Latter-Day Sweethearts

by Mrs. Burton Harrison

With the ghost of a smile hovering upon his face, the man walked over and gave a look out into the night.

"It might be half a gale," he said dubiously. "But you see, miss, in these ships we sort o' get out o' the way of knowing what is going on outside!"

Half a gale! Posey's inclination to resent the belittling statement went back to bed with her, but presently her sense of humor got the better of the other poignant emotions, and she laughed at her own alarms, of which the interruption had, on the whole, proved a wholesome one; and at last, completely wearied out, fell into deep sleep, amid the continued howling of the harmless wind.

The gay voyage that had begun so buoyantly passed, at the finish, beneath the shadow of a cloud. The first sight of land gave but a sorry welcome to the new-comers, as it immediately disappeared under a dense curtain of fog. The ship crept up the Irish coast to the melancholy tooting of the siren, answered by other craft, from ocean liners to humble trawlers, made Queenstown toward morning in an interval of clear weather, and, relapsing into the embrace of fog, came next evening finally to anchor for the night at some distance from Liverpool to await a safer opportunity of docking the monster, and letting her passengers ashore. During the dolorous hours preceding their final parting the disappointed passengers, before so friendly, smiling, intimate, seemed to draw away from each other, darkling and afraid. Smiles, jokes, good stories, civil speeches and compliments had been apparently packed up with sea rugs and steamer chairs. The decks, dripping and cheerless, offered no attraction to promenaders, the library was filled to oppression with forms bending listlessly over books that could not hold attention. Every desk held diligent scribblers, glaring suspiciously at each other through the top of the separating screen, their places awaited by more would-be correspondents impatient of delay. In the companion-ways, subdued people huddled together or walked over the unfortunate beings with buckets whose duty it is to swab the sticky linoleum underfoot. A reminiscent odor of their last sea-dinner arose to mingle with suggestions, coming none knew whence, of bilge, fresh paint, tarpaulin and wet ropes. The only thoroughly lively mortals to be seen were the stewards bustling everywhere; the tidy stewardesses, with their cap-streamers flying; and the ladies' maids and valets who hoped to get their charges early to bed, thus advancing their own time of freedom and farewell.

At a comparatively early hour, the usual spaces where passengers assemble were deserted, most people giving up the pretence of being exhilarated by near approach to the British Isles. The dining-saloon displayed still a few groups sitting around the tables sipping from glasses, reading or talking; the smoking-room alone retained its usual features of cards and conviviality.

Here, toward ten o'clock, Clandonald, looking more than commonly bored, arose from a game in which he had not acquitted himself with brilliancy, and strolled outside, alone.

Since the night of the supper, he had not been called upon to put into effect his stern resolution of eschewing Miss Winstanley's society. She had come to her meals late, or early, contriving to avoid more than a passing contact with her acquaintances at table. While the rest of them, notably Bobby Vane, deplored this circumstance, attributing it to a caprice or an indisposition; while Miss Bleecker secretly chuckled with delight that the enemy had so soon struck her colors, and Helen wondered in silence why there was no following up on Posey's part of the promising beginning of a friendship between them; while even the astute Mariol was nonplussed at the young girl's sudden drop in spirit and voluntary abdication of her past as reigning sovereign, Clandonald felt himself a prey to more acute and genuine feeling concerning her than he had ever dreamed of experiencing. So far from going ashore at Queenstown, it was now his ardent wish to stay on the ship till he saw the last of Miss Winstanley at Liverpool; since Mr. Winstanley had announced that instead of running up to town on the special steamer train with their friends, his daughter had taken a fancy to see Wales, and they would accordingly stop over at Chester.

Up to the moment, perhaps, when Clandonald had interposed himself between Posey and her annoyer, it had not occurred to him that he could feel for her anything more than man's honest delight in youth and extraordinary beauty, as well as the titillation that came to his mental part from her amusing indifference to his rank, her straightforward appeal to his comradeship. Even the fleeting revelation in her gaze that had occasioned his resolve to fly, had excited until then in him little more than regret at the misadventure.

When he had brusquely stood himself in Vereker's way, Helen Carstairs had not observed what caused a current of pleasure to run through his veins, and a quick rush of protective tenderness toward Posey to fill and overflow his heart. Involuntarily the girl had pressed nearer to him, slipping her arm through his, and, for the few seconds that this attitude endured, he had wanted never to part with her again!

Then she had started away from him, almost guiltily, and Miss Carstairs had carried her off in tears! From thenceforward a blank, as far as a return to their old relations went! Clandonald, puzzling himself wofully to know what he had done to alienate her, had spent hours in meditation upon the theme. Now that he had lost her, the possession of her guileless friendship, still more of her possible love, had become of supreme value and importance; to win it he was ready to forfeit anything, even to throwing over his excellent and devoted Mariol, whose keen glances worried him, and whose wit and wisdom had temporarily lost their flavor.