The Four Feathers

by AEW Mason

  "The road from Berber to Merowi," said Abou Fatma. "North of it we turn east to the river. We cross that road to-night; and if God wills, to-morrow evening we shall have crossed the Nile."

  "If God wills," said Trench. "If only He wills," and he glanced about him in a fear which only increased the nearer they drew towards safety. They were in a country traversed by the caravans; it was no longer safe to travel by day. They dismounted, and all that day they lay hidden behind a belt of shrubs upon some high ground and watched the road and the people like specks moving along it. They came down and crossed it in the darkness, and for the rest of that night travelled hard towards the river. As the day broke Abou Fatma again bade them halt. They were in a desolate open country, whereon the smallest protection was magnified by the surrounding flatness. Feversham and Trench gazed eagerly to their right. Somewhere in that direction and within the range of their eyesight flowed the Nile, but they could not see it.

  "We must build a circle of stones," said Abou Fatma, "and you must lie close to the ground within it. I will go forward to the river, and see that the boat is ready and that our friends are prepared for us. I shall come back after dark."

  They gathered the stones quickly and made a low wall about a foot high; within this wall Feversham and Trench laid themselves down upon the ground with a water-skin and their rifles at their sides.

  "You have dates, too," said Abou Fatma.

  "Yes."

  "Then do not stir from the hiding-place till I come back. I will take your camels, and bring you back fresh ones in the evening." And in company with his fellow-Arab he rode off towards the river.

  Trench and Feversham dug out the sand within the stones and lay down, watching the horizon between the interstices. For both of them this perhaps was the longest day of their lives. They were so near to safety and yet not safe. To Trench's thinking it was longer than a night in the House of Stone, and to Feversham longer than even one of those days six years back when he had sat in his rooms above St. James's Park and waited for the night to fall before he dared venture out into the streets. They were so near to Berber, and the pursuit must needs be close behind. Feversham lay wondering how he had ever found the courage to venture himself in Berber. They had no shade to protect them; all day the sun burnt pitilessly upon their backs, and within the narrow circle of stones they had no room wherein to move. They spoke hardly at all. The sunset, however, came at the last, the friendly darkness gathered about them, and a cool wind rustled through the darkness across the desert.

  "Listen!" said Trench; and both men as they strained their ears heard the soft padding of camels very near at hand. A moment later a low whistle brought them out of their shelter.

  "We are here," said Feversham, quietly.

  "God be thanked!" said Abou Fatma. "I have good news for you, and bad news too. The boat is ready, our friends are waiting for us, camels are prepared for you on the caravan track by the river-bank to Abu Hamed. But your escape is known, and the roads and the ferries are closely watched. Before sunrise we must have struck inland from the eastern bank of the Nile."

  They crossed the river cautiously about one o'clock of the morning, and sank the boat upon the far side of the stream. The camels were waiting for them, and they travelled inland and more slowly than suited the anxiety of the fugitives. For the ground was thickly covered with boulders, and the camels could seldom proceed at any pace faster than a walk. And all through the next day they lay hidden again within a ring of stones while the camels were removed to some high ground where they could graze. During the next night, however, they made good progress, and, coming to the groves of Abu Hamed in two days, rested for twelve hours there and mounted upon a fresh relay. From Abu Hamed their road lay across the great Nubian Desert.

  Nowadays the traveller may journey through the two hundred and forty miles of that waterless plain of coal-black rocks and yellow sand, and sleep in his berth upon the way. The morning will show to him, perhaps, a tent, a great pile of coal, a water tank, and a number painted on a white signboard, and the stoppage of the train will inform him that he has come to a station. Let him put his head from the window, he will see the long line of telegraph poles reaching from the sky's rim behind him to the sky's rim in front, and huddling together, as it seems, with less and less space between them the farther they are away. Twelve hours will enclose the beginning and the end of his journey, unless the engine break down or the rail be blocked. But in the days when Feversham and Trench escaped from Omdurman progression was not so easy a matter. They kept eastward of the present railway and along the line of wells among the hills. And on the second night of this stage of their journey Trench shook Feversham by the shoulders and waked him up.

