She picked out the one face which she knew, and which it pained her to lose. By gestures and smiles, with a tear in the eye, she tried to make amends to Joséphine for the hasty parting, the half-spoken words. The maid on her side was in tears, and after the French fashion was proud of them. So the last minute came. The paddles were already turning, the ship was going slowly astern, when a man pushed his way through the crowd. He clutched the ladder as it was unhooked, and at some risk and much loss of dignity he was bundled on board. There was a lamp amidships, and, as he regained his balance, Mary, smiling in spite of herself, saw that he was an Englishman, a man about thirty, and plainly dressed. Then in her anxiety to see the last of Joséphine she crossed the deck as the ship went about, and she lost sight of him.
She continued to look back and to wave her handkerchief, until nothing remained but a light or two in a bank of shadow. That was the last she was to see of the land which had been her home for ten years; and chilled and lonely she turned about and did what, had she been an older traveller, she would have done before. She sought the after-cabin. Alas, a glance from the foot of the companion was enough! Every place was taken, every couch occupied, and the air, already close, repelled her. She climbed to the deck again, and was seeking some corner where she could sit, sheltered from the wind and rain, when the captain saw her and fell foul of her.
“Now, young lady,” he said, “no woman’s allowed on deck at night!”
“Oh, but,” she protested, “there’s no room downstairs!”
“Won’t do,” he answered roughly. “Lost a woman overboard once, and as much trouble about her as about all the men, drunk or sober, I’ve ever carried. All women below, all women below, is the order! Besides,” more amicably, as he saw by a ray of lantern-light that she was young and comely, “it’s wet, my dear, and going to be d — d wet, and as dark as Wapping!”
“But I’ve a cloak,” she petitioned, “if I sit quite still, and — —”
A tall form loomed up at the captain’s elbow. “This is the lady I am looking for,” the new-comer said. “It will be all right, Captain Jones.”
The captain turned sharply. “Oh, my lord,” he said, “I didn’t know; but with petticoats and a dark night, blest if you know where you are! I’m sure I beg the young lady’s pardon. Quite right, my lord, quite right!” With a rough salute he went forward and the darkness swallowed him.
“Lord Audley?” Mary said. She spoke quietly, but to do so she had to steady her voice.
“Yes,” he replied. “I knew that you were crossing to-night, and as I had to go over this week I chose this evening. I’ve reserved a cabin for you.”
“Oh, but,” she remonstrated, “I don’t think you should have done that! I don’t know that I can — —”
“Afford it?” he said coolly. “Then — as it is a matter of some shillings — your kinsman will presume to pay for it.”
It was a small thing, and she let it pass. “But who told you,” she asked, “that I was crossing to-night?”
“The Princess. You don’t feel, I suppose, that as you are crossing, it was my duty to stay in France?”
“Oh no!” she protested.
“But you are not sure whether you are more pleased or more vexed? Well, let me show you where your cabin is — it is the size of a milliner’s box, but by morning you will be glad of it, and that may turn the scale. Moreover,” as he led the way across the deck, “the steward’s boy, when he is not serving gin below, will serve tea above, and at sea tea is not to be scorned. That’s your number — 7. And there is the boy. Boy!” he called in a voice that ensured obedience, “Tea and bread and butter for this lady in number 7 in an hour. See it is there, my lad!”
She smiled. “I think the tea and bread and butter may turn the scale,” she said.
“Right,” he replied. “Then, as it is only eight o’clock, why should we not sit in the shelter of this tarpaulin? I see that there are two seats. They might have been put for us.”
“Is it possible that they were?” she asked shrewdly. “Well, why not?”
She had no reason to give — and the temptation was great. Five minutes before she had been the most lonely creature in the world. The parting from Joséphine, the discomfort of the boat, the dark sea and the darker horizon, the captain’s rough words, had brought the tears to her eyes. And then, in a moment, to be thought of, provided for, kindly entreated, to be lapped in attentions as in a cloak — in very fact, in another second a warm cloak was about her — who could expect her to refuse this? Moreover, he was her kinsman; probably she owed it to him that she was here.
