Chapter Seventeen.
The News.
The day wore on with the storm now lulling slightly, now increasing in violence, till it seemed as if the great rolling banks of green water must end by conquering in their attack, and sweeping away first the rough pier, and then the little twin towns on either side of the estuary. Nothing was visible seawards, but in a maritime place the attention of all is centred upon the expected, and in the full belief that sooner or later there would be a wreck, all masculine Hakemouth gathered in sheltered places to be on the watch.
Van Heldre and Leslie came into contact again that afternoon, and after a long look seaward, the merchant took the young man’s arm.
“Come on to my place,” he said quietly. “You’ll come too, Luke Vine?”
“I? No, no,” said the old fellow, shaking his head. “I want to stop and watch the sea go down.”
His refusal was loud and demonstrative, but somehow there was a suggestion in it of a request to be asked again.
“Nonsense!” said Van Heldre. “You may as well come and take shelter for a while. You will not refuse, Leslie?”
“Thanks all the same, but I hope you will excuse me too,” replied Leslie with his lips, but with an intense desire to go, for there was a possibility of Louise being at the house with Madelaine.
“I shall feel vexed if you refuse,” said Van Heldre quietly. “Come along, Luke, and dine with us. I’m depressed and worried to-day; be a bit neighbourly if you can.”
“Oh, I’ll come,” said the old man; “but it serves you right. Why can’t you be content as I am, instead of venturing hundreds and hundreds of pounds in ships on the sea? Here, come along, Leslie, and let’s eat and drink all we can to help him, the extravagant spendthrift.”
Van Heldre smiled, and they went along to the house together.
“The boy in yonder at work?” said Uncle Luke, giving a wag of his head toward the office.
“Yes,” said Van Heldre, and ushered his visitors in, the closed door seeming directly after to shut out the din and confusion of the wind-swept street.
“There, throw your mackintoshes on that chair,” said Van Heldre; and hardly had Leslie got rid of his than Mrs Van Heldre was in the hall, her short plump arms were round Leslie’s neck, and she kissed him heartily.
“God bless you!” she whispered with a sob; and before Leslie had well recovered from his surprise and confusion, Madelaine was holding one of his hands in both of hers, and looking tearfully in his face in a way which spoke volumes.
“Ah, it’s nice to be young and good-looking, and well off,” said Uncle Luke. “Nobody gives me such a welcome.”
“How can you say that,” said Madelaine, with a laugh. “Come, Uncle Luke, and we’re very glad to see you.”
As she spoke she put her hands on his shoulders, and kissed his wrinkled cheek.
“Hah! that’s like old times, Maddy,” said the grim-looking visitor, softening a little. “Why didn’t you keep a nice plump little girl, same as you used to be?”
Madelaine gave him a smile and nod, but left the old man with her father, and followed her mother and Leslie into the dining-room.
“So that’s to be it, is it, Van, eh?”
“I don’t know,” was the reply. “It’s all very sudden and a surprise to me.”
“Angled for it, haven’t you?”
“Angled? No.”
“She has then. My dear boy, son of my heart, the very man for my darling, eh?” chuckled Uncle Luke.
“Be quiet, you sham cynic,” said Van Heldre dreamily. “Don’t banter me, Luke, I’m sorely ill at case.”
“About money, eh?” cried Uncle Luke eagerly.
“Money? No! I was thinking about those poor fellows out at sea.”
“In your brig, eh? Ah, ’tis sad. But that money—quite safe, eh?”
“Oh, yes, safe enough.”
“Oh, do come, papa dear,” said Madelaine, reappearing at the door. “Dinner is waiting.”
“Yes, yes, we’re coming, my dear,” said Van Heldre, laying his hand affectionately on Uncle Luke’s shoulder, and they were soon after seated round the table, with the elder visitor showing at times quite another side of his character.
No allusion was made to the adventure of the morning, but Leslie felt in the gentle tenderness displayed towards him by mother and daughter that much had been said, and that he had won a very warm place in their regard. In fact, in word and look, Mrs Van Heldre seemed to be giving him a home in her motherly heart, which was rather embarrassing, and would have been more so, but for Madelaine’s frank, pleasant way of meeting his gaze, every action seemed to be sisterly and affectionate, but nothing more.
So Leslie read them, but so did not the elders at the table.
