The Shivering Sands

12

It was afternoon…the time of quiet. Sir William had been ordered to rest by the doctor and Mrs. Lincroft was lying down. She felt very distressed, she told me; and I saw the guilt in her eyes for she could scarcely bear to look at me.

I wanted to think about everything. I wanted to go over minute by minute that interview with Napier. I had to think about him and Godfrey.

But in my heart I did not need to make a decision. I knew…just as I had known when I had pretended to consider whether to give up my career for marriage with Pietro, that I would always follow my heart’s direction. If Roma were here now she would say I was mad to throw aside marriage with Godfrey for the sake of Napier. Godfrey offered security…the comfortable, easy life. And Napier? I was not sure what life would be like with him. I did not believe the shadow of Beaumont’s death had receded suddenly. I could not hope to eliminate it so easily. It would appear at unexpected moments; it would be a shadow across Napier’s life for many years to come. And what of Pietro? Should I ever forget?

On this sunny afternoon with an hour or so to spare I would go to the walled garden to think.

I made my way there and was surprised when I arrived to find Alice sitting there demurely, her hands folded in her lap.

“I thought you’d come here, Mrs. Verlaine,” she said.

“Did you want to see me?”

“Yes, I did. I want to tell you something…show you something I’ve found and I don’t really want to talk about it here.”

“Why ever not?”

“Because I think it may be very important.” She stood up. “Could we go for a little walk?”

“But certainly.”

As we walked away from the house, she kept looking over her shoulder.

“What’s the matter, Alice?” I asked.

“I was making sure that no one was following us.”

“Did you think they were?”

“I always think they are—after the fire.” I shivered, and she went on: “And so do you, Mrs. Verlaine, don’t you?”

I confessed that I often felt uneasy. “Of course,” said Alice, “anyone might get trapped in a burning cottage. But I felt ever since, that I had to look after you rather specially.”

“That is sweet of you, Alice. And I certainly feel very cherished.”

“It’s how I want you to feel.”

“It’s comforting to have a guardian angel.”

“Yes, it must be. Well, you have one now, dear Mrs. Verlaine.”

“Where are we going and what are you going to show me?”

“We’re turning off here and going down to the shore.”

“Is it down there then?”

“Yes, and I do really think it may be very important.”

“You’re keeping me in suspense.”

“Not really, Mrs. Verlaine. But I don’t know how to describe it. But I think it may be of archaeological significance.”

“Good heavens, Alice, don’t you think we ought to…”

“To tell someone else? Oh no, not yet. Let us be the ones to discover it.”

“You are being mysterious.”

“You’ll soon know.” She looked over her shoulder.

“What’s the matter?”

“I just had a feeling that we were being followed.”

“I can see no one.”

“They could be hidden by those bushes.”

“I don’t think so. In any case there are two of us. We mustn’t be so nervous.”

Alice led the way down the winding cliff path to the sands.

Halfway down she paused and said: “Listen.”

We stood still listening. “You can hear footsteps clearly here…even if people are a long way away.”

“All’s well,” I said. “I came this way before.”

“Yes and I warned you to be sure you didn’t get cut off by the tide. Remember? Perhaps I saved your life then.” The thought pleased her. “It seems to be my mission in life.”

We had reached the sands and a little way ahead of us was that little cove with the overhanging rock where she had told me previously it was so easy to get cut off by the tide.

Purposefully, now and then looking uneasily about her, she led the way.

“Here, Mrs. Verlaine.” She had disappeared in an opening in the rocks.

“What is this, Alice?”

“It’s a sort of cave. Come in.”

I entered and she said: “This part is just a cave. But I think I’ve found some drawings in an inner cave. They’re very crude…the sort that people did hundreds of years ago. The Stone Age probably. Mr. Wilmot was telling us about that. Or perhaps the Bronze Age.”

I thought of Roma. Drawings in a cave! Had Godfrey been right? Had she made some startling discovery and had she been murdered because of it?

“I believe it’s of very great importance,” went on Alice.

“But where…” I looked about the dim cave and could see nothing.

