Land Beyond the Map

He shuddered and went on: “Very well, Miss Harbottle. If you care to drive out in this weather tonight then what you have for sale must be very interesting. Come out, by all means.”

The phone went dead at once. That might be a fallen telegraph pole just as easily as the replacement of the receiver.

He watched as Annie finished clearing away the glass. Odd that the glass had broken at all, really, just like that; but that had been a treasure bought entire — frame, map, glass and all. The glass was old and weak. He made a mental note to check all the other framed charts and maps. Those housed in the ponderous sliding drawers of the cabinets were preserved better, perhaps; but he would have missed that oriflamme of color along the wall.

Maps perhaps formed too great a part of his life. He had tried various of the other ways rich men spent their days and had found them all uniformly dull, pompous or cruel. His interest in maps stemmed from that early odd experience; he had told the story a few times but, meeting raised eyebrows and smiling incredulity, hadn’t bothered lately. He wondered now, not for the first time, if he followed a will o’ the wisp. The main fact that the search went on still was good enough.

The buns toasted well before the banked fire roaring in the hearth. Wasteful, perhaps; shedding a benison, yes. And that was what counted with Roland Crane.

He poured milk and added tea and sugar and lay back in his winged armchair with the sliding seat and back fixed in the most comfortable position years of experience had taught him. It was good to be alive. It was good to be rich with financial cares handled by a remote glass-walled office in the City of London. It was good to live a full life in these bleak moorlands of the west country, and to go off on a dig during the season, working with men and women who shared his archaeological dedication. The idle wasting away of life in frittering pursuits that was a disease with the rich would have killed him inside three months.

Next season would be — if he was lucky — Turkey. A great deal to be dug up there, to be found, to be added to the store of human knowledge. Many of mankind’s origins were to be discovered there and Crane’s wealth would once more be willingly thrown into the work of unfolding the veil of the past. Yes, it was good to have a purpose in life.

He drank more tea and ate a toasted bun, liberally smeared with good rich farm butter, and lay back in the great winged armchair, well content.

He wondered, not without a twinge of muted excitement, what this strange woman would be bringing him tonight out of the storm.

Miss Harbottle had wasted no time. She’d probably driven up that winding road with the wipers tick-tocking across the windshield, the tires hissing in the rain, the main beams scything ruthlessly ahead, a cigarette held casually between her lips, clocking a steady sixty.

She looked that sort of girl.

Annie ushered her in, said that she would bring fresh tea, and closed the door silently. Miss Harbottle advanced with outstretched hand. Crane took it, looking at her, suddenly and disastrously uncomfortable.

Miss Harbottle’s fair wavy hair had been cut murderously short. She had a face that could find a match only in those old books of high romance that Crane had read and pored over as a child, a face that made the faces of modern magazine advertisement girls look the vapid blanks they were. She wore slacks and a short leather coat, an attire for which she apologized at once.

“Felt it more suitable for the weather. Filthy ride.”

“Yet you came anyway,” Crane said, showing her to a chair. “It must be very important.” He looked vainly for a case.

She laughed, sitting down. “I’m afraid I played a little deception on you, Mr. Crane. I have no maps to sell.”

Crane sat up. “Well, what on earth—?” he began.

Her face, while still retaining all its vitality and vivacious radiation of breeziness that had so befuddled Crane, became at once somber, penetrating and intelligent. The impression she gave Crane was of an elfin sprite full of feminine loveliness and charm barely concealing the practical toughness of a dynasty-toppling Empress. She leaned forward.

“I’m not selling maps, Mr. Crane. But I am interested in acquiring a map—”

“I’m sorry, Miss Harbottle.” Crane was brusque and annoyed. “If you knew I collected maps you should also have known I do not-sell. I—”

“I know, Mr. Crane. I am interested in one special map. A map which I believe, you, also, do not have.”

“Oh?”

Her eyes were hidden now behind down-dropped lids. He wondered for a panic-stricken instant what she was thinking; then he rallied. That was between him and his memories alone.

“Well, Miss Harbottle—”

“And my name isn’t Harbottle. That happens to be the nam? of the proprietor of the Royal Garage. I used it on the spur of the moment.”

“But why—?”

“Mr. Crane. If I told you that I am looking for a certain map and came to you for assistance, what would you say?”