108. An Archangel Called Ivan Read online

  She slammed the door behind her and turned the key in the lock.

  Arliva put her hands up to her face.

  She wondered how much more of this she could bear.

  Then, almost as if she could hear her father talking to her, he was telling her not to despair.

  She remembered once when things were not going well for him he had said,

  “Never give up until you are utterly defeated and that is something that you and I, my darling, must never be.”

  ‘Perhaps there will be some way I can escape when we reach the Canon,’ she thought.

  Arliva had the idea that it would be very difficult because she felt so weak, as, even if the way was clear for her to run, she knew that she would be unable to do so.

  At luncheontime when she was given nothing to eat or drink, she thought that the Countess and her son would be gorging themselves downstairs.

  It was then that the Countess came up to fetch her.

  Because she knew there was no point in arguing about whether she went or not, Arliva had already put on her small hat and she did not bother with a coat or a wrap as it was very warm.

  She was quite certain that they would be driven to see the Canon in a closed carriage.

  She was quite right.

  She and the Countess sat on the back seat and the Earl sat opposite them.

  He was looking, she thought, more unpleasant and more idiotic than usual.

  They drove in silence until, as they turned in at the gate of the Canon’s residence, the Countess said, speaking for the first time,

  “Now just behave yourself and remember that one word of protest that the wedding is not to your liking and you will return to The Castle to starve for several more days.”

  Arliva did not reply and the carriage ground to a standstill.

  On the Countess’s orders, Simon helped her down from the carriage and she felt herself shudder as his hand touched her arm.

  They went in. Not to the Canon’s house, but to the Chapel that was built on the side of it.

  Inside the Chapel was empty at that time of day.

  The Verger told the Countess that His Reverence was in his private room.

  The Countess then looked round the Chapel as if to make quite certain that there was no one there.

  Next she said to Arliva,

  “Sit down and wait here! The Canon will see you after he has spoken to Simon.”

  As if she thought that she could discern a glimmer of hope in Arliva’s eyes, she continued,

  “I will escort him and you. You know full well the consequences if you make any protest.”

  Then she followed the Verger who was waiting for them.

  Arliva walked past the rows of pews and sat down on a chair facing the altar.

  She felt that she must go on praying even though, with the Countess escorting her son and her, it would be impossible for either of them to say that they did not wish to be married.

  She knew that, if she was to be starved for very much longer, she would find it impossible to think and would then become completely helpless in the Countess’s hands.

  For a moment she felt almost too weak to kneel down, so she sat in her chair clasping her hands together and closing her eyes.

  ‘Help me! Please God help me,’ she prayed again and again.

  She felt that she was utterly alone in a hostile world with no one to hear her.

  Then surprisingly she heard a voice beside her that made her start.

  A man had obviously just come into the Chapel.

  And he had moved as she had into a row of chairs facing the altar.

  “How is it possible,” he asked in a low voice, “that someone so beautiful should look so unhappy?”

  She turned her head and saw that the speaker was a man who was tall and good-looking and very obviously a gentleman.

  As she met his eyes and saw the compassion in his expression, without thinking she cried out,

  “Save me! Save me!”

  He moved a little nearer to her and asked,

  “From what?”

  Almost as if she was hypnotised into answering the question, Arliva replied,

  “I am being forced to marry a dreadful man I hate and loathe.”

  “Why do you not run away?” he quizzed her.

  “Because,” she whispered, “they are starving me into submission. I have no chance of escape.”

  She thought as she spoke that even if she ran away now the servants on the carriage would doubtless, on the Countess’s orders, prevent her from going even a short distance down the drive.

  “Where are you staying?” the stranger asked.

  Because somehow the way he spoke in a quiet low voice seemed to make it impossible for her not to answer his question, Arliva replied,

  “I am at Sturton Castle. I am being kept a prisoner there.”

  “In which part of the castle?” he enquired.

  “I am on the first floor overlooking the garden,” she answered, “but it is a sheer drop to the ground and if I jump, as I want to do – I will kill myself.”

  “Put a light in your window tonight after dark,” the stranger said, “when they are all asleep.”

  “You can save me?” Arliva asked. “But it’s a sheer drop and for me there is no way of escape.”

  The man smiled at her.

  “I have climbed the Himalayas,” he told her, “and I don’t think that Sturton Castle will be quite so difficult.”

  Arliva stared at him.

  Then before she could speak, the Countess and her son came through the door that led into the private room of the Canon.

  As Simon closed the door behind them, Arliva felt something thrust into her hand.

  As he did so, the stranger moved two chairs away from her.

  It was something small yet hard and she put it into her handbag, taking out her handkerchief as if to wipe her eyes.

  Simon came heavily through the rows of chairs to her side.

  “Mother says you are to join her,” he demanded in his hard rather ugly voice. “And don’t say one word to upset her.”

