Adrea knew all, and as they sailed southwards together, the sense of the present was strong enough to drive past and future from his thoughts. The clouds cleared from his face, and his heart was lightened. It was Adrea who had saved him from despair.

He thought of this as she stood by his side, and he answered her question. Before their eyes, Cruta was rising up from the sea. The grim castle was there, looking as old as the rocks on which it was perched, the wide, open harbour, and the little fleet of fishing smacks. The seabirds circled about their heads; every moment brought the rocky little island more distinctly into view. Paul looked down into Adrea's face gravely.

"It is our destination, Adrea," he said. "You must go now. There will be a lot of surf crossing the bar, and I shall have enough to do to run her in. Look behind! It is just as well we are going into harbour!"

He pointed to the fast-gathering clouds coming up from the westward, and she paused with her foot on the ladder. "We leave the storm behind us," she said. "There is fair weather ahead!"

She went down into her cabin, and left Paul upon the bridge, with his eyes fixed upon the castle. Fair weather ahead! How dared he hope for it! The sun had finally disappeared now, but some part of the afterglow still lingered in curious contrast to the lurid yellow and black clouds hurrying on behind him. The old castle was bathed for a moment in a sea of purple light,--every line of it, and the huge rock which it crowned, standing out with peculiar vividness against the empty background. But it was a brief glory. Even while Paul was gazing, the colouring faded away, and it resumed its former aspect.

Fair weather ahead! Every moment, as memories of his former visit to the place thronged in upon him, Paul doubted it the more.

He was close to the entrance of the harbour now, and all his thoughts and energies were required to pilot his yacht safely. In a few moments the brief line was pa.s.sed, and the islanders waiting about upon the beach saw the English vessel ride smoothly into harbourage under shadow of the huge castle rock. Presently she dropped an anchor, and swung gracefully round. A boat was lowered, and made for the sh.o.r.e.

There were plenty of hands willing to help pull her in. Paul stepped out on to the beach, and looked around for some one to whom he could make himself understood.

They were all islanders of the rudest cla.s.s; but seeing no one else, Paul lifted his hand to the castle, and asked them the way in Italian.

They understood him, and pointed along the beach to a point where a rude road curved inland, and reappeared a little higher up in zigzag fashion behind the rocks. But no one offered to go a step with him. On the contrary, directly the question had left his lips, they all shrunk away, whispering and exclaiming amongst themselves.

"It is the son of the Englishman!" cried Antonio. "He is going into the lion's mouth! Do not let us be seen with him. The Count may be watching."

"I wonder if he knows his danger?" Guiseppe said thoughtfully. "He is young and brave looking. It would be a good action to warn him."

"I would not risk it!" cried Antonio.

"Nor I!" echoed Ferdinand.

"Nor I!" chorused the others.

Guiseppe glanced at them in contempt. Then he stepped forward and laid his hand upon Paul's shoulder--a strange, picturesque-looking object, in his bright scarlet shirt, and trousers turned up to his knees. He had been in Italy once, and he tried to speak the language of that country as well as he could.

"Ill.u.s.trious Englishman!" he said, "go not to that castle, the home of the Count of Cruta. Danger lurks there for you--danger and death. It is our lord who lives there; we are his va.s.sals, and we are dumb. But he is wild and fierce, and your countrymen are like devils to him.

Strange things have happened up there. Be wise. Put back your boat, weigh your anchor and sail away. The stormy seas are dangerous, but not so dangerous as the Castle of Cruta to an Englishman of your features. Take the word of Guiseppe, and depart!"

Paul shook his head. He understood most of what Guiseppe had said, and he knew that it was kindly meant. "You are very good," he said.

"I thank you for your warning; but I have important business with the Count, and I have come from England on purpose to see him. Here, spend this for me," he added, throwing a handful of silver money amongst the little group of men. "Yonder path will take me straight to the castle, I suppose. Good evening."

He strode away along the beach alone. Meanwhile a strange thing was happening. The islanders were all gathered eagerly around the little shower of money, but not one had offered to touch a piece.

"Holy Mother! there are fifty pieces!" cried Antonio. "If only I was sure that the Count would not see me! I would keep holiday for a month, and start again with a fresh set of fishing nets."

"Touch not the money!" advised Guiseppe, shaking his head. "The Count's eyes are everywhere!"

"It is very hard!" groaned Ferdinand. "It has been such a bad season, too!"

"I know! I know!" cried Antonio excitedly. "We will go to the monastery, and get Father Bernard to come and bless it. He will claim half for the Church, but we can divide the other half, and we shall, each man, have given six pieces in charity. What say you? shall we go?"

"Bravo! Antonio is right! Antonio is a sensible fellow!" they all cried. Then there was the sound of bare feet scampering over the hard sands as they hastened up to the monastery. Guiseppe was left alone.

He waited until they were out of sight. Then he stooped down, and carefully collecting all the coins, placed them in his pouch.

"Ignorant fools!" he muttered. "The Count can see no further than other men, and at any rate he will not see these in my pocket."

