Geoffrey Hamstead Part 13

"Can't see. Guess it's blue water to the knees, most of the time."

"Shouldn't wonder. Do 'em good."

After this jargon was finished, it did not take long to run down to the False Duck Light. Here the double-reefed mainsail was "squatted" and the fourth reef-pennant hauled down. The reefed staysail was taken in and stowed; and under the peak of the mainsail they jibed over. Steering by the compa.s.s, they then rounded to leeward of Timber Island and hauled their wind into South Bay.

To put the Ideal over so far with so little canvas showing, it must have been blowing a gale. They sped up into the bay close hauled, and "came to" in about four fathoms. Down went the big anchor through the hissing ripples to that best of holding-grounds, and the vessel, drifting back as if for another wild run, suddenly fetched up with a grind on her iron cable. The mad thing knew that unyielding grip, and swung around submissively.

CHAPTER X.

Full souls are double mirrors, making still An endless vista of fair things before, Repeating things behind.

GEORGE ELIOT'S _Poems._

There is a want of primness in the manners and customs of my characters which a reviewer might take exception to. To be sure he might with effect criticise their making up a pool on Sunday. But the fact was that n.o.body remembered it to be Sunday until Jack wanted to collect his winnings after dinner. At this, Mrs. Dusenall held up her hands in high disapproval. While out in the lake, in the worst part of the sea, she had commenced to read her Bible, and had felt thankful to arrive in shelter. Consequently she remembered the day.

"Surely, Charley, you have not been gambling on Sunday?" said she reprovingly.

The girls looked guilty, with an expression of "Oh, haven't we been bad?" on their faces.

Rankin endeavored to relieve the situation by explaining in many words that the whole thing was a mere matter of form, and no more than an expression of opinion as to the time the boat would reach the harbor, because no money was put up--in fact, as the arrangement was made on Sunday, the whole thing was illegal, and no money ever would be put up, etc.

Jack kicked him under the table for arguing away his winnings, and Margaret quoted at him:

"His tongue Dropped manna, and could make the worse appear The better reason, to perplex and dash Maturest counsels."

"Good," said Geoffrey. "Give him the rest of it, Miss Margaret. Rub it in well."

Margaret continued, and with mirthful eyes declaimed at Maurice:

"For his thoughts were low; To vice industrious, but to n.o.bler deeds Timorous and slothful: and yet he pleas'd the ear, And with persuasive accent thus began."

This amused Margaret, because Maurice was such a decent little man. But Geoffrey's enjoyment of it was different. Rankin felt that there was growing in him an antagonism to Hampstead. He was afraid of him for her sake--afraid she would learn to like him too much. At any other time chaff would have found him invulnerable, but Geoffrey's amus.e.m.e.nt made him redden.

"You seem to be well acquainted with the characteristics of Belial, Hampstead," he said. "Margaret, your memory is excellent. Could you favor us with the lines just preceding what you first quoted?"

Why should Margaret have blushed as she did so? She quoted:

"On th' other side up rose Belial, in act more graceful and humane; A fairer person lost not heaven; he seem'd For dignity compos'd and high exploit: But all was false and hollow; though his tongue Dropp'd manna," etc.

"Thank you," said Maurice. "You see the lines are intended to describe a person far different from me in appearance. Hampstead, you observe, had studied the pa.s.sage. A coincidence, is it not?"

Soon they were all composing themselves for sleep. Margaret was listening peacefully to the shrieking of the wind in the rigging as she thought how every moment on board the yacht had been one of unclouded enjoyment. An unconscious smile went over her face that would have been pleasant to see. Then she thought of Geoffrey and smiled again. This time she caught herself, and asked herself why? All day, since she had watched Geoffrey steering the yacht beside the schooner in the lake, her mind had been chanting two lines of poetry. When asked in the evening to repeat the lines aloud she had blushed because it seemed like confessing herself.

A fairer person lost not heaven; he seemed For dignity composed and high exploit.

In her mind Geoffrey had become identified with these two lines. But what had friend Maurice meant by saddling the context on him in that malevolent way? Could he really have thought that Belial's character was also Geoffrey's? She put away this idea as untenable. She was one of those born in homes where the struggle for existence has not for generations taught the household to be suspicious; with the innate n.o.bility that tends, whether rightly or wrongly, to think the best of others; she was one of those whom men turn to with relief after the cunning and suspicion of the business world, each feeling the a.s.sistance it is to meet some one who is ready to take him at the valuation he would like to be able justly to put upon himself.

When morning broke, there were eight or ten schooners to be seen on different sides that had run in for shelter during the night. About six o'clock Margaret crept out to satisfy her curiosity as to what kind of place they were in. With only her head above the hatchway at the top of the stairs leading up from the ladies' cabin she gazed about for some time before she spied Maurice sitting on the counter with his back to her, his feet dangling over the water while he watched the vessels.

She crept toward him and gave a cry close to his ear, to startle him.

