Chapter X

Toby thought that Anne was supernatural, and that human nature was of a more temperate stuff than he had ever supposed. Forty years of experience had given him no parallel to their successful quartette. There was no indication that they were four sophisticated people playing skilfully with fire; they were, instead, four friends enjoying an intercourse as free from irritations and self-consciousness as that of congenial children. Anne improved daily. She no longer came methodically out of distant speculations with a cheerfulness that chilled the heart; her eyes were full of light and she carried her head as if she were crowned.

Their plans for the day fell into a natural order. Norman and Nina started out first by themselves and Anne, who was a more reluctant riser, breakfasted an hour or two later with Toby on the terrace above the waterfall. Toby, with a map and a developed instinct for mountains, usually managed to find an easier and quicker route by which they joined their companions for a midday meal. Anne and Nina rested afterwards, or collected flowers, while the two men explored further, rejoining them at sunset. Sometimes they returned as they had come, sometimes the two women continued their apparently insatiable _tête-à-tête_ and sometimes (but this was the rarest of their combinations) Toby would find himself with Nina, watching with an unappeased curiosity the figures of Anne and Norman disappearing along a mountain path. What they found to talk about when they were alone together was a perpetual problem; but Toby came to the conclusion that they remained comfortably poised upon the subject of Nina. Norman was in that stage of the affections when a blind absorption in one subject reduces the intellect to a moth-like hovering. What he liked best, if he wasn’t with Nina, was to discuss her, and above all what she ought to wear, and to this discussion Anne brought a skilled and untiring response. It was obvious that Anne seriously enjoyed anything which was to the girl’s advantage. She drew out all Nina’s best qualities and most attractive moments, and her only difficulties were when Nina herself threw these opportunities away. Nina was a bad reasoner and an inaccurate talker. She rushed full tilt upon subjects about which the little she knew had been presented to her misleadingly, and she wouldn’t let her mistakes go when Norman pointed them out to her. Nobody else pointed them out to her. Toby refrained because he was afraid of Anne, and Anne because she wanted to bluff Norman into thinking Nina hadn’t made any mistakes.

Anne watched Nina carefully, fencing her off from the most fatal of her dangers, lying in wait to prevent her mis-statements, and when they had occurred, head over heels, affording them covert by a quick diversion. Nina herself knew that her best ally was Anne. When she got into difficulties she turned to her as instinctively as a climber stretches his hand out for his rope. Norman was too critical. So complete was Nina’s triumph over him in every other direction that he resented the slightest sign of fallibility in her which could be apparent to others. He ran her fallibilities down, exposed them, and waited for her to translate them into miracles of good sense. She couldn’t have done it alone, but with Anne’s help she very often did.

As time went on, Toby realised that their brilliant ease had a background of effort. Norman made none at all, and Nina’s was so slight as to be merely the clever acceptance of invisible supports held out by Anne. The lovers had the best conscience in the world; they contributed to the welfare of the party a perfect good will and the spectacle of their bliss. All they asked in return was for everyone to be happy and, a good deal of the time, happy somewhere else. This part of Anne’s task was easy. She required very little of their companionship, and was never insistent, even when she was present. The protection of Nina from the occasional criticism which flickered in the very intelligent eyes of her lover was a harder task, but practicable. It was some time before even the watchful Toby discovered what was Anne’s hardest task of all. Anne had whole-heartedly accepted their love, and spent herself with satisfaction in brushing away from it the last crumb of friction, but she stuck at a point which to Toby appeared frictionless and obscure. What she found it so hard to bear was that Nina wasn’t anxious about Norman. After all, what had Anne’s life been for the last ten years but the masterly handling of Norman’s well-being, and now she had to see it jeopardised by no handling at all. Anne might have taken a subtle pleasure in this absence of rivalry in her favourite rôle, but she had no feeling of rivalry in her heart; she had instead an even more formidable instinct—an instinct which blocks out all rivalries, and makes for the most incongruous relationships or the bitterest emotions—the instinct of protection. It was her greatest quality and the direst of her defects. She protected Nina, and Norman loved her the better for it, and so, reluctantly, did Toby (for he was not in need of incitements to his affection). But when it came to protecting Norman, Anne had valiantly determined to keep her hands off.

