The Lonely Stronghold

by Mrs. Baillie Reynolds

  CHAPTER XXXIV

  THE MILE-CASTLE AGAIN

  Messrs. Green, Son & Wilkinson, who had the care of Miss Innes's legalaffairs, were much inclined to advise her to think more than twicebefore purchasing a Border Pele. In like manner they had striven topersuade her not to face the tremendous expenditure of running a privatehospital. The result was the same in both cases. Miss Innes, as shegently pointed out, was no longer a child. She was now well on in hertwenties, and when she had made up her mind to do a thing she did it.She did not come to them for Advice, but to have her orders carried out.

  They told her that the land to be sold with the tower was inconsiderableand of poor quality. The Pele itself needed to have a large sum laidout upon it in order to make it fit for residence. The country wasexposed, the distance from the railway great, the difficulties of watersupply and electric light alike formidable.

  She listened, smiled, said she knew the place well, and had set herheart upon it. She declined to entertain the idea of a lease, would buyonly the freehold; and stipulated that the present tenant, Mr. Guyse,should not be told the name of the purchaser.

  She was perfectly willing to agree to the somewhat stiff terms of sale,namely, that she undertook, under heavy penalties, not to divide theland, not to pull down the Tower, not to build cheap houses on theproperty, and a dozen other restrictions which seemed to her veryabsurd, but which were, none the less, insisted upon.

  There actually was another would-be buyer in the market, besidesherself--an American; and she gave instructions that whatever thisgentleman offered, her own representatives should offer more. Theresult was that, although she came off victorious, she had to pay morethan Messrs. Green, Son & Wilkinson thought a fair price.

  Little cared she!

  It seemed to her that never had she really grasped the happiness ofbeing rich, until she actually held in her hands the bulky title-deeds,the precious documents which made her the owner of the Pele, which gaveNinian's future, so to speak, into her tyrant hands.

  It was not until this transaction was accomplished that she realised howcompletely she had burnt her boats. The capital sum paid down mustappreciably cripple her own income. Suppose that her worst fears weretrue--that Ninian had never loved her, and did not want her--what wasshe to do?

  What would the rest of life be like, after she had made over the Pele tohim?

  She shut her ears to all such maddening thoughts. She was going to seehim, or die in the attempt.

  "_He has never got over your turning him down._" So Wolf had said.That might, however, easily be true, even though he had no spark of lovefor her. Had she accepted him, his home need never have been sold.Here was matter enough for regret from his point of view. It must bethe loss of the fortune and not the woman that he lamented. Wolf's liphad curled as he said, "You can have your pick of the fortune-huntersnow. You'll not find a man among them fit to tie up old Nin'sshoe-string." In her heart she admitted the exact truth of this.

  As soon as she received Lily Guyse's letter she determined not to seeWolf again for the present. She coaxed Aunt Maud to leave town, andthey went to a hotel a few miles out, whence she could easily motor inand interview her lawyers. During the time that the negotiations werepending, she was in a state of mind so unlike herself that Miss Wilsonconfided to General Grey her wish that Olwen would take a fancy tosomebody and marry soon. "If she doesn't, she will be quite soured,"said she with a sigh.

  "Is there anybody?" he asked.

  "Not that I know of. I always had an idea that there was something orsomebody, but it was while she was staying away. There was a youngdoctor--it is possible she is fretting for him. I thought that veryirresistible Colonel Guyse might have a chance, but somehow I don'tfancy he has made much impression. I suppose the poor child feels thateverybody must be after her money."

  "Oh, but she is attractive. She need not feel that. She is a girl whowould always have had lovers."

  "Yes, indeed, Mr. Holroyd would have married her long before anybodydreamed she would be rich. But I am glad she did not care for him. Heis not the husband for her; she wants a more dominant person, for she isvery wilful and impetuous."

  The wilfulness and impetuosity of her niece were more clearlydemonstrated in the course of a very few days. Miss Innes announced herintention of starting upon a tour in the north of England.

  Miss Wilson was seriously annoyed. She was wrapped up in her ownaffairs at the time, very busy, every moment occupied, London full,plenty of interest, the General just in the stage when a man may or maynot go further according to opportunity.

