The Five-Minute Marriage (34 page)

But where had they gone? Another flash helped her to memorize the contours of the area close to where she stood: the small door through which she had emerged had brought her into a kind of flat, leaded valley, between four rising ridges. Nervously she began to climb the pent of a ridge, and, as she had hooked her fingers over its angle, another flash suddenly revealed the two men, about fifteen yards away from her, moving behind a great outcrop of twisted, sloped, bent, crow-stepped, intricately piled chimney stacks. Somehow Delphie managed to scramble over the peak of her ridge; then she waited, afraid to venture farther until she was certain that the ravine of an inner courtyard did not lie between her and her quarry.

Another flash came, and again she followed, surmounting yet another ridge—yet another—skirting around a gable, feeling her way among a jumble of slate and stone. Now she saw the men again—rather nearer; they seemed to have come to a stop, on a flat open place with nothing beyond it but darkness. She caught a voice—Mordred
’
s—saying:

“
Best take
that
off—wouldn
’
t wish any accident to overtake the family ruby—!
”

Now the two men were standing close together, comparing, it seemed, the lengths of objects which they held; then they turned and walked apart, pacing, measuring. Gareth still swayed drunkenly, as if blown by the wind—it seemed incredible that he had managed to stagger so far through this wilderness. He must have been buoyed up by the irrational sense of balance that sometimes carries drunkards along paths narrow as tightropes and beside the verge of precipices.

“
Stop!
”
shouted Delphie.
“
Gareth, come back! Mordred, I can see you!
Don
’
t shoot
!”

But they were ignoring her, they were on the other side of a drop filled with crisscrossing walls, exhibited like actors on a stage. They stood braced, each in the same attitude, one leg forward, one back, in the posture of archers, each pointing a pistol.

The light went suddenly, and then came back again, a huge leaden glare, throwing every shadow as distinct and sharp as if it had that instant been traced out in wet black paint. The lightning seemed to hover in the sky for a dreamlike spell of time—perhaps ten seconds in reality; the crack of the pistols was drowned by a huge roll of thunder which followed, but Delphie saw the red flash from one of them—Mordred
’
s. Another blaze of light an instant later showed Gareth fallen and rolling toward an edge of blackness—and it showed Delphie something else, too: Elaine
Carteret, white-faced, glaring at Mordred, half a dozen paces away from him.

She heard Mordred exclaim:

“
How the devil did you get up here? I expected t
’
other one
—
not you!
”

“
Nurse
Durnett
told me the way up—she guessed what you would be at. You murderer! You vile murderer!
”

“
Well, really, m
’
dear, it is only what you yourself intended. You said so! Now, where the devil did I lay that ring?
”
He stooped, searching about; by the light of the next flash, Delphie saw Elaine violently strike his head with the pistol butt. He staggered and fell backward over the edge into darkness, and she flung the pistol after him. Then, stooping also, she snatched up something and ran away, climbing the roof ridges with the speed of a lizard, vanishing over a distant series of sierras.

But Delphie began with slow and careful labor making her way in the opposite direction, toward where she had seen Gareth last. Four—five lightning flashes—and she must be nearly there; now she was on the wide flat expanse of lead roof where they had stood, and could see that beyond a low parapet, only an inch or two high, there lay nothing but black space. Trembling, she levered a bit of rubble out from between the bricks of a chimney stack and tossed it away into the dark; she thought she heard a splash. Did the moat lie down there?

By the next flash she confirmed that it did: she could see the outer bank, and a few heads of water lilies, closed for the night into black spearheads, outlined against the silvered water. The lightning had shown her something else—a pistol, Gareth
’
s, it must be—lying farther back from the edge than she had expected, in a dark pool of some liquid. Blood?

