The Secret of Sarek Part 36

"I will have confidence, darling, I promise you."

"And you will be right," he said, laughing, "for I shall be the leader.

And what a leader, eh, mother? Why, yesterday evening I foresaw that, to carry the enterprise through successfully and so that my mother should be neither cold nor hungry, in case we were not able to take the boat this afternoon, we must have food and rugs! Well, they will be of use to us to-night, seeing that for prudence's sake we mustn't abandon our post here and sleep at the Priory. Where did you put the parcel, mother?"

They ate gaily and with a good appet.i.te. Then Francois wrapped his mother up and tucked her in: and they both fell asleep, lying close together, happy and unafraid.

When the keen air of the morning woke Veronique, a belt of rosy light streaked the sky. Francois was sleeping the peaceful sleep of a child that feels itself protected and is untroubled by dreams. For a long time she just sat gazing at him without wearying: and she was still looking at him when the sun was high above the horizon.

"To work, mother," he said, after he had opened his eyes and given her a kiss. "No one in the tunnel? No. Then we have plenty of time to go on board."

They took the rugs and provisions and, with brisk steps, went towards the descent leading to the Postern, at the extreme end of the island.

Beyond this point the rocks were heaped up in formidable confusion: and the sea, though calm, lapped against them noisily.

"I hope your boat's there still!" said Veronique.

"Lean over a little, mother. You can see her down there, hanging in that crevice. We have only to work the pulley to get her afloat. Oh, it's all very well thought out, mother darling! We have nothing to fear . . . .

Only . . . only . . ."

He had interrupted himself and was thinking.

"What? What is it?" asked Veronique.

"Oh, nothing! A slight delay."

"But . . ."

He began to laugh:

"Really, for the leader of an expedition, it's rather humiliating, I admit. Just fancy, I've forgotten one thing: the oars. They are at the Priory."

"But this is terrible!" cried Veronique.

"Why? I'll run to the Priory and I shall be back in ten minutes."

All Veronique's apprehensions returned:

"And suppose they make their way out of the tunnel meanwhile?"

"Come, come, mother," he laughed, "you promised to have confidence. To get out of the tunnel would take them an hour's hard work; and we should hear them. Besides, what's the use of talking, mother? I'll be back at once."

He ran off.

"Francois! Francois!"

He did not reply.

"Oh," she thought, once more a.s.sailed by forebodings. "I had sworn not to leave him for a second!"

She followed him at a distance and stopped on a hillock between the Fairies' Dolmen and the Calvary of the Flowers. From here she could see the entrance to the tunnel and also saw her son jogging along the gra.s.s.

He first went into the bas.e.m.e.nt of the Priory. But the oars seemed not to be there, for he came out almost at once and went to the main door, which he opened and disappeared from sight.

"One minute ought to be plenty for him," said Veronique to herself. "The oars must be in the hall . . . or at any rate on the ground-floor . . . . Say two minutes, at the outside."

She counted the seconds while watching the entrance to the tunnel.

But three minutes, four minutes, five minutes pa.s.sed: and the front-door did not open again.

All Veronique's confidence vanished. She thought that it was mad of her not to have gone with her son and that she ought never to have submitted to a child's will. Without troubling about the tunnel or the dangers from that side, she began to walk towards the Priory. But she had the horrible feeling which people sometimes experience in dreams, when their legs seem paralysed and when they are unable to move, while the enemy advances to attack them.

And suddenly, on reaching the Dolmen, she beheld a sight the meaning of which was immediately clear to her. The ground at the foot of the oaks round the right-hand part of the semi-circle was littered with lately cut branches, which still bore their green leaves.

She raised her eyes and stood stupefied and dismayed.

One oak alone had been stripped. And on the huge trunk, bare to a height of twelve or fifteen feet, there was a paper, transfixed by an arrow and bearing the inscription, "V. d'H."

"The fourth cross," Veronique faltered, "the cross marked with my name!"

She supposed that, as her father was dead, the initials of her maiden name must have been written by one of her enemies, the chief of them, no doubt; and for the first time, under the influence of recent events, remembering the woman and the boy who were persecuting her, she involuntarily attributed a definite set of features to that enemy.

It was a fleeting impression, an improbable theory, of which she was not even conscious. She was overwhelmed by something much more terrible. She suddenly understood that the monsters, those creatures of the heath and the cells, the accomplices of the woman and the boy, must have been there, since the cross was prepared. No doubt they had built a foot-bridge and thrown it over the chasm to take the place of the bridge to which she had set fire. They were masters of the Priory. And Francois was once more in their hands!

Then she rushed straight along, collecting all her strength. She in her turn ran over the turf, dotted with ruins, that sloped towards the front of the house.

"Francois! Francois! Francois!"

She called his name in a piercing voice. She announced her coming with loud cries. Thus did she reach the Priory.

One half of the door stood ajar. She pushed it and darted into the hall, crying:

"Francois! Francois!"

The call rang from floor to attic and throughout the house, but remained unanswered:

"Francois! Francois!"

She went upstairs, opening doors at random, running into her son's room, into Stephane's, into Honorine's. She found n.o.body.

"Francois! Francois! . . . Don't you hear me? Are they hurting you?

. . . Oh, Francois, do answer!"

She went back to the landing. Opposite her was M. d'Hergemont's study.

She flung herself upon the door and at once recoiled, as though stricken by a vision from h.e.l.l.

A man was standing there, with arms crossed and apparently waiting for her. And it was the man whom she had pictured for an instant when thinking of the woman and the boy. It was the third monster!

She said, simply, but in a voice filled with inexpressible horror: