The Girl From Over the Sea (30 page)

CHAPTER
X
I

Only a da
y
or two now. Lesley relaxed in a warm bath and then with her thin dressing gown slung around her she went into the bedroom. As she was
having an early night would it be a good idea to do some packing? Rita was down at’ Penpethic Harbour with Ricky, so she had the room to herself.

Downstairs, she had just had a cup of tea with
Mrs.
Piper who had been telling her about the fairy ring on the downs opposite the. Kissing Seat. Jennifer, drinking tea too, had laughed,
‘
You and your Cornish
superstitions,
Mrs.
Piper! You
’
ll
make Lesley think we
’
re still living in the Middle Ages.
’
She
’
d
said
to Lesley
,
‘
It
’
s just a dark
green fungus growing in a circle round an area of grass. Don
’
t believe a word about the piskies dancing round it
.’

But when she had gone,
Mrs.
Piper had shaken her head.

‘
She can say what she likes, Miss Lesley, but them circles is made by the piskies—fairies you call un—dancing round
’
And they dew say if you
’
m be foolish enough to go out in the moonlight and see un, they
’
ll dance you away wi
’
un and you
’
ll not be seen for a hundred years
.’

Lesley laughed.
‘
Moral is to keep away from the fairy ring, especially in the moonlight
.’

No, she was too tired to do any packing. She slid into bed and almost immediately she was asleep. Too good to last! Lesley hadn
’
t slept well for a long time. Perhaps that was why those violet shadows were always under her heavy eyes.

What had wakened her? Rita creeping in quietly. But Rita didn
’
t usually creep anywhere. She blew in like one of the gales that sprang up over the turquoise seas here, lashing them into pewter cauldrons.

Lesley had been heavy with sleep an hour ago, but now she felt wide awake. She slid out of bed and went to the small window on her side of the room, its casement flung wide to get as much air as possible. The low roar of the surf came into the room like the giant breathing of a huge sea monster.

As she turned her head slightly, Lesley gave a little gasp. The moon was coming up over the garden. It must be almost full
.
It was pale orange in colour and so very, very large. She gave a nervous little laugh. Her first crazy idea was that something had gone wrong with the moon, as if it had moved much too close to earth. But it was because it was only just above the horizon that it seemed so big.
Mrs.
Piper had said this was called the hunter
’
s moon, and now Lesley remembered that she had heard Dominic making an appointment with someone to go shooting next week.

The hunter
’
s moon—a full moon or near enough—and there was that fairy ring on the downs. If you were ever likely to see the fairies dancing it would be at the time of the full moon.

The idea was too much for Lesley to stay any longer in this stuffy little room. Even if she saw no fairies, at least she could breathe some sea air and walk in the moonlight. A sense of the ridiculous shook her for a moment. If you were a fool—and where could you find a bigger one than Lesley Arden—then you might as well go the whole hog and be a real fool. Go out alone in the moonlight and dance round the fairy ring, and if by chance the piskies came and stole you away for the next hundred years, then so much the better. After a hundred years surely this bitter pain in her heart would have vanished completely.

Of course she ought to have known that she was asking for more heartbreak. After all, it was a night for lovers.

The house was very quiet. Jennifer was in her own room asleep, no doubt dreaming of her wedding at Christmas when Rod came home from Switzerland for good. .Dominic, Rita and Rick were still out because it was not very late.

She pulled on jeans and a thin sweater, stepped into her walking sandals and went quietly downstairs and out of the front door. She went quickly across the garden, paused for a moment by the Kissing Trees, and then when the pain in her heart was more than seemed humanly possible, to bear she went through the gate.

The fairy ring was there, but no piskies, and it was doubtful if Lesley would have seen them had they been there. She was walking blindly, quickly, running away from herself and from her memories
...
memory of a kiss under those trees, memory that tonight she had typed the last of Blake
’
s manuscript. Her work for the slave-master was finished.

Tomorrow all she need do was to go into the little office and
tidy up the desk. At the end of the week the last guests would be leaving and the hotel would be closed. And the girl from over the sea could go back from whence she had come,

Blake had been away all day. Dominic had whispered to her that he
w
as sure he was making the final arrangements for the transfer of the two Manors to a hotel consortium in which the Trevendones would have shares, but no one else spoke of it.

Lesley had walked—run, rather—so swiftly in her efforts to escape her own thoughts that she had come to where the downs overhung the little harbour of St Benga Town. The tide was low and the beach stretched away in lonely moonlit beauty—the beach where he had reined in the runaway Sheba and told her at their second meeting that she was a menace that he hoped never to see again.

And now she was near to the cliff road above which the lovely houses stood, one with a blue door and shutters. For a moment Lesley stood in the shadows, and then she saw them—two lovers, closely
locked.

Sorrel
’
s voice ripped through the moonlight.
‘
Come, my love. It
’
s time we went in.
’

Lesley did not
w
ait to see or hear more. On silent footsteps she fled back along the downs, not pausing for breath until she came abreast of the Kissing Trees. No pi
s
kies dancing round the Fairy Ring, and no truth either, in Sirs Piper
’
s other story that when a man and a girl kissed for the first time beneath the Kissing Trees
they
would be true lovers, for ever and a day.

There were no tears in Lesley
’
s green eyes
.
Only in her heart.

Lesley whistled to Dingo. He, like the twins, had gone over to the side of the enemy, but this afternoon he was at a loose end, and he responded ecstatically to the suggestion of a walk. Not that she intended to walk, at least not on the Trevendone estate. She felt if she stayed anywhere in the vicinity she would disgrace herself by lying down and giving way to the misery which was tearing out her heart.

