Delphi Collected Works of Maurice Leblanc (Illustrated) (Delphi Series Nine Book 17)

by Maurice Leblanc

  Simon had never been in love before. Love was an event which he awaited at his leisure; and he did not think it essential to prepare for its coming by seeking it in adventures which might well exhaust his ardour:

  “Love,” he used to say, “should blend with life, should form a part of life and not be added to it. Love is not an aim in itself: it is a principle of action and the noblest in the world.”

  From the first day when he saw her, Isabel’s beauty had dazzled him; and he needed very little time to discover that, until the last moment of his life, no other woman would ever mean anything to him. The same irresistible and deliberate impulse drove Isabel towards Simon. Brought up in the south of France, speaking French as her native tongue, she did not feel and did not evoke in Simon the sense of embarrassment that almost invariably arises from a difference of nationality. That which united them was infinitely stronger than that which divided them.

  It was a curious thing, but during these past four months, while love was blossoming within them like a plant whose flowers were constantly renewed and constantly increasing in beauty, they had had none of those long conversations in which lovers eagerly question each other and in which each seeks to find entrance into the unknown territory of the other’s soul. They spoke little and rarely of themselves, as though they had delegated to gentle daily life the task of raising the veils of the mystery one by one.

  Simon knew only that Isabel was not happy. After losing at the age of fifteen a mother whom she adored, she failed to find in her father the love and the caresses that might have consoled her. Moreover, Lord Bakefield almost immediately fell under the dominion of the Duchess of Faulconbridge, a vain, tyrannical woman, who rarely stirred from her villa at Cannes or her country-seat near Battle, but whose malign influence exerted itself equally close at hand and far away, in speech and by letter, on her husband and on her step-daughter, whom she persecuted with her morbid jealousy.

  Naturally enough, Isabel and Simon exchanged a mutual promise. And, naturally enough, on coming into collision with Lord Bakefield’s implacable will and his wife’s hatred, they arrived at the only possible solution, that of running away. This was proposed without heroic phrases and adopted without any painful struggle or reluctance. Each formed a decision in perfect liberty. To themselves their action appeared extremely simple. Loyally determined to prolong their engagement until the moment when all obstacles would be smoothed away, they faced the future like travellers turning to a radiant and hospitable country.

  In the open Channel a choppy sea was beginning to rise before a steady light breeze. In the west the clouds were mustering in battle array, but they were distant enough to promise a calm passage in glorious sunshine. Indifferent to the assault of the waves, the vessel sped straight for her port, as though no power existed which could have turned her aside from her strict course.

  Isabel and Simon were seated on one of the benches on the after deck. The girl had taken off her cloak and hat and offered to the wind her arms and shoulders, protected only by a cambric blouse. Nothing more beautiful could be imagined than the play of the sunlight on the gold of her hair. Though grave and dreamy, she was radiant with youth and happiness. Simon gazed at her in an ecstasy of admiration:

  “You don’t regret anything, Isabel?” he whispered.

  “No!”

  “You’re not frightened?”

  “Why should I be, with you? There is nothing to threaten us.”

  Simon pointed to the sea:

  “That will, perhaps.”

  “No!”

  He told her of his conversation with Lord Bakefield on the previous day and of the three conditions upon which they had agreed. She was amused, and asked him:

  “May I too lay down a condition?”

  “What condition, Isabel?”

  “Fidelity,” she replied, gravely. “Absolute fidelity. No lapses! I could never forgive anything of that sort.”

  He kissed her hand and said:

  “There is no love without fidelity. I love you.”

  There were few people around them, for the panic had affected mainly the first-class passengers. But, apart from the two lovers, all those who had persisted in crossing betrayed by some sign their secret uneasiness or their alarm. On the right were two old, very old clergymen, accompanied by a third, a good deal younger. These three remained unmoved, worthy brothers of the heroes who sang hymns on the sinking Titanic. Nevertheless, their hands were folded as though in prayer. On the left was the French couple whose conversation Dubosc had overheard. The young father and mother, leaning closely on each other, searched the horizon with fevered eyes. Four boys, the four older children, all strong and robust, their cheeks ruddy with health, were coming and going, in search of information which they immediately brought back with them. A little girl sat crying at her parents’ feet, without saying a word. The mother was nursing the sixth child, which from time to time turned to Isabel and smiled at her.

