The sad adventurers; a novel

Chapter I I

S HE was unbelievably happy. It was like get¬ ting up early on a beautiful morning and looking forward to a day of gifts, of sur¬ prises; a day that need never end. This was the way one should feel, of course, with a new and won¬ derful husband, and a new and wonderful life un¬ folding its brilliant vistas far into desirable lands. Europe! She was going to Europe to live—she, Anita Moffett of Stamford—no, Anita Brassington- Welsh from now on. Forever and ever.

Somewhere, among the shifting pattern of the crowd in the cavernous dusk of the pier, her mother and friends were straining to catch a last glimpse of her. As they saw her now on the verge of depar¬ ture, so would they think of her for months to come—radiant, fortunate, sheltered by the tall soldierly figure of her husband. But would they ever discover her where she stood on the upper deck leaning over the rail with Hal beside her?

She seemed already removed from them, a stranger about to sail away on this immense exciting ship; a little woman of golden lights, her wide lips parted, her green eyes brilliant with adventure, and the gay green of her new travelling costume spring¬ ing like a young plant in the sun. A bunch of violets at her breast made her aware of farewells.

It was good to feel this man at her side; to feel so close to her his ruddy face with the dark, dashing sweep of moustache, the smart black and white check of cap and coat.

“There’s the mater, Nita, on the left next to the scrawny old bird with the flag. See her?” He was gleeful as a boy. “Hello there—hello!” His voice boomed out.

“Where, Hal?—I don’t see—” She was crush¬ ing her poor violets against the railing. There was something poignant about those upturned faces below; the sway of arms and heads, the flutter of handkerchiefs; of flags like leaves in a wind trying to be bright, trying to speak, trying to express all that had not been said. It must be hard to be left behind. Such a queer little pain like hot wires slowly twisted through her heart. Hal’s big hand rested on hers. It only made the pain worse.

Yes, there was her mother in the grey suit she had bought especially to see them off. But how small and lonely she looked, how unlike herself. It was the grey, of course. The first time her mother had worn any color since her father’s death.

And there was Miss Lacy. They would go back to Stamford together on the four o’clock train. Oh, and there were the Lucas girls, and the Burlins, at whose house in New York she had met Hal—was it only two months ago?

Her dear, brave mother trying to smile.

Smile! Wave back at the little group. She would see them again soon. She would come back. And then her mother would visit them as soon as they were settled in Brassington Hall. What fun that would be ! Silly of her to want to cry.

“Oh, I say, Nita, buck up, dear girl. Every¬ thing’s quite all right, you know.” He was bending over her. His arm was around her.

She knew that. Everything was gloriously right. But it was as if a thread so slender, so fragile that she had never before realised its existence, had thickened into a chain of many links fastening her to that shore, to the house in Stamford which she could see every time she shut her eyes; fastening her to her mother and to something more intangible which she had not valued enough—her youth. Never the same again—never.

Voices were flung like streamers from decks to wharfs, enclosing them all in a web of farewells that spun thinner and thinner, breaking, strand by strand, as with a din of whistles and steam, the rattle of chains, and pound of engines, the inexorable moment was upon them.

“Good-bye—good-bye—be sure to write-”

“Good-bye—best of luck-”

“Good-bye—don’t forget-”

Slowly they were moving, backing out. The dark water widened.

“Off at last!” Hal sounded relieved. Of course it wasn’t his country, his mother, his friends.

On the open end of the pier, coloured specks clung under the hot June sun. Smaller and smaller, dwindling-

And here was she standing in her new clothes beside her new husband, crying like a baby. Not fair to Hal. There was so much to see, too—the harbour, the boats, the skyline in that vivid morning light. Joy came back to her, curling her light lashes, her lips. “Oh, Hal, it’s wonderful!”

As she trotted along the deck, she was conscious of eyes looking her over, looking Hal over. She lifted her head to sparkle at him, and felt him sleek and glistening beside her. He had a way of pro¬ jecting himself into the foreground of a picture. There was something large and lavish about him, a sonorous quality that carried, especially when he was explaining things to her.

