"Yes," she continued, as if answering a question, "I know someone in just that position. And all at once it struck me--I had hardly thought of it before--what an idiot I should be if I let it affect my feelings or behaviour!"
"I think no one would have suspected you of such narrowness."
"Indeed I hope not!--Have you done your letters? Do come up and watch Mrs. Smithson playing at quoits--a sight to rout the brood of cares!"
In the smoking-room on deck sat Dr. Derwent and Arnold Jacks, conversing gravely, with subdued voices. The Doctor had a smile on his meditative features; his eyes were cast down he looked a trifle embarrassed.
"Forgive me," Arnold was saying, with some earnestness, "if this course seems to you rather irregular."
"Not at all! Not at all! But I can only assure you of my honest inability to answer the question. Try, my dear fellow! _Solvitur quaerendo_!"
Jacks' behaviour did, in fact, appear to the Doctor a little odd. That the young man should hint at his desire to ask Miss Derwent to marry him, or perhaps ask the parental approval of such a step, was natural enough; the event had been looming since the beginning of the voyage home. But to go beyond this, to ask the girl's father whether he thought success likely, whether he could hold out hopes, was scarcely permissible. It seemed a curious failure of tact in such a man as Arnold Jacks.
The fact was that Arnold for the first time in his life, had turned coward. Having drifted into a situation which he had always regarded as undesirable, and had felt strong enough to avoid, he lost his head, and clutched rather wildly at the first support within reach. That Irene Derwent should become his wife was not a vital matter; he could contemplate quite coolly the possibility of marrying some one else, or, if it came to that, of not marrying anyone at all. What shook his nerves was the question whether Irene would be sure to accept him.
Six months ago, he had no doubt of it. He viewed Miss Derwent with an eye accustomed to scrutinise, to calculate (in things Imperial and other), and it amused him to reflect that she might be numbered among, say, half a dozen eligible women who would think it an honour to marry him. This was his way of viewing marriage; it was on the woman's side a point of ambition, a gratification of vanity; on the man a dignified condescension. Arnold conceived himself a brilliant match for any girl below the titled aristocracy; he had grown so accustomed to magnify his place, to regard himself as one of the pillars of the Empire, that he attributed the same estimate to all who knew him. Of personal vanity he had little; purely personal characteristics did not enter, he imagined, into a man's prospects of matrimony. Certain women openly flattered him, and these he despised. His sense of fitness demanded a woman intelligent enough to appreciate what he had to offer, and sufficiently well-bred to conceal her emotions when he approached her. These conditions Miss Derwent fulfilled. Personally she would do him credit (a wife, of course, must be presentable, though in the husband appearance did not matter), and her obvious social qualities would be useful. Yet he had had no serious thought of proposing to her. For one thing, she was not rich enough.
The change began when he observed the impression made by her upon Trafford Romaine. This was startling. Romaine, the administrator of world-wide repute, the man who had but to choose among Great Britain's brilliant daughters (or so his worshippers believed), no sooner looked upon Irene Derwent than he betrayed his subjugation. No woman had ever received such honour from him, such homage public and private. Arnold Jacks was pricked with uneasiness; Irene had at once a new value in his eyes, and he feared he had foolishly neglected his opportunities. If she married Romaine, it would be mortifying. She refused the great man's offer, and Arnold was at first astonished, then gratified. For such refusal there could be only one ground: Miss Derwent's "heart" was already disposed of. Women have "hearts"; they really do grow fond of the men they admire; a singular provision of nature.
He would propose during the voyage.
But the voyage was nearly over; he might have put his formal little question fifty times; it was still to be asked--and he felt afraid. Afraid more than ever, now that he had committed himself with Dr. Derwent. The Doctor had received his confession so calmly, whereas Arnold hoped for some degree of effusiveness. Was he--hideous doubt--preparing himself for an even worse disillusion?
Undoubtedly the people on board had remarked his attentions; for all he knew, jokes were being passed, nay, bets being made. It was a serious thing to proclaim oneself the wooer of a young lady who had refused Trafford Romaine; who was known to have done so, and talked about with envy, admiration, curiosity. You either carried her off, or you made yourself fatally ridiculous. Half a dozen of the passengers would spread this gossip far and wide through England. There was that problematic Mrs. Borisoff, a frisky grass widow, who seemed to know crowds of distinguished people, and who was watching him day by day with her confounded smile! Who could say what passed between her and Irene, intimates as they had become? Did they make fun of him? Did they _dare_ to?
Arnold Jacks differed widely from the common type of fatuous young man. He was himself a merciless critic of fatuity; he had a faculty of shrewd observation, plenty of caustic common sense. Yet the position into which he had drifted threatened him with ridiculous extremes of self-consciousness. Even in his personal carriage, he was not quite safe against ridicule; and he felt it. This must come to an end.
He sought his moment, and found it at the hour of dusk. The sun had gone down gloriously upon a calm sea; the sky was overspread with clouds still flushed, and the pleasant coolness of the air foretold to-morrow's breeze on the English Channel. With pretence of watching a steamer that had passed, Arnold drew Miss Derwent to a part of the deck where they would be alone.
"You will feel," he said abruptly, "that you know England better now that you have seen something of the England beyond seas."
"I had imagined it pretty well," replied Irene.
"Yes, one does."
Under common circumstances, Arnold would have scornfully denied the possibility of such imagination. He felt most unpleasantly tame.
"You wouldn't care to make your home out yonder?"
"Heaven forbid!"
This was better. It sounded like emphatic rejection of Trafford Romaine, and probably was meant to sound so.
"I myself," he pursued absently, "shall always live in England. If I know myself, I can be of most service at the centre of things. Parliament, when the moment arrives----"
"The moment when you can be most mischievous?" said Irene, with a glance at him.
"That's how you put it. Yes, most mischievous. The sphere for mischief is growing magnificent."
He talked, without strict command of his tongue, just to gain time; spoke of expanding Britain, and so on, a dribble of commonplaces. Irene moved as if to rejoin her company.
"Don't go just yet--I want you--now and always."
Sheer nervousness gave his voice a tremor as if of deep emotion. These simple words, which had burst from him desperately, were the best he could have uttered--Irene stood with her eyes on the darkening horizon.
"We know each other pretty well," he continued, "and the better we know each other, the more we find to talk about. It's a very good sign--don't you think? I can't see how I'm to get along without you, after this journey. I don't like to think of it, and I _won't_ think of it I Say there's no need to."
Her silence, her still attitude, had restored his courage. He spoke at length like himself, with quiet assurance, with sincerity; and again it was the best thing he could have done.
"I am not quite sure, Mr. Jacks, that I think about it in the same way."
Her voice was subdued to a very pleasant note, but it did not tremble.
"I can allow for that uncertainty--though I have nothing of it myself. We shall both be in