The Naiad had weighed anchor at daybreak, and the forenoon was well advanced when Burgo went on deck to stretch his legs and enjoy a smoke. By that time they were out of sight of land. True to the promise he had given, Burgo asked no questions. To him it mattered not at all where they were, or for what port they were bound. He had achieved all that he wanted. He had rescued his uncle from the fate which had too surely threatened him, and the girl he loved was here on board with him. What more could any reasonable being long for? He felt that he would have been quite content to go on voyaging in the Naiad for an indefinite period. To-day he was more like the Burgo Brabazon of other days than he had been since the date of that memorable6 meeting in Great Mornington Street when he and Lady Clinton crossed weapons for the first time.
By-and-by Miss Roylance came on deck. Sir Everard was sleeping soundly, and might be left for a little while.
Marchment had a deck chair brought for her, and she sat for upwards7 of an hour, drinking in the briny8 life-giving air and enjoying the novelty of the scene and its surroundings.
In the afternoon the long-threatened rain began to fall, and they seemed to have got into one of those cross seas which are apt to make non-sailors feel somewhat qualmish. Marchment and the crew had donned their oilskins.
In the dusk of the afternoon Burgo again went on deck and found a sheltered nook abaft9 the funnel10 where his pipe would not be put out by the rain. They were now well within sight of land again, and in point of fact were leisurely11 skirting, at a distance of three or four miles, a rocky picturesque-looking coast which stretched as far as the eye could reach nearly due north and south of their course.
Some hours later, long after night had fallen, the screw of the Naiad ceased to revolve12, an intermission which Miss Roylance, at any rate, did not fail to appreciate. Then presently (as it appeared to those below) a boat seemed to put off from the yacht and other boats to put out to her from the shore. There was the tramp of many footsteps and a confused murmur4 of many voices, and to Burgo it seemed as if the contents of the hold, or part of them--whatever they might consist of--were being brought up by degrees and transferred to the boats; yet all was done with such an evident caution and such an absence of more noise than was absolutely unavoidable, that if there had been some one on board in extremis greater care could scarcely have been used. In less than an hour and a half the last boat left the yacht, and then, after a few minutes' interval13, the screw began slowly to revolve.
While this mysterious business had been going forward all lights below deck had been extinguished. Marchment had apologised, almost humbly14, for the necessity he was under of asking his guests to so far oblige him; but, as Mr. Brabazon told him, his guests would only have been too glad had they been called upon to oblige him in some matter of far greater moment than that.
When Burgo went on deck at an early hour next morning the Naiad was again out of sight of land. Presently he was joined by Marchment, who said, "I got rid of my business last evening, and am now my own master. Perhaps you will ask Sir Everard in the course of the morning what his programme is, provided he has one. If he would like a few days' cruise in the yacht, I and it are wholly at his service. On the other hand, if he would prefer to be landed at some port within, say, a couple of hundred miles of where we are, we are equally at his command."
"Marchment, you are weighing us down with obligations which we can never repay. But may I be permitted to ask whereabouts on the map of Europe we are just now?"
"It will perhaps be near enough to satisfy you if I tell you that we are within a score miles of the Mull of Galloway."
When the subject was mentioned to the baronet and he had taken time to think it over, he said that if it would not be inconveniencing Mr. Marchment too much, he should like to be landed at Ardrossan. He had an old friend living within a dozen miles of that place whom he had not seen for years, and who had lately acquired some very rare Byzantine coins which he, Sir Everard, was particularly desirous of examining.
Accordingly the yacht's head was put about and Ardrossan made in due course. There Marchment and his new-found friends took leave of each other, not without many expressions of hearty15 goodwill16 on both sides, one may be sure. As for Burgo and Marchment, they by no means intended to lose touch of each other in time to come.
