Parrot & Co. Part 13

"I used to learn whole pages from stories and recite them to the trees or to the parrot. It kept me from going mad, I believe. In camp I handled coolies; none of whom could speak a word of English. I didn't have James with me at that time. During the day I was busy enough seeing that they did their work well. When things ran smoothly I'd take out a book and study. At night I'd stand before my tent and declaim. I could not read at night. If I lighted a lantern the tent would become alive with abominable insects. So I'd declaim, merely to hear the sound of my voice. Afterward I learned that the coolies looked upon me as a holy man. They believed I was nightly offering prayers to one of my G.o.ds. Perhaps I was; the G.o.d of reason. In the mornings I used to have to shake my boots. Frogs and snakes would get in during the night, the latter in search of the former. Lively times!

All that seems like a bad dream now."

"And how is Rajah?"

"Ugly as ever."

"Are you going to take him with you?"

"Wherever I go. Looks silly, doesn't it, for a man of my size to tote around a parrot-cage? But I don't care what people think. Life is too short. It's what you think of yourself that really counts."

"That is one of the rules I have laid down for myself. If only we all might go through life with that idea! There wouldn't be any gossip or scandal, then."

"Some day I am going to tell you why I have lived over here all these years."

"I shouldn't, not if it hurts you."

"On the contrary, there's a kind of happiness in unburdening one's conscience. I called that day in Rangoon for the express purpose of telling you everything, but I couldn't in the presence of a third person."

"I do not demand it."

"But it's a duty I owe to myself," he insisted gravely. "Besides, it is not impossible that you may hear the tale from other lips; and I rather prefer to tell it myself."

"But always remember that I haven't asked you."

"Are you afraid to hear it?"

"No. What I am trying to convince you with is the fact that I trust you, and that I give you my friendship without reservations."

He laid his hand on hers, strongly. "G.o.d bless you for that!"

She liked him because there was lacking in his words and tones that element of flattery so distasteful to her. Men generally entertain the fallacy that a woman demands homage, first to her physical appearance, next to her taste in gowns, and finally to her intellect, when in the majority of cases it is the other way around. Elsa knew that she was beautiful, but it no longer interested her to hear men state the fact, knowing as she did that it was simply to win her good will.

"Would you like to sit next to me at the table?"

"May I?" eagerly.

"I'll have Martha change her chair for yours. Do you speak Italian?"

"Enough for ordinary conversation. It is a long time since I have spoken the tongue."

"Then, let us talk it as much as possible at the table, if only to annoy those around us."

He laughed.

"I was educated in Rome," she added.

"Are you religious?"

Elsa shrugged. "At present I don't know just what my religion is.

Scandalous, isn't it? But for many weeks a thousand G.o.ds have beset me. I've got to get back to civilization in order to readjust my views. At luncheon, then. I am beginning to feel snoozy."

Craig had been eying the two, evilly. Set the wind in that direction?

An idea found soil in his mind, and grew. He would put a kink, as he vulgarly expressed it, into that affair. He himself wasn't good enough for her. The little cat should see. Warrington's ultimatum of the night before burned and rankled, and a man of Craig's caliber never accepted the inevitable without meditating revenge, revenge of a roundabout character, such as would insure his physical safety. The man could not play fair; there was nothing either in his heart or in his mind upon which square play could find foothold. There was nothing loyal or generous or worthy in the man. There is something admirable in a great rascal; but a sordid one is a pitiful thing. Craig entered the smoke-room and ordered a peg. At luncheon he saw them sitting together, and he smothered a grin. Couldn't play cards, or engineer a pool, eh? All right. There were other amus.e.m.e.nts.

That afternoon Martha chanced to sit down in a vacant chair, just out of the range of the cricketers. She lolled back and idly watched the batsmen. And then she heard voices.

"She is Elsa Chetwood. I remember seeing her pictures. She is a society girl, very wealthy, but something of a sn.o.b."

Martha's ears tingled. A sn.o.b, indeed, because she minded princ.i.p.ally her own affairs!

"They think because they belong to the exclusive sets they can break as many laws of convention as they please. Well, they can't. There's always some scandal in the papers about them. There was some rumor of her being engaged to the Duke of What's-his-name, but it fell through because she wouldn't settle a fortune on him. Only sensible thing she ever did, probably."

"And did you notice who sat next to her at luncheon?"

"A gentleman with a past, Mr. Craig tells me."

"I dare say Miss Chetwood has a past, too, if one but knew. To travel alone like this!"

Busybodies! Martha rose indignantly and returned to the other side of the deck. Meddlers? What did they know? To peck like daws at one so far above them, so divinely far above them! Her natural impulse had been to turn upon them and give them the tongue-lashing they deserved.

But she had lived too long with Elsa not to have learned self-repression, and that the victory is always with those who stoop not to answer. Nevertheless, she was alarmed. Elsa must be warned.

All Elsa said was: "My dear Martha, in a few days they and their t.i.ttle-tattle will pa.s.s out of my existence, admitting that they have ever entered it. I repeat, my life is all my own, and that I am concerned only with those whom I wish to retain as my friends. Gossip is the shibboleth of the mediocre, and, thank heaven, I am not mediocre."

While dressing for dinner Elsa discovered a note on the floor of her cabin. The writing was unfamiliar. She opened it and sought first the signature. Slowly her cheeks reddened, and her lips twisted in disdain. She did not read the note, but the natural keenness of her eye caught the name of Warrington. She tore the letter into sc.r.a.ps which she tossed out the port-hole. What a vile thing the man was! He had had the effrontery to sign his name. He must be punished.

It was as late as ten o'clock when she and Warrington went up to the bow and gazed down the cut-water. Never had she seen anything so weirdly beautiful as the ribbons of phosph.o.r.escence which fell away on each side, luminously blue and flaked with dancing starlike particles, through which, ever and anon, flying-fish, dripping with the fire, spun outward like tongues of flame.

"Beautiful, beautiful! This is the one spot on the ship. And in all my travels I have never seen this before. All silence and darkness in front of us, and beneath, that wonderful fire. Thanks for bringing me here. I should not have known what I was missing."

"Often, when I was stoking, during an hour or so of relief, I used to steal up here and look down at the mystery, for it will ever be a mystery to me. And I found comfort."

"Are you religious, too?"

"In one thing, that G.o.d demands that every man shall have faith in himself."

How deep his voice was as compared to Arthur's! Arthur. Elsa frowned at the rippling magic. Why was she invariably comparing the two men?

What significance did it have upon the future, since, at the present moment, it was not understandable?

"There is a man on board by the name of Craig," she said. "I advise you to beware of him."

"Who introduced him to you?" The anger in his voice was very agreeable to her ears. "Who dared to?"

"No one. He introduced himself on the way up to Mandalay. In Rangoon I closed the acquaintance, such as it was, with the aid of a hat-pin."

"A hat-pin! What did he say to you?" roughly.

"Nothing that I care to repeat. . . . Stop! I am perfectly able to take care of myself. I do not need any valiant champion."