The Sailor Part 32

It was vain, however, of Miss Foldal to protest. Moreover, she knew it was vain. There was a look in Mr. Harper's face that all the Miss Foldals in the world could not have coped with.

"Well, I'm sorry, I'm very sorry," was all she could gasp, and then he was gone.

XXI

Bag in hand he entered the February night. As he turned up the collar of his overcoat his excitement crystallized into a definite thought.

Whatever happened he must not meet Ginger.

He didn't know where he was going; he had neither purpose nor plan; his only guide was a vague desire to get a long way from Blackhampton in a short s.p.a.ce of time.

In obedience to this instinct, he pa.s.sed over the ca.n.a.l bridge, the main highway to the center of the city, turned down several byways in order to avoid the Crown and Cus.h.i.+on, threaded a path through a maze of slums and alleys, and emerged at last, almost without knowing it, within twenty yards of Blackhampton Central Station.

This seemed a special act of Providence; and subsequent events confirmed Henry Harper in that view. He walked through the station booking-hall, yet without taking a ticket, since in a dim way he felt it was not wise to do so before you have given the least thought to where you are going.

A train was standing in the station. The porters were closing the doors, the guard had taken out his whistle.

"Jump in, sir, we're off."

Henry Harper pitched head foremost into a first non-smoker, his bag was pitched in after him, the door was slammed, and the train was already pa.s.sing through the long tunnel at the end of the station before he was able to realize what had happened.

An old lady was the only other occupant of the compartment. She was a stern looking dame, with a magnificent fur cloak, a dominant nose, fearless eyes, and a large black hat with plenty of tr.i.m.m.i.n.g but without feathers.

It was clear from the demeanor of the old lady that she was inclined to regard the intruder with disfavor. However, as she was a person not without consequence in her own small world, this was her fixed att.i.tude of mind in regard to the vast majority of her fellow creatures. But she never allowed herself to be afraid of them, partly out of pride, also because it was good for the character. All the same, a nature less powerful might easily have pulled the cord and communicated with the guard, such was the look of wildness in the eyes of her fellow traveler. Moreover, he had fallen into her lap, and had trodden on her foot rather severely, and she was not sure that he had apologized.

Between Duckingfield Junction and High Moreton she became involved in quite a train of speculations. In the first place, he was obviously not a gentleman. That was her habitual jumping-off point in her survey of the human male. In fact, she would have ignored his existence had it been possible to do so. But her foot had suffered so much from his clumsiness that she was not able to put him out of her mind. Besides, she was a sharp and quizzical old thing, and from the height of her own self-consequence she stole glances at him that were a nice mingling of caution and truculence. It was an honest, open, unusual face, there was that to be said for it. The behavior, the manner, and the portmanteau marked H.H. were unconventional, to say the least; there was an absence of gloves, but the eyes were remarkable. Probably a young poet on his way to Oxford for the week-end. Although they confessed to two of these unfortunate persons in her own family, it was an article of her faith that a poet was never a gentleman.

Somehow the young man in the corner interested the old lady so much that when the last of the tunnels was safely pa.s.sed, a temperament by nature adventurous as became three grandsons in the Household Cavalry led her to study him at closer quarters.

"Do you mind having the window down a little?"

"No, lady."

He sprang to his feet and lowered the window, and the old lady, pitying herself profoundly that she could ever have thought about him at all, settled herself in her corner and was very soon asleep.

This cynical proceeding had no effect upon the young man opposite. As far as he was concerned she did not exist, any more than he now existed for her; moreover, she never had existed for him, therefore the balance of indifference was in his favor.

The Sailor's one preoccupation, as the long and slow succession of stations pa.s.sed, was the face of Ginger. It was gazing through the window at him out of the intense darkness of the night. And what a face it was, with the blood streaming down it and a look in the eyes he would never forget.

Where was he going? He didn't know and he didn't care, if only it was far enough from Blackhampton. Presently he began to feel cold and hungry and horribly lonely. Now he was beginning to realize that Ginger and Miss Foldal and d.i.n.kie and the Rovers were things of the past, his misery grew more than he could bear. His dream was shattered! He would never bring the Cup to Blackhampton. And there was the face of Ginger looking in at the window, and he nearly woke the old lady by jumping up with a cry of agony.

There was nothing left for him now but to go on into unending night.

He was moving out of an unspeakable past into a future of panic and emptiness. And then he tried to sleep, but strange and awful thoughts prevented him. The old lady awoke with a start, only to find that her feet were cold in spite of their hot water bottle, which was also cold, and was great negligence on the part of the railway company. Still, she hoped to be at the end of her journey soon. In that reflection the old lady was more fortunate than her fellow traveler, who had no such hope to console him.

XXII

The train went on and on. Its stoppings and startings were endless; the night grew very cold; the old lady, gathering her fur cloak around her, resettled herself in her corner and slept again. The chill in the heart of the Sailor was now a deadly thing. Repose for him was out of the question. Red and white striped phantoms converged upon him through the gloom; tier upon tier of ma.s.sed humanity rose shrieking to the sky; but there was only one face that he could recognize, and it was a face he would never forget.