By mutual consent no allusion was made to the missing brig, and it seemed to Leslie that the thoughts of mother and daughter were directed principally to one point, that of diverting Van Heldre from his troublesome thoughts. “Ah, I was hungry,” said Uncle Luke, when the repast was about half over. “Very pleasant meal, only wanted one thing to make it perfect.”
“Why, my dear Luke Vine, why didn’t you speak? What is it? oh, pray say.”
“Society,” said Uncle Luke, after pausing for a moment to turn towards the window, a gust having giving it a tremendous shake. “I say if I find my place blown away, can you find me a dry shed or a dog kennel, or something, Leslie?”
“Don’t talk such stuff, Luke Vine,” cried Mrs Van Heldre. “Don’t take any notice of him, Mr Leslie, he’s a rich old miser and nothing else. Now Luke Vine, what do you mean?”
“Said what I meant, society. Why didn’t you ask my sister to dinner? She’d have set us all right, eh, Madelaine?”
“Oh, I don’t know,” said Madelaine, smiling.
“But I do,” cried her mother; “she’d have set us all by the ears with her nonsense. You are a strange pair.”
“We are—we are. Nice sherry this, Van.”
“Glad you like it,” said Van Heldre, with his eyes turned towards the window, as if he expected news.
“How a woman can be so full of pride and so useless puzzles me.”
“Mamma!” whispered Madelaine, with an imploring look.
“Let her talk, my dear,” said Uncle Luke, “it doesn’t hurt any one. Don’t talk nonsense, Van’s wife. What use could you make of her? She is like the thistle that grows up behind my place, a good-looking prickly plant, with a ball of down for a head. Let her be; you always get the worst of it. The more you excite her the more that head of hers sends out floating downy seeds to settle here and there, and do mischief. She has spoiled my nephew Harry, and nearly spoiled my niece.”
“Don’t you believe it, Mr Leslie,” cried Madelaine, with a long earnest look in her eyes.
“Quite true. Miss Impudence,” continued Uncle Luke. “Always was a war between me and the useless plants.”
“Well, I can’t sit here silent and listen to such heresy,” cried Mrs Van Heldre, shaking her head. “Surely, Luke Vine, you don’t call yourself a useful plant.”
“Bless my soul, ma’am, then I suppose I’m a weed?”
“Not you,” said Van Heldre, forcing a show of interest in the conversation.
“Yes, old fellow, I am,” said Uncle Luke, holding his sherry up to the light, and sipping it as if he found real enjoyment therein. “I suppose I am only a weed, not a thistle, like Margaret up yonder, but a tough-rooted, stringy, matter-of-fact old nettle, who comes up quietly in his own corner and injures no one so long as people let him alone.”
“No, no, no, no!” said Madelaine emphatically.
“Quite right. Miss Van Heldre,” said Leslie.
“Hear, hear?” cried Van Heldre.
“Stir me up, then, and see,” cried the old man grimly. “More than one person has found out before now how I can sting, and—hallo! what’s wrong? You here?”
There had been a quick step in the long passage, and, without ceremony, the door was thrown open, Harry Vine entering, to stand in the gathering gloom hatless and excited.
He was about to speak, Van Heldre having sprung to his feet, when the young man’s eyes alighted on Leslie and Madelaine seated side by side at the table, and the flash of anger which mounted to his brain drove everything else away.
“What is it?” cried Van Heldre hoarsely. “Do you hear?—speak?”
“There is a brig on the Conger Rock,” said Harry quickly, as if roused to a recollection of that which he had come to say.
“Yes, sir,” cried another voice, as old Crampton suddenly appeared. “And the man has just run up to the office with the news, for—”
“Well, man, speak out,” said Van Heldre whose florid face was mottled with patches of ghastly white.
“They think it’s ours.”
“I felt it coming,” groaned Van Heldre, as he rushed into the hall, Leslie following quickly.
As he hurriedly threw on his waterproof a hand caught his, and turning, it was to see Madelaine looking up imploringly in his eyes.
“My father, Mr Leslie. Keep him out of danger, pray!”
“Trust me. I’ll do my best,” said the young man quickly; and then he awoke to the fact that Harry Vine was beside him, white with anger, an anger which seemed to make him dumb.
The next minute the whole party were struggling down the street against the hurricane-like wind, to learn from a dozen voices, eager to tender the bad news, that the mist of spray had been so thick that in the early gloom of evening the vessel had approached quite unseen till she was close in, and directly after she had struck on the dangerous rock, in a wild attempt to reach the harbour, a task next to impossible in such a storm.