Kitabı oku: «One Day's Courtship, and The Heralds of Fame», sayfa 7
Chapter III
Kenan Buel walked the deck alone in the evening light, and felt that he ought to be enjoying the calmness and serenity of the ocean expanse around him after the noise and squalor of London; but now that the excitement of the recent quarrel was over, he felt the reaction, and his natural diffidence led him to blame himself. Most of the passengers were below, preparing for dinner, and he had the deck to himself. As he turned on one of his rounds, he saw approaching him the girl of Euston Station, as he mentally termed her. She had his book in her hand.
“I have come to beg your pardon,” she said. “I see it was your own book I took from you to-day.”
“My own book!” cried Buel, fearing she had somehow discovered his guilty secret.
“Yes. Didn’t you buy this for yourself?” She held up the volume.
“Oh, certainly. But you are quite welcome to it, I am sure.”
“I couldn’t think of taking it away from you before you have read it.”
“But I have read it,” replied Buel, eagerly: “and I shall be very pleased to lend it to you.”
“Indeed? And how did you manage to read it without undoing the parcel?”
“That is to say I—I skimmed over it before it was done up,” he said in confusion. The clear eyes of the girl disconcerted him, and, whatever his place in fiction is now, he was at that time a most unskilful liar.
“You see, I bought it because it is written by a namesake of mine. My name is Buel, and I happened to notice that was the name on the book; in fact, if you remember, when you were looking over it at the stall, the clerk mentioned the author’s name, and that naturally caught my attention.”
The girl glanced with renewed interest at the volume.
“Was this the book I was looking at? The story I bought was Hodden’s latest. I found it a moment ago down in my state-room, so it was not lost after all.”
They were now walking together as if they were old acquaintances, the girl still holding the volume in her hand.
“By the way,” she said innocently, “I see on the passenger list that there is a Mr. Hodden on board. Do you think he can be the novelist?”
“I believe he is,” answered Buel, stiffly.
“Oh, that will be too jolly for anything. I would so like to meet him. I am sure he must be a most charming man. His books show such insight into human nature, such sympathy and noble purpose. There could be nothing petty or mean about such a man.”
“I—I—suppose not.”
“Why, of course there couldn’t. You have read his books, have you not?”
“All of them except his latest.”
“Well, I’ll lend you that, as you have been so kind as to offer me the reading of this one.”
“Thank you. After you have read it yourself.”
“And when you have become acquainted with Mr. Hodden, I want you to introduce him to me.”
“With pleasure. And—and when I do so, who shall I tell him the young lady is?”
The audacious girl laughed lightly, and, stepping back, made him a saucy bow.
“You will introduce me as Miss Caroline Jessop, of New York. Be sure that you say ‘New York,’ for that will account to Mr. Hodden for any eccentricities of conduct or conversation he may be good enough to notice. I suppose you think American girls are very forward? All Englishmen do.”
“On the contrary, I have always understood that they are very charming.”
“Indeed? And so you are going over to see?”
Buel laughed. All the depression he felt a short time before had vanished.
“I had no such intention when I began the voyage, but even if I should quit the steamer at Queenstown, I could bear personal testimony to the truth of the statement.”
“Oh, Mr. Buel, that is very nicely put. I don’t think you can improve on it, so I shall run down and dress for dinner. There is the first gong. Thanks for the book.”
The young man said to himself, “Buel, my boy, you’re getting on;” and he smiled as he leaned over the bulwark and looked at the rushing water. He sobered instantly as he remembered that he would have to go to his state-room and perhaps meet Hodden. It is an awkward thing to quarrel with your room-mate at the beginning of a long voyage. He hoped Hodden had taken his departure to the saloon, and he lingered until the second gong rang. Entering the stateroom, he found Hodden still there. Buel gave him no greeting. The other cleared his throat several times and then said—
“I have not the pleasure of knowing your name.”
“My name is Buel.”
