“Oh—fine!” Judge Barton was conscious of a restiveness suppressed. He said to himself that he had not come two hundred and fifty miles to talk about Martin Collingwood’s looks.
“I am so glad you think so, because I think so myself. I fancy Mrs. Maclaughlin did not feed him properly in the old days, and men get so careless by themselves. He says I ‘hold him up to the collar beautifully’ and I really try to, and regular food and physical comfort will tell.”
“Collingwood is the picture of health and of masculine good looks,” said Judge Barton; “and as for you, it is a joy to see anyone looking so healthy, so vital. You have changed immensely. I wonder, dear lady, if you yourself realized how tired and nearly broken-down you were in those old days.”
“I was miserable, physically and nervously worn out, and I suppose I looked it. But I have had a glorious rest and nothing in the world to fret or worry about, and—” she raised her eyes to his, blushing as she approached the topic which had been the source of so much constraint between them—“and Martin and I have been ridiculously happy in each other. I may as well be frank and admit that half that was depressing me was sheer loneliness and wounded pride. Probably the loneliness was much my own fault, for I hardly met people half way; and the wounded pride was wholly my own fault, for I started out to earn my own living in defiance of all my relatives’ wishes. I suppose I had not the philosophy to meet the situation, in spite of that hateful little slap you gave me about ‘the unloveliest thing in women.’” The Judge started forward.
“Thank you for giving me my opportunity,” he said in a low voice. “I could not have referred to it otherwise. I have writhed with shame every time I have thought of those words, Mrs. Collingwood. Will you permit me to apologize for them and for numerous other unmanly stabs that I have given you? I do not know why I did it; all the time I was longing to be friends with you.”
“I suppose I irritated you,” Charlotte replied slowly, a little surprised by his vehemence. “It is inexplicable to me also when I look back upon it. I had really forgiven you long ago. You were very nice to us on our wedding day, I remember, and I felt forlorn and deserted enough on that occasion to be grateful to anyone who showed any signs of human interest in us. But I am glad that you have apologized, and am glad to express my forgiveness, and to regret that I was so snappish. All of which may be expressed in that homely phrase, ‘Let us bury the hatchet.’”
“We were always meant to be friends, I think.” Some vibration in the voice made Charlotte sheer off from an approach to intensity. “Martin always liked you,” she said; and thus, ten seconds after their reconciliation, the Judge had cause to reflect with some irritation that there is no woman in the world so unsatisfying at times as one born without natural coquetry. He had a few minutes in which to develop this idea, while Charlotte made a voyage of investigation to the kitchen. She came back well satisfied. “I think we can count on dinner in half an hour,” she said, and carried him back with her to the veranda, where she did her duty by the Commissioner and the Honorable Mr. Jones, who was not expansive on any subject other than oyster shells.
Kingsnorth, who had gone over to his own cottage and had donned the English mess jacket, which is the standard evening attire in the Orient, came back, an undeniable English gentleman in spite of his degenerate countenance, and devoted himself to the judicial luminary, who took stock of him as they chatted. Indeed, the Judge was profoundly interested in Charlotte’s island companions. The Maclaughlins were the sort of people he would expect to find in company with Collingwood, but the Englishman was a surprise. He said to himself that it must have strained all Mrs. Collingwood’s pride to accommodate herself to that household, and he marvelled at her tremendous growth in self-control and in social vagabondage. Six months before she would not have met so unconcernedly such a situation as that in which she found herself.
At dinner the Commissioner, sitting on one side of Mrs. Collingwood with the Judge on the other, was secretly amazed at the house, the household, and the very agreeable woman who was his hostess. With one laughing remark—“My dear, I am the housekeeper, and I won’t be apologized for”—she had silenced Martin, who was inclined to drift into that apologetic and explanatory vein which demands continual reassurance from the guests of their appreciation of their food; and, picking up the conversational ball, she had sent it spinning lightly here and there through all the courses of as perfectly served a dinner as the Commissioner had ever sat through. She was ably assisted by the two officials and Kingsnorth and even by Martin, whose delight in his wife’s grasp of the situation set his dry, keen wits at bubbling effervescence. Maclaughlin, though not partial to what he called “gentlefolk,” was a hard-headed Scot, not likely to rush in where angels tread lightly, and Mrs. Maclaughlin, who found the general trend of conversation too agile for her, may be said to have concentrated herself on the oyster-shell seeker and the Captain, who suffered also from a slowness of abstract speech.
It was also, considering the fact that it was limited by the resources of a comparatively unproductive island, a good dinner, even in the opinion of two habitual diners-out. It began with a cocktail of Martin’s own mixing and was continued in a clear soup and in a baked fish which must have weighed ten pounds and was of incomparable flavor. “Never have I eaten such fish,” declared Judge Barton, helping himself the second time to the fish and its garnish of thin, sliced cucumbers. Then there was a roast of beef highly relished by the fisher folk, camote, or sweet potato, croquettes, a dish of bamboo sprouts cooked after a savory native recipe, and green peppers stuffed with force-meat. There was a crab salad, deliciously cold, and papaya ice.