curiously Swiss, all but the ancient cross which made me think of Eden
Phillpotts's "American Prisoner." How can I say an "ancient" cross,
though, when the _really_ old things on the moor began not only before
Christ, but before history--the stone circles, the cairns and the
cromlechs, the kistvaen and the barrows! The hut circles, where a
forgotten people used to live, are strewn in thousands over the moor,
and cooking utensils are sometimes dug up, even now; so you see,
everything isn't discovered yet. The people hadn't any metal to work
with, poor creatures, until the Bronze Age, and they clothed themselves
in skins, which I suppose their dressmakers and tailors made when the
sheep and cows that wore them first had been cut up and eaten. I wonder
if girls were pretty in those days, or men handsome, and if anyone
cared? But I suppose knowing the difference between ugliness and beauty
is as old as Adam and Eve. If Eve hadn't been pretty, Adam wouldn't have
looked at her, but would have waited in the hope of something better.
The first sight of Princetown only intensified the loneliness of the
moor, somehow, partly because it loomed so gray and grim, partly,
perhaps, because we knew it to be a prison town. The dark buildings
looked as much a natural growth of the moor as those ruined temples on
the horizon, which were tors. It was almost impossible to believe that
Plymouth was only fifteen miles away. And the sombreness and gloom of
the melancholy place increased instead of diminished as we drew nearer
to it, after leaving behind us the pleasant oasis of Tor Bridge and its
little hotel that anglers and walkers love.
The prison settlement was stuck like a black vice-spot in the midst of
wide purity. Gloom hung over it in a pall, and stole the warmth from the
sunshine. What a town to name after a Prince Regent! and what a town to
have lunch in! Yet it was a singularly good lunch.
We ate it in a hotel built of gray stone, with gray stone colonnades,
which looked like an annex to the prison. There was meat pie, which one
expected to find smoking hot, and it gave quite a shock to find it not
only cold, but iced. There was a big, cool dining-room, all mysterious,
creeping shadows, and queer echoes when one dared to speak. And unless
one did speak the silence sent a chill through one's body, but it was an
interesting chill. Certainly the hotel was the strangest I ever saw; and
the hotel dog was like no other animal on land or sea. He appeared to be
a mixture of brindled bull and Irish terrier, with long side-whiskers on
a bull-dog face. He was a nightmare, but he loved Devonshire cream and
junket, and ate them as if he were a lamb.
We stayed a long time in Princetown, and then started to go home by a
different way. Out of a vast moorland tract we descended to Dartmoor
Bridge, the prettiest oasis in the wild desert of moor which we had seen
yet. But soon we were back in moorland again, with tors rising up to
snatch at heaven with their dark claws. Each one seemed different from
all the rest, just as people's faces are different in crowds. Some were
like crests of waves, petrified as they were ready to break; but the
weirdest of all were exactly like ruined forts of dwarfs. And presently
the scenery changed again in a kaleidoscopic way. We came to lovely
Houndsgate, with a great, deep wonder-valley far below us, only to
return to a region of tors and bracken, and to plunge down the most
tremendous hill of all--a hill which was like gliding down the glassy
side of an ocean wave.
I had just exclaimed, "See, there's a motor ahead of us!" when an
extraordinary thing happened. The car going before us, very fast,
suddenly ran to the side of the steep road, stopped, some people jumped
out, and at the same instant a great flame spouted straight up toward
the sky.
Not one of us said one word, except Emily, who squeaked, and cried, "Oh,
Lionel! we shall all be killed and burned up!"
Of course, Sir Lionel didn't answer. I would have given anything to be
in Mrs. Senter's place, sitting beside him, so that I could see his
face, and guess what he meant to do. But it was decided and done in a
few seconds. He took Apollo on a little farther, and then stopped as
near the burning motor as he dared, so that there might be no danger of
our catching fire. Before we could have counted "one, two," he had
sprung from the car and was running toward the fiery chariot, with Young
Nick flying after him. Dick Burden got down, too, and sauntered in their
wake, but he didn't go very fast.