“Well, Mr. Buel, I am sorry that I spoke to you in the manner I did, and I hope you will allow me to apologise for doing so. Various little matters had combined to irritate me, and—Of course, that is no excuse. But—”
“Don’t say anything more. I unreservedly retract what I was heated enough to say, and so we may consider the episode ended. I may add that if the purser has a vacant berth anywhere, I shall be very glad to take it, if the occupants of the room make no objection.”
“You are very kind,” said Hodden, but he did not make any show of declining the offer.
“Very well, then, let us settle the matter while we are at it.” And Buel pressed the electric button.
The steward looked in, saying,—
“Dinner is ready, gentlemen.”
“Yes, I know. Just ask the purser if he can step here for a moment.”
The purser came promptly, and if he was disturbed at being called at such a moment he did not show it. Pursers are very diplomatic persons.
“Have you a vacant berth anywhere, purser?”
An expression faintly suggestive of annoyance passed over the purser’s serene brow. He thought the matter had been settled. “We have several berths vacant, but they are each in rooms that already contain three persons.”
“One of those will do for me; that is, if the occupants have no objection.”
“It will be rather crowded, sir.”
“That doesn’t matter, if the others are willing.”
“Very good, sir. I will see to it immediately after dinner.”
The purser was as good as his word, and introduced Buel and his portmanteau to a room that contained three wild American collegians who had been doing Europe “on the cheap” and on foot. They received the new-comer with a hilariousness that disconcerted him.
“Hello, purser!” cried one, “this is an Englishman. You didn’t tell us you were going to run in an Englishman on us.”
“Never, mind, we’ll convert him on the way over.”
“I say, purser, if you sling a hammock from the ceiling and put up a cot on the floor you can put two more men in here. Why didn’t you think of that?”
“It’s not too late yet. Why did you suggest it?”
“Gentlemen,” said Buel, “I have no desire to intrude, if it is against your wish.”
“Oh, that’s all right. Never mind them. They have to talk or die. The truth is, we were lonesome without a fourth man.”
“What’s his name, purser?”
“My name is Buel.”
One of them shouted out the inquiry, “What’s the matter with Buel?” and all answered in concert with a yell that made the steamer ring, “He’s all right.”
“You’ll have to sing ‘Hail Columbia’ night and morning if you stay in this cabin.”
“Very good,” said Buel, entering into the spirit of the occasion. “Singing is not my strong point, and after you hear me at it once, you will be glad to pay a heavy premium to have it stopped.”
“Say, Buel, can you play poker?”
“No, but I can learn.”
“That’s business. America’s just yearning for men who can learn. We have had so many Englishmen who know it all, that we’ll welcome a change. But poker’s an expensive game to acquire.”
“Don’t be bluffed, Mr. Buel. Not one of the crowd has enough money left to buy the drinks all round. We would never have got home if we hadn’t return tickets.”
“Say, boys, let’s lock the purser out, and make Buel an American citizen before he can call for help. You solemnly swear that you hereby and hereon renounce all emperors, kings, princes, and potentates, and more especially—how does the rest of it go!”
“He must give up his titles, honours, knighthoods, and things of that sort.”
“Say, Buel, you’re not a lord or a duke by any chance? Because, if you are, we’ll call back the purser and have you put out yet.”
“No, I haven’t even the title esquire, which, I understand, all American citizens possess.”
“Oh, you’ll do. Now, I propose that Mr. Buel take his choice of the four bunks, and that we raffle for the rest.”
When Buel reached the deck out of this pandemonium, he looked around for another citizen of the United States, but she was not there. He wondered if she were reading his book, and how she liked it.
Chapter IV
Next morning Mr. Buel again searched the deck for the fair American, and this time he found her reading his book, seated very comfortably in her deck chair. The fact that she was so engaged put out of Buel’s mind the greeting he had carefully prepared beforehand, and he stood there awkwardly, not knowing what to say. He inwardly cursed his unreadiness, and felt, to his further embarrassment, that his colour was rising. He was not put more at his ease when Miss Jessop looked up at him coldly, with a distinct frown on her pretty face.
“Mr. Buel, I believe?” she said pertly.
“I—I think so,” he stammered.
