The Sailor

"Life is queer," said Klondyke. "And the more you see of it, the queerer it seems. Take me. If I had been born you, I'd have been as happy as a dead bird swabbing the main deck and shinning up the futtock shrouds and hauling in the tops'ls. And if you had been born me, you'd have been as happy as a dead bird going great guns and doing all sorts of honor to the family. I wanted to go into the Navy, but my mother and the old governor wouldn't stand for it. It must be diplomacy, because the governor had influence, and I was the eldest son and I ought to make use of it. What a job you would have made of that billet! And how you hated the Margaret Carey. It was hell all the time, wasn't it?"

"Yes," said the Sailor, "just hell."

"Still, it helped you to find yourself."

"Yes – if I was worth finding."

"Of course you were."

"Anyhow, I took the advice you gave me," said the Sailor, with his odd simplicity.

"You'd have given it yourself in the end without any help of mine. But it's strange that when I read your book I never guessed that you were the author, and that you were writing about our old coffin ship and the Old Man and the mate … what was his name?"

"Mr. Thompson."

"Since deceased, I hear."

"Yes."

"One always felt he was a proper cutthroat."

"I'd not be sitting here now, but for Mr. Thompson. I'll tell you."

Klondyke's eyes began to shine.

In a few words and very simply, the Sailor told the story of the Island of San Pedro.

"I've sometimes thought since," was his conclusion, "that they were just guying me, knowing they could frighten me out of my wits."

"Of course they were," said Klondyke. "That's human nature. But you had rotten luck ever to come to sea. However, you are in smooth waters now. You'll never have to face the high seas again, my boy."

"I don't know that," said the Sailor, with a sudden sickness of the heart.

"No fear. The wicket's going to roll out plumb. You are the most wonderful chap I have ever met. Now I suppose we had better join the others."

They went upstairs and had a gay reception.

"I wish you would dance a hornpipe or something," said Silvia, "or cross talk as they did on the brigantine Excelsior, else we shall none of us believe that either of you have ever been before the mast at all."

"I tell you, Sailor, what we might do," said Klondyke. "If we can remember the words, we might give 'em that old chantey that was always so useful round the Horn. How does it go?"

Klondyke sat down at the piano and began to pick out the notes with one finger of each hand.

"'Away for Rio!' I'll sing the solo, if I can remember it, and you sing the chorus, Sailor!"

Such stern protests were raised by those who knew the capacity of Klondyke's lung power that very reluctantly he gave up this project, yet the very indifferent backing of his shipmate may have carried more weight with him than the pressure of public opinion.

When Edward Ambrose and the Sailor had gone their ways and the others apparently had gone to bed, Klondyke doffed the coat of civilization in favor of a very faded and generally disreputable Ramblers' blazer, lit his pipe, and then, in the most comfortable chair he could find, began to read again "The Adventures of Dick Smith on the High Seas."

"Yes, he's a wonderful chap," he kept muttering at intervals. After he had been moved to this observation several times, he was interrupted by the reappearance of the Prince, who looked uncommonly serious, in an elaborate quilted silk smoking jacket that he affected in his postprandial hours.

"This chap Harper," suddenly opened the Prince. "I want to have a word with you about him."

The look on the face of the elder and less reputable brother seemed pretty clearly to show that this desire was not shared. But duty had to be done, and the Prince seated himself doggedly on the high fender, his back to the fire.

"Tell me," he said, "what you know about this chap Harper."

Somehow, Klondyke hardly felt inclined. For one thing, the slow but sure growth of the Foreign Office manner, which he was able to detect in his younger brother every time he returned from his wanderings, always seemed to rattle him a bit. Of course Otto was a first-rate chap according to his lights; still, Klondyke was the elder, and if questions must be asked he did not feel bound to answer them.

A mild but concentrated gaze conveyed as much.

"Ted Ambrose brought him here," said the Prince, with a nice feeling for these nuances. "A good chap, I dare say … quite a good chap … but…"

The mild gaze was still concentrated, but if possible more limpid.

"… but somehow a little … Mother thinks so, anyway."

