MISS FENSHAWE SEEKS AN ALLY
Royson was not in the least nonplussed by this recurrence of a dilemma
for which he was not responsible. Von Kerber, of course, could have
extricated him with a word, but von Kerber, for reasons of his own,
remained, invisible. So Dick threw his head back in a characteristic
way which people soon learnt to associate with a stubborn resolve to
see a crisis through to the end. He ignored Mrs. Haxton, and spoke to
the captain.
"I am glad the question of my right name has been raised," he said.
"When Baron von Kerber comes on deck I shall ask him to settle the
matter once and for all."
"Just so," said Stump, "I would if I was you."
"The really important thing is the whereabouts of our cabins,"
interrupted Mrs. Haxton's clear drawl.
"Take the ladies aft,--Mr. Royson,--an' let 'em choose their quarters,"
directed Stump curtly.
Dick would have obeyed in silence had not Miss Fenshawe thought fit to
help him. She had found Mrs. Haxton's airs somewhat tiresome during the
long journey from London, and she saw no reason why that lady should be
so ready to bring a hornet's nest about Royson's ears.
"We are not in such a desperate hurry to bestow our belongings that you
cannot read your telegram," she said to Dick. Then she favored Stump
with a frank smile. "I know you mean to start almost immediately,
captain, and it is possible that Mr. Royson may wish to send an answer
before we leave Marseilles. You won't be angry if he waits one moment
before he shows us to our staterooms?"
"Not at all, miss," said the skipper, "he's at your service. I can do
without him--easy."
Stump was angry with Dick, and did not hesitate to show it. A blunt
man, of plain speech, he resented anything in the nature of
double-dealing. Royson's remarkable proficiency in most matters bearing
on the navigation of a ship had amazed him in the first instance, and
this juggling with names led him to suspect some deep-laid villainy
with which the midnight attack on von Kerber was not wholly unconnected.
But the person most taken aback by Irene's self-assertion was Mrs.
Haxton. A firm attitude on the girl's part came as an unpleasing
novelty. An imperious light leaped to her eyes, but she checked the
words which might have changed a trivial incident into a sharp tussle
for supremacy.
"I am sorry," she said quietly. "Telegrams are important things,
sometimes. And the messenger is waiting, too."
Thus, under the fire of many eyes, Royson tore open the _petit bleu_,
and read its typewritten contents. The words were brief, but
sufficiently bewildering:
"Better return to England forthwith. I undertake full responsibility
for advice, and guarantee you against loss, Forbes."
"Forbes," undoubtedly, was his uncle's solicitor. But how was it
possible that he should have discovered the name of the yacht and her
port of departure? And why did he, a methodical old lawyer, not only
disobey his client's strict injunctions that no help or assistance of
any sort was to be given to a rebellious nephew, but ignore Dick's own
wishes, and address him as Royson, not as King?
There were twenty questions which might be asked, but staring at the
flimsy bit of paper, with its jerky lettering, would not answer any of
them. And the issue called for instant decision. Already, in obedience
to a signal from Stump, men were standing by the fixed capstans on the
mole ready to cast off the yacht's hawsers. Perhaps Sir Henry Royson
was dying? Even in that unlikely event, of what avail was a title with
nothing a year? Certainly, the solicitor's cautious telegram might be
construed into an offer of financial aid. That reading implied a more
cheerful view than he had taken hitherto of his prospects with regard
to the Cuddesham estate. Yet, the only way in which he could meet Mr.
Forbes's wishes was to spring ashore then and there, if such a
proceeding were practicable, and abandon the adventure whose strange
by-ways were already opening up before his mind's eye.
Then Irene said sympathetically:
"I hope you have not received any bad news, Mr.--Royson."
The captain's pause before addressing him by his real name was intended
to be ironical. Not so the girl's hesitancy. Interpreting Dick's mood
with her woman's intuition, she felt that he wished to drop any
subterfuge now, no matter what his motive might have been in adopting
one hitherto.
