_ PROLOGUE
CHAPTER IV. THE DIVINE MAGIC
When Chris went bathing it was her custom to slip a mackintosh over her bathing costume and to run down to the shore thus equipped, discarding the mackintosh before entering the water and leaving it in the charge of Cinders.
Cinders never went treasure-hunting on these occasions, but invariably sat bolt upright, brimful of importance, watching his mistress's proceedings from afar with eager eyes and quivering nose. He would never be persuaded to follow her, owing to a rooted objection to wetting his feet. He was, as a rule, very patient; but if she kept him waiting beyond the bounds of patience he howled in a heartrending fashion that always brought her back.
Chris was a good swimmer, and had a boy's healthy love of the sea. Great was her joy when her injured foot healed sufficiently for her to resume the morning bathe. Mademoiselle Gautier's pleasure was not so keen, but then--poor Mademoiselle!--who could expect it? Besides, what could she know of the exquisite enjoyment of floating on a summer sea with the summer sun in one's eyes and wave after gentle wave rocking one to drowsy content?
The only drawback was the impossibility of diving, Chris longed for a dive on that brilliant morning, longed for the headlong rush through water, the greenness of it below the surface, the sparkling spray above. If only she could have commandeered a boat! But that would have entailed a boatman, and Mademoiselle would have been scandalized at the bare suggestion.
"She would make me bathe in a coat and skirt and a hat if she could," reflected Chris, shaking the wet hair out of her eyes.
It was still early, not nine o'clock. The sea lay calm and empty all about her. Was she really the only person in Valpre, she wondered, who cared for a morning dip? She had swum some way from the little town, and now found herself nearing the point where the rocks jutted far out to the sea. The Magic Cave was at no great distance. She saw the darkness of it and the water foaming white against the cliffs. Even in the morning light it was an awesome spot, and she remembered how her friend had told her that the dragon was there when the tide was up. With a timidity half-actual, half-assumed, she began to swim back to her starting-point.
Half-way back, feeling tired, she allowed herself a rest in consideration of the fact that this was the longest swim that she had ever undertaken. Serenely she lay on the water with her hair floating about her. The morning was perfect, the sea like a lake. Overhead sailed a gull with no flap of wings. She wondered how he did it, and longed to do the same. It must be very nice to be a gull.
Regretfully at length--for she was still feeling a little weary--she resumed her leisurely journey towards the shore. As she did so she caught the sound of oars grating in rowlocks. She turned her head, saw a boat cutting through the water at a prodigious rate not twenty strokes from her, caught a glimpse of its one rower, and without a second's hesitation flung up an imperious arm.
"Stop!" she cried. "It's me!"
He ceased to row on the instant, but the boat shot on. She saw the concern in his face as he brought it back. His black head shone wet in the sunlight. He was evidently returning from a bathe himself.
"It's all right," smiled Chris. "Are you in a great hurry? I wondered if you would tow me a little way. I've come too far, and I'm just a tiny bit tired."
He brought the boat near, and shipped his oars. "I will row you to the shore with pleasure, mademoiselle," he said.
"No, no," she said. "Just throw me a rope, that's all."
"But I have no rope, mademoiselle."
He leaned down to her as she swam alongside; but Chris still hung back, with laughing eyes upraised. "You will capsize in a minute, and that won't help either of us. Really, I don't think I will come out."
But she gave him her hand, nevertheless.
His fingers closed upon it in a warm clasp that seemed very sure of itself. He smiled down at her. "I think otherwise, mademoiselle."
She found it impossible to resist him, and so yielded with characteristic briskness of decision. "Very well, if you will let me dive from the boat afterwards. Hold tight, _preux chevalier_! One--two--three!"
She came up to him out of the sea like a bird rising from the waves. A moment he had her slim young body between his hands. Then she stepped lightly upon the thwart, and he let her go.
And in that instant something happened: something that was like the kindling of spirit into flame ran between them--a transforming magic that only one knew for the Divine Miracle that changes the face of the whole earth.
