The thud of the engines falls on a padded atmosphere, and the lascars move like ghosts along the decks. The long, smooth promenade is canopied and curtained, and hung with banners, and gay devices of the gorgeous East are contributing to the federation of pleasure.
And now, through a festooned doorway, there come the people of many lands to inhabit the gay court. Music follows their footsteps: Hamlet and Esther; Caractacus and Iphigenia; Napoleon and Hermione; The Man in the Iron Mask and Sappho; Garibaldi and Boadicea; an Arab sheikh and Joan of Arc; Mahomet and Casablanca; Cleopatra and Hannibal—a resurrected world. But the illusion is short and slight. This world is very sordid—of shreds and patches, after all. It is but a pretty masquerade, in which feminine vanity beats hard against strangely-clothed bosoms; and masculine conceit is shown in the work of the barber's curling-irons and the ship-carpenter's wooden swords and paper helmets. The pride of these folk is not diminished because Hamlet's wig gets awry, or a Roman has trouble with his foolish garters. Few men or women can resist mumming; they fancy themselves as somebody else, dead or living. Yet these seem happy in this nonsense. The indolent days appear to have deadened hatred, malice, and all uncharitableness. They shall strut and fret their hour upon this little stage. Let that sprightly girl forget the sudden death which made her an orphan; the nervous broker his faithless wife; the grey-haired soldier his silly and haunting sins; the bankrupt his creditors.
"On with the dance, let joy be unconfined!" For the captain is on the bridge, the engineer is beneath; we have stout walls, and a ceaseless sentry-go. In the intervals of the dance wine passes, and idle things are said beside the draped and cushioned capstan or in the friendly gloom of a boat, which, in the name of safety, hangs taut between its davits. Let this imitation Cleopatra use the Cleopatra's arts; this mellow Romeo (sometime an Irish landlord) vow to this coy Juliet; this Helen of Troy— Of all who walked these decks, mantled and wigged in characters not their own, Mrs. Falchion was the handsomest, most convincing. With a graceful swaying movement she passed along the promenade, and even envy praised her. Her hand lay lightly on the arm of a brown stalwart native of the Indian hills, fierce and savage in attire. Against his wild picturesqueness and brawny strength, her perfectness of animal beauty, curbed and rendered delicate by her inner coldness, showed in fine contrast; and yet both were matched in the fine natural prowess of form.
With a singular affirmation of what had been, after all, but a sadly- humourous proposal, I had attired myself in a Greek costume—quickly made by my steward, who had been a tailor—and was about to leave my cabin, when Hungerford entered, and exclaimed, as he took his pipe from his mouth in surprise: "Marmion, what does this mean? Don't you know your duties better? No officer may appear at these flare-ups in costume other than his uniform. You're the finest example of suburban innocence and original sin I've seen this last quarter of a century, wherein I've kept the world—and you—from tottering to destruction." He reached for one of my cigars.
Without a word, and annoyed at my own stupidity, I slowly divested myself of the clothes of Greece; while Hungerford smoked on, humming to himself occasionally a few bars of The Buccaneer's Bride, but evidently occupied with something in his mind. At length he said: "Marmion, I said suburban innocence and original sin, but you've a grip on the law of square and compass too. I'll say that for you, old chap—and I hope you don't think I'm a miserable prig."
Still I replied nothing, but offered him one of my best cigars, taking the other one from him, and held the match while he lighted it—which, between men, is sufficient evidence of good-feeling. He understood, and continued: "Of course you'll keep your eye on Mrs. Falchion and Madras to-night: if he is determined that they shall meet, and you have arranged it. I'd like to know how it goes before you turn in, if you don't mind. And, I say, Marmion, ask Miss Treherne to keep a dance for me—a waltz— towards the close of the evening, will you? Excuse me, but she is the thorough-bred of the ship. And if I have only one hop down the promenade, I want it to be with a girl who'll remind me of some one that is making West Kensington worth inhabiting. Only think, Marmion, of a girl like her—a graduate in arts, whose name and picture have been in all the papers—being willing to make up with me, Dick Hungerford! She is as natural and simple as a girl can be, and doesn't throw Greek roots at you, nor try to convince you of the difference between the songs of the troubadours and the sonnets of Petrarch. She doesn't care a rap whether Dante's Beatrice was a real woman or a principle; whether James the First poisoned his son; or what's the margin between a sine and a cosine. She can take a fence in the hunting-field like a bird—! Oh, all right, just hold still, and I'll unfasten it." And he struggled with a recalcitrant buckle. "Well, you'll not forget about Miss Treherne, will you? She ought to go just as she is. Fancy-dress on her would be gilding the gold; for, though she isn't surpassingly beautiful, she is very fine, very fine indeed. There, now, you're yourself again, and look all the better for it."
By this time I was again in my uniform, and I sat down, and smoked, and looked at Hungerford. His long gossip had been more or less detached, and I had said nothing. I understood that he was trying, in his blunt, honest way, to turn my thoughts definitely from Mrs. Falchion to Belle Treherne; and he never seemed to me such a good fellow as at that moment. I replied at last: "All right, Hungerford; I'll be your deputation, your ambassador, to Miss Treherne. What time shall we see you on deck?"
"About 11.40—just in time to trip a waltz on the edge of eight bells."
"On the edge of Sunday, my boy."
"Yes. Do you know, it is just four years ago tomorrow since I found Boyd
Madras on the No Man's Sea?"