IV

'I don't know what to do, and you must help me,' Mrs. Nettlepoint said

to me that evening, as soon as I went in to see her.

'I'll do what I can--but what's the matter?'

'She has been crying here and going on--she has quite upset me.'

'Crying? She doesn't look like that.'

'Exactly, and that's what startled me. She came in to see me this

afternoon, as she has done before, and we talked about the weather and

the run of the ship and the manners of the stewardess and little

commonplaces like that, and then suddenly, in the midst of it, as she

sat there, _a propos_ of nothing, she burst into tears. I asked her what

ailed her and tried to comfort her, but she didn't explain; she only

said it was nothing, the effect of the sea, of leaving home. I asked her

if it had anything to do with her prospects, with her marriage; whether

she found as that drew near that her heart was not in it; I told her

that she mustn't be nervous, that I could enter into that--in short I

said what I could. All that she replied was that she _was_ nervous, very

nervous, but that it was already over; and then she jumped up and kissed

me and went away. Does she look as if she had been crying?' Mrs.

Nettlepoint asked.

'How can I tell, when she never quits that horrid veil? It's as if she

were ashamed to show her face.'

'She's keeping it for Liverpool. But I don't like such incidents,' said

Mrs. Nettlepoint. 'I shall go upstairs.'

'And is that where you want me to help you?'

'Oh, your arm and that sort of thing, yes. But something more. I feel as

if something were going to happen.'

'That's exactly what I said to Jasper this morning.'

'And what did he say?'

'He only looked innocent, as if he thought I meant a fog or a storm.'

'Heaven forbid--it isn't that! I shall never be good-natured again,'

Mrs. Nettlepoint went on; 'never have a girl put upon me that way. You

always pay for it, there are always tiresome complications. What I am

afraid of is after we get there. She'll throw up her engagement; there

will be dreadful scenes; I shall be mixed up with them and have to look

after her and keep her with me. I shall have to stay there with her till

she can be sent back, or even take her up to London. _Voyez-vous ca?_'

I listened respectfully to this and then I said: 'You are afraid of your

son.'

'Afraid of him?'

'There are things you might say to him--and with your manner; because

you have one when you choose.'

'Very likely, but what is my manner to his? Besides, I have said

everything to him. That is I have said the great thing, that he is

making her immensely talked about.'

'And of course in answer to that he has asked you how you know, and you

have told him I have told you.'

'I had to; and he says it's none of your business.'

'I wish he would say that to my face.'

'He'll do so perfectly, if you give him a chance. That's where you can

help me. Quarrel with him--he's rather good at a quarrel, and that will

divert him and draw him off.'

'Then I'm ready to discuss the matter with him for the rest of the

voyage.'

'Very well; I count on you. But he'll ask you, as he asks me, what the

deuce you want him to do.'

'To go to bed,' I replied, laughing.

'Oh, it isn't a joke.'

'That's exactly what I told you at first.'

'Yes, but don't exult; I hate people who exult. Jasper wants to know why

he should mind her being talked about if she doesn't mind it herself.'

'I'll tell him why,' I replied; and Mrs. Nettlepoint said she should be

exceedingly obliged to me and repeated that she would come upstairs.

I looked for Jasper above that same evening, but circumstances did not

favour my quest. I found him--that is I discovered that he was again

ensconced behind the lifeboat with Miss Mavis; but there was a needless

violence in breaking into their communion, and I put off our interview

till the next day. Then I took the first opportunity, at breakfast, to

make sure of it. He was in the saloon when I went in and was preparing

to leave the table; but I stopped him and asked if he would give me a

quarter of an hour on deck a little later--there was something

particular I wanted to say to him. He said, 'Oh yes, if you like,' with

just a visible surprise, but no look of an uncomfortable consciousness.

When I had finished my breakfast I found him smoking on the forward-deck

and I immediately began: 'I am going to say something that you won't at

all like; to ask you a question that you will think impertinent.'

'Impertinent? that's bad.'

'I am a good deal older than you and I am a friend--of many years--of

your mother. There's nothing I like less than to be meddlesome, but I

think these things give me a certain right--a sort of privilege. For the

rest, my inquiry will speak for itself.'

'Why so many preliminaries?' the young man asked, smiling.

We looked into each other's eyes a moment. What indeed was his mother's

manner--her best manner--compared with his? 'Are you prepared to be

responsible?'

'To you?'

'Dear no--to the young lady herself. I am speaking of course of Miss

Mavis.'

'Ah yes, my mother tells me you have her greatly on your mind.'

'So has your mother herself--now.'

'She is so good as to say so--to oblige you.'

