The Pilot and his Wife Part 15

Madam Garvloit only made one slight objection--

"You know that you can't drink ale, my friend."

Another objection, namely, what they would say at home in Norway when they heard that her husband had sunk into a mere tavern-keeper, she very wisely kept to herself. The important point was that they should find a way of living, and they had at all events the great consolation that now they would be able to keep Elizabeth. What feeling of pride still remained she got rid of in telling Elizabeth that at home they knew nothing of millionaires in wooden shoes such as were to be found in Holland; and her husband found her much more keen for his project than he had expected. Being accustomed to place great reliance upon her stronger understanding, he would not have been happy if she had been against the plan.

Thus it came about, then, that in the crowded street by the ca.n.a.l one Monday morning there appeared over one of the entrance-doors a sign-board with "The Star," in letters of gold on a blue ground. It was set up at a fortunate time and in a fortunate place, and almost as soon as the house was opened, customers from the vessels in the harbour began to gather in, both into the down-stairs and up-stairs rooms, so that there was a prospect of a steadily increasing traffic. Garvloit generally presided himself in the bar behind the counter, at the lower end of which there stood an array of stone mugs with tin lids; while in a recess of the wall there stuck out from beside canisters of tobacco, long and short Dutch clay pipes, a new one filled being handed to every customer, with whatever drink he ordered. Out of sight under the counter where the stone mugs stood was the ale-barrel, with its bright tap over a vessel that caught the drip; and after the same cleanly Dutch fashion, spittoons filled with sand stood in every corner of the room. The shelves above were filled in rows with a regular apothecary's shop of bottles and jars of spirits, and among them a goodly array of securely-fastened, dark-green flasks of Dutch hollands.

Elizabeth had as housekeeper quite as much as she could do, and did not directly busy herself with waiting, unless there was something particular required to be done for the up-stairs customers.

Occasionally, however, she would come into the bar also, on some errand or another, or to make sure that nothing was wanted; and the fame of handsome Elizabeth of "The Star" contributed not a little to bring custom to the house.

Such Norwegians as came to Amsterdam with timber--the majority unloaded their cargoes up at Purmurende or Alkmar--invariably patronised "The Star." Elizabeth used to talk to them as countrymen of her own; and if she heard that any of them had been across the Atlantic, she would quietly, and as if quite casually, ask if perchance they had come across or had heard anything of a sailor of her acquaintance called Salve Kristiansen who hailed from Arendal. No one had ever heard of him, and she had begun to fear that he might be lost to her for ever.

One forenoon, however, when she had a great deal to do in the house, she was pa.s.sing quickly through the room up-stairs, and there sat at one of the small tables, with an untouched mug of ale before him, a bearded man in a blue pea-jacket. In her hurry she had set him down as some mate or captain; but there must have been something about him that attracted her attention, for she turned again at the door for an instant, and looked at him before she went out. He was so pale--and he had sent her one look.

As she stood outside the door she knew it was Salve, although she had always pictured him to herself as a common sailor. She stood there trembling all over, and fumbling with the latch of the door in the greatest agitation, evidently debating with herself whether she should dare go in again. She pressed upon the latch, in the certainty that it would go up before she had actually decided that she would go in; and it did so. The door opened again of itself, and Elizabeth entered with downcast eyes, and scarlet in the face, and pa.s.sed through the room, making a slight inclination of her head, as if for greeting, as she pa.s.sed him. She had reached the opposite door when she heard a quiet bitter laugh behind her.

At once she turned, with pride in every feature of her face, and looked at him.

"How do you do, Salve Kristiansen?" she said, firmly and quietly.

"How do you do, Elizabeth?" he replied, rather huskily, getting up and looking confused.

"Are you lying here in Amsterdam with some vessel?"

He sat down again, for there was something in her manner that denied approach.

"No; in Purmurende," he replied. "I only came in here to--"

"You are in the timber line, then, now?"

"Yes--Elizabeth," he ventured to add, in another tone, which had a whole volume of meaning in it. But she took her leave of him now in the same proud manner, and left the room.

Salve sat for a while with compressed lips, looking down upon the table before him. When she turned round the first time at the door, something told him that she would come in again; but he had expected quite a different kind of scene. A good deal of the tyrant had been developed in him since they had last met; and when she had come in so quietly and so humbly, with the acknowledgment of the great wrong she had done him written upon her face, he felt himself at once, with a certain bitter and devouring pleasure, upon the judgment-seat. He must first see her crushed before him; then he would have forgiven her, and loved her with all the pa.s.sion of his soul.

But as she stood there by the door, looking so grand in her pride, and so pale with repressed mortification, and spoke so calmly, he had felt that in that moment he had been separated farther from her than ever he had been in all his wanderings at the other side of the globe.

He sat there with his mind in a chaotic state of desperation and sorrow, and of anger with himself. What a grand creature she was! and he--how pitiful and petty! He set down the mug, which he had been absently toying with, hard on the table, and went out.

