Chapter XXVIII: 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.