Lady Alene rose; her boatman aided her, and she sprang lightly to the coquina dock and walked straight over the low dune in front of her.
There was nothing whatever in sight except beach-grapes and scrubby tufts of palmetto, and flocks of grey, long-legged, long-billed birds running to avoid her. But they did not run very fast or very far, and she saw them at a little distance loitering, with many a bright and apparently friendly glance at her.
There was another dune in front. She mounted it. Straight ahead of her, perhaps half a mile distant, stood a whitewashed bungalow under a cl.u.s.ter of palms and palmettos.
From where she stood she could see a cove--merely a tiny crescent of sand edged by a thin blade of cobalt water, and curtained by the palmetto forest. And on this little crescent beach, in the shade of the palms, a young man lay at full length, very intent upon his occupation, which was, apparently, to dig holes in the sand with a child"s toy shovel.
He was clad in white flannels; beside him she noticed a red tin pail, such as children use for gathering sh.e.l.ls. Near this stood two camp-chairs, one of which was piled with pads of yellow paper and a few books. She thought his legs very eloquent. Sometimes they lay in picturesque repose, crossed behind him; at other moments they waved in the air or sprawled widely, appearing to express the varying emotions which possessed his deep absorption in the occult task under his nose.
"Now, what in the world can he be doing?" thought Lady Alene Innesly, watching him. And she remained motionless on top of the dune for ten minutes to find out. He continued to sprawl and dig holes in the sand.
Learning nothing, and her interest increasing inversely, she began to walk toward him. It was her disposition to investigate whatever interested her. Already she was conscious of a deep interest in his legs.
From time to time low dunes intervened to hide the little cove, but always when she crossed them, pushing her way through fragrant thickets of sweet bay and sparkle-berry shrub, cove and occupant came into view again. And his legs continued to wave. The nearer she drew the less she comprehended the nature of his occupation, and the more she decided to find out what he could be about, lying there flat on his stomach and digging and patting the sand.
Also her naturally calm and British heart was beating irregularly and fast, because she realised the fact that she was approaching the vicinity of one of those American young men who did things in books that she never dreamed could be done anywhere. Nay--under her arm was a novel written by this very man, in which the hero was still kissing a Balkan Princess, page 169. And it occurred to her vaguely that her own good taste and modesty ought to make an end of such a situation; and that she ought to finish the page quickly and turn to the next chapter to relieve the pressure on the Princess.
Confused a trifle by a haunting sense of her own responsibility, by the actual imminence of such an author, and by her intense curiosity concerning what he was now doing, she walked across the dunes down through little valleys all golden with the flowers of a flat, spreading vine. The blossoms were larger and lovelier than the largest golden portulacca, but she scarcely noticed their beauty as she resolutely approached the cove, moving forward under the cool shadow of the border forest.
He did not seem to be aware of her approach, even when she came up and stood by the camp-chairs, parasol tilted, looking down at him with grave, lilac-blue eyes.
But she did not look at him as much as she gazed at what he was doing.
And what he was doing appeared perfectly clear to her now.
With the aid of his toy shovel, his little red pail, and several a.s.sorted sh.e.l.ls, he had constructed out of sand a walled city. Houses, streets, squares, market place, covered ways, curtain, keep, tower, turret, crenelated battlement, all were there. A driftwood drawbridge bridged the moat, guarded by lead soldiers in Boznovian uniform.
And lead soldiers were everywhere in the miniature city; the keep bristled with their bayonets; squads of them marched through street and square; they sat at dinner in the market place; their cannon winked and blinked in the westering sun on every battlement.
And after a little while she discovered two lead figures which were not military; a civilian wearing a bowler hat; a feminine figure wearing a crown and ermines. The one stood on the edge of the moat outside the drawbridge: the other, in crown and ermines, was apparently observing him of the bowler hat from the top of a soldier-infested tower.
It was plain enough to her now. This amazing young man was working out in concrete detail some incident of an unwritten novel. And the magnificent realism of it fascinated the Lady Alene. Genius only possesses such a capacity for detail.
Without even arousing young Smith from his absorbed preoccupation, she seated herself on the uninc.u.mbered camp-chair, laid her book on her knees, rested both elbows on it, propped her chin on both clasped hands, and watched the proceedings.
The lead figure in the bowler hat seemed to be in a bad way. Several dozen Boznovian soldiers were aiming an a.s.sortment of firearms at him; cavalry were coming at a gallop, too, not to mention a three-gun battery on a dead run.
