Thelma
with one hand from the glittering sunlight, as she watched them
descending the winding path to the shore, accompanied by her lather, who
hospitably insisted on seeing them into their boat. They looked back
once or twice, always to see the slender, tall white figure standing
there like an angel resting in a bower of roses, with the sunshine
flashing on a golden crown of hair. At the last in the pathway Philip
raised his hat and waved it, but whether she condescended to wave her
hand in answer he could not see.
Left alone, she sighed, and went slowly into the house to resume her
spinning. Hearing the whirr of the wheel, the servant Britta entered.
"You are not going in the boat, Froeken?" she asked in a tone of mingled
deference and affection.
Thelma looked up, smiled faintly, and shook her head in the negative.
"It is late, Britta, and I am tired."
And the deep blue eyes had an intense dreamy light within them as they
wandered from the wheel to the wide-open window, and rested on the
majestic darkness of the overshadowing, solemn pines.
CHAPTER VII.
"In mezzo del mio core c' e una spina;
Non c' e barbier che la possa levare,--
Solo il mio amore colla sua manina"
_Rime Popolari._
Errington and Lorimer pulled away across the Fjord in a silence that
lasted for many minutes. Old Gueldmar stood on the edge of his little
pier to watch them out of sight. So, till their boat turned the sharp
corner of the protecting rock, that hid the landing-place from view,
they saw his picturesque figure and gleaming silvery hair outlined
clearly against the background of the sky--a sky now tenderly flushed
with pink like the inside of a delicate shell. When they could no longer
perceive him they still rowed on speaking no word,--the measured,
musical plash of the oars through the smooth, dark olive-green water
alone breaking the stillness around them. There was a curious sort of
hushed breathlessness in the air; fantastic, dream-like lights and
shadows played on the little wrinkling waves; sudden flushes of crimson
came and went in the western horizon, and over the high summits of the
surrounding mountains mysterious shapes, formed of purple and grey mist,
rose up and crept softly downwards, winding in and out deep valleys and
dark ravines, like wandering spirits sent on some secret and sorrowful
errand. After a while Errington said almost vexedly--
"Are you struck dumb, George? Haven't you a word to say to a fellow?"
"Just what I was about to ask _you_," replied Lorimer carelessly; "and I
was also going to remark that we hadn't seen your mad friend up at the
Gueldmar residence."
"No. Yet I can't help thinking he has something to do with them, all the
same," returned Errington meditatively. "I tell you, he swore at me by
some old Norwegian infernal place or other. I dare say he's an Odin
worshipper, too. But never mind him. What do you think of _her_?"
Lorimer turned lazily round in the boat, so that he faced his companion.
"Well, old fellow, if you ask me frankly, I think she is the most
beautiful woman I ever saw, or, for that matter, ever heard of. And I am
an impartial critic--perfectly impartial."
And, resting on his oar, he dipped the blade musingly in and out of the
water, watching the bright drops fall with an oil-like smoothness as
they trickled from the polished wood and glittered in the late sunshine
like vari-colored jewels. Then he glanced curiously at Philip, who sat
silent, but whose face was very grave and earnest,--even noble, with
that shade of profound thought upon it. He looked like one who had
suddenly accepted a high trust, in which there was not only pride, but
tenderness. Lorimer shook himself together, as he himself would have
expressed it, and touched his friend's arm half-playfully.
"You've met the king's daughter of Norroway after all, Phil;" and his
light accents had a touch of sadness in them; "and you'll have to bring
her home, as the old song says. I believe the 'eligible' is caught at
last. The 'woman' of the piece has turned up, and your chum must play
second fiddle--eh, old boy?"
Errington flushed hotly, but caught Lorimer's hand and pressed it with
tremendous fervor.
"By Jove, I'll wring it off your wrist if you talk in that fashion,
George!" he said, with a laugh. "You'll always be the same to me, and
you know it. I tell you," and he pulled his moustache doubtfully, "I
don't know quite what's the matter with me. That girl fascinates me! I
feel a fool in her presence. Is that a sign of being in love I wonder?"
"Certainly not!" returned George promptly; "for _I_ feel a fool in her
presence, and I'm not in love."
"How do you know that?" And Errington glanced at him keenly and
inquiringly.
"How do I know? Come, I like that! Have I studied myself all these years
for nothing? Look here,"--and he carefully drew out the little withering
bunch of daisies he had purloined--"these are for you. I knew you wanted
them, though you hadn't the impudence to pick them up, and I had. I
thought you might like to put them under your pillow, and all that sort
of thing, because if one is resolved to become love-lunatic, one may as
well do the thing properly out and out,--I hate all half-measures. Now,
if the remotest thrill of sentiment were in me, you can understand, I
hope, that wild horses would not have torn this adorable posy from my
possession! I should have kept it, and you would never have known of
it," and he laughed softly. "Take it, old fellow! You're rich now, with
the rose she gave you besides. What is all your wealth compared with the
sacred preciousness of such blossoms! There, don't look so awfully
estactic, or I shall be called upon to ridicule you in the interests of
common sense. So you're in love with the girl at once, and have done
with it. Don't beat about the bush!"
"I'm not sure about it," said Philip, taking the daisies gratefully,
however, and pressing them in his pocket-book. "I don't believe in love
at first sight!"
