by Jonas Lie
CHAPTER XX
When Madam Garvloit had made some excuse next morning to leave the two alone together in her sitting-room, Salvé took out of his pocket a small parcel, and opening it deliberately, said, with a certain solemnity—
“Five years ago, Elizabeth, when I was in Boston, I bought these rings.” He took them out of the paper, and laid them in her hand. “I have had a good deal to bear since, but you see I have kept them all along notwithstanding.”
She threw her arms round his neck, hid her face upon his breast, and he could feel that she was crying. She tried them on then, both on the same finger, and holding up the hand to show him, said—
“That is the first ring I ever possessed.”
A shadow passed across his face, and it flushed slightly; and she only then perceived what connection of ideas her remark might have suggested.
He had three days to spare before he was obliged to be back at Pürmurende on board the old brig of which he was now master, and with which, patched and leaky though she was, after his sailor’s pride had been overcome, he had grown to be well satisfied enough—more particularly, perhaps, because she was his own. The happiness of these days was not marred by a single further incident to remind him of the past; and it was only on the day that he was to leave that the foul fiend Distrust was again awakened in his unlucky heart.
It was a Sunday, and after the morning service there was to be a sort of popular fête in Amsterdam. At the famous town-hall, where, in Holland’s great days, when De Ruyter’s and Van Tromp’s guns were thundering in the sea outside, the great merchant princes used to sit round the republican council-board, was to be exhibited that day, for the first time, the new picture of the young Dutch hero, Van Spyck, who blew up his ship in the war of 1830 against Belgium.
Salvé and Elizabeth joined the stream, and even caught some of the national enthusiasm prevailing in the crowd that was swaying backwards and forwards in the courtyard, where a band was playing the stirring national air, “Wien Neerlands bloed door de aders vloeit.”
At last they found themselves before the canvas. It represented the young cadet of seventeen years on the gunboat at the supreme moment.
Elizabeth stood with her hands clasped before her silently engrossed, while Salvé kept her from being pressed upon behind.
“Look!” she said, turning half round to him, but without taking her eyes off the picture,—“the Belgian captain is inviting him to surrender. He has no choice—they are too many for him. But don’t you see the thought he has in his mind?—you can read it in his face. And what a fine fellow he looks, with his handsome uniform, and his epaulets, and his short sword!” she said, in a lower tone, with a revival of her old childish enthusiasm for that kind of show.
Her last words were like a dagger’s thrust to Salvé. She still had a hankering, then, for all this, and he stood behind her pale with suppressed feeling, while she continued to gaze at the picture and think aloud to him.
“Poor, handsome lad! But he never will surrender—one can easily see that; and so he must go down,” she said, in a subdued voice, involuntarily folding her hands, as if in fancy she went with him; “and he blows up Belgian and all into the air, Salvé,” she said, turning to him with a fine spirited look in her face, and with moistened eyes.
He made no reply; and supposing that, like herself, he was lost in the scene before them, she turned again to the picture. But while, after giving vent to her feelings, she stood there with a smile on her face, thinking that she knew one who would have been quite as capable as Van Spyck of such an exploit—the man, namely, who was then standing behind her—to him the picture had become a hateful thing; and he could have shot Van Spyck through the heart for his uniform’s sake.
The whole of the way home he was silent and serious, and it was not until late in the afternoon that he at all recovered his spirits.
As this was to be his last trip for the year, the following spring was fixed for their marriage; and when he took his leave, it was with the gloomy presentiment that he had a dreary winter before him.
Certainly, for the development of a morbid state of mind, no conditions could have been more favourable than the enforced inactivity to which, with many another, he was condemned for the long dark months during which the ice put a stop to navigation. To his restless, energetic nature, such prolonged inaction was little suited under any circumstances, and in his present condition of mind it was little less than disastrous.
“If she was only here!” he would sometimes inwardly exclaim, as if crying out for help against himself and the thoughts which he felt to be unworthy, but which nevertheless he could not shake off.
He often thought of writing to her, but was so afraid of saying something which he might afterwards regret, that he kept putting it off from time to time, until at last he could restrain himself no longer.
His letter ran as follows:—
“To much esteemed Miss Elizabeth Raklev—
“As concerning the Apollo, she lies in a row of other ships up in Selvig Sound, and the ice is about a foot thick, and will be late in breaking up this year, they all prophesy: she is well looked after, and has a watchman on board, and storage room has been taken for her rigging in Pettersen’s rigging-loft. But as touching her captain, to whom you said in Amsterdam you had given your full and first heart so firmly that it couldn’t be moved by any might or power in the world whatsoever—he has thought much and often about this, and would like to hold out and see you again before all his shore cable is chafed away. It seems as if it was holding by its last threads, and these half-scraped through. But if I could see you, it would become so strong again that it could hold against any stream; and you must forgive me for my weakness when you think of those five years; but I won’t say that it is your fault, neither make myself out better than I am, for I have confidence in you, Elizabeth, if I have not the same reliance upon myself, and I can’t help it if I haven’t. When you read this letter, Elizabeth, you must remember the poor sailor who is frozen up here, and not forget it afterwards till we meet again, which I would give half my life-blood or more for, if it was any use, as I am consuming away with impatience up here—I have such a longing to see you again. And now, farewell from my heart, and God bless you. I will trust you and hope in you till my last hour, come what may. Farewell, my dearest girl, with fond love from
“SALVÉ KRISTIANSEN.”
