The Curious Quests of Brigadier Ffellowes Page 4

  " 'When they were still little, Donald, still in the nursery, Lionel tried to kill James. They are only two years apart in age. He packed a fruit cake, or rather James' portion, with ground glass! I don't think he could have been eight years old!'

  "My friend looked at me after she had spoken. 'I'm afraid it's true, you know. Had a good old nanny, who didn't take to Lionel, and she saw him do it. Told Dad, and we were sent off to separate schools. If it hadn't been for an open scandal and mother's weeping, I think it might have come out in the open. As it was, Dad made him see some alienist or something: they were just coming in then. I've seen the medical reports. Chap said he could do nothing with Lionel, nothing at all, and would be afraid to try. Fact is, I've never felt quite safe while he was nearby. Sounds silly, but Isobel and I have no kids, which makes him heir. Rotten thing to suspect your own brother, but he's been such an all-round bloody piece of work ...' His voice trailed off.

  " 'That's the oldest of all crimes,' I said in a tight voice, 'murder for a throne or title. If you get away with it, it's called rebellion. One thing is clear to me, and that is that all your present troubles have started since your brother came on the scene. To my knowledge, and I'd like this confirmed, there has never been any trouble of any even vaguely supernatural nature in this house, or around it, until recently?'

  "Isobel looked at James. After all, it was his house. He shook his head, finally. 'No,' he said, 'I can think of nothing. I expect I would have heard, too. I used to be awfully put down about it as a kid at school, come to think of it. All the others had places with Anne Boleyn or someone walking, and Cavaliers on the battlements. When they asked me, I had nothing to tell them, not even a monk or headless serf, or whatever. No, Donald, there has never been anything of the kind here.'

  "I could only take refuge in silence. Poor devil, if my slowly coalescing ideas were correct, he was about to get an overabundance of all the things he had treated so lightly!

  "We dined early. There was little conversation, and that was of a nature which omitted any discussion of what we were awaiting. Traheal came up the stairs with me, and I knew that, on his part, it was no accident. 'Well, sir,' he said hoarsely, 'have you got some idea now of what we are going through?'

  "I stared at him, not out of any class consciousness, I assure you, but simply because my thoughts were elsewhere. Then, I realized that a good man was asking for information.

  " 'Yes,' I answered bluntly. 'I think the whole thing centers around his lordship's brother. What do you think?'

  "The blaze of anger on his face surprised me, though it should not have done so had I thought. After all, Lord Lionel had grown up in these parts.

  " 'I knew it,' he said. 'Just what I've been telling the rest of them. There's black evil, and he's the man to bring it. Sir, when he was even a little child, he was wrong. We all knew this! The Earl, God bless him, never could see what his brother was like ... but we could! My father was of the opinion that he was mad! All the servants used to watch him when he was young, so that he was never unobserved. We all felt that he would do his lordship an evil. And he tried, sir.' He looked at me in a questioning way, as if debating what else he could tell me.

  " 'I know about the ground glass,' I said in answer to his look. 'I shall do my utmost to protect the Earl and Countess, yes, and you all as well. But I may need help. If I am right, there is a most ancient malignancy gathering around this house, yes, and one which seems to be gaining strength.' Looking back from this distant point in time, it seems the maddest conversation ever held between a guest at an English country house and its dignified butler! But, you know, after what we had seen it seemed quite normal, in the context.

  "I continued: 'By the way, Traheal, did you know the two men Lord Lionel employs were Bretons? I am told that their language is very close to the original Cornish. And I think Lord Lionel doesn't want this known. Do you make anything of that?'

  "He paused in the act of opening my door, his face thoughtful. 'We used, back in the old smuggling days, sir, to have a lot to do with the Bretons. Long before my time of course, but I've heard many tales from the older folk. There was a lot of intermarriage among the sailors, back in Napoleon's day and earlier, my granny used to say. Most of us have some Breton blood in us, if you can believe the stories. And they do say, too, that a Cornishman could understand them, and vice versa, those of us who used the old talk, mind you. But there's none of them left now that speaks it any longer.' He paused, still thinking, or rather, trying to recall some thought. 'I don't know, Captain, that we have much in common any longer. This is King Arthur's land, you know, sir, and I do seem to remember somewhere that the Bretons lay some claim to him, too, some old stories about him living there or something. Maybe that's how the languages got to be the same? They tell us now, Captain, that there was no such King and that the whole thing was a made-up tale of some old writer.' He laughed, his rosy countryman's face clearing. 'You'll never get a Cornish man or women to believe that, now. Why, to us the King over there in London, and a fine man he is, meaning no disrespect, I assure you, he's a new chum compared to our king.' His face sobered as he turned to go back downstairs. 'Those two rogues may be Bretons, though I'd hate to claim kinship to such ill-looking scoundrels. But I'll leave you with this, Captain. If those two are Lord Lionel's men, then they're also black evil. None but the worst would willingly do his bidding!'