It was so exciting and confusing that I scarcely understood at first
what was happening, but Sir Lionel tore off his coat as he ran, and
flung it round the woman from the other car. She had not been on fire
when she jumped out, but the grass and bushes close by the road had
already begun to blaze, and her dress had caught in the flame. She was
tall and big, but Sir Lionel lifted her up as if she'd been a child,
and, wrapped in his coat, laid her down at a little distance on the
grass, where he rolled her over, and put out the fire. Then, when she
was on her feet again, panting and sobbing a little, he and the other
men began stamping out the flames playing among the low bushes, lest
they spread along the moor. As for the car, Sir Lionel said afterward it
was hopeless trying to save her, as there were gallons and gallons of
petrol to burn (it was her brakes that had got on fire, and ignited the
rest), and no sand or anything of that sort to throw on. But while we
were staring at the strange scene, the flames died down, having drunk up
all the petrol; and whether some part of the mechanism which held the
red-hot brakes in place gave way suddenly, I don't know. All I do know
is, that the car quivered, moved forward, began running down the
tremendous hill, faster and faster, until, with a wild bound, she
disappeared from our sight over a precipice.
By this time we were all out, except Emily, hurrying down the hill, to
talk to the people who had lost their car; but would you believe it,
they hardly cared for their loss, now they were out of danger? It was a
bride and groom, with their chauffeur, and they were Americans, staying
at the Imperial, in Torquay. The bridegroom was elderly but humorous,
and told us he used to hate motors and kept tortoises for pets, because
he liked everything that moved slowly, all his ancestors having come
from Philadelphia. But the girl he loved wouldn't marry him unless he
promised to take her to England on an automobile trip. Now he hoped she
had had enough, and would let him go back to tortoises again.
He said he had never enjoyed anything so much as seeing the car's
red-hot skeleton jump over the precipice, where it could not hurt
anyone, but would just fall quietly to pieces on the rocks.
The bride was great fun, too, and as she comes from St. Louis, it is not
likely she will cultivate tortoises. When we took them all three back to
Torquay with us, squashed in anyhow, she talked about running over to
Paris and buying a balloon or an aeroplane! We came by way of the
Buckland Chase, as it is called--private property; and an elfin glen of
beauty, for mile after mile, with the Dart singing below, and the
Lover's Leap so close that it seemed painfully realistic--especially
after the adventure of the car which leaped into space.
Sir Lionel got his coat burnt, and his hands a little, too; but he would
drive, though Young Nick might have done so as well as not.
After all we shan't get to Cornwall to-morrow! Sir Lionel says it would
be a crime to leave this part of the world without going up the Dart
(the "Rhine of England") in a boat, and seeing the beautiful old Butter
Market at Dartmouth.
I shall send you postcards from there, if I have the chance, for it's
very historic. It will be Cornwall the day after, but I shall have to
wire my next address.
With all the love of
Your Moorland Princess.
P. S. You ought to have seen Emily and Mrs. Senter fussing over Sir
Lionel when he burnt his hands! He hates being fussed over, and was
almost cross, until our eyes happened to meet, and then we both smiled.
That seemed to make him good-natured again. And he is wonderfully
patient with his sister, really.
XVII
MRS. SENTER TO HER SISTER, MRS. BURDEN, AT GLEN LACHLAN, N. B.
_White Hart Hotel, Launceston, Cornwall_,
_Aug. 10th_
My Dear Sis: It came off all right. My things usually do, don't
they? With some women, it is only their lip-salve and face powder that
come off. With me, it is plans. Luckily I inherited mamma's genius for
high diplomacy, while you, alas, only came in for her rheumatism. And by
the way, how _are_ your poor dear bones? Not devilled, I hope? Do
forgive the cheap wit. I am obliged to save my best things for Sir
Lionel. He appreciates them highly, which is one comfort; but it is
rather a strain living up to him (though I do think it will pay in the
end), and in intercourse with my family I must be allowed to rest my
brain. When everything is settled, one way or the other, my features,
also, shall have repose. To keep young, every woman ought to go into
retirement for at least one month out of the twelve, a fortnight at a
time, perhaps, and do nothing but eat and sleep, see nobody, talk to
nobody, think of nothing, and especially not _smile_. If one followed
that regime religiously, with or without prayer and fasting, one need
never have crow's-feet.
Of course, with you it is different. You have now decided to live for
Dick, and let your waist measure look after itself; but I have larger
aims and fewer years than you, dearest. My conception of self-respecting
widowhood is to be as young as possible, as attractive as possible, as
rich as possible, and eventually to read my title clear to (at least) a
baronet, and have a castle in a good hunting county. There are
difficulties in my upward way, yet I feel strongly I shall overcome
them. Let my motto be, "The battle to the smart, and the situation to
the pretty." Why shouldn't I triumph on both counts? The ward, to be
sure, is pretty, and is in the situation; but she doesn't know her own
advantages, and I'm not sure she would marry Sir Lionel if he asked her;
which at present he apparently has no intention of doing, although he
admires her more warmly than either Dick or I think advisable in a
guardian.