'She would oblige me a great deal more by reassuring me. I am aware that

you know I have told her that Miss Mavis is greatly talked about.'

'Yes, but what on earth does it matter?'

'It matters as a sign.'

'A sign of what?'

'That she is in a false position.'

Jasper puffed his cigar, with his eyes on the horizon. 'I don't know

whether it's _your_ business, what you are attempting to discuss; but it

really appears to me it is none of mine. What have I to do with the

tattle with which a pack of old women console themselves for not being

sea-sick?'

'Do you call it tattle that Miss Mavis is in love with you?'

'Drivelling.'

'Then you are very ungrateful. The tattle of a pack of old women has

this importance, that she suspects or knows that it exists, and that

nice girls are for the most part very sensitive to that sort of thing.

To be prepared not to heed it in this case she must have a reason, and

the reason must be the one I have taken the liberty to call your

attention to.'

'In love with me in six days, just like that?' said Jasper, smoking.

'There is no accounting for tastes, and six days at sea are equivalent

to sixty on land. I don't want to make you too proud. Of course if you

recognise your responsibility it's all right and I have nothing to say.'

'I don't see what you mean,' Jasper went on.

'Surely you ought to have thought of that by this time. She's engaged to

be married and the gentleman she is engaged to is to meet her at

Liverpool. The whole ship knows it (I didn't tell them!) and the whole

ship is watching her. It's impertinent if you like, just as I am, but we

make a little world here together and we can't blink its conditions.

What I ask you is whether you are prepared to allow her to give up the

gentleman I have just mentioned for your sake.'

'For my sake?'

'To marry her if she breaks with him.'

Jasper turned his eyes from the horizon to my own, and I found a strange

expression in them. 'Has Miss Mavis commissioned you to make this

inquiry?'

'Never in the world.'

'Well then, I don't understand it.'

'It isn't from another I make it. Let it come from yourself--_to_

yourself.'

'Lord, you must think I lead myself a life! That's a question the young

lady may put to me any moment that it pleases her.'

'Let me then express the hope that she will. But what will you answer?'

'My dear sir, it seems to me that in spite of all the titles you have

enumerated you have no reason to expect I will tell you.' He turned away

and I exclaimed, sincerely, 'Poor girl!' At this he faced me again and,

looking at me from head to foot, demanded: 'What is it you want me to

do?'

'I told your mother that you ought to go to bed.'

'You had better do that yourself!'

This time he walked off, and I reflected rather dolefully that the only

clear result of my experiment would probably have been to make it vivid

to him that she was in love with him. Mrs. Nettlepoint came up as she

had announced, but the day was half over: it was nearly three o'clock.

She was accompanied by her son, who established her on deck, arranged

her chair and her shawls, saw that she was protected from sun and wind,

and for an hour was very properly attentive. While this went on Grace

Mavis was not visible, nor did she reappear during the whole afternoon.

I had not observed that she had as yet been absent from the deck for so

long a period. Jasper went away, but he came back at intervals to see

how his mother got on, and when she asked him where Miss Mavis was he

said he had not the least idea. I sat with Mrs. Nettlepoint at her

particular request: she told me she knew that if I left her Mrs. Peck

and Mrs. Gotch would come to speak to her. She was flurried and fatigued

at having to make an effort, and I think that Grace Mavis's choosing

this occasion for retirement suggested to her a little that she had been

made a fool of. She remarked that the girl's not being there showed her

complete want of breeding and that she was really very good to have put

herself out for her so; she was a common creature and that was the end

of it. I could see that Mrs. Nettlepoint's advent quickened the

speculative activity of the other ladies; they watched her from the

opposite side of the deck, keeping their eyes fixed on her very much as

the man at the wheel kept his on the course of the ship. Mrs. Peck

plainly meditated an approach, and it was from this danger that Mrs.

Nettlepoint averted her face.

'It's just as we said,' she remarked to me as we sat there. 'It is like

the bucket in the well. When I come up that girl goes down.'

'Yes, but you've succeeded, since Jasper remains here.'

'Remains? I don't see him.'

'He comes and goes--it's the same thing.'

'He goes more than he comes. But _n'en parlons plus_; I haven't gained

anything. I don't admire the sea at all--what is it but a magnified

water-tank? I shan't come up again.'

'I have an idea she'll stay in her cabin now,' I said. 'She tells me

she has one to herself.' Mrs. Nettlepoint replied that she might do as

she liked, and I repeated to her the little conversation I had had with

Jasper.

She listened with interest, but 'Marry her? mercy!' she exclaimed. 'I

like the manner in which you give my son away.'

'You wouldn't accept that.'

