“Halloa there, my good fellow,” he called loudly, “and have you found anything?”
“This,” replied a voice from the rafters. “Here goes!” And a flashing object came hurtling down between them and fell with a metallic rattle on the floor at their feet. It was so close it might easily have struck them. It missed the Gentleman’s top hat by an inch. “An old cutlass,” laughed the voice, “but I’ve polished it up a bit, and it fairly shines now. Buried in the ‘ay it was, but a pirate’s weapon, if ever there was one.”
Maria agreed with that, as she stared down at the gleaming curved blade lying against her very shoe. Then, with a rush and scuffle, down came the speaker after it. The dark blob of an object on the highest rafter, the thing that had moved and watched her, came down with the light agility of a big monkey. A leap, a slither, another leap, a light plop, and the dashing Sailor shot dancing across the floor towards her.
“All I could find, Maria, and a merry search it was. Keep it, Miss, it’s the best I could do. It’s all yours, and if it ain’t right, we’ll look again and find something better, maybe!”
Maria shook her head disappointedly. “You keep it, Sailor. It’s not what I’m looking for.” And again she felt that she was being fobbed off with a foolish toy. “But I’m delighted to see you, Sailor! I’m really frightfully glad.” And she was on the point of kissing him when — well, she just decided not to. She gazed at him with obvious admiration instead. His beard was gone, the gold ear-rings dangled from his sun-burned ears, his telescope swung loose, he brought a whiff of salt and seaweed with him. But his skin, too, seemed to have crinkled a little more. He was not exactly less real, she decided, but he was somehow less — what was the right word? — spontaneous — less himself perhaps. There was something mechanical about him. A strange feeling passed over her as she gazed.
“Seen a bit since I saw you, Missie Maria,” he half chanted, “but now I see you again it’s the best bit I ever saw.” His singing voice rolled enchantingly along, deep and jolly. “Grown a bit, too, ‘aven’t you, I will say.”
What Maria said sounded ridiculous, but she could not help it.
“I like you better without the beard after all.”
“The tropics took it off,” he explained; “‘of as a hoven down there, you’ve no hidea.”
“Hawful,” agreed Maria, before she could prevent it.
“Wouldn’t ‘ardly believe it,” he replied.
“So you were down in the tropics and searching in this Barn at the same time?” she asked.
“That’s it, yes. Same as usual,” agreed the Sailor, clapping the telescope to his eye and gazing into her face two feet away.
“That is our melancholy fate,” put in the Gentleman. “You see, nothing matters here — er — much.” He smiled a trifle mournfully, catching the Sailor’s eye.
It seemed to Maria — or did she fancy it merely? — that they exchanged a swift glance together. A touch of uneasiness brushed her mind, but instantly was gone again.
“Something matters to me very much,” she said with quick decision: “my search.” Either she had not heard the Gentleman’s words properly, or had not understood them quite. “My search,” she repeated firmly. “And I must get on with it at once.” She looked hurriedly round her. “Are the others coming?” she asked impatiently. “You’re all going to help me look, aren’t you?”
“They are already here,” the Gentleman said quietly, “and every one of us at your service. All are searching and have doubtless found something. There is, however, no hurry, as you know.”
Why, she wondered for a second, did his words disturb her? How did she get the odd impression that they were playing with her, trifling, fobbing her off with a pretence that was really wasting precious time? Both question and impression, however, came and vanished again so swiftly that no trace seemed left. A sound of rustling movement stirred about her, of breathing, of feet shuffling softly, quietly. From all sides it came, from in front as well. So quickly then that she had not even noticed them emerging from their hiding-places in the hay, from behind the cart and plough, from beneath the heap of potatoes and coil of rope in the corner, the other six Fruit Stoners stood already grouped about her.