Her voice broke the spell which the telegram, with its curious
phrasing, had cast on him.
"No, Miss Fenshawe, not bad news, certainly. Indeed, it was the absence
of any sort of news that troubled me for a moment. _Chasseur_!"
"_Oui, m'sieu_'," and the messenger raised his hat.
"_Voila_!" Dick threw him a franc. "_Il n'a pas de reponse_."
"_Merci bien, m'sieu'_."
That spinning of a coin through the air showed that Royson had made up
his mind. He had tossed with Fortune, and cared not who won.
The messenger drew away from the gangway, and entered into a
conversation with the driver of the omnibus. Stump nodded to a man on
the quay. The forward mooring rope was cleared, and fell into the water
with a loud splash. Two sailors ran the gangway on board. An electric
bell jarred in the engine-room, and the screw revolved, while the
rattle of the steering chains showed that the helm was put hard a-port.
When the _Aphrodite_ moved slowly astern, her bow swung towards the
mouth of the dock. The indicator rang again, twice, and the yacht,
after a pause, began to forge ahead. Another splash, and the second
hawser was cast loose. The mole, the neighboring ships, the landward
quays and the warehouses thereon, seemed to diminish in size without
any perceptible cause, and, in a space of time that might have been
measured by seconds rather than minutes, the _Aphrodite_ was throbbing
southward.
Mrs. Haxton, whose eagerness to inspect her stateroom had gone, was
hailed pleasantly by Irene.
"Now, because I asked you to wait, you shall have first choice," she
said, "Lead on, Mr. Royson. Let us see our dens."
But Baron von Kerber came running along the deck, all smiles and
welcoming words, and it was evident that some reason other than
physical unfitness had kept him out of sight until the yacht's voyage
was actually commenced. Dick heard him explaining coolly that he had
met with a slight accident on arriving at Marseilles overnight. Some
difficulty in dressing, he said, combined with the phenomenal
punctuality of the _train de luxe_, accounted for his tardy appearance,
but the ladies would find that the steward had everything in readiness,
and Mr. Fenshawe was too experienced a _voyageur_ not to make himself
at home instantly. Rattling on thus agreeably, he led the way aft.
In the midst of his explanations, he saw that Dick was accompanying the
party, and told him, rather abruptly, that his services were not
required. In no amiable mood, therefore, the second officer went to the
upper deck, where the skipper was growling his views to Tagg about the
mysterious incident of the telegram. It was a moment of tension, and
something might have been said that would tend to place Royson and the
captain at arm's length if the _Aphrodite_ had not taken it into her
head to emulate Miss Fenshawe's action by coming to Dick's assistance.
The little vessel remembered that which Stump paid small heed to, and
asserted herself.
Notwithstanding her half-deck saloon, with the tiny chart-house perched
thereon, and the narrow bridge that gave her a steamer-like aspect, she
was rigged as a topsail schooner, her sharp lines and consequent extra
length affording full play to her fore-and-aft sails. Her first owner
had designed her with set purpose. It was his hobby to remain in
out-of-the-way parts of the world for years at a time, visiting savage
lands where coal was not procurable, and he trusted more to sails than
to engine-power. But Stump, and his chief officer, and nearly every
sailor on board, being accustomed to steam, despised windjammers, and
pinned their faith to the engines.
With a favorable wind such as was blowing at the moment, or to steady
the yacht in a cross sea, the captain would have set a foresail and
jib. To help the propeller was good seamanship, but to bank the
engine-room fires and depend wholly on sails was the last thing he
would think of. Hence, the _Aphrodite_ straightway taught him a sharp
lesson. While Stump was ruminating on the exact form of some scathing
remark for Royson's benefit, a sudden stoppage of the screw, and an
ominously easy roll over the crest of the next sea, showed that the
engines were idle.
