Mrs. Falchion Part 21

Even her affection for her father had been dutiful rather than instinctive. She had provoked love, but had never given it. She had been self-centred, compulsive, unrelenting. She had unmoved seen and let her husband go to his doom--it was his doom and death so far as she knew.

Yet, as I thought of this, I found myself again admiring her. She was handsome, independent, distinctly original, and possessing capacity for great things. Besides, so far, she had not been actively vindictive--simply pa.s.sively indifferent to the sufferings of others.

She seemed to regard results more than means. All she did not like she could empty into the mill of the destroying G.o.ds: just as General Grant poured hundreds of thousands of men into the valley of the James, not thinking of lives but victory, not of blood but triumph. She too, even in her cruelty, seemed to have a sense of wild justice which disregarded any incidental suffering.

I could see that Mr. Devlin was attracted by her, as every man had been who had ever met her; for, after all, man is but a common slave to beauty: virtue he respects, but beauty is man's valley of suicide.

Presently she turned to Mr. Devlin, having, as it seemed to me, made Roscoe and Ruth sufficiently uncomfortable. With that cheerful insouciance which was always possible to her on the most trying occasions, she immediately said, as she had often said to me, that she had come to Mr. Devlin to be amused for the morning, perhaps the whole day. It was her way, her selfish way, to make men her slaves.

Mr. Devlin gallantly said that he was at her disposal, and with a kind of pride added that there was plenty in the valley which would interest her; for he was a frank, bluff man, who would as quickly have spoken disparagingly of what belonged to himself, if it was not worthy, as have praised it.

"Where shall we go first?" he said. "To the mill?"

"To the mill, by all means," Mrs. Falchion replied; "I have never been in a great saw-mill, and I believe this is very fine. Then," she added, with a little wave of the hand towards the cable running down from Phil Boldrick's eyrie in the mountains, "then I want to see all that cable can do--all, remember."

Mr. Devlin laughed. "Well, it hasn't many tricks, but what it does it does cleverly, thanks to The Padre."

"Oh yes," responded Mrs. Falchion, still looking at the cable; "The Padre, I know, is very clever."

"He is more than clever," bluffly replied Mr. Devlin, who was not keen enough to see the faint irony in her tones.

"Yes," responded Mrs. Falchion in the same tone of voice, "he is more than clever. I have been told that he was once very brave. I have been told that once in the South Seas he did his country a great service."

She paused. I could see Ruth's eyes glisten and her face suffuse, for though she read the faint irony in the tone, still she saw that the tale which Mrs. Falchion was evidently about to tell, must be to Galt Roscoe's credit. Mrs. Falchion turned idly upon Ruth and saw the look in her face. An almost imperceptible smile came upon her lips. She looked again at the cable and Phil Boldrick's eyrie, which seemed to have a wonderful attraction for her. Not turning away from it, save now and then to glance indolently at Mr. Devlin or Ruth, and once enigmatically at myself, she said:

"Once upon a time--that is the way, I believe, to begin a pretty story--there were four men-of-war idling about a certain harbour of Samoa. One of the vessels was the flag-s.h.i.+p, with its admiral on board.

On one of the other vessels was an officer who had years before explored this harbour. It was the hurricane season. He advised the admiral not to enter the harbour, for the indications foretold a gale, and himself was not sure that his chart was in all respects correct, for the harbour had been hurriedly explored and sounded. But the admiral gave orders, and they sailed in.

"That day a tremendous hurricane came crying down upon Samoa. It swept across the island, levelled forests of cocoa palms, battered villages to pieces, caught that little fleet in the harbour, and played with it in a horrible madness. To right and left were reefs, behind was the sh.o.r.e, with a monstrous surf rolling in; before was a narrow pa.s.sage. One vessel made its way out--on it was the officer who had surveyed the harbour. In the open sea there was safety. He brought his vessel down the coast a little distance, put a rope about him and in the wild surf made for the sh.o.r.e. I believe he could have been court-martialled for leaving his s.h.i.+p, but he was a man who had taken a great many risks of one kind and another in his time. It was one chance out of a hundred; but he made it--he got to the sh.o.r.e, travelled down to the harbour where the men-of-war were careening towards the reefs, unable to make the pa.s.sage out, and once again he tied a rope about him and plunged into the surf to try for the admiral's s.h.i.+p. He got there terribly battered.

They tell how a big wave lifted him and landed him upon the quarter-deck just as big waves are not expected to do. Well, like the hero in any melodrama of the kind, he very prettily piloted monsieur the admiral and his fleet out to the open sea."

She paused, smiling in an inscrutable sort of way, then turned and said with a sudden softness in her voice, though still with the air of one who wished not to be taken with too great a seriousness: "And, ladies and gentlemen, the name of the s.h.i.+p that led the way was the 'Porcupine'; and the name of the hero was Commander Galt Roscoe, R.N.; and 'of such is the kingdom of heaven!'"

There was silence for a moment. The tale had been told adroitly, and with such tact as to words that Roscoe could not take offence--need not, indeed, as he did not, I believe, feel any particular self-consciousness. I am not sure but he was a little glad that such evidence should have been given at the moment, when a kind of restraint had come between him and Ruth, by one who he had reason to think was not wholly his friend might be his enemy. It was a kind of offset to his premonitions and to the peril over which he might stumble at any moment.

To me the situation was almost inexplicable; but the woman herself was inexplicable: at this moment the evil genius of us all, at that doing us all a kind of crude, superior justice. I was the first to speak.

"Roscoe," I said, "I never had heard of this, although I remember the circ.u.mstance as told in the newspapers. But I am glad and proud that I have a friend with such a record."

