ESCAPE
Sunia awaited her--Sunia, with eyes that seemed to entreat, to
expect--to listen breathless for some tidings.
For the first few minutes Olwen sat where she had flung herself, in her
chair beside the hearth, fighting for the control she knew to be so
necessary if she were to carry out the purpose taking shape within her.
First she was inclined to announce that she would not go down to supper.
On reflection she thought it would look better if she were to dress
quietly, as though nothing had happened, allow Sunia to leave her, and
then be, as it were, suddenly obliged to undress and go to bed.
She owned, in a low voice, that she was not feeling well, and the ayah,
in consequence, tended her with extra gentleness and no words. When she
had hastened away upon her other duties the girl began to consider
possibilities.
It was of no use to ask to be driven to Caryngston, because they would
say she was not well enough to travel. She could not post a letter,
ordering a fly to be sent, until to-morrow, which meant that she could
not set out until the day following. It seemed clear that her only
practicable course would be to descend the mount, walk through the woods
and go to Lachanrigg, where Mrs. Kay would no doubt have her driven to
Raefell station, and her homeward journey would be more simple than by
way of Picton Bars.
So she sat cogitating, planning by the fireside until, as she had
expected, the ayah returned to know why she had not come down to supper.
She said she had been suddenly taken faint and must lie down, begging
that no food might be brought to her.
Sunia had her disrobed and between the sheets in a very short time. She
then departed, returning, as well the girl had expected, with a tray of
appetising fare. Upon the plate lay a note, addressed merely to O. I.
Hoping that Madam had chosen this manner of giving her notice, she
opened it. Then her colour changed. Whatever she had expected, she had
not been prepared for what she read:
"I can't stand this. I give in. I must tell you everything. That's
what I've been trying to avoid. I made an attempt to write it down, but
in black and white it makes me seem too great a blackguard. How can I
see you alone? Could you come down to the banqueting-hall at six
o'clock to-morrow morning? It won't take long, for I shan't try to make
excuses. You shall know me for what I am, and then I suppose it will be
'Good-bye' for always."
"Nin."
Half stupidly she sat up in bed, staring at the tapestried walls,
holding the paper in her shaking hand.
Her trust had been misplaced. Ninian had evidently lied to her when he
professed his innocence with regard to Lily Martin. Just now, in the
dining-room, he said he had told more lies since her coming than in his
life before. Yet on the summit of Duke's Crag he had sworn that he had
told her nothing but the truth. She could not reconcile it. The only
saving clause was that he had determined to confess--at last!
Tumultuous thoughts chased each other through her mind.
Did he really care for her? In her heart she believed that he did. She
had trusted him, and that trust, which he knew to be undeserved, had
melted him at last. He would not marry her, with this hateful thing
between them. He meant to tell her ... what?
Strong shuddering seized her. She felt her whole self yearning with
longing unutterable for him--for the merest chance to believe in him.
She knew that if he showed her his sweet side she must believe anything
he told her. Yet, ah! How could she pardon it, if the girl who
attempted suicide were--it must be put in plain language--if she were,
as Dr. Balmayne evidently thought, Ninian Guyse's discarded mistress?
She must not, would not love such an one as he must be, if this were the
atrocious truth.
How her words of defence, her assertion of faith in him, must have cut
him to the heart! He had left the room and the house precipitately. He
had wandered about, trying to make up his mind; he had been suddenly
confronted with the sight of her--alone--and had intended flight. That
not being practicable, he had turned to his usual weapon, derisive
flippancy.
Having hurt her more deeply than he intended, he had at last come to a
decision to make a clean breast of it.
Such was the situation as she saw it. How to grapple with it was the
point upon which all her energies were directed.
It came to her soon, as with a flash of illumination, that at no cost
must she allow Ninian to give her the explanation he desired. Her
weakness where he was concerned was too abject. She was in his hands.
The one thing she craved was to be in his arms. If he dropped his rude
flippancy, if he pleaded, she well knew there was in her no force to
resist him....
In the extremity of her mental distress she loathed herself for her
weakness, yet acknowledged the man's power.
She wondered whether, after all, Madam was the best judge of her own
son, and whether this knowledge was the cause of her anxiety to get him
married, even to so poor a match as Olwen Innes. She must know, or
suspect, the worst. Her opinion of Ninian, as the girl had seen from
the first, was anything but high--was, in fact, what it must be, granted
the truth of this ugly story.
... And she, little fool, wanted him, loved him, longed for him with
every pulse she possessed. So strong was the rush of her feeling that
she felt she dare not see him, dare not meet him, even in the presence
of others, for a single moment more. If she decided to renounce him, it
must be done forthwith; and her better self had so decided.
How to accomplish her flight was now the question.