  "He left me with a good deal more than he thought to mull over. A missing piece had dropped onto my puzzle table, though one I could not yet fully assess. The Pendragon! The great king of legend, and the savior of what was last and best in Celtic Britain! Arthur, the most towering shape in the mist of legend, the greatest of folk heroes in Western Europe! Was he a last Roman, as some have postulated, an inspired commander of heavy cavalry? One theory I had read made him Dux Brittanorum, the British war leader left behind by the last Roman garrison to save what vestige of civilization he could from the barbarism reaching out of the north and west. Another school thought him to be Comes Littorae Saxoni, The Count of the Saxon Shore, and thus the guardian of the east coast against the migrating hordes from the dark German forests, pagans and sacrificers to the bloodstained idols of the vast Hercynian woods.

  "All accounts agree on a few points, though many of them have become cause for laughter in our present state of so-called enlightenment. Arthur was a Christian, and he fought the sorcery of his enemies with spiritual powers of his own. He was aided by at least one white wizard, usually called Merlin, but sometimes Blaize, or other names. Discounting the Round Table, Galahad, the Sword in the Stone, and other such trimmings, one was left with a series of desperate battles, against diverse foes, such as that of Mount Badon, and final defeat at the hands of ...!

  "I opened my window and leaned against the shutter, staring out into the swirling mist. Could this be the solution to my riddle? If it was, Avalon House was a nexus, a focal point for an historic crime, a crime of the immemorial and incredibly antique past. Was it now in the process of recreation? What was Lord Lionel Penruddock, a man of the foulest antecedents, with a limitless potential for evil, doing in that slag heap without a name out there on the cliff? What was he digging for?

  "I stared out into the dark, my eyes trying to pierce the wraiths of mist and fog, down to the nameless castle on the rock promontory of that ocean-bound crag. The night was silent, save for the distant murmur of the Atlantic surges against the Cornish shore. Yet I felt, somehow, that far to the west something was stirring, out beyond human sight or the reach of human kind at all. I looked absently at my watch. It was eleven thirty. More time had gone on than I had realized, as I had stood there trying to see light where there was none to see, trying to read sense into a matter so strange that a mention of it in most places would have been grounds for accusations of insanity! It was well for us that no one at Avalon House had returned a second time for help from the police! This battle, for that was how I saw it, had to be fought by us alone, and our antagonist was a man
with strange weapons at his command. If I were right, they might be weapons against which we would find ourselves powerless.

  "I was about to close and bar the windows when I heard the sound in the night. Far off, to the south, I felt sure, echoing through the mist, came the high, shrill whinnying of a horse. Now, all the horses, the some half-dozen there were, belonging to the estate, were stabled and shut in tight at sundown. So too, with the sheep and cattle. And nothing lay to the south but miles of empty cliff and moor, with no habitations or roads. Save for the cliff cottage.

  "And the castle, if that were truly ever a habitation. And anything that issued from the gloomy pile meant this house and all in it no good. Whatever was coming, and I knew in my bones that it was coming, was advancing from there. I knew this also, just as I knew that midnight was fast approaching.

  "Then I heard it again, a high-pitched neighing, which got all through my bones, nearer than last time and coming fast. That nickering cry was wrong in some way I could not define. No normal horse would have made such a sound, nor indeed, could have done so.

  "At the same time the mist began to swirl and part. It was a cloudy night, and the stars and moon were still hidden. But the ground mist was being shredded, and I heard, far off, the first faint moan of a wind, off in the uttermost west. And almost, so faint I could hardly catch the tremor of a scent in my nostrils, I seemed to smell the delicate perfume of apples. It seemed to give me hope, though why I did not know, and it also spurred me to action.

  "I hurled myself out the door and raced down the corridor toward James' and Isobel's bedroom. They had to be roused at once.

  "The door was opening as I arrived, and James stood there, fully clothed, with his wife behind him. Like myself, they had not undressed, but on his feet he now wore boots instead of the evening slippers he had worn with his dinner clothes.

  "Her face was pale and frightened, though she was striving hard to conceal it. But his? The quiet, placid face of the country squire that I knew was utterly gone. He was a big man, and suddenly a most formidable one as well. His face was set like flint, in a brooding but awesome expression, one I had never seen before and I expect no one else had either. He looked steady as a rock and just as hard to move, but it was more than that. Above all, the impression was regal, in the old sense of the word, that of a great ruler and master of men, one who controlled destiny and was never its plaything.

  "And as I stared transfixed at this new and mighty visage, there came from outside in the night the sound of the rising wind and over it the neighing of whatever it was out there masquerading as a horse!

  "James turned and gently, without a word, pushed his wife back into the room. I caught one glimpse of her white face before the door closed. Then he turned back to me and stared hard at me for a second, as if in assessment.

  " 'He has loosed the Hunter upon us,' he said. 'Do you dare face him, and perhaps worse?' His voice was as strange as his expression had been to me, being deep and sonorous, with each word carefully chosen, as if he were speaking a language which was somehow not his, but a recently acquired tongue.

  "I could only nod, for somehow speech seemed out of place, or else my tongue simply would not function in my dry mouth.

  "He seemed to understand and laid a hand on my shoulder. 'Then come,' he said, 'Follow and ask no questions for there is no longer time. We must go and face this thing at its lair. What has been summoned must be laid to rest or it will come again and that must not be.'