It was three weeks later. Sir Everard, Miss Roylance, and Burgo were still at Hazeldean, where the Marrables had accorded them the heartiest17 of welcomes, and with that large-hearted hospitality for which they were noted18, would not hear of their leaving short of a month at the very soonest. Besides, Sir Everard was "picking up wonderfully," as Mrs. Marrable termed it The bracing19 Scotch20 air had proved the finest of tonics21, and it would be a thousand pities for him to quit Hazeldean with his cure only half accomplished22.
But although the baronet and Burgo were going to stay on a while longer, the eve of Miss Roylance's departure was come. A cousin of her mother, a widow lady of mature years, of whose existence Dacia had hardly been aware, had found her out quite by accident, and had written her such a pressing invitation to go and visit her in Edinburgh, where she resided, and stay with her for as long as she liked, that, under the circumstances in which she was placed, the girl felt she had no option but to accept the offer. She and Burgo had spent a very happy time together; the more they saw of each other the stronger became the bond of attraction between them. Although no word of love had been spoken, each knew the other's secret. They had been happy from day to day, as children are happy, and had not troubled themselves about the future. But such halcyon23 moments could not last for ever, and this sudden summons must necessarily bring them to an end.
It was not likely, however, that Burgo would consent to let Dacia go without coming to an understanding with her. But indeed, whether she stayed or went, he told himself that further silence on his part might be construed24 into a proof of dilatoriness25, and that was one of the last of a lover's crimes which he would willingly have had imputed26 to him.
So now, on the eve of Dacia's departure--she was to start almost immediately after breakfast next morning--he sought his opportunity and found it.
It was a mild November afternoon, overcast27 for the most part, yet with now and then a passing gleam of pallid28 sunshine. Not a breath of air fluttered the last poplar leaves which still hung, ragged29 and forlorn, on the two tall trees that fronted the house. There seemed a hush30 over all things; it was as though the dying year lay with shut eyes and folded hands awaiting its end. Sir Everard, together with his host and hostess, had gone in the brougham to visit some archaeological remains31 a dozen miles away. Our young people had the house to themselves. It was possible that kind-hearted Mrs. Marrable had had some hand in this arrangement. She was a born matchmaker, and had quite early seen how the land lay as between Burgo and Dacia, while it was equally a matter of course that her husband should not have seen anything.
The grounds at Hazeldean were extensive, and Dacia, hampered32 as she was with her crutch33, found them quite ample enough to wander about in. She and Burgo had been strolling about for half an hour or more, when they came to a seat fixed34 at a point from which an especially fine view was to be had. Here they sat down as they had many times before. It was not often that Burgo was absent-minded, but he had been so to-day, and for the last ten minutes he had hardly spoken a word. Dacia had made no attempt to break his spell of silence, but had glanced at him once or twice a little timorously35. Had she any prevision of what it was he was about to say to her?
He had been staring straight before him for some little time, but seeing nothing save some inner vision of his own. Suddenly he turned, and bending his glowing eyes full upon her, said: "And so you are going to leave us to-morrow; but for how long, Dacia?--that is the question, for how long?"
It was not the first time by several that he had called her by her baptismal name, and she did not seem to resent the liberty.
"You know what my cousin, Mrs. Croxford, said in her letter," she replied in a low voice. "She virtually offers me a home. Although we have never met, she is my nearest living relative, and I have no option but to go to her."
"But not to stay with her long, Dacia--oh, no!--not to stay with her long. I love you, Dacia--that you have known for days and weeks; it needed no words on my part to tell you that--and I want you to be my wife. My uncle knows and approves. During the last few weeks you have become very dear to him. He loves you as if you were his own child--I have his word for it--and he has charged me to tell you that the dearest wish left him in life is that you should--well, become the wife of his good-for-nothing nephew."
"Dear Sir Everard! I would do much to please him," said Dacia, softly.
