The Girl on the Boat
“Yes. I’d quite forgotten that Mr. Mortimer was to be on board. He has
given me all the money I shall need. You see it was this way. I had to
sail on this boat in rather a hurry. Father’s head clerk was to have
gone to the bank and got some money and met me on board and given it to
me, but the silly old man was late and when he got to the dock they had
just pulled in the gang-plank. So he tried to throw the money to me in
a handkerchief and it fell into the water. But you shouldn’t have dived
in after it.”
“Oh, well!” said Sam, straightening his tie, with a quiet, brave smile.
He had never expected to feel grateful to that obese bounder who had
shoved him off the rail, but now he would have liked to seek him out
and shake him by the hand.
“You really are the bravest man I ever met!”
“Oh, no!”
“How modest you are! But I suppose all brave men are modest!”
“I was only too delighted at what looked like a chance of doing you a
service.”
“It was the extraordinary quickness of it that was so wonderful. I do
admire presence of mind. You didn’t hesitate for a second. You just
shot over the side as though propelled by some irresistible force!”
“It was nothing, nothing really. One just happens to have the knack of
keeping one’s head and acting quickly on the spur of the moment. Some
people have it, some haven’t.”
“And just think! As Bream was saying....”
“It _is_ all right,” said Mr. Mortimer, reappearing suddenly. “I saw a
couple of the stewards and they both said it was all right. So it’s all
right.”
“Splendid,” said the girl. “Oh, Bream!”
“Hello?”
“Do be an angel and run along to my state-room and see if Pinky-Boodles
is quite comfortable.”
“Bound to be.”
“Yes. But do go. He may be feeling lonely. Chirrup to him a little.”
“Chirrup?”
“Yes, to cheer him up.”
“Oh, all right.”
“Run along!”
Mr. Mortimer ran along. He had the air of one who feels that he only
needs a peaked cap and a uniform two sizes too small for him to be a
properly equipped messenger boy.
“And, as Bream was saying,” resumed the girl, “you might have been left
behind.”
“That,” said Sam, edging a step closer, “was the thought that tortured
me, the thought that a friendship so delightfully begun....”
“But it hadn’t begun. We have never spoken to each other before now.”
“Have you forgotten? On the dock....”
Sudden enlightenment came into her eyes.
“Oh, you are the man poor Pinky-Boodles bit!”
“The lucky man!”
Her face clouded.
“Poor Pinky is feeling the motion of the boat a little. It’s his first
voyage.”
“I shall always remember that it was Pinky who first brought us
together. Would you care for a stroll on deck?”
“Not just now, thanks. I must be getting back to my room to finish
unpacking. After lunch, perhaps.”
“I will be there. By the way, you know my name, but....”
“Oh, mine?” She smiled brightly. “It’s funny that a person’s name is
the last thing one thinks of asking. Mine is Bennett.”
“Bennett!”
“Wilhelmina Bennett. My friends,” she said softly as she turned away,
“call me Billie!”
CHAPTER III.
SAM PAVES THE WAY
For some moments Sam remained where he was, staring after the girl as
she flitted down the passage. He felt dizzy. Mental acrobatics always
have an unsettling effect, and a young man may be excused for feeling a
little dizzy when he is called upon suddenly and without any warning to
re-adjust all his preconceived views on any subject. Listening to
Eustace Hignett’s story of his blighted romance, Sam had formed an
unflattering opinion of this Wilhelmina Bennett who had broken off her
engagement simply because on the day of the marriage his cousin had
been short of the necessary wedding garment. He had, indeed, thought a
little smugly how different his goddess of the red hair was from the
object of Eustace Hignett’s affections. And now they had proved to be
one and the same. It was disturbing. It was like suddenly finding the
vampire of a five-reel feature film turn into the heroine.
Some men, on making the discovery of this girl’s identity, might have
felt that Providence had intervened to save them from a disastrous
entanglement. This point of view never occurred to Samuel Marlowe. The
way he looked at it was that he had been all wrong about Wilhelmina
Bennett. Eustace, he felt, had been to blame throughout. If this girl
had maltreated Eustace’s finer feelings, then her reason for doing so
must have been excellent and praiseworthy.
After all ... poor old Eustace ... quite a good fellow, no doubt in
many ways ... but, coming down to brass tacks, what was there about
Eustace that gave him any claim to monopolise the affections of a
wonderful girl? Where, in a word, did Eustace Hignett get off? He made
a tremendous grievance of the fact that she had broken off the
engagement, but what right had he to go about the place expecting her
to be engaged to him? Eustace Hignett, no doubt, looked upon the poor
girl as utterly heartless. Marlowe regarded her behaviour as thoroughly
sensible. She had made a mistake, and, realising this at the eleventh
hour, she had had the force of character to correct it. He was sorry
for poor old Eustace, but he really could not permit the suggestion
that Wilhelmina Bennett—her friends called her Billie—had not behaved
in a perfectly splendid way throughout. It was women like Wilhelmina
Bennett—Billie to her intimates—who made the world worth living in.
Her friends called her Billie. He did not blame them. It was a
delightful name and suited her to perfection. He practised it a few
times. “Billie ... Billie ... Billie....” It certainly ran pleasantly
off the tongue. “Billie Bennett.” Very musical. “Billie Marlowe.” Still
better. “We noticed among those present the charming and popular Mrs.
‘Billie’ Marlowe....”
