The Cruise of the Shining Light

“I fancied,” he answered, putting his hands on my shoulders, very gravely regarding me as he spoke, “that I must sacrifice my hope. ’Twas a hope I had long cherished, Dannie, and was become like life to me.” His voice was fallen deep and vibrant and soft; and the feeling with which it trembled, and the light in the man’s eyes, and the noble poise of his head, and the dramatic arrangement of his sentences, so affected me that I must look away. “Miserable necessity!” says he. “A drear prospect! And with no more than a sigh to ease the wretched fate! And yet,” says he, quite heartily, “the thing had a pretty look to it. Really, a beautiful look. There was a fine reward. A good deed carries it. Always remember that, Dannie–and remember that I told you. There was a fine reward. No encouragement of applause, Dannie–just a long sigh in secret: then a grim age of self-command. By jove! but there was a splendid compensation. A compensation within myself, I mean–a recollection of at least one heroically unselfish act. There would have been pain, of course; but I should never have forgotten that I had played a man’s part–better than a man’s part: a hero’s part, a god’s part. And that might have been sufficiently comforting: I do not know–perhaps. I’ll tell you about it, Dannie: the thing was to have been done,” he explained, in sincere emotion, every false appearance gone from him, “for whom, do you think?”

I did not know.

“For a friend,” says he.

“But John Cather,” says I, “’twas too much to require of you.”

His eyes twinkled.

“You’ve no trouble now, have you?” I asked.

“Not I!” cries he. “I have read a new fortune for myself. Trouble? Not I! I am very happy, Dannie.”

“That’s good,” says I; “that’s very good!”

XXIII

THE TIDE-RIP

Next day ’twas queer weather. ’Twas weather unaccountable, weather most mysteriously bent, weather that laughed at our bewilderment, as though ’twere sure of wreaking its own will against us by some trick recently devised. Never before had I known a time so subtly, viciously, confidently to withhold its omens. Queer weather, indeed! here, in early spring, with drift-ice still coming in vast floes from the north, queer weather to draw the sweat from us, while a midsummer blue loom of the main-land hung high and fantastically shaped in the thick air. Breathless, ominously colored weather! Why, the like, for stillness and beggarly expression of intention, had never been known to Twist Tickle: they talked with indignation of it on Eli Flack’s stage; ’twas a day that bred wrecks, said they. Ay, and ’twas an outrage upon the poor fishermen of that coast: what was a man to do, said they–what was he to do with his salmon-gear and cod-traps–in this evil, wilful departure from traditional procedure? And what did the weather mean? would it blow wet or dry? would it come with snow? would the wind jump off shore or from the northeast? and how long, in the name o’ Heaven, would the weather sulk in distance before breaking in honest wrath upon the coast? ’Twas enough, said they, to make a man quit the grounds; ’twas enough, with this sort o’ thing keepin’ up, t’ make a man turn carpenter or go t’ Sydney!

All this I heard in passing.

“Ah, well, lads,” says my uncle, “ye’ll find winter skulkin’ jus’ over the horizon. An’ he’ll be down,” he added, confidently, “within a day or two.”

I led John Cather to the brink of Tom Tulk’s cliff, where, in the smoky sunshine, I might talk in secret with him. ’Twas in my mind to confide my perplexity and miserable condition of heart, without reserve of feeling or mitigation of culpable behavior, and to lean upon his wisdom and tactful arts for guidance into some happier arrangement with the maid I loved. It seemed to me, I recall, as I climbed the last slope, that I had been, all my life, an impassive lover, as concerned the welfare of the maid: that I had been ill-tempered and unkind, marvellously quick to find offence, justified in this cruel and stupid conduct by no admirable quality or grace or achievement–a lad demanding all for nothing. I paused, I recall, at the cairn, to sigh, overcome and appalled by this revelation; and thereupon I felt such a rush of strenuous intention in my own behalf–a determination to strive and scheme–that I had scarce breath to reach the edge of the cliff, and could not, for the life of me, begin to narrate my desperate state to John Cather. But John Cather was not troubled by my silence: he was sprawled on the thick moss of the cliff, his head propped in his hands, smiling, like the alien he was, upon the ice at sea and the untimely blue loom of the main-land and the vaguely threatening color of the sky. I could not begin, wishful as I might be for his wise counsel: but must lie, like a corpse, beyond all feeling, contemplating that same uneasy prospect. I wished, I recall, that I might utter my errand with him, and to this day wish that I had been able: but then could not, being overwhelmed by this new and convincing vision of all my communion with the maid.

