The Destroying Angel

by Louis Joseph Vance

  XVI

  THE BEACON

  Through the meal, neither spoke; and if there were any serious thinkingin process, Whitaker was not only ignorant of it, but innocent ofparticipation therein. With the first taste of food, he passed into astate of abject surrender to sheer brutish hunger. It was not easilythat he restrained himself, schooled his desires to decent expression.The smell, the taste, the sight of food: he fairly quivered like aravenous animal under the influence of their sensual promise. He wassensible of a dull, carking shame, and yet was shameless.

  The girl was the first to finish. She had eaten little in comparison;chiefly, perhaps, because she required less than he. Putting aside herknife and fork, she rested her elbows easily on the table, cradled herchin between her half-closed hands. Her eyes grew dark with speculation,and oddly lambent. He ate on, unconscious of her attitude. When he hadfinished, it was as if a swarm of locusts had passed that way. Of themore than plentiful meal she had prepared, there remained but a beggarlyarray of empty dishes to testify to his appreciation.

  He leaned back a little in his chair, surprised her intent gaze, laughedsheepishly, and laughing, sighed with repletion.

  A smile of sympathetic understanding darkened the corners of her lips.

  "Milord is satisfied?"

  "Milord," he said with an apologetic laugh, "is on the point of passinginto a state of torpor. He begins to understand the inclination of theboa-constrictor--or whatever beast it is that feeds once every sixmonths--to torp a little, gently, after its semi-annual gorge."

  "Then there's nothing else...?"

  "For a pipe and tobacco I would give you half my kingdom!"

  "Oh, I'm _so_ sorry!"

  "Don't be. It won't harm me to do without nicotine for a day or two."But his sigh belied the statement. "Anyway, I'll forget all about itpresently. I'll be too busy."

  "How?"

  "It's coming on night. You haven't forgotten our signal fires?"

  "Oh, no--and we must not forget!"

  "Then I've got my work cut out for me, to forage for fuel. I must getright at it."

  The girl rose quickly. "Do you mind waiting a little? I mustn't neglectmy dishes, and--if you don't mind--I'd rather not be left alone anylonger than necessary. You know...."

  She ended with a nervous laugh, depreciatory.

  "Why, surely. And I'll help with the dish-cloth."

  "You'll do nothing of the sort. I'd rather do it all myself. Please."She waved him back to his chair with a commanding gesture. "I meanit--really."

  "Well," he consented, doubtful, "if you insist...."

  She worked rapidly above the steaming dish-pan, heedless of the effectsupon her hands and bared arms: busy and intent upon her business, thefair head bowed, the cheeks faintly flushed.

  Whitaker lounged, profoundly intrigued, watching her with sober andstudious eyes, asking himself questions he found for the presentunanswerable. What did she mean to him? Was what he had been at firstdisposed to consider a mere, light-hearted, fugitive infatuation,developing into something else, something stronger and more enduring?And what did it mean, this impression that had come to him so suddenly,within the hour, and that persisted with so much force in the face ofits manifest impossibility, that he had known her, or some one strangelylike her, at some forgotten time--as in some previous existence?

  It was her voice that had made him think that, her voice of marvellousallure, crystal-pure, as flexible as tempered steel, strong, tender,rich, compassionate, compelling.... Where had he heard it before, andwhen?

  And who was she, this Miss Fiske? This self-reliant and self-sufficientwoman who chose to spend her summer in seclusion, with none but servantsfor companions; who had comprehension of machinery and ran hermotor-boat alone; who went for lonely swims in the surf at dawn; whotreated men as her peers--neither more nor less; who was spied upon,shadowed, attacked, kidnapped by men of unparalleled desperation anddaring; who had retained her self-possession under stress ofcircumstance that would have driven strong men into pseudo-hysteria; whonow found herself in a position to the last degree ambiguous andanomalous, cooped up, for God only knew how long, upon a lonelyhand's-breadth of land in company with a man of whom she knew littlemore than nothing; and who accepted it all without protest, with aserene and flawless courage, uncomplaining, displaying an implicit andunquestioning faith in her companion: what manner of woman was this?

