“I couldn’t see too well through all the branches. What did you—?”
Still her eyes probed at Simon. “He’s still sitting there reading. That’s about all I could make out.”
“Ah.” Simon nodded, and faced uphill again, and climbed. Toward a real meeting with Vivian. Just as on that unforgettable day when he’d climbed alone. All he could really think about, then or now, was her. He wondered now if anything about that damned crazy experience had been real. Damn her, damn her anyway. He was suddenly angry at Vivian, angrier than he had ever suspected he might become at this late date. Whatever had really happened to him on that day fifteen years ago, it was a wonder that it hadn’t done him permanent psychological damage.
And maybe it had. Simon knew a sudden chilled feeling deep in his gut. Maybe it had. Could it have anything to do with his being still unmarried?
Of course there were a lot of people, no more damaged than anyone else, who for one reason or another just didn’t want to get married. Margie was one. Simon deliberately fell back a step to watch her climb ahead of him, her trim body moving smoothly in jeans and longsleeved shirt. Her evening’s costume, along with a few other items that might be useful, was in her shoulder bag.
They had reached the fifth, penultimate switchback of the path. Here just as it approached the turn the path sloped briefly downward. Looking up from here you could see the tall hedge, almost as impenetrable as a wall, that marked off the rear of the castle grounds proper from the surrounding woods. From this angle the hedge was tall enough to block sight of the forbidding stone walls beyond it. At the tip of the switchback loop Simon halted momentarily. From this point a branching path, even fainter than the one they followed, went off on a level course to the right. After going a few yards in that direction it curved around a protruding limestone shoulder of the bluff and vanished completely. Not, Simon realized, that the branching path was still really visible at all; it was just that he knew that it was there.
He glanced round quickly. As far as he could tell, Margie and he were still utterly alone. Then he quickly led her along the unseen trail to the right. Not only had grass and weeds completely overgrown the way during the last fifteen years, but now the new branches of small trees had to be put aside. And here in the deeper shade were more mosquitoes.
Simon moved around a second limestone shoulder, perhaps thirty yards from the place where the pathways had branched. And came to a stop. At least he knew now that he hadn’t dreamed or imagined this part. Before them was the grotto, and the cave.
Within and against the natural limestone face of the cliff, the two concentric arches of the grotto had been constructed so that a natural small cave was at their center. It had all been done in the time of Grandfather Littlewood, of course, along with the rest of the construction. A knee-high rustic wall of stone surrounded the small area paved with flagstones before the grotto, an area centered on a stone construction that Simon in his earlier childhood had taken for a simple picnic table. He couldn’t remember the first time that he had seen it; but he couldn’t forget the last. He approached this central tabular structure now and stood staring down at it, for the moment oblivious to all else. It was a little less than waist high, built solidly of stones that on second glance were not quite the same in color and texture as the flags below, or the castle walls of which one corner was now partially visible through greenery above. The top of the table was flat, circular, and perhaps eight feet across. In its center, as if to provide the only reason for its existence, was mounted an ancient-looking sundial, a spherical cage of green-patinaed metal; probably copper, thought Simon now. An all but completely illegible inscription ran round the sundial’s metal base.
Simon didn’t look long at the dial or its inscription, though. On the flat stones of the tabletop faint brownish stains were visible. There was no telling how old the stains were or what had made them.
“What weird statues, Si.”
He looked up; he had actually managed to forget the statues, along with piled clamshells and much else. There were six or eight pieces, mostly life size, cast concrete or carved marble, disposed on pedestals made for them around the little paved court before the grotto. Staring at a crude, figleafed imitation of Michaelangelo’s David, he said: “The story goes that there was an artists’ colony of some kind in the woods near here, when Old Man Littlewood was putting up his house. He just about bought out their stock of things they’d done for practice, stuff that was heavy and hard to move and that no one else wanted to buy. He didn’t want it in the house, evidently, but it was good enough for decoration out here in this… whatever this is… out here in the woods.”
“They’re weird.”
“Yeah. Let’s get to work.” The grotto at the cliff face was about ten feet deep, if you were to have measured it from the outer of its two concentric arches to the heavy iron grillwork, like a jail door, that closed off the twisted mouth of the natural cave. The cave mouth was almost too small for an adult to enter anyway, and when looked at from the outside gave no indication of being any bigger farther in. The grillwork door was guarded on each side by a piece of fantastic statuary. When Simon moved up to the door for a close look it was obvious that no one had opened it for some time, and he muttered his satisfaction. The chain and small padlock holding it shut were both rusted, probably enough so that he could have broken them with relative ease. He pulled on the door, tentatively, swinging it through the few inches of play given it by the chain, creating a small aperture through which his adult body could never be made to pass. Then he decided on a more subtle way than breakage.
“Pass me the tool kit, Marge.” Escape work, opening locks, was not his strongest act. But he had dabbled.
Margie dug into her shoulder bag and pulled out the packet of folded cloth, the size of a billfold. It opened to show pockets filled with a jeweler’s, or an escape artist’s, selection of instruments. Simon selected a small pick and went to work. The lock didn’t look terribly expensive or difficult.
Meanwhile Margie retreated to stand just inside the mouth of the grotto, on watch, looking out and listening. Once she turned to ask him in a whisper: “Did you hear something?”
He paused, ready to be irritated at the interruption, but still believing that she would not have interrupted him for any commonplace sound. He listened, but could hear nothing out of the ordinary. “Maybe a bird?” he suggested. “Some animal in the woods?”
Margie shrugged. Simon went back to work. The cheap lock gave up after only a couple of minutes, unrusted parts of its shackle sliding into view. With a mutter of triumph he undid the chain and set it down; and now, with a minimum of skreeking, the jail door could be swung open. A few spider webs tore soundlessly. Inside lay blown dust and dead leaves, untrodden.
When Margie had got herself wedged into the cave mouth with him, he closed the door again behind them both, and re-wrapped the chain as convincingly as possible. He secured its links with the lock, which he almost closed. “Now,” he said.
Margie had already repacked the tool kit, and now had a tiny flashlight ready. With this in hand Simon led the way into the cave. It was a way along which progress at first looked hopeless; it seemed that you must run into a wall before you had gone more than the length of your body. But around the first corner the light already shone into deep blackness, showing where a small natural crevice had been carved wider. Simon went down on all fours and inched and scraped his way ahead, with Margie groping at his heels. He slid down, deeper into the hillside. A moment later they could both stand up.
“Wow,” whispered Margie. “I’m starting to believe your story.”
The passage was too narrow for more than one person at a time, but adequately high. From here it snaked slowly upward through the hill, presumably following some path of least resistance through the rock. It darkened briefly to almost pitch blackness, then brightened again somewhat as they approached the outlet of an air-and-light shaft that pierced the solid stone roof ahead. The outlet of the vent at or above ground level was obviously very well concealed in some way; Simon had never had an opportunity to try to learn where or how. The last time he’d come this way, he hadn’t had a flashlight with him; he could recall groping and stumbling; and he told himself now that those memories at least had to be real enough.
The secret way did not continue underground for very long. After fifteen yards or so, and one more small vent for light and air, they reached a steep, short flight of stairs, cut out of the native limestone just like the rest of the passage. Then, when they had climbed about ten steps, walls and stair alike became construction instead of carving. The passage had brought them up within the main castle walls themselves, twelve feet in thickness at the base.
Here the way was as narrow as before, and still quite dim. The air was fresh-smelling, but considerably cooler than outdoors. Unexpectedly, a branching passage appeared, twisting away to one side and again