  "What has made you all of a sudden turn against London?" she asked withnatural vexation. "You were wild to come here at first."

  "I know. One has to find out one's mistakes, and I have found out mine.There are disadvantages that I never foresaw. One is the way in whichmen keep on asking me to marry them without caring one bit for me, andexpect me to take their devotion for granted."

  "Nonsense, Olwen!"

  "It isn't nonsense. I wish they wouldn't do it. I said to Mr. Lambertonly the other day, 'You don't know what love means, you haven't anyidea! I am younger than you, but I know and you don't.' He took me upvery quickly. 'Do you know by personal experience?' he wanted to know,and I asked him what he meant. 'Has a man made violent love to you--hashe kissed you?' he asked. I told him nobody ever had done that; thoughfive men, counting Ben Holroyd, have asked me to marry them. So he saidI couldn't know. But I do, so what's the good of arguing? Heigh-ho!One man is just the same as another to me, and I'm sure they all go tothe same tailor."

  "Don't get bitter, child."

  "If any of them looked different, or--weather-stained, or--even didthings at a different time from anybody else, like the Snark youknow--breakfasted at five o'clock tea and dined on the following day.But in London people are not like that. We are just like thecarpet-bedding in the parks, we look all right in the mass, but if youexamine any one of us individually, it is a poor little specimen, and ifwe grew too tall or too big, the gardener would snip us and trim us tomake us match the others."

  Miss Wilson had no reply to make to this, and the heiress continuedafter a minute.

  "Have you ever heard that if a man brings the girl he loves into a housewhere a corpse is lying he will never marry her?"

  "Really, Ollie, what unpleasant things you sometimes say! No, I neverheard of such a thing."

  "Well, I did. I believe it's true, too. Superstitions often are. Theygrow out of wild nature. In some parts of the world wild nature isstill alive, and strong enough to hurt. The elements--cold and wind andsnow--might kill you there. They have power! But for all that youwould be free; ever so much more free than we are here, whereeverybody's thoughts are coloured by the latest novel that everybodyelse is reading, too."

  "I'm really not sure what you are talking about."

  "Oh, I'm not talking, merely thinking aloud. You have got to bear thatnow and then. If you knew how often I brood over things like this, andhow seldom I bore you with them, you would think yourself lucky. I havejust now got a craving for solitude and savagery. I want to see a blackcrag with a frozen lake at its base, and a low grey sky, a flurry ofsnow, the mist blotting out all the rest of the world--and in the midstof it all just one little place of refuge...."

  "At the end of June, I'm afraid, even in the wildest parts of thiscountry, you won't be able to indulge your desire," said Aunt Maud withirony. "Do you want to go abroad?"

  "N-no. Only to the north."

  "Well, I am afraid I really can't leave town for another fortnight atleast."

  "Then you mustn't think me a beast if I go off without you. You canjoin me, wherever I happen to be, can't you? You had better let me go,for I shall be poor company. I have nothing to do, I am at a loose end,and I think if I go somewhere where I can walk and walk and walk till Iam so tired that I drop off to sleep the moment I have eaten my supper,
I shall regain a more normal view of life. I'll go in the car. AuntEthel's in town this week, and she would love it if I were to motor herand Marjorie back to Leeds with me, and drop them at Mount Prospect onmy way."

  "My child! Go travelling alone! Grandpapa would not like that."

  Olwen smiled serenely. "He won't be asked, bless him! Dear aunt,consider my advanced age! Chaperons and dodos now occupy the same glasscase in most museums. I'll take Parkinson, and then Heaven knows I shallbe respectable enough!"

  The plans thus made were duly carried through, as plans made by Olwenhad a habit of being.

  Mrs. Whitefield, since her niece's accession to wealth, had varied inher feelings between envy and a desire to stand well with the heiress.She accepted all favours offered, but could not forbear disparagingcriticism. She was pleased to travel north in the fine Rolls-Royce, butvexed because she could not understand why Ollie should continue hertour alone, instead of taking Marjorie with her. Marjorie had grownstout, and was stolid and uninteresting. Olwen was kindly disposed toher, but just now she felt that her continual company would be quiteunbearable, and breathed a sigh of relief, when, after spending a nightin the overpowering magnificence of Mount Prospect, she was free topursue her journey unhindered.

