Читать книгу Dinky Darbison - Edwin J Welch - Страница 7

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Glad of the opportunity to distract his attention from present troubles, Harold entered upon the topic with a degree of satisfaction, and the older sailor listened with increasing interest, as the story was told.

"To begin at the beginning," Armstead said, "my acquaintance with the Geffels began on the occasion of Neptune's visit to the good old windjammer Essex on our way out. We were, of course, crossing the line, and when His Majesty came aboard the usual horse-play was indulged in. You know their tricks, old chap."

"Yes," said Darbison, "I have to this day a lively recollection of my first crossing."

"Well, the regular procedure was religiously gone through, and it served, any way, as a break in the monotony of the daily routine.

"The chief feature was the induction of Geffel, who, with his wife and daughter, if she is his daughter, was a steerage passenger. He proved himself a most unwilling victim. He fought wildly and swore volubly in his native tongue, freely enriched with such samples of fiery English, as a year's domicile in a Soho restaurant, as waiter when a young man, had enabled him to acquire. But resistance availed him little in the grasp of the quaint looking athletes who posed as Neptune's court officials, urged to desperation by that monarch's devoted spouse, Amphitrite, a stalwart sailor disguised in an enormous crinoline, flowing skirts, and a huge wig of tow, a raddled face, and a large green umbrella, with which the court was constantly produced to renewed exertions.

"In spite of all his struggles and a perfect volcano of polyglot talk, Carl was compelled to submit to the devices of his captors.

"I can see the old fellow now, as I saw him then, blindfolded, his arms bound, placed on a plank over the coaming of the main hatch, beneath which was made fast by the corners a bellying tarpaulin full of sea water. He was then generously lathered all over the face and head with a white-wash brush dipped in a bucket of some mixture that looked white, but smelt of the hereafter, and the torrent of his eloquence—mainly consisting of threats of awful vengeance on his persecutors—only ceased when the contents of the brush were plastered over his open mouth. Then the court barber stepped up with a gigantic razor, fashioned out of iron hoop, and proceeded to shave him, taking off the rough of the lather only, and then somebody tipped the plank and Carl was spluttering and swearing in the good salt water beneath.

"With his release the ceremony was over. It had been a source of great amusement to the audience, which included most of the cabin passengers, gathered in groups on the break of the poop, and those from the steerage, amongst them being Geffel's wife and daughter. Mrs. Geffel showed no sign of disapproval of the way in which her husband was treated. Beside her stood a short, thick-set man of Jewish type, to whom she spoke frequently. Her hand was clasped in that of a sweet-faced girl of 11, or perhaps 12, years of age. That girl was Alice, then a child of remarkable beauty, more, perhaps, of expression than of actual feature, a small face lit up by large greyish-blue eyes, and surmounted by a wealth of glossy, crinkly hair, the color of ripening grain. The second officer had, in fact, rechristened her 'Cornflower' soon after the ship left port, and it certainly was impossible to trace the slightest resemblance between her and either of her reputed parents."

Here Darbison, who had been listening most intently to Armstead's narrative, interjected.

"I noticed that when they first came to Barumbah. I have said several times since, and still maintain, that there is some mystery attaching to Alice. She behaves in every way with the inmate characteristics of a high-born lady. But excuse my interruption, Armstead, and go on with your story."

"Well," proceeded Harold, "the groups speedily separated and dispersed to their respective quarters, Mrs. Geffel, with the child and her companion, stopping on their way to chat with a group of sailors, one of whom hazarded the opinion that 'that there Dutchy had a bad time in for somebody, if he knowed what it was to see the devil lookin' out of a man's eyes, an' if I was you, missus, I'd see as he didn't carry a wepping of any sort about with him!'

"She merely smiled and said:—'Oh! there's no fear, Carl isn't one of that sort, though I must say his temper don't seem to improve much since we left home. But I fancy the hot weather has something to do with that.'

"Eventually I got on quite friendly terms with Mrs. Geffel and learnt something of her story. Carl had never been what she considered a good husband to her; at least nothing like what she expected him to be when she married him. Then he was a waiter and she the cook in the little Soho restaurant, where foreigners of many nationalities gathered in the evening and spent the greater part of the night in the big room upstairs, drinking all sorts of foreign messes, gambling when they had anything left to gamble with, and invoking the help of the Evil One to destroy all crowns, powers, and principalities that stood between them and the objects of their wide-spread ambitions.

