A Day's Ride: A Life's Romance

“Scoundrel is strong, eh?” said he, slowly; “very strong!”

“Who spoke of a scoundrel?” asked I, in terror, for his confounded calm, cold manner made my very blood run chilled.

“Scoundrel is exactly the sort of word,” added he, deliberately, “that once uttered can only be expiated in one way. You do not give me the impression of a very bright individual, but certainly you can understand so much.”

I bowed a dignified assent; my heart was in my mouth as I did it, and I could not, to save my life, have uttered a word. My predicament was highly perilous; and all incurred by what? – that passion for adventure that had led me forth out of a position of easy obscurity into a world of strife, conflict, and difficulty. Why had I not stayed at home? What foolish infatuation had ever suggested to me the Quixotism of these wanderings? Blondel had done it all. Were it not for Blondel, I had never met Father Dyke, talked myself into a stupid wager, lost what was not my own; in fact, every disaster sprang out of the one before it, just as twig adheres to branch and branch to trunk. Shall I make a clean breast of it, and tell my companion my whole story? Shall I explain to him that at heart I am a creature of the kindliest impulses and most generous sympathies, that I overflow with good intentions towards my fellows, and that the problem I am engaged to solve is how shall I dispense most happiness? Will he comprehend me? Has he a nature to appreciate an organization so fine and subtle as mine? Will he understand that the fairy who endows us with our gifts at birth is reckoned to be munificent when she withholds only one high quality, and with me that one was courage? I mean the coarse, vulgar, combative sort of courage that makes men prizefighters and bargees; for as to the grander species of courage, I imagine it to be my distinguishing feature.

The question is, will he give me a patient hearing, for my theory requires nice handling, and some delicacy in the developing? He may cut me short in his bluff, abrupt way, and say, “Out with it, old fellow, you want to sneak out of this quarrel.” What am I to reply? I shall rejoin: “Sir, let us first inquire if it be a quarrel. From the time of Atrides down to the Crimean war, there has not been one instance of a conflict that did not originate in misconceptions, and has not been prolonged by delusions! Let us take the Peloponnesian war.” A short grunt beside me here cut short my argumentation. He was fast, sound asleep, and snoring loudly. My thoughts at once suggested escape. Could I but get away, I fancied I could find space in the world, never again to see myself his neighbor.

The train was whirling along between deep chalk cuttings, and at a furious pace; to leap out was certain death. But was not the same fate reserved for me if I remained? At last I heard the crank-crank of the break! We were nearing a station; the earth walls at either side receded; the view opened; a spire of a church, trees, houses appeared; and, our speed diminishing, we came bumping, throbbing, and snorting into a little trim garden-like spot, that at the moment seemed to me a paradise.

I beckoned to the guard to let me out, – to do it noiselessly I slipped a shilling into his band. I grasped my knapsack and my wrapper, and stole furtively away. Oh, the happiness of that moment as the door closed without awakening him!

“Anywhere – any carriage – what class you please,” muttered I. “There, yonder,” broke I in, hastily, – “where that lady in mourning has just got in.”

“All full there, sir,” replied the man; “step in here.”: And away we went.

My compartment contained but one passenger; he wore a gold band round his oil-skin cap, and seemed the captain of a mail steamer, or Admiralty agent; he merely glanced at me as I came in, and went on reading his newspaper.

“Going north, I suppose?” said he, bluntly, after a pause of some time. “Going to Germany?”

“No” said I, rather astonished at his giving me this destination. “I ‘m for Brussels.”

“We shall have a rough night of it, outside; glass is falling suddenly, and the wind has chopped round to the southward and eastward!”

“I’m sorry for it,” said I. “I’m but an indifferent sailor.”

“Well, I ‘ll tell you what to do: just turn into my cabin, you ‘ll have it all to yourself; lie down flat on your back the moment you get aboard; tell the steward to give you a strong glass of brandy-and-water – the captain’s brandy say, for it is rare old stuff, and a perfect cordial, and my name ain’t Slidders if you don’t sleep all the way across.”

