The Collected Fiction of William Hope Hodgson: The Dream Of X & Other Fantastic Visions (29 page)

Yet from that time forward I kept a strict watch on every possible occasion and in every possible way—even to the extent of spending much of my watch below on the fo’c’s’le head, so as to be able to keep an eye on the poop. In this way I observed that Miss Vairne seemed to offer no objection to the company of the third mate. Yet, in all conscience, she must have found him monotonous enough; for he was a great, dull, fat—also good-humoured—plough-boy sort of fellow—an apprentice just out of his “time.” Still, it was a comfort to me to feel that she had this friend among the afterguard, though it was poor enough when pitted against such a man as the second mate. As regards the skipper and her, I observed that they appeared to be great friends; but he was getting an old man, and turned in early and rose late—often spending his afternoons sleeping in his bunk; besides which, he was not altogether free from the friendship of the whisky bottle. Thus there were many long hours when she was absolutely companionless. This was especially evident later—I am referring now to the first mate’s watch—when the first mate kept the third busy in other parts of the ship, so—as it seemed to me—to keep him away from her. This apparently purposeful keeping of the third mate from her I gathered at odd times during those portions of my watch below when I sat smoking upon the fo’c’s’le’ head.

As I have said, it was only by means of sheer audacity that I at last got speech again with her. It was in this wise. I had been sent up the mizzen to grease down the spanker gaff. While I was busy at this, Miss Vairne came up on deck. She did not see me, and I had time to notice how worried she looked. It seemed to me that the girl was actually looking thinner, and at the thought of this a great sense of anger rose within me. I determined I would see and speak to her in one way or another. Yet, puzzle as I might, I could not see how I was to accomplish this without attracting attention. Suddenly, when I was about half-way down the gaff, an idea came to me, and, with a view to carrying it out, I cast off the lanyard of the slush-pot from which I was dipping, and waited for the next heavish roll.

It came, and I gave a shout, and slid round on the gaff, so that my crossed feet were uppermost; at the same moment I let go the pot of grease, which fell with a bang on to the lee side of the poop, scattering grease in all directions.

Down on deck I heard Miss Vairne cry out sharply in fear, and somehow, even as I hung there feet uppermost, a feeling of pleasure filled me at the concern in her voice. The next moment I had reached up to the spanker head outhaul, and was making my way swiftly down to the deck. As I dropped on my feet I heard the second mate’s voice below the break of the poop. His head came into view. When he saw me standing on the deck wiping my greasy hands on a bit of shakins, he wanted to know what the blazes I was doing there. Then his eyes caught sight of the grease-bespattered decks, and he fairly gasped.

“By gad,” he roared, “you’ve made a mess here, d—n you! Get some waste and your knife, and get it cleaned up. You’re worse than a rotten ordinary!”

I replied nothing. This was the very thing for which I had aimed in dropping the grease-pot. I knew that I should have to clean it up, and I knew that it would take time. I intended that it should take time, and during that time it would be very hard luck indeed if I did not get a chance to have a talk with Miss Vairne.

For some ten minutes I scraped away busily, without raising my gaze from the deck. Then I heard the second mate go down the poop ladder, and I knew that it would be safe to look round. I now saw that Miss Vairne was sitting on the lee side of the cabin skylight. From the wheel, neither of us could be seen, so that I felt safe in smiling and raising my cap; yet I did not attempt to rise to my feet, but kept on busily scraping. At my salutation, Miss Vairne smiled a rather wan little smile. Then she rose slowly and walked towards me. Reaching the rail, she stopped, and I spoke.

“Aren’t you well, Miss Vairne?” I asked.

^“
Yes,” she replied. “You might have been killed.”

“Oh, this!” I replied. “Why, I’ve done it on purpose, so as to get a chance to speak to you while I am cleaning it up.”

“But you slipped—you all but fell. That—that—”

“Yes,” I said; “that was done purposely, so as to make the dropping of the slush-pot appear an accident.”