  Without speaking Arliva rose to her feet, putting her handkerchief back into her bag.

  She did not dare glance at the man she had been talking to, but she realised that he was not watching her but staring at the altar as if for inspiration.

  ‘Perhaps he will help me,’ she thought desperately.

  Yet her common sense told her that it was hopeless.

  How could she expect a stranger to take such a risk for her?

  The interview with the Canon was very brief with the Countess doing all the talking.

  The Canon merely agreed that he would perform the marriage.

  Only when he shook Arliva’s hand did he say,

  “I hope, my dear, that you will be very happy and the Marriage Service I will take tomorrow evening will give me great pleasure.”

  Arliva merely bowed her head.

  The Countess, taking her arm roughly, then moved her quickly out of the Chapel as if she thought at the last moment that she might beg the Canon not to marry her to Simon.

  He was already outside in the carriage.

  They drove back to The Castle in complete silence.

  Only when she was once again locked up inside her bedroom, did Arliva wonder if what had happened in the Chapel had been part of her imagination and had not really taken place.

  Yet something inside her which had made her beg the stranger to help her in the first place seemed to tell her that it was true and that her prayers had been answered.

  When she was alone in her room, she opened her handbag to see what he had given her.

  To her delight it was a bar of chocolate.

  She then wondered why he was carrying it, except perhaps it was a present for his son if he had one or maybe he was on a journey that might make him hungry.

  Having had nothing to eat for so very long, it was a nectar of joy and hope.

  She ate
it very slowly, feeling that it give her back the strength she had lost.

  *

  The rest of the day dragged by.

  As previously no one came near her.

  As she had long ago finished the small amount of water on the washstand, she was now desperately thirsty, but not as hungry and weak as she had been previously.

  Eventually the sun sank in the West and the first evening star appeared in the sky.

  It was then as darkness came, Arliva lit the candles on her dressing table and carried one of them to the table in front of the window.

  As it had been hot in the afternoon, the windows were wide open.

  When she looked down below, she shuddered and knew that, if she had thrown herself down as she intended to do, she would have been smashed to pieces.

  Or perhaps she would be left to suffer the pain and agony of falling on hard stone and be crippled for life.

  The moon was now rising steadily in the sky.

  Although she sat at the window gazing out, she told herself that she was just making matters worse than they were already.

  How could she trust someone she had never seen before?

  But for some strange reason she had asked for help to come to her.

  Yet, because she had prayed so fervently, she could not help but feel that God and her father, if he had heard her, would somehow answer her prayers.

  It was just eleven o’clock when she was suddenly aware that there was someone on the ground beneath her.

  She looked out of the window and, although she could not see very clearly, there was definitely a man down there in the shadows.

  She saw beside him that there was something on the ground, which she thought seemed coiled round as if it was a rope.

  Moving very quietly and peering down at him, she became aware that he was climbing up the outside of The Castle.

  Arliva did not believe what she was seeing.

  Then she remembered that her father had told her how climbers of the great mountains in the East could grip the bare rocks in front of them and pull themselves up.

  As she stared down, she realised that was exactly what the stranger she had spoken to in the Chapel was now doing.

  He had special tools in his hands and on his feet that cut into the ancient walls of The Castle and helped him ascend it step by slow step.

  She held her breath until suddenly the tool he was holding grabbed the inside of the window, making a low metallic sound.

  A few seconds later he pulled himself up and was seated in the window.

  “You have come! You have really come! Arliva exclaimed.

  He put his finger up to his lips and she understood at once that she must not say anything.

  Although she was alone in that part of The Castle, she knew that he was wise as their voices might carry if they conversed with each other.

  He swung himself deftly into the room.

  By the light of the candle she could see that round his waist he had a rope.

  Pushing the table out of the way, he pulled the rope further and further into the room until through the window came tied to it a much thicker and heavier coil of rope.

  Still without speaking, he bent down in front of the bed and tied the rope firmly to one its legs.

  Then he moved a large chest of drawers as quietly as possible in front of the door.

  He smiled at Arliva.

  “How can you be so clever and so wonderful,” she asked in a whisper.

  “We are not out of the wood yet,” he replied, “and voices carry. You have to trust me and move very slowly and try not to be afraid.”

  She nodded.

  Holding the thick rope in his hand, he slipped out of the window and she watched him until he reached the ground below silently.

  Then he signalled to her.

  She took hold of the rope with both hands and very slowly she let herself out of the window.

  She realised exactly what she should do next, but she was afraid that in her hurry she would fall rather than reach the ground as athletically as he had done.

  Slowly she lowered herself hand over hand trying to hold the rope between her legs.

  Then, after an agonising descent, she felt his arms lifting her to safety.

  She could hardly believe that she had succeeded in escaping from the prison that she had been forcibly kept in for what seemed to her years not days.

