Full Tide

by Celine Conway

  “You’ll do well in the classroom,” said Lisa, in the unemphatic tones she reserved specifically for this mood in Nancy. “You won’t go to school till after the next holiday, and by that time you’ll have had some of the outdoors, too. At least, you can swim.”

  There came a pause, while Nancy attacked a dish of jellied fruit. Her appetite was healthier than it had been in England and Lisa thought, hopefully, that she was a little rounder, too. No doubt at all that her color was good, and when she was happy her features had an elfin expressiveness.

  “How long will you stay with us, Lee?” she asked, not for the first time.

  Lisa replied evasively, “It depends on your father.”

  “Couldn’t you get a job in a Durban hospital instead of going home to work?”

  Lisa shook her head. "Officially, you’re an immigrant, but I’m only a visitor.”

  The answer, thin though it was, satisfied Nancy, and doubtless diverted her thoughts from her own immediate future. She finished the jelly and drank her milk, washed her hands and helped to load the tray.

  The two of them took a walk around the deck, but the fierce south-easter, common to this coast, drove them back to the cabin. In any case, they were surfeited with views of masts and cranes and African dock-workers in shapeless headgear and ragged trousers.

  They had not long been seated in their former comfortable positions before a knock came at the door. Remembering the steward and stewardess were off duty for two hours, Lisa took it to be Jeremy, and called, “Come in.”

  It was Mark who entered, however, straightway filling the small cabin with his height and that indefinable something which was inseparable from him.

  Nancy spoke first. “Hello,” she said companionably, “haven’t you been ashore, either?”

  He gave her a smile. “I’ve been ashore and come back again. I had lunch in a bungalow perched on a rock that’s washed by the sea.”

  “Like a lighthouse?” she asked interestedly. “I bet it was nice, but I’d rather have a garden. Lee and I used to do a lot of gardening when we lived at Richmond.”

  “Did you?” Mark’s glance rested momentarily upon Lisa’s small, clear face, then lowered to her stiff elbow. “How does that feel?”

  “Not too bad, thank you.”

  “The doc told me about it a few minutes ago. Did it give you gyp in the night?”

  “A bit. Why?”

  “You’re pale and heavy-eyed. You should have gone to him before bed.”

  “It’s not so serious as that.” Oddly confused, she closed her book with a snap and said rather hurriedly, “It’s strange how long the day seems when you spend it on board in port. How soon shall we be sailing?”

  “At sunset.” Still non-committal, he added, “From here to Durban will be the last lap. You don’t look so gay about it as you ought. What’s wrong? Are you in a flutter about the impression you may make on Jeremy’s people?”

  Lisa cast a swift look at Nancy and said hastily, “Dr. Veness is my employer; I shall be staying with him. It isn’t very likely that I shall meet the Carnes.”

  “Oh, but surely,” he said in a soft, tantalizing voice which at that moment had nothing in common with the hard, blue, narrowed eyes, “you’ll find time for a quick run up to the Carne homestead before Jeremy goes north to Johannesburg? Astra tells me the contract is practically signed and sealed.”

  “Astra’s wrong,” said Lisa with an effort.

  Before she could continue, Mark went over to Nancy and held out both hands to heave her to her feet. “You wanted a walk on the bridge, didn’t you, Nancy? Go there , now and tell the officer on duty that I sent you. Ask him all the questions you like. He’ll answer them.”

  “I don't think she ought to go alone,” said Lisa swiftly.

  “Of course I can go alone,” Nancy told her scornfully. “I know more about the ship than you do.”

  Quite serenely she buttoned on a jacket against the wind and stepped into the corridor. The door closed behind her, and with her going Mark’s manner altered.

  He barely looked at Lisa as he asked, “Well, how is Astra wrong?”

  “Jeremy won’t go with her to Johannesburg. I’m sure of it.”

  “Has he told you,” he demanded deliberately, “that she has doubled the original figure she offered?”

  Startled and bewildered, she stared up at him. Part of her wrestled with what he said while the rest shrank from the chill of his expression. “When did that happen?”

