COMRADESHIP
"I want you to promise me that you will not hide yourself where I cannot
find you. I have grave reason for the request. Also, I want you, if
you will, to let some others know where you are." At first there was
instinctive defiance in her mouth and nostrils. Then her brows wrinkled
in thought; the sequence was an index to character which I could not but
notice. However the war was not long; reason, whatever was the outcome
of its dominance, triumphed over impulse. I thought I could understand
the logical process which led to her spoken conclusion:
"You want to report me to 'Uncle Sam'."
"That's about it!" I answered, and hurried on to give her a reason
before she made up her mind to object.
"Remember, my dear, that your nation is at war; and, though you are
at present safe in a country friendly to both belligerents, there are
evil-minded people in all countries who will take advantage of anything
unusual, to work their own ends. That splendid gift of yours to the
nation, while it has made you a public favourite and won for you
millions of friends--and proposals--has yet made for you a host of
enemies. It is not as if you had given a hospital-ship or an ambulance.
Your gift belongs to the war side and calls out active hatred; and no
doubt there are men banded together to do you harm. This cannot be
allowed. Your friends, and the nation as a whole, would take any step
to prevent such a thing; but they might all be powerless if you were
hidden anywhere where they could not find you." As I spoke, Marjory
looked at me keenly, not with hostility, but with genuine interest. When
I had finished she said quietly:
"That is very well; but now tell me, dear"--how the word thrilled me; it
was the first time she had used it to me--"did Sam Adams fill you up
with that argument, or is it your own? Don't think me nasty; but I want
to know something of what is going on. Believe me, I am willing to
do all _you_ wish if it is your own will; and I am grateful for your
thought for me. But I don't want you to be a mere mouthpiece for any
party moves by the politicians at home."
"How do you mean?"
"My dear boy, I don't suppose you know enough of American politics to
see how a certain lot would use to their own advantage anything that
came in their way. Anybody or anything which the public takes an
interest in would be, and is, used by them unscrupulously. Why, if the
hangers-on to the war party wanted to make a show, they might enroll my
proposers and start a new battalion."
"But," I remonstrated, "you don't think the Government is like that?" In
reply she smiled:
"I don't altogether know about that. Parties are parties all the world
over. But of course the Washington people wouldn't do things that are
done by local politicians. And one other thing. Don't imagine for a
moment that I think Sam Adams is anything of the kind. He belongs to the
service of the nation and takes his orders from his chief. How can he,
or any one fixed like him, know the ins and outs of things; except
from what he hears privately from home, or gathers from what goes on
around him if he is cute?" It appeared to me that all this was tending
to establish an argument against taking the American Embassy into
confidence, so I struck in before it should be complete. As I was not
at liberty to take Marjory into confidence with regard to my source of
information, I had to try to get her to agree to what I thought right or
necessary on other grounds:
"My dearest, can you not leave out politics, American or otherwise. What
on earth have politics to do with us?" She opened her eyes in wonder;
she was reasoning better than I was. With an air of conviction she said:
"Why, everything! If any one wants to do me harm, it must be on the
grounds of politics. I don't believe there is any one in the world who
could want to injure me on private grounds. Oh! my dear, I don't want
to talk about it, not even to you; but all my life I have tried to help
other people in a quiet way. My guardians would tell you that I have
asked them for too much money to give to charities; and personally I
have tried to do what a girl can in a helpful way to others. I have been
in hospitals and homes of all kinds; and I have classes of girls in my
own house and try to make them happier and better. Archie, don't think
poorly of me for speaking like this; but I couldn't bear that _you_
should think I had no sense of the responsibility of great wealth. I
have always looked on it as a trust; and I hope, my dear, that in time
to come you will help me to bear the burden and to share the trust!" I
had thought up to now that I couldn't love her more than I did. But when
I heard her words, and recognised the high purpose that lay behind them,
and saw the sweet embarrassment which came to her in speaking them to
me, I felt that I had been mistaken. She looked at me lovingly, and,
holding my hand in both of hers, went on:
"What then could hurt me except it came from the political side. I could
quite understand it if Spaniards wished to harm me, for I have done
what I can to hinder them from murdering and torturing other victims.
And I could understand if some of our own low-down politicians would try
to use me as a stalking horse, though they wouldn't harm me. I want to
keep clear of politics; and I tell you frankly that I shall if I can."
"But Marjory dear, there may be, I believe there are, Spaniards who
would try to harm you. If you were in America you would be safer from
them; for there at present, whilst the war is on, every stranger is a
marked man. Here, on neutral ground, foreigners are free; and they are
not watched and observed in the same way. If there were such fiends, and
I am told there are, they might do you a harm before any one could know
their intention or have time to forestall them."
