I'd finished saying good-night, and shut my door upon the world. It
seemed to me that this birthplace of Sir Lionel's ancestor, King Arthur
Pendragon, was too romantic and wonderful to go tamely to sleep in. And
what was my covered balcony for, if not to dream dreams and think
thoughts, by moonlight?
So I switched off the electricity in my room, and went out to find that
the moon (which is big and grand now) had come out, too, tearing apart a
great black cloud in order to look down on Arthur-land, and see if she
had any adorers. Anyway, she must have seen me, for she turned the night
into silver dawn, so clear and bright that she couldn't have missed me
if she tried.
I did wish for you to be with me then, and I'm ashamed to confess I
wouldn't have minded Sir Lionel as a companion, because Tintagel seems
so much more his than mine.
Never did I hear the sea talk poetry and legend as it does round those
dark rocks of old "Dundagel." I thought as I leaned out from my balcony,
a lonely, unappreciated Juliet--that the sound was like the chanting
voice of an ancient bard, telling stories of the golden days to himself
or to all who might care to listen. I fancied I could hear the words:
They found a naked child upon the sands
Of dark Dundagel by the Cornish sea.
I could see the ruined castle, on its twin cliffs, below the
hotel-castle cliff and between me and the sea; and the very meagreness
of what remains seemed to increase the interest and mystery by
stimulating the imagination, forcing it to create its own pictures. I
"reconstructed" the castle, building it of the same stone they use now
at Tintagel, and have used for the last thousand years or so; a dark
stone, singularly rich with colour--pansy and wallflower colour, with
splashes of green flung on to dead gray, like bright autumn leaves
stirred into a heap of other leaves dim and dead. And the mortar for my
masonry was the moonlight which flooded the sea and those wide downs
whose divisions into fields turned them into enormous maps.
I worked myself up into such a romantic mood that I almost cried in the
joy and pain of living, and expected to look back upon myself with the
"utmost spurn" when I should come back to real life after a good sleep
in the morning. But I didn't,--perhaps because, instead of encouraging
the good sleep, I lay and listened to the wild song of the Cornish wind.
I waked early, feeling exactly the same, if not more so, and could
hardly wait to get down into the ruins of the old castle. I splashed
about in a cold bath, dressed as quickly as a well-groomed girl can, and
then--I committed what might seem an indiscreet act if the last of the
Pendragons and I did not stand toward each other in the place of
guardian and ward. "Nothing is, but thinking makes it so." And Sir
Lionel certainly does think we're in those positions; therefore it was
all right for me to knock at his door, and ask through the keyhole if he
would very, very much mind taking me to the castle?
He was dressed, and opened the door instantly. It was the one thing he
would have liked to propose, said he, only he had been afraid of
disturbing me so early. Wasn't that kind of him? I remembered the glove,
and the thought of it was more delicious than a breakfast of Cornish
cream and honey; although, of course, lurking in the background of my
mind was the horrid idea that he might have accidentally picked the
thing up to use as a bookmark. And another idea, gloomier even, though
not so horrid, was that, even if he does like me well enough to keep
things of mine, he must soon grow to hate me when he knows who I am.
He suggested coffee, but I wouldn't have it, because I was afraid Mrs.
Senter might appear and want to go to the castle too. I had visions of
her, hearing our voices in the corridor, and dashing out of bed to fling
on her clothes; but even if she did overhear the whole conversation, I
don't think she's the kind who looks her best before breakfast, if she
has dressed in a hurry; and anyway, we were spared the apparition.
It was a fine scramble getting to the ruins, and when Sir Lionel had
opened a door (with a key you get from a cottage close by the sea) it
was quite as if he were my host, entertaining me in his ancestral home.
I told him that it felt twice as interesting to be there with a true
Pendragon, than with a mere king or anybody like that, and he seemed
pleased.
"I _hope_ I am a 'true' Pendragon," he said, rather thoughtfully. "One
must try to be--always." He looked at me very, very kindly, as if he
would have liked to say something more; but he didn't speak, and turned
away his eyes to look far over the sea. It was only for a little while,
though, that he was absent-minded. Sitting there on the rough,
wind-blown grass which is the floor of the castle now, he told me things
about the place and its history. How Dundagel meant the "Safe Castle,"
and how the "Arthurian believers" say it was built by the Britons in
earliest Roman days; how David Bruce of Wales was entertained by the
Earl of Cornwall on the very spot where we were sitting, and how the
great hall, once famous, was destroyed as long ago as when Chaucer was a
baby. And as he talked, the rising wind wailed and sobbed like old, old
witches crying over the evil fallen on Arthur and his castle. Such an
old, wise-sounding wind it was, old enough to have been blowing when
Arthur was a baby, drowning the lullabies sung by his mother Igerna,
"that greatest beauty in Britain."
