King of the Castle. Fenn George Manville
likely to. Sort of woman with stuff enough in her to last to a hundred. It strikes me, dear boy, that you are in a fix.”
Glyddyr sat frowning.
“And now you see the value of a friend.”
“Yes,” said Glyddyr thoughtfully. “I must go.”
“And you must take me too. If she sees me, she will smell a rat.”
“Yes, confound you, and one of the worst sort. There, ring that bell.”
“What for – brandy? Plenty here.”
“No, man, for the bill; I must be off at once.”
Volume One – Chapter Eleven.
How to Reach the Fair Star
As Burns said, matters go very awkwardly sometimes for those who plot and plan – as if some malicious genius took delight in thwarting the most carefully-laid designs, and tangling matters up, till the undoing seems hopeless.
Chris Lisle had had a bad time mentally. He was wroth against Gartram and Glyddyr, and far more wroth with himself for letting his anger get the better of him.
“It was as if I had made up my mind to fight against my own interests, for I could not have done that man a greater service than to strike him.”
“That’s it, sure enough,” he said. “This good-looking yachting dandy is the man, and it was enough to make poor Claudie think me a violent ruffian, upon whom she must never look again. But I will not give her up. I’d sooner die; and, bless her, she will never allow herself to be forced into marrying such a man as that, good-looking as he is. Well, we shall see.”
To go up to the Fort and apologise seemed to him impossible, and he spent his time wandering about the shore, the pier, harbour and rocks, everywhere, so that he could keep an eye on Glyddyr’s proceedings.
He told himself that he merely went down to breathe the fresh air, but the air never seemed to be worth breathing if he could not watch the different trimly-rigged yachts lying in the harbour, the smartest and best kept one of all being The Fair Star.
Glyddyr stayed at the hotel while his yacht was in the harbour, and Chris avoided that hotel on principle; but all the same he seemed to be attracted to it, and several times over the young men had met, to pass each other with a scowl, but they had not spoken since the day they had encountered up at the Fort.
There was a lurking hope, though, in Chris’s breast, that sooner or later he would meet Claude, and come to an explanation.
“Just to ask her,” he said, “to wait. I know I’m poor; at least, I suppose I am, but I’ll get over that, and force myself somehow into a position that shall satisfy the old man. He will not be so hard upon me when he sees what I have done. How unlucky in my choice of time. He was in a horrible fit of irritability from his illness, and I spoke to him like a weak boy. I ought to have known better.”
Just then he caught sight of a dress in the distance, and his heart began to beat fast.
“It’s Claude!” he exclaimed, and he increased his pace.
“No, it is not,” he said, slackening directly. “Stranger.”
If he could have seen two hundred yards farther, and round a corner, he would not have checked his pace, but then his were ordinary eyes, and he continued his course, looking half-inquiringly at the figure which had attracted his attention, and gradually grew more curious as he became aware of the fact that the lady was fashionably dressed, and very elegant in her carriage.
The next minute he saw that she was young, and almost directly that she was very handsome, while, to complete his surprise, she smiled, showing her white teeth, and stopped short.
“I demand your pardon, monsieur,” she said, in a particularly rich, sweet voice, and pronouncing the words with a very foreign accent, “but I am so strange at zis place. I want ze small ship yacht Ze Fair Star. You will tell me?”
“Oh, certainly,” said Chris quickly; “one, two, three, four,” he continued pointing to where several graceful-looking yachts swung at their buoys. “That is it, the fourth from the left.”
“Ah, but yes, I see. One – two – tree – four, and zat is Ze Fair Star?”
There was something droll and yet prettily piquant about her way of speaking, and in spite of himself Chris smiled, and the stranger laughed a little silvery laugh.
“I say someting founay, n’est-ce pas?” she said.
“I beg your pardon,” cried Chris. “I don’t think I made myself understood.”
“Ah, perfectly. I am not Engleesh, but I understand. I count one, two, tree, four, and zat is Ze Fair Star, nombair four. Is it not so?”
“Quite right,” said Chris.
“But how shall I get to him?”
“You must go down to the landing-place and hail her, or else hire a boatman to take you to her.”
“Hail! What is hail?”
“Call – shout to the men on board.”
“But, yes: I am vairay stupide. But where is ze boat to take me. I am so strange here at zis place.”
“If you will allow me, I will show you.”
“Ah, I tank you so much,” and in the most matter-of-fact way, the stranger walked beside Chris towards the harbour, smiling and chatting pleasantly.
“I make you laugh vairay much,” she said merrily; and then, “aha! ze charmante young lady is your friend. I will find my own way now.”
She looked curiously at Chris, who had suddenly turned scarlet and then ghastly pale, for at the lane leading to the harbour they had come upon Claude and Mary, both looking wonderingly at him and his companion, and passing on without heeding his hurried salute.
“No, no,” said Chris, recovering himself quickly; and there was a flash of anger in his eyes as he continued rather viciously, “I will see you to the harbour, and speak to one of the boatmen for you.”
“I thank you so vairay much,” she said; “but I understand you wish to go back to ze two ladies.”
“You are mistaken,” he said coldly; “this way, please. It is very awkward for a stranger, and especially for a foreign lady.”
She smiled, looking at him curiously, and, aware that they were the object of every gaze, Chris walked on by her trying to be perfectly cool and collected; but, as he replied to his companions remarks, feeling more awkward than he had ever felt in his life, and growing moment by moment more absent as in spite of his efforts he wondered what Claude would think, and whether he could overtake her afterwards and explain.
“I am French, and we speak quite plain, what we do tink,” she said laughingly; “here you have been vairay good to me, but you want to go to ze ladies we encounter; is it not so? – Ah!”
The laughing look changed to one full of vindictive anger, as she muttered that quick, sharp cry, and increased the pace almost to a run.
Chris stared after his companion, seeming to ask himself whether she was a mad woman, but almost at the same moment he caught sight of Glyddyr and a showily – dressed stranger, just at the end of the little half-moon shaped granite pier which sheltered the few fishing luggers, brigs and schooners, and formed the only harbour for many miles along the coast.
They were sixty or eighty yards away, and as he saw Chris’s late companion running towards them, Glyddyr stepped down from the harbour wall, and, with less activity, his companion followed, that being a spot where some rough granite steps led down to the water, and where boats coming and going from the yachts were moored.
Chris stood still for a moment or two, and then, carried away by an intense desire to see the end of the little adventure, he walked slowly down towards the pier, gradually coming in sight of Glyddyr and his companion, as