The Sailor

No answer had yet come to this letter. Therefore in the half light of dawn he sat down to write a second and more considered one. Vain endeavor! It was not for the pen of mortal to unlock the heart of the true prince, unless the genie willed it. And this morning, alas, the genie was not amenable. For it suddenly addressed the Sailor, not with the voice of a magician, but with rude horse sense.

"Get into bed, you fool," said the genie. "Cease making an idiot of yourself. Athena is as far beyond you as the stars in their courses which have just gone back into heaven."

The Sailor returned to his bed, to dream. He did his best to be rational, but the task was hopeless. "Mary Pridmore! Mary Pridmore!" twittered the sparrows in the eaves of Chelsea.

IX

A little after five had struck by the church of St. Clement at the bottom of Brinkworth Street, he rose again from his bed. He flung on his clothes, draped a scarf round his neck in lieu of a collar, crept downstairs and out of the front door of No. 14 into the streets of the metropolis.

This morning there was a coolness in the air. And as soon as he felt it he was able to think more clearly. A sharp thrill ran through his brain. It was hardly three months since he had roamed the streets of London in the morning hours with tumult in his heart.

Since that night he had explored whole continents; hardly anything remained of many former worlds he had inhabited; but there was a spear in the side of Ulysses, and he must always remember that none could pluck it out.

As he reached the bottom of the street and Thames in his majesty smiled grimly upon him, he knew that he was in terrible case. He was no more than a frail mortal, caught in the toils of irresistible forces. What hope had such a one of outfacing the decrees of fate?

It was not until he had walked for an hour by the waters of Thames that he returned to Brinkwater Street, to breakfast. A letter with the Woking postmark was at the side of his plate. It said:

Greylands.

Thursday.

MY DEAR MR. HARPER,

Your view of 'The Egoist' is a new light to me on a most wonderful book. It is not exactly how I see it myself, but I somehow feel you are very near the truth. But when you say that a man such as Willoughby is not quite sane there is a point for argument. You are also too severe, I think, in your judgment of the author of his being. You say he could never really have known what life is. There I frankly don't agree with you, but of course we look at things so differently, and that is the great charm of your long letter. This is a very stupid one, but I won't apologize for it, because it is the best I can write, and I shall not have the presumption to try to meet you on your own ground. You have sailed the High Seas, whereas I have only read about them. Looking back on the conversations we have had I see you as a master mariner. This is not an idle compliment. You have not yet gained your full stature, you have yet to declare yourself in your power, but believe me you have the strength of a giant, and if such a wish is not an impertinence I hope you will have the courage to achieve your destiny.

Yours always most sincerely,

MARY PRIDMORE.

This letter was like a draft of wine to the Sailor. He read it many times before that day was out, but he turned to it again and again long after he knew every word by heart. It gave him a new zest for his work. He had quite a good day with the pen. Under these high auspices he took new courage to go on. Much was asked of him by this sacred intimacy. By deeds alone could he show himself worthy.

In reply to this letter he wrote a very long one to Miss Pridmore, at Greylands, near Woking. It was not so discreet and carefully considered as the one he had intended to write; he let himself go far more than he felt he ought to have done. And the reply he received the day before the fortnight was up was similarly expansive and just as entrancing as the former one. But the whole effect was marred by a grievous disappointment. Instead of returning from Greylands on the morrow, which was Saturday, she was going to stay another week.

How could he bear the burden of existence for such an intolerable length of time without a sight of her? It was asking more of flesh and blood than flesh and blood thought reasonable.

The next day, Saturday, was a time of gloom. He could not work at all, and it was no use making a pretence of it. But in the evening, sadly smoking a pipe after so meager a dinner that Mr. Paley was quite disconcerted, there came an inspiration.

Why not pay a visit to Woking on the morrow? Why not make his way to Greylands – wherever Greylands might be – and without revealing an unsanctioned presence, gaze upon Athena in all her glory as she came out of church, which he knew she attended every Sunday?

The idea at once took possession of him. And presently it flamed so hot in his mind that he borrowed a Bradshaw from Mr. Paley and found, as he had surmised, that there was no lack of trains to Woking on the morrow. He decided that the one which arrived at 9.20 would be the best for his purpose. That would give him plenty of time to locate Greylands, and ample opportunity, no doubt, to reach it.

