His will is not his own;
For he himself is subject to his birth:
He may not, as unvalued persons do,
Carve for himself; for on his choice depends
The safety and the health of this whole state,
And therefore must his choice be circumscribed
Unto the voice and yielding of that body,
Whereof he is the head.
_Osric_.... Believe me, an absolute gentleman, full of most excellent
differences, of very soft society and great showing; indeed, to speak
feelingly of him, he is the card... of gentry.
_Hamlet_.... His definement suffers no perdition in you... But, in the
verity of extolment I take him to be a soul of great article.--_Hamlet._
|THE information which Daireen had received on the unimpeachable
authority of the special correspondent of the _Dominant Trumpeter_ was
somewhat puzzling to her at first; but as she reflected upon the fact
hat the position of governor of the newly-acquired Castaway group must
be one of importance, she could not help feeling some happiness; only in
the midmost heart of her joy her recollection clasped a single grief---a
doubt about her father was still clinging to her heart. The letter her
grandfather had received which caused her to make up her mind to set out
for the Cape, merely stated that Colonel Gerald had been found too weak
to continue the homeward voyage in the vessel that had brought him from
India. He had a bad attack of fever, and was not allowed to be moved
from where he lay at the Cape. The girl thought over all of this as she
reflected upon what Mr. Harwood had told her, and looking over the long
restless waters of the Bay of Biscay from her seat far astern, her eyes
became very misty; the unhappy author represented by the yellow-covered
book which she had been reading lay neglected upon her knee. But soon
her brave, hopeful heart took courage, and she began to paint in her
imagination the fairest pictures of the future--a future beneath the
rich blue sky that was alleged by the Ministers who had brought about
the annexation, evermore to overshadow the Castaway group--a future
beneath the purple shadow of the giant Slieve Docas when her father
would have discharged his duties at the Castaways.
She could not even pretend to herself to be reading the book she had
brought up, so that Mrs. Crawford could not have been accused of an
interruption when she drew her chair alongside the girl's, saying:
“We must have a little chat together, now that there is a chance for it.
It is really terrible how much time one can fritter away aboard ship. I
have known people take long voyages for the sake of study, and yet never
open a single book but a novel. By the way, what is this the major has
been telling me Harwood says about your father?”
Daireen repeated all that Harwood had said regarding the new island
colony, and begged Mrs. Crawford to give an opinion as to the
trustworthiness of the information.
“My dear child,” said Mrs. Crawford, “you may depend upon its truth if
Harwood told it to you. The _Dominant Trumpeter_ sends out as many arms
as an octopus, for news, and, like the octopus too, it has the instinct
of only making use of what is worth anything. The Government have been
very good to George--I mean Colonel Gerald--he was always 'George' with
us when he was lieutenant. The Castaway governorship is one of the
nice things they sometimes have to dispose of to the deserving. It was
thought, you know, that George would sell out and get his brevet long
ago, but what he often said to us after your poor mother died convinced
me that he would not accept a quiet life. And so it was Mr. Harwood that
gave you this welcome news,” she continued, adding in a thoughtful tone,
“By the way, what do you think of Mr. Harwood?”
“I really have not thought anything about him,” Daireen replied,
wondering if it was indeed a necessity of life aboard ship to be able at
a moment's notice to give a summary of her opinion as to the nature of
every person she might chance to meet.
“He is a very nice man,” said Mrs. Crawford; “only just inclined to be
conceited, don't you think? This is our third voyage with him, so that
we know something of him. One knows more of a person at the end of a
week at sea than after a month ashore. What can be keeping Mr. Glaston
over his pears, I wonder? I meant to have presented him to you before.
Ah, here he comes out of the companion. I asked him to return to me.”
But again Mrs. Crawford's expectations were dashed to the ground. Mr.
Glaston certainly did appear on deck, and showed some sign in a
languid way of walking over to where Mrs. Crawford was sitting, but
unfortunately before he had taken half a dozen steps he caught sight
of that terrible pink dress and the hat with the jaundiced interior. He
stopped short, and a look of martyrdom passed over his face as he turned
and made his way to the bridge in the opposite direction to where
that horror of pronounced tones sat quite unconscious of the agony her
appearance was creating in the aesthetic soul of the young man.
