The Prelude to Adventure
H >> Hugh Walpole >> The Prelude to AdventureTranscriber's Note: Errors found: A name is sometimes spelt 'Med. Tetloe' and
sometimes 'Med-Tetloe' & Cleopatre maybe wrong. So that just 7 bit text
is used the accented & ligatured words are repeated here with numbers
for codepages 437 & 850: Acute e 130 e: blase, chasmed, Cleopatre, elite
& unperturbed i with 2 (or 3) dots 139 i: dais & dais ea ligature 145
ae: mediaeval u with 2 dots 129 ue: Duerer's 'The Hound of Heaven' poem, The
letter to father and separate 'All things betray Thee Who betrayest Me.'
quote are in a smaller font.
THE PRELUDE TO ADVENTURE
BY HUGH WALPOLE AUTHOR OF "MR. PERRIN AND MR. TRAILL"
MACMILLAN AND CO., LIMITED, ST. MARTIN'S STREET, LONDON
_New Edition September_,1919
TO MY FRIEND R. A. STREATFIELD
CONTENTS
CHAP.
I. LAST CHAPTER
II. BUNNING
III. THE BODY COMES TO TOWN
IV. MARGARET CRAVEN
V. STONE ALTARS
VI. THE WATCHERS
VII. TERROR
VIII. REVELATION OF BUNNING (I)
IX. REVELATION OF BUNNING (II)
X. CRAVEN
XI. FIFTH OF NOVEMBER
XII. LOVE TO THE "VALSE TRISTE"
XIII. MRS. CRAVEN
XIV. GOD
XV. PRELUDE TO A JOURNEY
XVI. OLVA AND MARGARET
XVII. FIRST CHAPTER
Up vistaed hopes I sped;
And shot, precipitated Adown Titanic glooms of chasmed fears,
From those strong Feet that followed, followed after.
But with unhurrying chase,
And unperturbed pace,
Deliberate speed, majestic instancy,
They beat--and a Voice beat
More instant than the Feet--
All things betray thee, who betrayest Me.
The Hound of Heaven.
16 HALLAM STREET,
_October_ 11, 1911.
CHAPTER I
LAST CHAPTER
1
"There _is_ a God after all." That was the immense conviction that
faced him as he heard, slowly, softly, the leaves, the twigs, settle
themselves after that first horrid crash which the clumsy body had made.
Olva Dune stood for an instant straight and stiff, his arms heavily at
his side, and the dank, misty wood slipped back once more into silence.
There was about him now the most absolute stillness: some trees dripped
in the mist; far above him, on the top of the hill, the little path
showed darkly--below him, in the hollow, black masses of fern and weed
lay heavily under the chill November air--at his feet there was the
body.
In that sudden after silence he had known beyond any question that might
ever again arise, that there was now a God--God had watched him.
With grave eyes, with hands that did not tremble, he surveyed and then,
bending, touched the body. He knelt in the damp, heavy soil, tore open
the waistcoat, the shirt; the flesh was yet warm to his touch--the
heart was still. Carfax was dead.
It had happened so instantly. First that great hulking figure in front
of him, the sneering laugh, that last sentence, "Let her rot . . . my
dear Dune, your chivalry does you credit." Then that black, blinding,
surging rage and the blow that followed. He did not know what he had
intended to do. It did not matter--only in the force that there had been
in his arm there had been the accumulated hatred of years, hatred that
dated from that first term at school thirteen years ago when he had
known Carfax for the dirty hypocrite that he was. He could not stay now
to think of the many things that had led to this climax. He only knew
that as he raised himself again from the body there was with him no
feeling of repentance, no suggestion of fear, only a grim satisfaction
that he had struck so hard, and, above all, that lightning certainty
that he had had of God.
His brain was entirely alert. He did not doubt, as he stood there, that
he would be caught and delivered and hanged. He, himself, would take no
steps to prevent such a catastrophe. He would leave the body there as it
was: to-night, to-morrow they would find it,--the rest would follow. He
was, indeed, acutely interested in his own sensations. Why was it that
he felt no fear? Where was the terror that followed, as he had so often
heard, upon murder? Why was it that the dominant feeling in him should
be that at last he had justified his existence? In that furious blow
there had leapt within him the creature that he had always been--the
creature subdued, restrained, but always there--there through all
this civilized existence; the creature that his father was, that his
grandfather, that all his ancestors, had been. He looked down. The
hulking body that had been Carfax made a hollow in the wet and broken
fern. The face was white, stupid, the cheeks hanging fat, horrible, the
eyes staring. One leg was twisted beneath the body. Still in the air
there seemed to linger that startled little cry--"Oh!"--surprise,
wonder--and then fading miserably into nothing as the great body fell.