We forgot breakfast, and stopped in the ruins a long time, until
suddenly we both realized that we were desperately hungry. But instead
of going up to our own hotel, we walked into the quaint village (whose
real name is Trevena, though nobody calls it that) and had something to
eat at a hotel where Sir Lionel used to stop occasionally when he was a
boy. Afterward, we went to see the village schoolmaster, whom he knew;
such a nice man, who paints pictures as well as teaches the
children--and I felt guilty at being introduced as Sir Lionel's "ward."
I think my conscience is like a bruised peach, pinched by many fingers
to see if it's ripe, I have that guilty feeling so often! When we spoke
of the schoolmaster's versatility, he laughed and said it was "nothing
to his predecessor's," who used to cut the children's hair, clip horses,
measure land, act as parish clerk as well as teacher, pull teeth, and
beat such transgressors as had to be punished in a way less serious than
prison. Doesn't that take one back to long ago? But so does everything
in Tintagel--and all over Cornwall, Sir Lionel says. They have such nice
old-fashioned words here! Isn't "jingle" good? It's some kind of a
conveyance, exactly the opposite of a motor-car, I fancy, from the
description. And I like the word "huer," too. It means a man who gives
the hue and cry when the pilchards are coming in, and all the fishermen
must run to the sea.
I should like to know everything about Cornwall, from the smugglers, and
the famous wrestlers, to the witches--the last of whom lives near
Boscastle still. But the little that travellers in motors can learn
about places steeped in history, is like trying to know all about a
beautiful great tree by one leaf of flying gold which falls into the
automobile as it sweeps by, along the road. Still, the little one does
learn is unforgettable, impressed upon the mind in a different way from
the mere _learning_. And I suppose few people know everything about
every place, even in their own countries. If they did, I'm sure they'd
be prigs, and no one would want to know _them_!
When we got back to our hotel castle on the cliff, the Tyndals' motor
was at the door, a huge, gorgeous chariot, and nothing would do but we
must "try the car." Mrs. Senter had promised to go, and was putting on
her hat.
The Tyndals are difficult people to resist, because if you try to make
excuses they pin you down in one way or another, so that you must either
do what they want or hurt their feelings; and though Sir Lionel is
supposed to have been so strict in Bengal, he is quite soft-hearted in
England. I think he hates going about in motors that aren't his, because
he enjoys being the man at the helm, which is perhaps characteristic of
him; however, the Tyndals swept all of us, except Mrs. Norton, away to
Delabole to see the slate quarries, and to have the adventure of sliding
down a fearfully steep incline in a tiny trolley-car--if that's the
right word for it. I half expected Charon to meet me with his ferry-boat
at the bottom. It wouldn't have seemed much stranger than other things
in Cornwall.
All that happened yesterday. To-day we have been to Trebarwith Strand
and Port Isaac, and have walked to the loneliest church I ever saw, with
the gravestones in the burying ground propped by buttresses, that the
wind mayn't throw them down. It is Tintagel church, though it's a good
long way from the village, and the vicarage is of the fourteenth
century.
Oh, and I heard a splendid legend about the ruined castle from the
vicar, who is its warden! It seems, when it was built by the old princes
of West Wales--very beautiful as well as strong, with walls "painted of
many colours," it was placed under a powerful spell by Merlin, that it
might become invisible twice in every year. How I should like to be at
Tintagel at the right time, and see if the ruins would disappear from
before my eyes. I believe they would; and the enchantment would take the
form of a sea mist.
To-morrow we are to leave Cornwall for Bideford.
I had got as far as that, when Mrs. Senter knocked at my door, and asked
if she might come in for a few minutes; so I had to say yes, and "smile
full well in counterfeited glee." But I hated to be interrupted, as
there was just time before dressing for dinner to finish my letter to
you. Now it is after dinner, and before I go to bed, I'll tell you what
has happened.
How conceited I was to suppose it possible that Sir Lionel thought me an
important person! I am sure the glove episode must have been a mere
accident. Serves me right!