Daireen having glanced up and seen the look of dismay upon his face, and
the flight of Mr. Glaston, could not avoid laughing outright so soon as
he had disappeared. But Mrs. Crawford did not laugh. On the contrary she
looked very grave.
“This is terrible--terrible, Daireen,” she said. “That vile hat has
driven him away. I knew it must.”
“Matters are getting serious indeed,” said the girl, with only the least
touch of mockery in her voice. “If he is not allowed to eat anything at
breakfast in sight of the dress, and he is driven up to the bridge by
a glimpse of the hat, I am afraid that his life will not be quite happy
here.”
“Happy! my dear, you cannot conceive the agonies he endures through his
sensitiveness. I must make the acquaintance of that young person and
try to bring her to see the error of her ways. Oh, how fortunate you had
this chocolate-gray!”
“I must have thought of it in a moment of inspiration,” said Daireen.
“Come, you really mustn't laugh,” said the elder lady reprovingly. “It
was a happy thought, at any rate, and I only hope that you will be able
to sustain its effect by something good at dinner. I must look over your
trunks and tell you what tone is most artistic.”
Daireen began to feel rebellious.
“My dear Mrs. Crawford, it is very kind of you to offer to take so much
trouble; but, you see, I do not feel it to be a necessity to choose the
shade of my dress solely to please the taste of a gentleman who may not
be absolutely perfect in his ideas.”
Mrs. Crawford laughed. “Do not get angry, my dear,” she said. “I admire
your spirit, and I will not attempt to control your own good taste;
you will never, I am sure, sink to such a depth of depravity as is
manifested by that hat.”
“Well, I think you may depend on me so far,” said Daireen.
Shortly afterwards Mrs. Crawford descended to arrange some matters in
her cabin, and Daireen had consequently an opportunity of returning to
her neglected author.
But before she had made much progress in her study she was again
interrupted, and this time by Doctor Campion, who had been smoking with
Mr. Harwood on the ship's bridge. Doctor Campion was a small man, with
a reddish face upon which a perpetual frown was resting. He had a jerky
way of turning his head as if it was set upon a ratchet wheel only
capable of shifting a tooth at a time. He had been in the army for a
good many years, and had only accepted the post aboard the _Cardwell
Castle_ for the sake of his health.
“Young cub!” he muttered, as he came up to Daireen. “Infernal young
cub!--I beg your pardon, Miss Gerald, but I really must say it. That
fellow Glaston is getting out of all bounds. Ah, it's his father's
fault--his father's fault. Keeps him dawdling about England without any
employment. Why, it would have been better for him to have taken to the
Church, as they call it, at once, idle though the business is.”
“Surely you have not been wearing an inartistic tie, Doctor Campion?”
“Inartistic indeed! The puppy has got so much cant on his finger-ends
that weak-minded people think him a genius. Don't you believe it, my
dear; he's a dam puppy--excuse me, but there's really no drawing it mild
here.”
Daireen was amused at the doctor's vehemence, however shocked she may
have been at his manner of getting rid of it.
“What on earth has happened with Mr. Glaston now?” she asked. “It is
impossible that there could be another obnoxious dress aboard.”
“He hasn't given himself any airs in that direction since,” said the
doctor. “But he came up to the bridge where we were smoking, and after
he had talked for a minute with Harwood, he started when he saw a boy
who had been sent up to clean out one of the hencoops--asked if we
didn't think his head marvellously like Carlyle's--was amazed at our
want of judgment--went up to the boy and cross-questioned him--found out
that his father sells vegetables to the Victoria Docks--asked if it had
ever been remarked before that his head was like Carlyle's--boy says
quickly that if the man he means is the tailor in Wapping, anybody that
says his head is like that man's is a liar, and then boy goes quietly
down. 'Wonderful!' says our genius, as he comes over to us; 'wonderful
head--exactly the same as Carlyle's, and language marvellously
similar--brief--earnest--emphatic--full of powah!' Then he goes on
to say he'll take notes of the boy's peculiarities and send them to a
magazine. I couldn't stand any more of that sort of thing, so I left him
with Harwood. Harwood can sift him.”