Such a huge hulking brute; now so sordid and useless, looking at last,
after all these years, the thing that it ought always to have looked.
Some money had rolled from the pocket and lay shining amongst the fern.
A gold ring glittered on the white finger, seeming in the heart of that
silence the only living note.
Then Olva remembered his dog--where was he? He turned and saw the fox
terrier down on all fours amongst the fern, motionless, his tongue out,
his eyes gazing with animal inquiry at his master. The dog was waiting
for the order to continue the walk. He seemed, in his passivity, merely
to be resting, a little exhausted perhaps by the heavy closeness of the
day, too indolent to nose amongst the leaves for possible adventure:
Olva looked at him. The dog caught the look and beat the grass with his
tail, soft, friendly taps to show that he only waited for orders. Then
still idly, still with that air of gentle amusement, the dog gazed at
the thing in the grass. He rose slowly and very delicately advanced a
few steps: for an instant some fear seemed to strike his heart for he
stopped suddenly and gazed into his master's face for reassurance. What
he saw there comforted him. Again he wagged his tail placidly and half
closed his eyes in sleepy indifference.
Then Olva, without another backward glance, left the hollow, crashed
through the fern up the hill and struck the little brown path. Bunker,
the dog, pattered patiently behind him.
2
Olva Dune was twenty-three years of age. He was of Spanish descent,
and it was only within the last two generations that English blood had
mingled with the Dune stock. He was of no great height, slim and dark.
His hair was black, his complexion sallow, and on his upper lip he wore
a small dark moustache. His ears were small, his mouth thin, his chin
sharply pointed, but his eyes, large, dark brown, were his best feature.
They were eyes that looked as though they held in their depths the
possibility of tenderness. He walked as an athlete, there was no spare
flesh about him anywhere, and in his carriage there was a dignity that
had in it pride of birth, complete self-possession, and above all,
contempt for his fellow-creatures.
He despised all the world save only his father. He had gone through
his school-life and was now passing through his college-life as a man
travels through a country that has for him no interest and no worth but
that may lead, once it has been traversed, to something of importance
and adventure. He was now at the beginning of his second year at
Cambridge and was regarded by every one with distrust, admiration,
excitement. His was one of the more interesting personalities at that
time in residence at Saul's.
He had come with a historical scholarship and a great reputation as a
Three-quarter from Rugby. He was considered to be a certain First Class
and a certain Rugby Blue; he, lazily and indifferently during the course
of his first term, discouraged both these anticipations. He attended
no lectures, received a Third Class in his May examinations, and was
deprived of his scholarship at the end of his first year. He played
brilliantly in the Freshmen's Rugby match, but so indolently in the
first University match of the season that he was not invited again. Had
he played merely badly he would have been given a second trial, but
his superior insolence was considered insulting. He never played in
any College matches nor did he trouble to watch any of their glorious
conflicts. Once and again he produced an Essay for his Tutor that
astonished that gentleman very considerably, but when called before the
Dean for neglecting to attend lectures explained that he was studying
the Later Roman Empire and could not possibly attend to more than one
thing at a time.
He was perfectly friendly to every one, and it was curious that, with
his air of contempt for the world in general, he had made no enemies. He
wondered at that himself, on occasions; he had always been supposed, for
instance, to be very good friends with Carfax. He had, of course, always
hated Carfax--and now Carfax was dead.
The little crooked path soon left the dark wood and merged into the long
white Cambridge road. The flat country was veiled in mist, only, like
a lantern above a stone wall, the sun was red over the lower veils of
white that rose from the sodden fields. Some trees started like spies
along the road. Overhead, where the mists were faint, the sky showed the
faintest of pale blue. The long road rang under Olva's step--it would be
a frosty night.
When the little wood was now a black ball in the mist Olva was suddenly
sick. He leant against one of the dark mysterious trees and was
wretchedly, horribly ill. Slowly, then, the colour came back to his
cheeks, his hands were once more steady, he could see again clearly. He
addressed the strange world about him, the long flat fields, the hard
white road, the orange sun. "That is the last time," he said aloud, "the
last weakness."
He definitely braced himself to face life. There would not be much of
it--to-morrow he would be arrested: meanwhile there should be no more of
these illusions. There was, for instance, the illusion that the body was
following him, bounding grotesquely along the hard road. He knew that
again and again he turned his head to see whether anything were there,
and the further the little wood was left behind the nearer did the body
seem to be. He must not allow himself to think these things. Carfax was
dead--Carfax was dead--Carfax was dead. It was a good thing that Carfax
was dead. He had saved, he hoped, Rose Midgett--that at any rate he had
done; it was a good thing for Rose Midgett that he had killed Carfax.
