Helbeck of Bannisdale, vol 2 | Page 8

panic terror drove her on, but exhaustion and physical
weakness caught at her will, and shod her feet with lead.
She walked down the platform, however, to the station-master.
"The gentleman has gone to inquire at the inn. Will you kindly tell him
when he comes back that I have made up my mind after all to walk to
Marsland? He can catch me up on the sands."
"Very good, Miss. But the sands aren't very safe for those that don't
know 'em. If you're a stranger you'd better not risk it."
"I'm not a stranger, and my cousin knows the way perfectly. You can
send him after me."
She left the station. In her preoccupation she never gave another
thought to the station-master.
But there was something in the whole matter that roused that person's
curiosity. He walked along the raised platform to a point where he

could see what became of the young lady.
There was only one exit from the station. But just outside, the road
from the town passed in a tunnel under the line. To get at the sands one
must double back on the line after leaving the station, walk through the
tunnel, and then leave the road to your right. The stony edge of the
sands came up to the road, which shot away eastwards along the edge
of the estuary, a straight white line that gradually lost itself in the night.
The man watching saw the small figure emerge. But the girl never once
turned to the tunnel. She walked straight towards the town, and he lost
sight of her in a dense patch of shadow made by some overhanging
trees about a hundred yards from the station.
"Upon my word, she's a deep 'un!" he said, turning away; "it beats
me--fair."
"Hi!" shouted the porter from the end of the platform. "There's a
message just come in, sir."
The station-master turned to the telegraph office in some astonishment.
It was not the ordinary signal message, or the down signal would have
dropped.
He read off. "If a lady arrives by 10.20, too late for Marsland train,
kindly help her make arrangements for night. Direct her to White Hart
Inn, tell her will meet her Marsland first train. Reply. Helbeck,
Bannisdale."
The station-master stared at the message. It was, of course, long after
hours, and Mr. Helbeck--whose name he knew--must have had
considerable difficulty in sending the message from Marsland, where
the station would have been shut before ten o'clock, after the arrival of
the last train.
Another click--and the rattle of the signal outside. The express was at
hand. He was not a man capable of much reasoning at short notice, and
he had already drawn a number of unfavourable inferences from the
conduct of the two people who had just been hanging about the station.
So he hastily replied:
"Lady left station, said intended to walk by sands, but has gone towards
town. Gentleman with her."
Then he rushed out to attend to the express.
* * * * *
But Laura had not gone to the town. From the platform she had clearly

seen a path on the fell-side, leading over some broken ground to the
great quarry above the station. The grove of trees had hidden the
starting of the path from her, but some outlet into the road there must
be; she had left the station in quest of it.
And as soon as she reached the trees a gate appeared in the wall to the
left. She passed through it, and hurried up the steep path beyond it.
Again and again she hid herself behind the boulders with which the fell
was strewn, lest her moving figure should be seen from below--often
she stopped in terror, haunted by the sound of steps, imagining a breath,
a voice, behind her.
She ran and stumbled--ran again--tore her light dress--gulped down the
sob in her throat--fearing at every step to faint, and so be taken by the
pursuer; or to slip into some dark hole--the ground seemed full of
them--and be lost there--still worse, found there!--wounded,
defenceless.
But at last the slope is climbed. She sees before her a small platform,
on a black network of supporting posts--an engine-house--and beyond,
truck lines with half-a-dozen empty trucks upon them, lines that run
away in front of her along the descending edge of the first low hill she
has been climbing.
Further on, a dark gulf--then the dazzling wall of the quarry. A patch of
deepest, blackest shadow, at the seaward end of the engine-house,
caught her eye. She gained it, sank down within it, strengthless and
gasping.
Surely no one could see her here! Yet presently she perceived beside
her a low pile of planks within the shadow, and for greater protection