I really had no words for such unexpected generosity; how was I to believe my ears at such a kind proposal of a perfect stranger? Was it anything in my appearance that could have marked me out as an object for these attentions? “I don’t know how to thank you enough,” said I, in confusion; “and when I think that we meet now for the first time – ”

“What does that signify?” said he, in the same short way. “I ‘ve met pretty nigh all of you by this time. I ‘ve been a matter of eleven years on this station!”

“Met pretty nigh all of us!” What does that mean? Who and what are we? He can’t mean the Pottses, for I ‘m the first who ever travelled even thus far! But I was not given leisure to follow up the inquiry, for he went on to say how in all that time of eleven years he had never seen threatenings of a worse night than that before us.

“Then why venture out?” asked I, timidly.

“They must have the bags over there; that’s the reason,” said he, curtly: “besides, who’s to say when he won’t meet dirty weather at sea, – one takes rough and smooth in this life, eh?”

The observation was not remarkable for originality, but I liked it. I like the reflective turn, no matter how beaten the path it may select for its exercise.

“It’s a short trip, – some five or six hours at most,” said he; “but it’s wonderful what ugly weather one sees in it. It’s always so in these narrow seas.”

“Yes,” said I, concurringly, “these petty channels, like the small events of our life, are often the sources of our greatest perils.”

He gave a little short grunt: it might have been assent, and it might possibly have been a rough protest against further moralizing; at all events, he resumed his paper, and read away without speaking. I had time to examine him well, now, at my leisure, and there was nothing in his face that could give me any clew to the generous nature of his offer to me. No, he was a hard-featured, weather-beaten, rather stern sort of man, verging on fifty seven or eight. He looked neither impulsive nor confiding, and there was in the shape of his mouth, and the curve of the lines around it, that peremptory and almost cruel decision that marks the sea-captain. “Well,” thought I, “I must seek the explanation of the riddle elsewhere. The secret sympathy that moved him must have its root in me; and, after all, history has never told that the dolphins who were charmed by Orpheus were peculiar dolphins, with any special fondness for music, or an ear for melody; they were ordinary creatures of the deep, – fish, so to say, taken ex-medio acervo of delphinity. The marvel of their captivation lay in the spell of the enchanter. It was the thrilling touch of his fingers, the tasteful elegance of his style, the voluptuous inthralment of the sounds he awakened, that worked the miracle. This man of the sea has, therefore, been struck by something in my air, bearing, or address; one of those mysterious sympathies which are the hidden motives that guide half our lives, had drawn him to me, and he said to himself, ‘I like that man. I have met more pretentious people, I have seen persons who desire to dominate and impose more than he, but there is that about him that somehow appeals to the instincts of my nature, and I can say I feel myself his friend already.’”

As I worked at my little theory, with all the ingenuity I knew how to employ on such occasions, I perceived that he had put up his newspaper, and was gathering together, in old traveller fashion, the odds and ends of his baggage.

“Here we are,” said he, as we glided into the station, “and in capital time too. Don’t trouble yourself about your traps. My steward will be here presently, and take all your things down to the packet along with my own. Our steam is up; so lose no time in getting aboard.”

I had never less inclination to play the loiterer. The odious attaché was still in my neighborhood, and until I had got clear out of his reach I felt anything but security. He, I remembered, was for Calais, so that, by taking the Ostend boat, I was at once separating myself from his detestable companionship. I not only, therefore, accepted the captain’s offer to leave all my effects to the charge of the steward; but no sooner had the train stopped, than I sprang out, hastened through the thronged station, and made at all my speed for the harbor.

Is it to increase the impediments to quitting one’s country, and, by interposing difficulties, to give the exile additional occasion to think twice about expatriating himself, that the way from the railroad to the dock at Dover is made so circuitous and almost impossible to discover? Are these obstacles invented in the spirit of those official details which make banns on the church-door, and a delay of three weeks precede a marriage, as though to say, Halt, impetuous youth, and bethink you whither you are going? Are these amongst the wise precautions of a truly paternal rule? If so, they must occasionally even transcend the original intention, for when I reached the pier, the packet had already begun to move, and it was only by a vigorous leap that I gained the paddle-box, and thus scrambled on board.

“Like every one of you,” growled out my weather-beaten friend; “always within an ace of being left behind.”

