West Wind Drift Part 25

"Well, there you are," he rejoined persuasively.

"But how do we know she won't be tickled to death with our name? She'd ought to be. It's purtier than any name I can think of," argued Jack Wales, a sailor. "When she's well enough, we'll tell her the kid's name is Doraine, and--"

"She won't hold back a second, boss, when she finds out that you picked it for her," broke in another. "Only a couple o' days ago she was sayin'

to one of the other women in my hearin' that if it was a boy she was goin' to call him Percival,--and she didn't know what on earth she'd do if it was a girl. Said she'd probably have to call it after her mother and she didn't like her mother's name a little bit."

"I know, but after all, we did b.u.t.t in a trifle too soon with our--"

"For G.o.d's sake, don't let any of these here women hear you talk like that, boss," groaned Jack Wales. "They'll think we're beginning to hedge. We got to stand together in this thing. If we don't, they'll rule this camp sure as you're a foot high. I don't give a dern what the kid's name is, far as I'm concerned, but on principle, boss, it's just got to be Doraine. Doraine she is an' Doraine she stays."

Every one of them was good-humoured about it. They were taking it as a rare and unexpected bit of politics. The thrill of opposition invested them. They scoffed at surrender.

Buck Chizler, however, was seriously affected. He was courting one of the nurses and he, for one, saw peril in preliminary defeat.

"There won't be any living with 'em," he proclaimed, scowling darkly. "I know what it is to have 'em get the bit in their teeth. You just can't manage 'em, that's all. Upset all the dope. Likely to throw you clear over the fence. Experience ain't a particle of use. The gad don't do a bit of good. They just shut their jaws, lay back their ears, and--"

"We're not talking about race-horses, Buck," interrupted Percival, smiling.

"Neither am I," said Buck forcibly.

Ruth went to Olga Obosky. She did so only after a rather prolonged inward struggle. The Russian's interest in Percival was not moderated by the reserve supposed to be inherent in women. She was an open idolatress. One had only to watch the way she followed him with her dark, heavy-lidded eyes to know what was in her mind. Ruth tried not to despise her. She tried not to care, when she saw Percival laughing and talking with this beguiling sensualist,--and it was not an infrequent occurrence.

The dancer was seated on the floor of her hut, tailor-fashion, a cigarette between her lips, her bare arms resting limply on her knees, her body bent forward in an att.i.tude of extreme fatigue. The three "coryphees" were busy at work about the place with Olga's maid. Ruth stopped in the doorway. Olga lazily removed the cigarette from her lips and smiled.

"I once thought I was very strong and unbreakable," she said, "but now I know I am not. See, I am all in, as we would say in America. Suffering snakes,--how tired I am! That also comes from America. Won't you sit down, Miss Clinton? We have three or four deck chairs, you see, and some cushions."

"Why do you sit there on the floor, all doubled up and--heavens, it must be uncomfortable,--if you are so tired? How do you manage your legs?"

"My legs? Oh, my legs are never tired. It is my poor back." Whereupon she slowly, gracefully straightened out one of her legs, and without changing the position of her body, raised it, with toes and instep on a perfect line, until the heel was some three feet from the floor. Then she swung it slowly backward, twisting her body sinuously to one side.

A moment later the foot was stretched out behind her and she lifted herself steadily, without apparent exertion, upon the other knee,--and then stood erect. Ruth watched this remarkable feat in wonder and admiration.

"How--how on earth do you do it?" she cried. "Why,--you must be as strong as--as--a--" She was about to say horse, and floundered.

"But I trust not as clumsy as one," said Madame Obosky, stretching her body in luxurious abandon. "I sit on the floor like zat, my friend, because my back is tired, not my legs. If I lie back in ze deck chair when I am tired, I would relax,--and would make so much more regret for myself when the time came to get up again. Besides, it is a good way to rest, zis way. Have you never tried it? Do, sometime. The whole body rests, it sags; the muscles have nothing to do, so they become soft and grateful. The backbone, the shoulders, the neck,--they all droop and oh, zey--they are so happy to be like zat. It is the same as when I am asleep and they are not running errands all the time for my brain. The Arab sits like zat when he rests,--and the Hindoo,--and they are strong, oh, so very strong. Try it, sometime, Miss Clinton, when you are very tired. It is the best way to let go, all over."

Ruth laughed. "I couldn't do it to save my soul."

"Oh, I do not mean for you to get up as I did, or use your leg as I did.