  At least one to marvel over and admire without reserve; to rejoice inand, if it could not be otherwise, to desire in silence and in pridethat it should be given to one so unworthy the privileges of desiringand of service and mute adoration....

  "It's almost dark," her pleasant accents broke in upon his revery."Would you mind lighting the lamp? My hands are all wet and sticky."

  "Assuredly."

  Whitaker got up, found matches, and lighted a tin kerosene lamp in abracket on the wall. The windows darkened and the walls took on a sombreyellow as the flame grew strong and steady.

  "I'm quite finished." The girl scrubbed her arms and hands briskly witha dry towel and turned down her sleeves, facing him with her fine,frank, friendly smile. "If you're ready...."

  "Whenever you are," he said with an oddly ceremonious bow.

  To his surprise she drew back, her brows and lips contracting to levellines, her eyes informed with the light of wonder shot through with theflashings of a resentful temper.

  "Why do you look at me so?" she demanded sharply. "What are youthinking...?" She checked, her frown relaxed, her smile flickeredsoftly. "Am I such a fright--?"

  "I beg your pardon," he said hastily. "I was merely thinking,wondering...."

  She seemed about to speak, but said nothing. He did not round out hisapology. A little distance apart, they stood staring at one another inthat weird, unnatural light, wherein the glow from the lamp contendedgarishly with the ebbing flush of day. And again he was mute inbewildered inquiry before that puzzling phenomenon of inscrutableemotion which once before, since his awakening, had been disclosed tohim in her mantling colour, in the quickening of her breath, and theagitation of her bosom, in the timid, dumb questioning of eyes grownstrangely shy and frightened.

  And then, in a twinkling, an impatient gesture exorcised theinexplicable mood that had possessed her, and she regained her normal,self-reliant poise as if by witchcraft.

  "What a quaint creature you are, Hugh," she cried, her smile whimsical."You've a way of looking at one that gives me the creeps. I seethings--things that aren't so, and never were. If you don't stop it, Iswear I shall think you're the devil! Stop it--do you hear me, sir? Andcome build our bonfire."

  She swung lithely away and was out of the house before he could regainhis wits and follow.

  "I noticed a lot of old lumber around the barn," she announced, when hejoined her in the dooryard--"old boxes and barrels and rubbish. And awheelbarrow. So you won't have far to go for fuel. Now where do youpurpose building the beacon?"

  He cast round, peering through the thickening shades of dusk, andeventually settled upon a little knoll a moderate distance to leeward ofthe farm-house. Such a location would be safest, even though the windwas falling steadily with the flight of the hours; and the fire would beconspicuously placed for observation from any point in the north andeast.

  Off in the north, where Whitaker had marked down the empurpled headlandduring the afternoon, a white light lanced the gloom thrice with asweeping blade, vanished, and was replaced by a glare of angry red,which in its turn winked out.

  Whitaker watched it briefly with the finger-tips of his right handresting lightly on the pulse in his left wrist. Then turning away, heannounced:

  "Three white flashes followed by a red at intervals of about tenseconds. Wonder what _that_ stands for!"

  "What is it?" the girl asked. "A ship signalling?"

  "No; a lighthouse--probably a first-order light--with its characteristicflash, not duplicated anywhere along this section of the Atlantic coast.If I knew anything of such matters, it would
be easy enough to tell fromthat just about where we are. _If_ that information would help us."

  "But, if we can see their light, they'll see ours,--won't they?--andsend to find out what's the matter."

  "Perhaps. At least--let's hope so. They're pretty sure to see it, but asto their attaching sufficient importance to it to investigate--that's aquestion. They may not know that the people who live here are away. Theymay think the natives here are merely celebrating their silver wedding,or Roosevelt's refusal of a third term, or the accession of Edward theSeventh--or anything."

  "Please don't be silly--and discouraging. Do get to work and build thefire."

  He obeyed with humility and expedition.

