Frenchmans Creek - Daphne du Maurier

"Only that I hid William in the nursery that night, my lady, when I found him lying in the passage, with a cut on his arm, and another on the back of his head. And he told me then that Sir Harry and the other gentlemen would kill him if he was found, that the French pirate was his master, and there had been fighting at Navron that night. So, instead of giving him up, my lady, I bathed and dressed his wounds, and I made him up a bed on the floor beside the children, and after breakfast, when the gentlemen were all away searching for him and the other pirates, I let him out, my lady, by the side-door, and no one knows anything about it but you and me."

She blew her nose noisily on her handkerchief, and would have cried again. But Dona smiled at her, and leaning forward patted her shoulder, and said, "It's all right, Prue. You are a good faithful girl to tell me this, and I shall keep it to myself. I am fond of William, too, and should be greatly distressed if any harm came to him. But I want you to tell me something. Where is William now?"

"He said something about Coverack when he woke, my lady, and asked for you, and I told him you were in bed, very shocked and exhausted, as Lord Rockingham had been killed in the night. At that he seemed to think a while, my lady, and then when I had bathed and dressed his wounds afresh he said he had friends at Gweek who would shelter him, and would not betray him, and that he would be there if you wished to send word to him, my lady."

"At Gweek?" said Dona. "Very well then, Prue. I want you to go back to bed, and think no more of this, and to say nothing of it ever again, to anyone, not even to me. Go on as you have always done, won't you Prue, and look after the children, and love them well."

"Yes, my lady," said Prue, and she curtseyed, her tears still near the surface, and left the room, and went back to the nursery. And Dona smiled to herself in the darkness, for William the faithful was still at hand, her ally and her friend, and his master's escape from the keep had become a thing of possibility.

So she slept, her mind easier than it had been, and when she woke she saw that the listless sky had become blue again, and the clouds were gone, and there was something in the air of that midsummer that would not come again, a warmth and a brilliance belonging to the days when, careless and enraptured, she had gone fishing in the creek.

While she dressed she made her plans, and when she had breakfasted she sent word for Harry to come to her. Already he had recovered something of his former spirits, and as he came into the room he called to his dogs in his usual voice, hearty and well content with himself, and he kissed her on the back of her neck as she sat before her mirror.

"Harry," she said, "I want you to do something for me."

"Anything in the world," he promised eagerly, "what is it?"

"I want you to leave Navron today," she said, "and take Prue and the children with you."

His face fell, and he stared at her in dismay.

"But you?" he said, "why will you not come with us?"

"I shall follow you," she said, "tomorrow."

He began to pace up and down the room.

"I imagined we could all travel together, when this business is over," he protested. "They'll be hanging that fellow tomorrow in all probability. I thought of going over to see Godolphin and Eustick about it today. You'd like to see him hanged, would not you? We could fix it for nine in the morning, perhaps, and then start our journey afterwards."

"Have you ever seen a man hanged?" she said.

"Why, yes, there's little to it, I admit. But this is rather different. Damn it, Dona, the fellow murdered poor Rock, and would have killed you too. Do you mean to say you have no wish for revenge?"

She did not answer, and he could not see her face, for her back was turned to him.

"George Godolphin would think it very cool of me," he said, "to slip away without a word of explanation."

"I would do the explaining," she said. "I propose calling on him myself this afternoon, after you have gone."

"Do you mean that I should deliberately set off on the journey, without you, taking the children and the nurse, and leaving you here, all alone, with a handful of half-witted servants?"

"Exactly that, Harry."

"And if I take the carriage for the children, and ride myself, how would you travel tomorrow?"

"I should hire a post-chaise from Helston."

"And join with us at Okehampton you mean, in the evening?"

"And join with you at Okehampton, in the evening."

He stood by the window, staring moodily out into the garden.

"Oh, God damn it, Dona, shall I ever understand you?"

"No, Harry," she said, "but it does not matter very much."

"It does matter," he said, "it makes life most confounded hell for both of us."

She glanced up at him standing there with his hands behind his back.

"Do you really think that?" she said.

He shrugged his shoulders. "Oh, damme," he said, "I don't know what I think. I only know I'd give everything in the world to make you happy, but the cursed trouble is I don't know how to, and you are fonder of James's fingernail than you are of me. What's a fellow to do when his wife doesn't love him but drink and play cards? Will you tell me that?"

She stood beside him a moment, and put her hand on his shoulder. "I shall be thirty in three weeks' time," she said. "Perhaps as I grow older, Harry, I shall grow wiser."

"I don't want you any wiser," he said sullenly, "I want you as you are."

She did not answer, and playing with her sleeve he said to her, "Do you remember, before you came to Navron, you said some nonsense or other about feeling like that bird in your father's aviary? I couldn't make head or tale of it, and I still can't. It sounded such gibberish, you know. I wish I knew what you were driving at."

