"_Wide open and unguarded stand our gates,
Named by the four winds, North, South, East and West;
Portals that lead to an enchanted land. . ._"
T. B. ALDRICH.
Damaris duly arrived in Egypt, accompanied by Wellington--who had shown
no sign of incipient hydrophobia--and Jane Coop, her maid.
It were best to describe them both now, and so get it all over.
Whilst waiting one exeat upon Waterloo station, the girl had annexed
unto herself a holy terror in the shape of a brindle bull-pup.
The hilarious quadruped had twined its leash about one leg of its
master--who was an alien from Wapping--and the spout of a zinc
watering-can which a porter had left upon the platform; for which joke
it had received a vile cuff on its wrinkled physiognomy from the alien
master.
Like some avenging goddess, Damaris, the ladylike, almost finished
product of Onslow House, sprang straight at the man, smote him with the
flat of the hand upon the face, and pounced upon the yelping pup.
"Take your leg out of the dog's chain, you idiot!" she cried, her eyes
blazing, her perfect teeth flashing in a positive snarl. "Be quick;
don't be so clumsy. How dare you hit a dog. He _hit_ him," she
announced to the interested, sympathetic crowd. "Hit him on his lovely
face.
"You gif that dog back to me, missie,--he's mine."
"He's mine. I've got him, and my mother is one of the heads of the
Society that protects children."
"That's got nothing to do wif dogs."
"This is a puppy, so it's a child," had come the decisive reply. "And
I'll buy him, though I needn't really, if I refer it to the Society."
"I'll take ten poun' for 'im."
The child fished for her purse, which, contained half-a-crown and her
ticket, and flung it with a supreme gesture of contempt at the man's
feet; then, squeezing up the dog in her arms, tore a simple gold
bracelet off her left arm and flung it after the purse.
"Worv two poun' at the mos'."
Then, from out of a first-class carriage of the train waiting to start
for Southampton slowly descended Olivia, Duchess of Longacres.
The girl and the alien had their backs turned to her, but the crowd had
seen; had looked; started to laugh, and then had become silent, so
great was the dignity of the old lady.
Clad in a voluminous grey taffeta gown, from under which peeped little
crimson shoes; covered with a huge loose ermine wrap, with the black
poke-bonnet on top of the outrageous golden perruque and the grey
parrot bobbing up and down excitedly upon her shoulder, she stood
silently taking in the scene.
There was the light of battle in the famous hawk's-eyes as she listened
to the girl defending the pup, and her splendid teeth shone in a grin
of enjoyment as she suddenly rattled her ebony stick upon the alien's
ankle-bones, those most tender bits of anatomical scaffolding.
There was a yell of pain as the alien backed hastily into the arms of a
lusty youth who had continuously besought Damaris, to allow him "ter
put it acrorst ther blighter's h'ugly mug," and a cry of delight as
Damaris ran to the old lady's side and, squeezing the pup in one arm,
made the sweetest little reverence in the pretty continental way before
she excitedly wrung her god-mother's hand.
"_Marraine_, he hit the puppy, and I've bought him for ten pounds; at
least, Dad will send a cheque tonight. I've given him half-a-crown and
my bracelet on account."
"Call Hobson," said her grace to the bird, who, obeying, had shrilly
piped, "Tumble up, men, tumble up," until Hobson the maid suddenly
surged, from the second-class and ploughed her way through the
delighted crowd.
"Give the purse and bracelet to my maid, you------"
"Swab," supplemented the parrot.
"-----at once," finished her grace, just as, with a cry of "Here's
Dad!" Damaris ran to meet her father, who, having got hung up in the
traffic, had failed to meet the train. He listened patiently, with
dancing eyes, to the story, smiled across at the duchess, gave the man
a pound-note and a jolly good talking to, and acquired a bull pup with
the Rodney Stone strain, which they promptly christened Wellington, as
it had won at Waterloo.
Wellington forthwith developed an inordinate jealousy of Jane Coop.
