Chapter 14

She took shelter from the howling sea-wind behind a great boulder of rock. She dreaded his reproaches unspeakably. For the past six weeks she had lived in dread of that moment. Her fingers were shaking as she opened the envelope that bore his boyish scrawl.

An enclosure fell out before she had withdrawn his letter. She caught it up hastily before the wind could take possession. It was an unmounted photograph--actually the portrait of a girl.

Evelyn stared at the roguish, laughing face with a great amazement. Then, with a haste that baffled its own ends, she sought his letter.

It began with astounding jauntiness:

"DEAR OLD EVE,--What a pair of superhuman idiots we have been! Many thanks for your sweet letter, which did me no end of good. I never loved you so much before, dear. Can you believe it? I am not surprised that you feel unequal to the task of keeping me in order for the rest of our natural lives. Will it surprise you to know that I had my doubts on the matter even when I wrote to suggest it? Never mind, dear old girl, I understand. And may the right man turn up soon and make you happy for the rest of your life!

"I am sending a photograph of a girl who till three weeks ago was no more than a friend to me, but has since become my _fiancee_. Love is a wonderful thing, Eve. It comes upon you so suddenly and carries you away before you have time to realise what has happened. At least that has been my experience. There is no mistaking the real thing when it actually comes to you.

"I am getting on awfully well, and like the life. By the way, it was through your friend, Lester Cheveril, that I got this appointment. A jolly decent chap that! I liked him from the first. It isn't every man who will stand being told he squints without taking offence. We are hoping to get married next month. Write--won't you?--and send me your blessing. Much love--Yours ever,

"JAMES WILLOBY."

Evelyn looked up from the letter with a deep breath of relief. It was so amazingly satisfactory. She almost forgot the emptiness of her own life for the moment in her rejoicing over Jim's happiness.

There was a little puddle of sea-water at her feet; and she climbed up to a comfortable perch on her sheltering rock and turned her face to the sea. Somehow, it did not seem so desolate as it had seemed five minutes before. This particular seat was a favourite haunt of hers in the summer. She loved to watch the tide come foaming up, and to feel the salt spray in her face.

Five minutes later, a great wave came hurling at the rock on which she sat, and, breaking in a torrent of foam, deluged her from head to foot.

She started up in swift alarm. The tide was coming in fast--much faster than she had anticipated. The shore curved inwards in a deep bay just there, and the cliffs rose sheer and unscalable from it to a considerable height.

Evelyn seldom went down to the shore in the winter, and she was not familiar with its dangers. The sea had seemed far enough out for safety when she had rounded the point nearest to the town, barely half an hour before. It was with almost incredulous horror that she saw that the waves were already breaking at the foot of the cliffs she had skirted.

She turned with a sudden, awful fear at her heart to look towards the farther point. It was a full mile away, and she saw instantly that she could not possibly reach it in time. The waves were already foaming white among the scattered boulders at its base.

Again a great wave broke behind her with a sound like the booming of a gun; and she realised that she would be surrounded in less than thirty seconds if she remained where she was. She slipped and slid down the side of the rock with the speed of terror, and plunged recklessly into a foot of water at the bottom. Before another wave broke she was dashing and stumbling among the rocks like a frenzied creature seeking safety from the remorseless, devouring monster that roared behind her.

The next five minutes of her life held for her an agony more terrible than anything she had ever known. Sea, sky, wind, and sudden pelting rain seemed leagued against her in a monstrous array against which she battled vainly with her puny woman's strength. The horror of it was like a leaden, paralysing weight. She fought and struggled because instinct compelled her; but at her heart was the awful knowledge that the sea had claimed her and she could not possibly escape.

She made for the farther point of the bay, though she knew she could not reach it in time. The loose shingle crumbled about her feet; the seaweed trapped her everywhere. She fell a dozen times in that awful race, and each time she rose in agony and tore on. The tumult all about her was like the laughter of fiends. She felt as if hell had opened its mouth, and she, poor soul, was its easy prey.

