e hill, pass through the
village, and step out, under the heavy grey clouds, upon the little
shingly beach. He was aware then that out at sea a dark, black ship was
riding, slipping a little with the tide, one light gleaming and swinging
against the pale glow of the dusky horizon. The church clock struck
four below the hill; he was still on the high road waiting, his eyes
straining for figures... He was prepared for some journey, because he
had at his feet a bundle. And he knew that he ought not to be there.
He knew that something awful was about to happen and that, when it had
occurred, he would be committed always to something or someone... A
little cold breeze then would rise in the hedges and against the silence
that followed the chiming of the clock he could hear first the bleating
of a sheep, then a sudden pounding of the sea as though the breakers
responded to the sudden rising of the wind, then the hoofs of a horse,
clear and hard, upon the road... At that moment the picture clouded
and was dim. Had this been a dream? Was it simply a confusion of summer
visits to Rafiel, stories told him by Mary, pictures in books (a fine
illustrated edition of "Redgauntlet" had been a treasure to him since
he was a baby), the exciting figure of the Captain, and the beginning of
spring? And yet the vision was so vividly detailed that it was precisely
like a remembered event. He had always seen things in pictures;
punishment meant standing in the corner counting the ships on the
wallpaper; summer holidays meant the deep green meadows of Cow Farm,
or a purple pool under an afternoon sun; religion meant walking up
the great wide aisle of the Cathedral in creaking boots and clean
underclothes, and so on. It was nothing new for him to make a picture,
and to let that picture stand for a whole complex phase of life. But
this? What had it to do with the Sea-Captain, and why was it, as he knew
in his heart that it was, wicked and wrong and furtive? For this had
begun as a high adventurous romance. There had been nothing wrong
in that first talk in the Meads, when the Captain had shown him the
tatooes. The wickedness of it had developed partly with his growing
longing to see the Captain again, partly with the meeting that actually
followed, and partly with the sense that grew and grew as the days
passed that the Captain was always watching him.

The Captain, during these weeks, seemed to be everywhere. Never was
there an afternoon that Je