he lady and the lighthouse

They were hungry, weary, and alone. Looking around them, they could see nothing, no road, no habitation, no thread of smoke from a friendly fire. Exhausted, one was ready to give up and to die of cold and hunger on the shore, but the other, who's name was Kavan, had a stronger spirit and he urged his companion up. "Come on, lad," He said, "We may at least find fresh water. I don't know about you, but my mouth is parched from all the salt water I swallowed last night."

The cold wind hurried them into the dunes by the sea's edge, but they found nothing. Just dunes and the wild sea grass.

As it began to grow dark, the companion started to weep. "It is useless," He said, in his thin, exhausted voice. "I can go no further. This is just torture. You should have left me to die by the sea's edge, when we were first washed ashore."

"No, no," Said Kavan. "this is just exhaustion. Even if we are to die let us die with hope in our hearts, so that the angels we meet after we have passed from this world to the next will see our hope as a light we keep with us, and the angels will recognise us as men and will carry us with them as they fly with their powerful wings to heaven."

"No." Said his companion, crying wretchedly. "We are doomed. To hope is fruitless. To hope and to have our hopes always dashed is cruel. We should give up, now."

But Kavan cried out, "I see a light!"

As it was getting dark, the lady had lit the lighthouse lamp and it was spreading it's wide searchlight through the night. Together they scrambled towards the lighthouse, but when they reached the part of the shore nearest the lighthouse they saw that the sea was all around it, and there was no boat to carry them across.

"We'll swim for it," Said Kavan, resolutely.

"No, no! Cried his companion. "We will be drowned for sure, and dashed against the rocks! Let us stay here, until someone may see us."

"How will they see us?" Kavan asked. "No. we must make the effort." But he could not persuade his companion, who refused to enter the water.

"Very well." Said Kavan. "I'll go. They are sure to have a boat, and I will send it back for you."

But the companion did not want to be left alone. "I have not been a good man," He wept. "I am frightened that the angels will punish me when they find my soul, when I have passed into the next world."

"Nevertheless, I feel I must try to swim to the lighthouse," Said Kavan.

"No, no,' said the companion, holding Kavan's sleeve. "I was cruel to my mother, I sometimes stole from people and I lied when they asked me if I was the thief. And twice I told young women I would marry them, in order to enjoy the comfort of their embrace, and afterwards I left them."

"Then you can go back to them and make amends if we are saved," Said Kavan, pulling away and walking into the waves. "I will make sure a boat is sent for you if I am successful," He called to the companion; and he began to swim towards the lighthouse.

The night was very dark and the lighthouse supplied his only direction. "It is a good thing it is so strong a light," Thought Kavan, "Otherwise I should be lost, here, in the black night and the stormy waves."

He was a strong swimmer but soon he was very tired, but his hope and the light carried him on. In a little while, very battered and exhausted he pulled himself up on to the rocks near the door of the lighthouse; and feebly he knocked at the door, but no-one answered.

"They cannot hear my knocking above the crashing of the waves," He said to himself. He was quite bemused, hungry and faint, and the waves made his head spin.

He tried the door handle and the door was open. Inside, there was a lamp set on a table by the door and he sat down beside it to enjoy the friendliness of it's light.

"Some one is here," He said. "There is a sweet fragrance in the air, and someone must be attending to the light."

"Hello? He called, but no-one answered.

He searched but he could find no-one, because the lady was right at the top of the lighthouse, in her apartment there.

'Should I climb the stair to find whoever tends the light?" Kavan wondered; but opening a door, he found it led into a boathouse, and there was a boat there.

"I shall save my companion first," He decided. "He is in a poor way, and it's best we get him here before I go looking for the lighthouse keeper."

He took the boat and rowed back to the shore. The companion saw the little light on the boat and struggled to his feet.

"You were gone a long time," He said, wretchedly. "I am nearly frozen and I was so frightened. You should not have left me alone for so long. It was cruel of you."

"But it took me a while to swim to the lighthouse," Kavan explained. "Get in the boat, we'll soon both be safe and warm."

So Kavan took his companion to the lighthouse.

Once there, he put the boat back into the boathouse and together they climbed the stair. The companion grumbled at the stairs all the while, but Kavan urged him on. "Not much further now,' He said.

At the top of the stair they found a door. Kavan knocked and a sweet voice said, "Come in."

