
"All! All! All! I was there—in the chamber! My master's words to him—I heard them all. He has told, then! He has threatened! Oh! if only I had known when he was here!"
The man's fierce face and gesture told their own tale. I beckoned him to follow me into the room where Paul and I had been sitting, and closed the door.
"You were Martin de Vaux's faithful servant," I said. "Do you want to see his son driven from his home and robbed of his lands?"
The man moved his lips, making a curious sound, and drew a long, gurgling breath. He was shaking with excitement.
"Who should do it?"
"The priest!" I answered softly.
"Because of the words, the story of which my master spoke to him at his death in the monastery?"
"Yes! because of that."
"Ah!" He stole up to my side with a noiseless, animal movement, and whispered in my ear. His eyes were burning; his face was full of evil meaning. Yet I did not shrink from him. I welcomed him with a smile. He whispered into my ear. It was like the hiss of a snake; but I smiled. I whispered back again. He nodded. Ah! the way before me was growing clear at last. Was it not fate that had brought Gomez ready to my hand? Ay! fate! A good fate! A kind fate! We stood close together in that dimly lit room; and though we were alone in the house, we spoke in whispers to one another. When I moved to the door, Gomez followed me.
I came down in ten minutes, clad in a long, dark cloak, with a small hat and a thick veil. I took a stick from the rack, and there was something else in my deep pocket.
"Alone!" he whispered, as I moved towards the door.
"Alone!" I answered. "Make a good fire in the drawing-room, and let there be food and wine there."
"For two?" he asked with an evil smile.
"For two!"
"A land that is lonelier than a ruin."
"A land that is lonelier than a ruin."
A cold twilight followed close upon the day. The sky was strewn with dark clouds, and a wild wind blew in my face. I was on an unknown road, and in all my life I had seen nothing so dreary.
On one side, about a hundred yards away, was the sea; on the other was a broken stretch of bare moorland covered with only the scantiest herbage and piles of barren grey rocks. Some were lying together in quaint, grotesque shapes; others stood out alone against the sky, and broken fragments of all sizes covered the ground, choking and destroying all vegetation. There was no background of woods or trees; there was nothing between that barren, stony surface and the leaden sky. What turf there had been had lost its colour, and never a fragment of moss had grown upon one of those weather-beaten boulders. The sea air had stained them, and the grey evening mists had rotted them, until their surface was honeycombed with indentations,but neither had softened or toned down their fierce ugliness. Even in the bright sunlight such a country as this must still have been a country of desolation, and a light heart must sometimes have lost its gaiety and felt oppressed. To me, as I hurried along, with the cold evening settling down around me, that walk was horrible. Strange shadows seemed to dog my path and stalk solemnly along by my side. Footsteps seemed to follow behind me, and every stone I dislodged made me start. Sometimes I fancied that I heard strange whisperings in my ears, and I started round, shivering and trembling, to find myself alone. Once I stopped short. Was that a dead man in the way? How my heart beat! No! it was only a long boulder of rock! Listen! was not that the scream of a dying man? My own voice, raised in helpless terror, drowned the sound, and while I stood there ready to sink to the ground, a great sea-gull came circling round my head, and the blood flowed warm in my veins once more. How sad and mournful was that solitary cry and slow, hopeless flapping of the wings! Who was it said that the evil spirits of dead men dwell imprisoned in those sad-crying birds? It was very, very human, that cry. Bah! was I getting superstitious and faint-hearted before my task was begun? I set my teeth and stepped boldly onwards. For a while I had no more fancies.
Throughout that hideous walk my whole imagination seemed coloured with a reflection of the purpose towards which I was tending. I do not write this in any morbid fit. Few women have passed through what I have passed through; fewer still have stopped to record their sensations. It is strange that it should afford me any satisfaction to record them here, but it is so. I have begun, and I must go on. This part of my life is drawing rapidly to a close, and with its close I shall seal this little book up and put it away for ever.
The night grew darker, and the road was fast becoming little more than a rude cattle-track. A little distance ahead of me, from some building as yet unseen, a strong, clear light was steadily burning. Save for it, I might have feared that I had lost my way, for as yet I had passed no sign of human habitation. But that light was sufficient. Gomez had told me of it. It was the light which burned always, from dusk to morning, from the tower of the monastery of St. Bernard.
