The Light of Scarthey: A Romance

Mr. Landale made no answer; during the last few minutes his reflections had enabled him to take a new view of the situation. After all the future fate of Captain Jack was of little moment. He had been successfully exposed before Madeleine, whose love for the young man was, as had just been sufficiently proved, chiefly composed of those youthful illusions which dispelled once, never can return.

Rupert fell gradually into a reverie in which he found curious satisfaction. His work had not been unsuccessful, whatever Mr. Hobson's opinion might be. But, as matters stood between Madeleine and her lover, the girl's eyes had been opened in time, and that without scandal… And even the escape of Captain Jack was, upon reflection, the best thing that could have happened.

And so it was with a return to his usual polite bearing, that he listened to the officer's relapse into expostulation.

"Now if you had only given me the hint first of all," the man was grumblingly saying, "and then let me act – for who would have suspected a boat, yacht-rigged like that? – A friend of Sir Adrian's, too! If you'd only left it to me! Why that six-oared galley alone is agin the law unless you can prove good reason for it … as for the vessel herself…"

"Yes, my dear Mr. Hobson," interrupted Mr. Landale, smiling propitiously. "I have no doubt you would have secured him. I have made a mess of it. But now you understand, least said, soonest mended, both for me and (between ourselves, Mr. Hobson) for the young lady."

The man, in surprise at this sudden alteration of manner, stopped short and gaped; and presently a broad smile, combined with a knowing wink, appeared on his face. He received the guineas that Mr. Landale dropped in his palm with an air of great candour, and, without further parley, acted on the kind advice to repair to the Priory and talk with one Mrs. Puckett the housekeeper, on the subject of corporeal refreshment.

"Well," said Molly, bursting in upon her sister, who sat by her writing-table, pen in hand, and did not even raise her head at the unceremonious entrance. "This is evidently the day for mysterious disappearances. First Rupert and Sophia; then my lord and master who is fetched hurriedly to his island (that isle of misfortune!) God knows for what – though I mean to know presently; then you, Mademoiselle, and Rupert again. It is, faith, quite a comedy. But the result has been that I have had my meals alone, which is not so gay. Sophia is in bed, it turns out; Rupert out a-riding, on important business, of course! all he does is desperately important. And there you are – alone in your room, moping. God, child, how pale you are! What ails you then?"

"Molly," cried Madeleine, ignoring Lady Landale's question and feverishly folding the written sheet which lay under her hand, "if you love me, if ever you loved me, will you have this letter conveyed by a safe messenger to Scarthey, and given to René – to none but René, at once? Oh, Molly, it will be a service to me, you little guess of what moment!"

"Voyez un peu!" said Lady Landale coolly. "What trust in Molly, all at once! Aha, I thought it would come. If I love you? Hum, I'm not so sure about that. If ever I loved you? – a droll sort of plea, in truth, considering how you have requited my love!"

Madeleine turned a dazed look upon her sister, who stood surveying her, glowing like a jewel of dazzling radiance, from her setting of black mantle and black plumed hat. "So you will not!" she answered hopelessly, and let her forehead fall upon her hand without further protest.

"But I did not say I would not – as it happens I am going to the island myself. How you stare – oh you remember now do you? Who told you I wonder? – of course, such a couple as we are, Adrian and I, could not be divided from each other for over half a day, could we? By the way, I was to convey a gracious invitation to you too. Will you come with me? – No? – strange girl. So even give me the letter, I will take it to – no, not to René, 'tis addressed to Captain Smith, I see. Dear me – you don't mean to say, Madeleine, that you are corresponding with that person; that he is near us? What would Tanty say?"

"Oh, Molly, cease your scoffs," implored poor Madeleine, wearily. "You are angry with me, well, now rejoice, for I am punished – well punished. Oh, I would tell you all but I cannot! my heart is too sick. See, you may read the letter, and then you will understand – but for pity's sake go – Do not fail to go; he will be there on the island at dark – he expects me– Oh, Molly! I cannot explain – indeed I cannot, and there is no time, it will soon be dusk; but there is terrible danger in his being there at all."

