Marjorie

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  MARJORIE

  BY

  Justin Huntly McCarthy

  _Author of_ "IF I WERE KING"

  _Oh Marjorie, my world's delight Your yellow hair is angel-bright, Your eyes are angel-blue. I thought, and think, the sweetest sight Between the morning and the night Is just the sight of you._

  New York

  R. H. RUSSELL

  1903

  COPYRIGHT, 1903, BY R. H. RUSSELL

  First Impression, March, 1903

  To

  ANTHONY HOPE

  CONTENTS

  CHAPTER PAGE

  I. MY APOLOGY 1

  II. LANCELOT AMBER 7

  III. THE ALEHOUSE BY THE RIVER 15

  IV. A MAID CALLED BARBARA 29

  V. LANCELOT LEAVES 38

  VI. THE GENTLEMAN IN BLUE 54

  VII. CAPTAIN MARMADUKE'S PLAN 62

  VIII. THE COMPANY AT THE NOBLE ROSE 68

  IX. THE TALK IN THE DOLPHIN 72

  X. SHE COMES DOWN THE STAIRS 81

  XI. A FEAST OF THE GODS 87

  XII. MR. DAVIES'S GIFTS 91

  XIII. TO THE SEA 100

  XIV. THE SEA LIFE 105

  XV. UTOPIA HO! 113

  XVI. I MAKE A DISCOVERY 117

  XVII. A VISITATION 126

  XVIII. THE NIGHT AND MORNING 134

  XIX. HOW SOME OF US GOT TO THE ISLAND 145

  XX. A BAD NIGHT 155

  XXI. RAFTS 163

  XXII. WE LOSE CORNELYS JENSEN 168

  XXIII. WE GET TO THE ISLAND 179

  XXIV. FAIR ISLAND 190

  XXV. THE STORY FROM THE SEA 205

  XXVI. THE BUSINESS BEGINS 214

  XXVII. AN ILL TALE 232

  XXVIII. WE DEFY JENSEN 241

  XXIX. THE ATTACK AT LAST 249

  XXX. OUR FLAG COMES DOWN 261

  XXXI. A PIECE OF DIPLOMACY 268

  XXXII. THE SEA GIVES UP ITS QUICK 280

  XXXIII. THE LAST OF THE SHIP 290

  MARJORIE

  CHAPTER I

  MY APOLOGY

  What I have written may seem to some, who have never tossed an houron salt water, nor, indeed, tramped far afield on dry land, to beastounding, and well-nigh beyond belief. But it is all true none theless, though I found it easier to live through than to set down. Ibelieve that nothing is harder than to tell a plain tale plainly andwith precision. Twenty times since I began this narrative I have damnedink and paper heartily after the swearing fashion of the sea, and havewished myself back again in my perils rather than have to write aboutthem.

  I was born in Sendennis, in Sussex, and my earliest memories are fullof the sound and colour and smell of the sea. It was above all thingsmy parents' wish that I should live a landsman's life. But I was madfor the sea from the first days that I can call to mind.

  My parents were people of substance in a way--did well with a mercer'sshop in the Main Street, and were much looked up to by their neighbours.My mother always would have it that I came through my father of gentlelineage. Indeed, the name I bore, the name of Crowninshield, was not thekind of name that one associates usually with a mercer's business andwith the path in life along which my father and mother walked withcontent. There certainly had been old families of Crowninshields inSussex and elsewhere, and some of them had bustled in the big wars.There may be plenty of Crowninshields still left for aught I know orcare, for I never troubled my head much about my possible ancestors whocarried on a field gules an Eastern crown or. I may confess, however,that in later years, when my fortune had bettered, I assumed those armesparlantes, if only as a brave device wherewith to seal a letter. Anyway,Crowninshield is my name, with Raphael prefixed, a name my mother fellupon in conning her Bible for a holiname for me. So, if my arms are butcanting heraldry, I carry the name of an archangel to better them.

  I was an only son, and my parents spoilt me. They had some fancy intheir heads that I was a weakling, and needed care, though I had thestrength of a colt and the health a sea-coast lad should have, sothey did not send me to a school. Yet, because they set a store bybook-learning--which may have its uses, though it never charmed me--Ihad some schooling at home in reading, writing, and ciphering. My fathersought to instil into me an admiration for the dignity of trade, becausehe wished me to become a merchant in time, with mayhap the Mayoralty inperspective. I liked the shop when I was little, and thought it a famousplace to play in, lurking down behind its dark counter as in a robbers'den, and seeing through the open door of the parlour at the back of theshop my mother knitting at her window and the green trees of the garden.I liked, too, the folds of sober cloth and coloured prints, and thefaces of folk when they came in to buy or cheapen. Even the jangle ofthe bell that clattered at the shop door when we put it to at meal timespleased my ears, and has sounded there many times since and softly inplaces thousands of miles away from the Main Street. I do not know howor why, but the cling-clang of that bell always stirred strange fanciesin my mind, and strange things appeared quite possible. Whenever thebell went tinkle I began to wonder who it was outside, and whether bychance they wanted me, and what they might want of me. But the callerwas never better than some neighbour, who needed a button or a needle.

  The great event of my childhood was my father's gift to me of anEnglish version of Monsieur Galland's book, 'The Arabian Nights'Entertainments.' Then the tinkle of the shop bell assumed a newsignificance. Might not Haroun al Raschid himself, with Giafar, hisvizier, and Mesrour, his man, follow its cracked summons, or someterrible withered creature whom I, and I only, knew to be a genie indisguise, come in to catch me by the shoulder and sink with me throughthe floor?

  Those were delicious terrors. But what I most learnt from that book wasan unconquerable love for travel and an unconquerable stretching to thesea. When I read in my book of Sinbad and his Seven Voyages I wouldthink of the sea that lay so near me, and wish that I were waiting for awind in a boat with painted hull and sails like snow and my namesomewhere in great gold letters. I would wander down to the quays andwatch the shipping and the seamen, and wonder whence they came andwhere they went, and if any one of them had a roc's egg on board. I wasvery free for a child in those days, for my parents, still fretting onmy delicacy, rarely crossed me; and, indeed, I was tame enough, partlyfrom keeping such quiet, and well content to be by myself for the hourtogether.

  But, when I had lived in this wise until I was nearly fifteen, my fatherand my mother agreed that I needed more book-learning; and, since theywere still loath to send me to school, they thought of Mr. Davies, thebookseller, of Cliff Street. He was a man of learning. His business wassteady. He had leisure, and was never pressed for a penny, or even
for aguinea. It was agreed that I should go every day for a couple ofafternoon hours, to sit with him and ply my book, and become a famousscholar. Poor Mr. Davies! he never got his will of me in that way, andyet he bore me no grudge, though it filled him with disappointment atfirst.

  There was a vast deal of importance for me, though I did not dream it atthe time, about my going to take my lessons of Mr. Davies, of CliffStreet. For if I had not gone I should never have got that tincture ofLatin which still clings to me, and which a world of winds and watershas not blown or washed from my wits; nor, which is far more important,should I ever have chanced upon Lancelot Amber; and if I had not chancedupon Lancelot Amber I should have lost the best friend man ever had inthis world, and missed seeing the world's fairest woman.