  As she had said, there was no lack of fodder for the flames. By dint ofseveral wheelbarrow trips between the knoll and the farmyard, he hadpresently constructed a pyre of impressive proportions; and by that timeit was quite dark--so dark, indeed, that he had been forced to hunt up ayard lantern, carrying the which the girl had accompanied him on his twofinal trips.

  "Here," he said clumsily, when all was ready, offering her matches. "Youlight it, please--for luck."

  Their fingers touched as she took the matches. Something thumped in hisbreast, and a door opened in the chambers of his understanding, lettingin light.

  Kneeling at the base of the pyre, she struck a match and applied it to aquantity of tinder-dry excelsior. The stuff caught instantly, puffinginto a brilliant patch of blaze; she rose and stood back, _ensilhouette_, delicately poised at attention, waiting to see that herwork was well done. He could not take his gaze from her.

  So what he had trifled and toyed with, fought with and prayed against,doubted and questioned, laughed at and cried down, was sober, painfulfact. Truth, heart-rending to behold in her stark, shining beauty, hadbeen revealed to him in that moment of brushing finger-tips, and he hadlooked in her face and known his unworthiness; and he trembled and wasafraid and ashamed....

  Spreading swiftly near the ground, the flames mounted as quickly, withsnappings and cracklings, excavating in the darkness an arena of reddishradiance.

  The girl retreated to his side, returning the matches.

  A tongue of flame shot up from the peak of the pyre, and a column ofsmoke surpassed it, swinging off to leeward in great, red-bosomedvolutes and whorls picked out with flying regiments of sparks.

  "You'd think they couldn't help understanding that it's a signal ofdistress."

  "You would think so. I hope so. God knows I hope so!"

  There was a passion in his tones to make her lift wondering eyes to his.

  "Why do you say that--that way? We should be thankful to be safe--alive.And we're certain to get away before long."

  "I know--yes, I know."

  "But you spoke so strangely!"

  "I'm sorry. I'd been thinking clearly; for the first time, I believe,since I woke up."

  "About what? Us? Or merely me?"

  "You. I was considering you alone. It isn't right that you should be inthis fix. I'd give my right hand to remedy it!"

  "But I'm not distressed. It isn't altogether pleasant, but it can't behelped and might easily have been worse."

  "And still I can't help feeling, somehow, the wretched injustice of itto you. I want to protest--to do something to mend matters."

  "But since you can't"--she laughed in light mockery, innocent ofmalice--"since we're doing our best, let's be philosophical and sit downover there and watch to see if there's any answer to our signal."

  "There won't be."

  "You _are_ a difficult body. Never mind. Come along!" she insisted withpretty imperiousness.

  They seated themselves with their backs to the fire and at a respectfuldistance from it, where they could watch the jetting blades of lightthat ringed the far-off headland. Whitaker reclined on an elbow,relapsing into moody contemplation. The girl drew up her knees, claspedher arms about them, and stared thoughtfully into the night.

  Behind them the fire flamed and roared, volcanic. All round it in aradius of many yards the earth glowed red, while, to one side, the grim,homely facade of the farm-house edged blushing out of the ambient night,all its staring windows bloodshot and sinister.

  The girl stirred uneasily, turning her head to look at Whitaker.

  "You know," she said with a confused attempt to laugh: "this is reallyno canny, this place. Or else I'm balmy. I'm seeing things--shapes thatstir against the blackness, off there beyond the light, moving, halting,staring, hating us for butchering their age-old peace and quiet. MaybeI'll forget to see them, if you'll talk to me a little."

  "I can't talk to you," he said, ungracious in his distress.

  "You can't? It's the first time it's been noticeable, then. What'sresponsible for this all-of-a-sudden change of heart?"

  "That's what's responsible." The words spoke themselves almost againsthis will.

  "What--change of heart?"

  "Yes," he said sullenly.

  "You're very obscure. Am I to understand that you've taken a suddendislike to me, so that you can't treat me with decent civility?"