As has been said, the top floor of the Pele, like the others, was
divided into rooms. Of these there were three, the remaining quarter,
entered from the stairs, being a receptacle for spare articles, a kind
of landing. This landing formed the south-east quarter, Olwen's room
opening from it, being the south-west. Sunia's room was the north-west,
next Olwen's; and from the way she would emerge thence, bearing trays of
tea and so on, the girl had always suspected that on that side of the
tower there was another newel stair. This reflection now gave her an
idea. Knowing herself to be safe from observation for the moment, she
sprang out of bed and went to reconnoitre. It was as she had supposed.
In the corner of the ayah's room was a little door, set slanting, and
within was a stair not quite like the one in general use, for it was
enclosed in a circular corner turret, and she knew it must go straight
down to the ground floor, and no doubt communicated with the kitchen by
a passage in the thickness of the wall.
By this stair she could go, so she believed, right out upon the narrow
walk which edged the tower upon its precipitous side. The door below
was not likely to be locked from without. The key would almost
certainly be in it. If she waited until all were in bed she might thus
get away with ease. The difficulty was that she could not enter Sunia's
room when its owner was there without being heard.
With the thought that there might be some small chamber in the wall
where she might lurk until the woman came up to bed, she slipped down
the dark corkscrew, descended past the next landing, and reached the
first floor. Here were two doors, one leading into a passage and one
into the Priest's Room.
This was the place. She must dress herself warmly, creep down the
stairs, leaving her own room locked behind her, hide in the Priest's
Room, wait until the house was quiet, and then simply let herself out.
Hurriedly reascending, she set about her preparations, putting what
little money she had into a small handbag, with one or two necessaries.
In order completely to reassure Sunia, she wrote a note to Ninian, put
it in an envelope, and sealed it elaborately. It contained only these
words:
"I will come to-morrow morning if I can.--O. I."
When Sunia came to take away her supper tray Miss Innes gave her this
note, impressing upon her the necessity of delivering it quite unseen by
anybody else. The ayah undertook the commission with beaming smiles.
Was not this intrigue--the very air in which she flourished? She would,
in return, have done anything that Olwen chose to command; and when
ordered not to come in again, but to leave the invalid undisturbed until
morning, she cheerfully consented.
It seemed to the over-excited girl a long time before everything was
arranged finally for the night--a supply of bed-candles near at hand,
Brand's extract and Horlick lozenges in case of hunger in the dark
hours, the fire built up as only Sunia could build it, a kettle full of
hot water in case her bottle needed replenishment.
Was not any girl a fool to leave such luxury? Was she going to flee
when Ninian's love awaited her? Just because he had behaved badly to
another girl, who, if her portrait were to be trusted, was distinctly a
minx?
Yet words would ring in her head, words learned when a child in the
schoolroom--"Haste, for thy life escape, nor look behind!"
As soon as she felt sure that Sunia had gone down to her own supper she
arose and dressed herself with the greatest haste, all but her thick
boots. These she carried in her hand, wearing her felt bedroom slippers
that she might make no noise upon the stone steps.
Warmly wrapped, she crept out into Sunia's room, locking her door behind
her and taking away the key. Very softly she descended two floors,
opened the little door and emerged into the Priest's Room.
In the pitch darkness a very narrow thread of light was visible below
the door which opened into the banqueting-hall. She sat down, hardly
daring at first to breathe, upon an old arm-chair which she and Ninian
had stored away there when rearranging the room. She began to wonder
how she would know when the ayah came up to bed; for it was quite
possible that she might not come up this way at all, since she could
reach her own quarters through the third room upon the top landing, a
room intended for another servant should the dwellers in the Pele employ
one.
There was a youngish moon near its setting. Olwen gazed from the window
and noted a curious fact. The light from the Pele windows was flung
right across the valley, and made little squares of radiance upon the
black trees on which it fell. There was the pattern of the oriel, quite
big and bright. There, too, was the dining-room below it, extinguished
even as she gazed. Presently, about half an hour after the beginning of
her vigil, the little glimmer at the very top. That was Sunia. Yes,
there was another patch, which was Madam's window. To watch them become
dark was amusing.
But, although these darkened most satisfactorily, the oriel in the
banqueting-hall remained lit up. This was awkward. Somebody was still
awake, still sitting up in the Pele. If she began to move about, would
not she be heard? Could she leave the Priest's Room, close the door
behind her, descend the stairs, unlock the door below and shut it again
without some unwonted stir penetrating to the ear of the watcher?
If it was Ninian, as she thought most likely, Daff would be with him,
and she dare not risk attracting Daff's attention.
Her eyes, fixed upon the far-flung square of light, saw a shadow flit
slowly from side to side. It must be Ninian, and he was pacing
restlessly to and fro. The longing to push open the door of her
hiding-place and emerge,--to run to him and forget everything in the
stronghold of his arms, was hard to master. She closed her eyes that
she might not see the weary pacing.
