“It was too good to last. But nothing can rob me of it now.... Don’t
think that I repine. I am not even sad now. Yes, I have been happy.
But I remember also the time when I was unhappy beyond endurance, beyond
desperation. Yes. You remember that. And later on, too. There was a
time on board the _Ferndale_ when the only moments of relief I knew were
when I made Mr Powell talk to me a little on the poop. You like him?—
Don’t you?”
“Excellent fellow,” I said warmly. “You see him often?”
“Of course. I hardly know another soul in the world. I am alone. And
he has plenty of time on his hands. His aunt died a few years ago.
He’s doing nothing, I believe.”
“He is fond of the sea,” I remarked. “He loves it.”
“He seems to have given it up,” she murmured.
“I wonder why?”
She remained silent. “Perhaps it is because he loves something else
better,” I went on. “Come, Mrs Anthony, don’t let me carry away from
here the idea that you are a selfish person, hugging the memory of your
past happiness, like a rich man his treasure, forgetting the poor at the
gate.”
I rose to go, for it was getting late. She got up in some agitation and
went out with me into the fragrant darkness of the garden. She detained
my hand for a moment and then in the very voice of the Flora of old
days, with the exact intonation, showing the old mistrust, the old doubt
of herself, the old scar of the blow received in childhood, pathetic and
funny, she murmured, “Do you think it possible that he should care for
me?”
“Just ask him yourself. You are brave.”
“Oh, I am brave enough,” she said with a sigh.
“Then do. For if you don’t you will be wronging that patient man
cruelly.”
I departed leaving her dumb. Next day, seeing Powell making
preparations to go ashore, I asked him to give my regards to Mrs
Anthony. He promised he would.
“Listen, Powell,” I said. “We got to know each other by chance?”
“Oh, quite!” he admitted, adjusting his hat.
“And the science of life consists in seizing every chance that presents
itself,” I pursued. “Do you believe that?”
“Gospel truth,” he declared innocently.
“Well, don’t forget it.”
“Oh, I! I don’t expect now anything to present itself,” he said,
jumping ashore.
He didn’t turn up at high water. I set my sail and just as I had cast
off from the bank, round the black barn, in the dusk, two figures
appeared and stood silent, indistinct.
“Is that you, Powell?” I hailed.
“And Mrs Anthony,” his voice came impressively through the silence of
the great marsh. “I am not sailing to-night. I have to see Mrs
Anthony home.”
“Then I must even go alone,” I cried.
Flora’s voice wished me “_bon voyage_” in a most friendly but tremulous
tone.
“You shall hear from me before long,” shouted Powell, suddenly, just as
my boat had cleared the mouth of the creek.
“This was yesterday,” added Marlow, lolling in the armchair lazily. “I
haven’t heard yet; but I expect to hear any moment.... What on earth are
you grinning at in this sarcastic manner? I am not afraid of going to
church with a friend. Hang it all, for all my belief in Chance I am not
exactly a pagan....”