"I should like to know Mr. Farquharson better," said Evelyn presently. With the exception of Farquharson and his host, the remaining guests had gathered round Madame de Mirelle. Not to have paid for a professional entertainment is the surest factor in its enjoyment. As her voice died away, tenderly, like a caress, the buzz of talk rose and fell easily, and drifted to them at intervals. Presently the accompanist began a few modulations, preparatory to the prelude of the next song.
"I will do what you say, of course; I will gladly make opportunities, if Mr. Farquharson will take them."
"He only needs a chance," said Calvert. "Look at me." He rose heavily from his chair and stood before her: a man of loose build, large and solid; the type of man whom a photographer would pose beside a writing-table, with right hand extended on an open book, against a "good library background," like some suburban mayor. "I'm not a romantic figure, am I? but I've had my dreams, as romantic as any lover's, and Farquharson materialized one of them. I want to materialize his now as a thank-offering."
Evelyn said nothing. She looked up with eyes quick with sympathy, that drew him gently to her side again.
"I wanted an island to play with—to administrate," said Calvert after a pause. "It was the first definite plan that came to me after a blow which shook my world. You know about that, probably. I had nothing of my own left to care for. Kith and kin had either died or left me—they cared for nothing but my money. I wanted some one thing—in default of a person—a place I could do as I liked with—could run on my own lines—make in my own image, as you would have made your child. They were Utopian lines, maybe, which I meant to follow, but I wanted a commercial success too. There were plenty of useless places to be had as a mere matter of barter; some of them even carried titles with them! They didn't do. Hobbies—as hobbies—don't appeal to me. I went to Stamford's and bought maps; spent hours at the Geographical Society in Savile Row, groping in Parliamentary Reports, and so forth, until I found a spot which seemed to be all I wanted. And one day, very shortly after, Farquharson and I set sail for Taorna."
His eyes softened as a man's eyes soften when he recalls a splendid vision.
"If you could see it," he said impulsively, "you'd understand then all that the first glimpse of it meant to me. It's as dear to me now as it was then. It was Farquharson's first voyage. We got there early one morning, soon after dawn. Our bagahalow drew in to the shore as slowly and rhythmically as a gondola. There was light and colour everywhere. Bamboo skiffs, their decks flush with the sides, floated by, steered by negro slaves, singing. The oil of their skins gleamed like polish. The whole scene——" He stopped, seeking for the right expression. "It throbbed with the sunlight. Naked boys near the shore were diving into the water, not for pennies as they do in Madeira, but to catch shining fish in their hands, or in bright nets. A herd of little black babies with big stomachs were rolling over and over in the lemon-coloured sands, under the charge of atoms of three and four years old, twirling tops made out of whelk shells."
"For nobody knew what the bagahalow was bringing," said Evelyn softly.
"Unconscious, all," said Calvert grimly. "That was what touched me—and their patience. On the shore a group of slaves stood chained together; they had unhealed wheals across their shoulders, and the fetters had cut into their arms and made festering sores. I've lived too long out in the East to call black men my brothers, but injustice sticks in my gorge. All the voyage I'd been digesting a volume of evidence as to the Sheikh's ways of dealing with offenders."
He knocked the ashes off his cigarette with care. Lady Ennly, more accustomed to the society of men than women, allowed her guests to smoke in the drawing-room.