Dear Dragon

by Sara Seale

  All the characters in this book have no existence outside the imagination of the Author, and have no relation whatsoever to anyone bearing the same name or names. They are not even distantly inspired by any individual known or unknown to the Author, and all the incidents are pure invention.

  First published 1959

  This edition 1974 © Sara Seale 1959

  For copyright reasons, this book may not be issued on loan or otherwise except in its original soft cover.

  ISBN 0 263 71654 6

  Made and Printed in Great Britain by Richard Clay {The Chaucer Press), Ltd., Bungay, Suffolk

  CHAPTER ONE

  I

  Dear Dragon . . . she came to address him when writing, long afterwards, but on this stormy night, standing on the steps of a shuttered and empty house, she could have no knowledge of how her life was to shape. She only knew that she had made a long journey into Cornwall on what now seemed to be a wild goose chase, and that she was young and alone and apparently stranded.

  "But I was engaged — to look after the little girl," she protested to the dour old man who eventually answered the door and told her the house was empty. "They were expecting me — the Tregenas, I mean."

  "Changed they minds, then, didn't 'un?" he replied without interest. "Always was fickle folks, they Tregenas. Went abroad to foreign parts two — three days ago."

  "But did they leave no message for me?"

  "No so far as I knows. Who did you say you be?"

  "I'm Alice Brown. I — I was engaged by letter."

  "Never 'eard of 'e," he said and started to close the door.

  "Oh, please-" she said. "What am I to do? It's late,

  and even if I had the money for the fare, I expect the last train for London has gone."

  He paused to regard her with latent curiosity. In the uncertain light he could see she was small and thin and not very old. The straight fair hair blew about a high, worried forehead and her eyes stared back at him looking scared and enormous in her white face.

  "You're a rum choice for these parts," he observed with faint derision. "How old be 'e?"

  She stiffened visibly and her pointed chin went up.

  "That's hardly your concern, I think," she replied with unexpected hauteur. "I simply want to know where to go for the night."

  "Pendragon Arms, back to St. Mewan, is the only place round here," he said, his surliness returning.

  "Which way do I go?" she asked breathlessly before the door could close in her face.

  "Back to the village, the way you come," he grunted, and banged the door shut. She could hear him dealing with bolts and chains in no uncertain fashion on the other side, and picking up her suitcase, turned back towards the road.

  Here the wind leapt at her again, lashing across from the sea which she knew lay beyond the rough stone wall and little fields. The road wound narrow and lonely between high banks in the darkness, and she began to battle her way against the wind, helped by a small spurt of anger as she remembered that the driver of the taxi which had brought her from the station at St. Mewan must have known the house was empty.

  But her anger did not act as a spur for very long. Presently her suitcase became an intolerable burden and it began to rain. Her thin coat soon became soaked and her cheap London shoes let in the water badly.

  "It's all a nightmare!" she gasped aloud, and sat down on the bank to rest, and, indeed, it could only be a nightmare, she thought. Strangers did not engage you and disappear at the last moment without letting you know, or paying your fare; rude old men did not slam the door in your face and turn you into the unfriendly night, neither was it conceivable that the only inn in a remote Cornish village would refuse you shelter on a raw February evening.

  But all this had happened to her, save the last, thought Alice, tears beginning to mingle with the rain on her cheeks, and in London she had already burnt her boats, given up her room in the cheap hostel, and the job which a philandering manager had begun to make impossible, to answer impulsively an advertisement which had caught her eye in a newspaper.

  Aunt Brown always said I was a fool, she thought ruefully, remembering with nostalgia the vague, kindly spinster who had brought her up and died, leaving her unprovided for both as regards money and any aptitude for earning a living. Poor Aunt Brown with her old-fashioned ideas about young girls and her touching belief that sooner or later a husband would resolve all difficulties even though she, herself, had been passed by.