This letter cost Elizabeth many a tear. She sat over it in the evenings before she went to bed, and felt so poignantly that it was she who had brought him to this—that he could not trust her; for she understood but too well what lay between the lines. “If I could only be with him,” she thought, and she longed to be able to send him an answer; but she had never learnt properly how to write or to compose a letter.
With some difficulty, however, and after several ineffectual attempts, she managed to put two lines together which she remembered from the Catechism:—
“To my lover Salvé Kristiansen—
“You shall put your trust in God, and after Him, in me before all others, who careth for you in all things, and have faith in me. That is the truth from your ever-unforgetting “ELIZABETH RAKLEV. And in the spring, “ELIZABETH KRISTIANSEN.”
She folded the letter, and got one of Garvloit’s sons to write the address; but, that it might be certain to go, she went with it herself to the post-office.
Salvé received it one day with great surprise. He guessed from whom it came, and delayed opening it in the fear that it might contain a breaking off of their engagement occasioned by his own letter: he remembered that first morning in Amsterdam. What was his joy, then, when he found what the contents actually were; he seemed to have the thing now in black-and-white. He put the letter carefully back into his pocket-book every time after reading it, and for a while was quite another man. Still, it was high time that t
he ice should begin to break up, and that he should find occupation for his thoughts in work; he had begun to be afraid to be alone with them.
His first voyage was to Pürmurende, and thence to Amsterdam; and they determined to be married there and then, although he had but four days to stay while the brig was loading in Pürmurende. Out of consideration for the Garvloits, whom they wished to spare the expense of the wedding as much as possible, they insisted that they would be married on the day they were to leave for Pürmurende.
The morning on which the wedding took place, Garvloit’s house put forth all its splendour. Dress suits from former days of better circumstances were brought out from old boxes for the occasion; and Madam Garvloit appeared in a green-silk dress of stiff brocade, with a massive brooch, and a huge gilt comb that shone over her forehead like a piece of a crown. Garvloit, too, did his best; but his utmost endeavour had only availed to adapt one article of his grandfather’s state dress to his corpulent person—a gold-laced waistcoat namely, which was much too long for him, and which appeared to occasion him extreme discomfort in the region of the buttons.
A couple of old friends of the family and the children went with the pair to church, and also the skipper’s son from Vlieland, over whose round soft cheeks there trickled a regretful tear or two as the bride, with her myrtle wreath and long white veil, was led up to the altar by Garvloit. Elizabeth wore that day a pair of particularly handsome shoes with silver buckles, which Salvé, with glad surprise, recognised as the ones he had presented to her many years before.
There was an entertainment provided by Madam Garvloit when they returned from church, which was not a very lively affair, the Garvloits not being in spirits at the prospect of losing Elizabeth, and she, notwithstanding all her present happiness, being really sorry to go.
A couple of hours after, they were on their way to Pürmurende, and later on in the mellow evening, were standing together on the deck of the Apollo, as she was being towed up the wide canal. The bells were ringing out from Alkmar as they passed—ringing a sweet old chime of other days; and as they stood together by the ship’s side, silently listening to the changing tones from the tower as they mingled in the air above them, they pleased themselves with the thought that it was their wedding chime.
CHAPTER XXI
In a small house at Tonsberg, at the entrance to the beautiful Christiana fjord, the first summer of their married life passed without a cloud upon its sky. The house and all about it, with its flowers in each window, were a model of neatness and Dutch polish; and with Elizabeth herself as a centre to it all, it was no wonder that Salvé’s crew found him indifferent to all weathers when it was a question of getting home.
The charming young skipper’s wife, however, during her husband’s frequent absences, had attracted the notice of some of the leading families of the town, and had come presently to be if not exactly on intimate terms, at all events on a footing of acquaintanceship with many of them; and Salvé’s enjoyment of his home ceased then to be so perfectly unalloyed.
When Elizabeth recounted to him the flattering proofs of appreciation which she received, he listened in silence; and her social successes, instead of giving him pleasure, had a precisely opposite effect. He would not for the world have said a word to express his dislike of her making such acquaintances; and he even, when they went to church together on Sundays, liked her to be as well-dressed as any of these fine friends who now seemed to share his wife with him. But if he said nothing, and was even angry with himself for thinking about the subject, still he did think about it, and with increasing irritation. He could not get the idea out of his head that Elizabeth must now be always contrasting him unfavourably with these people; and as he paced the deck of his brig alone out at sea, he would picture them to himself as constantly in his house, and always talking on the subject which he could least endure—the sacrifice which Elizabeth must have made to become his wife.