She went on with her reading, ignoring him, and he stood there not knowing how to get away. When he pulled himself together, after a few moments’ silence, and was about to depart, wondering at the caprice of womankind, she looked up again, and said icily—
“Why don’t you ask me to walk with you? Do you think you have no duties, merely because you are on shipboard?”
“It isn’t a duty, it is a pleasure, if you will come with me. I was afraid I had offended you in some way.”
“You have. That is why I want to walk with you. I wish to give you a piece of my mind, and it won’t be pleasant to listen to, I can assure you. So there must be no listener but yourself.”
“Is it so serious as that?”
“Quite. Assist me, please. Why do you have to be asked to do such a thing? I don’t suppose there is another man on the ship who would see a lady struggling with her rugs, and never put out his hand.”
Before the astonished young man could offer assistance the girl sprang to her feet and stood beside him. Although she tried to retain her severe look of displeasure, there was a merry twinkle in the corner of her eye, as if she enjoyed shocking him.
“I fear I am very unready.”
“You are.”
“Will you take my arm as we walk?”
“Certainly not,” she answered, putting the tips of her fingers into the shallow pockets of her pilot jacket. “Don’t you know the United States are long since independent of England?”
“I had forgotten for the moment. My knowledge of history is rather limited, even when I try to remember. Still, independence and all, the two countries may be friends, may they not?”
“I doubt it. It seems to be natural that an American should hate an Englishman.”
“Dear me, is it so bad as that? Why, may I ask? Is it on account of the little trouble in 1770, or whenever it was?”
“1776, when we conquered you.”
“Were we conquered? That is another historical fact which has been concealed from me. I am afraid England doesn’t quite realise her unfortunate position. She has a good deal of go about her for a conquered nation. But I thought the conquering, which we all admit, was of much more recent date, when the pretty American girls began to come over. Then Englishmen at once capitulated.”
“Yes,” she cried scornfully. “And I don’t know which to despise most, the American girls who marry Englishmen, or the Englishmen they marry. They are married for their money.”
“Who? The Englishmen?”
The girl stamped her foot on the deck as they turned around.
“You know very well what I mean. An Englishman thinks of nothing but money.”
“Really? I wonder where you got all your cut-and-dried notions about Englishmen? You seem to have a great capacity for contempt. I don’t think it is good. My experience is rather limited, of course, but, as far as it goes, I find good and bad in all nations. There are Englishmen whom I find it impossible to like, and there are Americans whom I find I admire in spite of myself. There are also, doubtless, good Englishmen and bad Americans, if we only knew where to find them. You cannot sum up a nation and condemn it in a phrase, you know.”
“Can’t you? Well, literary Englishmen have tried to do so in the case of America. No English writer has ever dealt even fairly with the United States.”
“Don’t you think the States are a little too sensitive about the matter?”
“Sensitive? Bless you, we don’t mind it a bit.”
“Then where’s the harm? Besides, America has its revenge in you. Your scathing contempt more than balances the account.”
“I only wish I could write. Then I would let you know what I think of you.”
“Oh, don’t publish a book about us. I wouldn’t like to see war between the two countries.”
Miss Jessop laughed merrily for so belligerent a person.
“War?” she cried. “I hope yet to see an American army camped in London.”
“If that is your desire, you can see it any day in summer. You will find them tenting out at the Métropole and all the expensive hotels. I bivouacked with an invader there some weeks ago, and he was enduring the rigours of camp life with great fortitude, mitigating his trials with unlimited champagne.”
“Why, Mr. Buel,” cried the girl admiringly, “you’re beginning to talk just like an American yourself.”
“Oh, now, you are trying to make me conceited.”
Miss Jessop sighed, and shook her head.
“I had nearly forgotten,” she said, “that I despised you. I remember now why I began to walk with you. It was not to talk frivolously, but to show you the depth of my contempt! Since yesterday you have gone down in my estimation from 190 to 56.”
“Fahrenheit?”
“No, that was a Wall Street quotation. Your stock has ‘slumped,’ as we say on the Street.”
