Читать книгу The Obstacle Race - Ethel M. Dell - Страница 6

A long, green wave ran up, gleaming like curved glass in the sunlight, and broke in a million sparkles against a shelf of shingle. Above the shingle rose the soft cliffs, clothed with scrubby grass and crowned with gorse.

"Columbus," said the stranger, "this is just the place for us."

Columbus wagged a cheery tail and expressed complete agreement. He was watching a small crab hurrying among the stones with a funny frown between his brows. He was not quite sure of the nature or capabilities of these creatures, and till he knew more he deemed it advisable to let them pass without interference. A canny Scot was Columbus, and it was very seldom indeed that anyone ever got the better of him. He was also a gentleman to the backbone, and no word his mistress uttered, however casual, ever passed unacknowledged by him. He always laughed when she laughed, however obscure the joke.

He smiled now, since she was obviously pleased, but without taking his sharp little eyes off the object of his interest. Suddenly the scuttling crab disappeared and he started up with a whine. In a moment he was scratching in the shingle in eager search, flinging showers of stones over his companion in the process.

She protested, seizing him by his wiry tail to make him desist. "Columbus! Don't! You're burying me alive! Do sit down and be sensible, or I'll never be wrecked on a desert island with you again!"

Columbus subsided, not very willingly, dropping with a grunt into the hole he had made. His mistress released him, and took out a gold cigarette case.

"I wonder what I shall do when I've finished these," she mused. "The simple life doesn't include luxuries of this sort. Only three left, Columbus! After that, your missis'll starve."

She lighted a cigarette with a faint pucker on her wide brow. Her eyes looked out over the empty, tumbling sea—grey eyes very level in their regard under black brows that were absolutely straight and inclined to be rather heavily accentuated.

"Yes, I wish I'd asked Muff for a few before I came away," was the outcome of her reflections. "By this time tomorrow I shan't have one left. Just think of that, my Christopher, and be thankful that you're just a dog to whom one rat tastes very like another!"

Columbus sneezed protestingly. Whatever his taste in rats, cigarette smoke did not appeal to him. His mistress's fondness for it was her only failing in his eyes.

She went on reflectively, her eyes upon the sky-line. "I shall have to take in washing to eke out a modest living in cigarettes and chocolates. I can't subsist on Mr. Rickett's Woodbines, that's quite certain. I wonder if there's a pawnshop anywhere near."

Her voice was low and peculiarly soft; she uttered her words with something of a drawl. Her hands were clasped about her knees, delicate hands that yet looked capable. The lips that held the cigarette were delicately moulded also, but they had considerable character.

"If I were Lady Joanna Farringmore, I suppose I should say something rather naughty in French, Columbus, to relieve my feelings. But you and I don't talk French, do we? And we have struck the worthy Lady Jo and all her crowd off our visiting-list for some time to come. I don't suppose any of them will miss us much, do you, old chap? They'll just go on round and round in the old eternal waltz and never realize that it leads to nowhere." She stretched out her arms suddenly towards the horizon; then turned and lay down by Columbus on the shingle. "Oh, I'm glad we've cut adrift, aren't you? Even without cigarettes, it's better than London."

Again Columbus signified his agreement by kissing her hair, in a rather gingerly fashion on account of the smoke; after which, as she seemed to have nothing further to say, he got up, shook himself, and trotted off to explore the crannies in the cliffs.

His mistress pillowed her dark head on her arm, and lay still, with the sea singing along the ridge of shingle below her. She finished her cigarette and seemed to doze. A brisk wind was blowing from the shore, but the beach itself was sheltered. The sunlight poured over her in a warm flood. It was a perfect day in May.

Suddenly a curious thing happened. A small stone from nowhere fell with a smart tap upon her uncovered head! She started, surprised into full consciousness, and looked around. The shore stretched empty behind her. There was no sign of life among the grass-grown cliffs, save where Columbus some little distance away was digging industriously at the root of a small bush. She searched the fringe of flaming gorse that overhung the top of the cliff immediately behind her, but quite in vain. Some sea gulls soared wailing overhead, but no other intruder appeared to disturb the solitude. She gave up the search and lay down again. Perhaps the wind had done it, though it did not seem very likely.

The tide was rising, and she would have to move soon in any case. She would enjoy another ten minutes of her delicious sun-bath ere she returned for the midday meal that Mrs. Rickett was preparing in the little thatched cottage next to the forge.