She waited for another flash and then ran to where the pistol lay. Surely, she thought, if Gareth fell backward
—that way
—
then
he might
not
have gone into the moat? Dropping to her hands and knees she crawled gingerly to the parapet, which here described a right angle; felt it with her fingers, and waited for the next flash to come. When it came, she looked down, and found that she was overlooking a kind of gulley—vertical on one side, sloping on the other, where a narrow peak of roof was contained between two square towers. And below her, not six feet away, jammed in the acute angle between roof and wall, lay Gareth
’
s body. It was about six inches back from the drop to the moat—if he had fallen sideways, rather than backward, he must certainly have gone over the edge.

In the next lightning flash, Delphie stared about her with agonized speed, trying to learn everything that she could of the geography around her—the angles, verticles, and horizontals of her situation in relation to that of Gareth.

Yes—there! If she went back, and then to her right, quite soon came a point at which the roof peak below her was not so very far down from her own level. She could climb down to it, and then make her way diagonally across its slope to the crack where Gareth
’
s body had been caught.

She began to move in the dark, feeling her way around the shallow parapet—found where it turned to the right, followed that
—
presently another flash showed her that she had already come too far and passed the highest point of the roof peak. Patiently she crawled back, scrambled on hands and knees over the parapet, and let herself backward down the four feet or so onto the ridge below. This, in darkness, was frightening; she hoped she had not mistaken the spot. No, here was the ridge—now down the slope
...
and presently, she felt the vertical wall with her right hand. Now, forward again—inch by inch, this time, for Gareth
’
s body must be within a few feet and she must not risk jolting or nudging it; there! She had found his hand with hers, groping; she grasped his wrist. Bracing herself with one foot on the slope and one pressed against the wall, she exerted all her strength to pull him backward; began to despair; pulled again, and felt his body move a little.

Dragging, panting, and gasping, she presently had him as far back from the edge as it was possible to move him, on this level, right against the back wall of the gulley. Would it be feasible to pull him up the slope of the roof, and then hoist him from its peak onto the level above? Looking up, the next brilliant flash, Delphie thought not. The roof itself was a steep slope, five or six feet high; then there would be the vertical lift of another three feet; and Gareth was a tall, muscular man. He was too heavy. She did not think she could manage it. But at least he was away from that awful edge!

N
ow, with trembling, eager hands, she felt for his pulse—and found it, to her amazement, solid, firm, steady as the tick of her metronome. He was alive, at least! Perhaps not even badly hurt? In her astonished relief at this almost unlooked-for good fortune, Delphie burst into tears.

“
Oh my dear, mad, crazy creature!
”
she sobbed.
“
How could you have been such an
idiot
as to let him entice you up here?
”

Gingerly, carefully, when the next flash of lightning came, she began looking over him to find, if possible, where he was wounded. Where had all that blood come from? But to her perplexity she could find no trace of blood on him; his clothes seemed intact—so far as she could make out, there was no bullet hole anywhere to be found.

After a while she began to conclude that he must have staggered and fallen backward into the gully just at the instant when Mordred
’
s pistol was discharged. What a strange piece of good fortune! For if Gareth had not fallen so, and Elaine therefore supposed him dead, she would not have taken her revenge by striking Mordred; since the latter had fallen outward Delphie felt certain that he must have gone straight down into the moat. He must have been killed, and she was disposed to think that the world was very well rid of him. As to Elaine—she was of small importance; Delphie
’
s entire concern at present was to see that Gareth should be prevented from rolling or falling until he should have recovered consciousness.

It was possible, she concluded, ruefully, that he was merely in a drunken stupor; no doubt when he did come to he would have the most atrocious headache, and would believe himself at death
’
s door. In the meantime, all she could hope to do was keep him warm, which she did by edging him into the angle of roof and wall, and huddling herself against him. (Any slight awkwardness she might have felt as to this necessary precaution was dispelled by the fact that she herself, in her soaked velvet and damp cambric, was excessively cold, and needed all the warmth she could find.)