Stump hurled a lurid question down the speaking-tube. The engineer's
equally emphatic reply told him that there was a breakdown, cause not
stated. Now, the outer roadstead of Marseilles harbor is one of the
most awkward places in the Mediterranean for a disabled vessel. Though
the Gulf of Lions is almost tideless, it has strong and treacherous
currents. The configuration of the rocky coast, guarded as it is by
small islands and sunken reefs, does not allow much seaway until a
lighthouse, some miles distant from the mainland, is passed. Stump, of
course, would have made use of the ship's sails before she drifted into
peril. But he was purple with wrath, and the necessary commands were
not familiar to his tongue.
Therefore, he hesitated, though he was far from remaining silent, and
Royson, never at a loss when rapidity of thought and action was
demanded, took the lead. He woke up the crew with a string of orders,
rushed from foremast to mainmast and back to the bows again to see that
the men hauled the right ropes and set the sails in the right way, and,
had the _Aphrodite_ bowling along under canvas in less than two minutes
after the stopping of the screw. Not until every sheet was drawing and
the yacht running free did it occur to him that he had dared to assume
unto himself the captain's prerogative.
Rather red-faced and breathless, not only from his own exertions but by
reason of the disconcerting notion which possessed him, he raced up the
short companion-ladder leading from the fore deck to the bridge. Stump
seemed to be awaiting him with a halter.
"I hope I did right, sir, in jumping in like that," gasped Dick. "I
thought it best to get steering way on the yacht without delay, and--"
"Wot's yer name now?" roared Stump, glowering at him in a manner which
led Dick to believe he had committed an unpardonable offense.
"Still the same, sir--Royson."
"I thought p'raps it might ha' bin Smith, as you're such a lightnin'
change artist. Just bung in to the engine-room, will you, an' find out
wot that son of a gun below there is a-doing of?"
"I will go if you like, sir, but I know nothing about engines."
"Take charge here, then. Keep her steady as she goes. You've a clear
course half a mile to westward of that light."
Stump disappeared, and Royson found himself entrusted with full charge
of the vessel ere she had been ten minutes at sea. His gruff commander
could have paid him no greater compliment.
In the engineer, a man from West Hartlepool, the captain met one who
spoke the vernacular.
"It's no good a-dammin' me because there's a flaw in a connectin' rod,"
he protested, when Stump's strenuous questioning allowed him to explain
matters. "I can't see inside a piece of crimson steel any more'n you
can."
"None of your lip, my lad, or I'll find flaws all over you, P. D. Q.
Can you fix this mess at sea, or must we put back?"
The engineer quailed under Stump's bovine eye.
"It would be better to put back, sir. I may be able to manage, but it's
doubtful."
Stump went aft to consult von Kerber. So speedily had the yacht's
mishap been dealt with that no member of the saloon party was aware of
it, though any sailor among them, would have recognized instantly that
the vessel was traveling under canvas. The Baron, when he heard what
had taken place, was most emphatic in vetoing the suggestion that the
_Aphrodite_ should return to Marseilles, and Stump was equally
determined not to sail through the Straits of Bonifacio in half a gale
of wind. As a compromise, a course was shaped for Toulon, and that port
was made during the afternoon. It was the wisest thing to do, under the
circumstances. Toulon is the French naval base for the Mediterranean,
and her marine _chantiers_ not only repaired the engines in a few
hours, but supplied a set of spare parts, a wise precaution in view of
the yacht's probable sojourn in a locality where castings would be
unattainable.
Thenceforth the voyage proceeded smoothly. Royson took the first
opportunity of explaining to von Kerber how and why the mistake as to
his name had arisen, and the Baron only smiled, in his superior way,
having recovered his somewhat domineering manner from the hour that the
French coast-line sank beneath the horizon.
Stump soon ascertained that the _Aphrodite_ made better weather and
faster running as a schooner than as a steamship when the wind suited,
and Royson's position on board was rendered all the more secure
thereby. For the rest, Dick lived the humdrum life of the ship.
