Part 13 (2/2)
... At last the habitations of man grew fewer. Gardens gave place to sloping fields enclosed by ”hedges” of stone, and at length a long, level sky-line above and in front showed me that the moors were close.
I reached the top at last, and took in a great breath of the sweetest, most exhilarating air that I have ever known. The unfenced road stretched away ahead of me for miles, a long, white ribbon laid upon the heath and yellow gorse. I was on a vast plateau of gold and brown and purple. To the left great hills crowned with rock granite tors cut into the sky, and to the right was the jagged summit of Carne Zerran, three miles away as the crow flies. At its foot, on the edge of mighty cliffs that fell away a sheer three hundred feet to the ocean, I knew lay the little village that I sought.
I looked at my map for a moment, took out my pocket compa.s.s, and then plunged into the heather. Already I had a good idea of the lie of the country--it is an instinct with your flying man--and I realized that an accurate knowledge of it would prove invaluable in the task before me.
I met no living soul during that first walk over the moor. Larks were singing high above in the blue; a pair of the rare Cornish choughs, with their scarlet bills, flew screeching from the summit of a lichen-covered rock as big as a house; but until I got to Carne Zerran, and looked down to the narrow strip of pasture lands and cornfields that lie along the cliffs, there was no sign of human habitation.
Far down below I saw a church tower and a little cl.u.s.ter of grey houses.
Beyond was the coast-line, with a creamy froth of breakers at the foot of the jagged cliffs, and the Atlantic, ”Mother of Oceans,” beyond.
There was no land between me and New York! I suppose that in all the glory of sun and colour, superb s.p.a.ces of sea and sky, I stood alone, and looked upon a scene as fair as any on this earth. But as I focussed my binoculars, and swept the coast, my only thought was that here--if anywhere at all--was the heart of the mystery I had come to solve.
Well! It was a fitting setting, in its lonely vastness. Anything might happen here among these Druid-haunted hills. A crafty fiend, a man with a great intellect and Satan in his soul, might well find this his proper theatre!
About a mile from the village, and just below me, I saw the cliffs bent inwards between two projecting headlands. This must be the Zerran Cove of the map, and--yes, seemingly upon the very edge of the precipice was a long, grey building, which could be none other than ”The Miners'
Arms.”
I began the descent, leaping from rock to rock, where the adders lay basking in the sun. After a few hundred yards, I struck a gorge, through which a stream fell towards the sea. Here I found a well-defined path, which looped downwards to the ruins of a deserted tin-mine. I saw, as I pa.s.sed it, the windowless engine-house, and the gaunt timbers of the winding gear still in place. The gibbet-like erection and the dumps of useless stuff covered with rank dock leaves made a forlorn and ugly picture in that narrow gorge where the sun hardly penetrated.
I pa.s.sed it soon, and came out upon the main coach road from St. Ives to Land's End, and, crossing this, found a side lane, which took me direct to the remote hostelry I had seen from the heights above.
It was a large place, covered with ivy, and no doubt did a considerable trade eighty years before, when the innumerable tin-mines on the moor were all at work. Now it seemed forgotten by the world, and all asleep in the sun. ”An ideal base for our operations!” I thought, as I strode through an open door into a long, low room, with a stone floor and heavily timbered roof.
It was cool, and so dark after the blazing suns.h.i.+ne that, for a moment, I could see nothing, though I heard a sound of stertorous breathing.
When my eyes became accustomed to the gloom I saw that there was a man asleep by the little counter. He sat on a bench which ran along the wall, and his head was buried in his arms, which rested on a beer-stained table. By his side stood a bottle half full of whisky.
Supposing him to be the landlord--and no engaging figure at that--I touched him on the shoulder. It was like springing a trap! Instantly he s.n.a.t.c.hed away his arms and sat up. For a second sleep held him. Then it pa.s.sed away like a breath on gla.s.s, and if ever I saw fear on a man's face I saw it then.
He was dressed in a blue jersey and an alpaca coat, oil-stained and dirty. His hands were the hands of a mechanic, with grimy nails. But it was his face that held me. It was sleek and cunning. There was a curious mixture of refinement and wickedness. He seemed like a naturally sensitive man, whom circ.u.mstances, indulgence, or some special temptation, had led very deeply astray.
I noted all this while he stared at me with a drooping jaw and bloodshot eyes. His skin had turned dead-white, like the belly of a fish, and whatever he was thinking I felt that I would not have that man's conscience for a million.
”I want you,” I said--they were the first words that came.
He made an inarticulate noise.
”You are the landlord, aren't you?”
At that he gave a long breath and his rigidity relaxed. He s.n.a.t.c.hed at the whisky bottle, poured some into a gla.s.s and drank it off neat.
”Lord, how you startled me!” he said glibly. ”I was far away--dreaming--and you frightened me out of my life!”
It was my turn to be amazed, though I showed nothing. The fellow spoke with a cultivated voice and accent which were impossible to mistake. He was not what I had thought him.
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