Deadham Hard by Lucas Malet

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Just because she was tired, a little shattered still and spent, did this
predominance of outward nature draw her, imposing itself. It beckoned
her; and, through passing deficiency of will, she followed its beckoning,
making no serious effort to resist. With the consequence she presently
did hear sounds, but sounds surely real and recognizable enough.

Coming from the shore eastwards, below the sea-wall along the river
frontage, ponies walked, or rather floundered, fetlock deep in blown
sand--a whole drove of them to judge by the confused and muffled
trampling of their many hoofs. The drop from the top of the sea-wall to
the beach was too great, and the space between the foot of the wall and
the river-bank and breakwater too confined, for her to see the animals,
even had not oncoming darkness rendered all objects increasingly
ill-defined.

But the confused trampling instead of keeping along the foreshore, as in
all reason it should, now came up and over the sea-wall, on to the
battery, into the garden, heading towards the house, Damaris strained her
eyes through the tranquil obscurity, seeking visible cause of this
advancing commotion, but without effect. Yet all the while, as her
hearing clearly testified, the unseen ponies hustled one another,
plunging, shying away from the swish and crack of a long-thonged whip.
One stumbled and rolled over in the sand.--For although the mob was
half-way up the lawn by now, the shuffling, sliding sand stayed always
with them.--After a nasty struggle it got on to its feet, tottering
forward under savage blows, dead lame. Another, a laggard, fell into its
tracks, and lay there foundered, rattling in the throat.

By this time the foremost of the drove came abreast the house front,
where Sir Charles Verity's three ground-floor rooms, with the corridor
behind them, ranged out from the main building. The many-paned
semicircular windows of these rooms dimly glistened, below their
fan-shaped, slated roofs. The crowding scurry of scared, over-driven
animals was so indisputable that Damaris expected a universal smashing of
glass. But the sound of many hoofs, still muted by sliding sand, passed
straight on into and through the house as though no obstacle intervened
barring progress.

The many-paned windows remained intact, undemolished, dimly glistening
beneath their slated roofs. The garden stretched vacant, as before, right
away to the battery, in the elusive twilight, a sky of smoked
crystal--through which stars began to show faintly, points of cold
blurred light--above the gloom of the ilex trees to the west, and in the
south, above the indistinguishable sea, the slender moon hanging upright,
silver and sickle-shaped.

Thus far Damaris' entire consciousness had resided in and been limited to
her auditory sense; concentration being too absorbed and intense to allow
room for reasoning, still less for scepticism or even astonishment. She
had watched with her ears--as the blind watch--desperate to interpret,
instant by instant, inch by inch, this reconstructed tragedy of long-dead
man and long-dead beast. There had been no thinking round the central
interest, no attempted reading of its bearing upon normal events. Mind
and imagination were fascinated by it to the exclusion of all else. It
acted as an extravagant dream acts, abrogating all known laws of cause
and effect, giving logic and science the lie, negativing probability,
making the untrue true, the impossible convincingly manifest.

Not, indeed, until she beheld Mary Fisher, deep-bosomed and comely, in
black gown, white apron and cap, moving within those rooms
downstairs--still echoing, as they surely must, to that tumultuous and
rather ghastly equine transit--did the extraordinary character of the
occurrence flash into fullness of relief.

Mary, meanwhile, set down her flat candlestick upon the big writing-table
in Sir Charles's study, lighted lamps and drew blinds and curtains. Went
into the bedroom next door and dressing-room beyond, methodically
performing the evening ritual of "shutting up." Her shadow marched with
her, as though mockingly assisting in her operations, now crouching, now
leaping ahead, blotting a ceiling, extending itself upon a wall space.
Other shadows, thrown by the furniture, came forth and leapt also,
pranced, skipping back into hiding as the candle-light shifted and
passed. But save this indirect admission of the immaterial and grotesque,
everything showed reassuringly ordinary, the woman herself unconcerned,
ignorant of disturbance.

Damaris rose from her kneeling posture upon the window-seat and,
standing, lowered the sash. Once was enough. It was no longer incumbent
upon her to listen or to look. If these ghostly phenomena were repeated
they could convey nothing more to her, nothing fresh. They had delivered
their message--one addressed wholly and solely to herself, so she judged,
since Mary had so conspicuously no suspicion of it.

Our maiden's lips were dry. Her heart beat in her ears. Yet she was in no
degree unnerved. Seldom indeed had she been more mistress of her powers,
self-realized and vigilant. Nor did she feel tired any more, infirm of
will and spent. Rather was she consciously resolute to encounter and
withstand events--of what order she did not know as yet but events of
moment and far-reaching result, already on the road, journeying toward
her hotfoot. They were designed to test and try her. Would do their
utmost to overwhelm, to submerge her, were she weak. But she didn't
intend them to submerge her. She bade weakness quit, all her young
courage rising in arms.