"But you must not think I am trying to make love by proxy," continued Burgo. "It is on my own account I woo you--that you know full well. If I could only make love to you more pleadingly, and in softer fashion! but I can't. I know that in such things I am as uncouth36 as a bear; Nature has made me so; but, trust me, dearest, the bear knows how to love! Dacia, will you, dare you, take me with all my imperfections on my head? Search the world over, and nowhere will you find a truer, more devoted37 love than mine, nowhere a man who will strive harder than I to make you happy! O Dacia!--dearest!--what can I say more? I know my words must sound terribly trite38 and commonplace, but for once my tongue has turned traitor39. Before I opened my lips I thought I was going to be eloquent40 in a way I had never been before, and the result is a thin, feeble trickle41 of words which seem to carry no conviction with them. It is most pitiable. Still, Dacia, it all comes to this: I love you!--I love you!"
To Dacia it seemed as if his words were lacking neither in eloquence42 nor passion; but then, no one had ever spoken to her in such fashion before; while there was such a fervour of sincerity43 in his utterances44 that even had she not been predisposed in his favour, her heart could scarcely have failed to be touched. It was her turn now to gaze straight before her. She durst not let her eyes meet his; she felt that they would have betrayed her in her own despite, and the moment for surrender had not yet come.
There was no coyness about Dacia, no shilly-shallying; she had a way of speaking straight to the point which was sometimes eminently45 disconcerting to others. She was unconventional, and she knew it.
"You ask me, Mr. Brabazon, whether I dare accept you," she said, trying her best to speak without any trace of emotion, but not quite succeeding. "I dare do a number of things; but when you further ask me whether I will accept you, your question becomes one which can only be met by a straightforward46 and categorical answer. My answer to it is, No--for your own sake."
"No--for my own sake!" gasped47 Burgo. "I wholly fail to apprehend48 your meaning."
"Have you considered, have you thought seriously, of all that is involved in your proposal to wed49 a girl who is both a cripple and a hunchback? No, you cannot have done so. You are letting a temporary infatuation (which before long will seem to you nothing more than am foolish dream which it were wise to forget as quickly as possible) blind you to the consequences of a step which you would soon see cause to bitterly rue5 that you had ever taken. I should be a clog50 and an incubus51 to you all your life, or at least till death stepped in and severed52 the tie between us. When you took me into society, which you would very quickly tire of doing, think of the lifted eyebrows53 and the meaning glances that would be shot from one to another, and of the whisperings behind your back! 'A cripple and a hunchback! what could he have been thinking about?' How you would writhe54 in your impotence and turn hot and cold by turns! And then your love for me would inevitably55 cool, and by-and-by it would change into positive dislike. Oh, I seem to see it all! Therefore, Mr. Brabazon, my answer is, No."
"But it is an answer which I utterly56 refuse to accept," he retorted impetuously. "If you have nothing to urge against my suit but that, you might just as well have left it unsaid for any effect it has upon me. Such an objection I brush away as the flimsiest of cobwebs. As for the hobgoblins you have tried to conjure57 up, they are the merest futilities, and you yourself would be the first to despise a man who did not laugh them to scorn. On that score you shall not despise me. For me the world holds no other woman than you, and that is enough. Dacia, you are mine!"
His arms enfolded her, he drew her to him, he kissed her again and again. His masterful style of love-making deprived her of all further power of resistance. But indeed her heart had been his long before.
Once she murmured while his arms were still round her, her eyes searching his the while, "Oh, but to think of it! a cripple and----" but she could not say more for the kiss that sealed her lips.
When they got back to the house an hour later--and it was an hour which neither of them would ever forget--Sir Everard and the others had not yet returned. They went together into the library, which was one of the cosiest58 rooms in the house, as befitted the purpose to which it was devoted. A cheerful fire was burning in the grate by way of antidote59 to the dull November afternoon. "Sit down here," said Dacia to her lover, indicating a big easy-chair, "while I go and take off my outdoor things. I shall not be gone more than a few minutes."
Burgo was quite content to wait. He had won her, she was his, and a few minutes more or less were of no consequence.