Sunday came, a fair June day, and the Sailor, having made an early, but in the circumstances surprisingly efficient, breakfast, set forth to Waterloo Station. Such an adventure could receive no sanction from men or gods, but after all, reflected Henry Harper as he went his way, no possible harm can come of it if I don't let her see me!

The train arrived at Woking only five minutes late, which was really not bad for the Sabbath. Only one porter was to be seen on the deserted platform, and he, with the gruffness of a martyr ill resigned, had "never heard on it," that is to say, had never heard of Greylands.

This was a rebuff. The clerk in the booking office, suffering also from a sense of injustice, was equally unhelpful. However, outside the station was a solitary flyman in charge of a promiscuous vehicle, and he, it seemed, had heard of Greylands, moreover, scenting a fare, knew how to get there.

"It's afore you come to Bramshott, just off the Guildford Road. How far? All out three mile. But I shan't ask more than four shilling."

The Sailor declined this offer with politeness. He would have plenty of time to walk, which was what he wanted to do. The flyman, in spite of a keen disappointment, received such a sincere and cordial "Good morning," that he returned it without discourtesy.

The first thing to enkindle the senses of the Sailor was the smell of the fresh country earth. A very little rain had fallen in the night, but enough to renew with a divine cleanliness these wide spaces, these open heaths.

The bracken, young and green and a mass of shining crystals, was uncurling itself on each side of the road. The birds were in full choir, the trees were near the pomp of midsummer, the sun of June made a glory of the distant hills. It was a noble world. Long before the Sailor came to Greylands he was like a harp strung and touched to ecstasy by the implicit hand of nature.

He knew he was speculating on the bare chance of a sight of Athena. There was nothing to tell him that she would go that morning to Bramshott parish church. The only guide he had was that she went to church at least once every Sunday, and sometimes twice, but whether this would involve attendance at the local service must be the part of faith to answer.

At any rate, whether he set eyes on her or not, he was trudging to Greylands through the bracken in ease of mind and high expansion of spirit. He might not see her, yet he was giving himself the glorious opportunity. It was on the knees of the gods, but already he felt stronger, braver, saner, for having put it to the touch.

A little after ten he came to Bramshott village. It was a small place of quaint timber-framed houses, and in the middle was a church. But it all seemed commonplace enough. There was nothing here to minister to an intense emotion; nothing but the sun, the birds, the sky, the bracken, the perfumed loveliness of mother earth.

He was not such a fool as to fear his ecstasy. Come what might he would live his hour. The towers of Greylands, he was told in the village, could be seen from the church porch. There they were, sure enough, banked and massive, cutting across the sun with their importunate red brick. This, at any rate, was her local habitation. It was his to gaze upon even if no other guerdon rewarded him.

As became a true sailorman, who had sailed six years before the mast, he had brought home a pocket of horse sense from his wanderings. Therefore, as soon as he had drunk his fill of those flanked towers, he went inside the church and found a decrepit pew-opener who was full of information.

The service began at eleven. Reverend Manson was the vicar and also the squire of the parish, although Greylands was the rich folk, and they always came of a Sunday morning, whatever the weather, if the Fambly was at home. Their name was Ellis, and they were very rich.

Armed with this knowledge, the Sailor decided upon a bold course. He took up a position in a corner of the church some way behind the Greylands pew, which had been duly pointed out to him. Here he sat unseen with one solid pillar to conceal him. But he had taken care that in spite of the pillar a clear sight of the Greylands pew should be his.

It seemed a long time to eleven. But it came at last, and with it, or rather shortly before it, by the courtesy of the gods, came Mary Pridmore. She entered before the Sailor, counting the seconds in his fastness, realized that she was there.

She wore a simple dress of soft gray and a black hat. But in no particular had she abated a whit of her regality. In that fine outline was a quality that made his pulses leap. As she went down the aisle with two white-spatted, ultra-princelike cavaliers, and two ladies, older than she, yet in garb more fanciful, the Sailor caught just a glimpse of her face. Yes, this was Athena herself, a creature altogether splendid yet restrained, who drew the Sailor's very soul and held it, while she knelt on her hassock, with an air of gravest submission and dignity.

