The Real Charlotte - Edith Somerville [50]
It was evident that Lambert wished to make the most of his time, for almost immediately after the Daphne had gone about with smooth precision, and had sprung away on the other tack, the party on the launch saw a flutter of white, and a top-sail was run up.
“By Jove! Lambert didn’t make much on that tack,” remarked Captain Cursiter to his brother-in-arms, as with an imperceptible pressure of the wheel he serenely headed the launch straight for her destination, “I don’t believe he’s done himself much good with that top-sail either.”
Mr. Hawkins turned a sour eye upon the Daphne and said laconically, “Silly ass; he’ll smother her.”
“Upon my word, I don’t think he’ll get in much before nine o’clock to-night,” continued Cursiter; “it’s pretty nearly dead in his teeth, and he doesn’t make a hundred yards on each tack.”
Mr. Hawkins slammed the lid of the coal-bunker, and stepped past his chief into the after-part of the launch.
“I say, Miss Mullen,” he began with scarcely suppressed malignity, “Captain Cursiter says you won’t see your niece before to-morrow morning. You’ll be sorry you wouldn’t let her come home in the launch after all.”
“If she hadn’t been so late for her tea,” retorted Miss Mullen, “Mr. Lambert could have started half an hour before he did.”
“Half an hour will be neither here nor there in this game. What Lambert ought to have done was to have started after luncheon, but I think I may remind you, Miss Mullen, that you took him off to the holy well then.”
“Well, and if I did, I didn’t leave my best pocket handkerchief hanging in rags on the thorn-bush, like some other people I know of!” Miss Mullen felt that she had scored, and looked for sympathy to Pamela, who, having as was usual with her, borne the heat and burden of the day in the matter of packings and washings-up, was now sitting, pale and tired, in the stern, with Dinah solidly implanted in her lap, and Max huddled miserably on the seat beside her. Miss Hope-Drummond, shrouded in silence and a long plaid cloak, paid no attention to anyone or anything. There are few who can drink the dregs of the cup of pleasuring with any appearance of enjoyment, and Miss Hope-Drummond was not one of them. The alteration in the respective crews of the yacht and the steam-launch had been made by no wish of hers, and it is probable that but for the unexpected support that Cursiter had received from Miss Mullen, his schemes for Mr. Hawkins’ welfare would not have prospered. The idea had indeed occurred to Miss Hope-Drummond that the proprietor of the launch had perhaps a personal motive in suggesting the exchange, but when she found that Captain Cursiter was going to stand with his back to her, and steer, she wished that she had not yielded her place in the Daphne to a young person whom she already thought of as “that Miss Fitzpatrick,” applying in its full force the demonstrative pronoun that denotes feminine animosity more subtly and expressively than is in the power of any adjective. Hawkins she felt was out of her jurisdiction and unworthy of attention, and she politely ignored Pamela’s attempts to involve her in conversation with him. Her neat brown fringe was out of curl; long strands of hair blew unbecomingly over her ears; her feet were very cold, and she finally buried herself to the nose in a fur boa that gave her the effect of a moustached and bearded