drifting, slow drifting down a wizard stream.
“no one knows,” victor durnovo was in the habit of saying, “what is going on in the middle of africa.”
and on this principle he acted.
“ten miles above the camping-ground where we first met,” he had told meredith, “you will find a village where i have my headquarters. there is quite a respectable house there, with—a—a woman to look after your wants. when you have fixed things up at loango, and have arranged for the dhows to meet my steamer, take up all your men to this village—msala is the name—and send the boats back. wait there till we come.”
in due time the telegram came, via st. paul de loanda, announcing the fact that oscard had agreed to join the expedition, and that durnovo and he might be expected at msala in one month from that time. it was not without a vague feeling of regret that jack meredith read this telegram. to be at msala in a month with forty men and a vast load of provisions meant leaving loango almost at once. and, strange though it may seem, he had become somewhat attached to the dreary west african town. the singular cosmopolitan society was entirely new to him; the life, taken as a life, almost unique. he knew that he had not outstayed his welcome. maurice gordon had taken care to assure him of that in his boisterous, hearty manner, savouring more of harrow than of eton, every morning at breakfast.
“confound durnovo!” he cried, when the telegram had been read aloud. “confound him, with his energy and his business-like habits! that means that you will have to leave us before long; and somehow it has got to be quite natural to see you come lounging in ten minutes late for most things, with an apology for jocelyn, but none for me. we shall miss you, old chap.”
“yes,” added jocelyn, “we shall.”
she was busy with the cups, and spoke rather indifferently.
“so you've got oscard?” continued maurice. “i imagine he is a good man—tip-top shot and all that. i've never met him, but i have heard of him.”
“he is a gentleman, at all events,” said meredith quietly; “i know that.”
jocelyn was looking at him between the hibiscus flowers decorating the table.
“is mr. durnovo going to be leader of the expedition?” she inquired casually, after a few moments' silence; and jack, looking up with a queer smile, met her glance for a moment.
“no,” he answered.
maurice gordon's hearty laugh interrupted.
“ha, ha!” he cried. “i wonder where the dickens you men are going to?”
“up the ogowe river,” replied jack.
“no doubt. but what for? there is something mysterious about that river. durnovo keeps his poor relations there, or something of that kind.”
“we are not going to look for them.”
“i suppose,” said maurice, helping himself to marmalade, “that he has dropped upon some large deposit of ivory; that will turn out to be the solution of the mystery. it is the solution of most mysteries in this country. i wish i could solve the mysteries of ways and means and drop upon a large deposit of ivory, or spice, or precious stones. we should soon be out of this country, should we not, old girl?”
“i do not think we have much to complain of,” answered jocelyn.
“no; you never do. moreover, i do not suppose you would do so if you had the excuse.”
“oh yes, i should, if i thought it would do any good.”
“ah!” put in meredith. “there speaks philosophy—jam, please.”
“or resignation—that is strawberry and this is black currant.”
“thanks, black currant. no—philosophy. resignation is the most loathsome of the virtues.”
“i can't say i care for any of them very much,” put in maurice.
“no; i thought you seemed to shun them,” said jack, like a flash.
“sharp! very sharp! jocelyn, do you know what we called him at school?—the french nail; he was so very long and thin and sharp! i might add polished and strong, but we were not so polite in those days. poor old jack! he gave as good as he got. but i must be off—the commerce of western africa awaits me. you'll be round at the office presently, i suppose, jack?”
“yes; i have an appointment there with a coloured person who is a liar by nature and a cook by trade.”
maurice gordon usually went off like this—at a moment's notice. he was one of those loud-speaking, quick-actioned men, who often get a reputation for energy and capacity without fully deserving it.
jack, of a more meditative habit, rarely followed his host with the same obvious haste. he finished his breakfast calmly, and then asked jocelyn whether she was coming out on to the verandah. it was a habit they had unconsciously dropped into. the verandah was a very important feature of the house, thickly overhung as it was with palms, bananas, and other tropical verdure. africa is the land of creepers, and all around this verandah, over the trellis-work, around the supports, hanging in festoons from the roof, were a thousand different creeping flowers. the legend of the house—for, as in india, almost every bungalow on the west coast has its tale—was that one of the early missionaries had built it, and, to beguile the long months of the rainy season, had carefully collected these creepers to beautify the place against the arrival of his young wife. she never came. a telegram stopped her. a snake interrupted his labour of love.
jack took a seat at once, and began to search for his cigar-case in the pocket of his jacket. in this land of flies and moths men need not ask permission before they smoke. jocelyn did not sit down at once. she went to the front of the verandah and watched her brother mount his horse. she was a year older than maurice gordon, and exercised a larger influence over his life than either of them suspected.
presently he rode past the verandah, waving his hand cheerily. he was one of those large, hearty englishmen who seem to be all appetite and laughter—men who may be said to be manly, and beyond that nothing. their manliness is so overpowering that it swallows up many other qualities which are not out of place in men, such as tact and thoughtfulness, and perhaps intellectuality and the power to take some interest in those gentler things that interest women.
when jocelyn came to the back of the verandah she was thinking about her brother maurice, and it never suggested itself to her that she should not speak her thoughts to meredith, whom she had not seen until three weeks ago. she had never spoken of maurice behind his back to any man before.