  “This morning, before, we docked.” He leaned back against the door, hands in his pockets, one corner of his mouth sarcastically drawn in. “Shakes you, doesn’t it— because he didn’t rush to you with the news! Thoughtless of him to leave his fiancée out in the cold.”

  She sprang up, clenching her teeth rather than wince at the sudden jar to her arm. “That joke is stale. He’ll tell me when he comes back.”

  “So it’s a joke. You’re not yet engaged to Jeremy. Never mind; it can still happen.” His lips twitched unpleasantly. “You’ve used most of a woman’s weapons to persuade that young man where his duty lies, but I daresay you’ve a last one in reserve.”

  She stood back, against the dressing-chest, nerves quivering. “Why should it matter to you? Is it because you’re anxious that Astra Carmichael shall have whatever she sets her heart on, even if it does cost her twice the price? Jeremy told me she had an ace up her sleeve, and I suppose this is it. Money!” Her breath caught. “She hasn’t any other yardstick.”

  “That’s not true,” he said, unsmiling but unperturbed. “In this case it merely means that she has the measure of her man. You’ve almost failed, Lisa, unless you’re willing to go farther than a mere kiss with friend Carne.”

  “A ... kiss?” she echoed, heat rising from her neck. “I haven’t kissed Jeremy.”

  His teeth went together. “You’ve let him kiss you ... haven’t you?”

  His whole bearing just then was arrogant and hateful. She couldn’t help feeling that he was throwing even more of his weight on Astra’s side, and hurt and puzzlement burned in her like an acid.

  It wasn’t simply a matter of Jeremy’s career. The affair had expanded into something big and unmanageable, encompassing four people, and she stood almost alone against the other three, fighting for something which was of no personal importance to herself. It was crazy, yet unavoidable.

  She moved sideways towards the porthole, felt the sudden wind in her short fine curls and heard the lazy crying of sated gulls. Against the glaring light there was an element of the untouched about her.

  “In a better cause your tenacity would be admirable,” he said abruptly. “It was a pity you had to lose your head over Carne.”

  “I haven’t lost my head over him,” she retorted instantly. “All this has come about accidentally, because I knew of his engineering degree and the lengths his parents had gone to, to give him a university education. It seemed sinful to me to waste all that.”

  “It didn’t occur to you that if the fellow himself was willing to forget it you couldn’t do much about it. If the career he’d chosen meant so little to him why should you concern yourself to keep him to it?” Sharply he added, “All right, you needn’t answer that one. I’m afraid; though, that Astra’s most recent move will defeat you. Carne hasn’t the sort of courage it takes to turn down such an excellent proposition.”

  When Lisa faced him her eyes were no longer pure grey, but dark and smouldering. Pain and anger ran together in her veins, so that she sounded choked and fierce.

  “You think you know everything about other men, but you don’t! You count on Jeremy’s being young with his way yet to make in the world, and you believe you’ve accurately assessed his character as feeble and grasping. But he’s not like that. I do admit he’s not a man of steel...”

  “That’s big of you,” he mocked coolly.

  “… but it isn’t the money which attracts him to a stage career,” she finished, her pulses beating furiousl
y. Then she swallowed and tacked on hotly and bitterly, “Astra must want him pretty badly to double the stakes, but if she’s trying to persuade him that he has more than a mere gift for putting over callow heroes she might show her confidence by contracting to give him work in England when she goes back. She’ll stop short of that, because she hasn’t any doubt at all about his “capabilities!”

  “Gets right under your skin, doesn’t it?” he said cynically. “You loathe the idea of failing where hard cash succeeds.”

  “I haven’t failed yet!”

  It was out before Lisa realized what she was saying, and it inevitably set the pattern for her immediate behavior. She saw Mark straighten and his jaw go hard and resolute. Instinctively her chin lifted and her nerves contracted to withstand whatever came.

  He spoke quietly, the words sharp and clear, like pebbles upon ice. ‘‘Very well, go on trying and see where it gets you. Tomorrow night is your last aboard and Carne has promised his answer by then. If you want us all to part enemies go ahead with your cracked idea.”

