"I would like to hear about it."
Then Jan began. He spoke slowly and with some hesitation at first. His youth was connected with affairs about which the Shetlanders always spoke cautiously. His father had been one of the boldest and most successful of the men who carried on that "French trade" which the English law called smuggling. He had made money easily, had spent it lavishly, and at the last had gone to the bottom with his ship, rather than suffer her to be taken. His mother had not long survived her husband, but there had been money enough left to educate and provide for Jan until he reached manhood.
"I was ten years old when mother died," he continued, "and since then no one has really loved me but Michael Snorro. I will tell thee how our love began. One day I was on the pier watching the loading of a boat. Snorro was helping with her cargo, and the boys were teasing him, because of his clumsy size and ugly face. One of them took Snorro"s cap off his head and flung it into the water. I was angry at the coward, and flung him after it, nor would I let him out of the water till he brought Snorro"s cap with him. I shall never forget the look Snorro gave me that hour. Ever since we have been close friends.
I will tell thee now how he hath repaid me for that deed."
Then Jan spoke of Margaret"s return from school; of their meeting at one Fisherman"s Foy, and of their wedding at the next. All of Peter"s kindness and subsequent injustice; all of Margaret"s goodness and cruelty, all of Snorro"s affection and patience he told. He made nothing better nor worse. His whole life, as he knew and could understand it, he laid before Lord Lynne.
"And so thou sees," he concluded, "how little to blame and how much to blame I have been. I have done wrong and I have suffered. Yes, I suffer yet, for I love my wife and she has cast me off. Dost thou think I can ever be worthy of her?"
"I see, Jan, that what you said is true--in any corner of the earth where women are, they can make men suffer. As to your worthiness, I know not. There are some women so good, that only the angels of heaven could live with them. That 600 was a great mistake."
"I think that now."
"Jan, life is strangely different and yet strangely alike. My experience has not been so very far apart from yours. I was induced to marry when only twenty-one a lady who is my inferior in rank, but who is a very rich woman. She is a few years older than I, but she is beautiful, full of generous impulses, and well known for her charitable deeds."
"You are surely fortunate."
"I am very unhappy."
"Does she not love thee?"
"Alas! she loves me so much that she makes both her own and my life miserable."
"That is what I do not understand."
"Her love is a great love, but it is a selfish love. She is willing that I should be happy in her way, but in no other. I must give her not only my affection, but my will, my tastes, my duties to every other creature. My friends, horses, dogs, even this yacht, she regards as enemies; she is sure that every one of them takes the thought and attention she ought to have. And the hardest part is, that her n.o.ble side only is seen by the world. I alone suffer from the fault that spoils all. Consequently the world pities her, and looks upon me very much as the people of Lerwick looked on you."
"And can thou do nothing for thy own side?"
"Nothing. I am in the case of a very worthy old Roman lord who desired to divorce his wife. There was a great outcry. All his friends were amazed. "Is she not handsome, virtuous, rich, amiable?" they asked.
"What hath she done to thee?" The Roman husband pointed to his sandal.
"Is it not new, is it not handsome and well made? But none of you can tell where it pinches me." That old Roman and I are brothers. Every one praises "my good wife, my rich wife, my handsome wife," but for all that, the matrimonial shoe pinches me."
This confidence brought the two men near together. Henceforward there was no lack of conversation. While every other subject fails, a domestic grievance is always new. It can be looked at in so many ways.
It has touched us on every side of our nature. We are never quite sure where we have been right, and where wrong. So Lord Lynne and Jan talked of "My Lady" in Lynnton Castle, and of Margaret Vedder in her Shetland home, but the conversations were not in the main unkind ones. Very early in them Lynne told Jan how he had once seen his wife standing on the Troll Rock at sunset, "lovely, and grand, and melancholy, as some forsaken G.o.ddess in her desolated shrine."
They were sitting at the time among the ruins of a temple to Pallas.
The sun was setting over Lydian waters, and Jan seemed to see in the amber rays a vision of the tall, fair woman of his love and dreams.
She ruled him yet. From the lonely islands of that forlorn sea she called him. Not continents nor oceans could sever the mystical tie between them. On the sands close by, some young Greek girls were dancing to a pipe. They were beautiful, and the dance was picturesque, but Jan hardly noticed them. The home-love was busy in his heart.