He had, incidentally, no interest on his own account in Rose Midgett--he
scarcely knew her by sight--but it was pleasant to think that she would
be no longer worried. . . .
Then there was that question about God. Now the river appeared, darkly,
dimly below the road, the reeds rising spire-like towards the faint blue
sky. That question about God--Olva had never believed in any kind of a
God. His father had defied God and the Devil time and again and had been
none the worse for it. And yet--here and there about the world people
lived and had their being to whom this question of God was a vital
question; people like Bunning and his crowd--mad, the whole lot of
them. Nevertheless there was something there that had great power. That
had, until to-day, been Olva's attitude, an amused superior curiosity.
Now it was a larger question. There had been that moment after Carfax
had fallen, a moment of intense silence, and in that moment something
had spoken to Olva. It is a fact as sure as concrete, as though he
himself could remember words and gesture. There had been Something
there. . . .
Brushing this for an instant aside, he faced next the question of his
arrest. There was no one, save his father, for whom he need think. He
would send his father word saying--"I have killed a beast--fairly--in
the open"--that would be all.
He would not be hanged--poison should see to that. Dunes had murdered,
raped, tortured--never yet had they died on the gallows.
And now, for the first time, the suspicion crossed his mind that
perhaps, after all, he might escape--escape, at any rate, that order of
punishment. Here on this desolate road, he had met no living soul; the
mists encompassed him and they had now swallowed the dripping wood and
all that it contained. It had always been supposed that he was good
friends with Carfax, as good friends as he allowed himself to be with
any one. No one had known in which direction he would take his walk;
he had come upon Carfax entirely by chance. It might quite naturally be
supposed that some tramp had attempted robbery. To the world at large
Olva could have had no possible motive. But, for the moment, these
thoughts were dismissed. It seemed to him just now immaterial whether he
lived or died. Life had not hitherto been so wonderful a discovery
that the making of it had been entirely worth while. He had no tenor of
disgrace; his father was his only court of appeal, and that old rocky
sinner, sitting alone with his proud spirit and his grey hairs, in his
northern fastness, hating and despising the world, would himself slay,
had he the opportunity, as many men of the Carfax kind as he could find.
He had no terror of pain--he did not know what that kind of fear was.
The Dunes had always faced Death.
But he began, dimly, now to perceive that there were larger, crueller
issues before him than these material punishments. He had known since
he was a tiny child a picture by some Spanish painter, whose name he had
forgotten, that had always hung on the wall of the passage opposite his
bedroom. It was a large engraving in sharply contrasted black and white,
of a knight who rode through mists along a climbing road up into
the heart of towering hills. The mountains bad an active life in the
picture; they seemed to crowd forward eager to swallow him. Beside the
spectre horse that he rode there was no other life. The knight's face,
white beneath his black helmet, was tired and worn. About him was the
terror of loneliness.
From his earliest years this idea of loneliness had pleasantly seized
upon Olva's mind. His father had always impressed upon him that the
Dunes had ever been lonely--lonely in a world that was contemptible. He
had always until now accepted this idea and found it confirmed on every
side. His six years at Rugby had encouraged him--he had despised, with
his tolerant smile, boys and masters alike; all insincere, all weak, all
to be used, if he wanted them, as he chose to use them. He had thought
often of the lonely knight--that indeed should be his attitude to the
world.
But now, suddenly, as the scattered Cambridge houses with their dull
yellow lights began to creep stealthily through the mist, upon the road,
he knew for the first time that loneliness could be terrible. He
was hurrying now, although he had not formerly been conscious of it,
hurrying into the lights and comforts and noise of the town. There might
only be for him now a night and day of freedom, but, during that time,
he must not, he must not be alone. The patter of Bunker's feet beside
him pleased him. Bunker was now a fact of great importance to him.
And now he could see further. He could see that he must always now, from
the consciousness of the thing that he had done, he alone. The actual
moment of striking his blow had put an impassable gulf between his soul
and all the world. Bodies might touch, hands might be grasped,
voices ring together, always now his soul must be alone. Only, that
Something--of whose Presence he had been, in that instant, aware--could
keep his company. They two . . . they two. . . .