She looked at them with some bewilderment. They stood in silence, hardly moving, no voice audible. They stood about her, she noticed, as usual, in a circle. What was the matter with them? Why did they seem different somewhere? What was it? Why did she feel uneasy? Why did her heart sink a little? Her eyes ran rapidly round the group, passing over each face in turn. How lined and crinkled they all looked. Yet why did they seem less real, less vital? An odd sense of distress deepened in her. These figures of real life, why — how — could they suggest a dream...?
This shock — that it was all unreal and shadowy — staggered her. She recovered her manners.
“Thank you all — all of you — for coming to the Barn,” she heard herself saying, “and for helping me to make this search.” She trembled.
Her eyes, running round the group, found difficulty in picking them out individually. The faces were a blur. Vaguely she noticed that the Tailor fumbled with a pair of rusty garden shears, the Tinker with a broken saucepan, the Ploughboy with a long-handled spud, while the Soldier seemed trying to unwind a piece of copper wire. Only the Apothecary and the Thief stood out with really vivid sharpness. And they held nothing in their hands. She met the Apothecary’s eye for a fraction of a second, but without expression, without the smallest exchange between them, yet in that brief instant a strange, sweet longing disturbed her heart, a poignant yearning swept her, then passed as swiftly as it came. “Oh, God!” ran through her bitterly, “there’s something more real than this!” The Thief’s big, penetrating eyes, gazing fixedly into hers, set something shivering in her. A thrill of unbelievable excitement rushed over her like fire.
“And have you — found anything?” she asked. “Is there any sign of what I’m looking for? My great, important thing — ?”
All held out optimistically their articles as one man — the shears, the spud, the saucepan, the Gentleman brandishing his dreadful pistol. Only the
Apothecary and the Thief had nothing to show, smiling quietly behind the outstretched hands. And again the fierce, deep longing, the strange, exciting fire danced through her blood.
“It is very sweet of you,” said Maria, hiding as best she could her deep disappointment, “but we must go on looking. These have nothing to do with what I’ve got to find, dear Fruit Stoners. My thing, you see, is very hard to find, I’m afraid. It is of frightful value. It is a pearl of great price — it is beyond rubies,” she added, thinking it an odd phrase to use and wondering why she chose it, “and if I can’t find it, I’ve” — her voice faltered—” come here — for nothing — haven’t I?”
“Off we go again then!” someone cried cheerfully, and the circle suddenly broke up.
She no longer stood in the centre of a ring. The Sailor started dancing again as he moved away towards the hay, the Tailor and the Tinker went off arm in arm, the Ploughboy and the Soldier followed slowly. And as they scattered, the feeling of something solemn and grave, of something uneasily disturbing that had oppressed her, dissipated. A mood of light-heartedness came back. She had been distressed and frightened about nothing after all. That ticking in her heart was really not worth bothering about, it was so faint, so far away.... These people, after all, were quite real, their various activities were real, too.... Oh, yes....
“Thank you, thank you, my Fruit Stoners! I know we shall find it in the end!”
They looked over their shoulders and smiled at her, and she threw back a similar smile. They had offered their toys, she had inspected them, and it was all well meant. Only the Apothecary and the Thief, she saw, did not move, but stood there watching her.
The Gentleman, however, his perfume, she thought, a little too sweet, came up to her. The Sailor was already by the door, flashing his scimitar as he poked it vigorously about in t
he hay.
“I am afflicted,” remarked the former, brandishing his pistol, “that this is, after all, not exactly what you are looking for, Maria, but it may prove useful none the less. In a search like this it is safer to go armed.” He raised the pistol to his face, and blew down both barrels so violently that a shower of seed and dust flew up into his eyes. “Many a kingdom,” he went on, wiping his face, blowing his nose and readjusting his hat, “many a kingdom has been lost because the dust was in the leader’s eyes.”
“I wish you would point the barrel away from me,” said Maria nervously. “It might be loaded, you know, Gent.”
“It is,” he replied quietly, bowing so low that she thought he was going to kneel to her, “for an engagement involves certain risks, and of what use — anywhere — is an unloaded pistol?”