Molly took the letter, turned it over with scornful fingers and then popped it in her pocket. "If he expects you," she asked, fixing cold, curious eyes on her sister's distress, "and he is in danger, why don't you go?"

A flush rose painfully to Madeleine's face, a sob to her throat. "Don't ask me," she murmured, turning away to hide her humiliation. "I have been deceived, he is not what I thought."

Lady Landale gazed at the shrinking figure for a little while in silence. Then remarking contemptuously: "Well you are a poor creature," turned upon her heel to leave her. As she passed the little altar, she paused to whisk a bunch of violets out of a vase and dry the stems upon her sister's quilt.

"Molly," cried Madeleine, in a frenzy, "give me back my letter, or go."

"I go, I go," said Lady Landale with a mocking laugh. "How sweet your violets smell! – There, do not agitate yourself: I'm going to meet your lover, my dear. I vow I am curious to see the famous man, at last."

CHAPTER XXIV

THE NIGHT

So the blood burned within her,And thus it cried to her:And there, beside the maize fieldThe other one was waiting —He, the mysterious one.Luteplayer's Song.

The mantle of night had already fallen upon the land when Lady Landale, closely wrapped in her warmest furs, with face well ensconced under her close bonnet, and arms buried to the elbow in her muff, sallied from her room on the announcement that the carriage was waiting. As, with her leisurely daintiness, she tripped it down the stairs, she crossed Mr. Landale, and paused a moment, ready for the skirmish, as she noticed the cynical curiosity with which he examined her.

"Whither, my fair sister," said he, ranging himself with his best courtesy against the bannisters, "so late in the day?"

"To my lord and master's side, of course," said Molly.

"Why – is not Adrian coming back to-night?"

"Apparently not, since he has graciously permitted me to join him upon his rock. I trust you will not find it too unhappy in our absence: that would be the crowning misfortune of a day when everything seems to have gone wrong. Sophia invisible with her vapours; Madeleine with the megrim; and you in and out of the house as excited and secret as the cat when she has licked all the cream. I suppose I shall end by knowing what it is all about. Meanwhile I think I shall enjoy the tranquillity of the island – although I have actually to tear myself away from the prospect of a tête-à-tête evening with you."

But as Rupert's serenity was not to be moved, her ladyship hereupon allowed herself to be escorted to the carriage without further parley.

As she drove away through the dark night, first down the level, well-metalled avenue, then along the uneven country road, and finally through the sand of the beach in which hoofs and tyres sank noiselessly, inches deep, Molly gave herself up, with almost childish zest to the leaven of imagination… Here, in this dark carriage, was reclining, not Lady Landale (whose fate deed had already been signed, sealed and delivered to bring her nothing but disappointment), but her happier sister, still confronted with the fascinating unknown, hurrying under cover of night, within sound of the sea, to that enthralling lure, a lover – a real lover, ardent, daring, young, ready to risk all, waiting to spread the wings of his boat, and carry her to the undiscovered country.

Glowing were these fleeting images of the "might have been," angry the sudden relapses into the prose of reality.

No, Madeleine, the coward, who thought she had loved her lover, was now in her room, weak and weeping, whilst he, no doubt, paced the deck in mad impatience (as a lover should), now tortured by the throes of anxiety, now hugging himself with the thought of his coming bliss … that bliss that never was to be his. And in the carriage there was only Molly, the strong-hearted but the fettered by tie and vow, the slave for ever of a first girlish fancy but too successfully compassed; only Lady Landale rejoining her husband in his melancholy solitude; Lady Landale who never – never! awful word! would know the joys which yonder poor fool had had within her grasp and yet had not clutched at.

Molly had read, as permitted, her sister's letter, and to some purpose; and scorn of the girl who from some paltry quibble could abandon in danger the man she professed to love, filled her soul to the exclusion of any sisterly or ever womanly pity.

At the end of half an hour the carriage was stopped by the black shadow of a man, who seemed to spring up from the earth, and who, after a few rapid words interchanged with the coachman, extinguished both the lights, and then opened the door.

Leaning on the offered elbow Molly jumped down upon the yielding sand.

"René?" she asked; for the darkness even on the open beach was too thick to allow of recognition.

