Homeward Bound - James Fenimore Cooper (free e books to read .txt) 📗

answered the second mate; "and the ship is the Foam."

"Let her foam away, then, if she wishes to speak us. Has any one tried her bearings since daylight?"

"We set her by the compass at six o'clock, sir, and she has not varied her bearing, as far as from one belaying pin to another, in three hours; but her hull rises fast: you can now make out her ports, and at daylight the bottom of her courses dipped."

"Ay, ay, she is a light-going Foam, then! If that is the case, she will be alongside of us by night."

"In which event, captain, you will be obliged to give him a broadside of Vattel," threw in John Effingham, in his cool manner.

"If that will answer his errand, he is welcome to as much as he can carry. I begin to doubt, gentlemen, whether this fellow be not in earnest: in which case you may nave an opportunity of witnessing how ships are handled, when seamen have their management. I have no objection, to setting the experience of a poor come-and-go sort of a fellow, like myself, in opposition to the geometry and Hamilton Moore of a young man-of-war's-man. I dare say, now, yonder chap is a lord, or a lord's progeny, while poor Jack Truck is just as you see him."

"Do you not think half-an-hour of compliance on our part might bring the matter to an amicable conclusion a once?" said Paul Blunt. "Were we to run down to him, the object of his pursuit could be determined in a few minutes."

"What! and abandon poor Davis to the rapacity of that rascally attorney?" generously exclaimed Sir George Templemore. "I would prefer paying the port-charges myself, run into the handiest French port, and let the honest fellow escape!"

"There is no probability that a cruiser would attempt to take a mere debtor from a foreign vessel on the open sea."

"If there were no tobacco in the world, Mr. Blunt, I might feel disposed to waive the categories, and show the gentleman that courtesy," returned the captain, who was preparing another cigar. "But while the cruiser might not feel authorised to take an absconding debtor from this vessel, he might feel otherwise on the subject of tobacco, provided there has been an information for smuggling."

Captain Truck then explained, that the subordinates of the packets frequently got their ships into trouble, by taking adventures of the forbidden weed clandestinely into European ports, and that his ship, in such circumstances, would lose her place in the line, and derange all the plans of the company to which she belonged. He did the English government the justice to say, that it had always manifested a liberal disposition not to punish the innocent for the guilty; but were any such complaints actually in the wind, he thought he could settle it with much less loss to himself on his return, than on the day of sailing. While this explanation was delivered, a group had clustered round the speaker, leaving Eve and her party on the opposite side of the deck.

"This last speech of Mr. Blunt's quite unsettles my opinion of his national character, as Vattel and our worthy captain would say," remarked Mr. Sharp. "Last night, I set him down as a right loyal American; but I think it would not be natural for a thorough-going countryman of yours, Miss Effingham, to propose this act of courtesy to a cruiser of King William."

"How far any countrymen of mine, thorough-going or not, have reason to manifest extreme courtesy to any of your cruisers," Eve laughingly replied, "I shall leave Captain Truck to say. But, with you, I have long been at a loss to determine whether Mr. Blunt is an Englishman or an American, or indeed, whether he be either."

"Long, Miss Effingham! He then has the honour of being well known to you?"

Eye answered steadily, though the colour mounted to her brow; but whether from the impetuous exclamation of her companion, or from any feeling connected with the subject of their conversation, the young man was at a loss to discover.

"Long, as girls of twenty count time--some four or five years; but you may judge how well, when I tell you I am ignorant of his country even."

"And may I venture to ask which do you, yourself, give him credit for being, an American or an Englishman?"

Eve's bright eyes laughed, as she answered, "You have put the question with so much finesse, and with a politeness so well managed, that I should indeed be churlish to refuse an answer:--Nay, do not interrupt me, and spoil all the good you have done by unnecessary protestations of sincerity."

"All I wish to say is, to ask an explanation of a finesse, of which I am quite as innocent as of any wish to draw down upon myself the visitations of your displeasure."

"Do you, then, really conceive it a credit to be an American?"

"Nobody of less modesty than yourself, Miss Effingham, under all the circumstances, would dream of asking the question."

"I thank you for the civility, which must be taken as it is offered, I presume, quite as a thing en règle ; but to leave our fine opinions of each other, as well as our prejudices, out of the question--"

"You will excuse me if I object to this, for I feel nay good sense implicated. You can hardly attribute to me opinions so utterly unreasonable, so unworthy of a gentleman--so unfounded, in short! Am I not incurring all the risks and hardships of a long sea-voyage, expressly to visit your great country, and, I trust, to improve by its example and society?"

