The Red Rover & Other Sea Adventures – 3 Novels in One Volume. Джеймс Фенимор Купер

Чтение книги онлайн.

СКАЧАТЬ doubts than one, “is it usual for the officers of a vessel of war to appear armed among their crew, in the manner I see here?”

      “It is the pleasure of our Commander.”

      “That Commander is evidently a skilful seaman, but one whose caprices and tastes are as extraordinary as I find his mien. I have surely seen him before; and, it would seem, but lately.”

      Mrs Wyllys then became silent for several minutes. During the whole time, her eye never averted its gaze from the form of the calm and motionless being, who still maintained his attitude of repose, aloof from all that throng whom he had the address to make so entirely dependant on his authority. It seemed, for these few minutes, that the organs of the governess drunk in the smallest peculiarity of his person, and as if they would never tire of their gaze. Then, drawing a heavy and relieving breath, she once more remembered that she was not alone, and that others were silently, but observantly, awaiting the operation of her secret thoughts. Without manifesting any embarrassment, however, at an absence of mind that was far too common to surprise her pupil, the governess resumed the discourse where she had herself dropped it, bending her look again on Wilder.

      “Is Captain Heidegger, then, long of your acquaintance?” she demanded.

      “We have met before.”

      “It should be a name of German origin, by the sound. Certain I am that it is new to me. The time has been when few officers, of his rank, in the service of the King, were unknown to me, at least in name. Is his family of long standing in England?”

      “That is a question he may better answer himself,” said Wilder, glad to perceive that the subject of their discourse was approaching them, with the air of one who felt that none in that vessel might presume to dispute his right to mingle in any discourse that should please his fancy. “For the moment, Madam, my duty calls me elsewhere.”

      Wilder evidently withdrew with reluctance; and, had suspicion been active in the breasts of either of his companions, they would not have failed to note the glance of distrust with which he watched the manner that his Commander assumed in paying the salutations of the morning. There was nothing, however, in the air of the Rover that should have given ground to such jealous vigilance. On the contrary his manner, for the moment, was cold and abstracted he appeared to mingle in their discourse, much more from a sense of the obligations of hospitality than from any satisfaction that he might have been thought to derive from the intercourse. Still, his deportment was kind, and his voice bland as the airs that were wafted from the healthful islands in view.

      “There is a sight”—he said, pointing towards the low blue ridges of the land—“that forms the lands-man’s delight, and the seaman’s terror.”

      “Are, then, seamen thus averse to the view of regions where so many millions of their fellow creatures find pleasure in dwelling?” demanded Gertrude, (to whom he more particularly addressed his words), with a frankness that would, in itself, have sufficiently proved no glimmerings of his real character had ever dawned on her own spotless and unsuspicious mind.

      “Miss Grayson included,” he returned, with a slight bow, and a smile, in which, perhaps, irony was concealed by playfulness. “After the risk you have so lately run, even I, confirmed and obstinate sea-monster as I am, have no reason to complain of your distaste for our element. And yet, you see, it is not entirely without its charms. No lake, that lies within the limits of yon Continent, can be more calm and sweet than is this bit of ocean. Were we a few degrees more southward, I would show you landscapes of rock and mountain—of bays, and hillsides sprinkled with verdure—of tumbling whales, and lazy fishermen, and distant cottages, and lagging sails—such as would make a figure even in pages that the bright eye of lady might love to read.”

      “And yet for most of this would you be indebted to the land. In return for your picture, I would take you north, and show you black and threatening clouds—a green and angry sea—shipwrecks and shoals—cottages, hillsides, and mountains, in the imagination only of the drowning man—and sails bleached by waters that contain the voracious shark, or the disgusting polypus.”

      Gertrude had answered in his own vein; but it was too evident, by her pale cheek, and a slight tremour about her full, rich lip, that memory was also busy with its frightful images. The quick-searching eye of the Rover was not slow to detect the change. As though he would banish every recollection that might give her pain, he artfully, but delicately, gave a new direction to the discourse.

      “There are people who think the sea has no amusements,” he said. “To a pining, home-sick, sea-sick miserable, this may well be true; but the man who has spirit enough to keep down the qualms of the animal may tell a different tale. We have our balls regularly, for instance; and there are artists on board this ship, who, though they cannot, perhaps, make as accurate a right angle with their legs as the first dancer of a leaping ballet, can go through their figures in a gale of wind; which is more than can be said of the highest jumper of them all on shore.”

      “A ball, without females, would, at least, be thought an unsocial amusement, with us uninstructed people of terra firma.”

      “Hum! It might be better for a lady or two Then, have we our theatre: Farce, comedy, and the buskin, take their turns to help along the time. You fellow, that you see lying on the fore-topsail-yard like an indolent serpent basking on the branch of a tree, will ‘roar you as gently as any sucking dove!’ And here is a votary of Momus, who would raise a smile on the lips of a sea-sick friar: I believe I can say no more in his commendation.”

      “All this is well in the description,” returned Mrs Wyllys; “but something is due to the merit of the—poet, or, painter shall I term you?”

      “Neither, but a grave and veritable chronologer. However, since you doubt, and since you are so new to the ocean”—

      “Pardon me!” the lady gravely interrupted, “I am, on the contrary, one who has seen much of it.”

      The Rover, who had rather suffered his unsettled glances to wander over the youthful countenance of Gertrude than towards her companion, now bent his eyes on the last speaker, where he kept them fastened so long as to create some little embarrassment in the subject of his gaze.

      “You seem surprised that the time of a female should have been thus employed,” she observed, with a view to arouse his attention to the impropriety of his observation.

      “We were speaking of the sea, if I remember,” he continued, like a man that was suddenly awakened from a deep reverie. “Ay, I know it was of the sea; for I had grown boastful in my panegyrics: I had told you that this ship was faster than”—

      “Nothing!” exclaimed Gertrude, laughing at his blunder. “You were playing Master of Ceremonies at a nautical ball!”

      “Will you figure in a minuet? Shall I honour my boards with the graces of your person?”

      “Me, sir? and with whom? the gentleman who knows so well the manner of keeping his feet in a gale?”

      “You were about to relieve any doubts we might have concerning the amusements of seamen,” said the governess, reproving the too playful spirit of her pupil, by a glance of her own grave eye.

      “Ay, it was the humour of the moment, nor will I balk it.”

      He then turned towards Wilder, who had posted himself within ear-shot of what was passing, and continued,—

      “These ladies doubt our gaiety, Mr Wilder. Let the boatswain give the magical wind of his call, and pass СКАЧАТЬ