She hadn
’
t seen Blake this morning. Probably he was still in the white house on the cliff above St Benga Town. But she had gone into the little office, left it tidy, moving out all her
own possessions, leaving the typewriter covered.

This afternoon she was free, but she wasn
’
t going to bother about lunch. Food would choke her, she thought. This afternoon, she would go off on her own and say a final farewell to her dreams of the lovely land of Lyonesse, of Camelot and the legends of chivalry. It had turned sour on her, this lovely cruel coast. Farewell now to all that. Tonight she would pack and begin to prepare for the vigorous reality of life in Australia.

She ran the Mini out of the garage, opened the door for Dingo to jump in beside her and set off much too fast down the drive and along the main road. Weeks ago she had promised herself that she would explore a little ruined church on a steep cliff point about five miles north of St Benga Town.

She parked just outside the farm which advertised cream teas, though now there was the word
‘
Closed
’
across the notice. They must regret it, she supposed, in this glorious autumn weather with plenty of tourists still around. No doubt if the new Manor House was remaining open there would still be visitors. But she didn
’
t want to think about Trevendone or anyone who lived there this afternoon. She just wanted to breathe the air, find a warm sheltered spot on the cliffs and indulge her own misery and then brace herself for the future.

She took only a cursory glance at the ruined church and the old gravestones. They slept quietly enough in this peaceful spot, those who had been laid to rest here.

She shivered and hurried through the lych-gate into the meadow that led on to the cliff. Her mood was sombre enough without such thoughts. She held Dingo tightly on the lead when she saw some young heifers grazing nearby.
His
mood was far from sombre and he began to pull away and bark. Fortunately the animals were distant enough to take no notice and his attention was soon distracted by a late butterfly fluttering ahead of them.

It was a windless day, but as Lesley reached the cliff path she could hear the surf thundering belo
w
her. Even on a day like this, a throwback to midsummer with the grass green and scabious and harebells still studding the hedgerow which marched right up to the cliff edge, when she peered over she could see the surf breaking in white foam against the black teeth which like a great monster
’
s fangs opened a giant maw
to the waves. Yet beyond the breakers, the sea, summerlike, stretched in a band of dark blue silk to the horizon, cloudless too, and only a few shades lighter than the sea below.

At first she sauntered along the cliff edge, watching the meadow grasses shiver and sway in a tiny breeze that was imperceptible at her height. Then the ground dropped suddenly and she was looking down into a steep combe. It was as if some giant hand had cut a perfect vee into the landscape. Beyond on the other side was the rich deep colour of p
u
rple heather.

Lesley turned back and began to descend a steep path which led down to a tiny cove. There was some shingle and just at this state of the tide, a bit of sand. She would throw pebbles into the water for Dingo to retrieve. He never made any real attempt to get them, but he enjoyed dashing to the edge of the water and barking enthusiastically. In this lonely spot his vocal efforts would be of annoyance to no one.

Then she had a slight qualm. Under Blake
’
s firm handling Dingo was losing some of his more offensive mannerisms. Perhaps it would be wiser not to encourage him in this barking session.

She shrugged. Who wanted to be wise
?
Not she just now. After all, if she was thinking in terms of wisdom, then what
she
should have done was to have stayed in Australia and never come searching for the fai
r
y gold
of romance that didn
’
t exist.

She had lost not only her own peace of mind in coming here but her close contact with the twins. They had their own thoughts now, their own dreams, and in a way were indifferent to hers. There was nothing more cruel than indifference. All at once her throat was aching and her thoughts now on someone else. Oh, what was the use!

She began to plunge down the narro
w
cliff path, Dingo rushing in front of her in the headlong manner with which he did everything. He was at the bottom long before her, his tongue lolling out expectantly.

It was hotter down here than she had imagined, for in the shelter of the cove the cliffs gave off a stifling heat on this day of midsummer-like languor.

For a while she found bits of driftwood to fling into the lapping tide for him to retrieve. The water
was
very calm
down
here, but further out on the rocks, jutting cruelly out on either side of the cove, the surf was breaking with its usual angry roar. You never got far away from the cruelty or this coast, Lesley reflected with a shiver. Any more than she could get away from the stabbing cruelty of the knowledge that had come to her last night. Probably they were married already. It was a permissive society, but Blake Defontaine and Sorrel Lang
...
no. It would be marriage for them.

Dingo kept reminding her that they were supposed
to be having a game, but in the end, even he grew tired of it. His barks grew less raucous and his chasing to the edge of the sea more languid.

The tide had now turned, and whistling the dog, Lesley began the steep upward climb. She was sticky with perspiration when she reached the top. The afternoon seemed hotter than ever and the climb had left her completely exhausted
—
or was it last night when she had not slept at all?

‘
Dingo, I
’
m all in, and so are you by the look of you, poor old thing. Come and lie down.
’
She patted the sward on to which she had thrown herself and he came and put his chin on her knee and looked up at her with the adoring expression he knew so well how to assume.

‘
You
’
re a fraud,
’
she told him dreamily.
‘
You look like that for lots of us, but there
’
s only one person you
’
re all go
ing
for now, isn
’
t there? The slave-
m
aster. But I mustn
’
t call him that now. Even the twins object.
’

She sighed. She was back to the same theme and that tightness in her chest and throat was getting worse. She turned and lay quite fiat on the grassy down, pressing hard against the soft turf as if she could still the pain in her body by the pressure, her arms stretched out on either side of her as she dug her fingers into the grass.