At any rate she thought that it would be prudish to demur, and she took one of the seats in the lee of the screen. Audley tucked the cloak about her, and took the other. The light of a lantern fell on their faces and the few passengers who still tramped the windy deck could see the pair, and doubtless envied him their shelter. “Are you comfortable?” he inquired — but before she could answer he whistled softly.
“What is it?” Mary asked.
“Not much.” He laughed to himself.
Then she saw coming along the deck towards them a man who had not found his sea-legs. As he approached he took little runs, and now brought up against the rail, now clutched at a stay. Mary knew the man again. “He nearly missed the boat,” she whispered.
“Did he?” her companion answered in the same tone. “Well, if he had quite missed it, I’d have forgiven him. He is going to be ill, I’ll wager!”
When the man was close to them he reeled, and to save himself he grasped the end of their screen. His eyes met theirs. He was past much show of emotion, but his voice rose as he exclaimed, “Audley. Is that you?”
“It is. We are in for a rough night, I’m afraid.”
“And — pardon me,” the stranger hesitated, peering at them, “is that Miss Audley with you?”
“Yes,” Mary said, much surprised.
“Oh!”
“This is Mr. Basset,” Audley explained. Mary stared at the stranger. The name conveyed nothing to her.
“I came to meet you,” he said, speaking with difficulty, and now and again casting a wild eye abroad as the deck heaved under him. “But I expected to find you at the hotel, and I waited there until I nearly missed the boat. Even then I felt that I ought to learn if you were on board, and I came up to see.”
“I am very much obliged to you,” Mary answered politely, “but I am quite comfortable, thank you. It is close below, and Lord Audley found this seat for me. And I have a cabin.”
“Oh yes!” he answered. “I think I will go down then if you — if you are sure you want nothing.”
“Nothing, thank you,” Mary answered with decision.
“I think I — I’ll go, then. Good-night!”
With that he went, making desperate tacks in the direction of the companion. Unfortunately what he gained in speed he lost in dignity, and before he reached the hatch Lord Audley gave way to laughter.
“Oh, don’t!” Mary cried. “He will hear you. And it was kind of him to look for me when he was not well.”
But Audley only laughed the more. “You don’t catch the full flavor of it,” he said. “He’s come three hundred miles to meet you, and he’s too ill to do anything now he’s here!”
“Three hundred miles to meet me!” she cried in astonishment.
“Every yard of it! Don’t you know who he is? He’s Peter Basset, your uncle’s nephew by marriage, who lives with him. He’s come, or rather your uncle has sent him, all the way from Stafford to meet you — and he’s gone to lie down! He’s gone to lie down! There’s a squire of dames for you! Upon my honor, I never knew anything richer!”
And my lord’s laughter broke out anew.
CHAPTER V
THE LONDON PACKET
Mary laughed with him, but she was not comfortable. What she had seen of the stranger, a man plain in feature and ordinary in figure, one whom the eye would not have remarked in a crowd, did not especi
ally commend him. And certainly he had not shown himself equal to a difficult situation. But the effort he had made to come to her help appealed to her generosity, and she was not sure how far she formed a part of the comedy. So her laughter was from the lips only, and brief. Then, “My uncle’s nephew?” she asked thoughtfully.
“His wife’s nephew. Your uncle married a Basset.”
“But why did he send him to meet me?”
“For a simple reason — I should say that he had no one else to send. Your uncle is not a man of many friends.”
“I understood that some one would meet the boat in London,” she said. “But I expected a woman.”
“I fancy the woman would be to seek,” he replied. “And Basset is a kind of tame cat at the Gatehouse. He lives there a part of the year, though he has an old place of his own up the country. He’s a Staffordshire man born and bred, and I dare say a good fellow in his way, but a dull dog! a dull dog! Are you sure that the wind does not catch you?”
