A Crime of the Under-seas Part 19

Now, of all those who had scoffed at Pennethorne's theories, the most persistent was William Pevis Farrington, afterwards His Honour Mr.

Justice Farrington. In the middle of his happiness, Pennethorne had invited the judge, if ever he should be travelling that way, etc.--you know the usual sort of thing--to put in a day or two with him, and see for himself how things stood. About a year later Farrington did happen to be somewhere in the district and called as requested.

Meeting his host near the homestead, they rode up together, and Farrington noticed that Pennethorne decidedly looked his age. When they reached the house the latter, leaving his guest in the dining-room, went in search of his wife, to return about ten minutes later saying she was unwell. They dined alone. All through the meal Pennethorne seemed disturbed and uncomfortable, and when it was over led the way into the garden, where he said abruptly, "Farrington, you think me a madman, don't you?"

The judge mumbled the only thing he could think of at the moment, and endeavoured to push the conversation off to a side track by an inquiry after Mrs. Pennethorne's health. It had precisely the contrary effect to what he intended.

His friend had twelve years' arrears to work off before he could be considered, conversationally, a decent companion. So, setting to work, he poured into the unfortunate judge's ears his granary of theories, facts, and arguments. He marshalled his arguments, backed them up with his theories, and clinched all with his facts, his voice rising from its usual placid level to a higher note of almost childish entreaty.

Unconsciously he was endeavouring to convince himself, through the medium of a second person, of the wisdom contained in his marriage experiment.

Farrington listened attentively. His trained mind distinguished between what the other believed and what he was endeavouring to prove against his own convictions. However, he could see that the keynote of the whole harangue was Failure, but as every one admitted that the last experiment had proved entirely successful, in what direction did such failure lie?

He was more than a little mixed, and by delicate cross-examination elicited certain facts that puzzled him still more.

One thing was plainly evident: Pennethorne was very much in love with his wife. In the first place he was given to understand that no man could desire a more amiable wife than Mrs. Pennethorne had proved herself to be. This heading included virtues too numerous to mention--but she was not well. Nor could any man desire a more _accomplished_ wife than Mrs. Pennethorne, who was fit to be the helpmate of an Oxford Don--but she was not well. His a.s.sertions always had the same refrain--"She was not well!"

Because he could not understand, Farrington became deeply interested.

Just before daylight the judge was wakened by his host. He saw in an instant that something terrible had happened.

_Mrs. Pennethorne had disappeared in the night, her husband knew not whither!_

Even with his teeth chattering in his head, and his palsied old hand rattling the candlestick, he was compelled to state _his theory_ of her absence.

Farrington, seeing he was not responsible for his actions, acted for him. He routed out all the station hands and scoured the country. They spent all day searching the scrub, dragging the dams and waterholes, and at nightfall had to give it up as hopeless.

Farrington and Pennethorne rode home together. Pa.s.sing through a rocky gully, they noticed the smoke of a camp fire floating up into the still night air, and rode up to make inquiries. The blacks were at their evening meal. One filthy girl raised her head and looked up at them from her frowsy blankets. _It was Mrs. Pennethorne!_

After thirteen years of civilization the race instinct had proved too strong: the reek of the camp fires, the call of the Bush, and the fascination of the old savage life had come back upon her with double intensity, and so the last theory had to be written down a failure.

_Q.E.D._

Cupid and Psyche

"Handsome, amiable, and clever, With a fortune and a wife; So I make my start whenever I would build the fancy life.

After all the bright ideal, What a gulf there is between Things that are, alas! too real And the things that might have been!"

--Henry S. Leigh.

His name upon the ship's books was Edward Braithwaite Colchester, but between Tilbury and Sydney Harbour he was better known as Cupid. His mother was a widow with four more olive branches, absolutely dependent on her own and Teddy's exertions.

At the best of times Kindergartens for the children of respectable tradespeople are not particularly remunerative, and the semi-detached villa in Sydenham was often sorely tried for petty cash. But when Teddy was appointed fourth officer of the X.Y.Z. Company's steamship _Cambrian Prince_, endless possibilities were opened up.

If you will remember that everything in this world is ordained to a certain end, you will see that Teddy's future entirely depended on his falling in love--first love, of course, and not the matter-of-fact business-like affair that follows later.

After his second voyage he obtained a fortnight's leave and hastened home. Being fond of tennis and such-like amus.e.m.e.nts, he was naturally brought into contact with many charming girls, who, because he was a strange man and a sailor, were effusively polite. Then he fell hopelessly in love with a horribly impossible girl, and in the excitement of the latest waltz proposed, and was accepted, on the strength of a fourth officer's pay, an incipient moustache, and a dozen or so bra.s.s b.u.t.tons.

During the next voyage his behaviour towards unmarried women was marked by that circ.u.mspection which should always characterize an engaged man.

He never allowed himself to forget this for an instant, and his cabin had for its chief ornament a plush-framed likeness of a young lady gazing, with a wistful expression, over a palpably photographic sea.

