The Captain chuckled. He had been married twice.
XVII
The Galatea was under way at two o'clock,—a clear, bright, sparkling afternoon with a hot sun, a transparent sky and hardly a puff of wind. Built on thorough sea-going lines, newly painted and in apple-pie order and carrying a crew of forty men she was, as well she might be, the envy of passing craft. Men who knew, ran their eyes along her graceful lines with admiration and took pleasure in her swan-like movement. Others on tugboats, shifting a quid, made rough guesses as to her daily cost in the manner of women talking over the clothes, jewels and spendings of a distinguished leader of society.
About one-thirty two things happened,—the first of them comic, the other not without a touch of pathos. The sandy-headed mate, Horatio Jones, whose middle name of Nelson was dropped by him with a sneaking sense of its unfitness, had used his wide smile and glib tongue to some purpose and returned to the yacht with Mrs. O'Dowd after a busy thirty minutes. The young Irish, childless, wife of a sea-faring friend of his, she was not above earning good wages as stewardess and taking a look at the world, her husband being away. Also he brought with him a heterogeneous box full of what the book-seller had called the latest novels, but some of them had been out six months and so were in ripe old age. There was no time to make much of a choice, but Jones had, as usual, looked after himself by seeing that his collection included Rex Beach, Jack London, Irvin Cobb, Robert Chambers, Gene Stratton-Porter and Sinclair Lewis. It was simply to make up weight that he threw in Wells, Walpole, Dunsany, Lucas Malet, Conrad, Galsworthy, and other drawing-room "geezers," as he called them. They meant nothing to him. He handed Mrs. O'Dowd over to the chief steward and with an air of pride and satisfaction followed the case down to the library and arranged its pristine contents in a long alluring line on the centre table. It seemed to him that the hardly-ever read sporting and technical volumes behind the glass of all the cases turned up their noses in contempt.
The pathetic incident was the unexpected arrival of little Mrs. Lester Keene, who came on board with the air of a moving picture heroine chased by at least six desperate and obviously made up villains armed to the teeth. A little bag into which she had placed all her small items of jewelry and other treasures was clutched in one agitated hand and she carried an umbrella in the other. She was one of those women who regard an umbrella as the patent of respectability rather than as a weapon of service. She took it with her walking or driving,—wet or fine. It was a fetish, an institution. Deprived of her umbrella she would have felt like an actor without his daily advertisement or an Oxford Don caught naked by a chambermaid. She was assisted aboard, with many gasps, by a deck hand, and drew up, expecting apparently to see pirates and the skull and cross bones. Franklin turned and saw her and smiled a welcome.
For some reason which he didn't endeavor to define he was glad to see the admirable little woman who had won his complete respect and admiration in her endeavor to put up a fight in Beatrix's bedroom that memorable night. "My dear Mrs. Keene," he said, holding out his hand, "I'm delighted to see you. Welcome to the Galatea! I was wondering how it was that my wife came to leave you behind."
Mrs. Keene bridled with indignation. "Your wife?" she said. "Well, this is really a most extraordinary country."
"I beg your pardon," said Franklin, "I should have said Miss Vanderdyke." It had seemed to him quite natural to use the word "wife."
"That's why I have come," said Mrs. Keene, her rather loose skin wabbling nervously. "Need I say more?"
"Nothing more, but I must ask you at once to oblige me by remembering that everybody on this yacht believes, and must continue to believe, that Miss Vanderdyke is Mrs. Franklin. You know why as well as I do. That is understood, of course." His question, behind which there was very palpably the suggestion of a drastic course of action, achieved a bow from Mrs. Keene. He then pointed to a small suit-case. "Is that all you've brought?"