01 The Building of Jalna Page 5
The ayah had taken a fancy to Patsy. To her he seemed a macabre being but somehow benevolent. She stood close beside him, her draperies blowing gracefully in the breeze, her infant charge in her arms. The stay in Ireland had done little Augusta good. Her cheeks had filled out and she was less pale. Her hair had grown long enough to make a silky black curl on her forehead, gazing in wonder at the scene, but when her eyes rested on Patsy she would show her four milk-white teeth in a smile of delight. She had had the milk from one goat during her stay in Ireland and the goat had been given to her to take to Canada, so that no change of milk might upset her digestion. The goat, held on a halter by a shock-headed boy, stood immobile, regarding with equanimity, even with cynicism, what was going on. It had been named Maggie and Lady Honoria had tied a small bell to its neck, and the vicissitudes of the voyage were accented by its silvery tinkle.
Augusta’s young uncles had been carefully outfitted for the new life by their mother. But to Philip’s mind their clothes looked too picturesque, their hair too long, their hands too white. Conway especially — he was the one who reminded Philip of the Knave of Diamonds — looked too exquisite. They were here, there, and everywhere — giving facetious orders to the sailors who were carrying aboard the crates of hens, geese, and ducks, prodding forward the pigs, dragging the sheep and the cows.
A group of poor emigrants were guarding their luggage, clinging tearfully to those last moments with their kinsfolk who had come to see them off. A priest was among them, doing his best to keep up their spirits, sweeping the heavens with his large grey eyes and prophesying a fair voyage. He was there to put two young nieces aboard who were going out to a brother, and he could not look at them without his eyes running over.
Adeline wore a long green cloak with wide sleeves edged by fur. She stood facing the sea, drinking in the joyful breeze that struck the white sails of the ship as a dancer might strike a tambourine. The shimmering sea lay before her, and beyond — that young continent where she and Philip were to make their home. She wished they two were going on the ship alone. She drew away from the weeping people about her and, slipping her hand into Philip’s, pressed his fingers. He looked into her eyes.
“Sure you haven’t left anything behind?” he asked.
“Nothing. Not even my heart.”
“Well, that’s sensible of you. For, if you had, I should have been forced to go back for it.”
The priest came up to her.
“Pardon me, my lady,” he said. He had heard Adeline’s mother so addressed and thought it proper to use the title to her.
“Yes?” she answered, not ill-pleased.
“I am going to ask you a favour,” he said. “I have two young nieces sailing on the ship, and a terrible long and risky voyage it is for thim. Would you be so kind as to give thim a word of encouragement if they are ill or in trouble? If I could carry such a message to their poor mother, sure ’t would dry the sorrowing eyes of her! D’ye think you could?”
“Indeed I will,” said Adeline. “And, if you will give me your address, I’ll write and tell you about the voyage and how your nieces fare.”
The priest wrote his address on a somewhat crumpled bit of paper and, full of gratitude, returned to the admonishing of the two rosy-cheeked, black-haired girls whose young bosoms seemed swelling with exuberance.
The confusion was apparently hopeless. The cries of animals and fowls, the shoutings, bangings, and thumpings as the sailors carried the luggage aboard, the orders of their officers which no one seemed to obey, the wailing and circling of sea gulls, the screams of excited urchins, the flutterings and flappings of the great sails of the ship, were woven into a fantastic tapestry of farewell which would hang forever on the walls of memory.
The moment came. Adeline had dreaded it but now that it had arrived she was almost past feeling. She wished her mother’s face was not wet with tears. It was a pity to remember her that way. “Oh, Mother dear, I’ll be back! So shall we all! I’ll take good care of the boys. Good-bye! Good-bye, Father! Be sure to write. Good-bye … Good-bye …” She was enfolded in their embraces. Her body pressed against the body that had carried her before birth, against the body that had made that birth possible. She felt as though she were being physically torn; then Philip put his arm about her and led her weeping to the ship.
III
THE FIRST VOYAGE
THE BARK ALANNA had formerly been an East Indiaman. She was bound for Quebec and would return laden with white pine. The Captain was a thick-set Yorkshireman, named Bradley; the first officer a tall lean Scot, with an enormous mouth, named Grigg. There were few cabin passengers and the Whiteoaks held themselves a little aloof, for the voyage would be long and there was the possibility of being thrown to intimately into uncongenial company. Indeed Philip and Adeline had been so surrounded by relatives since their arrival from India that they longed to be alone together. They made themselves as comfortable as possible in the cramped space of their cabin. Philip arranged their possessions in the most shipshape order. Adeline, wrapped in rugs, settled herself in a sheltered corner to read The History of Pendennis. Augusta and her ayah were established near by, the tiny girl clasping her first doll, an elegantly dressed wax creature, extremely corseted and wearing a dress and bonnet of plaid taffeta. Conway and Sholto were exploring the ship and Patsy and the goat making themselves as comfortable as they could in their far-from-comfortable quarters. Ireland lay, a hazy blue hump, on the pale horizon. There was a head wind and the ship made but slow progress, though her great sails strained at the masts and a living soul seemed demonstrating its will to move westward. The gulls followed the ship a long way out from Ireland. They lingered with her, as though waiting for messages to carry home.