  Meanwhile, the breeze was growing colder. Simon leant toward his companion:

  “You’re not feeling chilly, Isabel?” he said.

  “No, I’m used to it. . . .”

  “Still, though you left your bag below you brought your rug on deck, very wisely. Why don’t you undo it?”

  The rug was still rolled up in its straps; and Isabel had even passed one of the straps around an iron rod, which fastened the bench to the deck, and buckled it.

  “My bag contains nothing of value,” she said.

  “Nor the rug, I presume?”

  “Yes, it does.”

  “Really? What?”

  “A miniature to which my poor mother was very much attached, because it is a portrait of her grandmother painted for George III.”

  “It has just a sentimental value, therefore?”

  “Oh dear no! My mother had it set in all her finest pearls, which gives it an inestimable value to-day. Thinking of the future, she left me, in this way, a fortune of my own.”

  Simon laughed:

  “And that’s the safe!”

  “Yes, that’s the safe!” she said, joining in his laughter. “The miniature is pinned to the middle of the rug, between the straps where no one would think of looking for it. You’re laughing, but I am superstitious where that miniature is concerned. It’s a sort of talisman. . . .”

  For some time they spoke no further. The coast had disappeared from sight. The swell was increasing and the Queen Mary was rolling a little.

  At this moment they were passing a beautiful white yacht.

  “That’s the Comte de Bauge’s Castor,” cried one of the four boys. “She’s on her way to Dieppe.”

  Two ladies and two gentlemen were lunching under an awning, Isabel bowed her head so as to hide her face.

  This thoughtless movement displeased her; for, a moment later, she said (and all the words which they exchanged during these few minutes were to remain engraved on their memories):

  “Simon, you really believe, don’t you, that I was entitled to leave home?”

  “Why,” he exclaimed, in surprise, “don’t we love each other?”

  “Yes, we love each other,” she murmured. “And then there’s the life which I was leading with a woman whose one delight was to insult my mother. . . .”

  She said no more. Simon had laid his hand on hers and nothing could reassure her more effectually than the fondness of that pressure.

  The four boys, who had disappeared again, came running back:

  “You can see the company’s mail-boat that left Dieppe at the same time that we left Newhaven. She’s called the Pays de Caux. We shall pass her in a quarter of an hour. So you see, mama, there’s no danger.”

  “Yes, but it’s afterwards, when we get closer to Dieppe.”

  “Why?” objected her husband. “The other boat hasn’t signalled anything extraordinary. The danger is altering its position, moving farther away. . . .”

  The mother made no reply. Her face retained the same piteous expressi
on. The little girl at her knee was still silently crying.

  The captain passed Simon and saluted.

  And a few more minutes elapsed.

  Simon was whispering words of love which Isabel did not catch very distinctly. The little girl’s constant tears were causing her some distress.

  Shortly after, a gust of wind made the waves leap higher. Here and there streaks of white, seething foam appeared. There was nothing remarkable in this, as the wind was gaining in force and lashing the crests of the waves. But why did these foaming billows appear only in one part and that precisely the part which they were about to cross?

  The father and mother had risen to their feet. Other passengers were leaning over the rails. The captain was seen running up the poop-steps.

  And it came suddenly, in a moment.

  Before Isabel and Simon, sitting self-absorbed, had the least idea of what was happening, a frightful clamour, made up of a thousand shrieks, rose from all parts of the boat, from port and starboard, from stem to stern, even from below; from every side, as though the minds of all had been obsessed by the possibility of disaster, as though all eyes, from the moment of departure, had been watching for the slightest premonitory sign.

  A monstrous sight. Three hundred yards ahead, as though in the centre of a target at which the bows of the vessel were aimed, a hideous fountain had burst from the surface of the sea, bombarding the sky with masses of rock, blocks of lava and flying masses of spray, which fell back into a circle of foaming breakers and yawning whirlpools. And a wind of hurricane force gyrated above this chaos, bellowing like a bull.