“Friend of mine, Lord Bardell, crossed on her

maiden trip. He told me-”

Perhaps his voice was a trifle loud. A tall woman with a hooked nose and dangling earrings was staring at them and whispering to her companion, a stiff pinkish man. They looked English.

“Hal, aren’t those people English?”

But he had swaggered ahead to talk to the deck steward. You hardly noticed his slight limp except when he was tired. And anyway, she reflected, a game leg was very distinguished.

Trunks—people; people—trunks, in the narrow corridors down which presently he led her. Smells of salt, and rubber, and fresh paint, and a dull throbbing of engines.

She was glad to get back to their cabin with its real beds, and the polished gleam of its adjoining bathroom. The porthole on the promenade deck was open. It was all so light and large and gay.

How good he was, how thoughtful! The inti¬ macy of the room quivered through her. His trunk, her trunk, their bags together, and soon all their belongings out and mingled on the dressing table.

He stood beaming down at her. “Jolly, isn’t it?”

Someone knocked on the door. He laughed as she started away from him. It was only the steward with boxes of flowers, baskets of fruit, books, tele¬ grams. What fun it was! She saw herself in the mirror of the wardrobe, a flushed, happy little woman, slim with the promise of gracious curves, golden-green as a jonquil in the sun, her wide red lips winging upwards.

And now the door was shut. A great shyness came into her heart, a tenderness that exalted and humbled her. She turned and ran to him, and hid her face in the rough-feeling stuff of his coat. He smelt faintly of tobacco, of leather.

She clung to him fiercely, closely. “Please love me—please always love me, Hal.”

“God knows I love you. If I didn’t—” How strange his voice sounded, low and almost stern. She raised her head. He was looking over her, beyond her. His arms around her tightened.

She wasn’t afraid. All their life together-

She wondered the next day how long that life would be! If only those wicked clamps would loosen their hold on her poor head. They seemed fixed at the back, adjusted to a maximum of torture, as if some malignant spirit were tightening the screw, slowly squeezing her brain to a pulp.

The rest of her, attached to that tortured head, lay limply on the bed, aware of every movement, every sound. Hal, poor dear, meant to be quiet. But he was such a big, hearty creature, and he had so very much to tell her about the extraordinary weather, the jolly good fellows he was meeting, and how he wished she felt better, and wouldn’t she drink just a wee nippie of champagne?

She could hardly open her eyes to see him as he stood there in the mornings scrubbed and shining, his splendid moustache setting off his high colour.

When he bent to kiss her, it made her a little dizzy because always about him there seemed to linger whiffs from the smoking room.

He spent a great deal of his time in the smoking room.

She liked to lie with closed eyes during the long evenings thinking of him amusing himself among men. When the pain in her head receded for a while, she drifted into such beautiful dreams of the future. Could she ever live up to Brassington Hall? If his father and mother had lived, would they have loved her? She was so much younger than Hal. But then twenty-four wasn’t so very young. And after all—forty-four wasn’t really old.

To the lazy dip and roll of the ship, and the sound of voices outside, she evolved pictures, images of herself, presiding over that ancient pile of stones which stood for Hal’s family. How little, after all, he had told her of himself! But she knew. She knew already, in her heart, the fair English country¬ side. It flung out its smooth lawns and terraces before her; its English roses bloomed in the gardens, and there were deer and peacocks, and she and Hal, arm in arm, walked down endless avenues hedged with yew.

And then the pain would come back, and Hal would creak in, sit down on the edge of the bed, light a cigarette, and talk about a man called de Lancey Kane, with whom he had grown very chummy the first day out. He was always talking about this Mr. Kane, who, it seemed, came from the Middle West, and spent most of his time crossing and recrossing the ocean just for the fun of it.

A singular manner of enjoying oneself, she thought. But if Hal liked him-

Hal did like him. A good sport, a great hand at bridge, and yesterday he had won the pool. He and Hal seemed always to be playing games of some sort. There were little parties in the cabins of other men, and Hal would come jubilantly back to her displaying his winnings.

“Four pounds. Not so bad—what? Here, old girl, they’re for you to buy something with in Paris.”