  "You know that isn't so."

  "Surely"--she caught her breath sharply, paused for an instant, thenwent on--"surely you don't mean the converse!"

  "I've always understood women knew what men meant before the men did,themselves." His voice broke a little. "Oh, can't you see how it is withme? Can't you see?" he cried. "God forgive me! I never meant to inflictthis on you, at such a time! I don't know why I have...."

  "You mean," she stammered in a voice of amaze--"you mean--love?"

  "Can you doubt it?"

  "No ... not after what's happened, I presume. You wouldn't havefollowed--you wouldn't have fought so to save me from drowning--I_suppose_--if you hadn't--cared.... But I didn't know."

  She sighed, a sigh plaintive and perturbed, then resumed: "A woman neverknows, really. She may suspect; in fact, she almost always does; she isobliged to be so continually on guard that suspicion is ingrained in hernature; but...."

  "Then you're not--offended?" he asked, sitting up.

  "Why should I be?" The firelight momentarily outlined the smiling, halfwistful countenance she turned to him.

  "But"--he exploded with righteous wrath, self-centred--"only a scoundrelwould force his attentions upon a woman, in such circumstances! Youcan't get away from me--I may be utterly hateful to you--"

  "Oh, you're not." She laughed quietly. "You're not; nor am Idistressed--because of the circumstances that distress you, at least.What woman would be who received as great and honourable acompliment--from you, Hugh? Only"--again the whimsical little laugh thatmerged into a smothered sigh--"I wish I knew!"

  "Wish you knew what?"

  "What's going on inside that extraordinary head of yours: what's in themind behind the eyes that I so often find staring at me so curiously."

  He bowed that head between hands that compressed cruelly his temples."I wish _I_ knew!" he groaned in protest. "It's a mystery to me,the spell you've laid upon my thoughts. Ever since we met you'vehaunted me with a weird suggestion of some elusive relationship, someentanglement--intimacy--gone, perished, forgotten.... But since youcalled me to supper, a while ago, by name--I don't know why--your voice,as you used it then, has run through my head and through, teasing mymemory like a strain of music from some half-remembered song. Ithalf-maddens me; I feel so strongly that everything would be so straightand plain and clear between us, if I could only fasten upon thatfugitive, indefinable something that's always fluttering just beyond mygrasp!"

  "You mean all that--honestly?" she demanded in an oddly startled voice.

  "Most honestly." He looked up in excitement. "You don't mean _you_'vefelt anything of the sort?"

  "No, I"--her voice broke as if with weariness--"I don't mean that,precisely. I mean.... Probably I don't know what I do mean. I'm reallyvery tired, too tired to go on, just now--to sit here with you,badgering our poor wits with esoteric subtleties. I think--do youmind?--I'd better go in."


  She rose quickly, without waiting for his hand. Whitaker straightenedout his long body with more deliberation, standing finally at fullheight, his grave and moody countenance strongly relieved in the ruddyglow, while her face was all in shadow.

  "One moment," he begged humbly--"before we go in. I ... I've somethingelse to say to you, if I may."

  She waited, seriously attentive.

  "I haven't played fair, I'm afraid," he said, lowering his head toescape her steadfast gaze. "I've just told you that I love you, but...."

  "Well?" she demanded in an odd, ringing voice. "Isn't it true?"

  "True?" He laughed unnaturally. "It's so true I--wish I had died beforeI told you!"

  "Why?"

  "Because ... because you didn't resent my telling you...."

  It seemed impossible for him to speak connectedly or at any length,impossible to overcome his distaste for the hateful confession he mustmake. And she was intolerably patient with him; he resented her quiet,contained patience; while he feared, yet he was relieved when she atlength insisted: "Well?"

  "Since you didn't resent that confession, I am led to believe youdon't--exactly--dislike me. That makes it just so much the harder toforfeit your regard."

  "But must you?"

  "Yes."

  "Please explain," she urged, a trace wearily.

  "I who love you with all my heart and mind and soul--I am not free tolove you."

