A DIVIDED RESPONSIBILITY.
'Theo! Theo! I am sorry to wake you!'
Trist was a man who threw aside the heaviest sleep at a moment's
notice, and was in full possession of his faculties--probably making
active use of them--while others were still rubbing their eyes. The
touch of a soft, warm little hand upon his wrist had awakened him
before the words imprinted themselves upon his brain. Somehow he
remembered them afterwards, the syllables themselves, and the manner
in which they were uttered.
He looked up with a smile, and met Brenda's eyes. She was leaning
over his chair, and when he looked up she stood erect with her white
hands hanging before her against the soft black dress. She had
learnt something at Mrs. Wylie's school of womanliness, for
everything about her was as neat and trim and dainty as if there was
naught else to think of than the braiding and coiling of the bright
brown hair, and the pinning of the snowy collar round her throat.
'I am sorry to disturb you, Theo,' she repeated.
'Not at all,' he said. 'Why should you be? It is ten o'clock; I
have been asleep two hours. What more could I require?'
'I have kept some breakfast warm for you,' she said, turning towards
the table; 'but I awakened you because of these. There are four
telegrams and a number of letters for you. Hans Olsen brought them
off just now. He got them yesterday from the Bergen boat. We are
out of the Heimdalfjord now, and Nielsen has gone. I ... only hope
... it is not war, Theo!'
He stood up and took the telegrams and letters from her hands. Then
he crossed the saloon towards the table.
'It looks rather like it,' he said coolly.
He raised the cover of the dish which the steward had just placed
upon the table, and Brenda, taking the hint, poured out his coffee.
She walked away from him a little and stood quite motionless, with
her back turned towards him, while he tore open the thin white
telegraph envelopes. One ... two ... three ... four of them,
spreading the paper out upon the tablecloth. Her quick ears caught
each sound, and enabled her to picture every movement made by this
indifferent man.
'Yes, Brenda, it ... is ... war!'
She turned slowly and approached the table. Bending over it, she
attended to his requirements in a deftly graceful way, grouping round
him the toast, butter, and marmalade. He was studying a telegram
spread out before him, but his fixed eyes did not appear to be taking
in the purport of words written in uneven type. Furtively he looked
towards her hands, and then slowly upward, terminating in one
scrutinizing glance into her face.
'Where?' she asked, sitting down rather hastily opposite to him.
'Servia and Montenegro have declared war against Turkey,' he replied,
busying himself with his plate.
'And you must go?'
He stirred his coffee very deliberately, and, raising the cup to his
lips, took a long critical sip.
'Yes, Brenda. I must go!'
There are few more silent places than the cabin of a sailing yacht on
a calm day. In a steamer it is different, for there is the
ever-beating throb of life down below, in the engine-room, which is
half heard and half felt. But on a sailing yacht, when the
rudder-chains are taut and the breeze steady, there is no noise
whatever. In the pretty saloon of the _Hermione_ there was a
singular absence of sound when Trist finished speaking. He turned
again to the telegrams, neglecting his breakfast. Brenda thought
that she had never experienced such an utter, breathless silence.
Her ears seemed to tingle with the intensity of it, and in her brain
there was a sudden vacuous sensation. She could think of nothing to
say, although she strained her mind to discover some means of
breaking this dreadful pause.
Furtively she raised her eyes, and at the same moment Trist looked
across the table in a hurried, shifty way. Their eyes met for a
brief agonizing second.
'I hope,' said Brenda sweetly, 'that your coffee is not very cold.'
'Oh no! Oh no, thank you! It is very nice,' he replied awkwardly,
looking into the cup with absorbing interest.
Her question appeared to call him back from some vague, far-off
dream, for he resolutely began to eat; while she hovered round,
playing the hostess in a shy, constrained way. Presently he handed
the open telegrams across the table to her.
'You may as well read them,' he said conversationally. 'They are
very characteristic of the man who wrote them.'