Two things seemed strange to me, or rather seem strange to me now, when I look back upon that walk. The first was my utter indifference to all physical pain. There was a hole in my boot, and I found afterwards that my foot must have been bleeding most of the time. I never felt it. I was conscious of neither pain nor fatigue. The second thing which surprises me is that,as I drew near to my journey's end, I grew calmer. I had no desire to draw back. I had no fear. The thing which was before me never assumed any definite shape! It was there—in the background—a dim, floating purpose, never once oppressing me, never forcing its way forward in my mind for more definite consideration, and only showing itself at all in a vague, lurid glow which seemed to change even the shapes of all the gruesome surroundings of my dismal walk. Towards the end of my expedition this became even more marked. My thoughts had recoiled from the present to the past. Vague pictures of the days that had gone by seemed floating before my eyes. I saw myself in the convent garden, with all my little world enclosed in those four walls, and I heard the shrill laughter of the girls with whom I was walking, and I even fancied that I could catch the perfume of the lilac trees which drooped over the smoothly kept lawn. And then the picture faded away, and from the vessel's side I saw Cruta, a purple-topped island rising like some precious jewel from the sea! I shuddered at the memory of that face, which soon became a living dread to me, and I heard again the passionate voice of a dark-robed man reading poetry, and crushing with white, nervous fingers the hyacinths whose odour was making the air faint. I saw his white, sad face, in which the struggle of the man against himself was already born—born,alas! in those long mornings by the sea, at my unconscious bidding! And soon Cruta, too, faded away, and you, Paul, my love, my dear, dear love, your face came to me. Almost my eyes closed, almost I stayed here to dream. Ah! how the magic of this love, this wonderful love, lightens my little world! My heart is stirred to music, my blood is dancing. I am chilled no longer. Ah! Paul, it is for you that I strike this blow, for you that I tread this stony way. It is sweet to think of it. I go on as blithely as ever a village maiden stepped forward to her wedding. The way is as sweet to me as a garden of roses. Your face, too, is dying out of my thoughts, Paul. Farewell! Farewell!
The valley of the shadow of death! Did any one speak those words? What an evil fancy! Yet the air seemed full of whisperings. The valley of the shadow of death! Yes! it might be that, and these cold, grey boulders the spirits of the evil ones risen up out of Hades. Is there a hell, I wonder? How chill and dark the air seems! There is death about!
The sound of a single bell broke in upon my thoughts. I raised my eyes. My journey was accomplished. Before me was a grim, stern building, and attached to it a chapel. It was the monastery of St. Bernard.
"Farewell to the dead ashes of life."
"Farewell to the dead ashes of life."
The path which I had been following led straight up to the bare, arched door of the building. I had reached it unmolested, and rang the bell.
What a hoarse, clanging sound! I shivered as I stood there listening to its gloomy echoes until they died away. No one came. The place seemed wrapped in an austere silence. I listened, but I could hear no sound within; only the dull, melancholy sighing of the wind amongst a sickly avenue of firs behind.
I stretched out my hand, and rang again. Almost before the echoes had died away I heard footsteps within. A heavy bolt was withdrawn, and a dark-robed monk stood on the threshold before me. He recoiled for a moment at seeing a woman, and I thought that he would have closed the door, but he did not.
"What would you have at this hour, sister?" he asked sternly. "The chapel is closed, and morning is the time for dispensing charity."
"I have come in search of a priest who is only a visitor here," I said. "Father Adrian he is called!"
He seemed still indisposed to admit me. "Is your business urgent?" he asked doubtfully. "Father Adrian is at his devotions, and must not be lightly disturbed."
"It is urgent," I answered.
He beckoned me to follow him, and in silence led me a few yards down a bare stone corridor. Then he threw open the door of a small room, and bade me enter.
"This is the guest-chamber," he said. "Wait here, and I will summon Father Adrian!"
He closed the door and disappeared. The interior of the room in which he had left me was bare and chilling. I turned from it to the window. Almost opposite was a small eminence, and at its summit a rude cross of Calvary. A dark figure, with clasped hands and bent head, was slowly descending the path.
