“Edmund. Take hold of yourself.”
I looked out of the great stern window. It was a different sea, starker now, right to the horizon but strewn with white horses which attempted to follow us but were outrun by their own waves and slid back out of sight. Gusts were whipping through the steadier wind, for sudden lines of spray crossed the direction of the waves which were being marshalled to follow and overtake us.
I gave an involuntary shiver. In the excitement of my shift into seaman’s costume I had not noticed that the air, even in the saloon, was colder than it had been.
The door of the saloon opened. I looked round. Little Mrs Brocklebank stared, then bounced forward and stood with her arms akimbo.
“Where do you think you are?”
I rose to my feet. She gave a squeak.
“Mr Talbot! I did not know—I did not mean—”
“Who did you think it was, ma’am?”
For a moment or two she stood there, staring at me with her mouth open. Then she turned quickly and ran away. After a while I began to laugh. She was a pretty little thing and a man could do much worse—if it were not for, of course—Costume was proving to be a test of society.
I sat down again and returned to watching the sea. Rain lashed across the window and already the waves had taken up their new direction. The white horses were more numerous and galloped for a longer period on the waves which had engendered them. It seemed to me that our speed had increased. There came a tap! on the outside of the window. It was the log being lowered. The line stretched further and further astern of us. The saloon door opened and Bowles, the solicitor’s clerk, came in. He shook the last traces of water from his greatcoat. He saw me but evinced no great surprise to see how I was dressed.
“Good morning, Mr Bowles.”
“Good morning, sir. Have you heard the news?”
“What news?”
“The foremast. Mr Benét and the blacksmith are delayed in their preparation of the ironwork. So the perilous work of restoring the mast to its former efficiency must be put off.”
“Believe me, I am thankful to hear that! But why?”
“Charcoal for heating the iron. The ship does not have a large enough supply. The first lieutenant happened to check that part of the stores and found more has been used than was thought.”
“That might well be a good thing and give the captain time to think again. What will they do?”
“They are able to make more charcoal. I am told the shoe of the foremast is split and they wish to use the enormous power of metal shrinking as it cools to pull the wood together again.”
“So Mr Summers told me.”
“Ah yes. Well, you would know, would you not? Some people think that Mr Summers was not sorry to report how little charcoal was available. Mr Benét was not pleased and asked to be allowed to recheck the amount in case the first lieutenant had made a mistake. He was refused abruptly.”
“Does Benét not realize how dangerous the attempt is? He is such a fool!”
“That is the trouble, Mr Talbot. He is not a fool—not precisely.”
“He had best stick to his poetry which can harm no one except perhaps a sensitive critic. Good God, a cranky ship, a sullen captain—”
“Not so sullen, sir. Mr Benét, I think—speaking without prejudice—has brightened his life.”
“Mr Bowles! Favouritism!”
“Without prejudice, sir. Cumbershum is not in favour of the red-hot iron.”
“Nor is Mr Summers.”
“Nor is our wrinkled old carpenter, Mr Gibbs. Naturally he is a man for wood and thinks red-hot iron should be kept as far away from it as possible. Mr Askew, the gunner, approves. He says, ‘What’s a bit of hot metal between friends?’”
“They speak each according to his humour as in an old comedy.”
I was suddenly restless and stood up.
“Well, Mr Bowles, I must leave you.”
I went away through the cold air of the saloon into the windy lobby outside it, then down the stairs again to the wardroom where the air was minimally warmer. Charles had left and Webber brought me a brandy. I stood, my legs apart, and stared out of the window. So soon one accepts as normal a state once desperately desired! I had forgotten what it was to itch!
There came a tap! on the glass. The log was being lifted out of the water.
“The man’s a fool!”
It was Mr Benét speaking. He had entered the wardroom silently.
“The quartermaster?”
“He should pay the line out over the quarter. He will break every pane if he goes on like this.”
“How is your charcoal?”
“So you have heard too! This ship reverberates like the belly of a cello! Coombs is seeing to it. I must wait. It is in his hands.”
“Not yours?”
“I am in overall control. I am only thankful that Coombs knew exactly how much sheet iron he had before certain other people could measure the area.”
“At all events you must be glad for a time of leisure with your many activities.”
“Work enables me to forget my sorrow, Mr Talbot. I do not envy you, given twenty-four idle hours a day in which to feel the pangs of separation.”
“It is good of you to remember my situation. But, Mr Benét, since we are companions in sorrow—you remember those too brief hours when Alcyone was compelled by the flat calm to lie alongside us—”
“Every moment, every instant is chiselled in my heart.”
“In mine too. But you must remember that after the ball I was lying delirious in my cabin.”
“I did not know.”
“Not know? They did not tell you? I mean during that time when the wind returned and Alcyone was forced to leave us—”
“‘Utmost dispatch.’ I did not know about you, sir. I had my own sorrows. Separation from Belovéd Object—”
“And Miss Chumley too! She must have known I was—lying on a Bed of Pain!”
“The fact is, what with my sudden—departure—from one ship and entry into another—my exchange with one of your lieutenants—”
“Jack Deverel.”
