CHAPTER II.

GRACE AND GODFREY.

Godfrey Harland and Grace Vansittart were neither of them included in the amateur company that was to perform that evening on board the _Pandora_. Parts had been allotted to both of them at first, but Miss Vansittart, who had no idea of acting, found so much difficulty in learning her lines and taking up her positions, that she had voted the whole concern a bore, and thrown up her engagement in consequence. Upon which Mr Harland had thought it politic to follow suit. He knew that Grace would not like to sit out and watch him making mimic love to another woman, so he told her that he preferred sitting out as well; and she was only too delighted at his apparent devotion to refuse to accept it. It was an old story between them. The woman was so deeply in love as to be blind to the arts by which the man led her to believe that he shared her feelings. And it was Godfrey Harland’s policy to be more than usually attentive to Miss Vansittart at this period. He saw plainly that something had gone wrong with the older folks. They were still polite; but all the cordiality with which they had first greeted him had died away. Mr Vansittart’s manner had become distant and cool, whilst the old lady avoided him on every possible occasion. He began seriously to fear that they were only keeping up appearances until they arrived at Tabbakooloo, and that some disagreeable surprise awaited him there. It therefore behoved him to make all the running he could with the daughter before they reached their destination, so that there might be no chance of her acquiescing in the decision of her parents, if that decision proved to be against him. He was quite unprincipled enough (as Will Farrell had suggested) to get the girl into his power, so that there should be no turning back for her.

The little stage on which the comedy was to be represented, consisted of a few planks raised in the steerage, with a row of footlights before them, which, to do honour to this grand occasion, had been surmounted above and around with the Union Jack and other flags, in the form of a proscenium. The auditorium, which was filled with chairs, benches, chests, barrels, and any other articles capable of being used as seats, was left in complete darkness, the only light being an oil lamp hung in the entry to guide the feet of the audience. A rope tied across the upper end distinguished the ‘stalls,’ reserved for the saloon passengers, from the ‘pit,’ which was given over indiscriminately to the rest of the ship’s company. All had been cordially invited to attend, and the place was crammed for some time before the hour of commencement; but Will Farrell had been before everybody else, and secured seats for Iris and Maggie and himself on the benches that stood nearest to the reserved portion of the arena. Iris had, of course, informed Maggie of the confidence that had taken place between herself and Mr Farrell, and the women were equally anxious to see what the evening would reveal to them. No one who was not expecting to see her would have recognised Iris Harland. She had pleaded an attack of toothache as an excuse for wrapping up her head in a black woollen shawl, and had so enveloped her features that they would have scarcely been visible, even had there been light enough to distinguish them. A few minutes before the representation commenced, the captain appeared, followed by the saloon passengers, who, with a good deal of laughing and talking, took their seats, and Iris shrank back as she saw her husband conduct Miss Vansittart to the chairs just in front of her, so that there were but a couple of feet between them. He threw a careless glance behind him as he took his seat; but seeing only a couple of dowdy-looking steerage passengers, as he imagined, did not give them a second thought throughout the evening. Grace Vansittart was looking flushed and handsome, though dressed in an extravagant fashion for a performance on board ship, and Godfrey Harland was most attentive in folding her crimson shawl about her shoulders, and seeing that she had something to rest her feet upon.

‘Do keep it on, my darling,’ Iris heard him say in French, as Grace threw the wrap rather impatiently from her. ‘There is a horrid draught in this place, and you know you have a slight cold. For _my_ sake keep it on.’

‘I was _sure_ he’d bring her here,’ whispered Farrell to Iris. ‘All the old people, you see, get as close as they can to the stage, so that they may see and hear the better. But _his_ object is neither to be seen nor heard. Can you understand the lingo they’re talking, Miss Douglas?’

Iris nodded her head.

‘Oh! well, then, it’s all right. But I was afraid he was going to trick us. He _is_ a deep ’un, and no mistake.’

‘Hush, Will,’ said Maggie, ‘the play’s going to begin.’

At that juncture all eyes turned to the stage, and divers were the opinions as to whether Miss Vere’s short-waisted dress of sunflower hue, tied with a sash under her arms, or Miss Leyton’s soft white muslin, became her best. The acting went smoothly, and the majority of the audience were intensely interested in the comedy and its exponents. But for some there, a more thrilling drama, the incidents of which were interwoven with their very lives, was being enacted in the auditorium.