Since I wrote you last, just before starting on this motor match-making
venture of ours, there have been several new developments. I don't know
whether you are any deeper in Dick's confidence, in this affair, than I
am (though I fancy not), but I scent a mystery. Dick really _has_
detective talent, dear Sis, and if I were you, I shouldn't oppose his
setting up as a sort of _art nouveau_ Sherlock Holmes. Whether he has
found out about some schoolgirl peccadillo of Miss Lethbridge's, and is
dangling it over her head, Damocles sword fashion, I can't tell, because
_he_ won't tell; though he looks offensively wise when I tease him, and
I have tried in vain, on my own account, to discover. But certain it is
that he is either blackmailing her in a milk-and-water way, or
hypnotizing her to obey his orders.
He hinted, you know, that he could get the girl to make Sir Lionel
invite us to join the motoring party; but I supposed then that she had a
weakness of the heart where my dear nephew was concerned. Now, my
opinion is that she dislikes, yet fears him. Not very complimentary to
Dick, but he doesn't seem to mind, and is enjoying himself immensely in
his own deliciously, impertinently, perky way. Somehow or other he has
induced her to be more or less engaged to him, a temporary arrangement,
I understand, but pleasing to him and convenient to me. What Dick gets
out of it, I don't know, and don't enquire; but _I_ get out of it the
satisfaction of "shelving" the girl as a possible rival.
Sir Lionel, who (it's useless to spare your motherly vanity!) has no
very warm appreciation of Dick's qualities, is disgusted with his ward
for encouraging D.'s advances, and is inclined to turn to me for
sympathy. In that branch I am a great success, and altogether am getting
on like a house afire. What if I do have to pump up an intelligent
interest in politics in general, and affairs in the Far East in
particular? I am fortunately so constituted that fifteen minutes' study
of the _Times_, washed down by early tea (taken strong), enables me to
discourse brilliantly on the deepest subjects during the day; and, thank
goodness, virtue is rewarded in the evening with a little bridge. If I
am ever Lady Pendragon (sounds well, doesn't it?) it shall be all bridge
and skittles, for me--and devil take politics, military science,
history, the classics, Herbert Spencer, Robert Browning, Shakespeare,
and all other boring or out-of-date things and writers (if he hasn't
already taken them) on which I am now obliged to keep up a sort of
Maxim-fire of conversation.
As to Dick's affairs, however, if the girl really is the heiress we
thought her, I shall be only too glad to use my influence in every
direction at once, to make the temporary arrangement a permanent one.
But the worst of it is, I'm not at all sure that she is any sort of an
heiress.
Sir Lionel intimated to me the other night, when I was tactfully
tickling him with hints, that she has little except what he may choose
to give her. If that be true, I fear as Mrs. Dick her _dot_ will not be
large; but it strikes me as very probable that he was only trying to put
me off--or rather, to put Dick off, if Dick were fortune-hunting. I
don't know whether to believe his version or not, therefore; but I did
get at one fact which may help us to find out for ourselves. Dear
Ellaline is a daughter of _Frederic_ Lethbridge. It was rather a shock
to hear this, for I have a vague impression that there was once a
scandal, quite a ripe, juicy scandal, about a Frederic Lethbridge. Can
it have been this Frederic Lethbridge, and if so, had it anything to do
with money matters?
I haven't mentioned my doubts to Dick, because he really is idiotically
in love with the girl, and is capable of foolishness. I intend to let
him go on as he is going for the present, as he can do himself no harm,
and can do me a great deal of good, by keeping his darling out of my way
and Sir Lionel's thoughts. But of course, he mustn't be allowed to marry
her if she has nothing of her own. Sir Lionel is rich, but not rich
enough to make his ward rich enough for Dick, and keep plenty for his
wife--when he gets one--if she be anything like _me_.
Your dear hostess, who would by this time be my hostess if I weren't
otherwise engaged, knows everything and everybody. Not only that, she
has done both for a considerable term of years. You remember the joke
about her being torn between the desire not to exceed the age of
forty-five and yet to boast a friendship with Lord Beaconsfield? Well,
she can have known Frederic Lethbridge, and all about him, without being
a day over forty, as that is Sir Lionel's age, and Mrs. Lethbridge was a
distant relative of his.
