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Lucile Triumphant, a fiction by Elizabeth M. Duffield |
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Chapter 12. Monsieur Charloix |
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_ CHAPTER XII. MONSIEUR CHARLOIX "What's the matter, Lucy? You look so--funny----" It was the morning of the second day out and the three girls were leaning against the rail, gazing dreamily out over the boundless expanse of ocean. They wore natty white middy suits and, with floppy little sailor hats shading flushed cheeks and laughing eyes, they made an alluringly picturesque little group that had attracted much attention from their fellow-passengers. "I'm glad you think so," said Lucile, dryly, in response to Jessie's question. "If I look the way I feel I must be a very laughable object!" A quick glance of consternation passed between Jessie and Evelyn, and the latter turned to Lucile with dismay in her uplifted eyebrows. "Seasick?" she inquired in a still, small voice. Lucile nodded grimly. "Rather," she answered. "Guess I'm going to die." "Don't say that," begged the girls, stifling a desire to laugh and cry at once. "Oh, Lucy, dear, what can we do?" said Jessie, putting a comforting arm about her friend, whose complexion had grown a peculiar, greenish-gray color in the last few moments. "Don't you think you had better go below? Maybe if you lie flat on your back you will feel better. Come, dear." "I knew I'd go and spoil everything by getting seasick," moaned Lucile, in the same toneless voice, and then, as a flash of her old saving humor came to the front, she turned to the girls with a suggestion of a smile. "I suppose I'll have to come to the lemon and herring," she said. She was deathly sick all the rest of that day and most of the next, and it was not till near nightfall of the second day that she began to feel the first faint desire to live. Jessie and Evelyn had wandered about aimlessly all the time, looking, as Phil said, as if some one had just pronounced a death sentence upon them. Though they had become acquainted with a great many of the passengers, no one of them had been able to coax a smile to the girls' long faces. In spite of Phil's uncivil remarks, it must be noted that even the wondrous engine-room had lost much of its charm for him and he had cut his visit short, merely to ask if they, meaning his father and mother, thought it would not help some to get Lucile on deck--fresh air--etc., etc. Toward evening the cause of all this unrest opened heavy eyes upon a tossing gray world and turned her head languidly toward the porthole. At the slight sound, Evelyn, who had been sitting, chin in hand, gazing gloomingly out to sea, rose quickly and ran to the side of the bed. "Are you better, dear?" she said, softly stroking Lucile's dark hair back from her forehead with gentle fingers. "You went to sleep and I was so afraid of disturbing you that I didn't dare move." Lucile caught her friend's hand and pressed it to her cheek. "You and Jessie have been darling to me--both of you," she cried, warmly, and Evelyn dropped to her knees beside the bed. "Oh, that sounds like our old Lucy," she exulted. "You are feeling better aren't you, dear?" "Lots," said Lucile, smiling up at her friend. Then Jessie came running in and they hugged each other and laughed and cried after the dear and foolish manner of all girls, until a gentle knock disturbed them and brought Jessie to her feet with a start. "Oh, I promised Phil I'd come right back and tell him if you were awake, and I never did," she cried, in consternation. But, upon opening the door, the visitors proved not to be a wrathful and avenging young god, but Mr. and Mrs. Payton, coming to inquire after the patient's health. "Hello!" said Mr. Payton, as Jessie gave a relieved sigh. "We came down to see a sick girl and we find a rank imposter in her place." "Aren't you disappointed?" gibed his daughter. "Is that you, Mother? It's so dark in that corner I can hardly see." Her mother's answer was a very comforting one, for she took Lucile in her arms and kissed her gently. "I'm glad you are feeling better, my dear," she said. "It will do you good to get on deck as soon as possible. The salt air works wonders." So it was decided that Lucile should have a light supper brought her in the cabin, for she was beginning to develop an appetite, after which she was to go on deck and test the revivifying power of salt sea air, mixed with a little soft moonlight, for Phil had laughingly prophesied that there would be "a peach of a moon to-night." When Lucile, pale of face and lips and a trifle shaky and trembly on her feet, stepped from her cabin into the full beauty of a cloudless night, she turned to her friends with the first smile they had seen for ages--or so it seemed to them. "Girls, it's good to be alive again!" she stated, fervently. "Huh, you haven't been dead yet," grunted Phil. "Well, I thought I was going to die, which is as bad," she retorted, with spirit. "But I'm going to live now, my brother, if only to disappoint you," she added. "My, what a disposition!" said Evelyn, with a sad shake of her head, and Jessie murmured, with an encouraging pat, "Cheer up, Lucy; you are far from being a dead one yet." Lucile sank into the chair they had so carefully prepared for her with a low laugh. "They are all pickin' on me," she said, plaintively. "But what do we care, on such a night? Just look at that sky," and, leaning forward, with her hand on the rail, she let her gaze wander hungrily out over the water, where the long, graceful combers caught the reflected, starry light and passed it on till it merged in the silvery pathway of the moon, which, as Phil had prophesied, was at its height. She sat quite still, realizing as she had never done before the utter grandeur, the awe-inspiring majesty of the ocean. "It's enough to make one sentimental, isn't it?" said Jessie, at her elbow. "Wouldn't it be nice if Jack were here?" she added, innocently. "Oh, bother!" said Lucile, leaning back with a contented sigh. "He would spoil everything. He would probably want to talk, and I can't." "Oh," said Jessie, silenced, but unconvinced. However, they were