Suddenly he realized that she was praying. With a rather irrational impulse of shame he fell on his knees. The knowledge abased him that he had neglected this obvious duty, but yet he had the excuse, such as it was, that this was the very first time in his life he had entered a church.

Hitherto – if the Sailor must face the truth – the whole of his intercourse with religious things had been confined to two tea and bun fights with addresses to follow, under the ægis of that light of his youth, the Reverend Rogers, at the Brookfield Street Mission Hall. Therefore he didn't know in the least what to do. However, let him keep his eyes in front of him. When Athena got up he must get up, when she sat down he must sit down. And kneeling as she kneeled, he devoutly hoped that he was rendering homage to the same God as she, although with far less whole-hearted allegiance than hers at the moment.

It was hard to know what use to make of the Book of Common Prayer that the verger had given him. He had never opened such a volume before. To the best of his recollection one had been lent him at the Brookfield Street Mission Hall, but certainly it had not been opened. It would have been no use to do so, seeing that he could not read a word of it then. But he could read it now, and he desired to render thanks for that miraculous, that crowning mercy.

The service was long, but to the Sailor it was entrancing. The imperial outline of Athena was ever before him; and yet in despite of her he had at least a part of a devout mind to spare for an ancient mystery. Reverend Manson in his dual role of vicar and squire of Bramshott was something of a patriarch. It was a fine face, and to the Sailor it was a symbolical presence. He was simple and sincere, and whatever his learning may have been he wore it like a flower. Somehow, Reverend Manson spoke to the heart of the Sailor. During that enchanted hour he followed him into an unknown kingdom. Yet as he did this the young man was thrilled by the thought that he did not journey alone. Athena was with him at every step he took.

The prayers passed and the singing, which affected him strangely; then came the sermon, and after that more singing, and then came the verger with the collection plate. The Sailor put in half a sovereign; anything but gold seemed a profanation of a most solemn rite. And then he did an immensely wise thing. He glided swiftly, in the midst of the hymn, out of the church, and out of Bramshott village into the lanes of Surrey.

X

More than one long and golden hour the Sailor wandered through bracken and heather. He didn't know in the least where he was going, and there seemed no reason why he should care. He had a wonderful sense of adventure. Here was something real. This was the noble and gorgeous life to which the streets of Blackhampton, the deck of the Margaret Carey, the sojourn at King John's Mansions were the dreadful but necessary prelude.

After a long beat across country, and away, away he knew not where, he struck a path which carried him into a charming village tucked away under a hill. It then occurred to him that he was very hungry. The sign of "The Chequers" in the village street brought the fact home. At this neat hostelry with a roof of thatch he was able to declare himself a bona fide traveler, and was rewarded with a noble chunk of bread and cheese and a glass of beer, a thin and tepid brew whose only merit was the quality of wetness. But such fare and an hour's rest on a wooden bench in a cool parlor with a sanded floor was Elysium.

After that again the road – but only the road in a manner of speaking. The Sailor, roaming now the high seas of his desire, was in no mood at present for the ordered routes of commerce. Let it be the open country. Let him be borne across multitudinous seas on the wings of fancy. Therefore, as a bird flies, he struck across the pathless heather. The bracken rose waist high, but wherever it ran he followed it, now through the close-grown woods, now across furzy common and open spaces.

On and on he wandered all the golden afternoon. And then quite suddenly came evening and an intense weariness which was not made less because he didn't know where he was. He only knew that he was in Surrey and very tired. But, all at once, Providence declared itself in an unexpected way. Straight ahead among the trees was a tiny opening, and threading it a hum of telegraph wires.

This could only mean that a main road was at hand. Quickened to new life by such a rare piece of luck he pushed on, thanking his stars. Evidently he could not be far from a town or a railway. As a fact, he had struck the Guilford Road, and a hundred yards or so along it the friendliest milestone he had ever met assured him that he was three miles from the country town of Surrey.

