CHAPTER I.

JACK, THE SAILOR.

The August sun had just sunk below the horizon, as Jack Blythe, a passenger by the down train from London to Portsmouth, walked leisurely home to a little cottage situated on Southsea Common.

He was a tall, well-built young fellow of five-and-twenty, with a remarkably graceful figure. His hair was pale brown, with the faintest tinge of gold upon it; his eyes were grey and languid in their expression--his general appearance somewhat delicate. And yet Jack Blythe (who had been christened Vernon) was one of the merriest, most manly fellows in existence. The very fact of his proper name having been mysteriously changed to ‘Jack’ was a proof of his being a favourite with his own sex: as for the other, they, one and all, combined to spoil him. Few, seeing Jack for the first time, would have guessed his profession. He looked like a poet, but he was a sailor, and belonged to the roughest part of the profession--the Merchant Service. He had been educated, indeed, with a view to very different work; but when it was too late for him to enter the Royal Navy, he had intimated his unalterable decision to go to sea, and his mother, who was his only surviving parent, had, with many tears, consented to his wishes. But he was a good son and a good sailor, and she had never repented of letting him have his own way.

As he approached his destination, he was accosted by another young man who had run half-way across the common to meet him.

‘Hullo, Jack! how are you? You’re the very man I want,’ cried the new-comer effusively.

‘What for, Reynolds? To pull an oar in a boating party, or to rig up a tent for a camping-out expedition?’ asked Blythe.

‘Better than that, old boy! I’ve bought that little yacht, the _Water Witch_, at last, and you must sail her for me. I have my party all ready, and we can start for the Island to-morrow morning.’

‘I should very much like to join you, old man,’ said Jack, ‘but it can’t be done. I may have to go to town again to-morrow to meet an influential friend.’

‘Hang it! You are always going up to town!’ ejaculated the other. ‘One day off can surely do you no harm.’

‘It might, at present, Reynolds. I have stayed on shore too long already, and I find some difficulty in getting a ship. I have sent in my application for a berth on board the _Pandora_, and as I have good interest, I hope I may get it. But nothing is certain in this world, and I cannot afford to relax my energies until I am provided for. You see my twelve-month’s pay is nearly gone--that’s where the shoe pinches; so, if I lose my chance of the _Pandora_, I shall have to hunt up all the skippers and owners in the docks.’

‘You’ll get a ship fast enough,’ grumbled Reynolds; ‘you’ve passed for chief officer. What more do you want? Come, old boy,’ he continued coaxingly, ‘say you’ll give up to-morrow to the _Water Witch_ and me--’

‘I will, if it is possible! I can say no more,’ replied Jack Blythe.

‘Alice Leyton has promised to accompany us,’ resumed Reynolds, meaningly.

‘Has she?’ remarked Jack without a blush. ‘Well, if I can join the party, she will prove an extra attraction to it, naturally. But it is as necessary for her sake as for my own that I should get employment as soon as possible.’

And, with a wave of the hand, Jack Blythe continued his walk to his mother’s cottage.

‘I don’t believe he cares a rap for that girl,’ thought Reynolds, as he, too, turned homewards. ‘Fancy! calmly resigning a whole day on the water with the woman he is supposed to be in love with. Bah! The fellow’s not made of flesh and blood.’

But in this, as in many things, Mr Reynolds was mistaken. It was a hard trial for Vernon Blythe to relinquish what was, to him, one of the greatest pleasures in life. He would have given anything in reason to have had an opportunity to test the sailing powers, and seen the behaviour of the saucy little _Water Witch_ under his guidance; and for a while he felt half disposed to gratify his desire at the expense of his duty.

‘Shall I go?’ he asked himself as he strode onwards. ‘After all, it will only be a day more, and I don’t half like the idea of Alice going without me. She doesn’t mean any harm, I know--still, she is rather free in her manners, and apt to say more than she means, and Reynolds certainly admires her. Pshaw! I am talking nonsense! I have promised to meet Mr Barber, and I must be firm. Besides, if Alice is not to be trusted on a water-party without my protection, how am I to leave her (as I soon may) to take a voyage to New Zealand alone? I must trust her “all in all, or not at all.” I was a fool even to think of such a thing!’