  "You aren't free--!"

  "I.... No."

  After several moments, during which he fought vainly with his inabilityto go on, she resumed her examination with a manner aloof and yetdetermined:

  "You've told me so much, I think you can hardly refuse to tell more."

  "I," he stammered--"I am already married."

  She gave a little, stifled cry--whether of pain or horror or ofindignation he could not tell.

  "I'm sorry--I--" he began.

  "Don't you think you might have thought of this before?"

  "I ... you don't understand--"

  "Are you in the habit of declaring yourself first and confessinglater?... Don't answer, if you don't want to. I've no real right toknow. I asked out of simple curiosity."

  "If you'd only listen to me!" he broke out suddenly. "The thing's sostrange, so far off--dreamlike--that I forget it easily."

  "So it would seem," she put in cruelly.

  "Please hear me!"

  "Surely you must see I am listening, Mr. Whitaker."

  "It was several years ago--nearly seven. I was on the point ofdeath--had been told to expect death within a few months.... In a momentof sentimental sympathy--I wasn't at all myself--I married a girl I'dnever seen before, to help her out of a desperate scrape she'd gotinto--meaning simply to give her the protection of my name. She was inbad trouble.... We never lived together, never even saw one anotherafter that hour. She had every reason to think me dead--as I should havebeen, by rights. But now she knows that I'm alive--is about to sue for adivorce.... Now you know just what sort of a contemptible hound I am,and why it was so hard to tell you."

  After a long pause, during which neither stirred, she told him, in afaint voice: "Thank you."

  She moved toward the house.

  "I throw myself upon your mercy--"

  "Do you?" she said coolly, pausing.

  "If you will forgive me--"

  "Oh, I forgive you, Mr. Whitaker. My heart is really not quite sofragile as all this implies."

  "I didn't mean that--you know I didn't. I'm only trying to assure youthat I won't bother you--with this trouble of mine--again. I don't wantyou to be afraid of me."

  "I am not."

  The words were terse and brusque enough; the accompanying swift gesture,in which her hand rested momentarily on his arm as if in confidenceapproaching affection, he found oddly contradictory.

  "You don't see--anything?" she said with an abrupt change of manner,swinging to the north.

  He shaded his eyes, peering intently through the night, closely sweepingits encompassing obscurity from northwest to southeast.

  "Nothing," he said, dropping his hand. "If there were a boat headingthis way, we couldn't help seeing her lights."

  "Then there's no use waiting?"

  "I'm afraid not. They'd hardly come to-night, anyway; more likely bydaylight, if they should happen to grow suspicious of our beacon."

  "Then I think I'll go to bed. I'm very, very tired, in spite of my sleepon the sands. That didn't rest me, really."

  "Of course."

  "And you--?"

  "Oh, I'm all right."

  "But what are you going to do?"

  "Why--keep the fire going, I presume."

  "Is it necessary, do you think? Or even worth while?"

  He made a doubtful gesture.

  "I wish," she continued--"I wish you'd stay in the house. I--I'm reallya bit timid: unnerved, I presume. It's been, you know, rather aharrowing experience. Anything might happen in a place like this...."

  "Oh, certainly," he agreed, something constrained. "I'd feel morecontent, myself, to know I was within call if anything should alarmyou."

  They returned to the kitchen.

  In silence, while Whitaker fidgeted about the room, awkward and unhappy,the girl removed a glass lamp from the shelf above the sink, assuredherself that it was filled, and lighted it. Then, over her shoulder:

  "I hope you don't mean to stay up all night."

  "I--well, I'm really not sleepy."

  "Oh, but you are," she contradicted calmly.

  "Honestly; I slept so long down there on the beach--"

  "Please don't try to deceive me. I know that slumbers like those--ofexhaustion--don't rest one as they should. Besides, you show how tiredyou are in every gesture, in the way you carry yourself, in your veryeyes."

  "You're mistaken," he contended, looking away for fear lest his eyeswere indeed betraying him. "Besides, I mean merely to sit up here, tosee that everything is all right."

