Gideon's Band Part 44

"Good Lawd!" he gasped, and then t.i.ttered at himself. "I ax yo' pahdon, miss, I _neveh_ know de Hayles twins 'uz _double_ twins, male 'n'

female. You ax me----?"

"The bishop; how is he now?"

"Well, Miss Hayles--you is Miss Hayles, ain't you? Yit, my Lawd! miss, ain't I dess now see you down in de cabin a-playin' in de play, an' a hund'ed people sayin': '_'tis_ her, 'cose it is'?"

"Humph! no, I left as the curtain rose. How's the----?"

"Bishop? Oh, de bishop, he, eh--'bout five-six minute' ago--aw it mowt be ten--whilse I 'uz down dah--de bishop--I'm bleeds to say--breave his las'."

"While I--!" She tossed both arms.

"Ummmm, hmmmm!" droned old Joy; "gone to glory!"

"Ya.s.s, de good bishop gone to his good bishop!"

"Oh, who was with him?" cried the girl.

"Why, eh"--the three moved on their way--"de doctoh, he 'uz dah, and de bofe sis' o' charity; ya.s.s'm."

"The commodore--wasn't?--Nor the senator--nor----?"

"Oh, ya.s.s'm, de commodo', he 'uz dah--faw a spell. He didn' stay till de--finish. He couldn'. He git slightly indispose', hisseff, an' have to go to his own room."

The nurse made a meek show of despair and Ramsey turned upon her. "Now, mammy, this is no time--_now--don't--cry_."

The old woman braced up superbly. "Ya.s.s'm," persisted the waiter, "he dah now, in bed; slightly indispose'."

A rumble close below broke in upon the rhythm of the boat. "What's that?" demanded Ramsey.

"Oh, dat's on'y de aujience a-stompin' de actohs."

The next moment, a step or two down the stair, with the skylight roof still in sight as much as hidden tears would let her see it, she stopped again, to stare anxiously at another trio, coming from the bell to the captain's room.

"Da'--dat's all right," the white-jacket rea.s.sured her. "Dat's dess de cap'm, wid Mr. Hugh an' a pa.s.sengeh."

"Kentucky pa.s.senger?"

"Ya.s.s'm, 'zac'ly; f'om Ca'fawnia; dat's him."

She sprang back to the deck, and the servant went his way down the stair. Hugh had left his father to proceed on the arm of the Californian and was approaching. He murmured only a preoccupied greeting and would have taken the stair, but old Joy motioned eagerly to the girl. She spoke. He stopped. "Yes, Miss Ramsey?"

"Go on," she said, "we're going that way."

Down on the cabin guards the two paused at the bottom step, the old woman lingering at the top. "Mr. Hugh," said Ramsey, "mom-a's sending me for the twins." She drew a breath. "You know about the commodore?"

"Yes, Miss Ramsey."

"And the--the bishop?"

"I know, Miss Ramsey."

"Mr. Hugh, is your father--taken?"

"Yes, Miss Ramsey."

"Where are you going?"

"To bring the first clerk."

"The boat's command doesn't fall to him, does it?"

"It falls to the first mate."

"I don't see why. Who'll it fall to next? You?"

"No, the first clerk."

Double disappointment. "But you; you'll still look after us pa.s.sengers and help him, too, won't you?"

"I may."

She knew it! Somehow he was to share with the mate and the clerk the command of the boat!

"Mr. Hugh"--they moved on, with Joy at a discreet distance--"you're in a hurry--so am I; but I ought to tell you, though of course it's just ridiculous for us--for me--to think I've ever helped you or can help you in any of these things or in anything--I--oh--I can't help you, or play help you, any more."

Cruel word in a cruel moment. She felt it so and expected him to show the same feeling. But instead he halted in the lamplight of a pa.s.sageway to the cabin and confronted her with the widest, most formidable gaze, not her father's, she had ever met. He seemed absolutely majestic. It was very absurd for one so young and--stumpy--to seem majestic, yet there he stood, truly so. Partly for that reason she could not so much as smile; but partly, too, it was because she felt herself so guiltily frivolous, having anything to say to him, or even standing in his gaze, gazing into it, while his father, her brother, and the bishop lay as they were lying in their several rooms so close overhead.

"You _can_ help me," he said in his magisterial voice, so deep yet so soft. "You will. You must. I cannot spare you."

Did any one ever! She tossed a faint defiance: "I can't. No. I won't--can't--ever again, against my own kin."

"There are things stronger than kin."

"I'd like to know what!"

"Truth. Justice. Honor. Right. Public welfare."

She waved them all away as wholly immaterial. "Hoh!"

With a kindness far too much like magnanimity to suit her, Hugh, drawing backward, smiled, and replied, not as pressing the argument but as dropping it:

"One can be against one's kin, yet not against them. Basile knows that.

He proved it to-day."

"Basile--oh, Mr. Hugh, Basile wants to see you. Mom-a's sent me as much for you as for the twins. Basile's asked for you. But of course if your father----"

"I'll come, the moment I can be spared. Is your brother really better?"