Too much of water had'st thou, poor Ophelia.
How can that be unless she drowned herself?
If the man go to this water... it is, will he, nill he, he goes; mark
you that.--_Hamlet_.
|STANDISH Macnamara had ridden to the Dutch cottage, but he found it
deserted. Colonel Gerald, one of the servants informed him, had early in
the day driven to Simon's Town, and had taken Miss Gerald with him, but
they would both return in the evening. Sadly the young man turned away,
and it is to be feared that his horse had a hard time of it upon The
Flats. The waste of sand was congenial with his mood, and so was the
rapid motion.
But while he was riding about in an aimless way, Daireen and her father
were driving along the lovely road that runs at the base of the low
hills which form a mighty causeway across the isthmus between Table
Bay and Simon's Bay. Colonel Gerald had received a message that the
man-of-war which had been stationed at the chief of the Castaway group
had called at Simon's Bay; he was anxious to know how the provisional
government was progressing under the commodore of those waters whose
green monotony is broken by the gentle cliff's of the Castaways, and
Daireen had been allowed to accompany her father to the naval station.
The summer had not yet advanced sufficiently far to make tawny the dark
green coarse herbage of the hillside, and the mass of rich colouring
lent by the heaths and the prickly-pear hedges made Daireen almost
jealous for the glories of the slopes of Glenmara. For some distance
over the road the boughs of Australian oaks in heavy foilage were
leaning; but when Constantia and its evenly set vineyards were passed
some distance, Daireen heard the sound of breaking waves, and in an
instant afterwards the road bore them down to the water's edge at Kalk
Bay, a little rocky crescent enclosing green sparkling waves. Upon a
pebbly beach a few fishing-boats were drawn up, and the outlying spaces
were covered with drying nets, the flavour of which was much preferable
to that of the drying fish that were near.
On still the road went until it lost itself upon the mighty beaches of
False Bay. Down to the very brink of the great green waves that burst
in white foam and clouds of mist upon the sand the team of the wagonette
was driven, and on along the snowy curve for miles until Simon's Bay
with its cliffs were reached, and the horses were pulled up at the hotel
in the single street of Simon's Town at the base of the low ridge of the
purple hill.
“You will not be lonely, Dolly,” said Colonel Gerald as he left the
hotel after lunch to meet the commander of the man-of-war of which the
yellow-painted hull and long streaming pennon could be seen from the
window, opposite the fort at the farthest arm of the bay.
“Lonely?” said the girl. “I hope I may, for I feel I would like a little
loneliness for a change. I have not been lonely since I was at Glenmara
listening to Murrough O'Brian playing a dirge. Run away now, papa, and
you can tell me when we are driving home what the Castaways are really
like.”
“I'll make particular inquiries as to the possibilities of lawn-tennis,”
said her father, as he went down the steps to the red street.
Daireen saw a sergeant's party of soldiers carry arms to the colonel,
though he wore no uniform and had not been at this place for years; but
even less accustomed observers than the men would have known that he was
a soldier. Tall, straight, and with bright gray eyes somewhat hollower
than they had been twenty years before, he looked a soldier in every
point--one who had served well and who had yet many years of service
before him.
How noble he looked, Daireen thought, as he kissed his hand up to her.
And then she thought how truly great his life had been. Instead of
coming home after his time of service had expired, he had continued at
his post in India, unflinching beneath the glare of the sun overhead
or from the scorching of the plain underfoot; and here he was now, not
going home to rest for the remainder of his life, but ready to face
an arduous duty on behalf of his country. She knew that he had
been striving through all these years to forget in the work he was
accomplishing the one grief of his life. She had often seen him gazing
at her face, and she knew why he had sighed as he turned away.
She had not meant to feel lonely in her father's absence, but her
thoughts somehow were not of that companionable kind which, coming to
one when alone, prevent one's feeling lonely.
She picked up the visitors' book and read all the remarks that had been
written in English for the past years; but even the literature of an
hotel visitor's book fails at some moments to relieve a reader's mind.
She turned over the other volumes, one of which was the Commercial
Code of Signals, and the other a Dutch dictionary. She read one of Mr.
