A LOVER’S PERSISTENCE.
It was the fifth day out at sea; Britomarte had a stiff attack of
_mal-de-mer_, but had not been so sick as to be unable to enjoy the
witticisms of the Irish stewardess, Judith Riordon, or the pleasantries
of the good-natured Captain McKenzie; but the spell of dirty weather
that had ensued after crossing the bar was now over, and Britomarte
climbed the stairs, made her way carefully across the deck and seated
herself on one of the coils of rope stowed against the bulwarks.
Her eyes wandered over the scene.
What a grand, sublime and glorious round it was! This boundless sky! One
vast circle of air above; one vast circle of water below. Not a bird to
be seen in all the air; not a sail to be seen on all the sea.
Their own lonely ship was the center of this circle and the only one
within it. The solitude of this scene was even more stupendous than its
vastness.
Gazing, Britomarte sank into thought, then into dream, then almost into
trance.
What past life was the beautiful man-hater living over again in that
self-forgotten reverie?
Whatever it was, it wrapt her whole soul in an abstraction so profound,
that she did not hear the approach of a footstep, though that step rang
clearly and firmly upon the deck; nor did she see the form that stood
beside her, though that form sheltered her from the flying spray that
had begun to wet her clothing; nor did she become conscious of the
intruder’s presence until he stooped to her ear and breathed her name:
“Miss Conyers!”
She started and looked up.
Justin Rosenthal stood before her, looking tenderly down into her face.
In the first shock of surprise she gazed at him with widely-dilated
eyes, as though he had been an apparition from the unseen world; and she
seemed to think that she was in a dream, or that she had lost her
reason. Then, as the certainty, the reality of the presence rapidly grew
upon her—as she became conscious that it was he, himself, Justin
Rosenthal, her lover and her beloved, that was standing before her—an
overwhelming rush of joy filled her soul; and before she had time to
control her countenance, this joy beamed and radiated from every feature
of her beautiful face! It was as if the womanhood kept bound and captive
in the lowest depths of her heart by pride and principle had suddenly
burst her chains and looked forth in liberty and light. It was but for
one instant this womanhood showed itself, for in the next the man-hater
reasserted her supremacy, and put a strong guard upon her countenance.
“Well?” said Justin, answering her various changes of countenance with a
trusting smile.
“You here!” she exclaimed.
“Yes.”
It was but a word, calmly spoken; but it told everything.
“Why are you here?” she demanded, sternly.
But that assumption of sternness came too late. He had seen the
transient flash of an exceeding great joy on her face, and even if he
had ever entertained any doubts of her real feeling toward him, those
doubts were now forever dispelled.
He seated himself beside her, and then answered:
“You ask me why I am here. I am here because I love you, have faith in
you, and hope to win you as my wife.”
“As your slave, you mean! How dare you!” exclaimed the marriage
renouncer, with burning cheeks and flashing eyes.
“No, no, Britomarte; but as my wife and equal; and if not so, as my wife
and liege lady, for if one must serve, let it be the stronger. I have
said all this to you before.”
“So this, then, is the ‘distant duty’ you were to go upon when you were
ordained and went from home,” said Miss Conyers, sarcastically.
“Yes.”
“And Erminie never explained! It was not like her to be so reserved with
me.”
“My sister was in honor bound to keep my secret.”
“But why should your action in this matter have been kept a secret? It
seems to me that honorable actions need never be kept so.”
“That is a mistake. Sometimes they must. My intended voyage was kept a
secret because I thought, if you discovered that I was to be your
fellow-voyager, you would never embark on this enterprise.”
“That I never should have done.”
“And your valuable services would have been lost to the mission,” said
Justin, with a slight smile.
Her eyes flashed fire. She came down upon him with a trenchant scorn in
her next words.
“We sailed on Tuesday. This is Saturday, the fifth day out, and we have
not seen anything of you until this morning! Pray, do you consider it
conduct worthy of a gentleman to come secretly upon the ship, and remain
in hiding like a fugitive convict for four or five days?”
“I beg your pardon,” said Justin, good-humoredly, “but you are wrong in
your premises. I did not come secretly on the ship. I engaged myself as
clerk to the captain, who is an old friend of our family. The first day,
it is true, I kept out of sight, lest, if you happened to see me, you
might take flight and go back on the pilot-boat.”
