The Red Eric Part 2

"And did you," continued the lady in the same sepulchral tone, "did you note how that man--that beacon, if I may use the expression, set up as a warning to deter all wilful boys and men from reckless, and wicked, and wandering, and obstreperous courses--did you note, I say, how that man, that beacon, was shipwrecked, and spent a dreary existence on an uninhabited and dreadful island, in company with a low, dissolute, black, unclothed companion called Friday?"

"Yes," answered the captain, seeing that she paused for a reply.

"And all," continued Martha, "in consequence of his resolutely and obstinately, and wilfully and wickedly going to sea?"

"Well, it couldn't have happened if he hadn't gone to sea, no doubt."

"Then," argued Martha, "will you, can you, George, contemplate the possibility of your only daughter coming to the same dreadful end?"

George, not exactly seeing the connection, rubbed his nose with his forefinger, and replied--"Certainly not."

"Then you are bound," continued Martha, in triumph, "by all that is upright and honourable, by all the laws of humanity and _propriety_, to give up this wild intention--and you _must_!"

"There!" cried Miss Jane emphatically, as if the argument were unanswerable--as indeed it was, being incomprehensible.

The last words were unfortunate. They merely riveted the captain's determination.

"You talk a great deal of nonsense, Martha," he said, rising to depart.

"I've fixed to take her, so the sooner you make up your minds to it the better."

The sisters knew their brother's character too well to waste more time in vain efforts; but Martha took him by the arm, and said earnestly--"Will you promise me, my dear George, that when she comes back from this voyage, you will never take her on another?"

"Yes, dear sister," replied the captain, somewhat melted, "I promise that."

Without another word Martha sat down and held out her arms to Ailie, who incontinently rushed into them. Propriety fled for the nonce, discomfited. Miss Martha's curls were disarranged beyond repair, and Miss Martha's collar was crushed to such an extent that the very laundress who had washed and starched and ironed it would have utterly failed to recognise it. Miss Jane looked on at these improprieties in perfect indifference--nay, when, after her sister had had enough, the child was handed over to her, she submitted to the same violent treatment without a murmur. For once Nature was allowed to have her way, and all three had a good hearty satisfactory cry; in the midst of which Captain Dunning left them, and, proceeding on board his ship, hastened the preparations for his voyage to the Southern Seas.

CHAPTER THREE.

THE TEA-PARTY--ACCIDENTS AND INCIDENTS OF A MINOR KIND--GLYNN PROCTOR GETS INTO TROUBLE.

On the evening of the day in which the foregoing scenes were enacted, the Misses Dunning prepared a repast for their brother and one or two of his officers, who were to spend the last evening in port there, and discuss various important and unimportant matters in a sort of semi-convivio-business way.

An event of this kind was always of the deepest interest and productive of the most intense anxiety to the amiable though starched sisters; first, because it was of rare occurrence; and second, because they were never quite certain that it would pa.s.s without some unhappy accident, such as the upsetting of a tea-cup or a kettle, or the scalding of the cat, not to mention visitors' legs. They seemed to regard a tea-party in the light of a firearm--a species of blunderbuss--a thing which, it was to be hoped, would "go off well"; and, certainly, if loading the table until it groaned had anything to do with the manner of its "going off," there was every prospect of its doing so with pre-eminent success upon that occasion.

But besides the anxieties inseparable from the details of the pending festivities, the Misses Dunning were overwhelmed and weighed down with additional duties consequent upon their brother's sudden and unexpected determination. Little Ailie had to be got ready for sea by the following morning! It was absolute and utter insanity! No one save a madman or a sea-captain could have conceived such a thing, much less have carried it into effect tyrannically.

The Misses Dunning could not attempt any piece of duty or work separately. They always acted together, when possible; and might, in fact, without much inconvenience, have been born Siamese twins.

Whatever Martha did, Jane attempted to do or to mend; wherever Jane went, Martha followed. Not, by any means, that one thought she could improve upon the work of the other; their conduct was simply the result of a desire to a.s.sist each other mutually. When Martha spoke, Jane echoed or corroborated; and when Jane spoke, Martha repeated her sentences word for word in a scarcely audible whisper--not after the other had finished, but during the course of the remarks.