She laughed indulgently. “If it had been easy to see it would have been discovered long ago. Look.” She advanced into the cave. “There’s a great boulder here. You have to roll it away…and I suppose nobody thought of doing that…until I did. Oh, Mrs. Verlaine, it’s really my discovery. I could be famous, I suppose.”

“It depends what you’ve found, Alice.”

“Something wonderful. And I’m going to show you.”

She had succeeded in rolling away the boulder and beyond it a cavern yawned. “Look,” she said. “You have to squeeze through here…It’s not easy. I’ll go first and you follow.”

“Alice. Is it safe?”

“Oh yes…it’s only caves. I’ve already explored. You don’t think I’d let you come if it wasn’t safe, do you? Come on.” She had disappeared and I could just see the white of her dress. I followed it and stepped through into another cave.

Alice produced a candle from her pocket and striking a match lighted it. “There!” There was now a faint glow in the cave and I exclaimed with wonder for as my eyes grew accustomed to the dim light I saw that here was a wealth of stalagmite and stalactite formation and its beauty was unearthly. All kinds of shapes had been formed and even in this light I could see that the colors were wonderful—copper had produced that green, iron the brown and red, manganese that delightful pink. It was like stepping into a world of fantasy.

“Alice!” I cried. “But it’s a wonderful discovery…”

She laughed gleefully. “I thought you’d say that. I was longing to show it to you.”

“But we must get back. We must tell of this. It’s like the caves of Cheddar. Fancy all this time…it was here…and no one knew.”

“You are excited, Mrs. Verlaine.”

“It’s a great discovery.”

“There’s something else I want to show you though…this isn’t all. Give me your hand, you have to go carefully.” She took my hand and almost immediately I nearly stumbled. She was alarmed. “Oh, Mrs. Verlaine, do be careful. It would be awful if you fell here…”

“I’ll be careful, Alice. But let’s get someone else. Mr. Wilmot will be delighted. He’ll be mad with joy.”

“First I want to show you, Mrs. Verlaine. Oh please, let me show you first.”

I laughed. Then I said: “Listen! I can hear the sound of running water.”

“Yes. The next cave is far more exciting. Do come and look at it now. I can’t wait to show you. It’s a sort of waterfall. It’s an underground stream I think, and it goes through the caves and out into the sea somewhere. There are the drawings on the walls…that’s what I think is most interesting, Mrs. Verlaine.”

I said: “The sand here is quite damp.”

“It’s the stream and the waterfall.” She produced another candle. “One each,” she said. “I thought you’d like to have one. Isn’t this exciting? I call it my cave. It’s on the Stacy land, you know, and all the foreshore belongs to Sir William and his heirs.”

I could not take my eyes from those marvelous formations; the shapes were quite fantastic and when I thought that they had been slowly formed through the centuries I was so overawed that I could only stand and stare.

But Alice was impatient to disclose further wonders. I followed her through a gap in the rock and we were in a third cave. I could hear the water clearly now and I saw it freely trickling over the rocks. I peered forward.

Alice said: “The drawings on the walls are like those we saw in the British Museum.”

“Alice!” I cried. “But this is wonderful.” I was sure now that it was what Roma had discovered. Was it possible that Godfrey’s theory of the jealous archaeologist had some truth in it after all?

“You can see for yourself,” said Alice. “Over there.”

As I advanced my feet sank into the damp sand and it was difficult walking. I went forward holding the candle high, my eyes on the walls of the cave. Alice stood watching me.

“It’s quite…miraculous!” I began; and then suddenly I knew.

I turned to Alice. “Alice,” I cried, “stay where you are.”

She was standing at the mouth of the cave, the candle held high over her head.

“Yes, Mrs. Verlaine,” she said meekly.

“Alice…I…can’t…move…my feet. Alice…Alice…I’m sinking.”

She said: “They’re slow quicksands, Mrs. Verlaine. It takes a long time for you to disappear altogether.”

“Alice!” I shrieked. But she just stood there smiling at me.

“You!” I cried.

