One awful weight fell from her heart. "Will you say that you're sorry
for that horrid thing you flung at me about the huts and the desert
island?"
He thought for a moment, remembered and laughed. "Yes," he said, "I'm
sorry."
The other weight fell. There was a third, heavier than these two, that
would always remain. "I will marry you," she said.
And he gave a queer groan and his hands went out to catch her and fell
to his sides.
And the other weight fell with what seemed to her to be a crash that
echoed all over the world. Being a woman, and a woman in love, she
stood on tiptoe and kissed him.
"Don't do that," he cried out.
"Why not?" she asked softly, standing so close that the perfume of her
hair made him shake. "Aren't you forcing me to be your wife?"
"No. I'm only going to make you marry me."
"Then I won't marry you," she said.
"What the devil do you mean?"
She smiled at his roughness and held up her face so that he might see
what she meant in her eyes. She stood up straight, young and slim and
sweet,--her whole body radiating with love and joy and triumph.
And he looked and saw, gave a great cry like a shipwrecked man who sees
the shore, and held her against his heart, out there in the night, under
the stars, giving praise.
*XLII*
"Sorry you're going to leave us, sir," said Moffat, putting a pair of
shoes into a chamois bag.
"Thanks," said Malcolm.
"Mr. Franklin told me that you're going to make straight for my village,
sir,--London."
The valet chuckled at his little joke.
"Yes, London for the autumn, Paris for the winter, and probably back to
New York for the spring."
"And very nice too, sir, I'm sure."
Malcolm went over to one of the open port-holes of his stateroom. The
_Galatea_ lay in the harbor of Queenstown. The setting sun lay kindly
on the houses of the small Irish port that behaved as though it were the
hub of the universe. In one of them, a few hours ago, he had stood in
the shabby little room of the registrar of births, deaths and marriages,
making a mental and never-to-be-forgotten picture of a worn, cheap desk,
a worn, cheap man with a mop of grizzled hair and an absolutely
expressionless face, an inkpot which looked as though it had never been
cleaned, a square of green blotting paper, a dog-eared testament, and a
strip of carpet across which, slanting from the door to the desk, there
was a threadbare path made by the passing of feet. Births, deaths and
marriages,--they were all the same to the registrar. He had his quiet
days and his busy ones. Births and deaths gave a little less trouble
than marriages but they all worked out pretty much the same.
And in this picture, a startling contrast to the shabby and sordid room,
stood the vital figures of Beatrix and Franklin, hand in hand, the
representatives of the spirit of youth and love in that place which also
registered the beginning and the end of life. The feeling and the
symbolism and the beauty of this scene made their appeal to Malcolm
Fraser both as a poet and a man. Here stood a man and a woman, in all
the glory of youth, at the second of the three milestones. On to the
third, hidden behind the curtain of spring leaves, they would now go
together. God grant them the gifts of give and take and the blessed
fruit of love. Here stood his friend and the woman he had loved and
loved still. He wasn't losing her because he was never in the running
to win. He wasn't losing him because their bond was everlasting. All
was well, then. He had no complaints.
[Illustration: In this picture stood the vital figures of Beatrix and
Franklin, hand in hand.]
He followed his luggage on deck. Beatrix and Franklin were waiting for
him. How different they looked, he thought. No wonder. They had found
the way to live.
"Don't go, Mally," said Beatrix, putting an arm round his shoulder.
"Send your things down again and come back with us."
"Yes," said Franklin. "Come on."
Malcolm shook his head. "Don't tempt me," he said. "I've been lazy
long enough. I'm going to begin to work in the old cities. With any
luck I'll have a thin volume ready, very expensively bound, for your
golden wedding."
They all laughed. It was, somehow, a rather emotional moment. It was
good to laugh.
"All ready, sir," said Jones, who regretted to be the one to put good
old Peter Pan ashore.
Malcolm gave his hand to Beatrix. "God bless you, my dear," he said.
"God bless you, Mally."
"Good luck, old man."
"So long," said Franklin.
They watched him into the launch and away, waving their hands.
"Good old Malcolm!" said Franklin. "Among other things that he did for
me he brought you on the _Galatea_."
"But not for my honeymoon," said Beatrix with a little look that made
his heart jump. "When do we sail?"
"As soon as Jones gets back."
"And then, where?"
"Heaven," he said.
They began to walk. The sun was slipping away. A new day was coming, a
new beginning.
"I know one thing," she said.
"What's that?"
"You won't spoil me."
He saw the old mischievous smile lurking in her eyes. But she escaped
his eager hands and ran into her state-room.
And he followed her and shut the door.