Going into the room they saw it was extremely well, even luxuriously, furnished. There was a window and the glass in it was as crystal clear as a diamond, and sitting in a chair was the most beautiful woman either of them had ever seen.

She greeted them with kindness and consideration but did not move from her chair. She directed them to the kitchen and to a room where they might find warm clothes and blankets so that they might sleep comfortably.

When they left the room, the companion was in high spirits.

"What a place this is!" He said. "We have landed in clover now, Kavan! Did you see that girl? Did you ever see such a face? And her long hair, did you see how beautiful it was?"

"I saw." Said Kavan, wearily. "We shall eat, and then we shall sleep." He sounded low in spirits. But the companion kept talking, about the fine silverware he had seen in the woman's room, about the jewel she wore around her neck, and about the colour of her long hair, which was golden brown, like autumn leaves.

In the morning Kavan woke first and began to make breakfast. He knocked at the door of the woman's room and he said, "Hello?"

Her voice replied, "Come in," And going in he found her siting in her chair, and looking out of her crystal window at the sea. She had been combing her hair, and a silver comb was in her hand, and a silver mirror was in her lap.

"Can I get you anything?" Kavan said, timidly.

"No, thank you," She said, turning her head towards him. Her eyes were the colour of the sea, and very clear.

"We must talk about how we are to leave," Said Kavan.

She told him that in a week's time a boat would call at the lighthouse, and would give him passage to the town, many miles away, down the coast.

"This is a very isolated place," Said Kavan.

"I like the solitude," She said. "And I know I save many lives, with my light."

Back in the kitchen, Kavan found his companion awake, and still talking excitedly.

"How we have fallen into luck at last!" The companion crowed.

"It is not so lucky," Said Kavan. "When the boat comes, we shall leave and go on with our lives. It is a chance for us to live, that is all." He smiled at his companion. "You may return to the people you have injured, and set it all right," He said. "To your mother, and the others."

"My mothers been dead these fifteen years," Said his companion, brushing crumbs from his sleeve. He had a plan forming in his mind, but he did not want Kavan to know of it.

But Kavan puzzled him. He seemed down in his spirits. "Cheer up!" He said. "We've never had such lodgings as these!"

But Kavan would not cheer up, and the companion fell silent, occupied with his own thoughts, which he ceased to share with Kavan.

On the third day after they arrived he struck Kavan down, and left him unconscious on the kitchen floor. Then he went to the lady's room, and he burst in on her, while she was sitting looking out of her window at the sea.

"What do you want?" She said.

"To take all my booty." Said the companion,with a shout of triumph. "All the good things that lie here, protected by none, and just as ready for the taking as ripe apples in the orchard." And he went up to the lady who did not turn, who kept her face to the window.

"And what of Kavan, your friend? What has he to say about all this? And what do you intend to tell the boatmen,when they come and find my house sacked?

"Kavan is lying unconscious in the kitchen," He said. "I may have killed him, I hit him hard enough. The fool never saw it coming. And you, you aristocrats and fine people, you never know the hunger there is in the heart of a poor man, criminals, you call us, but we only take what should rightfully be shared out among the many, not kept for the few alone."

And he reached out, to grab her shoulder.

"And what of me?" She asked. "What do you intend for me? And what will you tell the boatmen about me?"

He reached for her hair, grabbed a handful of it, and pulled her around; and then he threw her down on the floor, laughing as he did so; but at that moment, Kavan, who had returned to consciousness and had staggered from the kitchen, came in behind him and pulled him away.

"What have you done!" Cried Kavan, and though still groggy from the blow to his head, he was stronger than the companion, and managed to restrain him, and held him so that he could do no more harm.

The woman lay where she had been thrown. Her eyes were open, her head still turned towards the window.

Kavan dragged the companion to the kitchen and locked him in. "I will go and see if she is alright," He said.

The companion beat on the kitchen door and swore terrible abuse at Kavan; but when a few moments later, Kavan returned, Kavan looked pale and shaken. She is alright, " He said. "She is sitting again in her chair. But what are we to do now?"

The companion swore at him. "you fool," He said. We had it all and you are throwing such a gift away."

"No," Said Kavan, "It was not ours. And tell me, what of those girls you mentioned when we were on the beach, did they come willing to your embrace, or were they forced?"