“By Jove!” John Cather ejaculated.

“What is it?” cries I.

“I must tell you,” says he, rising to his elbow. “I can keep it no longer.”

I waited.

“I’m in love,” he declared. “Dannie,” cries he, “I–I’m–in love!”

And now a peculiar change came upon the world, of which I must tell: whatever there had been of omen or beauty or curious departure from the natural appearance of sea and sky–whatever of interest or moment upon the brooding shore or abroad on the uttermost waters beyond it–quite vanished from my cognizance. ’Twas a drear day and place I dwelt in, a very dull world, not enlivened by peril or desirable object or the difficulty of toil, not excused or in any way made tolerable by a prospect of sacrificial employment. I had been ill brought up to meet this racking emergency. What had there been, in all my life, fostered in body and happiness, expanding in the indulgent love and pitiably misdirected purpose of my uncle, to fit me for this denial of pure and confident desire? I tried, God knows I tried! summoning to my help all the poor measure of nobility the good Lord had endowed me with and my uncle had cultivated–I tried, God knows! to receive the communication with some wish for my friend’s advancement in happiness. In love: ’twas with Judith–there was no other maid of Twist Tickle to be loved by this handsome, learned, brilliantly engaging John Cather. Nay, but ’twas all plain to me now: my deformity and perversity–my ridiculously assured aspiration towards the maid. I had forgot John Cather–the youth and person of him, his talents and winning accomplishments of speech and manner.

“And there she comes!” cries he.

’Twas Judith on the Whisper Cove road.

“You’ll wish me luck, Dannie?” says he, rising. “I’ll catch her on the way. I’ll tell her that I love her. I can wait no longer. Wish me luck!” says he. “Wish me luck!”

I took his hand.

“Wish me luck!” he repeated.

“I wish you luck,” says I.

“Thanks,” says he: and was off.

I lied in this way because I would not have Judith know that I grieved for her, lest she suffer, in days to come, for my disappointment…

I was faint and very thirsty, I recall: I wished that I might drink from a brook of snow-water. ’Twas Calling Brook I visualized, which flows from the melting ice of cold, dark crevices, musically falling, beneath a canopy of springing leaves, to the waters of Sister Bight. I wished to drink from Calling Brook, and to lie down, here alone and high above the sea, and to sleep, without dreaming, for a long, long time. I lay me down on the gray moss. I did not think of Judith and John Cather. I had forgotten them: I was numb to the passion and affairs of life. I suffered no agony of any sort; ’twas as though I had newly emerged from unconsciousness–the survivor of some natural catastrophe, fallen by act of God, conveying no blame to me–a survivor upon whom there still lingered a beneficent stupor of body. Presently I discovered myself in a new world, with which, thinks I, brisking up, I must become familiar, having no unmanly regret, but a courageous heart to fare through the maze of it; and like a curious child I peered about upon this strange habitation. Near by there was a gray, weathered stone in the moss: I reached to possess it–and was amazed to find that my hand neither overshot nor fell short, but accurately performed its service. I cast the stone towards heaven: ’twas a surprise to see it fall earthward in obedience to some law I could not in my daze define–some law I had with impatient labor, long, long ago, made sure I understood and would remember. I looked away to sea, stared into the sky, surveyed the hills: ’twas the self-same world I had known, constituted of the same materials, cohering in the self-same way, obedient to the self-same laws, fashioned and adorned the same as it had been. ’Twas the self-same world of sea and sky and rock, wherein I had so long dwelt–a world familiar to my feet and eyes and heart’s experience: a world of tree-clad, greening hills, of known paths, of children’s shouting and the chirp and song of spring-time. But there had come a change upon its spirit: nay! thinks I, quite proud of the conceit, its spirit had departed–the thing had died to me, and was become without meaning, an inimical mystery. Then I felt the nerves of my soul tingle with awakening: then I suffered very much.

