Captivity Part 24

"I had been at great, very great, trouble to trace the path of the fugitives in Lytton's immortal work. But I have an idea that at certain points Lytton was rather nebulous. I met your young friend and asked him what he thought. He only laughed, however. He is fond of laughing."

Marcella's dullness disappeared; the clouds from her mind packed like wolves and vanished. Her heart suddenly stood still.

"He was at Pompeii?" she whispered.

"Only for a little time this morning. Then he and his party went away again in their car."

"He was with the doctor," said Marcella, hating to talk about him, but unable not to.

"Not when I saw him. He was with those exceedingly noisy fellows--the man who is severely pitted with small-pox and the man with the missing fingers."

"Oh--"

She turned away and answered him at random after that. Even then she did not see that Louis had deliberately lied to her. She was hurt that he could have gone to Pompeii without her: she was indignant that he had gone with her abomination, the pock-marked man. But perhaps it was only an accident! She wondered, with sudden misgiving, if he could have been back on the boat for her and missed her. But that his desertion was intentional she could not imagine.

Lights began to twinkle from the houses, to flare from the streets, to dance from the boats. The sky of ultramarine became indigo with a green and mauve lightening to the west. Over Vesuvius was a column of white smoke that now turned rosy, now coppery from the fires beneath. Little boat loads of chattering people who seemed ghosts kept tumbling up the accommodation ladder out of the grey water; they seemed to come soundlessly as though they were produced by a conjuror's hand, for no one could hear what they said: only their gestures, their laughing, excited faces were visible. A little cold hand squeezed Marcella's, and she answered Jimmy's eager questions about his father thoughtlessly, while a steamer coming into port hooted shrilly and desolately beyond the bar. The little boats glided up and down, in and out of the shadows of big ships with double lights--lights on board that were determinate and steady, reflections of lights that cracked and shivered and went in long, shimmering ribbons through the water.

"Most of the pa.s.sengers are aboard now," volunteered the schoolmaster.

"Are they?" she said, her heart sinking. It came to her that he had gone, that she would never see him again. And in that moment she knew just how much she wanted to see him: and in that moment she saw him.

A boatload of men was zigzagging towards the Oriana with s.n.a.t.c.hes of loud song, laughter and occasional shouts. It was impossible to distinguish faces until the boat came within range of the vessel's arc lamps. And their dead white glare shone on Louis's face--and on his face alone, as far as Marcella was concerned. He was grinning vacantly: he looked very white. As he swayed up the ladder she saw that his clothes were covered in dust. Catching sight of her the minute he reached the deck, he lurched towards her. She shrank away a little, frightened of the glazed stare of his eyes, his loose, s...o...b..ring mouth. She knew that he was drunk, but he was not drunk as her father had been. Wild thoughts flickered on the curtain of her mind: "drunk as a lord" was one of them.

"That's how father used to be," and a queer sort of pride in him followed. After all, there was something in being a lord, even in drunkenness! But this foolish, grinning, damp-mouthed thing before her, who kept making ineffectual attempts to lift his hand to his head and take off his hat, who was coming closer towards her with the inadequate movements she had once seen made by a duck when its leg had been broken!--

"H'lo, ole girl!" he said, standing before her at last. "Parlez-vous Franshay? Ah, oui, oui! Give--kith, ole girl!"

"You'd better go below, Miss Lashcairn," said the schoolmaster in a low voice. "It's no use talking to an intoxicated man."

She knew he was speaking, but she felt mesmerized by Louis, and shook her head impatiently, never taking her eyes for an instant from the boy's dribbling mouth.

"Give's--kith--kith--kisssh," he said solemnly after a great effort, managing to close his mouth. "Baisez-moi--ole girl! Ah, oui, oui! Ole girl--I shay, ole girl--voulez-vous coucher avec moi?"

He caught her arm and held it tight, grinning into her face. She stood with set face, trembling.

"What does he mean?" she asked the schoolmaster, who was looking distressed.

"He is speaking French--I--don't quite"--he coughed nervously--"I don't quite understand him--it isn't cla.s.sical French. But I should go below.

He will be better to-morrow."

Louis turned to him solemnly, his jaws working.

"G-g-go to--school!" he cried, and giggled helplessly. "You w-w-white-livered k-k-kidpuncher! Are you after her yourself? G-G.o.d d.a.m.n you, you're always sniffing about after her."

