Free Randalls Round by Eleanor Scott Page B

held off from hour to hour. Neither of the two Englishmen felt inclined to walk under that lowering sky. Father Vétier had a second urgent summons from his sick parishioner at Cap Morel, and set off, wrapped in a curious garment of tarpaulin, soon after the second déjeuner. He remarked that he might take the occasion of being so near to Prénoeuf to pay some visits there, and that he probably would not be in until nightfall.
    “If monsieur should feel disposed,” he said rather shyly to Maddox before he left, “M. Foster might be interested to see the alterations I propose for the church. He has taste, M. Foster. It might amuse him…”
    He was so clearly keen to display his decorations, and yet a little afraid of appearing vain if he showed them himself, that Maddox smiled.
    “I’m sure he’d like to see them,” he said gently.
    Yet, though he could have given no possible reason for it, he felt strongly disinclined to go near that half-ruined wall with its stretch of painting only half displayed. He knew it was absurd. He had worked there till he was tired; he had been startled by the howling of a dog. That was all. No doubt, when he came to look at it again, he would find that the fresco was the merest clumsy daub, and that his own overwrought nerves, together with the uncanny light of the gloaming and the beastly dog, had exaggerated it into something sinister and horrible. He declared to himself that if he had the courage to go and look again, he would simply laugh at himself and his terrors. But at the back of his mind he knew that he would never have gone alone; and it was a mixture of bravado and a kind of hope that Foster’s horse-sense would lay his terror for him that finally induced him to propose a visit to the place.
    Foster was interested, mildly, by what Maddox told him of the painting on the ruined wall. He went out first to the rough little churchyard; Maddox, half reluctantly, went to fetch down the little case he had picked up on the beach in order that Foster might with his own eyes compare the two inscriptions; and when he did go out to join his friend he could hardly bring himself to go over to the wall he had worked on. It took quite an effort to force his feet over to it.
    The decoration was not quite as he had remembered it. The figures were so indistinct and faint that they were hardly visible. In fact, Maddox could well believe that a stranger would not recognise the daub as representing figures at all. His relief at this discovery was quite absurd. He felt as if an immense and crushing weight had been lifted from his spirit; and, his first anxiety over, he bent to examine the rest of the painting more attentively. That was nearly exactly as he remembered it – the pile of stones with the half-illegible words; the tumbled huddle of seaweed or rags lying before it; the long reach of shore – ah! that was it!
    “Foster! Come and look here,” he said.
    “Where?” asked the doctor, strolling over.
    “Look – this fresco or whatever it is. I said that bit of shore we saw yesterday was familiar. This is where I saw it.”
    “Mmmm. Might be… All very much alike, though, this part of the beach. I don’t see anything to get worked up about.”
    “Oh! If you’re going to take that line!” cried Maddox, exasperated. “You doctors are all alike – ’Keep calm’ – ’Don’t get excited’ – ’Nothing to worry about’!… ”
    He broke off, gulping with sheer rage.
    “My dear Maddox!” said Foster, startled by his silent friend’s outburst. “I’m awfully sorry. I wasn’t trying to snub you in the least. I simply thought-” He too broke off. Then he decided to risk another annoyance. “What have you got on your mind?” he asked, rather urgently. “Tell me, Maddox, there’s a good chap. What is it?”
    He paused hopefully; but Maddox had dried up. He could not explain. He knew that his solid, comfortable friend would never, could never understand that his terror was