Toby was first aware of the danger on a peculiarly hot day, when they had decided to walk to the foot of the Col di Brenta. Anne looked at the sky apprehensively and then went back into the hall of the hotel. When she rejoined Toby her face was very grave. “Nina,” she said, “has let Norman go without his panama!” Anne did not wish to protect Nina on this occasion, her voice was penal. When Toby attempted a cowardly vindication of the absent Nina, Anne replied in a tragic voice, “I told her two days ago that he had had a slight sunstroke when he was a boy.”

“Still,” began Toby, “that was such a long time ago.”

“No matter how long ago it was,” Anne answered stiffly, “sunstrokes recur very easily, and when they do recur they are most serious.”

“I don’t think,” said Toby consideringly, “that Nina bothers herself much about risks.”

“I don’t think she does,” said Anne, “but as far as I know, that has never prevented effects from following causes.” Toby was quite crushed by this retort, and they walked on in silence. Anne did not upbraid Nina when they reached the meadow, which was their meeting place. She looked at Norman, glanced from his hatless head towards the sun, and put up her own parasol with a decided click. Nina did not notice this tacit reproof, but she noticed others that followed, or else were deliberately checked from following by Anne’s desperate determination to keep her head. Perhaps by the time determination becomes desperate, some of the head is already lost. Toby saw that Nina had begun to notice, because when any trivial question arose which affected Norman’s well-being, she instantly became perverse. It was as if she wished him to run risks on purpose to annoy Anne. Toby became very angry with Nina and a little ashamed of Anne. What did it matter if Norman climbed down a slippery bit of rock to get an orchid, or ate what sometimes disagreed with him, or forgot to change his shoes after a shower? Norman wasn’t Samson, but neither was he an invalid. Why should Anne jeopardise her splendid success by stepping out of her place about a risk which, if it existed at all, was infinitesimal? Toby foresaw that something disagreeable would happen, but he literally hadn’t the nerve to warn Anne of her danger. She was at the best of moments walking on a tightrope, and to call to her to look out might precipitate an accident. After all, she was a miraculous person, and miraculous people ought to be able to count on the assistance of angels when the natural law stops functioning.

It was a curiously still clear day. The sky was like a blue inverted bowl, the flowers were shining with a sharp metallic lustre, as if they had been turned into precious stones overnight. The gentians burned deep, and in thick cushions over the rocky ground, daphne and rhododendron, honeysuckle and wild thyme sent up their scents like flame. The meadows were a sea of sulphur-coloured anemones, pale lemon ranunculus, forget-me-nots, wild pansies and a host of rainbow hued vetches and violets. By every soft and mossy spot soldanellas grew in colonies, under their grave white and purple hoods. The stillness of the scented sunny valleys was as definite as sound.

Toby and Anne walked slowly and without speech. The sun beat down through the pines, bringing out a hot fierce scent. They paused at the corner of a path which turned precipitately upward. In front of them was a small meadow where a group of cowboys were perched on a rock. Their cows, white and cream coloured, moved peacefully to and fro below them, shaking out the broken music of their bells. On the other side of the meadow was a group of Dolomites. They rose out of the flowered pasture, their bare rocks like magic steeples thrust into the sky. Still further behind them was a giant peak, shoulder deep in snow. Each pinnacle and crag was different. Some had the heads and sides of antediluvian monsters, others were slender like tall towers, a wreath of white cloud folded itself against their implacable surface. The air was so clear that there seemed no distance but height, and over the bare and lonely spaces of the rocks a blur of passing shadows came and went. Suddenly between the peaks a great bird shot into the air. It was so large that it frightened Anne, and all the light of the day seemed caught between its monstrous length of wings. “It’s only an eagle,” Toby reassured her in a low voice, “a golden eagle—that’s something to have seen together, Anne.” He felt her hand on his arm with a sudden pressure, and then she dropped it and turned hastily away as if she wanted the shelter of the woods. She had seen enough of beauty.