An hour or two went by. Slowly, the storm began to abate. The intervals between the lightning flashes grew greater. The thunder was no longer a deafening crack overhead, but had dwindled to a gentle mumble, far away in the distance. Then the clouds began to drift apart; at last, a half moon was revealed, gently illuminating the strange, angular world in which they were perched.

Delphie looked at Gareth and confirmed again, with infinite relief, that he was not dead, not even fainted, she thought, but just heavily asleep, in a kind of brandy-soaked coma.

She began to wonder if she could wake him. For it was decidedly cramped and uncomfortable in their triangular niche. Perhaps she could go off to summon help—but no, it would be too dangerous to leave him unguarded. He might wake, or half wake, and make some incautious movement.

“
Gareth!
”
she said hopefully.
“
Gareth, you odious wretch! Wake up!
Pray
wake up! It is too cold to be perching here like a pair of swallows!
”

But Gareth slept obstinately on, snoring somewhat. Since he must be quite as cold as she, besides suffering from the effects of a heavy fall and God knows how much brandy, Delphie with difficulty removed her damp pelisse and spread it over both of them. Then she began waiting for dawn: at least five hours more, she reckoned dejectedly.

By slow, insensible degrees, her eyes closed. Then she, too, was asleep.

1
6

Delphie opened her eyes to a blaze of sunshine. She felt quite warm, but cramped and damp; like some creature hatching out of an egg, she thought confusedly. Then she saw Gareth
’
s face, close to hers, looking down at her in a puzzled manner.

“
I daresay I am dreaming still?
”
he confided.
“
I have certainly had some very singular dreams during the night. If I am
not
dreaming—what the devil are
you
doing here?
”

Now Delphie realized that his arm was around her, and that her head was, in fact, pillowed on his shoulder. She blushed slightly, and said,

“
Well, it is perfectly easy to give you an account of it all, Cousin Gareth—
”

“
Naturally! I am quite sure of that! The stupidity was mine, first of all, in not realizing that you were a witch! You touched me with your wand—gave me a worse headache than I have ever suffered in my life before—and then popped me onto your broomstick and transported me—us—here. W
h
ere
are
we, by the by? It is exceedingly uncomfortable!
”

“
It is not only uncomfortable, but exceedingly dangerous! We are on the roof at Chase, and, if you are able to do so, I believe we should move from this spot directly
.”
She added in a scolding tone,
“
The stupidity was certainly yours, in allowing your cousin Mordred to make you so inebriated!
”

“
Oh, I was inebriated, was I?
”

“
Disgracefully so!
”

“
Did I say or do anything foolish?
”
he inquired with interest.

“
Oh dear me, no,
”
said Delphie with awful irony.
“
Only allowed Fitzjohn to entice you up to this perilous spot and then shoot his pistol at you, under the pretext of some silly wager!
”

“
Oh—yes,
”
he said slowly, frowning.
“
Deuce take it—my poor head! It feels as if the thunderstorm were still inside it. There
was
a thunderstorm, was there not?
”

“
One of the worst I have ever experienced. It was quite terrifying.
”

“
Yes—it all begins to come back to me. Mordred arrived—said he had something of importance to divulge to me. I
’
d been feeling low-spirited—had had a drink or two—nothing much. Then we had a drink or two more.
”

“
Indeed you
had
”
she said with asperity.
“
From the look of the room, you had each imbibed about four bottles of brandy. It is not to be wondered at that your head aches.
”

“
No—no—dash it, my dearest girl! Most of those were wine bottles.
”

“
Mr. Penistone,
”
she said, ignoring his appellation.
“
I think we should try to climb up on the roof above.
”

“
You should properly address me as Lord Bollington.
”

“
I think we should try to move.
”

“
No, why?
”
He tightened the arm around her.