Mrs. Senter came to tell me that they'd all been talking about the way
to Bideford, and Sir Lionel said the road was so hilly, he wished we
hadn't quite as many passengers in the car. Then the Tyndals asked if
they might take me, because they'd made up their minds to go to Bideford
too, and Sir Lionel answered that it would be a splendid way out of the
difficulty if I were willing. The only trouble was, he didn't like to
propose such a thing for fear of hurting my feelings; and the
conversation ended, according to Mrs. Senter, by the Tyndals planning to
suggest the idea to me as if it were their own, then letting the matter
rest on my decision.
Mrs. Senter went on to explain that Sir Lionel didn't know she was
repeating to me what had passed, but that she thought I would prefer to
know. "I'm sure _I_ should if I were in your place," she purred sweetly.
"When the Tyndals invite you, of course you must do exactly as you
please; but don't you think for Mrs. Norton's sake, as she's such a
coward, it would be best to keep the car as light as possible, since Sir
Lionel fears the roads are really bad?"
"Oh, certainly," said I, trying so hard not to blush that I must have
been purple. "I shall be delighted to go with Mr. and Mrs. Tyndal, in
their lovely car, and it's very nice of them to ask me."
"You _won't_ tell Sir Lionel I interfered, will you?" she begged. "I
should be quite afraid of him if he were angry."
"You needn't worry. He shan't hear anything from me," said I.
"And you do think I was right to let you know?" she implored.
"Of course," I assured her. But I was feeling hurt all the way up to my
topmost hair and down to my tipmost toe. Not that I mind going with the
Tyndals, but that Sir Lionel should pick _me_ out as the bit of
superfluous ballast to cast to the winds! That was what made me feel
cold and old, and alone in the world. I conscientiously told myself that
I was the youngest of the party, and the right one to sacrifice; but
nothing was much comfort until the thought jumped into my head that
maybe Mrs. Senter had fibbed. I went to dinner buoyed up by that hope,
but it died young; for the Tyndals _did_ invite me, in Sir Lionel's
hearing; and when I said that I should be charmed--he smiled calmly. So
far from making objections, I thought he looked quite pleased.
Poor me! I fancied in the castle ruins that he actually liked my
society. But I forgot that I'd invited him to go with me. _I shan't
forget again._ And _hang_ the glove!
Your poor, foolish, conceited, humiliated
Audrie.
XX
TELEGRAM FROM DICK BURDEN TO HIS AUNT
_Glen Lachlan, August 13th_,
_8 o'clock A.M._
Senter, King Arthur's Castle, Tintagel, Cornwall:
Returning to-day. Hope find you still at Tintagel. Try and make
Pendragon stay if he plans to leave. Find some excuse.
Dick.
XXI
TELEGRAM FROM MRS. SENTER TO HER NEPHEW
_Tintagel, August 13th_,
_9.20 A.M._
R. Burden, Glen Lachlan, N. B.
Just starting for Bideford. Can make no excuse to delay, but have done
better. If you arrive Tintagel to-night will find member of party most
important to you still there. Better hurry. Will leave letter explaining
all.
Senter.
XXII
LETTER LEFT BY MRS. SENTER AT KING ARTHUR'S CASTLE HOTEL,
FOR HER NEPHEW DICK BURDEN
_August 13th_
Dear Dick: Your wire has just come as we are starting. I've
telegraphed, and will leave a few words for you in pencil. Lucky you
have a resourceful relative, and that Mrs. Norton's washing didn't come
till late this morning! My resourcefulness enables me to change my plans
for your benefit, or rather, to make them work together for your good,
in the time most women take to change their minds; while the lateness of
Mrs. N.'s washing and her mild obstinacy in determining to wait for it,
against her brother's wishes, provide us with a few extra minutes.
Now it suddenly appears that Young Nick hasn't enough petrol to get on
as far as--anywhere. That will give us more minutes. Brown Buddha, as
your adored one calls him, has crawled humbly but swiftly off to obtain
a new supply. Sir Lionel, already in a vile temper for reasons which I
may have time to explain, is bursting with rage to which he is too proud
to give a natural outlet. He looks ready to explode, not with bombs, but
with dambs. I have never heard him say a single one, during the whole of
our acquaintance, but his eyes are sending out a fiery cataract of them
this minute. A good thing for me he doesn't know what I know, or the
fire would be turned upon me, and I should wither like "She" in her
second bath.