Harwood's letters in a back number of the _Dominant Trumpeter_, and she
found that she could easily recall the circumstances under which, in
various conversations, he had spoken to her every word of that column
and a quarter. She wondered if special correspondents write out every
night all the remarks that they have heard during the day. But even the
attempt to solve this problem did not make her feel brisk.
What was the thought which was hovering about her, and which she was
trying to avoid by all the means in her power? She could not have
defined it. The boundaries of that thought were too vague to be outlined
by words.
She glanced out of the window for a while, and then walked to the door
and looked over the iron balcony at the head of the steps. Only a few
people were about the street. Gazing out seawards, she saw a signal
flying from the peak of the man-of-war, and in a few minutes she saw a
boat put off and row steadily for the shore near the far-off fort at the
headland. She knew the boat was to convey her father aboard the vessel.
She stood there watching it until it had landed and was on its way back
with her father in the stern.
Then she went along the road until she had left the limits of the town,
and was standing between the hill and the sea. Very lovely the sea
looked from where it was breaking about the rocks beneath her, out to
the horizon which was undefined in the delicate mist that rose from the
waters.
She stood for a long time tasting of the freshness of the breeze. She
could see the man-of-war's boat making its way through the waves until
it at last reached the ship, and then she seemed to have lost the object
of her thoughts. She turned off the road and got upon the sloping beach
along which she walked some distance.
She had met no one since she had left the hotel, and the coast of the
Bay round to the farthest headland seemed deserted; but somehow her
mood of loneliness had gone from her as she stood at the brink of those
waters whose music was as the sound of a song of home heard in a strange
land. What was there to hinder her from thinking that she was standing
at the uttermost headland of Lough Suangorm, looking out once more upon
the Atlantic?
She crossed a sandy hollow and got upon a ledge of rocks, up to which
the sea was beating. Here she seated herself, and sent her eyes out
seawards to where the war-ship was lying, and then that thought which
had been near her all the day came upon her. It was not of the Irish
shore that the glad waters were laving. It was only of some words that
had been spoken to her. “For a month we will think of each other,” were
the words, and she reflected that now this month had passed. The month
that she had promised to think of him had gone, but it had not taken
with it her thoughts of the man who had uttered those words.
She looked out dreamily across the green waves, wondering if he had
returned. Surely he would not let a day pass without coming to her side
to ask her if she had thought of him during the month. And what answer
would she give him? She smiled.
“Love, my love,” she said, “when have I ceased to think of you? When
shall I cease to think of you?”
The tears forced themselves into her eyes with the pure intensity of
her passion. She sat there dreaming her dreams and thinking her thoughts
until she seemed only to hear the sound of the waters of the distance;
the sound of the breaking waves seemed to have passed away. It was this
sudden consciousness that caused her to awake from her reverie. She
turned and saw that the waves were breaking on the beach _behind
her_--the rock where she was sitting was surrounded with water, and
every plunge of the advancing tide sent a swirl of water through the
gulf that separated the rocks from the beach.
In an instant she had started to her feet. She saw the death that was
about her. She looked to the rock where she was standing. The highest,
ledge contained a barnacle. She knew it was below the line of high
water, and now not more than a couple of feet of the ledge were
uncovered. A little cry of horror burst from her, and at the same
instant the boom of a gun came across the water from the man-of-war;
she looked and saw that the boat was on its way to the shore again. In
another half-minute a second report sounded, and she knew that they were
firing a salute to her father. They were doing this while his daughter
was gazing at death in the face.
Could they see her from the boat? It seemed miles away, but she took off
her white jacket and standing up waved it. Not the least sign was made
from the boat. The report of the guns echoed along the shore mingling
with her cries. But a sign was given from the water: a wave flung its
spray clear over the rock. She knew what it meant.
She saw in a moment what chance she had of escape. The water between the
rock and the shore was not yet very deep. If she could bear the brunt of
the wild rush of the waves that swept into the hollow she could make her
way ashore.
In an instant she had stepped down to the water, still holding on by the
rocks. A moment of stillness came and she rushed through the waves, but
that sand--it sank beneath her first step, and she fell backwards, then
came another swirl of eddying waves that plunged through the gulf and
swept her away with their force, out past the rock she had been on. One
cry she gave as she felt herself lost.