“You’ll spoil me, Hal.” But she liked being spoiled.

Then suddenly late one afternoon, the pain in her head went away, and she decided to get up for dinner. She was absurdly weak, and, dear me, how pale she looked! Perhaps the tiniest touch of rouge would help. It made her feel so deliciously guilty to be putting on rouge. But yes, it really was be¬ coming, and with that borrowed brightness, her eyes could afford their languor. A white dress to-night, the soft chiffon one that showed up the golden lights of her hair. Hal would be pleased-

He was pleased. He stopped quite still in the doorway, his dark eyes twinkling under his tufted brows. “Oh, I say, you do look rippin’, my dear!”

He was handsome enough, himself, in his evening clothes, a long-limbed, highly polished, highly coloured military gentleman. And, even if she did feel a bit wobbly on her feet, delight flowed through her as, gallantly, he flung about her shoulders the soft white cape which completed her costume, and told her again how absolutely topping she looked.

Together they went out into the clear evening air. She would have liked to linger on deck watching the deepening blue of sky and sea, the long glistening rolls of water edged with foam. But a cocktail, Hal said, was just the thing. And a cocktail seemed inevitably associated in his mind with the pleasant company of Mr. de Lancey Kane. Apparently the smoking room was the one place where this new friend might be found.

Hal, with the genial spark of fellowship in his eye, guided her there. And sure enough Mr. Kane was waiting.

She did not like Mr. Kane. He was too perfect, too slim and glistening. She didn’t like the shape or colour of his eyes which lay like oysters in a shallow plate. One felt the ice under them, and his skin was the bluish white of a shell. Nor did she like the feel of his long white hand. He subtly missed being obtrusively common. It was because he really wasn’t that one wondered where he had come from and how he had managed to acquire such pleasant ways.

He was pleasant, very pleasant, with just the right note of diffidence in his welcome. “How delighted I am to meet you at last, Mrs. Brassington-Welsh,”

he said. “Our little circle is now complete. I’m sure the Major agrees with me.”

But “the Major” was too busy ordering the drinks to agree with anyone except the steward, whose chummy attitude implied, she thought, that it was Hal’s magnificent custom to pay. It became him and it evidently suited Mr. Kane.

“Here’s to my wife, the finest little woman in the world.” Hal raised his glass. “I’m a devilish lucky man—eh what, Kane? Nothing like her in England.”

Horrid stuff, cocktails. She made a little face as she took a sip.

“I certainly envy you, Major.” Mr. Kane’s smile seemed rather odiously to curl around her.

The atmosphere of men, the little glasses, the jaded smell of all the cigarettes and cigars that had been consumed in that room, turned her faint. How could those other women at adjoining tables stand it?

She sat on smiling at the two men. She smiled as the pain in her head began again.

But Hal was enjoying himself. He was launched on the subject of pools and cards. It seemed to her as if Mr. Kane with too clever gestures of his narrow white hands were flattering him overmuch about his skill and his winnings.

“Hal, I’m afraid—I’ll have to go out.” She must have looked her discomfort, for he was at once on his feet helping her up.

“Excuse us a moment, my dear fellow.”

HONEYMOON m

Mr. Kane’s concern hastened their departure. Oh, but she was glad to breathe the sweet fresh air, glad to nestle in the rug which Hal laid out over the steamer chair, glad to be alone with him in the gathering dusk.

Stupid of her to give in like this. But she couldn’t possibly, not even for his dear sake, face the dining room. The horrid din of the gong sent a shudder through her. She felt very pathetic in her white finery, very feminine and helpless.

“Hal, dear, will you forgive me if I don’t come down with you? If I can have a bit of dinner here-”

Of course he would forgive her. Devilish shame. Anything else he could do for her? He bent to pat her on the shoulder.

She watched him swagger away. How lovely the sea with night slowly drawing over it and the stars blossoming like a field of jonquils. She felt deli¬ ciously lazy and relaxed. She sat white and gold and dreamy with the tray on her lap the steward had brought. People drifted by.

There was a slight bustle as the deck steward and a maid carrying rugs and cushions attended to the comfort of a tall woman who was settling in the next chair.

