MY SWEETHEART'S JOY.
Once asleep I slept heavily, and it was twenty minutes past the
breakfast hour by the time I was ready to leave the crazy and groaning
dungeon that served me for a bedroom.
I entered the cabin, but had scarcely made two steps when there sounded
a loud cry in a girl's voice, half of terror, half of joy; a shriek so
startling for the passions it expressed that it brought me to a dead
stand. It was Imogene. I saw her jump from her seat, make a gesture
with her arms as though she would fly to me, then bring both hands
violently to her heart with a loud hysterical ha! ha! as if she could
only find breath in some such unnatural note of laughter, whilst she
stood staring at me with straining eyes that filled her violet beauty
with a light like that of madness.
The clock struck the half-hour as she cried, and the echo of her voice
and the deep, humming vibration of the bell were followed by the
parrot's diabolical croak:
"Wy zyn al Verdomd!"
"God in Heaven!" exclaimed Vanderdecken, in a tone deep with amazement,
"I thought that man was drowned!"
It was a picture of consternation that I should not have dreamt to
expect in men who had outlived life and in whom you would think of
seeking qualities and emotions outside those which were necessary to
the execution of their sentence. Vanderdecken, leaning forward at the
head of the table upon his great hands, the fingers of which were
stretched out, glared at me with a frown of astonishment. Prins--whose
attendance upon me in my cabin had long been limited to his placing
a bucket of salt-water at my door without entering--Prins, I say,
arrested by my entry whilst in the act of filling a cup of wine for
the captain, watched me with a yawn of wonder, and stood motionless as
though blasted by a stroke of lightning; whilst Van Vogelaar, with his
head upon his shoulder, the blade of the knife with which he had been
eating forking straight up out of his fist that lay like a paralysed
thing upon the table, eyed me with a sunk chin and under a double fold
of brow; his level, enchained stare full of fear, and cruelty and
passion.
I saw how it was, and giving the captain a bow and my darling a smile,
I went to my place at the table and sat down. Van Vogelaar shrunk as
I passed him, keeping his eyes upon me as a cat follows the motions
of a dog; and when I seated myself he fell away by the length of his
arm, dropping his knife and fork and watching me. Imogene, breathing
deeply, resumed her seat; nothing but Vanderdecken's amazement hindered
him from observing her agitation, which was of a nature he could not
possibly have mistaken, if indeed he still possessed the capacity of
distinguishing such emotions as love.
She merely said, letting out her words in a tremulous sigh: "O
Geoffrey, thank God! thank God!" The food in front of her was untasted;
but what grief there had been in her face before was lost in the
confusion of feelings which worked in her loveliness with a vitality
that made her red and white in the same moment. She repeated under her
breath to herself: "Thank God! thank God!"
This, while the others stared.
I turned to Van Vogelaar. "Mynheer," said I, "you regard me with
astonishment."
He shrank a little further yet, and, after a pause, said, "Are you man
or devil?"
"Captain Vanderdecken," said I, "has your mate lost his reason?"
On this Van Vogelaar cried out: "Captain, by the Holy Trinity, I swear
it was as I have reported. This Englishman, after prowling on deck last
night in the early hours of the middle watch, suddenly clambered on to
the rail, for what purpose I know not, and leaned his weight against
the starboard main-brace, the sail then reefing. I looked round--on
turning again he was gone! and Nicholas Houltshausen, who was at the
helm, swore he saw him rise black upon the white eddies of the wake."
Vanderdecken frowningly questioned me with his eyes. I should have been
acting a sillier part than a fool's to have jested with these men,
besides, I had long since resolved to be plain.
"Herr Van Vogelaar," said I, "doubtless refers to my having fallen into
the weather mizzen-channel last night from the rail, whilst peering at
what I believed to be a ship. The main-brace, upon which I had put my
hand to steady myself, yielded very suddenly," and here I shot a look
at the mate, "but I fell lightly, and after sitting a little to recover
my breath, made my way to my cabin."
Van Vogelaar's death-like face darkened. An oath or two rattled in his
throat, and returning to his old posture he fell to the meat upon his
plate with the ferocity of some starving beast, insomuch that the veins
about his forehead stood out like pieces of cord.
The feelings with which Vanderdecken received my explanation I could
not gather. He gazed hard at me with fiery eyes, as though, mistrusting
me, he sought to burn his sight down to my heart, and then, slowly
resuming his knife and fork, went on with his breakfast in his familiar
trance-like way, mute as a dead man.