There was nothing for it but to wait until he went upstairs. She was
very sleepy, the arm-chair was comfortable, the night not very cold.
She slipped into slumber.
When she awoke it was with a start. She was cramped and chilly, and at
first wondered where she was and what had happened. It was not
altogether reassuring when she recollected that she was in the Priest's
Room. She gazed from the window. The light was extinguished in the
oriel, and everywhere else. The moon had also set, which made it a very
dark night for her expedition. She had hidden a box of matches in her
bag, and she ventured to strike one. To her horror she found that it
was a quarter to four. However, it could not be helped. Having got so
far, she meant to carry out her plan, and she hastened downstairs, laced
her boots, and before long found herself out in the cold dark hour
before the dawn. Instantly she made the disagreeable discovery that it
had again begun to rain. She had no umbrella, but was warmly clad, and
as soon as she was under the trees she was sheltered. It was wet and
not at all easy going, but she held on, knowing that the descent was not
really very long, and that as soon as she was in the larger path to
which it led down she would make much easier progress.
She would hardly have credited the difficulty of threading one's way
along a path among trees in the pitch dark. If once she left the track
she felt that she would never regain it. When at last she stood upon
the wet, dark leaves which thickly carpeted the main path along which
she must turn to her right, she felt that the worst was over.
The rain was to be regretted, for she was not yet quite well. However,
she comforted herself by reflecting that Dr. Balmayne had said she might
go home on Thursday, and this was almost Thursday. She struggled along
pretty boldly for some time, listening to the rush of the unseen river
below her on her left hand. It had been fast bound in frost when first
she came. Now its song was loud and clear; and when at last she reached
the lower level of the meadows she found that her path was under water.
This was quite unlooked for. She dare not risk stepping through water
of unknown depth in the dark, so she struck up the hill-side to her
right. After going up some distance she found a track which seemed to
go in the right direction, and this she followed until she was extremely
tired. In her remembrance of the way, the woods ended after about two
miles, and you crossed open meadows to the farm. She felt sure she had
walked considerably more than two miles, and the woods were still thick
about her. In one way this was good, for it kept her dry. But she
began to think that she had better not go on too far without knowing
where she was. She had little choice, however. To sit down and rest in
the wet, wild woods was a risk she dare not take. Usually untiring on
her feet, she felt the power to go on for a long while yet.
Another half-hour's walking, on ground which still ascended, brought her
to a gate leading out of the woods upon a high road. Here she felt sure
that she must turn to the left, since she had not crossed the river, and
Lachanrigg lay upon its bank. But when, still farther on, she came once
more to cross-roads, she had no idea whether she ought to go on or to
turn again. She had now been at least two hours upon her feet, and the
first dim light of dawn was beginning to make the line of the roads more
apparent, the hedgerows blacker.
As she stood, bewildered, wondering what to do, she heard a sound of
cheery whistling along the road she was deciding to follow. Could this
be a human being, someone who would direct her? She felt a rush of
hope, and stood waiting until out of the gloom ahead came the figure of
a sturdy boy, wearing the cap of a telegraph messenger.
His whistling, probably executed in order to keep up his own spirits
upon his lonely tramp, was suddenly checked and his feet halted. In her
mist-coloured coat and veil the apparition in the road might easily have
been something of the kind which raises the hair.
To reassure him she called out at once: "Oh, please, can you tell me how
far am I from Raefell Station?"
The boy stopped. After the manner of his kind, he said nothing of his
startled surprise, though his chest rose and fell rapidly.
"It's all of five miles," he replied stolidly. "Want to get there?"
"Yes, but I did not mean to walk all the way. How far am I from
Lachanrigg Farm?"
"Lachanrigg? Oo, thaat's a canny way baack. Six mile happen."
"Oh!" she cried. "Am I really nearer the railway than I am to
Lachanrigg?"
It appeared that this was so.
"I came through the Guyseburn woods," she said, "and the path was
flooded, so I went up the hill and lost my way."
"D'ye coom from t' Pele?" asked the boy with sudden interest.
"Yes," she replied, not desiring to risk a lie which might be quite
unnecessary.
He gave her a long, speculative look, his hand fumbling doubtfully with
the leather pouch containing the dispatch he carried. An inquiry after
her name was trembling on his tongue, but to deliver a cablegram to an
unknown woman in the dark was too risky. It would save him some miles
of unpleasant walking, but, on the other hand, it might cost him his
job. It did not occur to Olwen that he was bound for the place she had
come from, for she believed she had come far out of the way. Her
preoccupation was to obtain directions for reaching the station, and
these he gave her. It did not sound a difficult route, and it would be
dawn before long. With hearty thanks she bade him good morning and set
off. Beyond a headache she did not feel over-tired. She thought she
could manage five miles, and she had several malted milk lozenges with
her. She took her way, and the boy took his, bearing the message which
contained such important news for herself.