Tell Lady MacRae that. Say that the Frederic Lethbridge you are
inquiring about married a Miss de Nesville, and that there is a daughter
in existence, a girl of nineteen. If Lady Mac doesn't know anything, get
her to ask her friends; but do hurry up for Dick's sake, there's a dear,
otherwise I shan't be able to pull the strings as you would like me to;
and already my sweet nerves are jangled, out of tune. Dear Lady Mac is
so adorably frank, when she has something disagreeable to say, that
you'll have no difficulty in ferreting out the truth--if it's anything
nasty. For most reasons I hope it isn't, as a rich girl would be a
valuable bird in the hand for Dick; and I am on the spot to see his
affairs as well as my own through, whatever happens.
For my part, if Sir Lionel weren't up to such a fatiguingly high level
of intelligence, I believe I could fall in love with him. He may be
descended from King Arthur, but he looks more like Lancelot, and I fancy
might make love rather nicely, once he let himself go. Although it's
long since he did any soldiering, he shows that he _was_ a soldier,
born, not made. He has improved, if anything, since we knew him in
India, but I remember you used to be quite afraid of having to talk to
him then, and preferred Colonel O'Hagan, whom you thought jolly and
good-natured, though, somehow, I never got on with him very well. I
always had the feeling he was trying to read me, and I do dislike that
sort of thing in a man. It ruins human intercourse, and takes away all
natural desire to flirt.
You ask me how I endure Emily Norton. Well, as I sit beside Sir Lionel
in the car, I don't need to bother with her much in the daytime. She
hates bridge, and thinks playing for money wrong in most circumstances,
but considers it her duty to please her brother's guests; and as she
never wins, anyhow, it needn't affect her conscience. I tell her that
_I_ always give my winnings to charity, and didn't think it necessary to
add that, to my idea, charity should not only begin at home, but end
there, unless its resources were unlimited. The poor, dull thing has
that kind of self-conscious religion that sends her soul trotting every
other minute to look in the glass, and see that it hasn't smudged
itself. So trying! Once she asked me what I did for _my_ soul? I longed
to tell her I took cod-liver oil, or Somebody's Fruit Salt, but didn't
dare, on account of Sir Lionel. And she has such a conceited way of
saying, when speaking of the future: "If the Lord spares me till next
year, I will do so and so." As if He were in immediate need of her, but
might be induced to get on without her for a short time!
One would know, by the way she screws up her hair, that she could never
have felt a temptation. But I shall not let myself be troubled much with
her if I marry Sir Lionel. She can go back to her doctor and her
curates, and be invited for Christmas to Graylees, which, by the way, I
hope to inspect when we have finished this tour.
I am looking quite lovely in my motoring things, and enjoying myself
very much, on the whole.
Devonshire I found too hot for this time of the year, but the scenery is
pretty. I had no idea what a jolly little river the Dart is; and
Dartmouth is rather quaint. For those who are keen on old things, I
suppose the Butter Market would be interesting; but I can't really see
why, because things happened in certain places hundreds of years ago,
one should stand and stare at walls or windows, or fireplaces. The
things _must_ have happened somewhere! Although Charles the Second, for
instance, may have been great fun to know, and one would have enjoyed
flirting with him, now that he's been dead and out of reach for ages,
he's of no importance to me.
We left Torquay yesterday, and arrived here in the evening, after a
hilly but nice run, and lunching at Plymouth. Of course, a lot of
nonsense was talked about Sir Francis Drake. One almost forgets _what_
the old boy did, except to play bowls or something; but I have a way of
seeming to know things, for which I deserve more credit than anyone
(save you) would guess. When they were not jabbering about him at lunch,
it was about the _Mayflower_, which apparently sailed from Plymouth for
the purpose of supplying Americans with ancestors. I never met any
Americans yet, except the kind who boast of having begun as shoeblacks,
whose great-great-grand-parents didn't cross in the _Mayflower_. It must
have been a huge ship, or else a lot of the ancestors went in the
steerage, or were stewards or stowaways.
There was a ferry, getting from Devonshire into Cornwall, so of course
we just missed a boat and had to wait half an hour. I was dying to go to
sleep, but the others were as chirpy as possible, gabbling Cornish
legends. When I say the "others," I mean Sir Lionel and Ellaline
Lethbridge. I didn't know any legends, but I made up several on the spur
of the moment, much more exciting than theirs, and that pleased Sir
Lionel, as he is a Cornishman. Heavens, how I did take it out of myself
admiring his native land when we'd got across that ferry! Said the
scenery was quite different from that of Devonshire, at the first go
off; and I'm not sure there _weren't_ differences. The road coming
toward Launceston really was romantic; rock-walled part of the way, with
a lot of pink and yellow lichen; and again, fine open spaces with
distant blue downs against a sky which looked, as I remarked to Sir
Lionel, as if the gods had poured a libation of golden wine over it. Not
bad, that, was it? I believe we passed an Arthurian battle-field, which
naturally interested him immensely, therefore _had_ to interest poor me!
