Beauty (7 page)

Father had not just recovered from a tiring journey; he seemed to have lost fifteen or twenty years from his age. Deep lines on his face had been smoothed out, and the squint he had developed as his sight

began to fail him was gone, and his gaze was sharp and clear. Even his white hair looked thicker, and he walked with the suppleness of a much younger man.

He smiled at us as though he noticed nothing strange in our staring, and said, “Forgive me for disturbing you. I hope you don’t mind if I spend my first day home just wandering around and getting in my family’s way; I promise you I will be back to work tomorrow.” We of course assured him he was free to do just as he liked, and he walked out again. There was a pause, while the colt flicked his ears back and forth and suspected us of inventing new atrocities to wreak upon him. “He looks very well, doesn’t he?” I said at last, timidly. Ger nodded, picked up a now-cold horse-shoe in the tongs, and put it back in the fire. As we watched the iron turn rosy, he said, “I wonder what’s in those saddle -bags?” The mystery was not alluded to again. We finished the Colt, and I took him, stepping high in his new shoes and flinging the fast-melting snow around him so that he could shy and dance at the shadows, to the stable and tied him up to await his master’s return.

It was after supper that Father finally told his story. We were all sitting around the fire in the front room, trying a little too hard to look peaceful and busy, when Father looked up from his study of the flames; He was the only unoccupied one among us, and the only one who seemed to feel no tension. He smiled around at us, and said: “You have been very patient, and I thank you. I will try to tell you my story now, though the end of it will seem very strange to you.” His smile faded. “It seems very strange to me, now, too, as I sit warm and safe among my family.” He paused a long time, and the sorrow we had seen in him the night before closed around him again. The rich smell of the rose was almost visible; I fancied it

lent a rosy edge Co the shadows cast by the firelight. Then Father began the story.

* * *

There was pitifully little to tell about his business in the city, he said. The trip south was easy, lasting about seven weeks. He had gone straight to his friend’s house upon arrival in town, Frewen had been pleased to see him, and had treated him very well; but despite the man’s and his family’s kindness, he felt, and he knew he looked, out of place. He had forgotten how to live in the city. The ship had arrived about a week before he had, and its cargo was being held in one of Frewen’s warehouses. It would have seemed a very small cargo to him in the days of his prosperity; but with Frewen’s help he sold it for a good profit and was able to pay the captain and crew what was owed them, and have a bit lef t over. The captain, a man named Brothers, was shocked at the change in his master’s estate, and was eager to set sail again—the
Merlyn
needed no more than the usual repairs any ten-year-old wooden ship would need

after five years at sea—and try and begin to recoup their losses; but Father had demurred. He told Brothers that it was too tall a hill for him to begin to climb again at his age, and while his new life was not

so grand as the old had been, still it was a good life, and his family was together.

“It’s a curious thing,” he said to us musingly; “after the first wrench of having to walk through the town that I had been used to driving in behind a coachman and four, I found I little minded the change. I seem to have developed a taste for country living. I hope I have not been unfair to you, children.”

I saw Hope, who was not in Father’s line of vision, look down at her slim hands, which were red and rough with work; but she smiled, if a little wryly, and said nothing.

The
Merlyn
was still a sound ship, if not so large and splendid as the ones they were building now, and he set out looking for a buyer for her. He was lucky, and found a purchaser almost immediately, a young captain who sailed for Frewen, who was ready to invest in a small ship of his own. Father had been in town for about a month at that point, and began to think of returning home. He could find out nothing of the
White Raven,
nor of the other ships whose whereabouts had been uncertain and

“presumed lost” when we left the city over two years ago. He did hear that ten of the crewmen from the
Stalwart
and the
Windfleet
had arrived home, only about six months ago; and one of the survivors was the third mate who had brought us the story of the little fleet’s disaster.