Jane Coop was maid, adviser and buffer to the girl whom she loved more
than anyone on earth.
Born on the Squire's lands, she had developed a positive genius for
mothering delicate lambs and calves and sickly chicks, so that when a
crisis had arrived almost immediately after the birth of Damaris, the
Squire had bundled the highly-certificated nurse into a motor and sent
her packing back to London, and called upon Jane Coop to rise to the
occasion.
She had risen.
Bonny and plump, she had taken the weakly little bit of humanity, also
the situation, into her strong, capable hands; treated the mother and
babe just as she would have treated a couple of delicate lambs, and
pulled them both through.
From that day forth she had dominated the house, tyrannised over the
Squire and his lady, defied each and every governess who had shown
signs of undue strictness, and found her reward for her devotion in the
love of the child who teased her to death and--in the long run--obeyed
her.
She had shown herself a positive sheep-dog on board the boat. She had
rounded up her white lamb and yapped upon the heels of those who dared
approach with too great familiarity; had bristled and shown her teeth
upon every possible occasion, until those who would fain have led the
girl into new and verdant pastures had fled at the sheep-dog's
approach, leaving them both to enjoy the novelty of everything, each
after her own kind.
Damaris revelled in it all: the seagulls; the lighthouses; the ships
that passed in the day and night; and the tail-end of a storm they hit
up in the Bay, whilst Jane Coop invented new verses to the Litany as
she tried, in her cabin, to solve the problem of two into one, and
Wellington, somewhere under the water-line, daily gave a fine imitation
of hell-bound to a circle of admiring seamen.
To his last hour at sea Captain X will forever retain the memory of
what it cost him in strength of will to maintain his dignity, when,
standing straight and exceedingly beautiful, with one hand full of
lists, the huge bulldog at her feet, with a black bow under his left
ear, and an assembly of the greatest sufferers before her, Damaris, two
days before arriving at Port Said, solemnly read out the items and the
shop price of each article chewed, damaged or totally destroyed during
the voyage by the dog.
"Shoes, boots, pants, edges of trousers; two pipes, one pouch, six
packets of gaspers; one entire tray of crockery; one air-cushion
dropped in fright by stewardess; one coil of rope, one life-buoy, one
tin can dented, one man's ankles slightly bruised; one bare patch to
ship's cat's back. . . ." And so on and so forth; whilst murmurs arose
from the sufferers, who chorused that "they didn't want no
compensation, only too pleased to part with their bits, as long . . ."
etc., etc.
"I do not think the fault was all on one side, Miss Hethencourt,"
summed up the Captain, speaking in guttural consonant and flattened
vowel from suppressed emotion. "The--er--the plaintiff must have
approached the dog as he was chained and------"
"A bulldog," broke in Damaris, "is a magnet to the best in every human
being. They simply could not help themselves; they were drawn within
reach of his teeth; they----"
"I cannot quite------" interrupted the captain. "Yes?"
Chips, the carpenter, showed signs of bursting with information
withheld.
"Beggin' your pardon for interruption, sir, but what; the lady says is
true; we just couldn't keep away. I saw the Chink--beg pardon, sir, I
mean Ling-a-Ling the laundryman, burning joss-sticks in front of
'im,"--pointing of stub finger towards shameless dog--"one night when
the dawg was asleep. Jus' worship, please, sir, on all parts. And
Mrs. Pudge what didn't oughter 'ave been down in our quarters, dropped
the air cushion, sir, 'cause she missed in stays------"
"I cannot," interrupted the captain--then choked at a mental vision of
Mrs. Pudge, who scorned such frivolous inventions as whalebone to
support the figure--then trumpeted behind his handkerchief, ending in
that combined half-snort, half-giggle which is so disastrous to dignity
and complexion, "I cannot allow the--the--er--form of the Company's
stewardesses to be so discussed."