Whether he had sat there five minutes or half an hour he could not afterwards have told, so pleasantly had his thoughts been occupied, when the sound of the opening door, which faced him at the other end of the room, caused him to lift his eyes. On the threshold stood Dacia, looking at him with an enigmatic smile. She had changed her heavier outdoor dress for one of pale blue corded silk which fitted her to perfection. While Burgo was still staring at her she dropped him an elaborate curtsey; then, still with that strange smile, she came a little way nearer and dropped him a second curtsey; and then she ran--yes, actually ran--across the room and sank on her knees by the side of his chair. Burgo could hardly believe the evidence of his eyes.
"What has become of your crutch?" he asked in a half-dazed kind of way.
"Gone."
"And--and your----?" He could not bring himself to utter the hateful word.
"My hump, I suppose you mean? Gone too--both gone for ever."
He drew a deep breath. "You altogether bewilder me," he said. "Is there anything real about you?" laying a hand on one of her shoulders--"or may I look to see you vanish piecemeal60 and leave not a wrack61 behind?"
She sprang to het feet with a happy musical laugh. "No," she replied, "you will be burdened with the residue62 of me--and serve you right, after what you said and did this afternoon--for the term of your natural life." And thereupon she proceeded to waltz gravely round him some half-dozen times.
"And to whom are you, or I, or both of us, indebted for this miracle?" he asked when she had brought her gyrations to an end and was again kneeling by the side of his chair.
"Why, you dear old simpleton, who should be the miracle-monger but myself? It is one of the most annoying traits of your sex that you always want so many explanations. You must know, then, most high and mighty63 seigneur, that once on a time--that is to say, somewhere about a year ago--I met with an accident which necessitated64 my walking with a crutch for several months afterwards; and even after I was well enough to cast it aside there were odd times and seasons when a return of the old pain compelled me to again seek its help for a day or two, so that I continued to keep it by me like an old servant whom one cannot afford to discard. Well, sir, when I first conceived the audacious scheme of seeking an interview with you I said to myself, 'What if he should get the notion into his head that I have forced myself upon him simply in the hope that he may fall in love with me?' The thought was intolerable so I determined65 to make your acquaintance in a guise66 which would--as I fondly imagined--effectually dispose of any such idea should even the germ of it have found lodgment in your mind. Hence it was that I called my old crutch into requisition and manufactured an artificial hump for myself. But alas67, and alack-the-day! my labours were all in vain, my good intentions were utterly thrown away. There are some people who cannot be made to see when they are well off, and if they will persist in taking on themselves a lot of unnecessary burdens simply because they are, as they term it, in love--well, one can afford to pity them, but that will hardly make their punishment easier to bear."
"I, at any rate, am prepared to undergo my punishment without the ghost of a grumble68. But tell me this, you young deceiver, how did you contrive69 to impose upon my uncle? He, at least, must have known that----"
"Oh! I took dear Sir Everard into my confidence. He promised not to betray me, and of course he didn't."
"And simple-minded, kind-hearted Mr. and Mrs. Marrable--you have deceived them?"
Dacia hung a contrite70 head, or pretended to do so. "I am very sorry, but I couldn't help it," she whispered.