I constantly exchanged glances with Imogene, but held my peace since
she remained silent. She struggled to compose her face, but her joy at
my presence shone through her mask of reserve, twitching the corners
of her mouth into faint smiles, and dancing in her eyes like sunshine
on the ripples of a sapphire pool. Her love for me spoke more in this
quiet delight than she could have found room for in a thousand words.
How sweet and fair she looked! The light of her heart lay with a fair
rosiness upon her cheeks, which had been as pale as marble when she had
risen with her shriek and laughter to my first coming.
Presently Van Vogelaar left the cabin, going out scowling and talking
to himself, but not offering so much as to glance at me. There was a
piece of hung meat on the table, of what animal I did not know; it
proved indifferent good eating. This and some cakes made of flour,
with a goblet of sherry and water, formed my breakfast. I ate slowly,
knowing that Vanderdecken would not smoke whilst I breakfasted, and
wishing to tire him away that Imogene and I might have the cabin to
ourselves. But my stratagem was to no purpose. He started suddenly
from his waking dream--if, indeed, it was to be credited that any
sort of intellectual faculty stirred in him when he lapsed into these
cataleptic stillnesses--and bade Prins go and get cut up some of the
tobacco they had removed from the wreck, and then erecting his figure
and stroking down his beard, he looked from me to Imogene and back to
me again, and said, "The weather promises to mend; but this wind must
come from a witch's mouth--and a witch of deep and steady lungs. I hope
you may not have brought us ill-luck, sir?"
"I hope not," said I, shortly.
"There are malign stars in the heavens," he continued, in a voice
that trembled richly upon the air, like the waving echoes of some
deep-throated melodious bell, "and there are men born under them.
North of the Baltic, on Muskovite territory, is a nation of wretches
who can bewitch the winds and sail their ships through contrary gales.
They are not far removed from Britain," said he, significantly.
"They are as close to Holland, mynheer," said I.
"Oh, captain!" cried Imogene, "you do not wish to say that Mr. Fenton
has had a hand in the fixing of this wind?"
He leaned his forehead upon his elbow, and stretching forth his
other hand, drummed lightly on the table with his long, lean,
leprous-coloured fingers as he spoke. "Why, Mynheer Fenton, Miss Dudley
must allow that a curious luck attends you. How many of a crew went to
your ship?"
"Forty, sir."
"Mark your star! Of forty men you alone fall overboard! But fortune
goes with you and you are rescued by Van Vogelaar. Observe again!
Of forty men you alone are delivered into a ship whose nation is at
war with yours! Yet fortune still attends you and you are hospitably
received, yea, even made welcome, and clothed, and fed and housed."
I bowed.
"More yet! Last night you fell from the bulwark-rail. What sorcery is
it that sways you into the mizzen-channel and presently, unseen, to
your bed? Nicholas Houltshausen is noted among us for his shrewd sight.
Did not he swear he saw you rise black after your plunge among the
froth of the ship's wake? What was it that he beheld? Can the soul shed
its body as the butterfly its skin and yet appear clothed, substantial,
real as flesh and blood?"
"I exactly explained that accident," said I. "If there be sorcery in my
having the luck to tumble into a ship's mizzen-chains instead of the
water, then am I a witch fit for a broomstick and a grinning moon!"
"Captain Vanderdecken does but amuse himself with you, Mr. Fenton,"
said Imogene. "It is true, mynheer," she continued, putting on an
inimitable air of sweet dignity, which was vastly reassuring to me as
proving that she had recovered her old easiness of mind and was now
playing a part, "that we believed you had fallen overboard last night,
and this being our conclusion you may judge how greatly your entrance
just now amazed us. For me, I was so frightened that I shrieked out,
as you doubtless heard. Truly I thought you, the dead, arisen. Captain
Vanderdecken cannot recover his surprise, and would have himself to
believe that you are a sorcerer. You, who are so young, and an English
sailor!" She laughed out, and a truer ring she could not have put into
her forced merriment had she been a Pritchard, or a Clive, or a Cibber.
"Indeed," she added, "to be a necromancer, you need a beard as long and
as grey as the captain's."
There was no temper in the look Vanderdecken cast upon her, nay, it
almost deserved the name of mildness in him whose eyes were forever
fiery with hot thought and passions of undivinable character. But not
the phantom of a smile showed in his face in response to her laughter.
"Madam," said I, putting on a distant air in conformity with the hint
of her own manner, "I am no sorcerer. For your sake I would I were, for
then my first business would be to veer this wind south, and keep it
there till it had thundered our ship with foaming stem into the smooth
waters of the Zuyder-Zee."