Again she stretched herself luxuriously. Yes, it was better than London; the soft splashing of waves was better than the laughter of a hundred voices, better than the roar of a thousand wheels, better than the voice of a million concerts … Again reverie merged into drowsy absence of thought. How exquisite the sunshine was! …

It fell upon her dark cheek this time with a sharp sting and bounced off on to her hand—a round black stone dropped from nowhere but with strangely accurate aim. She sprang up abruptly. This was getting beyond a joke.

Columbus was still rooting beneath the distant bush. Most certainly he was not the offender. Some boy was hiding somewhere among the humps and clefts that constituted the rough surface of the cliff. She picked up her walking-stick with a certain tightening of the lips. She would teach that boy a lesson if she caught him unawares.

Grimly she set her face to the cliff and to the narrow, winding passage by which she had descended to the shore. Her dreams were wholly scattered! Her cheek still smarted from the blow. She left the sea without a backward glance. She sent forth a shrill whistle to Columbus as she began to climb the slippery path of stones. She was convinced that it was from this that her assailant had gathered his weapons.

With springing steps she mounted, looking sharply to right and left as she did so! And in a moment, turning inwards from the sea, she caught sight of a movement among some straggling bushes a few yards to one side of the path.

Without an instant's hesitation she swung herself up the steep incline, climbing with a rapidity that swiftly cut off the landward line of retreat. She would give her assailant a fright for his pains if nothing better.

And then just as she reached the level, very sharply she stopped. It was as if a hand had caught her back. For suddenly there rose up before her a figure so strange that for a moment she felt almost like a scared child. It sprang from the bushes and stood facing her like an animal at bay—a short creature neither man nor boy, misshapen, grotesquely humped, possessing long thin arms of almost baboon-like proportions. The head was sunken into the shoulders. It was flung back and the face upraised—and it was the face that made her pause, for it was the most pathetic sight she had ever looked upon. It was the face of a lad of two or three and twenty, but drawn in lines so painful, so hollowed, so piteous, that fear melted into compassion at the sight. The dark eyes that stared upwards had a frightened look mingled with a certain defiance. He stood barefooted on the edge of the cliff, clenching and unclenching his bony hands, with the air of a culprit awaiting sentence.

There was a decided pause before his victim spoke. She found some difficulty in grappling with the situation, but she had no intention of turning her back upon it. She felt it must be tackled with resolution.

After a moment she spoke, with as much sternness as she could muster,

"Why did you throw those stones?"

He backed at the sound of her voice, and she had an instant of sickening fear, for there was a drop of twenty feet behind him on the shingle. But he must have seen her look, for he stopped himself on the brink, and stood there doggedly.

"Don't stand there!" she said quickly. "I'm not going to hurt you."

He lowered his head, and looked at her from under drawn brows. "Yes, you are," he said gruffly. "You're going to beat me with that stick."

The shrewdness of this surmise struck her as not without humour. She smiled, and, turning, flung the stick straight down to the path below. "Now!" she said.

He came forward, not very willingly, and stood within a couple of yards of her, still looking as if he expected some sort of chastisement.

She faced him, and the last of her fear departed. Though he was so terribly deformed that he looked like some dreadful beast reared on its hind legs there was that about the face, sullen though it was, that stirred her deepest feelings.

She did her best to conceal the fact, however. "Tell me why you threw those stones!" she said.

"Because I wanted to hit you," he returned with disconcerting promptitude.

She looked at him steadily. "How very unkind of you!" she said.

His eyes gleamed with a smouldering resentment. "No, it wasn't. I didn't want you there. Dicky is coming soon, and he likes it best when there is no one there."

She noticed that though there was scant courtesy in his speech, it was by no means the rough talk of the fisher-folk. It fired her curiosity. "And who is Dicky?" she said.

"Who are you?" he retorted rudely.

She smiled again. "You are not very polite, are you? But I don't mind telling you if you want to know. My name is Juliet Moore. Now tell me yours!"

He looked at her doubtfully. "Juliet is a name out of a book," he said.

She laughed, a low, soft laugh that woke an answering glimmer of amusement in his sullen face. "How clever of you to know that!" she said.

"No, I'm not clever." Tersely he contradicted her. "Old Swag at The Three

Tuns says I'm the village idiot."

"What a horrid old man!" she exclaimed almost involuntarily.

