Sir John Constantine Part 28

But on my way, as I drew near through the glades to the home of the enchantress Circe, there met me Hermes with his golden rod, in semblance of a lad wearing youth's bloom on his lip and all youth's charm at its heyday. He clasped my hand and spake and greeted me. 'Whither away now, wretched wight, amid these mountain-summits alone and astray? And yonder in the styes of Circe, transformed to swine, thy comrades lie penned and make their lairs!'"--_Odyssey, bk. X_.

"Prosper," said my father, seriously, "we must return to the s.h.i.+p."

"I suppose so," I admitted; but with a rising temper, so that my tone contradicted him.

"It is most necessary. We are no longer an army, or even a legation."

"Nothing could be more evident. You may add, sir, that we are badly scared, the both of us. Yet I don't stomach sailing away, at any rate, until we have discovered what has happened to the others."

I cast a vicious glance up at the forest.

"Good Lord, child!" my father exclaimed. "Who was suggesting it?"

"You spoke of returning to the s.h.i.+p."

"To be sure I did. She can work round to Ajaccio and repair.

She will arrive evidently from the verge of total wreck, an ordinary trader in ballast, with nothing suspicious about her. No questions will be asked that Pomery cannot invent an answer for off-hand.

She will be allowed to repair, refit, and sail for reinforcements."

"Reinforcements? But where will you find reinforcements?"

"I must rely on Gervase to provide them. Meanwhile we have work on hand. To begin with, we must clear up this mystery, which may oblige us to camp here for some time."

"O-oh!" said I.

"You do not suggest, I hope, that we can abandon our comrades, whatever has befallen them?"

"My dear father!" I protested.

"Tut, lad! I never supposed it of you. Well, it seems to me we are more likely to clear up the mystery by sitting still than by beating the woods. Do you agree?"

"To be sure," said I, "we may spare ourselves the trouble of searching for it."

"I propose then, as our first move, that we step down to the s.h.i.+p together and pack Captain Pomery off to Ajaccio with his orders--"

"Excuse me, sir," I interrupted. "_You_ shall step down to the s.h.i.+p, while I wait here and guard the camp."

"My dear Prosper," said he, "I like the spirit of that offer: but, upon my word, I hope you won't persist in it. These misadventures, if I may confess it, get me on the raw, and I cannot leave you here alone without feeling d.a.m.nably anxious."

"Trust me, sir," I answered, "I shall be at least as uncomfortable until you return. But I have an inkling that--whatever the secret may be, and whether we surprise it or it surprises us--it will wait until we are separated. Moreover, I have a theory to test. So far, every man has disappeared outside the churchyard here and somewhere on the side of the forest. The camp itself has been safe enough, and so have the meadow and the path down to the creek. You will remember that Billy was roaming the meadow for mushrooms at the very time we lost Mr. Fett: yet Billy came to no harm. To be sure, the enemy, having thinned us down to two, may venture more boldly; but if I keep the camp here while you take the path down to the creek, and nothing happens to either, we shall be narrowing the zone of danger, so to speak."

My father nodded. "You will promise me not to set foot outside the camp?"

"I will promise more," said I. "At the smallest warning I am going to let off my piece. You must not be annoyed if I fetch you back on a false alarm, or even an absurd one. I shall sit here with my musket across my knees, and half a dozen others, all loaded, close around me: and at the first sign of something wrong--at the crackling of a twig, maybe--I shall fire. You, on your way to the creek, will keep your eyes just as wide open and fire at the first hint of danger."

"I don't like it," my father persisted.

"But you see the wisdom of it," said I. "We must stay here: that's agreed. So long as we stay here we shall be desperately uncomfortable, fearing we don't know what: that also is agreed.

Then, say I, for G.o.d's sake let us clear this business up and get it over."

My father nodded, stood up and shouldered his piece. I knew that his eyes were on me, and avoided meeting them, afraid for a moment that he was going to say something in praise of my courage, whereas in truth I was horribly scared. That last word or two had really expressed my terror. I desired nothing but to get the whole thing over. My hand shook so as I turned to load the first musket that I had twice to shorten my grasp of the ramrod before I could insert it in the barrel.

From the gateway leading to the lane my father watched till the loading was done.

