Foul Play - Dion Boucicault (the best books to read txt) 📗

He saw no sufficient ground for deviating from Wardlaw’s positive instructions.

This decision soon became known throughout the ship. She was to weigh anchor at 11 A.M. next day, by high water.

At eight next morning, Captain Moreland and General Rolleston being on deck, one of the ship’s boys, a regular pet, with rosy cheeks and black eyes, comes up to the gentlemen, takes off his cap, and, panting audibly at his own audacity, shoves a paper into General Rolleston’s hand and scuds away for his life.

“This won’t do,” said the captain, sternly.

The high-bred soldier handed the paper to him unopened.

The captain opened it, looked a little vexed, but more amused, and handed it back to the general.

It was a ROUND ROBIN.

Round Robins are not ingratiating as a rule. But this one came from some rough but honest fellows, who had already shown that kindliness and tact may reside in a coarse envelope. The sailors of the Springbok, when they first boarded her in the Thames, looked on themselves as men bound on an empty cruise; and nothing but the pay, which was five shillings per month above the average, reconciled them to it; for a sailor does not like going to sea for nothing, any more than a true sportsman likes to ride to hounds that are hunting a red herring trailed.

But the sight of the general had touched them afar off. His gray hair and pale face, seen as he rowed out of Plymouth Harbor, had sent them to the yards by a gallant impulse; and all through the voyage the game had been to put on an air of alacrity and hope, whenever they passed the general or came under his eye.

If hypocrisy is always a crime, this was a very criminal ship; for the men, and even the boys, were hypocrites, who, feeling quite sure that the daughter was dead at sea months ago, did, nevertheless, make up their faces to encourage the father into thinking she was alive and he was going to find her. But people who pursue this game too long, and keep up the hopes of another, get infected at last themselves; and the crew of the Springbok arrived at Valparaiso infected with a little hope. Then came the Dutchman’s tale, and the discussion, which ended adversely to their views; and this elicited the circular we have now the honor to lay before our readers.

[We who sign About this line, hope none offence and mean none We think Easter Island is out of her course. Such of us as can be spared are ready and willing to take the old cutter, that lies for sale, to Easter Island if needs be; but to waste the Steamer it is a Pity. We are all agreed the Dutch skipper saw land and water aloft sailing between Juan Fernandez and Norfolk Isle, and what a Dutchman can see on the sky we think an Englishman can find it in the sea, God willing. Whereby we pray our good Captain to follow the Dutchman’s course with a good heart and a willing crew.

And so say we Whose names here be.]

General Rolleston and Captain Moreland returned to the cabin and discussed this document. They came on deck again, and the men were piped aft. General Rolleston touched his cap, and, with the Round Robin in his hand, addressed them thus:

“My men, I thank you for taking my trouble to heart as you do. But it would be a bad return to send any of you to Easter Island in that cutter; for she is not seaworthy, so the captain tells me. I will not consent to throw away your lives in trying to save a life that is dear to me. But, as to the Dutchman’s story about an unknown island, our captain seems to think that is possible; and you tell us you are of the same opinion. Well, then, I give up my own judgment, and yield to yours. Yes, we will go westward with a good heart (he sighed), and a willing crew.”

The men cheered. The boatswain piped; the anchor was heaved, and the Springbok went out on a course that bade fair to carry her within a hundred miles of Godsend Island.

She ran fast. On the second day some ducks passed over her head, one of which was observed to have something attached to its leg.

 

She passed within sixty miles of Mount Lookout; but never saw Godsend Island; and so pursued her way to the Society Islands; sent out her boats; made every inquiry around about the islands, but with no success; and, at last, after losing a couple of months there, brought the heart-sick father back on much the same course, but rather more northerly.

 

CHAPTER XLIV.

 

HAZEL returned homeward in a glow of triumph, and for once felt disposed to brag to Helen of his victory—a victory by which she was to profit; not he.

They met in the wood; for she had tracked him by his footsteps. She seemed pale and disturbed, and speedily interrupted his exclamations of triumph by one of delight, which was soon, however, followed by one of distress.

“Oh, look at you!” she said. “You have been in the water. It is wicked; wicked.”

“But I have solved the problem. I caught three ducks one after the other and tied the intelligence to their legs. They are at this moment careering over the ocean, with our story and our longitude, and a guess at our latitude. Crown me with bays.”

“With foolscap, more likely,” said Helen. “Only just getting well of rheumatic fever, and to go and stand in water up to the middle.”

