The Life Everlasting: A Reality of Romance Part 3

"You'll be in a floating palace,"--said Francesca, as we approached Rothesay pier, and she bade me an affectionate adieu--"Now take care of yourself, and don't fly away to the moon on what you call an etheric vibration! Remember, if you get tired of the Harlands to come to me at once."

I promised, and we parted. On landing at Rothesay I was almost immediately approached by a sailor from the 'Diana,' who, spying my name on my luggage, quickly possessed himself of it and told me the motor launch was in waiting to take me over to the yacht. I was on my way across the sparkling bay before the 'Columba' started out again from the pier, and Francesca, standing on the steamer's deck, waved to me a smiling farewell as I went. In about ten minutes I was on board the 'Diana,' shaking hands with Morton Harland and his daughter Catherine, who, wrapped up in shawls on a deck chair, looked as though she were guarding herself from the chills of a rigorous winter rather than basking in the warm suns.h.i.+ne of a summer morning.

"You look very well!"--she said, in tones of plaintive amiability--"And so wonderfully bright!"

"It's such a bright day,"--I answered, feeling as if I ought somehow to apologise for a healthy appearance, "One can't help being happy!"

She sighed and smiled faintly, and her maid appearing at that moment to take my travelling bag and wraps, I was shown the cabin, or rather the state-room which was to be mine during the cruise. It was a luxurious double apartment, bedroom and sitting-room together, divided only by the hanging folds of a rich crimson silk curtain, and exquisitely fitted with white enamelled furniture ornamented with hand-wrought silver. The bed had no resemblance whatever to a s.h.i.+p's berth, but was an elaborate full-sized affair, canopied in white silk embroidered with roses; the carpet was of a thick softness into which my feet sank as though it were moss, and a tall silver and crystal vase, full of gorgeous roses, was placed at the foot of a standing mirror framed in silver, so that the blossoms were reflected double. The sitting-room was provided with easy chairs, a writing-table, and a small piano, and here, too, ma.s.ses of roses showed their fair faces from every corner.

It was all so charming that I could not help uttering an exclamation of delight, and the maid who was unpacking my things smiled sympathetically.

"It's perfectly lovely!" I said, turning to her with eagerness--"It's quite a little fairyland! But isn't this Miss Harland's cabin?"

"Oh dear no, miss,"--she replied--"Miss Harland wouldn't have all these things about her on any account. There are no carpets or curtains in Miss Harland's rooms. She thinks them very unhealthy. She has only a bit of matting on the floor, and an iron bedstead--all very plain. And as for roses!--she wouldn't have a rose near her for ever so!--she can't bear the smell of them."

I made no comment. I was too enchanted with my surroundings for the moment to consider how uncomfortable my hostess chose to make herself.

"Who arranged these rooms?" I asked.

"Mr. Harland gave orders to the steward to make them as pretty as he could,"--said the maid--"John" and she blushed--"has a lot of taste."

I smiled. I saw at once how matters were between her and "John." Just then there was a sound of thudding and grinding above my head, and I realised that we were beginning to weigh anchor. Quickly tying on my yachting cap and veil, I hurried on deck, and was soon standing beside my host, who seemed pleased at the alacrity with which I had joined him, and I watched with feelings of indescribable exhilaration the 'Diana' being loosed from her moorings. Steam was up, and in a very short time her bowsprit swung round and pointed outward from the bay.

Quivering like an eager race-horse ready to start, she sprang forward; and then, with a stately sweeping curve, glided across the water, catting it into bright wavelets with her sword-like keel and churning a path behind her of opalescent foam. We were off on our voyage of pleasure at last,--a voyage which the Fates had determined should, for one adventurer at least, lead to strange regions as yet unexplored. But no premonitory sign was given to me, or suggestion that I might be the one chosen to sail 'the perilous seas of fairy lands forlorn'--for in spiritual things of high import, the soul that is most concerned is always the least expectant.

