Part 15 (1/2)

Madam Garvloit only made one slight objection--

”You know that you can't drink ale, my friend.”

Another objection, namely, what they would say at home in Norway when they heard that her husband had sunk into a mere tavern-keeper, she very wisely kept to herself. The important point was that they should find a way of living, and they had at all events the great consolation that now they would be able to keep Elizabeth. What feeling of pride still remained she got rid of in telling Elizabeth that at home they knew nothing of millionaires in wooden shoes such as were to be found in Holland; and her husband found her much more keen for his project than he had expected. Being accustomed to place great reliance upon her stronger understanding, he would not have been happy if she had been against the plan.

Thus it came about, then, that in the crowded street by the ca.n.a.l one Monday morning there appeared over one of the entrance-doors a sign-board with ”The Star,” in letters of gold on a blue ground. It was set up at a fortunate time and in a fortunate place, and almost as soon as the house was opened, customers from the vessels in the harbour began to gather in, both into the down-stairs and up-stairs rooms, so that there was a prospect of a steadily increasing traffic. Garvloit generally presided himself in the bar behind the counter, at the lower end of which there stood an array of stone mugs with tin lids; while in a recess of the wall there stuck out from beside canisters of tobacco, long and short Dutch clay pipes, a new one filled being handed to every customer, with whatever drink he ordered. Out of sight under the counter where the stone mugs stood was the ale-barrel, with its bright tap over a vessel that caught the drip; and after the same cleanly Dutch fas.h.i.+on, spittoons filled with sand stood in every corner of the room. The shelves above were filled in rows with a regular apothecary's shop of bottles and jars of spirits, and among them a goodly array of securely-fastened, dark-green flasks of Dutch hollands.

Elizabeth had as housekeeper quite as much as she could do, and did not directly busy herself with waiting, unless there was something particular required to be done for the up-stairs customers.

Occasionally, however, she would come into the bar also, on some errand or another, or to make sure that nothing was wanted; and the fame of handsome Elizabeth of ”The Star” contributed not a little to bring custom to the house.

Such Norwegians as came to Amsterdam with timber--the majority unloaded their cargoes up at Purmurende or Alkmar--invariably patronised ”The Star.” Elizabeth used to talk to them as countrymen of her own; and if she heard that any of them had been across the Atlantic, she would quietly, and as if quite casually, ask if perchance they had come across or had heard anything of a sailor of her acquaintance called Salve Kristiansen who hailed from Arendal. No one had ever heard of him, and she had begun to fear that he might be lost to her for ever.

One forenoon, however, when she had a great deal to do in the house, she was pa.s.sing quickly through the room up-stairs, and there sat at one of the small tables, with an untouched mug of ale before him, a bearded man in a blue pea-jacket. In her hurry she had set him down as some mate or captain; but there must have been something about him that attracted her attention, for she turned again at the door for an instant, and looked at him before she went out. He was so pale--and he had sent her one look.

As she stood outside the door she knew it was Salve, although she had always pictured him to herself as a common sailor. She stood there trembling all over, and fumbling with the latch of the door in the greatest agitation, evidently debating with herself whether she should dare go in again. She pressed upon the latch, in the certainty that it would go up before she had actually decided that she would go in; and it did so. The door opened again of itself, and Elizabeth entered with downcast eyes, and scarlet in the face, and pa.s.sed through the room, making a slight inclination of her head, as if for greeting, as she pa.s.sed him. She had reached the opposite door when she heard a quiet bitter laugh behind her.

At once she turned, with pride in every feature of her face, and looked at him.

”How do you do, Salve Kristiansen?” she said, firmly and quietly.

”How do you do, Elizabeth?” he replied, rather huskily, getting up and looking confused.

”Are you lying here in Amsterdam with some vessel?”

He sat down again, for there was something in her manner that denied approach.

”No; in Purmurende,” he replied. ”I only came in here to--”

”You are in the timber line, then, now?”

”Yes--Elizabeth,” he ventured to add, in another tone, which had a whole volume of meaning in it. But she took her leave of him now in the same proud manner, and left the room.

Salve sat for a while with compressed lips, looking down upon the table before him. When she turned round the first time at the door, something told him that she would come in again; but he had expected quite a different kind of scene. A good deal of the tyrant had been developed in him since they had last met; and when she had come in so quietly and so humbly, with the acknowledgment of the great wrong she had done him written upon her face, he felt himself at once, with a certain bitter and devouring pleasure, upon the judgment-seat. He must first see her crushed before him; then he would have forgiven her, and loved her with all the pa.s.sion of his soul.

But as she stood there by the door, looking so grand in her pride, and so pale with repressed mortification, and spoke so calmly, he had felt that in that moment he had been separated farther from her than ever he had been in all his wanderings at the other side of the globe.

He sat there with his mind in a chaotic state of desperation and sorrow, and of anger with himself. What a grand creature she was! and he--how pitiful and petty! He set down the mug, which he had been absently toying with, hard on the table, and went out.

For a long while he wandered about the quays in a state of gloomy indecision, stopping every now and then to run his eye over the s.h.i.+pping, and his expression becoming darker still every time he did so.

From long practice he could tell by the appearance of every vessel what trade it was engaged in. One was a coffee s.h.i.+p from Java; the next carried general cargo to all parts of the world; there was another that brought sugar and rum from the West Indies; and a fourth, that from its square build and breadth of beam must be a whaler returned from Spitzbergen. He thought of their long voyages, and of the life without root or tie that was pa.s.sed on board them--was he to go back to that life again? It depended on Elizabeth; and he had not much hope.

To his impatient nature delay was intolerable; and he had half made up his mind to have his fate decided at once. In spite of his agitation, however, he could still think with coolness; and he knew that if he was to have any chance at all, he must wait until the first unfortunate impression had had time to pa.s.s off.

It had been a grey, foggy autumn day, but was now clearing, and blue patches of sky were coming out; and as he crossed the bridge the afternoon sun shone out, and sent a ray of glittering light against the window-panes of the street along the ca.n.a.l. Up in Garvloit's house Elizabeth was standing at the open window--she, too, that day had needed to be alone with her thoughts. Salve saw her, and stood still for a moment contemplating her as she leant out over the window ledge.

”That dear head shall be mine,” he burst out then pa.s.sionately, and without knowing it, aloud; and the next moment he was at Garvloit's door.