“Yes,” she replied. “Why not? Because I’m young. I’m clever, Mrs. Verlaine. I’m cleverer than the rest of you. These are my caves. These are my sands…and I shall never let anyone take them from me.”

“No,” I murmured, my thoughts confused. I could not believe this. It was a nightmare, a fantastic dream. I should wake in a moment.

She stood watching me, holding the candle above her head—and she was the more evil because she looked so meek, so docile. My candle slipped from my fingers; I stared at it as it lay on the sand for a second or so before it was sucked under.

Alice had moved; I saw her turn away and then she was holding up a rope…the thick kind which I had seen tethering boats on the shore.

She was going to save me. She had been teasing me. Oh, what a dangerous and cruel trick to play!

“If I threw this to you, Mrs. Verlaine, I might be able to pull you in…but I might not…the sands are strong. They look so soft…but they grip so tightly and they don’t like letting their victims go. Just little particles of sand! Isn’t it fascinating, Mrs. Verlaine? But then nature is fascinating. The vicar always says so.”

“Alice, throw me the rope.”

She shook her head.

“It’s what is called exquisite torture, Mrs. Verlaine. All the time you think I may throw you the rope and that makes it all the harder. You see if you give up hope you’re resigned…and you let yourself slip away…Don’t struggle. That makes you go down more quickly. Unless you want to go quickly, of course. I shall stay here…until you’ve gone.”

“Alice…you fiend.”

“Yes, I am. But you must admit I’m a clever one.”

“You deliberately brought me here.”

“Yes, deliberately,” she said. “You and the others.”

“No!”

“But yes. This place belongs to me. I’m Sir William’s daughter. It should be mine. Napier is his son but Napier killed Beau and Sir William hates him. He hated Napier’s mother and he loves mine. He will leave me the place when Napier is sent away. That’s what I want. And when anyone bothers me I shall bring them down to my cave. You bothered me, Mrs. Verlaine. You came here to look for your sister. She bothered me because she almost discovered my cave. She came looking for it. She came down here so I showed her what I had found…just as I showed you.”

The sand was about my ankles now. She watched me with the eye of a connoisseur. “The deeper you sink the quicker it swallows you,” she told me. “But you are tall and these are slow quicksands.”

“Help me, Alice,” I pleaded. “What have I ever done to harm you?”

“You are too inquisitive, and you came here to find out, didn’t you? That was very sly to pretend it was only to teach us music when all the time you were her sister. I knew that as soon as Mr. Wilmot came. He gave it away, didn’t he? I used to follow you and hear you talking. I knew I’d have to kill you, but another disappearance seemed too many so I lured you to the cottage and that would have been an end of you but for that old gardener.”

She was smiling—diabolically, so delighted with her cleverness, so anxious that I should realize how skillful she was.

“He saw me and I thought I might be suspected so I saved you instead. I saved your life…well, now I’m taking it away. I’m a goddess with power over life and death.”

“You’re mad,” I cried.

“Don’t say that,” she cried angrily.

“Alice, what has happened to you?”

“Nothing. It’s all very easy to understand. You should have become engaged to Mr. Wilmot and stopped thinking about us. But you wouldn’t would you? You wanted to marry Napier and it would have been the same as Edith. She had to go away because she was going to have a baby and I wasn’t going to let there be another heir. So I brought her here and she went where you’re going now. I will drive Napier away because Sir William loved Beau and Napier killed him and Beau will haunt the house until Napier goes away. I shall see to that. Then Sir William will recognize his own daughter and all this will be mine. You always thought I was a good little girl, didn’t you? You didn’t know me really, although I told you when you came here that we should take you by surprise. You had a hint and you didn’t take it. Now you’re caught. You meddled. You found the pattern in the mosaic didn’t you and you went to the British Museum. There was a man there who knew you—but I knew already who you were. But after that it had to happen quickly because you’d found out about a pattern…and that pattern was my shivering sands.”

“Help me,” I said and my voice echoed in the cave.

“No one can hear and the deeper you sink the greater the grip it gets on you.”