"Don't make so much noise," said he, quite unstartled. "I don't like you to call out like that in my ear." He added, perforce, as he looked at her, "At least I don't like it when I can't see you."

"Don't tell stories, Morry. You know you would like me to do it at any time."

"I would not, indeed," he a.s.serted. "Come and sit down and keep quite silent. Just when I was having such a happy, peaceful time you come and spoil it all."

Margaret sat down on the rail and turned herself about so that she could sit in the same position beside him. His helping hand still held hers as they sat together. He was almost afraid to turn toward her, for fear he would look too tenderly. She might go away if he did. His _role_ was to bully her, and then she would never know how exquisite it was for him to have her sit beside him.

"There, now! Sit perfectly quiet and don't say another word. Just look around and enjoy yourself in a reasonable manner. I'm not going to have my morning disarranged and my valuable reveries disturbed."

The wind had shifted to the northwest in the morning and had blown itself out and down to a moderate breeze with a clearing sky, with patches of blue and broken clouds overhead.

"Now listen to the chorus of the sailors as they get up their anchor.

Does it not seem a sweet and fitting overture to the whole oratorio of the voyage before them? I have been watching the vessels go out, one by one, for over an hour. I must say there are some uncommonly rude men among the sweet singers we are listening to, and--and--" He stopped and forgot to go on.

"And what?" cried Margaret peremptorily.

Maurice had lost himself in the contemplation of some locks of sunny hair, that were flying in the breeze from Margaret's forehead, and the graceful curve of her full neck as she looked away at the ships.

"Oh, yes. And that's Timber Island over there, covered with trees and stamped out round like a breakfast bun, and that's the False Duck Island, where we came in last night. The schooner sailing yonder is going to take the channel between that white line of breakers and South Bay Point running out there, and those huts you see nestling in the trees far away on the main-land are fishermen's houses--"

He was not looking at any of these things, but was following out two trains of thought in his active head while he talked against time. What really absorbed him was Margaret's ear, and a sort of invisible down on the back part of her cheek. He was thinking to himself that if five dollars would purchase a kiss on that spot he would be content to see a notice in the Gazette: "Maurice Rankin, failed: liabilities, $5.00."

Margaret was listening, gravely unconscious of being so much admired, enjoying all he said, and feasting her eyes upon the distances, the brilliant colors, and the fleeting shadows of the broken clouds upon the water.

"Why, what a nice old chappie you are!" she exclaimed, giving his hand a pat and taking hers away. "How did you manage to find out all about the surroundings?"

"Been around boarding the different schooners lying at anchor. Examining their papers, you know," said he grandly. "Went around in the canoe to the first fellow--a coal vessel. A man appeared near the bow and looked down at me as if I were a kind of fish swimming about. 'Heave-to, or I'll sink you,' I said in the true old nautical style. He did not say a word, but stooped down and did heave two, in fact three, pieces of coal at me. I pa.s.sed on, satisfied that his vessel needed no further inspection. I was then attracted by the name of another schooner, on whose stern was painted the legend 'Bark Swaller.'"

"What a strange name," said Margaret, as Maurice spelled it out.

"Well, it puzzled me a good deal, as I examined it closely, being in doubt whether Barque Swallow was intended, or perhaps the name of some German owner. At all events a sailor spied me paddling about under the stern of the boat and regarded me with evident suspicion. I thought I would deal more gently with this man than with the other fellow. 'Can you tell me,' I asked, 'the name of that round island over there?' The only answer I got was unsatisfactory. 'Sheer off,' said he, 'wid your dirty dug-out.' This seemed rather rude, but I did not retaliate. I thought I might go further and fare worse, so I endeavored to mollify him. Perhaps, I thought, being up all night in hard weather had made these sailors irritable.

"'Can you drink whisky?' I said--" Margaret was looking at Maurice with a soft expression of interest and mirth. He was talking on in order that he might continue to bask in the beauty of the face that looked straight at him. But the strain for a moment was too great. For an instant he slacked up his check-rein, and while he narrated his story he continued in the same tone with: "(Believe me, my dear Margaret, you are looking perfectly heavenly this morning) and the effect on this poor toiler of the sea was, I a.s.sure you, quite wonderful." Rankin's tongue went straight on, as if the parenthesis were part of the narrative. Margaret saw that it was useless to speak, and resigned herself to listen again.

"Quite wonderful," he continued. "The fellow motioned to me to come to the bow of the vessel, and when I got there he came over the bulwarks and dropped like a monkey from one steel rope to another till he stood on the bobstay chains."

"'Whist!' said he. 'Divil a word! Have you got it there?'

"'There is some on the yacht,' I said, 'and I want to ask you some questions about this place. What island is that over there?'

"'Mother of Pathrick,' said he, 'an' did ye come down all the way in your yacht and not know Timber Island when you'd see it?'

"He looked at me as if I was some strange being.