“Hang it, Frank!” interposed the lad, “I wish you’d marry her yourself. I’ll go shares with her in fortune; there’s more than enough for us both, and you’re much fitter to be a respectable man than I am.”
The shaft went deep into his heart, but the strong man never winced or failed for a moment. “What right have you,” he broke in, almost fiercely, “what right have you to talk of giving her money, and laying her under obligations? Like Falstaff,” he added, relapsing into his usual manner, “you owe her yourself and the money too. For Heaven’s sake, Charlie, don’t tamper with the happiness of a lifetime—honour, duty, expediency, all point one way—do not, for a mere whim, neglect that which, left undone, you will repent ever afterwards. Promise me, now promise me, Charlie, that you will marry your cousin before you again leave Newton-Hollows.”
Charlie bit his lip, stroked his moustaches, looked first one way, and then another; and finally, blushing crimson over his wasted face, exclaimed, “Never, Frank—if you must know it, you had better know it now—never, I tell you, and for the best of all reasons; of course it goes no farther, but the fact is, I—I like somebody else much better.”
“And do you think you are the only person that has to sacrifice inclination—nay, happiness, existence itself—to duty? Do you think you are to be exempt from the common lot of man—to receive everything and give up nothing? Do you owe no duty to your cousin? Are you not all-in-all to her? And are you to destroy all the hopes of her lifetime, to break her young heart, as you have destroyed her prospects, for your own selfish gratification? Trust me, Charlie, she loves you, and whether you care for her or not, unless your word is irrevocably pledged to another, it is your duty to marry her, and marry her you must!”
“You’re wrong, Frank,” said Charlie, with a roguish smile; “you’re wrong—you’re a sharp fellow generally, but you’re out of your reckoning here. Blanche has exactly the same regard for me that a sister has for a brother—but love, as you and I understand the word, bless you, she hasn’t a notion of it, as far as I am concerned; but I’ll tell you whom I think she does love, Frank—ah! you may wince and turn pale, but you ought to know, and I’ll tell you. Frank, do you remember the Guyville ball?—why! you’re not pale now—I should never have mentioned it if you hadn’t driven me into a corner, but now out it shall come. Do you remember when you came up and turned away without asking her to dance, while we were waltzing together? Well, when Blanche looked up, her eyes were full of tears, and she said to me, ‘What’s the matter with Mr. Hardingstone? I’m afraid he’s offended with us.’ And I said, ‘Blanche, you little flirt, he thinks you’ve jilted him.’ And she blushed over her face and neck and shoulders—ay, redder than you are now, old boy; and she followed you with such a loving, piteous look—and I saw it all in a moment. Yes, Frank, Blanche is over head and ears in love with you, and I’m glad of it, for there’s no other man in the world that’s worthy of her; and you shall marry her, Frank, and I won’t, and I’ll get drunk at the wedding—but let’s go below now. These cold evenings make me cough, and I suppose the steward will manage some supper for us, though it is blowing so hard;” with which gastronomic aspiration hungry Charlie disappeared down the hatchway, and left an altered man behind him, to pace the deck in a confused state of tumultuous, almost delirious happiness.
Frank was anything but a vain man; he always considered himself as possessing no attractions for the other sex; and that such a girl as Blanche Kettering should look upon him favourably was a happiness he had scarcely allowed himself to picture in his dreams; but now that it was suggested by another, now that it appeared to impartial eyes neither an impossibility nor an absurdity, a thousand trifling circumstances rose in his recollection—a thousand little lights and shades of looks, and tones, and expressions, came back to him distinct and vivid, with a meaning and a colouring they had never possessed before, and he could hardly restrain the happiness that gushed up in his bosom and sparkled in his eye, as after a few minutes of delicious solitude on deck, he joined the party at supper in the cabin, and one and all remarked that now the voyage was nearly over, the grave Mr. Hardingstone appeared to be quite a different man. To their questions as to the weather, he stated that it was “a beautiful night”; which caused the captain to look at him as an undoubted lunatic, inasmuch as the sea was getting up rapidly, and a thick mist was driving over the face of the waters. With the passengers he joked and laughed, and played vingt-et-un, and made himself so universally popular and agreeable, that those very persons who had all along voted him an odd, reserved, uncomfortable sort of fellow, now almost regretted that they should so soon be parted from such a rand of good-humour and merriment as they discovered, all too late, in their fellow-passenger.