Those three miles, honest turnpike as they were, proved a test of endurance. But they ended at last. Footsore and limping now, he crossed a bridge and entered a railway station where the lamps were lit already. And then Providence really surpassed itself! The last train to London was due in twenty minutes.

The Sailor flung himself down on a seat in the station in a state of heavenly fatigue. It had been such a day as he had never known, and his final gracious act of fortune was a fitting climax. It was true the last train to London was twenty minutes late, but it sufficed to know that it was surely coming.

Finally it came, and the Sailor entered it. Moreover, he had the carriage to himself, and was able to lie full length on the cushions in an orgy of weariness. He dozed deliciously all the way to Waterloo, which he reached at something after eleven. It was striking midnight by St. Clement's Church as he turned the latchkey in the door of No. 14 Brinkworth Street. At a quarter past that hour the Sailor was in his bed too deeply asleep even to dream of Athena.

XI

One of Mary Pridmore's first acts upon her return from Greylands was to summon the sailorman to dine in Queen Street. She was a little peremptory. That is to say, she could take no refusal; it seemed that a certain Mr. Nixon, a Cabinet Minister, had expressed a wish to meet the author of "Dick Smith."

Miss Pridmore was a little excited by this desire on the part of Mr. Nixon. In her opinion, if you were a member of the Cabinet, it was important you should be met; yet Henry Harper did not attach as much significance to the matter as perhaps he ought to have done. In fact, he was a little vague upon the subject. He knew that the newspapers talked mysteriously about the Cabinet, and abused it fearfully every morning with the most devoted and courageous persistency; also he remembered that one of Auntie's temporary husbands was said to have been a cabinetmaker when he was in work, but neither this fact, nor the attitude of the public press, seemed to afford any reason why he must in no circumstances disappoint the President of the Board of Supererogation.

"Please don't be so cool to the Cabinet, Mr. Harper," Athena pleaded, while the young man sought a way out of the impasse. "When such a man as Mr. Nixon asks to meet you, it means that you have really arrived. Not that it matters. You have arrived without any help from Mr. Nixon. But he is an old friend of mother's, and he is greatly interested in your book."

The Sailor wanted very particularly, but as delicately as he could, to escape the ordeal of dining in Queen Street, Mayfair. Instinct warned him that this would prove a different matter from a party in Bury Street. The truth was, he had not been able to overcome an unreasonable awe of Lady Pridmore. Then, too, he had an uneasy feeling that he was a little out of his depth with the Prince. Yet again, Miss Silvia, friendly and amusing as she was, gave him a slight sense of hidden, invisible barriers which he could never hope to surmount.

Mary, however, would take no denial. Her mother would be much disappointed, and so would Mr. Nixon, and so would Uncle George, who had also expressed a desire to be present. In Lady Pridmore's opinion this really "ranged" Mr. Harper, and with such a person as Lady Pridmore, that was an operation of the first magnitude, not, of course, that her daughter confided that to the Sailor in so many words.

"I am talking nonsense," said Mary, with that sharp turn of frankness which the Sailor adored in her. "If you don't want to meet people, there is no reason why you should. I sometimes feel exactly the same myself. Mr. Nixon is a bore, and Uncle George – well, he's Uncle George. It will be a tiresome evening for you, but Edward is coming and Jack Ellis, whom we both like, and his fiancée who is quite amusing, and if you really decide to come, I am sure it will please mother."

The Sailor saw, however, that it would please Mary. And that was reason enough for him to accept the invitation after all.

When the day came, it was in fear and trembling that he put on his new evening clothes, with which he had been provided by Edward Ambrose's own tailor. Upon a delicate hint from his friend, he discarded his first suit, which he now realized was a little too crude for a growing reputation. Yet, rather oddly, he could hardly be brought to understand that he had such a thing as a reputation. Indeed, it was only in Queen Street, Mayfair, that a reputation seemed to matter.

A dinner party at No. 50 was a serious affair. He had to begin by shaking hands with Lady Pridmore, who looked like a lady from the walls of Burlington House. A week ago he had been with Mary to the Royal Academy of Arts. Then, also, formidable looking strangers abounded. Foremost of these was Uncle George.