He nodded his heavy head. "Yes, I knocked him down the other day, and kicked him for it. Dicky caned me afterwards—I'm not supposed to go to The Three Tuns—but I was glad I'd done it all the same."

"Well, who is Dicky?" she asked again. Her interest was growing.

He glared at her with sudden suspicion. "What do you want to know for?"

"Because I think he must be rather a brave man," she said.

The suspicion vanished. His eyes shown. "Oh, Dicky isn't afraid of anything," he declared with pride. "He's my brother. He knows—heaps of things. He's a man."

"You are fond of him," said Juliet, with her friendly smile.

The boy's face lighted up. "He's the only person I love in the world," he said, "except Mrs. Rickett's baby."

"Mrs. Rickett's baby!" She checked a quick desire to laugh that caught her unawares. "You are fond of babies then?"

"No, I'm not. I like dogs. I don't like babies—except Mrs. Rickett's and he's such a jolly little cuss." He smiled over the words, and again she felt a deep compassion. Somehow his face seemed almost sadder when he smiled.

"I am staying with Mrs. Rickett," she said. "But I only came yesterday, and I haven't made the baby's acquaintance yet. I must get myself introduced. You haven't told me your name yet, you know. Mayn't I hear what it is? I've told you mine."

He looked at her with renewed suspicion. "Hasn't anybody told you about

Me yet?" he said.

"No, of course not. Why, I don't know anybody except Mr. and Mrs.

Rickett. And it's much more interesting to hear it from yourself."

"Is it?" He hesitated a little longer, but was finally disarmed by the kindness of her smile. "My name is Robin."

"Oh, that's a nice name," Juliet said. "And you live here? What do you do all day?"

"I don't know," he said vaguely. "I can mend fishing-nets, and I can help Dicky in the garden. And I look after Mrs. Rickett's baby sometimes when she's busy. What do you do?" suddenly resuming his attitude of suspicion.

She made a slight gesture of the hands. "Nothing at all worth doing, I am afraid," she said. "I can't mend nets. I don't garden. And I've never looked after a baby in my life."

He stared at her. "Where do you come from?" he asked curiously.

"From London." She met his curiosity with absolute candour. "And I'm tired of it. I'm very tired of it. So I've come here for a change. I'm going to like this much better."

"Better than London!" He gazed, incredulous.

"Oh, much better." Juliet spoke with absolute confidence. "Ah, here is

Columbus! He likes it better too."

She turned to greet her companion who now came hastening up to view the new acquaintance.

He sniffed round Robin who bent awkwardly and laid a fondling hand upon him. "I like your dog," he said.

"That's right," said Juliet kindly. "We are both staying at the Ricketts', so when you come to see the baby, I hope you will come to see us too. I must go now, or I shall be late for lunch. Good-bye!"

The boy lifted himself again with a slow, ungainly movement, and raised a hand to his forehead in wholly unexpected salute.

She smiled and turned to depart, but he spoke again, arresting her.

"I say!"

She looked back. "Yes? What is it?"

He shuffled his bare feet in the grass in embarrassment and murmured something she could not hear.

"What is it?" she said again, encouragingly, as if she were addressing a shy child.

He lifted his dark eyes to hers in sudden appeal. "I say," he said, with obvious effort, "if—if you meet Dicky, you—you won't tell him about—about—"

She checked the struggling words with a very kindly gesture. "Oh, no, of course not! I'm not that sort of person. But the next time you want to get rid of me, just come and tell me so, and I'll go away at once."

The gentleness of her speech uttered in that soft slow voice of hers had a curious effect upon her hearer. To her surprise, his eyes filled with tears.

"I shan't want to get rid of you! You're kind! I like you!" he blurted forth.

"Oh, thank you very much!" said Juliet, feeling oddly moved herself. "In that case, we are friends. Good-bye! Come and see me soon!"

She smiled upon him, and departed, picking up her stick from the path and turning to wave to him as she continued the ascent.

From the top of the cliff she looked back, and saw that he was still standing—a squat, fantastic figure like a goblin out of a fairy-tale—outlined against the shining sea behind him, a blot upon the blue.

Again she waved to him and he lifted one of his long arms and saluted her again in answer—stood at the salute till she turned away.

"Poor boy!" she murmured compassionately. "Poor ruined child! Columbus, we must be kind to him."

And Columbus looked up with knowing little eyes and wagged a smiling tail. He had taken to the lad himself.