Quickly I'll tell you what I've done, and why Sir Lionel is wild; also
how I've rearranged everything and everybody at the last minute, in
order to satisfy you. What a precious darling aunt you have got, to be
sure, and what a lot you do owe her!
For motives of my own, I planned to transplant your sweet Ellaline from
our motor-car to the motor-car of others for the day. The "others" are
George and Sallie Tyndal, about whose sudden, apropos appearance I wrote
your mother only yesterday; but, of course, as you're leaving to-day
you'll miss the news in that letter. I thought your anxiety for your
parent's health would hardly be poignant enough to keep you in Scotland
long, but I didn't suppose you'd be able to tear yourself away _quite_
so soon.
I don't doubt you wonder how it can be possible for me to have too much
of dear E.'s society, but strange as that may seem, it can; and worse
than that, I dislike Sir Lionel getting too much of it. I don't think it
is good for him; and he's had enough of the commodity since we've been
in Tintagel to produce, according to my point of view and yours,
disastrous effects. I decided that drastic measures were necessary for
both our sakes, and with me to decide is to act--when anything really
important is at stake.
First I persuaded the Tyndals that it would be kindly to invite Miss
Lethbridge to travel in their motor to Bideford, whither they also are
bound. I said that Sir Lionel feared we would be rather a crowd for his
car, as the roads are supposed to be bad. This flattered them, for their
motor, which is somewhat more powerful than ours, is the one object for
which they live at present. Besides, they were delighted at the chance
of getting the girl to themselves, as they think they met her years ago
in Italy, where it is alleged she has never been. Some school girl
escapade, perhaps. You had better do a little catechising, later on.
Meanwhile, the Tyndals yearn for the opportunity of pumping. Sir Lionel
has quite fiercely prevented them from doing so, up to date. He looked
ready to challenge poor George to a duel the other evening for merely
suggesting that they might have met Miss Lethbridge in Venice.
To Sir L. I hinted that Ellaline was bored, now that you were gone, and
that she would enjoy the change of travelling for a day with new people;
that she had taken a fancy to the Tyndal boy; and I added that she had
asked me privately whether I thought that Sir Lionel would object to her
accepting, provided the Tyndals wanted her to go to Bideford. Naturally,
when the invitation came, he did _not_ object. You'd have laughed if you
could have seen her face when he smiled with apparent benevolent delight
upon the suggestion. The sight would have repaid you for many a snub, my
poor love-sick swain!
That was where matters stood till your telegram came, a few minutes ago.
All I hoped for was, to get rid of the dear child for one long, happy
day, and to estrange her a little (partly for your sake) from her
solicitous guardian. But your wire set another bee humming in my
motor-bonnet. I determined to do you a good turn if I could; so I flew
up, before answering you, to have a talk with the Tyndals. They were
starting a few minutes after us, by my advice, and hadn't come
downstairs yet. Ellaline, too, was still in her room, sulking, no doubt,
and hadn't said good-bye to Sir Lionel or any of us. I know that,
because my room at this hotel has been close to hers--and to his, too;
so whenever a word is murmured on a doorstep I hear. No word has been
murmured this morning; and E. has had her breakfast sent into her
bedroom.
To the Tyndals I said that word had arrived from you, and that in
confidence I would tell them that you and Miss Lethbridge are as good as
engaged. At least, that you had a private understanding which would be
an engagement if Sir Lionel weren't a dog in the manger. He didn't want
the girl himself, I explained, yet he didn't want to give her to anyone
else--short of a millionaire. You, I went on to say, had wired that you
would be back this evening, and Ellaline was dying to stay and see you.
Sir Lionel didn't know you were coming, I confessed, and would be angry
if he did; but if they--the Tyndals--could somehow misunderstand the
arrangements made overnight, and in the confusion of their minds leave
Miss Lethbridge behind, it would be a great favour to everyone
concerned--except Sir Lionel.
The Tyndals, who think a lot of themselves because they have more money
than brains, are annoyed with Sir L. because he snapped at them about
Venice; so they were rather pleased at the idea of doing him a bad turn
and at the same time advancing Love's Young Dream. When I assured them
it would be easy to say that they understood Ellaline had changed her
mind and was going with Sir Lionel, they agreed to slip off without her
about half an hour after the flight of Apollo. That is the plan, as it
stands, up to date. Sir Lionel and Mrs. Norton won't know till this
evening at Bideford that E. isn't with the Tyndals; and then of course I
shall get George and Sallie out of his bad graces as well as I can.
