Fire Below (17 page)

To this day I cannot account for my making so bad a mistake. But for Lelia’s observation, I believe that I should have set out on surely as wanton a journey as ever an idiot made, and I can only suppose that the blow on my head was to blame for my oversight.

Be that as it may, I now saw that unless I used Grieg’s car, I might as well stay where I was. The thing stood out. Even if I could do it – and, looking the distance in the face, I was not at all sure that I could – I must arrive late and jaded, unfit to keep any tryst, much less frustrate the ambition of such an enemy. There was nothing for it. I had the key to the car, and I must be thankful for that; but the thought of returning to the spinney and going alone about my business to get the car under way made me sit very silent, and when Lelia began to chatter, I scarcely heard what she said.

‘You are not listening to me.’

‘I know,’ I said. ‘I’m sorry. What did you say?’

‘What were you thinking about?’

‘That I am more dull than usual this afternoon. Of course I cannot walk to the path.’

Lelia nodded.

‘Your reason is returning,’ she said. ‘Do you think you can do as you have, and keep a clear brain? When the wheel stopped running, old Agen, the miller, drowned himself in that race. It took six men to get his body out, and the water had broken his neck and both of his legs.’

‘God forgive me,’ said I. ‘I am very lucky.’

‘You are very strong,’ said she. ‘If I told them the truth in the village they would laugh me to scorn. I am glad you see that you cannot–’

‘I am going by car,’ I said. ‘And I want you to teach me the way.’

It will be remembered that Grieg had so bestowed the car as to be able to drive away without being seen from the house or its curtilage. But the car was beside the drive which led to Vigil, while the drive which led to Vardar was now my way. Since I could not gain the latter without driving up to the house, I had no choice but to make towards Vigil until I was out of the park and then turn south and east as soon as I could. But remembering how we had floundered the night before, I was very shy of the country and fearful of losing my way; so I asked her to tell me how to fetch the compass which would bring me around the park to some road that I knew.

Here I confess that, though we both tried our best, Lelia and I were soon speaking different tongues. Corners and crossroads meant nothing at all to her. She had no eyes for the highway, but only for the lie of the land and the look of the neighbouring farms. Hog’s back and bluff and pasture – she knew them all: but I could not absorb such direction, and when I brought her back to the road, she could not tell me its turnings or how it ran.

‘Never mind. I shall get there somehow,’ I said at last. ‘The first farm you spoke of, Bremmas – is that on my right or left?’

‘I do not know,’ said Lelia, ‘which side of the road it stands. But you will see the roof of the homestead rising like a grey haystack amid the green of the trees. And if it is on your left, you must go straight on.’

‘And if it is on my right?’

‘Then you must bear to your right, till you see the gap I spoke of with the sugar-loaf hill beyond.’

I suppose my manner betrayed me, for after a little silence she spoke again.

‘You cannot learn your lesson, and I am not surprised. I will come with you, instead, to show you the way.’

‘Indeed, you will not,’ said I.

Lelia regarded the heaven.

‘You are very wilful,’ she said, ‘this afternoon.’

Then she bent again to her filing and left me to chew the cud…

It was past a quarter to six before the steel ring parted and fell away.

‘Let me cut the other,’ said Lelia. ‘You need not leave so early, now that you are taking your car.’

‘Tomorrow,’ said I. ‘You have done enough for today. And thank you very much, Lelia. Be sure I shall never forget.’

She looked at me sharply.

‘That is how people speak that are going away.’

I swallowed.

‘I am not going tonight,’ I said. ‘But you know I am going tomorrow – if I possibly can.’

‘I know that, but for your friends, you would go tonight.’

‘But not without telling you, Lelia.’

‘And thanking me for what I have done.’ She leapt to her feet and stood, breathing fast and hard, with her eyes on my face. ‘Am I some farmer’s grandmother that you should use me so? I know you are high and mighty, and I am a barelegged peasant of no degree, but what I have done I have done because I love you, and then you – you thank me, and throw my love in my face.’