"René, your ladyship – or Mademoiselle is it?" answered the man in his unmistakable accent. "I must ask; for, by the voice no one can tell, as your ladyship, or Mademoiselle knows – and the sky is black like a chimney."

"Lady Landale, René," and as he paused, she added, "My sister would not come."

"Ah, mon Dieu! She would not come," repeated the man in tones of dismay; and the black shadow was struck into a moment of stillness. Then with an audible sigh Mr. Potter roused himself, and saying with melancholy resignation, "The boat is there, I shall be of return in a minute, My Lady," took the traveller's bag on his shoulder and disappeared.

The carriage began to crunch its way back in the darkness and Molly was left alone.

In front of her was a faint white line, where the rollers spread their foam with mournful restless fugue of long drawn roar and hissing sigh.

In the distance, now and then glancing on the crest of the dancing billows, shone the steady light of Scarthey. The rising wind whistled in the prickly star-grass and sea-holly. Beyond these, not a sight, not a sound – the earth was all mystery.

Molly looked at the light – marking the calm spot where her husband waited for her; its very calm, its familiar placidity, monotony, enraged her; she hearkened to the splashing, living waves, to the swift flying gusts of the storm wind, and her soul yearned to their life, and their mysteriousness.

What she longed for, she herself could not tell. No words can encompass the desire of pent-up young vitality for the unknown, for the ideal, for the impossible. But one thing was overpoweringly real: that was the dread of leaving just then the wide, the open world whose darkness was filled to her with living scenes of freedom and space, and blood-stirring emotions; of re-entering the silent room under the light; of consorting with the shadowy personality, her husband; of feeling the web of his melancholy, his dreaminess, imprison as it were the wings of her imagination and the thoughtful kindness of his gaze, paralyse the course of her hot blood through her veins.

And yet, thither she was going, must be going! Ah Madeleine, fool – you may well weep, yonder on your pillow, for the happiness that was yours and that you have dropped from your feeble hands!

In a few minutes the black shadow re-appeared close to her.

"If My Lady will lean on my shoulder, I shall lead her to the boat." And after a few steps, the voice out of the darkness proceeded in explanation: "I have not taken a lantern, I have put out those of the carriage, for I must tell My Lady, that since what arrived this morning, there may be gabelous– they call them the preventive here – in every corner, and the light might bring them, as it does the night papilions, and … as I thought Mademoiselle was to accompany you – they might have frightened her. These people want to know so much!"

"I know nothing of what has happened this morning, that you speak of as if the whole world must know," retorted Lady Landale coolly. "You are all hatching plots and sitting on secrets, but nobody confides in me. It seems then, that you expected Mademoiselle, my sister, here for some purpose and that you regret she did not come; may I ask for an explanation?"

A few moments elapsed before the man replied, and then it was with embarrassment and diffidence: "For sure, I am sorry, My Lady … there have been misfortunes on the island this morning – nothing though to concern her ladyship – and, as for Mademoiselle, mother Margery would have liked to see her, no doubt … and Maggie the wife also – and – and no doubt also Mademoiselle would have liked to come… What do I know?"

"Oh, of course!" said Molly with her little note of mocking laughter.

Then again they walked a while in silence. As René lifted his mistress in his arms to carry her over the licking hissing foam, she resumed: "It is well, René, you are discreet, but I am not such a fool as people seem to think. As for her, you were right in thinking that she might easily be frightened. She was afraid even to come out!"

René shoved his boat off, and falling to his sculls, suddenly relapsed into the old vernacular: "Ah Madame," he sighed, "c'est bien triste – un gentilhomme si beau – si brave!"

During the crossing no further words passed between them.

"So brave – so handsome?" The echo of the words came back to the woman in every lap of the water on the sides of the boat, in every strain of the oars.

The keel ground against the beach, and René leaped out to drag the boat free of the surf. As he did so, two blacker outlines segregated themselves from the darkness and a rough voice called out, subdued but distinct: "Savenaye, St. Malo!"

"Savenaye, St. Malo!" repeated René, and helped Lady Landale to alight. Then one of the figures darted forward and whispered a rapid sentence in the Frenchman's ear. René uttered an exclamation, but his mistress intervened with scant patience:

"My good René," said she, "take the bag into the peel, and come back for me. I have a message for these gentlemen."

