CHAPTER XI.
A REBUFF FOR ADONIS.
The next two days were stormy. It rained steadily; and, prevented by the extreme roughness of the sea from going on deck, the passengers lounged about in the close atmosphere below, till, growing weary of the sound of their own voices, they lapsed into a dismal, moping condition.
Even Nina succumbed to the general wretchedness. They were crossing the track of a gale that was cyclonic in its tendencies; and her husband either could not or would not come below, not even for his meals or to inquire after her.
Miss Marsden did not leave her room. Nina sat with her until she drove her away, when she usually fell into the hands of the ever-waiting Delessert. How strange that on the first day at sea she should have thought one could never get tired of staring at his handsome face! Alas! in his case, “beauty soon grows familiar, fades in the eye, and palls upon the sense.” For he had nothing to sustain it, no manliness, no energy. He often reminded the girl—horribly enough—of something without life, a waxen image, a marble statue, even a dead man; so perfectly emotionless, so soulless did he usually appear. What a contrast he was to the forceful, hard-working man above, who did not condescend to come to see her!
Nina’s conversations with the beauty tired her greatly: and yet she kept them up, for she had shrewdness enough to perceive that Adonis really admired her; that he made an effort to please her by keeping above flattering, semi-flirting commonplaces; and also, most potent of all, that he had some mysterious interest in her, connected with the subject of her parentage.
True to her resolve, she would not ask him questions with regard to this interest; and he did not volunteer information except occasionally, and in the most delicate and blameless way. If by chance she left the region of the ship and referred to some occurrence in her former life, there would be in his manner a slight infusion of animation, and he would drop some item of slight information. Then she would hastily leave the subject, until her next lapse into forgetfulness.
When Mrs. Grayley chose to leave the seclusion of her own room during the two days of imprisonment below, Nina was faintly amused, for the lady of middle age was consumed with admiration for Mr. Delessert. Upon her appearance he was obliged to put all his small graces and accomplishments on exhibition, and she fairly worried him to invent devices for whiling away the tedium of the long hours.
When the weather permitted, and often when it did not, the piano was resorted to; and Mr. Delessert was obliged to sing and play even at the risk of rolling off the stool several times during the performance of one piece. Upon these latter occasions, Mrs. Grayley always clapped her lily-like hands and gaily assured him that never before, off the stage, had she seen a man fall so gracefully.