O Genteel Lady!/Chapter 8
Strange to feel yourself so alone among so many. Forty in the cabin. American tourists and business men flapping about in sodden ulsters, their whiskers blowing about their ears. English people with their careful bad manners, bad grammar too, with their affected 'goin's' and 'ain'ts,' and their ridiculous patter of 'awful clevah' and 'just fawncy.' Very fashionable people, so fashionable the eldest of the women affected ugly, defiant clothes and every one knew that her sister was a duchess. She wore heavy wool equestriennes over her stockings, bulging down over her shoetops. Other English people. Young men sweet and poised compared to the noisier American youths. Their feminine counterparts usually seemed too big and strong for them. Honest-looking girls whose beauty was often marred by meaningless mouths. 'My saddle mare is out of Rosemary and Pichon sired her. I'm goin' to breed her to Splendor as soon as the huntin's over.' They would never see the nuances of life, these handsome rational young women, but the young Englishmen would. Lanice pondered because the two sexes did not seem to tally.
She was lonely; the fog pressed close; the Diana spread her skirts like a great lady, so it seemed to the young fashion-plate artist, and walked upon the waters. And the oily sea breathed gigantically with the stirrings of its infinite life. Damp and cold, having no one to talk to, she felt at first a curious sense of unreality. Sky, sea, and between them the ship and the human particles upborne on its wooden decks. 'It will be like this when I am old,' she thought; 'nothing real and nothing matters, and everything floats by, but does not stop to possess you. I see the people and the waves, but they seem to float away from me.' She wrote assiduously, long paragraphs of impressions, and her pencil would droop in her fingers. 'That is Labrador,' she thought, 'but it is lead-colored like the sea and sky and isn't real. I suppose I am lonely and homesick. Gracious, I do hope not seasick!' Phrases stirred feebly through her mind. 'That at least has always been here...always. The Northmen liked the sea because it made them feel sad. I like to feel sad. Why do I wake up at night sometimes, so frightened, and think of death and even suicide? But I've liked to live so much. Probably that is why I could not bear to see life turn grey and bitter like this. I'd rather not live than not enjoy. Oh, dear, that is not Christian! That is why I start up at night so afraid. What am I building old age upon? I do not want it. That's what people mean by the necessity of children. But I feel no need. Will I when it is too late? When I sit as I sit to-day with no one to talk to and the whole world grey? And I grey and lonely as the gulls that follow us mewing like cats. I must have loved Anthony, for my face has changed in six months, grown sadder, I think. Oh, Anthony, Anthony, why couldn't you have loved me as I could have loved you? Or at least let me love you as I might have done. My dear Anthony...English people...Lady Maude does wear the ugliest clothes. Imagine her looking at me through her lorgnette and saying "quite ladylike for a clark, fawncy now," and those dreadful horsey daughters of hers. Perhaps I'm really a bit seasick and that's why I'm so depressed. I must take some of Mrs. Andrews's "Travellers' Elixir." The food is so wretched and greasy I hope it doesn't affect my skin.' She went to the hook where her towel was swaying delicately, got her hand mirror, and suspiciously examined the clear skin. Fog rolling in and the distant sound of a fog horn. The coast of Labrador blotted out and the sea oily and tireless, breathing and alive.
'I wish I could really be sick like that plump Mrs. Pontifex, although it was so hard for her to get out from that wall seat in the dining-room. Oh, I can smell them frying fish again. They must want to make us sick—we eat less and save them money. I'll lie down and count. Heavens, I am sick! I'm positively congealing around the mouth. Well, if I'm going to be...if I'm going to be...One, two, three, four, five, six, seven...I wonder if poetry would be better? It takes up your mind more. "Oh—gift—of—God—oh—perfect—day—whereon—shall—no—man—work—but—play—whereon—it—is—enough—for—me—not—to—to"...I've forgotten the rest. What a tiny little basin for such a big ship...Well, I ought to feel better now. Heavens! I'll lie down.'
The fourth day out was the Sabbath and the Captain courteously suggested that the three travelling clergymen hold a joint service, but the clergymen kept to their bunks and their basins, and the Captain himself read to the crew for a few minutes from his heavy Bible, and the stormy winds blew, and the landlubbers did indeed lie down below.
A shouting and a roaring above her on the deck as though the Diana were boarded by pirates, and the boatswain piping above the shrilling of wind in rigging. White-faced and dizzy, Lanice decided to leave the eleven seasick women with whom she shared a cabin and go on deck. At least up there it was fresh and thrilling. She wrapped herself in a seaman's overcoat that the kindly steward borrowed from one of the crew, and ventured up.
They were taking in sail, preparing for storm.
'Clew up the to'gallant sails, man the reef-tackle...hawl in the weather brace. Lower away the yard.'
'Aye, aye, sir,' and the sails came snapping down with a rattle of cordage and the goblin piping of the boatswain's pipe. Lanice was seen and ordered back to her cabin.
Then the storm was over and the passengers humbly gave praise to their Maker that they yet lived. Shrill women's voices filled the cabin.
The ocean yawned, and rudely blowed
The wind that tossed my foundering bark...'
Winds whipped up from the west, crowding the Diana's sails. Still like a great lady she swept the Atlantic, flying forward without tacking or turning. The passengers mingled freely. Even Lady Maude was not so bad, and the horsey girls such friendly, sensible creatures. She could no longer see the 'types' as she had the first two days, only individuals. At least one of the young Englishmen was, as she confided to her diary, so noble and gifted. They spent hours and hours sketching for their portfolios. Lanice drew everything, diagrams of the sailors' knots and tattooing, everything from Lady Maude asleep and snoring to the ship's cat fawning for food. The young man usually drew his fair companion.