There came a moment at last when she tripped and fell headlong, and could not rise again. That moment was the culmination of her anguish. Neither soul nor body could endure more. Darkness--a howling, unholy darkness--came down upon her in a thick cloud from which there was no escape. She made a futile, convulsive effort to pray, and lost consciousness in the act.

* * * * *

Out of the darkness at length she came.

The tumult was still audible, but it was farther away, less overwhelming. She opened her eyes in a strange, unnatural twilight, and stared vaguely upwards.

At the same instant she became aware of some one at her side, bending over her--a man whose face, revealed to her in the dim light, sent a throb of wonder through her heart.

"You!" she said, speaking with a great effort. "Is it really you?"

He was rubbing one of her hands between his own. He paused to answer.

"Yes; it's really me," he said. And she fancied his voice quivered a little. "They told me I might perhaps find you on the shore. Are you better?"

She tried to sit up, and he helped her, keeping his arm about her shoulders. She found herself lying on a ledge of rock high up in the slanting wall of a deep and narrow cave. She knew the place well, and had always avoided it with instinctive aversion. It was horribly eerie. The rocky walls were wet with the ooze and slime of the ages. There was a trickle of spring-water along the ridged floor.

Evelyn closed her eyes dizzily. The marvel of the man's presence was still upon her, but the horror of death haunted her also. She would rather have been drowned outside on the howling shore than here.

"The sea comes in at high tide," she murmured shakily.

Lester Cheveril, crouching beside her, made undaunted reply.

"Yes, I know. But it won't touch us. Don't be afraid!"

The assurance with which he spoke struck her very forcibly; but something held her back from questioning the grounds of his confidence.

"How did you get here?" she asked him instead.

"I saw you from the corner of the bay," he said. "It was before you left your rock. I climbed round the point over the boulders. I thought at the time that there must be some way up the cliff. Then I saw you start running, and I knew you were cut off. I yelled to you, but I couldn't make you hear. So I had to give chase."

His arm tightened a little about her.

"I am sorry you were scared," he said. "Are you feeling better now?"

She could not understand him. He spoke with such entire absence of anxiety. In spite of herself her own fears began to subside.

"Yes, I am better," she said. "But--tell me more. Why didn't you go back when you saw what had happened?"

"I couldn't," he said simply. "Besides, even if they launched the lifeboat, the chances were dead against their reaching you. I thought of a rope, too. But that seemed equally risky. It was a choice of odds. I chose what looked the easiest."

"And carried me here?" she said.

The light, shining weirdly in upon his face, showed her that he was smiling.

"I couldn't stop to consult you," he said. "I saw this hole, and I made for it. I climbed up with you across my shoulder."

"You are wonderfully strong," she said, in a tone of surprise.

He laughed openly.

"Notwithstanding my size," he said. "Yes; I'm fairly muscular, thank Heaven."

Evelyn's mind was still working round the problem of deliverance.

"We shall have to stay here for hours," she said, "even if--if----"

He interrupted her with grave authority.

"There is no 'if,' Miss Harford," he said. "We may have to spend some hours here; but it will be in safety."

"I don't see how you can tell," she ventured to remark, beginning to look around her with greater composure notwithstanding.

"Providence doesn't play practical jokes of that sort," said Cheveril quietly. "Do you know I have come from the other end of the earth to see you?"

She felt the burning colour rush up to her temples, yet she made a determined effort to look him in the face. His eyes, keen and kindly, were searching hers, and she found she could not meet them.

"I--I don't know what brought you," she said, in a very low voice.

She felt the arm that supported her grow rigid, and guessed that he was putting force upon himself as he made reply.

"Let me explain," he said. "You sent me a cablegram which said, 'Please cancel engagement.' Naturally that had but one meaning for me--you and Jim Willowby had got the better of your difficulties, and were going to be married. In the capacity of friend, I received the news with rejoicing. So I cabled back 'Delighted.' Soon after that came a letter from Jim to tell me you had thrown him over. Now, why?"

She answered him with her head bent:

"I found that I didn't care for him quite in that way."