"Oh, yes, I dare say," said Klondyke, with a casualness that rather annoyed the Prince.

"Fact is … I might as well tell you…" The tone of the Prince implied nothing less than a taking of the bull by the horns. "We all think Mary is inclined to … to…"

With nice deliberation, Klondyke laid "The Adventures of Dick Smith" on the hearthrug.

"Mother thinks," said the Prince plaintively, after a pause, "it would be better if he didn't come to the house so much."

Klondyke frowned heavily and tapped his pipe on a fire-dog.

"How long's he been coming here?" he asked.

"Some little time now."

Klondyke still frowned.

"Mother thinks," said the plaintive Prince, "that Mary sees far too much of him. And I rather agree with her."

"Why?" asked Klondyke stolidly.

"Why?" repeated his younger brother, looking at him with wary amazement. "Well, to start with, he ain't a gentleman."

Klondyke tapped his pipe again.

"I don't mind telling you," said the Prince, "we all think she is making a perfect idiot of herself."

"What's Ted Ambrose think?"

"I've not asked him, but I believe mother has mentioned the matter."

"What did he say?"

"She thought he seemed a good deal worried."

Klondyke's frown had assumed terrific dimensions.

"She's old enough to take care of herself, anyway," he said, beginning abruptly to refill a foul briar from a small tin box that he unexpectedly evolved from the pocket of his trousers.

"That's hardly the point, is it?" said the Prince, with a deference he didn't feel.

"What is the point?" asked Klondyke, striking a wooden match on the sole of his shoe.

"Mother has mentioned the matter to Uncle George, and he thinks the chap ought not to come here."

"Oh, that's rot," said Klondyke coolly. "That's like the old fool."

"I'm afraid I agree … with Uncle George, I mean … and so does Silvia."

"What's Ted Ambrose think about it? He generally knows the lie of a country."

"He'd give no opinion to mother. But he was certainly worried."

Klondyke resumed his frown. He felt rather at sea. He was, in spite of birth and training, a man of primal instincts; he looked at things in an elemental way. Either a man was a good chap or he was not. If he was a good chap, no matter where he may have started from in the race of life, he was fitted by nature to marry his sister. If he was not a good chap, no matter what else he was or might be, he didn't count anyway.

"You see" – the plaintive voice of the Prince broke in upon Klondyke's unsubtle analysis of the situation – "no one knows anything about him. Ambrose sprang him on us from nowhere, as you might say. Of course, he's a man with a sort of reputation … in his own line … but he's not one of us … and it wouldn't have so much mattered if he had been a gentleman."

"There I don't altogether agree," said Klondyke with conviction, but without vehemence. "I always think with Ted Ambrose on that point. Gentlemen are not made. They are born, like poets and cricketers."

"That's rot," said the Prince, with a sudden deepening of his tone of courtesy which made it seem excessive. "You are mixing, I think – aren't you – two entirely different things?"

"No, I don't think so," said Klondyke. "Harper is not a chap who would ever go back on a pal, and that's all that matters."

The Prince suddenly became so deeply angry that he decided to go to bed at once, and accordingly did so.

XVI

For a number of people there followed anxious days. Mary's friends made no secret of their belief that she was losing her head. They were much troubled. She was a universal favorite, one of those charming people who seem to have an almost poetic faculty of common sense. But she was thought to be far too wise ever to be carried away by anything.

The Pridmores, at heart, were conventional. They were abreast of the times, were lively and intelligent, and could be at ease in Bohemia, but up till now Bohemia had known the deference due to Queen Street, Mayfair.

Lady Pridmore had always thought – and Silvia, Uncle George, and the Prince had agreed with her – that Mary was predestined for Edward Ambrose. For one thing, Edward, when his father died, would be very well off – not that the Pridmores were in the least mercenary. They simply knew what money means to such a being as man in such a world as the present. Then Edward was liked by them all. It had long been a mystery why Mary had not married him. He was always her faithful cavalier, and a rather exceptional man. And now she had suddenly gone off at half cock, as Uncle George expressed it.