The marvellous things she just now heard, so nearly saw--for it had come
very near to seeing, hadn't?--were _avant couriers_ of these same
journeying events, their appointed prelude. She could explain neither how
nor why--but, very certainly, somehow. Nor could she explain the
relation--if any--coupling together the said marvels heard and the
events. Nevertheless, she knew the former rode ahead, whether in
malignity or mercy, to forewarn her. This place, The Hard, in virtue of
its numerous vicissitudes of office and of ownership, of the memories and
traditions which it harboured, both sinister, amiable, erudite,
passionate, was singularly sentient, replete with influences. In times of
strain and stress the normal wears thin, and such lurking influences are
released. They break bounds, shouting--to such as have the psychic
genius--convincing testimony of their existence.

All this Damaris perceived, standing in the middle of the room while the
silver crescent moon looked in at her. The stillness once again was
absolute. The dusk, save where the windows made pale squares upon the
carpet, thick. The four-post bed, gay enough by day with hangings and
valences patterned in roses on a yellow ground, looked cavernous.
Carteret would lie under its black canopy to-night if--

"If all goes well."

Damaris said the words aloud, her thought becoming personal and
articulate.

Once before she had heard the smugglers' ponies, waiting in this same
room. Waiting at the open window to catch the first rumble of the wheels
of a returning carriage. Her poor dear Nannie, Sarah Watson, was
returning home after a summer holiday spent with her own people in the
north. And Damaris, younger then by nearly five years, had listened
impatiently, ready to skirmish down into the front hall--directly the
carriage turned the elbow of the drive--and enclose her faithful nurse
and foster-mother in arms of child-like love. But destiny ruled otherwise.
In vain she waited. Sarah Watson returned no more, death having elected
to take her rather horribly to himself some hours previously amid the
flaming wreckage of a derailed express.

What did this second hearing presage? A like vain waiting and disclosure
of death-dealing accident? Notwithstanding her attitude of high
resolution, the question challenged Damaris in sardonic fashion from
beneath the black canopy of the great bed. Her hand went up to the string
of pearls which, on a sudden, grew heavy about her throat.

"But not--not--pray God, the dear man with the blue eyes," she cried.

She was glad to be alone, in the encompassing semi-dark, for a warm wave
of emotion swept over her, an ardour hardly of the spiritual sort. Had
she deceived herself? Was she, in truth, desirous Carteret should
approach her solely according to that earlier manner, in which she so
simply trusted him? Did she hail his coming as that of a wise counsellor
merely--or--

But here Mary--still pursuing the time-honoured ritual of shutting
up--entered candle in hand, the landing showing brightly lit behind her.

"Dear heart alive!" she exclaimed, "whoever's that? You, Miss Damaris?
Alone here in the dark. You did make me jump. But there," she added,
repentant of her unceremonious exclamation, "I don't know what possesses
us all to-night. The least thing seems to make you jump. Mrs. Cooper's
all of a twitter, and Laura--silly girl--is almost as bad. I suppose it's
the weather being so quiet after yesterday's gale. For my own part I
always do like a wind about. It seems company, particularly these long
evenings if you're called on to go round the house by yourself."

All of which amounted to an admission, as Damaris was not slow to detect.
She was still under the empire of emotion. The abrupt intrusion affected
her. She, too, needed to carry off the situation.

"Poor Mary," she said, "you have been frightened--by what? Did you hear
anything you could not account for when you were down in the library
just now?"

The answer came after a pause, as though the speaker were suspicious,
slightly unwilling to commit herself.

"No, Miss Damaris, not in Sir Charles's rooms or in the west wing either.
Whatever unaccountable noises there ever is belong to this old part of
the house."

She set her candlestick on the dressing-table, and went to each window in
turn, drawing blinds down and curtains across. So doing she continued to
talk, moving to and fro meanwhile with a firm, light tread.