“Now you are talking Latin, or worse, for I can understand a little Latin.”
“‘Slumped’ sounds slangy, doesn’t it? It isn’t a pretty word, but it is expressive. It means going down with a run, or rather, all in a heap.”
“What have I done?”
“Nothing you can say will undo it, so there is no use in speaking any more about it. Second thoughts are best. My second thought is to say no more.”
“I must know my crime. Give me a chance to, at least, reach par again, even if I can’t hope to attain the 90 above.”
“I thought an Englishman had some grit. I thought he did not allow any one to walk over him. I thought he stood by his guns when he knew he was in the right. I thought he was a manly man, and a fighter against injustice!”
“Dear me! Judging by your conversation of a few minutes ago, one would imagine that you attributed exactly the opposite qualities to him.”
“I say I thought all this—yesterday. I don’t think so to-day.”
“Oh, I see! And all on account of me?”
“All on account of you.”
“Once more, what have I done?”
“What have you done? You have allowed that detestably selfish specimen of your race, Hodden, to evict you from your room.”
The young man stopped abruptly in his walk, and looked at the girl with astonishment. She, her hands still coquettishly thrust in her jacket-pockets, returned his gaze with unruffled serenity.
“What do you know about it?” he demanded at last.
“Everything. From the time you meekly told the steward to take out your valise until the time you meekly apologised to Hodden for having told him the truth, and then meekly followed the purser to a room containing three others.”
“But Hodden meekly, as you express it, apologised first. I suppose you know that too, otherwise I would not have mentioned it.”
“Certainly he did. That was because he found his overbearing tactics did not work. He apologised merely to get rid of you, and did. That’s what put me out of patience with you. To think you couldn’t see through his scheme!”
“Oh! I thought it was the lack of manly qualities you despised in me. Now you are accusing me of not being crafty.”
“How severely you say that! You quite frighten me! You will be making me apologise by-and-by, and I don’t want to do that.”
Buel laughed, and resumed his walk.
“It’s all right,” he said; “Hodden’s loss is my gain. I’ve got in with a jolly lot, who took the trouble last night to teach me the great American game at cards—and counters.”
Miss Jessop sighed.
“Having escaped with my life,” she said, “I think I shall not run any more risks, but shall continue with your book. I had no idea you could look so fierce. I have scarcely gotten over it yet. Besides, I am very much interested in that book of yours.”
“Why do you say so persistently ‘that book of mine’?”
“Isn’t it yours? You bought it, didn’t you? Then it was written by your relative, you know.”
“I said my namesake.”
“So you did. And now I’m going to ask you an impudent question. You will not look wicked again, will you?”
“I won’t promise. That depends entirely on the question.”
“It is easily answered.”
“I’m waiting.”
“What is your Christian name, Mr. Buel?”
“My Christian name?” he repeated, uncomfortably.
“Yes, what is it?”
“Why do you wish to know?”
“A woman’s reason—because.”
They walked the length of the deck in silence.
“Come, now,” she said, “confess. What is it?”
“John.”
Miss Jessop laughed heartily, but quietly.
“You think John commonplace, I suppose?”
“Oh, it suits you, Mr. Buel. Goodbye.”
As the young woman found her place in the book, she mused, “How blind men are, after all—with his name in full on the passage list.” Then she said to herself, with a sigh, “I do wish I had bought this book instead of Hodden’s.”