All the native independence of Marjory's race and nature stood out in
strong relief as she answered me:
"My dear Archie, I come from a race of men who have held their lives in
their hands from the cradle to the grave. My father, and my grandfather,
and my great grandfather were pioneers in Illinois, in Kentucky, in
the Rockies and California. They knew that there were treacherous foes
behind them every hour of their lives; and yet they were not afraid. And
I am not afraid either. Their blood is in my veins, and speaks loudly to
me when any sense of fear comes near me. Their brains, as well as their
hands, kept guard on their lives; and my brains are like theirs. I do
not fear any foe, open or secret. Indeed, when I think of a secret foe
all the keenness of my people wakes in me, and I want to fight. And this
secret work is a way in which a woman can fight in an age like ours. If
my enemies plot, I can counter-plot; if they watch without faltering to
catch me off guard, I can keep guard unflinchingly. A woman can't go out
now-a-days, except at odd times, and fight with weapons like Joan of
Arc, or the Maid of Saragossa; but she can do her fighting in her own
way, level with her time. I don't see that if there is to be danger
around me, why I shouldn't do as my ancestors did, fight harder than
their foes. Here! let me tell you something now, that I intended to say
later. Do you know what race of men I come from? Does my name tell you
nothing? If not, then this will!"
She took from her neck, where again it had been concealed by a lace
collar, the golden jewel which I had rescued from the sea. As I took it
in my hand and examined it she went on:
"That came to me from my father, who got it from his, and he from his,
on and on till our story of it, which is only verbal, for we have no
records, is lost in the legend that it is a relic of the Armada brought
to America by two cousins who had married, both being of the family to
which the great Sir Francis Drake belonged. I didn't know, till lately,
and none of us ever did, where exactly in the family the last owners of
the brooch came in, or how they became possessed of such a beautiful
jewel. But you have told me in your translation of Don de Escoban's
narrative. That was the jewel that Benvenuto Cellini made in duplicate
when he wrought the figurehead for the Pope's galley. The Pope gave it
to Bernardino de Escoban, and he gave it to Admiral Pedro de Valdes.
I have been looking up the history of the time since I saw you, and I
found that Admiral de Valdes when he was taken prisoner by Sir Francis
Drake at the fight with the Armada was kept, pending his ransom, in the
house of Richard Drake, kinsman of Sir Francis. How the Drake family got
possession of the brooch I don't know; but anyhow I don't suppose they
stole it. They were a kindly lot in private, any of them that I ever
knew; though when they were in a fight they fought like demons. The old
Spanish Dons were generous and free with their presents, and I take it
that when Pedro de Valdes got his ransom he made the finest gift he
could to those who had been kind to him. That is the way I figure it
out."
Whilst she was speaking, thoughts kept crowding in upon me. Here was
indeed the missing link in the chain of Marjory's connection with the
hidden treasure; and here was the beginning of the end of Gormala's
prophecy, for as such I had come to regard it. The Fates were at work
upon us. Clotho was spinning the thread which was to enmesh Marjory and
myself and all who were in the scheme of the old prophecy of the Mystery
of the Sea and its working out.
Once more the sense of impotence grew upon me. We were all as
shuttlecocks, buffeted to and fro without power to alter our course.
With the thought came that measure of resignation which is the anodyne
to despair. In a sort of trance of passivity I heard Marjory's voice run
on:
"Therefore, my dear Archie, I will trust to you to help me. The
comradeship which has been between us, will never through this grow
less; though nearer and dearer and closer ties may seem to overshadow
it."
I could not answer such reasoning; but I took her in my arms and kissed
her. I understood, as she did, that my kisses meant acquiescence in her
wishes. After a while I said to her:
"One thing I must do. I owe it as a duty of honour to tell my informant
that I am unable to give your address to the American Embassy, and that
I cannot myself take a part in anything which is to be done except by
your consent. But oh! my dear, I fear we are entering on a dangerous
course. We are all staying deliberately in the dark, whilst there is
light to be had; and we shall need all the light which we can get."
Then a thought struck me and I added, "By the way, I suppose I am free
to give information how I can, so long as you are not committed or
compromised?" She thought for quite a few minutes before she answered.
I could see that she was weighing up the situation, and considering it
from all points of view. Then she said, putting both her hands in mine:
"In this, as in all ways, Archie, I know that I can trust you. There is
so much more than even this between us, that I should feel mean to give
it a thought hereafter!"