"They may not have been as willing as I suggested," Said the companion, sullenly. "I did not know you so well then, and even at the door of death a man likes to look well in the minds of strangers. I may have taken one or two by force, but these girls, they're all the same, they're like the rich, they keep it all to themselves and they never want to share it with a poor lonely sailor."

Kavan watched the companion very closely over the next few days, waiting for the boat. They saw no more of the lady, because she kept her door locked against them, but they heard her moving about, and the light that was accessed only from her apartment was always lit in the evening, as darkness fell. Kavan called through to her to ask if she needed food, but she refused, saying that she had all she needed with her.

When Kavan slept the companion tried to steal from the room, but Kavan woke and siezed him. "Think again," He said. "I sleep light."

And his companion again berated him. "Are you to be poor, and a fool all your life? It's all here, I tell you. We can leave as rich men."

But Kavan turned to him, his face was white and he was shaking, with anger or with some other emotion the companion could not tell. "Do you understand nothing?" Shouted Kavan.

On the seventh day after they had come to the lighthouse, the boat arrived. The companion expected that Kavan would tell them the whole story, and hand him over to be kept a prisoner. but Kavan said nothing, and after the boat captain came down from visiting the woman they did not speak of his assault upon her.

As the companion sat in the boat, watching the lighthouse grow distant, he thought furiously of what might have been, if things had worked out differently; and it seemed to him that the white lighthouse was a treasure trove he had found and attempted to plunder, but he had been prevented; and he wept at it's loss, and watched it until it was only a speck like a white seagull on the horizon, a speck of light like sunlight from a birds wing; and he watched it until it finally vanished.

"What were you going to do?' asked Kavan. "Kill me and throw the woman into the sea, when you had done with her?"

"I wasn't going to kill you,"Said the companion. "Just knock some sense into you. I was going to share the wealth with you."

"I cannot believe you," Said Kavan. "But I guess you needed there to be two of us, to have your story backed up, when the boat arrived. What was it going to be, an attack by pirates?"

But the companion fell silent, thinking of what might have been.

"I was so close," He thought. "I could have walked down the city streets as a proud man in fine clothes and not dressed as a beggar. Every woman would have vied for my attention, because of my wealth. Why, the red jewel the lady of the lighthouse wore around her neck was worth a fortune, alone. And all unguarded, unprotected!"

But he did wonder at Kavan, who could have joined forces with the women, and together they could have turned him over to the authorities, with the full tale of his attack. However , he was not grateful to Kavan.

"He'll have his reasons," He thought, suspiciously.

Kavan was silent, all through the boat journey. But when the boat docked, he said to the companion, "I would stay with you, to see you do no more harm. But I do not think you will do much harm, now," And he walked away, and that was the last the companion saw of him, though not the last he heard of him.

That night, the companion had a dreadful dream. He dreamed that he returned again to his mother's house, that he was young and the day was fair and he went with a light step up to his mother's door, but opening it he saw his mother at her work, her back turned to him. But when he took her by the shoulder to turn her around, lightly saying "It's me, mother, back home! Aren't you glad to see me?" He found his hands full of the golden brown hair he rememebered from the lady of the lighthouse; and in the dream, in a fit of revulsion and terror, he threw his mother to the floor and fled from the house.

And afterwards, when he went on his way, he noticed something strange. All the women he saw, from a distance they were all as he expected, some old, some fat, some dark, some fair; but, as he came closer, they all looked at him with the same clear eyes the color of the sea; and he would turn and walk away from them, and he began to shun the company of women altogether.

He found work but it was always hard and he was never well paid. and nothing went well for him. He swore to himself over his unfair treatment and often, longingly, there would come to him the image of the lighthouse.

And still he found he had to avoid women. As time went on, his condition worsened, so that he could not bear a woman to be within his view.

His life became more difficult. He rarely had money and not even enough to eat.

"Did I die there, on the beach?" He wondered. "Is this some weary afterlife, without any happiness for a poor sailor like myself?" And he wept again.

He heard of Kavan. Kavan had not become rich at all, but he had married and had children and he and his wife were very happy.

"Happy!" thought the companion. "What does that mean? He's still a poor man. still contemptible, still spat on. I daresay he cannot even afford to pay for the doctor to come if his children are sick and it would all have been so different if he had played it my way. He might then have married and brought something worthwhile to his poor hardworking wife. What is love worth in a world where soon her looks will be gone, where soon she will be stooped and bent by the hardships they will suffer?"