She looked at me a moment; then, slowly, a little wave of colour passed across her face—and grew.

And at that, as it were in an instant of time, I knew, and knowing, I cried almost inanely:

“You cared?”

The colour grew gloriously in her face, and suffused her throat and temples. She turned and looked out across the sea. For my part, I was filled with a tumult of wonder and unbelief, and, deeper than these, joy.

“Miss Vairne—Miss Vairne!” I cried.

She turned now and faced me, and her eyes were like love stars.

“Eina,” she said. “Call me Eina. And you?”

She paused.

“Eina! Eina! Eina!” I repeated, in a sort of delirium.

“You haven’t told me yours?” she reproached.

“Mine!” I said, with a sort of little gasp. “Mine! Just John.”

“John Kenstone?” she said.

“Yes,” I replied stupidly.

“And you’re one of the deck-hands—common sailors?” she added joyously.

“Nay,” I said, gathering my wits somewhat, “but your sweetheart.”

She laughed splendidly, and seemed intending to add some new impertinence; then, suddenly changing her mind, said:

“But you have not told me that you love me. You have not asked me. You—”

“You know that I do—since the very first moment in which I set eyes upon you. I believe you knew—then.”

I would have stood up to embrace her there upon the poop before all, but she beckoned me with her hand not to move.

“Nay, Mr. Common Sailor,” she answered. “Stay you and scrape up your grease-spots—”

She paused, caught her breath with a naughty little gurgle, and bent towards me, her eyes fairly dancing.

“John Kenstone,” she said, “you’re a naughty boy, and a silly boy, and you don’t know one bit how to make love. You gave me a horrid fright, and you’re afraid to say that you love me; but I’m not afraid. I love you. I loved you at first, and I shall always love you.”

She bent lower.

“Quick!” she said. “Now!”

Something touched my lips for the briefest part of an instant, and then she was standing demurely a yard away.

She had kissed me! It had been no more than like the breath of a summer wind; yet she had kissed me, and with the very thought, almost, I was overwhelmed.

I looked up at her confusedly. She was looking back at me with a funny little droop of the lids, and round her mouth it seemed to me there lurked a shadow of tenderness that was only for me.

Abruptly her mood changed.

“What was it you wanted to say when you risked your life?”

She nodded with her head towards the gaff.

“I didn’t—” I began; but she interrupted me with a queer air of sternness.

“What was it?”

I felt momentarily confused.

“Oh, lots of things!” I said. Then, remembering more particularly; “You seemed unhappy.”

“I was,” she put in, “but I’m not now! Oh, I have wanted you, but I’ve been afraid of getting you into trouble with that—that brute!”

“The second mate?”

“Yes. He seems to have kept you away from me at the other end of the ship, and I didn’t know—”

“That I loved you?” I said, as she hesitated.

She nodded.

“I’m afraid of that man and the first mate! They’ve—they’ve—”

“They’ve not said anything?” I asked, feeling suddenly savage.

“Yes,” she said simply. “I told the captain, and he’s had an awful row with the second mate. I keep out of their way as much as possible.”

“Your chaperon?” I questioned.

“I can’t stand her!” she returned passionately. “I believe she’s a bad woman. She’s false to me, and she and the steward and the second mate talk together. She watches me.”

I told her what the steward had said to me, and how afterwards I had seen her chaperon talking to the second mate under the break of the poop.

“You must take a stand,” I said. “Ask the skipper for a cabin for yourself. Lock yourself in at nights; you’ll be safe then. And, besides, there’s always the skipper. He’s the boss, you know.”

“And now I’ve got you,” she added.

“Yes,” I said.

“What a great man you are!” she went on, looking down at me as I knelt there upon the deck.

“Only six foot,” I said apologetically.

“No, not only that way—broad. And your arms; I noticed them that first day. I love your arms!”

I laughed, for I was very strong, and she seemed to sting all the virility in me to greater life.

“I do love a man!” she said, as though to herself. Then, quite gravely: “You could kill the second mate!”