Naturally, he saw a good deal of the occupants of the saloon, but the
acquaintance did not progress beyond formalities. The two ladies read,
and walked, and played bridge with Mr. Fenshawe and the Baron. They
took much interest in Stromboli and the picturesque passage through the
Straits of Messina, and the red glare of Etna kept them on deck for
hours. Then the yacht settled down for the run to Port Said, and
arrived at that sunlit abode of rascality on the first of November.
Here the stores and coal bunkers were replenished, but no member of the
crew was allowed to land. Cablegrams, letters, and newspapers came in
bundles for the cabin-folk. The only communication of any sort for
officers or men was a letter addressed to Royson by name. Von Kerber
constituted himself postman, and he brought the missive to Dick in
person, but not until the _Aphrodite_ had entered the canal after
shipping her French pilot and search-light.
He was annoyed, though he veiled his ill-humor under an affected
carelessness.
"How came you to give Port Said as a port of call to one of your
correspondents?" he asked.
"I did not," said Dick, whose surprise was genuine enough to disarm
suspicion.
"Then some one has made a very accurate guess, yes?" sneered the other.
"I expected no letter from any person under the sun, and I certainly
told no one I was passing through Port Said, for the sufficient reason
that I never even thought of the place until you informed me yourself,
sir, that we were bound for the Red Sea."
"It is strange. Well, here is your letter. Perhaps, when you have read
it, you may understand how the thing happened. I wished our destination
to remain hidden, from the general public, and you are the only man on
board, except Mr. Fenshawe and myself, whose whereabouts are known in
London."
Now it chanced that the postmark was illegible, and, furthermore, that
von Kerber had already read the letter by adopting the ingenious plan
of the Russian censor, who grips the interior sheet in an instrument
resembling a long, narrow curling-tongs, and twists steadily until he
is able to withdraw it uninjured. But Stiff legal note-paper is apt to
bear signs of such treatment. Somewhat later in the day, Royson saw
these things, and was perplexed. At the moment, he merely broke open
the envelope.
It was a brief communication from Mr. Forbes. "I telegraphed to you at
Marseilles," it said, "and have ascertained that my message was
delivered to you. I regret your apparent decision not to fall in with
my request. Sir Henry Royson is ill, almost dangerously so, and I have
reason to believe that he wishes to make amends to you for his past
attitude. I received your letter, wherein you stated that you were
shipping on some vessel under the name of King, but I had little
difficulty in tracing you to Mr. Fenshawe's yacht, and I do not feel
justified in recognizing your unnecessary alias. Again, I advise you to
return. I am sure that your employer, a most estimable man, will not
place any difficulties in your way. If you leave the _Aphrodite_ at
Port Said or Ismalia, and send me a cablegram, I will remit by cable
funds sufficient for your needs."
Dick had deemed this disturbing problem dead and done with. He had not
hesitated at Marseilles, nor was he less decided now. He held out the
letter to von Kerber frankly, little thinking how close a scrutiny had
been given to his face while he was learning its contents.
"Read it," he said, "and you will see for yourself that I am in no way
responsible."
Von Kerber seemed to be taken aback by this display of confidence.
"No, no," he said loftily. "I do not wish it. I have your word. That is
sufficient."
"May I send an answer?"
"Yes, from Suez."
And the incident might have ended there had it not been brought into
sharp prominence that evening. Mr. Tagg took the first watch, from
eight o'clock to midnight. Under ordinary conditions, Royson, who was
free until four in the morning, would have gone to his cabin and slept
soundly. But, like many another who passes through the great canal for
the first time, he could not resist the fascination of the ship's
noiseless, almost stealthy, passage through the desert.
After supper, while enjoying a pipe before turning in, he went forward
and stood behind the powerful electric lamp fitted in the bows to
illumine the narrow water-lane which joins East and West. The broad
shaft of light lent a solemn beauty to the bleak wastes on either hand.
In front, the canal's silvery riband shimmered in magic life. Its
nearer ripples formed a glittering corsage for the ship's tapered stem,
and merged into a witches' way of blackness beyond. The red signal of a
distant _gare_, or station, or the white gleam of an approaching
vessel's masthead light, shone from the void like low-pitched stars.