He seems to think there actually _was_ an Arthur, and was quite pleased
with me for saying that all the Cornish names of places rang with
romance like fairy bells sounding from under the sea--perhaps from
Atlantis. Anyhow, they're a relief after such Devonshire horrors as
Meavy and Hoo Meavy, which are like the lisping of babies. Sir Lionel
thought the "derivations" of such names an absorbing subject! But living
in the East so long has made him quixotically patriotic.
Here and there we passed a whole villageful of white-washed cottages,
with purplish-brown moss covering their roofs--rather picturesque; and
some of the slate-roofed, stone houses are nice in their way, too; I
suppose distinctively Cornish. Not that I care! I'm glad Graylees Castle
isn't in Cornwall, which is _much_ too far from town.
There were some mine-shafts about, to mar the scenery, toward the end of
the journey, and the road surface was bad compared to what we've had. If
the car weren't a very good one, we should have suffered from the bumps.
Ellaline Lethbridge, by the way, said something about Cornwall which
puzzled me. Suddenly she exclaimed: "Why, the atmosphere here is like
Spain! Everything swims in a sea of coloured lights!" _I_ thought she'd
spent all her life at school in France, and I mentioned the impression,
upon which she replied, with an air of being taken aback: "I mean, from
what I have _heard_ of Spain." Can she have had an escapade, I wonder?
But that is Dick's business, not mine--at present.
There's a castle in Launceston, which has kept us over to-day, as Sir
Lionel has been in these parts before, and can't rest unless we see
everything he admired in his youth. I wish he hadn't seen so much,
there'd be less for us to do. I _hate_ pottering about, seeing sights in
the rain, and it has been trying to rain all day. It's well enough to
say that the rain rains alike on the just and the unjust, but that is
not true, as some women's hair curls naturally. Ellaline's does, and
mine doesn't--except the part I owe for at Truefitt's.
It's an old hotel that we're in, quite pleased to show its age; and I
have made rather a beast of myself with some sort of Cornish pasty,
which, it seems, is a local favourite, and spoils the peasants' teeth.
Cornish cream is good, and, I understand from Sir Lionel, was invented
by the Phoenicians. I suppose they drowned their sorrows in it while
working in the tin mines one always associates with them.
We go to Tintagel to-morrow, and do some other Cornish things, I don't
know what. But write to me at Bideford, as we shall be back in
Devonshire in a few days on our way--I fancy--toward Wales. I long to
hear what you or Lady Mac may have up your sleeves about the dear
Ellaline's papa.
Ever your affectionate
Gwen.
Dick sends his love, and will write.
XVIII
MRS. SENTER TO HER SISTER, MRS. BURDEN
_King Arthur's Castle, Tintagel_,
_Aug. 12th_
My Dear Sis: I'm sorry I told you to write to Bideford, as
we're stopping at this place several days, and I might have had your
answer here. However, it's too late now, as by this time your letter is
in the post, perhaps, and we may or may not leave to-morrow. I think I
can be pretty sure your wire to Dick means that you'd heard from me, and
that the news for him is not favourable. If he guessed that I'd been
questioning you about the eligibility of his girl, frankly I doubt if
he'd have swallowed the bait of your telegram. Even as it was he seemed
restive, and didn't yearn to be packed off to Scotland, even for a few
days. However, he'd committed himself by reading your message aloud,
before he stopped to think; and when Sir Lionel and Ellaline had learned
that you were ill, and wanted him, they would have been shocked if he'd
refused to go. I comforted him by promising to sow strife between ward
and guardian, as often and diligently as possible, until he can get back
to look after his own interests, and I shall do my best to keep the
promise--not for Dick's sake alone.
He was off within an hour after the telegram, a little sulky, but not
too worried, as he has the faith engendered by experience in your
recuperative powers. I, naturally, worry still less, as I have a clue to
the mystery of your attack which Dick doesn't possess. I quite believe
that by the time he reaches your side it will no longer be a bedside,
but a sofaside; that you'll be able to smile, hold Dick's hand, and
replace Benger's Food with slices of partridge and sips of champagne. By
the way, this is the glorious Twelfth. It does seem odd and frumpish not
to be in Scotland, but motoring covers a multitude of social sins. Not a
word has been said about birds. Our sporting talk is of mufflers,
pinions, water-cooled brakes, and chainless drives.