  "In silence, I followed him down the dark stairs and into the great silent hall. The clouds had parted outside, and through a mullioned window came just enough fitful moonlight to show us the way. The moaning of the wind had risen once more to gale force, but over it we could hear the neighing bray of whatever ranged the night, and ever and anon the sound of its hooves, beating a sinister tattoo as they galloped to and fro in the dark and storm.

  "A patch of moonlight rested on one wall, and one could see the glimmer as it lighted on the various ancestral weapons which hung there. They ranged from trophies of foreign wars in the East, to mementos of Cavalier and Roundhead, and even older things, Lochaber axes, Scottish broadswords and claymores, with naval cutlasses of various times interwoven in the pattern.

  "James moved to the wall and studied it for a moment, then reached up and unhooked a great Scottish broadsword, a thing most men would have needed two hands to swing, though he held it lightly enough in one.

  "He turned to me, his face as grave as before and said, very simply, 'Choose.'

  "As I hesitated, he added in the same slow, stately way, 'We must use fire or steel. The newer things will not help against that which walks the night. The servants and the woman sleep. They cannot face what we must. Choose!'

  "This last was in a tone I could not resist. Nor did the mention of his beloved wife as 'the woman' rouse me to rebellion. Someone else had taken over command, and my business was to obey.

  "I stepped over and peered up at the great wall. My hand went out to a blade as if led, and d'you know, the thing I had grasped almost seemed to leap into my hand. The minute I felt the hilt, I knew what I had, for I had handled the weapon in admiration a day or so earlier. It was a long, straight cut-and-thrust, with a basket hilt, made for some remote Elizabethan ancestor by the great Andrea Ferrara himself. I had been handy enough with the saber at Woolwich and later at Oxford. I could have chosen nothing better.

  " 'A good choice,' rang out the deep voice at my side. 'A noble sword indeed, though lighter than is my use to wield. Now, let us on to the contest. We face the first challenge and perhaps not the lightest!'

  "Grasping the great weapon in his right hand, he strode down the hall and, freeing the bolts, flung open the great oak doors to the storm of wind and to whatever it was I knew waited for us in the night. Out beyond the portico we went, with me three paces behind.

  "Facing the darkness, he called above the storm in a voice like roll-thunder. 'Come and do battle, Hunter! You have no place here now! You and your kind were banished to the hills and under them, far back in the lost ages. You have no power over men of trust. I speak for Christ and defy you and all your pack. No longer should you roam the land and bring fear to the lost and the helpless in the dark! Come out, I command, on that horse I overthrew once and shall again!'

  "And over the storm and the moaning winds, came an answer! Out of the night came a wild cry, a long rising sound, which pierced the noise of the wind as if it were not there. I could distinguish no words, but the tone was enough. In it, I heard defiance and anger, and something else, a kind of emptiness, as if whatever spoke were wracked with lost hopes and challenged us from bleak despair as well as dreadful hate.

  "The moon had vanished for a second or two behind a cloud, and we stood in the dark, facing nothingness. In front of us and quite close, I heard the sound of a hoof, then another. Something was advancing on us and we were sightless!

  "The Earl stood, his sword in the guard position, solid as one of his own great gnarled oaks. I raised my own blade, though I could see no target. I felt a sudden chill, which seemed to cut through me like a knife. Then the clouds parted and the pale moon burst through and gave us light. At the same time, the gale from the west seemed to stiffen, and I caught again the sweet scent of apples.

  "In front of us, no more than ten yards off, was the outline of a great horse. Its color was a white, an opaque, shifting shade, so that it seemed almost without color at all. Its eyes were the same shade and showed no glint or light. And on its back, saddleless, it bore a rider.

  "He was as dark as the horse was light, and seemed clothed in furs of a tight fit, which caught the fitful moonlight and trapped it, giving nothing back. His head was bare, with shaggy hair, and rising from it were two forked projections, as if somehow he had made a cap from the upper cranium of some strange deer. I could not see his face at all, but the flicker of red points came from the place where his eyes should have been. In one hand he held a great barbed spear, and this
he now raised to shoulder height.

  "I sprang forward as fast I could for I knew I was not the target, but I was too slow for the cast.

  "The feeling of cold sharpened suddenly and terribly, and something long and barely glowing flew toward my companion's breast. His long sword flashed in the moon gleam, and there was a crash, as of riven metal. A nimbus of flame curved about his great blade and was gone.

  "The light died as the racing clouds once more covered the white moon. Out of the pitch-black air in front of us came that wild cry again, despairing and lost now, its defiance gone, leaving only loneliness and utter wildness.

  " 'Begone!' shouted James in that great roar. 'Seek the under hills and lie quiet! On the earth your time is done and your power gone from the world. I command you, get hence and never return!' He held the great sword in both hands with the cross guard facing out.

  "The moon came through the clouds again. Before us was ... emptiness! The twin shapes of the strange steed and its night-gaunt of a rider had vanished as if they had never been. And around us, the mighty winds raged as if in salute, roaring in bursts that sounded like my friend's new voice when he gave commands.