The Wind and the Spray (24 page)

CHAPTER TWENTY

SHE was still there ... in Nor’s arms ... when she opened her eyes. She looked around her, not believing.

The rain had stopped and miraculously the sun had come out, making it light once more, but it was not the fact that it was day when she had expected continuance of night that made Laurel gasp. It was the water, the water that had gone down almost as though it was in a sink and someone had pulled out a plug. But water, she thought weakly, could not disappear as quickly as that.

Had it all been fancy, then? Had she invented that nightmare with Jasper? Had she imagined the flood?

Nor looked down at her and nodded his head when he saw the awareness once more in her eyes. He must have read her puzzlement for he said, “No you didn’t dream it, it happened. There’s still plenty of water left, Laurel, if you want to satisfy yourself as to your sanity, but the Niagara part of it has passed on down the bay and out to the Pacific Ocean. There will be no danger there. It’s a big enough ocean to absorb our particular storage without even achieving high tide.” He grinned.

But she still stared in disbelief. The knoll whose top had seemed as accommodating as a pin head was now a
hill
with only its roots in a few feet of flood.

And it was also an empty hill
...
empty apart from Nor and herself.

“Jasper—” she murmured in a whispering breath.

She did not know what to think
...
She scarcely dared think
...
She looked nervously at Nor.

Nor looked calmly back at her. His eyes were grim.

“Yes, I shoved him into the flood,” he said, reading what was in Laurel’s eyes. “He’s probably now somewhere between here and Antarctica, that’s the prevailing current this month.”

“Nor?—” she breathed it fearfully.

He pushed her up to a sitting position, put a cushion behind her. He sat a few inches away on the other side of the car. They no longer touched.

“Don’t be an idiot, Laurel. As soon as the waters receded, he receded as well. We could have gone too, but not the jeep yet, of course. Seeing I would have had to carry you since you took your time, my child, in coming round, I decided we’d wait and drive away.”

She was silent a moment. She wanted to tell him about the pearl
...
how with Jasper gone, it was gone too. She wet her lips nervously and gave him a quick appraising look. His face was hard. She decided she could not tell it yet.

“Why did you come after us when you did?” she ventured instead.

“I could shoot myself,” he returned savagely, “for not coming earlier. When Ridge radioed that you hadn’t arrived as you had promised, I brought the
Clytie
back at once.”

“More delay in the schedule,” Laurel sighed.

The big man shrugged.

“What did you think I’d do, finish the day’s hunting?” he asked.

She glanced down on the Island and the bay, quite normal again, as though this had never happened at all.

“You could finish it now,” she suggested. “It’s still light enough.”

“I
’
ve rested the men,” he answered quietly.

“And yourself?”

“That can wait”—he looked directly at her—“until after we’ve talked.”

“Talked?”

“Yes, Laurel. There are things between us unsaid that must be said.”

She did not answer him. A little agitatedly she turned her face away. He did not press the subject, he simply went on with his account.

“When I got into the station, I saw Plush munching outside one of the cottages. Ridge and I were both satisfied then that you had come, driven the cow with you, but had taken the first shelter that offered.

“I put off going down for you then.”

“But—but weren’t there t
h
ings you wanted from the house?” She looked at him incredulously, thinking of the pearl.

“With you out of it, there was nothing,” he said. There was no expression in his voice, no glimmer in his eyes to tell her what he meant.

After a pause he resumed.

“I waited a while, even had coffee with Ridge, then went across to Mrs. Jessopp’s. Plush was still munching.” Nor’s bottom lip protruded truculently. “I even gave the beast a pat. Then I went in and asked for you. That started it. Mrs. Jessopp and I knocked on every door on the Island to see if you were there. When we drew blanks we knew you were either still coming across or hadn’t left the house.”

Laurel said with a shiver, “I—we were going from the house.”

“Yes. I’ve gathered that
...
” His eyes on her were
lance-sharp.

She knew he was going to ask where they were going
...
if she had known before all this that Jasper had a secret place
...
Hurriedly she interrupted, “Why did you come over in the jeep?”