II

THE FAIRY s.h.i.+P

I was introduced that evening at dinner to Mr. Harland's physician, and also to his private secretary. I was not greatly prepossessed in favour of either of these gentlemen. Dr. Brayle was a dark, slim, clean-shaven man of middle age with expressionless brown eyes and sleek black hair which was carefully brushed and parted down the middle,--he was quiet and self-contained in manner, and yet I thought I could see that he was fully alive to the advantages of his position as travelling medical adviser to an American millionaire. I have not mentioned till now that Morton Harland was an American. I was always rather in the habit of forgetting the fact, as he had long ago forsworn his nationality and had naturalised himself as a British subject. But he had made his vast fortune in America, and was still the controlling magnate of many large financial interests in the States. He was, however, much more English than American, for he had been educated at Oxford, and as a young man had been always a.s.sociated with English society and English ways. He had married an English wife, who died when their first child, his daughter, was born, and he was wont to set down all Miss Catherine's mopish languors to a delicacy inherited from her mother, and to lack of a mother's care in childhood. In my opinion Catherine was robust enough, but it was evident that from a very early age she had been given her own way to the fullest extent, and had been so accustomed to have every little ailment exaggerated and made the most of that she had grown to believe health of body and mind as well-nigh impossible to the human being. Dr. Brayle, I soon perceived, lent himself to this att.i.tude, and I did not like the covert gleam of his mahogany-coloured eyes as he glanced rapidly from father to daughter in the pauses of conversation, watching them as narrowly as a cat might watch a couple of unwary mice. The secretary, Mr. Swinton, was a pale, precise-looking young man with a somewhat servile demeanour, under which he concealed an inordinately good opinion of himself. His ideas were centred in and bounded by the art of stenography,--he was an adept in shorthand and typewriting, could jot down, I forget how many crowds of jostling words a minute, and never made a mistake. He was a clock-work model of punctuality and dispatch, of respectfulness and obedience,--but he was no more than a machine,--he could not be moved to a spontaneous utterance or a spontaneous smile, unless both smile and utterance were the result of some pleasantness affecting himself. Neither Dr. Brayle nor Mr. Swinton were men whom one could positively like or dislike,--they simply had the power of creating an atmosphere in which my spirit found itself swimming like a gold-fish in a bowl, wondering how it got in and how it could get out.

As I sat rather silently at table I felt, rather than saw, Dr. Brayle regarding me with a kind of perplexed curiosity. I was as fully aware of his sensations as of my own,--I knew that my presence irritated him, though he was not clever enough to explain even to himself the cause of his irritation. So far as Mr. Swinton was concerned, he was comfortably wrapped up in a pachydermatous hide of self-appreciation, so that he thought nothing about me one way or the other except as a guest of his patrons, and one therefore to whom he was bound to be civil. But with Dr. Brayle it was otherwise. I was a puzzle to him, and--after a brief study of me--an annoyance. He forced himself into conversation with me, however, and we interchanged a few remarks on the weather and on the various beauties of the coast along which we had been sailing all day.

"I see that you care very much for fine scenery," he said--"Few women do."

"Really?" And I smiled. "Is admiration of the beautiful a special privilege of men only?"

"It should be,"--he answered, with a little bow--"We are the admirers of your s.e.x."

I made no answer. Mr. Harland looked at me with a somewhat quizzical air.

"You are not a believer in compliments," he said.

"Was it a compliment?" I asked, laughingly--"I'm afraid I'm very dense!

I did not see that it was meant as one."

Dr. Brayle's dark brows drew together in a slight frown. With that expression on his face he looked very much like an Italian poisoner of old time,--the kind of man whom Caesar Borgia might have employed to give the happy dispatch to his enemies by some sure and undiscoverable means known only to intricate chemistry.

Presently Mr. Harland spoke again, while he peeled a pear slowly and delicately with a deft movement of his fruit knife that suggested cruelty and the flaying alive of some sentient thing.

