Soon the story will be forgotten; and perhaps in future years, not so very far distant, after all, some member of the great wandering British army, some taciturn mountaineer, or rough-clad fisherman, will ask in vain how a sea-faring countryman came to be buried here.
There is a picture in a Frenchman's study in Paris—a small untidy apartment reeking of cigarette-smoke, littered with manuscript and proof-sheet, for the owner is a giant among journalists. It is a rough water-colour drawing of a peculiar school, semi-Parisian, semi-Scandinavian, and full of a bright hard vigour. There is a wonderful strength, a subtle dramatic force, in this rough picture, which draws one to study it more closely. The scene is evidently Scandinavian, but among the figures there are unmistakable Englishmen—notably one who, standing bareheaded in the foreground, seems to look into one's face with meek, scrutinizing eyes.
'What is this picture? who is that man?' Again and again the journalist has looked up from his table, and laid aside his discoloured, odorous cigarette-end to answer such questions.
'Ah,' he replies with quick gesture, 'I know not. But it seems that it must be a funeral—the funeral of some Englishman in Norway. I bought the picture at an exhibition of Scandinavian art, at Copenhagen; and I bought it on account of the man standing in the middle—he with the brow of an angel and the mouth of Napoleon.'
'Who is he?'
'I think it must be a man I once knew. A wonderful fellow. The Philosopher, they called him in Plevna.'
The Hermione moved gracefully away while the postmaster stood hat-in-hand gravely saluting. A little further back a lean ill-clad figure leant against a post sketching. This was the impecunious artist who had hovered watchfully in the background since Trist and Captain Barrow first landed. There was a fair breeze, and all that day the Hermione crept down the narrow fjord and into broader waters. Among the low brown mountain-tops white clouds hung heavily, but there was blue sky overhead, and the sun shone gaily at intervals. The Hermione was the quickest craft in those waters, so Trist determined to stay on board as long as the breeze held good. Mrs. Wylie never appeared on deck, and Brenda reported no change. The cheerful little lady seemed to have lost heart altogether, but Brenda kept her fears to herself as only women can. At lunch she attempted a little cheerfulness, and Trist promptly assisted her, but cheerfulness à deux, when it is forced, cannot be long-lived. The solemn steward moved round them with his grave face set at zero, and the meal was soon despatched. It was already known on board that the Hermione was bound for home, and that Mr. Trist was going on by steamer—called away most inopportunely to an Eastern war.
It needed a cleverer woman than Brenda Gilholme to wear a smiling face amidst these solemn surroundings. The very elements were grave and foreboding, for there is no more melancholy scenery on earth than a narrow Norwegian fjord. It has all the grim, patient silence of the Arctic world without the Polar splendour of light and shade and colour; unrelieved by Arctic life. Lifeless, treeless hills, which rise sheer from the dead water without snow or herbage; a dull sea, often glassy, never rippling into green and silver shades like open ocean, and betraying no sign of life within its bosom.
While all goes well, the utter hopelessness is not noticed; but as soon as illness, or an anxiety, or, worst of all, dread death should come, the great solitude strikes one with a chill. All human aid, human science, human comfort, is so far and so obviously unattainable. To this Brenda was about to be left, with feelings naturally shaken by the Admiral's sudden and lonely death, for she did not possess a tittle of Theo Trist's superb nerve—a woman practically alone with men, kind enough, and very willing, but of a different grade, thinking different thoughts, and endowed with other feelings. Added to this, she was about to take upon her shoulders the sole responsibility of a lady usually cheery and independent, now apathetic, helpless and incomprehensible.
All this Theo Trist must have recognised as he paced by Brenda's side when the evening shadows crept down into the deeper valleys. The sun was hidden by a high range of hills to the north-west, and everything on the northern shore of the fjord was softly wrapt in a shimmering blue haze. The sea was very dark and lonesome, scarce rippled by the dying wind. Heavy gray clouds were catching on the mountain-tops all round, and seemed to cling sullenly to the land, creeping lower with the shadows. It could not be that Trist was ignorant of the girl's position. It was not thoughtlessness, because whatever this man's faults may have been, no one could, or ever did, accuse him of want of consideration for the feelings of others. But for some reason he never uttered one word of sympathy to Brenda. Already some vague shadow of war seemed to have fallen over his softer manner. He had learnt to respect the call of duty at the best school; in this respect he was a true soldier, with all a soldier's blind uncomplaining obedience to orders.