The Marriage of Esther

"He'll do now, poor fellow," said the woman, still chafing his left hand. "But it was a very close thing. What on earth induced you to try and swim the straits?"

"Despair, I suppose. We're both of us as nearly done for as it is possible for men to be. We tried the settlement yesterday for work, but nothing offered. Then we heard of your station, and thought we'd swim across on chance."

"I don't know that I altogether like the look of either of you. Beach-combers, I fancy, aren't you?"

"We're Englishmen who have experienced the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune, with a vengeance. I suppose you would call us beach-combers, now I come to think of it. However, if you can give us work, I can promise you we'll do it, and do it faithfully. If you can't – well, perhaps you'll give us a meal a piece, just to put strength into us for the swim back."

"Well, I'll think about it. In the meantime we must get your mate up to the station. Jimmy, you take his head, you – by the way, what's your name?"

"Ellison – Cuthbert Ellison."

"Very well then, Ellison, you take his heels. That's right, now bring him along."

Between them, and led by the woman, they carried Murkard up the path to the station. Arriving at a hut, near that from which the Kanaka had been summoned, she stopped, took a key from a bunch in her pocket, unlocked the door, and threw it open. It was small, but scrupulously clean. Two camp bedsteads were ranged beside the wall, furnished with coarse blue blankets; a tin wash-hand basin stood on a box at the far end, alongside it a small wooden table, with a six-inch looking-glass above that again.

"You can occupy this hut for the present. Put him down on that bed, so! Before I take it away give him a drop more brandy. That's right. I think he'll do now. If you don't want a spell yourself you'd better come with me."

Ellison arranged Murkard's head upon his pillow, glanced almost unconsciously at himself in the square of glass, and then followed her out of the hut, and across the yard to the veranda opposite. Arriving there she seated herself in a hammock, that swung across the corner, and once more looked him up and down.

"I don't think you need have told me you were an Englishman!" she said at length.

"Why not?" he asked, without any real curiosity. He was watching the shapely feet and ankles swinging beneath the hammock.

"Because I could see it for myself. Your voice is the voice of an Englishman, your face is the face of an Englishman, and, if I wanted any further proof, I should convince myself by your walk. Have you ever noticed that your countrymen" (she spoke as if Australians were not Englishmen), "Britishers, I mean, walk in quite a different fashion from our men? You haven't noticed it, I see. Well, I'm afraid, then, you haven't cultivated the faculty of observation."

"I have had things of more importance to think about lately."

"Oh, I beg your pardon! I had quite forgotten. Sit down for one moment."

She pointed to a long cane-chair. He seated himself, and she disappeared inside the house. In less than five minutes she returned with a bundle in her arms.

"Here you are – some clothes for you and your mate. You needn't thank me for them. They belonged to a man from your own country, who went to the bottom six months ago in one of our luggers, a degree east of the D'Entrecasteaux group. Take them over to the hut and change. When you've done that come back here, and I'll have some lunch ready for you."

As soon as she had given him the bundle she turned on her heel and vanished into the house, without giving him an opportunity of uttering an expression of his thanks. He looked after her as if he would like to have said something, but changed his mind and crossed to his hut. Murkard was still asleep, so he did not disturb him. Throwing the bundle on his own bed, he started to examine it. To the man who has lived in rags there is something that is apt to be almost discomposing in the sudden possession of a decent wardrobe. Ellison turned the dead man's effects over with a strange thrill. Ashamed as he was of his sordid rags, there was something to him indescribably beautiful about these neat tweeds, linen shirts, collars, socks, and white canvas shoes. Selecting those which looked nearest his own size, he prepared to make his toilet. A razor lay upon the dressing-table, a shaving brush stood on a tiny bracket above the tin wash-hand basin. A shave was a luxury he had not indulged in for some time. He lathered his face, stropped the razor on his belt, and fell to work. In three minutes the ugly stubble on his cheeks and chin had disappeared. Five minutes later he was dressed and a new man. With the help of water, a well-worn hair-brush, and his fingers, his matted locks were reduced to something like order, his luxuriant brown mustache received an extra twirl, and he was prepared to face the world once more, in outward appearance at least, a gentleman. Esther McCartney watched him cross the path from a window opposite, and noticed that he carried himself with a new swing. She allowed a smile, that was one of half pity, to flicker across her face as she saw it, and then went into the veranda to receive him.