A consuming desire came over him to talk about the girl to someone.
Obviously indicated as the party of the second part was Eustace
Hignett. If Eustace was still capable of speech—and after all the boat
was hardly rolling at all—he would enjoy a further chat about his
ruined life. Besides, he had another reason for seeking Eustace’s
society. As a man who had been actually engaged to marry this supreme
girl, Eustace Hignett had an attraction for Sam akin to that of some
great public monument. He had become a sort of shrine. He had taken on
a glamour. Sam entered the state-room almost reverentially, with
something of the emotions of a boy going into his first dime museum.
The exhibit was lying on his back, staring at the roof of the berth. By
lying absolutely still and forcing himself to think of purely inland
scenes and objects, he had contrived to reduce the green in his
complexion to a mere tinge. But it would be paltering with the truth to
say that he felt debonair. He received Sam with a wan austerity.
“Sit down!” he said. “Don’t stand there swaying like that. I can’t bear
it.”
“Why, we aren’t out of the harbour yet. Surely you aren’t going to be
sea-sick already.”
“I can issue no positive guarantee. Perhaps if I can keep my mind off
it.... I have had good results for the last ten minutes by thinking
steadily of the Sahara. There,” said Eustace Hignett with enthusiasm,
“is a place for you! That is something like a spot. Miles and miles of
sand and not a drop of water anywhere!”
Sam sat down on the lounge.
“You’re quite right. The great thing is to concentrate your mind on
other topics. Why not, for instance, tell me some more about your
unfortunate affair with that girl—Billie Bennett I think you said her
name was.”
“Wilhelmina Bennett. Where on earth did you get the idea that her name
was Billie?”
“I had a notion that girls called Wilhelmina were sometimes Billie to
their friends.”
“I never called her anything but Wilhelmina. But I really cannot talk
about it. The recollection tortures me.”
“That’s just what you want. It’s the counter-irritation principle.
Persevere, and you’ll soon forget that you’re on board ship at all.”
“There’s something in that,” admitted Eustace reflectively. “It’s very
good of you to be so sympathetic and interested.”
“My dear fellow ... anything that I can do ... where did you meet her
first, for instance?”
“At a dinner....” Eustace Hignett broke off abruptly. He had a good
memory and he had just recollected the fish they had served at that
dinner—a flabby and exhausted looking fish half sunk beneath the
surface of a thick white sauce.
“And what struck you most forcibly about her at first? Her lovely hair,
I suppose?”
“How did you know she had lovely hair?”
“My dear chap, I naturally assumed that any girl with whom you fell in
love would have nice hair.”
“Well, you are perfectly right, as it happens. Her hair was remarkably
beautiful. It was red....”
“Like autumn leaves with the sun on them!” said Marlowe ecstatically.
Hignett started.
“What an extraordinary thing! That is an absolutely exact description.
Her eyes were a deep blue....”
“Or, rather, green.”
“Blue.”
“Green. There is a shade of green that looks blue.”
“What the devil do you know about the colour of her eyes?” demanded
Eustace heatedly. “Am I telling you about her, or are you telling me?”
“My dear old man, don’t get excited. Don’t you see I am trying to
construct this girl in my imagination, to visualise her? I don’t
pretend to doubt your special knowledge, but after all green eyes
generally do go with red hair and there are all shades of green. There
is the bright green of meadow grass, the dull green of the uncut
emerald, the faint yellowish green of your face at the present
moment....”
“Don’t talk about the colour of my face! Now you’ve gone and reminded
me just when I was beginning to forget.”
“Awfully sorry. Stupid of me. Get your mind off it again—quick. What
were we saying? Oh, yes, this girl. I always think it helps one to form
a mental picture of people if one knows something about their
tastes—what sort of things they are interested in, their favourite
topics of conversation, and so on. This Miss Bennett now, what did she
like talking about?”
“Oh, all sorts of things.”
“Yes, but what?”
“Well, for one thing she was very fond of poetry. It was that which
first drew us together.”
“Poetry!” Sam’s heart sank a little. He had read a certain amount of
poetry at school, and once he had won a prize of three shillings and
sixpence for the last line of a Limerick in a competition in a weekly
paper; but he was self-critic enough to know that poetry was not his
long suit. Still there was a library on board the ship, and no doubt it
would be possible to borrow the works of some standard bard and bone
them up from time to time. “Any special poet?”
“Well, she seemed to like my stuff. You never read my sonnet-sequence
on Spring, did you?”
“No. What other poets did she like besides you?”
“Tennyson principally,” said Eustace Hignett with a reminiscent quiver
in his voice. “The hours we have spent together reading the Idylls of
the King!”
“The which of what?” inquired Sam, taking a pencil from his pocket and
shooting out a cuff.
“‘The Idylls of the King.’ My good man, I know you have a soul which
would be considered inadequate by a common earthworm but you have
surely heard of Tennyson’s ‘Idylls of the King?’”
“Oh, _those!_ Why, my dear old chap! Tennyson’s ‘Idylls of the King?’
Well, I should say! Have I heard of Tennyson’s ‘Idylls of the King?’
Well, really? I suppose you haven’t a copy with you on board by any
chance?”
“There is a copy in my kit bag. The very one we used to read together.
Take it and keep it or throw it overboard. I don’t want to see it
again.”
Sam prospected among the shirts, collars, and trousers in the bag and
presently came upon a morocco-bound volume. He laid it beside him on
the lounge.