An Unknown Lover Part 23

"Ah! I'm so glad. I was afraid you'd be shocked. And you will help?

He needs a man friend--a strong man--who will be kind, and not judge.

And you can be with him more, do so much more than I."

"I'm afraid he is very ill."

The tone, like the words, seemed lacking in fervour. Katrine had spoken with so intimate an appeal for help that she could not resist a momentary chill. She sat silent, wondering if she had been too quick to claim the privileges of friendship, recalling for her own comfort Jim Blair's words: "A curt, shy manner." That was the explanation! Only manner. The deep, smiling glance had already pledged help. She might be satisfied of its fulfilment.

After dinner Bedford joined her on deck. The vessel was steaming its slow course through the ca.n.a.l, and Katrine leaned over the rail gazing at the monotonous banks, listening to her companion's explanatory conversation with difficult attention. She was so much more interested in himself than in geographical facts; she wanted to talk of himself, his health, of his winter's experiences!

"Six miles an hour... Even if we put on full steam we could go no faster, for the bed is so narrow that if the screw revolves too rapidly, it merely draws the water backwards. Extra depth would be even more valuable than extra width. Years ago I was on board the _Ophir_, and we entered the ca.n.a.l to find a German vessel run aground. For five days we were stuck there until sixty-three vessels were waiting to get through."

"Sixty-three!" Katrine was startled out of her indifference. "For five days! What did you do?"

"Fifty-five of the boats flew the English flag. Their pa.s.sengers amused themselves playing cricket and polo in the desert. The others--swore!"

"But--" Katrine looked blank, "it might have been dreadful! Suppose there had been a war! What would they have done then?"

Captain Bedford smiled, but with a slight curl of the lip.

"Played cricket still, and--muddled through! When do we do anything else! In 1882, when Arabi was upsetting things in Egypt we sent a string of gunboats and transports along the ca.n.a.l and one ran aground.

If she had lain in the middle of the channel instead of at the side-- well! Wolseley's plans might not have come off. As it was, she lay near enough to the bank to allow the others to be towed past with ropes."

"Really? Yes. How interesting!" murmured Katrine vaguely. In the pause which followed she was conscious of a sound like that of a suppressed laugh, and turning round beheld her companion's eyes twinkling with an amus.e.m.e.nt so infectious that she laughed in sympathy.

"Well, but I'm _not_ interested!" she confessed boldly. "There is so much else... Now that we have pa.s.sed Port Said, I feel quite near to India, and there are so many personal things that I am longing to ask.-- It is months since you have seen them all, but for me it has been years.

Five years since Dorothea sailed, and she is my nearest friend. You know her intimately, of course. And Jack! Shall I find them changed?"

"In outward appearance? Yes! India ages; but they are the sort that keep young at heart. Jack wears well; growing a trifle grey perhaps; she is too thin, and the boy is like her,--all spirit, too little flesh.

Amusing little rascal!"

"Yes." Katrine resumed her former position, arms resting on the rail, head turned aside. The Lake of Menzaleh stretched to the western horizon, its surface dotted with fishing boats, and covered with vast flocks of pelicans, flamingoes, and duck, which, unlike the fishermen, had caught all the fish they desired, and were now settling for the night. There was a strangeness, an unreality about the scene, which gave it the substance of a dream.

"And--Captain Blair?" Katrine queried softly.

It was an effort to introduce the name, but she was determined to do so; nay, more, a mysterious impulse seemed to urge her to intimate something of the true position, to let this man realise that she and Jim Blair were more to each other than mere hearsay acquaintances. She stared before her, her profile pale in the waning light. "I have never seen him, but, through Dorothea, we know each other quite well. He has written to me,--been so kind--sent me bra.s.ses--"

"Yes."

"So, of course, I am interested! Is he nice?"

Captain Bedford smiled.

"Nice! What composes a woman's idea of 'nice'? Honestly, it is not exactly the word I should have chosen as a description!"

She turned her head, alert and startled.

"You don't like him?"

"Oh, pardon me, I _do_!" He considered a moment, then added with emphasis. "Extremely. As a matter of fact, more than any other fellow in the regiment, but 'nice' seems to picture a different type. He is not handsome."