“None,” she muttered, wondering what he meant, yet admiring his air of careless bravery, as though he was prepared for any odds. “Do you mean — a battle?”
An expression of reckless grandeur came upon his face.
“Take this,” he murmured, in the tone of a man who would defend her honour with his life, “and heaven grant you shoot straight if, and when, the moment comes!”
He passed the heavy blunderbuss gingerly into her outstretched hands, the barrel pointing well away from himself.
Maria took the thing still more gingerly and held it tight.
“Oh — can you use it?” he inquired politely. “I suggest pulling the trigger — to make quite sure it won’t — explode.”
She obeyed. There was a loud report, a blinding flash, and the Sailor, still standing by the door, sprang a foot into the air.
“Admirable!” remarked the Gentleman nonchalantly, as the smoke cleared away. “Your courage does you infinite credit. You placed the slug between his feet. A perfect shot!”
“I haven’t hit him, have I?” cried Maria breathlessly. “Is he wounded? I didn’t aim at anything really.” Her heart was in her mouth.
But the Sailor, having sprung into the air, continued springing. He was doing a kind of hornpipe, singing at the same time, waving his cutlass, and clasping his telescope to his eye to discover who had fired at him. He was not wounded certainly.
“You hit no one,” observed the Gentleman, “for you could not hurt a Fruit Stoner, no matter how you tried. We are, alas,” he added in a melancholy tone, “invulnerable, of course!
Invulnerable! The word ran through her like a knife. They could not feel physical pain, because they could not end; they could not die, they had no past, no future, they just went on and on, endlessly, growing no older... whereas she... she was different.... To her an end must come.... Some time, some day... when she had found what she was looking for... when the object of her being here was accomplished...!
The Gentleman’s melancholy smile burned in her hauntingly, her thoughts scattered, she felt a sudden dismay, uneasiness, so that her heart sank, and the dreadful ticking that never, never stopped inside her gained in power and loudness surely. She listened a moment intently. She could smother its hideous voice for a little while, but never altogether.
Invulnerable! She pretended she had not caught the word — not noticed it anyhow. For a second or two something frantic stirred in her, a sense of panic tried to show its head. There was another word, a name, a mighty name, she sought as with a gust of passion. A name that brought golden security, peace, ineffable peace... but she sought in vain, she could not find it, it had been so long neglected, its syllables utterly escaped her.
“Gent!” she exclaimed abruptly, “let’s search now — let’s search properly, I mean — please, please — we must get to work — at once!”
He bowed, taking the blunderbuss that she held out, and moved off with graceful steps towards the old broken-down cart, while Maria, pulling up her sleeves, turned back to hunt in the hay again.
“If only I knew what it was,” her thought plunged violently. “If only I could remember that!” and found herself blocked by two figures, the Apothecary and the Thief, standing in her way.
The other Fruit Stoners, she was generally aware, was already shuffling here and there among the shadows, looking in a vague, automatic way for what they could find, but these two, she remembered, had not yet stirred an inch. The Thief was nearest to her, but the Apothecary held her eye.
“Oh, you...!” she exclaimed, startled, staring up into his face, thinking for a moment it looked like a wax figure. “Aren’t you helping too? We’re all looking now.”
His old head shook gently to and fro, so that the stained beard brushed her cheek as it waggled. Goodness, how thoughtful his expression was, like a whole library! Could there be anything he did not know?
“I cannot help,” he said, without even looking up, and as though he spoke to himself almost, “for you alone can find it. No one else but you,” and he moved quietly away, like a shadow that joined other shadows.
She knew in her heart that what he said was true. She found herself alone now with the Thief, and she turned, shaking a little inwardly, to face him.
Oh, that exacting, that demanding face, those big, penetrating eyes that hung in the air and would not be put off! That dreadful, rather dangerous, attractive yet repulsive personality whom, after all, she had made with her best, her very best! The ruffian who had taken her hair-ribbon, her shell, her amber necklace and had them at this moment in his pocket doubtless.