  Alice got to her feet again and began plodding along the dark road. She was too tired to worry about the bleak

  tomorrows, she desired only a hot drink and a bed for the night; in the morning she would make further enquiries about the extraordinary couple who had engaged her without an interview and still owed her the railway fare from London.

  She came upon the Pendragon Arms at the beginning of the village, a low sprawling inn built of slate and granite like the rest of the straggling houses. A faded sign depicting a coat-of-arms which seemed to involve a dragon swung over the doorway and Alice paused for a moment, listening to the sound of voices from within, shy of intruding upon strangers. A gust of rain caught her, reminding her how wet she was, and without more ado she pushed open the door and went inside.

  It must, she supposed unhappily, be the public bar she had entered and she felt herself coloring as she stood there amongst the crowd of men who immediately fell silent and regarded her with eyes which seemed suddenly hostile. The low-ceilinged room reeked of beer and tobacco, and through the haze she saw a man leaning against the bar counter watching her. He would have been noticeable anywhere, she thought, wishing that someone would speak. He was head and shoulders taller than his companions and his dark face had the arrogant look of a buccaneer with its heavy, slanting brows and curling black hair. Suddenly he grinned, showing even very white teeth.

  "Well," he drawled. "Look what's come in out of the wet! What'll you have, m'dear?"

  She felt herself flushing again and quickly averted her eyes.

  "Is there another room?" she asked the man nearest her.

  He regarded her curiously for a moment, then jerked his head without speaking to a door which stood open near the bar. Alice made her way towards it, uncomfortably av/are that her suitcase bumped into people's legs. No one offered to carry it for her, and as she escaped into another part of the inn she heard the tall stranger say with a laugh:

  "Go and see what she wants, Ned. Looks as if she's come for the night. Got your best suite ready?"

  She sat down wearily in a wicker chair to wait for the landlord. The room, she supposed, was intended to be a

  lounge, but it looked as if it was seldom used. There was no fire in the grate and dust lay thickly on the sparse furniture and the hideous oleographs on the walls. Over the granite mantelpiece a replica of the inn's sign was carved in the stone and this time she could see it clearly, two dragons' heads erased in bend and a motto which she could not understand, Captum Teneo.

  The landlord took his time in coming to attend to her, but presently he pushed open the bar door and asked what she wanted to drink.

  "Nothing, thank you — at least, would it be possible to have something hot?" she said.

  "Can't serve hot drinks at this hour. The wife's bad," he replied ungraciously.

  "Oh, I'm sorry. Can I — can I have a room for the night, then?"

  "I told 'e the wife's bad. Can't go putting up strangers without notice."

  "But I've nowhere to go. Please — I will willingly make up my own bed. I won't be any trouble."

  Curiosity gleamed for a moment in his sharp little eyes.

  "How come you'm nowhere to go at this time of night?" he demanded suspiciously. "You don't belong around here."

  "I was engaged to loo
k after a little girl by some people called Tregena, but they've gone away," she said wearily and saw that the tall stranger who had joked at her expense earlier was standing in the doorway, listening.

  "Well, isn't that like the Tregenas?" he observed conversationally. "Proper mazed, even by village standards. Didn't they let you know?"

  "If they did, I wouldn't be here, would I?" she retorted, not unreasonably, and he grinned.

  "True for you. Well, perhaps I can offer you another job, and a roof over your head into the bargain."

  "What do you mean?" she asked with faint alarm and he grinned again, this time with a hint of malice.

  "Oh, very respectable," he said, propping his long back against the wall with indolent ease. "There happens to be another little girl who needs — er — looking after. Would you be prepared to give us a trial?"

  "Your little daughter?" she enquired doubtfully.

  "No, my sister, and not so little at that. You probably won't stay, like all the rest of them."

  "Now, Mr. Keverne, it's for Pendragon to settle these matters," the landlord said a little uneasily. "You can't go bringing home strange females you know nothing about. Look what happened the last time."

  "He threw her out and he can do the same again if he has a mind to," the young man replied carelessly, and Alice sprang to her feet.