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1
physically
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| adj.物质上，体格上，身体上，按自然规律 | |
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inevitable
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| adj.不可避免的，必然发生的 | |
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chronically
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| ad.长期地 | |
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murmur
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| n.低语，低声的怨言；v.低语，低声而言 | |
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rue
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| n.懊悔，芸香，后悔；v.后悔，悲伤，懊悔 | |
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memorable
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| adj.值得回忆的，难忘的，特别的，显著的 | |
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upwards
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| adv.向上，在更高处...以上 | |
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briny
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| adj.盐水的；很咸的；n.海洋 | |
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abaft
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| prep.在…之后；adv.在船尾，向船尾 | |
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funnel
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| n.漏斗；烟囱；v.汇集 | |
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leisurely
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| adj.悠闲的；从容的，慢慢的 | |
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revolve
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| vi.(使)旋转；循环出现 | |
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interval
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| n.间隔，间距；幕间休息，中场休息 | |
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humbly
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| adv. 恭顺地，谦卑地 | |
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hearty
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| adj.热情友好的；衷心的；尽情的，纵情的 | |
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goodwill
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| n.善意，亲善，信誉，声誉 | |
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heartiest
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| 亲切的( hearty的最高级 )； 热诚的； 健壮的； 精神饱满的 | |
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noted
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| adj.著名的，知名的 | |
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bracing
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scotch
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| n.伤口，刻痕；苏格兰威士忌酒；v.粉碎，消灭，阻止；adj.苏格兰(人)的 | |
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tonics
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accomplished
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| adj.有才艺的；有造诣的；达到了的 | |
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halcyon
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construed
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dilatoriness
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imputed
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overcast
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| adj.阴天的，阴暗的，愁闷的；v.遮盖，（使）变暗，包边缝；n.覆盖，阴天 | |
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pallid
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ragged
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hush
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remains
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| n.剩余物，残留物；遗体，遗迹 | |
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hampered
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| 妨碍，束缚，限制( hamper的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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crutch
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| n.T字形拐杖；支持，依靠，精神支柱 | |
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fixed
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| adj.固定的，不变的，准备好的；(计算机)固定的 | |
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timorously
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uncouth
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| adj.无教养的，粗鲁的 | |
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devoted
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| adj.忠诚的，忠实的，热心的，献身于...的 | |
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trite
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| adj.陈腐的 | |
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traitor
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| n.叛徒，卖国贼 | |
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eloquent
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| adj.雄辩的，口才流利的；明白显示出的 | |
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trickle
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| vi.淌，滴，流出，慢慢移动，逐渐消散 | |
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eloquence
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| n.雄辩；口才，修辞 | |
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sincerity
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| n.真诚，诚意；真实 | |
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utterances
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| n.发声( utterance的名词复数 )；说话方式；语调；言论 | |
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eminently
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| adv.突出地；显著地；不寻常地 | |
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straightforward
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| adj.正直的，坦率的；易懂的，简单的 | |
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gasped
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| v.喘气( gasp的过去式和过去分词 )；喘息；倒抽气；很想要 | |
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apprehend
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| vt.理解，领悟，逮捕，拘捕，忧虑 | |
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wed
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| v.娶，嫁，与…结婚 | |
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clog
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| vt.塞满，阻塞；n.[常pl.]木屐 | |
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incubus
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| n.负担；恶梦 | |
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severed
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| v.切断，断绝( sever的过去式和过去分词 )；断，裂 | |
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eyebrows
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| 眉毛( eyebrow的名词复数 ) | |
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writhe
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| vt.挣扎，痛苦地扭曲；vi.扭曲，翻腾，受苦；n.翻腾，苦恼 | |
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55
inevitably
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| adv.不可避免地；必然发生地 | |
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utterly
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| adv.完全地，绝对地 | |
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conjure
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| v.恳求，祈求；变魔术，变戏法 | |
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cosiest
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| adj.温暖舒适的( cosy的最高级 )；亲切友好的 | |
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antidote
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| n.解毒药，解毒剂 | |
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piecemeal
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| adj.零碎的；n.片，块；adv.逐渐地；v.弄成碎块 | |
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wrack
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| v.折磨；n.海草 | |
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62
residue
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| n.残余，剩余，残渣 | |
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63
mighty
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| adj.强有力的；巨大的 | |
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64
necessitated
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| 使…成为必要，需要( necessitate的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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determined
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| adj.坚定的；有决心的 | |
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66
guise
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| n.外表，伪装的姿态 | |
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67
alas
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| int.唉(表示悲伤、忧愁、恐惧等) | |
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68
grumble
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| vi.抱怨；咕哝；n.抱怨，牢骚；咕哝，隆隆声 | |
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69
contrive
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| vt.谋划，策划；设法做到；设计，想出 | |
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contrite
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| adj.悔悟了的，后悔的，痛悔的 | |
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