“Every one of us!” muttered I. “What can he have known of the Potts family, that he dares to describe us thus characteristically? And who ever presumed to call us loiterers or sluggards?”

“Step down below, as I told you,” whispered he. “It’s a dirty night, and we shall have bucketing weather outside.” And with this friendly hint I at once complied, and stole down the ladder. “Show that gentleman into my stateroom, steward,” called he out from above. “Mix him something warm, and look after him.”

“Ay, ay, sir,” was the brisk reply, as the bustling man of brandy and basins threw open a small door, and ushered me into a little den, with a mingled odor of tar, Stilton, and wet mackintoshes. “All to yourself here, sir,” said he, and vanished.

CHAPTER XI. A JEALOUS HUSBAND

I take it for granted that all special “charities” have had their origin in some specific suffering. At least, I can aver that my first thought on landing at Ostend was, “Why has no great philanthropist thought of establishing such an institution as a Refuge for the Sea-sick?” I declare this publicly, that if I ever become rich, – a consummation which, looking to the general gentleness of my instincts, the wide benevolence of my nature, and the kindliness of my temperament, mankind might well rejoice at, – if, I repeat, I ever become rich, one of the first uses of my affluence will be to endow such an establishment. I will place it in some one of our popular ports, say Southampton. Surrounded with all the charms of inland scenery, rich in every rustic association, the patient shall never be reminded of the scene of his late sufferings. A velvety turf to stroll on, with a leafy shade above his-head, the mellow lowing of cattle in his ears, and the fragrant odors of meadow-sweet and hawthorn around, I would recall the sufferer from the dread memories of the slippery deck, the sea-washed stairs, or the sleepy state-room. For the rattle of cordage, and the hoarse trumpet of the skipper, I would substitute the song of the thrush or the blackbird; and, instead of the thrice odious steward and his basin, I would have trim maidens of pleasing aspect to serve him with syllabubs. I will not go on to say the hundred device» I would employ to cheat memory out of a gloomy record, for I treasure the hope that I may yet live to carry out my theory, and have a copyright in my invention.

It was with sentiments deeply tinctured by the above that I tottered, rather than walked, towards the “Hôtel Royal.” It was a bright moonlight night, and, as if in mockery of the weather outside, as still and calm as might be. Many a picturesque effect of light and shade met me as I went: quaint old gables flaring in a strong flood of moonlight, showed outlines the strangest and oddest; twinkling lamps shone out of tall, dark-sided, old houses, from which strains of music came plaintively enough in the night air; the sounds of a prolonged revel rose loudly out of that deep-pillared chateau-like building in the Place, and in the quiet alley adjoining, I could catch the low song of a mother as she tried to sing her baby to sleep. It was all human in every touch and strain of it And did I not drink it in with rapture? Was it not in a transport of gratitude that I thanked Fortune for once again restoring me to land? “O Earth, Earth!” says the Greek poet, “how art thou interwoven with that nature that first came from thee!” Thus musing, I reached the inn, where, though the hour was a late one, the household was all active and astir.

“Many passengers arrived, waiter?” said I, in the easy, careless voice of one who would not own to sea-sickness.

“Very few, sir; the severe weather has deterred several from venturing across.”

“Any ladies?”

“Only one, sir; and, poor thing! she seems to have suffered fearfully. She had to be carried from the boat, and when she tried to walk upstairs, she almost fainted. There might have been some agitation, however, in that, for she expected some one to have met her here; and when she heard that he had not arrived, she was completely overcome.”

“Very sad, indeed,” said I, examining the carte for supper.

“Oh yes, sir; and being in deep mourning, too, and a stranger away for the first time from her country.”

I started, and felt my heart bounding against my side.

“What was it you said about deep mourning, and being young and beautiful?” asked I, eagerly.

“Only the mourning, sir, – it was only the mourning I mentioned; for she kept her veil close down, and would not suffer her face to be seen.”

“Bashful as beautiful! modest as she is fair!” muttered I. “Do you happen to know whither she is going?”

“Yes, sir; her luggage is marked ‘Brussels.’”

“It is she! It is herself!” cried I, in rapture, as I turned away, lest the fellow should notice my emotion. “When does she leave this?”