Even at that distance I thought I recognised the walk, and as he came nearer I saw that he was wearing the ordinary garb of a Roman Catholic priest instead of the monk's robes. I stood close to the window watching him, and as he crossed the open space before the door he raised his eyes and saw me. How he started, and how his eyes seemed to burn in their sockets! Doubtless he would have turned paler, but he was already deathlywhite. He stood there, swaying from side to side, with his eyes fastened wildly upon me, as though an apparition had appeared before him. Then he took a quick step forward; I heard the great front door creak and groan upon its hinges, and almost as soon as I could turn round he was on the threshold before me.
"Adrea! Adrea!" he cried, in a low, suppressed whisper which shook with passion. "You here! What has happened? Stand in the light! Let me see your face!"
I moved a step towards him, and raised my veil. "I am lonely," I said softly. "Was it very wrong of me to come here?"
He stood before me, with hungry, incredulous eyes fastened upon my face, as though he would see through it into my false heart. Yet I did not flinch; I was actress enough for my part. I watched him tremble—watched the colour flush into his face and die away. It was a very storm of passion which shook him before he could find the words to answer me.
"Adrea! Adrea! have you come here to mock me? As you are a woman, I implore you to spare me! Speak the truth!"
I answered him softly, with my eyes fixed upon the ground. "I came because I was lonely. Let us go away from here! Come home with me!"
"Home with you! Home with you!" He repeated my invitation. He scarcely seemed to understand.
"Yes! I was very silly the other day! I did not understand you! I did not understand myself! And you see I have humbled myself very much! I have come to tell you so! Am I forgiven?"
I raised my eyes to his, and added in a half whisper: "Won't you come home with me, and read aloud, as we used to on the rocks at Cruta?"
He stood there as though fascinated. I began to feel impatient, but I dared not show any signs of it.
Suddenly he took a quick step towards me, and before I could prevent it he had thrown himself at my feet on the cold stone floor, and was holding my hands tightly in his.
"Adrea!" he cried, his voice choked with passion, "is this thing true? My brain reels with the delight of it; but, oh, forgive me if I seem to doubt! I know nothing of women, but surely your lips could never lie! You are not mocking me? Oh, Adrea, my love, lift up your eyes and swear that this is no dream. I am dizzy with joy! Speak to me! Let me look into your face! I am not doubting you, yet say it once more! Tell me it is not a dream!"
I lied to him with my face, and with my eyes, and with my lips. "It is no dream," I said softly. "Ihave come to you, Adrian, because I want you. No one else would do."
He stood up, pale and shaken. His voice was still full of deep, throbbing earnestness. "Adrea!" he cried, "to-day I have been fighting a grim fight. Look into my face and mark its traces. I am desperate! For hours I have knelt on what was once a hallowed spot. In vain! In vain! On my knees before the cross of Calvary I have striven to pray, as a man wrestles for his life with the waves of a great ocean. Alas! alas! In the twilight I fancied always that your face was moving amongst the shadows, and even the breeze which rustled in the shrubs around seemed ever to be murmuring your name. Oh, my love, my love, sometimes I wonder that I have lived through the anguish of these days. But it is over! You have come to me, and the evil days are past. I renounce my priesthood! It has become only a barren farce to me! Heaven or hell, what matters it? I leave here with you to-night never to return! Never! never! never!"
He pressed hot kisses upon my hands; they stung me like molten lead, but I did not withdraw them. Then he rose up and held out his arms to me with a great yearning stealing into his dark eyes. But I kept him away.
"Not here! not here!" I cried. "I heard footsteps outside. Let us go!"
"You are right," he answered. "Wait for me; I have but few preparations to make."
He left me, and I breathed freely again. I had no fears, no hesitation. I never dreamt of turning back; but I began to find my task more difficult even than I had imagined. It was his touch, his passionate looks and words which were so hard to endure. My lips could lie, but it was hard to govern my looks; and oh, how I hated him!
Soon he was back—too soon for me; and then we left the place. He had changed his clothes, and, to my surprise, he wore an ordinary dark walking suit and a long ulster. He had discarded the priest altogether.
At the bend he looked back. There was a rift in the clouds just behind the hill of Calvary, and the rude cross stood out vividly against the sky. "At last!" he murmured; "at last! Farewell to the dead ashes of life! It is rest to have ended the struggle, even to have fallen. My new life is here!"