The night grew blacker as the mist increased with the somewhat moderating gale, and a long, heaving swell came rolling up from the Atlantic, each succeeding sea appearing to rear its gigantic volume higher, farther, fiercer than its predecessor, and still the good ship steamed on through the darkness. A light at her foretop, and an indistinct glimmer at the binnacle, only made the surrounding obscurity appear more palpable, and through the dense fog, which seemed to pervade the very deck, and to hang around the spars and tackle, it was difficult to distinguish the two phantom figures at the wheel and the look-out man in the bows. The captain ever and anon dived to his cabin to consult his chart, and re-appearing on the wet, slippery deck, cast an anxious eye at the ship’s compass, and the course she was lying—then glanced to windward, where some huge wave flung its crest of foam into the light, and sporting with that powerful steamer as with a plaything, dashed its beating spray, in wantonness of strength, high over the protecting bulwarks, till the very yards dripped and streamed with brine. A few gruff words, unintelligible to the landsmen, were addressed to the struggling steersmen, and again the captain glanced anxiously at the compass, and knit his brows and seemed ill at ease. Between the decks, confiding passengers snored in their berths and dreamt of home. Little thought they of darkness and fog and driving seas. They had paid their passage-money, and they were to be delivered safe at their destination—was it not in the bond? They were, besides, in the Channel; and the ladies on board derived unspeakable relief and consolation from the knowledge that they were once more in soundings—and they, too, slept the sleep of innocence and security. So midnight passed, and still the good ship held steadily on.
But the captain grew more restless and disturbed, and he ordered the steam to be slackened, and a sailor to be slung over the side, and to heave the lead; and these were wise and seamanlike precautions, but they were a few minutes too late. As the words left his mouth, a shock that made that huge fabric shake again brought him to the deck. True to his seaman nature, he shouted to “back the engines,” even as he fell; but she was aground, and it was too late. Ere he recovered his legs he knew too well what had happened. Sea after sea came pouring over the deck; one of the men at the wheel was washed overboard, the other barely saved as he clung for dear life to the helm: everything that was not secured went at once by the board, and the dashing waves plunging heavily into the engine-room, put out the fires, and reduced that triumph of man’s ingenuity to a mere helpless log upon the waters. The seamen came tumbling up to the forecastle, every man as he had slept, half-dressed, and even now scarce awake; yet such is the force of habit, that confusion prevailed more than alarm, and here and there even a jest arose to lips which in a few hours might probably be silenced for ever. But if not sole mistress on deck, Fear could boast of undivided dominion below. Shrieks and sobs and wailing prayers burst from the affrighted passengers, as they rushed tumultuously from their respective berths into the saloon, and asked wildly what had happened, and inquired with white lips if there was any danger; one said, “Is there any hope?” and the panic increased as it spread, and wives clung upon their husbands’ breasts, and pressed their children to their sides, and screamed in an unbearable agony of fear; and one, a strong, stout man, shouted for help as though terror had turned his brain, and raved of his wife and his little ones at home—that home, on firm dry land, that he had never known how to prize before; then a white-haired minister, one of honest John Wesley’s followers, proposed in a calm, steady voice that each and all should kneel down and pray; but the affrighted mass, now wavering and struggling to the hatchway, paid no attention to the good man’s suggestion; for each strove to reach the deck as though it were a haven of safety, each instinctively shrank from the idea of perishing in that dark, dreadful cabin, and the selfishness of man came out and developed itself even in that maddened crowd as they pushed each other aside and struggled who should be first to reach the door.
“Charlie! where are you?” exclaimed Frank Hardingstone’s unshaken voice, as he emerged already dressed from his cabin into the seething confusion of the saloon.
“Here!” said Charlie, struggling to free himself from the embraces of a stout old Frenchwoman, who, wild with terror, was choking the lad as she clung round his neck and implored him to be her preserver—“Here! Frank, we’re aground, I think; I want to get on deck and make myself useful, if this old woman would let me go!”