‘You do not love me, Lelia,’ I cried. ‘We have a lot in common, and we found it out very soon. And perhaps you like tall men, and I think you were sorry for me. But that is not love.’

‘Why do you think I gave you back your money? I have never had fifty crowns in all my life.’

‘Friends don’t give each other money,’ I said. ‘You gave me back the money when you made me your friend.’

‘And brought you a shirt and cried when you did not trust me?’

‘I cannot help it,’ I said doggedly. ‘I know that this is not love.’

‘How do you know? Has her Highness taught you the workings of women’s hearts?’

‘But you are a child,’ I cried. ‘You–’

‘I am twenty-two,’ said Lelia. ‘I do not think you are much older. But what of that? Your friend is better-looking than you, and I cannot bear foul linen, and yours was foul, and you are unshaven and – and not at all at your best. And yet when I saw you, none of these things mattered, and I – I felt just a little faint.’

‘Lelia, for God’s sake!’ I cried, and got up to my feet.

‘Then do not withstand me,’ she said. ‘If I like to love you, that is my own affair. I do not seek to make it yours. I do not ask you to love me – I should not like you if you did. But I have shown you my heart–’

‘Why?’ I cried. ‘Why did you do it, Lelia?’

‘Because I am like that,’ she said. ‘I wanted you to know. It is a little honour – even a peasant-girl’s love.’

‘It is a very high honour, Lelia. But I am not worth it, my dear.’

‘Her Highness does not think so.’

‘Oh, Lord,’ said I, miserably. ‘Was ever a man so placed?’

‘Well, then, I have shown you my heart. It is not kind of you to bruise it.’

‘I would not hurt you,’ said I, ‘for anything in the world. I cannot say I love you because I love Leonie. But you – you are a great beauty, and I – I am very glad of you, Lelia – because you are so sweet.’

‘Will you promise not to thank me again for what I may do?’

‘I promise,’ I said

Lelia looked at me with a measuring eye. Then she smiled and came forward and set her bare arm in mine.

‘You are almost too good to be true,’ she said.

I did not know what she meant, and said as much.

‘Her Highness will tell you,’ she said. ‘And now, where is this car?’

‘I cannot take you,’ I said.

‘Why, please? I have never been in a car, and I should like to go.’

I tried to argue, but I fear that I was as wax in her hands, and in the end I promised that I would take her, provided that she did as I said.

So often as I think of my weakness I am ashamed. But the drubbing which I had suffered had shaken my faith in myself, and I moved in a sea of apprehension of what the next hour would bring forth. And so I gave way, but, as was to be expected, found no relief in promising Lelia to let her run into the danger which governed my use of Grieg’s car. Indeed, as soon as I had done it, a host of new qualms began to hem me in, so that I felt bewildered as well as beset and at times when I looked at the beautiful maid by my side she seemed to be a great way off.

I think she divined my condition, for after looking into my eyes, she made me sit down again and drink what was left of the cordial which she had administered when I came out of the race, and when I had done so, she sat very still beside me and let me be.

Now what was the stuff in her phial I do not know, but within a very few minutes I felt a great deal better in body and soul. Though I still felt weary, my slackness seemed to have gone, and my mind became clear and steady, and the mists of dread and uncertainty rolled away. At first I feared that this was by way of some sudden stimulant and that after a while my state would be worse than before, but I need not have been afraid, for from the moment of drinking I never looked back.

Here I should say that the simples brewed in those parts are highly esteemed. Their secrets are jealously kept, being handed from mother to daughter by word of mouth, and all attempts to procure them have always failed; but, if Sully may be believed, their curious, potent virtue is an established fact. That of such was Lelia’s cordial I have no doubt. Apart from the help it gave me that evening when I sat on the grass, I cannot forget how I did when I came up out of the race. So far from lying speechless, I had my wits about me and was able to make George free of my counsel without delay and then to get up and strip and rub myself down. These things no man could have done for sheer exhaustion, but for some agent to lift his system up. And the first thing that I remember was Lelia’s arm about me and her flask at my lips.