  Suddenly silence fell upon the paralysed crowd, the deathly silence that precedes an inevitable catastrophe. Then, yonder, a rattle of thunder that rent the air. Then the voice of the captain at his post, roaring out his orders, trying to shout down the monster’s myriad voices.

  For a moment there seemed some hope of salvation. The vessel put forth so great an effort that she appeared to be gliding along a tangent away from the infernal circle into which she was on the point of being drawn. But it was a vain hope! The circle seemed to be increasing in size. Its outer waves were approaching. A mass of rock crushed one of the funnels.

  And again there were shrieks, followed by a panic and an insane rush for the life-boats; already some of the passengers were fighting for places. . . .

  Simon did not hesitate. Isabel was a good swimmer. They must make the attempt.

  “Come!” he said. The girl, standing beside him, had flung her arms about him. “We can’t stay here! Come!”

  And, when she struggled, instinctively resisting the course which he had proposed, he took a firmer hold of her.

  She entreated him:

  “Oh, it’s horrible . . . all these children . . . the little girl crying! . . . Couldn’t we save them?”

  “Come!” he repeated, in a masterful tone.

  She still resisted him. Then he took her head in his two hands and kissed her on the lips:

  “Come, my darling, come!”

  The girl fainted. He lifted her in his arms and threw one leg over the rail:

  “Don’t be afraid!” he said. “I will answer for your life!”

  “I am not afraid,” she said. “I am not afraid with you. . . .”

  They leapt into the water.

  CHAPTER III. GOOD-BYE, SIMON

  TWENTY MINUTES LATER, they were picked up by the Castor, the yacht which by this time had passed the Queen Mary. As for the Pays de Caux, the steamer sailing from Dieppe, subsequent enquiries proved that the passengers and the crew had compelled the captain to flee from the scene of the disaster. The sight of the huge waterspout, the spectacle of the ship lifting her stern out of the waves, rearing up bodily and falling back as though into the mouth of a funnel, the upheaval of the sea, which seemed to have given way beneath the assault of maniacal forces and which, within the circumference of the frenzied circle, revolved upon itself in a sort of madness: all this was so terrifying that women fainted and men threatened the captain with their levelled revolvers.

  The Castor also had begun by fleeing the spot. But the Conte de Bauge, detecting through his field-glasses the handkerchief which Simon was waving, persuaded his sailors, despite the desperate opposition of his friends, to put about, while avoiding contact with the dangerous zone.

  For that matter, the sea was subsiding. The eruption had lasted less than a minute; and it was as though the monster was now resting, sated, content with its meal, like a beast of prey after its kill. The squall had passed. The whirlpool broke up into warring currents which opposed and annulled one another. There were no more breakers, no more foam. Beneath the great undulating shroud which the little waves, tossing in harmless frolic, spread above the sunken vessel, the tragedy of five hundred death-struggles was consummated.

  Under these conditions, the rescue was an easy task. Isabel and Simon, who could have held out for hours longer, were taken to the two cabins and supplied with a change of clothing. Isabel had not even lost consciousness. The yacht sailed away immediately. Those on board were eager to escape from the accursed circle. The sudden subsidence of the sea seemed as dangerous as its fury.

  Nothing occurred before they reached the French coast. The oppressive, menacing lull continued. Simon Dubosc, directly he had changed his clothes, joined the count and his party. A little embarrassed in respect of Miss Bakefield, he spoke of her as a friend whom he had met by chance on the Queen Mary and by whose side he had found himself at the moment of the catastrophe.

  For the rest, he was not questioned. The company on board the yacht were still profoundly uneasy; the thought of what might happen obsessed them. Further events were preparing. All had the impression that an invisible enemy was prowling stealthily around them.