"Not that I pay much attention to such things myself. I don't hold it's
right. It's my opinion there's no sort of nonsense you can't drive
yourself into believing once you let ideas get a root in you. I've seen
too much of Mrs. Cooper giving away like that. The two winters you and
Sir Charles was abroad I'd a proper upset with her--though we are good
friends--more than once. After sundown she was enough to terrify you out
of your life--wouldn't go here and wouldn't go there for fear of she
didn't know what. Tempting Providence, I call it, and spoke to her quite
sharp. If ever I wanted to go over to spend an hour or two with father
and mother in Marychurch, I was bound to ask Mrs. Patch and the children
to come in and keep her company. There's no sense in putting yourself
into such a state. It makes you a trouble to yourself and everybody else.
And in the end, a thousand to one if anything comes of all the turmoil
and fuss--Mrs. Cooper, to be only fair to her, when she's in a reasonable
humour, allows as much."

Mary stepped across to the bed and doubled back the quilt, preparatory to
turning down the fine linen sheet. She felt she had extracted herself
from a somewhat invidious position with flying colours; and, in the
process, had administered timely advice. For it wasn't suitable Miss
Damaris should be moping alone upstairs at odd times like this. It all
came of yesterday's upset.--Her righteous anger blazed against the
clerical culprit. In that connection there was other matter of which she
craved to deliver herself--refreshing items of local gossip, sweet as
honey to the mouth did she but dare retail them. She balanced the
question this way and that. Would satisfaction outweigh offence, or
offence satisfaction, on the part of Miss Damaris? You could not be sure
how she'd take things--quite. And yet she ought to know, for the affair
certainly placed Captain Faircloth in a pleasant light. Only one who was
every inch a gentleman would behave so handsomely as he had.

She stretched across the bed to smooth the slightly wrinkled surface of
the sheet. This gymnastic feat necessitated the averting of her face and
turning of her back.

"There's a fine tale going round of how the Island lads--wild young
fellows ready for any pranks--served Mr. Sawyer, the curate," she began.
"They say William Jennifer put them up to it, having a grudge against him
for trying to get his youngest boy taken up for stealing apples last
week. They planned to give him a ducking in the pool just above the
ferry, where the water's so deep under the bank. And if Captain Faircloth
hadn't happened to come along, for certain they'd have made Mr. Sawyer
swim for it. Mr. Patch hears they handled him ever so rough, tore his
coat, and were on the very tick of pitching him in. But Captain Faircloth
would not suffer it. He took a very high line with them, it is said. And
not content with getting Mr. Sawyer away, walked with him as far as the
Grey House to protect him from any further interference."

She gave the pillows sundry judicious strokings and pats.

"I hope Mr. Sawyer's properly thankful, for it isn't many that would have
shown him so much leniency as that."

She would have enjoyed labouring the point. But comment appeared to her,
under the circumstances, to trench on impertinence. Facts spoke for
themselves. She restrained herself, fetched her candlestick from the
dressing-table, and stood by the open door, thereby enjoining her young
lady's exit.

Thus far Damaris maintained silence, but in passing out on to the
landing, she said--"Thank you. I am glad to know what has happened."

Encouraged by which acknowledgment, the excellent woman ventured
further advice.

"And now, miss, you must please just lie down on the schoolroom sofa and
get a little sleep before the gentlemen and Mr. Hordle arrive back. There
is a good two hours to wait yet, and I'll call you in plenty of time for
you to dress. You don't look altogether yourself, miss. Too much talking
with all that host of callers. You are properly fagged out. I'll get Mrs.
Cooper to beat up an egg for you in a tumbler of hot milk, with a
tablespoonful of sherry and just a pinch of sugar in it. That will get
your circulation right."

CHAPTER VI

SHOWING HOW SIR CHARLES VERITY WAS JUSTIFIED OF HIS LABOURS

Which homely programme being duly executed, worked restorative wonders.
Matter, in the sublimated form of egg-flip, acted upon mind beneficially
through the functions of a healthy, if weary, young body. Our maiden
slept, to dream not of ghostly ponies or other uncomfortably discarnate
creatures; but of Darcy Faircloth in his pretty piece of Quixotism,
rescuing a minister of the Church of England "as by law established" from
heretical baptismal rites of total immersion. The picture had a rough
side to it, and also a merry one; but, beyond these, generous dealing
wholly delightful to her feeling. She awoke soothed and restored, ready
to confront the oncoming of events--whatever their character--in a spirit
of high confidence as well as of resolution.

With the purpose of advertising this brave humour she dressed herself in
her best. I do not deny a love of fine clothes in Damaris. Yet in her own
home, and for delectation of the men belonging to her, a woman is surely
free to deck herself as handsomely as her purse allows. "Beauty
unadorned" ceased to be practicable, in self-respecting circles, with the
expulsion of our first parents from the paradisaic state; while beauty
merely dowdy, is a pouring of contempt on one of God's best gifts to the
human race. Therefore I find no fault with Damaris, upon this rather
fateful evening, in that she clothed herself in a maize-coloured silk
gown flowered in faint amber and faint pink. Cut in the piece from
shoulder to hem, according to a then prevailing fashion, it moulded
bosom, waist and haunches, spreading away into a demi-train behind. The
high Medici collar of old lace, at the back of the square decolletage,
conferred dignity; the hanging lace of the elbow sleeves a lightness. Her
hair, in two wide plaits, bound her head smoothly, save where soft
disobedient little curls, refusing restriction, shaded her forehead and
the nape of her neck.

