Rose Galbraith (6 page)

Rose was up early the next morning. It came to her that she wanted to see the early sea while the day was young, and perhaps there would not be so many alien watchers about before breakfast.

That young man called Harry Coster, if he'd done all the things he asked her to join him in last night, would surely not be up very early. It would be nice to get her first morning visions without him as accompaniment. Perhaps he would not be so anxious any more to companion with her after the way she had answered him last night. He doubtless was through with her. She sincerely hoped so. But she was running no chances. She wanted the sea all to herself for just a little while, to get acquainted with it and try to read in it the moods her mother had said were there.

So with her big blue coat about her and the soft wool cap on her head that matched the fur collar, she stole out to the deck and reveled in the early morning loveliness. Pearly tints of sky and sea, limitless space, golden morning air. Was it like that where her mother was, she wondered? More beautiful of course, only it was impossible to conceive of anything more beautiful. “Eye hath not seen … neither hath it entered into the heart of man to conceive.” The words so familiar, yet never tangible before, seemed to speak themselves to her heart. It was infinitely comforting to think of her mother in a beautiful place at last. Mother, who so loved lovely things, and who had had so few of them during the after part of her life! Mother, who had been brought up to have plenty and to expect beauty. Brought up to instant discernment of what was good and what was shoddy, and who couldn't help it that imitations and ugliness caused her actual physical discomfort. Mother, who had sometimes sacrificed a trifling extra for the table that she might have a flower. And now she was where there was plenty of beauty, no stinting! How grand for her! Mother amid eternal joy and loveliness! And she must be glad that Rose was here watching the morning rise out of the sea and thinking of her at home with God!

Suddenly a voice interrupted her.

“Well, beautiful, how are you this morning? Why so pensive? What are you thinking about? A penny for your thoughts!”

She turned, annoyed, to find Harry Coster beside her, handsome and sporty-looking, taking things for granted just as he had the night before. Was she going to be pestered with him all through the voyage? Would she be driven to stay in her cabin?

“Oh, you wouldn't be interested in my thoughts,” she said reticently. “They were just plain thoughts.”

“What about?” he insisted. “Sure I'd be interested.”

“Oh no,” she said gravely now, her eyes very sweet and far away. “I was just thinking about my mother, and if she sees this lovely morning I'm in, and if it is so much more beautiful where she is now than any mornings we have down here. Or whether this is just a piece of it, only with some of the glory dimmed so we can bear it.”

She was talking more to herself than to him, letting her thoughts go on into the infinite.

“There you go!” said the young man gaily. “How do you get that way? If you'd gone dancing with me last night and had a little drink or two, you wouldn't be so morbid this morning. What you need is a good hard walk around the decks to get up an appetite, and then after breakfast we'll play tennis. The other girl and fellow at our table are going to join us, and we'll have a great time. Come on now, and we'll have a constitutional.”

He seized her arm and laughingly forced her into step with him, getting into double-quick time and starting off on a brisk walk about the deck. Other people were coming out now and were walking, two by two, some of them singly. Rose wished she could get away by herself. She didn't really like this dominating young man who insisted on forcing her to do what he wanted to do. Yet perhaps it was easier just to fall into step and go on than create a scene here on the deck with all these staid older people taking businesslike walks with such careful purpose, obviously following a set plan.

But somehow the beauty of the morning had fled for Rose. She didn't want to fly along gaily with this young man who evidently had no purpose in life but to have a good time. She wondered what she ought to do about him. She couldn't very well do anything but be polite when he came around determined to be friendly. What did it matter? A sea voyage didn't last forever. Perhaps if she got friendly with some of the girls and women, she could wish him off onto them. That girl at the table. She looked to be far more his kind than she was.

Just then Harry Coster spoke.

“I told Lily Blake and Vance Hoffman that we were going to play tennis with them this morning, and they're keen for it. We'll play together, you and I. Partners, you know, against them. Then I'll have a chance to give you pointers.”

“But I couldn't possibly play,” said Rose, aghast. “I've never played in my life.”

“Oh, that's all right,” said her would-be partner, “neither has Lily, but she's keen for it, and you'll both soon learn. Hoffman and I made it up. We would both coach our partners, and you'll learn a lot that way in a short time.”

He rattled on about how it was important to keep your eye on the ball. Then the breakfast call came, and they could go to the dining room.

Rose sat next to the old lady again, who put her through a catechism about where she lived and what she had done in her life so far and where she was going and who were her relatives, until she was hard put to it not to have to tell her private affairs to the avid old gossip. She succeeded, however, by her quiet answers, in getting away with New York State as her home, not far from New York City, and Scotland as her destination. Her relatives she avoided naming, and the old lady came off with the opinion that she must have something to hide or she wouldn't be so reticent about herself and her family. She voiced this opinion freely on deck later that morning.

Rose played at tennis for a little while and rather enjoyed the exercise, even though she didn't always succeed in doing what she was directed to do. But when the rest of the party decided to finish with a swim in the pool, she pleaded something to do and got away. She found the deck chair that was assigned to her and enjoyed a little while with a book she had brought along to read.

All went well until she sighted Mrs. Adams, the old lady from her table, bearing down upon the empty deck chair beside her. Quietly, unostentatiously, she slid from her chair and made her way quickly out of sight before Mrs. Adams was near enough to realize she had been seen.