'Never in the world.'

'Then I don't understand your position.'

'Good heavens, I have none! It isn't a position to be bored to death.'

'You wouldn't accept it even in the case I put to him--that of her

believing she had been encouraged to throw over poor Porterfield?'

'Not even--not even. Who knows what she believes?'

'Then you do exactly what I said you would--you show me a fine example

of maternal immorality.'

'Maternal fiddlesticks! It was she began it.'

'Then why did you come up to-day?'

'To keep you quiet.'

Mrs. Nettlepoint's dinner was served on deck, but I went into the

saloon. Jasper was there but not Grace Mavis, as I had half expected. I

asked him what had become of her, if she were ill (he must have thought

I had an ignoble pertinacity), and he replied that he knew nothing

whatever about her. Mrs. Peck talked to me about Mrs. Nettlepoint and

said it had been a great interest to her to see her; only it was a pity

she didn't seem more sociable. To this I replied that she had to beg to

be excused--she was not well.

'You don't mean to say she's sick, on this pond?'

'No, she's unwell in another way.'

'I guess I know the way!' Mrs. Peck laughed. And then she added, 'I

suppose she came up to look after her charge.'

'Her charge?'

'Why, Miss Mavis. We've talked enough about that.'

'Quite enough. I don't know what that had to do with it. Miss Mavis

hasn't been there to-day.'

'Oh, it goes on all the same.'

'It goes on?'

'Well, it's too late.'

'Too late?'

'Well, you'll see. There'll be a row.'

This was not comforting, but I did not repeat it above. Mrs. Nettlepoint

returned early to her cabin, professing herself much tired. I know not

what 'went on,' but Grace Mavis continued not to show. I went in late,

to bid Mrs. Nettlepoint good-night, and learned from her that the girl

had not been to her. She had sent the stewardess to her room for news,

to see if she were ill and needed assistance, and the stewardess came

back with the information that she was not there. I went above after

this; the night was not quite so fair and the deck was almost empty. In

a moment Jasper Nettlepoint and our young lady moved past me together.

'I hope you are better!' I called after her; and she replied, over her

shoulder--

'Oh, yes, I had a headache; but the air now does me good!'

I went down again--I was the only person there but they, and I wished to

not appear to be watching them--and returning to Mrs. Nettlepoint's

room found (her door was open into the little passage) that she was

still sitting up.

'She's all right!' I said. 'She's on the deck with Jasper.'

The old lady looked up at me from her book. 'I didn't know you called

that all right.'

'Well, it's better than something else.'

'Something else?'

'Something I was a little afraid of.' Mrs. Nettlepoint continued to look

at me; she asked me what that was. 'I'll tell you when we are ashore,' I

said.

The next day I went to see her, at the usual hour of my morning visit,

and found her in considerable agitation. 'The scenes have begun,' she

said; 'you know I told you I shouldn't get through without them! You

made me nervous last night--I haven't the least idea what you meant; but

you made me nervous. She came in to see me an hour ago, and I had the

courage to say to her, "I don't know why I shouldn't tell you frankly

that I have been scolding my son about you." Of course she asked me what

I meant by that, and I said--"It seems to me he drags you about the ship

too much, for a girl in your position. He has the air of not remembering

that you belong to some one else. There is a kind of want of taste and

even of want of respect in it." That produced an explosion; she became

very violent.'

'Do you mean angry?'

'Not exactly angry, but very hot and excited--at my presuming to think

her relations with my son were not the simplest in the world. I might

scold him as much as I liked--that was between ourselves; but she didn't

see why I should tell her that I had done so. Did I think she allowed

him to treat her with disrespect? That idea was not very complimentary

to her! He had treated her better and been kinder to her than most other

people--there were very few on the ship that hadn't been insulting. She

should be glad enough when she got off it, to her own people, to some

one whom no one would have a right to say anything about. What was there

in her position that was not perfectly natural? What was the idea of

making a fuss about her position? Did I mean that she took it too

easily--that she didn't think as much as she ought about Mr.

Porterfield? Didn't I believe she was attached to him--didn't I believe

she was just counting the hours until she saw him? That would be the

happiest moment of her life. It showed how little I knew her, if I

thought anything else.'

'All that must have been rather fine--I should have liked to hear it,' I

said. 'And what did you reply?'

'Oh, I grovelled; I told her that I accused her (as regards my son) of

nothing worse than an excess of good nature. She helped him to pass his

time--he ought to be immensely obliged. Also that it would be a very

happy moment for me too when I should hand her over to Mr. Porterfield.'

'And will you come up to-day?'

'No indeed--she'll do very well now.'