  She passed by way of Watling Street, up to the Tyne, pausing when shereached Corbridge, to wander down to the river's edge, and trace the oldline of the great highway, through Corstopitum. She slept that night atthe Wheatsheaf, and early next morning passed through Hexham andFourstones, to Bardon Mill, and thence over the shoulder of Barcombe.The hedgerows as they passed were crimson with the glow of suchbrier-roses as seem to grow only in Northumbria; but when they hadpassed Vindolana and the Roman milestone, and come out upon Wade's Road,they had reached the end of the hedgerows.

  At the Twice-Brewed Inn they stopped, and she left the car withParkinson and Goddard, the chauffeur, to do as they liked until herreturn. She was going off by herself to slake her desire to behold oncemore Duke's Crag and the Hotwells Lough.

  Over her head was a sky of cloudless blue, in which larks sang andcurlews wheeled, with their mewing cry, over the lonely land. She had amap with her, and was able to make straight for the mile-castle.

  She had hardly left the road, and set her face northward, before she wasout of sight of all habitations. Before her, on the ridge, lay the longline of the outer vallum, and beyond it the swell of the height whichcarried the Wall itself, and was precipitous upon its northern face.

  After she had climbed some way she could, shading her eyes from theglare, descry, far away to her left, the smoke from the chimney of HazelCrag, drifting idly on the warm breeze; and she lived again the momentof the opening door, and the face of Balmayne as he recognised the nightwanderers.

  The cry of sheep, straying on the moor, came to her ears like a far awaylament.

  _Silence and passion, joy and peace,_ _An everlasting wash of air_ _Rome's ghost since her decease! ..._

  This was Ninian's native land. Its freedom, its loneliness, were aliketypical of him in her mind. The short turf on which she trod wasenamelled with the purple and gold of wild pansies. "There's pansies,that's for thoughts," she found herself whispering; and thoughts werethronging almost unbearably.

  In the long, awful months and years of his captivity, how must his wildheart have turned with sick longing to those broad spaces, thatgalloping wind, that fullness of liberty, that crowded solitude of hisnative north! She had a fantastic notion that for every time he or shehad visited the place in spirit, one little thought-flower had sprung tobear witness of the dream!

  She was making for the Gap, like a mountain pass in miniature, whichbrings one through, close to the dark Lough. The water to-day lookedtemptingly cool and clear. Somewhere in its depths lay the stone whichhad struck her head. She did not descend to the plain beyond her, butturned westward and made her way along the ridge to the mile-castle.

  To her active feet the distance seemed very short in the fair weather.It was hard even to picture the drifting snow, like cold foam aboutclogged feet--the keenness of the driving blast, the furious oppositionof the elements.

  Her imagination brought Ninian so near that she stopped and facedquickly about, with some idea of being followed. There was no one, onlythe memory-laden landscape looked her in the face, whispered in herear.... How he had suffered since then! ... She used to read in thepapers of the horrors of Griesslauen, harrowing details of typhoid, ofbad water, of half rations, of torture.... Had she known what he wasenduring she never could have borne it. The very memory forced dropsfrom her eyes as she dwelt upon it.

  She reached the mile-castle, where it lay open to the sun. Over itsbroken wall she could descry the corrugated iron roof of the shed whichhad sheltered them. Her feet were noiseless on the grass, and herapproach was unseen, unheard by the man who sat within, upon a remnantof inner wall.

  He was seated sideways, so that she saw his profile. His head wasdownbent, his elbows rested on his knees. In his hands he held somethingwhich at first she took to be a skein of silk, which he was idly pullingthrough his fingers. His hat lay on the ground beside him, and Olwensaw his hair, thickly sprinkled with grey.

  What was it which his fingers ceaselessly caressed? The sun glinted uponit, and it fell in a shower of gold. _It was a tress of hair_.

  A mixture of amazement, joy, and wicked triumph so flooded her that shecould hardly see. Hair! It was her own hair! It was the big tresswhich, to Sunia's rage, Dr. Balmayne had been obliged to cut away inorder to sew the wound on her head.