Why, it was the English lady with the hooked nose and the earrings who had stared at her that first day. She was staring now, but into space. Her dark cloak and the light scarf which shrouded her hair somehow lent her the familiar air of a Stamford matron starting out for a party. But there the resemblance ceased. Her long thin profile looked very, very English and rather terrifying.

Would it be indiscreet to talk to a stranger on shipboard, especially when you and that stranger were seated side by side in the intimate dusk of evening? Suddenly, she wanted to talk to someone.

“This is my first trip. It’s very exciting to go over for the first time.” She leaned forward, a little wistful and very young in her white gown and cape.

“Indeed!”

Of course the English were that way—reserved, very formal until you got to know them. “You’re English, aren’t you? My husband is an English¬ man.”

This time the lady turned and looked her over with a not unkindly china-blue eye. “Really!”

Oh, dear, would all those people, Hal’s friends, be so standoffish? “Perhaps you know my hus¬ band’s name—-Brassington-Welsh—Major Brassington-Welsh?” Her smile was a bright enough ques¬ tion to draw a civil answer.

“Brassington-Welsh—” The lady pronounced it thoughtfully.

She wasn’t going to be snubbed by anyone. “It’s a very old family. Brassington was my husband’s mother’s name, and Welsh his father’s. But the estate is Brassington Hall.” That would show her.

It seemed indeed to show her something, for there was a perceptible thaw in her manner, and the china-blue eye now seemed to be regarding a possible new acquaintance. “The name is familiar. You’ll be living in England then?”

“Oh, yes! But we’re going to Paris first. I’ve always wanted to see Paris.”

Just when they were getting on so nicely, a stiff¬ shouldered figure strolled toward them. It was the pinkish man who, as he approached, threw out a friendly— “How are you now?”

“Quite all right, thank you.” The lady hesi¬ tated. “Mrs.—Brassington-Welsh was telling me about her husband’s place—Brassington Hall, didn’t you say?”

Well, it wasn’t the way they did things at home. But she supposed it might be considered an introduc¬ tion, a one-sided one which the Englishman acknowl¬ edged with a bow.

“Brassington Hall,” he repeated as if it conveyed something to him. “May I ask in what county?”

How stupid of her! Of course she knew, but just for the moment she couldn’t think—and here she was blushing like a school girl. “I’m afraid I don’t remember-”

Even if he were a little stiff, you felt that he could twinkle humanly. She liked the straight, serious look he gave her as if he were understanding her youth and inexperience. Very different from Mr. Kane. If only Hal would turn up now-

And then he came, hurrying, not noticing her com-

H

panions, only seeing her. “I got Kane to dine with me. Hope you haven’t been lonely.” His shirt front gleamed, his face shone ruddy in the electric light overhead.

“Indeed, I haven’t been lonely.” Her smile played brightly over the group. “We’ve been talk¬ ing about Brassington Hall. I couldn’t remember what county-” 1

Why, what was the matter with him? He and the pinkish gentleman eyed one another, and stood like men of wood. Constraint was in the air.

Oh, well, if they wanted to be formal! “May I present my husband, Major Brassington-Welsh?” She waited for the murmured names which finally enlightened her—Lady Forbes, Colonel Annersley. Followed a pause so brittle that it had to break.

She broke it a trifle nervously. “Hal, dear, where is your place ?” Brassington Hall was the raft upon which they might all safely climb and drift toward the shores of their England.

But Hal, for once, didn’t seem eager to drift anywhere in company. “In Surrey.” His tone was curt. And his hand went to his moustache as if to assure himself that it was still there.

“Ah, indeed! Surrey—” The Colonel’s stare, she thought, was a shade insolent. “Happen to know Lansmere? I stopped with him last summer. I think he mentioned Brassington Hall.”

Hal gave him back the stare. “Lansmere was a friend of my governor’s.”

“Ah, yes! But I understood—” Whatever the Colonel understood he suddenly decided to keep to himself.

It was too bad of Hal to act in this unsociable way before her new friends—people who would know now who he was. But there he stood without saying a word. It made him look too heavy when he drew his brows together; it clouded the usual handsome good nature of his face.