And starting off at a brisk pace, he soon reached his mother’s cottage.

Mrs Blythe was on the look-out for her son’s return. He was her only child, and she loved him as only a mother can love the one treasure of her heart. His father, who was an officer in the Royal Navy, had been drowned at sea whilst Vernon was a baby, and it had been the one wish of her widowed life that her boy should not be a sailor. But as he grew up, the inherited instinct developed itself, and she had been forced to part with her darling; since which her life had been divided into two parts only--the days when Vernon was at home, and the days when he was not. Mrs Blythe always called her son ‘Vernon.’ It had been her own maiden name, and she would recognise him by no other. She thought the nickname of ‘Jack’ both low and vulgar, and was disgusted whenever she heard him addressed by it. She was a round, rosy little woman, very unlike her son, who inherited his beauty from his father, but she was a good mother to him, and he loved her devotedly. Although she had such good reason to hate and dread the sea, yet she felt she could not live away from it, and had been settled in Southsea ever since her husband’s death. Her cottage, which faced the common, was surrounded by a pretty garden, enclosed by a wooden paling and a little rustic gate. The room where she awaited her son was neatly furnished, the walls being covered with the curiosities which Vernon, and his father before him, had brought her home from different parts of the world. Talipots and fans from Rangoon, and bangles and hookahs from Calcutta hung by the side of skins and palm-leaf trophies from the West Coast, and green stone and carved wooden weapons from Maori land. Daintily-painted boxes, and wonderfully-carved pagodas were piled up with ornamented whales’ teeth, and the inexhaustible fern leaves from St Helena, and necklaces and poisoned spears from the Sandwich Islands. Here, in fact, were to be seen specimens of art from every quarter of the globe, and with a story attached to each, marking the milestones along the widow’s path of life, and hallowed by her smiles and tears. The room had more the appearance of a museum than a private dining-room, but these innumerable curiosities were Mrs Blythe’s greatest treasures, over which she brooded whilst her son was absent on his long sea voyages. She had had him all to herself for twelve months now, but the holiday was drawing to a close, and each day she dreaded to hear him say that he must leave her.

‘Well, Vernon, my darling!’ she exclaimed anxiously, as he entered the room where his tea was ready laid for him; ‘what news have you to-day?’

‘None in particular, mother,’ he replied, throwing himself into a chair. ‘I have been to dozens of firms, but it is the old story with all of them.’

‘Something will spring up by-and-by,’ said Mrs Blythe, soothingly, ‘and for my part I don’t care how long it may be first. But have your tea now, dear. I am sure you must be tired.’

‘I am dead beat,’ replied Vernon, drawing his chair to the table. ‘I called to-day on Stern & Stales, and saw their ship’s husband about the appointment on board the _Pandora_. I told him how very anxious I am to get it, but he is not sure if it is given away. However, he has four passenger ships all going to New Zealand, and if the _Pandora’s_ berth is filled, he has promised to try and get me on one of the others. If I don’t hear from him by to-morrow I am to go up and see him again.’

Mrs Blythe gave a shrug of impatience.

‘I can’t think,’ she said somewhat testily, ‘why you should be so dreadfully anxious to sail in the _Pandora_.’

Her son regarded her with mild surprise.

‘Why, mother, you know that the Leytons have secured their passages by her. What is more natural than I should wish to go too?’

‘Well, if you do your duty on board ship, as I know you always do, you will have no time to waste on making love to Alice Leyton.’

Vernon laughed in his lazy fashion.

‘Perhaps not! but I shall be near her in case of her requiring me, and when we get to New Zealand, I shall see her father and get the matter settled. It is time it was settled, mother. We have been engaged now for nearly a year, and I suppose that, sooner or later, we must be married.’