  "Look," he said, and he pointed to the south. "To-night there's no Southern Cross." His voice broke with emotion. "For six years, for every night of six years, until this night, I have seen the Southern Cross. How often have I lain awake watching it, wondering whether the night would ever come when I should not see those four slanting stars! I tell you, Feversham, this is the first moment when I have really dared to think that we should escape."

  Both men sat up and watched the southern sky with prayers of thankfulness in their hearts; and when they fell asleep it was only to wake up again and again with a fear that they would after all still see that constellation blazing low down towards the earth, and to fall asleep again confident of the issue of their desert ride. At the end of seven days they came to Shof-el-Ain, a tiny well set in a barren valley between featureless ridges, and by the side of that well they camped. They were in the country of the Amrab Arabs, and had come to an end of their peril.

  "We are safe," cried Abou Fatma. "God is good. Northwards to Assouan, westwards to Wadi Halfa, we are safe!" And spreading a cloth upon the ground in front of the kneeling camels, he heaped dhurra before them. He even went so far in his gratitude as to pat one of the animals upon the neck, and it immediately turned upon him and snarled.

  Trench reached out his hand to Feversham.

  "Thank you," he said simply.

  "No need of thanks," answered Feversham, and he did not take the hand. "I served myself from first to last."

  "You have learned the churlishness of a camel," cried Trench. "A camel will carry you where you want to go, will carry you till it drops dead, and yet if you show your gratitude it resents and bites. Hang it all, Feversham, there's my hand."

  Feversham untied a knot in the breast of his jibbeh and took out three white feathers, two small, the feathers of a heron, the other large, an ostrich feather broken from a fan.

  "Will you take yours back?"

  "Yes."

  "You know what to do with it."

  "Yes. There shall be no delay."

  Feversham wrapped the remaining feathers carefully away in a corner of his ragged jibbeh and tied them safe.

  "We shake hands, then," said he; and as their hands met he added, "To-morrow morning we part company."

  "Part company, you and I—after the year in Omdurman, the weeks of flight?" exclaimed Trench. "Why? There's no more to be done. Castleton's dead. You keep the feather which he sent, but he is dead. You can do nothing with it. You must come home."

  "Yes," answered Feversham, "but after you, certainly not with you. You go on to Assouan and Cairo. At each place you will find friends to welcome you. I shall not go with you."

  Trench was silent for a while. He understood Feversham's reluctance, he saw that it would be easier for Feversham if he were to tell his story first to Ethne Eustace, and without Feversham's presence.

  "I ought to tell you no one knows why you resigned your commission, or of the feathers we sent. We never spoke of it. We agreed never to speak, for the honour of the regiment. I can't tell you how glad I am that we all agreed and kept to the agreement," he said.

  "Perhaps you will see Durrance," said Feversham; "if you do, give him a message from me. Tell him that the next time he asks me to come and see him, whether it is in England
or Wadi Halfa, I will accept the invitation."

  "Which way will you go?"

  "To Wadi Halfa," said Feversham, pointing westwards over his shoulder. "I shall take Abou Fatma with me and travel slowly and quietly down the Nile. The other Arab will guide you into Assouan."

  They slept that night in security beside the well, and the next morning they parted company. Trench was the first to ride off, and as his camel rose to its feet, ready for the start, he bent down towards Feversham, who passed him the nose rein.

  "Ramelton, that was the name? I shall not forget."

  "Yes, Ramelton," said Feversham; "there's a ferry across Lough Swilly to Rathmullen. You must drive the twelve miles to Ramelton. But you may not find her there."

  "If not there, I shall find her somewhere else. Make no mistake, Feversham, I shall find her."

  And Trench rode forward, alone with his Arab guide. More than once he turned his head and saw Feversham still standing by the well; more than once he was strongly drawn to stop and ride back to that solitary figure, but he contented himself with waving his hand, and even that salute was not returned.