During this period, tribulation was rife at other places also. Edward Ambrose was in no enviable frame of mind. The woman he loved and the friend he served were cutting deeply into his life. But of one thing he was convinced – neither of them realized their danger.

He was a sufficient judge of his kind to know that Henry Harper was not a man willfully to practice deceit. Ambrose was aware of the skeleton in the cupboard. It was ever present to his mind. And his position was rendered painfully difficult by the fact that he was under a pledge not to reveal it. The root of the matter, as far as Harper was concerned, was that his inexperience of the world might cause him to drift into a relationship which he did not intend and could not foresee.

Ambrose was tormented by a desire to tell Mary Pridmore all he knew. Surely it was his duty. Her ignorance of certain facts, which Harper most unwisely withheld, was a very real and grave danger. Ambrose realized how quickly such a woman, almost unknown to herself, could sweep a man off his feet. He also felt that Henry Harper, with his atmosphere of mystery, and his remarkable powers which needed the help of a strong and stable intelligence, might make an irresistible appeal to a girl like Mary Pridmore.

Ambrose felt that he alone knew the peril which beset his friends. Yet he could not warn one without treason to the other. His regard for both seemed to preclude all interference. He had a sincere affection for a brave-spirited man; for Mary he had long cherished something more than affection; yet in circumstances such as these an untimely word might do mischief untold.

For the present, therefore, he had better remain silent. In the meantime, the Sailor had descended once more into the pit. He had been cast again, by that grim destiny which had never failed to dog him from the outset of his life, into the vortex of overmastering forces. He felt the time was near when without the help of Mary Pridmore he could not keep on.

One day, worn out with anxiety, he called at Spring Gardens and had an interview with Mr. Daniel Mortimer. That gentleman could give little solace. The woman drew her allowance every week. There was reason to believe that she had bad bouts of drinking, but Mr. Mortimer was still unable to advise a petition for divorce. The whole matter was full of difficulty, there was the question of expense, also it would be wise not to ignore the consequences to a rising reputation.

Henry Harper felt the force of this reasoning. It was no use attempting to gainsay the view of an expert in the law. Moreover, he had a clear knowledge of Mary's opinion on the subject of divorce. In any event she would never consent to marry him.

The young man took leave of the kindly and wise Mr. Mortimer, and with despair in his heart walked slowly back to Brinkworth Street. Every yard of the way he wondered what he should do now. He felt like an animal caught in a trap. For more than a week he had not been able to think of his work.

He had not seen Mary for some days. He was trying to keep her out of his thoughts. But the more he denied himself the sight of her, the less power he had to fight the demon in whose grip he was now held. He was unable to work, he slept little, he had no appetite for food; for the most part, he could only walk up and down this wonderful and terrible city of London which had now begun to appall him.

He had outgrown his present strength. And, as only a woman can, she realized where and how she might help him. This deep-sea mariner should not call to her in vain. Athena, in her high maternal sanity, was ready to yield all.

Three days ago, when he had seen her last, and had sat with her in the shade of the park, her eyes, her voice had told him that. They had told him that, even when it had not been his to ask. It was this implicit declaration which had so gravely frightened him. The truth struck home that he was not treading the path of honor.

By the time he had returned to Brinkworth Street, he knew the necessity of a definite course of action. It was madness to go on in their present way. They had come to mean too much to each other; besides, a perception keenly sensitive had told him that her friends were beginning to regard him with a tacit hostility. It had not found expression in word or deed; he was always received with kindness; but except on the part of Klondyke, there was no real warmth of sympathy.

Circumstances had placed him in a terribly false position, and he must be man enough to break his fetters. He knew that there was still one way of doing that. The course was extreme, but honor demanded it.

He had been invited to tea the next day at the house of a friend they had in common. It was to be a large party, and he knew that if he carried out his original intention of going, he would see Mary and no doubt have a chance of talking to her. Much painful reflection that evening finally decided him. He would go prepared to tell everything. It must be their last meeting, for she would surely see how hopeless was the intimacy into which they had drifted.

