The Honorable Percival Part 8

"Yes," said Percival, leaning forward, "there is."

At this critical juncture a well-built figure in a uniform started down the stairway above them, paused a moment un.o.bserved, then quietly retraced his steps to the bridge.

"See here, I must be going," said Bobby, rising abruptly. "I promised to practise for the tableaux at ten, and it's half-past now. Say, you were a brick to brace me up! I'm going to take your advice, too; you see if I don't. May I count on your help!"

"At your service," said Percival, rising, and clasping the hand she held out.

The captain's Chinese boy glided up un.o.bserved and stood at attention.

"Captain say missy please come top-side right away. Wantchee see Bird Island."

Percival, still holding her hand, smilingly shook his head.

"d.a.m.n Bird Island!" he murmured softly.

VII

THE DAY THAT NEVER WAS

Of all the places in the world where a flirtation can germinate, blossom, and bear fruit overnight, an ocean-liner is the most propitious. Two conventional human beings who in the city streets would pa.s.s each other with utter indifference will often drop a conscious lid over a welcoming eye when pa.s.sing and repa.s.sing on the deck of a steamer. When men and women are set adrift for four weeks, with thousands of miles of sparkling water separating them from the past and the present, and with nothing to do but observe one another, something usually happens.

The present voyage of the _Saluria_ was no exception; in fact, it threatened to break all former records. The love-epidemic started in the steerage, where a Dutch boy en route to Java developed a burning attachment for a young stewardess, and it extended to the bridge, where Captain Boynton frequently consigned his duties to the first officer in order to devote his energies to holding Mrs. Weston's worsted. When he was not holding the skein, he was holding the ball, and during the endless process of winding and unwinding he spun his own yarns, recalling tales of wild adventure that alternately shocked and fascinated his gentle listener.

The young people, meanwhile, were not by any means immune. Elise Weston had discovered that the Scotchman's voice blended perfectly with her own, and through endless practising of "Tales from Hoffman" they had arrived at a harmony that promised to be permanent. Andy Black and Bobby Boynton romped through the days, apparently wasting little time on sentiment, but developing a friendship that might at any time become serious.

Only the blighted being wandered the decks alone. Since that morning in the wind-shelter he had decided to take no more risks. Alarming symptoms had not been wanting to indicate the return of a malady from which he never expected to suffer again. The grand affair with the Lady Hortense had been a dignified, chronic ailment which he had learned to endure with a becoming air of pensive resignation. The present attack threatened to be of a much more disturbing character. It was acute; it responded to no treatment, mental, moral, or physical. It was like toothache or mumps or chicken-pox, an ign.o.ble, complaint of which one is ashamed, but before which one is helpless.

It was only at table that he found it impossible to maintain toward Bobby that att.i.tude of indifference which he had prescribed for himself.

With the arrival of the new pa.s.sengers at Honolulu the places had been slightly changed, and now that he found himself seated between Bobby and Andy Black, the temptation to turn his chair slightly toward the former, thus presenting an insolent and forbidding back to Andy, was more than he could resist. Moreover, it afforded him unlimited satisfaction to know that by the glance of his eye or a whispered half-phrase he could instantly center all her sparkling attention upon himself.

The captain viewed these elusive tete-a-tetes with growing disfavor. One morning when he was alone at breakfast with Mrs. Weston he unburdened his mind after his own peculiar fashion.

"A seaman has to cultivate three things, my lady, a Nelson eye, a Nelson ear, and a Nelson nose. I've got 'em all."

Mrs. Weston smiled with, flattering expectancy.

"I don't claim to know what's going on in the rest of the world," he continued significantly, "but you can back your Uncle Ik to know everything that's happening on board this wagon."

"What's happening now? Do tell me," said Mrs. Weston, leaning forward and almost upsetting the salt in her eagerness.

"An Englishman, a poisonously funny Englishman, is running out of his course. He'll hit a reef before long that will knock a hole in his hull."

"Oh, you mean the Honorable Percival?"

"I do. And if he's like the majority of those t.i.tled Johnnies, he's so crooked he can hide behind a corkscrew."

"O Captain, that's absurd! Why, he is one of the most absolutely irreproachable and unapproachable young aristocrats I ever saw."

"That's all right. I don't tie up to the British aristocracy, nor any other foreign n.o.bility. Besides, what headway will I make by steering that girl of mine off one shoal to land her on another?"