The suburbs of Cambridge had closed about him. Those dreary little
streets, empty as it seemed of all life, facing him sullenly with their
sodden little yellow lamps, shivering, grumbling, he could fancy, in
the chill of that November evening, eyed him with suspicion. He walked
through them now, with his shoulders back, his head up. He could fancy
how, to-morrow, their dull placidity would be wrung by the discovery of
the crime. The little wood would fling its secret into the eager lap
of these decrepit witches; they would crowd to their doors, chatter it,
shout it, pull it to pieces. "Body of an Undergraduate . . . Body of an
Undergraduate. . . ."
He turned out of their cold silence over the bridge that spanned the
river, up the path that crossed the common into the heart of the town,
Here, at once, he was in the hubbub. The little streets were mediaeval
in their narrow space, in their cobbles, in the old black, fantastic
walls that hung above them. Beauty, too, on this November evening, shone
through the misty lamplight. Beauty in the dark purple of the evening
sky, beauty in the sudden vista of grey courts with lighted windows,
like eyes, seen through stone gateways. Beauty in the sudden golden
shadows of some corner shop glittering through the mist; beauty in the
overshadowing of the many towers that were like grey clouds in mid-air.
The little streets chattered with people--undergraduates in Norfolk
jackets, grey flannel trousers short enough to show the brightest
of socks, walked arm in arm--voices rang out--men called across the
streets--hansoms rattled like little whirlwinds along the cobbles---many
bells were ringing--dark bodies, leaning from windows, gave uncouth
cries . . . over it all the mellow lamplight.
Into this happy confusion Olva Dune plunged. He shook off from him, as
a dog shakes water from his back, the memory of that white mist-haunted
road. Once he deliberately faced the moment when he had been sick--faced
it, heard once again the dull, lumbering sound that the body had made as
it bundled along the road, and then put it from him altogether. Now for
battle . . . his dark eyes challenged this shifting cloud of life.
He went round to the stable where Bunker was housed, chattered with the
blue-chinned ostler, and then, for a moment, was alone with the dog. How
much had Bunker seen? How much had he understood? Was it fancy, or did
the dog crouch, the tiniest impulse, away from him as he bent to pat
him? Bunker was tired; he relapsed on to his haunches, wagged his
tail, grinned, but in his eyes there seemed, although the lamplight was
deceptive, to be the faintest shadow of an apprehension.
"Good old dog, good old Bunker." Bunker wagged his tail, but the tiniest
shiver passed, like a thought, through his body.
Olva left him.
As he passed through the streets he met men whom he knew. They nodded or
flung a greeting. How strange to think that to-morrow night they would
be speaking of him in low, grave voices as one who was already dead. "I
knew the fellow quite well, strange, reserved man--nobody really knew
him. With these foreigners, you know . . ."
Oh! he could hear them!
He passed through the gates of Saul's. The porter touched his hat. The
great Centre Court was shrouded in mist, and out of the white veil the
grey buildings rose, gently, on every side. There were lights now in
the windows; the Chapel bell was ringing, hushed and dimmed by the heavy
air. Boots rang sharply along the stone corridors. Olva crossed the
court towards his room.
Suddenly, from the very heart of the mist, sharply, above the sound of
the Chapel bell, a voice called--
"Carfax! Carfax!"
Olva stayed: for an instant the blood ran from his body, his knees
quivered, his face was as white as the mist. Then he braced himself--he
knew the voice.
"Hullo, Craven, is that you?"
"Who's that? . . . Can't see in this mist."
"Dune."
"Hullo, Dune. I say, do you know what's happened to Carfax?"
"Happened? No--why?"
"Well, I can't find him anywhere. I wanted to get him for Bridge. He
ought to be back by now."
"Back? Where's he been?"
"Going over to see some aunt or other at Grantchester--ought to be back
by now."
An aunt?--No, Rose Midgett.
"No--I've no idea--haven't seen him since yesterday."
"Been out for a walk?"
"Yes, just took my dog for a bit."
"See you in Hall?"
"Right--o!"
The voice began again calling under the windows--"Carfax! Carfax!"
Olva climbed the stairs to his rooms.
CHAPTER II
BUNNING
1
He went into Hall. He sat amongst the particular group of his own year
who were considered the _elite_. There was Cardillac there, brilliant,
flashing Cardillac. There was Bobby Galleon, fat, good-natured, sleepy,
intelligent in an odd bovine way. There was Craven, young, ardent,
hail-fellow-well-met. There was Lawrence, burly back for the University
in Rugby, unintelligent, kind and good-tempered unless he were drunk.
