Laid up in Lavender Part 31

"But I did not tell you," the clergyman replied, driving his stick into the ground and working it about while his face grew scarlet--"and I take great shame to myself that I did not, Mr.

Stanton--that my father was much----"

"Good heavens, Jones!" Jim broke out, his patience exhausted. "What on earth has your father to do with it? Yesterday you gave me to understand that you had some entanglement which weighed on your mind.

And I thought that you had come here to make a clean breast of it.

Instead of which--for Heaven's sake man, don't make me think that you are not running straight!"

The vicar glared at him, while the squire gazed at both. "But that old man," Jones said at last, almost at choking point by this time, "whom you saw this afternoon was----"

Jim struck in again savagely. "We do not want to know anything about him either. As for him, he is----"

"My father!"

"He is dead," Jim persisted, raising his hand for silence, and determined to keep his man to the point and to have things straightened out. "We do not want to hear anything about him. He is dead. We want----"

"Who is dead?"

The question was the vicar's. He wheeled round as he put it, his face white, his voice changed. The squire, who, like most listeners, had learned more than the talkers, saw his tremendous agitation, and, grasping some idea of the truth, tried to intercept Foley's answer.

But he was too late. "The old fellow we went to see off," Jim said, almost lightly. "He is dead. Died in a fit half an hour ago, I tell you."

"Dead?"

"Yes, dead. At least the doctor says so."

The vicar put his hands to his face, and turned away, his back shaking. The others looked at him. "He was--he was my father!" he murmured--almost under his breath. And even Jim, his eyes as wide as saucers, understood.

"Fetch some wine, you fool" the squire muttered, giving him a nudge.

And he put his arm round the clergyman, and led him to a seat in the shade. There, I think, Walter Jones prayed that he might not be thankful. Man is weak. And conventional man very weak.

Once a gentleman always a gentleman, was the squire's motto. There was no attempt at concealment. The poor man, whose life had been so unlovely, lay at peace at last in the best room at the vicarage, and was presently, with some tears of pity shed by gentle eyes, laid in a quiet corner of the churchyard. There was talk, of course, but the talk was confined to the village, where the possession of a drunken father was not uncommon, or uncharitably considered. The worst of the dead man was known only to Jim Foley, and he kept it even from his wife; while any Spartan thoughts which the squire might otherwise have entertained, any objections he might have raised to his daughter's match, were rendered futile and quixotic by the strange mode in which the denouement had been reached in his presence. He consented, and all--after an interval--went well. But the vicar will sometimes, I think, in the days to come, when prosperity laps him round, wander to the churchyard and recall the hot noon when he walked the roads haunted by that strange sense of forlornness and ruin.

THE OTHER ENGLISHMAN

THE OTHER ENGLISHMAN

"You are English, I take it, sir?"

It was clear to me that the speaker was. I was travelling alone, and had not fallen in with three Englishmen in as many weeks. I turned to inspect the new-comer with a cordiality his smudged and s.m.u.tty face could not wholly suppress. "I am," I answered, "and I am glad to meet a fellow-countryman."

"You are a stranger here?" He did not take his eyes from me, but he indicated by a gesture of his thumb the busy wharf below piled high with hundreds and thousands of crates full of oranges. From the upper deck of the _San Miguel_ we looked down upon it, and could see all that came or went in the trim basin about us. The _San Miguel_, a steamer of the Segovia Quadra and Company's line, bound for several places on the coast southward, was waiting to clear out of El Grao, the harbour of Valencia, and I was waiting impatiently to clear out with her. "You are a stranger here?" he repeated.

"Yes; I have been in the town four or five days, but otherwise I am a stranger," I answered.

"You are not in the trade?" he continued. He meant the orange trade.

"No, I am not. I am travelling for pleasure," I answered readily. "You will understand that, though it is more than a Frenchman or Spaniard can." I smiled as I spoke, but he was not very responsive.

"It is a queer place to visit for pleasure," he said, looking from me to the busy throng about the orange crates.

"Not at all," I retorted. "It is a lively town and quaint, and it is warm and sunny. I cannot say as much for Madrid, from which I came two or three weeks back."

"Come straight here?" he asked.

