VIII
Ruth, in a misery of wild light-headedness, responded as well as she could to the civilities of her two travelling companions, while they drove through narrow, animated streets. They reached the docks. There lay the massive ship, its relentless black hulk resting abroadside, in ominous expectation of some mysterious coming change. Ruth walked up the white gangway. The turmoil, the excited crowd, the stolid stewards,—lolling,—indifferent yet curious sentinels,—the ragged throng of emigrants passing endlessly into the forecastle, the noise of clanking wains and girders hoisting trunks and freight into mid air, all, gave to her a sense of doom, of the finality of things in chaos.... Half an hour passed before she was able to go to her room. Telegrams were handed to her, even flowers, fruit; thus rapidly does news spread; she had to talk with friends of the Bolingbrokes come to bid them God-speed, to look pleasant and pleased as everybody else did.
But when at last Ruth closed the door of her cabin behind her, she took a little step forward and with a cry threw herself upon the couch. Regardless of Paolina, who was already opening bags and unfolding dresses, she permitted herself the luxury of a passionate outburst of grief. A tornado of pent misery racked her; she pressed her face into the linen pillow to deaden the sound of her sobbing, her hands against her breast.
“Signorina, Signorina, do not feel so badly,” cried the good Italian maid, dropping Ruth's lace and beribboned morning gown and running towards her. “Oh, do not weep. It is very sad to have to leave our lovely Italian land, so beautiful, so carina. But do not weep so! What will the Signora Dor say if I allow you to make yourself ill? Think! It is I who should be weeping. It is I who am leaving all behind me, my country, my sister, my mother, and yet I do not weep.” But the tears belied her words and welled from her eyes.
Ruth clasped the girl's hand affectionately. She felt grateful for the warm Italian heart. Paolina at least was there, to keep her recollected in the exquisite life she was forsaking. Why she was forsaking it, now seemed to her an absolutely incomprehensible riddle. For the nonce she could remember not one of her substantial reasons for doing so.
Paolina withdrew the pins from Ruth's hat, removed it from her hair and put it away.
“You have crushed your pretty hat, Signorina,” she said, reproachfully. Then, very much in the tone a mother would use to distract a child:
“You did not see how pale the Signor Pontycroft looked when he said good-bye,” she added, “and Maria told me the Signora had not slept the whole night, but kept going constantly to your door and listening to know whether you were asleep. They love you very much. It must be good to be loved so much,” the girl continued wistfully. “That must comfort you. And you will soon come back to them, to Italy, when you have seen your Signor uncle and your American home—for I am very sure they cannot live without you.”
“Oh, Paolina, I am so unhappy,” Ruth said, simply. “But leave me,” she smiled to the girl through her tears, “I will call you when I feel better.”
Paolina turned to go, then came back, lifted Ruth's hand, kissed it. “I hope you will pardon me, Signorina,” she added shyly, “Scusi, if I say, we must always smile, it pleases God better.”
And Paolina left the room.
For a long while, Ruth, quite still, battled with her feelings. A fresh passion of grief overtook her.... When at last it had spent itself, she drew her Rosary, which she carried in the gold bag in her hand, from its sheath. Slowly, the sweetness of the five decades passed into her spirit, she felt comforted. Peace filled her heart. There was only, now and then, the ache, where before there had been uncontrollable despair. She stood up, bathed her face, rang for Paolina, and began removing the tortoise-shell pins from her hair.
“Paolina,” she cried, as the maid entered the room. “Paolina,” she twisted her hair again into its thick coil, “we are going to enjoy ourselves now! No more tears, no more regrets. You are quite right. We must smile to the good God if we wish Him to smile on us! Make haste and give me a short skirt and a warm coat, and my cap and veil. I long to get out and breathe the air and fill my eyes with a sight of the shores of Italy.”
At dinner and during the rest of the evening, as they steamed down the coast towards Naples, Ruth was an irresistible precis of smiles and vivacity. The Bolingbrokes were captivated.
“Richard,” the young Mrs. Bolingbroke told her lord when they were alone together, “that Miss Adgate is a most charmin' girl. What was that nonsense Mrs. Wilberton retailed about her runnin' away from Henry Pontycroft whom she's hopelessly in love with? She is in love with no man! You can't deceive me!” Mrs. Bolingbroke cried gaily. “It's easy to see from the fun she's positively bubblin' over with that her heart isn't weighted by any hopeless passion. She's never been in America before she says, and it's the great adventure of her life.... She's goin' to visit an old uncle, whom she's never seen but adores. Her childlike enjoyment of doin' it quite alone (she has her maid with her) and her eagerness about it, is quite fascinatin'. Although she is so rich, she's evidently seen very little of the world,” said Mrs. Bolingbroke, who happened to be a year Ruth's junior, but had the feeling of knowing the world thoroughly from within and from without.
“Yes,” her husband answered guardedly; he remembered that a First Secretary must show diplomatic reticence in his judgments, even to his wife. “Yes, Miss Adgate does seem rather a decent sort. I dare say the story is all a fabrication. She does seem a nice sort of unsophisticated young creature and I dare say the story's all a fabrication. Just the pretty charitable way people have of talking. I can see no objection to your enjoying as much of her society as you like, Isabel.”
Thus it happened that safe in her husband's blessing upon the friendship, Mrs. Bolingbroke, all unsuspected by Ruth, became her champion.