Well, we spent the day till five o'clock in that dreary spot, cold and
wretched. Then Sir Archibald proposed that I should go home with Mrs.
Pomeroy in the motor; they said we should get there quicker that way!
He meant to drive Miss Pomeroy in the pony chaise, not being at all
afraid, he said, of any pony, however spirited. Of course nothing
would induce me to enter a pony carriage drawn by that animal again. A
motor is more dangerous in some ways, but at any rate it cannot sit
down like that pony, and they all assured us that it was both safe and
speedy. Mrs. Pomeroy had been quite at ease in it, she said, so at
last I consented to go. Cecilia tied on my bonnet with my grey wool
shawl, and we set out. It surprises me that motoring should have
become a favourite pastime with so-called fashionable people, for
certainly one does not appear to advantage in motoring garments. The
cold was intense, and at first everything whizzed past me at such a
rate that I could remember nothing except two lines that Cecilia read
to me last evening, about 'the void car hurled abroad by reinless
steeds.'
There were no steeds, of course, nor reins, and the car was not void,
but that was quite the motion. My bonnet, in spite of the shawl and
string, was instantly torn from my head. I begged Johnson, a very
civil Scotchman who could understand what I said, to stop the machine
for a few moments and let me breathe. Cecilia advised me to remove the
bonnet and trust wholly to the shawl. My hair is not thick, especially
on the top, and I soon had all the sensation of the head being padded
in ice, which we read of as a treatment for brain fever.
It was now beginning to get dark. Johnson drew up suddenly, and
declared that he must have taken the wrong road. There were no
sign-posts anywhere, and it had begun to rain heavily. We were
standing just at the foot of a steep hill where the road lay through a
thick wood. Above us was a tower of rock,--another 'tor,' I suppose,
if not a 'monolith.'
Johnson proposed to drive the machine on into the wood, and leave us
under shelter whilst he went to a cottage that we saw farther up, to
inquire about the road. This I decidedly objected to. Mrs. Pomeroy and
Cecilia seemed to think me foolish, and could not understand my being
afraid.
'But,' I said, 'I have good reason to refuse to enter that wood.
Indeed it will not be safe for Johnson to leave us there alone: I
recognise the place perfectly. In one of the books by that Mr.
Phillpotts, who, you have all told me, is most accurate in his
descriptions, I read about this place, and he said, 'The Wolf suckled
her young there yesterday.' Yes, Cecilia, laugh if you like; those
were the very words, and I examined the date of the publication, which
was not a year ago. _Yesterday_ was the word used.'
'Then the cubs will still be too small to attack us,' observed
Cecilia, who has no tact and is constantly trying to be facetious when
she should be endeavouring to allay my nervous terrors.
'He would be meaning foxes, ma'am,' said Johnson, who had been
listening whilst fright compelled me to quote the exact expression I
had read.
'It is possible that he meant foxes, Johnson,' allowed I, 'but three
ladies alone in a motor, in the dark, attacked even by wild foxes,
would be in some danger; so I hope that you will drive on directly,
and get us out of this horrid place as soon as possible.'
They tried to smooth over the situation, but I would listen to none of
them, and Johnson at last drove on. Half-way up the hill the motor
stuck. Something had gone wrong with it inside, and I felt that we
might stay there in the wilderness all night, which would have been
impossible, as I had taken very few remedies of any kind with me, and
cannot sleep sitting up. These stoppages occurred several times. How
we at length got home I scarcely remember. My velvet mantle was like a
sponge, my feet so cold that it was all I could do to dismount from
the motor when it ground up to the hotel door. There was Sir Archibald
standing smoking as if nothing extraordinary had occurred.
'Why, Mrs. MacGill,' he cried, 'you are even later than we were, and I
thought that blessed pony was going to her own funeral.'
I thought that in spite of his tone he looked rather pale and
agitated; he was of course anxious, and rightly so, about my safety.
'Sir Archibald,' I said, as soon as I could speak,'I trust that I
never again may have to enter one of those motors. Human life,
especially mine, is too precious to be thrown away in such a fashion.
Another half-hour of it would have killed me outright. Had Mr. MacGill
been alive he would never have consented to my going into it for a
moment. As it is, I can scarcely hear or see owing to the frightful
noises and the rain lashing on my face; every hair on my head feels
pulled the wrong way, and I'm sure I shall have another bad relapse of
influenza by to-morrow morning. Your uncle was a friend of my poor
brother-in-law who died at Agra in a moment, and unless you take a
warning you will have an end quite as sudden and much more frightful,
for his was heart complaint, and you will be smashed to pieces by the
wheels of that hideous machine.'
I left them downstairs and went to bed. Cecilia tried to make me
believe there was nothing wrong with me, as she always does when she
has neuralgia, or _says_ she has neuralgia, herself, but I know that
there is. What is the matter I can't exactly say, only I am certain
that I am going to suffer in some way from this horrible expedition.