"They fit you beautifully," said she, referring to the clothes. "You look like a new man."

"How can I thank you? I feel almost like my old self once more. I tremble to think what a figure I must have cut half an hour ago."

"Never mind that. Now come and have something to eat."

He followed her into the sitting room. It was a pretty place, and showed on all sides evidences of a woman's controlling hand. The weatherboard walls were nicely stained, a painted canvas cloth took the place of a plaster ceiling; numerous pictures, mostly water-colours, and many of them of considerable merit, hung on either hand, interspersed with curiosities of the deep, native weapons, and other odds and ends accumulated from among the thousand and one islands of the Southern seas. In the furthest corner Ellison noticed an open piano, with a piece of music on the rest. But the thing which fascinated him beyond all others was the meal spread upon the centre-table. Its profusion nearly took his breath away – beef, tomato salad, pickles, cheese, and a bottle of home-brewed beer. At her command he seated himself and ravenously set to work. All the time he was eating she sat in a deep chair by the window and watched him with an amused smile upon her face. When he had taken off the first raw edge, she spoke:

"Do you know, I don't think that black eye is exactly becoming to you."

Ellison made as if he would like to cover it up.

"Oh, you can't hide it now. I noticed it directly you showed yourself this morning. I wonder who gave it you? for of course you've been fighting. I don't like a quarrelsome man!"

"I'm sorry I should appear before you in such a bad light, for naturally I want to stand well with you."

"I understand. You mean about the billet. Well, will you tell me how you got it – the eye, I mean?"

"Willingly, if you think it will make my case any better."

"I'm not quite sure that it will, but you'd better go on."

She laid herself back in the great chair and folded her hands behind her head. Her face struck him in a new light. There was an expression on it he had not expected to find there; its presence harmonised with the pictures and the piano and made him pause before he spoke. In that moment he changed his mind and let the words he was about to speak die unuttered.

"The story is simple enough. I was drawn into a quarrel and obliged to fight a man. I broke his jaw, he gave me this and this."

He pointed first to his eye and then to his ear. She nodded her head and smiled.

"Do you know that you have come out of that test very well?"

"I'm afraid I don't quite understand."

"Well, then, let me tell you. I was trying you. I didn't really want to know how you got that bruise, because – well, because, you see, I knew beforehand. I've heard the whole story. You stood up for your deformed friend and thrashed the man who was coward enough to strike him. That is the correct version, I think, isn't it? Ah, I see it is. Well, Paddy the Lasher, the man you fought, is one of our hands. I had only just returned from making inquiries about him when you turned up this morning. I like your modesty, and if you'll let me, I think I'll shake hands with you on it!"

Without knowing exactly why he did it, Ellison rose and gravely shook hands with her. In these good clothes his old manner, in a measure, came back to him, and he felt able to do things with a grace that had long been foreign to his actions. He sat down again, drank off his beer, and turned once more to her.

"How can I thank you enough for your goodness to me? I have never enjoyed a meal so much in my life."

"I am glad of that. I think you look better than you did an hour ago. It must be awful to be so hungry."

"It is, and I am more than grateful to you for relieving it. I hope you will believe that."

"I think I do. And now about your friend. Don't you think you had better go and look after him? I have told the cook to send some food across to the hut. Will you see that he eats it?"

"Of course I will. I'll go at once."

He rose and went towards the door. She had risen too, and now stood with one hand upon the mantelpiece, the other toying with the keys hanging from her belt. The fresh breeze played through the palm fronds beyond the veranda, and whisked the dry sand on to the clean white boards. He wanted to set one matter right before he left.

"As I said just now, I'm afraid I don't appear to very great advantage in your eyes," he remarked.

"I'm not exactly sure that you do," she answered candidly. "But I'll see if I can't let by-gones be by-gones. Remember, however, if I do take you on you must both show me that my trust is not misplaced."

"For myself I will promise that."

"It may surprise you to hear that I am not so much afraid of your mate as of yourself. I have seen his face, and I think I like it."

"I'm certain you're right. I am a weak man; he is not. If either of us fails you, I don't think it will be Murkard."

"I like you better for sticking up for your friend."

"I am sorry for that, because you may think I do it for effect."

"I'll be better able to tell you about that later on. Now go."