Overhead the sky was of deepest blue, its stupendous arch studded with
stars of extraordinary radiance, while low on the west could be seen
the paler sheen of departing day. At times his wondering eyes fell on
some Arab encampment on the neighboring bank, where shrouded figures
sat round a fire, and ghostly camels in the background raised ungainly
heads and gazed at the ever-mysterious sight of the moving ship.
The marvelous scene was at once intimate and remote. Its
distinguishable features had the sense of nearness and actuality of
some piece of splendid stagecraft, yet he seemed to be peering not at
the rigid outlines of time but rather into the vague, almost
terrifying, depths of eternity. And it was a bewildering fact that this
glimpse into the portals of the desert was no new thing to him. Though
never before had his mortal eyes rested on the far-flung vista, he
absorbed its soothing glamour with all the zest of one who came back to
a familiar horizon after long sojourn in pent streets and tree-shrouded
valleys.
Time and again he strove to shake off this eerie feeling, but it was
not to be repelled. He fought against its dominance, and denounced its
folly, yet his heart whispered that he was not mistaken, that the
majestic silence conveyed some thrilling message which he could not
understand. How long he stood there, and how utterly he had yielded to
the strange prepossession of his dream, he scarce realized until he
heard a soft voice close behind him.
"Is that you, Mr. Royson?" it said, and he was called back from the
unknown to find Miss Fenshawe standing near.
"I beg your pardon," he stammered. "I was--so taken up with this--to
me--most entrancing experience--"
"That you did not hear my fairy footsteps," she broke in, with a quiet
laugh. "Do not apologize for that. I am wearing list slippers, so my
ghostlike approach is easily accounted for. And I am really very
greatly relieved at having found you at all. I was afraid you had left
the ship without my knowledge."
"But how could that be possible, Miss Fenshawe?" he asked, startled out
of his reverie by her peculiar phrase.
"Please don't speak so loudly," she said, dropping her voice almost to
a whisper. "I have been looking for you during the past half hour. I
came here twice, but you were so wrapped up in shadow that I failed to
see you, and I was becoming quite anxious, because one of the men
assured me you were not in your cabin."
Dick caught a flurried note in her utterance, a strained desire to
avoid the semblance of that anxiety which she had just admitted. It
puzzled him quite as much as the curious sense of familiarity with his
surroundings, a sense which the girl's unexpected appearance had by no
means dispelled. And he was oddly conscious of a breaking away of the
social barrier of whose existence she, at least, must have been
convinced. The mere whispering together in this lonely part of the ship
might account for it, to some extent, so he braced himself for the
effort to restore her self-control.
"I came here to have a good look at the desert by night," he said. "You
may be sure, Miss Fenshawe, that I had little notion you were searching
for me. It was by the merest accident that I was able to stow myself
out of sight in this particular locality."
She laughed softly again, and her manner became perceptibly less
constrained.
"A big man and a small ship--is that it?" she asked. "Tell me, Mr.
Royson, why did that officer of the Guards call you 'King Dick' on the
morning of the carriage accident?"
Had the girl racked her brain for a day to frame a question intended to
perplex Royson she could not have hit on one of more penetrating
effect. He was astounded not because she had heard Paton's exclamation,
but by reason of the flood of light which her recollection of it at
that moment poured on his own wandering thoughts.
"It is a most amazing thing that you should ask me that, Miss
Fenshawe," he cried.
"Sh-s-s-h. I have always imagined you to be a man who would smile in
the midst of earthquakes, yet here you are quite dazzled by a harmless
bit of feminine curiosity. Don't you wish me to know how you came by
that nickname? I suppose it is one?"
"There is no other in whom I would confide so willingly," he said.
"Promise you will not laugh at me if I tell you more than you bargain
for."
"What? Is there humor in the story?"
"Let us see. I am hardly a fair judge. At present I am more than
mystified. It is easy enough to explain why I was called 'King Dick' at
school. That is a mere preface to my romance. One of the cherished
traditions of my family is that we are lineal descendants of King
Richard the First of England."