"Was the Wyoming affair quite out of the question?"

"Oh, Hal Ford is a good-enough chap, but he's a perfect kid. They are both too young to know what they want. Besides, I am not going to have her drop anchor on a ranch for the rest of her days. I'll send her up to 'Frisco to school first. That's what the row was about before she left home. The little minx defied me, so I picked her up and brought her with me out to Hong-Kong."

"Poor child! She probably sees now that you were quite right."

"Maybe she does and maybe she doesn't. She's a wily little scamp all right. I discovered that the second day out. I'd forbidden her to write any letters to the ranch, so she was keeping a log-book which she was going to mail at every port."

"And were you hard-hearted enough to confiscate it?"

"I was. At least I ordered her to give it to me on the spot, and she said she'd chuck it overboard first."

"And did she!"

"She did," said the captain, with a grim chuckle.

"You don't understand that girl," said Mrs. Weston. "I'm quite sure she'd be amenable if she were handled right. However, she doesn't seem to be breaking her heart. Between Andy and the Honorable she's finding consolation."

"Most women do," said the captain, with one of those flashes of bitterness that sent all the good humor scurrying out of his face.

"Of course, she's just playing with Andy," Mrs. Weston hurried on, fearful of the memories she had stirred; "but Mr. Has...o...b.. is different.

He is so good-looking and so polished, almost any girl would have her head turned a bit by his attentions."

"You don't mean to say that you think Bobby--"

"I can't quite make out. She doesn't seem to see much of him on deck, but at the table she hasn't eyes or ears for any one else. You watch her."

"Trust my Nelson eye!" said the captain.

When Antipodal Day arrived, every one felt called upon to celebrate it.

The guileless tried to see the imaginary line of the meridian which the sophisticated pointed out to them on the water; the cream-peppermint lady went so far as to say she felt the jar as the steamer pa.s.sed over it. Conjectures, witty, mathematical, or inane, were made as to the ident.i.ty of to-day, if yesterday was Friday and to-morrow going to be Sat.u.r.day.

During the morning Percival wandered disconsolately from one part of the ship to another. Despite the fact that he was quite determined to keep away from Bobby, he chafed under her seeming indifference. After that intimate hour together in the wind-shelter it was strange that she could be so oblivious of his presence. It was distasteful to him to have to signal the train of her attention. To be sure, a very little signal served,--a word, a look, a thoughtful gesture,--but he preferred a homage that required no prompting. Moreover, she was guilty of "smiling on all she looked upon," and her acceptance of Andy Black into the ever-widening circle of her admirers offended him deeply.

The day dragged interminably. By five o'clock in the afternoon a tango-tea was in progress, and it seemed to Percival that everybody on board was dancing except the missionaries and himself. Even they were taking part as spectators, having secured their places half an hour before the appointed time in order not to miss a moment of the shocking exhibition.

Percival went to the upper deck and sought the most secluded corner he could find, but even there he was haunted by the soul-disturbing music.

Dancing was one of his accomplishments, and he had trod stately measures through half a dozen London seasons, the admiration and the despair of more than one aspiring mama. He looked with great disapproval upon these new and boisterous American dances, he wondered if they were as difficult as they looked. Seeing n.o.body about, he rose and tentatively tried a few steps behind the shelter of a life-boat. He found it interesting, and was getting quite pleased over his cleverness in catching the syncopated time, when he spied an impertinent sailor grinning at him from the rigging. Instantly his legs became rigid, and he affected an interest in the horizon intended to convince the sailor that he had been the victim of an optical illusion. Of course it was quite beneath his dignity to take part in these rollicking dances, especially in such a public place as on shipboard. He realized that fully; yet he thought of Bobby and sighed. There were actually times in his life when he almost wished he had been born in the middle cla.s.s.

Then he drew himself up sharply. If there was one thing inc.u.mbent upon the second son of the late Lord Westenhanger, it was that he maintain his position. Though grievously disappointed in his failure to capture the incomparable Lady Hortense, he must don his armor and ride forth again to find another lady, differing in kind, perhaps, but not in degree. In his scheme of things wild young daughters of American sea-captains had no place whatever.

Yet even as he made this a.s.sertion he found himself moving toward the companionway and down to the deck below.

"Will you sit out the next dance with me?" he heard himself murmuring to Bobby over her partner's shoulder.