THE ROCK.
Here was the dull blue wintry sea under the dull gray wintry sky. No
wind blew, no rain fell. A thin, soft sea moisture rose from the sea
and met a thin, soft cloud moisture descending from the clouds. The
long, even roller of the Atlantic stole slowly, deliberately,
sullenly, from the level plains of the ocean, growing to the eye
imperceptibly as it came. The water was thickly streaked with tawny,
vapid froth; the base of the high, impassable, brown rocky coast was
marked by a broad but diminishing line of yellow foam.
No bird was visible in the air, no ship on the sea, no living creature
on the land but the two men, O'Hanlon and O'Brien. A mile inland stood
lonely Kilcash House, which had for years been the home of the dead
man and his beautiful wife. Below, between the towering, oppressive,
liver-coloured cliffs and the foam-mantled, blanched blue sea lay the
Black Rock, a huge, flat, monstrous table cast off by the land and
spurned by the sea.
For a while the two men stood speechless on the edge of the cliff
overlooking the barren waste of heaving waters and the sullen ramparts
of indomitable heights. The deep boom of the bursting wave, the roar
of the outwashing boulders, and the shrill hiss of the falling spray,
made the dismal scene more deserted and forlorn. The sea and cliffs
were forbidding to man. They seemed to resent the presence of man--to
desire, now that they were not engaged in actual war, no intrusion on
the lines where their gigantic conflicts were waged.
The Black Rock stretched out half-a-mile from the base of the cliff
into the sea, and was half-a-mile wide. Above it the land was slightly
hollowed towards the sea, and would, but for the Black Rock beneath,
form a bay-like indentation in the shore. The chord of this arc was
about six hundred yards, so that the greater mass of the Black Rock
projected into the sea beyond the heads of the cliffs.
The Rock, as it was called for brevity in the neighbourhood, was only
a few feet above the reach of the waves and broken water when a strong
wind blew from the south-west. It shelved outward, and when the waters
were very rough, when a storm raged, the shattered waves leaped up on
it, and bounded, hissing in irresistible fury, towards the inner
cliff, but were arrested, dispersed, and poured down the sides of the
Rock ere they reached the inner cliff. The Rock was highest at the
centre, and descended to right, left, front, and rear. But although it
was lower at the rear than in the centre, it was much higher there
than in front. Viewed from above, it was not unlike the back of some
prodigious sea monster rising above the surface of the water. In shape
it resembled a vast creature of the barnacle kind, the apex of whose
shell would represent the highest point of the Rock, and the
corrugations stand for the ridges and hollows of the sides from the
highest point of the ledge to the lower ones.
The colour, too, was not unlike that of a barnacle. For, although the
people had given it the name of the Black Rock, it was black only by
comparison with the cliffs. The surface was made up of smooth, slimy
ridges, dark blue-green in the hollows, growing lighter as the curve
sloped upward, and on the summit, here and there, deep yellow brown or
oak.
Winter or summer, the Rock was never quite dry. It was always damp,
clammy, treacherous. It was always dangerous to the foot. There was no
fear of one who fell slipping into the sea, unless the misfortune
occurred very near the brink. Then a fall and a plunge were certain
death, for the great rollers of the ocean would grind or dash the life
out of a man against these rocks in a few minutes. But many a man had
slipped and hurt himself badly, and two fatally, on that cruel Black
Rock.
Once a man of the village of Kilcash had fallen, broken his leg in two
places, and been carried up the cliff path and across the downs to
die. Another had slipped on the top of one ridge. For a moment his
body swept backward in an arc like a bent bow, until his head touched
the top of the next ridge behind. All his muscles instantly relaxed,
his chin was crushed down upon his chest, he rolled for an instant
into a shapeless heap, rolled down into the trough, and lay at full
length with dead, wide open eyes turned upward to the sun. Several
people had from time to time met with dire accidents on that dangerous
slope by reason of the uncertain footing it afforded.
But the great terror of the Black Rock did not lie in the greasiness
of its surface. The chief danger lay below the surface. The deadly
monster of that desolate tract was hidden from view, until suddenly,
and generally without warning, it sprang forth upon its victim, and
seized him and bore him away to certain and awful death. It gave no
chance of respite or rescue; it gave no time for thought or prayer.
One moment man in the full vigour of life, full of the pride of life,
full joy in life, stood upon that awful field of slippery rock, and
the next was caught from behind and dragged into the foaming sea by a
force no ten men could fight against for a moment.
All the year round this terrible monster of death lurked here, and
upon provocation would rush out, and, when opportunity offered,
invariably destroy. It could not be drowned with water or scared by
fire, or slain with lethal weapons. It could not be lured or trapped.
It would come to an end no one knew when. It had begun to exist
centuries ago. It varied in length with the season of the year, and in
bulk with the phases of the moon. It had its lair in a cave. No boat
along all that coast durst enter the Whale's Mouth for fear of it; for
although much could be foretold of its habits, all could not. No one
could infallibly predict for an hour what it would do--except one
thing: that any boat in that cave when it did appear would infallibly
be dashed into a thousand splinters. That was the only thing certain
about it. To be caught in its cave would, if possible, be still more
terrible than to be caught by it on the Black Rock.
Its dimensions varied from twenty to a hundred and fifty feet one way
by ten to twelve and six to eight another.
Along the whole coast it was spoken of with fear. Nothing else like it
was known in those parts. It was one of the sights which made holiday
makers seek the secluded fishing of Kilcash. The inhabitants knew its
ways better than strangers. And yet people of the village had fallen a
prey to its fury. More than a dozen villagers had within four
generations died in its deadly embrace, and more than an equal number
of visitors within the same period. Suppose the season visitors had
been at their highest number all the year round, it had been
calculated that forty of them would have been sacrificed in the time.