"Beggin' yer pardon, sir," fiercely rejoined Chips--who was getting a
bit of his own back on Mrs. Pudge--"I'm using the nautical expression,
sir; she failed to get about when that there dawg"--pointing of stub
thumb at heedless dog--"growled 'cause she has water in the knee. I'm
usin' a an--anatomical expression now, sir--her knee--this,
sir"--slapping of knee with horny hand of toil--"The ship's knees,
miss," addressing Damaris, whose straight brows had almost met in
puzzlement, "is a chock on the forepart of the lowermast on which the
'eel--heel, miss, of the topmast rests. Yuss, sir. Her knee may 'ave
water in it; but no one couldn't say the same of her _grog_."
To prevent death from combustion, the speechless captain here intimated
by signs that the culprit should stand up. And the brindle of Rodney
Stone strain stood, whilst the men's eyes glistened as they fidgeted
upon their feet from very joy in the spectacle.
His skull was massive and perfectly-shaped, the under-jaw square and
strong, thrust up and beyond the upper; the teeth were perfect, even,
large and also strong; the nose was black and large, well back between
the eyes, which were set low down and wide apart, but well in front and
round, with a deep "stop" between them; the honestest outward sign of
his gallant loving heart. The ears were rose; not in colour, of
course, but of rose-leaf shape, set high and small and fine; the face
was closely-wrinkled, the "chop" well down, and the loose skin in
abundant folds about his throat and neck.
The chest was wide and deep and prominent; the shoulders were
tremendously muscular; the body was short, with a Roach back, fine in
the rear; the forelegs, short and strong, with the developed calves
which give them the appearance of being bowed, whereas the bones are
really straight; the feet turned out a bit, with toes split up and
arched; the tail set low and straight down and anything but a glad
tail. His heart was of the finest, honest, loving, courageous, capable
of hurling its owner to instant battle or death, in defence of the one
loved, at other times rendering him, in its gentleness, an almost
ludicrous spectacle of adoration. Of such was Wellington, and if the
description is somewhat detailed and technical it is because he happens
a good deal into the book.
The duchess had been put into the train for Port Said by Ben Kelham,
who, inwardly kicking at her sage advice, looked as despondent as a
camel who considers its strength unequal to its burden.
"Cheer up, lad," she cried as the train moved off. "Cheer up;
something is sure to happen before long."
Which was a perfectly safe prophecy to make where Damaris was concerned.
Arrived at Port Said, she put off in a boat with her maid and her
parrot, and found her godchild, who did not expect her, on deck,
entranced with all she saw.
Yes! of course Port Said is a sink of iniquity and a place of odours
and a fold for native wolves in sheep's clothing; also a centre for
antiquities made in Birmingham, or by the vendor himself in the hot
weather; and a market for things which should not be sold, much less
bought.
In fact, in one short sentence, it is a deal of cosmopolitan
wrong-doing.
All the same, you need not buy and you need not listen nor look, and if
it is the first bit of the Orient you have meet with for the first time
in your life, well! it is the East, and jolly exciting and interesting,
too.
Damaris rushed at the old lady, and having curtsied to her, gathered
her up in her strong arms and hugged her tightly, just as Captain X,
who during one trip had had the duchess as passenger and therefore
loved her, came along.
As they turned in the direction of the dining-saloon, the girl looked
over her shoulder at the two maids, and smiled.
With a great love of their respective mistresses as their sole bond in
common they stood, otherwise divided, staring at each other.
"Pleased to meet you again," volunteered country-bred Jane, offering a
plump hand.
"Hoping you are in good health," responded Maria Hobson, making a
corner in strawberry-leaves as she just touched the finger-tips.
"Wellington, you have met Dekko, I think," laughed the girl.
"Woomph!" grunted the dog disdainfully, as he cocked an eye at the
bird, which ruffled its feathers, spread its red tail and looked down
sideways and spitefully for a long moment.
"My Gawd!" it suddenly shrieked. "My Gawd!"
And it swung about and rubbed its soft grey pate against its mistress's
outrageous golden perruque, then hurled itself onto the captain's
shoulder.