“
Just now you said it was uncomfortable here.
”

“
I have changed my mind. I think we are delightfully situated. The sun shines on us, the swallows are twittering—why must you be forever carping and finding fault? It is true that, as usual, you have a certain amount of grime on your nose
”
—he removed it, with a careful finger—
”
but otherwise I have no complaint to make regarding my position—not the least in the world.
”

“
Oh,
”
she said, laughing,
“
you absurd creature! Come along
—
we
must
bestir ourselves!
”

“
Both my arm and my foot have gone to sleep. I am quite unable to move them!
”

“
Then you should shift without delay—they are probably frostbitten, and will presently fall off!
”

Moving herself out of his grip with considerable difficulty, she scrambled up the sloping roof against which they had been reclining, and turned, when she was seated on its peak, to reach a hand down to him. He was looking up at her with a good deal of amusement on his face.

“
Cousin Delphie, what
have
you been doing? Every stitch you have on appears to be both wet and filthy—your boots are covered in mud—your hair is in rat
’
s tails—and your face looks as if you have been climbing chimneys!
”

“
I have been climbing chimneys
,”
said Delphie.
“
Come along!
”
He caught hold of the hand she reached down, and allowed himself to be pulled up, wincing as he moved his head. Seated beside her on the roof ridge, he held her hand to steady her, while she clambered up and over the parapet onto the wide expanse of flat roof beyond. When she turned around she saw that he was swaying and looking rather pale.

“
Gareth! Quick, take my hand!
”

“
Thank you; it was but a passing touch of vertigo,
”
he said as she assisted him to follow her.
“
Ah, this is certainly better
”
—as they stood on the flat leads, a safe distance from the edge.
“
Most refreshing, in fact—a charming prospect!
”

From this eminence they could see a considerable distance over the surrounding countryside, and the green sheep-studded pastures near at hand. The sound of bleating came faintly through the sun-warmed air.

“
What the deuce is
that
doing up here?
”
said Gareth, frowning. He had just caught sight of his pistol, which was lying in a puddle at no great distance. He crossed to it and picked it up.

“
W
h
at
is that? How strange—it is not water, but oil,
”
Delphie said, observing the rainbow hues of the damp patch where the pistol had lain.

“
Neats
’
-foot oil!
”
said Gareth, suddenly and blankly.
“
What was that you were saying about a duel?
”

“
I told you! You and Mordred were fighting a duel.
”

“
A fine sort of duel!
”
he said, inspecting the pistol.
“
It is not loaded.
”

“
How strange! I am sure his was—I saw the red spark when he fired it. You are
sure
you are not wounded?
”

“
I suppose, come to think, this graze on my arm must be from a bullet.
”

She exclaimed as he bared a red, furrowed graze, which, under his shirt sleeve, she had missed the night before.

“
But what is that oil?
”

“
Uncle Mark used to say—when he was in his cups—that he had oiled the spot where Lancelot was to stand on the roof. I think Mordred must have taken a leaf out of his book—slipped up here beforehand and done the same thing.
”
He looked about and said, frowning,
“
Where
is
Mordred, then?
”

“
Elaine Carteret somehow followed him onto the roof. She
—
she thought he had killed you. When he was stooping—searching for something—she pushed him off the edge—
”

Without answering, Gareth walked to the edge and looked over.

“
Gareth!
Pray
take care!
”

Anxiously she followed him and looked down. Among the close
-
set pattern of the lily pads they could see a larger clear space; something appeared to have disturbed them and pushed them apart.

“
Come away from the edge!
”
Delphie said, shivering.

He did so, and then put his hands on her shoulders, looking down at her gravely.

“
And where were
you
, when all this was going on? How come you to have arrived at Chase in the midst of all this?
”

“
Oh, well, it—it is a long story! But I chanced to learn that both Mordred and Elaine had plots against you—and that they had quarreled—I believed it possible that he might wish to get rid of you—murder you, perhaps—as
she
wished to marry you—and indeed I saw him setting out for Chase looking exactly like a Fiend! So I—so I followed. And when I arrived, I found you both in the library—he was urging you to some wager—
”

“
Yes, I remember now. He told me that he had a valid claim to the title. His father, he said, was after all a legitimate son of Grandfather Lancelot, who had married Prissy Privett. I said in that case he was
welcome
to the title—I wanted nothing that did not come to me by right. But that did not suit him—he said, why not fight for it, fight a duel like grandfather and Uncle Mark—?
”

“
That
does not sound as if he were very sure of his claim,
”
said Delphie.