The money he had from the sale of the
Merlyn
made him think of buying a horse and risking the trip north. It had been an easy winter so far, and he was more and more restless, lingering without purpose in

the city, eating at Frewen’s table and trespassing on his hospitality, when he knew he did not belong. At last he went to Tom Black’s stable; and Tom welcomed him and sold him a plain-looking, dependable horse that would be good for the trip, and also be able to earn its keep in Blue Hill. Tom asked after Greatheart, and was very interested, and not at all offended, to hear about the horse’s fame as a puller.

“I

told her he’d do what she told him,” he said in a satisfied tone, “Say hello to your family for me, especially the two new little ones.”

Father set out only a few days later. He made good time; in less than five weeks he saw smudges of smoke from the chimneys in Goose Landing above familiar hills. That night storm clouds rolled up, and in the morning it began to snow. He had stayed the night at the Dancing Cat in the Landing, and set off across country soon after dawn. He was sure he couldn’t go wrong between there and Blue Hill. He was anxious to get home, and the road would take him some miles out of his way.

The blizzard blew up around him without warning. One minute snow was falling gently over a familiar horizon; the next he was wrapped so closely around in wind—

borne white that he could make out the shape of his horse’s ears only with difficulty. They went on now because they could not stop, but they were lost at once.

His horse began to stumble over the ground, as if the footing had suddenly become much rougher.

The snow covered everything. He let his mount pick its way as best it could, trying to shield his own face from the sharp-slivered wind. He did not know how long he had been traveling when he felt the wind lessen; he dropped his arm and looked around him. The snow was falling only softy now, almost caressingly, clinging to twig-tips, sliding on heaped branches. He was lost in a forest; all he could see in any direction was tall dark trees; overhead he saw nothing but their entangling branches.

In a little while they came to a track. It wasn’t much of a track, being narrow and now deep with snow, presenting itself only as a smooth ribbon of white, a slightly sunken ribbon running curiously straight

between holes and hummocks and black tree trunks, straight as if it had been planned and built. A trail of

any recognizable sort is a welcome thing to a man lost in a forest. He guided his tired horse to it, and it seemed to take heart, raising its head and picking its feet up a little higher as it waded through the snow.

The track widened and became what might have been a carriage-road, if there had been any reason to drive a carriage through the lonesome forests around Blue Hill. It ended, at last, before a hedge, a great, spiky, holly-grown hedge, twice as tall as a man on horseback, extending away on both sides till it was lost in the darkness beneath the trees. In the hedge, at the end of the road, was a gate, of a dull silver

colour. He dismounted and knocked, and halloed, but without much hope; the heavy silence told him there was no one near. In despair, he put his hand to the latch, which fell away from his touch, and the gates swung silently open. He was uneasy, but he was also tired; and the horse was exhausted and could not go much farther. He remounted and went in.

Before him was a vast expanse of silent, unmarked snow. It was late afternoon, and the sun would soon be gone; just as he was thinking this a ray of sunlight lit up the towers standing above the trees of an

orchard that stood at the centre of the vast bare field he stood in. The towers were stone, and belonged to a great grey castle, but in the light of the dying sun, they were the colour of blood, and the castle looked like a crouching animal. He rubbed his face with his hand and the fancy disappeared as quickly as the red light. A tiny breeze searched his face as if discovering who and what he was; it was gone again in a moment. Once again he took heart; he must be approaching human habitation.

The brief winter twilight escorted him as far as the orchard, and as he emerged from it on the f ar side, near the castle, his horse started and snorted. An ornamental garden was laid out before him, with rocks,

and hedges, and grass, and white marble benches, and flowers blooming everywhere: For here no snow had fallen. He was so weary he almost laughed, thinking this was some trick of fatigue, a waking dream.

But the air that touched his face was warm; he threw his hood back and loosened his cloak; he breathed deeply, and found the smell of the flowers heavy and delightful. There was no sound but of the tiny brooks running through the gardens. There were lanterns everywhere, standing on black or silver carved posts, or hanging from the limbs of the small shaped trees; they cast a warm golden light of few shadows.

His horse walked forwards as he stared around him, bewildered; and when they stopped again he saw they had come to one corner of a wing of the castle. There was an open door before them, and more lanterns lit the inside of what was obviously a stable.

