I
Rachel Hepburn believed that her first lover had been drawn to her—when she was twenty-two years old—by the way in which she played the violin. She played it remarkably well; and she was also exceedingly pretty, in a frank open-air fashion. Until she was seventeen, she had lived on the mountainous coast of Cumberland, where she rode astride, and swam half a mile every morning before breakfast. Her family nicknamed her "the Shetland Pony"; and that was her picture to the life, as she used to come in from her swim, with her face glowing and her dark eyes like mountain pools, and the thick mane of hair blowing about her broad forehead. Her sturdy build helped the picture at the time; but she had shot up in height since then, and the phrase was no longer applicable. At twenty-four, she became beautiful, and her music began to show traces of genius. Unfortunately, she had the additional attraction of ten thousand pounds a year in her own right; and, when the marriage settlement was discussed, she proposed to share the money with her three younger sisters.
The young man behaved very badly. She told him—very quietly—that this was the result of her own folly; for, in her family, hitherto, marriages had always been "arranged." He replied—for he was an intellectual young man, who understood women, and read the most advanced novelists—that she was one of those who were ruining England with their feudal ideas. Then they parted, the young man cursing under his breath, and Rachel lilting the ballad to which she had hitherto attributed her good fortune.
"Maxwelton's braes are bonnie, where early fa's the dew,
And it's there that Annie Laurie gi'ed me her promise true,
Gi'ed me her promise true, which ne'er forgot shall be,
And for bonnie Annie Laurie, I'd lay me doon and dee."
He had quoted it so often in his letters that she was justified, perhaps, in thinking that it had influenced her fate. "You know, darling, that those words were supposed to tell the love of a soldier, who died in Flanders, fighting for England, more than a hundred years ago, and when you sing them, I feel that I, too ..." So it was the obvious thing to toss at him as she went through the door, holding her head up almost as gallantly as a soldier. But he didn't seem to mind, and the parting was final.
Rachel, apparently, minded very much indeed; but she kept it to herself and her violin, till on a certain day, she decided that she must escape from all her old surroundings and forget.
Her guardian was the only person she consulted, and he made no criticism of her scheme of travel so far as she divulged it. She had been brought up to complete freedom, while her parents were alive, and in the six years since their death, she had proved that she was capable of taking care of herself. He was wise or unwise enough not to let her know that he understood her trouble. But he tried to express a certain sympathy in his gruff parting words, "London is a grimy cavern."
"Yes, and the people are grimy, too," she replied, waving her hand to him, as she went out into the fog. She looked brighter than she had looked for months past. His last impression of her was that she looked as roses would look if they could wear furs and carry stars in their eyes.
She had been studying the sailings of the ocean-steamers for some time, but it was not her intention to follow the traveled routes more than was necessary. Her brain was busy with a new music, the music of the names in a hundred tales that she had read. The Golden Gate and Rio Grande called to her like chords in a Beethoven symphony. Yokohama and Singapore stirred her like Rossini. But it was the folk-song of travel that she wanted, something wilder and sweeter even than Tahiti, some fortunate Eden island in the South Seas.
Egypt and Ceylon were only incidents on her way. They only set the fever burning a little more restlessly in her veins; and her first moment of content was when the yacht of thirty tons, which she chartered in San Diego, carried her out to the long heave of the Pacific, and turned southward on the endless trail to the Happy Islands.
This was a part of her scheme about which she had not consulted any one at home, or she might have received some good advice about the choice of her ship. It was a sturdy little craft, with small but excellent cabins for herself and her maid. The captain and his wife were apparently created for her special benefit, being very capable people, with the quality of effacing themselves. The crew, of half a dozen Kanakas in white shirts and red pareos, was picturesque and remote enough from all the associations of cities to satisfy her desire for isolation.
The maid was the only mistake, she thought, and she did not discover this until they had been a fortnight at sea. Her own maid had fallen ill at an early stage of her travels, and had been sent home from Cairo. Rachel had engaged this new one in San Diego, chiefly because she thought it necessary to take somebody with her. When Marie Mendoza had come to do Rachel's hair at San Diego, she had a somewhat pathetic story to tell about a husband who had deserted her and forced her to work for her living. Rachel thought there might be two sides to the story when she discovered that the captain was playing the part of Samson to this Delilah. It was a vivid moonlight picture that she saw in the bows one night, when she had come up on deck unexpectedly for a breath of air. Captain Ryan was an ardent wooer, and he did not see her. Marie Mendoza looked rather like a rainbow in the arms of a black-bearded gorilla, and Rachel retired discreetly, hoping that it was merely a temporary aberration.
She would have been more disturbed, probably, if she had heard a little of the conversation of this precious pair.
"I tell you, it's a cinch, Mickey. I never seen pearls like 'em. They're worth fifty thousand dollars in Tiffany's, if they're worth a cent. She keeps 'em locked up in her steamer-trunk, but I seen her take 'em out several times."
"Well, I've been hunting pearls up and down the South Seas for twenty years, and never had a chance of making good like this."
But Rachel did not hear the conversation, or she might have been able to change the course of events considerably. She might even have taken an opportunity of explaining to Marie that the real pearls were in the bank at home, and that the necklace in her trunk was a clever imitation, useful when she wished to adorn herself without too much responsibility, and worth about thirty-five pounds in London, or perhaps a little more than one hundred and fifty dollars in New York.
But Rachel knew nothing of all this; and so, on a certain morning, when the Seamew dropped anchor off the coral island of her dreams, she went ashore without any misgivings. It was an island paradise, not recognized by any map that she had seen, though Captain Ryan seemed to know all about it. Rachel had particularly wanted to hear the real music of the islanders, and Captain Ryan had assured her that she would find it at its best among the inhabitants of this island, who had been unspoiled by travelers, and yet were among the most gentle of the natives of the South Seas. Marie Mendoza pleaded a headache, and remained on board; but the Captain and his wife accompanied Rachel up the white beach, leaving the boat in charge of the Kanakas. A throng of brown-skinned, flower-wreathed islanders watched them timidly from under the first fringe of palm trees; but the Captain knew how to ingratiate himself; and, after certain gifts had been proffered to the bolder natives, the rest came forward with their own gifts of flowers and long stems of yellow fruit. Two young goddesses seized Rachel by the hands, and examined her clothes, while the rest danced round her like the figures from the Hymn to Pan in "Endymion."
Before the morning was over, Rachel had made firm friends of these two maidens, who rejoiced in the names of Tinovao and Amaru; and, when she signified to them that she wanted to swim in the lagoon, they danced off with her in an ecstasy of mirth at the European bathing dress which she carried over her arm, to their own favorite bathing beach, which was hidden from the landing-place by a palm-tufted promontory.
It was more than an hour later when she returned, radiant, with her radiant companions. She was a superb swimmer, and she had lost all her troubles for the time in that rainbow-colored revel. She thought of telling the Captain that they would stay here for some days. She wanted to drink in the beauty of the island, and make it her own; to swim in the lagoon, and bask in the healing sun; to walk through the palms at dusk, and listen to the songs of the islanders. But where was the Captain? Surely, this was the landing-place. There were the foot-prints and the mark of the boat on the beach. Then she saw—with a quick contraction of the heart—not only that the boat was missing, but that there was no sign of the yacht. She stared at the vacant circle of the sea, and could find no trace of it. There was no speck on that blazing sapphire.