After a few seconds of silent debate she clasped Carteret's pearls about
her throat again; and so fared away, a creature of radiant aspect, amid
sombre setting of low ceilings and dark carpeted floors, to await the
advent of the travellers.

These arrived some little while before their time, so that the girl, in
her gleaming dress, had gone but half-way down the staircase when they
came side by side into the hall.--Two very proper gentlemen, the moist
freshness of the night attending them, a certain nobility in their
bearing which moved her to enthusiasm, momentarily even bringing a mist
before her eyes. For they were safe and well both of them, so she
joyously registered, serene of countenance, moreover, as bearers of glad
tidings are. Whatever the ghostly ponies foretold could be no evil
shadowing them--for which she gave God thanks.

Meanwhile, there without, the light of the carriage lamps pierced the
enclosing gloom, played on the silver plating of harness, on the shining
coats of the horses, whose nostrils sent out jets of pale steam. Played
over the faces of the servants, too, Mary and Laura just within the open
door, Hordle and Conyers outside loading down the baggage from the back
of the mail-phaeton, and on Patch, exalted high above them on the
driving-seat.

As Damaris paused, irradiated by the joy of welcome and of forebodings
falsified, upon the lowest step of the staircase, Sir Charles turned
aside and tenderly kissed her.

"My darling," he said.

And Carteret, following him an instant later, took her by both hands and,
from arm's length, surveyed her in smiling admiration he made no effort
to repress.

"Dear witch, this is unexpected good fortune. I had little thought of
seeing you so soon--resplendent being that you are, veritably clothed
with sunshine."

"And with your pearls," she gaily said.

"Ah! my poor pearls," he took her up lightly. "I am pleased they still
find favour in your sight. But aren't you curious to learn what has made
us desert our partridge shooting at an hour's notice, granting the pretty
little beggars unlooked-for length of life?"

His blue eyes laughed into hers. There was a delightful atmosphere about
him. Something had happened to him surely--for wasn't he, after all, a
young man even yet?

"Yes--what--what has brought you, Colonel Sahib?" Damaris laughed back at
him, bubbling over with happy excitement.

"Miracles," he answered. "A purblind Government at last admits the error
of its ways and proposes to make reparation for its neglect of a notable
public-servant."

"You?" she cried.

Carteret shook his head, still surveying her but with a soberer glance.

"No--no--not me. In any case there isn't any indebtedness to
acknowledge--no arrears to pay off. I have my deserts.--To a man
immensely my superior. Look nearer home, dear witch."

He made a gesture in the direction of his host.

"My Commissioner Sahib?"

"Yes--your Commissioner Sahib, who comes post haste to request your dear
little permission, before accepting this tardy recognition of his
services to the British Empire."

"Ah! but that's too much!" the girl said softly, glancing from one to the
other, enchanted and abashed by the greatness of their loyalty to and
prominent thought of her.

"Has this made him happy?" she asked Carteret, under her breath. "He
looks so, I think. How good that this has come in time--that it hasn't
come too late."

For, in the midst of her joyful excitement, a shadow crossed Damaris'
mind oddly obscuring the light. She suffered a perception things might so
easily have turned out otherwise; a suspicion that, had the reparation of
which Carteret spoke been delayed, even by a little, its beloved
recipient would no longer have found use for or profit in it. Damaris
fought the black thought, as ungrateful and faithless. To fear disaster
is too often to invite it.

Just at this juncture Miss Felicia made hurried and gently eager
irruption into the hall; and with that irruption the tone of prevailing
sentiment declined upon the somewhat trivial, even though warmly
affectionate. For she fluttered round Sir Charles, as Mary Fisher helped
divest him of his overcoat, in sympathetic overflowings of the simplest
sort.--"She had been reading and failed to hear the carriage, hence her
tardy appearance. Let him come into the drawing-room at once, out of
these draughts. There was a delightful wood fire and he must be chilled.
The drive down the valley was always so cold at night--particularly where
the road runs through the marsh lands by Lampit."