Chapter V
At first Mr. Hodden held somewhat aloof from his fellow-passengers; but, finding perhaps that there was no general desire to intrude upon him, he condescended to become genial to a select few. He walked the deck alone, picturesquely attired. He was a man who paid considerable attention to his personal appearance. As day followed day, Mr. Hodden unbent so far as to talk frequently with Miss Jessop on what might almost be called equal terms. The somewhat startling opinions and unexpected remarks of the American girl appeared to interest him, and doubtless tended to confirm his previous unfavourable impressions of the inhabitants of the Western world. Mr. Buel was usually present during these conferences, and his conduct under the circumstances was not admirable. He was silent and moody, and almost gruff on some occasions. Perhaps Hodden’s persistent ignoring of him, and the elder man’s air of conscious superiority, irritated Buel; but if he had had the advantage of mixing much in the society of his native land he would have become accustomed to that. People thrive on the condescension of the great; they like it, and boast about it. Yet Buel did not seem to be pleased. But the most astounding thing was that the young man should actually have taken it upon himself to lecture Miss Jessop once, when they were alone, for some remarks she had made to Hodden as she sat in her deck-chair, with Hodden loquacious on her right and Buel taciturn on her left. What right had Buel to find fault with a free and independent citizen of another country? Evidently none. It might have been expected that Miss Jessop, rising to the occasion, would have taught the young man his place, and would perhaps have made some scathing remark about the tendency of Englishmen to interfere in matters that did not concern them. But she did nothing of the kind. She looked down demurely on the deck, with the faint flicker of a smile hovering about her pretty lips, and now and then flashed a quick glance at the serious face of the young man. The attitude was very sweet and appealing, but it was not what we have a right to expect from one whose ruler is her servant towards one whose ruler is his sovereign. In fact, the conduct of those two young people at this time was utterly inexplicable.
“Why did you pretend to Hodden that you had never heard of him, and make him state that he was a writer of books?” Buel had said.
“I did it for his own good. Do you want me to minister to his insufferable vanity? Hasn’t he egotism enough already? I saw in a paper a while ago that his most popular book had sold to the extent of over 100,000 copies in America. I suppose that is something wonderful; but what does it amount to after all? It leaves over fifty millions of people who doubtless have never heard of him. For the time being I merely went with the majority. We always do that in the States.”
“Then I suppose you will not tell him you bought his latest book in London, and so you will not have the privilege of bringing it up on deck and reading it?”
“No. The pleasure of reading that book must be postponed until I reach New York. But my punishment does not end there. Would you believe that authors are so vain that they actually carry with them the books they have written?”
“You astonish me.”
“I thought I should. And added to that, would you credit the statement that they offer to lend their works to inoffensive people who may not be interested in them and who have not the courage to refuse? Why do you look so confused, Mr. Buel? I am speaking of Mr. Hodden. He kindly offered me his books to read on the way over. He has a prettily bound set with him. He gave me the first to-day, which I read ever so many years ago.”
“I thought you liked his books?”
“For the first time, yes; but I don’t care to read them twice.”
The conversation was here interrupted by Mr. Hodden himself, who sank into the vacant chair beside Miss Jessop. Buel made as though he would rise and leave them together, but with an almost imperceptible motion of the hand nearest him, Miss Jessop indicated her wish that he should remain, and then thanked him with a rapid glance for understanding. The young man felt a glow of satisfaction at this, and gazed at the blue sea with less discontent than usual in his eyes.
“I have brought you,” said the novelist, “another volume.”
“Oh, thank you,” cried Miss Duplicity, with unnecessary emphasis on the middle word.
“It has been considered,” continued Mr. Hodden, “by those whose opinions are thought highly of in London, to be perhaps my most successful work. It is, of course, not for me to pass judgment on such an estimate; but for my own part I prefer the story I gave you this morning. An author’s choice is rarely that of the public.”
“And was this book published in America?”
“I can hardly say it was published. They did me the honour to pirate it in your most charming country. Some friend—or perhaps I should say enemy—sent me a copy. It was a most atrocious production, in a paper cover, filled with mistakes, and adorned with the kind of spelling, which is, alas! prevalent there.”
“I believe,” said Buel, speaking for the first time, but with his eyes still on the sea, “there is good English authority for much that we term American spelling.”
“English authority, indeed!” cried Miss Jessop; “as if we needed English authority for anything. If we can’t spell better than your great English authority, Chaucer—well!” Language seemed to fail the young woman.
“Have you read Chaucer?” asked Mr. Hodden, in surprise.
“Certainly not; but I have looked at his poems, and they always remind me of one of those dialect stories in the magazines.”