The boom of the saluting gun doing honour to her father was the sound
she heard as the cruel foam flashed into her face.
But at her cry there started up from behind a rock far ashore the figure
of a man. He looked about him in a bewildered way. Then he made a rush
for the beach, seeing the toy the waves were heaving about. He plunged
in up to his waist.
“Damn the sand!” he cried, as he felt it yield. He bent himself against
the current and took advantage of every relapse of the tide to rush
a few steps onward. He caught the rock and swung himself round to the
seaward side. Then he waited until the next wave brought that helpless
form near him. He did not leave his hold of the rock, but before the
backward sweep came he clutched the girl's dress. Then came a struggle
between man and wave. The man conquered. He had the girl on one of his
arms, and had placed her upon the rock for an instant. Then he swung
himself to the shoreward side, caught her up again, and stumbling,
and sinking, and battling with the current, he at last gained a sound
footing.
Daireen was exhausted but not insensible. She sat upon the dry sand
where the man had placed her, and she drew back the wet hair from her
face. Then she saw the man stand by the edge of the water and shake his
fist at it.
“It's not the first time I've licked you singlehanded,” he said, “and
it'll not be the last. Your bullying roar won't wash here.” Then he
seemed to catch sight of something on the top of a wave. “Hang me if
you'll get even her hat,” he said, and once more he plunged in. The
hat was farther out than the girl had been, and he had more trouble in
securing it. Daireen saw that his head was covered more than once, and
she was in great distress. At last, however, he struggled to the beach
with the hat in his hand. It was very terrible to the girl to see him
turn, squeezing the water from his hair, and curse the sea and all that
pertained to it.
Suddenly, however, he looked round and walked up to where she was now
standing. He handed her the hat as though he had just picked it up from
the sand. Then he looked at her.
“Miss,” he said, “I believe I'm the politest man in this infernal
colony; if I was rude to you just now I ask your pardon. I'm afraid I
pulled you about.”
“You saved me from drowning,” said Daireen. “If you had not come to me I
should be dead now.”
“I didn't do it for your sake,” said the man. “I did it because that's
my enemy”--he pointed to the sea--“and I wouldn't lose a chance of
having a shy at him. It's my impression he's only second best this time
again. Never mind. How do you feel, miss?”
“Only a little tired,” said Daireen. “I don't think I could walk back to
the hotel.”
“You won't need,” said the man. “Here comes a Cape cart and two ancient
swells in it. If they don't give you a seat, I'll smash the whole
contrivance.”
“Oh!” cried Daireen joyfully; “it is papa--papa himself.”
“Not the party with the brass buttons?” said the man. “All right, I'll
hail them.”
Colonel Gerald sprang from the Cape cart in which he was driving with
the commodore of the naval station.
“Good God, Daireen, what does this mean?” he cried, looking from the
girl to the man beside her.
But Daireen, regardless of her dripping condition, threw herself into
his arms, and the stranger turned away whistling. He reached the road
and shook his head confidentially at the commodore, who was standing
beside the Cape cart.
“Touching thing to be a father, eh, Admiral?” he said.
“Stop, sir,” said the commodore. “You must wait till this is explained.”
“Must I?” said the man. “Who is there here that will keep me?”
“What can I say to you, sir?” cried Colonel Gerald, coming up and
holding out his hand to the stranger. “I have no words to thank you.”
“Well, as to that, General,” said the man, “it seems to me the less
that's said the better. Take my advice and get the lady something to
drink--anything that teetotallers won't allow is safe to be wholesome.”
“Come to my house,” said the commodore. “Miss Gerald will find
everything there.”
“You bet you'll find something in the spirituous way at the admiral's
quarters, miss,” remarked the stranger, as Daireen was helped into the
vehicle. “No, thank you, General, I'll walk to the hotel where I put
up.”
“Pray let me call upon you before I leave,” said Colonel Gerald.
“Delighted to see you, General; if you come within the next two hours,
I'll slip the tinsel off a bottle of Moët with you. Now, don't wait
here. If you had got a pearly stream of salt water running down your
spine you wouldn't wait; would they, miss? Aw revaw.”