He touched my hand fondly, and held it within his own. "How deathly cold your hand is, Adrea!" he said. "It is the night air. You are well, are you not?" he added anxiously.
"Quite well; only tired."
He took my arm. I could not resist him, only I walked the more swiftly. He tried to check me, but Ishook my head. "I am cold and tired," I told him. "This desolate walk frightened me, and even with you I think I am a little nervous. Let us hurry. Hark! What was that?"
"A bittern in the marshes! Why, Adrea, how frightened you are! It is not like you!"
"I know it," I answered; "but to-night—to-night the air seems full of whisperings and strange sounds. Yes, I am frightened."
I shivered as I spoke. He would have drawn me closer to him, but I waved him away. How could he know anything of the horrors of that walk for me! Strange phantoms seemed ever rising from the sea, stalking across the path, and away over the moor, and passing and repassing, grinning and whispering in my ear. Sometimes it seemed as though I could have touched them by stretching out my hand; but when I tried, my fingers closed upon thin air. What were they? Why had they come to torment me? Was it because they scented an evil deed? Would they haunt me for ever like this? What folly! If I gave way so I should soon be altogether unnerved, and my task was still before me. I closed my eyes and opened them again. They had gone! It was good! I had conquered!
It was late, and we had eaten and drunk together. He was lying back in an easy-chair, flushed, andstrange to say, wonderfully handsome. The hollows in his cheeks seemed suddenly filled up, and his eyes were soft and bright. I sat at his feet looking into the firelight.
"Will you answer me some questions, Adrian?" I asked. "There has been so much mystery around us lately, and, like a woman, I am curious."
"Yes, I will tell you anything," he answered. "Am I not your slave, dearest? Only ask me them quickly. There are many things I have to talk about. What was that?" he added quickly. "Is there any one else in this room?"
I shook my head. "No one; it was fancy. Tell me, who was Madame de Merteuill?"
"My mother!"
"Your mother?"
"Yes; and the old Count of Cruta is my grandfather. Madame de Merteuill is his daughter. But that is not her real name!"
There was a high screen just behind his chair,—a japanned one, which seemed to have been badly used, for there was a great hole in it. While we had been talking a strange thing had happened. A man's hand had slowly been thrust through, and a crumpled piece of paper was dropped upon the carpet. I moved to his side, and raised the cushion in his chair. Before Icould help it he had caught my face, and pressed a hot, burning kiss upon my cheek. I dared not struggle. I had to yield, and endure for a moment his passionate embrace. Then I dropped my handkerchief upon the piece of paper, and picked up both hastily.
"Will you tell me something else, please?"
"Anything you ask! You know that I will!"
"The De Vaux estates——"
"Are mine. I am the son of Martin de Vaux. Paul de Vaux has no claim at all. If I had remained in the Church, it was my intention to found a great monastery here. But now——"
"Well?"
"Everything is yours!"
There was a moment's silence. I drew the piece of paper from my pocket, as though by accident, and read it to myself. There were only a few hastily scrawled lines:—
"I dare not do it. I am afraid. I will put the knife on the floor."
I glanced towards the hole. The hand was there, holding a long, gleaming dagger. It laid it noiselessly upon the carpet, and was withdrawn. I went over to his side, and knelt down there.
"And what will become of Paul de Vaux?" I asked.
He laughed grimly. "He must take his chance.He knows the whole story. He has known since last night. Adrea, tell me once more," he pleaded: "you never loved him really,—say that you never did!"
"Are you jealous, sir?" I asked lightly. My left hand was wandering down his side! Ah! there was his heart! How it was beating! My right hand was on the floor, cautiously feeling its way towards the screen. It reached the dagger! I clutched it by the hilt! Now was the time. There was his heart. I knew the exact spot.
"Adrea, are you ill?" he asked. "How white and strange you look! Ah!"
It was done! Lucrezia Borgia could not have bungled less! He lay doubled up in the chair, with a long Genoese dagger buried in his heart, and it was I who had done it!
Gomez crawled from behind the screen, and looked first at him and then at me with protruding eyes. He tried to speak, but his teeth chattered.
"It is done!" I said calmly, "and you are saved, Paul, my love," I whispered to myself. "Be a man, Gomez. We must carry it into the wood. Lift him gently; there must be no blood here."