"Don't think about it," she said, patting his cheek, "because the linnet found its way to the sky. And now, Harry, are you going to do what I asked you?"

"Yes, I suppose so," he said, "but I warn you, I don't like it, and I shall put up at Okehampton and wait for you. You won't delay your journey for any reason, will you?"

"No," she said. "No, I won't delay."

And he went downstairs to make the necessary arrangements for departure, while she summoned Prue and told her of the sudden change of plans. At once all was bustle and confusion, the strapping up of bedding and boxes, the packing of food and clothing for the journey, while the children ran about like puppies, delighted in all movement, any sort of change for the variety it gave, and "They don't mind leaving Navron," thought Dona; "in a month's time they will be playing in Hampshire fields, and Cornwall will be forgotten. Children forget places so easily, and faces even faster."

They had cold meat at one o'clock, the children eating with herself and Harry for a treat. Henrietta danced about the table like a fairy, white with excitement because he was to ride beside their carriage. James sat on Dona's lap, endeavouring to put his feet up on the table, and when Dona permitted him, he looked about him with an air of triumph, and she kissed his fat cheek and held him to her. Harry caught something of his children's excitement, and he began to tell them about Hampshire, and how they would go there in all probability, for the rest of the summer. "You shall have a pony, Henrietta," he said, "and James too, later on," and he began to throw pieces of meat across the floor to the dogs, and the children clapped their hands and shouted.

The carriage came to the door, and they were bundled inside, packages, rugs, pillows, and the baskets for the two dogs, while Harry's horse champed at his bit, and pawed the ground.

"You must make my peace with George Godolphin," said Harry, bending down to Dona, flicking his boots with his whip. "He won't understand it, you know, my tearing off in this way."

"Leave everything to me," she answered, "I shall know what to say."

"I still don't know why you won't come with us," he said, staring at her, "but we'll be waiting for you, tomorrow evening, at Okehampton. When we pass through Heldston today I will order your chaise for the morning."

"Thank you, Harry."

He went on flicking the toe of his boot. "Stand still, will you, you brute?" he said to his horse; and then to Dona, "I believe you've still got that damned fever on you, and you won't admit it."

"No," she said, "I have no fever."

"Your eyes are strange," he said; "they looked different to me the first moment I saw you, lying in bed there, up in your room. The expression has changed. God damn it, I don't know what it is."

"I told you this morning," she said, "I'm getting older, and shall be thirty in three weeks' time. It's my age you can see in my eyes."

"Damn it, it's not," he said. "Ah, well, I suppose I'm a fool and a blockhead, and will have to spend the rest of my days wondering what the hell has happened to you."

"I rather think you will, Harry," she said.

Then he waved his whip, and wheeled his horse about, and cantered away down the drive, while the carriage followed soberly, the two children smiling from the window and blowing kisses, until they turned the corner of the avenue and could see her no more.

Dona went through the empty dining-hall and into the garden. It seemed to her that the house already had a strange, deserted appearance, as though it knew in its old bones that soon the covers would be placed upon the chairs, and the shutters drawn, and the doors bolted, and nothing would be there any longer but its own secret darkness: no sunshine, no voices, no laughter, only the quiet memories of the things that had been.

Here, beneath this tree, she had lain on her back in the sun and watched the butterflies, and Godolphin had called upon her for the first time, surprising her with her ringlets in disorder and the flowers behind her ears. And in the woods there had been bluebells, where there were bluebells no more, and the bracken had been young which was now waist-high and darkly green. So much loveliness, swiftly come and swiftly gone, and she knew in her heart that this was the last time of looking upon it all, and that she would never come to Navron again. Part of her would linger there for ever: a footstep running tiptoe to the creek, the touch of her hand on a tree, the imprint of her body in the long grass. And perhaps one day, in after years, someone would wander there and listen to the silence, as she had done, and catch the whisper of the dreams that she had dreamt there, in midsummer, under the hot sun and the white sky.

Then she turned her back on the garden, and calling to the stable-boy in the courtyard she bade him catch the cob who was in the meadow, and put a saddle on him, for she was going riding.

CHAPTER XXII

When Dona came to Gweek she made straight for a little cottage almost buried in the woods, a hundred yards or so from the road, and which she knew instinctively to be the place she sought. Passing there once before she had seen a woman at the doorway, young and pretty, and William, driving the carriage, had saluted her with his whip.

"There have been ugly rumours," Godolphin had said, "of young women in distress," and Dona smiled to herself, thinking of the girl's blush as she remembered it, and William's expression, his gallant bow, little guessing that his mistress had observed him.

The cottage appeared deserted, and Dona, dismounting, and knocking on the door, wondered for one moment if she had been mistaken after all. Then she heard a movement from the scrap of garden at the back, and she caught the glimpse of a petticoat disappearing into a door, and that door suddenly shutting, and the bolt being drawn. She knocked gently, and getting no answer called, "Don't be afraid. It is Lady St. Columb from Navron."