  "If it comes to that, I know nothing about you," she said with a hint of temper. "Do you imagine I make a practice of going home with strange men in the middle of the night?"

  He only laughed and looked at her with a flicker of interest, but the landlord appeared to take her remarks as an affront.

  "Shows you'm a furriner," he observed with disgust. "The Pendragons are known and respected the width of the Duchy — ay, and beyond, too. Not that you'd suit their way of life, I'm thinking. Puling, that's what you are."

  "Get back to your customers, Ned, it'll be closing time shortly. I think I will try my hand at persuading the lady," the young man called Keverne said, and the landlord, with a shrug, went back to his bar. "Now — let's get acquainted. What's your name?"

  "" Puling!" Alice exclaimed indignantly. "He called me puling!"

  "Well, you don't look too hot," he said, coming behind her and pushing her towards a cracked mirror on the wall.

  She gazed at her reflection in dismay. The rain had plastered her hair in damp, unbecoming strands, and her face was the face of a traditional waif, pale and transparent, the large eyes seeming to dwarf the rest of her features.

  "See what I mean?" he said, the pressure of his hands on her shoulders steadying himself for an instant before he turned away and resumed his position of propping himself against the wall. It was not until then that she realized he was just a little bit drunk.

  "Well now," he said. "Suppose we start again. What's your name?"

  "Alice Brown."

  "Alice Brown — very non-committal And you were coming to look after the Tragena brat, but found they had

  gone away without cancelling the arrangement."

  "Yes," she said, "and I need a job very badly. I — I've given up my old one and I haven't much money, but-"

  "But you don't go home with strange men in the

  middle of the night, I think you said. Well what are you

  going to do?"

  "I don't know."

  "Well, why not give us a trial? Pendragon will pay well and, if he likes you, you could do worse."

  "Pendragon?" she echoed, understanding very little.

  "My half-brother and head of the house. Do you know nothing of Cornish history?"

  "No," she said, her eyelids growing heavy with fatigue.

  "Then you should. Pendragons date back to the court of King Arthur. Uther Pendragon was Arthur's father and from him we have all sprung. The Welsh and Cornish in our line have become one through the Pendragons. Did you know that Pen means a head and the dragon was their war standard? Pendragon was a title conferred on a few British chiefs in times of great danger when they were invested with supreme power. In Cornwall, and in Wales, too, I expect, ours is a name to conjure with. Do you doubt your good fortune, now?"

  She gazed up at him, mesmerised anew by his suddenly impassioned speech, by the proud, visionary look in the dark face. Drink had, no doubt, lent fire to his tongue, but, tired and perplexed though she was, Alice experienced her first romantic stirring at the name of Pendragon.

  "Why wouldn't the others stay?" she asked, striving to be sensible.

  He shrugged, the strange look of pride dying out of his face.

  "Afraid of Pendragon, perhaps — a feckless lot for the most part, anyway. I doubt you'll do any better."

  "Aren't you assuming I'll take the job?" she asked with a certain asperity and he shrugged again.

  "What else can you do, at least for tonight?" he said.

  "What does your household consist of?" she asked, still striving to be practical.

  "My brother and sister, Pendragon — and, of course, my wife," he replied negligently.

  "Your wife?" She did not know why she should be surprised that he was married.

  "Disappointed?" he asked, with a teasing lift to his eyebrows.

  "Why should I be?" she said quickly, adding, to cover her confusion: "Who is this Pendragon who seems to rule you all?"

  He looked at her with a small, bitter smile.

  "My half-brother, Keir," he said. "He holds the purse-strings by virtue of the mine we all have shares in and the fact that he's the first-born."

  "And you — what is your name?"

  "Oh, I'm a Pendragon, too, but Keir has supreme right to the title. It is a title in these parts, you know. There can only be one Pendragon."

  "He sounds — rather overbearing, I think," she said, not understanding these family intricacies.