For a long while he wandered about the quays in a state of gloomy indecision, stopping every now and then to run his eye over the shipping, and his expression becoming darker still every time he did so.

From long practice he could tell by the appearance of every vessel what trade it was engaged in. One was a coffee ship from Java; the next carried general cargo to all parts of the world; there was another that brought sugar and rum from the West Indies; and a fourth, that from its square build and breadth of beam must be a whaler returned from Spitzbergen. He thought of their long voyages, and of the life without root or tie that was pa.s.sed on board them--was he to go back to that life again? It depended on Elizabeth; and he had not much hope.

To his impatient nature delay was intolerable; and he had half made up his mind to have his fate decided at once. In spite of his agitation, however, he could still think with coolness; and he knew that if he was to have any chance at all, he must wait until the first unfortunate impression had had time to pa.s.s off.

It had been a grey, foggy autumn day, but was now clearing, and blue patches of sky were coming out; and as he crossed the bridge the afternoon sun shone out, and sent a ray of glittering light against the window-panes of the street along the ca.n.a.l. Up in Garvloit's house Elizabeth was standing at the open window--she, too, that day had needed to be alone with her thoughts. Salve saw her, and stood still for a moment contemplating her as she leant out over the window ledge.

"That dear head shall be mine," he burst out then pa.s.sionately, and without knowing it, aloud; and the next moment he was at Garvloit's door.

Elizabeth heard the door of the room open behind her; and when she saw Salve unexpectedly standing before her, she sank down for a moment on to a chair, but got up the next with a scared look, almost as if he was some hostile apparition.

"Elizabeth!" he said, gently, "are you going to send me out again into the world? G.o.d only knows how I shall come back if you do."

She did not answer, but stood looking at him with a rigid expression, and pale as death; she seemed to have forgotten to breathe, and to be only waiting for him to say more.

"Be my wife, Elizabeth," he asked, "and I shall grow up into a good man again. What a pitiful creature I have been without you, you have already seen sufficiently this morning."

"G.o.d be my witness, Salve," she answered, the tears bursting into her eyes with emotion which she tried to control, "you alone have always had my heart--but I must first know in perfect truth what you think of me."

"The same as I think of G.o.d's angels, Elizabeth," he said from his heart, and tried to take her hand.

"Do you know that I--was once very nearly engaged to young Beck?" she asked, reddening, but with a steady look. "I didn't know my real self then, but was thinking only of folly and nonsense, until I was obliged to fly from it all."

"Your aunt has told me all about it, Elizabeth. Don't let us mention the subject again."

"And you haven't a doubt about me in your heart? For that I never will bear, Salve, like to-day,--I can't bear it, do you understand?" she said, with a shake in her voice, and looking as it were down into his very soul.

"Doubt!" he said; and for that moment, at all events, he was evidently convinced that she had never given her real heart to any one but himself.

A look of inexpressible happiness came into her face; he caught her into his arms, and they stood as if they never would let go of each other again, cheek to cheek, not speaking, not thinking even. There was something convulsive in their embrace, as if they could not believe in the reality of their happiness, and as if they felt an instinctive dread that they should lose it again.

Un.o.bserved by either of them the door had opened, and in the doorway stood pursy Garvloit, gazing in helpless bewilderment at the scene before him. At last Elizabeth caught sight of him, and--not with any confusion, but only eager to communicate her happiness--exclaimed--

"It is my lover--"

"Your lover!" and he fell back a step, as if he did not know what he was doing.

"My name is Salve Kristiansen, master of the Apollo," added Salve, without letting her go, and feeling everything around him infinitely small at that moment.

Garvloit turned round and shouted several times from the top of the stairs, raising his voice at each repet.i.tion, "Andrea! Andrea!" to his wife; and as she did not come immediately, he stumbled as fast as his corpulence would allow him down the stairs, pausing, however, with a vacant look upon the last step.

Madam Garvloit came out with her work in her hand, and asked what the matter was.

"The matter is," replied her husband, dismally, "that I am ruined. There is Elizabeth up there sitting with some skipper, G.o.d knows whom, who she says is her lover."

"Is it possible?"

"Go and see for yourself;" and as his wife hurried past him up the stairs, he added in the same dismal tone--"Who shall we get to look after the house now? we shall never have another like her;" and he sighed profoundly.

When Madam Garvloit appeared at the door, Elizabeth finished her interrupted explanation.

"I have known him ever since I was a little girl," she said.

It was at once evident to her mistress that there must be a romantic story here; but though br.i.m.m.i.n.g over with curiosity, she deferred her questions until a more convenient season. In the meantime she manifested the most lively sympathy; and after winning Salve's heart by telling him what a treasure Elizabeth had been to her, she begged that as long as he remained in Amsterdam he would come in and out of the house as he pleased.

CHAPTER XX.