Chance - A Tale in Two Parts

wife and to his wife's father was noticeable enough. It was as if they had been a pair of not very congen

eck Mr. Powell made a remark to that

ould have induced the newly-joined second mate to enter the way of confidences. His was an instinctive prudence. Powell did not know why it was he had resolved to keep his own counsel as to his colloquy with Mr. Smith.

slowly. I hadn't noticed him inside. I hadn't expected to see anybody. It gave me a start. She says: "My father-Mr. Franklin." He was staring at me like an owl. "How do you do, sir?" says I. Both of them looked funny. It was as if something had happened to them on the way. Neither of them moved, and I stood by waiting. The captain showed himself on the poop; and I saw him at the side looking over, and then he disappeared; on the way to meet them on shore, I expected. But he just went down below again. So, not seeing him, I said: "Let me help you on board, sir." "On board!" says he in a silly fashion. "On board!" "It's not a very good ladder, but it's quite firm," says I, as he seemed to be afraid of it. And he didn't look a broken-down old man, either. You can see yourself what he is. Straight as a poker, and life enough in him yet. But he made no move, and I began to feel foolish. Then she comes forward. "Oh! Thank you, Mr. Franklin. I'll help my father up." Flabbergasted me-to be choked off like this. Pushed in between him and me without as much as a look my way. So of course I dropped it. What do you think? I fell back. I would have gone up on board at once and left them on the quay to come up or stay there till next week, only they were blocking the way. I couldn't very well shove them on one side. Devil only knows what was up between them. There she was, pale as death, talking to him very fast. He got as red as a turkey-cock-dash me if he didn't. A bad-tempered old bloke, I can tell you. And a bad lot, too. Never mind. I cou

and suspicion talked over endlessly by the band of Captain Anthony's faithful subordinates. It was evidently so refreshing to his worried spirit that it made him forget the advisability of a little caution with a complete stranger. But really with Mr. Po

*

mere absurdity was not unmingled with indignation. And his years were too few, his position too novel, his reliance on his own opinion n

centre of the world, as the ship which carries one always remains the centre figure of the round horizon. He viewed the apoplectic, goggle-eyed mate and the saturnine, heavy-eyed steward as the vict

ys, had but few occasions for intercourse-once, I say, the thick Mr. Franklin, a quaintly bulky figure under the star

u have no par

ad lost his father and mo

I say, give me a mother. I dare say if she had not lasted it out so well I might have gone and got married. I don't know, though. We sailors haven't got much time to look about us to any purpose. Anyhow, as the old lady was there I haven't, I

hem. The mate's presence made the first half-hour and sometimes even more of his watch on deck pass away. If his senior did not mind lo

ow like you knows that there's precious little fun to be got out of it." He fetched a deep sigh. "I wish Captain Anthony's mother had been a lasting sort like my

urning bitter in his mouth. Mr. Powell thought to

rd on the captain, Mr. Franklin. I th

rvant. He begged Powell to understand that if Captain Anthony chose to strike a bargain with Old Nick to-morrow, and Old Nick were good to the captain, he (Fra

n in his strained pathetic voice (which he had never raised) he observed

ng Powell, "it is impo

with a pair of eyes on him and some sense too! Is that how a happy man loo

of the mate's view. Still, it seemed as if it had opened his understan

we left port? Do you know that he has never once opened his lips to me unless I spoke to him first? I? His chief officer; his shipmate for full six years, with whom he had no cross word-not once in all that time. Aye. Not a cross look even. True that when I do make him speak to me, there is his dear old self, the quick eye, the kind voice. Could hardly be other to his old Franklin. But what's the good? Eyes, voice, everything's miles away. And for all that I take good care never to address him when the poop isn't clear. Yes! Only we two and nothing but the sea with us. You think it would be all right; the on

he grotesque squat shape, with the knob of the head as if rammed down between the square shoulders by a blow from a club, moved vaguely in a circumscribed space limited by the two harness-casks lashed to the front rail of the poop, without gestures, hands in the pockets of the jacke

ought that it was all over, the other, fidgeting in the darkness, was heard again explosive,

m! What is it? What can it be?