This seemed to weigh with Vanderdecken. He reflected a little and then
said, with something of lofty urbanity in his mode of addressing me,
"Had you that power, mynheer, I do not know that I should object to
your presence were you Beelzebub himself."
Imogene's smile betrayed the delight she felt in her gradual, happy,
nimble drawing of this fierce man's thoughts away from his astonishing
suspicions of me as a wizard.
"Have you ever heard, Mr. Fenton," said she, "of that nation to the
north of the Baltic of whom Captain Vanderdecken has spoken?"
"Oh! yes, madam," I replied; "they are well known as Russian Finns,
and are undoubtedly wizards, and will sell such winds to ships as
captains require. I knew a master of a vessel who, being off the
coast of Finland, grew impatient for a wind to carry him to a certain
distant port. He applied to an old wizard, who said he would sell him
a gale that should enable him to fetch the Promontory of Rouxella,
but no further, for his breeze ceased to obey him when that point
was reached. The captain agreed, holding that a wind to Rouxella was
better than light airs and baffling calms off the Finland coast, and
paid the wizard ten kronen--about six and thirty shillings of English
money--and a pound of tobacco; on which the conjurer tied a woollen
rag to the fore-mast, the rag being about half a yard long and a nail
broad. It had three knots, and the wizard told him to loose the first
knot when he got his anchor, which he did, and forthwith it blew a
fresh favourable gale."
"That is so?" demanded Vanderdecken, doubtingly, and folding his arms
over his beard.
"I knew the captain, mynheer," I answered; "his name was Jenkyns, and
his ship was a brig called the True Love."
"Did the first knot give him all the wind he wanted?" asked he.
"No, sir. It gave them a brisk west south-west gale that carried them
thirty leagues beyond the maelstrom in the Norwegian sea; then shifted,
on which Captain Jenkyns untied the second knot, which brought the wind
back to its own quarter. It failed them again, but when the third knot
was untied there arose so furious a tempest that all hands went to
prayers, begging for mercy for choosing to deal with an infernal artist
instead of trusting to Providence."
It was not easy to make out the thoughts in Vanderdecken's mind, not
less because of the half of his countenance being densely clothed with
hair, than because of the white, iron rigidity of as much of his face
as was visible; yet I could not doubt that he believed in those Finnish
wizards from a sudden yearning in his manner, followed by a flashing
glance of impatience at the cabin entrance, that was for all the world
as though he had cried out "Would to God there was a purchasable wind
hereabouts!" But the reader must consider that this man belonged to an
age when wise men soberly credited greater wonders than Icelandish and
Finnish wind-brokers.
By this I had made an end of breakfast, and Prins arriving with a jar
full of the tobacco, flaked and fit for smoking, the captain filled
his pipe, first pushing the jar to me, and then fell into one of his
silences, from which he would emerge at wide intervals to say something
that was as good as a warrant he was thinking no longer of the sorcery
of my fall and appearance. When he had emptied his bowl, he went to his
cabin. Imogene instantly arose and came to my side.
"Oh, my dearest!" she whispered, with a sudden darkening of her eyes by
the shadow of tears, "I did believe, indeed, you were lost to me for
ever! My senses seemed to leave me when Vanderdecken accounted for your
absence."
"Dear heart! My precious one!" I answered, fondling her little hand,
which lay cold with her emotion in mine; "I am still with thee, and
hope with us may remain fearless. But it was a narrow escape. Van
Vogelaar came red-handed to this table. For hours he has had my blood
upon his devilish soul. No wonder the villain quailed when I entered
this cabin."
"What did he do?" she cried.
"I believed I saw a ship," I answered; "I jumped on to the rail to
make sure, and leaned against the brace that governs the main-yard. He
slipped aft and let go the rope, meaning that I should fall overboard,
but my grip was a sailor's, and I swung with the rope into the
mizzen-chains."
"The wretch! He told Vanderdecken that you had climbed on to the
bulwarks and fallen. I could kill him!" She clenched her white fingers
till the jewels on them flashed to the trembling of the tension, and a
delicate crimson surged into her face. "I could kill him!" she repeated.
"Hush, sweet one! It is our business to escape, and we need an
exquisite judgment. I, too, could kill the treacherous ruffian, only
that he is deathless. You, brave heart, will advise me that we are not
to know of this thing. No, let it be an accident of my own doing. We
are in a shipful of devils, and must act as if we believed them angels."