"Oh, I know! What does that matter?" Katrine's voice took an impatient tone. "Every one says the same thing,--Dorothea, you, himself,--and it is so unilluminating! I have asked so often for a description, and it has never gone further than that: 'He is not handsome!'"

Captain Bedford laughed.

"That must be because he has no distinctive features. What would describe him, would apply equally well to a dozen others. Isn't that often the case? Take these men on board!--how many of them could you describe to me so that I could pick them out of the ruck?"

"But I don't like people who are alike!" objected Katrine pettishly. "I wanted Captain Blair to be different. However, I shall soon be able to judge for myself. Handsomeness doesn't matter, but personality does. I can feel in a minute whether I am going to care for a person or not. I want to care for--Dorothea's friends!"

Captain Bedford did not answer; he stood tall and straight by her side, his face set in a mask-like composure, but Katrine was conscious that he understood the implication. His silence was more eloquent than words.

The dusk fell; out of the glare of the vessel's searchlight the banks glided by, melting into the great desert beyond. Katrine bade her companion good-night, and retired early to rest. Mrs Mannering had not yet descended, and for once Katrine regretted her company, and ceaseless flow of conversation. Her own thoughts were out of control. It was only by an effort that she could concentrate them on Jim Blair, as was her custom in moments of leisure, for Jim had contradicted himself, and blurred his own image, while another personality had sprung vividly into life. She fell asleep with Jim's name on her lips, wafting towards him mental messages of hope, but when dreams came, she dreamt of grey eyes in a sunburnt face, and waking before dawn, lay conscious, seeing them once again.

CHAPTER TWENTY THREE.

The view on reaching the deck the next morning was strangely impressive to Katrine's unaccustomed eyes. The sun's rays flooded the great waste of sand, a limitless expanse crossed by ridges of barren hill. Not a tree or a blade of gra.s.s was in sight. All that Katrine had read and imagined of desert places had not prepared her for such absolute dearth, and the thought of her own green, sweet-smelling land came back to her with the traveller's first pang of home-sickness. A clergyman father was discoursing to a young son and daughter on the probable cause which had transformed the once fertile Lower Egypt and Palestine into their present and poverty. Katrine, listening with a wandering attention, gained an impression of camels _versus_ horses. The Egyptians, declared the cleric, were a race of hors.e.m.e.n, owning sheep and cattle, cultivating the soil. Palm trees shaded the surface, and extracted dew from the air. Later, following the dominion of the Pharaohs, bands of nomadic Arabs wandered over the land with herds of camels, which consumed young trees, in preference to gra.s.s. The centuries pa.s.sed, and as the old trees died, and no new ones survived to take their places, the exposed gra.s.s withered and died. The clergyman proceeded to ill.u.s.trate his theories by pointing out the results of cutting down the forests of Australia, and Katrine went down to breakfast, recalling the garden at The Glen, with the shining drops of water standing on every leaf and twig, the sweet, moist smell of the earth. Already with this first sight of the East, England had become dearer, more beautiful.

Captain Bedford had not appeared. Katrine knew a pang of disappointment at the sight of his empty place, but each moment which pa.s.sed seemed to deepen a nervous shrinking at the thought of meeting. Had she said too much last night, been too confiding, presumed too much on his help? She must be careful to show that she exacted nothing. It was pleasant, of course, to have some one on board to whom one could appeal in an emergency, but companionship was another matter. She must keep out of his way. She hurried through her breakfast, reached the deck with a gasp of relief, and ensconced her chair in the quietest corner of the shady side of the deck. Gradually, as the next hour pa.s.sed by, the chairs around her were filled, until she sat hedged in, and hidden from the pa.s.sing glance. A book served as a screen, behind which she could study her companions, and peer nervously at each newcomer. An hour pa.s.sed before Captain Bedford came in sight, looking taller, browner than ever, in a loose white suit. Katrine spied him afar off, caught the quick turn of his head, searching the rows of chairs, and involuntarily bent lower to conceal her face from view. She kept her head bent, the blood rising in her cheeks, until a child's cry, followed by a general ripple of laughter from the surrounding throng, roused her curiosity. She recognised the cry as coming from an urchin of three or four years, a noisy, obstreperous morsel, especially abhorred by elderly pa.s.sengers, and raising her head beheld him swinging with clasped hand from the end of Bedford's coat, his small fat feet kicking viciously at the white trousered legs. The brilliant idea of annoying a new-comer had occurred to the imp just at the moment when the Captain happened to pa.s.s by, and for the moment the situation was his own. Only for a moment; then a strong, lean hand detached his grasp, and lifting him as lightly as a giant would lift a pigmy brought him round face to face.