Now, it was necessary for his ultimate happiness that Teddy Colchester should learn that, like his own bra.s.s b.u.t.tons, without constant burnishing, a young lady's affection is apt to lose much of its pristine brightness, and that too much sea air is good for neither. He ticked off the days of absence, and, as his calendar lessened, his affection increased.

At Plymouth a letter met him--a jerky, inky, schoolgirl epistle, evidently written by a writer very cold and miserable; and the first reading stunned him. Had he seen a little more of the real world, he would have been able to read between the lines something to this effect: "You're Teddy, three months away, and I'm madly in love with a soldier."

Then he would have noted that the writer was staying in Salisbury, after which he would have hunted up his home papers and discovered that the Royal Wiltshire Yeomanry Cavalry were encamped at Humington Down. But as he had only seen life through a telescope, he could not do this, consequently his pain was a trifle acute.

His mother wrote him four pages of sympathy. But though she wondered at any girl jilting her boy, she could not help a feeling of satisfaction at its being still in her power to trans.m.u.te three-quarters of his pay into food and raiment for her brood.

Next voyage the _Cambrian Prince_ had her full complement of pa.s.sengers, and the "Kangaroo Girl," whom perhaps you may remember, was of the number. At Plymouth a little reserved girl joined, and as she is considerably mixed up in this story, you must know that she rejoiced in the unpretentious name of Hinks.

For the first week or so Teddy held very much aloof from the pa.s.sengers, engaging himself entirely with recollections of the girl for whose sake he was going to live "only in a memory."

Being an honest, straightforward young fellow, he of course followed the prescribed programme of all blighted love affairs. He began by pitying himself for the sorrow he was undergoing, then went on to picture the future that might have been theirs had she married him; but before they were clear of the Bay he had arrived at the invariable conclusion, and was pitying himself for pitying the girl who was foolish enough to jilt such an entirely estimable young man as Edward Braithwaite Colchester.

One moonlight night, after leaving "Gib," he was leaning over the rails of the promenade deck, feeling sympathetically inclined to the world in general, when somebody stepped up beside him. It was Miss Hinks. She prefaced her conversation with two or three questions about the sea, and he made the astounding discovery that her voice possessed just the note of sympathy he required for his complaint. He had felt sorry for her because other people snubbed her, and she for him because she had been told exaggerated stories about his love affair. Together they made rather a curious couple.

[Ill.u.s.tration: "One moonlight night ... somebody stepped up beside him."]

When, under the supervision of the "Kangaroo Girl," the sh.o.r.e parties for Naples were being organized, Miss Hinks was tacitly left out.

Somehow the impression got about that she was poor, and no one cared about paying her expenses. But eventually she did go, and it was in the charge of the fourth officer. When she thanked him for his kindness, he forgot for the moment his pledge "to live henceforth only in a memory."

The "Kangaroo Girl," on discovering that Miss Hinks _had_ been on sh.o.r.e, under the escort of that "dear little pink officer," was vastly amused, and christened them Cupid and Psyche.

Now, the end of it all was, that Teddy began to find himself caring less and less for the thumb-stained photograph in his locker, and more and more for the privilege of pumping his sorrows into a certain sympathetic ear. Shipboard allows so many opportunities of meeting; and, strange as it may appear, a broken heart is quickest mended when subjected to a second rending. This cure is based on the h.o.m.oeopathic principle of like curing like.

By the time they reached Aden he had convinced himself that his first love affair had been the result of a too generous nature, and that this second was the one and only _real_ pa.s.sion of his life.

At Colombo Miss Hinks went ash.o.r.e with the doctor's party--tiffined at Mount Lavinia, dined at the Grand Oriental, and started back for the ship about nine o'clock.

Teddy, begrimed with coal-dust, watched each boat load arrive, and as he did so his love increased.

On account of the coal barges it was impossible for boats to come alongside, consequently their freight had to clamber from hulk to hulk.

Miss Hinks was the last of her party to venture; and just as the doctor, holding out his hand, told her to jump, the hulk swayed out and she fell with a scream into the void. Then, before any one could realize what had happened, the barge rolled back into its place. Miss Hinks had disappeared.

Teddy, from half-way up the gangway, tore off his coat, leapt into the water, and, at the risk of having his brains knocked out, dived and plunged between the boats, but without success. Then he saw something white astern, and swam towards it.

The half-drowned couple must have come to an understanding in the rescuing-boat, for next day their engagement was announced.

The "Kangaroo Girl" gave evidence of her wit when she said, "It was fortunate they were Cupid and Psyche, otherwise they would find love rather insufficient capital to begin housekeeping upon!"

Teddy wrote to his mother from Adelaide, and she, poor woman, was not best pleased to hear the news. But a surprise was in store for us all.

On the _Cambrian Prince's_ arrival in Sydney, Miss Hinks was met by an intensely respectable old gentleman, who, it appeared, was her solicitor. On being informed of the engagement, he examined Teddy with peculiar interest, and asked if he were aware of his good fortune. Miss Hinks smiled.