When their son Gjert was born in the spring following their marriage, he had been sitting by Elizabeth’s bedside unable to tear himself away from her and the cradle, until a small present arrived from one of her friends in the town, who with others had often sent to inquire after her, when he got up and went straight out of the house and paced backwards and forwards with his hands behind his back outside, as she could see through the window, thoroughly out of humour, though when he came in again he was even more affectionate and attentive to her than before.
As she never for a moment imagined that he could think her deep love for him could be in any way affected by the slight surface interest which her new acquaintances afforded her, she looked upon his jealousy of them, of which she had had indications often enough before, as a weakness merely to which he ought to have been superior; and as he said nothing himself on the subject, she also let it pass without comment on her side, but determined at the same time that she would see less of them in future, at all events while he was at home.
It happened however, unluckily, some weeks afterwards, that she had just been talking to some of them when he returned from an expedition to Notterö to hire a crew for his next voyage to Amsterdam, on which she was to accompany him. “Herr Jurgensen and his wife,” she said, “had just passed, and she had been talking to them; they were to start for Frederiksvoern on the following day.”
“And fancy!” she went on with animation, “Fru Jurgensen knows Marie Forstberg. So I asked her to remember me to her.”
“Marie Forstberg?—who is she?” asked Salvé.
“She who was so kind to me,”—she stopped here, and the colour came and went in her face as she continued—“it was she who married—Beck’s son—the lieutenant.”
“You ought to have asked Fru Jurgensen to remember me to Beck then at the same time,” he said, cuttingly, and went past her into the house without looking her in the face.
Elizabeth followed him, feeling very uncomfortable, and after standing for a moment in indecision, went over to him, and sitting down on his knee, put her arm round his neck, saying—
“You are not angry with me, are you? I didn’t think you would mind, or I wouldn’t have done it.”
“Oh! it’s quite immaterial to me, of course, who you send your love to.”
“She was my best friend when I was—in Arendal,” Elizabeth said, avoiding the mention of Beck’s name again.
“I don’t doubt you are on the best possible terms with all these people,” Salvé said, impatiently, and making a movement as if he would get up from his seat.
It was Elizabeth who rose first.
“Salvé!” she exclaimed, and was about to add more, when he pulled her down to him again, and said in a gentle tone of remorse—
“Forgive me, Elizabeth. I didn’t mean what I said. But I do so hate hearing you talk of these people.”
Elizabeth burst into tears, protesting against his want of confidence in her; and Salvé, now thoroughly distressed at the result of his want of self-control, overwhelmed her with tenderness in his endeavours to appease her. He succeeded after a while, and the evening was passed in such sunshine as only succeeds to storm.
After a quarrel of the kind, however, there must be always something left behind, and though Salvé was doubly affectionate for many days, afterwards he grew more and more silent, and presently even irritable and moody, and would not go to church on any of the succeeding Sundays while he remained at home.
CHAPTER XXII
Elizabeth carried out her intention of accompanying him to Amsterdam, where she paid a visit of several days to the Garvloits, and the pleasure of the trip was only alloyed for her by the change which had come over Salvé’s manner, and to which she had now to try and accustom herself as one does to a less brilliant light after having seen the sun.
They were on their way home again, sailing before a light breeze, and under a soft blue sky, out of the busy, shallow
Zuyder Zee. Elizabeth was sitting on deck with little Gjert, blooming as a rose, and asking animated questions of the pilot, whom they had been compelled to take on board, about the various flat sandy islands and towns which came in sight from time to time, Salvé occasionally stopping in his walk to listen.
By Terschelling the channel from the Zuyder Zee to the North Sea is marked out like a narrow strait with black and red buoys; and even in that calm weather there were foaming breakers the whole way close to the ship on either side. “What must it be like,” Elizabeth asked, in a sort of terror, “in a storm, when the whole sea was driving in?”
“That is a sight it’s better not to see,” replied the pilot.
“But you have to be out, storm or not, pilot?”
“It is my way of getting a living,” he answered, shortly.
Salvé stood and listened, as the conversation took this turn.
“We have pilots in Norway, too,” she said, “who don’t mind a wet jacket either. It is a fine life!”
The Dutchman merely observed, coldly, in reply—
“In two successive years—it is three years ago now—they lost out here off Amland a total of fifty pilots.”
“Still, it is a fine life!” she said; and Salvé resumed his walk.
A couple of evenings after, the Apollo was pitching out on the Doggerbank in the moonlight, with a reef in her topsails. Elizabeth had not yet gone below, and was sitting with her child warmly wrapped up on her lap, while Salvé paced the deck and looked at her from time to time. A little farther off, near the main-hatch, Nils Buvaagen (whom Salvé had met again at Notterö, and persuaded to take service with him) and a couple of the crew who were off duty were engaged in story-telling, the others lounging about near them to listen. Elizabeth, too, was listening.