She said that she was very comfortable, and they were silent awhile, listening to the monotonous slapping of a rope against the mast and the wash of the waves as they surged past the beam. A single light at the end of the breakwater shone in the darkness behind them. She marked the light grow smaller and more distant, and her thoughts went back to the convent school, to her father, to the third-floor where for a time they had been together, to his care for her — feeble and inefficient, to his illness. And a lump rose in her throat, her hands gripped one another as she strove to hide her feelings. In her heart she whispered a farewell. She was turning her back on her father’s grave. The last tendril which bound her to the old life was breaking.
The light vanished, and gradually the girl’s reflections sought a new channel. They turned from the past to the present, and dwelt on the man beside her, who had not only thought of her comfort, who had not only saved her from some hours of loneliness, but had probably wrought this change in her life. This was the third time only that she had seen him. Once, some days after that memorable evening, he had called at the Hôtel Lambert, and her employer had sent for her. He had greeted her courteously in the Princess’s presence, had asked her kindly if she had heard from England, and had led her to believe that she would hear. And she remembered with a blush that the Princess had looked from one to the other with a smile, and afterwards had had another manner for her.
Meanwhile the man wondered what she was thinking, and waited for her to give him the clue. But she was so long silent that his patience wore thin. It was not for this, it was not to sit silent beside her, that he had taken a night journey and secured these cosey seats.
“Well?” he said at last.
She turned to him, her eyes wet with tears. “It seems so strange,” she murmured, “to be leaving all and going into a world in which I know no one.”
“Except the head of your family.”
“Except you! I suppose that I owe it to you that I am here?”
“I should be happy if I thought so,” he replied, with careful reticence. “But we set a stone rolling, we do not know where it falls. You will soon learn — Basset will tell you, if I don’t — that your uncle and I are not on good terms. Therefore it is unlikely that he was moved by what I said.”
“But you said something?”
“If I did,” he answered, smiling, “it was against the grain — who likes to put his finger between the door and the jamb? And let me caution you. Your uncle will not suffer meddling on my part, still less a reminder of it. Therefore, as you are going to owe all to him, you will do well to be silent about me.”
She was sure that she owed all to him, and she might have said so, but at that moment the boat changed its course and the full force of the wind struck them. The salt spray whipped and stung their faces. Her cloak flew out like a balloon, her scarf pennon-wise, the tarpaulin flapped like some huge bird. He had to spring to the screen, to adjust it to the new course, to secure and tuck in her cloak — and all in haste, with exclamations and laughter, while Mary, sharing the joy of the struggle, and braced by the sting of the salt wind, felt her heart rise. How kind he was, and how strong. How he towered above ordinary men. How safe she felt in his care.
When they were settled anew, she asked him to tell her something about the Gatehouse.
“It’s a lonely place,” he said. “It is quite out of the world. I don’t know, indeed, how you will exist after the life you have led.”
“The life I have led!” she protested. “But that is absurd! Though you saw me in the Princess’s salon, you know that my life had nothing in common with hers. I was downstairs no more than three or four times, and then merely to interpret. My life was spent between whitewashed walls, on bare floors. I slept in a room with twenty children, ate with forty — onion soup and thick tartines. The evening I saw you I wore shoes which the maid lent me. And with all that I was thankful, most thankful, to have such a refuge. The great people who met at the Princess’s — —”
“And who thought that they were making history!” he laughed. “Did you know that? Did you know that the Princess was looking to them to save the last morsel of Poland?”
“No,” she said. “I did not know. I am very ignorant. But if I were a man, I should love to do things like that.”
“I believe you would!” he replied. “Well, there are crusades in England. Only I fear that you will not be in the way of them.”
“And I am not a princess! But tell me, please, what are they?”
