Allan and the Ice Gods (2 page)

lacking in me—of a sudden I became convinced that it was to me that

her nature really turned and not to Ragnall. I did not seek it, I did

not even hope that it was so, for surely she was his possession, not

mine, and I wanted to rob no man. Yet in that moment there the fact

loomed before me large and solid as a mountain, a calm, immovable

mountain, a snow-capped volcano, apparently extinct, that still, one

day, might break into flames and overwhelm me, taking me as its

possession upon wings of fire.

Such were my reflections during the moments of weakness which followed

the shock I had received from that remarkable letter, outwardly and

visibly so final, yet inwardly and spiritually opening up vast avenues

of unexpected possibilities. Presently, they passed with the faintness

and I was my own man again. Whatever she might or might not be, so far

as I was concerned, there was an end to my active association with

Lady Ragnall—at any rate, until I was certain that she was rid of her

store of
Taduki
. As she admitted in her curiously worded

communication, that book was closed for our lives, and any

speculations concerning the past and the future, when we were not in

being, remained so futile that about them it was unnecessary to

trouble.

A little while later, I read in a newspaper, under the head of

“Fashionable Intelligence,” that Lady Ragnall had left England to

spend the winter in Egypt, and, knowing all her associations with that

country, I marvelled at her courage. What had taken her there, I

wondered; then shrugged my shoulders and let the matter be.

Six weeks or so afterward, I was out shooting driven partridges. A

covey came over me, of which I got two. As I thrust new cartridges

into my gun, I saw approaching me, flying very fast and high, a couple

of wild duck that I suppose had been disturbed from some pond by the

distant beaters. I closed the gun and lifted it, being particularly

anxious to bag those wild duck, which were somewhat rare in the

neighbourhood, especially at that season of the year. At that moment I

was smitten by a most extraordinary series of impressions that had to

do with Egypt and Lady Ragnall, the last things I had been thinking of

a minute before.

I seemed to see a desert and ruins that I knew to be those of a

temple, and Lady Ragnall herself seated among them, holding up a

sunshade which suddenly fell onto the sand. This illusion passed, to

be followed by another; namely, that she was with me, talking to me

very earnestly but in a joyful, vigorous voice, only in a language of

which I could not understand one word. Yet the burden of her speech

seemed to reach my mind; it was to the effect that now we should

always be near to each other, as we had been in the past.

Then all was gone, nor can those impressions have endured for long,

seeing that, when they began, I was pointing my gun at the wild duck,

and they left me before the dead birds touched the ground for,

automatically, I went on with the business at hand, nor did my

accustomed skill desert me.

Setting down the fancy as once of those queer mental pranks that

cannot be explained—unless, in this instance, it was due to something

I had eaten at lunch—I thought no more about it for two whole days.

Then I thought a great deal, for, on opening my newspaper, which

reached the Grange about three o’clock, that is exactly forty-eight

hours after my telepathic experience, or whatever it may have been,

the first thing that my eye fell on among the foreign telegrams was

the following from Cairo:

A message has been received here conveying the sad intelligence of

the sudden death yesterday of Lady Ragnall, the widow of the late

Lord Ragnall, who, as a famous Egyptologist, was very well known

in Egypt, where he came to a tragic end some years ago. Lady

Ragnall, who was noted for her wealth and beauty, was visiting the

ruins of a temple of Isis which stands a little way back from the

east bank of the Nile between Luxor and Assouan, where her husband

met with his fatal accident while engaged in its excavation.

Indeed, she was seated by the monument erected on the sand which

entombed him so deeply that his body was never recovered, when

suddenly she sank back and expired. The English medical officer

from Luxor certified heart disease as the cause of death and she

has been buried where she died, this ground having been

consecrated at the time of the decease of Lord Ragnall.

If I had felt queer when I received Lady Ragnall’s mystical letter

before she left for Egypt, now I felt much queerer. Then I was

perplexed; now I was terrified, and, what is more, greatly moved.

Again that conviction came to me that, deep down in my being, I was

attached, unchangeably attached, to this strange and charming woman,

and that with hers my destiny was intertwined. If this were not so,

indeed, why had her passing become known to me, of all people and in

so incongruous a fashion, for, although the hour of her death was not

stated, I had little doubt that it occurred at the very moment when I

shot the wild duck.

Now I wished that I had not refused to visit her, and even that I had

given her some proof of my regard by asking her to marry me,

notwithstanding her great wealth, the fact that I had been her

husband’s friend, and all the rest. No doubt, she would have refused;

still, the quiet devotion of even so humble an individual as myself

might have pleased her. However, regrets came too late; she was dead

and all between us at an end.

A few weeks later, I discovered that here I was mistaken, for, after a

preliminary telegram inquiring whether I was in residence at the

Grange, which I answered on a prepaid form to the address of some

unknown lawyers in London, there arrived at lunch time on the

following day a gentleman of the name of Mellis, evidently one of the

firm of Mellis & Mellis who had sent me the telegram. He was shown in

and, without waiting for luncheon, said:

“I believe I am addressing Mr. Allan Quatermain.”

I bowed and he went on:

“I come upon a strange errand, Mr. Quatermain, so strange that I doubt

whether, in the course of your life, which as I have heard has been

full of adventure, you have ever known its equal. You were, I believe,

well acquainted with our late client, Lord Ragnall, also with his

wife, Lady Ragnall, formerly the Hon. Luna Holmes, of whose recent sad

death you may perhaps have heard.”