  "You'll find, I doubt, that we're all overbearing," he told her quite pleasantly. "It would seem to be a Pendragon trait. Well — are you coming?"

  "Very well," she said, struggling to her feet again. "I will accept your hospitality for the night, Mr. Pendragon, whether it leads to anything more or not. As you said, yourself, your half-brother can always throw me out."

  Outside, it was still raining. Keverne flung her suitcase into the back of a long, open sports car and told her briefly to get in. He did not offer to put up the hood, but snatched a tarpaulin cover from the back and told her to put it over her head. As the powerful engine sprang to life and they roared down the deserted village street, Alice knew an instant's panic. Was she mad, she thought, picturing Aunt Brown's scandalized face, allowing herself to be whisked away into the unknown by a complete stranger who looked like a buccaneer and was, for all his expert driving, just a little bit drunk?

  II

  Peering out from under the tarpaulin, Alice could see little of the countryside. High banks flashed by in the

  glare of the headlights, and broken stone walls, and presently the car surged across a dark strip of moorland, negotiating the twists and bends in the road with a scream of tires. Alice was too tired and defeated to be afraid, but her eyes became mesmerised by Keverne's hands on the wheel, watching their strength as he pulled the car round, aware of the passion and recklessness which seemed to be part of his nature.

  She had thought they were coming away from the coast, but the moor must have been a circuitous way round the headland for, as they left it, there was the sea dashing against the cliffs below them, and a great house loomed, it seemed, almost at the edge, like some imagined fortress. Keverne turned in under a stone archway and pulled up with a screech of tires on the drive.

  "Welcome to Polrame!" he cried, but there was little assurance in his reckless shout. Waves beat with a muffled boom at the foot of the cliffs and the blank windows of the house showed no lights.

  "There's no one here," she said, as she scrambled out of the car and, panic taking her again, she turned to run.

  "Come back, you little fool, there's no house here for miles around!" Keverne shouted and caught
her at once.

  "Let me go! There's no one here," she cried again and he laughed above her head. He was, she dimly recognized, enjoying himself as if the two of them were play-acting.

  "They're at the back, if anyone has stayed up," he replied. "We keep early hours in the country, Miss Brown. Come — I'm not going to chase after you along the headland on a night like this."

  He picked her up without more ado and carried her up the curved stone steps of the porch, but before he reached the great door with its studs and staples of iron, it opened to reveal a man's figure holding an oil lamp high above his head. His shadow leapt to a fantastic height on the wall behind him and, when he spoke, his voice held the same savage intolerance of Keverne's own.

  "If this is another of your boyish pranks, you can take your doxy back to where she belongs," he said, but Keverne only laughed.

  "She's no doxy—a captive for you, Pendragon, a willing captive, what's more, or was until this minute," he said

  and deposited his burden without gentleness at his half- brother's feet.

  She lay there, dazed and frightened, while the two men exchanged bitter words across her and, looking up. she saw the likeness between them. Keir Pendragon had lowered the lamp so that his face was in the full circle of light, an older face with deeper and more bitter lines, but with the same slanting brows, the dominant nose and coal black hair. He was as tall and lean as his half-brother, but his eyes held a chill arrogance which the other man's lacked. She would, thought Alice, surprised that she should muster any opinions at such a moment, prefer the braggadocio of the one to the harsh inflexibility of the other.

  "Oh, to hell with your arguments, Pendragon!" Keverne exclaimed at last. "You wanted another watch-dog for Doone, didn't you? Well, I've found you one and all the thanks I get is a dressing-down. It's becoming a habit."

  "And it's becoming a habit with you to foist your indiscretions on to my threshold," Keir bit back. "You've been drinking, Keverne. Did you imagine I'd employ a woman of your choosing as companion for Doone? Where did you find her?"

  "In the Pendragon Arms, if you must know."

  "Good God! Are you crazy? Bringing a woman here that you picked up in a pub!"