“Why, you don’t listen to me!” cried Hazel, in amazement. “I tell you I have solved the problem.”

“It is you that don’t listen to common sense,” retorted Helen. “If you go and make yourself ill, all the problems in the world will not compensate me. And I must say I think it was not very kind of you to run off so without warning. Why give me hours of anxiety for want of a word? But there, it is useless to argue with a boy; yes, sir, a boy. The fact is, I have been too easy with you of late. One indulges sick children. But then they must not slip away and stand in the water, or there is an end of indulgence; and one is driven to severity. You must be ruled with a rod of iron. Go home this moment, sir, and change your clothes; and don’t you presume to come into the presence of the nurse you have offended, till there’s not a wet thread about you.”

And so she ordered him off. The inventor in his moment of victory slunk away crestfallen to change his clothes.

So far Helen Rolleston was a type of her sex in its treatment of inventors. At breakfast she became a brilliant exception. The moment she saw Hazel seated by her fire in dry clothes she changed her key and made him relate the whole business, and expressed the warmest admiration, and sympathy.

“But,” said she, “I do ask you not to repeat this exploit too often; now don’t do it again for a fortnight. The island will not run away. Ducks come and go every day, and your health is very, very precious.”

He colored with pleasure, and made the promise at once. But during this fortnight events occurred. In the first place, he improved his invention. He remembered how a duck, over-weighted by a crab, which was fast to her leg, had come on board the boat. Memory dwelling on this, and invention digesting it, he resolved to weight his next batch of ducks; for he argued thus: “Probably our ducks go straight from this to the great American Continent. Then it may be long ere one of them falls into the hands of a man; and perhaps that man will not know English. But, if I could impede the flight of my ducks, they might alight on ships; and three ships out of four know English.”

Accordingly, he now inserted stones of various sizes into the little bags. It was a matter of nice calculation. The problem was to weight the birds just so much that they might be able to fly three or four hundred miles, or about half as far as their unencumbered companions.

But in the midst of all this a circumstance occurred that would have made a vain man, or indeed most men, fling the whole thing away. Helen and he came to a rupture. It began by her fault, and continued by his. She did not choose to know her own mind, and, in spite of secret warnings from her better judgment, she was driven by curiosity, or by the unhappy restlessness to which her sex are peculiarly subject at odd times, to sound Hazel as to the meaning of a certain epigram that rankled in her. And she did it in the most feminine way, that is to say, in the least direct; whereas the safest way would have been to grasp the nettle, if she could not let it alone.

Said she one day, quietly, though with a deep blush: “Do you know Mr. Arthur Wardlaw?”

Hazel gave a shiver, and said, “I do.”

“Do you know anything about him?”

“I do.”

“Nothing to his discredit, I am sure.”

“If you are sure, why ask me? Do I ever mention his name?”

“Perhaps you do, sometimes, without intending it.”

“You are mistaken. He is in your thoughts, no doubt; but not in mine.”

“Ought I to forget people entirely, and what I owe them?”

“That is a question I decline to go into.”

“How harshly you speak to me. Is that fair? You know my engagement, and that honor and duty draw me to England; yet I am happy here. You, who are so good and strong, might pity me at least; for I am torn this way and that.” And here the voice ceased and the tears began to flow.

“I do pity you,” said Hazel. “I must pity any one who is obliged to mention honor and duty in the same breath as Arthur Wardlaw.”

At this time Helen drew back, offended bitterly. “That pity I reject and scorn,” said she. “No, I plighted my faith with my eyes open, and to a worthy object. I never knew him blacken any person who was not there to speak for himself, and that is a very worthy trait, in my opinion. The absent are like children; they are helpless to defend themselves.”

Hazel racked with jealousy, and irritated at this galling comparison, lost his temper for once, and said those who lay traps must not complain if others fall into them.

“Traps! Who lay them?”

“You did, Miss Rolleston. Did I ever condescend to mention that man’s name since we have been on the island? It is you make me talk of him.”

“Condescend?”

“That is the word. Nor will I ever deign to mention him again. If my love had touched your heart, I should have been obliged to mention him, for then I should have been bound to tell you a story in which he is mixed, my own miserable story—my blood boils against the human race when I think of it. But no, I see I am nothing to you; and I will be silent.”

“It is very cruel of you to say that,” replied Helen, with tears in her eyes; “tell me your story, and you will see whether you are nothing to me.”

“Not one word of it,” said Hazel slowly, “until you have forgotten that man exists.”

“Oh! thank you, sir, this is plain speaking. I am to forget honor and plighted faith;