“And what with my separation from One who is more to me than all the world—despite the warmth of your genial captain’s welcome—”
“Genial! Are we thinking of the same man?”
“—I had no solace but my Art.”
“You could not have known that there would be scope for your engineering proclivity!”
“My Muse. My poetry. The parting struck verses from me as quickly as the iron strikes a spark from the flint or vice versa.”
Mr Benét put his left hand on the long table and leaned on it. He laid the other hand on that portion of the chest where I am assured the heart lies concealed. He then stretched that hand out towards the increasingly tormented sea.
The salutation which she cast
From ship to ship had been our last!
Her eye had dropped a winking tear
Which I could see for she stood near—
And standing did not smile nor frown
As seamen drew the main course down,
But ’twas a dagger at my heart
To feel the two ships move apart!
The tap of blocks, a loosened brail,
A breath of air, a filling sail,
A yard no more, of shadow’d sea—
But oh, what leagues it was to me!
“I am sure all the verses will seem very pretty, Mr Benét, when properly written down and corrected.”
“Corrected? You find some fault?”
“I could detect little enjambement but that is by the way. She was with Miss Chumley. Did Miss Chumley not speak?”
“Lady Somerset and Miss Chumley were speaking together. They ran to Truscott, the surgeon, as soon as he came aboard from your ship.”
“You could not hear what they said?”
“Directly Alcyone had cast off, Sir Henry left the deck and went below. Then Lady Somerset came
to the taffrail and gestured thus.”
Lieutenant Benét straightened up. He raised his cupped hand to his mouth and deposited something in it. Then with a female twist of the body he brought his right hand back over his shoulder and, opening the palm, appeared to throw something through our stern window.
“It seems an elaborate way of getting rid of her spittle, Mr Benét. Commonly people do what young Mr Tommy Taylor describes as ‘dropping it in the drink’.”
“You are facetious, sir. It was the Salutation!”
“But Miss Chumley—you could not hear what she said?”
“I had been below, stowing my gear. When I heard the pipes I knew the moment had come—thrust Webber out of the way—rushed up the ladder—it was too late. The springs and breast ropes were in. You, sir, I doubt you have the sensibility to understand the completeness of separation between two ships when the ropes are in—they might be two separate continents—familiar faces are those of strangers at once. Their future is different and unknown. It is like death!”
“I believe I have as much sensibility as the next man, sir!”
“That is what I said.”
“But Miss Chumley did not speak?”
“She came to the rail, and stood there as Alcyone moved away. She looked woebegone. I daresay she was feeling seasick all over again, for you know, Mr Talbot, she was said to be a martyr to it.”
“Oh, the poor child! I appeal to you, Mr Benét. I will not elaborate on the nights of tears, the yearnings, the fear that some other man, the need to communicate with her and the present impossibility of doing so! She is bound for India, I for New South Wales. I met her for no more than a few hours of that miraculous day when our two ships were becalmed side by side—I dined with her—later I danced with her at that ball aboard this ship—was ever such a ball held in mid-Atlantic? And then I collapsed—concussion—fell sick—was delirious—but we had parted—if only you could understand how precious to me would be some kind of description of her time in Alcyone when you were—wooing Lady Somerset—”
“Worshipping Lady Somerset.”
“And she, Miss Chumley, I mean your acquaintance, even your ally in that reprehensible—what am I saying—that tender attachment—”
“The love of my life, sir.”
“For you know, that one day thrust me into a new life! The instant I saw her I was struck by, destroyed by lightning, or if you are familiar with the phrase, it was the coup de foudre—”
“Say that again.”
“Coup de foudre.”
“Yes, the phrase is familiar.”
“And before we parted she did declare that she held me in higher regard than anyone else in the two ships. Later still I received a billet doux—”
“A billet doux, for God’s sake!”
“Was that not encouragement?”
“How can I tell unless I know what was in it?”
“The words are chiselled in my heart. A young person will always remember the time when two ships were side by side in the middle of the sea and hopes that one day they may put down their anchors in the same harbour.”
Mr Benét shook his head.
“I find no encouragement for you there, sir.”
“None? Oh, come! What—none?”
“Very little. In fact it sounds to me uncommonly like a congé, if you are familiar with the word. You would probably call it a ‘congy’ or something.”
“A farewell!”
“With perhaps an undertone of relief—”
“I will not believe it!”
“A determination that the affair should end as painlessly as possible.”
“No!”
“Be a man, Mr Talbot. Do I whine or repine? Yet I have no hope whatever of seeing the Belovéd Object again. All that consoles me is my genius.”
With those words Mr Benét turned away and vanished into his own cabin. A tide of furious indignation overwhelmed me.
“I do not believe a word he said!”
For she was there, vividly—not the Idea of a young person, the lineaments of whose face I could never bring together no matter how I tried as I writhed in my bunk—but there, breathing lavender, her eyes shining in the darkness and her soft but passionate whisper—“Oh no indeed!”
Benét had not seen her so, heard her so.
“She felt as I do!”