Meanwhile you will find her at Tintagel, and can bring her on by rail.
That will be delightful for you; and as Sir Lionel is old-fashioned in
some of his notions, he may be more inclined to consent to an engagement
between you after the sort of journey you and she will have together.
So I think all interests will have been served.
I am writing in the big hall of the hotel, and Sir Lionel is walking up
and down, glaring first out of one window, and then out of another, at
the rain, which is beginning to come down in drops as large as
half-crowns. I only wish _my_ half crowns, or even my shillings, were as
plentiful! But perhaps they will be, some day before long--who knows? I
do hope Ellaline won't take it into her head to appear at the last
minute before we get off, and complicate things. Not that I won't be
equal to disposing of her if she does! But no! here is Young Nick, very
meek and soapy. He has got his petrol. Emily Norton reluctantly puts
down a twenty-year-old volume of Blackwood which she has found in the
hotel library. We are off. Good-bye--and good luck.
Gwen.
XXIII
AUDRIE BRENDON TO HER MOTHER
_Tintagel_,
_August 13th_
Dearest Lodestar: I can feel you drawing me across miles of
land and sea, and if only I could travel on a telepathic pass I would
start this minute, Ellaline or no Ellaline. Toward her and Sir Lionel I
feel as Mercutio felt toward the Montagus and Capulets: "A plague on
both your houses!" Nobody seems to care what becomes of me. Why should I
care what becomes of them?
Everything is too horrid and too extraordinary to-day. I got into the
wrong side of bed last night, and got out again on the wrong side this
morning. It happened to be the only side there was, as the bed stands
against the wall in an alcove, where it can't be pulled out; and nobody
could expect me to bound like a kangaroo over the foot, could they? But
there are times in life when every side of everything is wrong; and this
is one of those times with me--has been since dinner last night, when
Sir Lionel grinned with joy at the prospect of shunting me upon the
Tyndal family for a day. (When you are friends with people they smile;
when you are out with them, they grin.)
Well, this morning I thought I wouldn't hurry to get down. I felt, if
Mrs. Senter beamed at me from under her becoming motor-hat at starting,
I should do her a mischief, and if Emily smirked inoffensively I should
throw Murray in her face. As for Sir Lionel--words fail to express what
I believed myself capable of doing to him. I could have stolen his car,
in which he appeared to grudge me a seat, and have gone off with it into
space to be a motor pirate. Whence can I have inherited these vicious
tendencies? Truly, I never supposed I had them before; but you don't
know yourself until people have practically accused you of taking up too
much room in their old automobiles, although you're perfectly aware that
you are less than eighteen inches wide at your broadest part in your
thickest frock, and you thought they liked your society and kept your
gloves. In that mood I wouldn't have condescended to see Apollo off if
he'd been twice a god, armed with an invitation for me from Juno to a
house-party on Olympus.
No sooner, however, did I hear his dear familiar purr as he swept away
from the door of the hotel (my balcony is a corner one, and I could just
catch the well-known c-r-r-r) when I regretted intensely that I hadn't
been _en evidence_, looking indifferent. Suddenly, I suffered pangs of
apprehension lest my stopping in my room had seemed like (what it really
was) a fit of the sulks; but it was past repentance-time. Apollo was
gone, Mrs. Senter doubtless sitting by Sir Lionel's side as usual, and
probably commenting wittily on my silly conduct.
The Tyndals told me last night that they meant to start at ten, so I
went downstairs five minutes before, too late to have to wait about, too
early to be called. I expected to find them in the hall, and when they
weren't there, I strolled out to see if the motor had come to the door,
thinking they might be watching the loading up of their luggage. As for
mine, Apollo had taken it as usual, except a pretty little fitted
handbag, small and wonderfully convenient, which Sir Lionel came across
in a shop and bought for me (I mean for Ellaline) at Torquay. But there
wasn't a Tyndal in sight, and not so much as the smell of a motor-car,
so I wandered inside and asked the handsome landlady, whom I met near
King Arthur's Round Table, whether she had seen the Tyndal automobile or
its owners.
"Why," said she, "they went off about ten minutes ago."
"Went off--where?" I asked blankly.
"To Bideford, I think they were going," she replied.
"That can't be, for I was to have gone with them," said I.