At last the Sailor dozed a little. And then the train stopped once more, and an official of the railway company entered the carriage with a demand for tickets. The old lady found hers without difficulty, but the young man opposite had no ticket, it appeared. Also his behavior was so odd that at first the official seemed to think he was drunk. He had no idea of where he was going. But the next station, it seemed, was Marylebone, and that was as far as he could go.

While the old lady watched from her corner grimly, the official was able to gather that this unsatisfactory traveler had come from Blackhampton, which, as he had been so unwise as to travel first cla.s.s, meant a sovereign in coin of the realm.

The traveler was able to produce a sovereign from a belt which he wore round his waist--a proceeding which seemed to stimulate the curiosity of his fellow traveler in the highest degree--and paid it over without a murmur. The official wrote out a receipt with an absurd stump of pencil.

"Thank you, mister," said the young man.

The train moved on.

A few minutes later it had come to the end of a long and wearisome journey. The old lady was the first to leave the carriage. She was a.s.sisted in doing so by the ministrations of a very tall and dignified footman.

As the Sailor stepped to the platform, bag in hand, there was a great clock straight before him pointing to the hour of midnight. Where was he? He had never heard of Marylebone. It might be England, it might be Scotland; in his present state of mind it might be anywhere.

"Keb, sir?" The inquiry surged all round him, but the Sailor did not want a cab.

His first feeling as he stood on the platform of that immense station was one of sheer bewilderment. He didn't know where he was, he had nowhere to go, he had no plans. An intense loneliness came over him again. Soon, however, it was merged in the exhilaration of the atmosphere around him. This was a different place from Blackhampton; it was larger, more vital, more mysterious.

As he walked slowly down the platform the importance of everything seemed to increase. He would have to think things out a bit, although just now any kind of thinking was torment.

He had learned much during his sixteen months at Blackhampton, not only in regard to the world in which he lived, but also--and as he moved down the platform with his bag the thought gave him a thrill of joy--to read and write. He felt these things, bought and paid for at a heavy cost, were so infinitely precious that he need not fear the future.

Straight before his eyes was the legend, "Cloak Room." Sixteen months ago it would have been High Dutch. But the new knowledge told him it was the place to leave your bag. Accordingly, he went and left it, paid his twopence, and put the ticket in exchange carefully in his belt, where nineteen sovereigns and twelve half-sovereigns were secure.

He had learned the meaning of money during his six years at sea.

Perhaps it was the sight of so much and the knowledge of its value that gave him a thrill of power as he pa.s.sed out of the station into the wide, peopled immensity of this unknown land. There was a policeman standing on an island in the middle of the road, and the time had long pa.s.sed since those grim days when he would have been as likely to fly to the moon as to address a question to the police.

"What place is this, mister?"

"Marylebone Road."

The information did not seem very valuable. Still, the policeman's tone implied that it might be. As the Sailor stood in the middle of the road he was suddenly comforted by the sight of manna in the wilderness. Across the way was a coffee stall. Such a bright vision told him how sore was his need.

All the same he was not hungry. He drank two cups of coffee, but he was too excited to eat. That was odd, because there was nothing to excite him. But when he turned away from the stall and started to walk he didn't know where, something curious, and terrible had begun again to lay hold of his brain. Nevertheless, he went on and on through streets interminable, fully determined to free himself of that eerie, horrible feeling.

Had it not been for the face of Ginger perhaps all would have been well. But it was lurking everywhere amid the gloom and byways of the night. The place he was in was endless; it was a waste of bricks and mortar. Even Liverpool and the waterfront at Frisco could not compare with it. Then it suddenly came upon him that he was a guy. This place was London. It was the only place it could be.

There was something in the mere thought which fired the imagination of the Sailor. The Isle of Dogs had been London in a manner of speaking, but this was surely the heart of the city. He could not remember to have seen such houses as he was pa.s.sing now. Liverpool and Frisco had had them no doubt. But in his present mood the ma.s.s and gloom of these great bulks addressed him strangely. This vastness immeasurable, debouching upon the lamps at the corners of the streets, was instinct with the magic of the future. It was as if this world of bricks and mortar towering to the night was girt with fabulous secret riches.

Symbols of opulence spoke to the Sailor as he walked. Somehow he felt he could claim kins.h.i.+p with them. He had his store of riches also.

No, it was not contained in the belt around his body. That was only a very little between him and the weather; a man like Klond.y.k.e would soon have done it in. But Henry Harper could now read and write, that was the thought which nerved him to meet the future, that was his store of secret and fabulous wealth.

G.o.d knew he had paid a price for Aladdin's lamp. A week ago that night he had seen performed at the Blackhampton Lyceum the first play of his life, "Aladdin's Wonderful Lamp." He had sat in the pit, d.i.n.kie Dawson one side of him, Ginger the other. He had now his own wonderful lamp.

It was glowing and burning, a ma.s.s of dull fire, in the right-hand corner of his brain. It was a talisman which had come to him at the cost of blood and tears; a magic gift of heaven that he must guard with life itself.

On and on he went. Now and again the face of Ginger tried to overthrow him, but the presence of the talisman meant much to him now....