The cool of the day was at hand, as we made our way back through the park. The sun was low and was shedding a golden light, the clear, sweet air was radiant, and the haze that had hung about the mountains had disappeared. All around, there was now a grandeur which had not been there at noon, and the peace upon the face of the landscape was rare and notable.

Presently Lelia pointed away to the left.

‘There is the drive to Vardar. Do you see? The road goes curling between those oaks. The house is half a mile distant from where we stand.’

‘Very good,’ said I. ‘Now you will go off and leave me to get the car. Cross the drive where we see it and bear due west and do not turn north until you have gone a mile.’

‘Very well,’ said Lelia obediently.

I stood and watched her until she was over the road and out of my sight. Then I followed the line she had taken, crossed the drive to Vardar and bore north-west. Ten minutes later I sighted the western drive…

The car was as we had left it, with one half of its bonnet open and one of its doors ajar. So much I saw by peeping, and, though the sight reassured me, I must confess that I dreaded taking possession and getting her out of the wood.

For me the place was haunted. The spot belonged to Murder and all his dreadful train. Here was no peace, nor grandeur, but only a sinister silence, ready to usher havoc and, when the echoes had faded, to steal back into its seat. Grieg might or might not be there. But whether he was or was not I should not know till one of two things happened – the shocking roar of his pistol, or the flick of the road beneath me and the evening air upon my face.

I took a deep breath and glided towards the bonnet with my heart in my mouth…

For my purpose the wrong half was open, and I had, of course, to close it, before I could open its fellow and put back the contact-breaker which I had taken away. I closed it gingerly. Then I passed the front of the car, opened the other half and bent to my task. As I did so, a movement behind me made me leap almost out of my skin, but, though I swung about, trembling, the movement was not repeated and I could see or hear nothing which argued that Grieg was there. This was cold comfort, for the spinney was offering cover for fifty men, and, peering into its depths, I might have been trying to fathom the secret some arras hid. As I stood with my back to the engine, the thought came into my mind that Grieg was there in the shadows, but meant to hold his hand until I had made the adjustment we both required…

No words can tell what it cost me to turn my back on the covert and bend again to my work, and I took twice as long about it as the trifling business deserved.

When it was done I left the bonnet open, in the hope that if Grieg was there, he would think that I had not finished and let me be: then I turned the switch and set the spark and throttle and stepped to the front of the car. I dared not use the self-starter because of the noise it made, but the engine started the first time I swung the shaft.

Though I think it was fairly silent, it seemed to me to make an unearthly din, and I whipped to the steering-wheel with the sweat running down my face. For an instant I shrank from taking the driver’s seat, for once I was there, I was trapped, and if Grieg rose out of the bushes, I had no chance. Still, to wait was futile, and a moment later I had my foot on the clutch…

The gears were storming, and the car was rocking like a ship…behind me the door slammed to, and the clap took a week from my life…my hands were slipping on the wheel… and then I was out on the road, and the blessed sunshine was streaming into my eyes and a flood of soft, cool air was sliding over the windscreen and falling upon my face…

So I recovered the car. I am not proud of the memory, but I have set out the truth, to show what a fool his nerves may make of a man; and I have no defence to offer except that the place was a covert and I have but two eyes.

Now I was very anxious to quit the road I was using as soon as I could, for Grieg might have telephoned to Vigil and told the police to call for him with their car, and I had no wish to meet them in such a way. But until I had taken up Lelia, I dared not go very fast, for I had no means of knowing where she would strike the road and I might have set her a longer walk than I thought. Indeed, as the moments went by, but I did not see her, I began to fear that I must have passed her by: then the drive bent round to the left, and there was her white and scarlet a furlong ahead.

She was very much disappointed because I would not allow her to sit with me, but I would not hear her protests, and ushered her and her wolf-hound into the car. Then I let down the window behind the driver’s seat, ‘for so,’ said I, ‘I shall hear all you have to say: and you are to sit well back and on no account lean forward whatever befalls. If I should stop or be stopped, you are to crouch on the floor and stay quite still, and if the worst should happen, you must swear that you do not know me, but found the car standing empty and entered it out of mischief and then were afraid to alight.’