not destined to enjoy the beauty of the night in peace, for it was not long before the after-dinner crowd began to pour out on deck and the girls were surrounded by friendly, interested fellow-passengers, who inquired solicitously after Lucile's health. Lucile was surprised and touched by these demonstrations, and it was not long before she was chatting naturally and merrily with a jolly little group to whom her father had laughingly introduced her as "the convalescent." "Do you see that young man coming toward us?" said Evelyn, nodding in the direction of a tall, spare young fellow, who, with his shock of black hair, long, aquiline nose, and sensitive, thin-lipped mouth, looked decidedly temperamental, even to the most casual observer. Lucile nodded. "What about him?" she asked. "He's a Frenchman," adding, with a mysterious shake of her head, "Thereby hangs a tale." Much to Lucile's secret annoyance, the young man at her right claimed her attention at that important moment, asking her, inanely, or so she thought, if she could swim. It was not until an hour later, when most of the passengers had drifted off to different, and often more secluded, parts of the deck, and only three or four remained with them, that Lucile had an opportunity to question her friend. "I hate mysteries, Evelyn," she whispered. "What did you mean by 'thereby hangs a tale'? Explain yourself." "I can't just now," answered Evelyn. "He might hear us. Anyway, I don't know very much to tell. He would probably explain for himself if only those old stick-plasters would go away and tend to their own affairs," and she glared belligerently at the three unconscious gentlemen and young Monsieur Charloix, the Frenchman. "No chance--they're glued!" said Jessie, gloomily, and Lucile looked from one to the other of them despairingly. "I wish I knew what you were getting at," she sighed. "Mademoiselle has been very seek?" the voice was low, caressing, with the slightest suggestion of a foreign accent. Lucile turned her head and found herself looking into the bright, restless eyes of the mysterious stranger. For the first moment she was startled and a little confused, but the next instant, recovering herself, she answered, gravely, "Yes, I have been rather under the weather for a couple of days," and she added, with her bright smile, "The thing that bothers me most is the thought of what I have missed during that time." "Mademoiselle is brave," he smiled back. "Most would think only of their sufferings. However, there are still two good days in which to see everything." "Two days?" sighed Lucile. "It seems to me as if it would take two years to see all I'd like to." "Ah, but it is Mademoiselle's first voyage." There was an undertone of sadness in the low voice that made Lucile steal a quick glance at him. There was something about the man, perhaps in the tired droop of his shoulders, perhaps something in the wistful way he had of looking far out to sea, as if seeking the solution of his problem there; perhaps it was only the pathos in his low, Southern voice. Be that as it may, Lucile's heart went out to him then and there. "When one has been back and forth, back and forth, many times," he went on, "he is bound to lose that so fresh enthusiasm and long only for the shore where something may be done. At such times the days, they seem to have no end. But I transgress," he interrupted himself, with a little deprecatory laugh. "Mademoiselle should have reminded me." "You speak of having crossed the ocean many times," said Mr. Payton, who, with his wife, had approached the absorbed little group unknown to them. Monsieur Charloix arose from his chair quickly and offered it, with a Frenchman's elaborate courtesy, to Mrs. Payton. When they were again seated, this time in a cozy little semicircle, Mr. Payton repeated his question and the girls listened eagerly for the reply. "Didn't I tell you?" Jessie managed to whisper. "Now we are going to have the story." "Yes," came, in the gentle, modulated tones, "Monsieur is right; I am not a stranger to America." "And you like our country?" said Mrs. Payton, adding, with a laugh, "Do not be afraid to tell the truth; we shall not be offended." "Ah, but that is where Madam does me great injustice," said the stranger, with a smile. "There is no country in the world for which I have so great respect and admiration as I have for your great America. It has been my misfortune that, in my flying visits, I have had so little time and opportunity to make the acquaintance of so great a nation." "Hip-hip-hooray!" cried Phil, the irrepressible, taking possession of the chair next to Jessie. "It's good to have the old country boosted when you're so far away." "Phil," protested his mother, "I do wish you could get along without so much slang." "He'll be engaging an interpreter next," murmured Jessie, at which the culprit looked his reproach. "I hope you will pardon the interruption, Monsieur Charloix," said Mrs. Payton, apologetically, and her husband added, "Our excuse for Phil is that he is young and still has much to learn, although it is mighty hard to convince him of the truth of that last fact," at which scathing remark, delivered with a twinkle that was lost in the dark, Phil looked almost cast down, until Jessie declared in a whisper "that she loved slang," accompanying the declaration with a comforting little pat that cheered him immensely. "No apologies, Madame and Monsieur," the Frenchman was saying. "I was once a boy myself. The slang has many advantages which the more flowery language has not; it is, at least, much to the point." "If he would only use it, he might reach the point sooner," complained Jessie, in an aside. "I'd be happy if I only knew what point you wanted him to get to," sighed Lucile. "You see, I am completely in the dark." "'Listen, my children, and you shall hear,'" Jessie broke in, still in an undertone. "Methinks the story is about to unfold itself----" "Sh-h!" said Lucile, warningly. "Listen!" Mr. Payton was speaking. "You say the will cannot be found?" Four pairs of bright young eyes centered upon the stranger with eager intensity as they waited for his reply. _ |
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