For the Term of His Natural Life Part 35

'Tis the second time she served me so."

"How long was it this time, Danny?"

"Six months, miss. She said I was a drunkard, and beat her. Beat her, G.o.d help me!" stretching forth two trembling hands. "And they believed her, o' course. Now, when I kem back, there's me little place all thrampled by the boys, and she's away wid a s.h.i.+p's captain, saving your presence, miss, dhrinking in the 'George the Fourth'. O my, but it's hard on an old man!" and he fell to sobbing again.

The girl sighed. "I can do nothing for you, Danny. I dare say you can work about the garden as you did before. I'll speak to the Major when he comes home."

Danny, lifting his bleared eyes to thank her, caught sight of Mr.

Meekin, and saluted abruptly. Miss Vickers turned, and Mr. Meekin, bowing his apologies, became conscious that the young lady was about seventeen years of age, that her eyes were large and soft, her hair plentiful and bright, and that the hand which held the little book she had been reading was white and small.

"Miss Vickers, I think. My name is Meekin--the Reverend Arthur Meekin."

"How do you do, Mr. Meekin?" said Sylvia, putting out one of her small hands, and looking straight at him. "Papa will be in directly."

"His daughter more than compensates for his absence, my dear Miss Vickers."

"I don't like flattery, Mr. Meekin, so don't use it. At least,"

she added, with a delicious frankness, that seemed born of her very brightness and beauty, "not that sort of flattery. Young girls do like flattery, of course. Don't you think so?"

This rapid attack quite disconcerted Mr. Meekin, and he could only bow and smile at the self-possessed young lady. "Go into the kitchen, Danny, and tell them to give you some tobacco. Say I sent you. Mr. Meekin, won't you come in?"

"A strange old gentleman, that, Miss Vickers. A faithful retainer, I presume?"

"An old convict servant of ours," said Sylvia. "He was with papa many years ago. He has got into trouble lately, though, poor old man."

"Into trouble?" asked Mr. Meekin, as Sylvia took off her hat.

"On the roads, you know. That's what they call it here. He married a free woman much younger than himself, and she makes him drink, and then gives him in charge for insubordination."

"For insubordination! Pardon me, my dear young lady, did I understand you rightly?"

"Yes, insubordination. He is her a.s.signed servant, you know," said Sylvia, as if such a condition of things was the most ordinary in the world, "and if he misbehaves himself, she sends him back to the road-gang."

The Reverend Mr. Meekin opened his mild eyes very wide indeed. "What an extraordinary anomaly! I am beginning, my dear Miss Vickers, to find myself indeed at the antipodes."

"Society here is different from society in England, I believe. Most new arrivals say so," returned Sylvia quietly.

"But for a wife to imprison her husband, my dear young lady!"

"She can have him flogged if she likes. Danny has been flogged. But then his wife is a bad woman. He was very silly to marry her; but you can't reason with an old man in love, Mr. Meekin."

Mr. Meekin's Christian brow had grown crimson, and his decorous blood tingled to his finger-tips. To hear a young lady talk in such an open way was terrible. Why, in reading the Decalogue from the altar, Mr.

Meekin was accustomed to soften one indecent prohibition, lest its uncompromising plainness of speech might offend the delicate sensibilities of his female souls! He turned from the dangerous theme without an instant's pause, for wonder at the strange power accorded to Hobart Town "free" wives. "You have been reading?"

"'Paul et Virginie'. I have read it before in English."

"Ah, you read French, then, my dear young lady?"

"Not very well. I had a master for some months, but papa had to send him back to the gaol again. He stole a silver tankard out of the dining-room."

"A French master! Stole--"

"He was a prisoner, you know. A clever man. He wrote for the London Magazine. I have read his writings. Some of them are quite above the average."

"And how did he come to be transported?" asked Mr. Meekin, feeling that his vineyard was getting larger than he had antic.i.p.ated.

"Poisoning his niece, I think, but I forget the particulars. He was a gentlemanly man, but, oh, such a drunkard!"

Mr. Meekin, more astonished than ever at this strange country, where beautiful young ladies talked of poisoning and flogging as matters of little moment, where wives imprisoned their husbands, and murderers taught French, perfumed the air with his cambric handkerchief in silence.

"You have not been here long, Mr. Meekin," said Sylvia, after a pause.

"No, only a week; and I confess I am surprised. A lovely climate, but, as I said just now to Mrs. Jellicoe, the Trail of the Serpent--the Trail of the Serpent--my dear young lady."

"If you send all the wretches in England here, you must expect the Trail of the Serpent," said Sylvia. "It isn't the fault of the colony."

"Oh, no; certainly not," returned Meekin, hastening to apologize. "But it is very shocking."

"Well, you gentlemen should make it better. I don't know what the penal settlements are like, but the prisoners in the town have not much inducement to become good men."

"They have the beautiful Liturgy of our Holy Church read to them twice every week, my dear young lady," said Mr. Meekin, as though he should solemnly say, "if that doesn't reform them, what will?"

"Oh, yes," returned Sylvia, "they have that, certainly; but that is only on Sundays. But don't let us talk about this, Mr. Meekin," she added, pus.h.i.+ng back a stray curl of golden hair. "Papa says that I am not to talk about these things, because they are all done according to the Rules of the Service, as he calls it."

"An admirable notion of papa's," said Meekin, much relieved as the door opened, and Vickers and Frere entered.

Vickers's hair had grown white, but Frere carried his thirty years as easily as some men carry two-and-twenty.

"My dear Sylvia," began Vickers, "here's an extraordinary thing!" and then, becoming conscious of the presence of the agitated Meekin, he paused.

"You know Mr. Meekin, papa?" said Sylvia. "Mr. Meekin, Captain Frere."

"I have that pleasure," said Vickers. "Glad to see you, sir. Pray sit down." Upon which, Mr. Meekin beheld Sylvia unaffectedly kiss both gentlemen; but became strangely aware that the kiss bestowed upon her father was warmer than that which greeted her affianced husband.

"Warm weather, Mr. Meekin," said Frere. "Sylvia, my darling, I hope you have not been out in the heat. You have! My dear, I've begged you--"

"It's not hot at all," said Sylvia pettishly. "Nonsense! I'm not made of b.u.t.ter--I sha'n't melt. Thank you, dear, you needn't pull the blind down." And then, as though angry with herself for her anger, she added, "You are always thinking of me, Maurice," and gave him her hand affectionately.

"It's very oppressive, Captain Frere," said Meekin; "and to a stranger, quite enervating."

"Have a gla.s.s of wine," said Frere, as if the house was his own. "One wants bucking up a bit on a day like this."

"Ay, to be sure," repeated Vickers. "A gla.s.s of wine. Sylvia, dear, some sherry. I hope she has not been attacking you with her strange theories, Mr. Meekin."

"Oh, dear, no; not at all," returned Meekin, feeling that this charming young lady was regarded as a creature who was not to be judged by ordinary rules. "We got on famously, my dear Major."

"That's right," said Vickers. "She is very plain-spoken, is my little girl, and strangers can't understand her sometimes. Can they, Poppet?"

Poppet tossed her head saucily. "I don't know," she said. "Why shouldn't they? But you were going to say something extraordinary when you came in. What is it, dear?"