She took the papers and read in a semi-tone:
'_War--Serbia, Turkey--imminent. Come._'
Number two was longer:
'_Where on earth are you? War. Look sharp. Montenegro is in it,
too._'
The third was more serious:
'_Two messages without reply. Are yen coming?_'
Then number four:
'_They are at it already. It will be a bad business. Come at once._'
She returned them without a word; and he, seeing the necessity of
saying something, remarked pleasantly:
'It is my misfortune to be required in two places at once, or not at
all.'
She stood by the table and looked at the date of the latest telegram.
The four messages had been despatched within two days.
'Are you not,' she asked innocently, 'too late? It may be all over
now.'
He glanced up at her in a curious, laughing way.
'No--I am afraid not. War in these semi-barbaric countries is like
an illness in a young person. It is only half healed beneath a
deceptive surface, and breaks out in a fresh place.'
Again she took up the telegrams. It seemed as if there were a
fascination in the flimsy papers which she could not resist.
'This man seems to look upon it as rather a good joke. He takes the
matter jovially.'
'Yes! He takes most things in that way. It is a good thing for him,
you see. Brings up the circulation of his paper.'
'That,' she said quietly, 'is a very practical way of looking at war.'
Trist appeared to ignore, purposely, the slight reproach conveyed by
her remark.
'War is a practical thing,' he replied. 'This is a splendid chance
for me, and one I should be sorry to miss. It is not a surprise,
Brenda. We all knew that it might come at any time, but I did not
mention it, because the knowledge would only have been unsettling,
and I did not think ... then ... that my sudden departure would have
made much difference.'
She looked at him calmly and thoughtfully before replying, with an
indifference which was not quite complimentary:
'You must not allow this ... this calamity to make any difference. I
quite understand the position you are in. Of course you are pledged
to this man?...'
Trist nodded a brief acquiescence.
'Then you must go. I can manage quite well alone. Mrs. Wylie is
much better this morning, though she is still dull and horribly
apathetic. We will go home as quickly as we can.'
There was something in her voice, a slight catch, which he could not
understand, and of course he misread it. The last few words were
spoken in a peculiar monotone, with feverish haste.
'I feel horribly selfish,' he said, 'thinking of my own affairs at
this time. No, Brenda. I cannot go and leave you in such a
fix--alone.'
'I want you to go, Theo; I do really. It would never do for you to
miss this chance. You are pledged to this man (who sits comfortably
at home), and I would never forgive myself if I thought that you
stayed here on my account. Besides, you are a sort of public
servant; it is your duty to go.'
'Yes,' he said, catching at the phrase uneasily; 'it is certainly my
duty. It is my duty ... to go.'
She stood beside him quite still. Then she moved a step nearer to
him and laid her hand upon his shoulder.
'Theo,' she pleaded, 'you must go. To please me, pack up and go.'
He smiled suddenly, but did not look up into her face, which was very
pale, while her lips remained red. There was a slight quiver of her
chin whenever her mouth remained for a second unclenched. It needed
an effort on her part to prevent his hearing the chattering of her
teeth. Involuntarily he shrunk a little away from her light touch,
and glanced furtively at the white fingers on his shoulder.
Thus they remained for some moments while the yacht heaved gently
onwards. The lamps swayed a little, but beyond that there was no
motion in the pretty cabin. At last Trist reached out his hand and
took the envelope from which he had torn one of the telegrams. He
bent it over and smoothed it very carefully, while she watched the
movements of his fingers.
'When is there a steamer to England?' she asked suddenly.
'The day after to-morrow, from Bergen, at nine o'clock in the
evening.'
His answer was laconic and concise as Bradshaw.
Brenda knew then that he had expected war all along, and war was his
element; she could not forget that, despite the wild incongruity of
it.
'How can you manage it?' she asked simply and practically.
It would appear that he had foreseen everything, provided for every
possible contingency. While she moved away from him and sat down
near a small table, he answered her without a moment's thought.