Will Farrell had no personal interest in Godfrey Harland’s infidelity to his wife, but he hated the man as he hated hell, and longed to see him exposed on every point. Maggie, too, had her reasons for wishing to be revenged on him; and Iris felt intuitively that in some unknown way the happiness or misery of her whole future life lay in the discovery of that evening. As she listened to her husband’s conversation with Miss Vansittart, she was convinced of one thing--that she loved him no longer. Not a particle of jealousy or regret assailed her as she heard him pouring his tale of love into another woman’s ear. All she felt was an intense surprise that she should ever have believed in, or fancied she cared for, him. He seemed to appear before her for the first time in his true colours. Had she seen him long ago, she thought, as she did then, she never could have married him.

And while Iris thought thus, another face rose up before her--the pleading, earnest eyes of Vernon Blythe gazed into hers, and she felt the tears of regret rise to dim her sight. But she brushed them hurriedly away. She would not have had Farrell and Maggie think she was weeping at what she saw before her, for all the world. Besides, she wanted to keep her mind clear, in order not to lose a word of what was passing between her husband and Miss Vansittart. And as she listened she knew that all that had been told her was true, and Godfrey designed to ruin another life as he had done hers.

‘In a few more weeks,’ he whispered, when the curtain, amidst much applause, had descended on the first act of the ‘Rivals,’ ‘we shall be in New Zealand, Grace. Shall you be glad or sorry when our voyage is at an end?’

He still spoke in French, which he had acquired fluently whilst knocking about in the Southern States of America, and Grace, fresh from her boarding-school, retained sufficient knowledge of the language to understand and answer him.

‘Why should I be sorry?’ she replied to his question. ‘We shall be as much together then as we are now, shall we not?’

‘Ah, that is the doubt that worries me,’ said Harland; ‘will your parents permit a free intercourse between us? You know how few opportunities for meeting occur on land to what they do on board ship; and unless I am received as your accepted suitor--’

‘But you _must_ be received as my accepted suitor! I will have no one else,’ interrupted Grace determinately.

‘My dearest, if it depended only on _you_, I know what my happy fate would be. But it is this horrid £ _s._ _d._, Grace! I am so poor. Your father is certain to look for money, in exchange for his daughter’s hand.’

‘Well, I don’t know that, Godfrey! Papa has often told me he is rich enough to be able to afford to let me choose for myself. And I _have_ chosen! If he doesn’t like it, it can’t be helped! But I have chosen _you_.’

‘My sweet girl! You will not be persuaded to give me up, then, Grace?’

‘Not for worlds! How _could_ I?’

‘But if, on arriving at Tabbakooloo, your father should absolutely refuse to consent to our engagement, what then?’

‘I shall marry you without his consent! Godfrey, you _will_ marry me?’ she added, with a quick look of alarm.

He laid his hand on hers, with a soothing gesture.

‘Do you doubt me, my darling? Have we not sworn to belong to each other? If you are determined to stick to me, through thick and thin, I want nothing more--’

She turned her head towards him then, and whispered in his ear, and Iris could just see the glistening tear in her eye, as one of the lights fell across her face.

‘I understand,’ he answered, ‘and your assurance was all I needed to make me perfectly happy. It is an agreement, then? Whatever any one may say or think, you are to be my wife as soon as I can make you so?’

‘Whenever you like,’ she said, slipping her hand into his under cover of her shawl.

They spoke without reserve, because they quite believed that it was safe to do so. The rest of the saloon passengers were well in front of them. As to the inmates of the second cabin and steerage, who sat behind, they did not suppose for a moment that any of them could understand, even if they overheard, their words. How little they imagined _who_ sat just behind them.

‘Godfrey,’ said Grace, after a pause, ‘I cannot believe I am really the first girl to whom you have said such sweet things! Tell me the truth now. Have you often been in love before?’

‘_Never!_ That is, _really_ in love, Grace. I have had my flirtations and _amourettes_--what man of my age has not?--but I never felt what it was to be _in earnest_ until now.’

‘Have you never thought of marrying any other woman?’

At this point-blank question, Iris could see, even through the gloom, that Godfrey winced.

‘Now, don’t call me to book for my thoughts, you little tyrant!’ he answered, with affected gaiety. ‘The fact remains that--that--I am going to marry _you_. Is not that sufficient?’

‘Yes, more than sufficient. It makes me so happy,’ said the girl earnestly, ‘to think that I shall belong to you only, and that you will belong only to me! The world will seem like fairyland when we share it together.’

