New Arabian Nights

  THE PAVILION ON THE LINKS

  CHAPTER ITELLS HOW I CAMPED IN GRADEN SEA-WOOD, AND BEHELD A LIGHT IN THE PAVILION

  I WAS a great solitary when I was young. I made it my pride to keepaloof and suffice for my own entertainment; and I may say that I hadneither friends nor acquaintances until I met that friend who became mywife and the mother of my children. With one man only was I on privateterms; this was R. Northmour, Esquire, of Graden Easter, in Scotland. Wehad met at college; and though there was not much liking between us, noreven much intimacy, we were so nearly of a humour that we could associatewith ease to both. Misanthropes, we believed ourselves to be; but I havethought since that we were only sulky fellows. It was scarcely acompanionship, but a coexistence in unsociability. Northmour’sexceptional violence of temper made it no easy affair for him to keep thepeace with any one but me; and as he respected my silent ways, and let mecome and go as I pleased, I could tolerate his presence without concern.I think we called each other friends.

  When Northmour took his degree and I decided to leave the universitywithout one, he invited me on a long visit to Graden Easter; and it wasthus that I first became acquainted with the scene of my adventures. Themansion-house of Graden stood in a bleak stretch of country some threemiles from the shore of the German Ocean. It was as large as a barrack;and as it had been built of a soft stone, liable to consume in the eagerair of the seaside, it was damp and draughty within and half ruinouswithout. It was impossible for two young men to lodge with comfort insuch a dwelling. But there stood in the northern part of the estate, ina wilderness of links and blowing sand-hills, and between a plantationand the sea, a small Pavilion or Belvidere, of modern design, which wasexactly suited to our wants; and in this hermitage, speaking little,reading much, and rarely associating except at meals, Northmour and Ispent four tempestuous winter months. I might have stayed longer; butone March night there sprang up between us a dispute, which rendered mydeparture necessary. Northmour spoke hotly, I remember, and I suppose Imust have made some tart rejoinder. He leaped from his chair andgrappled me; I had to fight, without exaggeration, for my life; and itwas only with a great effort that I mastered him, for he was near asstrong in body as myself, and seemed filled with the devil. The nextmorning, we met on our usual terms; but I judged it more delicate towithdraw; nor did he attempt to dissuade me.

  It was nine years before I revisited the neighbourhood. I travelled atthat time with a tilt cart, a tent, and a cooking-stove, tramping all daybeside the waggon, and at night, whenever it was possible, gipsying in acove of the hills, or by the side of a wood. I believe I visited in thismanner most of the wild and desolate regions both in England andScotland; and, as I had neither friends nor relations, I was troubledwith no correspondence, and had nothing in the nature of headquarters,unless it was the office of my solicitors, from whom I drew my incometwice a year. It was a life in which I delighted; and I fully thought tohave grown old upon the march, and at last died in a ditch.

  It was my whole business to find desolate corners, where I could campwithout the fear of interruption; and hence, being in another part of thesame shire, I bethought me suddenly of the Pavilion on the Links. Nothoroughfare passed within three miles of it. The nearest town, and thatwas but a fisher village, was at a distance of six or seven. For tenmiles of length, and from a depth varying from three miles to half amile, this belt of barren country lay along the sea. The beach, whichwas the natural approach, was full of quicksands. Indeed I may say thereis hardly a better place of concealment in the United Kingdom. Idetermined to pass a week in the Sea-Wood of Graden Easter, and making along stage, reached it about sundown on a wild September day.

  The country, I have said, was mixed sand-hill and links; _links_ being aScottish name for sand which has ceased drifting and become more or lesssolidly covered with turf. The Pavilion stood on an even space; a littlebehind it, the wood began in a hedge of elders huddled together by thewind; in front, a few tumbled sand-hills stood between it and the sea.An outcropping of rock had formed a bastion for the sand, so that therewas here a promontory in the coast-line between two shallow bays; andjust beyond the tides, the rock again cropped out and formed an islet ofsmall dimensions but strikingly designed. The quicksands were of greatextent at low water, and had an infamous reputation in the country.Close in shore, between the islet and the promontory, it was said theywould swallow a man in four minutes and a half; but there may have beenlittle ground for this precision. The district was alive with rabbits,and haunted by gulls which made a continual piping about the pavilion.On summer days the outlook was bright and even gladsome; but at sundownin September, with a high wind, and a heavy surf rolling in close alongthe links, the place told of nothing but dead mariners and sea disaster.A ship beating to windward on the horizon, and a huge truncheon of wreckhalf buried in the sands at my feet, completed the innuendo of the scene.

  The pavilion—it had been built by the last proprietor, Northmour’s uncle,a silly and prodigal virtuoso—presented little signs of age. It was twostoreys in height, Italian in design, surrounded by a patch of garden inwhich nothing had prospered but a few coarse flowers; and looked, withits shuttered windows, not like a house that had been deserted, but likeone that had never been tenanted by man. Northmour was plainly fromhome; whether, as usual, sulking in the cabin of his yacht, or in one ofhis fitful and extravagant appearances in the world of society, I had, ofcourse, no means of guessing. The place had an air of solitude thatdaunted even a solitary like myself; the wind cried in the chimneys witha strange and wailing note; and it was with a sense of escape, as if Iwere going indoors, that I turned away and, driving my cart before me,entered the skirts of the wood.