(4)
So I stared out at the waters of separation until my anger subsided—but my grief remained! I heard a door open and close behind me, the brisk steps of Benét and another door open and close as he left the wardroom. I did not look round. Clearly the man was inclined to taunt me, and besides he was of the other faction. Even if Charles forbade the word he should not prevent me using it on his behalf to myself. He needed my support. With that thought I called for Webber and had him help me into my oilskins and seaboots. I then made a laborious way up to the waist and looked for Charles, who was nowhere to be seen. But what was immediately evident was that we had passed some invisible boundary in the open sea. There was a clear green tone in the water rather than blue or grey. The air had indeed become colder and a few drops of spray which struck my cheek felt as though they had frozen there. The wind was from the southwest now and we were reaching towards the southeast. It was no longer a gale but a strong wind marshalling the waves on our beam. Under the low clouds strands of mist were beginning to stream past us from the invisible western horizon. Our ship once again had begun that swift roll which was the result of our shortened masts and inadequate sail area. But at least she did not seem to pitch and the cables which Charles had passed round her belly remained taut and motionless. The crew were busy. I do not mean that part of the watch which stood by for sail changing and which supplied the lookouts and quartermasters for the wheel. I mean the other part, which was busily rigging lifelines from the break of the fo’castle to the bitts of the mainmast and then from there to the aftercastle and the stairs ascending to the quarterdeck. This was suggestive. As I watched, I saw Charles Summers come out of the fo’castle and stand talking with Mr Gibbs, who presently knuckled his forehead and went into the fo’castle again. Charles came aft to the foremast, examined the wedges and then talked with the petty officer who was directing the men at the lifelines. He then examined the lines, putting his weight on them here and there. There was an argument for a while about one point of attachment but finally Charles seemed satisfied. He climbed up and spoke to someone by the belfry on the fo’castle, saw me and raised his arm in greeting. I answered in a like manner but did not go forrard. Charles busied himself with some other people on the fo’castle. Then he turned away and came briskly along the waist to me.
“You are still dry?”
“As you see—and wearing oilskins as much for warmth as dryness. The air is much colder.”
“The ‘roaring forties’. We have found them at last but distinctly farther south than they ought to be!”
“The change was sudden.”
“It always is, we are told. Waters have their own islands, continents, roadways. This is a continent.”
“The lifelines are ominous.”
“A precaution.”
“You seem cheerful.”
“I ought not to be but am. For—may I whisper?—forrard there, below decks, Coombs is making charcoal, which will take him days. Add to that the weather which as it gets rougher will render far too dangerous any tinkering with the foremast—”
“Our faction is in the ascendant!”
“Do not use that word!”
“I am sorry. I forgot.”
“What sort of reputation would you carry to the governor if Captain Anderson told him that you had made trouble in the ship?”
“He will not do that so long as he remembers my journal which will lie before my godfather!”
“I had forgotten. How long ago all that affair seems! But to please me, avoid words which might suggest a division among us. All I meant was that I am happy because an unnecessary hazard has been pos
tponed.”
“I own I was looking forward to an increase in our speed. But that was before I understood the possible cost.”
“May I advise you? Only wear oilskins for their proper purpose—keeping yourself dry. Inside them you heat up and sweat. Then before you know where you are all the good work of your rare bath will be undone.”
He nodded meaningly, then strode back along the deck and into the fo’castle. I muttered to myself.
“A nod is as good as a wink. I used to stink.”
I became aware that old Mr Brocklebank was standing within two yards of me. He was in the shelter (for what it was worth) of the starboard mainstays and had his right arm hooked through a bight of rope. Somewhere he had found or been given a large coach cloak which was ancient, worn and dirty. He had arranged this round his body so that it presented a kind of sculptural effect. His beaver was tied on by some material passed over the crown and fastened under his chin. I believe it was a lady’s stocking! His plump face was melancholy as he gazed at nothing or perhaps into himself. I decided that I did not want any conversation with him, for he, at least, was unlikely to be able to add anything to what I knew of Miss Chumley. I went past him, therefore, with no more than a nod and into the passenger lobby. The door of the cabin to which I had planned so nobly to return was open. As I approached, Phillips came out with a brush and bucket and went to the larboard side of the waist.
I had not entered that cabin since Wheeler had chosen the place for his last, tragic and criminal act. With a sudden determination to get on with the business I opened the door and stepped inside. All seemed as before, except that the place was cleaner and brighter. For the bulkheads, the ship’s side and the deckhead—or better, the walls and the ceiling—were now covered, not with the dull mustard-coloured paint which seemed to be the best the Navy could do for passenger accommodation, but with glossy white enamel. That was cheerful enough. I touched it here and there and found it dry. There was now no excuse for not returning. I sat down in the canvas chair and willed the place to be ordinary and not connected to its history. I could not succeed. No matter how hard I tried, my eye would return to that eyebolt in the ship’s side so near the head of the bed. There the rigid hand of the dead man had hung, his body dinted as if leaden into the furnishings of his bed! My mind flinched away from Colley, only to imagine at once Wheeler standing by me, his head raised, the golden goblet of the blunderbuss only an inch or two from his face—there was no flinching from that! It was as if the man’s misdirected courage in facing the shot of self-destruction held me too, chin up, staring up, his last sight of anything my last sight, nothing but the massive and worn timbers of the deckhead.