The Queen's Cup, G. A. Henty [best fantasy books to read .TXT] 📗

out that, although a fishing eagle, the Osprey can scarcely be called a water bird, inasmuch that it is no swimmer."

"But it is hypercritical even to suggest such a thing," she said, pouting. "The Osprey has to do with the sea. It is strong and swift on the wing, and the sails of the yacht are wings, are they not? Then it is strong and bold, and I am sure your boat will not be afraid to meet a storm. Altogether, I think it is an excellent name."

"I think it a very good name, too."

"You ought to have one for your figurehead."

"Yachts don't have figureheads, else I would certainly have it. At any rate, I will choose an eagle for my racing flag."

"I have never been on board a yacht yet," the girl said. "I think I only know one man who has one, at least a large one; that is Mr. Carthew. Of course you know him; he had a new one this spring––the Phantom. He has won several times this season."

"I saw he had," Frank said, quietly. "Yes, I used to know him, but it's seven or eight years since we met."

"And you don't like him," she said, quickly.

"What makes you think that, Miss Greendale?"

"Oh, I can tell by the tone of your voice."

"I don't think it expressed anything but indifference, as it is such a long time since I met him. But I never fancied him much. I suppose we were not the same sort of men; and then, too, perhaps I am rather prejudiced from the fact that I know that he was considered rather a hard landlord."

"I never heard that," she said.

"No, I dare say you would not hear it, but I fancy it was so. However, he sold his estate, at least so I heard."

"Yes, he told me that he did not care for country life. I have seen him several times since we came up to town. He keeps race horses, you know. His horse was second in the Derby this spring. That takes him a good deal away, else one would meet him more often, for he knows a great many people we do."

"Yes, I know that he races, and is, I believe, rather lucky on the turf."

"You have no inclination that way, Major Mallett?"

"Not a shadow," he said, earnestly. "It is the very last vice I should take to. I have seen many cases, in the service, of young fellows being ruined by betting on the turf. We had one case in my own regiment, in which a man was saved by the skin of his teeth. Happily he had strength of mind and manliness enough to cut it altogether, and is a very promising young officer now, but it was only the fact of our embarking when we did for India that saved him from ruin.

"The man who bets more than he can afford to lose is simply a gambler, whether he does so on racehorses or on cards. I have seen enough of it to hate gambling with all my heart. It has driven more men out of the service than drink has, and the one passion is almost as incurable as the other."

Bertha laughed. "I think that is the first time I have ever heard you express any very strong opinion, Major Mallett. It is quite refreshing to listen to a thorough-going denunciation of anything here in London. In the country, of course, it is different. All sorts of things are heartily abused there; especially, perhaps, the weather, free trade, poaching, and people in whose covers foxes are scarce. But here, in London, no one seems to care much about anything."

"People in your set have no time to do so."

"That is very unkind. They think about amusement."

"They may think about it, but it is all in a very languid fashion. Now, in a country town, when there is a ball or a dance in the neighbourhood, it is quite an excitement; and, at any rate, everyone enters into it heartily. People evidently enjoy the dancing for dancing's sake, and they all look as if they were thoroughly enjoying themselves. Whereas here, people dance as if it was rather a painful duty than otherwise, and there is a general expression of a longing for the whole thing to be over."

"I enjoy the dancing," Bertha said, sturdily. "At least, when I get a really good partner."

"Yes, but then you have only been three months at it. You have not got broken into the business yet."

"Nor have you, Major Mallett."

"No, but while you are an actor in the piece, I am but a spectator, and lookers-on, you know, see most of the game."

"What nonsense! Don't pretend you are getting to be a blase man. I know that you are only about ten years older than I am—not more than nine, I think—and you dance very well, and no doubt you know it."

"I like dancing, I can assure you, where there is room to dance; but I don't call it dancing when you have an area of only a foot square to dance in, and are hustled and bumped more than you would be in a crowded Lord Mayor's show. My training has not suited me for it, and I would rather stand and look on, listen to scraps of conversation, watch the faces of the dancers and of those standing round. It is a study, and I think it shows one of the worst sides of nature. It is quite shocking to see and hear the envy, uncharitableness, the boredom, and the desperate efforts to look cheerful under difficulties, especially among the girls that do not get partners."

"For shame! I am disappointed in you," Bertha said, half in jest, half in earnest. "You are not at all the person I thought you were. Whatever I may have fancied about you, I never imagined you a cynic or a grumbler."

"I suppose it brings out the worst side of my nature, too," he laughed. "When you come down on board the Osprey, Miss Greendale, you will see the other side. I fancy one falls into the tone of one's surroundings. Here I have caught the tone of the bored man of society, there you will see that I shall be a breezy sailor—cheerful in storm or in calm, ready to take my glass and to toast my lass and all the rest of it in true nautical fashion."