I said that this was so, and the lawyer went on in his dry precise

way, watching my face as he spoke:

“It would appear, Mr. Quatermain, that Lady Ragnall must have been

much attached to you, since, a while ago, after a visit that you paid

to her at Ragnall Castle, she came to our office and made a will, a

thing I may add that we had never been able to persuade her to do.

Under that will—as you will see presently, for I have brought a copy

with me—she left everything she possessed, that is, all the great

Ragnall property and accumulated personalty of which she had the power

to dispose at her unfettered discretion, to—ahem—to
you
.”

“Great heavens!” I exclaimed, and sank back into a chair.

“As I do not sail under false colours,” went on Mr. Mellis with a dry

smile, “I may as well tell you at once that both I and my partner

protested vehemently against the execution of such a will, for reasons

that seemed good to us but which I need not set out. She remained firm

as a rock.

“‘You think I am mad,’ she said. ‘Foreseeing this, I have taken the

precaution of visiting two eminent London specialists to whom I told

all my history, including that of the mental obscuration from which I

suffered for a while as the result of shock. Each of these examined me

carefully and subjected me to tests with the result—but here are

their certificates and you can judge for yourselves.’

“I, or rather we, read the certificates, which, of course, we have

preserved. To be brief, they stated that her ladyship was of

absolutely sound and normal mind, although certain of her theories

might be thought unusual, but not more so than those of thousands of

others, some of them eminent in various walks of life. In face of

these documents, which were entirely endorsed by our own observation,

there was but one thing to do, namely, to prepare the will in

accordance with our client’s clear and definite instructions. While we

were writing these down, she said suddenly:

“‘Something has occurred to me. I shall never change my mind, nor

shall I remarry, but, from my knowledge of Mr. Quatermain, I think it

possible and even probable that he will refuse this great inheritance’

—a statement, sir, which struck us as so incredible that we made no

comment.

“‘In that event,’ she continued, ‘I wish all the real property to be

realized and together with the personalty, except certain legacies, to

be divided among the societies, institutions, and charities that are

written down upon this list,’ and she handed us a document, ‘unless

indeed Mr. Quatermain, whom, should he survive me, I leave my sole

executor, should disapprove of any of them.’

“Do you now understand the situation, sir?”

“Quite,” I answered. “That is, no doubt I shall when I have read the

will. Meanwhile, I suggest that you must be hungry after your journey

and that we should have lunch.”

So we lunched, talking of indifferent matters while the servants were

in the room, and afterward returned to my study, where the documents

were read and expounded to me by Mr. Mellis. To cut the story short,

it seemed that my inheritance was enormous; I am afraid to state from

memory at what figure it was provisionally valued. Subject to certain

reservations, such as an injection that no part of the total, either

in land or in money, was to be alienated in favour of Mr. Atterby-Smith, a relative of Lord Ragnall whom the testatrix held in great

dislike, or any member of his family, and that, for part of the year,

I must inhabit Ragnall Castle, which might not be sold during my

lifetime, or even let. All this vast fortune was left at my absolute

disposal, both during my life and after my death. Failure to observe

these trusts might, it seemed, invalidate the will. In the event of my

renouncing the inheritance, however, Ragnall Castle, with a suitable

endowment, was to become a county hospital, and the rest of the estate

was to be divided in accordance with the list that I have mentioned—a

very admirable list, but one which excluded any society or institution

of a sectarian nature.

“Now I think that I have explained everything,” said Mr. Mellis at

length, “except a minor and rather peculiar provision as to your

acceptance of certain relics, particularly described by the testatrix

in a sealed letter which I will hand to you presently. So it only

remains for me, Mr. Quatermain, to ask you to sign a document which I

have already prepared and brought with me, to enable me to deal with

these great matters on your behalf. That is,” he added with a bow,

“should you propose to continue that confidence in our firm with which

the family of the late Lord Ragnall has honoured it for several

generations.”

While he was hunting in his bag for this paper, explaining, as he did

so, that I must be prepared to face an action brought by Mr. Atterby-Smith, who had been raging round his office “like a wild animal,”

suddenly I made up my mind.

“Don’t bother about that paper, Mr. Mellis,” I said, “because Lady

Ragnall was right in her supposition. I have no intention of accepting

this inheritance. The estate must go for division to the charities,

etcetera, set down in her list.”

The lawyer heard, and stared at me.

“In my life,” he gasped at last, “I have known mad testators and mad

heirs, but never before have I come across a case where both the

testator and the heir were mad. Perhaps, sir, you will be pleased to

explain.”

“With pleasure,” I said when I had finished lighting my pipe. “In the

first place, I am already what is called a rich man and I do not want

to be bothered with more money and property.”

“But, Mr. Quatermain,” he interrupted, “you have a son who, with such

wealth behind him, might rise to anything—yes, anything.” (This was

true, for, at that time, my boy Harry was living.)

“Yes, but, as it chances, Mr. Mellis, I have ideas upon this matter

which you may think peculiar. I do not wish my son to begin life with

enormous resources, or even the prospect of them. I wish him to fight

his own way in the world. He is going to be a doctor. When he has

succeeded in his profession and learned what it means to earn one’s

own bread, it will be time for him to come into other people’s money.

Already I have explained this to him with reference to my own, and

being a sensible youth, he agrees with me.”

“I daresay,” groaned the lawyer. “Such—well, failings—as yours, are

often hereditary.”