“It’s a queer day,” Anne said evasively to Toby when he joined her, “I think there’s going to be a storm.” They reached the hut after another hour’s steep climbing. Norman and Nina were already there, full of their own adventures and experiences. Neither Toby nor Anne mentioned the golden eagle, but there could be no doubt now about the storm. They watched the clouds coming up from every direction as if they had been summoned; huge white and golden clouds, like ruffled swansdown, or shaped in gigantic spirals as if they were strange shells, or bending upward like the breaking of a wave. As they came nearer the mountains, their rising whiteness changed into heavy grey, with purple edges. The sunlight still played under them and caught at a valley here and there, or rested on a distant lake, sparkling like burnished silver. The meadow at their feet was the last to let the sunlight go. One by one the mountains opposite began to disappear, swallowed up in a black rift of cloud; for a moment or two the peaks peered out muffled and dim like ghosts, and then as suddenly vanished into impenetrable blackness. A cold quick wind blew in front of the storm.

All four of them sat on the steps of the hut in the open doorway, watching it. Anne said nothing, but she did not enjoy the storm as much as the others did. She shrank back a little when (before the first clap of thunder) the lightning, dry and forked, ran across the tops of the flowers. When the thunder came it was an enormous shattering sound, as if some inconceivable accident had precipitated the breaking of a world. Nina sprang to her feet and clapped her hands with joy. “Better come in now,” said Toby, “we shall get the rain in a minute.” But for five minutes not a drop fell, only the lightning fleered and leapt about the hills, the sky opened and shut with the giddy effect of the rise and fall of waves, and every second the thunder roared and rolled, crashed and reverberated, knocking its way about the corrugated sky.

Anne went into the hut and covered her eyes with her hands. There was a sudden shriek of wind and then the rain came solidly in a blinding sheet. Norman picked Nina off her feet and flung her, laughing and half drenched, into the hut. Toby drew the door to sharply after them. He wished they were not there; they were too happy to be very companionable at close quarters. But Anne had finished with all signs of her distress by now, and was busy getting lunch ready. They had a merry meal, with the rain falling on the hut sharp as castanets and the wind shrieking all around them like an awakened fury. By the time it was over the black pall opposite to them was fringed and ragged at the edges, the mountains began to peer in and out of the clouds, and far away, as if it had always been there, they saw a distant valley full of sunshine.

“Do you still want to go to Tuckett’s hut?” Toby asked Norman a little doubtfully. “It will be rather rough going after the storm.”

“Much too rough,” said Anne suddenly, “and dangerous. Norman, please don’t go.” There was a moment’s pause. Even Norman realised Anne had made a great mistake. Her determination had broken suddenly in her hands. She had not only appealed to Norman, she had made her appeal very nearly a command. To agree to it or to refuse it would be equally awkward.

Norman glanced uncertainly at Nina. “Nonsense,” she said sharply, “he’ll be a muff if he doesn’t go. What earthly difference can it make now the storm is over?”

“It isn’t the least dangerous,” said Toby quickly, “but it’s rough going, and it’s bound to be slippery after the rain. I hardly think it’s worth it.”

Anne, having broken her word to herself and seen the effect of it, became reckless. She repeated to Norman, “Please don’t go.”

Nina was sitting on a bench swinging her legs. She got off it abruptly and went outside the hut. “My dear Anne, don’t be a goose,” she said over her shoulder, “I shall be ashamed of him if he doesn’t go.”

Norman turned with visible distress to Anne. “It’s really quite all right,” he said, “please don’t worry.” Anne turned away with shaking lips. It was a dreadful episode.

Toby said again more urgently, “Oh, what does it matter anyhow? Let’s give it up!” Then he saw Nina look at Norman. There was derision in her look. Norman couldn’t give up going now. He really wanted to give it up. He hated to hurt Anne, he had no desire to climb that particular mountain, but he saw that he would have to do it. Anne also saw it and said no more. But she wasn’t, after they’d gone, in the mood for saying anything to Nina.