on discovering that this was an appeal ad

lack-eyed . . . I've seen you talki

illed, remarked in a disdainful tone t

n. "She and that old chap with the scraped jaws who sits over her and stares down at her dead-whi

r. Smith's eyes, made a vague gesture. Ye

He can't know. No! No more than a

nd what you mean," obs

tell of women doing for a man in one way or another when they got him fairly ashore. But to bring their devilry t

op. Before he left it with nearly an hour of his watch below sacrificed, he addressed himself once more to our young man who stood abreast of the miz

have been telling me something very new you are mistaken. You can't keep that matter out of yo

ence. To Mr. Powell's truthful statement he answered with equal truth and simplicity that it was very likely, very likely. With a thing like that (next door to witchcraft almost) weighing on his mind, the wonder was that he could think of anything else. The poor man

is innocent soul. The apoplectic mate, already half-way down, went up again three steps of the poop ladder. Why, yes. A proper young fellow, the mate expected, wouldn't stand by and s

ing at?" he cried with a

God only knows what may be going on there . . . Don't laugh . . . It was bad enough last voyage when Mrs. Brown had a cabin

which would put such paying jobs in his way. So Flora de Barral had but a five months' voyage, a mere excursion, for her first trial of sea-life. And Anthony, dearly trying to be most attentive, had induced this Mrs. Brown, the wife of his faithful steward, to come along as maid to his bride. But for some reason or other this arrangement was not continued.

ught Mrs. Anthony would have been glad anyhow to have another woman on board. He was thinking of the white-faced girlish personality whic

For no fault, mind you. The captain was ashamed to send her away. But that wife of his-aye the precious pair of them have got hold of him. I can't speak to him for a minute on the poop without that thimble-rigging coon coming gliding up. I'll tell you what. I overheard once-God knows I didn

ight, very gentle rolling of the ship slipping before the N.E. trade-wind seemed to be a s

whom one wished well? No better proof of something wrong was needed. Therefore he hoped, as he vanished at last,

and so still that the helmsman over there at the other end of the poop might have (and he probably did) suspect him of being criminally asleep on duty, he tried to "get hold of that thing" by some side which would fit in with his simple notions of psychology. "What the deuce are they worrying about?" he asked himself in a dazed and contemptuous impatience. But all the same "jailer" was a funny name to give a man; unkin

to calling his son-in-law (whom he never approached

well marve

I am not thinking here of numbers. Two men may behave like a crowd, three certainly will when their emotions are engaged. It was as if the forehead of Flora de Barral were

s the sentimental and apoplectic chief-mate and the morose steward, however astounding to him in its detached condition was much more so to me as a member of a series, following the chapter outside the Eastern Hotel in which I myself had played my part. In view of her declarations and my sage remarks it was very unexpected. She had meant well, and I had certainly meant well t

the smile was dim too. Dim and fleeting. The girl's life had presented itself to me as a tragi-comical adventure, the saddest thing on earth, slipping

waiting on fate which some of them, and not the most intelligent, cover up by the vain appearances of agitation. Flora de Barral was not exceptionally intelligent but she was thoroughly feminine. She would be passive (and that does not mean inanimate) in the circumstances, where the mere fact of being a woman was enough to give her an occult a

precipice. But I did not ask Mr. Powell anxiously what had happened to Mrs. Anthony in the end. I let him go on in his own way feeling that no m

in as though he had advanced something beyond my grasp

noble savages carry off a girl and the honest backwoodsman with his incomparable knowledge follows the track and reads the sign

Well let us say that I had a look in . . . A young girl, you know, is something like a temple. You pass by and wonder what mysterious rites are going on in there, what prayers, what visions? The privileged men, the lover, the husband, who are given the key of the sanctuary do not always know how to use it. For myself, without claim, without merit, simply by chance I had been allowed to look through the half-opened doo

-luck which is like the hate of invisible powers interp

the Ferndale, and the strangeness of being mixed up in what went on aboard, simply because his name was also the name of a sh

ing aloofness of his captain. He wanted to make a clean breast of it. I imagine that his youth stood in good stead to Mr. Powell. Oh, yes. Youth is a power. Even Captain Anthony had to take some notice of it, a

Mr. Powell seized the opportunity whatever it was. The captain who had started and stopped in his

And you felt you must p

s,

sent from his ship as Franklin supposed: "That's all right. You seem to be getting on very well with everybody,

s,

haggard expression was returning, he had the impulse, from some con

Powell and made him even step back a little. The captain

. You . . . of course

Anthony was off on his headlong tramp his

ced strangeness. Not that the captain-Powell was careful to explain-didn't see things as a ship-master should. The proof of it was that on that very occasion he desired him suddenly after a period of silent pacing, to have all the staysails sheets eased off, and he was going on with some

constraint between them. For instance, on that very occasion, when Mrs. Anthony came out they did look at each other; the captain's eyes indeed followed her till she sa

ay. "I went over and talked to Mrs. Anthony. I was thinking that it mu

was there

tch over her. And I think," he added, "that he was worrying her. Not that she showed it in an

