“Oh, indeed? And why don’t you look shocked at my question and say, ‘Er – not very flattering to your father, is it?’ or something to that effect? That’s how you ought to retort, by every known rule,” said Olive, wickedly demure.
“And why don’t you look shocked at my answer and say, ‘Er – kindly remember that you are reflecting on my father’? That’s how you ought to retort, etc, etc.”
“Because,” answered Olive, when she had recovered from the laughter into which his quizzical reply had launched her, “because I know you were making an exception in his favour as well as you knew I was. So we are agreed on that head.”
“Quite so. There’s nothing like a good understanding to begin with. And now by way of trying whether it’ll continue, let’s see if you’ll fall in with my idea. We must go for a sail. How does that idea strike you?”
“As perfection,” she rejoined, looking up at him with a light laugh. “Jem Pollock has the lightest boat here, but even that’s a shocking tub.”
It was. By the time they had put a couple of hundred yards between themselves and the beach Roland was fain to admit the justice of the stigma.
“Where are we going to?” asked Olive, as he suddenly turned the boat’s head and coasted along the shore.
“The Skegs. I’ve set my heart on exploring that pinnacle of scare, and was waiting until you could go with me. You were the first to unfold its dread mysteries, and you shall be the first to aid me in braving them.”
“Oh! But – I’m just the very least little bit afraid.”
“Naturally.”
“It’s fortunate – or unfortunate – you didn’t say where you intended going, or Jem Pollock wouldn’t have let us have his boat for love or money.”
“He wouldn’t?”
“Not he! They’re all in mortal terror of the place. To land there would bring them ill-luck for life. They even think they would hardly leave the rock alive. A boy was killed there once trying to get at some sea gulls’ nests. They put it down to his temerity in landing there at all.”
“A set of oafs! Well, we are going to land there – the tide is just right for it – and I wager long odds we don’t come to grief in any sort of way. Village superstition will receive a salutary check – and I, even I, shall place your father under a debt to me for my share in exploding such a pagan relic. Look,” he broke off, “there would be a good drop for a runaway horse or anyone tired of life.”
A bend in the coastline had shut out the fishing village behind them, for they had come some distance along the shore. The face of the cliff at this point rose sheer for a couple of hundred feet, where its surface was broken by a narrow ledge like a mere goat-path. Above this it slanted upwards to nearly twice that height.
“It would, indeed,” assented Olive. “That rejoices in the name of Hadden’s Slide.”
“Does it? And who was Hadden, and what the mischief possessed him to try his hand at toboganning on such a spot?”
Olive laughed. “Nobody knows. It is an old landslip, and it is supposed that a cottage belonging to one Hadden was carried away with it. But that is very old tradition.”
“A pity. I had quite thought another spectral wanderer had lighted on the place for his posthumous disportings, like my ancestor yonder at The Skegs.”
“Well, he would have a better right, for that is your property.”
“My property!”
“Yes. It is a part of Cranston,” answered Olive, looking surprised.
“Oh – ah! I see. But you said my property. Now Cranston is not my property, and very likely never will be.”
This remark was made with a purpose. How would that strike her? he thought, and he watched her narrowly. But, however it happened to strike her, she took care that he should be none the wiser.
“Why do you take me up so sharply?” she expostulated with pretty mock petulance. “Really I shall become quite afraid of you if you are going to be so precise. One can’t always think for five minutes or so before making every innocent little remark. Now can one?”
“Of course not. What’s that extraordinary looking fissure there in front? It seems as if a stroke of lightning had split the whole cliff from brow to base.”
“That is Smugglers’ Ladder. It is well worth seeing. I’ve only been there once. We must make up a picnic and go there some day. Are you fond of picnics, Mr Dorrien?”
“Passionately – under some circumstances. But can’t we get as far this afternoon?”
Olive looked dubious.
“It’s a long way. Further than it seems. And father was right. It’s coming on to rain.”
“So it is. Here we are at our destination, though, and we can shelter under the rock.”
Great drops began to plash on the water, and the cliffs above looked dim as through a mist. The tallest of The Skegs reared up its lofty turret overhead, the sea washing over a narrow sloping ledge of rock at its base with a hollow plash. This was the only landing place.
The landing was a good deal more difficult than it looked. There was something of a current swirling round the rock, and the boat, as it got within the recoil of the waves, danced about in lively fashion. Olive, a little overawed at finding herself for the first time in this uncanny place, looked about her in a half-scared, half-subdued manner, as if she expected to behold the spectral hound start open-mouthed from the waves. Then enjoyment of the adventure dispelled all other misgiving.
“Just in time,” she remarked gaily, as, her companion having secured the boat, they gained the desired shelter. A violent downpour followed, beating down the sea like oil. Not a soul was in sight on the lonely and desolate beach, and away on the horizon great cloud banks came rolling. Our two wanderers – three rather, for Roy was not slow to assert his claim – made the best they could of the limited shelter, contemplating the rushing deluge a yard in front of them with the utmost equanimity.
“May as well make ourselves snug while we can. I shall venture to smoke.”
“One of your many advantages over us poor women. Well, why do you look so astonished? Isn’t it?”
“Why do I look astonished?” echoed her companion lazily and between the puffs as he lighted up. “Oh, only because one seems to have heard that sentiment before.”
“Well? And then?”
“And then? Oh – and then – I suppose it astonished me to hear a threadbare sort of a commonplace proceed from you. That’s all.”
Olive tried to feel angry. She could not even look it, however. The tell-tale laugh rose to her eyes, curved the witching little mouth – then out it came.
“Do you know – you are very rude? At least I ought to tell you so – ”
“Another commonplace.”
“Why you deliberately snubbed me?” she went on, taking no notice of the murmured interruption. “Snubbed me like a brother. Shut me up, in fact.”
“Cool hands, brothers – stick at nothing. Ought to know. One myself. But, I say, wasn’t it odd how we first ran against each other that morning – you and I – when you were drawing?”
Now there was nothing in the foregoing conversation as set down on cold-blooded and unfeeling paper which all the world and his wife might not have heard. Nothing in the words, that is. But were that conjugal impersonality within earshot of these two people coasting along a dismal and desolate seashore at imminent peril of a wetting through, or crouched under the rock to avoid it, much gossip might it have chucklingly evolved, merely from the tone of their voices. For the said tone had that subtle ring about it which meant that the owners of these voices were fonder of each other’s society than