"Since you appear to wish it, Mr. Sharp--" Eve glanced her playful eye up at him as she pronounced the name--"I will be as credulous as a believer in animal magnetism: and that, I fancy, is pushing credulity to the verge of reason. It is now settled between us, that you do conceive it an honour to be an American, born, educated, and by extraction."

"All of which being the case with Miss Effingham."

"All but the second; indeed, they write me fearful things concerning this European education of mine; some even go so far as to assure me I shall be quite unfitted to live in the society to which I properly belong!"

"Europe will be rejoiced to receive you back again, in that case; and no European more so than myself."

The beautiful colour deepened a little on the cheek of Eve, but she made no immediate reply.

"To return to our subject," she at length said; "Were I required to say, I should not be able to decide on the country of Mr. Blunt; nor have I ever met with any one who appeared to know. I saw him first in Germany, where he circulated in the best company; though no one seemed acquainted with his history, even there. He made a good figure; was quite at his ease; speaks several languages almost as well as the natives of the different countries themselves; and, altogether, was a subject of curiosity with those who had leisure to think of any thing but their own dissipation and folly."

Mr. Sharp listened with obvious gravity to the fair speaker, and had not her own eyes been fastened on the deck, she might have detected the lively interest betrayed in his. Perhaps the feeling which was at the bottom of all this, to a slight degree, influenced his answer.

"Quite an Admirable Crichton!"

"I do not say that, though certainly expert in tongues. My own rambling life has made me acquainted with a few languages, and I do assure you, this gentleman speaks three or four with almost equal readiness, and with no perceptible accent. I remember, at Vienna, many even believed him to be a German."

"What! with the name of Blunt?"

Eve smiled, and her companion, who silently watched every expression of her varying countenance, as if to read her thoughts, noted it.

"Names signify little in these migratory times," returned the young lady. "You have but to imagine a von before it, and it would pass at Dresden, or at Berlin. Von Blunt, der Edelgeborne Graf Von Blunt, Hofrath --or if you like it better, Geheimer Rath mit Excellenz und eure Gnaden "

"Or, Baw-Berg-Veg-Inspector-Substitut! " added Mr. Sharp, laughing. "No, no! this will hardly pass. Blunt is a good old English name; but it has not finesse enough for Italian, German, Spanish, or anything else but John Bull and his family."

"I see no necessity, for my part, for all this Bluntishness; the gentleman may think frankness a good travelling quality."

"Surely, he has not concealed his real name!"

"Mr. Sharp, Mr. Blunt; Mr. Blunt, Mr. Sharp;" rejoined Eve, laughing until her bright eyes danced with pleasure. "There would be something ridiculous, indeed, in seeing so much of the finesse of a master of ceremonies subjected to so profound a mystification! I have been told that passing introductions amount to little among you men, and this would be a case in point."

"I would I dared ask if it be really so."

"Were I to be guilty of indiscretion in another's case, you would not fail to distrust me in your own. I am, moreover, a protestant, and abjure auricular confessions."

"You will not frown if I inquire whether the rest of your party remember him?"

"My father, Mademoiselle Viefville, and the excellent Nanny Sidley, again; but, I think, none other of the servants, as he never visited us. Mr. John Effingham was travelling in Egypt at the time, and did not see him at all, and we only met in general society; Nanny's acquaintance merely that of seeing him check his horse in the Prater, to speak to us of a morning."

"Poor fellow, I pity him; he has, at least, never had the happiness of strolling on the shores of Como and the islands of Laggo Maggiore in your company, or of studying the wonders of the Pitti and the Vatican."

"If I must confess all, he journeyed with us on foot and in boats an entire month, among the wonders of the Oberland, and across the Wallenstadt. This was at a time when we had no one with us but the regular guides and the German courier, who was discharged in London."

"Were it not for the impropriety of tampering with a servant, I would cross the deck and question your good Nanny, this moment!" said Mr. Sharp with playful menace. "Of all torture, that of suspense is the hardest to be borne."

"I grant you full permission, and acquit you of all sins, whether of disrespect, meanness, impertinence, ungentle-manlike practices, or any other vice that may be thought to attend and characterize the act."

"This formidable array of qualities would check the curiosity of a village gossip!"

"It has an effect I did not intend, then; I wish you to put your threat in execution."

"Not seriously, surely?"

"Never more so. Take a favourable moment to speak to the good soul, as an old acquaintance; she remembers you well, and by a little of that interrogating management you possess, a favourable opportunity may occur to bring in the other subject. In the mean time, I will glance over the pages of this book."

As Eve began to read, Mr. Sharp perceived she was in earnest, and hesitating a moment, in doubt of the propriety of the act, he yielded to her expressed