He hesitated a moment, then called aloud, but got no answer; by now he was expecting none. He dismounted slowly and stared around a minute longer; then he straightened his shoulders and led his horse inside, as if empty enchanted castles were a commonplace. When the first stall he came to slid its doors open at his approach, he only swallowed hard once or twice, and took the horse in. Inside there was fresh litter, and hay in a hanging net; and water that ran into a marble basin from a marble trough, and ran sweetly out through a marble drain; a steaming mash was in the manger. He said “Thank you”

to

the air in general, and felt suddenly that the silence was a listening one. He pulled the saddle and bridle off

the horse, and outside the stall found racks to hang the harness on, which he was sure had not been there

when they entered. Except for himself and his horse, the long stable was empty, although there was room

enough for hundreds of horses.

The sweet smell of the hot mash reminded him suddenly how hungry he was. He left the stable and shut the door behind him. He looked around, and across the courtyard formed by two wings of the castle, one of which was the stable he had just left, another door opened as if it had been waiting only to

catch his eye. He went towards it, giving a look as he passed it to what he supposed was the main entrance: double arched doors twenty feet high and another twenty broad, bound with iron and decorated with gold. Around the rim of the doors was another arch, six feet wide, of the same dull silver metal that the front gates were made of, here worked into marvelous relief shapes that seemed to tell a story; but he did not pause to look more closely. The door that beckoned to him was of a more reasonable size. He went in with scarcely a hesitation. A large room lay before him, lit by dozens of candles in candelabra, and hundreds more candles were set in a great chandelier suspended from the ceiling. On one wall was a fireplace big enough to roast a bear; there was a fire burning in it. He warmed himself at it gratefully, for in spite of the flower garden the enchanted castle was cool, and he was chilled

and wet after his long ride.

There was a table set for one, drawn snugly near the fire. As he turned to look at it, the chair, padded with red velvet, moved away from the table a few inches, swinging towards him; and the covers slid off the dishes, and hot water descended from nowhere into a china teapot. He hesitated. He had seen

no sign of his host—nor, indeed of any living thing that goes on legs, or wings: There weren’t even any birds in the garden—and surely hidden somewhere in this vast pile was the someone who was waited on

so efficiently. And one never knew about enchantments; perhaps he, whoever he was, lived alone, and these invisible servants were mistaking this stranger

X

for their master, who would be very angry when he discovered what had happened. Or perhaps there was something wrong with the food, and he would turn into a frog, or fall asleep for a hundred years.... The chair jiggled a little, impatiently, and the teapot rose up and poured a stream of the sweetest-smelling tea he had ever known into a cup of translucent china. He was very hungry; he sighed once, then sat down and ate heartily.

When he was done, a couch he hadn’t noticed before had been made up into a bed. He undressed and lay down, and fell immediately into a dreamless sleep.

No more than the usual eight hours seemed to have passed when he awoke. The day was new; the sun had not yet risen above the tops of the tall, white-crowned forest trees, and a grey but gentle light slipped through the tall leaded windows and splashed on the floor. His clothes had been cleaned, and were folded neatly over the back of the red velvet chair; and for his coarse shirt, a fine linen one had been substituted. His boots and breeches looked new, and his cloak was mysteriously healed of its travel tears and stains. There were tea and toast and an elegantly poached egg on the little table, and a rust-coloured chrysanthemum floating in a crystal bowl.

There was still no sign of his host, and he grew anxious. He wanted to be on his way, but he did not wish to leave without expressing his gratitude to someone—and furthermore he still had no idea where he

was, and would have liked to ask directions. He went outside, and then into the stable, where he found his horse relaxed and comfortable, pulling at wisps of hay. The tack outside the stall had been cleaned and mended, and the bits and buckles were polished till they sparkled. He went outside again, and looked around; went round the corner of the castle and stared across more gardens, and grassy fields beyond. The snow had disappeared entirely, and the green was the green of early summer. Far across the fields he saw the black border of the wood, and as he strained his eyes something shiny winked at him, something that might be another gate. “Very well,” he said aloud. “I will go that way.”