The Adventures of Miss Gregory. Gibbon Perceval
was anything to do, they'd straighten up in a minute."
Miss Gregory mused. "I wonder," she said.
"Have you got a dodge?" asked Miss Ducane.
"Well, I half thought of something," said Miss Gregory. "That scrap lunch was enough to demoralize a congregation of saints. And I learned to cook a little when I was a girl."
Miss Ducane sat up and opened her fine eyes.
"Were you thinking—were you dreaming—of getting dinner for them?"
Miss Gregory nodded, and Miss Ducane sprang to her feet with a spurt of laughter.
"Why," she cried, "if that isn't the very thing! The very thing. Cook! You ought to see me with pancakes. I've made pancakes from Lourenço Marquez to Zanzibar. Let's get at it right away. You remind me of that poetry about the mouths of babies and ducklings. Here's me thinking of guns and all that stuff, and you come right out with the one thing to do the trick. Come along and let's get at it."
The good news was not long in spreading: Miss Gregory had done the trick. Throughout the afternoon, the men seemed occupied in finding pretexts for strolling past the galley, where Miss Gregory, nervous at last, perspired before the fire, and Miss Ducane, a marvelous vision with her sleeves rolled back from her slim arms and a new flush in her cheeks, prepared the pancakes of her life, the crucial pancakes of an illustrious career, for her famous frying-pan trick.
Great are the uses of formality. It was as if decorum dwelt in the white table-cloth and returned with it to the saloon in the evening. From among the natives forward there had been recruited emergency waiters, negroes who had at some time or other been house-boys in the service of Europeans. There was a little delay in the beginning; the men were ready for a quarter of an hour before Miss Gregory arrived.
When she came in at the door, with Miss Ducane at her heels, the hum of talk ceased as on a signal. Somebody, prompted by a forgotten instinct of courtliness, rose; one by one, they all stood after him, and their eyes testified an almost resentful astonishment. Miss Gregory was in evening dress. It was the most modest evening frock that ever left the hands of a famous modiste—black and plain, with no more than a prudish little V of décolletége. But for them, who had seen her only in her garb of travel—the flannel jacket, felt hat, and short skirt that she imposed upon the world—it transformed her. It identified her, it was a badge of caste; it set her forth as a citizen of that remote and desirable world where strength is not violence, where people write home and are answered by return of post, and everybody goes by his right name. She took her place at the head of the table, smiling the general smile of the hostess, and they waited for her to sit before they seated themselves.
The deck passenger was at Miss Gregory's left; he had come as her guest, protesting none the less. Miss Ducane scowled at the sight of him.
"Well," she said in a clear voice, "since we're shipwrecked, I suppose we're all on a level, niggers an' all. It isn't for long, anyhow."
The deck passenger looked up with an expressionless face.
"Ah," he said, "your revolver—I forgot. You must feel uncomfortable without it. Thanks."
He passed it across to her, and for a moment she looked as if she were about to use it. It lay beside her plate while dinner lasted, a blot upon the feast.
Miss Gregory has since placed it on record that, of all the dinners she ever ate, that was the stiffest. She had the conscience of a good hostess; she did her best to talk, to make conversation travel, to be amused, to be trivial, to sparkle. It was all of no avail. A rigidity of demeanor that nothing could thaw into festivity governed the table. It was like dining with some very ceremonial order of monks. They were striving to exalt their manners to the level of her evening gown, and they ate and drank and passed each other the salt with a somber magnificence of bearing and gesture which was more murderous to the social spirit than any mere constraint of embarrassment.
"And to-morrow night we may all be dining together on the mail-boat," remarked Miss Gregory innocently, at one point.
The deck passenger laughed. "Not all of us." He was looking at Miss Ducane; that lady flushed.
"Why not?" asked Miss Gregory. "I thought you said——"
He nodded. "Oh, I think she'll be here to-morrow," he said; "that part's all right. But"—his eye still on Miss Ducane—"the Germans know this Coast. You'll be in the first saloon; and I'll be in the third, according to my ticket. And the rest, they'll travel second-class. You'll see!"
"But why?" asked Miss Gregory, and bit her lip as the question escaped her.
He smiled with slow malice. "They've their other passengers to think of," he said. "They'd never stand these people."
Miss Ducane put her glass down with a jolt. The deck passenger returned to the food before him with an air of quiet triumph.
Dinner came to an end at last. Miss Gregory felt that another ten minutes of it would be beyond human endurance. She finally found herself on deck again, with the swish of water on the reef for company and a sense of duty performed to warm her. The ship was as still as a hospital ward; the people had not yet come out of their trance. A noise of labored breathing startled her, and Miss Ducane flopped on the deck at her feet.
"He had to say it," she was repeating. "He had to say it!"
Miss Gregory sat up in haste. The tall girl was weeping. The sight of it was horrible to her—horrible and heartbreaking.
"Why, what's the matter?" she cried. "My dear, what's the matter?"
Miss Ducane leaned her forehead on the edge of the chair, and spoke through sobs:
"If it hadn't been—for that revolver—we'd ha' had trouble. I—I—had to fetch it out. I—I couldn't help it. And I've no pockets—an' where else could I carry it?"
Miss Gregory had an impulse to laugh, but she laid a hand on the bowed head. "Come," she said. "Thank goodness you had it. It was splendid. It was the only thing to save us."
"Bub-bub-but—" began Miss Ducane.
"I only wish I had one," said Miss Gregory. "I'll have to see about it when I get ashore."
"You've got pockets," said Miss Ducane.
Miss Gregory smiled over her head. "They're not big enough," she said—"not nearly big enough."
Miss Ducane sat up and wiped her eyes, frankly and without pretense, on her sleeve.
"Well," she said, "if you don't tell the truth, nobody does! I'm a fool, after all; I don't seem to grow out of it, but I've got my modesty, like other people. That's what that feller was hitting at, at dinner-time."
Miss Gregory made soft noises of consolation.
"And it's true enough I'll have to go second-class on the mail-boat," said Miss Duane; "I know that well enough. But there's one thing you can't go back from, Miss Gregory. We was introduced, and you gave me your card."
"I did," said Miss Gregory. "Have you lost it? Do you want another?"
"Lost it!" Miss Ducane uttered a short bark of laughter. "Lost it? Not me. I've got it safe enough—safe as a bank."
"Where?" asked Miss Gregory, with some curiosity.
"In my stock—" Miss Ducane stopped short.
There was no help for it—Miss Gregory had to laugh; the girl's involuntary movement of the hand had betrayed her. She sat motionless till Miss Gregory was silent again.
"Well, it's safe, anyhow," she said, then. "I won't lose it. It'll remind me I met a lady and was friends with her."
Miss Gregory was touched. She was not given to easy emotions, but she leaned forward now.
"It has my address on it, too," she said, "and I always answer letters." The girl's brow was close to her face, and she kissed it.
Miss Ducane sat still for a space of seconds, then rose to her feet. She was