There were others. They all sat in their glory, noisily happy. Somewhere
in the distance on a raised dais were the Dons gravely pompous. Every
now and again word was brought that the gentlemen were making too much
noise. The Master might be observed drinking elaborately, ceremoniously
with some guest. Madden, the Service Tutor, flung his shrill treble
voice above the general hubbub--
"But, my dear Ross, if you had only observed---"
"Where is Carfax?" came suddenly from Lawrence. He asked Craven, who
was, of course, the devoted friend of Carfax. Craven had large brown
eyes, a charming smile, a prominent chin, rather fat routed cheeks and
short brown hair that curled a little. He gave the impression of eager
good-temper and friendliness. To-night he looked worried. "I don't
know," he said, "I can't understand it. He said this morning that he'd
be here to-night and make up a four at Bridge. He went off to see an
aunt or some one at Grantchester!"
"Perhaps," said Bobby Galleon gravely, "he had an exeat and has gone up
to town."
"But he'd have said something--sure. And the porter hasn't seen him. He
would have been certain to know."
Olva was never expected to talk much. His reserve was indeed rather
popular. The entirely normal and ordinary men around him appreciated
this mystery. "Rum fellow, Dune . . . nobody knows him." His high dark
colour, his dignity, his courtesy had about it something distinguished
and romantic. "He'll do something wonderful one day, _you_ bet. Why, if
he only chose to play up at footer there's nothing he couldn't do."
Even the brilliant Cardillac, thin, dark, handsome leader of fashion and
society, admitted the charm.
Now, however, Olva, looking up, quietly said--
"I expect his aunt's kept him to dinner. _He'll_ turn up."
But of course he wouldn't turn up. He was lying in the heart of that
crushed, dripping fern with his leg doubled under him. It wasn't often
that one killed a man with one blow; the signet ring that he wore on the
little finger of his right hand--a Dune ring of great antiquity--must
have had something to do with it.
He turned it round thoughtfully on his finger. Robert, an old, old
trembling waiter, said in a shaking voice--
"There's salmi of wild game, sir--roast beef."
"Beef, please," Olva said quietly.
He was considering now that all these men would to-morrow night have
only one thought, one idea. They would remember everything, the very
slightest thing that he had done. They would discuss it all from every
possible point of view.
"I always knew he'd do something. . . ." He suddenly knew quite sharply,
as though a voice had spoken to him, that he could not endure this
any longer. There was gathering upon him the conviction that in a few
minutes, rising from his place, he would cry out to the hall--"I,
Olva Dune, this afternoon, killed Carfax. You will find his body in the
wood." He repeated the words to himself under his breath. "You will find
his body in the wood. . . ." "You will find . . ."
He finished his beef very quietly and then got up.
Craven appealed to him. "I say, Dune, do come and make a four--my rooms,
half-past eight--Lawrence and Galleon are the other two."
Olva looked down at him with his grave, rather melancholy smile.
"Afraid I can't to-night, Craven; must work."
"Don't overdo it," Cardillac said.
The eyes of the two men met. Olva knew that Cardillac--"Cards" as he was
to his friends, liked him; he himself did not hate Cardillac. He was the
only man in the College for whom he had respect. They were both of them
demanding the same thing from the world. They both of them despised
their fellow-creatures.
Olva, climbing the stairs to his room, stood for a moment in the dark,
before he turned on the lights. He spoke aloud in a whisper, as though
some one were with him in the room.
"This won't do," he said. "This simply won't do. Your nerves are going.
You've only got a few hours of it. Hold on--Think of the beast that he
was. Think of the beast that he was."
He walked slowly back to the door and turned on the electric lights. He
did not sport his oak--if people came to see him he would rather like
it: in some odd way it would be more satisfactory than that he should go
to see them--but people did not often come to see him.
He laid out his books on the table and sat down. He had grown fond of
this room. The walls were distempered white. The ceiling was old and
black with age. There was a deep red-tiled fireplace. One wall had low
brown bookshelves. There were two pictures: one an Around reprint of
Matsys' "Portrait of Aegidius"--that wise, kind, tender face; the other
an admirable photogravure of Durer's "Selbstbildnis." The books were
mainly to do with his favourite historical period--the Later Roman
Empire. There was some poetry--an edition of Browning, Swinburne's
_Poems and Ballads_, Ernest Dowson, Rossetti, Francis Thompson. There
was an edition of Hazlitt, a set of the _Spectator_, one or two novels,
_Henry Lessingham_ and _The Roads_ by Galleon, _To Paradise_ by Lester,
Meredith's _One of Our Conquerors_ and _Diana of the Crossways, The
Ambassadors_ and _Awkward Age_ of Henry James.