The problem seemed to be how, in the face of such a situation, was the lead gentleman in the bowler hat to get away, much less penetrate the city?
Flight seemed hopeless, but presently Smith picked him up, marched him along the edge of the moat, and gave him a shove into it.
"He"s swimming," said Smith, aloud to himself. "Bang! Bang! But they don"t hit him.... Yes, they do; they graze his shoulder. It is the only wound possible to polite fiction. There is consequently a streak of red in the water. Bang--bang--bang! Crack--crack! The cavalry empty their pistols. Boom! A field piece opens---- Where the devil is that battery----"
[Ill.u.s.tration: "The magnificent realism of it fascinated the Lady Alene."]
Smith reached over, drew horses, cannoniers, gun and caisson over the drawbridge, galloped them along the moat, halted, unlimbered, trained the guns on the bowler hatted swimmer, and remarked, "Boom!"
"The sh.e.l.l," he murmured with satisfaction, "missed him and blew up in the casemates. Did it kill anybody? No; that interferes with the action.... He dives, swims under water to an ancient drain." Smith stuck a peg where the supposed drain emptied into the moat.
"That drain," continued Smith thoughtfully, "connects with the royal residence.... Where"s that Princess? Can she see him dive into it? Or does she merely suspect he is making for it? Or--or--doesn"t she know anything about it?"
"She doesn"t know anything about it!" exclaimed Lady Alene Innesly. The tint of excitement glowed in her cheeks. Her lilac-tinted eyes burned with a soft, blue fire.
X
Slowly as a partly paralysed crab, Smith raised himself to a sitting posture and looked over his shoulder into the loveliest face that he had ever beheld, except on the paper wrappers of his own books.
"I"m sorry," said the Lady Alene. "Shouldn"t I have spoken?"
The smoke and turmoil of battle still confused Smith"s brain; visualisation of wall and tower and crowns and ermines made the Lady Alene"s fresh, wholesome beauty very unreal to him for a moment or two.
When his eyes found their focus and his mind returned to actuality, he climbed to his feet, hat in hand, and made his manners to her. Then, tumbling books and pads from the other camp-chair, he reseated himself with a half smiling, half shamed glance at her, and a "May I?" to which she responded, "Please! And might I talk to you for a few moments?"
Smith shot a keen glance at the book on her knees. Resignation and pride altered his features, but when again he looked at the Lady Alene he experienced a pleasure in his resignation which hitherto no curious tourist, no enterprising reporter had ever aroused. Smilingly he composed himself for the impending interview.
"Until now," said the girl earnestly, "I think I have not been entirely convinced by your novels. Somehow or other I could not bring myself to comprehend the amazing realism of your plots. But now I understand the basis of great and fundamental truth on which you build so plausibly your splendid novels of love and life."
"What?" said Smith.
"To see you," she continued, "constructing the scenes of which later you are to write, has been a wonderful revelation to me. It has been a privilege the importance of which I can scarcely estimate. Your devotion to the details of your art, your endless patience, your almost austere absorption in truth and realism, have not only astounded me but have entirely convinced me. The greatest thing in the world is Truth. _Now_ I realise it!"
She made a pretty gesture of enthusiasm:
"What a wonderful nation of young men is yours, Mr. Smith! What qualities! What fearlessness--initiative--idealism--daring--! What invention, what recklessness, what romance----"
Her voice failed her; she sat with lips parted, a soft glow in her cheeks, gazing upon Smith with fascinated eyes. And Smith gazed back at her without a word.
"I don"t believe," she said, "that in all England there exists a single man capable even of conceiving the career for which so many young Americans seem to be equipped."
After a moment Smith said very quietly:
"I am sorry, but do you know I don"t quite understand you?"
"I mean," she said, "that you Americans have a capacity for conceiving, understanding, and performing everything you write about."
"Why do you think so?" asked Smith, a trifle red.
"Because if Englishmen could understand and do such things, our novelists would write about them. They never write about them. But you Americans do. You write thousands of most delightful novels about young men who do things unheard of, undreamed of, in England. Therefore, it is very clear to me that you Americans are quite capable of doing what you write about, and what your readers so ardently admire."
"I see," said Smith calmly. His ear-tips still burned.
"No doubt," said the girl, "many of the astonishing things you Americans write about are really done. Many astounding episodes in fiction are of not uncommon occurrence in real life."
"What kind of episodes?" asked Smith gravely.
"Why, any of them you write about. They all are astonishing enough. For example, your young men do not seem to know what fear is."