“I estimated by the way the water was rising that if I was to save you at all it would have to be pretty fast. Thank heaven the old girl didn’t let me down.” Nor patted the muddied sides of the battered truck.

“Was it the high level storage tank, do you think?”

“Undoubtedly. Everything must have collapsed all at once. I can imagine the uproar when the water let go. One thing, it would run only down this side. In fact”—Nor looked sharply at Laurel—“the only person at any time in danger was the occupant of the Larsen cottage.
”

“Two occupants,” she said quietly.

His eyes were narrowed now. “Yes, two, Laurel, and I must know about that. When did Jasper come? Why did he come? Had he been there before?” He paused a savage moment. “Why was I never told?”

Laurel interrupted stubbornly, “There are things I must know first, Nor. Why did you let me think you had done nothing towards bringing David out here?”

“I never said so at any time.”

“You let me assume it.”

He nodded. “It allowed me to estimate how you really considered me.”

“And did you estimate that?” Her
voice
was not quite steady.

“I estimated enough,” came his
laconic reply.

“I found, of course,” she ventured after
a pause,
“David’s letter to you, Nor.”

“So you were snooping again.”

“I
w
as not. Jasper scattered the contents of the tin when he was searching for the pearl.” She looked at him a
little
fearfully. “You see,
he
came for the pearl
—
”

“Yes, I do see.” His expression was enigmatical. “Go on.”

“The letter fell out. I recognized the writing. I
read
it, Nor.”

“Well?” Still the enigmatical look, laurel wrung her hands together. “Tell me, Nor, you must tell me.’

“Tell you what?”

“About David, about
—
us.”

“I’ll tell you
about
David,” he replied.
“Yes,
I
did
do something about David. I wrote to your brother ... I wrote to Doctor Frith. David’s reply
came
at once.” Nor was silent a moment.

“I wonder,” he said presently,
“if
you would believe
me,
Laurel, if I
told
you
that going
over all this
now”—
he made a brief gesture
with his hands—“is
just as
painful,
I honestly believe, to
me as it
is to
you.

“In your brother’s letter back to me was all the
courage
any man hopes to meet in one lifetime. David knew what lay ahead. He discussed it quite calmly. He told me he would never come out
...
never
see
me
...
never see you again.

“If you want it, I can tell you every word he said. Those words
are
written indelibly in
my heart.”

Again Nor paused.

“I wrote back. David wrote again to me. I
—
I
came to
love that boy.” The big man’s voice broke
a
little.

“Yes,” whispered Laurel, “in his letter David wrote: ‘My beloved new brother, my dear, dear Nor.’ ”

“We
were
brothers,” Nor said.

A moment went
past.
Laurel
reminded him in a
quiet voice, “To have David
as
a brother
you
would have to have me as a wife.”

“I’m coming to that presently.” Again the entire lack of expression in the voice.

“David,” Nor resumed, “on his own insistence, kept up the pretence of his coming out. Doctor Frith, however, did not know of the pretence. At one period he wrote frankly of David’s fast deterioration, wrote it to you.”

“That was the letter I didn’t receive?”

“Yes.”

“Why did I get no letter from David for weeks ... for one month?”

“That was the worst period, Laurel. He was too weak even to write. He wrote to me, by dictation, but that would not have done for you, you would have been alarmed.”

“Perhaps if I had been alarmed, I would have gone back and seen him before—before—”

“That’s what he didn’t want. He didn’t want you to see him as he was then.”

“But he wrote later, Nor—”

“Often the scheme of life runs like that, Laurel. Before the end comes a return of vitality
...
before the slack a current will run high.”

Nor was fumbling in the jeep pocket for his makings and matches. He said banally, “Thank heaven they’re dry.”

Deliberately, quite unemotionally, Laurel asked, “Nor, why did you bring me to Humpback Island? Why did you marry me?”

He raised his bleached eyebrows at that, but he still did not hurry, he lit up first. None for her.

“Question one,” he said at length, “the answer is that Peter asked me to get you. Question two,” he continued, “the answer is propriety. All clear, girl?”

