The Tidal Wave - Ethel May Dell (top books to read TXT) 📗

else, sir," she said, with her air of womanly dignity.
He made no outward comment, but inwardly he wondered. Was this odd little, dark-haired creature some nameless waif of the sea brought up on the charity of the fisher-folk, he asked himself.
She stood aside for him to pass, drawing Caesar out of his way. He stopped a moment to pat the dog's head. And so standing, leaning upon his crutches, he suddenly and keenly looked into the olive-tinted face that the sunbonnet shadowed.
"Sorry for me, eh?" he said, and he uttered a laugh that was short and very bitter.
She bent down over the dog.
"Yes, I am sorry," she said, almost under her breath.
Bending lower, she picked up something that lay on the ground between them.
"You dropped this," she said.
He took it from her with a grim hardening of the mouth. It was the letter he had received from his _fiancee_ a year ago. But his eyes never left the face of the girl before him.
"I wonder--" he said abruptly, and stopped.
There was a pause. The girl waited, her hand nervously caressing the Newfoundland's curls. She did not raise her eyes, but the lids fluttered strangely.
"I wonder," Durant said, and his voice was suddenly kind, "if I might ask you to do something for me."
She gave him a swift glance.
"Please do!" she murmured.
"This letter," he said, and he held it out to her.
"I should like it torn up--very small."
She took the envelope and hesitated. Durant was watching her. There was unmistakable mastery in his eyes.
"Go on!" he said briefly.
And with a quick, startled movement, she obeyed. The letter fluttered around them both in tiny fragments. Hugh Durant looked on with a hard, impassive face, as he might have looked on at an execution.
The girl's hands were shaking. She glanced at him once or twice uncertainly.
When the work of destruction was accomplished she made him a nervous curtsey and turned to go.
Durant's face softened a second time into a smile.
"Thank you--Molly," he said, and he put his hand to his hat though she was not looking at him.
And afterwards he stood among the fragments of his letter and watched till both the girl and the dog were out of sight.
Twenty-four hours later Hugh Durant stood on the sandy shore and tapped with his crutch on the large, flat stone that was set for a step on the threshold of the little, wooden cottage behind the sand dunes.
He had reached the place with much difficulty, persevering with a doggedness characteristic of him; and there were great drops on his forehead though the afternoon was cloudy and cool.
A quick step sounded in answer to his summons, and in a moment his hostess appeared at the open door.
"Why didn't you come straight in?" she said hospitably.
She was dressed in lilac print. Her sleeves were turned up to the elbows, and she wore a big apron with a bib. He noticed that her feet were no longer bare.
He took off his hat as he answered.
"Perhaps I might have been tempted to do so," he said, "if I had felt equal to mounting the step without assistance."
"Oh!" She pulled down her sleeves hastily. "Will you let me help you?" she suggested shyly.
Durant's eyes were slightly drawn with pain. Nevertheless they were very friendly as he made reply.
"Do you think you can?" he said.
She took his hat from him with an anxious smile, and then the crutch that he held towards her.
"Tell me exactly what to do!" she said in her sweet, low voice. "I am very strong."
"If I may put my arm on your shoulder," Durant said, "I think it can be managed. But say at once if it is too much for you!"
Her face was deeply flushed as she bent from the step to give him the help he needed.
"Bear harder!" she said, as he leant his weight upon her. "Bear much harder!"
There was an odd little quiver in her voice, but, slight as she was, she supported him with sturdy strength.
The door opened straight into the tiny cottage parlour. A large wicker chair, well cushioned, stood in readiness. As Durant lowered himself into it, he saw that the girl's eyes were brimming with tears.
"I've hurt you!" he exclaimed.
"No, no!" she said, and turned quickly away. "You didn't bear nearly hard enough."
He laughed a little, though his teeth were clenched.
"You're a very strong woman, Molly," he said.
"Oh, I am," she answered instantly. "Now shall you be all right while I go to fetch tea?"
"Of course," he said. "Pray don't make a stranger of me!"
She disappeared into the room at the back of the cottage, and he was left alone. The great dog came in with stately stride and lay down at his feet.
Durant sat and looked about him. There was little to attract the eye in the simple furnishing of the tiny room. There was a small bookcase in one corner, but it was covered by a red curtain. Two old-fashioned Dutch figures stood on the mantelpiece on each side of a cheap little clock that seemed to tick at him almost resentfully. The walls were tinted green and bore no pictures or decoration of any sort. There was a plain white tablecloth on the table, and in the middle stood a handleless jug filled with pink and white wild roses, freshly gathered. There was no carpet. The floor was strewn with beach sand.
All these details Durant took in with keen interest. Nothing could have exceeded the simplicity of this dwelling by the sea. There had obviously been no attempt at artistic arrangement. Cleanliness and a neatness almost severe were its only characteristics.
