HIGH TIDE AT MIDNIGHT (6 page)

terrific bruise. 'I still might manage to finish fourth.'

'Stand still,' he ordered abruptly. 'You might have broken something.'

She stood, teeth clenched more with anger than with pain as he completed a

swift but comprehensive examination of her moving parts.

'Thank you,' she said with awful politeness when he had finished. 'You

should have been a vet.'

'I won't complete the analogy,' he returned with equal courtesy. 'Although

several members of the animal kingdom do suggest themselves. Which

reminds me—when you get down to Trevennon, watch out for the dogs.

They're not trained to encourage strangers.'

'Oh God!' Morwenna, retrieving her case and rucksack from the hedge,

swung round to look at him. It was maddening that it was too dark to see his

face properly, let alone the expression on it, and she could hardly ask him to

stand in the car headlights for a moment so that she could judge whether he

was joking. He hadn't done a great deal of joking up to that point, certainly,

and there was no reason for him to start now, so the dogs probably existed.

She moistened her lips uncertainly. 'Do—do they bite?*

'It has been known,' he said laconically. 'The thing to do is stand your

ground. Don't try to outrun them—that's fatal.'

'I can imagine it would be.' Morwenna knew an overwhelming desire to sit

down on the wet lane and scream and drum her heels. 'But you don't have to

worry. I doubt very much whether I could outrun a tortoise at the moment.

Would it help if I knew the dogs' names?'

'It might. They're called Whisky and Max. Do you think you can remember

that?'

'Oh, I think so,' she said grimly. 'I imagine I shall have great difficulty in

remembering anything else.' Wincing slightly, she settled her rucksack on

her shoulder then picked up her case.

'Dear God!" He was still standing in the shadows well out of range of the

headlights. 'Not just a casual call, I see. Just how long were you planning to

stay at Trevennon?'

It was on the tip of her tongue to confess that she would -he satisfied with a

roof over her head for the night, but she suppressed it. After all, it was none

of his business.

She sent him a smiling glance over her shoulder as she prepared to negotiate

the tree. It was one of her best, slightly teasing, deliberately provocative,

aimed at leaving him with something to think about.

'We'll just have to see how things work out,' she said lightly. 'Maybe the king

of Cornwall will take a fancy to me.'

But if she had counted on, having the last word, she was to be disappointed.

'I'm sure he'll take something to you.' His voice was bland. 'Preferably a

riding crop.
Au revoir,
my pretty wayfarer.'

She held her head high, and wouldn't allow herself to limp until she was

round the next bend and out of the range of those too-revealing headlights.

The force of the wind seemed to have spent itself, and now the air was full of

the sound of the sea, a sullen booming roar as the breakers hurled themselves

against the granite cliffs. Nor was it rain on her face any longer, but spray.

As she trudged on wearily, Morwenna found herself wondering how easy it

would be to miss the house entirely and walk straight over the cliff into the

sea. She grinned wanly at the thought, and then stiffened, peering almost

incredulously into the gloom. Somewhere just to the left she could see a

light, a steady, purposeful light like a lamp set in the windows of an

uncurtained room. And at that moment the moon emerged from behind the

flying clouds, and Morwenna saw the dark mass of the house, its chimneys

and roofs clearly outlined against the sky.

Under the circumstances, it was madness to feel such a sense of relief, of

homecoming' even, but the familiarity of the building's shape, imprinted on

her mind by her mother's painting^caught at her heart, and she felt childish

tears prick at the back of her eyelids.

Somewhere close at hand a dog began to bark, deep and full-throated, and

then another took it up, and in the house another light went on, as if the

occupants were responding to the animals' warning. Of course, she thought,

they would be expecting a visitor—the man she had met on the road.

Summoning all her courage, she walked up to the front door. The notice she

had seen had been perfectly correct, she thought wryly. The road indeed led

to nowhere but Trevennon—straight to its door in fact. And what kind of

arrogance had decided to build a house in this very spot anyway—out on a

headland, exposed four-square to the elements? 'A barn', Biddy had called it,

she thought, and wished that her first view of it had been in daylight.

There was an old-fashioned bell pull at the side of the front door, and

Morwenna tugged at it half-heartedly, not really expecting any results. But

to her surprise, a bell did start jangling somewhere inside the house, and the

dogs began barking again tumultuously. They seemed to be penned up

somewhere in the outbuildings which rambled away from the side of the

house, and as Morwenna waited, she heard the barking rise almost to a

frenzy and the sound of heavy bodies banging against some kind of wooden

barricade. It was altogether too close for comfort and Morwenna hoped

devoutly that it would hold.

'Whisky!' she called out, trying to sound firm. 'Max! Quiet, good dogs.'

The good dogs were clearly puzzled by- this personal appeal from an

unfamiliar voice, but they stopped barking. There was a lot of subdued

whining, and convulsive sniffing, and paws scrabbling on a hard surface, but

that, Morwenna felt, was a far more acceptable alternative.

And someone was actually coming to answer the door. Morwenna felt her

stomach flutter with nervousness, and clenched her hands into fists deep in

the pockets of her coat as the heavy door swung open with an appropriate

creak of hinges.

She was confronted by a small stocky man, almost enveloped in a large and

disreputable butcher's apron. His face was wrinkled like a walnut into lines

of real malevolence, and bright eyes under grey shaggy eyebrows glared

suspiciously up at her.

'Wrong 'ouse,' he snorted, and attempted to close the door.