Then the lookers-on beheld an amusing scene, as regarding him the while with a calm, expressionless face, the big man taught the youngster a lesson out of his own book. Gently, deliberately he swung him to and fro by the tails of his own short coat, reversed him slowly, so that for a breathless moment he dangled by his feet, balanced him by the chin, tucked him under one arm, brought him out beneath the other, and finally swung him over one shoulder, and dropped him lightly as a feather upon the deck.

The urchin staggered against the gunwale, and gaped bewilderment. Up till now, frowns and threats had been his only punishment, and to these he was scornfully impervious. "They" were always "going to," but "they"

never "did." To provoke a storm of invective was the deliberate object of his tricks; he pranced the deck during its delivery, rejoicing in his triumph, but now for the first time he had met his master. He stood staring, his fat face blank with surprise, while the onlookers chuckled approval, seeing themselves avenged in this humiliation of a common enemy.

As Bedford straightened himself, his eyes met Katrine's, and contracted in quick recognition. The flushed, laughing face stood out in charming contrast among the pallid, elderly throng, but the laughter was replaced by embarra.s.sment, as scattering apologies to right and left, Bedford made a bee line towards her through the serried chairs, and seated himself on the deck at her feet.

"Morning, Miss Beverley! I was wondering where you had hidden yourself!"

"Good morning. Thank you very much! I've wondered several times how one would be able to endure the Red Sea, _and_ Jackey at the same time, but he will have no spirit left in him, after _that_ trouncing! He deserved it, little wretch, but--are you always as drastic in your retaliations?"

Sitting on the deck, his hands clasped round his knees, looking up smiling into her face, he looked young, almost boyish, despite the crow's-feet round his eyes, the powdering of grey above his ears.

Katrine felt young too, lapped with a delicious sense of well-being. To one who had never before been out of England it was an excitement just to be able to wear dainty white clothes, to sit screened beneath double awnings, looking out on a blaze of light. It added to her content that her companion looked so young, that his eyes twinkled when he smiled.

The night before his face had shown lines, which she had interpreted as signs of the suffering of the past months, but this morning he looked rested and refreshed.

"Oh, that nipper! We shall be good pals after this. He only needed a lesson. I like kiddies," he said easily. The fingers which had swung the st.u.r.dy youngster with such ease, flicked daintily at a scattering of dust on his sleeve. Katrine noticed the shape of the fingers, long, pointed, the nails filbert-shaped, and carefully manicured. His toilette suggested a consideration of ease above fashion, but the hands were evidently tended with care. The woman in her approved the distinction.

As Katrine looked round the deck she noticed more than one pair of eyes riveted upon her in curious scrutiny, but neither Mrs Mannering nor Vernon Keith were in sight. She divined that the latter was deliberately keeping out of her way, and struggled after regret. She _was_ anxious to introduce him to Captain Bedford, at the same time there was no denying that a _tete-a-tete_ was more agreeable than a triologue.

"Sister Anne, Sister Anne, is there anybody coming?" said the deep ba.s.s voice in her ear, and she turned towards him with a shrug.

"No! But I was looking to see if there _were_! I want to introduce you to Mr Keith and Mrs Mannering, the lady who shares my cabin."

He did not reply, and Katrine looking down in surprise, caught a frowning of the forehead and pursing of the lips which betrayed obvious disapproval. He met her glance, and smiled back with an attempt at alacrity which was far from convincing.

"Certainly. If you wish--"

"You don't _want_ to know them? You would rather not?"