  There is no word to describe what she felt, as she fought for composure,schooled the trembling of her limbs and the muscles of her mouth.

  His gaze was fixed upon something which lay on the ground between hisknees; something too small for her to see. Having made herself readyfor the encounter, she let a bit of stone fall, with a rattling noise.He looked up.

  Nin it was, but the change in him was at first sight awful.

  His face was lined and parchment-like. There were puckers about hiseyes, which looked sunken. He might have passed for ten years olderthan Wolf. For a long instant his look met hers as though he did notsee her. Then suddenly there awoke, in his bewildered stare, somethingthat resembled the Ninian she had known. With a swift movement hethrust the tress of hair into his breast pocket, snatched up what layupon the grass, and with a flicker, a characteristic glance, he openedfire.

  "Ah, well, you haven't succeeded in growing any taller, you know, inspite of all your new dignities." His manner, at least, was unchanged,though his voice sounded forced and unnatural.

  His words pulled Olwen together wonderfully. She had been on the veryverge of self-betrayal--of a burst of silly tears. The familiar mockingseemed to put them back at once, just at the place where they left off,and she summoned her strength to fence with him as of old. "Yes," shereplied, with a conventional smile, not moving forward, but speakingfrom her post in the entrance. "I am still a mouse, as your brotherreminded me the other day; only the country mouse has become a townmouse."

  A quiver crossed his face as her voice was heard. "Oh," he said, "soyou really are, are you? I've once or twice thought I saw you beforeto-day--slipping round a corner or peeping over a wall; but never faceto face like this. How did you get here?"

  "My car is waiting at Twice-Brewed. I have walked from there, and amvery hot. I didn't expect to find you here."

  "Obviously not," he replied, with a grin which showed his teeth to be asgood as ever. "You looked as if you had found a black-beetle in thesugar-basin. However, I'm not a fixture, you know." As he spoke, helaid down the thing he held in his hand, as it were furtively, on thestone at the farther side of him, out of sight.

  Determined to know what this was, she came suddenly forward and sank onthe grass at his feet with a flutter of white skirts. The manoeuvrefound him unprepared. Quickly he covered the little square bit of cardwith his hand; but her eyes were very keen, and she had
seen that it washer own photo. She remembered that she had extracted it from a drawerwhile at the Pele, with the intention of sending it to her father, andhad placed it on the mantelshelf in her room. She had never noticed thefact that it was not among the things so carefully packed and returnedafter her departure.

  Now, it told her all! She found him here, in this place, sacred to amemory which she alone could share; and with him he brought her pictureand a tress of hair!

  Her courage rose with one bound, for all doubt was solved. Her lipscurved with mischief as she looked up at him provocatively, bold in thedelightful knowledge that she was prettier than she used to be, and thather clothes set her off to the best advantage.

  "Since you don't ask me to be seated, I do so without ceremony!"

  "My manners have gone to pieces since I saw you last. Pretty annoying,isn't it, to think how you wasted time and instruction on me?"

  "Oh," was her retort, "I'm not surprised. I remember you had decidedthat you could not keep it up! You prepared me for a lapse."

  "It's worse than a lapse. It's what you might describe as a _debacle_if you knew as much French as I do."

  She was below him, facing him, and she looked up steadily at him as shereplied:

  "Ah, well, I suppose I shall have to begin all over again."

  That moved him. "No, by God you don't--not again," he answereddefiantly.

  "Do you suppose that you can stop me, if my mind is made up?"

  "Upon my word, you have the cheek of the----"

  "Cheek! I should think I have. Don't be under the impression that youcan browbeat me."

  "If you'll take my advice, you'll run away to that car of yours as fastas your expensively shod feet will take you. I'm not good companyto-day for the wealthy and frivolous."

  "I know, you always did find me a bore. But you can't get rid of me soeasily as all that. I had the intention of coming to the Pele to callupon Madam, but as we have met here, perhaps you will take this as acall--like the two ladies in _Punch_, who met while bathing? Now let usbegin to talk properly, and remember as much as you can of the nicemanners I once taught you. How is your mother, Mr. Guyse?"