‘Still, my darling, the truth remains that, since they have seen that we love each other, your parents have not been so cordial to me as they were. You never hear your father ask me to take a hand at whist in the evenings now; and as for your mother, she scuttles out of the way whenever she sees me coming. It makes things very unpleasant for me, especially as I am in Mr Vansittart’s employment. Has he ever warned you against me?’

‘Never mind,’ replied Grace soothingly; ‘it can make no difference to us if he _has_. We are going to marry each other, whatever they may say; and when it is once over, they will not hold out long against their only child. Why, who have they but me? It will all come right, Godfrey, never fear. And, meanwhile, we love each other, and nothing on earth can alter that.’

As Iris listened to the words of this girl, whom love, however misdirected, was transforming from a pert boarding-school miss to a thoughtful woman, the tears ran down her cheeks with pity and compassion. It was terrible to her to sit there, the lawful wife of Godfrey Harland, and hear another woman express her implicit faith and trust in him; whilst she knew that, before long, she herself must inevitably be the instrument to open that woman’s eyes, and expose the treachery and falsehood of which she had been made the victim. The idea turned Iris sick and faint, and she rose from her seat with the intention of leaving the theatre.

‘What is the matter?’ asked Farrell; ‘are you ill?’

‘Yes,’ she whispered back to him; ‘I have heard enough! Let me go to my berth.’

They both wanted to accompany her, but she over-ruled their request, and begged them not to make a commotion that might attract attention to their party. So they let her have her own way, and as soon as she could do so without disturbing the audience, she crept away. She was trembling all over, however, as she did so; and when she reached the entrance of the auditorium, and felt the fresh air blowing on her face, she leant against the side for a moment to recover herself, and pulled the wrap off her face.

‘Are you not well?’ said a voice by her side.

She looked up and encountered Vernon Blythe. The sight of him set her tears flowing in earnest.

‘Oh, yes! thank you. Only the place is too hot for me, and I am going on deck instead.’

‘Let me go with you.’

‘No! no! Why should I take you away from your amusement? I am perfectly well able to go by myself.’

‘Have I made you afraid of me, Iris?’ he asked gently. ‘You need not be. You must know that if I offended you, it was done in ignorance of your position, and I shall never repeat it. Show me that I am forgiven by letting me attend you now.’

‘There is nothing to forgive,’ she faltered, placing her hand upon his for a moment; ‘and I was only sorry that circumstances had misled you. But why have you never spoken to me since? Am I to lose your friendship as well as--as--everything?’

‘I have been too unhappy to be able to trust myself to speak to you,’ said Vernon frankly, as he led her on to the quarter-deck. ‘The shock of your intelligence was greater to me than you may think. I had been living on my hope ever since I met you again, and believed you to be free, and when you dashed it from me, it knocked me over--that’s all. Don’t be angry with me. A woman can’t understand a man’s feelings in such matters. We can’t drink milk after brandy. And so I have kept out of your sight, that I might dream of you as little as possible. And I didn’t think that you would miss me.’

‘Oh, yes, I have,’ replied Iris simply. ‘All my pleasure seemed gone with you. Perhaps, as you say, I cannot enter into your feelings; but I think I would rather have “milk” than nothing at all.’

‘Let us have some “milk” now, then,’ replied Jack, almost cheerfully, as he placed her under the shelter of the long-boat, and established himself by her side. ‘Let us be friends, since we can be nothing more. And now, what is the fresh trouble, for I can see there is something fresh by your face? Treat me like a friend, and tell me everything.’

‘Yes! indeed I will,’ said Iris, ‘for I feel that it will be a great comfort, and perhaps a help to me. I will tell you everything, and you shall advise me what is best to be done. And in the first place, Mr Blythe--’

‘That’s a bad beginning,’ interrupted Jack, ‘for in the first place, you must not call me “_Mr Blythe_.”’

‘What am I to call you then?’

‘What _used_ you to call me when we walked and talked together at Dunmow?’

‘Ah! that was such a long time ago, and you were such a boy!’

‘Well, some people say I’m not much more than a boy now, and, at all events, it is not so long ago as to be forgotten. I think you used to call me “Vernie” then. Won’t you call me by that name now?’

‘If it will please you--’ commenced Iris hesitatingly.

‘It will give me about as much pleasure as I am capable of, Iris. If I may not be your lover, let me fancy myself your friend.’

‘There is no fancy about _that_,’ she answered warmly; ‘and I will call you whatever you like. Come nearer to me then, Vernie, and let me tell you all.’

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