With such dispositions and propensities, it is not a matter to be wondered at that the good ladies, while arranging the tea-table, should suddenly remember some forgotten article of Ailie's wardrobe, and rush simultaneously into the child's bedroom to rectify the omission; or, when thus engaged, be filled with horror at the thought of having left the b.u.t.tered toast too near the fire in the parlour.

"It is really quite perplexing," said Martha, sitting down with a sigh, and regarding the tea-table with a critical gaze; "quite perplexing.

I'm sure I don't know how I shall bear it. It is too bad of George-- darling Ailie--(dear me, Jane, how crookedly you have placed the urn)-- it is really too bad."

"Too bad, indeed; yes, isn't it?" echoed Jane, in reference to the captain's conduct, while she a.s.sisted Martha, who had risen to readjust the urn.

"Oh!" exclaimed Martha, with a look of horror.

"What?" cried Jane, who looked and felt equally horrified, although she knew not yet the cause.

"The eggs!"

"The eggs?"

"Yes, the eggs. You know every one of the last dozen we got was bad, and we've forgot to send for more," said Martha.

"For more; so we have!" cried Jane; and both ladies rushed into the kitchen, gave simultaneous and hurried orders to the servant-girl, and sent her out of the house impressed with an undefined feeling that life or death depended on the instant procuring of two dozen fresh eggs.

It may be as well to remark here, that the Misses Dunning, although stiff, and starched, and formal, had the power of speeding nimbly from room to room, when alone and when occasion required, without in the least degree losing any of their stiffness or formality, so that we do not use the terms "rush," "rushed," or "rushing" inappropriately.

Nevertheless, it may also be remarked that they never acted in a rapid or impulsive way in company, however small in numbers or unceremonious in character the company might be--always excepting the servant-girl and the cat, to whose company, from long habit, they had become used, and therefore indifferent.

The sisters were on their knees, stuffing various articles into a large trunk, and Ailie was looking on, by way of helping, with very red and swollen eyes, and the girl was still absent in quest of eggs, when a succession of sounding blows were administered to the green door, and a number of gruff voices were heard conversing without.

"_There_!" cried Martha and Jane, with bitter emphasis, looking in each other's faces as if to say, "We knew it. Before that girl was sent away for these eggs, we each separately and privately prophesied that they would arrive, and that we should have to open the door. And you see, so it has happened, and we are not ready!"

But there was no time for remark. The case was desperate. Both sisters felt it to be so, and acted accordingly, while Ailie, having been forbidden to open the door, sat down on her trunk, and looked on in surprise. They sprang up, washed their hands simultaneously in the same basin, with the same piece of soap broken in two; dried them with the same towel, darted to the mirror, put on two identically similar clean tall caps, leaped down-stairs, opened the door with slow dignity of demeanour, and received their visitors in the hall with a calmness and urbanity of manner that contrasted rather strangely with their flushed countenances and heaving bosoms.

"Hallo! Ailie!" exclaimed the captain, as his daughter pulled down his head to be kissed. "Why, you take a fellow all aback, like a white squall. Are you ready, my pet? Kit stowed and anchor tripped? Come this way, and let us talk about it. Dear me, Martha, you and Jane--look as if you had been running a race, eh? Here are my messmates come to talk a bit with you. My sisters, Martha and Jane--Dr Hopley." (Dr Hopley bowed politely.) "My first mate, Mr Millons" (Mr Millons also bowed, somewhat loosely); "and Rokens--Tim Rokens, my chief harpooner."

(Mr Rokens pulled his forelock, and threw back his left leg, apparently to counterbalance the bend in his body.) "He didn't want to come; said he warn't accustomed to ladies' society; but I told him you warn't ladies--a--I don't mean that--not ladies o' the high-flyin' fashionable sort, that give themselves airs, you know. Come along, Ailie."

While the captain ran on in this strain, hung up his hat, kissed Ailie, and ran his fingers through his s.h.a.ggy locks, the Misses Dunning performed a mingled bow and courtsey to each guest as his name was mentioned, and shook hands with him, after which the whole party entered the parlour, where the cat was discovered enjoying a preliminary meal of its own at one of the pats of b.u.t.ter. A united shriek from Martha and Jane, a nautical howl from the guests, and a rolled-up pocket-handkerchief from Rokens sent that animal from the table as if it had received a galvanic shock.