I was growing tired of his curiosity, but I answered, "No. I stayed a short time at Toledo and Aranjuez, and at several other places."

"You speak Spanish?"

"Not much. _Muy poco de Castellano_," I laughed, calling to mind the maddening grimace by which the Spanish peasant indicates that he does not understand, and is not going to understand you. He is a good fellow, is Sancho Panza, but having made up his mind that you do not speak Spanish, the purest Castilian is not Spanish for him.

"You are going some way with us--perhaps to Carthagena?" the inquisitor persisted.

He laid some stress on the last word, and with it shot a sly glance at me--a glance so unpleasantly suggestive that I did not answer him at once. Instead, I looked at him more closely. He was a wiry young fellow, rather below than above the middle height, to all appearance the chief engineer. Everything about him, not excluding the atmosphere, was greasy and oily, as if he had come straight from the engine-room. The whites of his eyes showed with unlovely prominence.

Seeing him thus, I took a dislike for him. "To Carthagena!" I answered brusquely. "I am not going to stay at Carthagena. Why should you suppose so? Unless, indeed," I added, as another construction of his words occurred to me, "you think I want to see some fighting? No, I fancy the fun might grow too furious."

I should say that three days before there had been a mutiny among the troops at Carthagena. An outlying fort had been captured, and the governor of the city killed before the attempt was suppressed. The news was in every one's mouth, and I fancied that his question referred to it.

My manner or my words disconcerted him. Without saying more he turned away, not going below at once, but standing on the main deck near the office in the afterpart. There was a good deal of bustle in that quarter. The captain, the second officer, and clerk were there, giving and taking receipts and what not. He did not speak to them, but leaned against the rail close at hand. I had an uncomfortable feeling that he was watching me; and this gave rise to a shrinking from the man, which did not affect me always, but returned from time to time.

Presently the dinner-bell rang, and simultaneously the _San Miguel_ moved out to sea. We were to spend the next day at Alicante, and the following one at Carthagena.

Dinner was not a cheerful meal. The officers of the ship did not speak English or French, and were not communicative in any language. Besides myself there were only three first-cla.s.s pa.s.sengers. They were ladies, relatives of the newly appointed Governor of Carthagena, and about to join him there. I have no doubt that they were charming and fashionable people, but their partiality for the knife in eating prejudiced them unfairly in English eyes. Consequently, when I came on deck again, and the engineer--he told me his name was Sleigh--sidled up to me, I received him graciously. He proffered the omnipresent cigarette, and I provided him with something to drink. He urged me to go down with him and see the engine-room, and after some hesitation I did so. It was after dinner.

"I have pretty much my own way," he boasted. "They cannot do without English engineers. They tried once, and lost three boats in six months. In harbour, my time is my own. I have seven stokers under me, all Spaniards. They tried it on with me when I first came aboard! But the first that out with his knife to me I knocked on the head with a shovel. I have had none of their sauce since!"

"Was he much hurt?" I asked, scanning my companion. He was not big, and he slouched. But there was an air of swaggering dare-devilry about him that gave colour to his story.

"I don't know," he answered. "They took him to the hospital, and he never came aboard again. That is all I know."

"I suppose your pay is good?" I suggested. To confess the truth, I felt myself at a disadvantage with him down there. The flaring lights and deep shadows, the cranks and pistons whirling at our elbows, the clank and din, and the valves that hissed at unexpected moments, were matters of every hour to him; they imbued me with a desire to propitiate. As my after-dinner easiness abated, I regretted that it had induced me to come down.

He laughed harshly. "Pretty fair," he said, "with my opportunities. Do you see that jacket?"

"Yes."

"That is my sh.o.r.e-going jacket," with a wink. "Here, look at it!"

I complied. It appeared at first sight to be an ordinary sailor's pea-coat; but, looking more closely, I found that inside were dozens of tiny pockets. At the mouth of each pocket a small hook was fixed to the lining.

"They are for watches," he explained, when he saw that I did not comprehend. "I get five francs over the price for every one I carry ash.o.r.e to a friend of mine--duty free, you understand."

I nodded to show that I did understand. "And which is your port for that?" I asked, desiring to say something as I turned to ascend.