“does it ever strike you,” she said, “that maurice is the sort of man to be led astray by evil influence?”
“yes; or to be led straight by a good influence, such as yours.”
he did not meet her thoughtful gaze. he was apparently watching the retreating form of the horse through the tangle of flower and leaf and tendril.
“i am afraid,” said the girl, “that my influence is not of much account.”
“do you really believe that?” asked meredith, turning upon her with a half-cynical smile.
“yes,” she answered simply.
before speaking again he took a pull at his cigar.
“your influence,” he said, “appears to me to be the making of maurice gordon. i frequently see serious flaws in the policy of providence; but i suppose there is wisdom in making the strongest influence that which is unconscious of its power.”
“i am glad you think i have some power over him,” said jocelyn; “but, at the same time, it makes me uneasy, because it only confirms my conviction that he is very easily led. and suppose my influence—such as it is—was withdrawn? suppose that i were to die, or, what appears to be more likely, suppose that he should marry?”
“then let us hope that he will marry the right person. people sometimes do, you know.”
she smiled with a strange little flicker of the eyelids. they had grown wonderfully accustomed to each other during the last three weeks. here, it would appear, was one of those friendships between man and woman that occasionally set the world agog with curiosity and scepticism. but there seemed to be no doubt about it. he was over thirty, she verging on that prosaic age. both had lived and moved in the world; to both life was an open book, and they had probably discovered, as most of us do, that the larger number of the leaves are blank. he had almost told her that he was engaged to be married, and she had quite understood. there could not possibly be any misapprehension; there was no room for one of those little mistakes about which people write novels and fondly hope that some youthful reader may be carried away by a very faint resemblance to that which they hold to be life. moreover, at thirty, one leaves the first romance of youth behind.
there was something in her smile that suggested that she did not quite believe in his cynicism.
“also,” she said gravely, “some stronger influence might appear—an influence which i could not counteract.”
jack meredith turned in his long chair and looked at her searchingly.
“i have a vague idea,” he said, “that you are thinking of durnovo.”
“i am,” she admitted, with some surprise. “i wonder how you knew? i am afraid of him.”
“i can reassure you on that score,” said meredith. “for the next two years or so durnovo will be in daily intercourse with me. he will be under my immediate eye. i did not anticipate much pleasure from his society. but now i do.”
“why?” she asked, rather mystified.
“because i shall have the daily satisfaction of knowing that i am relieving you of an anxiety.”
“it is very kind of you to put it in that way,” said jocelyn. “but i should not like you to sacrifice yourself to what may be a foolish prejudice on my part.”
“it is not a foolish prejudice. durnovo is not a gentleman either by birth or inclination. he is not fit to associate with you.”
to this jocelyn answered nothing. victor durnovo was one of her brother's closest friends—a friend of his own choosing.
“miss gordon,” said jack meredith suddenly, with a gravity that was rare, “will you do me a favour?”
“i think i should like to.”
“you admit that you are afraid of durnovo now: if at any time you have reason to be more afraid, will you make use of me? will you write or come to me and ask my help?”
“thank you,” she said hesitatingly.
“you see,” he went on, in a lighter tone, “i am not afraid of durnovo. i have met durnovos before. you may have observed that my locks no longer resemble the raven's wing. there is a little grey—just here—above the temple. i am getting on in life, and i know how to deal with durnovos.”
“thank you,” said the girl, with a little sigh of relief. “the feeling that i have some one to turn to will be a great relief. you see how i am placed here. the missionaries are very kind and well-meaning, but there are some things which they do not quite understand. they may be gentlemen—some of them are; but they are not men of the world. i have no definite thought or fear, and very good persons, one finds, are occasionally a little dense. unless things are very definite, they do not understand.”
“on the other hand,” pursued jack, in the same reflective tone, as if taking up her thought, “persons who are not good have a perception of the indefinite. i did not think of it in that light before.”
jocelyn gordon laughed softly, without attempting to meet his lighter vein.
“do you know,” she said, after a little silence, “that i was actually thinking of warning you against mr. durnovo? now i stand aghast at my own presumption.”
“it was kind of you to give the matter any thought whatever.”
he rose and threw away the end of his cigar. joseph was already before the door, leading the horse which maurice gordon had placed at his visitor's disposal.
“i will lay the warning to heart,” he said, standing in front of jocelyn and looking down at her as she lay back in the deep basket-chair. she was simply dressed in white—as was her wont, for it must be remembered that they were beneath the equator—a fair english maiden, whose thoughts were hidden behind a certain gracious, impenetrable reserve. “i will lay it to heart, although you have not uttered it. but i have always known with what sort of man i was dealing. we serve each other's purpose, that is all; and he knows that as well as i do.”
“i am glad mr. oscard is going with you,” she answered guardedly.
he waited a moment. it seemed as if she had not done speaking—as if there was another thought near the surface. but she did not give voice to it, and he turned away. the sound of the horse's feet on the gravel did not arouse her from the reverie into which she had fallen; and long after it had died away, leaving only the hum of insect life and the distant ceaseless song of the surf, jocelyn gordon sat apparently watching the dancing shadows on the floor as the creepers waved in the breeze.