  "How should it be otherwise?" She laughed the thought away, yet notunkindly. "This island is as empty as a last-year's bird's-nest. Whatcould happen to harm, or even alarm us--or me?"

  "You never can tell--"

  "Nonsense! I'm not in the least frightened. And furthermore I shan'tsleep a wink--shan't even try to sleep unless you promise me not to besilly. There's a comfortable room right at the foot of the stairs. Ifyou sleep there, I shall feel more than secure. Will you promise?"

  He gave in at discretion: "Yes; I promise."

  "As soon as you feel the least need of sleep, you'll go to bed?"

  "I promise."

  "Very well, then."

  The insistent note faded from her tones. She moved toward the table, putthe lamp down, and hesitated in one of her strange, unpresaged moods ofdiffidence, looking down at the finger-tips with which she traced ameaningless pattern on the oil-cloth.

  "You are kind," she said abruptly, her head bowed, her face hidden fromhim.

  "Kind!" he echoed, dumfounded.

  "You are kind and sweet and generous to me," she insisted in a levelvoice. "You have shown me your heart--the heart of a gentleman--withoutreserve; but of me you have asked nothing."

  "I don't understand--"

  "I mean, you haven't once referred to what happened last night. You'vebeen content to let me preserve my confidence, to remain secretive andmysterious in your sight.... That is how I seem to you--isn't it?"

  "Secretive and mysterious? But I have no right to your confidence; youraffairs are yours, inviolable, unless you choose to discuss them."

  "You would think that way--of course!" Suddenly she showed him her faceillumined with its frank, shadowy smile, her sweet eyes, kind and asfearless as the eyes of a child. "Other men would not, I know. And youhave every right to know."

  "I--!"

  "You; and I shall tell you.... But not now; there's too much to tell, toexplain and make understandable; and I'm too terribly tired. To-morrow,perhaps--or when we escape from this weird place, when I've had time
tothink things out--"

  "At your pleasure," he assented gently. "Only--don't let anything worryyou."

  Impulsively she caught both his hands in a clasp at once soft andstrong, wholly straightforward and friendly.

  "Do you know," she said in a laughing voice, her head thrown back, softshadows darkening her mystical eyes, the lamplight caressing her hairuntil it was as if her head were framed in a halo of pure gold, brightagainst the sombre background of that mean, bare room--"Do you know,dear man, that you are quite, quite blind?"

  "I think," he said with his twisted smile, "it would be well for me if Iwere physically blind at this instant!"

  She shook her head in light reproof.

  "Blind, quite blind!" she repeated. "And yet--I'm glad it's so with you.I wouldn't have you otherwise for worlds."

  She withdrew her hand, took up the lamp, moved a little away from him,and paused, holding his eyes.

  "For Love, too, is blind," she said softly, with a quaint little nod ofaffirmation. "Good night."

  He started forward, eyes aflame; took a single pace after her; paused asif against an unseen barrier. His hands dropped by his sides; his chinto his chest; the light died out of his face and left it gray and deeplylined.

  In the hallway the lamp's glow receded, hesitated, began to ascend,throwing upon the unpapered walls a distorted silhouette of the rudebalustrade; then disappeared, leaving the hall cold with empty darkness.

  An inexplicable fit of trembling seized Whitaker. Dropping into a chair,he pillowed his head on his folded arms. Presently the seizure passed,but he remained moveless. With the drift of minutes, insensibly his tautmuscles relaxed. Odd visions painted the dark tapestries of his closedeyes: a fragment of swinging seas shining in moonlight; white swords oflight slashing the dark night round their unseen eyrie; the throat of awoman swelling firm and strong as a tower of ivory, tense from thecollar of her cheap gown to the point of her tilted chin; a shrieking,swirling rabble of gulls seen against the fading sky, over the edge of acliff....

  He slept.

  Through the open doorway behind him and through the windows on eitherhand drifted the sonorous song of the surf, a muted burden for thestealthy disturbances of the night in being.