"Good-bye and good luck, lad!" said he, and turned to go. A pace or two beyond the gateway he halted as if to add a word, but thought better of it and resumed his stride. His footsteps sounded hollow between the walls of the narrow lane. Then he reached the turf of the meadow, and the sound ceased suddenly.

I wanted--wanted desperately--to break down and run after him.

By a bodily effort--something like a long pull on a rope--I held myself steady and braced my back against the bole of the ilex tree, which I had chosen because it gave a view through the gateway towards the forest. Upon this opening and the glade beyond it I kept my eyes, for the first minute or two scarcely venturing to wink, only relaxing the strain now and again for a cautious glance to right and left around the deserted enclosure. I could hear my heart working like a pump.

The enclosure--indeed the whole valley--lay deadly silent in the growing heat of the morning. On the hidden summit behind the wood a raven croaked; and as the sun mounted, a pair of buzzards, winging their way to the mountains, crossed its glare and let fall a momentary trace of shadow that touched my nerves as with a whip.

But few birds haunt the Corsican bush, and to-day even these woods and this watered valley were dumb of song. No breeze sent a s.h.i.+ver through the grey ilexes or the still paler olives in the orchard to my right. On the slope the chestnut trees ma.s.sed their foliage in heavy plumes of green, plume upon plume, wave upon wave, a still cascade of verdure held between jagged ridges of granite. Here and there the granite pushed a bare pinnacle above the trees, and over these pinnacles the air swam and quivered.

The minutes dragged by. A caterpillar let itself down by a thread from the end of the bough under which I sat, in a direct line between me and the gateway. Very slowly, while I watched him, he descended for a couple of feet, swayed a little and hung still, as if irresolute. A b.u.t.terfly, after hovering for a while over the wall's dry coping, left it and fluttered aimlessly across the garth, vanis.h.i.+ng at length into the open doorway of the church.

The church stood about thirty paces from my tree, and by turning my head to the angle of my right shoulder I looked straight into its porch. It struck me that from the shadow within it, or from one of the narrow windows, a marksman could make an easy target of me.

The building had been empty over-night: no one (it was reasonable to suppose) had entered the enclosure during Billy's sentry-go; no one for a certainty had entered it since. Nevertheless, the fancy that eyes might be watching me from within the church began now to worry, and within five minutes had almost worried me into leaving my post to explore.

I repressed the impulse. I could not carry my stand of muskets with me, and to leave it unguarded would be the starkest folly. Also I had sworn to myself to keep watch on the gateway towards the forest, and this resolution must obviously be broken if I explored the church. I kept my seat, telling myself that, however the others had vanished, they had vanished in silence, and therefore all danger from gunshot might be ruled out of the reckoning.

I had scarcely calmed myself by these reflections when a noise at some distance up the glade fetched my musket halfway to my shoulder.

I lowered it with a short laugh of relief as our friends the hogs came trotting downhill to the gateway.

For the moment I was glad; on second thoughts, vexed. They explained the noise and eased my immediate fear. They brought back--absurd as it may sound--a sense of companions.h.i.+p: for although half-wild, they showed a disposition to be sociable, and we had found that a wave of the arm sufficed to drive them off when their advances became embarra.s.sing. On the other hand, they would certainly distract some attention which I could very ill afford to spare.

But again I calmed myself, reflecting that if any danger lurked close at hand, these friendly nuisances might give me some clue to it by their movements. They came trotting down to the entrance, halted and regarded me, pus.h.i.+ng up their snouts and grunting as though uncertain of their welcome. Apparently rea.s.sured, they charged through, as hogs will, in a disorderly mob, rubbing their lean flanks against the gateposts, each seeming to protest with squeals against the crush to which he contributed.

One or two of the boldest came running towards me in the hope of being fed; but, seeing that I made no motion, swerved as though their courage failed them, and stood regarding me sideways with their grotesque little eyes. Finding me still unresponsive, they began to nose in the dried gra.s.ses with an affected unconcern which set me smiling; it seemed so humanlike a pretence under rebuff. The rest, as usual, dispersed under the trees and along the nettle-beds by the wall. It occurred to me that, if I let these gentlemen work round to my rear, they might distract my attention--perhaps at an awkward moment--by nosing up to the forage-bags or upsetting the camp-furniture, so with a wave of my musket I headed them back.