René hesitated. As he did so a rustle of anger shook the lady in her silks and furs. "Do you hear me?" she repeated, and he could guess how her little foot stamped the yielding sand.

"Oui, Madame," said he, hesitating no longer. Immediately the other two drew near. Molly could just see that they stood in all deference, cap in hand.

"Madam," began one of these in hurried words, "there is not a moment to be lost: the captain had to remain on board."

"What!" interrupted Lady Landale with much asperity, "not come in person!" She had been straining her eyes to make out something of her interlocutor's form, unable to reconcile her mind's picture with the coarse voice that addressed her – And now all her high expectations fell from her in an angry rush. "Have I come all this way to be met by a messenger! Who are you?"

"Madam," entreated the husky voice, "I am the mate of the Peregrine. The captain has directed me to beg and pray you not to be afraid, but to have good courage and confidence in us – the schooner is there; in five minutes you can be safe on board. You see, madam," continued the man with an earnestness that spoke well of his devotion, "the captain found he couldn't, he dared not leave the ship – he is the only one who knows the bearings of these waters here – any one of us might run her on the bank, and where would we be then, madam, and you, if we were found in daylight still in these parts? – 'For God's sake, Curwen,' says he, 'implore the lady not to be afraid and tell her to trust, as she has promised,' so he says. And for God's sake, say I, madam, trust us. In five minutes you will be with him? Say the word, madam, am I to make the signal? There he is, eating his heart out. There are all the lads ready waiting for your foot on the ladder, to hoist sail. No time to lose, we are already behind. Shall I signal?"

Molly's heart beat violently; under the sudden impulse, the fascination of the black chasm, of the peril, the adventure, the unfathomed, took possession of her, and whirled her on.

"Yes," she said.

On the very utterance of the word the man, who had not yet spoken, uncovered a lantern, held it aloft, as rapidly replaced it under his coat, and moved away.

Almost immediately, against the black pall, behind the dim line of grey that marked the shore, suddenly sprang up three bright points in the form of a triangle.

It was as if all the darkness around had been filled with life; as if the first fulfilment of those promises with which it had been drawing this woman's soul was now held out to her to lure her further still.

"See, madam, how they watch! – By your leave."

And with no further warning, Molly felt herself seized with uncompromising, but deferential, energy, by a pair of powerful arms; lifted like a child, and carried away at a bear-like trot. By the splashing she judged it was through the first line of breakers. Then she was handed into another irresistible grasp. The boat lurched as the mate jumped in. Then:

"Now give way, lads," he said, "and let her have it. Those lights must not be burning longer than we can help. Tain't wholesome for any of us."

And under the pulse of four willing pairs of arms the skiff, like a thing of life, clove the black waters and rose to the billows.

"You see, madam," explained the mate, "we could not do without the lights, to show us where she lay, and give us a straight course. We are all right so long as we keep that top 'un in the middle – but he won't be sorry, I reckon, when he can drop them overboard. They can't be seen from the offing yet, but it's astounding how far a light will reach on a night like this. Cheerily, lads, let her have it!"

But Molly heeded him not. She had abandoned herself to the thrilling delight of the excitement. The die was cast – not by her own hand, no one should be able to hold her responsible – she had been kidnapped. Come what might she must now see the adventure out.

The lights grew larger; presently a black mass, surmounted by a kind of greyish cloud, loomed through the pitch of the night; and next it was evident that the beacon was hanging over the side of a ship, illuminating its jagged leaping water line.

A voice, not too loud, yet, even through the distance, ringing clear in its earnestness sounded from above. "Boat ahoy! what boat is that?"

And promptly the helmsman by Molly's side returned: "Savenaye, St. Malo."

On the instant the lights went out. There was a creaking of block and cordage, and new ghostly clouds rose over the ship – sails loosened to the wind. As the skiff rowers came alongside, boat-hooks leaped into action and gripped the vessel; an arm, strong as steel, was held out for the passenger as she fearlessly put her foot on the ladder; another, a moment later, with masterful tenderness bent round her waist, and she was fairly lifted on board the Peregrine. But before her foot touched the deck, she felt upon her lips, laid like a burning seal, a passionate kiss; and her soul leaped up to it, as if called into sudden life from slumber, like the princess of fairy lore. She heard Madeleine's mysterious lover whisper in her ear: "At last! Oh, what I have suffered, thinking you would not come!"