But he was finding his own life so difficult he began to seek advice. He was told of a wise woman who lived not far away. He was offered some better paid work, and he took it, so that he would have money for her council. She did not come cheap, he was told.

"A wise woman?" he asked, "Could you not tell me of a wise man?"

But he went, all the same, and he stood at the wise woman's door, and he called through to her, "I do not want to see your face. So, cover your head with your shawl and do not turn to look at me, and keep the light down low."

Entering the wise woman's room he saw that she had done as he had asked; she was just a dim silhouette at her window. And beyond the window he could see the dark night and the stars, and the bay with the lights of the small craft bobbing in the water.

He laid his money on the table. "Tell me your story," She said.

Uncomfortably, he told her his story, but she said, "There is more, that you conceal from me."

So he told her what he had intended for the woman, and what he had done to Kavan, hitting him in the head; and she said, "Here is my council. I cannot tell you the meaning of all of this but you will meet, by chance, one who will. And remember, at the time, you were in a place between heaven and earth."

"You have told me nothing," He cried angrily. "It is not worth the money I laid on the table, the money I worked so hard so many days to raise."

"That is my council," Said the woman. "My four sons are in the room next door. If you attempt to take your money back they will come here and they will make you pay me."

Cursing, he left her. he had heard sounds coming from the room next door and anyway he feared her, as he feared all women.

He travelled on. Sometimes life was bad and sometimes worse, and his hair became thin and grey and his strength was spent. He could not work at the kind of jobs he had taken before; he was little more than a beggar, now.

One evening, sitting in a dark corner alone, spending his last few coins on a drink, he spied one of the boat captains who had taken him from the lighthouse. He talked to the man, who did not at first recognise him; life had been good to the captain, the companion noticed, enviously. He wore a fine uniform and he had filled out and he smiled a good deal.

The companion turned the conversation to the lighthouse. "Do you remember the day you picked us up?" He asked the man.

"Oh yes I remember it well," said the boatman. "That would be, let me see, around Soules end, they call the place. It has a terrible reputation, and many have lost their lives along that part of the coast."

"What do you know of the lighthouse?" Asked the companion.

"Lighthouse? What lighthouse?" Asked the boatman, looking confused.

"You took us off from a lighthouse," Said the companion.

"No, no," Said the boatman, quite kindly, but laughing. "Your wits were befuddled. I remember Kavan was in better shape than you were, even though he had taken a nasty blow to the head, and a fine, brave man he was, and hopefully still is. No, there was no light house. I remember the morning cloudy, very early morning and the moon was still bright though it was morning, and the moon was huge and bright, that was how we saw you. You and Kavan had been clinging to a piece of your boat that had been wrecked, you'd been drifting a week, Kavan said, how you'd both survived I"ll never know but you were in better shape than I'd have expected, but there the two of you were, the setting moon behind you; biggest, brightest moon I ever saw."

The companion tearfully refuted the captain's story. "You have it all wrong," he exclaimed. "We were in a lighthouse and you went up to see the lady, and then you brought us back to the town."

"What lady?" Asked the captain. he laughed, cheerfully. "No, you'd been through a lot and you were probably delirious. There was no lighthouse, and no lady; though I will say they tell some strange stories along that coast."

"What strange stories?" Asked the companion; his wits were reeling, he felt as if everything he knew and understood had been disintegrated.

"Well," Said the captain slowly. "They speak of a light that guides them home on wild nights, and others, they say it was a light that brought them to the rocks. No, there's no lighthouse there. Biggest, brightest moon I ever saw; and the fairest morning, and the sea and the sky all blue, so that you could not see them meet; and the moon hanging so close you couldn't see if it was in the sea or in the sky, looking close enough to touch."

"The wise woman told me I was in a place between heaven and earth," Thought the companion. "I never knew what she meant, until now."

The following morning the people found him in a ditch next to the house. He was lying on his back, his face turned up to the sky, and though he was dead, his eyes were open. It was early morning when they found him, and the moon was a thin, bright sickle. "As if he died looking at the moon," They said to each other.

On the companion's face there was an expression of grief and sorrow.

"What a beautiful morning!" They said. Soon, they had forgotten all about him. None knew him, or cared about his passing.