"Our little friend is of a rather strange disposition," he observed--"She has the indifference of an old-world philosopher to the saying of speeches that are merely socially agreeable. She is ardent in soul, but suspicious in mind! She imagines that a pleasant word may often be used to cover a treacherous action, and if a man is as rude and blunt as myself, for example, she prefers that he should be rude and blunt rather than that he should attempt to conceal his roughness by an amiability which it is not his nature to feel." Here he looked up at me from the careful scrutiny of his nearly flayed pear. "Isn't that so?"

"Certainly,"--I answered--"But that's not a 'strange' or original att.i.tude of mind."

The corners of his ugly mouth curled satirically.

"Pardon me, dear lady, it is! The normal and strictly reasonable att.i.tude of the healthy human Pigmy is that It should accept as gospel all that It is told of a nature soothing and agreeable to Itself. It should believe, among other things, that It is a very precious Pigmy among natural forces, destined to be immortal, and to share with Divine Intelligence the privileges of Heaven. Put out by the merest trifle, troubled by a spasm, driven almost to howling by a toothache, and generally helpless in all very aggravated adverse circ.u.mstances, It should still console Itself with the idea that Its being, Its proportions and perfections are superb enough to draw down Deity into a human shape as a creature of human necessities in order that It, the Pigmy, should claim kins.h.i.+p with the Divine now and for ever! What gorgeous blasphemy in such a scheme!--what magnificent arrogance!" I was silent, but I could almost hear my heart beating with suppressed emotion. I knew Morton Harland was an atheist, so far as atheism is possible to any creature born of spirit as well as matter, but I did not think he would air his opinions so openly and at once before me the first evening of my stay on board his yacht. I saw, however, that he spoke in this way hoping to move me to an answering argument for the amus.e.m.e.nt of himself and the other two men present, and therefore I did what was inc.u.mbent upon me to do in such a situation--held my peace.

Dr. Brayle watched me curiously,--and poor Catherine Harland turned her plaintive eyes upon me full of alarm. She had learned to dread her father's fondness for starting topics which led to religious discussions of a somewhat heated nature. But as I did not speak, Mr.

Harland was placed in the embarra.s.sing position of a person propounding a theory which no one shows any eagerness to accept or to deny, and, looking slightly confused, he went on in a lighter and more casual way--

"I had a friend once at Oxford,--a wonderful fellow, full of strange dreams and occult fancies. He was one of those who believed in the Divine half of man. He used to study curious old books and ma.n.u.scripts till long past midnight, and never seemed tired. His father had lived by choice in some desert corner of Egypt for forty years, and in Egypt this boy had been born. Of his mother he never spoke. His father died suddenly and left him a large fortune under trustees till he came of age, with instructions that he was to be taken to England and educated at Oxford, and that when he came into possession of his money, he was to be left free to do as he liked with it. I met him when he was almost half-way through his University course. I was only two or three years his senior, but he always looked much younger than I. And he was, as we all said, 'uncanny '--as uncanny as our little friend,"--here indicating me by a nod of his head and a smile which was meant to be kindly--"He never practised or 'trained' for anything and yet all things came easily to him. He was as magnificent in his sports as he was in his studies, and I remember--how well I remember it!--that there came a time at last when we all grew afraid of him. If we saw him coming along the 'High' we avoided him,--he had something of terror as well as admiration for us,--and though I was of his college and constantly thrown into a.s.sociation with him, I soon became infected with the general scare. One night he stopped me in the quadrangle where he had his rooms--"

Here Mr. Harland broke off suddenly.

"I'm boring you,"--he said--"I really have no business to inflict the recollections of my youth upon you."

Dr. Brayle's brown eyes showed a glistening animal interest.

"Pray go on!" he urged--"It sounds like the chapter of a romance."