t me talk to her," confessed Mr. Powell. "I don't know that she was

er. With the warm generosity of his age young Powell was on her side, as it were, even before he knew that there were sides to be taken on board that ship, and what this taking sides was about. There was a girl. A nice girl. He asked himself no questions. Flora de Barral was not so much younger in years than himself; but for some reason, perhaps by contrast with the accepted idea of a captain's wife, he could not regard her o

he was alone on the poop, in charge, keeping well aft by the weather rail and staring to windward, when amongst the white, breaking seas, under the black sky, he made out the lights of a ship. He watched them for some time. She was running dead before the wind of course. She will pass jolly close-he said to himself; and then suddenly he felt a great mistrust of that approaching ship. She's heading straight for us-he thought. It was not his business to get out of the way. On the contrary. And his une

e ship. Powell forgot all about the direction on that point given him by the chief. He flew over as I said, stamped with his foot and then putting his face to the cowl of the big ventilator shouted down there: "Please come on deck, sir," in a voice which wa

as though he had waited an hour but it was something much less than a minute before he fairly bellowed into the wide tube "Captain Anthony!" An agitated "What is it?" was what he heard down there in Mrs. Anthony

tand by to spin that helm up at the first word." The answer "Aye, aye, sir," was delivered in a steady voice. Then Mr.

paralysis of thought, of voice, of limbs. The unexpectedness of this misfire positively overcame his faculties. It was the only thing for which his imagination was not prepared. It was knocked clean over. When it got up it was with the suggesti

th or stir a limb to ward off the vision, a voice very near his ear, the measured voi

ried to strike a light. But he had to press the flare-holder to his breast with one arm, his fingers were damp and stiff, his hands trembled a little. One match broke. Another went out. In its flame he saw the colourless face of Mrs. Anthony a little below him, standing on t

ounded amused as if they had been a couple of children up to some lark behind a wa

are. Cat

ore he had the time to finish the sentence the flare blazed up violently between them and he saw her throw herself back with an arm across her face. "Hallo," he exclaimed;

g shadows over the poop, lighting up the concave surfaces of the sails, gleaming on the wet pai

and one red eye which swayed and tossed as if they belonged to the restless head of some invisible monster ambushed in the night amongst the waves. A moment, long

aft to watch the passing of that menace of destruction coming blindly with its parti-coloured stare out of a blind night on the wings of

d pauses in the midst of the overtaking waves. It was only when actually passing the stern within easy hail of the Ferndale, that her headlong speed became apparent to the e

voice just raised enough to be heard in the wind. "A

d fierce shooting violently from a white churned patch of the sea, lighting up the very clouds and carrying upwards in its volcanic rush flying spars, corpses, the fragments of two destroyed ships. It vanished and there was an immense relief. He

are in its usual place saw in the darkness the motionless

oing to happen

r now," he wh

t rushed out on deck. She had remained quietly there. This was pluck. Wonderful self-restraint. And it was

g for what would come,"

e best thing to

d blood could not have stood it. He would have felt he must see what was coming. Then

to hurt. Smell t

nother voice was heard in the companion, saying some indistinct words. Its tone was contemptuous; it came from below, from the bottom of the stairs. It was a voice in the cabin. And the only other voice which could be heard in the main cabin at this time of the evening was the voice of Mrs. Anthony's father. The indistinct white oval sank from Mr. Powell's sight so swiftly as to take him by surprise. For a moment he hung at the opening of the companion a

dowy in the uproar of the following seas. He stirred not; and Powell keeping near by did not dare speak to him, so enigmatical in its contemplation of the n

less agitation? The stillness of Captain Anthony became almost intolerable to his second officer. Mr. Powell loitering about t

his back remaining turned to the whole length of the ship he asked Mr. Powell with some brusquenes

"The mate told me to stamp on the port side when I

h an effort. Then added mumbling "I don't want

l said innocently: "She light

"Mrs. Anthony lighted the flare? Mrs. Anthony! . . . " Po

eemed queer to Powell that instead of goin

e ther

Anthony made a movement towards the companion himself, when Powell added the information. "

e captain give up the idea

Powell placing himself on the break of the poop kept a look-out. When after some time he turned his head to steal a glance at his eccentric captain he cou

n gone

tobacco bulging out his left cheek kept his eye

"Do you mean the captain did? You must be

know,

use he conceded a few words more to the second officer's weakness. "Yes. He was walking the deck as usua

ing his watch, with the chilly gusts of wind sweeping at him out of the darkness where the short sea of the soundings growled spitefully all round the ship, that it occurred to his unsophisticated mind that perhaps things are not what they are confidently expected to be; that it was possible that Captain Anthony was not a happy man . . . In so far you will perceive he was to a certai