Geoffrey Hamstead Part 11

"Horribly so," said Nina. "It all seems just as if we were married. Not quite so bad, though, because I suppose I would then have to be civil.

What a bore! Fancy having to be civil continually!"

"I believe that a fair amount of civility is considered--"

"Oh, you need not tell me what our married life will be. I know all about it. Mutual resignation and endearing nothings. Church on Sundays; wash on Mondays. It will be respectable and meritorious and virtuous and generally unbearable--"

"Hush, hush, Nina! Why do you talk in this strain? Why do you go out of your way to say unkind things? I know you do not mean a quarter of what you say. If I thought you did I--"

"Was I saying unkind things?" interrupted Nina. "I did not think of their being unkind. It seems natural enough to look at things in this way."

She was endeavoring now to neutralize her hasty words by softer tones, and she only made matters worse. It is difficult to climb clear of the consciousness of our own necessities when it envelops us like a fog, obscuring the path. In some way a good deal of what she said to Jack now seemed tinged with the wrong color, and out of the effort to be pleasant had begun to grow a distaste for his presence. Much as she still liked him, she always tried during this cruise to get into the boat or into the party where Jack was not.

It had been his own proposal that she should see a good deal of Hampstead, and so it never occurred to him to be jealous; and afterward she became more crafty in blinding his eyes to the real cause of the dissatisfaction she now expressed. While in Jack's presence her manner toward Geoffrey was studiously off-hand and friendly. Whatever her manner might be when they strolled off together, it was certain that an understanding existed between the two to conceal from Jack whatever interest they might have in one another. She was forced to think continuously of Geoffrey so that every other train of thought sank into insignificance, and was crowded out. A colder person, with temptation infinitely less, would have done what was right and would have captured the world's approbation. It would do harm to examine too closely the natures of many saints of pious memory and to be obliged to paint out their accustomed halo. If the convicted are ever more richly endowed than the social arbiters, they are different and not understood, and therefore judged. No sin is so great as that which we ourselves are not tempted to commit. Ignorance either deifies or spits upon what can not be understood. But, after all, we must have some standard, some social tribunal; and social wrong, no matter how it is looked at, must be prevented, no matter how well we understand that some are, as regards social law, made crooked.

But let us hasten more slowly.

Sunday morning, strangely enough, followed the Sat.u.r.day night which had been spent at the Arlington. The daylight of Sunday followed about two hours after the last man coaxed himself to his berth from the yacht's deck and the tempting night. When all the others were fairly off in a solid sleep, as if wound up for twenty-four hours, one individual arrived at partial consciousness and wondered where he was. A sensation of pleasure pervaded him. Something new and enjoyable lay before him, but he could not make up his mind what it was. That he was not in 173 Tremaine Buildings seemed certain. If not there, where was he? To fully consider the matter he sat up in his berth and gave his head a thump on a beam overhead, which conveyed some intelligence to him. Then, lying back on the pillow, he laughed and rubbed his poll. "A lubber's mistake," quoth he; and then, after a little, "I wonder what it's like outside?" A lanky figure in a long white garment was presently to be seen stumbling up the companion-way, and a head appeared above the deck with hair disheveled looking like a sleepy bird of prey. All around it was so still that nothing could be heard but some one snoring down below. The yacht lay with her anchor-chain nowhere--a thread would have held her in position. The boats behind were lying motionless with their bows under the yacht's counter, drawn up there by the weight of their own painters lying in the water. Maurice gazed about the little wharf-surrounded harbor with curiosity and artistic pleasure. It could only have been this and the feeling of gladness in him that made him interested in the lumber-piles and railway-derricks about him, but it was all so new and strange to him. "Gad! to be off like this, on a yacht, and to live on board, you know!" said he, talking to himself, as he hoisted himself up by his arms and sat on the top of the sliding hatchway. He moved away soon after sitting down, because of about half an inch of cold dew on the hatch. This awakened him completely. He walked gingerly toward the stern and looked at the blaze of red and gold in the eastern sky where the sun was making a triumphal entry. Then he walked to the bow and watched the light gild the masts of the lumber-schooners and the fog-bank over the lake, and the carca.s.s of a drowned dog floating close at hand. He saw bits of the sh.o.r.e beyond the town and wanted to go there. He wanted to inspect the little squat lighthouse that shone in its reflected glory better than it ever shone at night. Yes, he must see all these things. It was all fairyland to him. The gig was carefully pulled alongside when, happy thought! a smoke would be just the thing. The weird figure dived down for pipe, matches, and "'baccy," and soon came up smiling. "Never knew anything so quiet as this," he said, as he filled the pipe. The snore below seemed to be the only note typical of the scene--not very musical, perhaps, but eloquent and artistically correct.

He had not gone far in the gig when he came across the picturesque drowned dog. Really it would be too bad to allow this to remain where it was, even though gilded. The sun would get up higher, and then there would be no poetry about it, but only plain dog. So he went back to the deck and saw a boat-hook. That would do well enough to remove the eyesore with, but how could he row and hold the boat-hook at the same time? If he only had a bit of string, now, or a piece of rope! But these articles are not to be found on a well-kept deck, and it would not be right to wake up anybody. Happy thought! He took the pike-pole and rowed rapidly toward the dog, and, as he pa.s.sed it, dropped the oars and grabbed the dog with the end of the pike-pole. His idea was that the momentum of the boat would, by repeated efforts, remove the dog. But the deceased was not to be coaxed in this way from the little harbor where he had so peacefully floated for four weeks. So Maurice, after suffering in the contest, went on board again. Still the snore below went on, and still n.o.body got up to help him. He searched the deck for any part of the rigging that would suit him, determined to cut away as much as he wanted of whatever came first. Ah! the signal halyards! He soon had about two hundred feet unrove, little recking of the man who had to "s.h.i.+n up" to the topmast-head to reeve the line again. The dog must go.