Uncle George was an elderly admiral retired. Among the younger members of the family he was known as "Old Blunderbore." His voice, once of great use on the quarterdeck, was really a little too much for a drawing-room of modest dimensions. Also, his opinions were many and they were unqualified, his stories were long and quite pointless as a rule, he was apt to indulge in a kind of ventriloquial entertainment when he ate his soup, he drank a goodish deal, and was not always very polite to the servants; yet being Uncle George, his sister-in-law seemed to feel that he was a person of immense consequence, and he did not disguise the fact that he considered her a sensible woman for thinking so.

Uncle George seized the hand of the Sailor in marine style, and said, in his loud voice, "Good book you wrote, young man. 'Adventures of Paul Jones.' Good book. Some of it's true, I'm told, and, of course, that makes it much better."

At this point, Mary the watchful led the Sailor gently but firmly out of the range of Uncle George.

That warrior, baffled of his prey, fell like a sea leopard upon Edward Ambrose, who, however, countered him quietly and with frank amusement.

"Never made a bigger mistake in your life, Ambrose, than to compare 'Paul Jones' with 'Robinson Crusoe.'"

Ambrose did not consider it necessary to point out that he had never once mentioned "Paul Jones," and that he was too wise a man ever to compare anything with "Robinson Crusoe." Instead, he laughed the note that was quite peculiar to himself, and mildly asked Uncle George what he thought of the latest performance of the First Lord of the Admiralty.

In the meantime, the Sailor was having to sustain the shock of a first meeting with the President of the Board of Supererogation. His mentor had already described this pillar of the Government as a bore. But the Sailor was not yet sufficiently acquainted with things and men to regard the Right Honorable Gregory Nixon with this measure of detachment.

The impact, however, of the Front Bench manner was less severe than was to have been expected. The voice of Mr. Nixon was nothing like so formidable as his appearance.

"A great pleasure, a great pleasure." Mr. Nixon had a trick of repeating his phrases. "Pray, how did you come to write it all? Angrove thinks" – to the profound and morbid horror of the public press, Mr. Angrove at that moment was the Prime Minister of the realm – "Angrove thinks…"

Happily, the butler informed his mistress that dinner was served, and for a time Mr. Nixon had to postpone what Mr. Angrove thought.

It was only for a time, however, that it was possible to do so. The President of the Board of Supererogation did all his thinking vicariously in terms of Mr. Angrove. But there was just one subject on which Mr. Nixon had opinions of his own. That was the subject of divorce, and it may have been for the reason that it was not a cabinet matter. Before the evening was over, it was tolerably certain that the President of the Board of Supererogation would identify himself publicly and at length with the minority report.

This cheerless fact had to be taken for granted. Divorce in its various aspects was a constant preoccupation of the right honorable gentleman. He had never been married himself, and was never likely to be. Had this not been the case Mr. Gregory Nixon must have felt bound to defer to any opinion that Mr. Angrove might or might not have expressed upon the matter.

"We are in for it now," whispered Mary to the Sailor, who was eating the entrée, sweetbreads with white sauce, and wishing he could use a knife as well as a fork. "But it's Uncle George's fault. He's given him a chance with his silly and pointless story, which is a mere perversion of a very much better one. There, what did I say?"

It was tragically true, that Mr. Nixon was already in the saddle.

"If he would only say something sensible! He is like that character in Dickens – but his King Charles's head is the minority report."

Still, this may have been a woman's thrust, because Mary did not happen to be an admirer of Mr. Nixon's personality. Yet he was a very agreeable man, and on the subject of divorce he talked extraordinarily well, perhaps quite as well as it is possible for any human being to talk on such a vexed and complicated subject.

Mr. Nixon knew that, no doubt. The fact was, that just as one man may have a genius for playing chess, another for shooting clay pigeons, a third for hitting a golf ball or casting a fly, so this eminent politician had a genius for discussing divorce. He may have felt that on that topic no human being could stand against him at a small dinner party where the conversation was general. Lady Pridmore seemed grieved when her hero began to expose this flaw in the armor of a Christian gentleman, Uncle George became furious and was suddenly rude to the butler, Mary and Silvia and the Prince looked the picture of misery, and Edward Ambrose came within an ace of choking himself.