“She seems doubtful, sir; she told the landlady that she is going to reside at Brussels; but never having been abroad before, she is naturally timid about travelling even so far alone.”

“Gentle creature! why should she be exposed to such hazards? Bring me some of this fricandeau with chiccory, waiter, and a pint of Beaune; fried potatoes too. – Would that I could tell her to fear nothing!” thought I. “Would that I could just whisper, ‘Potts is here; Potts watches over you; Potts will be that friend, that brother, that should have come to meet you! Sleep soundly, and with a head at ease. You are neither friendless nor forsaken!’” I feel I must be naturally a creature of benevolent instincts; for I am never so truly happy as when engaged in a work of kindness. Let me but suggest to myself a labor of charity, some occasion to sorrow with the afflicted, to rally the weak-hearted, and to succor the wretched, and I am infinitely more delighted than by all the blandishment of what is called “society.” Men have their allotted parts in life, just as certain fruits are meet for certain climates. Mine was the grand comforting line. Nature meant me for a consoler. I have none of those impulsive temperaments which make what are called jolly fellows. I have no taste for those excesses which go by the name of conviviality. I can, it is true, be witty, anecdotic, and agreeable; I can spice conversation with epigram, and illustrate argument by apt example; but my forte is tenderness.

“Is not this veal a little tough, waiter?” said I, in gentle remonstrance.

“Monsieur is right,” said he, bowing; “but if a morsel of cold pheasant would be acceptable – mademoiselle, the lady in mourning, has just taken a wing of it – ”

“Bring it directly. – Oh, ecstasy of ecstasies! We are then, as it were, supping together – served from the same dish! – May I have the honor?” said I, filling ont a glass of wine and bowing respectfully And with an air of deep devotion across the table. The pheasant was exquisite, and I ate with an epicurean enjoyment. I called for another pint of Beaune too. It was an occasion for some indulgence, and I could not deny myself. No sooner had the waiter left me alone, than I burst into an expansive acknowledgment of my happiness. “Yes, Potts,” said I, “you are richer in that temperament of yours than if you owned half California. That boundless wealth of good intentions is a well no pumping can exhaust. Go on doing imaginary good forever. You are never the poorer for all the orphans you support, all the distresses you relieve. You rescue the mariner from shipwreck without wetting your feet. You charge at the head of a squadron without the peril of a scratch. All blessed be the gift which can do these things!”

You call these delusions; but is it a delusion to be a king, to deliver a people from slavery, to carry succor to a drowning crew? I have done all of these; that is, I have gone through every changeful mood of hope and fear that accompanies these actions, sipping my glass of Beaune between whiles.

When I found myself in my bedroom I had no inclination for sleep; I was in a mood of enjoyment too elevated for mere repose. It was so delightful to be no longer at sea, to feel rescued from the miseries of the rocking ship and the reeking cabin, that I would not lose the rapture of forgetful-ness. I was in the mood for great things, too, if I only knew what they were to be. “Ah!” thought I, suddenly, “I will write to her. She shall know that she is not the friendless and forsaken creature that she deems herself; she shall hear that, though separated from home, friends, and country, there is one near to watch over and protect her, and that Potts devotes himself to her service.” I opened my desk, and in all the impatience of my ardor began: —

“‘Dear Madam,’ – Quere: Ought I to say ‘dear’? ‘We are not acquainted, and can I presume upon the formula that implies acquaintanceship? No. I must omit ‘dear;’ and then ‘madam’ looks fearfully stern and rigid, particularly when addressed to a young unmarried lady; she is certainly not ‘madam’ yet, surely. I can’t begin ‘miss,’ What a language is ours? How cruelly fatal to all the tenderer emotions is a dialect so matter-of-fact and formal!

“If I could only start with ‘Gentilissima Signora,’ how I could get on! What an impulse would the words lend me! What ‘way on me’ would they impart for what was to follow! In our cast-metal tongue there is nothing for it but the third person: ‘The undersigned has the honor,’ &c., &c. This is chilling – it is positively repulsive. Let me see, will this do? —

“‘The gentleman who was fortunate enough to render you some trivial service at the Milford station two days ago, having accidentally learned that you are here and unprovided with a protector, in all humility offers himself to afford you every aid and counsel in his power. No stranger to the touching interest of your life, deeply sensible of the delicacy that should surround your steps, if you deign to accept his devoted services, he will endeavor to prove himself, by every sentiment of respect, your most faithful, most humble, and most grateful servant

“‘P. S. His name is Potts.’

