Part 9 (1/2)

For a long time he stood musing over the recital. He had seen enough of life's grotesqueries to understand it. Finally he asked:

”Will you read me some of your diary?”

I took him to my cabin and for an hour he listened while I read the hastily scrawled pages that I had set down. Of course I read them with a certain diffidence because it had occurred to me that certain phases might strike a man living in civilization as the vagaries of a brain touched with sun and isolation. Indeed, I was surrept.i.tiously watching his face from time to time as a man might watch a jury box when he is on trial for lunacy, but I was rea.s.sured to find there no politely veiled judgment against my sanity.

”It's decidedly interesting,” he said at last, ”though it's one of the things we would rule out as too improbable to believe if we didn't happen to know it was true. In the first place I have been reliably informed by many expert witnesses that the South Seas have long since given up their last secrets as to undiscovered islands.”

”I was also convinced of that,” I admitted, ”until I was cast up on one.

I am now prepared to believe there are many others. Whenever I live six months in a place I am ready to admit its existence.”

He refilled and lighted his pipe, then he said, ”I don't want to invade private precincts, but after hearing that I'd like to see the portrait.

May I?”

I delved into the mate's chest, and unwrapped the newspaper page.

For some moments he gazed at it, and I began to wonder whether it held the same magic infatuation for every one else that it did for me. His expression was enigmatical and his voice, when he spoke at last, was puzzled.

”It's very hackneyed,” he said, ”but we must go on saying it. The world is an extremely small place.”

”What do you mean?” I demanded.

He was still looking at the picture and he spoke reflectively as though I had not been present.

”The loveliest girl in Dixie. They all said so.”

”In Dixie,” I echoed eagerly, ”Do you mean you know her?”

”I've danced with her a dozen times,” he answered, ”and yet I can't say I know her. I remember that all the men were paying court, and I fancy I should have been smitten like the rest except that my wife had just accepted me, and I had only one pair of eyes.”

”For G.o.d's sake,” I said very quietly, ”let me have all that you know about her--name--address.”

”It was four years ago,” he explained. ”We were all at Bar Harbor. She was visiting at one of the cottages there. I was so engrossed with my own courts.h.i.+p that other girls, even this wonderful one, didn't count with me. I don't know where she lived, except that she was from the South. Her name was Frances.” He broke off and an expression of extreme vexation clouded his face.

”I know her first name,” I urged him. ”It's the surname I need.”

”Yes,” he responded, ”of course. Her surname was----” Again he halted and an embarra.s.sed flush spread over his cheeks and forehead. Then he spoke impulsively. ”You must bear with me. It's ludicrous, but the name has slipped me. It's just at the tip of my tongue, yet I can't call it.

This thing is inexcusable, but ever since that first trip to the Islands I've been subject to it. Names which I know perfectly, elude me--sometimes for a few moments, sometimes for weeks.”

”Can't you remember it,” I demanded insistently, ”if you cudgel your brain? I don't care how mercilessly you cudgel it. I must know.”

He nodded. ”I quite understand. It has slipped me. I shall remember it by morning, but--” his voice became graver.

”But what?” I inquired.

”I'm afraid it's too late to help you. We heard just before leaving the place that she was to marry some man at home. It hadn't been formally announced, but I think it was quite definite.”

I suppose he said good-night and that I replied. I don't remember his leaving the stateroom. I recall standing some time later alone on the deck and seeing a white-clad officer tramping the bridge. His noiseless feet seemed to be treading upon me. The one honeymoon couple on our pa.s.senger-list pa.s.sed and halted to comment on the rare quality of the air and the splendid softness of the stars. The little bride laughed delightedly. ”Oh, Mr. Deprayne,” she enthused, ”it was under skies like this that Stevenson wrote,