  Lisa moistened horribly dry lips and met his glittering stare. “You know very well I don’t want us to be enemies. I ... I’ve never quite understood how you came into it, Mark. What will you gain if Astra does get her own way with Jeremy?”

  “Nothing,” he answered. “I’ve simply been looking on and offering the common-sense view.”

  “Looking on but swayed by contempt,” she said huskily, “contempt for Jeremy and me. But you’ve been angry, too, because we’re not nearly important enough to cause Astra so much bother. We ought to have realized the immense honor she—and you—were doing us to notice our existence at all. You can’t forgive us the oversight.”

  “That’s enough,” he said crisply. “Don’t work yourself up on me. I won’t have it!”

  His imperiousness, the almost vicious snap of his teeth as he finished speaking made her eyes widen in unbelief. This was Mark, the impregnable. She had known him capable of anger, but the set cruelty in his expression was beyond anything she could have imagined. It was heart-shaking.

  She turned back to face the blaze of the afternoon sun through the porthole, closed her eyes against it and felt fingers of flame beating behind her eyelids.

  “I’m sorry,” she said at last. “Not for anything I’ve said but because I don’t care to have anyone ... hating me.”

  “Don’t talk like that. I couldn’t hate you, but if you were to allow Carne to manage his own affairs you’d be amazed how quickly the antagonism between us all would melt.”

  “I can’t do that. I just can’t stand aside, now.”

  A spear flashed through her arm as he took her shoulders and turned her about. She heard the harsh intake of his breathy met the warning glint of his eyes.

  “You really mean you won’t give it up?” he demanded.

  “Mark, you’re hurting!”

  “I wish I were!” But his hold slackened and his thumb automatically smoothed the bone of her shoulder. “You don’t know what it is to be hurt—not really hurt—because you’ve never felt anything deeply enough!” He withdrew his hands suddenly, as if they were seared “You mean me to understand you’re all for Jeremy. Is that it?”

  Desperately, Lisa said, “Don’t you see that I’m committed? Can’t you view it as impersonally as you view everything else?”

  But Mark had swung open the door. “I’ve no wish to,” he replied curtly. From the doorway he looked back with a tight, malicious smile. “All right, go ahead. You’ll have to work hard and fast, little one, and don’t underestimate your opponent. She’s an expert.”

  It was not till some minutes after he had gone that Lisa’s muscles began to relax. She felt as exhausted as if she had run a race, and her brain had gone thick and woolly. She leaned back against, the end of the built-in wardrobe and thought how heartbreaking it was that the barrier between herself and Mark had to become stronger at almost every encounter.

  Just before six the ship left East London and sailed away from the hot and golden sunset. The spectacular eastern sky, a soft blue fleeced with flame which darkened richly every moment, drew many people to the deck, and it was there that Lisa met Jeremy.

  His day, he confessed, had been grueling. His second cousin, whom he had visited, had insisted on telephoning his mother at the small farm near Durban. He had spent an uncomfortable hour awaiting the call and nine ghastly minutes talking first to his mother and then to his father.

  “I felt an absolute snake,” he said broodingly. “They’re so happy about my coming home and they’re planning party. You’d think I’d pulled off a miracle instead of just scratching through my finals after a second go.”

  Lisa did not pass any of the soothing, encouraging remarks to which he had become accustomed. She nodded once or twice and let him join his arm with hers, but she felt she had already said everything. And, strangely, during the last few hours she had come to care very little what Jeremy decided about his future. She had defied Mark instinctively, not because she was determined to work still harder upon Jeremy; there was nothing more she could do in that direction. In fact, she found herself with singularly little mental energy to expend upon this matter which had cropped up so early in the voyage and proceeded to grow into something monstrous and threatening.

  That night she did not go to the saloon for dinner. She did some packing and, over a glass of milk and some sandwiches, worked out the state of her finances. She would have liked to have an exacting job of work to do, but Mark had put “Hospital Row” out of bounds to passengers, and there was nothing else with which to tire herself.