“Not clear at all. They’re not the reasons. Nor, you must tell me, you must.”

He considered that. He considered it at length. “Look,” he said at last, “I could tell you for a thousand years, but I could never make you understand.”

“Try me.”

“Very well.” He shrugged. “It was simply something that was passed on to me from my father, from my father’s father, from his father before that.”

“You mean from the House of Larsen—”

Nor said, “Yes.”

“And it was—?”

Was it the smoke from his cigarette narrowing the sailor blue eyes?
L
aurel did not know. She simply waited
...
and heard.

“It was a Larsen’s one right love for the one right woman. Circumstances had made me rebel, determined me to turn my back on it all—”

“The ava
ilable male with other ideas?”

“Yes, I had other ideas,” Nor said.

“But it was no use. From the moment I saw you and instantly adapted Peter’s vague request to fit you and you alone, I knew the rule still stood good.

“Only, of course”—the tone was dry now—“it takes two to clinch a thing like that.”

The cigarette had gone out
.
He lit it, taking his time. “Finished your questions?” he enquired.

“No. There are lots of things I must know.”

He looked at her quickly.

“You could be sorry, child.”

“I’m not a child, Nor.”

“I have yet to believe that.”

She did not heed him. “I want to know why—why you kissed me one day and then another day you shook me instead.”

“Shake you! I could have shaken you twice as long and twice as hard. I could have kept shaking you to
make
you see
...
to make you come alive ... to live. What was the use? You simply hadn’t grown up.”

“I had, I had. Sometimes I tried to tell you.”

“You didn’t try very hard.” His eyes held hers. “You never confided in me at any time. You never made one step forward. You even kept this business over Jasper to yourself. Why?
Why
?”

“I was frightened.”

“You had me to protect you.”

“
I was frightened for you,” she said simply.

He stared at her, disbelieving. Then he was angry, terribly angry.

“Do you think I was incapable of dealing with him?” he flung.

“With him, no, but incapable of dealing with a gun.”

Nor took a pull at the cigarette. “Oh, yes, the gun. I’m afraid he doesn’t have it any more.” He grinned.

“Did you—?”

“I threw it away? It was a fair fight, Laurel, rest assured of that.”

“Where is Jasper now? And don’t say Antarctica.”

“He’s down on the jetty waiting for the coastal launch. When he arrives at Anna Head someone else will be waiting for him, I’m afraid. He’s not very comfortable, Laurel, indeed he’s sore and sorry. And you belie
v
ed I could be frightened of him!”

Suddenly Nor was not in his opposite corner any more. Laurel found she was not in hers.

“You’ve been taking a lot of things for granted, haven’t you?’ he said in a low vibrant voice. “I don’t advise you to keep on doing that.”

She pushed away from him, bewildered.

“I can’t understand you, Nor, I never will. You never told me anything, but you expected me to know how you felt. How could I know? How can I know now? Now with a passage back to England, a little flat, a career—an annulled marriage.
How,
Nor?”

“They were words,” he answered. “Words are easy when you are
d
esperate.”

“Desperate?”

All at once his arms were round her fiercely. “Do you think when it came to it I would have let you go?” he
said
.

Still she evaded him. “You had the means,” she reminded him. “You have now, you have the pearl.”

“I have
not
the pearl, Laurel.”

She looked at him startled. She thought of Jasper. Her eyes widened. So in spite of whatever had happened between the two men while she lay unconscious, Jasper had got what he had laid low for after all
...

“No,” said Nor.
“
You
have.”

She stared at him, then looked where he looked, at her hand. It was on her finger. Above the plain gold wedding ring. He must have slipped it there after he had taken it by force from Jasper and then sent the man reeling down the hill. She caught her breath.

“I—I had it hidden on me,” she blurted. “Jasper forced me to hand it over.”

Nor said coolly, in what she sensed was vast understatement, “I believe the fellow is sorry now for that.”

Laurel shivered a little for the man. She glanced down at her hand again, feeling a faint hysteria rising within her.

“I’m engaged,” she said a little vaguely. “Engaged after I’m married, Nor.”