The Pilot and his Wife Part 3

They kept away then, and stood in under land with the least sail they could carry in the tremendous sea that was now breaking in their wake, and soon the thunder of the breakers became audible.

Salve was pale, but perfectly calm, as he stood there with the speaking-trumpet, after having taken over the command, and with the captain and mate by his side. But all of a sudden great beads of perspiration came out on his forehead. There was something curiously irregular about the light. It had become dim and red, and then seemed to go out altogether. Had he by any possibility made a mistake? and was he now sailing the Juno with all on board straight for the rocks?

The uncertainty lasted for a quarter of an hour, and never in his life had Salve seen so heavy a countenance as that with which Beck, whose expression discovered a trace of doubt, looked at him, evidently hesitating whether he should not take the command again himself.

But in the mean time the gleam of light shone forth again--whatever might have been the cause of its obscuration--and that night Salve Kristiansen brought the Juno safely into Merdo.

CHAPTER VII.

Out on Little Torungen meanwhile noteworthy events had occurred, which were now the talk of the town.

Old Jacob had had a stroke the week before, and had died the same night the Juno had had her wrestle for life. In the preceding two days of fog and storm they had heard many signal-guns of distress, and his granddaughter had during that time kept up the fire alone at night. It was only as he was drawing his last breath, and she sat by his side and bent over him, forgetful of aught else, that it was for a while neglected; and it was this little moment that had caused Salve such a _mauvais quart d'heure_ on board the Juno. On the following day, in her despair, she had attempted a perilous journey over the drift ice to bring people out to her a.s.sistance, and had been taken up by a boat and brought in by it to Arendal.

The poor girl was far too much occupied with her grief for the loss of her grandfather to think in the remotest degree of making her story interesting. But Carl Beck, in his enthusiasm, knew very well how to give the incident a colouring of romance, and she was very soon exalted into the heroine of the hour. It was talked of at the Amtmand's--a house with two handsome daughters, where Lieutenant Beck was a daily visitor--and it was in everybody's mouth how, all alone out on Torungen with her dying grandfather, she had been the means of saving the Juno, and had since risked her life on the ice. Every one could see by a glance at her that she must have a remarkable character; but as to her uncommon beauty there prevailed different opinions in feminine circles.

It was, at all events, a pity that she was so forlorn; and the Becks, it was thought, were now morally bound to look after her.

For the present she had gone to live with her aunt up in one of the narrow streets at the back of the town, and there came pouring in, with and without the owners' names, all sorts of friendly advice, with black dress materials and ornaments from the young men and shop lads; and a couple of the bustling ladies of the town even came in person to see her aunt and talk over the girl's future. When Carl Beck, however, gave out that he looked upon these presents as slights upon himself, they ceased.

He had only been up there once, and then his eldest sister was with him: but his manner on that occasion had been most attractive, he had sympathised with such winning sincerity, and at the same time so una.s.sumingly, in Elizabeth's grief; and when leaving a.s.sured her, with emotion which he made no attempt to conceal, that they owed it to her that their father was still alive.

When he was gone, his sister had proceeded to the real matter of her visit. She had come to propose to the aunt that Elizabeth should live with them for the present with the view of qualifying herself for a housekeeper's place, as she must not be exposed to the necessity of going out as a common servant-girl. It was her brother, she added, who had made this plan for Elizabeth's future.

The offer was a highly desirable one for persons in their position, and was accepted by the aunt with unmixed satisfaction. Over Elizabeth's face, however, there pa.s.sed a momentary cloud. She felt, without knowing why, a sense of oppression at the prospect of coming into closer contact with the young lieutenant; but at the same time she would not for a great deal have refused the offer.

CHAPTER VIII.

As for Salve, during the first few days after coming home he was a happy man. He was in love: he had received from his captain a hundred-daler note, accompanied by a promise that as soon as he had learnt navigation he should be third mate on board the Juno; and he heard himself admired on all sides by his equals and a.s.sociates. There was so much work to be done, though, in discharging the cargo and getting the vessel into dock for repairs--they had managed to get her up as far as Arendal--that it would be Sat.u.r.day evening before he could get his so longed-for home-leave.

On the day before, as he was sitting on watch in the early morning under the lee of the bulwark, he accidentally overheard a conversation going on upon the slip below that set his blood on fire.

The carpenters had just come to their work, and one of them was telling the story of old Jacob's death, and of the heroism which his granddaughter had displayed.

"They say," he went on, "that Captain Beck is to have him buried on Monday next, and that he is to provide for the granddaughter--the navy lieutenant has seen to that."

The noise and the clinking of the hammers that were now at work made Salve lose a good deal of the conversation here.

"There is good reason for that, mind you," was the next observation he caught, made in a somewhat lower tone, and accompanied by a doubtful laugh. "It is not for nothing that he has been out so constantly shooting sea-fowl about Torungen."