No trace was left of the storm except the raindrops on the flowers and a few lazily moving, dazzling plumes of cloud. “It’s quite all right,” said Nina defensively, but Anne made her no answer. Nina went off to the plateau edge. She was ashamed and defiant, her happiness for the first time knew a definite check. Anne disapproved of her. That was bad enough; so did that tiresome Toby who always thought Anne was right. But also, so did Norman! He must have thought Anne was right or he would have turned to wave to Nina before he disappeared. She could see the white storm crags far off, against which, remote and plain, stood Tuckett’s hut. Of the two men there was no trace at all. They had vanished as suddenly as if they had been wiped off the world. The intervening space looked as flat as a plain, but it had innumerable hills and knolls which had hidden them in a moment. Nina wished she had left Anne alone and gone with them. Her shoes were not suitable for real climbing, but she would rather have walked her feet bare than find herself alone in a kind of disgrace, surrounded by mountain scenery.

Anne had not moved from the steps of the hut and it is extremely difficult to begin a conversation with an angry person who keeps quite still. Nina curled herself up on a fallen log with her back to Anne, closed her eyes and slept. When she woke she was conscious first of all of the silence, and then of a quite peculiar sound. It was like someone knocking. “Anne,” she called, “Anne, what is that sound?”

Anne did not turn her head to answer her, but she had been listening to the knocking for some time. “I think,” she said slowly, “it is stones falling from the mountains.” They heard it again a long way off, but as distinct as if it had been a hand against the door of their hut.

“Oh,” said Nina in a shaking voice, “I didn’t know stones fell like that out of mountains.” They said nothing for a long time. The knocking became almost continuous. In between, the silence had a startled air. Nina got up slowly and came and knelt down close to Anne. “Do you think,” she asked in a strained voice, “they know about the stones?”

“Toby must,” said Anne, “he used to climb mountains.”

“He said it wasn’t dangerous,” Nina pleaded.

Anne hesitated; she was torn between her instinct to protect Nina and her outraged feelings at not having been allowed to protect Norman. “Toby did not want to go,” she said at last, in a low, flint-like voice. “He tried twice to stop Norman.”

Nina flushed from her chin to her forehead. “I would never in the world have said a thing like that to you,” she said. Anne trembled but she retracted nothing.

The air was torn suddenly by a frightful sound. Close to where they were sitting the gorse and flowers bent towards them and simultaneously there came a crash as if half the world had fallen. Anne sprang to her feet and Nina clung to her blindly. There was no visible sign of the disturbance. The flowers were still again, the mountains in front of them unchanged. They strained their eyes all around them but the serene and splendid day hung on their vision like a curtain. “Was that—was that thunder?” Nina whispered.

Anne moved her dry lips to answer, and held Nina close. “I think perhaps it was,” she said mercifully.

“But there are no clouds,” protested Nina.

“No,” agreed Anne dejectedly, “there aren’t any clouds.”

“Can’t we _do_ something?” Nina cried desperately, “can’t we go and look for them, Anne?”

“I think we had better wait here,” Anne said gently; “they might come here tired out and have to search for us. We are more likely, you see, to get into difficulties than they are. We can go later, if they don’t come at the time they said.”

“Oh Anne, tell me, tell me,” Nina urged passionately, “do you think they’re safe, and that it was all my fault?”

“Toby,” Anne answered quietly, “knows all about mountains. I don’t think he’d let anything dangerous happen.” Nina hung her head. Anne wasn’t going to say anything easier. It was somehow a comfort that she had said so much as that. Nina sat close to her again and put her head on Anne’s lap. Anne made her comfortable with a tender movement and then looked across at the impenetrable hills. Time did not pass—it stood above them knocking at invisible doors.

Anne saw the two men first, and for one long cruel moment she took in their security alone. “They are quite safe,” she said at last, “I can see them both.” Her punishment was in the wild swift movement Nina made as she flew across the meadow into Norman’s arms. Norman had no eyes for anyone but her. She might have killed him and he would still, with his last strength, have sought her. Anne rose slowly to meet Toby. “That was a rock stream, wasn’t it?” she asked in her quiet careful voice, “were you anywhere near it?”

“I am afraid you’ve been frightened,” said Toby, as if he had allowed the rock stream to happen on purpose to annoy Anne. “It was just our confounded luck. We came back as quickly as we could. Yes, I haven’t seen such a thing for years—a great piece of rock as big as a church, and half a hundred smaller ones. We were quite near enough. But of course, after that storm, we’d given the fellows a wide berth.”

Anne looked at him approvingly. “I thought you would,” she said, “but of course, however careful people are, accidents sometimes happen.”