"What you really want is a sea voyage."
"And a winter at St. Moritz, or do you recommend Cannes or Cairo? It's
all very well, A. J., but you forget what I told you about my funds."
"I forget nothing. I merely don't want to hurt your feelings. But,
look here, a sea voyage you shall have. I want a change myself, and
you shall come with me as my guest. We'll spend July in the
Mediterranean."
"But you're playing cricket--"
"Hang the cricket!"
"Well, if I thought you meant it--"
"Of course I mean it. Will you come?"
"Like a shot--if you go."
And I shook his hand, and waved mine in farewell, with the perfectly
good-humored conviction that I should hear no more of the matter. It
was a passing thought, no more, no less. I soon wished it were more;
that week found me wishing myself out of England for good and all. I
was making nothing. I could but subsist on the difference between the
rent I paid for my flat and the rent at which I had sublet it,
furnished, for the season. And the season was near its end, and
creditors awaited me in town. Was it possible to be entirely honest?
I had run no bills when I had money in my pocket, and the more
downright dishonesty seemed to me the less ignoble.
But from Raffles, of course, I heard nothing more; a week went by, and
half another week; then, late on the second Wednesday night, I found a
telegram from him at my lodgings, after seeking him vainly in town, and
dining with desperation at the solitary club to which I still belonged.
"Arrange to leave Waterloo by North German Lloyd special," he wired,
"9.25 A. M. Monday next will meet you Southampton aboard Uhlan with
tickets am writing."
And write he did, a light-hearted letter enough, but full of serious
solicitude for me and for my health and prospects; a letter almost
touching in the light of our past relations, in the twilight of their
complete rupture. He said that he had booked two berths to Naples,
that we were bound for Capri, which was clearly the island of the
Lotos-eaters, that we would bask there together, "and for a while
forget." It was a charming letter. I had never seen Italy; the
privilege of initiation should be his. No mistake was greater than to
deem it an impossible country for the summer. The Bay of Naples was
never so divine, and he wrote of "faëry lands forlorn," as though the
poetry sprang unbidden to his pen. To come back to earth and prose, I
might think it unpatriotic of him to choose a German boat, but on no
other line did you receive such attention and accommodation for your
money. There was a hint of better reasons. Raffles wrote, as he had
telegraphed, from Bremen; and I gathered that the personal use of some
little influence with the authorities there had resulted in a material
reduction in our fares.
Imagine my excitement and delight! I managed to pay what I owed at
Thames Ditton, to squeeze a small editor for a very small check, and my
tailors for one more flannel suit. I remember that I broke my last
sovereign to get a box of Sullivan's cigarettes for Raffles to smoke on
the voyage. But my heart was as light as my purse on the Monday
morning, the fairest morning of an unfair summer, when the special
whirled me through the sunshine to the sea.
A tender awaited us at Southampton. Raffles was not on board, nor did
I really look for him till we reached the liner's side. And then I
looked in vain. His face was not among the many that fringed the rail;
his hand was not of the few that waved to friends. I climbed aboard in
a sudden heaviness. I had no ticket, nor the money to pay for one. I
did not even know the number of my room. My heart was in my mouth as I
waylaid a steward and asked if a Mr. Raffles was on board. Thank
heaven--he was! But where? The man did not know, was plainly on some
other errand, and a-hunting I must go. But there was no sign of him on
the promenade deck, and none below in the saloon; the smoking-room was
empty but for a little German with a red moustache twisted into his
eyes; nor was Raffles in his own cabin, whither I inquired my way in
desperation, but where the sight of his own name on the baggage was
certainly a further reassurance. Why he himself kept in the
background, however, I could not conceive, and only sinister reasons
would suggest themselves in explanation.
"So there you are! I've been looking for you all over the ship!"
Despite the graven prohibition, I had tried the bridge as a last
resort; and there, indeed, was A. J. Raffles, seated on a skylight, and
leaning over one of the officers' long chairs, in which reclined a girl
in a white drill coat and skirt--a slip of a girl with a pale skin,
dark hair, and rather remarkable eyes. So much I noted as he rose and
quickly turned; thereupon I could think of nothing but the swift
grimace which preceded a start of well-feigned astonishment.
"Why--BUNNY?" cried Raffles. "Where have YOU sprung from?"