Having quite definitely made up his mind, he was able to snatch a little more sleep that night than for some weeks past. Moreover, he got up the next day with his resolution strong upon him. Let the cost be what it might, he must accept a bitter and humiliating situation.

At half past four that afternoon he was one of many more or less distinguished persons filling the spacious rooms of a house in a fashionable square. The hostess, a quick-witted adroit woman, was very much a friend of both. She had a real regard for Mary, also a genuine weakness for a man of genius.

Athena was there already when the Sailor arrived. And as she sat on a distant sofa, nursing her teacup, with several members of her court around her, the young man was struck yet again, as he always was, by her look of vital power. She had in a very high degree that curious air of distinction which comes of an old race and seems to strike from a distance. The features were neither decisive nor regular, but the modeling of the whole face and the poise of the head no artist could see without desiring to render on canvas.

The Sailor had to steel his will. The thought was almost intolerable that at one blow he was about to sever his friendship with her. She was so strong and fine, she was a sacred part of his life, she was the key of those central forces that now seemed bent on his destruction.

Presently, amid the slow eddy of an ever changing crowd they came together. Her greeting was of a peculiarly simple friendliness. She seemed grave, with something almost beyond gravity. There was a shadow upon a face that hardly seemed to have known one in all its years of shelter and security.

"Is there anywhere we can talk?" he managed to say after a little while.

She rose from her sofa with the decision he had always lacked.

"Let us try the library," she said.

And with the assured skill of an experienced navigator of social waters, she led him there and found it empty.

XVII

Henry Harper's decision had been taken finally. But as soon as he entered this large and dull room, he felt the chill of its emptiness in an almost symbolical way. It was what his whole life was going to be, and the thought nearly wrung a groan out of him.

She was puzzled by a certain oddness in his manner, a feeling which of late had been growing upon her. It was hard to understand. She knew his need of help, his craving for it, yet now the time had come when he had only to ask in order to receive it he seemed at the mercy of a painful indecision which had the power to wound.

Here and now a subtle withdrawal of the highest part of himself seemed more than ever apparent. It was even in his face this afternoon, in the wonderful face of Ulysses that had all the oceans of the world in it. What did it portend? Was it that he was afraid?

What had he to fear? How could such a person as herself repel him? She had all to give if only he would demand it of her.

Of that he must be aware. The haunted eyes of the sailorman too clearly proclaimed his knowledge.

"How is 'A Master Mariner'?" she asked, in order to end the silence which had intervened as soon as they entered the room.

"It doesn't get on," he said, in a voice that did not seem to be his own.

"I'm very sorry." The deep note was sincerity itself.

"I don't know why," said the Sailor, "but it's too much for me now."

"Of course, it is all immensely difficult. The latter part particularly. Somehow, one always felt it would be."

"It's not that," said the Sailor. "Not the difficulty, I mean. That was always there, and I was never afraid of it. But I think I am losing grip."

She looked at him, a little disquieted. There was a note in his voice she heard then for the first time.

"That must not be," she said. "There's no reason for it."

"Ah, you don't know. I begin to feel now that I'll never be able to put it through."

"Why should you feel that? What reason can you have, a man of your wonderful powers, a man with all his life before him?"

"I just haven't the strength," he said in his quaint speech, "and that's all there is to it."

To her surprise, to her horror almost, he suddenly covered his face with his hands. Somehow, the sight of a weakness so palpable in a thing so strong and fine was unnerving.

"I'll never be able to put it through by myself."

As she stood facing him, she felt the truth of that.

"Is it necessary?" The words seemed to shape themselves in despite of her.

"Yes." Involuntarily, he drew away from her. A sure feminine instinct waited for the words that should follow. She read in those strange eyes that he must now speak. She could almost feel, as she stood so near him, a slow and grim gathering of the will. She could almost hear the surge of speech to his lips. But no words came, and the moment passed.

Now that he had to strike the knife into his heart, it could not be done. It was not cowardice, it was not a failure of the will, it was not even a momentary weakness of the soul. He was in the grip of ineluctable forces, of a power beyond himself. As he stood not three yards from her with the table supporting him, his whole nature seemed wrenched and shaken to the roots of being.