"I wish you would go below," said the schoolmaster. "Men when intoxicated say things unfit for the ears of young ladies. You go away and leave him to me, Miss Lashcairn."

"Louis, you trusted me to take care of you," she said in a low voice.

He laughed hysterically until tears ran down his cheeks.

"Tha.s.s ri', ole girl! Trus' take care of me! Nashly! Father drunkard--father _dead_ drunkard! Nash'ly ta' care poor little Louis."

Ole Fred and the red-haired man had made immediately for the bar, but finding it closed had come back to claim Louis. They saw the schoolmaster's white face and Louis's pa.s.sionate gestures; they scented a fight, and hoped for it.

"Wan' 'ny 'elp, mate?" cried Ole Fred, putting up his fists.

Marcella did not see them. She saw her father standing by his bed, holding on to the post, praying for courage. Something in her brain gave a little snap like a fiddle string breaking, and, taking Louis by both shoulders, she shook him violently. His head wobbled about loosely. He was terrified, and so were the others. Ole Fred had seen girls and women resort to physical argument: in his world of the East End it was quite common, but he was rather surprised to see a "young lady" do it. Nor had they ever imagined it possible for such a blaze of anger to scorch anyone as shone in her eyes, vibrated in her voice as she loosed him, quite breathless, propped him against the rail and said, very quietly:

"The very next time you mention my father I'll put you in the sea."

Louis was trembling and staring at her, his mouth open. The schoolmaster was the first to speak.

"I regret this," he began, and stopped, coughing.

"Just you shut the 'ole in yer fice," growled Ole Fred. Then, turning to Louis, he became maudlinly soothing. "Look 'ere, mate, no young lady likes to hear her father spoke of rough--even if he ain't her father, as the saying goes. I do' know what the rah's abaht, but y' know, ole chap, no man should make sin--sin--sinuation he can't prove--in black an'

white." He looked from one to the other with engaging earnestness.

"Life's--life's--slife's too short to quarrel, hearts are too precious to break, so shake hands and kissh and kiss and be frien's, for ole time's sake."

He was so overcome by the pathos of his own eloquence that he began to sob brokenly, clinging to the red-haired man. "We alwiz bin mates, ain't we?" he added, trying to shake hands with him. Fired by his example, Louis made a grab at Marcella. He had entirely forgotten his fright, his shame of a moment ago.

"Tha.s.s ri', Marsh--Marcella. Kith--kith--kisssh an' be fren's! Ah, oui, oui, n'est ce pas? Ole Fred--no, no, Ole girl--voulez-vous coucher avec moi?"

She looked at him, frowning. The unusual words--she had never heard French words before--worried her: she never afterwards was able to hear French without an acute sense of discomfort. He was smiling at her with open mouth and wet eyes. She came quite close to him: he cringed unconsciously, and then lifted his face, expecting her to kiss him.

Instead, she said in a low voice, close to his ear:

"You asked me to help you, Louis. Do you know the best way to help you?"

"Kith--baisez-moi--ah, oui, oui."

"The best way to help you is to drown you. You're--you're not fit to live! Oh, you're a perfect idiot!"

She turned and ran down below. Dimly she heard the schoolmaster say, "Very foolish to talk to an intoxicated man"; she heard the same boy who had begged her vine leaves singing his pa.s.sionate love song to the tinkling music of his guitar and the lapping water. Then she was below deck, making blindly for her cabin.

At the door of Number 15 she was arrested by Jimmy. He was standing in the doorway, his head well back, his hands in his trouser pockets.

"Marcella!" he whispered proudly. "Look!"

She made herself conscious of him and looked. On the outer bunk was a crumpled ma.s.s of clothing that was heaving up and down and snoring loudly.

"He's there all right. I got him up when he wanted to be on the floor.

He pinched my arm fearful. He's very strong, my Daddy is! He didn't pinch it on purpose, he couldn't help it."

Pushing back the sleeve of his jersey, he showed her a red mark as a soldier might show his scars.

"Now he's fast asleep. Marcella, isn't he making a funny noise?" he added with the queerest cross between amus.e.m.e.nt and puzzlement on his small face. She suddenly realized what he was saying.

"Oh, you little brave man," she cried, taking him up in her arms and kissing him. He wriggled down quickly, and stood in the doorway again, on sentry duty. She forgot to take him with her. She had forgotten everything save her instinct to be alone with her misery.