Cheveril did not speak for several seconds. Then, abruptly, he said:

"There is another fellow in the business."

She made a slight gesture of appeal, and remained silent.

He leaned forward slowly at length, and laid his hand upon both of hers.

"Evelyn," he said very gently, "will you tell me his name?"

She shook her head instantly. Her lips were quivering, and she bit them desperately.

He waited, but no word came. Outside, the roaring of the sea was terrible and insistent. The great sound sent a shudder through the girl. She shrank closer to the cold stone.

He pulled off his coat and wrapped it round her. Then, as if she had been a child, he drew her gently into his arms, and held her so.

"Tell me--now," he said softly.

But she hid her face dumbly. No words would come.

It seemed a long while before he spoke again.

"That cable of yours was a fraud," he said then. "I was not--I am not--prepared to release you from your engagement except under the original condition."

"I think you must," she said faintly.

He sought for her cold hands and thrust them against his neck. And again there was a long silence, while outside the sea raged fiercely, and far below them in the distance a white streak of foam ran bubbling over the rocky floor.

Soon the streak had become a stream of dancing, storm-tossed water. Evelyn watched it with wide, fascinated eyes. But she made no sign of fear. She felt as if he had, somehow, laid a quieting hand upon her soul.

Higher the water rose, and higher. The cave was filled with dreadful sound. It was almost dark, for dusk had fallen. She felt that but for the man's presence she would have been wild with fear. But his absolute confidence wove a spell about her that no terror could penetrate. The close holding of his arms was infinitely comforting to her. She knew with complete certainty that he was not afraid.

"It's very dark," she whispered to him once; and he pressed her head down upon his breast and told her not to look. Through the tumult she heard the strong, quiet beating of his heart, and was ashamed of her own mortal fear.

It seemed to her that hours passed while she crouched there, listening, as the water rose and rose. She caught the gleam of it now and then, and once her face was wet with spray. She clung closer and closer to her companion, but she kept down her panic. She felt that he expected it of her, and she would have died there in the dark, sooner than have disappointed him.

At last, after an eternity of quiet waiting, he spoke.

"The tide has turned," he said. And his tone carried conviction with it.

She raised her head to look.

A dim, silvery light shone mysteriously in revealing the black walls above them, the tossing water below. It had been within a foot of their resting-place, but it had dropped fully six inches.

Evelyn felt a great throb of relief pass through her. Only then did she fully realise how great her fear had been.

"Is that the moon?" she asked wonderingly.

"Yes," said Cheveril. He spoke in a low voice, even with reverence, she thought. "We shall be out of this in an hour. It will light us home."

"How--wonderful!" she said, half involuntarily.

Cheveril said no more; but the silence that fell between them was the silence of that intimacy which only those who have stood together before the great threshold of death can know. Many minutes passed before Evelyn spoke again, and then her words came slowly, with hesitation.

"You knew?" she said. "You knew that we were safe?"

"Yes," he answered quietly; "I knew. God doesn't give with one hand and take away with the other. Have you never noticed that?"

"I don't know," she answered with a sharp sigh. "He has never given me anything very valuable."

"Quite sure?" said Cheveril, and she caught the old quizzical note in his voice.

She did not reply. She was trying to understand him in the darkness, and she found it a difficult matter.

There followed a long, long silence. The roar of the breaking seas had become remote and vague.

But the moonlight was growing brighter. The dark cave was no longer a place of horror.

"Shall we go?" Evelyn suggested at last.

He peered downwards.

"I think we might," he said. "No doubt your people will be very anxious about you."

They climbed down with difficulty, till they finally stood together on the wet stones.

And there Cheveril reached out a hand and detained the girl beside him.

"That other fellow?" he said, in his quiet, half-humorous voice. "You didn't tell me his name."

"Oh, please!" she said tremulously.

He took her hands gently into his, and stood facing her. The moonlight was full in his eyes. They shone with a strange intensity.

"Do you remember," he said, "how I once said to you that I was romantic enough to like to see a love affair go the right way?"

She did not answer him. She was trembling in his hold.