Meanwhile Lady Forbes had grown visibly more gracious. She was really quite pretty when she smiled. “I have quite a number of friends in Surrey,” she said. “No doubt we shall run across one another.”

“I do hope so.” She was beginning to like Lady Forbes. “Hal, how long do we stay in Paris?”

But he had stepped to the deck railing to study the sky. He turned with a sudden brusqueness. “It’s a bit chilly for you, don’t you think?”

If it were chilly, he and Colonel Annersley were responsible. But her animation, and the courage to renew it, had slipped from her. “Perhaps we had better go in.” Her smile was mechanical as she rose from her chair.

The Colonel’s clear grey eye, fixed on her as he stepped aside, seemed to hold a message which she couldn’t quite make out. It was a swift and deeply searching look which she met, standing beside Hal with her head held high. Of course she couldn’t be friends with anyone her husband didn’t like. And i6 yet she felt oddly reluctant to leave as Lady Forbes murmured a friendly good evening.

Hal didn’t speak to her. What could she have done to offend him? It was the first time, the very first time she had ever felt so miserable. She glanced up at him as he stalked along the deck, and the little hurt in her heart burned at the injustice of his mood. They were dancing in the big saloon. She loved dancing. There were groups of people talking to one another, strolling about or watching the dancers. The music made her want to cry because always before it had meant light-hearted rhythms, light-hearted chatter and the swaying movement of dance in a partner’s arms.

She moved slowly, passing it all. Going to bed.

And now the door was shut and they were alone in their cabin, and the tears came. She stood there in her pretty white gown and cape, feeling that really, really, he hadn’t been kind.

Then she was in his arms and he was fiercely lov¬ ing her. He was telling her that he had been a brute but that it was all over now.

“I thought you’d like them, Hal. I thought-”

But he didn’t want to talk about them. It was all right. Everything was all right.

She was glad to be tucked in bed and to lie very still. And she didn’t mind in the least if he left her for a while to go and play a little game with the odious Kane man. Only she wished he wouldn’t.

“I half promised Kane and two other chaps to take a hand to-night—” He stood over her very big and humble.

She wasn’t going to be the kind of wife who would ever hold back her husband. “Do go, then, Hal dear.”

“I won’t be long,” he promised from the door.

She lay back listening to the noises, the creak and groan, as of uneasy ghosts roving through the ship, the footfalls, the sound, rather felt than heard, of the sea.

Marriage. Love. You played with these things in your mind, and then when they came, they were not at all as you imagined them. They were made up of little disappointments, betrayals, surrenders.

Hal hadn’t meant to be rude. He hadn’t meant to hurt her. He would never willingly hurt her.

Hal wouldn’t explain why, on this brilliant morn¬ ing of their last day, he preferred to mope in the cabin. When she, herself, proposed the smoking room before luncheon, he only grunted and flopped over on the bed, where he lay smoking cigarettes, and flipping ashes on the floor. And right after breakfast the steward had brought him a bottle of Scotch. The smell of it, somehow, poisoned for her the beautiful morning air.

She had counted so on this last day of blue skies and sea. But there was no pleasure in going out alone, and there was always the danger that Mr. Kane might attach himself to her for a morning stroll. She felt self-conscious about being seen with Mr. Kane, particularly by Lady Forbes and Colonel Annersley who, beyond a polite nod now and then, had not sought a closer acquaintance. You couldn’t blame them after Hal’s brusque behaviour of the other evening.

She wouldn’t have minded if only he had told her what was the matter with him. He assured her that nothing was the matter. But she knew better. Her little sigh, as she turned the pages of her book, im¬ plied that she was being very patient indeed.

The knock on the door came as a relief. But when, at her bright invitation, the door opened and the Kane man stepped in, she had only time for a ges¬ ture of surprise and annoyance before suddenly Hal sprang to his feet— “What d’you mean by coming here?”

His voice startled her. Something had obviously happened to change his friendly attitude toward Mr. Kane. Of course he had no business to intrude and Hal knew how much she disliked him. But even that couldn’t quite explain the tense moment pre¬ ceding Mr. Kane’s murmured:— “I beg your pardon, Mrs. Brassington-Welsh. I must speak to your husband.”

