I had supposed that the girl would take some interest in, or show some pleasure at, the sights about her. She glanced languidly, and exhibited a spiritlessness of manner, as though the thought of leaving her father was beginning to sit very heavily upon her heart.
I observed, however, that, whilst she barely had eyes for the ship, she did not neglect to look at the chief mate, Mr. Aiken, who stood at the main-hatch superintending some work that was going on. He was a good-looking man, and it was therefore intelligible that the girl should notice him. He was a smart officer, and understood his duty, and continued to shout orders and sing down instructions to the fellows in the hold, insensible of our presence. Aiken was about thirty years of age; his face was coloured by weather into the manly hue of the ocean calling; he had white teeth, a finely chiselled profile, an arch, intelligent, dark grey eye. Captain Mills looked at him whilst we stood on the quarter-deck after coming out of the cuddy, but seemed more struck by the smartness of his demeanour and general air than by the beauty of his face. The old salt was full of the ship, and could think of little else. All sorts of memories crowded upon him now that he was in the docks.
“I wouldn’t go to it again,” he exclaimed in a broken voice; “yet I love the life—I love the life!”
Miss Minnie chose a berth on the port side. I asked if she meant to bring a maid with her.
“No,” says Captain Mills. “She can do without a maid. What scope of purse, Cleaver, do you suppose I ride to?”
“If I can do without a maid on shore,” said Miss Minnie, “I can do without one at sea.”
A note of complaint ran through her sentences, as though she had a mind to make a trouble of things.
“A maid,” said Captain Mills, “will be sea-sick till you’re up with the Cape, and idle and useless and carrying on with the steward for the rest of the time till you go ashore, and then she’ll leave you to get married.”
As we went to the gangway the mate made a step to let us pass. Miss Minnie looked at him again, and went over the side holding her father’s arm with a sudden life in her movements, as though the sight of a handsome man had worked up the whole spirit of the coquette in her.
I felt rather sorry for the Reverend Joseph Moxon as I followed the couple on to the quay, hugely admiring the fine floating grace of the girl’s figure, the sparkle of her dark eye as she turned her head to look at the ship, the rich tinge her hair took from the sun. In fact, I seemed to find an image of the Reverend Joseph Moxon in old Mills’ square, lurching figure alongside the sweet shape of his daughter; and that set me thinking of well-bred, jingling, handsome young officers at Moxon’s station, where life would provide plenty of leisure for looking and for sighing.