The Last Hope Part 5

"On the other hand, why should you stay?"

"Because I fancy I am wanted," she replied, in the lighter tone which he had used. "It is gratifying to one's vanity, you know, whether it be true or not."

"Oh, it is true enough. One cannot imagine what they would do without you."

He was watching Septimus Marvin as he spoke. Sep had joined him and was walking gravely by his side toward the house. They were ill-a.s.sorted.

"But there is a limit even to self-sacrifice and--well, there is another world open to you."

She gave a curt laugh as if he had touched a topic upon which they would disagree.

"Oh--yes," he laughed. "I leave myself open to a _tu quoque_, I know.

There are other worlds open to me also, you would say."

He looked at her with his gay and easy smile; but she made no answer, and her resolute lips closed together sharply. The subject had been closed by some past conversation or incident which had left a memory.

"Who are those two men staying at 'The Black Sailor?'" she asked, changing the subject, or only turning into a by-way, perhaps. "You saw them."

She seemed to take it for granted that he should have seen them, though he had not appeared to look in their direction.

"Oh--yes. I saw them, but I do not know who they are. I came straight here as soon as I could."

"One of them is a Frenchman," she said, taking no heed of the excuse given for his ignorance of Farlingford news.

"The old man--I thought so. I felt it when I looked at him. It was perhaps a fellow feeling. I suppose I am a Frenchman after all. Clubbe always says I am one when I am at the wheel and let the s.h.i.+p go off the wind."

Miriam was looking along the d.y.k.e, peering into the gathering darkness.

"One of them is coming toward us now," she said, almost warningly. "Not the Marquis de Gemosac, but the other--the Englishman."

"Confound him," muttered Barebone. "What does he want?"

And to judge from Mr. Dormer Colville's pace it would appear that he chiefly desired to interrupt their _tete-a-tete_.

CHAPTER VI

THE STORY OF THE CASTAWAYS

When River Andrew stated that there were few at Farlingford who knew more of Frenchman than himself, it is to be presumed that he spoke by the letter, and under the reserve that Captain Clubbe was not at the moment on sh.o.r.e.

For Captain Clubbe had known Frenchman since boyhood.

"I understand," said Dormer Colville to him two or three days after the arrival of "The Last Hope," "that the Marquis de Gemosac cannot do better than apply to you for some information he desires to possess. In fact, it is on that account that we are here."

The introduction had been a matter requiring patience. For Captain Clubbe had not laid aside in his travels a certain East Anglian distrust of the unknown. He had, of course, noted the presence of the strangers when he landed at Farlingford quay, but his large, immobile face had betrayed no peculiar interest. There had been plenty to tell him all that was known of Monsieur de Gemosac and Dormer Colville, and a good deal that was only surmised. But the imagination of even the darksome River Andrew failed to soar successfully under the measuring blue eye, and the total lack of comment of Captain Clubbe.

There was, indeed, little to tell, although the strangers had been seen to go to the rectory in quite a friendly way, and had taken a gla.s.s of sherry in the rector's study. Mrs. Clacy was responsible for this piece of news, and her profession giving her the _entree_ to almost every back door in Farlingford enabled her to gather news at the fountain-head. For Mrs. Clacy went out to oblige. She obliged the rectory on Mondays, and Mrs. Clubbe, with what was technically described as the heavy wash, on Tuesdays. Whatever Mrs. Clacy was asked to do she could perform with a rough efficiency. But she always undertook it with reluctance. It was not, she took care to mention, what she was accustomed to, but she would do it to oblige. Her charge was eighteen-pence a day with her dinner, and (she made the addition with a raised eyebrow, and the resigned sigh of one who takes her meals as a duty toward those dependent on her) a bit of tea at the end of the day.

It was on a Wednesday that Dormer Colville met Captain Clubbe face to face in the street, and was forced to curb his friendly smile and half-formed nod of salutation. For Captain Clubbe went past him with a rigid face and steadily averted eyes, like a walking monument. For there was something in the captain's deportment dimly suggestive of stone, and the dignity of stillness. His face meant security, his large limbs a slow, sure action.

Colville and Monsieur de Gemosac were on the quay in the afternoon at high tide when "The Last Hope" was warped on to the slip-way. All Farlingford was there too, and Captain Clubbe carried out the difficult task with hardly any words at all from a corner of the jetty, with Loo Barebone on board as second in command.