  Still without speaking the man who had rescued her took her by the hand.

  Lifting the ropes without even glancing at her, he started to walk swiftly through the flower beds and under the trees.

  It was not likely that anyone would be looking out of the window of The Castle at this time of night, but he was obviously taking no risks.

  As they made their way out of the garden and into the shrubbery, then a short distance across a field, they still did not speak.

  Waiting for them on the road was an open chaise drawn by a team of four and in charge of them were two village youths.

  “They’ve been ever so good, sir,” one of the boys said, as they joined them.

  “And you two have been good in looking after them for me. Here is some money which I am sure you will be able to spend tomorrow at the village shop.”

  He paused for a moment before he added,

  “Don’t forget that you have never seen me or heard of me nor my horses. If people ask questions just say you know nothing.”

  “We’ll do that, sir, and thank you, thank you,” the boys replied, clutching the money he had given to them.

  The man lifted Arliva into the chaise and, climbing inside, he picked up the reins.

  As they drove off with the boys waving goodbye, he said,

  “We have done it and now you are free.”

  “How can you be so brilliant? How can you have saved me?” she asked a little breathlessly.

  “You can tell me all about it as soon as we are out of here and away as quickly as we can,” he answered. “I think the boys will keep their word, although I may have been seen by others.”

  He smiled before he added,

  “Although there is no reason for anyone to connect your escape with me, they will undoubtedly try to do so.”

  Arliva drew in her breath.

  “Of course you are right,” she sighed.

  “You will find some sandwiches beside you,” he explained. “I suggest you eat them and they will make you feel a little better. When we stop I will give you something to drink.”

  “I cannot believe you are real,” Arliva cried. “I think you are an angel sent down from Heaven to save me. I think I have just dreamt you and will wake up to find I am still a prisoner.”

  “Not if I can help it,” the man laughed.

  “Just how could you have been so superb?” Arliva asked. “How could you have had those special tools that mountaineers use?”

  “I told you I had climbed the Himalayas,” the man replied, “and it was the truth. But I assure you that it was not as difficult as I was told it might be.”

  Arliva did not answer and after a moment he said,

  “Tell me where you want to go.”

  “Anywhere I can hide. The Countess will look for me and, if she catches me again, you may not be there to save me.”

  She thought it extremely unlikely that the Countess would dare to make her a prisoner another time especially if she went back to London.

  But for the moment she wanted to take no risks.

  She had been so frightened and was still too weak to take any more.

  As if he knew just what she was thinking, the man said,

  “I thought you would feel like that especially after such a terrifying experience. Therefore I am taking you somewhere where you can hide, if that is what you want, until you are brave enough to face the world again.”

  “That is exactly what I do feel,” Arliva said, “and thank you, thank you for being so understanding.”

  “While we have quite some way to go, I suggest
that you eat and we will talk a little later,” he told her.

  As he spoke, they moved out of the narrow lane they were driving along onto a wider road.

  It was easy in the moonlight to see the way and the horses were moving swiftly.

  Arliva ate the sandwiches he had brought for her.

  She thought that they were the most delicious food she had ever eaten. In fact she could now feel her strength coming back to her with every mouthful she swallowed.

  They must have driven for over half-an-hour before her saviour drew his horses to a standstill by some fir trees.

  “Now I am going to give you something to drink,” he said. “I am sure you are feeling very thirsty.”

  “How do you know how really dreadful it is being a prisoner?” Arliva asked.

  “It is something I have never been, thank God,” he replied, “but I have never seen anyone look so miserable or so desperately unhappy as you did in that Chapel.”

  “When I looked at you, I knew that somehow you had come in answer to all my prayers,” Arliva sighed.

  As they were talking, the man was pouring her out a liquid from a bottle.

  She thought it might be some wine and, if she took it, because she had been starving for so long, she would undoubtedly feel very odd.

  But to her delight it was lemonade to which, she thought, had been added a little honey to make it sweet.

  She drank it gratefully and, when he filled up her glass again, she did not protest.

  Then he put the bottle and the glass away and said,

  “There is more to eat where I am taking you. You need no longer be afraid or feel that you must keep looking over your shoulder.”

  “I am not doing that. I have never met anyone so clever or so marvellous as you. I am only thanking God every second that you saved me.”

  ”Forget it!” the man exclaimed. “Instead we will talk about ourselves. I have no idea of your name and you have no idea of mine. But let me tell you that my friends call me ‘Ivan’ and I rather think that your name should be ‘Cinderella’.”

  Arliva laughed.

  “No, it is not that.”

  She was now thinking swiftly what she should call herself, as she felt as if he had been in London and with such magnificent horses he could well have been, he might guess who she was.

  She therefore said,

  “My friends always call me ‘Alma’, which is easy to remember.”