‘It had better be later, then,’ replied Mrs Blythe, hotly. ‘For my part, I think it is nonsense to hear you talk of such a thing as marriage. A child like you, and without any money.’

‘The last objection is unfortunately true enough,’ replied Vernon; ‘but as for being a child--well, all I can say is, I don’t feel like one. And if Alice chooses to marry a poor man, that is her business, and no one else’s.’

‘There is a much greater objection to the marriage, in my opinion, than that, urged Mrs Blythe. ‘I don’t think Alice Leyton really cares for you.’

‘Oh, mother, why should you say so. What right have you to think it. I should never have proposed to her if I had not seen plainly that she cared for me.’

‘Any fool could see that she set her cap at you, Vernon. But she is not the only girl that has done that. And she is a flirt, my dear. I daresay you will be angry with me, but I must speak the truth. Whilst you are away in London, Alice Leyton is running about the common and the pier with any man she can get hold of, and chattering--dear! dear! how that girl’s tongue does run. I pity you if you are ever shut up with it between four walls.’

The young man did not seem in the least angry at this tirade. He waited till his mother had finished, and then he answered very quietly, but determinately.

‘Look here, mother dear. You mustn’t speak in that way of Alice. Remember she will be my wife. Besides, you are quite mistaken. She is not a flirt at all. She is very high-spirited, and has been brought up in a free and easy manner (what with her father being away and her mother an invalid), but that will be all altered by-and-by. She loves me very dearly, for aught you may think, and when she is my wife, she will be all that you can wish her to be--of that I am very sure.’

‘She may well love you,’ said Mrs Blythe, looking fondly at her son; ‘who could help loving you, Vernon? But there is another side to the question, _Do you love her?_’

At that he started, and looked uneasy. Still his answer was given manfully.

‘Of course I do. Who wouldn’t? A dear, sweet little girl like that. Why, mother, when I look at Alice, I think sometimes she’s just the very prettiest girl I’ve ever seen. Such eyes and teeth and skin! And such a merry smile! She’s the very impersonation of a sunbeam! A man couldn’t be unhappy with a creature like that by his side. She’d make him laugh at a funeral.’

‘I acknowledge all that,’ said Mrs Blythe, shaking her head oracularly; ‘but giggles and blushes and good eyes don’t make the happiness of a man’s life, when there’s nothing else behind them. And sometimes, my boy,’ she continued, coming round to his side and putting her hand caressingly upon his hair, ‘sometimes I fancy--now don’t be angry with me, dear, for I wouldn’t vex you for the world--but sometimes I have thought--’

‘Well, mother, what have you thought?’ asked Vernon, as he took her hand in his and laid his cheek against it.

‘That Alice Leyton is not your first fancy, Vernon, and that my boy has had a disappointment of which I have never heard.’

His youthful cheek grew crimson, then. She could see the blood mounting to his forehead and the roots of his hair. And when he answered her his voice seemed suddenly to have changed.

‘And what then?’ he said curtly.

‘Is there no hope--no chance--my darling?’ asked Mrs Blythe.

‘Not the slightest. Had there been, do you suppose I should have been engaged to Alice Leyton? I don’t know how you have guessed there was ever another, mother, but it all happened a long time ago, and I have nearly forgotten it.’

‘Vernon, my dear, that is not true. You cannot have forgotten it, or the allusion would not move you in this manner. And as for “long ago,” why, you were only five-and-twenty last month. How soon did you begin to fall in love?’

‘Never mind that, mother. Whenever it occurred, or however it affected me, it is a thing of the past, and I would rather you never spoke of it to me or any one again.’

‘And won’t you tell me who it was?’ said Mrs Blythe, kissing his forehead.

‘What is the use?’ he rejoined, wearily.

Yet he knew, as he asked the question, that to tell her everything would be a relief to him. He had suffered very deeply, and in all other sufferings but this his mother had been his true confidant and friend. And so, with a little gentle coaxing on her part, as they sat together when the evening meal was concluded, he was induced to tell his tale.

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