  The Sea-Wood of Graden had been planted to shelter the cultivated fieldsbehind, and check the encroachments of the blowing sand. As you advancedinto it from coastward, elders were succeeded by other hardy shrubs; butthe timber was all stunted and bushy; it led a life of conflict; thetrees were accustomed to swing there all night long in fierce wintertempests; and even in early spring, the leaves were already flying, andautumn was beginning, in this exposed plantation. Inland the ground roseinto a little hill, which, along with the islet, served as a sailing markfor seamen. When the hill was open of the islet to the north, vesselsmust bear well to the eastward to clear Graden Ness and the GradenBullers. In the lower ground, a streamlet ran among the trees, and,being dammed with dead leaves and clay of its own carrying, spread outevery here and there, and lay in stagnant pools. One or two ruinedcottages were dotted about the wood; and, according to Northmour, thesewere ecclesiastical foundations, and in their time had sheltered pioushermits.

  I found a den, or small hollow, where there was a spring of pure water;and there, clearing away the brambles, I pitched the tent, and made afire to cook my supper. My horse I picketed farther in the wood wherethere was a patch of sward. The banks of the den not only concealed thelight of my fire, but sheltered me from the wind, which was cold as wellas high.

  The life I was leading made me both hardy and frugal. I never drank butwater, and rarely ate anything more costly than oatmeal; and I requiredso little sleep, that, although I rose with the peep of day, I wouldoften lie long awake in the dark or starry watches of the night. Thus inGraden Sea-Wood, although I fell thankfully asleep by eight in theevening I was awake again before eleven with a full possession of myfaculties, and no sense of drowsiness or fatigue. I rose and sat by thefire, watching the trees and clouds tumultuously tossing and fleeingoverhead, and hearkening to the wind and the rollers along the shore;till at length, growing weary of inaction, I quitted the den, andstrolled towards the borders of the wood. A young moon, buried in mist,gave a faint illumination to my steps; and the light grew brighter as Iwalked forth into the links. At the same moment, the wind, smelling saltof the open ocean and carrying particles of sand, struck me with its fullforce, so that I had to bow my head.

  When I raised it again to look about me, I was aware of a
light in thepavilion. It was not stationary; but passed from one window to another,as though some one were reviewing the different apartments with a lamp orcandle.

  I watched it for some seconds in great surprise. When I had arrived inthe afternoon the house had been plainly deserted; now it was as plainlyoccupied. It was my first idea that a gang of thieves might have brokenin and be now ransacking Northmour’s cupboards, which were many and notill supplied. But what should bring thieves to Graden Easter? And,again, all the shutters had been thrown open, and it would have been morein the character of such gentry to close them. I dismissed the notion,and fell back upon another. Northmour himself must have arrived, and wasnow airing and inspecting the pavilion.

  I have said that there was no real affection between this man and me;but, had I loved him like a brother, I was then so much more in love withsolitude that I should none the less have shunned his company. As itwas, I turned and ran for it; and it was with genuine satisfaction that Ifound myself safely back beside the fire. I had escaped an acquaintance;I should have one more night in comfort. In the morning, I might eitherslip away before Northmour was abroad, or pay him as short a visit as Ichose.

  But when morning came, I thought the situation so diverting that I forgotmy shyness. Northmour was at my mercy; I arranged a good practical jest,though I knew well that my neighbour was not the man to jest with insecurity; and, chuckling beforehand over its success, took my place amongthe elders at the edge of the wood, whence I could command the door ofthe pavilion. The shutters were all once more closed, which I rememberthinking odd; and the house, with its white walls and green venetians,looked spruce and habitable in the morning light. Hour after hourpassed, and still no sign of Northmour. I knew him for a sluggard in themorning; but, as it drew on towards noon, I lost my patience. To say thetruth, I had promised myself to break my fast in the pavilion, and hungerbegan to prick me sharply. It was a pity to let the opportunity go bywithout some cause for mirth; but the grosser appetite prevailed, and Irelinquished my jest with regret, and sallied from the wood.

  The appearance of the house affected me, as I drew near, withdisquietude. It seemed unchanged since last evening; and I had expectedit, I scarce knew why, to wear some external signs of habitation. Butno: the windows were all closely shuttered, the chimneys breathed nosmoke, and the front door itself was closely padlocked. Northmour,therefore, had entered by the back; this was the natural and, indeed, thenecessary conclusion; and you may judge of my surprise when, on turningthe house, I found the back door similarly secured.

  My mind at once reverted to the original theory of thieves; and I blamedmyself sharply for my last night’s inaction. I examined all the windowson the lower storey, but none of them had been tampered with; I tried thepadlocks, but they were both secure. It thus became a problem how thethieves, if thieves they were, had managed to enter the house. They musthave got, I reasoned, upon the roof of the outhouse where Northmour usedto keep his photographic battery; and from thence, either by the windowof the study or that of my old bedroom, completed their burglariousentry.

  I followed what I supposed was their example; and, getting on the roof,tried the shutters of each room. Both were secure; but I was not to bebeaten; and, with a little force, one of them flew open, grazing, as itdid so, the back of my hand. I remember, I put the wound to my mouth,and stood for perhaps half a minute licking it like a dog, andmechanically gazing behind me over the waste links and the sea; and, inthat space of time, my eye made note of a large schooner yacht some milesto the north-east. Then I threw up the window and climbed in.

  I went over the house, and nothing can express my mystification. Therewas no sign of disorder, but, on the contrary, the rooms were unusuallyclean and pleasant. I found fires laid, ready for lighting; threebedrooms prepared with a luxury quite foreign to Northmour’s habits, andwith water in the ewers and the beds turned down; a table set for threein the dining-room; and an ample supply of cold meats, game, andvegetables on the pantry shelves. There were guests expected, that wasplain; but why guests, when Northmour hated society? And, above all, whywas the house thus stealthily prepared at dead of night? and why were theshutters closed and the doors padlocked?

  I effaced all traces of my visit, and came forth from the window feelingsobered and concerned.

  The schooner yacht was still in the same place; and it flashed for amoment through my mind that this might be the _Red Earl_ bringing theowner of the pavilion and his guests. But the vessel’s head was set theother way.