They took the hint obediently enough, and, wheeling about, fell to rooting between me and the entrance. So I sat maybe for another five minutes, still keeping my main attention on the gateway, but with an occasional glance to right and left, to detect and warn back any fresh attempt to work round my flanks.

Now, in the act of waving my musket, I had happened to catch sight of one remarkably fine hog among the nettles, who, taking alarm with the rest, had winced away and disappeared in the rear of the church, where a narrow alley ran between it and the churchyard wall. If he followed this alley to its end, he would come into sight again around the apse and almost directly on my right flank. I kept my eye lifting towards this corner of the building, Waiting for him to reappear, which by-and-by he did, and with a truly porcine air of minding his own business and that only.

His unconcern was so admirably affected that, to test it, instead of waving him back I lifted my musket very quietly, almost without s.h.i.+fting my position, and brought the b.u.t.t against my shoulder.

He saw the movement; for at once, even with his head down in the gra.s.ses, he hesitated and came to a full stop. Suddenly, as my fingers felt for the trigger-guard, my heart began to beat like a hammer.

_There_ lay my danger; and in a flash I knew it, but not the extent of it. This was no hog, but a man; by the start and the quick arrested pose in which the brute faced me, still with his head low and his eyes regarding me from the gra.s.ses, I felt sure of him.

But what of the others? Were they also men? If so, I was certainly lost, but I dared not turn my eyes for a glance at them. With a sudden and most natural grunt the brute backed a little, shook his head in disgust, and sidled towards the angle of the building.

"Now or never," thought I, and pulled the trigger.

As the musket kicked against me I felt--I could not see--the rest of the hogs swerve in a common panic and break for the gateway.

Their squealing took up the roar of the report and protracted it.

They were real hogs, then.

I caught up a second musket, and, to make sure, let fly into the ma.s.s of them as they choked the gateway. Then, without waiting to see the effect of this shot, I s.n.a.t.c.hed musket number three, and ran through the drifting smoke to where my first victim lay face-downwards in the gra.s.ses, his swine's mask bowed upon the forelegs crossed--as a man crosses his arms--inwards from the elbow. As I ran he lifted himself in agony on his knees--a man's knees. I saw a man's hand thrust through the paunch, ripping it asunder; and, struggling so, he rolled slowly over upon his back and lay still. I stooped and tore the mask away. A black-avised face stared up at me, livid beneath its sunburn, with filmed eyes. The eyes stared at me unwinking as I slipped his other hand easily out of its case, which, even at close view, marvellously resembled the cleft narrow hoof of a hog. I could not disengage him further, his feet being strapped into the disguise with tight leathern thongs: but having satisfied myself that he was past help, I turned on a quick thought to the gateway again, and ran.

A second hog--a real hog--lay stretched there on its side, dead as a nail. Its companions, scampering in panic, had by this time almost reached the head of the glade. Forgetting my promise to my father, I started in pursuit. The thought in my mind was that, if I kept them in sight, they would lead me to my comrades; a chance unlikely to return.

The glade ran up between two contracting spurs of the hill. As I climbed, the belt of woodland narrowed on either side of the track, until the side-valley ended in a cross ridge where the chestnuts suddenly gave place to pines and the turf to a rocky soil carpeted with pine needles. Here, in the s.p.a.ces between the tree-trunks, I caught my last glimpse of the hogs as two or three of the slowest ran over the ridge and disappeared. I followed, sure of getting sight of them from the summit. But here I found myself tricked. Beyond the ridge lay a short dip--short, that is, as a bird flies. Not more than fifty yards ahead the slope rose again, strewn with granite boulders and piled ma.s.ses of granite, such as in Cornwall we call "tors"; and clear away to the mountain-tops stretched a view with never a tree, but a few outstanding bushes only. Yet from ridge to ridge green vegetation filled every hollow, and in the hollow between me and the nearest the hogs were lost.

I heard, however, their grunting and the snapping of boughs in the undergrowth: and in that clear delusive air it seemed but three minutes' work to reach the next ridge. I followed then, confidently enough--and made my first acquaintance with the Corsican _macchia_ by plunging into a cleft twenty feet deep between two rocks of granite.