It took all our strength to move him, and we had to drag him, yard by yard, down the avenue and across the road into the little wood.
My pen is weary of horrors. The memory of that hour is not to be written about. But when he turned away I took the flowers which he had begged for from my corsage and threw them down amongst the wet leaves. It was my sole moment of relenting.
A strange figure stood on the edge of the castle cliff, looking across the bay of Cruta to the sea. He was tall, loose jointed, and gaunt, and the long grey beard and unkempt locks of flowing hair which streamed behind in the breeze showed that he was an old man; but his eyes, set back in deep hollows, and fringed with long, bushy grey lashes, were still dark and piercing. Great passions had branded his face with deep-set lines, but had failed to belittle him. On the contrary, his presence, though forbidding and awesome, was full of latent strength and dignity. To the islanders, who never mentioned their lord's name save with bated breath and after having zealously crossed themselves, he was the object of the most unbounded superstition. His personality and the strangeness of his habits appalled them. They scarcely believed him a being of the same world as their own. The most ignorant amongst them firmly believed that the sea obeyed his uplifted hand, and that when he spoke thethunder rolled amongst the hills. When stories were told of the mystery and strange isolation in which he lived, they nodded their heads and were willing to believe everything. No one ever met him or had speech with him, for twenty years had passed since he had issued from the castle gates. But sometimes, most often when a storm was brewing, they could see a tall, dark figure standing on the giddy edge of the castle wall which overhung the sea, or walking, with slow, stately movements, up and down the narrow foot-path at the summit of the cliff. If the moon had risen, or the sky were clear beyond, they could see the huge, gaunt figure outlined with grim distinctness against the empty background, always with his face to the sea, and with a long black cloak flowing behind. It was not often that they saw him, but when they did they told one another in whispers; and though the sky were cloudless and the sea calm, the women whose husbands were out in their fishing boats beyond the bay told their beads and prayed for their safe return, and those who had remained behind prepared for rough weather. Once, at a marriage feast, when all the little village was making merry, the whisper had gone about that "the Count was walking;" and immediately they had all departed for their homes in fear and silence, and the luckless bride and bridegroom had hastened to thepriest and besought him to unloose the knot, that they might celebrate their wedding on some less ill-omened day.
To-night the storm was already breaking when the Count appeared on the castle wall and turned his face seaward. One by one the fishing smacks were crossing the gathering line of surf, and gaining the deep, still waters of the bay. As they passed underneath the towering mass of granite rock, against the base of which the waters were boiling and seething, the men in the boats gazed fearfully up at that black speck far away above their heads, and crossed themselves. The Count had stood there for an hour, they whispered, ever since that piled-up mass of angry, lurid clouds had first gathered, and a warning breath of wind had swept across the smooth, glass-like surface of the water, now troubled and restless. Not one of them doubted but that his coming had brought the storm; but there was not one of them who dared to utter a word of complaint. Only they stood up in their boats, and shielding their eyes with an uplifted hand from the fierce rays of the sinking sun, gazed out seaward, searching for the boats not yet in safety.
Suddenly a little murmur arose from amongst them, and a word was passed from one to another of their little crafts. The blinding glare of the sun and itsreflection, stretched far away across the surface of the sea, had dazzled their eyes, and for the last quarter of an hour they had seen nothing on the westward horizon. But now the bright silver light was fading into a dull, glorious purple; and full upon its bosom a strange sail was seen, making direct for the harbour. The sunlight was still flashing upon its white sails,—little specks of gold upon a background of richer colouring—and they saw that she was a handsome, shapely-looking vessel, very different to the dirty Italian lugger which put in at their harbour for a few hours week by week.
"Will she need a pilot?" cried Francesco, rising in his boat, and watching the stranger. "Let us wait here, and see if she signals for one!"
"Let us all go! There will be something for each!" cried another.
"We will race," Antonio answered, whose boat was the fastest. "The first to reach her shall have the stranger's money!"
"No, no! that is not fair," chorused the others. "We will draw lots!"
Then up rose old Guiseppe, the father of them all. He shook his head, and turned a sorrowing face seawards. "Peace! children. You are like chattering seabirds squabbling over a bait which will never be yours. Yonder ship will need no pilot! She is no stranger to Cruta!"