Part 31

Here we are again on our homeward trip, making fewer landings and briefer stops, principally to take on passengers and thousands of barrels of limes.

Barbados, with its charming hotel at Hastings, was an unalloyed delight; and Dorothea, who had determined to live in each of the islands as it came along, would finally have transferred her allegiance for good and all had it not seemed more loyal for an American to choose one of our own possessions and "grow up with the country." We found ourselves in the midst of pleasant, even distinguished, society--British officials, ex-governors, and judge-advocates of the various islands, English and Canadian soldiers on sick-leave, and officers commanding the U-boat chasers in near-by waters. Dorothea danced nightly and held court daily on the broad piazzas, reminding me of Rudyard Kipling's fascinating heroine in an Indian army post, who, whenever she appeared, caused the horizon to become black with majors. Her head and heart remained true to the absent Marmaduke--I am not so sure about her dancing feet!

Now that that experience is over, with the many others, we are at sea and quiet again, with one tranquil day just like the other.

"What a honeymoon journey it would make, Charlotte!" said Dolly one moonlight evening on deck. "It is so difficult to grow in knowledge of people in New York or Washington. One doesn't even know one's self."

"All journeys must be good for honeymooners, don't you think?"

"Yes, in a way; but some places are created for lovers and newlyweds, who are, after all, only explorers, Charlotte, forever discovering new lands and annexing new territories."

"Yes; and sometimes falling into the hands of savages and cannibals, I suppose."

"Yes; that must be terrible--the awakening to find that one has been mistaken in a man!" sighed Dolly.

"I dare say we ought to worry lest men be mistaken in us; it might happen, you know."

"Your mind is so logical, Charlotte! However, this voyage wouldn't have to be idealized to meet the needs of honeymooners. In a Vermont village where I sometimes stay I remember a girl who had to be married on Sunday because she could not give up her position as telegraph-operator till Saturday night. That was dull enough in all conscience, but she was married in her high-school graduating dress, and went to her grandmother's house, ten miles away, for her wedding-journey. I think it required considerable inward felicity to exalt that situation!"

I sat upright in my steamer chair. "Dorothea," I said sharply, "you have been manufacturing conversation for the last five minutes--just killing time for fear that I should ask you questions. Is there anything on your mind? You have been absentminded and nervous for days."

"Your imagination is working overtime, Charlotte," she answered. "We are nearing home, that is all; and life presses closer."

I could not gainsay her, for every mile of ocean crossed makes my heart beat faster. I seem to be living just now in a sort of pause between my different lives. There is the heaven of my childhood in the vague background; then the building of my "career," if so modest a thing can be called by so shining a name; then the steady, half-conscious growth of a love that illumines my labors, yet makes them difficult and perplexing; and now there is a sense of suspended activity, of waiting, with a glimmering air-castle rising like an iridescent bubble out of the hazy future. Sometimes there are two welcoming faces at a window and sometimes the indistinct figure of a woman stretching out a forbidding hand, my chief's sister, who may not want a third person in the family!

* * * * *

S.S. Diana, February 13, 1918

Dolly went on the bridge this afternoon and stayed a half-hour with the captain, giving no reason save that she liked to talk with him, which seemed plausible, but did not satisfy me. At bedtime I discovered her unpacking and laying out in her upper berth a dazzling toilet for our landing at St. Thomas to-morrow. She blushed when I looked in upon her.

"Do dress 'up to me,' Charlotte," she coaxed. "I don't want to be conspicuous. Wear your gray georgette and the broad hat with the roses."

"Why this sudden display of vanity and good clothes?"

"Hasn't your letter of introduction to Governor Oliver brought us an invitation to luncheon at Government House?"

"Yes; but I don't suppose it is a banquet."

"Charlotte, I must confide in you."

"I should think it was about time."

"What do you mean?"

"I have known for days that you were concealing something."

"I didn't want to be secretive, but I thought it was only fair to you to keep my own counsel. Now you can report to mother that you knew nothing, and that therefore you couldn't interfere."

"But what have you done? You can't be secretly married--with your chosen man in Washington and you on the vasty deep."

"No; but I'm next door to it."

"What do you mean by 'next door'? Have you a groom and a minister waiting on the New York dock?"