The swimming party arrived at the table noisily just as Rose was finishing her lunch, and she managed to slip away again without getting involved in any plans. If they only would let her alone and allow her to enjoy that deck chair and the wonderful breeze!

But at last she settled down to write her letter to Gordon McCarroll.

She had thought it out in the small hours of the night that if her mother were here and she asked her advice about that letter her mother would say, “Make it natural and simple and not too long.”

So Rose set to work.

The roses were there beside her—his roses, and the memory of his kindly farewell was with her. So she wrote with a sudden sense of his having been near her for those few moments on the ship.

She put the letter into its envelope, addressed it in her clear pretty hand and then slipped out to mail it. She wanted to feel that it had started on its way, though she knew it could not really start until they landed. After that she took her book and went to her deck chair again, thankful to find the adjoining chair vacant.

For a long time she lay there quietly watching the sea, because she felt too happy over the thought of her letter going to Gordon McCarroll to settle herself for reading. It seemed such an important thing, that letter.

How surprised she would have been in her school days if she had been told that she would ever write a letter to Gordon McCarroll!

S
he was lying back in her chair with a dreamy expression in her eyes, thinking with quickening heartbeats about that letter she had just written and mailed. Thinking of the way Gordon McCarroll had looked at her when he gave her that good-bye kiss. “Like a real friend,” she told herself, the rosy color stealing into her cheeks, her eyes bright with unexpected pleasure.

There was a pleasant little smile on her sweet lips and her eyes were off at sea, her book lying in her lap with her fingers between the leaves keeping her place, when Mrs. Adams bore down upon her again and clumsily writhed herself into the vacant chair by her side. Rose wasn't aware of what had happened until it was too late to escape, and her heart sank. Oh dear! Could it be that that was Mrs. Adams' own chair? And would she have to endure her presence perhaps every time the old lady wanted to sit on deck? That would spoil a good many nice quiet hours upon which Rose had counted, for the woman talked incessantly. She just couldn't keep still. Rose had found that out already.

But perhaps she would go to sleep, and then it wouldn't be so bad. She turned her disappointed gaze and gave a wan little smile, hoping to find Mrs. Adams looking sleepy.

But no, Mrs. Adams had no intention of going to sleep! She got out her knitting from the large substantial bag which she carried and prepared to entertain her companion as she worked.

“Well, I'm glad I've found somebody to talk to at last!” she said ponderously, with great satisfaction. “It certainly does bore me the way some people sit selfishly and refuse to say a word. Over on the other side of the deck where my chair is located there are three women right in a row with me, and not one of the three has a civil tongue in her head. If you ask them a question, they either don't answer at all or else they get off a lot of modern slang that doesn't mean a thing, and they are the most unfriendly lot I ever saw. And
sleep
? Why, they pretend to be asleep every time I come in sight. I'm glad they're not at our table. I intend to see the purser and get my deck chair changed. Do you know if anyone has this chair? I like your looks and wouldn't mind having a young person to talk to. Do you knit? I could teach you some new stitches perhaps. I'm a real good knitter. And by the way, I don't remember your name. What is it? I like to put all the names down in my travelogue. Do you mind?”

“My name's Galbraith,” said Rose quietly. “Isn't the sea lovely this afternoon, Mrs. Adams? And I really don't know who has that chair. I haven't had time to be out much yet. But I thought I saw someone sitting here a little while ago when I looked this way from a distance. No, I don't knit. I've never had time. I'm not long out of school.”

“Oh,” said Mrs. Adams looking at her narrowly. “Well, that explains why you look so sweet and wholesome, I suppose. No lipstick and no rouge, you know. I can't abide makeup. Like that other girl who sits at our table. She doesn't look to me like a really respectable character, does she to you? Or perhaps she's an old friend of yours, is she? How long have you known her?”

“Oh, I don't know her at all,” Rose said. “They asked me to play tennis with them this morning, and I did for a few minutes, but that isn't very conducive to getting acquainted with people, you know.”

“Well, no, I suppose not,” said Mrs. Adams dryly. “But I do think you ought to be a little careful till you really know people, don't you? There are so many adventuresses and divorcees going about these days, you can't tell who is respectable and who isn't. It's my opinion this Blake person—Lily Blake she says she is—is
divorced
! Don't you think she is? I was looking at her hands at the table today and she looks as if she had been wearing rings on the third finger of her left hand, wedding rings you know, and if that is so, you can depend upon it she's divorced. My dear, I think you can't be too careful. You don't look like a girl that would run around with women like that, and I thought I'd warn you.”

“Well, but I'm not running around with anybody,” Rose replied, amused. “I don't see what harm it would be to play tennis with anybody for a few minutes, do you? We're all God's people in the world together, and we've no right to judge one another. Besides, playing tennis a few minutes isn't choosing them for intimate friends and going in their ways if they happen to be wrong.”

“Yes, of course you'd excuse it! Young folks will, but it's a dangerous thing to be easy about such things. You can't tell—! By the way, are you and that Harry Coster old friends? I can't help feeling
he'll
bear watching. He's too good-looking to be all right, don't you think? Did he give you those roses you were wearing to dinner last night?”

“Oh, no,” laughed Rose. “They were from a box of roses that a friend from home left in my cabin.”