"Carl had been among them, if not actually of them, but be had always been kind and considerate towards her, whose life was persistently drab-colored, and when a police raid on the Soho establishment scattered its occupants, she was easily persuaded to marry him with a view to starting a little business of their own on somewhat similar lines. They did that at the cost of all their small savings, and lost everything. Then, by a lucky chance meeting with an old friend, Carl heard of an opening in a midland county, where the recently-married heir of an ancient and influential family was in want of a trustworthy man and his wife as house servants. How Carl contrived to get his references and testimonials she never knew, but they passed muster, and then all went well until—ah! yes, that was the way of it. She was suddenly stricken down with fever and moved to a cottage on the outskirts of the village, where the doctor came to see her often, and once or twice some ladies she had never seen before. And once she heard the doctor say; 'Yes, quite providential, isn't it?'

"Then she got better slowly, and found her hair had all been cut off, and a beautiful baby was in a tiny cot beside the bed, and everything was provided for it.

"Her baby? No, certainly not! But she was to claim it as hers, and a regular allowance could be paid quarterly for it, and Carl was quite satisfied, and they were to leave Elmcourt and go back to London, where friends would provide for them until the child should be claimed. So, she never knew for certain who the parents were, although almost sure she knew the mother. But the child—that is Alice—had never suspected anything and, please God, never would. For she had always loved the child as though it was her very own, and now it really was, for the lawyer and written long before they left England to say that no more payments could be made, so then they started another little business that failed like the first one they had, and with the few pounds that were left they decided for Australia, the diggings—and fortune.

"Oh! yes, Carl was fond of Alice in his own queer way, but he was always a man of most uncertain temper, although, she supposed, as good enough husband as husbands go.

"I thought it just as well to give her a hint about her apparent preference for the society of Sim Garcia, the chap who stood by her side when her husband was put through by Neptune.

"'Garcia,' she said. 'What nonsense!' Why, of course she never cared a straw about him, and her husband knew it too. He and Carl got to be chummy in the old Soho days, and after she was married Carl brought him home sometimes to tea. 'Sim,' as they called him, wasn't a bad sort at all, outside that club nonsense that he and Carl were mixed up in. As for his going out in the same ship, that was just pure accident. He seemed to have struck hard times the same as themselves, and they never knew he was on board till days after they sailed.

"She admitted without hesitation, that Carl had been absurdly jealous of her friendship with Sim Garcia, for which there was absolutely no reason whatever."

"And he manifested that unreasonable jealousy at times here," broke in Darbison.

"It was the suspicious nature of the man," continued Armstead, "backed by his desire for vengeance against those who had subjected him to such rough treatment at the hands of Neptune and his satellites, that prompted him to take the first opportunity of soothing his ruffled dignity, and that was not long in presenting itself. He began by attacking his wife on the subject of her evident preference for the company of Garcia, as shown by the fact that together they had evidently enjoyed his sufferings at the hands of 'dose tam picks of sailor mans,' and he had seen them laugh heartily 'ven der pick vomans knock him off der shtool into der vasser.'

"Then he called her evil names, and she escaped from the cabin, and took refuge under the open hatch, which was immediately over their quarters. Following, he tried to drag her back, but she clung with desperation to an iron standard, appealing piteously to be let go, he all the time denouncing her in deep, harsh gutterals for her supposed perfidy.

"In the middle of the altercation, and before any of the other occupants of the quarters appeared to consider it necessary to interfere, one of the first cabin passengers, little more than a boy, was making his way aft, disgusted with his futile efforts to use the grains on a dolphin from a perch on the bobstays, and was attracted by the noise.

"Looking down the hatchway, he quickly grasped the situation, and, shouting:—'Let the woman alone, you brute!' was soon between them, and speedily received the reward of his temerity in the shape of heavy blows from the fist of the surprised but athletic Carl.

"However praiseworthy the impulse which had prompted him to interfere in a quarrel between a man and his wife, the youngster had yet to learn the unwisdom of such action. The woman grasped him by the hair with both hands, screaming, 'Let go my husband!' and fell prostrate on the deck at the same moment that Sim Garcia appeared on the scene and tried to get between the combatants.

