Читать книгу Geoffrey Hampstead: A Novel - Jarvis Stinson - Страница 8

Mr. Maurice Rankin was enjoying his summer vacation. Although the courts were closed he still could be seen carrying his blue bag through the street on his way to and from the police court and other places. It is true that, for ordinary professional use, the bag might have been abandoned, but how was he to know when a sprat might catch a whale? – to say nothing of the bag's being so convenient for the secret and non-committal transportation of those various and delectable viands that found their way to his aerial abode at No. 173 Tremaine Buildings. He was now provided by the law printers with pamphlet copies of the decisions in different courts, and a few of these might always be found in his bag. They served to fill out to the proper dimensions this badge of a rank entitling him to the affix of esquire, and they had been well oiled by parcels of butter or chops which, on warm days, tried to lubricate this dry brain food as if for greater rapidity in the bolting of it.

In this way he was passing his summer vacation. Many a time he thought of his father's wealth before his failure and death. Where had those thousands melted away to? Oh, for just one of the thousands to set him on his feet! This perpetual grind, this endless seeking for work, with no more hope in it than to be able to get even with his butcher's bill at the end of the month! To see every person else go away for an outing somewhere while he remained behind began to make him dispirited. The buoyancy of his nature, which at first could take all his trials as a joke, was beginning to wear off. After yielding himself to their peculiar piquancy for six months, these jokes seemed to have lost their first freshness, and he longed to get away somewhere for a little change. The return, then, he thought, would be with renewed spirit.

While thinking over these matters his step homeward was tired and slow. He was by no means robust, and his narrow face had grown more hatchety than ever in the last few hot days. Hope deferred was beginning to tell upon him, but a surprise awaited him.

Jack Cresswell and Charley Dusenall were walking at this time on the other side of the street. They sighted Rankin going along gloomily, with his nose on the ground, well dressed and neat as usual, but weighted down, apparently with business, really with loneliness, law reports, and lamb-chops.

They both pointed to him at once. Jack said, "The very man!" and Charlie said, nodding assent, "Just as good as the next." Jack clapped Charley on the back – "By Jove, I hope he will come! Do him all the good in the world."

Charley was one of those happy-go-lucky, loose-living young men who have companions as long as their money lasts, and who seem made of some transmutable material which, when all things are favorable, shows some suggestion of solidity, but, when acted upon by the acid of poverty, degenerates into something like that parasitic substance remarkable for its receptibility of liquids, called a sponge. He liked Rankin, although he thought him a queer fish, and he would laugh with the others when Rankin's quiet satire was pointed at himself, not knowing but that there might be a joke somewhere, and not wishing to be out of it.

The two young men crossed the road and walked up to Rankin who was just about to enter Tremaine Buildings. Charlie asked him to come on a yachting cruise around Lake Ontario – to be ready in two days – that Jack would tell him all about it, as he was in a hurry. He then made off, without waiting for Maurice to reply.

Jack explained to Rankin that the yacht was to take out a party, with the young ladies under the chaperonage of Mrs. Dusenall, that the two Misses Dusenall, and Nina and Margaret were going, that he and Geoffrey Hampstead and two or three of the yacht-club men would lend a hand to work the craft, and that Rankin would be required to take the helm during the dead calms. As Rankin listened he brightened up and looked along the street in meditation.

"The business," he said thoughtfully, "will perish. Bean can't run my business."

His large mouth spread over his face as he yielded himself to the warmth of the sunny vista before him. Already he felt himself dancing over the waves. Suddenly, as they stood at the entrance to Tremaine Buildings, he caught Jack by the arm and whispered – so that clients, thronging the streets might not overhear:

"The business," he whispered. "What about it?" He drew off at arm's length and transfixed Jack with his eagle eye. Then, as if to typify his sudden and reckless abandonment of all the great trusts reposed in him, he slung the blue bag as far as he could up the stairs while he cried that the business might "go to the devil."

"Correct," said Jack. "It will be all safe with him. You know he is the father of lawyers. But I say, old chap, I am awfully glad you are coming with us. You see, the old lady has to get those girls married off somehow, and several fellows will go with us who are especially picked out for the business. Then, of course, the Dusenall girls want 'backing,' and they thought Nina and I could certainly give them a lead. And Nina would not go without Margaret. I rather think, too, that Geoffrey would not go without Margaret. Wheels within wheels, you see. Have you not got a lady-love, Morry, to bring along? No? Well, I tell you, old man, I expect to enjoy myself. I've been round that lake a good many times, but never with Nina."

Jack blushed as he admitted so much to his old friend, and after a pause he went on, with a young man's facile change of thought, to talk about the yacht.

"And we will just make her dance, and don't you forget it."

"But, my dear fellow, won't she object?"