I thought: This is the end. Oh Roma, what did you feel in those moments before the sands swallowed you? Poor Roma! The discovery of the paintings in the cave would have been the greatest adventure of her life—and she had died here as they were revealed to her.

And Edith. What had Edith felt?

“Alice,” I cried. “You’re mad…mad…”

“Don’t say that. Don’t dare say it.”

I felt numb with fear. This was the second time in a very short period that I had faced horrible death. I could feel the cold sand above my ankles now and in vain did I try to extricate my feet. I tried not to see that demure, diabolical figure standing there on the edge of the quicksand holding the candle high above her head. I tried to think what I could do.

“Help me! Help me!” I sobbed.

And I could feel the implacable sand drawing me slowly and surely down.

There was someone else in the cave. I heard a voice cry: “Good God!” And it was Godfrey’s voice. “Caroline! Caroline!”

“Don’t come near,” I shouted, “I’m sinking…sinking in the sand.”

Alice said coldly: “Please go away. This is my cave.”

Godfrey stepped forward. I screamed: “No. Don’t set foot on the sand. Stay…stay where she is…”

“We need a rope.” He turned to Alice. “Go and get one…quickly.”

She stood there not speaking. I cried out: “She has a rope there. It’s for…exquisite torture. She’s a murderess. She murdered Roma…and Edith.”

Then Napier was there and in his hands he was holding the rope.

The nightmare of that cave lives with me still. The drawings on the walls, the pictures, the knowledge that hundreds of years ago men had been brought there to die…And Alice…strange Alice…had brought her enemies to die in the same way. Roma…Edith…myself.

I caught at the rope. They were shouting to me to tie it about my waist. They would save me…these two men together who both loved me.

I heard Alice’s voice—strange, mad, chanting. “Hurry, my shivering sands. Take her…take her as you took the others.”

I kept my eyes on those two men.

“We’ll do it,” I heard Napier say.

And I knew they would.

I lay in bed, nightmare haunted. I kept starting out of my unconsciousness to feel the soft implacable grip about my knees. It was only the bed clothes. I was haunted by the memory of a nightmare figure holding a candle…a face revealed to me in all its horror which was even greater because of the guileless mask with which I had become familiar.

Napier was at my bedside; so was Godfrey.

“Try to rest,” said Napier; and the pressure of his hand on my wrist reassured me. It shut out the nightmare and brought me back to reality.

“Everything is all right now,” said Godfrey.

Then I was able to sleep.

I had been fortunate on that day. What luck for me that Godfrey should have been coming over to Lovat Stacy to show me pictures of Roman mosaics in a book he had found in a secondhand bookshop in Dover.

He had seen me descending the cliff with Alice. She had been right to fear that we were being followed.

As for Napier, he believed that I would marry Godfrey and in a jealous mood, believing that Godfrey was going to meet me, he had followed him. A set of circumstances which had brought them both into the cave when the strength of two men was needed for my rescue.

Yes, I was undoubtedly fortunate on that day.

I lay in bed thinking of it and I kept telling myself: the barriers are down now. The way ahead is clear for us.

And Alice? Why had this strange girl behaved as she had? What canker had eaten into her soul?

The girls were questioned…they who had lived so much closer to her than any of us and who knew so much of her.

Allegra said: “She made us do what she wanted. It started long ago. She used to find out things we’d done and make us do what she commanded…to show she had power over us. We had to pretend that she was a sort of goddess and we were ordinary mortals. At first it was little things like making a face at Miss Elgin when her back was turned or breaking the handle off a cup or picking roses in the garden when we weren’t supposed to, or going to Beau’s room and making fun of his picture. Then it was bigger things. We had to haunt the chapel. Sometimes with candles, sometimes with a lantern. It was to pretend Beau didn’t want Napier here and was haunting it. And one day I set fire to the altar cloth and it all blazed up. I ran away and the fire started. After that I had to do everything she said because if I didn’t she would have told what I’d done. I was afraid Grandfather would send me away. So we haunted the chapel in turns…and when Mrs. Verlaine suspected one of us the other had to do it, while Mrs. Verlaine was with the one she had suspected. And then when she thought that Napier was getting too fond of Mrs. Verlaine we pretended we had seen him digging a hole in the copse…”

Sylvia said: “I had to do the haunting, too. I was always hungry and used to take things from the pantry at home. She said she would tell my mother that I was a thief. And she knew that Edith was meeting Jeremy Brown and so Edith had to do what she was told. Then Jeremy went away and Edith said she wouldn’t do anything more and that she was going to stop Alice’s blackmailing…which was what she called it. And so…she disappeared.”