  Twice Simon went below to Isabel’s cabin. The door was closed and there was no sound from within. But Simon knew that Isabel, though she had recovered from her fatigue and was already forgetting the dangers which had threatened them, nevertheless could not shake off the horror of what she had seen. He himself was still terribly depressed, haunted by the vision so frightful that it seemed the extravagant image of a nightmare rather than the memory of an actual thing. Was it true that they had one and all lost their lives: the three clergymen with their austere faces, the four happy, cheerful boys, their father and mother, the little girl who had cried, the child that had smiled at Isabel, the captain and every single individual of all those who had covered the Queen Mary’s decks?

  About four o’clock, the clouds, unrolling in blacker and denser masses, had conquered the heavens. Already the watchers felt the first breath of the great squalls whose precipitous onset was at hand, whose battalions, let loose across the Atlantic, were about to rush into the narrow straits of the Channel and mingle their devastating efforts with the mysterious forces rising from the depths of the sea. The horizon was blotted out as the clouds released their contents.

  But the yacht was nearing Dieppe. The Count and Simon Dubosc, each gazing through a pair of binoculars, cried out as with one voice, struck at the same moment by the most unexpected sight. Looking at the row of buildings, which line the long sea-front like a tall rampart of brick and stone, they could plainly see that the roof and upper storey of the two largest hotels, the Imperial and the Astoria, situated in the middle, had collapsed. And the next instant they caught sight of other houses which were tottering, leaning forward, fissured and half-demolished.

  Suddenly a flame shot up from one of these houses. In a few minutes there was a violent outbreak of fire; and on every side, from one end of the sea-front to the other, a panic-stricken crowd, whose shouts they could hear, came pouring down the streets and running to the beach.

  “There is no doubt about it,” spluttered the Count. “There has been an earthquake, a very violent shock, which must have synchronized with the sort of waterspout in which the Queen Mary disappeared.”

  When nearer, they saw that the sea must have risen, sweeping over
the sea-wall, for long streaks of mud marked the lawns, while the beach to right and left was covered with stranded shipping.

  And they saw too that the end of the jetty and the light-house had disappeared, that the breakwater had been carried away and that boats were drifting about the harbour.

  The wireless telegram announcing the wreck of the Queen Mary had redoubled the panic. No one dared fly from the peril on land by taking to the open sea. The relatives of the passengers stood massed together, in witless and hopeless waiting, on the landing stage and what remained of the jetty.

  In the midst of all this turmoil, the yacht’s arrival passed almost unperceived. Each was living for himself, without curiosity, heedless of all but his own danger and that of his kinsfolk. A few distraught journalists were darting about feverishly for news; and the port-authorities subjected Simon and the Count to a hasty and perfunctory enquiry. Simon evaded their questions as far as possible. Once free, he escorted Isabel to the nearest hotel, saw her comfortably settled and asked her for permission to go in search of information. He was uneasy, for he believed his father to be in Dieppe.

  The Duboscs’ house stood at the first turning on the great slope which climbs to the top of the cliffs on the left, itself hidden behind a clump of trees and covered with flowers and creepers, it had a series of terraced gardens which overlooked the town and the sea. Simon was at once reassured on learning that his father was in Paris and would not be home until next day. He was also told that they had felt only a slight shake on this side of Dieppe.

  He therefore went back to Isabel’s hotel. She was still in her room, however, needing rest, and sent down word that she would rather be alone until the evening. Somewhat astonished by this reply, the full meaning of which he was not to understand till later, he went on to his friend Rolleston’s place, failed to find him in, returned to his own house, dined and went for a stroll through the streets of the town.

  The damage was not so widespread as he had supposed. What is usually described as the first Dieppe earthquake, to distinguish it from the great upheaval of which it was the forerunner, consisted at most of two preliminary oscillations, which were followed forty seconds later by a violent shock accompanied by a tremendous noise and a series of detonations. As for the tidal wave, improperly called an eagre, which rushed up the sea-front, it had but a very moderate height and a quite restricted force. But the people whom Simon met and those with whom he talked remembered those few seconds with a terror which the hours did not appear to diminish. Some were still running with no idea of where they were going, while others — and these were the greater number — remained in a state of absolute stupefaction, making no reply when questioned or answering only with incoherent sentences.