Читать книгу Hills of Han: A Romantic Incident - Samuel Merwin - Страница 12

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Late that night Betty sat in her tiny stateroom, indulging rebellious thoughts. It was time, after an awkwardly silent evening, to go to bed. But instead she now slipped into her heavy traveling coat, pulled on her tam-o'-shanter, tiptoed past the Hasmers' door and went out on deck.

It was dim and peaceful there. The throb of the engines and the wash of water along the hull were the only sounds. They were in the strait now, heading out to sea.

She walked around the deck, and around. It was her first free moment since they left the Pacific ship at Yokohama. After that very quietly—sweetly, even—the chaperonage of Mrs. Hasmer had tightened. For Betty the experience was new and difficult. She felt that she ought to submit. But the rebellion in her breast, if wrong, was real. She would walk it off.

Then she met Mr. Brachey coming out of the smoking-room. Both stopped.

“Oh!” said he.

“I was just getting a breath of air,” said she.

Then they moved to the rail and leaned there, gazing off at the faintly moonlit land.

He asked, in his cold way, how she had learned Chinese.

“I was born at T'ainan-fu,” she explained. “My father is a missionary.”

“Oh,” said he. And again, “Oh!”

Then they fell silent. Her impulse at first was to make talk. She did murmur, “I really ought to be going in.” But he, apparently, found talk unnecessary. And she stayed on, looking now down at the iridescent foam slipping past the black hull, now up into the luminous night.

Then he remarked, casually, “Shall we walk?” And she found herself falling into step with him.

They stopped, a little later, up forward and stood looking out over the forecastle deck.

“Some day I'm going to ask the chief officer to let me go out there,” said she.

“It isn't necessary to ask him,” replied Mr. Brachey. “Come along.”

“Oh,” murmured Betty, half in protest—“really?” But she went, thrilled now, more than a little guilty, down the steps, past hatches and donkey engines, up other steps, under and over a tangle of cables, over an immense anchor, to seats on coils of rope near the very bow.

The situation amounted already to a secret. Mrs. Hasmer couldn't be told, mused Betty. The fact was a little perplexing. But it stood.

Neither had mentioned Mrs. Hasmer. But now he said:

“I was rude to-day, of course.”

“No,” said she. “No.”

“Oh, yes! I'm that way. The less I see of people the better.”

This touched the half-fledged woman in her.

“You're interested in your work,” said she gently. “That's all. And it's right. You're not a trifler.”

“I'm a lone wolf.”

She was beginning to find him out-and-out interesting.

“You travel a good deal,” she ventured demurely. “All the time. I prefer it.”

“Always alone?”

“Always.”

“You don't get lonesome?”

“Oh, yes. But what does it matter?”

She considered this. “You go into dangerous places.”

“Oh, yes.”

“You traveled among the head-hunters of Borneo.”

“How did you find that out?”

“There's an advertisment of that book in To-morrow in India.”

“Oh, have you read that thing?”

“Part of it. I …”

“You found it dull.”

“Well … it's a little over my head.”

“It's over everybody's. Mine.”

She nearly laughed at this. But he seemed not to think of it as humor.

“Aren't you a little afraid, sometimes—going into such dangerous places all alone?”

“Oh, no.”

“But you might be hurt—or even—killed.”

“What's the difference?”

Startled, she looked straight up at him; then dropped her eyes. She waited for him to explain, but he was gazing moodily out at the water ahead.

The soft night air wrapped them about like dream-velvet. Adventure was astir, and romance. Betty, enchanted, looked lazily back at the white midships decks, bridge and wheelhouse, at the mysterious rigging and raking masts, at the foremost of the huge funnels pouring out great rolling clouds of smoke. The engines throbbed and throbbed. Back there somewhere the ship's bell struck, eight times for midnight.

“I don't care much for missionaries,” said Mr. Brachey.

“You'd like father.”

“Perhaps.”

“He's a wonderful man. He's six feet five. And strong.”

“It's a job for little men. Little souls. With little narrow eyes.”

“Oh … No!”

“Why try to change the Chinese? Their philosophy is finer than ours. And works better. I like them.”

“So do I. But …” She wished her father could be there to meet the man's talk. There must surely be strong arguments on the missionary side, if one only knew them. She finally came out with:

“But they're heathen!”

“Oh, yes!”

“They're—they're polygamous!”

“Why not?”

“But Mr. Brachey …” She couldn't go on with this. The conversation was growing rather alarming.

“So are the Americans polygamous. And the other white peoples. Only they call it by other names. You get tired of it. The Chinese are more honest.”

“I wonder,” said she, suddenly steady and shrewd, “if you haven't stayed away too long.”

His reply was:

“Perhaps.”

“If you live—you know, all by yourself, and for nobody in the world except yourself—I mean, if there's nobody you're responsible for, nobody you love and take care of and suffer for …” The sentence was getting something involved. She paused, puckering her brows.

“Well?” said he.

“Why, I only meant, isn't there danger of a person like that becoming—well, just selfish.”

“I am selfish.”

“But you don't want to be.”

“Oh. but I do!”

“I can hardly believe that.”

“Dependence on others is as bad as gratitude. It is a demand, a weakness. Strength is better. If each of us stood selfishly alone, it would be a cleaner, better world. There wouldn't be any of this mess of obligation, one to another. No running up of spiritual debt. And that's the worst kind.”

“But suppose,” she began, a little afraid of getting into depths from which it might be difficult to extreate herself, “suppose—well, you were married, and there were—well, little children. Surely you'd have to feel responsible for them.”

“Surely,” said he curtly, “it isn't necessary for every man to bring children 'nto the world. Surely that's not the only job.”

“But—but take another case. Suppose you had a friend, a younger man, and he was in trouble—drinking, maybe; anything!—wouldn't you feel responsible for him?”

“Not at all. That's the worst kind of dependence. The only battles a man wins are the ones he wins alone. If any friend of mine—man or woman—can't win his own battles—or hers—he or she had better go. Anywhere. To hell, if it comes to that.”

He quite took her breath away.

One bell sounded.

“It's perfectly dreadful,” said she. “If Mrs. Has-mer knew I was out here at this time of night, she'd …”

This sentence died out. They went back.

“Good night,” said she.

She felt that he must think her very young and simple. It seemed odd that he should waste so much time on her. No other man she had ever met was like him. Hesitantly, desiring at least a touch of friendliness, on an impulse, she extended her hand.

He took it; held it a moment firmly; then said:

“Will you give me that drawing?”

“Yes,” said she.

“Now?”

“Yes.” And she tiptoed twice again past the Hasmers' door.

“Please sign it,” said he, and produced a pencil. “But it seems so silly. I mean, it's nothing, this sketch.”

“Please!”

She signed it, said good night again, and hurried off, her heart in a curious flutter.