Over and over again visitors had been warned against going near the
place; but the attraction of danger proved too strong for prudence,
and people would go for mere bravado or out of morbid curiosity. The
chance of contracting a fatal malady has no allurements for man: the
prospect of a violent death fascinates him. The love of daring certain
death by violence is found in few; the willingness to dare great peril
by violence is almost universal in young men of healthy bodies and
minds. It has been justly said that the most extraordinary contract
into which large bodies of men ever voluntarily enter is that by which
they agree to stand up in a field and allow themselves to be shot at
for thirteenpence a day; and yet men risk their lives daily willingly,
at a less price--nay, for no price at all.
Here, on this very Black Rock, a terrible instance occurred with
disastrous result five years before, when three young Trinity College
students were staying for the summer vacation at Kilcash. They were
friends, and lodged in the same cottage. They went on little
excursions together. Of course they had heard all about the terrors of
the Black Rock. In an hour of eclipse they resolved not only to visit
the fatal Rock, but to lunch there under circumstances of the greatest
danger. They mentioned their intention freely, and were warned by the
simple people of the village that they ran a risk in going to the spot
they named, and at the time they selected, and that they absolutely
courted death by delaying for luncheon. That afternoon one of the
three ran the whole way back into the village and told the appalling
tale. He had strayed a few yards from his friends, when suddenly burst
upon his ears a thunderous roar. The Rock shook beneath his feet as
though it would burst asunder. He was instantly covered and blinded
with mist and sea smoke. He gave himself up for lost, and
instinctively ran towards the cliff. Then he heard a fearful crash of
waters, and again the Rock shook. He wondered his destruction had been
so long delayed. He waited until all was still. He turned round. His
friends had disappeared. Their bodies were never recovered.
As it has been said, the Black Rock was not in reality black, but a
dark, dirty olive green. Perhaps it got its name from the dark or
black deeds which had been enacted on it.
Around the Black Rock the cliffs do not stand very high. They reach to
little more than a hundred feet above the solid shelf below. In colour
they are of a deep liver hue. They lean outward and take the form of
huge broad broken pilasters, set against an irregular wall. These
cliffs, like the Rock, are always damp, but, unlike the Rock, never
clammy. They are smooth and flat, with sharp angles and rectangular
fractures. They are cold and hard, and seem built by nature to define
for ever the frontier of the ocean.
At the point of the Rock furthest inland the cliff is of a softer
nature, and hence the water has eaten deeper in here. The cliff is
part clay, part gravel, and part boulder. Here is a temporary break in
the continuity of the regular formation. There is no depression on the
downs above to correspond with this fault. Thus at the back of what
has been called the bay, there are about two hundred yards long of
cliff, which the sea would soon tear away if it could get at it. But
the Black Rock stood between the greedy ocean and the vulnerable point
of the cliff. It formed a sufficient outpost. This part of the bay
slants inwards, not outwards, as the two arms. In this part a little
copper ore was once found, and a shaft sunk. But the mine proved of no
practical value, and, after absorbing much money, was abandoned fifty
years ago. The shaft was sunk two hundred feet; but here, even if the
mine had proved rich, the water would have presented serious
difficulties, for after getting down a hundred and twenty feet it
began to appear, and at a hundred and fifty it occasioned delay and
inconvenience. Forty years ago the top of the shaft had been covered
with planks and clay to prevent accident. Long ago the machinery and
wooden engine-house and tool-house had been carried away, and now the
site of the head of the shaft was indistinguishable from the other
bramble-grown parts of the sloping cliff over the Black Rock. This
head of the mine was always carefully avoided by the inhabitants, for
every one said some day or other the planks were sure to give way and
fall to the bottom. It was of no interest whatever to visitors, for
nothing was to be seen, and a landslip had destroyed the rude road
long ago made to it. It was on the right-hand side of one looking
seaward.
On this inside of the bay of stone ran downwards the path leading to
the great table below. It was a natural path almost the whole way. Art
of the simplest kind had cut a little here and filled up a little
there, and levelled a little in another place, but the lion's share of
the work had been found ready to man's hand. There was no attempt at
road-making, or attaining to a surface. Those were luxuries of
civilisation: this was a work of rough art and benignant nature.
As one faced the sea, the path crossed over from left to right, then
from right to left, and finally from left to right. Standing on the
cliff at the middle point of the bay, and looking down at the broad
expanse of slanting rock, only two things caught the eye, when the
dimensions, the colour, and conformation had been taken in. Directly
in front, and almost in the middle of the Rock, rose the apex of what
has been likened to the shell of a barnacle. It was not more than ten
feet above the level of the Rock, twenty feet from its centre, and was
part of the Rock itself.
In a direct line with the apex, and about half-way between it and the
outer rim of the Rock, there is a black spot which, upon closer
inspection, proves to be a hole of some kind. At the distance it is
impossible to perceive any more.
Towards this hole O'Hanlon pointed his arm, and said to O'Brien:
"There's the Hole. You know it well enough."
"Of course. But you could not recognise him so far off," said O'Brien,
shading his eyes to look.
"No; but I told you I saw him in here quite close;" and he pointed.
"He or it went on without hesitation, and then jumped in. He or it,
whichever you prefer, O'Brien, went in as sure as I have a head on me.
Either that or I am going mad."
O'Brien thought awhile in silence, with his hand on his chin and his
eyes turned on the bleak, dreary waste of stone and water before him.
"O'Hanlon, you're not afraid to risk seeing anything--that thing
again?" he asked at length--adding, "I want to have a look at the
place."
The other hesitated a little before he drew himself up, and said:
"No. I may as well face it and be sure of the worst--be certain
whether I am to end my days in a lunatic asylum or not."
The two men descended to the Black Rock.