Besides the Whiteoaks’ party there were fewer than a dozen passengers in the Cabin Class. Of these they became friendly with only five. There were two Irish gentlemen, educated well but with a rich brogue, named D’Arcy and Brent. They were travelling for pleasure and were to make an extensive tour of the United States. There was a Mrs. Cameron from Montreal who had with her a delicate daughter of fifteen. The two had journeyed all the way to China to join the child’s father who had previously been sent there to take an important post concerned with the trade between the two countries. But, when they had arrived, they had found that a plague of cholera had carried him off. Now they were retracing the long weary way to Montreal. Mrs. Cameron and little Mary would sit huddled together wrapped in one shawl, gazing into the distant horizon, as though in their hearts they held no hope that their journeyings would ever end but felt that they would go on from ship to ship, from sea to sea, till the Day of Judgment. The young girl had indeed acquired a strange seaborn look, as Adeline described it. Her cloak and hat were faded to the greyness of winter waves; her hair hung like lank yellowish seaweed about her shoulders; her wide-open light eyes had an unseeing look; her face and hands were deeply tanned. Only her mouth had colour and between her lips, which were always parted, her small pearl-like teeth showed. Her mother had degenerated, by sorrow and exhaustion, into little more than an element for the protection of Mary.
“Why doesn’t she do something to make the child happy, instead of brooding over her like a distracted hen!” exclaimed Adeline, on the second day out. “Really, Philip, I am excessively annoyed at that woman! I shall tell my brothers to make friends with Mary. It’s unnatural for a young girl to look like that!”
She did so. However days passed before the boys were able to persuade Mary to leave her mother’s side. Mrs. Cameron indeed was unwilling to let her child out of her sight. She looked worried rather than pleased when finally Mary went for a promenade along the sloping deck, supported on either side by Conway and Sholto. They made an extraordinary trio, the boys in their elegant new clothes, the girl travel-stained; the boys bright-eyed, alert to everything that passed about them, the girl seeming in a kind of dream; the boys continually chaffing each other, she looked from one face to the other, scarcely seeming
to take in what they said.
The remaining passenger with whom the Whiteoaks became friendly was an Englishman, a Mr. Wilmott who, like themselves, was going out to settle in Canada. He was a tall thin man with sharp but well-cut features and short brown whiskers. He was reserved concerning himself but a fluent talker when politics were under discussion. He and the two Irishmen soon provided entertainment for the rest, for they argued without open rancor. Mr. Wilmott was ironic, with flashes of wit, the Irishmen humourous and ever ready with the most violent exaggerations. Philip had been so long out of England that he felt unequal to political discussion. Also, in any such argument concerning their two countries, he would have had Adeline as his opponent, and the thought of this was distasteful to him.
Adeline’s mind was occupied by her desire to bring Mr. Wilmott and Mrs. Cameron together. Here they were, two lonely people (Mr. Wilmott certainly wore a sombre look at times) who would do well to link their lives together. And what a protector, what a father he would make for little Mary! She felt that Mrs. Cameron was melancholy, rather than heartbroken, over the loss of her husband. She was wrapped up in her child. How could a woman be mother before mate, Adeline wondered, as her eyes drank in Philip’s strength and beauty. Not she — not she! Her man would always come first. She despised the too maternal woman.
So a new world was created on board the Alanna, very different from the world on board the ship that had brought them from India. This was a much smaller, closer world, more cut off from the old life. The last voyage had been a voyage homeward. This was one into what was new and unknown. The last had been a linking up; this was a cutting off. Adeline was conscious of an odd detachment, an exhilaration, as though she were adventuring into a spiritual as well as a material distance.
For a week they pressed forward in fair weather. Then the head wind increased in strength and the ship struggled on against it and against the rising green waves that crashed on her bow, enveloping her in spray. It was no longer possible to stay on deck. They must spend the long hours below where there was not only the close air but the smells and noises from the steerage to be endured. The ayah became seasick and Adeline had the care of the baby on her hands. Mrs. Cameron and Mary adored little Augusta and took a large share of her care. But at night she was restless and Adeline and Philip did not get their proper sleep.
They were going to their berths early one stormy night when there was at thumping on the door and Conway’s voice called out: —
“Philip! There’s a leak sprung!”
“What?” shouted Philip, staying the unbuttoning of his waistcoat.
“She has sprung a plank! She’s leaking!”
Then there came the heavy tramping of feet overhead and the shouts of officers.
Adeline turned pale. She had the quietly whimpering baby in her arms.
“Will the ship sink?” she asked.
“Certainly not. Don’t be alarmed,” said Philip. He threw open the door.
Conway stood there supporting himself by the brass railing which ran along the passage. He wore a bright-coloured dressing gown and, even in the excitement of the moment, Philip noticed how it heightened his resemblance to the Knave of Diamonds. With the door open, the noise of tramping feet and vehement shoutings, the roar of the steadily rising squall, the thunder and rattle of canvas and tackle, were increased. The sails were being lowered.