Her face slowly paled, her fingers opened, and the angry shining faded
out of her eyes leaving the soft, violet pensive light there.
"Yes, you are right; we must not know the truth of this thing," said
she, musingly, after a little. "But be on your guard, Geoffrey; keep
well away from that rogue. His Spanish treachery is made formidable
by his Dutch cunning. How swiftly he acted last night! His thoughts
must have been intent for some time or even the demon in him would not
have been equal to such readiness. See to your cabin door at night--O
Geoffrey, he might steal in upon you."
I smiled. "He has spoken once; I shall not require a second hint."
"O that I had a man's arm, Geoffrey, that I might be your sentinel
whilst you slept!"
"Precious one! You shall sentinel me yet! Patience, meanwhile! It is
this ship that makes home so distant. Once clear of this groaning vault
and we shall be smelling the sweetbriar and the violet."
Vanderdecken came out of his cabin and went on deck. He walked with
impetuosity and passed without regarding us. Through the open door
leading to the quarter-deck I saw him stand a minute with his face
upturned and then toss his hand with a gesture of baffled rage.
"He is cursing the wind," said Imogene. "How often has he done so since
I have been in this ship! And when will a last day come to him, when
there shall be no wind to curse, when death shall have paralysed his
tongue and silenced his heart? How fiercely it now throbs! Surely there
is more stormy passion in one day of its beating than in twenty years
of a human pulse! O, my dear, that you had the northern wizard's power
of evoking prosperous gales!"
"I should be glad of that power," said I, "for better reasons than to
help this man to fight against his Sentence. Can you guess what I would
do? I would straightway blow this old ship ashore. Dread the Afric
coast as you will, dear one, it will be our only chance."
"I dread it for its savages--the thought of captivity beyond the
mountains is horrible! I have heard my father tell of the wreck of an
East Indiaman named the Grosvenor, in which were ladies of distinction,
who were seized by the natives and carried far inland and made wives
of. That is not more than twenty years ago. O, Geoffrey, sooner than
that--I would be content to die in this ship--to go on sailing about
in her till my hair was as white as the foam about our keel!" and as
she said this she grasped a handful of her golden hair and held it
to me, unconscious in the earnestness of her fears of the child-like
simplicity of her action. I put my lips to the tress, that flowed from
her head through the snow of her hand and thence down like a stream of
sunny light or the raining of the jet of a golden fountain, and told
her not to fear, that I loved the natives as little as she, and would
contrive to give them a wide berth; and then I changed the subject by
wondering what the consequences would be if last night's business and
Vanderdecken's talk this morning put it into the minds of the crew that
I was as much a wizard as any Finn and could control the breezes if I
chose.
She shook her head. "Better that they should regard you as what you
really are--an English sailor. Suppose they persuaded themselves that
you could raise and sell winds, they might determine to test you, and
imprison, even torture you in the belief you were stubborn and would
not do their bidding; or, if they came to consider you a wizard, they
might think your presence in the ship unlucky, and, being half-savages,
with demons for souls, as I believe, and with instincts belonging to a
time when the world was brutal and human life held in no account--there
is no imagining how they would serve you."
"Oh, Imogene!" cried I, "you are my good angel----"
"A true sweetheart must ever be that to the boy she loves," she
whispered, looking down and softly blushing.
"You are my true sweetheart, Imogene! And how faithfully you are able
to guide me through the marvellous experience we are both passing
through, I know by the words you have just uttered," and I went on to
tell her how Van Vogelaar had under his breath talked as if to himself
of my being a curse in the ship.
As I said this, Prins came to the cabin door, and stood looking in.
Perceiving him, Imogene rose and saying quietly, "He has perhaps been
sent to report if we are together; go you on deck, dearest; I will join
you, presently," went to her berth.
END OF VOLUME II.
PRINTED BY
TILLOTSON AND SON, MAWDSLEY STREET
BOLTON
Transcriber's Notes
Obvious punctuation errors repaired.
Inconsistent hyphenation fixed.
P. 28: stancheons -> stanchions.
P. 33: schellings -> schillings.
P. 60: silival -> salival.
P. 63: rotteness -> rottenness.
P. 109: least my thoughtlessness -> lest my thoughtlessness.
P. 197: mani-hued dinginess -> many-hued dinginess.
P. 227: Voeglaar -> Vogelaar.
P. 248: assasinated -> assassinated.
P. 249: solemly -> solemnly.
End of Project Gutenberg's The Death Ship, Vol. II (of 3), by W. Clark Russell