“You will not be long before you come upon one,” he replied, a hint of derision in his tone. “You will see a placard in the streets, ‘Shall the people’s bread be taxed?’ Not quite so romantic as the independence of Poland? But I can tell you that heads are quite as likely to be broken over it.”
“Surely,” she said, “there can be only one answer to that.”
“Just so,” he replied dryly. “But what is the answer? The land claims high prices that it may thrive; the towns claim cheap bread that they may live. Each says that the country depends upon it. ‘England self-supporting!’ says one. ‘England the workshop of the world!’ says the other.”
“I begin to see.”
“‘The land is the strength of the country,’ argues the squire. ‘Down with monopoly,’ cries the cotton lord. Then each arms himself with a sword lately forged and called ‘Philanthropy,’ and with that he searches for chinks in the other’s armor. ‘See how factories work the babes, drive the women underground, ruin the race,’ shout the squires. ‘Vote for the land and starvation wages,’ shout the mill-owners.”
“But does no one try to find the answer?” she asked timidly. “Try to find out what is best for the people?”
“Ah!” he rejoined, “if by the people you mean the lower classes, they cry, ‘Give us not bread, but votes!’ And the squires say that that is what the traders who have just got votes don’t mean to give them; and so, to divert their attention, dangle cheap bread before their noses!”
Mary sighed. “I am afraid that I must give it up,” she said. “I am so ignorant.”
“Well,” he replied thoughtfully. “Many are puzzled which side to take, and are waiting to see how the cat jumps. In the meantime every fence is placarded with ‘Speed the Plough!’ on one side, and ‘The Big Loaf!’ on the other. The first man you meet thinks the landlord a devourer of widows’ houses; to the next the mill-owner is an ogre grinding men’s bones to make his bread. Even at the Gatehouse I doubt if you will escape the excitement, though there is not a field of wheat within a mile of it!”
“To me it is like a new world,” she said.
“Then, when you are in the new world,” he replied, smiling as he rose, “do not forget Columbus! But here is the lad to tell you that your tea is ready.”
He repented when Mary had left him that he had not made better use of his time. It had been his purpose to make such an impression on the girl as might be of use in the future, and he wondered why he had not devoted himself more
singly to this; why he had allowed minutes which might have been given to intimate subjects to be wasted in a dry discussion. But there was a quality in Mary that did not lightly invite to gallantry — a gravity and a balance that, had he looked closely into the matter, might have explained his laches.
And in fact he had builded better than he knew, for while he reproached himself, Mary, safe within the tiny bathing machine which the packet company called a cabin, was giving much thought to him. The dip-candle, set within a horn lantern, threw its light on the one comfortable object, the tea-tray, seated beside which she reviewed what had happened, and found it all interesting; his meeting with her, his thought for her, the glimpses he had given her of things beyond the horizon of the convent school, even his diversion into politics. He was not on good terms with her uncle, and it was unlikely that she would see more of him. But she was sure that she would always remember his appearance on the threshold of her new life, that she would always recall with gratitude this crossing and the kindness which had lapped her about and saved her from loneliness.
In her eyes he figured as one of the brilliant circle of the Hôtel Lambert. For her he played a part in great movements and high enterprises such as those which he had revealed to her. His light treatment of them, his air of detachment, had, indeed, chilled her at times; but these were perhaps natural in one who viewed from above and from a distance the ills which it was his task to treat. How ignorant he must think her! How remote from the plane on which he lived, the standards by which he judged, the objects at which he aimed! Yet he had stooped to explain things to her and to make them clear.
She spent an hour deep in thought, and, strange as the life of the ship was to her, she was deaf to the creaking of the timbers, and the surge of the waves as they swept past the beam. At intervals hoarse orders, a rush of feet across the deck, the more regular tramp of rare passengers, caught her attention, only to lose it as quickly. It was late when she roused herself. She saw that the candle was burning low, and she began to make her arrangements for the night.
Complete Works of Stanley J Weyman Page 579