You could not do zat. You are too old. That is one of the fruits, one of the benefits of the cruelest kind of child labour. I was a great many years in making myself able to do zat. See! Put your hand on my leg. Now my back,--my arm. What you think, eh?"

Ruth, in some embarra.s.sment, had shyly obeyed her. The dancer's thigh was like a column of warm iron; her waist, free as ever from stays, was firm and somehow suggestive of actual resilience; her shoulders and back possessed the hard, rippling muscles of a well-developed boy; her shapely forearm was as hard as steel. Ruth marvelled.

"How strong you are!" she cried; "and yet you are slight. You are not as big as I am, but oh, how much stronger you are!"

"I have a perfect figure," said Olga calmly. "It is worth preserving. No one admires my body so much as I do myself. I must not get fat. When you are a fat old woman, I shall still be as I am now. You will diet, and pray, and rave,--because you are growing old,--and I shall do none of these things. I eat like a pig, I never pray, and I do not believe in growing old. But you do not come to see me about myself, Miss Clinton.

You find me sitting idly with my legs crossed, and you are surprise.

I work as I dance,--very, oh, so very hard while I am at ze task,--but with frequent periods of rest. So I do not wear out myself too soon.

It is the only way. Work for an hour, rest for ten minutes,--relax and forget,--and you will see how well it goes. Why do you come? Is it to talk about the baby?"

"Yes, it is, Madame Obosky. I have come to ask you to use your influence with Mr. Percival. You--"

"But I have no influence with Mr. Percivail," interrupted the other, staring.

Ruth flushed. "You are his friend. You--"

"Ah, yes,--but nothing more than zat. You too are his friend, Miss Clinton."

"I see little or nothing of Mr. Percival," said Ruth stiffly. "We are not friends,--not really friends."

"But you admire him, eh? Quite as much as I admire him,--and as every one else does."

"There are certain things about him that I admire, of course."

"You admire him for the same reason that I admire him. Because he has a most charming and agreeable way of telling me to go to the devil. Is that not so?"

"Madame Obosky!"

"It comes to the same thing. If you would like me to put it in another form, he has a very courteous way of resisting. He is most aggravating, Miss Clinton. He is most disappointing. He should be like soft clay in our hands, and he isn't. Is that not so?"

"Is it not possible, Madame Obosky, that we,--you and I,--may have an entirely different viewpoint so far as Mr. Percival is concerned? Or any other man, for that matter?" Ruth spoke coldly, almost insultingly.

"I dare say," agreed Olga, composedly, not in the least offended by the implication. "You want to marry him. I do not."

"How dare you say that? I do not want to marry that man. I do not want to marry him, I say."

"How interesting. You surprise me, Miss Clinton. It appears, then, that our viewpoint is in nowise different, after all."

"What do you mean by that?"

"I leave it to your imagination,--and to reflection. Listen! We may as well be friends. You do not wish to admit it, even to yourself, but you are in love with him. So am I. The difference between us is that I realize I can get along without him, and still be happy. I am not jealous, my dear. If I were, I should hate you,--and I do not. He is in love with you. You know it perfectly well, because you are not a fool.

He is not in love with me. No more am I a fool. He--"

"I am not in love with him!"

"So be it," said Olga shortly. "Have your own way about it. It is not my affair. You have come to me, however, because you know he loves you and you know you do not love him. Why, therefore, are you afraid of me?"

"It is useless to continue this--"

"Oh, I see! You do not wish my girls to hear our conversation." Without more ado, she ordered the three girls out of the hut. "Go out and play,"

she commanded. Then, as the girls imparted in haste, she turned to Ruth.

"I am very thoughtless. You are not in the habit of discussing your love affairs quite so generously as I. Poof! They do not care, those girls.

Love affairs mean nothing to my girls."

"I have no love affair to discuss, Madame Obosky. You need not have sent them away. Good-bye..There is nothing more to be said--"

"Do not go away,--please. You do not know whether to like me or not. You do not understand me. You have never encountered any woman as honest as I am, zat is the trouble. Sit down, please. Let us talk. We may be here together on this island all the rest of our lives, Miss Clinton. It would not be right for us to hate each other. When you are married to Mr. Percivail, you will have nothing to fear from me. I give you my solemn oath on zat, Miss Clinton. Our little world here is too small. If we were out in the great big world,--well, it might be different then.

But, how, I ask you, is it possible for me to run away with your husband when there is no place to run away to?"

She spoke so quaintly that Ruth smiled in spite of herself.