He waited for a few seconds; then spoke, still kindly, but with a force that in a measure compelled her:

"That is why I want you to tell me his name."

She turned her face aside.

"I--I can't!" she said piteously.

"Then I hold you to your engagement," said Lester Cheveril, with quiet determination.

Her hands leapt in his. She threw him a quick uncertain glance.

"You can't mean that!" she said.

"I do mean it," he rejoined resolutely.

"But--but--" she faltered. "You don't really want to marry me? You can't!"

He looked grimly at her for a moment. Then abruptly he broke into a laugh that rang and echoed exultantly in the deep shadows behind them.

"I want it more than anything else on earth," he said. "Does that satisfy you?"

His face was close to hers, but she felt no desire to escape. That laugh of his was still ringing like sweetest music through her soul.

He took her shoulders between his hands, searching her face closely.

"And now," he said--"now tell me his name!"

Yet a moment longer she withstood him. Then she yielded, and went into his arms, laughing also--a broken, tearful laugh.

"His name is--Lester Cheveril," she whispered. "But I--I can't think how you guessed."

He answered her as he turned her face upwards to meet his own.

"The friend who stands by sees many things," he said wisely. "And Love is not always blind."

"But you--you weren't in love," she protested. "Not when----"

He interrupted her instantly and convincingly.

"I have always loved you," he said.

And she believed him, because her own heart told her that he had spoken the truth.

* * * * *

The Right Man

I

"He hasn't proposed, then?"

"No; he hasn't." A pause; then, reluctantly: "I haven't given him the opportunity."

"Violet! Do you want to starve?"

The speaker turned in his chair, and looked at the girl bending over the fire, with a quick, impatient frown on his handsome face. They were twins, these two, the only representatives of a family that had been wealthy three generations before them, but whose resources had dwindled steadily under the management of three successive spendthrifts, and had finally disappeared altogether in a desperate speculation which had promised to restore everything.

"You don't seem to realise," the young man said, "that we are absolutely penniless--destitute. Everything is sunk in this Winhalla Railway scheme, up to the last penny. It seemed a gorgeous chance at the time. It ought to have brought in thousands. It would have done, too, if it had been properly supported. But it's no good talking about that. It's just a gigantic failure, or, if it ever does succeed, it will come too late to help us. Just our infernal luck! And now the question is, what is going to be done? You'll have to marry that fellow, Violet. It's absolutely the only thing for you to do. And I--I suppose I must emigrate."

The girl did not turn her head. There was something tense about her attitude.

"I could emigrate too, Jerry," she said, in a low voice.

"You!" Her brother turned more fully round. "You!" he said again. "Are you mad, I wonder?"

She made a slight gesture of protest.

"Why shouldn't I?" she said. "At least, we should be together."

He uttered a grim laugh, and rose.

"Look here, Violet," he said, and took her lightly by the shoulders. "Don't be a little fool! You know as well as I do that you weren't made to rough it. The suggestion is so absurd that it isn't worth discussion. You'll have to marry Kenyon. It's as plain as daylight; and I only wish my perplexities were as easily solved. Come! He isn't such a bad sort; and, anyhow, he's better than starvation."

The girl stood up slowly and faced him. Her eyes were wild, like the eyes of a hunted creature.

"I hate him, Jerry! I hate him!" she declared vehemently.

"Nonsense!" said Jerry. "He's no worse than a hundred others. You'd hate any one under these abominable circumstances!"

She shuddered, as if in confirmation of this statement.

"I'd rather do anything," she said; "anything, down to selling matches in the gutter."

"Which isn't a practical point of view," pointed out Jerry. "You would get pneumonia with the first east wind, and die."

"Well, then, I'd rather die." The girl's voice trembled with the intensity of her preference. But her brother frowned again at the words.

"Don't!" he said abruptly. "For Heaven's sake, don't be unreasonable! Can't you see that it's my greatest worry to get you provided for? You must marry. You can't live on charity."

Her cheeks flamed.

"But I can work," she began. "I can----"

He interrupted her impatiently.