From the warm shelter of her loosened cloak the violets in her bosom sent forth a wave of sweetness.

For a moment these two were in all creation alone to each other, while in a circle the Peregrine's crew stood apart in respectful silence: a broad grin of sympathy upon the mouth of every mother's son.

Released at last, Lady Landale took a trembling step on the deck. Into what strange world had she come this night?

The schooner, like a mettled steed whose head is suddenly set free, was already in motion, and with gentle forward swaying leaps rising to the wave and gathering speed under her swelling sails.

Captain Jack had seized Molly's hand, and the strong clasp trembled round the little fingers; he said no more to her; but, in tones vibrating with emotion which all the men, now silently seeking their posts in the darkness, could hear:

"My lads," he cried, "the lady is safe with us after all. Who shall say that your skipper is not still Lucky Smith? Thank you, my good fellows! Now we have yet to bring her safe the other side. Meanwhile – no cheering, lads, you know why – there is a hundred guineas more among you the hour we make St. Malo. Stand to, every man. Up with those topsails!"

Scarcely had the last words been spoken when, from the offing, on the wings of the wind, came a long-drawn hail, faint through the distance, but yet fatally distinct: "Ahoy, what schooner is that?"

Molly, who had not withdrawn her hand, felt a shock pass over Captain Jack's frame. He turned abruptly, and she could see him lean and strain in the direction of the voice.

The call, after an interval, was repeated. But the outlook was impenetrable, and it was weird indeed to feel that they were seen yet could not see.

Molly, standing close by his side, knew in every fibre of her own body that this man, to whom she seemed in some inexplicable fashion already linked, was strongly moved. Nevertheless she could hardly guess the extremity of the passion that shook him. It was the frenzy of the rider who feels his horse about to fail him within a span of the winning post; of the leader whose men waver at the actual point of victory. But the weakness of dismay was only momentary. Calm and clearness of mind returned with the sense of emergency. He raised his night-glass, with a steady hand this time, and scanned the depth of blackness in front of him: out of it after a moment, there seemed to shape itself the dim outline of a sail, and he knew that he had waited too long and had fallen in again with the preventive cutter. Then glancing aloft, he understood how it was that the Peregrine had been recognised.

The overcast sky had partly cleared to windward during the last minutes; a few stars glinted where hitherto nothing but the most impenetrable pall had hung. In the east, the rays of a yet invisible moon, edging with faint silver the banks of clouds just above the horizon, had made for the schooner a tell-tale background indeed.

On board no sound was heard now save the struggle of rope and canvas, the creaking of timber and the swift plashing rush of water against her rounded sides as she sped her course.

"Madeleine," he said, forcibly controlling his voice, and bringing, as he spoke, his face close to Molly's to peer anxiously at its indistinct white oval, "we are not free yet; but in a short time, with God's help, we shall have left those intermeddling fools yonder who would bar our way, miles out of the running. But I cannot remain with you a moment longer; I must take the helm myself. Oh, forgive me for having brought you to this! And, should you hear firing, for Heaven's sake do not lose courage. See now, I will bring you to your cabin; there you will find warmth and shelter. And in a little while, a very little while, I will return to you to tell you all is well. Come, my dearest love."

Gently he would have drawn her towards the little deck-cabin, guiding her steps, as yet untutored to the motion of the ship, when out of the black chasm, upon the weather bow of the Peregrine, leaped forth a yellow tongue of light fringed with red and encircled by a ruddy cloud; and three seconds later the boom of a gun broke with a dull, ominous clangour above the wrangling of sea and wind. Molly straightened herself. "What is that?" she asked.

"The warning gun," he answered, hurriedly, "to say that they mean to see who we are and that if we do not stop the next will be shotted. Time presses, Madeleine, go in – fear nothing! We shall soon be on their other side, out of sight in darkness again."