The Viking Blood: A Story of Seafaring

by Frederick William Wallace

Cultured, handsome, brave, generous and all as he was, yet he was but a common fisherman, with but a bare and hazardous livelihood assured him. Love him, she might, but she knew she would not marry him as a fisherman, and he would not change his occupation. She admired the fishermen; she had listened, with her imagination thrilled, to tales of their adventurous existence, but ever since she was a little child she had shuddered at the thought of ever having a near one and a dear one following that hazardous vocation. She feared for her brother, Judson, and she would fear ten times more for the man she loved. The recent gale in which Donald had lost a man and seen another maimed for life; in which he himself had escaped death but narrowly, served to stiffen her determination. She could not marry him. She admitted she was a coward, but she could not bear the strain and anxiety of the days when her man was at sea. When she married, her husband would have to be near and to home.

At last Judson and Helena came in and interrupted their delightful tête-à-tête. They had been to a theatre and they burst into the parlor full of the recollections of a pleasurable show, and with their entry the conversation became general. Then they had some playing and singing, and when McKenzie prepared to depart he felt that the time was fast approaching when he would have to declare himself. Ruth’s attitude towards him gave him hope and he knew instinctively that he stood well in her estimation. This evening she had been particularly charming to him—not the charm of a hostess to a dear friend—but rather the charm of a woman in whose heart love was budding; that indefinable something, the touch of fingers, the fleeting glances and soft-spoken phrases which only lovers can understand, and McKenzie was quick to sense it.

In the darkened hallway she pressed close to him and her hair brushed his face, leaving a faint and indescribably sweet perfume in his nostrils. In the reflected light her rounded shoulders and head were faintly illuminated, and she became, to his imagination, a Venus of the shadows; a woman waiting to be caressed and loved unseen by prying eyes and desirous of keeping her affections secret. While he stood whispering to her the intoxication of her presence and the circumstances were causing his blood to pound through his veins. She, too, was fighting a tumult in her heart. “Love him!” urged Desire and the woman in her, but Reason’s icy hand repressed the inclination. She would have to decide soon—aye, even now. If she gave way...?

Walter Moodey’s face rose before her eyes. She’d have no reason to fear sea terrors with him. He was handsome, manly, generous ... and yet she had a deep feeling for this poor, brave, clean-hearted Scotch fisher-boy. But the sea ... the lonely nights. The hazardous livelihood ... the sweating toil of it. It was hard, terribly hard, but it could not be otherwise. A tremendous wave of sympathy swept over her and she found herself murmuring, “Don! Kiss me ... and go!”

She barely whispered the words, but the telepathy of love communicated their import to his quickened sensibilities and he crushed her to his breast. For a moment—a space of seconds charged with happiness supreme—he could feel the throbbing of her heart and her warm, soft body against his as their lips met in the age-old seal of love. Then, drunk with the sense of possession, with the intoxicating sensation of having held this glorious creature in his arms for a delicious and memorable portion of time, of having kissed her on that desirable mouth, he reeled away, feeling that he had reached the uttermost heights of visioned and desired joy.

When McKenzie left, Ruth immediately felt ashamed of her weakness and cringed mentally at the thought of her impulsive action. It was sympathy and a feeling which she could not control that spurred her to display her excess of emotion, and she knew that Donald had misinterpreted her true feelings towards him. She admired and respected him, but she did not love him enough to marry him. He had neither money nor prospects sufficient to give her what she expected and had been used to, and she was too much of a coward to become the wife of a fisherman. With Walter Moodey as her husband she would move in a sphere corresponding to her desires, tastes and ambition. With Donald McKenzie she would live as a house-drudge, solitary for long periods, uncertain as to the future for many years, and unable to enjoy and fraternize with the things and people she admired.

In her bedroom she lay in the dark and analyzed the spirit which urged her to the action which she was now repenting. It was purely sympathy—sympathy for a manly, clean-hearted young fellow who loved her and whom she would be putting on the rack within a short period when she accepted Walter Moodey. Moodey was in her class. He was handsome, clever, generous, courteous and a gentleman, and she thought she loved him. When he was with her she was sure of it, and it was only when she was alone and thinking of McKenzie that the little doubt came.

McKenzie’s voyage in the Alameda was the cause of his undoing. Ruth had heard the story from Judson and the horror of it had stiffened her determination to break off the dangerous intimacy with Donald. She laid awake the best part of the night a prey to conflicting emotions, and scheme after scheme ran through her mind like sheep racing through a pen gate. She would have to let McKenzie know the real state of affairs between them. To let him go away with the impression which he undoubtedly had, would be a torture to her conscience and self-respect. She would write him to Eastville the first thing in the morning and explain—but ... if the letter should not reach him before he sailed? Or again, if it did, how would he act? This caused her much speculative pain, and for a space, her reason refused to suggest an easier way. Harassed by her fears she ultimately decided to evade and postpone the day of reckoning with McKenzie. Walter had already proposed to her, but she had not given her answer. She would accept him and have him hasten the marriage ere Donald returned from the fishery in the fall, and by doing so she would be spared the necessity of making painful explanations and of living in the same locality with him.

Stampeded into this ruthless line of action, she tried to soothe her conscience that it was for the best. Next day she accepted Walter Moodey. The engagement was to be kept secret, and they were to marry in August.