"I do," returned Lorimer decidedly. "Love is electricity. Two telegrams
are enough to settle the business,--one from the eyes of the man, the
other from those of the woman. You and Miss Gueldmar must have exchanged
a dozen such messages at least."
"And you?" inquired Errington persistently. "You had the same chance as
myself."
George shrugged his shoulders. "My dear boy, there are no wires of
communication between the Sun-angel and myself; nothing but a blank,
innocent landscape, over which perhaps some day, the mild lustre of
friendship may beam. The girl is beautiful--extraordinarily so; but I'm
not a 'man o' wax,' as Juliet's gabbling old nurse says--not in the
least impressionable."
And forthwith he resumed his oar, saying briskly as he did so--
"Phil, do you know those other fellows must be swearing at us pretty
forcibly for leaving them so long with Dyceworthy. We've been away two
hours!"
"Not possible!" cried Errington, amazed, and wielding his oar
vigorously. "They'll think me horribly rude. By Jove, they must be bored
to death!"
And, stimulated by the thought of the penance their friends were
enduring, they sent the boat spinning swiftly through the water, and
rowed as though they were trying for a race, when they were suddenly
pulled up by a loud "Halloo!" and the sight of another boat coming
slowly out from Bosekop, wherein two individuals were standing up,
gesticulating violently.
"There they are!" exclaimed Lorimer. "I say, Phil, they've hired a
special tub, and are coming out to us."
So it proved. Duprez and Macfarlane had grown tired of waiting for their
truant companions, and had taken the first clumsy wherry that presented
itself, rowed by an even clumsier Norwegian boatman, whom they had been
compelled to engage also, as he would not let his ugly punt out of his
sight, for fear some harm might chance to befall it. Thus attended, they
were on their way back to the yacht. With a few long, elegant strokes,
Errington and Lorimer soon brought their boat alongside, and their
friends gladly jumped into it, delighted to be free of the company of
the wooden-faced mariner they had so reluctantly hired, and who now, on
receiving his fee, paddled awkwardly away in his ill-constructed craft,
without either a word of thanks or salutation. Errington began to
apologize at once for his long absence, giving as a reason for it, the
necessity he found himself under of making a call on some persons of
importance in the neighborhood, whom he had, till now, forgotten.
"My good Phil-eep!" cried Duprez, in his cheery sing song accent, "why
apologize? We have amused ourselves! Our dear Sandy has a vein of humor
that is astonishing! We have not wasted our time. No! We have made Mr.
Dyceworthy our slave; we have conquered him; we have abased him! He is
what we please,--he is for all gods or for no god,--just as we pull the
string! In plain words, _mon cher_, that amiable religious is drunk!"
"Drunk!" cried Errington and Lorimer together. "Jove! you don't mean
it?"
Macfarlane looked up with a twinkle of satirical humor in his deep-set
grey eyes.
"Ye see," he said seriously, "the Lacrima, or Papist wine as he calls
it, was strong--we got him to take a good dose o't--a vera feir dose
indeed. Then, doun he sat, an' fell to convairsing vera pheelosophically
o' mony things,--it wad hae done ye gude to hear him,--he was fair lost
in the mazes o' his metapheesics, for twa flies took a bit saunter
through the pleasant dewy lanes o' his forehead, an' he never raised a
finger to send them awa' aboot their beeziness. Then I thoet I wad try
him wi' the whusky--I had ma pocket flask wi' me--an' O mon! he was
sairly glad and gratefu' for the first snack o't! He said it was
deevilish fine stuff, an' so he took ane drappikie, an' anither
drappikie, and yet anither drappikie,"--Sandy's accent got more and more
pronounced as he went on--"an' after a bit, his heed dropt doun, an' he
took a wee snoozle of a minute or twa,--then he woke up in a' his
strength an' just grappit the flask in his twa hands an' took the hale
o't off at a grand, rousin' gulp! Ma certes! after it ye shuld ha' seen
him laughin' like a feckless fule, an' rubbin' an' rubbin' his heed,
till his hair was like the straw kicked roond by a mad coo!"
Lorimer lay back in the stern of the boat and laughed uproariously at
this extraordinary picture, as did the others.
"But that is not all," said Duprez, with delighted mischief sparkling in
his wicked little dark eyes; "the dear religious opened his heart to us.
He spoke thickly, but we could understand him. He was very impressive!
He is quite of my opinion. He says all religion is nonsense, fable,
imposture,--Man is the only god, Woman his creature and subject.
Again,--man and woman conjoined, make up divinity, necessity, law. He
was quite clear on that point. Why did he preach what he did not
believe, we asked? He almost wept! He replied that the children of this
world liked fairy-stories and he was paid to tell them. It was his bread
and butter,--would we wish him to have no bread and butter? We assured
him so cruel a thought had no place in our hearts! Then he is
amorous--yes! the good fat man is amorous! He would have become a
priest, but on close examination of the confessionals he saw there was
no possibility of seeing, much less kissing a lady penitent through the
grating. So he gave up that idea! In his form of faith he _can_ kiss, he
says,--he _does_ kiss!--always a holy kiss, of course! He is so
ingenuous,--so delightfully frank, it is quite charming!"
They laughed again. Sir Philip looked somewhat disgusted.
"What an old brute he must be!" he said. "Somebody ought to kick him--a