  His face, which had changed a dozen times as she teased him, settledinto a scowl. "She is very ill," he said gruffly, "and she is gettingworse. That's a topic I can't joke about."

  "I don't ask you to joke. I think you ought to consider it veryseriously. Madam needs change of air and scene. Why don't you take heraway somewhere--say to the Riviera?"

  He looked at her as if he could box her ears with pleasure. "Oh, justbecause I don't choose," he answered savagely. "I like to thwart her,just for the sake of thwarting her, as you ought to know by this time."

  "I do know, but I like to force you to admit it," said she with a demuresmile. "I am wondering whether I could not do something to help cheerher up. I often think with regret of the fact that I refused to do whatshe wanted me to do so badly. I--I wonder whether it would do any goodnow.... Or whether it is too late."

  She pulled a blade of grass from beside her, and twisted it round herfingers, carefully keeping her eyes fixed upon it.

  "Afraid I can't help you to a decision," he said harshly.

  "Oh, yes, you can. In fact, it all depends on you," she replied, in avery small voice. "Do you remember our last talk at the Pele--when youcame in to tea and I was so kind, I had kept yours hot for you, and Istayed to pour it out? And do you remember that on that occasion, inthe intervals of drinking your tea, you did me the honour to ask me tomarry you?"

  "Did I? I must have been an ass."

  "Well, perhaps you were. But I really am not sure. Perhaps I was theass for saying NO. Anyway, it has been in my mind that I ought to havesaid Yes, on account of Madam. Don't you agree?"

  He sprang to his feet. "Not in the humour to-day for any more twaddle,"he said, laughing, with a catch in his breath. "I--I know I've been abeast and--and drawn this on myself, but have a little pity for me.This morning I've heard that the last blow has fallen. I'm now notmerely a beggar but an outcast. I can't sit bandying words with you, Itell you I can't stand it."

  She did not move, but answered with a quiet which disarmed him. "Well,I won't keep you long, but as we have met, I wish you would just put upwith me for a few minutes longer. You have roused all my curiosity andI think you ought to satisfy it. What do you mean by saying that youare not merely a beggar but an outcast?"

  "Just what I say. When I did the one thing I shall regret all my life,and asked you to marry me, I did think I had something to offer a woman.Now I've nothing. It is sold over my head--the Pele I mean--and I shallhave to take Madam on my back and tramp the country, asking thecharitable for shelter."

  He had sunk down in his place again, and sat there, eyes fiercely fixedon the contemplation of his troubles.

  "Oh, Nin," she said softly, "don't you think even having to marry memight be better than that? It does sound so uncomfortable for poorMadam."

  He looked at her, marvelling at her cruelty, and made a shrinkingmovement, as if hurt. "Out there," he said, after a pause, "out inGriesslauen I used to think I had endured everything a man could, andthat hereafter I might reckon myself immune to pain. But I--I expectyou have the right. If you get any satisfaction out of baiting me, goon. It's up to me to take what you give."

  She rose deliberately from where she had been sitting, and went away afew paces. He raised his head. She had gone to the door of the shed inwhich they had sheltered and stood staring in. After a while she turnedslowly and caught his look fixed upon her. The colour flowed warm overher face.

  "Perhaps," said she in a low voice, "perhaps your mother was right.It--it was very unconventional, wasn't it? Do you think--perhaps--onthose grounds--I was wrong to say 'No'?"

  He stood up, and his face was rigidly set. "I think you had better go,"was all he said.

  She turned to him, looking not into his face but somewhere about hissecond waistcoat button. "So you won't marry me on Madam's account--norbecause it would be more _comme il faut_. Would you marry me--now tellthe truth--if by doing so you could get back the Pele?"

  "No!" he shouted wrathfully. "No, no, and yet again no! I wouldn'tmarry you if you were hung all over with silver and gold--not if youwere Venus and Diana rolled into one----"

  "Well, well, well, you needn't make such a noise about it. I'm not abit deaf--"

  He broke off, seeming to swallow rage in gulps. For a moment hesurveyed her critically, as if he sneered at her fine clothes, then heturned abruptly on his heel. "Good-bye," he said shortly, making forthe entrance.