"I hope so," she said, gravely. "I shall certainly need something of the sort to correct the very unfavourable impression you have just been giving me. Now let us change the subject. You have not told me yet whether you had any flirtations in India."

"Flirtations!" he repeated. "For once, the small section of womankind that I encountered were above and beyond flirtations.

"I don't think," he went on seriously, "that you in England can quite realise what it was, or that a woman in London society can imagine that there can exist a state of things in which dress and appearance are matters which have altogether ceased to engross the female mind. The white women I saw there were worn and haggard. No matter what their age, they bore on their faces the impress of terrible hardship, terrible danger, and terrible grief and anxiety. Few but had lost someone dear to them, many all whom they cared for. A few had made some pitiful attempt at neatness, but most had lost all thought of self, all care whatever for personal appearance. There was an anxious look in their eyes that was painful to witness."

"I spoke without thinking," the girl said, gravely. "It must have been awful—awful, as you say. It is impossible for us really to imagine quite what it was, or to picture up such scenes as you must have witnessed. I can understand that all this must seem frivolous and contemptible to you."

"No, I don't go so far as that," he smiled. "It is good that there should be butterflies as well as bees; and, at any rate, the women of India, who had the reputation of being as frivolous and pleasure-loving as the rest of their sex, came out nobly and showed a degree of patience under suffering and of heroic courage unsurpassable in history.

"I am afraid," he said, as the hostess gave the signal for the ladies to rise, "you will long look back upon this dinner as one of unprecedented dullness."

"Not dullness," she smiled. "Exceptional certainly, but as something so different from the usual thing, when one talks of nothing but the opera, the theatres and exhibitions, as to deserve to be put down in one's diary by a mark. I won't flatter you by telling you whether a red or a black one."

"Who are the party going to be, Mallett?" his friend Colonel Severn said, as they stood together on the deck of the Osprey early in August. "You guaranteed that it would be a pleasant one when you persuaded me to leave London, for the first time since I retired, before shooting began."

"Well, to begin with, there is Lady Greendale, an eminently pleasant woman. She comes as general chaperon, and I shall consider her under your especial care. You will not find it hard work, for she is an eminently sympathetic woman, ready to chat if you are disposed to talk, to interest herself in other ways if you are not. She has plenty of common sense, is tolerant of tobacco, and a thorough woman of the world, though her headquarters have for years been in the country. With her is her daughter."

"Well, what about her? I have heard of her as having made quite a sensation this season, and between ourselves I had some idea that this party was specially planned on her account."

"To some extent perhaps it was," Frank Mallett laughed. "Bertha Greendale is an old chum of mine. I knew her in very short frocks, for they were near neighbours of ours in the country; and her father, Sir John, was always one of my kindest friends. She was a slip of a girl when I went out to India, and though I thought that she would turn out pretty, I certainly did not expect she would be anything like as good looking as she is. She was always a nice girl, and success so far has not spoiled her.

"Then there is a Miss Sinclair, a great friend of Bertha's; and Jack Hawley of the Guards. I knew him out in the Crimea. The other two are Wilson, who is a clever young barrister, and a particularly pleasant fellow; and his wife, who is a sister of Miss Sinclair; so I think there are the elements of a pleasant party. All the ladies are broken into smoke, for Sir John smoked, and so does Wilson; so that you won't be expected to go forward, as they do on the P and O, whenever you want to enjoy your favourite pipe."

"That is a comfort, anyhow, Mallett. If there is one thing in the world I hate, it is having to go and hunt about for some place to smoke in; and I never accept an invitation to any shooting party unless I know beforehand that smoking is allowed. At what time do you expect the others?"

"They will be down at half-past twelve; they are all coming by the same train, and it was because I knew that you would want to be in a smoking carriage that I told you to come down by the earlier one. And, besides, I thought it well to get you here first. You are the only stranger, as it were. The others are all intimate with each other, and it was as well to post you as to their various relationships."

"One thing, Mallett. I hope Lady Greendale is not in any way a marrying woman. I am not like Mr. Pickwick, afraid of widows, and have perfect confidence in my power to resist temptation; but at the same time it makes all the difference in the world to one's comfort. I am not ass enough to suppose that Lady Greendale would even dream for a moment of setting her cap at a Colonel on half pay, but if a woman is in the marrying line she always expects a certain amount of what you may call delicate attention. It is her daily bread, for she considers that unless every man she comes across evinces a certain amount of admiration, it is a sign that her charms are on the wane, and her chances growing more and more remote."

Mallett laughed. "You can set your mind at ease, for nothing is further from the thoughts of Lady Greendale than re-marriage. She was very happy with her husband."

"The more reason for her marrying again," the Colonel said. "A woman who has been happy with her husband is apt