13
DAYS of such journeying followed; sometimes they went in the boats and sometimes wandered by dizzy paths along the sides of the zigzagging mountains among groves of spruce, fir, or high up among pines and slender cascades. The weather was very fair and warm, and the sun was only dimmed by the shadow of the lapis lazuli crags that towered threateningly over the path or by the jade-brown walls of a gorge. At every turn there was some new glimpse of a sun-bathed horizon, or a gleam of the sails of their boats on the shining, enamelled stream. White cranes stalked among the emerald rice-fields. The roofs of villages reposed under the hills, suitably to the contour, and sometimes there were to be seen the quaint eaves of a temple appositely jutting out. And sometimes the glistening cascade fell from their very feet to some green trough in the snowy bloom of cherry, peach and magnolia far below. The spring weather, the exhilarating air of the heights, and a special comradeship that, as Ambrose notes, is apt to accompany such an adventure—at any rate for the first few days—put them all in good spirits with themselves and one another, and the ravines and wrinkled, wizard-faced crags not infrequently echoed with human song. Lychnis usually glided ahead, like a spirit that seeks the consummation of life in some perfect gesture of the dance, and her attendant followed with a more deliberate and serene enjoyment. Terence came next, officially leading, often in colloquy with Such-a-one; and the rest streamed out behind in ever-changing order, gay in their coloured garments, like a marching troop of flowers.
They camped one warm night, there being no village and no inn, at the mouth of an unusually gloomy ravine, where the mountains, towering above them, seemed almost to meet. The moon was in her third quarter. Three of the Sages—Terence, Frew-Gaff and Sprot—with Ambrose, were standing among the reeds by the water’s edge, peering into the mysterious, moon-dappled mouth of the gorge. Terence, profoundly stirred in spirit, had received illumination, and his eyes were deep pools troubled by shining moon-angels. He raised his hands up before the mountains and exclaimed: “The Last Wall!”
“Meaning,” said Frew-Gaff, “that on the other side of this barrier, which is to be pierced by means of this gorge, we shall find a sort of Fairyland of Pantomime Peaches?”
“The land of the Peach-blossom People, undoubtedly, matter-dividing Richard.”
“Dancing about in pink and purple tights, I suppose.”
“And as real as æther waves, fanatic particle-worshipper.”
“Well, after all,” said Sprot surprisingly, “there may be something in what Terence says. There are more things in heaven and earth, as Wordsworth reminds us. There is much that we cannot comprehend, and I was never one to scoff at what is beyond our understanding.” It was clear, Ambrose saw, that he had something up his sleeve.
“Let me feel your pulse,” said Sir Richard. “Ah! I thought so. The spring and the excellent wine we drank at dinner, and something that is no doubt aphrodisiacal in the night itself, have disturbed your blood. I detect overtones of moonshine in the vibrations of your nervous system. The sap is stirring in you; you are beginning to Sprot.”
“Clever—very clever,” replied the little man, with a certain resentment. He would have shown it more positively, but he knew it was better not to engage with these men in a contest of words.
“He has had a vision, perhaps,” fluted Terence from the gorge-mouth in deep tones. “Illumination comes oftenest to those who are simple in mind.”
“True,” observed Sir Richard.
“Not entirely a vision,” said Sprot, with a sudden falter. Then he made up his mind. “Look here, you chaps, you mustn’t laugh at me for once....”
“Go on,” said Frew-Gaff.
“How beautiful is the humility of those who have experienced the Experience!” exclaimed Terence.
Sprot pointed a finger. “You see Blackwood up there?”
Following his finger, they dimly saw the motionless form of Blackwood seated cross-legged on a ledge of the mountain. He was in discipline. “Yes,” they breathed.
“Well, I was up there talking to him, because I thought he might do me a bit of good, and as we were chatting, about self-control and” (he coughed) “purity and that sort of thing, and it was getting dark, we both distinctly saw a man pass riding on a goat, like the one you saw, Terence, beside the ship. He went down that narrow path very silent and swift, ghost-like; but what got us both a bit startled was his eyes, which were what you might call fierce and majestic, if I might put it so.”
Terence took him by the hand, exclaiming, “Brother!” Then once more addressing the mountain as “The Last Wall,” he stepped towards the river and said, to some hypothetical listener, “I come.”
“Stop!” cried Sprot. Terence, knee-deep in the reedy water, turned with an expression of inquiry.
“There’s more than ghosts in these mountains,” said the man of business. “Gentlemen, I am not an artist, or a dreamer, or a scientist; I am a practical man, and as such I keep my eyes and ears pretty wide open, and perhaps I see things that escape some others. Now this fellow Such-a-one, and his talisman, and all the tales we’ve heard about this part of the world—what do you make of it?” He paused, a conjuror about to produce an idea out of an apparently empty mind.
“Absolutely nothing,” said Sir Richard, looking down at him with tolerance in his moonlit, distinguished face.
“Nothing, naturally, it being a matter plain to be seen without a microscope, and hence not interesting to a scientific man. Well, Mr. Poet Fitzgerald, wade into the river by all means, though I might warn you against catching cold. As I said, I am a practical man. But there’s something more than a feverish cold hidden in the blackness of that split in the mountains, in my opinion.”
He stopped, and the others stared expectantly into the gorge.
“There’s dragons,” he exclaimed, like an explosion.
“Credo quia absurdum.” The voice of Quentin unexpectedly broke the silence, and Sprot jumped round as if his fancies had taken on a fearful reality.
“These mountains are certainly full of dragons,” continued Quentin. “Listen!” They listened, and a murmur of rippling water came down the gorge. “Do you not hear them drinking and swimming? Do you not realize that all these past days, as we walked among contorted crags, we were among dragons, twisting and grinning in their sleep? Look above you at those gruesome, moonlit shapes among the mountains, and their light, white breath drifting about the peaks. Look——” He stopped abruptly, and resumed in a queer tone. “Look, in fact, at that one hanging in the air.”
They looked and saw a great, beaked bird floating overhead with wide, motionless wings. Their mouths hung open, and Ambrose ascertained afterwards that their sensations were rather of astonishment than alarm. Frew-Gaff was the first to bring his mind to bear on it.
“An aeroplane, by all that’s holy!” he exclaimed.
The bird wheeled round a great circle and vanished over the mountains.
“Then what silent engines!” replied Quentin. “I fear it is the Dragon. Remember the emblem on our boats. It is clear that we have come here, by the hand of Such-a-one, in the capacity of sacrifice for some annual feast. Hence the respectful attitude of the surrounding population. Sprot will undoubtedly suffer first.”
Sprot was pale, trembling. “The camp!” he muttered. “The girls!”
Taken by his infectious alarm, they rushed back to the camp. All was well. The blue-clad stewards, under the assiduous tutelage of Such-a-one, were prostrating themselves forehead to ground. The others were looking up at the mountains with mingled amusement and apprehension, as if they preferred to believe that someone had played a rather uncanny joke. The girls, by their dishevelled hair, had come from their pillows. This drew Quentin. “A girl fresh from her bed is among the most intoxicating sights of earth,” he murmured to Ambrose.
Then Blackwood came flitting through the night with a not altogether well-disciplined haste, asking: “What is it in the sky?”
The matter was pretty thoroughly discussed, without satisfactory conclusion. “Anyway,” said Lord Sombrewater at last, “dragon or aeroplane, the incident adds piquancy to the adventure. What do you say, Lychnis? Would you rather go back?”
She shook her head. “On the contrary.”
“And you, Ruby?”
But Ruby had fallen asleep. “What a lovely morsel for sacrifice!” said Quentin, looking down at her.