West Wind Drift Part 41

"Has it occured to you that the Doraine is lying out there in the harbour--Here! Look out! I don't like being hugged by--"

"My gosh, A. A! Oh, my gosh!" barked the ecstatic bridegroom-apparent.

"How did you happen to think of such a beautiful, wonderful--"

"How did I happen to think of it?" shouted Percival, just as ecstatically. "Why, darn your eyes, why shouldn't I think of it? Why did old Noah think of the Ark? Why, I ask you?"

"He didn't," said Buck succinctly. "The feller that wrote the Bible thought of it."

"What time is it? Oh, Lord, nearly three hours yet before school is out."

"Say, are you off your base,--lemme smell your breath. You act like--Wait a second! There's something else I want to speak to you about. Is it--is it all right for me to get married? She says I'll have to get your O. K. before she'll move an inch. She says n.o.body can do anything around here without you say so. So I--"

"You tell her I give my consent gladly, Buck, my boy. Give her a good kiss for me, and say I'll speak to Captain Trigger this afternoon about pa.s.sage on the Doraine. By George, I--I think I'll go and speak to him about it now."

"Much obliged, boss. By gosh, you are a brick. There ain't anything you won't do for a friend, is there?"

Percival blushed and stammered. "I--I've got to see him anyhow, Buck,--so don't thank me. By the way, while I'm about it, I suppose I might as well speak to Parson Mackenzie, eh? Or is it to be Father Francisco? And that reminds me, I'll have to see Malone and find out about the legality,--got to have the law on our side, you see, Buck.

Something in the form of a license,--United States of America and all that,--and also see about fixing up desirable quarters on board the Doraine. I may have to transfer quite a lot of--er--furniture and so forth from my hut to the ship, and--"

"Gee whiz, A. A., you mustn't go to so blamed much trouble for me,"

gasped the delighted Buck.

"Eh? What? Oh, the devil take you! Beat it now. I'm going to be mighty busy this morning."

"I'll do as much for you, A. A., if you ever get married," cried Buck, once more wringing the other's hand. Then he was off up the road like a schoolboy.

Shortly before the noon recess, Percival returned from the Doraine. By this time, the news had spread through the camp that there was to be a wedding. Every one he met hailed him with the excited question:

"Say, have you heard the news?"

"What news?"

"There's going to be a wedding."

"Good Lord!" said Percival to himself. "They must have been peeping through those windows after all."

Finding that he had ten minutes to spare before school was out, he decided to call upon Mrs. Spofford. That lady received him with icy politeness.

"I have been expecting you," she said. "Your friend Mr. Shay honoured us with a visit yesterday. My niece is at the school. Will you sit down and wait for her, or--"

"I beg your pardon. What was that you said about Shay?"

"I said he came to see us."

Percival stared, "He did?"

"Please sit down, Mr. Percival. Do not ask me to tell you anything more about Mr. Shay," she went on hurriedly, and in some confusion. "I don't believe he would like it,--and as he is a dangerous character, I beg of you not to--"

"If Soapy Shay dared to intrude--"

"I implore you, do not think anything more about it. He was most courteous and polite and all that."

He remained standing, his gaze fixed upon her face. Somehow, he guessed the nature of Soapy's visit.

"I suppose he came as a tale-bearer."

"I must decline to discuss the matter, Mr. Percival."

"Mrs. Spofford," he began, with all the dignity of a courtier, "I have come to request the hand of your niece in marriage. I have loved her from the very--"

"Oh, G.o.d!" groaned the trembling lady. "It has come at last! It has come,--just as I feared. For pity's sake, Mr. Percival, spare her! She is--"

"I beg your pardon," he broke in, flushing. "I think you misunderstand me. I am asking your consent to marry her. I believe it is still customary among gentlemen to consult the--"

"Permit me to interrupt you, Mr. Percival," said she, regaining her composure and her austerity. "What you ask is quite impossible. My niece is,--ah,--I may say tentatively engaged. I am sorry for you. Perhaps it would be just as well if you did not wait for her to come in. She will be--"

"Mrs. Spofford, I am obliged to confess to you that I have already spoken to Miss Clinton, and I may add that she is not tentatively engaged. She has promised to be my wife."

She drew back as if struck. She was silent for many seconds.

"It would appear that my consent is not necessary, Mr. Percival," she said at last, "Why do you come to me?"

"Because, while you may not suspect it, I was born a gentleman," said he stiffly.

She received this with a slight nod of the head and no more.

"My niece, no doubt in her excitement, has neglected to ask you one or two very important questions," she said levelly. "First of all, have you any means of convincing us that you do not already possess a wife?"

He started. "You are right," he said. "That is an important question, and she has not asked it. I have no means of convincing you that I have never been married, Mrs. Spofford. My word of honour is the only thing I can offer."

She regarded him narrowly. "Do you consider that sufficient, Mr.

Percival?"

"I do," said he simply. She waited for him to go on, and was distinctly impressed by his failure to do so. So far as he was concerned, there was nothing more to be added.

"How are we to know what your past life contains? You may have left your homeland in disgrace, you may even have been a fugitive from justice. We have no means of knowing. You were a stowaway on board the Doraine. That much, at least, we do know. We know nothing more. You are smart, you are clever. Surely you must see yourself that under other circ.u.mstances, under normal conditions, my niece would not have condescended to notice you, Mr. Percival. We are on an undiscovered island, remote from the environment, the society, the--"

"Permit me to remind you, Mrs. Spofford," he interrupted, a trifle coldly, "that you just remarked that you know nothing whatever about me.

Isn't it barely possible that my life may contain something desirable in the shape of family, position and environment?"

"I recall that Mr. Gray did speak of knowing the Percival family. My niece never allows me to forget it."

"Mr. Gray did not know my family. He knew of my family, Mrs. Spofford, if that conveys anything to you. Not that they would not have been proud to have known him, for he was a gentleman. As for my own case, I can only say that I am not a fugitive from justice, nor have I done anything more disgraceful than the average young man who has been through college and who, ignoring the counsel of his father, proceeds to find out for himself the same things that his father had found out a great many years before,--and his father before him, and so on back to the beginning of man. My great-great-grandfather on my mother's side was a comparatively recent settler in America. He didn't come over from Scotland until about 1750. My father's people came over in the days of Lord Baltimore. Most of my remote ancestors were very wicked men. You will find that one of them was executed in the Tower of London the same week that Lady Jane Grey went to her death, and another was openly in love with Mistress Nell Gwyn, thereby falling into disgrace with a monarch named Charles. I admit that I come of very bad stock."

A fleeting twinkle lurked in her eyes.

"You are very adroit, Mr. Percival."