Miss Jessop turned over the pages of the book which had been given her, and as she did so a name caught her attention. She remembered a problem that had troubled her when she read the book before. She cried impulsively—“Oh, Mr. Hodden, there is a question I want to ask you about this book. Was—” Here she checked herself in some confusion.
Buel, who seemed to realise the situation, smiled grimly.
“The way of the transgressor is hard,” he whispered in a tone too low for Hodden to hear.
“Isn’t it?” cordially agreed the unblushing young woman.
“What did you wish to ask me?” inquired the novelist.
“Was it the American spelling or the American piracy that made you dislike the United States?”
Mr. Hodden raised his eyebrows.
“Oh, I do not dislike the United States. I have many friends there, and see much to admire in the country. But there are some things that do not commend themselves to me, and those I ventured to touch upon lightly on one or two occasions, much to the displeasure of a section of the inhabitants—a small section, I hope.”
“Don’t you think,” ventured Buel, “that a writer should rather touch on what pleases him than on what displeases him, in writing of a foreign country?”
“Possibly. Nations are like individuals; they prefer flattery to honest criticism.”
“But a writer should remember that there is no law of libel to protect a nation.”
To this remark Mr. Hodden did not reply.
“And what did you object to most, Mr. Hodden?” asked the girl.
“That is a hard question to answer. I think, however, that one of the most deplorable features of American life is the unbridled license of the Press. The reporters make existence a burden; they print the most unjustifiable things in their so-called interviews, and a man has no redress. There is no escaping them. If a man is at all well known, they attack him before he has a chance to leave the ship. If you refuse to say anything, they will write a purely imaginative interview. The last time I visited America, five of them came out to interview me—they came out in the Custom House steamer, I believe.”
“Why, I should feel flattered if they took all that trouble over me, Mr. Hodden.”
“All I ask of them is to leave me alone.”
“I’ll protect you, Mr. Hodden. When they come, you stand near me, and I’ll beat them off with my sunshade. I know two newspaper men—real nice young men they are too—and they always do what I tell them.”
“I can quite believe it, Miss Jessop.”
“Well, then, have no fear while I’m on board.”
Mr. Hodden shook his head. He knew how it would be, he said.
“Let us leave the reporters. What else do you object to? I want to learn, and so reform my country when I get back.”
“The mad passion of the people after wealth, and the unscrupulousness of their methods of obtaining it, seem to me unpleasant phases of life over there.”
“So they are. And what you say makes me sigh for dear old London. How honest they are, and how little they care for money there! They don’t put up the price 50 per cent. merely because a girl has an American accent. Oh no. They think she likes to buy at New York prices. And they are so honourable down in the city that nobody ever gets cheated. Why, you could put a purse up on a pole in London, just as—as—was it Henry the Eighth—?”
“Alfred, I think!” suggested Buel.
“Thanks! As Alfred the Great used to do.”
Mr. Hodden looked askance at the young woman.
“Remember,” he said, “that you asked me for my opinion. If what I have said is offensive to one who is wealthy, as doubtless you are, Miss Jessop, I most sincerely—”
“Me? Well, I never know whether I’m wealthy or not. I expect that before long I shall have to take to typewriting. Perhaps, in that case, you will give me some of your novels to do, Mr. Hodden. You see, my father is on the Street.”
“Dear me!” said Mr. Hodden, “I am sorry to hear that.”
“Why? They are not all rogues on Wall Street, in spite of what the papers say. Remember your own opinion of the papers. They are not to be trusted when they speak of Wall Street men. When my father got very rich once I made him give me 100,000 dollars, so that, should things go wrong—they generally go wrong for somebody on Wall Street—we would have something to live on, but, unfortunately, he always borrows it again. Some day, I’m afraid, it will go, and then will come the typewriter. That’s why I took my aunt with me and saw Europe before it was too late. I gave him a power of attorney before I left, so I’ve had an anxious time on the Continent. My money was all right when we left Liverpool, but goodness knows where it will be when I reach New York.”
“How very interesting. I never heard of a situation just like it before.”
