What was it, I wonder, made him start away with a yelp of pain, and look reproachfully at her from under the refuge of my chair, safe from her wicked little fingers?
I think the ‘fiend,’ as we called her, was quite the most beautiful child I had ever seen; she was about eight years old, and was being sent to England, under the charge of the captain, to be educated.
Her father was an Englishman and her mother a Cingalese, which accounted for the curious combination of olive skin, red-brown hair and deep blue eyes with their long lashes. She was marvellously graceful, too. Her movements often reminded me of a young tiger. Her moods were various. Sometimes, if the spirit moved her, she would organize strange games of her own invention, in which the children--who were all completely under her influence--would be commanded to join. Woe betide any child who dared to disobey her instructions. ‘Fiend’ would stamp her foot, her eyes would flash, and the unfortunate little offender would retire howling to its indignant ayah. In vain were the complaints of fond parents to the captain. Such a spell did the strange, beautiful child cast over the other children, that neither threats nor entreaties could keep them away when the next wild game was organized. Even I fell under her strange fascination, although, I regret to say, I, too, had to pay the penalty.
I think, in her half-savage way, she was fond of me; and I had for that reason more influence with her than had most people on board.
But one morning, as I was sitting in my deckchair with Chang at my side enjoying the sweet, sleepy existence of a morning in the tropics, I suddenly felt a little hand stroking my hair and a soft cheek rubbing against my arm. Knowing well what those cat-like caresses meant, and that I was probably about to be asked some favour, I continued reading until a sharp pain in my shoulder caused me to jump to my feet, and there I saw my tormentor, a truly wicked expression on her lovely face, poised on the glass roof of the saloon well out of my reach, and indignant Chang, evidently knowing from experience what had happened, vainly trying to reach the bare legs of the culprit. She had calmly bitten my shoulder through my thin cotton blouse, and it was some time before the marks of her sharp little teeth disappeared.
For the rest of the day I completely ignored her existence. I think my plan was effective.
That evening I came upon a solitary little figure in the stern of the ship leaning against the rails, her hands clasped, her eyes gazing far away at the still crimson sunset.
‘Oh God,’ I heard her say, ‘I know I am very wicked, but somehow I can’t help it! Please wash me with that stuff you always use to make bad people good, for I am sorry, really!’
Poor child! There was much that was good in her nature, but she needed a strong, yet loving and patient, hand to guide her. I fear her life may be a hard one. What a change from the wild, unfettered existence in the East, where she ruled the natives on her father’s estate with a rod of iron, and rode bare-backed where her fancy chose over the hills, to the stiff, conventional life, however advanced and modified, of an English boarding-school!
Soon after the incident just mentioned poor Chang was seen on deck by the ‘disagreeable man,’ who for some reason best known to himself had risen earlier than usual that morning. Furious at having his commands disregarded, he strode up to the captain’s cabin, and, after abusing everyone on board, from the skipper downwards, informed him that he should lodge a complaint against the North German Lloyd Steamship Company if that abominable Chinese cur was seen again on deck.