In her zeal of welcome Miss Verity was voluble to the point of
inconsequence, not to say incoherence. Questions poured from her. She
appeared agitated, quaintly self-conscious, so at least it occurred to
Damaris. Finally she addressed Carteret.

"And you too must be frozen," she declared. "How long it is since we met!
I have always been so unlucky in just missing you here! Really I believe
I have only seen you once since you and Charles stayed with us at Canton
Magna.--You were both on leave from India. I dare not think how many
years ago that is--before this child"--her candid eyes appealingly sought
those of Damaris--"before this child existed. And you are so wonderfully
unaltered."

Colour dyed her thin face and rather scraggy neck. Only the young should
blush. After forty such involuntary exhibitions of emotion are
unattractive, questionably even pathetic.

"Really time has stood still with you--it seems to me, Colonel Carteret."

"Time has done better than stand still," Damaris broke in, with a rather
surprising imperiousness. "It has beautifully run backwards--lately."

And our maiden, in her whispering gleaming dress, swept down from the
step, swept past the sadly taken aback Miss Felicia, and joined her
father. She put her hand within his arm.

"Come and warm yourself--come, dearest," she said, gently drawing him
onward into the long room, where from above the range of dark
bookshelves, goggle-eyed, pearl-grey Chinese goblins and monsters, and
oblique-eyed Chinese philosophers and saints looked mysteriously down
through the warm mellow light.

Damaris was conscious of a singular inward turmoil. For Miss Felicia's
speeches found small favour in her ears. She resented this open claiming
of Carteret as a member of the elder generation. Still more resented her
own relegation to the nullity of the prenatal state. Reminiscences, in
which she had neither lot nor part, left her cold. Or, to be accurate,
bred in her an intemperate heat, putting a match to jealousies which,
till this instant, she had no knowledge of. Touched by that match they
flared to the confusion of charity and reverence. Hence, impulsively,
unscrupulously, yet with ingenious unkindness, she struck--her tongue a
sword--to the wounding of poor Miss Felicia. And she felt no necessity
for apology. She liked to be unkind. She liked to strike. Aunt Felicia
should not have been so self-assertive, so tactless. She had brought
chastisement upon herself. It wasn't like her to behave thus. Her
enthusiasms abounded; but she possessed a delicate appreciation of
relative positions. She never poached. This came perilously near
poaching.--And everything had danced to so inspiring a tune, the movement
of it so delicious! Now the evening was spoilt. The first fine alacrity
of it could not be recaptured--which was all Aunt Felicia's fault.--No,
for her unkindness Damaris felt no regret.

It may be remarked that our angry maiden's mind dwelt rather upon the
snub she had inflicted on Miss Verity, than upon the extensive compliment
she had paid, and the challenge she had delivered, to Carteret. Hearing
her flattering declaration, his mind not unnaturally dwelt more upon the
latter. It took him like a blow, so that from bending courteously over
the elder lady's hand, he straightened himself with a jerk. His eyes
followed the imperious, sun-clad young figure, questioning and keenly
alert. To-day he had liberally enjoyed the pleasures of friendship, for
Charles Verity had been largely and generously elate. But Damaris'
outburst switched feeling and sentiment onto other lines. They became
personal. Were her words thrown off in mere lightness of heart, or had
she spoken deliberately, with intention? It were wiser, perhaps, not to
ask. He steadied his attention on to Miss Felicia once more, but not
without effort.

"You always said kind and charming things, I remember," so he told her.
"You are good enough to say them still."

Damaris stood by her father, upon the tiger skin before the hearth.

"Tell me, dearest?" she prayed him.

Charles Verity put his hand under her chin, turned up her face and looked
searchingly at her. Her beauty to-night was conspicuous and of noble
quality. It satisfied his pride. Public life invited him, offering him
place and power. Ranklings of disappointment, of detraction and slight,
were extinguished. His soul was delivered from the haunting vexations of
them. He was in the saddle again, and this radiant woman-child, whom he
so profoundly loved, should ride forth with him for all the world to
see--if she pleased. That she would please he had no doubt. Pomp and
circumstance would suit her well. She was, moreover, no slight or frothy
piece of femininity; but could be trusted, amid the glamour of new and
brilliant conditions, to use her judgment and to keep her head.
Increasingly he respected her character as well as her intelligence. He
found in her unswerving sense of right and wrong, sense of honour
likewise. Impetuous she might be, swift to feel and to revolt; but of
tender conscience and, on occasion, royally compassionate. Now he could
give her fuller opportunity. Could place her in circumstances admittedly
enviable and prominent. From a comparative back-water, she should gain
the full stream--and that stream, in a sense, at the flood.

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