"Let the boy alone, Carl, he's no match for you, and you know it. Let him go, I tell you. By heavens, I think the man has gone mad! If you don't let him go, I'll——"

"'Ha! Sim, you verdamte dog, it vas you, eh? Ya, I am mat, isn't id? Vell, dis dime I do nod any misdake make. You haf make me kill mein vife, und now I vill also kill you.'

"And the two men were locked in what looked like a life and death struggle, in which Carl's powerful frame gave him every advantage. In the meantime, Mrs. Geffel, in an unconscious condition, had been removed by some of the other women, and Sim had succeeded in planting one or two blows in the face of his adversary, when a voice was heard from behind:—

"'Look out. Sim! He's got a knife!'

"It was a fact. The now infuriated Carl had drawn a butcher's knife from its sheath on his belt, and with upraised arm was in the act of striking, when his wrist was seized in the sturdy grip of the chief officer, who had been carrying out the captain's orders to shorten sail, and was only just in time to drop suddenly down the hatchway and help to wrest the weapon from the maniac's grasp.

"Geffel's struggles, furious as they were, availed him nothing. A couple of sturdy sailors quickly had his arms pinioned, in which manner he was haled before the captain.

"As the latter listened to the narrative of his chief officer his whole demeanor changed. He was no longer the genial skipper, but the stern, uncompromising dispenser of quarter-deck justice. The evidence of Sim Garcia, the would-be dolphin striker, and some of the steerage passengers was taken, and then, with all a British sailor's horror of the knife as a lethal weapon, he turned to the prisoner with:—'Now, my man, what have you to say in answer to this serious charge?'

"'I say nodings. Dis verdamte schvine haf bin make lofe vid mein vife."

"The captain did not hesitate. He ordered that Geffel should be placed in irons and handed over to the authorities the moment the Essex reached Melbourne, on a charge of attempting to commit murder on the high seas.

"The former part of the sentence was immediately put into effect, and that the latter part was not also carried out was due chiefly to the earnest pleadings of his wife, who had a long interview with the captain, during which she succeeded in conveying the impression that perhaps she was not entirely free from blame in consequence of the unconventional terms of the long association between her husband, Garcia, and herself.

"But it took a long time to shift Carl from the obstinate position he had taken up, and to make promises for the future, hard though wife and child tried to induce him to do so.

"Alice was nearly broken-hearted over the estrangement, and on more than one occasion endeavored to induce her friend, Mr. Parkin, the second officer, to intercede with the captain for the release of 'poor daddy.' 'Mother is fretting herself to death over it,' she said one day. 'Oh! please, dear Mr. Parkin, do tell the captain that you are quite sure daddy is very sorry, and will never be so wicked again.'

"'No use, Cornflower. I can't talk to him like that. He wouldn't listen to me. Why not do it yourself, lassie? He has little girls of his own, and I'm sure he'd be kind to you. He's just gone into his cabin, go and knock at the door.' And she did, and the result of all the pleadings was that Carl was eventually allowed to return to his cabin, not, however, without warning of what would happen in the event of another outbreak.

"'You owe your release solely to the pleadings of your unfortunate wife and child, Geffel,' said the captain to him. 'You are evidently a man of suspicious nature and violent temper. Better curb it before it is too late. Mrs. Geffel is, I feel sure, a really good, honest woman, and if you are not ashamed of yourself you ought to be. You can go back to your berth now, but take care not to break out again. If I have to put you in irons a second time you will stop there until I can hand you over to the police. Go below, and make your peace as best you can.'

"'Dank you, gaptains. I do not any more haf some irons, and I makes you no more droubles.'

"Neither did he, and Melbourne was reached in due course, and the Geffels vanished from sight with the crowd, only, however, to be met with again, as you have seen, after the lapse of many years, in Queensland, and under even more exciting conditions. Truly, the currents of human lives are strangely intermingled."

"A strange and most interesting story," said Darbison. "I have always felt that there was more than a tinge of mystery about the Geffels, and more especially as to their daughter Alice. Some day, perhaps, the full and true story will be known. Until then we can only wait and watch the ever-changing events that circle round them.

"And now," added Darbison, rising, "as we both have to face the road to-morrow, we had better turn in. It is to be our last night at Barumbah, and, hang it all, I like the old spot, despite the sad memories it must always have for me."

"Perhaps, some day, who knows, we may meet again under conditions that will effectually efface the very bitter events that have so recently occurred.

"So (extending his hand), good-bye, old chap."