"Good gracious!"
"The statement lends itself to disbelief, I admit--"
"Why do you think me disbelieving?"
"Pray forgive me, Miss Fenshawe. I am in doubting mood myself to-night.
At any rate, the lineage of the Roysons has not been disputed during
many centuries. Our name is part of our proof, and there has been a
Richard Royson associated with Westmoreland ever since Coeur-de-Lion
returned from Palestine. That is the kind of family asset a boy will
brag of. Joined to a certain proficiency in games, it supplies a
ready-made nickname. But the wonderful and wholly inexplicable thing is
that while I have been standing here, watching our head-light dancing
over the desert, the fantastic conceit has invaded my very soul that I
share with my kingly ancestor his love of this land, his ambition to
accomplish great deeds in its secret places, his contempt and scorn of
all opposing influences. Do you remember how he defied a rain of blood
which scared his courtiers? One of his friends has placed on record the
opinion that if an angel from heaven bade Richard abandon his work he
would have answered with a curse. Well, I am poor, and of slight
consequence in the world to-day, but at least it has been vouchsafed me
to understand what a strong man and a king can feel when there are
those who would thwart his will. At present, I am powerless, as little
able to give effect to my energies as Richard himself when pent in an
Austrian prison, but I do ask that some Blondel shall free me, no
matter what the ransom, and that Fate shall set me a task worthy of the
man who fought and dreamed and planned empires out there eight
centuries ago."
Royson threw back his head, and stretched his right hand toward the
desert where lay Jaffa and Jerusalem. He was quite carried away by the
magic of the hour. He had brushed aside the cobwebs of society, and
spoke to Irene as a gallant and fearless youth might address the maid
at whose feet he hoped to lay the trophies gained in winning his
knighthood. And she, as might be expected, responded to the passionate
chord which sounded this challenge to fortune. She, too, forgot
convention, for which Heaven be praised!
"You have my prayers for your success," she whispered. "What is more, I
believe in you, and that is why I am here now, for I have come to ask
you, for my sake and the sake of one whom I love, not to leave this
ship until I bid you."
At any other moment such a request must have had a sinister sound.
Coming then, it seemed to be a direct answer to Dick's excited appeal
to the unseen power that governs men's lives. He turned and looked into
her eyes. She was so near to him that he could see the wondrous light
shining in their limpid depths. He felt the fragrance of her presence,
the glow of her tender beauty, and she did not shrink from him when he
placed a protecting hand on her shoulder.
"You need no promise from me, Miss Fenshawe," he said, with a labored
utterance that was wholly unaccountable to him. "Twice already have I
refused to leave you, though I have been summoned to England to resume
an inheritance wrongfully withheld. We are stubborn, we Richards, and
we are loyal, too. It was you, I now believe, who snatched me from
misery, almost from despair. Have no fear, therefore, that I shall
desert you."
"You have taken a load from my heart," she answered softly. "You are
the only man on board in whom I have any real confidence. I fear that
my grandfather has been misled, wilfully and shamefully misled, but I
am unable to prevent it for lack of proof. But to-night, after dinner,
I chanced to overhear a conversation with reference to you which
redoubled the doubts I have felt ever since this expedition was decided
on. I feel that I must tell you. Baron von Kerber distrusts you because
you are a gentleman. He fears you will act as one if you have to choose
between his interests and your own honor. And today, since your letter
arrived--"
"Yes, ma'am," they heard Captain Stump shout from the bridge, "Miss
Fenshawe is forrard, with Mr. Royson. You'll find it a very pretty
sight goin' through the canal on a night like this."
And Mrs. Haxton, hunting the ship for Irene--not to speak of Royson and
the girl herself when in calmer mood--may have wondered why Stump
should trumpet forth his information as though he wished all on board
to hear it. Perhaps it was, as Dick already well knew, that the stout
skipper had good eyesight as well as a kind heart.