  She saw Nancy into bed and took a few turns on deck while the child slipped off to sleep. It was still gusty, but the quality of the wind was changing, acquiring the blanketing softness of warmth and humidity. Once more they were heading for the mysterious and romantic sub-topics, but mystery and romance were outside Lisa’s world. For her the days ahead bristled with hard facts, the biggest and most bruising being the knowledge that soon she and Mark must part.

  She wished it were possible to keep to her cabin and avoid the risk of a definite severance of all connection with him. Then it occurred to her that events were sure to move more or less as he directed, a vaguely cheering realization which sent her to bed just a little less troubled.

  The next day was long and unsettled, Nancy, now that the voyage was nearing its close, was inclined to be nervy. She bought a pipe for her father, wrapped and labelled it, but said, suddenly, that she did not want to meet him yet; it would have been so much nicer if he had met them at Cape Town. Perhaps he wasn’t so anxious to have her, after all.

  “He’s a doctor, darling,” Lisa said reasonably. “He couldn’t leave his practice for so long, but he’ll be at the quay tomorrow, you’ll see.”

  “I'd rather stay on the ship and go back to England,” Nancy almost quavered. “Wouldn’t it be wonderful if all the passengers stayed on and we all went back together— and if we picked up Mrs. Basson at Cape Town!”

  For a moment Lisa allowed her heart to be swayed. Yes, it would be wonderful, so long as Astra and Jeremy were left behind!

  “In three weeks,’’ she said, dragging her mind back to realities, “you’d be living with Aunt Anthea at Richmond, and longing all over again to go to your father.”

  Nancy sighed. “I wouldn’t mind so much if you were staying in Durban,” she said for the twentieth time.

  All day, much to Jeremy’s disgust, she kept close to Lisa, and after her supper she helped with the rest of the packing. Oddments acquired here and there swelled the contents of the trunk till it seemed unlikely it would ever close down. It took both Lisa’s and Nancy’s full weight to bring the hasps together.

  Both had got to their feet, victorious, when the steward knocked and handed a note to Lisa. “No reply, miss,” he said.

  She slit the envelope and read four lines of feminine writing. “Captain Kennard and I would like you and Jeremy to join us for dinner in the
private dining room next to the saloon. Shall we say at seven-thirty?” It was signed by Astra Carmichael.

  No invitation this; a command, rather. The cool nerve of Astra! Lisa’s thumbs came together on the sheet of paper as if to rip it across; then she pushed and the paper crumpled in her hand. She had never dined at Mark’s table and this was her last chance of an evening with him. It was to be a sort of farewell and the occasion for Jeremy’s decision, perhaps also for a firm and final negative from Lisa. She had an inner conviction that Mark had suggested this dinner for four, and that he would not be surprised if she declined., He couldn’t know, of course, that part of her wanted so badly to be with him that,, she would face arrows and stones rather than be deprived of this opportunity; the remaining part of her felt quite sick at, the thought of a farewell dinner.

  Farewell to love, she reflected hollowly. One-sided love, through which ran a hard core of bitterness. Not for Lisa the joy, the sweet pains and terrors of passionately returned love. Mark was a stranger, now and for ever.

  For several reasons, the chief being that her evening dresses were packed away, Lisa put on a powder-blue tailored silk frock and navy linen shoes. With the short pale curls brushed back from her wide forehead and her lips straighter than she normally held them, she looked young and a little sad and resigned.

  Jeremy, when he came to confirm that she as well as he had received an invitation, was perplexed that her vexation had so soon abated. He had even been somewhat angry himself at the tone of Astra’s note.

  “Well, this is it,” he said, watching her with narrow-eyed expectancy.

  But Lisa was silent. Tonight, when everything was so near the end, his needs and frustrations had not even a ghostly importance. For once she was thinking only of herself ... and Mark.

  At exactly half-past seven they left Nancy in the top bunk and went straight to the private dining Cabin. Mark and Astra were already there, seated in upholstered tub chairs near a cocktail cabinet of which the doors stood wide, displaying many bottles and winking glasses. They were drinking Martinis and smiling as if sharing an intimate joke. Mark stood up, let the smile rest upon Jeremy and then upon Lisa. The penetrating blue gaze went keen as a blade as it moved over the small composed face, but when he looked away his whole expression became non-committal.