I stared at her.

“I don’t know,” I said, with equal gravity. “He’s a great, thick-set brute.”

She gave a gesture of dissent, and abruptly dropped her serious air. A ripple of mischief ran across her face and stirred in her eyes. She came a step towards me, and bent her face dangerously near.

“Wouldn’t you like to?” she said.

I caught her with my great hands.

“Yes,” I replied; and kissed her full on the lips.

I released her, and she stood up, her hair tossing in the wind and her cheeks gloriously rosy. On my part, I knelt upon the deck almost at her feet and looked up at her manfully. Then I caught the sound of the second mate returning along the main-deck. She also heard him, and walked away to the side and leant over. I went on with my scraping.

During the rest of that watch the second mate stayed on the poop, so that I had no further chance of speaking with Eina. Yet, in spite of his presence, our eyes met more than once, and that was something.

That same night Eina and I had a long, cautious talk as I stood at the wheel. She managed it by leaning over the taffrail and staring down into the wake, as though lost in thought. Yet all the time that she kept her face turned away she was talking to me in a low voice.

My gad! I was happy. She spoke unhesitatingly, and told me that I was the one fellow on this earth, and the sea, too—I heard her laugh naughtily to herself at that—whom she should ever love. And once, when the second mate had gone down on to the main deck to give the yards a cant, she stepped swiftly over to where I stood and kissed me on the lips. I had not become inured to such surprises, and it was done so quickly that she was back again by the rail and staring down demurely into the waters before I had recovered my wits. Yet she had left me tingling, so that I was possessed with a blind desire to leave the wheel and take her into my arms.

Even as I comprehended my wish, the second mate’s head appeared over the top step of the poop-ladder. He came aft and stared into the binnacle. Fortunately, the ship’s head was steady on her course. As he turned away, he gave one sharp, almost suspicious glance into my face; but I was prepared for him, and my features were set in an expression of complete indifference, while my eyes bore steadily on the compass-card swaying within the lighted binnacle.

I think he was satisfied, for the next instant he went for’ard and resumed his interrupted tramp to and fro across the break of the poop.

As soon as he was gone, Eina began again to talk to me, though still taking the utmost care never to turn her face in my direction. Indeed, once she even left her place and went to sit on the saloon skylight some distance away; but presently she came back to her former post.

It was after her return that I put into execution an idea that had occurred to me since the morning. This was to take from my pocket a peculiar little whistle that I had used years previously when second mate. The tone of this whistle was extraordinarily piercing, and I knew that I should be able at any time to recognise its note were it blown.

“Eina,” I said, “I’ve a whistle here that I’m going to throw over to you. See you catch it.”

I waited until the second mate was on the opposite side of the deck; then I threw. It struck her dress and tinkled down on to the deck, but in an instant she had it.

“Look you, Eina,” I called, in a low voice, “if ever you want me at any time—want me badly—blow that whistle, and I will come to you, if I am alive.”

It was the following day, in the afternoon watch, that a great sensation went through the ship. This was neither more nor less than the sudden death of the captain. He had complained soon after dinner of feeling unwell, and had gone to his bunk. Then, a little before four bells, he was discovered by the steward lying there dead.

I was convinced, as soon as I heard the news, that the poor old chap had been done to death. I remembered how the steward and second mate had colloqued together. It would have been but a very simple matter for the steward—at someone’s instigation—to doctor the skipper’s grub. I felt sure that the second mate was not the sort of chap to stick at anything, and there had been that row between him and the skipper. I thought of Eina, and grew afraid for her, alone amongst the crowd aft. I thanked God for the thought that had prompted me to give her the whistle. At least, it gave her a means of communicating with me, should there be need. And then there was the third mate. He, I felt sure, was to be depended on. The idea came to me to try and get a few words with him, and this I managed at the end of the second dog watch that night. At first he was inclined to be on his dignity, but I showed him my second’s ticket, and he came round then, I spoke of Eina, and told him how that the second mate had acted towards her in an insulting manner.