On the second Sabbath all three of the clergymen wished to preach, but that honor went to the Reverend Mr. Nightingale, and the service was held on the deck. The ladies, devout and modest, sat near him, their gentlemen standing about them, the steerage passengers at a suitable distance. Here and there an able-seaman fervently 'got religion.' They sang hymns such as 'Star of Bethlehem,' 'The Voice of Free Grace,' and 'We'll Praise Him Again When We Pass Over Jordan.'
On the third Sabbath the breakers crashed upon the Scilly Isles and the Lizard's Light stared through the night, and such passengers as would land the next day in Southampton and not go on to the ship's final port of Marseilles prepared to leave. And then, on the next day, the red cliffs and the smell of the rich Devon shore, and the low rain-swollen clouds playfully pelted down the harmless English rain, then broke apart and permitted the sun to shine through and drink up the raindrops on one's ulster. But the night smelled sweeter than the day, and one saw little cottage lights upon the shore. The noble and high-minded young Englishman sang 'A Sailor's Lassie,' in a husky baritone, and when the moon moved out from the clouds and walked upon the water he kissed the lady's finger tips. But a lady travelling alone cannot be too careful and one must stop somewhere, especially when one's heart is broken.
'I must retire, Mr. Cassmondey. A lady must, as the saying is, have some beauty sleep.'
'But not you, Miss Bardeen. Really, greater beauty would be blinding. Really, I swear, Miss Bardeen...'
It was splendid fun, and were it not for the fragrance of England, Anthony's England, coming in soft waves to her through the night, she would have been absurdly happy.
In her cabin, the other women tossing and sighing about her, she pondered piteously on Anthony Jones, and finally fell asleep comforted with the conviction that she would be in England within a month herself, and certainly she would see him again. First her mother's death had ordered her to Italy, and the business of Messrs. Redcliffe & Fox made England necessary. Surely the hand of God was leading her again to Anthony Jones. 'So that is Marseilles, Captain?'
'Yes, Madam, Marseilles. I think at least one of every race lives here, except Chinamen.'
'Will I see Turks?'
'Why, put your hand down anywhere in Marseilles and scoop up a handful. Greeks, too, sailor-men and merchants, low, lying, dirty scoundrels.'
'And Spaniards?'
'Oh, every other man's a don. You can tell them by their high heads and angry walk. Moors, too, and black folk from over in Africa. See their boats now with the red and yellow sails, striped like as not. You never saw ships like that in Boston, nor water so blue it hurt you to stare at it.'
They paused to look and listen. She saw the radiant sky, the blue sea crinkling under the gentle breeze like silk. The prow of the Diana tore through it and it made a ripping sound as though it were silk and the ship a tailor's shears. White limestone mountains were pale and tremulous in the heat, and below them spread upon the water's edge was the great white port, Marseilles.
'I expect a letter in Marseilles.'
'Well, they may send it on board. From Italy is it?'
'Yes.'
'But what's a fine, healthy girl like you doing in Italy? You look as if your lungs were strong.'
'Oh, yes.'
'There are many there who are suffering from consumption, poor souls, a long way from home to die.'
By sunset the Diana was in her place, one of hundreds of fine ships whose bowsprits lay upon the stone wharf as a dog would lay its nose upon the hearth.
'In the morning, Captain, I shall go to the post office to see if there is a letter.'
'Nay, better than that. This lad says he has a message for you.'
She looked down and behind the bulk of the captain was a hunchbacked dwarf. The creature seemed more ape than man. He stood in humility as if waiting until the first unfavorable impression should wear off. She felt she had seen him before, and then realized it was on the cover of the English 'Punch.' He wore old-fashioned livery and a little cape over his deformity. His expression was sweet and intelligent.
'You have a letter for the lady?'
'Si, Signor,' he said in a big man's voice, and then, bowing low, presented a sealed and folded blue sheet.
Dear Miss Bardeen: This is my servant, Gian, who is as good as he is ugly. He understands English, although he will not talk it. Let him help you on your way to Florence, for you will find little else to help except the saints, who in emergencies are always sleeping or hunting. I am,
Sincerely
Roger Cuncliffe
Villa Poppea
Firenze, Tuscany
And in the morning she set out with Gian carrying her boxes and shawl, his dwarfishness increasing the appearance of her slender height. His thick, dark face made hers look fair as a goddess. He managed all the arrangements for train or diligence. He bullied the hotel-keepers, served her at table himself, slept just outside her door at night, and took her to some church every day. She found that he had been raised by monks and had, until his deformity became too marked, hoped to be a priest. But his life had been interesting. At one time he had been valet de chambre to a countess and had hooked her into her dresses and curled her hair. He spoke often of young Cuncliffe, 'my master,' whom he adored with a doglike simplicity, less often but very naturally of his master's lovely 'cousin' who, may saints give her rest, had died that winter, 'oh, the pretty.'
'Cousin!'
Young Cuncliffe could not have picked a better ambassador.
By the time Genoa was passed and the road turned south to Lucca and Florence, Lanice felt towards Cuncliffe more curiosity than resentment. Of course she would treat him very formally, and would only see him in regard to the sad business at hand. She would bow and not offer her hand. 'Mr. Cuncliffe, I presume.' But if she had never met Captain Jones, how different the meeting might be. Then she really would have hated him.
'Those lights, like fireflies swarming, are they Florence?'
'Si, Signora.'
'And to-night I shall sleep in Florence?'
'Si, Signora.'