"Would she be a--sea-bird of that feather? Old Jacob, I should have thought, was not the kind of man--"

"Well, perhaps not that altogether; but the first thing she did was to come straight over here; and he has had her already taken into his own house. I have that from the aunt. The old woman had no suspicion of anything, but told me quite innocently that now she was to be a sort of housekeeper with the Becks."

A slight noise above him here caused the speaker to look up. A deadly pale young sailor was staring down at him over the ship's side with a pair of eyes that struck him as resembling those he had once seen in the head of a mad dog. Their owner turned away at once and crossed the deck.

"That must have been the lover!" he whispered over to the other, as he set to work with his adze upon the pencilled plank. Shortly after he muttered in a tone of compunction--

"If I saw that physiognomy aright, some one had better take care of himself when he gets leave ash.o.r.e."

Salve had sprung to his feet in a fury when he heard about young Beck, but the desire to hear more had kept him spellbound. What further had been hinted of his relations with Elizabeth, and that the latter had even taken refuge in his house, seemed all only too probable. He knew both the men who had been speaking; they were respectable folks, and the one besides had had the news from the aunt herself.

There was hard work that day on board, but his hands were as if they had been benumbed. It was impossible for him to give any a.s.sistance, except in appearance, when any hauling was to be done;--he did everything mechanically.

"Are you sick, lad, or longing after your sweetheart?" said the mate to him in the course of the afternoon. He saw that there was something wrong with him.

That last, "after your sweetheart," had a wonderfully rousing influence.

He felt himself all at once relieved of his heavy feeling of exhaustion, and worked now so hard that the perspiration poured down his face, joining in the hauling song from time to time with a wild, unnatural energy: he was afraid to leave himself a moment for thought. When the day was over, however, he took the anchor watch for a comrade, who was overjoyed at the unexpected prospect of getting a quiet night in his hammock, and at escaping from his turn of "ship's dog"--that watch consisting of one man only, whose business it is to keep the ship from harbour-thieves.

He paced up and down the deck alone in the pitchy darkness, that was only relieved by a lantern or two out in the harbour, and a light here and there up in the town--sometimes standing for long minutes together, with his cheek on his hand, leaning on the railing. He could, without the slightest scruple, murder young Beck--that he felt.

At two o'clock he crossed over to the boards that were sloped against the vessel's side, slid down them in the dark to the slip, and from there made his way ash.o.r.e. Elizabeth's aunt lived in one of the small houses above; and he had determined to wake her and have a talk with her.

Widow Kirstine was a portly, somewhat worn perhaps, but otherwise strong-looking, old woman, with a good broad face, and thin grey hair drawn down behind her ears. She was not unused to being disturbed at night, one of her occupations being to nurse sick people; but she always grumbled whenever she was. When she held up the candle she had lit, and recognised Salve Kristiansen, she thought, from his paleness and general appearance, that he was drunk.

"Is that you, Salve?--and a pretty state to be in at this time of night!" she began, severely, in the doorway, not caring to let him in at first. "Is that the way you spend your wages?"

"No, mother, it's not. I've come off my watch; I wanted to have a word with you about Elizabeth."

His tone was so strangely low and sorrowful, that the old woman saw that there must be something unusual the matter; and she opened the door.

"About Elizabeth, you say?"

"Yes--where is she stopping now?"

"Where is she stopping?--why, with the Becks, of course. Is there anything the matter?"

"You ought to know that best, mother Kirstine," he said, earnestly.

She held up the light to his face, and looked at him in vague anxiety, but could make nothing out of it.

"If I ought to know it, tell me," she said, almost in a tone of entreaty.

"Young Beck, I hear, has been out about Torungen the whole year--shooting sea-birds--or--do you really think he means to marry her?" he broke out wildly, and raising his voice.

It was only now that she caught his full meaning; and setting down the candlestick hard upon the table, she dropped into the chair by the side herself.

"So--that is what they are saying, is it?" she cried at last. Her first fear was over; but anger had succeeded to it, and she rose now from her seat with arms akimbo and flashing eyes. She was not a woman to offend lightly.

"So they have fastened that lie upon Elizabeth, have they!--it's a shame for them, so it is! And you, Salve, can soil your lips with it? Let me just tell you, then, for your pains, that the Becks' house is as respectable a one as any in Arendal; and it isn't you, and such as you, that can take its character away. Never fear but Elizabeth shall hear every word of your precious story--ay, and the captain, and the lieutenant, and Madam Beck, too; and you'll be hunted from the Juno like a dripping cur. So you thought that Elizabeth was to be beholden to the lieutenant for a character--?"

"Dear mother Kirstine!" Salve cried, interrupting her in the full torrent of her indignation, "I didn't think about it--I couldn't think.

Only, I heard Anders of the Crag down on the slip this morning say it all so confidently.