"Not at all. The hour I"ve waited for was the one which would best enable me to meet your father on equal terms as measured by his own standards."
"Oh, I see. I believe I see."
"Yes, the hour when I should be not owner merely, but captain too, of the finest boat----"
"Dat eveh float"--" she tenderly put in.
"Yes, on this great river."
"Oh, Captain Courteney----"
"Don"t Courteney or captain me now, Ramsey, whether this is beginning or end." There was a silence, and then--
"Hugh," she said, as softly as a female bird trying her mate"s song, "you mustn"t ask my father. You mustn"t ask any one. I can"t let you."
"Your father"s already asked. If he consents I go ash.o.r.e at Natchez, having telegraphed ahead from Vicksburg----"
"You shan"t. You shan"t go to my brothers. You shan"t go armed and you shan"t go unarmed."
"Yes, I shall. I"ll go and settle with them in an hour without the least fear of violence on either side."
"Armed with nothing but words? You shan"t. And armed with anything else you shan"t."
"Ramsey, words are the mightiest weapon on earth. The world"s one perfect man--we needn"t be pious to say it--set about to conquer the human race by the sheer power of words and died rather than use any other weapon. Died victorious, as he counted victory. And the result--a poor, lame beginning of the result--is what we call Christendom."
"You shan"t die victorious for me."
"No, I shall not. I talk much too vast."
"Humph! you always did." She smiled, but a moonbeam betrayed a tear on her folded hands.
"True," he admitted. "I talk too vast. I"m only claiming the power of words in small as well as large. I"ve no hope of martyrdom; I"m only confident of victory."
"No matter. You _won"t_ go ash.o.r.e at Natchez."
"You mean your father won"t consent?"
"I do. There"s one thing, at the very bottom of his heart, that you"ve never thought of."
"I think I have."
"What is it?"
"That as the Hayle boats are all one day to be yours, and our union would unite the two fleets under the one name of Courteney, he will never allow it."
"He never will."
"Ramsey, he says he may. If we and the boats are so united the fleet will be, while grandfather lives, the Courteney fleet; but each new boat from now on will be named for a Hayle, beginning with you, or your father, or your mother, as you and they may choose. At Vicksburg, if he consents in time, we can telegraph her--we must have her--to come aboard at Natchez for the rest of the trip. Grandfather, I suppose you"ve been told, is now waiting for us at Vicksburg. He came up on the _Antelope_."
"The _Antelope_! How do you know?"
"By a despatch received at Memphis."
"Mmm! what a blessing is the telegraph! But, ah, Hugh"--the name was almost naturalized--"this is a mere castle in the air! My--my brothers----"
"I"ll take care of them."
"You can"t! You can"t! Oh, Hugh, they--keep--their--threats." She caught a breath and looked at him. If he went seeking them she would go at his side! He must have read her mind, for in his majestical way he smilingly shook his head.
Mrs. Gilmore had ceased to sing and with the others had risen and turned Ramsey"s way, confident that up there the conclusive word had been spoken. Ramsey called down:
"Don"t stop. Sing "My Old Kentucky Home" or that thing in which "the river keeps rolling along" and "the future"s but a dream." We"re song hungry up here."
"Then sing to each other," was the reply. "You can do it."
"Let Captain Hugh sing," said Watson. "He"s off watch."
"He says," said Ramsey, "captains don"t sing on the texas roof." She moved to join the group on its way to an after stair. Watson bent his steps for the pilot-house. At the stair the actor"s wife let her husband and "California" go down before her and as Ramsey and Hugh came close said covertly:
"Sing, captain. Sing as softly as you please, just for us two while the world is in dreams and sleep, won"t you?"
The lover"s heart was big with happiness, his solicitor had just been singing pointedly in his interest, the seclusion here was all but absolute, the quoted line was from Ramsey"s song of that first night on the _Votaress_, and to the bright surprise of both his hearers he laid a touch on Mrs. Gilmore"s arm and in a restrained voice so confidential as to reach only to the pilot-house above and to the two men at the stair"s foot below began to sing.
Before half a line was out the Californian had seized both of Gilmore"s shoulders. "My poem!" he gasped. "I gave it to him last night to grammatize! He"s fit it to a tchune. Partner, he"s the only man that"s listened----"
"Sh-sh-sh! listen yourself," whispered the actor, and this is what they heard:
[Music: O come and grace my gar-den, From all the world a-part. Thou on-ly may"st the won-der see Of birds and flow"rs that in it be, For all of them are dreams of thee. My gar-den is my heart,... My gar-den is my heart.]
"If heaven might make my garden An empire wide and great, Fidelity should close it in, The joy of life bloom evergreen, And love be law and thou be queen, Might I but keep the gate.
"For where would be my garden, Dear love, from thee apart?
Whose every bush and bower and tree, Its founts, perfumes, and minstrelsy And all its flowers spring all from thee, Thou sunlight of my heart."
"You say that"s your poem?" murmured the actor.
"Oh, he"s doctored it," stealthily admitted the Californian. "He"s doctored it a lot."
LXI
WANTED, HAYLE"S TWINS
Early in the next forenoon another of the Californian"s benevolent schemes threatened to miscarry.