Hal wouldn’t let her answer. His face frightened her, it was so red and fierce. He towered in front of her, his hands thrust in his pockets as if they were safer there. “Get out,” he roared.

But Mr. Kane did not get out. He stayed by the door, his shallow, oyster-coloured eyes fixed on Hal. Somehow his polished surface seemed to have thinned, so that one caught uneasy glimpses of the man beneath it all,—the man she distrusted.

“I would rather have spoken to you alone, Major,” and he looked at her before softly adding, “the Captain wants to see us.”

“He does, does he?” Hal’s voice was lower, harsher. He strode over to Mr. Kane, and his hands still in his pockets, his head thrust forward, he stood there glowering. “Well, I’m not goin’— understand? It’s your own rotten business. How dare you come near me after last night?”

What were they talking about? What could have happened last night? “Hal, dear, please—please Mr. Kane—” She felt hot and sick with the sense of outraged privacy.

Mr. Kane raised his long white hand. “One moment, Major.” And then he turned to her. You could see now that he was nervous, struggling to keep his poise. “I think you should know, Mrs. Brassington-Welsh, that there was a little trouble last night. Your husband and I-”

Hal was upon him before she could speak. “You dirty blackguard. Leave my wife out of it.” He had the man by the shoulder, was hustling him to the door.

“You ask your husband about that little game last night.” His voice reached her thin and venomous as Hal pushed him out and slammed the door.

But ugliness lingered in the air as Hal whirled around, his face and eyes congested. “Damn the fellow’s impertinence! I’d like to wring his crooked neck. I’d like-”

“Hal, what happened last night?” It was her right to know. She was no longer a child to shrink from unpleasantness. But she couldn’t help feeling young and rather helpless as she faced him with a brave show of composure.

He avoided the pleading of her eyes. “Oh, nothin’!”

“Hal, something did happen. You’ve got to tell me.” Her hand was on his arm, her face lifted to his. “I want to share everything with you, Hal. You must never keep anything from me.” She made him look at her. Yes, he must see how deeply, deeply in earnest she was; how love to her meant just this—this sharing.

He looked and turned his head away, as if he couldn’t bear what he saw. “You’re so sweet—I’m not fit—” And he broke loose from her.

“Hal, what do you mean ?” Now she was startled to the very roots of her being—straight and quiver¬ ing as a golden flower in a wind.

“What do I mean?” He swung around, his hand fumbling at his moustache. He looked at her again, and staunchly she met his eyes. So they stood rock¬ ing a little to the sway of the boat.

She smiled with a tremulous curl of lip. “You big goose to say you’re not fit— What happened last night? Tell me that first.” He might as well realise that his Nita always, always got what she wanted in the end.

“Hang it all, I’ll tell you then.” But it seemed hard to begin.

She sat down and waited.

The cabin was too small for him. He paced back and forth, a big nervous man frowning with those thick black brows. He stopped to light a cigarette, and his hand, she noticed, trembled.

“You’ve heard of professional gamblers, of course,” he burst out at last. “Well, that’s what Kane is. A low-down crook, too. And—well— they caught him at it last night in a fellow called Noland’s cabin. We were playin’ with his pack of cards. He’d pin-pricked the face cards—under¬ stand? And Noland—” Now that he was started, he couldn’t stop.

She imagined the hot smoky cabin, the men drink¬ ing and playing. Red, excited men. Hal and Kane winning—Hal and Kane-

“But, Hal, you’ve got nothing to do with it.” She sat up brightly indignant. She would have blotted out the picture if she could.

“They wouldn’t believe me,” he raged. “Con¬ found ’em. Why, that chap Noland said-”

She saw it all. She saw it as he blurted out the end of the wretched story. She heard the angry voices, saw Kane slender and pale letting Hal take the blame with him. Major Brassington-Welsh and Mr. Kane always partners, always winning— Yes, Kane had used Hal.

“What could I do?” Hal groaned, tramping to and fro. “Oh, what an ass I’ve been! What a blighted ass!”