THE WOMAN AND THE MAN WHO LOVED HER
The wife of the admiral, to whom he had brought the flags of the two
British ships on that memorable cruise, had long since departed this
life. Her daughter, too, who had married somewhat late in life, had
died in giving birth to a girl, and this little maiden, Emily Sanford
by name, in default of other haven or nearer relationship, had been
brought, when still an infant in arms, to the white house on the hill,
to be taken care of by the old admiral. In the hearts of both the old
men she divided affection with the ship.
With the assistance of one of the admiral's distant connections,
a faithful old woman, also passed to the enjoyment of her reward
long since, Emily Sanford had been carried through the troubles and
trials incident to early childhood. At first she had gone with other
little children to the quaint red school-house in the village. She
had been a regular attendant until she had exhausted its limited
capacity for imparting knowledge. After that the admiral, a man of
keen intelligence, of world-wide observation, and of a deeply
reflective habit of mind, had completed her education himself, upon
such old-fashioned lines as his experience suggested. She had been an
apt pupil indeed, and the results reflected great credit upon his
sound, if somewhat unusual, methods of training, or would have
reflected had there been any one to see.
In all her life Emily Sanford had never been away from her grandfather
for a single day; she had actually never left that little town, and,
except in school-time, she had not often left the Point. Although
just out of her teens, she was not old enough to have become
discontented--not yet. She was as childlike, as innocent, as unworldly
and unsophisticated a maiden as ever lived,--and beautiful as well. It
was Prospero and Miranda translated to the present. The old admiral
adored his granddaughter. If the ship was his Nemesis, Emily was his
fortune.
As for Barry the sailor,--and it were injustice to the brave old
seaman to think of him as Caliban,--he worshipped the ground the girl
walked on. He was in love with her. A rude old man of fifty in love
with a girl of twenty; a girl immeasurably above him in birth,
station, education--in everything! It was surprising! Had any one
known it, however, it would not have seemed grotesque,--only pitiful.
Barry himself did not know it. He was too humble and too ignorant for
self-examination, for subtle analysis. He loved, and he did not
comprehend the meaning of the word! Even the wisest fail to solve the
mysteries of the heart.
Although the veteran seaman was too ignorant of love rightly to
characterize his passion, it was nevertheless a true one. It was not
the feeling of a father, nor of a companion, nor yet that of a
servant, though it partook in some measure of all three. That was an
evidence of the genuineness of his feeling. Nothing noble, no feeling
that is high, self-sacrificing, devoted, is foreign to love that is
true, and love is the most comprehensive of the passions--it is a
complete obsession. Captain Barry would have given his soul for Emily
Sanford's happiness, and rejoiced in the bestowal.
He cherished no hopes, held no aspirations, dreamed no dreams
concerning any future relationship. He was just possessed with an
inexplicable feeling for her. A feeling that expected nothing, that
asked nothing, that hoped for nothing but the steady happiness of
being near her. To be in sight, in sound, in touch, that was all, that
was enough. The sea in calmer mood gives no suggestion of potential
storms. Barry's love was the acme of self-abnegation. If he had ever
reached the covetous point he would have realized that she was not for
him. He never did.
He loved her with a love beside which even his devotion to the old
admiral, the passionate affection he bore for the old ship, were
trifles. The girl had grown into his heart. Many a time he had carried
her about in his arms when she was a baby. He had played with her as a
child; she could always call a smile to his lips; he had cared for her
as a young girl, he had served her as a woman.
He, too, had been happy to contribute to her education as he had been
able. There was a full-rigged model of the _Susquehanna_ in her room
in the white house. He had made it for her. It was a perfect replica,
complete, finished in every detail; so the ship might have looked if
she had ever been put in commission. Emily knew every rope, every
sheet, line, and brace upon it. She could knot and splice, box the
compass, and every sailor's weather rhyme was familiar to her. She
could handle a sail-boat as well as he, and with her strong young arms
pulled a beautiful man-o'-war stroke. He had taught her all these
things. When study hours were over and play-time began, the two
together had explored the coast-line for miles in every direction.
So far as possible he had gratified every wish that she expressed. If
a flower grew upon the face of an inaccessible cliff and she looked at
it with a carelessly covetous glance, he got it for her, even at the
risk of his life. He followed her about, when she permitted, as a
great Newfoundland dog might have done, and was ever ready at her beck
and call. His feeling towards her was of so exalted a character that
he never ventured upon the slightest familiarity; he would have
recoiled from such an idea; yet had there been any to mark, they might
have seen him fondle the hem of her dress, lay his bronzed cheek upon
her footprint in the sands, when he could do so without her knowing
it.
There was no man in the village with whom Emily could associate on
terms of equality. The admiral had come from a proud old family, and
all its pride of birth and station was concentrated in his last
descendant. Simply as she had been reared, she could not stoop to
association with any beneath the best; it was part of her
grandfather's training. He was of a day when democratic iconoclasm was
confined to state papers, and aristocracy still ruled the land by
right divine, even though the forms of government were ostensibly
republican. There were some quaint old novels in the library, which
the girl had read and re-read, however, and, as she was a woman, she
had dreamed of love and lovers from over the sea, and waited.
Her life, too, had been bound up with the ship. Not that she feared an
end when it ended, but she often wondered what would happen to her
when it fell. What would she do when the admiral was gone? And Captain
Barry also? Who would take care of her then? What would her life be in
that great world of which she dreamed beyond that sparkling wave-lit
circle of the horizon? Who would care for her then? That lover who was
coming? Ah, well, time would bring him. Somewhere he lived, some day
he would appear. With the light-heartedness of youth she put the
future by and lived happily, if expectantly, in the present.