“You too!” she exclaimed, and though she meant to frown, she smiled, and if she shivered, it was not with the horror and revulsion she knew she ought to feel. “Aren’t you doing anything to help?”
He fixed those big starry eyes upon her face, but he did not smile, nor did he betray the smallest sign of shame.
“How can I take anything,” he replied, and his voice was oddly silvery, “unless I find it first? So far,” he added, “there is nothing I can do.”
She glared at him half angrily; at least, she intended the glare to be an angry one, but the way he gazed at her seemed to make her eyes melt into his. They held a fire that set something blazing in her.
“Oh, I understand you, Thief, I know what you’re up to. You don’t want to find my precious thing. You don’t mean me to find it either.”
Was he changing a little before her eyes? Was he growing younger, sweeter possibly in expression, even — even — more desirable? “And that’s the truth — that’s the real truth,” she cried, as that same old shock, as of electricity, pierced through her very bones. “Isn’t it? Is it not, my Thief?” she shouted at him.
For an instant the eyes seemed to hang there before her in the air without a face, without a body behind them, like ghostly living stars.
“I don’t want you — to — leave,” his silvery voice fell through the air.
So that, for a second, Maria stood spellbound in front of him, utterly unable to find any words at all. It was his voice again that filled the empty gap, yet not before she had caught herself murmuring something that rose like lightning from the centre of her being where that dreadful ticking sounded, something she was utterly unable to control, something so low, however, that he could not possibly hear it even: “Have you enough to eat, Thief? Are you warm and comfortable? Does somebody look after you... and care for you?”
A violent reaction shook her the same instant. He was a worthless scoundrel. And then his words dropped into that waiting gap.
“And you’ll never find it till you’ve first done everything, gone through the rest... all that you came to do.”
He smiled an odd superior smile, he shrugged his shoulders.
“I know what you mean,” she found her voice, noticing for the first time that her pretty belt had loosened. But her attention was fixed upon the challenge in his words and manner. “You mean — I’ve got to — marry one of you!
He made a curious little bow, coming a shade closer as he did so, and the belt was whipped off her waist with such amazing speed and dexterity that she never even saw it go.
/> “Silk, satin, calico, rags,” he chanted with a grin, as he straightened up again, “and Big House, Little House, Pig Stye, Barn, and Gentleman...”
“Well, I am affianced to the Gentleman,” she forced out in a loud, strong voice, “and you heard him mention the engagement a moment ago.”
“One of us,” was the quiet rejoinder, stuffing the pretty belt into his pocket, “one of us will do.” He shrugged his shoulders again, with a repetition of that curious, waiting smile. “The choice is your own — Maria.”
A sharp darting pain ran through her heart. What would happen, she wondered, if she kissed him full on the lips? Oh, how that inner fire danced and spread.
“I believe you’re right,” she murmured in a low voice. “Once that’s out of the way — I shall be more free — to search properly. I’d better go through with everything first!
They looked at one another for a moment. Heavens! Was she burning up?
“I’m ready,” said Maria, furious with herself because her voice gave a queer little tremble. “But all the same, I know you’ve got my belt.”
He gave a delicious, understanding laugh.
“Gentleman! Hi, there!” he called, and at once the Gentleman came prancing up with that air of debonair grace and courtliness that belongs only to those who have daily intercourse with kings and queens. And Maria, watching it, felt her whole being sink down in a gulf of bitter and violent disappointment.
CHAPTER XIII
THE marriage had its queer aspect — for, looking back, it seemed a sort of long endless dream that had yet happened all in a moment. Its prospect had appeared so tremendous an event somehow. “I shall be a bride, a married woman!” The change in her life so drastic, the difference so startling. After marriage she would be really another person with new characteristics, thoughts, ideas... and yet now she found herself much the same as before. Looking back, yes, it seemed merely an event in dreamland after all. Nothing had altered much. She herself, at any rate, was surprisingly just the same as before. Oh, exactly the same.
Collected Works of Algernon Blackwood Page 312