"Until death us part." Nothing is more certain, in a life of such uncertainty.
Amid the loveliest scenes of earth they pa.s.sed the winter months. It was far on in May when they touched Gibraltar on their return. Letters for both were waiting there. For Jan a short one from Dr. Balloch, and a long one from Michael Snorro. He was sitting with Snorro"s in his hand when Lord Lynne, bright and cheerful, came out of his cabin. "I have very fair news, Jan; what has the mail brought you?" he asked.
"Seldom it comes for nothing. I have heard that my mother-in-law is dead. She was ever my friend, and I am so much the poorer. Peter Fae too is in trouble; he is in trouble about me. Wilt thou believe that the people of Lerwick think he may have----"
"Murdered you?"
"Yes, just that."
"I have often thought that the suspicion would be a natural one. Has he been arrested?"
"No, no; but he is in bad esteem. Some speak not to him. The minister, though, he stands by him."
"That is enough. If Dr. Balloch thought it necessary, he would say sufficient to keep Peter Fae out of danger. A little popular disapproval will do him good. He will understand then how you felt when wife and friends looked coldly on you, and suspicion whispered things to injure you that no one dared to say openly. Let Peter suffer a little. I am not sorry for him."
"Once he liked me, and was kind to me."
"Jan!"
"Yes, my friend."
"We are now going straight to Margate. I am promised office, and shall probably be a busy public man soon. It is time also that you buckled down to your work. We have had our holiday and grown strong in it--every way strong. What next?"
"Thou speak first."
"Well, you see, Jan, men must work if they would be rich, or even respectable. What work have you thought of?"
"Only of the sea. She is my father and my mother and my inheritance.
Working on land, I am as much out of place as a fish out of water."
"I think you are right. Will you join the Merchant Service, or do you think better of the Royal Navy? I have a great deal of influence with the Admiralty Lords, and I have often wished I could be a "blue jacket" myself."
"Above all things, I would like the Royal Navy."
"Then you shall be a "blue jacket;" that is quite settled and well settled, I am sure. But every moment will take time, and it will probably be winter before I can get you a post on any squadron likely to see active service. During the interval I will leave "The Lapwing"
in your care, and you must employ the time in studying the technical part of your profession. I know an old captain in Margate who will teach you all he knows, and that is all that any of them know."
Jan was very grateful. The prospect was a pleasant one and the actual experience of it more than fulfilled all his expectations. "The Lapwing" was his home and his study. For he soon discovered how ignorant he was. Instruction in naval warfare was not all he needed.
Very soon the old captain was supplemented by the schoolmaster. The days were too short for all Jan wished to learn. He grudged the hours that were spent in sleep. So busy was he that he never noticed the lapse of time, or, if he did, it was only that he might urge himself to greater efforts.
It did not trouble him that Lord Lynne seldom wrote, and never came.
His salary was promptly paid, and Jan was one of the kind of men whom good fortune loves. He did not worry over events. He did not keep wondering what she was going to do for him, or wish night and day that she would make haste with the next step in his behalf. He took gratefully and happily the good he had, and enjoyed it to the utmost.
When a change came it was the first week in November. A lovely afternoon had not tempted Jan from his books. Suddenly the cabin door was darkened; he lifted his head, and saw Lord Lynne regarding him with a face full of pleasure. He came rapidly forward and turned over the volumes on the table with great interest. "I am glad to see these books, Jan," he said, "Arithmetic, Geography, History, French--very good, indeed! And your last letter delighted me. The writing was excellent. Her Majesty"s officers ought to be educated gentlemen; and you are now one of them."
Jan looked up, with eager, inquiring face.
"Yes, sir; you are now Lieutenant Jan Vedder, of Her Majesty"s Schooner Retribution. You are to sail for the African coast within a week. Jan, I congratulate you!"
Jan rose and put out both hands. The action was full of feeling. No words could have been so eloquent. It was worth an hour of words, and Lord Lynne so understood it.
"I called at the mail as I came through the town, here is a letter for you. While you read it I will go through the yacht."
When he returned Jan was walking anxiously about with the letter in his hand. "Has bad news come with the good, Jan?"
"I know not if it be bad or if it be good. Peter Fae hath married again."
"Do you know the new wife?"