'If we have the funeral to-morrow morning, I can start immediately
afterwards in a small boat, and row or sail to Gudvangen, reaching
there early next morning. Drive to Vossevangen, and catch the
afternoon train down to Bergen.'
'It sounds very simple, but it means thirty hours without sleep.'
'I can sleep all the way across the North Sea. Don't think of me,
Brenda; I'm outside the question altogether.'
He stopped, with a worried look upon his face, but did not raise his
eyes. Had he done so he would inevitably have noticed a heightened
colour in her cheeks, although she turned aside and gazed at nothing
in particular.
'What bothers me,' he continued, 'is you and Mrs. Wylie and the
_Hermione_. What will you do?'
'I will take the _Hermione_ home,' she said with gentle confidence.
'You can safely leave Mrs. Wylie to me.'
'I know I can, but I do not want to leave you to Mrs. Wylie. It is
putting too much on your shoulders.'
She shrugged the graceful members in question, and gave a little
short laugh.
'They are strong,' she answered carelessly. 'Besides, there is no
choice in the matter. I simply must be left in charge because there
is no one else. It seems to me that the matter in question is...'
she glanced towards the closed door of Trist's late state-room, where
Admiral Wylie kept his silent watch--'is whether Mrs. Wylie will
consent to Fjaerholm or not.'
'Can I see her?'
'No ... no, Theo. I think it is better not. She is so strange and
natural that I am afraid the sight of you might have some serious
effect. Even in her dreams she is constantly recalling the sight of
you ... coming down the little path ... with _him_ in your arms. You
remember--just beside the big rock where it was too narrow for you
both to carry him.'
'Yes,' he replied in a voice that might well have been rendered
purposely careless. 'Yes, I remember.'
'I have not dared,' the girl continued, 'to say anything about ...
about Fjaerholm. I have never seen anyone in grief like this before,
Theo, and it frightens me a little.'
He had left the table, forsaking the farce of breakfast, and was now
walking noiselessly backwards and forwards. At the sound of her
voice, timid and deprecating, when she spoke the last words he
stopped short before her.
'Then I must see her,' he said--'I must see her before I go. I have
seen a good deal of ... of grief, Brenda--in other people, I
mean--and know its symptoms. Some people are stunned for a time,
like a man who has been thrown from a gun-carriage, but it ought not
to last very long, not more than twenty-four hours. And then they
usually become nervously active. If Mrs. Wylie is like that, you
must employ her somehow. Tire her out if you can. But we must take
it upon ourselves, now, to have the Admiral buried at Fjaerholm. She
is not taking it as I thought she would, and the voyage home, or back
to Bergen even, with him on board would send her mad. When he is
buried it will be different; she will recover then, under your care.'
'Yes,' replied the girl. 'Yes, we must take it upon ourselves, Theo.
I thought of it before.'
'If at any time,' he murmured in his gently suggestive way, 'the
matter is discussed--when I am away, I mean--you can say that the
whole responsibility rests with me.'
She raised her head and looked at him with a sudden light in her blue
eyes.
'I am not afraid of responsibility,' she said tersely.
'No, I think you are afraid of nothing!'
She received this statement as it was made, simply, half playfully,
and quite without afterthought.
After a pause he rose, collected his letters, and went on deck,
leaving her seated near the small table. She also had letters, and
there was a packet of magazines and journals lying unopened near at
hand. But she showed no desire to learn news from the outer world.
All her interests were centred within four wooden walls just then,
and she sat thinking far into the forenoon. Over her head, on the
lightly-built deck, the regular tread of Theo Trist acted as an
accompaniment to her thoughts. It was so light, that footstep, and
yet so steady, seeming to tell of a gentle force which never swerved,
never turned back, and never halted.
'I wonder,' she meditated, 'if he would have gone at all events. I
wonder if I have the slightest influence upon his motives or his
actions. Sometimes it seems as if anyone could lead him like a
child, and then suddenly there comes a conviction that no human force
can move him.'