"Object? No – likes it. She is coming out in a brand-new suit. Wait till you see her. She'll be a dandy."

"I can quite believe that she will appear more beautiful than ever," said Maurice, rather mystified.

"She is as clean as a knife, clean as a knife. I tell you, Morry, her shape just fills the eye. She – "

"Oh, yes, I understand. You are speaking of the yacht. I thought when you said you would make her dance that you referred to Miss Lindon. Excuse my ignorance of yachting terms. I know absolutely nothing about them."

"Never mind, old man, you might easily make the mistake. Talking of dancing now, I had a turn with her the other day and I will say this much – that she can waltz and no mistake. You could steer her with one finger."

"And shall we rig this spinnaker boom on her?" asked Rankin, with interest. "What is a spinnaker boom? I have always wanted to know."

"Spinnaker on who? or what?" cried Jack, looking vexed. "Don't be an ass, Rankin."

"My dear fellow – a thousand pardons – I certainly presumed you still spoke of the yacht. It is perfectly impossible to understand which you refer to."

"Well, perhaps it is," replied Jack; "I mix the two up in my speech just as they are mixed up in my heart, and I love them both. So let us have a glass of sherry to them in my room."

"I think," said Rankin, smiling, with his head on one side, "that to prevent further confusion we ought to drink a glass to each love separately, in order to discriminate sufficiently between the different interests."

"Happy thought," said Jack. "And just like you robbers. Every interest must be represented. Fees out of the estate, every time."

After gulping down the first glass of sherry in the American fashion, they sat sipping the second as the Scotch and English do. It struck Rankin as peculiar that Mr. Lindon allowed Nina to go off on this yachting cruise when he must know that Jack would be on board. He asked him how he accounted for his luck in this respect.

Jack said: "I can not explain it altogether to myself. The old boy sent her off to Europe to get her away from me, and that little manœuvre was not successful in making her forget me. I think that now he has washed his hands of the matter, and lets her do entirely as she pleases – except as to matrimony. They don't converse together on the subject of your humble servant. He is fond of Nina in his own way – when his ambition is not at stake. One thing I feel sure of, that we might wait till crack of doom before his consent to our marriage would be obtained. I never knew such a man for sticking to his own opinion."

"But you could marry now and keep a house, in a small way," said Rankin.

"Too small a way for Nina. She knows no more of economy than a babe. No; I may have been unwise, from a practical view, to fall in love with her, but the affair must go on now; we will get married some way or other. Perhaps the old boy will die. At any rate, although I have no doubt she would go in for 'love in a cottage,' I don't think it would be right of me to subject her to the loss of her carriage, servants, entertainments, and gay existence generally. Of course she would be brave over it, but the effort would be very hard upon the dear little woman."

When Jack thought of Nina his heart was apt to lose some of its chronometer movement. He turned and began fumbling for his pipe.

Maurice wished to pull him together, as it were, and said, as he grasped the decanter and filled the wine glasses again:

"Thank you; I don't mind if I do. Now I come to think of it, your first proposed toast was the right one. For the next three weeks at least we do not intend to separate the lady from the yacht. Why should we drink them separately? Ho, ho! we will drink to them collectively!" He waved his glass in the air. "Here's to The Lady and the Yacht considered as one indivisible duo. May they be forever as entwined in our hearts as they are incomprehensibly mixed up in our language!"

"Hear, hear!" cried Jack, with renewed spirit. "Drink hearty!" And then he energetically poured out another, and said "Tiger!" – after which they lit cigars and went out, feeling happy and much refreshed, while Rankin quite forgot the blue bag and the contents thereof yielding rich juices to the law-reports in the usual way.

About ten o'clock on the following Saturday morning valises were being stowed away on board the yacht Ideal, and maidens fair and sailors free were aglow with the excitement of departure. The yacht was swinging at her anchor while the new cruising mainsail caused her to careen gently as the wind alternately caught each side of the snowy canvas. A large blue ensign at the peak was flapping in the breeze, impatient for the start, while the main-sheet bound down and fettered the plunging and restless sail. Lounging about the bows of the vessel were a number of professional sailors with Ideal worked across the breasts of their stout blue jerseys. The headsails were loosed and ready to go up, and the patent windlass was cleared to wind up the anchor chain. Away aloft at the topmast head the blue peter was promising more adventures and a new enterprise, while grouped about the cockpit were our friends in varied garb, some of whom nervously regarded the plunging mainsail which refused to be quieted. Rankin was the last to come over the side, clad in a dark-blue serge suit, provided at short notice by the long-suffering Score. His leather portmanteau, lent by Jack, had scarcely reached the deck before the blocks were hooked on and the gig was hoisted in to the davits. Margaret, sitting on the bulwarks, with an arm thrown round a backstay to steady her, was taking in all the preparations with quiet ecstasy, her eyes following every movement aloft and her lips softly parted with sense of invading pleasure.