That Margaret's eyes should not be insulted was so settled in his chivalrous little head that--well, in fact, the dog would have to go, and, if not by hook or by crook, he finally went la.s.soed a good two hundred feet behind, Rankin rowing l.u.s.tily.

After this object had been committed to the deep, a seagull came and lighted on a floating plank to consider the situation, and gave a cry that could be heard a vast distance. Maurice rowed out about half a mile into the lake, and then could be seen a lithe figure diving in over the side of the boat and disporting itself, which uttered cries like a peac.o.c.k when it came to the surface, and interested the lethargic seagulls.

While he was doing this the fog bank slowly moved in from the lake and enveloped him, so that he began to wonder where the sh.o.r.e was. He got into the boat, without taking the trouble to don his garment, and rowed toward the place where he thought the sh.o.r.e was. Half an hour's rowing brought him back to some driftwood which he had noticed before, so he gave up rowing in circles, put on the garment, settled himself in the stern-sheets, and lit a pipe. The air was warm, and a gentle motion in the lake rocked him comfortably, until a voice aroused him that might have been a hundred yards or two miles off.

"Ahoy!" came over the water.

"Ahoy yourself," called Rankin.

Jack had got up, and, having missed the gig, had come to the end of the wharf in his ba.s.swood canoe, which the Ideal also carried in this cruise.

"By Jove," thought Jack, "I believe that's Morry out there in the fog; he will never get back as long as he can not see the sh.o.r.e."

"Ahoy there," he called again.

"Ahoy yourself," came back in a tone of indifference.

"Where are you?"

"Never you mind."

"Who is out there with you?"

"The gulls," answered Maurice, as he smiled to himself.

Jack did not quite hear him. "The Gull?" thought he. "Surely not! Why, he must be at least three miles off."

"Do you mean the Gull Light?" he called.

"Ya-as. What's the matter with you, any way?"

They were so far apart that their voices sounded to each other as if they came through a telephone.

At this time the fog had lifted from Maurice, and he lay basking in the sun, perfectly content with everything, while Jack, still enveloped in fog, was feeling quite anxious about him. He paddled quickly back to the yacht and got a pocket compa.s.s, and with this in the bottom of the canoe steered sou'-sou'west until he got out of the fog, and discovered the gig floating high up at the bow and low down aft, puffing smoke and drifting up the lake before an easterly breeze and looking, in the distance, rather like a steam-barge.

"Is that the costume you go cruising in?" asked Jack, as he drew near.

"This is the latest fas.h.i.+on, Mother Hubbard gown, don't you know!" said Maurice, as he viewed his spindle calves with satisfaction. "Look at that for a leg," he cried, as he waved a pipe-stem in the air. "No discount on that leg."

"Nor anything else," growled Jack. "What do you mean by going off this way with the s.h.i.+p's boats?"

"Not piracy, is it?" asked Morry.

"Don't know," said Jack, "but I am going to arrest you for being a dissolute, naked vagrant, without visible means of support, and I shall take you to the place whence you came and--"

"Bet you half a dollar you don't. I'm on the high seas, so 'get out of me nar-east coorse,' or by the holy poker I'll sink you."

Jack came along to tie the gig's painter to his canoe and thus take it into custody. Then a splas.h.i.+ng match followed, during which Jack got hold of the rope and began to paddle away. This was but a temporary advantage. A wild figure leaped from the gig and lit on the gunwale of the canoe, causing confusion in the enemy's fleet. Jack had just time to grab his compa.s.s when he was shot out into the "drink," as if from a catapult, and when he came to the surface he had to pick up his paddle, while Morry swam back to the gig, proceeding to row about triumphantly, having the enemy swamped and at his mercy. The overturned canoe would barely float Jack, so Rankin made him beg for mercy and promise to make him an eggnog when they reached the yacht. When on board again they slept three hours before anybody thought of getting up.

As eight o'clock was striking in the town, these two children thought it was time for everybody to be up. They were spoiling for some kind of devilment. Geoffrey and Charley and others were already awake, and had slipped into s.h.i.+rt and trousers to go away for a morning swim in the lake.

Jack visited the sleepers with a yell. Mr. Lemons, another proposed victim of the Dusenalls, still slept peacefully.

"Now, then, do get up!" cried Jack, in a tone of reproach.

"Wha's matter?"

"Get up," yelled Jack.

"Wha' for?"

"To wash yourself, man."

Suppressed laughter was heard from the ladies' cabins.

"Gor any washstands on board?" still half asleep, but sliding into an old pair of sailing trousers.

"Washstands? Well, I never! Wouldn't a Turkish bath satisfy you? No, sir! You'll dive off the end of the pier with the others."

"Not much. Gimme bucket an' piece soap."

"What! you won't wash yourself?" cried Jack, at the top of his voice.

"Oh, this is horrible! I say there, aft! you, fellows, come here! Lemons says he won't wash himself."

At this four or five men ran in and pulled him on deck, where Charley stood with a towel in his hand. No one would give Lemons a chance to explain. They said, "See here, skipper, Lemons won't wash himself."

Charley's countenance a.s.sumed an expression of disgust. "Oh, the dirty swab! Heave him overboard!"