A Bookful Of Girls Part 2

Yet when she came up the companionway after breakfast, she found a stout rope stretched across the deck from stanchion to stanchion to hold on by, the steamer chairs all tied fast to the rail that runs around the deckhouse, and every preparation made for rough weather.

It was not what a sailor would have called a storm, but the sea was changed enough from the smiling calm of yesterday. Not many pa.s.sengers were on deck, half a dozen, only, reclining in their chairs in the lee of the deckhouse, close reefed in their heavy wraps; while here and there a pair of indefatigable promenaders lurched and slid along the heaving deck arm in arm, or clung to any chance support in a desperate effort to keep their footing.

Blythe had to buffet her way l.u.s.tily as she turned a corner to windward. Holding her golf-cape close about her and jamming her felt hat well down on her head, she made her way to the narrow pa.s.sageway forward of the wheel-house where one looks down into the steerage. The waves were dashing across the deck, which was deserted excepting for one or two dark-browed men crouched under shelter of the forecastle.

There was a light, drizzling rain, and now and then the spray struck against her face. Blythe looked up at the "crow's nest," which was describing strange geometrical figures against the sky. The lookouts in their oil-coats did not seem in the least to mind their erratic pa.s.sage through s.p.a.ce. She wished it were eight-bells and time for them to change watch; it was always such fun to see them running up the ladder, hand over hand, their quick, monkey-like figures silhouetted against the sky.

How n.o.bly the great ship forged ahead against an angry sea, climbing now to the crest of a big wave, and giving a long, shuddering shake of determination before plunging down into a black, swirling hollow!

And how the wind and the waters bellowed together!

The Captain was on the bridge in his rubber coat and sou'-wester. He had said this would not last long, and he had stopped for a second cup of coffee before leaving the table. All the same, Blythe would not have ventured to accost him now, even if he had pa.s.sed her way.

Presently she returned under shelter of the awning and let Gustav tuck her up in her chair to dry off. And Mr. DeWitt came and sat down beside her and instructed her in the delectable game of "Buried Cities," in which she became speedily so proficient that, taking her cue from the lettering on one of the lifeboats, she discovered the city of Bremen lying "buried" in "the som_bre men_ace of the sea!"

After a while, Gustav appeared before them, bearing a huge tray of _bouillon_ and sandwiches, with which he was striking the most eccentric angles; and Blythe discovered that she was preposterously hungry. And while her nose was still buried in her cup, she espied over its rim a pair of legs planted well apart, in the cause of equilibrium, and the big, pleasant voice of Mr. Grey made itself heard above wind and sea, saying, "Guess where I've been."

"In the smoking-room," was the prompt reply.

"Guess again."

"On the bridge,--only you wouldn't dare!"

"Once more."

"Oh, I know," Blythe cried, setting her thick cup down on the deck, and tumbling off her chair in a snarl of steamer-rugs; "You've been down in the steerage finding out about the little Signorina!"

"Who told you?"

"You did! You looked so pleased with yourself! Oh, do tell me all about her!"

"Well, I've had a long talk with the woman. Shall we walk up and down?"

And off they went, with that absence of ceremony which characterises life on shipboard, leaving Mr. DeWitt to bury his cities all unaided and unapplauded. Then, as the two walked up and down,--literally up and down, for the ship was pitching a bit, and sometimes they were labouring up-hill, and sometimes they were running down a steep incline,--as they walked up and down Mr. Grey told his story.

The woman, Giuditta, had confided to him all she knew, and he had surmised more. Giuditta had known the family only since the time, three years ago, when she had been called in to take care of the little Cecilia during the illness of the Signora. The father had been a handsome good-for-nothing, who had got shot in a street row in that quarter of New York known as "Little Italy." He was nothing,--_niente_, _niente_;--but the Signora! Oh, if the gentleman could but have known the Signora, so beautiful, so patient, so sad!

Giuditta had stayed with her and shared her fortunes, which were all, alas! misfortunes,--and had nursed her through a long decline. But never a word had she told of her own origin,--the beautiful Signora,--nor had her father's name ever pa.s.sed her lips.

Had she known that she was dying, perhaps then, for the child's sake, she might have forgotten her pride. But she was always thinking she should get well,--and then, one day, she died!

There was very little left,--only a few dollars; but among the squalid properties of the pitiful little stage where the poor young thing had enacted the last act of her tragedy, was one picture, a _Madonna_, with the painter's name, G. Bellini, just decipherable. It was a little picture, twelve inches by sixteen, in a dingy old frame, and not a pretty picture at that. But a kind man, a dealer in antiquities, had given Giuditta one hundred dollars for it. "Think of that, Signore! One hundred dollars for an ugly little black picture no bigger than that!"

"I suppose," Mr. Grey remarked, as they stood balancing themselves at an angle of many degrees,--"I suppose that the picture was genuine,--else the man would hardly have paid one hundred dollars for it."

"And would it be worth more than that?"

"A trifle," he replied, rather grimly. "Somewhere among the thousands."

"But why should they have kept such a picture when they were so poor?

Why didn't they sell it?"