“I verily believe that I should have done so.”
“Certainly you would; and, as I said before, your valuable services
would have been lost to the mission. To obviate such a misfortune, I
have kept out of your sight, and in the captain’s office, where I
occupied myself in arranging his books and papers until the pilot went
back. After which, as it was quite impossible you should swim back to
the mainland, I did not mind showing myself at the table. But,
unfortunately, you were seasick, and I could not see you until this
morning.”
“But was it right, was it manly, was it honorable, to follow me in this
manner?” scornfully questioned the man-hater.
“Yes, Miss Conyers, it was all that,” said Justin, gravely. “I told you
in the beginning that I loved you with my whole heart and soul, for time
and for eternity; that I should make it the first object of my life to
win you, letting wait all other business that might be incompatible with
the pursuit of that object. I do not say I could not live without you,
for I have a sound, strong constitution, and could endure a great deal
of suffering for a great length of time. But I do say that I do not
choose to live without you. So much do I love you, so hopeful I am of
winning you.”
“You are very arrogant and presumptuous to say so!” with which she left
him.
Justin, though he had embarked on the same ship with Britomarte, had no
intention of playing the bore. It was enough for him just then that she
was near. She rarely spoke to him, and only then with the most frigid
politeness.
So the days passed away without incident, till, one morning, the lookout
announced land in sight, and everybody rushed on deck, but only the
faintest speck could be discerned on the horizon.
In an hour, with the aid of the glass, they made out Table Mount, and in
two hours they could see the whole line of coast, with its bold
headlands and deeply-indented inlets. A few hours more of sailing
brought them to the entrance of Table Bay, under the shadow of Table
Mount.
The ship dropped anchor just as the sun touched the horizon. The sailors
were all busy with the rigging. The missionary party hurried forward to
view the novel scene; but Miss Conyers, though belonging to them, walked
aft, and leaned over the taffrail, to bid good-night to the last sun of
the old year, as he sank beneath the wave.
Justin Rosenthal followed her, and stood by her side for a few minutes,
watching in reverent silence the rich crimson light fading from the
western horizon; and then he said, quietly:
“It is gone! Will you please to take my arm and allow me to lead you
forward? The captain will not send a boat on shore to-night; but
to-morrow morning we shall all have an opportunity of visiting the
colony. In the meantime, the view of the town and its vicinity, from
this anchorage, is well worth looking at. Will you come?”
“Thank you—yes,” said Miss Conyers; and she permitted him to draw her
hand within his arm, and take her forward, where all her companions were
grouped together, gazing upon the new sights before them.
The view, as Justin Rosenthal had truly said, was well worth looking at.
First of all, the bay into which they had put was vast enough to
accommodate any number of ships, and, indeed, a very considerable number
rode at anchor within it. Before them lay Cape Town, nestled at the foot
of Table Mount, whose perpendicular sides rose up behind it; while on
either hand, like giant sentinels to guard the entrance of the port,
stood the barren crags of Lion’s Head and Devil’s Peak. A little back
from the shores were sunny, green hills and shady grove trees, among
which, half hidden, stood beautiful villas, built in the old Dutch
style, with flat roofs and painted walls and broad terraces.
The newly-arrived voyagers remained on deck, gazing on this scene with
never-tiring interest, until the short, bright twilight of those
latitudes suddenly sank into night, and the stars came out in the
purple-black heavens, and the lights shone in the streets and houses of
Cape Town. Then they went below to the supper that had long been
waiting; and afterward they turned in for the night.
As soon as they were awake in the morning, the whole party arose and
dressed, and hurried up on deck to take another look at the harbor, the
shipping, the town and the mountain.
“So this is Africa!” exclaimed Mrs. Ely, gazing in open-mouthed wonder
upon the scene before them; “and only think—as long as we have been
expecting to get here, now that we are here, I feel as if I was in a
dream. Africa! Why, law, you know, though I always studied the map of
Africa at school, and read about it in geography, I never seemed to
realize there was such a place. It always seemed to me only like a place
in a story, just as the Happy Valley, or the Cave of Despair. And I am
sure it is as strange for me to be standing here, looking at it, as if I
suddenly saw before me the Island of Calm Delight, or any other place
that was only in a book. How queer! Africa!”