"I ax yer parding, ladies," said Mr Rokens, whose aim had been so perfect that his handkerchief not only accelerated the flight of the cat, but carried away the violated pat of b.u.t.ter along with it. "I ax yer parding, but them brutes is sich thieves--I could roast 'em alive, so I could."

The harpooner unrolled his handkerchief, and picking the pat of b.u.t.ter from its folds with his fingers, threw it into the fire. Thereafter he smoothed down his hair, and seated himself on the extreme edge of a chair, as near the door as possible. Not that he had any intention whatever of taking to flight, but he deemed that position to be more suited to his condition than any other.

In a few minutes the servant-girl returned with the eggs. While she is engaged in boiling them, we shall introduce Captain Dunning's friends and messmates to the reader.

Dr Hopley was a surgeon, and a particular friend of the captain's. He was an American by birth, but had travelled so much about the world that he had ceased to "guess" and "calculate," and to speak through his nose.

He was a man about forty, tall, big-boned, and muscular, though not fat; and besides being a gentlemanly man, was a good-natured, quiet creature, and a clever enough fellow besides, but he preferred to laugh at and enjoy the jokes and witticisms of others rather than to perpetrate any himself. Dr Hopley was intensely fond of travelling, and being possessed of a small independence, he indulged his pa.s.sion to the utmost. He had agreed to go with Captain Dunning as the ship's doctor, simply for the sake of seeing the whale-fishery of the South Seas, having already, in a similar capacity, encountered the dangers of the North.

Dr Hopley had few weaknesses. His chief one was an extravagant belief in phrenology. We would not be understood to imply that phrenology is extravagant; but we a.s.sert that the doctor's belief in it was extravagant, a.s.signing, as he did, to every real and ideal facility of the human mind "a local habitation and a name" in the cranium, with a corresponding depression or elevation of the surface to mark its whereabouts. In other respects he was a commonplace sort of a man.

Mr Millons, the first mate, was a short, hale, thick-set man, without any particularly strong points of character. He was about thirty-five, and possessed a superabundance of fair hair and whiskers, with a large, broad chin, a firm mouth, rather fierce-looking eyes, and a hasty, but by no means a bad temper. He was a trustworthy, matter-of-fact seaman, and a good officer, but not bright intellectually. Like most men of his cla.s.s, his look implied that he did not under-estimate his own importance, and his tones were those of a man accustomed to command.

Tim Rokens was an old salt; a bluff, strong, cast-iron man, of about forty-five years of age, who had been at sea since he was a little boy, and would not have consented to live on dry land, though he had been "offered command of a seaport town all to himself," as he was wont to affirm emphatically. His visage was scarred and knotty, as if it had been long used to being pelted by storms--as indeed it had. There was a scar over his left eye and down his cheek, which had been caused by a slash from the cutla.s.s of a pirate in the China Seas; but although it added to the rugged effect of his countenance, it did not detract from the frank, kindly expression that invariably rested there. Tim Rokens had never been caught out of temper in his life. Men were wont say he had no temper to lose. Whether this was true or no, we cannot presume to say, but certainly he never lost it. He was the best and boldest harpooner in Captain Dunning's ship, and a sententious deliverer of his private opinion on all occasions whatsoever. When we say that he wore a rough blue pilot-cloth suit, and had a large black beard, with a sprinkling of silver hairs in it, we have completed his portrait.

"What's come of Glynn?" inquired Captain Dunning, as he accepted a large cup of smoking tea with one hand, and with the other handed a plate of b.u.t.tered toast to Dr Hopley, who sat next him.

"I really cannot imagine," replied Miss Martha.

"No, cannot imagine," whispered Miss Jane.

"He promised to come, and to be punctual," continued Miss Martha ("Punctual," whispered Miss J), "but something seems to have detained him. Perhaps--"

Here Miss Martha was brought to an abrupt pause by observing that Mr Rokens was about to commence to eat his egg with a teaspoon.