"That would hardly have occurred to them. It was evidently a family heirloom that the girl had taken with her because she loved it. I doubt if she guessed its value. A Bellini! A Giovanni Bellini, in a New York tenement house! Think of it! And now I suppose some millionaire has got it. Likely enough somebody who doesn't know enough to buy his own pictures! Horrible idea! Horrible!" and Mr. Grey strode along, all but snorting with rage at the thought.

"But tell me more about the little girl," Blythe entreated, wishing the wind wouldn't blow her words out of her mouth so rudely. "Her name is Cecilia, you say?"

"Yes; Cecilia. Dopo is the name they went by, but the nurse doesn't think it genuine. Her idea is that her Signora was the daughter of some great family, and got herself disowned by marrying an opera singer who subsequently made a fiasco and dropped his name with his fame. She doesn't think Dopo ever was a family name. It means 'after,'

you know, and they may have adopted it for its ironical significance."

"And the poor lady died and never told!" Blythe panted, as they toiled painfully up-hill with the rain beating in their faces.

"Yes, and--look out! hold tight!" for suddenly the slant of the deck was reversed, and they came coasting down to an impromptu seat on a bench.

"It seems," Mr. Grey went on, when they had resumed their somewhat arduous promenade,--"it seems the woman, Giuditta, is quite alone in the world and has been longing to get back to Italy. So she easily persuaded herself that she could find the child's family and establish her in high life. Giuditta has an uncommonly high idea of high life,"

he added. "I think she imagines that somebody in a court train and a coronet will come to meet her Signorina at the pier in Genoa. Poor things! There'll be a rude awakening!"

"But we won't let it be rude!" Blythe protested. "We must do something about it. Can't you think of anything to do?"

They were standing now, clinging to the friendly rope stretched across the deck, shoulder high.

"Giuditta's plan," Mr. Grey replied, "is the nave one of appealing to the Queen about it. And, seriously, I think it may be worth while to ask the American Minister to make inquiries. For there is, of course, a bare chance that the family may be known at Court. In the meantime----"

"In the meantime," Blythe interposed, "we've got to get her out of the steerage!"

"But how?"

"Oh, Mamma will arrange that. We'll just make a cabin pa.s.senger of her, and I can take her in with me in my stateroom. Oh! how happy she will be, lying in my steamer chair, with that dear Gustav to wait on her! I must go down at once and get Mamma to say yes!"

"And you think she will?"

"I know she will! She is always doing nice things. If you really knew her you wouldn't doubt it!" And with that the young optimist vanished in her accustomed whirl of golf-cape.

If faith can move mountains, it is perhaps no wonder that the implicit and energetic faith of which Blythe Halliday was possessed proved equal to the removal of a small child from one quarter to another of the big ship. The three persons concerned in bringing about the change were easily won over; for Mrs. Halliday was quite of Blythe's mind in the matter, Mr. Grey had little difficulty in bringing the Captain to their point of view, while, as for Giuditta, she hailed the event as the first step in the transformation of her small Signorina into the little "great lady" she was born to be.

Accordingly, close upon luncheon time, when the sun was just breaking through the clouds, and the sea, true to the Captain's prediction, was already beginning to subside, the tiny Signorina was carried, in the strong arms of Gustav, up the steep gangway by the wheel-house, where Blythe and her mother, Mr. DeWitt and the poet, to say nothing of Captain Seemann himself, formed an impromptu reception committee for her little ladyship.

As the child was set on her feet at the head of the gangway, she turned to throw a kiss down upon her faithful Giuditta, and then, without the slightest hesitation, she placed her hand in Blythe's, and walked away with her.

That evening there was a dance on board the _Lorelei_; for it had been but the fringe of a storm which they had crossed, and the sea was again taking on its long, easy swell.

The deck presented a festal appearance for the occasion. Rows of j.a.panese lanterns were strung from side to side against the white background of awning and deckhouse, and the flags of many nations lent their gay colours to the pretty scene. The ship's orchestra was in its element, playing with a "go" and rhythm which seemed caught from the pulsing movement of the ship itself.

As Blythe, with Mr. DeWitt, who had been a famous dancer in his day, led off the Virginia Reel, she wondered how it would strike the sailors of a pa.s.sing brig,--this gay apparition of light and music, riding the great, dark, solemn sea.

The dance itself was rather a staid, middle-aged affair, for Blythe was the only young girl on board, and none but the youngest or the surest-footed could put much spirit into a dance where the law of gravitation was apparently changing base from moment to moment. Blythe and her partner, however, took little account of the moving floor beneath their feet, or the hesitating demeanour of their companions.

One after another, even the most reluctant and self-distrustful of the revellers found themselves caught up into active partic.i.p.ation in the figure.

In a quiet corner of the deck sat Mrs. Halliday, with little Cecilia beside her, snugly stowed away in a nest of steamer-rugs; for they could not bear to take her below, out of the fresh, invigorating air.

Their little guest spoke hardly any English, but, although Mrs.

Halliday was under the impression that she herself spoke Italian, the child seemed more conversable in Blythe's company than in that of any one else, not excepting Mr. Grey, about whose linguistic accomplishments there could be no question.