“I think your feeling is a more common one than would be generally
acknowledged,” replied her husband. “Until it is presented to our
senses, the Real, like the Ideal, only exists, for us, in our
imaginations.”
“What astounds me,” said Mrs. Breton, “is to see here, at the most
southern extremity of the most barbarous grand division of the earth, a
town with houses, and a harbor with shipping, so much like the seaports
of our own Christian and civilized native country. Why, law, only for
that great mountain behind the town, and those two great rocks to the
right and left, that stand like Gog and Magog to guard the port, one
might think we were in New York Bay, and looking in upon some of the old
Dutch quarters of the city.”
“Yes,” said Mr. Breton; “for harbors and shipping have a certain general
resemblance all over the world. So also do seaport towns. And this town,
with its Dutch style of building, does certainly resemble some of the
older portions of New York. But it resembles still more the seaports of
Holland, with canals running through the middle of all the principal
streets, as you never see in ours.”
“Oh! canals running down the middle of the streets! How queer! Like
Venice.”
“Oh, no, not Venice; for the streets of Venice are all canals—the walls
of the houses rising straight up from the edge of the water. But here
the canals only run down through the middle of the most important
streets, and there are beautiful sidewalks, well shaded by lofty trees,
before the rows of houses, each side. But you will see all these things
when you go on shore. And there is the breakfast bell.”
While the others talked, Miss Conyers and Mr. Rosenthal stood side by
side, perfectly silent, and letting their eyes rove over the sea and
land. And now they turned and followed their companions into the saloon.
While they were breakfasting, the sailors were getting out the yawl
boat, so that when they came on deck again, they found it waiting. They
made haste to prepare themselves, and were soon ready. The gentlemen
handed the ladies carefully down into the boat. The captain, who was
going on shore with his passengers, joined them; and the sailors laid
themselves to their oars and pushed off the boat.
“In African waters—only think!” said Mrs. Breton, who did not seem to be
able to get over her astonishment at finding herself in such a, to her,
mythical place.
They rowed cautiously past British men-of-war, past East India
merchantmen, past Dutch traders, past Chinese junks and the shipping of
all nations that rode at anchor in the harbor; and then past the
fortifications, and past the custom-house, near which they landed.
As they brought nothing into the town but what they wore on their
persons or carried in their hands, they had no business with the
receivers of duty; so they went on into the town. First they found the
usual crowd that day and night haunt the piers of seaports—only in this
place the crowd was smaller as to number and greater as to variety than
is commonly to be met with, for here were English, Dutch and Portuguese
colonists, and Hottentot, Kaffir and other natives, besides a sprinkling
of strangers and visitors from all parts of the world.
Through this crowd they went up a narrow street, and turned into a broad
avenue, beautifully shaded with poplar, oak and pine trees, and built up
on each side with handsome houses in the Dutch style of architecture,
having gayly painted fronts, flat roofs and broad terraces.
Here the captain paused to point out to them the way to the South
African College, and left them, and went in pursuit of his own business.
Mr. Ely and Mr. Breton had letters of introduction to Professor John of
that institution, and thitherward the whole party turned their steps. It
was a long but pleasant walk. The novelty of everything around them, and
the strangeness of seeing so many old familiar objects of their own
native land and home mixed up with so much that was new and foreign,
beguiled the time, so that they were unconscious of fatigue until they
reached the college building.
The professor was within, and received them in his private study—a
comfortable room, carpeted, curtained, and fitted up with chairs and
tables, desks and bookcases, like any European or American gentleman’s
library.
Professor John was a pleasant little old man, in a dressing-gown, cap
and slippers. And very cordially he arose and welcomed the party to
Africa.
“To Africa!” echoed Mrs. Ely, who seemed in a chronic state of
amazement—“it seems like saying—‘to the moon.’”
“Well, my dear young lady, it is rather an outlandish place, and in the
same quarter of the globe as the mountains of the moon!” said the
Professor, who was something of a humorist.
He offered them refreshments, consisting of the rich Constantia wine of
the colony, and biscuits, cold fowl, cake, fruit, and so forth. And,
when they had eaten and drank and rested, he showed them over the
college—into the library, museum, classrooms, refectories and
dormitories. And, when they returned to his study, he sent a messenger
to procure a carriage to take them around the town.