  Feversham, indeed, had neither thought nor eyes for the companion of his flight. His six years of hard probation had come this morning to an end, and yet he was more sensible of a certain loss and vacancy than of any joy. For six years, through many trials, through many falterings, his mission had strengthened and sustained him. It seemed to him now that there was nothing more wherewith to occupy his life. Ethne? No doubt she was long since married ... and there came upon him all at once a great bitterness of despair for that futile, unnecessary mistake made by him six years ago. He saw again the room in London overlooking the quiet trees and lawns of St. James's Park, he heard the knock upon the door, he took the telegram from his servant's hand.

  He roused himself finally with the recollection that, after all, the work was not quite done. There was his father, who just at this moment was very likely reading his Times after breakfast upon the terrace of Broad Place among the pine trees upon the Surrey hills. He must visit his father, he must take that fourth feather back to Ramelton. There was a telegram, too, which must be sent to Lieutenant Sutch at Suakin.

  He mounted his camel and rode slowly with Abou Fatma westwards towards Wadi Halfa. But the sense of loss did not pass from him that day, nor his anger at the act of folly which had brought about his downfall. The wooded slopes of Ramelton were very visible to him across the shimmer of the desert air. In the greatness of his depression Harry Feversham upon this day for the first time doubted his faith in the "afterwards."

  Chapter XXXI - Feversham Returns to Ramelton

  *

  On an August morning of the same year Harry Feversham rode across the Lennon bridge into Ramelton. The fierce suns of the Soudan had tanned his face, the years of his probation had left their marks; he rode up the narrow street of the town unrecognised. At the top of the hill he turned into the broad highway which, descending valleys and climbing hills, runs in one straight line to Letterkenny. He rode rather quickly in a company of ghosts.

  The intervening years had gradually been dropping from his thoughts all through his journey across Egypt and the Continent. They were no more than visionary now. Nor was he occupied with any dream of the things which might have been but for his great fault. The things which had been, here, in this small town of Ireland, were too definite. Here he had been most happy, here he had known the uttermost of his misery; here his presence had brought pleasure, here too he had done his worst harm. Once he stopped when he was opposite to the church, set high above the road upon his right hand, and wondered whether Ethne was still at Ramelton—whether old Dermod was alive, and what kind of welcome he would receive. But he waked in a moment to the knowledge that he was sitting upon his horse in the empty road and in the quiet of an August morning. There were larks singing in the pale blue above his head; a landrail sent up its harsh cry from the meadow on the left; the crow of a cock rose clear from the valley. He looked about him, and rode briskly on down the incline in front of him and up the ascent beyond. He rode again with his company of ghosts—phantoms of people with whom upon this road he had walked and ridden and laughed, ghosts of old thoughts and recollected words. He came to a thick grove of trees, a broken fence, a gateway with no gate. Inattentive to these evidences of desertion, he turned in at the gate and rode along a weedy and neglected drive. At the end of it he came to an open space before a ruined house. The aspect of the tumbling walls and unroofed rooms roused him at last completely from his absorption. He dismounted, and, tying his horse to the branch of a tree, ran quickly into the house and called aloud. No voice answered him. He ran from deserted room to deserted room. He descended into the garden, but no one came to meet him; and he understood now from the uncut grass upon the lawn, the tangled disorder of the flowerbeds, that no one would come. He mounted his horse again, and rode back at a sharp trot. In Ramelton he stopped at the inn, gave his horse to the ostler, and ordered lunch for himself. He said to the landlady who waited upon him:—

  "So Lennon House has been burned down? When was that?"

  "Five years ago," the landlady returned, "just five years ago this summer." And she proceeded, without further invitation, to give a voluminous account of the conflagration and the cause of it, the ruin of the Eustace family, the inebriety of Bastable, and the death of Dermod Eustace at Glenalla. "But we hope to see the house rebuilt. It's likely to be, we hear, when Miss Eustace is married," she said, in a voice which suggested that she was full of interesting information upon the subject of Miss Eustace's marriage. Her guest, however, did not respond to the invitation.

  "And where does Miss Eustace live now?"