She couldn't help pitying him profoundly. There was something that had crept into his eyes which harrowed her. Poor mariner! For the first time in her life, she felt a curious sudden tightening of the throat. She could have shrieked, almost, at the sight of this tragic pain it was not to be hers to ease.

A moment later, she had regained control.

"You must keep on," said Athena. "You must keep on."

But he knew that he was down, and that the ineluctable forces were killing him.

She may have known it, too. No longer able to bear the look upon his face, she drew back, an intense pity striking her.

Was she upon the verge of some great tragedy? She did not dare to frame the question.

"Mary." … She awoke to the sound of the Sailor's voice and of her own name on his lips… "I've made up my mind to – to go away for a bit."

In the midst of these throes, an inspiration had come to him. It was no more than a miserable subterfuge, but it was all he could do.

"I somehow feel I'm on the rocks. I think I'll go a voyage. I'm losing myself. I'll perhaps be able to…"

A stifling sense of pity kept her silent.

"… to persuade Klondyke to come along with me."

"I wish I could have helped you." The words were wrung from her.

"You can't," he said, and he spoke with a gust of passion as one half maddened. "No one can help me."

She saw his wildness, and somehow her strength went out to him.

"You can't think what I've been through," he said, with something worse than rage entering his voice.

She knew she couldn't even guess, and was too wise to try. But again she was hurt by the sight of a suffering it could never be hers to heal.

"Henry," she said, "I would like you always to feel and always to remember that whatever happens to you, and wherever you are, I am your friend, if only I may be."

To this high and rare simplicity of Athena the goddess, he could make no response.

"And now I must go," she said, gathering the whole force of her resolution.

"Suppose I walk with you a little of the way?" he said.

She almost guessed that he meant it for their last stroll together.

It was a long step from the scene of the tea party to Mary's door, but no finer evening for a walk could have been desired. Neither knew why they chose to take it. For both it was a mere prolongation of misery. Perhaps it was that he still hoped, against hope itself, for the moment to return in which it would be possible to tell the secret that locked his lips.

Humiliated as he was, there may still have been that thought in his mind. But it was vain in any case. There could be no real intention now of telling her. By the time they had crossed the park, he had cast it entirely away. And now they fell to talking of other matters.

Unwilling to let her go, cleaving to her in his weakness to the very last second of the very last hour, he persuaded her to sit a few minutes on an empty bench under the trees … under the trees within whose shade he had sat when he had seen her first. And there he had from her lips a definite expression of her faith.

It was with that they parted – finally, as he believed. He dared not put it to himself in a way so explicit, it was not a thing he could face in such bare, set terms, but in his brain the Aladdin's lamp was burning fitfully, and it was this that flashed the cruel light of truth.

"… If ever you want help!"

Those were the words of their parting, as the pressure of his fingers met the last touch of hers. And then she was gone, and he was gone … and then a bleak, dull blindness came over him and he knew that more than life had gone with her.

XVIII

A rudderless ship in mid-ocean, he wandered long and aimlessly about the byways of the city. It was past midnight when he found himself back in Brinkworth Street. Without taking off his clothes, he flung himself face down on his bed.

After a while, he tried very hard to pull himself together. He must be a man, that was the whole substance of his thoughts. As ever, he knew that to be his simple duty. Throughout his overdriven life, he had always had to tell himself, and other people had always made a point of telling him, to be a man. Auntie had been the first to ask it of him when she had dragged him upstairs and tied him to the bed. "Enry Arper" – he had heard that shrill snigger above the roar of Knightsbridge – "what I shall do to you is going to hurt, but you must be a man and bear it." A jolly looking policeman had told him to be a man at the police station. Mr. Thompson had told him to be a man the night he carried him to sea. The Old Man had given him equally sound advice when he had gravely told him of the Island of San Pedro.

All his life, it seemed, he had not lacked good advice, and hell only knew he had always done his best to follow it. But as now he lay on his bed in Brinkworth Street in a cold summer dawn, he felt that he was done.