To the girl, with her wet hair all around her and her face of baby-like innocence, it only meant that the sun shone more brightly and the sea was more blue for the coming of her _preux chevalier_. And she sang, without knowing why.
To the man it meant the sudden, primal tumult of all the deepest forces of his nature; it meant the awakening of his soul, the birth of his manhood.
He was young, barely twenty-two. Very early Ambition had called to him, and he had followed with a single heart. He had never greatly cared for social pleasures; he had been too absorbed to enjoy them. But now--in a single moment--Ambition was dethroned. At the time, though his eyes were open, he scarcely realized that the old supremacy had passed. Only long afterwards did he ask himself if the death-knell of his success had begun to toll on that golden morning; because a man cannot serve two masters.
"A penny for your thoughts!" laughed the elf in the stern, and he came to himself to wonder how old she was. "No, never mind!" she added. "I daresay they are not worth it, and I couldn't pay if they were."
Her eyes dwelt approvingly upon him as, with sleeves rolled above his elbows, he began to pull at the oars. He was certainly very handsome. She wondered that she had not noticed it before.
"Mademoiselle will not swim so far again all alone?" he suggested gently, after a few steady strokes.
She looked at him frowningly. There was no faintest tinge of dignity about her, only the careless effrontery of childhood and the grace that is childhood's heritage.
"I am going to swim as far as the skyline some day," she announced lightly, "and look over the edge of the world."
"_Mais, mademoiselle_--"
She held up an imperious hand. "That is one of the things you are not allowed to say. You are never to talk French to me. It is holiday-time when I am with you, and I never talk French in the holidays, except to Mademoiselle, who won't listen to English. And won't you call me Chris? Everyone else does."
"Chris?" he repeated after her very softly, his eyes upon her, tenderly indulgent. "Ah! let it be Christine. I may call you that?"
"Of course," she returned practically. "My actual name is Christina, but that's a detail. You can call me Christine if you like it best."
"I have another name for you," he said, with slight hesitation.
"Have you?" she asked with interest. "What is it? Do tell me!"
But he still hesitated. "It will not vex you? No?"
She flashed him her merriest smile. "Of course not. Why should it?"
He smiled back upon her, but there was the light of something deeper than mirth in his eyes. "I call you my bird of Paradise," he said.
"How pretty!" said Chris. "Quite poetical, _preux chevalier_! You may go on calling me that if you like, but it's too long for general use. And what shall I call you? Tell me your Christian name."
"Bertrand, mademoiselle."
She held up an admonitory finger. "Chris!"
"Christine," he said, with his friendly smile.
She nodded. "Now don't forget! I think I shall call you Bertie because it sounds more English. I'm going to dive now, so don't row any farther."
She sprang to her feet and stepped on to the thwart, where she stood balancing, her arms above her head.
He waited motionless to see her go. But she remained poised for several seconds, the sunlight full upon her slim, straight figure and bare, upraised arms. Her hair, that had begun to dry, fluttered a little in the breeze. The splendour of it almost dazzled the onlooker. He sat with bated breath. She was like a young goddess, invoking the spirit of the morning.
Suddenly she turned a laughing face over her shoulder. "Bertie!"
He pulled himself together. "Christine!" he answered, with a quick smile.
She laughed a little more. "Well done! I wondered if you would remember. Will you do something for me?"
"All that you wish," he said.
"Well, when you come to tea with me in the Magic Cave on the tenth bring a lantern. Will you?"
"But certainly," he said.
"I want to explore," said Chris. "I want to find out all the secrets there are."
She turned back to contemplate the deep blue water at her feet, paused a moment longer; then, "Good-bye, Bertie!" she cried, and was gone.
He saw the curve of her young body in the sunshine before she disappeared, felt the spray splash upwards on his face; but he continued to gaze at the spot where she had stood as a man spellbound, while every pulse and every nerve throbbed with the thought of her and the mad, sweet exultation that she had stirred to life within him. Child she might be, but in that amazing moment he worshipped her as man was made to worship woman in the beginning of the world. _