Mrs. Dusenall was down in the after-cabin making herself more busy than useful. Instead of leaving everything to the steward, the good woman was unpacking several baskets which had found their way aft by mistake. In a very clean locker devoted solely to charts she stowed away five or six pies, wedging them, thoughtfully, with a sweet melon to keep them quiet. Then she found that the seats at the side could be raised, and here she placed a number of articles where they stood a good chance of slipping under the floor and never being seen again. Fortunately for the party, her pride in her work led her to point out what she had done to the steward, who, speechless with dismay, hastily removed everything eatable from her reach.

As the anchor left its weedy bed, the brass carronade split the air in salute to the club and the blue ensign dipped also, while the headsail clanked and rattled up the stay. There was nobody at the club house, but the ladies thought that the ceremony of departure was effective.

Jack was at the wheel as she paid off on the starboard tack toward the eastern channel, and Geoffrey and others were slacking off the main-sheet when Rankin heard himself called by Jack, who said hurriedly:

"Morry, will you let go that lee-backstay?"

Maurice and Margaret left it immediately and stood aside. Jack forgot, in the hurry of starting, that Rankin knew nothing of sailing, and called louder to him again, pointing to the particular rope: "Let go that lee-backstay."

"Who's touching your lee-backstay?" cried Morry indignantly.

The boom was now pressing strongly on the stay, while Jack, seeing his mistake, leaned over and showed Rankin what to do. He at once cast off the rope from the cleat, and, there being a great strain on it, the end of it when loosed flew through his fingers so fast that it felt as if red hot.

"Holy Moses!" cried he, blowing on his fingers, "that rope must have been lying on the stove." He examined the rope again, and remarked that it was quite cool now. The pretended innocence of the little man was deceiving. The Honorable Marcus Travers Head, one of the rich intended victims of the Dusenalls, leaned over to Jack and asked who and what Rankin was.

"He's an original – that's what he is," said Jack, with some pride in his friend, although Rankin's by-play was really very old.

"What! ain't he soft?" inquired the Hon. M. T., with surprise.

"About as soft as that brass cleat," said Jack shortly. "I say, old Emptyhead, you just keep your eye open when he's around and you'll learn something."

There was a murmur of "Ba-a Jeuve!" and the honorable gentleman regarded Rankin in a new light.

The Ideal was a sloop of more than ordinary size, drawing about eight feet of water without the small center-board, which she hardly required for ordinary sailing. Her accommodations were excellent, and her internal fittings were elegant, without being so wildly expensive as in some of the American yachts. Her comparatively small draught of water enabled her to enter the shallow ports on the lakes, and yet she was modeled somewhat like a deep-draught boat, having some of her ballast bolted to her keel, like the English yachts. Her cruising canvas was bent on short spars, which relieved the crew in working her, but, even with this reduction, her spread of canvas was very large, so that her passage across the bay toward the lake was one of short duration.

To Margaret and Maurice the spirited start which they made was one of unalloyed delight. For two such fresh souls "delight" is quite the proper word. They crossed over to the weather side and sat on the bulwarks, where they could command a view of the whole boat. It was a treat for all hands to see their bright faces watching the man aloft cast loose the working gaff-topsail. When they heard his voice in the sky calling out "Hoist away," Morry waved his hand with abandon and called out also "Hoist away," as if he would hoist away and overboard every care he knew of, and when the booming voice aloft cried "Sheet home," it was as good as five dollars to see Margaret echo the word with commanding gesture – only she called it "Sea foam," which made the sailors turn their quids and snicker quietly among themselves. But when the huge cream-colored jib-topsail went creaking musically up from the bowsprit-end, filling and bellying and thundering away to leeward, and growing larger and larger as it climbed to the topmast head, their admiration knew no bounds. As the sail was trimmed down, they felt the good ship get her "second wind," as it were, for the rush out of the bay. It was as if sixteen galloping horses had been suddenly harnessed to the boat, and Margaret fairly clapped her hands. Maurice called to Jack approvingly:

"You said you would make her dance."

"She's going like a scalded pup," cried Jack poetically in reply, and he held her down to it with the wheel, tenderly but firmly, as he thereby felt the boat's pulse. When they came to the eastern channel Jack eased her up so close to the end of the pier that Maurice involuntarily retreated from the bulwarks for fear she would hit the corner. The jib-topsail commenced to thunder as the yacht came nearer the wind, but this was soon silenced, and half a dozen men on the main-sheet flattened in the after-canvas as she passed between the crib-work at the sides of the channel in a way that gave one a fair opportunity for judging her speed.