The Winter Ghosts (24 page)

On a crisp October morning, where the light fell in sharp angles across the platform from the steel and glass roof, George took the Express from the Gare Montparnasse. A sharp blast from the whistle, a shriek from the engine as it belched out its first jet of steam and Paris was lost to George in a cloud of white smoke.

The voyage took seven days. Down through Laroche, Tonnerre, Dijon to Mâcon, where he broke his journey. The following morning, against an endless blue sky, on to Lyon-Perranche, Valence, Avignon and finally Marseille. George spent a couple of days in the old port, sampling the local speciality of
bouillibaise
, then took the coast train to Carcassonne. Everywhere there were fields of sunflowers and vines, a legacy of the Roman occupation of centuries before.

A week after leaving Paris, having transferred to the branch line that served the mountain villages of the high valley of the Ariège, George found himself in a wild and prehistoric landscape very much to his liking. Small villages crouched between sweeps of rock. The clouds hung low in the narrow valleys, like smoke from an autumn bonfire, so close that he felt he could reach out and touch them. And everywhere, black openings into caverns set high above the road, like mouths in the granite face. There was no order, no clear line, but rather a jagged and irregular ridge of mountains and hills, angry against the sky, as if the world had here been formed by some cataclysm, some violent upheaval.

George settled himself into a modest hotel in Ussat-les-Bains, a former spa town a few miles south of Tarascon. He engaged a guide and a fiacre for the morning and, after a plain meal of cured mountain ham and chicken pie, washed down with a pichet of local
vin de table
, he fell asleep dreaming of the adventure to come.

At ten o’clock the following morning, dressed in clothes and boots appropriate for a visit to the mountains, George and his guide, Henry Sandall, were deposited by the carriage at the head of a small overgrown path which spurred off the road. Overgrown by box and laurel bushes, it was easy going at first, but quickly the ground began to rise and George saw they were following a rough track up the mountain side.

The guide was a young English geologist, who had studied with Monsieur Noulet at the Natural History Museum in Toulouse, and stayed to marry a local girl. Sandall knew the caves well and as they climbed up to the opening through which they would descend into the first level only, Sandall explained how the temperature within the caves of Lombrives was always the same, something approximating to fifty five degrees Farenheit, regardless of the weather outside. That it was this that had meant the caves, over centuries, had been used as a refuge for those fleeing persecution in times of war. He told him that, though visitors could not go beyond the first levels, there were miles of caves on seven different levels, with evidence of calcium aragonite, limestone. Sandall explained how stalagmites and columns were formed, all in an easy and clear manner that brought to mind, even more than ever, the exploits of Professor Von Hardwigg, his nephew Axel and their guide Hans.

The path grew more precipitous and George began to feel the strain in his legs. His chest grew tight. Until now, he had not realised how quickly he had slipped from soldier to man of leisure. Too little exercise and too much reading. Seeing he was struggling, Sandall suggested they rest a while before the final ascent and the two men sat in companionable silence.

Looking out over the timeless landscape, over the leaves tipping from green to the gold and copper of autumn, George felt a surge of affection for the natural world, all the more poignant because he realised that he could put off his return to England for only a little longer. There was something about the stillness of the air and the enduring nature of the landscape which led him to reflection, so much so that he did not realise for a moment that Sandall was talking; this time, he said, telling a story that owed rather more to mythology than history or scientific study. Would he like to hear it? George said he would and sat back to listen.

Sandall’s eyes were bright with the pleasure of his narrative. Associated with a particular cavern within the caves of Lombrives was the story of how the Pyrenees had been formed and named. Going back even beyond the acknowledged history of the region - its Prehistoric, Roman, Visigoth and Huguenot pasts - was a myth of how the Greek demi-god, Heracles, had found himself in the Ariège after the tenth of his twelve labours. At that time the people of the Cerdagne, the Bébryces, lived there under the rule of their king, Bebryx.

There were various versions of the myth, but the most persistent was that Heracles had fallen in love with Bebryx’s daughter, Pyrène, and she with him. They had spent one night together but, under the terms of his quest, was bound to deliver the Cattle of Géryon to the Goddess Hera. Under cover of dawn, he had slipped away. Waking to find him gone, Pyrène, distraught and suffering, had followed and was torn to pieces by wild animals. Hearing her cries, Heracles turned back and finding her dead, in remorse and rage fashioned the Pyrenees from the earth and stone as a mausoleum to his lost lover.

After six months in Paris, George was in no way immune to stories from antiquity, and the
écrivain-manqué
in him enjoyed the fanciful explanation for the naming of the mountains to the more prosaic offerings of the men of science. But the most romantic part of the story was yet to be told. What was peculiar, Sandall added, was that there was one cave within Lombrives where a limestone deposit had formed a structure in the shape of a tomb or a sarcophagus. And although, as he had said previously, the temperature was constant within the labyrinthine networks of tunnels and openings, in times of drought the water that dripped constantly through the caves did dry up - except in this one chamber. As if, or so the local people said, the mountain itself was mourning.

‘The Tombe of Pyrène?’ George suggested.

‘Quite so. A tribute to the endless grief of Heracles for his lost lover.’

As the two men lingered on the ancient mountainside a while longer, George thought of his fiancée waiting for him in Sussex: Miss Anne Purfew, pretty and flighty. And though he knew his love was not equal to that of Heracles for his Pyrène, he would be a constant husband, steady. He smiled, then, his thoughts moving quickly to the son they would have, then the daughter too. Of how hard he would strive to be a better father than his own had been to him. Less distant, more affectionate. How he and young George would go walking, on the Sussex Downs and perhaps in the French Pyrenees. Of how he would instil in his boy a love of France. And, at home, as the winter evenings drew in, how his little girl would play the piano and he would be charmed. It would be a quiet life, no surprises, but a contented life. Safe in hearth and home. Away from the dust and the blood and the flies that had marked his youth.

George thought of his mother’s wedding ring patiently sitting in a vault in the family solicitor’s offices overlooking the West Door of the cathedral in Chichester. He was resolved now. The decision was made. He would present himself to Colonel Purfew at the first opportunity on his return to England. And from that all of his life would follow. It was time to go back. January 1892 would find him at home.

Sandall stood up. ‘Are you ready to go on, sir?’

‘How much further?’

‘Quite a way, sir. Pretty steep from here on.’

George looked up at the bare rock. Suddenly the sadness of the story seemed too real. A chill came over him, despite the warmth of the afternoon. He shook his head.

‘No,’ he said. Going further felt impossible. ‘No, I don’t think so.’

Sandall nodded, as if not surprised. They turned their backs and walked away. Leaving the place where, still, the mountain wept for Pyrène.

Kate Mosse Sussex, August 2009