"You can't. You haven't the strength, and probably not the ability either. It's no use talking this sort of rot. It's simply silly, and makes things worse for both of us. It's all very well to say you'd rather starve, but when it comes to starving, as it will--as it must--you'll think differently. Look here, old girl: if you won't marry this fellow for your own sake, do it for mine. I hate it just as much as you do. But it's bearable, at least. And--there are some things I can't bear."

He stopped. She was clinging to him closely, beseechingly; but he stood firm and unyielding, his young face set in hard lines.

"Will you do it?" he said, as she did not speak.

"Jerry!" she said imploringly.

He stiffened to meet the appeal he dreaded. But it did not come. Her eyes were raised to his, and she seemed to read there the futility of argument. She remained absolutely still for some seconds, then abruptly she turned from him and burst into tears.

"Don't! don't!" he said.

He stepped close to her, as she leaned upon the mantelpiece, all the hardness gone from his face. Had she known it, the battle at that moment might have been hers; for he would have insisted no longer. He was on the brink of abandoning the conflict. But her anguish of weeping possessed her to the exclusion of everything else.

"Oh, Jerry, go away!" she sobbed passionately. "You're a perfect beast, and I'm another! But I'll do it, I'll do it--for your sake, as I would do anything in the world, though it's quite true that I'd rather starve!"

And Jerry, rather pale, but otherwise complete master of himself, patted her shoulder with a hasty assumption of kindly approval; and told her that he had always known she was a brick.

II

"Heaven knows I don't aspire to be any particular ornament to society," said Dick Kenyon modestly. "Never have; though I've been pretty well everything else that you can think of, from cow-puncher to millionaire. And I can tell you there's a dashed deal more fun in being the first than the last of those. Still, I think I could make you comfortable if you would have me; though, if you don't want to, just say so, and I'll shunt till further notice."

It was thus that he made his proposal to the girl of his choice; and no one, hearing it, would have guessed that beneath his calm, even phlegmatic, exterior, the man was in a ferment of anxiety. He spoke with a slight nasal twang that seemed to emphasise his deliberation, and his face was mask-like in its composure. Of beauty he had none.

His eyes were extraordinarily blue, but the lids drooped over them so heavily that his expression was habitually drowsy, even stolid. In build, he was short and thick-set, like a bulldog; and there seemed to be something of a bulldog's strength in the breadth of his chest, though there was no hint of energy about him to warrant its development.

The girl he addressed did not look at him. She sat perfectly still, with her hands fast clasped together, and her eyes, wide and despairing, fixed upon the fire in front of her. She was wondering desperately how long she could possibly endure it. Yet his last words were somehow not what she had expected from this man whose manner always seemed to hint that at least half of creation was at his sole disposal. They expressed a consideration on his part that she had been far from anticipating. He waited for an interval of several seconds for her to speak. He was standing up on the hearthrug, his ill-proportioned figure thrown into strong relief by the firelight behind him. At last, as she quite failed to answer him, he drew a pace nearer to her.

"Don't mind me, Miss Trelevan," he said, in a drawl so exaggerated that she thought it must be intentional. "Take your time. There's no hurry. I've always thought it was a bit hard on a woman to expect her to answer an offer of marriage offhand. Perhaps you'd rather write?"

"No," she said, rather breathlessly. "No!" Then, after a pause, still more breathlessly: "Won't you sit down?"

He stepped away from her again, to her infinite relief, and sat down a couple of yards away.

There ensued a most painful silence, during which the battle in the girl's heart raged fiercely. Then at length she took her resolution in both hands, and faced him. He was not looking at her. He sat quite still, and she fancied that his eyes were closed; but when she spoke he turned his head, and she realised that she had been mistaken.

"I can give you your answer now," she said, making the greatest effort of her life. "It is--it is--yes."

She rose with the words, almost as if in preparation for headlong flight. But Dick Kenyon kept his seat. He leaned forward a little, his blue eyes lifted to her face.

"Your final word, Miss Trelevan?" he asked her, in his cool, easy twang.