Читать книгу Seibert of the Island - Gordon Young - Страница 23

Oreena sat cross-legged like a little Hindu on a divan, and every few minutes would snatch Nada to her in a smothering embrace, questioning and scolding, and all with so lively a play of tongue and gesture that one who had seen Oreena only in her haughty posing would not have thought it could possibly be the same small person.

Seibert sat close by, watching them, listening, smiling broadly.

The first moment that he was across the big room, anything like out of earshot, Nada asked, "You are happy?" and inclined her head significantly.

"Finest man in the world!" said Oreena quickly.

Nada, eyeing the back of the finest man, who had gone for a cigar, saw his massive shoulders stiffen in pride.

"Nothing he doesn't do for me. Like a great, fine dream, Nada. A great, fine dream," she repeated, with meditative lowering of her voice.

Seibert, when his cigar was smoked, left them. He must go, he had said, to see about the new tobacco field. One field hadn't been successful. Now he had cleared the jungle out of a low, hot valley. New seed was coming from Havana. He told Nada approximately how many tens of thousands of years the jungle in this valley had been dropping leaf mould, preparing the soil for him.

"This cigar"—he held up the smouldering stump—"is of leaf from Vuelta-abajo. I can raise as good as they do in Cuba."

He struck his chest, as if pointing out who he was; then, with a parting handshake, making her feel as heartily welcome as when she came, and telling her to come often, to stay, to live at their house, he strode out. His big shoulders were squared. He seemed to know that the women were watching him go. As soon as he got beyond the rug his spurs jangled importantly; then he stepped on a mat in the hall, and the jangle was lost. The heavy screen slammed on the veranda. Seibert was gone.

Oreena instantly raised both hands in a sweeping gesture, and sighed. Her little face was comically wry.

"Why—this?" Nada mimicked her.

"Shh-hh." Then Oreena called softly, sweetly: "Lalua?" There was no answer.

Quite stealthily she got up, and, slipping to a curtained doorway, jerked back the curtain. No one was behind it.

"You can never tell—until you have looked," she said. "That Lalua, she is part Chinaman or something. And she hates me. I know she does!"

"Who?"

"Just a servant."

"Why keep her?"

"The others are as bad."

She threw herself on Nada, clutching her, and whispered fiercely: "Why did you let me come from San Francisco? Why did you let me leave you? I should have stayed, too."

"But you were eager to come."

"No. I knew you didn't want me with you, and——"

"Oreena!"

"Oh, I've thought of you a thousand times a day—and the men—men have loved you. And I—here! Remember how we used to spill rum on sugar and watch the flies get drunk? I wish I had men like that over me. Oh, Nada, if I had only even a fly to love me!"

"But aren't you happy?"

"Happy? Me—here!"

"But you said——"

"I knew he'd hear. I said 'a great, fine dream.' That's just it. Now I am awake. Love him? Why, he's a fat old man—and sweats! He says it's healthy to sweat. And fertiliser. Talks about manures at breakfast, manures at dinner; at night manures. He smells of them. I'm so sick of it all I've wanted to die! Honestly, I've wanted to kill myself—to jump from a rock and die!"

"But he loves you, Oreena! I can see that he loves you."

"You just say that to put me in the wrong. Oh, Nada, I thought from you I would have sympathy."

"Oreena."

"I hate him. Love—with hands like that? You call it love to be grabbed and—you can't move! If I try to tease, 'Don't be a fool!' Other men aren't that way."

"You don't know men, my dear," said Nada, perhaps pretending to a little more wisdom than she had, in the hope of being consoling.

"No, I don't! I've been penned up on this wretched island, and you—it must have been wonderful for you in San Francisco. All I can do is go up by the waterfall and cry. Nobody can hear me cry with all that splashing, and cold water is there to wash my eyes when I am done.

"He knows that I go there—I say I like the place—and now he is making plans to dig it up—the bank, you know—and put in some of his old flowers. He is always going up there, just to decide what to do. It isn't for me. I know it isn't for me. He likes digging and planting. Oh, I hate these gardens and groves, all in rows, as if waiting to march. I want to get off in the jungle. It is the native in me. Don't you ever feel that way?"

"No, I should say not! I hate the jungle!"

"Then you should have married him. So does he. But you can't know how I feel, for you have been loved all your life. Everybody has loved you. I used to say, 'Nada is a little fool. She listens to anybody that says, "I love you."'"

"Oh, nothing of the kind."

"You did. And I wish I had. I haven't even friends, Nada. What friends can I have here? The natives I won't look at. I never would. You know that. The whites, down in the town, they won't look at me—not the women. They think I feel above them, and always did. Oh, I have paid for my 'airs,' as those seminary wretches called——"

"But why did you marry him? There are other men, and——"

"Oh, listen, Nada. When I first came home there was a man. Black hair and black eyes he had. When I was riding I used to see him watching me. Out of the corners of my eyes I could see how he stared. Then one day he got on horseback just so he could meet me. He couldn't ride, but he wanted to talk to me, so he had come on a horse. He rode right up, and just began talking. Oh, it was wonderful! He said, 'Look here, you're the prettiest thing I've seen, and I've looked at 'em all from Singapore to 'Frisco, 'Frisco to hell an' back!'

"That was what he said! To me! I nearly fainted. Oh, it was wonderful!

"'Miss Combe'—he had learned my name—'I've got a ship and a sack of dollars. You come with me, and we'll take this old world by the tail and whirl it over our heads. These fools around here say you are cold; they don't know a red-hot heart when they see it!'

"Oh, Nada, for one wild minute I wanted to do it! But I froze my lips, and I rode by him. I did not even speak. If I had opened my mouth I would have said, 'Yes!' He wasn't handsome, but I liked him. If he had been handsome I might have done it. I wish I had. I learned afterwards that he was a wild one. I wish I had!"

"Why, Oreena, what has got into you!"

"I never see anybody, not a soul—I mean to speak to. Once I pretended to be sick. I thought Dr. Lemaitre would come. I was just hungry for somebody I had known all my life. Mr. Seibert sent for him. He really did. I afterwards gave the boy a dollar to tell me honest, and Mr. Seibert had told him to bring Dr. Lemaitre, but he wouldn't come. He sent back word that there was a sick baby he couldn't leave. That made me so angry that I pretended to be worse. And then Mr. Seibert brought in a young idiot that he has to doctor the blacks and horses! Manure smell was on his clothes, too. The fool held my hand, pretending to feel my pulse! Oh, but he is an ugly thing, with glasses thick as my thumb. When Mr. Seibert wasn't looking the wretch kissed my hand! Oh, how I slapped him! It sounded like a shot. Mr. Seibert turned around. My, but that fellow was scared! So was I. I clapped my hands together, as if I was in pain, and moaned. I don't know why I did it. I just did it. Mr. Seibert would have killed him, and I wouldn't have cared, but I clapped my hands—like that!"

The little palms came together—smack!

Oreena laughed nervously; and Nada smiled, trying not to show that she was vaguely saddened.