It was small wonder that we asked what canker of madness was working in that youthful mind.

And what should be done with Alice?

When she had been brought back from the caves she had resumed her docile demeanor. I was deeply sorry for Mrs. Lincroft who had become like a woman who walked in her sleep.

Strangely enough it was to me that she told her story. I was in my room, for the doctor had said I should rest for the whole of that day and the next for I had sustained a great shock, and it was when I was lying in my room that this strange woman glided in and sat by my bed.

“Mrs. Verlaine,” she said, “what can I say to you? My daughter tried to kill you…twice.”

I said: “Don’t distress yourself, Mrs. Lincroft. I’m safe now.”

“But I am to blame,” she insisted. “I only am to blame. What will they do with my little Alice? They will not punish her. It is not her fault. I and I only am the one to blame.”

She walked about my room—a strange shadowy figure in her long skirts and her chiffon blouse with the loose bishop’s sleeves caught in at the wrists.

“I am the murderess. I…Mrs. Verlaine…not Alice.”

I said: “Mrs. Lincroft, try not to distress yourself. This is a terrible thing. But the doctors will know what to do with Alice. Where is she now?”

“She is sleeping. She looked so strange when they brought her back. She behaved as though nothing had happened. She was so gentle…so sweet…as she always was.”

“There is something terrible wrong with Alice.”

“I know,” she said. Then: “I know what is wrong with my daughter.”

“You know?”

“She cared so much that she should live here; it was important to her that she should be Sir William’s daughter…she wanted to own this place…”

“But how could she?”

“She would never accept defeat. Even now…she does not. She behaves as though nothing has happened, as though…in time she will convince us of this.”

Mrs. Lincroft was silent for a moment and then she went on: “I shall have to tell the truth now. There is no holding back. Perhaps I should have told it years ago. But I kept my secret. I kept it well and no one knew. No one at all…least of all Alice. I felt it was important that no one should know…not only for my sake but mainly for hers. But you are supposed to be resting. Perhaps I shouldn’t tell you. It will only disturb you. Anyone would be disturbed by such a story.”

“Tell me, please, Mrs. Lincroft. I want to know.”

“You already know that Sir William was my lover and that I came here as a penniless girl to be a companion to his wife. You know of the position between us; you know of the death of Beau and how Lady Stacy shot herself soon afterwards. The gypsy spoke the truth. It was because of us…Sir William and myself. There was a scene when she found us together and that, added to her grief over Beau’s death, was more than she could endure. I went away when she died. We thought it best for a while. I was very unhappy. I did not think Sir William would want me back, and I was terribly shocked by the tragedy for which we were responsible…and I could only remind him of it. During the years he has tried to convince himself that she killed herself because of her grief over Beau—but in his heart he knew that that wasn’t true. It was her grief over his infidelity. But for that, he could have helped her over the tragedy. But Sir William tried to force himself to believe that it was due to Beau’s death. He blamed Napier; and every time he saw his son he was reminded of what he had done. And so…he could not bear the sight of Napier. He blamed Napier for everything so that he could stop blaming himself. People often hate those to whom they are unjust.”

“I know this is true,” I replied. “Poor Napier.”

“Napier knew this. But he could not get over the fact that he had killed his beloved brother, and he seemed to want to be blamed. You see he took the responsibility for Allegra’s existence on his own shoulders.”

“People’s motives are so mixed…so difficult to fathom.”