And evening came…

By-and-by, having heartened myself with courageous plans, I stepped out, with the feet of a man, upon the Whisper Cove road. I had it in mind to enjoy with Judith and John Cather the tender disclosure of their love. I would kiss Judith, by Heaven! thinks I: I would kiss her smile and blushes, whatever she thought of the deed; and I would wring John Cather’s fragile right hand until his teeth uncovered and he groaned for mercy. ’Twas fearsome weather, then, so that, overwrought in the spirit as I was, I did not fail to feel the oppression of it and the instinctive alarm it aroused. ’Twas very still and heavy and sullen and uneasy, ’twas pregnant of fears, like a moment of suspense: I started when an alder branch or reaching spruce limb struck me. In this bewildering weather there were no lovers on the road; the valleys, the shadowy nooks, the secluded reaches of path, lay vacant in the melancholy dusk. ’Twas not until I came to the last hill, whence the road tumbled down to a cluster of impoverished cottages, listlessly clinging to the barren rock of Whisper Cove, that I found Judith. John Cather was not about: the maid was with Aunt Esther All, the gossip, and was now so strangely agitated that I stopped in sheer amazement. That the child should be abject and agonized before the grim, cynical tattler of Whisper Cove! That she should gesticulate in a way so passionate! That she should fling her arms wide, that she should cover her face with her hands, that she should in some grievous disturbance beat upon her heart! I could not make it out. ’Twas a queer way, thinks I, to express the rapture of her fortune; and no suspicion enlightened me, because, I think, of the paralysis of despair upon my faculties.

I approached.

“Go ’way!” she cried.

I would not go away: ’twas Aunt Esther, the gossip, that went, and in a rout–with a frightened backward glance.

“Go ’way!” Judith pleaded. “I’m not able to bear it, Dannie. Oh, go back!”

’Twas an unworthy whim, and I knew it to be so, whatever the vagaries of maids may be, however natural and to be indulged, at these crises of emotion. She had sent John Cather away, it seemed, that she might be for a space alone, in the way of maids at such times, as I had been informed; and she would now deny to me the reflection of her happiness.

“’Tis unkind,” I chided, “not to share this thing with me.”

She started: I recall that her eyes were round and troubled with incomprehension.

“I’ve come to tell you, Judith,” says I, “that I do not care.”

’Twas a brave lie: I am proud of it.

“’Tis kind,” she whispered.

We were alone. ’Twas dusk: ’twas dusk, to be sure, of a disquieting day, with the sky most confidently foreboding some new and surprising tactics in the ancient warfare of the wind against us; but Judith and I, being young and engaged with the passion of our years, had no consciousness of the signs and wonders of the weather. The weather concerns the old, the satisfied and disillusioned of life, the folk from whom the romance of being has departed. What care had we for the weather? ’Twas dusk, and we were alone at the turn of the road–a broad, rocky twist in the path, not without the softness of grass, where lovers had kissed in parting since fishing was begun from Twist Tickle and Whisper Cove. By the falling shades and a screen of young leaves we were hid from the prying eyes of Whisper Cove. ’Twas from me, then, that the maid withdrew into a deeper shadow, as though, indeed, ’twas not fit that we should be together. I was hurt: but fancied, being stupid and self-centred, that ’twas a pang of isolation to which I must grow used.

“Why, Judy,” says I, “don’t, for pity’s sake, do that! Why, maid,” I protested, “I don’t care. I’m glad–I’m just glad!”

“Glad!” she faltered, staring.

“To be sure I’m glad,” I cried.

She came close to me.

“I don’t care,” says I.

“You do not care!” she muttered, looking away. “You do not care!” she repeated, in a voice that was the faintest, most drear echo of my own.

“Not I!” I answered, stoutly. “Not a whit!”

She began to cry.