"I'm not a believer in romance,"--said Mr. Harland, grimly--"Facts are enough in themselves without any embroidered additions. This fellow was a Fact,--a healthy, strong, energetic, living Fact. He stopped me in the quadrangle as I tell you,--and he laid his hand on my shoulder. I shrank from his touch, and had a restless desire to get away from him.

'What's the matter with you, Harland?' he said, in a grave, musical voice that was peculiarly his own--'You seem afraid of me. If you are, the fault is in yourself, not in me!' I shuffled my feet about on the stone pavement, not knowing what to say--then I stammered out the foolish excuses young men make when they find themselves in an awkward corner. He listened to my stammering remarks about 'the other fellows'

with attentive patience,--then he took his hand from my shoulder with a quick, decisive movement. 'Look here, Harland'--he said--'You are taking up all the conventions and traditions with which our poor old Alma Mater is encrusted, and sticking them over you like burrs. They'll cling, remember! It's a pity you choose this way of going,--I'm starting at the farther end--where Oxford leaves off and Life begins!'

I suppose I stared--for he went on--'I mean Life that goes forward,--not Life that goes backward, picking up the stale crumbs fallen from centuries that have finished their banquet and pa.s.sed on.

There!--I won't detain you! We shall not meet often--but don't forget what I have said,--that if you are afraid of me, or of any other man, or of any existing thing,--the fault is in yourself, not in the persons or objects you fear.' 'I don't see it,' I blurted out, angrily--'What of the other fellows? They think you're queer!' He laughed. 'Bless the other fellows!' he said--'They're with you in the same boat! They think me queer because THEY are queer--that is,--out of line--themselves.' I was irritated by his easy indifference and asked him what he meant by 'out of line.' 'Suppose you see a beautiful garden harmoniously planned,' he said, still smiling, 'and some clumsy fellow comes along and puts a crooked pigstye up among the flower beds, you would call that "out of line," wouldn't you? Unsuitable, to say the least of it?'

'Oh!' I said, hotly--'So you consider me and my friends crooked pigstyes in your landscape?' He made me a gay, half apologetic gesture.

'Something of the type, dear boy!' he said--'But don't worry! The crooked pigstye is always a most popular kind of building in the world you will live in!' With that he bade me good-night, and went. I was very angry with him, for I was a conceited youth and thought myself and my particular a.s.sociates the very cream of Oxford,--but he took all the highest honours that year, and when he finally left the University he vanished, so to speak, in a blaze of intellectual glory. I have never seen him again--and never heard of him--and so I suppose his studies led him nowhere. He must be an elderly man now,--he may be lame, blind, lunatic, or what is more probable still, he may be dead, and I don't know why I think of him except that his theories were much the same as those of our little friend,"--again indicating me by a nod--"He never cared for agreeable speeches,--always rather mistrusted social conventions, and believed in a Higher Life after Death."

"Or a Lower,"--I put in, quietly.

"Ah yes! There must be a Down grade, of course, if there is an Up. The two would be part of each other's existence. But as I accept neither, the point does not matter."

I looked at him, and I suppose my looks expressed wonder or pity or both, for he averted his glance from mine.

"You are something of a spiritualist, I believe?"--said Dr. Brayle, lifting his hard eyes from the scrutiny of the tablecloth and fixing them upon me.

"Not at all,"--I answered, at once, and with emphasis. "That is, if you mean by the term 'spiritualist' a credulous person who believes in mediumistic trickery, automatic writing and the like. That is sheer nonsense and self-deception."

"Several experienced scientists give these matters considerable attention,"--suggested Mr. Swinton, primly.

I smiled.

"Science, like everything else, has its borderland," I said--"from which the brain can easily slip off into chaos. The most approved scientific professors are liable to this dire end of their speculations. They forget that in order to understand the Infinite they must first be sure of the Infinite in themselves."

"You speak like an oracle, fair lady!"--said Mr. Harland--"But despite your sage utterances Man remains as finite as ever."