“Yes, all will do but the confounded postscript. What a terrible bathos, – ‘His name is Potts’! What if I say, ‘One word of reply is requested, addressed to Algernon Sydney Pottinger, at this hotel’?”

I made a great many copies of this document, always changing something as I went. I felt the importance of every word, and fastidiously pondered over each expression I employed. The bright sun of morning broke in at last upon my labors and found me still at my desk, still composing. All done, I lay down and slept soundly.

“Is she gone, waiter?” said I, as he entered my room with hot water. “Is she gone?”

“Who, sir?” asked he, in some astonishment.

“The lady in black, who came over in the last mail-packet from Dover; the young lady in deep mourning, who arrived all alone.”

“No, sir. She has sent all round the hotels this morning to inquire after some one who was to have met her here, but, apparently, without success.”

“Give her this; place it in her own hand, and, as you are leaving the room, say, in a gentle voice: ‘Is there an answer, mademoiselle?’ You understand?”

“Well, I believe I do,” said he, significantly, as he slyly pocketed the half-Napoleon fee I had tendered for his acceptance.

Now the fellow had thrown into his countenance – a painfully astute and cunning face it was – one of those expressive looks which actually made me shudder. It seemed to say, “This is a conspiracy, and we are both in it.”

“You are not for a moment to suppose,” said I, hurriedly, “that there is one syllable in that letter which could compromise me, or wound the delicacy of the most susceptible.”

“I am convinced that monsieur has written it with most consummate skill,” said he, with a supercilious grin, and left the room.

How I detest the familiarity of a foreign waiter! The fellows cannot respond to the most ordinary question without an affectation of showing off their immense acuteness and knowledge of life. It is their eternal boast how they read people, and with what an instinctive subtlety they can decipher all the various characters that pass before them. Now this impertinent lackey, who is to say what has he not imputed to me? Utterly incapable as such a creature must necessarily be of the higher and nobler motives that sway men of my order, he will doubtless have ascribed to me the most base and degenerate motives.

I was wrong in speaking one word to the fellow. I might have said, “Take that note to Number Fourteen, and ask if there be an answer;” or, better still, if I had never written at all, but merely sent in my card to ask if the lady would vouchsafe to accord me an audience of a few minutes. Yes, such would have been the discreet course; and then I might have trusted to my manner, my tact, and a certain something in my general bearing, to have brought the matter to a successful issue. While I thus meditated, the waiter re-entered the room, and, cautiously closing the door, approached me with an ostentatious pretence of secrecy and mystery.

“I have given her the letter,” said he, in a whisper.

“Speak up!” said I, severely; “what answer has the lady given?”

“I think you ‘ll get the answer presently,” said he, with a sort of grin that actually thrilled through me.

“You may leave the room,” said I, with dignity, for I saw how the fellow was actually revelling in the enjoyment of my confusion.

“They were reading it over together for the third time when I came away,” said he, with a most peculiar look.

“Whom do you mean? Who are they that you speak of?”

“The gentleman that she was expecting. He came by the 9.40 train from Brussels. Just in time for your note.” As the wretch uttered these words, a violent ringing of bells resounded along the corridor, and he rushed out without waiting for more.

I turned in haste to my note-book; various copies of my letter were there, and I was eager to recall the expressions I had employed in addressing her. Good heavens! what had I really written? Here were scraps of all sorts of absurdity; poetry, too! verses to the “Fair Victim of a Recent War,” with a number of rhymes for the last word, such as “low,” “snow,” “mow,” &c., – all evidences of composition under difficulty.

While I turned over these rough copies, the door opened, and a large, red-faced, stern-looking man, in a suit of red-brown tweed, and with a heavy stick in his hand, entered; he closed the door leisurely after him, and I half thought that I saw him also turn the key in the lock. He advanced towards me with a deliberate step, and, in a voice measured as his gait, said, —

“I am Mr. Jopplyn, sir, – I am Mr. Christopher Jopplyn.”