Captain Clubbe could not fail to perceive the strangers, for they stood a few yards from him, Monsieur de Gemosac peering with his yellow eyes toward the deck of "The Last Hope," where Barebone stood on the forecastle giving the orders transmitted to him by a sign from his taciturn captain. Colville seemed to take a greater interest in the proceedings, and noted the skill and precision of the crew with the air of a seaman.

Presently, Septimus Marvin wandered down the d.y.k.e and stood irresolutely at the far corner of the jetty. He always approached his flock with diffidence, although they treated him kindly enough, much as they treated such of their own children as were handicapped in the race of life by some malformation or mental incapacity.

Colville approached him and they stood side by side until "The Last Hope"

was safely moored and chocked. Then it was that the rector introduced the two strangers to Captain Clubbe. It being a Wednesday, Clubbe must have known all that there was to know, and more, of Monsieur de Gemosac and Dormer Colville; for Mrs. Clacy, it will be remembered, obliged Mrs.

Clubbe on Tuesdays. Nothing, however, in the mask-like face, large and square, of the s.h.i.+p-captain indicated that he knew aught of his new acquaintances, or desired to know more. And when Colville frankly explained their presence in Farlingford, Captain Clubbe nodded gravely and that was all.

"We can wait, however, until a more suitable opportunity presents itself," Colville hastened to add. "You are busy, as even a landsman can perceive, and cannot be expected to think of anything but your vessel until the tide leaves her high and dry."

He turned and explained the situation to the Marquis, who shrugged his shoulders impatiently as if at the delay. For he was a southerner, and was, perhaps, ignorant of the fact that in dealing with any born on the sh.o.r.es of the German Ocean nothing is gained and, more often than not, all is lost by haste.

"You hear," Colville added, turning to the Captain, and speaking in a curter manner; for so strongly was he moved by that human kindness which is vaguely called sympathy that his speech varied according to his listener. "You hear the Marquis only speaks French. It is about a fellow-countryman of his buried here. Drop in and have a gla.s.s of wine with us some evening; to-night, if you are at liberty."

"What I can tell you won't take long," said Clubbe, over his shoulder; for the tide was turning, and in a few minutes would be ebbing fast.

"Dare say not. But we have a good bin of claret at 'The Black Sailor,'

and shall be glad of your opinion on it."

Clubbe nodded, with a curt laugh, which might have been intended to deprecate the possession of any opinion on a vintage, or to express his disbelief that Dormer Colville desired to have it.

Nevertheless, his large person loomed in the dusk of the trees soon after sunset, in the narrow road leading from his house to the church and the green.

Monsieur de Gemosac and his companion were sitting on the bench outside the inn, leaning against the sill of their own parlour-window, which stood open. The Captain had changed his clothes, and now wore those in which he went to church and to the custom-house when in London or other large cities.

"There walks a just man," commented Dormer Colville, lightly, and no longer word could have described Captain Clubbe more aptly. He would rather have stayed in his own garden this evening to smoke his pipe in contemplative silence. But he had always foreseen that the day might come when it would be his duty to do his best by Loo Barebone. He had not sought this opportunity, because, being a wise as well as a just man, he was not quite sure that he knew what the best would be.

He shook hands gravely with the strangers, and by his manner seemed to indicate his comprehension of Monsieur de Gemosac's well-turned phrases of welcome. Dormer Colville appeared to be in a silent humour, unless perchance he happened to be one of those rare beings who can either talk or hold their tongues as occasion may demand.

"You won't want me to put my oar in, I see," observed he, tentatively, as he drew forward a small table whereon were set three gla.s.ses and a bottle of the celebrated claret.

"I can understand French, but I don't talk it," replied the Captain, stolidly.

"And if I interpret as we go along, we shall sit here all night, and get very little said."

Colville explained the difficulty to the Marquis de Gemosac, and agreed with him that much time would be saved if Captain Clubbe would be kind enough to tell in English all that he knew of the nameless Frenchman buried in Farlingford churchyard, to be translated by Colville to Monsieur de Gemosac at another time. As Clubbe understood this, and nodded in acquiescence, there only remained to them to draw the cork and light their cigars.

"Not much to tell," said Clubbe, guardedly. "But what there is, is no secret, so far as I know. It has not been told because it was known long ago, and has been forgotten since. The man's dead and buried, and there's an end of him."

"Of him, yes, but not of his race," answered Colville.

"You mean the lad?" inquired the Captain, turning his calm and steady gaze to Colville's face. The whole man seemed to turn, ponderously and steadily, like a siege-gun.