Lament for a lost lover

Wrapped in my sombre cloak, acquired before we set sail, I felt a strange exhilaration. This was home. Something we had talked of for years, certain that one day we would be there. And here I was.

I could not help my thoughts going back to that long-ago night when we had been accompanied to the coast by my grandparents; I remembered the smell of the sea and the way in which the boat had tossed, and our mother had held Lucas and me close to her while the waves rocked the boat and the wind caught at our hair. I remember our grandparents standing on the shore, watching and Batching, and the strange, mingled feelings of sadness and exhilaration which I had felt then.

Now there was only exhilaration. Tom, Edwin’s servant, jumped out of the boat and waded ashore. Then Edwin stepped out. He took first me in his arms and carried me to dry land, and then Harriet.

It was dark. He whispered to me: “Don’t be afraid. I know every inch of this shore.

Eversleigh is six miles from here. I used to ride down here to play on the beach.

Come.”

He took my hand in his left and Harriet’s in his right and we walked over the shingle.

“Can you see anyone around, Tom?” he asked of his man.

“No, sir. Maybe if you stayed here with the ladies I’ll scout around.”

“I know where,” Edwin said. “White Cliffs cave. We’ll wait there. Don’t tarry too long, Tom.”

“No, sir. I’ll be back at the cave in twenty minutes or so if I can’t find what we need.”

I listened to Tom’s footsteps crunching on the shingle. Then Edwin said: “You ladies follow me.”

Within a few minutes we were in the cave. “White Cliffs cave,” he went on. “Why they called it that I don’t know. It’s all white cliffs here. I used to hide in here where I was a boy. I’d make a fire and spend hours here. It was my special hideaway.”

“How lucky that we landed near it,” said Harriet.

“It was due to my expert navigation.”

“What is your cousin going to say when he finds us here?” I asked.

“That we shall discover,” replied Edwin blithely.

“I am looking forward to playing the Puritan,” said Harriet. “It’ll be a testing role, because I have a particular dislike of Puritans.”

“As we all have,” replied Edwin.

“Edwin,” I said, “what will be expected of Harriet and me at Eversleigh?”

“As we are not expected nothing will be expected of us,” retorted Harriet, and she and Edwin laughed as though sharing a joke.

But I insisted: “This is an important mission and we have joined it rather recklessly. Your cousin will be surprised to see us I know, and as we are here, we could perhaps do something to help the enterprise.”

“He will quickly make use of you if he feels a need to,” said Ed-“We have to wait to see what he has discovered. I shall make him agree that it is less conspicuous travelling with two ladies than alone with a manservant, and I am sure he will grant me that.”

“Then we have been of some use,” said Harriet. “It is good to be useful.”

We lay against the hard rock and I felt I had never been so excited in my life. My quiet existence had suddenly become a thrilling adventure. How long ago it seemed since I had received a letter from my mother telling me that the Eversleighs would be inviting me. How could I have guessed what a sesame that would be to glorious living?

Edwin talked of his boyhood when he had camped in this cave. “My secret hiding place,” he called it. “When the tide is high the water comes in. One could be trapped here. It’s happened once in about fifty years. Don’t be alarmed. It’s low tide and at this time of the year we’re safe enough. Besides, Tom will soon be back. You can be sure Cousin Carleton has not let us down. We are to have horses waiting to take us to Eversleigh.”

“How many horses?”

“Two only, my darling.”

“But we are four.”

“Never fear, you will ride pillion. One with me, one with Tom.”

“So it has worked out very satisfactorily,” said Harriet.

I heard him chuckle in the darkness of the cave. “Couldn’t be more so.”

There was a crunching on the shingle and Tom was at the mouth of the cave.

‘The horses are waiting, sir,” he said.

We emerged and climbed up the slight incline to a path.

“We’re to be travellers in difficulties’ said Edwin lightly “Come.” He looked from me to Harriet, and hesitated a moment “I’ll carry my wife,” he said. “Tom, you take Mistress Main.”

We mounted and were soon riding through the early morning. The dawn was just breaking in the sky when we reached Eversleigh Court. A high wall surrounded it, and above this, one could glimpse the gables. The gates were open and we rode in. The austerity of the place hit me like a cold wind. Chateau Congreve and Villers Tourron had been shabby-second-rate dwellings of the rich offered by them to their needy friends who had become exiles-but this was different. Very clean, in good order, but on it was the stamp of that kind of Puritanism which sees sin in colour, beauty and charm.