A SOLDIER OF FORTUNE
JACK may have been asleep for a little while. She was not quite sure.
Anyhow, when she opened her eyes, she was surprised to see how the storm
had increased and how entirely the promenade deck had become deserted.
There had been a few persons about when Jean and Olive had departed, but
now she saw no one except a man walking quietly up and down as though
the pitching of the ship in no way affected him. He was wearing an
English mackintosh with the collar turned up past his ears, but neither
his appearance nor his existence at present interested Jack. Her only
thought was for the oncoming storm. As yet there was no rain falling,
only a cold gray Atlantic mist enveloped the sky and the sea. The waves
had curling borders of white foam as they rolled and broke. There was no
relief in the sky. Once the thunder roared as though they were
cannonading on the other side of the world and then a single flash of
lightning split straight across the horizon. Jack had thrown aside her
steamer rug and was sitting upright in her chair, her hands clasping
both sides. The color had gone from her cheeks (the storm was so
wonderful, almost it was taking her breath away), but her head was
thrown back, showing the beautiful line of her throat, and her lips were
parted with the intensity of her admiration. Then the boat dipped and
half the ocean picture became obscured.
It never occurred to Jack that she would be running any risk of falling
by moving from her place. Never had she been able to think of herself as
an invalid, even after her two years' experience. Besides, was she not
well by this time and the railing of the deck but a few feet away?
When the ship had righted itself she stepped forward without any
difficulty, laying her hand lightly on the rail for support.
Then she became wholly absorbed. The plunging and tossing of the great
steamer was fairly regular, so that Jack found no especial trouble in
keeping her footing.
So unconscious was she that she did not glance over her shoulder at the
solitary passenger pacing the deck, although in the course of his march
he must have passed her at least half a dozen times. Nevertheless the
man had not been so unmindful of his fellow traveler. He was possibly
twenty years or more her senior.
Unexpectedly the ship gave an uneven lurch, almost twisting herself
about, and at the same instant an immense amount of spray struck Jack
Ralston full in the face. With a little cry of surprise straightway she
lost her clasp on the rail and would have gone down in a heap if an arm
had not immediately steadied her.
"I beg your pardon; you might have fallen. At the moment I happened to
be passing." The man spoke stiffly.
In Jack's position, after her long suffering from a fall, one might have
expected her to be frightened. However, although she was being kept on
her feet by a perfect stranger with no one else in sight, while a storm
raged around them, she was not even embarrassed.
Catching hold on her old support again, this time more firmly, Jack said
"Thank you" in an even voice. And then, as though she must have sympathy
in her enjoyment from some quarter: "Isn't this storm splendid? It
seems to me that before I have seen nothing but land, land all my life!
I thought I loved it, but somehow all this water gives one quite a
different sensation. I feel as if I weren't a person, but just a pair of
eyes and lungs!" Jack spoke these last words with little gaspings for
breath. So hard was the wind blowing that it had wrapped her heavy coat
close about her; her hat had slipped backward and her heavy yellow-brown
hair whipped across her face.
Her courage and frankness made her companion smile. And, although until
this moment Jack had not paid any special attention to her rescuer, she
now observed that he had a skin so bronzed as to look almost like
leather, that he had a closely clipped blonde moustache and equally
light hair. Also, that his eyes were of the deep blue seen only with
that complexion, and that his bearing was distinctly military.
"But the sea is after all not so unlike a distant view of your American
prairies," he replied. And in answer to Jack's expression of surprise:
"I know your name, Miss Ralston. Among many other things I have tried
running a ranch in the west, although none too successfully."
Whatever the strange man's intentions, certainly his words succeeded in
arousing Jack's attention. For at once, without liking to ask, she was
curious to find out how he had discovered her name. Then she was always
interested in any ranching experience. The people she had been meeting
on board ship were most of them from cities and without any special
outdoor knowledge. Only a few persons actually have kinship with nature,
and they have usually spent their youth in the _real_ country, in big,
open, unpeopled spaces as Jacqueline Ralston had.
This time she smiled more shyly. "I thought you were an Englishman--a
soldier." Jack hesitated. She did not think that a few words of
conversation with a stranger, who had been kind to her, made any
difference, but it would not do to talk on indefinitely.
Instantly, as though divining her thought, the man's hat was lifted, and
he moved a few paces away.
But at this moment the storm broke. No rain had been falling up to this
time, but now the clouds lightened, and from between two of them a heavy
sheet of water descended, apparently straight on to the ship's deck.
Why did Jack not run to shelter? Still she stood clinging with both
hands to the ship's rail, her head thrown back inhaling deep breaths of
the salt spray air. She was enjoying the storm but actually was afraid
to move. Surely now that the storm had fairly broken either Olive or
Jean would come for her. Both girls had made her promise not to return
to her stateroom alone and at the present time it was impossible. The
decks were soaking wet and slippery and she was tired from too long
standing and opposing her strength to the fury of the wind.
Yet the sailors were rushing about, lashing the tarpaulins to the
balustrade, and in a few seconds she would be obliged to move.
Jack set her teeth. It was absurd to be afraid of falling just because
of a former weakness. She turned, took a few steps forward and then the
ship gave another sudden lurch.
It was Jean Bruce, however, who made the outcry. She and Olive were
running down the deck without hats or coats and regardless of the storm
for their own sakes. They were not yet near enough to save Jack from
slipping. However, there was no need for them.
When Captain Madden turned and left Jack he walked only a few steps away
and then as the rain descended swung himself about to enter the door of
the saloon about midway the promenade deck. Naturally he expected the
girl with whom he had just been talking to have run on before him, she
was even less well prepared for the downpour. But to his surprise he saw
that Jack had remained fixed at her place.
This was carrying a love of nature a little too far. Not only would the
young woman get a thorough soaking, she would be in positive danger in a
few moments should a wave break over the deck. It was odd that no ship's
officer had yet suggested that she go inside.
Captain Madden did not wish to offend Jack by officiousness. He had
still no idea of her lameness, although he had been watching her more
carefully than any one dreamed for the past few days. However, he did
not wish to see her hurt and so put an end to his scarcely thought-out
plan.
The second time that the stranger held her up on her feet Jack could
only stammer and blush. It seemed rather absurd to have been rescued by
the same person twice in ten minutes and yet she did not even now wish
to confess her difficulty in walking alone.
Jean and Olive saved the situation.
"Thank you ever so much," Olive began, arriving first and a little out
of breath.
"We never can be sufficiently grateful to you!" Jean exclaimed. "And oh,
Jack, I suppose you can't imagine what had become of us? We sent the
stewardess for you half an hour ago. Ruth is dreadfully worried."
But Jean was not in the habit of forgetting her manners and so stopped
speaking of their private concerns. She and Frieda had both seen and
spoken of the man who was now with her cousin. He had his place at a
table across from theirs and, possibly because of his soldierly
appearance, had seemed unlike the other men aboard.
"My cousin isn't very well, or at least she hasn't been," Jean
announced, remembering Jack's sensitiveness. And then as Jack and Olive
moved quickly away she added with a gracious condescension that made the
older man smile: "Our chaperon, Miss Drew, will express her appreciation
to you in the morning." And fled out of the rain as though she had been
eight instead of eighteen.
Notwithstanding, Captain Madden did not immediately leave the deck after
the girls' withdrawal.
"Things have turned out rather better than I could have arranged them,"
he remarked thoughtfully, pulling at his moustache. "She is an
uncommonly attractive girl. Lots of spirit, but I've an idea she has yet
to learn a great deal about men and women. It's worth trying anyhow.
It's jolly odd my having run across them in this fashion and recalling
what I was once told."