IN the summer of 1874 I was in Liverpool, whither I had gone on business
for the mercantile house of Bronson & Jarrett, New York. I am William
Jarrett; my partner was Zenas Bronson. The firm failed last year, and
unable to endure the fall from affluence to poverty he died.
Having finished my business, and feeling the lassitude and exhaustion
incident to its dispatch, I felt that a protracted sea voyage would be
both agreeable and beneficial, so instead of embarking for my return on
one of the many fine passenger steamers I booked for New York on the
sailing vessel _Morrow_, upon which I had shipped a large and valuable
invoice of the goods I had bought. The _Morrow_ was an English ship
with, of course, but little accommodation for passengers, of whom there
were only myself, a young woman and her servant, who was a middle-aged
negress. I thought it singular that a traveling English girl should be
so attended, but she afterward explained to me that the woman had been
left with her family by a man and his wife from South Carolina, both of
whom had died on the same day at the house of the young lady’s father in
Devonshire—a circumstance in itself sufficiently uncommon to remain
rather distinctly in my memory, even had it not afterward transpired in
conversation with the young lady that the name of the man was William
Jarrett, the same as my own. I knew that a branch of my family had
settled in South Carolina, but of them and their history I was ignorant.
The _Morrow_ sailed from the mouth of the Mersey on the 15th of June and
for several weeks we had fair breezes and unclouded skies. The skipper,
an admirable seaman but nothing more, favored us with very little of his
society, except at his table; and the young woman, Miss Janette Harford,
and I became very well acquainted. We were, in truth, nearly always
together, and being of an introspective turn of mind I often endeavored
to analyze and define the novel feeling with which she inspired me—a
secret, subtle, but powerful attraction which constantly impelled me to
seek her; but the attempt was hopeless. I could only be sure that at
least it was not love. Having assured myself of this and being certain
that she was quite as whole-hearted, I ventured one evening (I remember
it was on the 3d of July) as we sat on deck to ask her, laughingly, if
she could assist me to resolve my psychological doubt.
For a moment she was silent, with averted face, and I began to fear I had
been extremely rude and indelicate; then she fixed her eyes gravely on my
own. In an instant my mind was dominated by as strange a fancy as ever
entered human consciousness. It seemed as if she were looking at me, not
_with_, but _through_, those eyes—from an immeasurable distance behind
them—and that a number of other persons, men, women and children, upon
whose faces I caught strangely familiar evanescent expressions, clustered
about her, struggling with gentle eagerness to look at me through the
same orbs. Ship, ocean, sky—all had vanished. I was conscious of
nothing but the figures in this extraordinary and fantastic scene. Then
all at once darkness fell upon me, and anon from out of it, as to one who
grows accustomed by degrees to a dimmer light, my former surroundings of
deck and mast and cordage slowly resolved themselves. Miss Harford had
closed her eyes and was leaning back in her chair, apparently asleep, the
book she had been reading open in her lap. Impelled by surely I cannot
say what motive, I glanced at the top of the page; it was a copy of that
rare and curious work, “Denneker’s Meditations,” and the lady’s index
finger rested on this passage:
“To sundry it is given to be drawn away, and to be apart from the body
for a season; for, as concerning rills which would flow across each other
the weaker is borne along by the stronger, so there be certain of kin
whose paths intersecting, their souls do bear company, the while their
bodies go fore-appointed ways, unknowing.”
* * * * *
Miss Harford arose, shuddering; the sun had sunk below the horizon, but
it was not cold. There was not a breath of wind; there were no clouds in
the sky, yet not a star was visible. A hurried tramping sounded on the
deck; the captain, summoned from below, joined the first officer, who
stood looking at the barometer. “Good God!” I heard him exclaim.
An hour later the form of Janette Harford, invisible in the darkness and
spray, was torn from my grasp by the cruel vortex of the sinking ship,
and I fainted in the cordage of the floating mast to which I had lashed
myself.
It was by lamplight that I awoke. I lay in a berth amid the familiar
surroundings of the stateroom of a steamer. On a couch opposite sat a
man, half undressed for bed, reading a book. I recognized the face of my
friend Gordon Doyle, whom I had met in Liverpool on the day of my
embarkation, when he was himself about to sail on the steamer _City of
Prague_, on which he had urged me to accompany him.
After some moments I now spoke his name. He simply said, “Well,” and
turned a leaf in his book without removing his eyes from the page.
“Doyle,” I repeated, “did they save _her_?”
He now deigned to look at me and smiled as if amused. He evidently
thought me but half awake.
“Her? Whom do you mean?”
“Janette Harford.”
His amusement turned to amazement; he stared at me fixedly, saying
nothing.
“You will tell me after a while,” I continued; “I suppose you will tell
me after a while.”
A moment later I asked: “What ship is this?”
Doyle stared again. “The steamer _City of Prague_, bound from Liverpool
to New York, three weeks out with a broken shaft. Principal passenger,
Mr. Gordon Doyle; ditto lunatic, Mr. William Jarrett. These two
distinguished travelers embarked together, but they are about to part, it
being the resolute intention of the former to pitch the latter
overboard.”
I sat bolt upright. “Do you mean to say that I have been for three weeks
a passenger on this steamer?”
“Yes, pretty nearly; this is the 3d of July.”
“Have I been ill?”
“Right as a trivet all the time, and punctual at your meals.”
“My God! Doyle, there is some mystery here; do have the goodness to be
serious. Was I not rescued from the wreck of the ship _Morrow_?”
Doyle changed color, and approaching me, laid his fingers on my wrist. A
moment later, “What do you know of Janette Harford?” he asked very
calmly.
“First tell me what _you_ know of her?”
Mr. Doyle gazed at me for some moments as if thinking what to do, then
seating himself again on the couch, said:
“Why should I not? I am engaged to marry Janette Harford, whom I met a
year ago in London. Her family, one of the wealthiest in Devonshire, cut
up rough about it, and we eloped—are eloping rather, for on the day that
you and I walked to the landing stage to go aboard this steamer she and
her faithful servant, a negress, passed us, driving to the ship _Morrow_.
She would not consent to go in the same vessel with me, and it had been
deemed best that she take a sailing vessel in order to avoid observation
and lessen the risk of detection. I am now alarmed lest this cursed
breaking of our machinery may detain us so long that the _Morrow_ will
get to New York before us, and the poor girl will not know where to go.”
I lay still in my berth—so still I hardly breathed. But the subject was
evidently not displeasing to Doyle, and after a short pause he resumed:
“By the way, she is only an adopted daughter of the Harfords. Her mother
was killed at their place by being thrown from a horse while hunting, and
her father, mad with grief, made away with himself the same day. No one
ever claimed the child, and after a reasonable time they adopted her.
She has grown up in the belief that she is their daughter.”
“Doyle, what book are you reading?”
“Oh, it’s called ‘Denneker’s Meditations.’ It’s a rum lot, Janette gave
it to me; she happened to have two copies. Want to see it?”
He tossed me the volume, which opened as it fell. On one of the exposed
pages was a marked passage:
“To sundry it is given to be drawn away, and to be apart from the body
for a season; for, as concerning rills which would flow across each other
the weaker is borne along by the stronger, so there be certain of kin
whose paths intersecting, their souls do bear company, the while their
bodies go fore-appointed ways, unknowing.”
“She had—she has—a singular taste in reading,” I managed to say,
mastering my agitation.
“Yes. And now perhaps you will have the kindness to explain how you knew
her name and that of the ship she sailed in.”
“You talked of her in your sleep,” I said.
A week later we were towed into the port of New York. But the _Morrow_
was never heard from.