Morwenna stepped forward quickly to circumvent the move. She smiled

beguilingly at him, ignoring the scowl she received in return. Her thoughts

were seething. Was this— could this be Dominic Trevennon? He would be

about the right age, she reasoned, and he seemed to fit the portrait of

unlovable eccentric which she had begun to build in her mind.

'Mr Trevennon?' she asked, trying to speak confidently.

'Not 'ere,' was the discouraging reply. 'So you may's well take yourself off.'

'Do you mean he's away?' Morwenna's heart sank within her. 'Or is he just

out?'

'Tedn't none of your business,' the gnome remarked with satisfaction. 'Now

go 'long with you. I want to get this door shut.' Somewhere in the house a

telephone began to ring, and his face assumed an expression of even deeper

malice. "Ear that?" he snarled. 'I should be answering that, not stood 'ere,

argy-bargying with you.'

'Oh, please,' Morwenna said desperately, seeing that he was about to slam

the door on her. 'I—I've come a long way today. If Mr Trevennon isn't here

at the moment, couldn't I come in and wait?'

'No, you couldn't.' He looked outraged at the thought. 'If Mr Trevennon

wanted to see you, he'd have left word you were expected. You phone up

tomorrow in a decent manner and make an appointment. Now, go on. I'm

letting all this old draught in.'

The door was already closing in Morwenna's face when a woman's voice

called, 'Hold on there, you, Zack. You're to let her in.'

' 'Oo says?' Zack swung round aggressively.

The woman approaching jerked a thumb over her shoulder. ' 'E does. Good

enough for you?'

Apparently it was, because Zack held the door open— not wide, it was true,

but sufficiently to allow Morwenna to squeeze herself through it into the

hall. She put her case down and eased the rucksack from her aching

shoulder, ignoring Zack's mutter of. 'Seems mazed t'me.'

'You keep your opinion until you'm asked, Zack Hubbard.' The woman gave

Morwenna a searching but not unfriendly look. 'You can wait in the study

for the master, miss. There's a nice fire in there.' She paused doubtfully,

taking in Morwenna's chilled and generally bedraggled appearance. 'Would

you fancy a cup of something hot, while you're waiting?'

Morwenna accepted gratefully and followed her rescuer across the wide

hall. She was too bemused by the suddenness of her access to the house, just

when she had almost given up all hope, to take much account of her

surroundings. but the paramount impression was one of all- pervading

shabbiness.

And this was confirmed by the room in which she found herself. A big

shabby desk, littered with papers and crowned by an ancient typewriter,

dominated the room. A sagging sofa covered in faded chintz was drawn up

in front of the fireplace, and these with the addition of a small table just

behind the sofa constituted the entire furniture of the room. The square of

dark red carpet was threadbare in places, and the once-patterned wallpaper

seemed to have faded to a dull universal beige, with lighter, brighter square

patches seeming to' indicate depressingly that pictures had once hung there.

Morwenna sank down on to the sofa and held out her hands to the blazing

logs. What she had seen so far gave her no encouragement at all. The

Trevennons, it seemed, had fallen on hard times since her mother had last

visited the house. And it could furnish an explanation as to why Laura

Kerslake had never returned there. Perhaps the Trevennons themselves had

discouraged any reunions, preferring her to remember things as they had

been. To remember people as they had been.

She glanced at the rucksack which she had placed on the sofa beside her and

began to fumble with the buckles. She "took out the parcel of paintings, and

after a moment's hesitation walked across and laid it on the desk. Her own

equivalent, she thought wryly, of putting all her cards on the table.

There were some newspapers and magazines piled rather untidily at one end

of the sofa and she riffled through them casually when she sat down again.

They were an odd mixture, she thought, giving little clue as to the tastes and

personality of the subscriber.

There were some local newspapers as well and Morwenna unfolded one of

these and began to glance casually through the news items on the front page,

but the newsprint had a disturbing way of dancing up and down in front of

her eyes, and at length she gave up the effort, acknowledging that she was

more tired than even she had guessed.

The door opened and the women came in carrying a tray, which she placed

down on the sofa table. Again Morwenna was the recipient of one of those

searching looks.

'Is—is something wrong?' she asked.

'You have a look of someone I know. Can't bring to mind who it is, but I

daresay it'll come to me.'

Morwenna's heart skipped a beat. Was it her mother that this woman

recognised in her? She was quite aware that there was a resemblance, but

before she could ask further, a door banged nearby and Zack's voice shouted

pettishly, 'Inez!'

The woman tutted and moved towards the door. 'Dear life, doesn't he go on,"

she remarked placidly, and went out closing the door behind her.

Morwenna studied the tea tray with slight amusement. It had been laid with a

tea towel, and bore in addition to a fat brown earthenware teapot, a cup and

saucer, neither of which matched, and a small plate holding two buttered

cream crackers. But the tea itself was strong and fragrant, and by some

miracle not made with teabags. She sipped it as if it was nectar.

When she had finished, she leaned back against the shabby, comfortable

cushions and closed' her eyes. She felt warmed through, and oddly at peace

in spite of her inner uncertainties. All kinds of curious images began to

dance behind her shuttered eyes, and it was pleasant to lie back and

contemplate them while the warmth of the fire began to dissolve away some

of the ache from her tired limbs.

Trees danced in the wind, and dogs with eyes as big and golden as the

headlamps on a car went bounding through the night, baying at the moon.

And somehow Biddy was there too, the wind filling her black cape. 'Private

road,' She seemed to be saying over and over again. 'Private road. Keep out.'

Morwenna had no idea how long she had been asleep or what had disturbed

her, but she was wide awake in an instant and sitting up startled. It was much