“
So we came up onto the roof—I remember his telling me to take off my ring. Where is it?
”
he said, staring around.

“
I think Elaine took it down.
”

“
Oh—well, it does not signify. After that, I remember nothing. I do not remember
your
arrival at all.
”

“
I am not surprised!
”

“
Was I uncivil?
”

“
Oh, no—not in the least. I believe you thought I was an apparition.
”

“
And then you followed us up here—
”

“
—Hoping to dissuade or somehow prevent you from fighting. But I was too far off. So then—so then I looked to see if I could find where you had fallen—
”

Her voice trembled a little as she remembered how she had felt at that point.
“
And then I saw your body—
”

Moving his hands down from her shoulders, Gareth took her into a close embrace. She put her own arms tightly around him, and thought, How natural this feels!

“
And then you spent the night beside me, making sure that I did not fall off,
”
he said, resting his cheek on the top of her head. He added, and there was a smile in his voice,
“
I wish I had been awake, after all!
”

Her chuckle was muffled against his shoulder.

“
So did I! You were snoring horribly! Now I know the worst about you!
”

“
You have known
that
any time this last six weeks! I am uncivil, misogynistic, overbearing—
”
He held her at arms
’
length, looking her in the eyes, and said seriously,

“
I love you. You know that?
”

“
I-I believe that I do.
”

“
But do
you
love me?
”

“
Oh, good gracious! How can you
conceive
of such a notion? Why, I came to Chase—walking five miles through a downpour, I may say, because that odious Mordred made off with my carriage-followed you up onto the roof—clambered over I do not know how many obstacles—dragged your lifeless corpse back from the chasm
’
s brink—all from motives of the calmest—most phlegmatic—neutrality—and altruism—
”

The last words came out of her in jerks, for he was shaking her.
“
Oh, you little wretch! How often have I not longed to wring your neck! Or at the very least to do this—
”

And he set his lips on hers.

After some time, Delphie said,

“
Gareth?
”

“
Yes, my angel?
”

“
Do you not think we ought to get down off the roof?
”

“
Why? I should be happy to spend the rest of my life up here!
”

“
You might be so, but I should like some breakfast. Besides, I can hear horses down below—I believe a carriage is arriving.
”

From where they stood, it was not possible to see the drawbridge or the main court, so, with some difficulty and several false starts, they retraced their way back to the original door from which they had come out.

“
How we ever found our path through this maze in the dark
—
and in a thunderstorm to boot!
”
said Gareth.
“
But Mordred was brought up at Chase. I suppose he knew the roofs from a child.
”
However, when they tried the door, their plans received a check. It appeared to be locked; no amount of shaking, banging, or rattling would shift it.

“
I suppose Elaine did that,
”
Delphie said thoughtfully.
“
Hoping perhaps that I should fall off the roof in the dark—or die of starvation—or some such thing.
”

“
The puzzle is,
”
said Gareth,
“
how
she
found her way up here. For she has never been to Chase.
”

“
She said her nurse told her—I wonder where they are now.
”

“
Downstairs, perhaps, asserting her claim to be the true Miss Carteret.
”

Delphie then bethought herself to tell Gareth about Lady Bablock-Hythe
’
s expulsion of Elaine, and how this had led to the quarrel with Mordred.

“
It is all most singular,
”
he said.
“
I had long since decided she was the false pretendant, but we still have no clue at all as to
who
she is, or why my uncle Mark should have supported her from infancy.
”

Delphie was visited by inspiration.

“
Could she not be a child of his?
”