She nodded and went on: “I was frightened when I left here. I knew I had to find another job. First though I took a little holiday.” She shivered and it was evident that she found it a great effort to go on. “I met a man. He was charming, attentive…and I was greatly attracted to him…and he to me. He talked of marriage and all in the space of a fortnight we became lovers. He left me at the boardinghouse where we were staying and said he would go back to his home in London and in a week or so send for me. We were to be married there. He was arrested and I learned that my lover was a homicidal maniac who had already murdered three women. He had escaped from Broadmoor and in his lucid moments appeared to be perfectly normal. I believe that had he not been arrested he would have murdered me in time. Perhaps it would have been better if he had. I was completely shattered when this was discovered. I hastily left the boardinghouse and tried to lose myself in London. And then I discovered that I was to have a child: ‘Gentleman’ Terrall’s child.”

I caught my breath. Now I understood why she had been upset when she had seen the announcement of this man’s escape, how relieved by his recapture. This man…Alice’s father!

“I was desperate!” she said. “What would you have done, Mrs. Verlaine? What could anyone have done? Tell me that. I was alone in the world…about to have a madman’s child. What could I do? I made a plan. I wrote to Sir William. I told him I was going to have a child…his child. It was easy to delude him by making Alice six months older than she actually is. He sent me money…enough to enable me to get comfortably through my difficult time. And when Alice was two years old I came back as Mrs. Lincroft, a widow with one child, and that is where I have been ever since.”

“Oh, Mrs. Lincroft, how sorry I am for you.”

She rocked herself gently to and fro. “What tragedies we hide behind our masks,” she murmured. “And one builds a little refuge and one feels one is safe but there is the slippery step…at everybody’s door.”

“And now?” I asked.

“Who knows?” she answered. “I expect they will take her away from me now. I must tell them the truth. My poor child…She was so like him…I used to watch for the signs. He had her gentleness. He wanted to be good, I am sure.”

I could only murmur my sympathy. I could offer her nothing else.

“What will become of us?” she murmured. “What will become of us now.”

Alice herself decided what should be done.

The day after we had come back from the caves she was missing. Her little room was as neat as ever, the bed made, the coverlet smooth; everything neatly folded in her drawers.

But there was no Alice.

I knew where she was. She had heard that she was not Sir William’s daughter, that she would have to go away. This was something she had vowed she would never do. She had determined she would stay at Lovat Stacy forever. She would not accept the fact that it was not her home.

She would always think of the dramatic effect. Beside the shifting sands she had dropped a handkerchief with A neatly embroidered in the corner.

I pictured her standing there, holding her candle in her hand. Now she would be buried forever in the land which she had determined should be her own.

Nothing would be the same again. Between the new and the old life was a great chasm which could never be crossed. The past was dead and the future was vital and living. For one thing Death had taught me when it had come close to me and all but taken me by the hand was that I wanted to live. I wanted desperately to live. I wanted to build up a new life over the ruins which should be so completely hidden that it would be as though they had never existed.

There were two men waiting for me. One was cool and charming, so certain of his place in the world; and the other was scarred by life. Godfrey was so sure, Napier so unsure.

They had both been at hand when I needed them; they had both been watchful since the fire; in their different ways they loved me. Godfrey tenderly, kindly, gently and perhaps dispassionately; perhaps he had chosen me because I would make a suitable wife. And Napier fiercely, possessively, desperately.

“Marry Godfrey,” my head told me. “Go right away from here and forget your nightmares. Live graciously…bring up a family in ideal surroundings…comfortable and easy.”

“But,” said my heart, “this is where you belong.” Nightmares, perhaps. Memories. Devils to fight, his and your own. Pietro to mock you for having once more followed the call of the heart.

And when Napier came to me and took my hands in his, different now, Napier the free man, he said: “Now I suppose you think you should marry Godfrey and settle down in your country vicarage while you await your bishopric. But you’re not going to.” And he laughed and I laughed with him. “You’re going to be a fool, Caroline. Everyone will tell you you’re a fool.”

“Not everyone,” I said.

And I was confident. My heart would always win.