  "At Glenalla," she replied. "Halfway on the road to Rathmullen there's a track leads up to your left. It's a poor mountain village is Glenalla, and no place for Miss Eustace, at all, at all. Perhaps you will be wanting to see her?"

  "Yes. I shall be glad if you will order my horse to be brought round to the door," said the man; and he rose from the table to put an end to the interview.

  The landlady, however, was not so easily dismissed. She stood at the door and remarked:—

  "Well, that's curious—that's most curious. For only a fortnight ago a gentleman burnt just as black as yourself stayed a night here on the same errand. He asked for Miss Eustace's address and drove up to Glenalla. Perhaps you have business with her?"

  "Yes, I have business with Miss Eustace," the stranger returned. "Will you be good enough to give orders about my horse?"

  While he was waiting for his horse he looked through the leaves of the hotel book, and saw under a date towards the end of July the name of Colonel Trench.

  "You will come back, sir, to-night?" said the landlady, as he mounted.

  "No," he answered, "I do not think I shall come again to Ramelton." And he rode down the hill, and once more that day crossed the Lennon bridge. Four miles on he came to the track opposite a little bay of the Lough, and, turning into it, he rode past a few white cottages up to the purple hollow of the hills. It was about five o'clock when he came to the long, straggling village. It seemed very quiet and deserted, and built without any plan. A few cottages stood together, then came a gap of fields, beyond that a small plantation of larches and a house which stood by itself. Beyond the house was another gap, through which he could see straight down to the water of the Lough, shining in the afternoon sun, and the white gulls poising and swooping above it. And after passing that gap he came to a small grey church, standing bare to the winds upon its tiny plateau. A pathway of white shell-dust led from the door of the church to the little wooden gate. As he came level with the gate a collie dog barked at him from behind it.

  The rider looked at the dog, which was very grey about the muzzle. He noticed its marking, and stopped his horse altogether. He glanced towards the church, and saw that the door stood open. At once he dismounted; he fastened his horse to the fence, and entered the churchyard. The collie thrust its
muzzle into the back of his knee, sniffed once or twice doubtfully, and suddenly broke into an exuberant welcome. The collie dog had a better memory than the landlady of the inn. He barked, wagged his tail, crouched and sprang at the stranger's shoulders, whirled round and round in front of him, burst into sharp, excited screams of pleasure, ran up to the church door and barked furiously there, then ran back and jumped again upon his friend. The man caught the dog as it stood up with its forepaws upon his chest, patted it, and laughed. Suddenly he ceased laughing, and stood stock-still with his eyes towards the open door of the church. In the doorway Ethne Eustace was standing. He put the dog down and slowly walked up the path towards her. She waited on the threshold without moving, without speaking. She waited, watching him, until he came close to her. Then she said simply:—

  "Harry."

  She was silent after that; nor did he speak. All the ghosts and phantoms of old thoughts in whose company he had travelled the whole of that day vanished away from his mind at her simple utterance of his name. Six years had passed since his feet crushed the gravel on the dawn of a June morning beneath her window. And they looked at one another, remarking the changes which those six years had brought. And the changes, unnoticed and almost imperceptible to those who had lived daily in their company, sprang very distinct to the eyes of these two. Feversham was thin, his face was wasted. The strain of life in the House of Stone had left its signs about his sunken eyes and in the look of age beyond his years. But these were not the only changes, as Ethne noticed; they were not, indeed, the most important ones. Her heart, although she stood so still and silent, went out to him in grief for the great troubles which he had endured; but she saw, too, that he came back without a thought of anger towards her for that fourth feather snapped from her fan. But she was clear-eyed even at this moment. She saw much more. She understood that the man who stood quietly before her now was not the same man whom she had last seen in the hall of Ramelton. There had been a timidity in his manner in those days, a peculiar diffidence, a continual expectation of other men's contempt, which had gone from him. He was now quietly self-possessed; not arrogant; on the other hand, not diffident. He had put himself to a long, hard test; and he knew that he had not failed. All that she saw; and her face lightened as she said:—