He stood up, and gazed steadily along the path which Paul had taken.

"What am I to do now?" he continued. "It is to the Englishman's father that I owe my boat and my little h.o.a.rd of sayings. He behaved to me as a prince, did Signor de Vaux. Can I see his son hasten yonder to his doom without one effort to save him? No. The Count is terrible, but I need run no risk. At any rate, I will follow a little way."

He walked swiftly along the beach, and commenced the ascent to the castle. In a few minutes the little band of fishermen returned, carrying lanterns in their hands, and with a priest walking amongst them. They reached the spot, and paused, while the priest commenced to mumble a prayer. He was scarcely half-way through when he was interrupted.

"The money is gone!" cried Antonio.

"Every piece!" echoed Ferdinand.

There was a moment's blank silence. Then they all crossed themselves.

"Let us go home," whispered Antonio hoa.r.s.ely. "The Count knows. He has been here."

The priest turned away disgusted, and the others followed him, talking with bated breath amongst themselves. And, in the darkness, no one noticed Guiseppe's absence.

CHAPTER x.x.xIV

"A VOICE AND FIGURE FROM THE DISTANT PAST"

It was a long, steep ascent, hewn out of the solid rock; but at last Paul stood before the great gates of the castle, and paused to take breath. Hundreds of feet below him his yacht was riding at anchor, looking like a toy vessel upon a painted sea, and a little group of scattered lights showed him where the hamlet lay. Before him was the stern, ma.s.sive front of the castle, wrapped in profound gloom, but standing out in clear, ponderous outline against the starlit sky.

There seemed to be no light from any part of it, and the great iron gates leading into the courtyard were closed. Nor was there any sound at all, not even the barking of a dog. It was like a dwelling of the dead.

A great, rusty bell-chain hung by the side of the gate, and as there seemed to be no other means of communication with the interior, Paul pulled it vigorously. Its hoa.r.s.e echoes had scarcely died away before several rough-looking islanders, carrying flaring oil lamps, trooped into the courtyard from the rear of the building, and one of them, drawing the bolts, threw open the gates.

"I have come to see the Count," Paul said, addressing the nearest of them. "Will you conduct me to him?"

The man replied energetically, but in a _patois_ utterly unintelligible. He led the way across the courtyard towards the castle, however, and Paul followed close behind. They did not enter by the front, but by a low, nail-studded door at the extreme corner of the tower, which the man immediately closed and locked behind him.

Paul looked around him curiously, but in the semi-darkness there was little to see. He was in a corridor, of which the walls were simply whitewashed, and the floor bare stone; but as they pa.s.sed onward, down several pa.s.sages, and up more than one flight of steps, the proportions of the place expanded. The ceilings grew loftier, and the corridors wider. Yet there was no attempt anywhere at decoration or furniture of any sort. The place was like an early-day prison--huge, bare, and damp. Once, crossing a bal.u.s.traded corridor, there was a view of a huge hall down below, bare save for a few huge skins thrown carelessly around, and a great stack of firearms and other weapons which lined the walls on either side. It was the only sign of habitation that Paul had seen.

Suddenly his guide paused, and held up his finger. Paul, too, listened; and close at hand he heard, to his surprise, the m.u.f.fled sound of voices chanting some sad hymn in a deep minor key. The rise and fall of those mournful voices was wonderfully impressive. What could it mean? It was a dirge, a funeral hymn! Its every note seemed to breathe of death.

"What is that?" Paul asked. "Is any one ill--dying?"

The man shook his head. He could not understand. He only motioned to Paul to move silently, and hurried on. They were in a wide corridor, with disused doors on either side, but their feet fell no longer upon the bare stone. A rough sort of drugget had been hastily thrown down in the centre of the pa.s.sage, and their movements roused no more strange echoes between the bare walls and the vaulted roof. At every step forward they took the chanting grew more distinct, and at last the man stopped at the end of the pa.s.sage before a door, softly tapped at it. It was opened at once, and Paul found himself ushered into a great, dimly lit bedchamber.

He glanced around him with keen interest. If the interior of the room was a little dilapidated, it was full of the remains of past magnificence. The walls were still covered with fine tapestry, of which the design was almost obliterated, although the texture and colouring still remained. The furniture was huge, and of the fashion of days gone by, and the bedstead was elaborately carved and surmounted by a coat of arms. Further Paul had but little opportunity to discover, for as soon as his presence became known in the room, a black-cowled monk left the bedside and approached him.

"We have been expecting you," he said in Italian, "and we fear now that you come too late. Our poor lady is beyond human skill!"

Paul looked at him in astonishment. "I do not quite understand you! It is the Count of Cruta whom I came to see!"

The priest started back, and commenced fumbling with a lamp which stood on a table at the foot of the bed. "Are you not the German doctor from Palermo?" he asked, bending over towards Paul, with his keen, dark face alight with suspicion and distrust.

Paul shook his head. "I am no doctor at all!" he answered. "I am an Englishman, and my name is Paul de Vaux!"