"And, only think," said Mrs. Falchion, "he actually was not court-martialled for abandoning his s.h.i.+p to save an admiral and a fleet.

But the ways of the English Admiralty are wonderful. They go out of their way to avoid a court-martial sometimes, and they go out of their way to establish it sometimes."

By this time we had started towards the mill. Roscoe walked ahead with Ruth Devlin. Mr. Devlin, Mrs. Falchion, Justine Caron and myself walked together.

Mrs. Falchion presently continued, talking, as it seemed to me, at the back of Roscoe's head:

"I have known the Admiralty to force an officer to resign the navy because he had married a native wife. But I never knew the Admiralty to court-martial an officer because he did not marry a native wife whom he OUGHT to have married: but, as I said, the ways of the Admiralty are past admiration."

I could see Roscoe's hand clinch at his side, and presently he said over his shoulder at her: "Your memory and your philosophy are as wonderful as the Admiralty are inscrutable."

She laughed. "You have not lost your old gift of retort," she said. "You are still amusing."

"Well, come," said Mr. Devlin cheerfully, "let's see if there isn't something even more amusing than Mr. Roscoe in Viking. I will show you, Mrs. Falchion, the biggest saw that ever ate the heart out of a Norfolk pine."

At the mill Mrs. Falchion was interested. She asked questions concerning the machinery which mightily pleased Mr. Devlin, they were so apt and intelligent; and herself a.s.sisted in giving an immense log to the teeth of the largest saw, which, with its six upright blades, ate, and was never satisfied. She stooped and ran her ungloved hand into the sawdust, as sweet before the sun has dried it as the scent of a rose. The rich smell of the fresh-cut lumber filled the air, and suggested all kinds of remote and pleasant things. The industry itself is one of the first that comes with the invasion of new territory, and makes one think of man's first work in the world: to fell the tree and till the soil. It is impossible to describe that fierce, jubilant song of the saw, which even when we were near was never shrill or shrieking: never drowning our voices, but vibrant and delightful. To Mrs. Falchion it was new; she was impressed.

"I have seen," she said to Mr. Devlin, "all sorts of enterprises, but never anything like this. It all has a kind of rough music. It is enjoyable."

Mr. Devlin beamed. "I have just added something to the mill that will please you," he said.

She looked interested. We all gathered round. I stood between Mrs.

Falchion and Ruth Devlin, and Roscoe beside Justine Caron.

"It is the greatest mill-whistle in the country," he continued. "It will be heard from twelve to twenty-five miles, according to the condition of the atmosphere. I want big things all round, and this is a masterpiece, I guess. Now, I'll let you hear it if you like. I didn't expect to use it until to-night at nine o'clock, when, also for the first time, I am to light the mills by electricity; a thing that's not been attempted yet in any saw-mill on the Continent. We're going to work night and day for a couple of months."

"This is all very wonderful. And are you indebted to Mr. Roscoe in these things too?--Everybody seems to need him here."

"Well," said the mill-owner, laughing, "the whistle is my own. It's the sort of thing I would propose--to blow my trumpet, as it were; but the electricity and the first experiments in it I owe to The Padre."

"As I thought," she said, and turned to Roscoe. "I remember," she added, "that you had an electrical search-light on the 'Porcupine', and that you were fond of electricity. Do you ever use search-lights here? I should think they might be of use in your parish. Then, for a change, you could let the parish turn it upon you, for the sake of contrast and edification."

For the moment I was exceedingly angry. Her sarcasm was well veiled, but I could feel the sardonic touch beneath the smiling surface. This innuendo seemed so gratuitous. I said to her, almost beneath my breath, that none of the others could hear: "How womanly!"

She did no more than lift her eyebrows in acknowledgment, and went on talking lightly to Mr. Devlin. Roscoe was cool, but I could see now in his eyes a kind of smouldering anger; which was quite to my wish. I hoped he would be meek no longer.

Presently Ruth Devlin said: "Would it not be better to wait till to-night, when the place is lighted, before the whistle is blown? Then you can get a better first impression. And if Mrs. Falchion will come over to our home at Sunburst, we will try and amuse her for the rest of the day--that is, after she has seen all here."

Mrs. Falchion seemed struck by the frankness of the girl, and for an instant debated, but presently said: "No, thank you. When all is seen now, I will go to the hotel, and then will join you all here in the evening, if that seems feasible. Perhaps Dr. Marmion will escort me here. Mr. Roscoe, of course, has other duties."

"I shall be happy," I said, maliciously smiling, "to guide you to the sacrifice of the saw."

She was not disturbed. She touched Mr. Devlin's arm, and, looking archly at him, nodded backwards towards me. "'Beware the anaconda!'" she said.

It was impossible not to be amused; her repartee was always so unrestrained. She disarmed one by what would have been, in a man, insolent sang-froid: in her it was piquancy, daring.

Presently she added: "But if we are to have no colossal whistle and no electric light till evening, there is one thing I must have: and that is your remarkable Phil Boldrick, who seems to hold you all in the palm of his hand, and lives up there like a G.o.d on his Olympus."

"Well, suppose you go and call on him," said Roscoe, with a touch of dry humour, his eye on the cable that reached to Boldrick's perch.

She saw her opportunity, and answered promptly: "Yes, I will call on him immediately,"--here she turned towards Ruth,--"if Miss Devlin and yourself will go with me."

"Nonsense," interposed Mr. Devlin. "Besides, the cage will only hold two easily. Anyhow, it's absurd."

"Why is it absurd? Is there any danger?" queried Mrs. Falchion.

"Not unless there's an idiot at the machinery."

"I should expect you to manage it," she persisted.

"But no woman has ever done it."