“They’re lowering the sails!” shouted Conway, but his voice came as no more than a whisper. “It’s blowing a terrible gale.”
His brother stood close behind him, clinging to the railing. He looked green with seasickness. Adeline said to him: —
“Come in and lie down in my berth, Sholto. You must keep the baby while we go to see the Captain.”
The boy obediently stumbled into the cabin and threw himself on to the berth.
“Oh, I’m so ill!” he moaned.
Adeline placed the baby beside him.
“You are not to come, Adeline,” Philip shouted.
Her eyes flashed rebellion. She gripped his arm in her hands. “I will come!” she shouted back.
The vessel gave a heave that sent them all staggering into one corner of the cabin. Mrs. Cameron now appeared in the doorway. She had a shawl wrapped about her head and she was holding Mary closely to her, as though determined not to be parted from her at the moment of sinking. But she spoke calmly.
“What is wrong?” she asked.
“Nothing but a leak, ma’am. We are going to see the Captain.” Philip’s tone, his very presence, were reassuring.
“We will go too.” They saw the words on her lips though they could not hear them.
Clinging to the rail and to each other Philip and Adeline gained the companionway. They found the Captain and the first officer supervising the lowering of the sails. The great canvas thundered deckward as in terrifying capitulation. The stark masts looked suddenly fragile and the ship vulnerable. The wind blew with terrific force and green walls of water reared themselves, then came crashing against the side of the rolling ship. The heaving wash of the waters was palely illuminated by a cloud-bound moon, that only now and again really showed herself. Adeline had seen storms at sea before this and they were tropic storms, but the ship had been larger, the company more numerous. There was a loneliness about this storm. The little group of people seemed helpless, the wind was piercingly cold. However, the Captain spoke with equanimity.
“It’s nothing but a squall,” he said in his hearty, Yorkshire accent. “I’ve been round the Cape many times myself and this is naught but a puff of wind. So you’d best go back to your berths, ladies, and not worry.”
Above the noise of the storm came confused shoutings and tramping from the companionway. The steerage passengers were pouring up from below. They looked wild-eyed, rough and terrified.
Captain Bradley strode over to them.
“What does this mean?” he demanded.
The second mate shouted back — “I couldn’t keep them down there, sir! The water’s pouring in below.”
The Captain looked grim. He pressed his way through the crowd, ordering them to descend with him, which they did in great confusion.
Adeline heard him shout — “All hands to the pumps!”
Philip was patting her on the back. He was smiling at her. She smiled bravely back. He raised his voice and said — “The squall is passing. Everything will be all right.”
“Take Mrs. Cameron’s arm,” she said. “She looks ready to drop.”
Mary Cameron had left her mother’s side. Conway Court had his arm about her. Neither of them looked frightened but they both wore expressions of pale hilarity. Philip helped Mrs. Cameron back to her cabin. The wind was falling. Yet the sea was still heavy with great thundering waves and the wind still fierce enough to fill the storm sails, to which the ship had been stripped, to bursting point. In the welter of the waves the Alanna lay almost on her beam ends. Now a rainstorm advanced like a wall, seeming to join with the waves in the effort to drown those aboard.
But Captain Bradley was not downcast. He went about, ruddy-faced and cheerfully shouting his orders. The swinging lanterns illumined but little the wild scene. Sailors were thrumming sails together and drawing them under the ship’s bow in what seemed a hopeless effort to stop the leak. Adeline felt that, if she went below, she would be desperate with fear. Here in the midst of the activity she felt herself equal to Philip in courage. She drew Mary Cameron and Conway to her side and the three of them linked themselves, waiting Philip’s return.
“I gave her some brandy,” he said as he came up. “She needed it, poor lady, for she is half-dead with cold.” He turned to the girl. “Shall I take you down to your mother, Mary?”
“Did she ask for me?” Mary’s voice was slightly sulky.
“No. I think she’ll sleep. Perhaps you are better with us.”
Conway Court gave a shout of laughter. “Mary, Mary, quite contrary — ” he sang. “Sailed away to the Port of Canary.”
Mr. Wilmott came up to them.
“The officers are not alarmed,” he said, “but the leak appears to be a bad one. The four pumps are working like the devil. Mr. D’Arcy and Mr. Brent are helping to man them and I’m ready to give a hand when I’m needed.”
When morning came there were five feet of water in the hold. The pumps were working hard and the Captain said he had the situation under control. A stewardess brought breakfast to Adeline in her cabin. She had changed into dry things but had not slept. The tiny room was in a state of disorder, her wet clothing, the belongings of Philip and the baby, scatter promiscuously and depressingly. She felt herself being sucked down into a vortex of confusion, rather than of fear. But the hot tea, the bread and bacon, put life into her. She sat on the edge of the berth and combed out her hair. A pale sunlight filtered in at the porthole. She noticed the lively beauty of her hair. “It would look like this, even if I were drowning,” she thought, half resentfully.
In the silver mirror of her dressing case, she saw how pale her face was. She bit her lips to bring some colour into them.
“When do you think we shall get to Newfoundland?” she asked the Scotch stewardess.
“Oh, we’ll get there right enough.”
“How far are we from Ireland?”