Daireen laughed at this new story of the young man whose movements
seemed to be regarded as of so much importance by every one aboard the
steamer. She began really to feel interested in this Mr. Glaston; and
she thought that perhaps she might as well be particular about the tone
of the dress she would select for appearing in before the judicial eyes
of this Mr. Glaston. She relinquished the design she had formed in
her mind while Mrs. Crawford was urging on her the necessity for
discrimination in this respect: she had resolved to show a recklessness
in her choice of a dress, but now she felt that she had better take Mrs.
Crawford's advice, and give some care to the artistic combinations of
her toilette.
The result of her decision was that she appeared in such studious
carelessness of attire that Mr. Glaston, sitting opposite to her, was
enabled to eat a hearty dinner utterly regardless of the aggressive
splendour of the imperial blue dress worn by the other young lady,
with a pink ribbon flowing over it from her hair. This young lady's
imagination was unequal to suggesting a more diversified arrangement
than she had already shown. She thought it gave evidence of considerable
strategical resources to wear that pink ribbon over the blue dress: it
was very nearly as effective as the blue ribbon over the pink, of the
morning. The appreciation of contrast as an important element of effect
in art was very strongly developed in this young lady.
Mrs. Crawford did not conceal the satisfaction she felt observing the
appetite of Mr. Glaston; and after dinner she took his arm as he went
towards the bridge.
“I am so glad you were not offended with that dreadful young person's
hideous colours,” she said, as they strolled along.
“I could hardly have believed it possible that such wickedness could
survive nowadays,” he replied. “But I was, after the first few minutes,
quite unconscious of its enormity. My dear Mrs. Crawford, your young
protégée appeared as a spirit of light to charm away that fiend of evil.
She sat before me--a poem of tones--a delicate symphony of Schumann's
played at twilight on the brink of a mere of long reeds and water-flags,
with a single star shining through the well-defined twigs of a solitary
alder. That was her idea, don't you think?”
“I have no doubt of it,” the lady replied after a little pause. “But
if you allow me to present you to her you will have an opportunity of
finding out. Now do let me.”
“Not this evening, Mrs. Crawford; I do not feel equal to it,” he
answered. “She has given me too much to think about--too many ideas to
work out. That was the most thoughtful and pure-souled toilette I ever
recollect; but there are a few points about it I do not fully grasp,
though I have an instinct of their meaning. No, I want a quiet hour
alone. But you will do me the favour to thank the child for me.”
“I wish you would come and do it yourself,” said the lady. “But I
suppose there is no use attempting to force you. If you change your
mind, remember that we shall be here.”
She left the young man preparing a cigarette, and joined Daireen and
the major, who were sitting far astern: the girl with that fiction of
a fiction still in her hand; her companion with a cheroot that was
anything but insubstantial in his fingers.
“My dear child,” whispered Mrs. Crawford, “I am so glad you took your
own way and would not allow me to choose your dress for you. I could
never have dreamt of anything so perfect and----yes, it is far beyond
what I could have composed.”
Mrs. Crawford thought it better on the whole not to transfer to Daireen
the expression of gratitude Mr. Glaston had begged to be conveyed to
her. She had an uneasy consciousness that such a message coming to
one who was as yet unacquainted with Mr. Glaston might give her the
impression that he was inclined to have some of that unhappy conceit,
with the possession of which Mrs. Crawford herself had accredited the
race generally.
“Miss Gerald is an angel in whatever dress she may wear,” said the major
gallantly. “What is dress, after all?” he asked. “By gad, my dear, the
finest women I ever recollect seeing were in Burmah, and all the dress
they wore was the merest----”
“Major, you forget yourself,” cried his wife severely.
The major pulled vigorously at the end of his moustache, grinning and
bobbing his head towards the doctor.
“By gad, my dear, the recollection of those beauties would make any
fellow forget not only himself but his own wife, even if she was as fine
a woman as yourself.”
The doctor's face relapsed into its accustomed frown after he had given
a responsive grin and a baritone chuckle to the delicate pleasantry of
his old comrade.