"I hope you like toasted scones, sir," said Molly's voice in the doorway.
He looked round to see her come forward with the tea-tray.
"Nothing better," he said lightly, "particularly if you have made them yourself."
She set down her tray and smiled at him. Her short, curling hair gave her an almost elfish look.
"I've been so busy getting ready," she said childishly. "I've never had a gentleman to tea before."
"That is a very great honour for me," said Durant.
Molly looked delighted.
"I think the honour is mine," she said in her shy voice. "I am just going to fetch the wooden chair out of the kitchen."
She departed hastily as if embarrassed, and Durant smiled to himself. It was wonderful how the oppression had been lifted from his spirit since his meeting with this lonely dweller on the shore.
When Molly reappeared, he saw that she had assumed a dignity worthy of the occasion. She sat down behind the brown teapot with a serious face. He waited for her to lead the conversation, and the result was complete silence for some seconds.
Then she said suddenly:
"Have you been sitting in the summer-house again?"
"No," said Durant.
"I am glad of that," said Molly.
"Why?" he asked.
She hesitated.
"Isn't it rather a lonely place?" she said.
He smiled faintly.
"You know I came here to be lonely, Molly," he said.
"Yes; you told me," said Molly, and he fancied that he heard her sigh.
"Are you never lonely?" he asked in a kindly tone.
"Often," she said. "Often."
She was pouring the tea as she spoke. Her head was slightly bent.
"And so you took pity on me?" said Durant.
She shook her head suddenly and vigorously.
"It wasn't that, sir," she said in a very low voice. "I--I wanted--someone--to speak to."
"I see," said Durant gently. He added after a moment: "Do you know, I am glad I chanced to be that someone."
She smiled at him over the teapot.
"You weren't pleased--at first," she said. "You were angry. I heard you saying--"
"What?" said Durant.
He looked across at her and laughed naturally, spontaneously, for the first time.
Molly had forgotten to be either embarrassed or dignified.
"I don't know what it was," she said; "I only know what it sounded like."
"And that made you want to speak to me?" said Durant.
The brown face opposite to him looked impish. Yet it seemed to him that there was sadness in her eyes.
"It didn't frighten me away," she said.
"It would need to be a very timid person to be frightened at me now," said Hugh Durant quietly.
She opened her eyes wide, and looked as if she were about to protest. Then, changing her mind, she remained silent.
"Yes," he said. "Please say it!"
She shook her head without speaking.
But he persisted. Something in her silence aroused his curiosity.
"Am I really formidable, Molly?" he asked.
She rose to take his empty cup, and paused for a moment at his side, looking down at him.
"I don't think you realise how strong you are," she said enigmatically.
He laughed rather drearily.
"I am gauging my weakness just at present," he said.
And then, glancing up, he saw quick pain in her eyes, and abruptly turned the conversation.
Later, when he took his leave, he stood on her step and looked out to the long, grey line of sea with a faint, dissatisfied frown on his face.
"You're not afraid--living here?" he asked her at the last moment.
"What is there to fear?" said Molly. "I have Caesar, and there are other cottages not far away."
"Yes, I know," he said. "But at night--when it's dark--"
A sudden glory shone in the girl's pure eyes.
"Oh, no, sir," she said. "I am not afraid."
And he departed, hobbling with difficulty up the long, sandy slope.
At the top he paused and looked out over the grey, unquiet sea. The dissatisfaction on his face had given place to perplexity and a faint, dawning wonder that was like the birth of Hope.
* * *


During the long summer days that followed, that strange friendship, begun at the moment when Hugh Durant's life had touched its lowest point of suffering and misery, ripened into a curiously close intimacy.
The girl was his only visitor--the only friend who penetrated behind the barrier of loneliness that he had erected for himself. He had sought the place sick at heart and utterly weary of life, desiring only to be left alone. And yet, oddly enough, he did not resent the intrusion of this outsider, who had openly told him that she was sorry.
She visited him occasionally at his hermitage, but more frequently she would seek him out in his summer-house and take possession of him there with a winning enchantment that he made no effort to resist. Sometimes she brought him tea there; sometimes she persuaded him to return with her to her cottage on the shore.
The embarrassment had wholly passed from her manner. She was eager and ingenuous as a child. And yet there was something in her--a depth of feeling, a concentration half-revealed--that made him aware of her womanhood. She was never confidential with him, but yet he felt her confidence in every word she uttered.
And the life that had ebbed so low turned in the man's veins and began to flow with a steady, rising surge of which he was only vaguely conscious.
Molly had become his keenest interest. He had ceased to think with actual pain of the woman who had loved his strength, but had shrunk in horror from his weakness. His bitterness had seemed to disperse with the fragments of her torn letter. It was only a memory to him now--scarcely even that.
"This place has done me a lot of good," he said to Molly one day. "I have written