It was like a miracle. Do what he would, Denry could not stop his face from glowing.

With false calm he gave the paper to Ruth. Her calmness in receiving it upset him.

"We 'll read it in the train," she said primly, and started to talk about something else. And she became most agreeable and companionable.

Mixed up with papers and sixpenny novels on the bookstall were a number of souvenirs of Llandudno-paper-knives, pens, paper-weights, watch-cases, pen-cases, all in light wood or gla.s.s, and ornamented with coloured views of Llandudno, and also the word "Llandudno" in large German capitals, so that mistakes might not arise. Ruth remembered that she had even intended to buy a crystal paper-weight with a view of the Great Orme at the bottom. The bookstall clerk had several crystal paper-weights with views of the pier, the Hotel Majestic, the Esplanade, the Happy Valley, but none with a view of the Great Orme. He had also paper-knives and watch-cases with a view of the Great Orme. But Ruth wanted a combination of paper-weight and Great Orme, and nothing else would satisfy her. She was like that. The clerk admitted that such a combination existed, but he was sold "out of it."

"Could n't you get one and send it to me?" said Ruth.

And Denry saw anew that she was incurable.

"Oh, yes, miss," said the clerk. "Certainly, miss. To-morrow at latest!" And he pulled out a book. "What name?"

Ruth looked at Denry, as women do look on such occasions.

"Rothschild," said Denry.

It may seem perhaps strange that that single word ended their engagement. But it did. She could not tolerate a rebuke. She walked away, flushing. The bookstall clerk received no order. Several persons in the vicinity dimly perceived that a domestic scene had occurred, in a flash, under their noses, on a platform of a railway station. Nellie was speedily aware that something very serious had happened, for the train took them off without Ruth speaking a syllable to Denry, though Denry raised his hat and was almost effusive.

The next afternoon Denry received by post a ring in a box. "I will not submit to insult," ran the brief letter.

"I only said 'Rothschild'!" Denry murmured to himself. "Can't a fellow say 'Rothschild'?"

But secretly he was proud of himself.

CHAPTER V. THE MERCANTILE MARINE

I

The decisive scene, henceforward historic, occurred in the shanty known as "John's cabin"-John being the unacknowledged leader of the 'longsh.o.r.e population-under the tail of Llandudno pier. The cabin, festooned with cordage, was lighted by an oil-lamp of a primitive model, and round the orange case on which the lamp was balanced sat Denry, Cregeen, the owner of the lifeboat, and John himself (to give, as it were, a semi-official character to whatever was afoot).

"Well, here you are," said Denry, and handed to Cregeen a piece of paper.

"What's this, I 'm asking ye," said Cregeen, taking the paper in his large fingers and peering at it as though it had been a papyrus.

But he knew quite well what it was. It was a check for twenty-five pounds. What he did not know was that, with the ten pounds paid in cash earlier in the day, it represented a very large part indeed of such of Denry's savings as had survived his engagement to Ruth Earp. Cregeen took a pen as though it had been a match-end and wrote a receipt. Then, after finding a stamp in a pocket of his waistcoat under his jersey, he put it in his mouth and lost it there for a long time. Finally Denry got the receipt, certifying that he was the owner of the lifeboat formerly known as _Llandudno_, but momentarily without a name, together with all her gear and sails.

"Are ye going to live in her?" the rather curt John enquired.

"Not in her. On her," said Denry.

And he went out on to the sand and shingle, leaving John and Cregeen to complete the sale to Cregeen of the _Fleetwing_, a small cutter specially designed to take twelve persons forth for "a pleasant sail in the bay." If Cregeen had not had a fancy for the _Fleetwing_ and a perfect lack of the money to buy her, Denry might never have been able to induce him to sell the lifeboat.

Under another portion of the pier Denry met a sailor with a long white beard, the aged Simeon, who had been one of the crew that rescued the _Hjalmar_, but whom his colleagues appeared to regard rather as an ornament than as a motive force.

"It's all right," said Denry.

And Simeon, in silence, nodded his head slowly several times.

"I shall give you thirty shillings for the week," said Denry.

And that venerable head oscillated again in the moon-lit gloom and rocked gradually to a standstill.

Presently the head said, in shrill, slow tones:

"I 've seen three o' them Norwegian chaps. Two of 'em can no more speak English than a babe unborn; no, nor understand what ye say to 'em, though I fair bawled in their ear-holes."

"So much the better," said Denry.

"I showed 'em that sovereign," said the bearded head, wagging again.

"Well," said Denry, "you won't forget. Six o'clock to-morrow morning."

"Ye 'd better say five," the head suggested. "Quieter like!"

"Five, then," Denry agreed.

And he departed to St. Asaph's Road burdened with a tremendous thought.

The thought was:

"I 've gone and done it this time!"

Now that the transaction was accomplished and could not be undone, he admitted to himself that he had never been more mad. He could scarcely comprehend what had led him to do that which he had done. But he obscurely imagined that his caprice for the possession of sea-going craft must somehow be the result of his singular adventure with the pantechnicon in the ca.n.a.l at Bursley.

He was so preoccupied with material interests as to be capable of forgetting, for a quarter of an hour at a stretch, that in all essential respects his life was wrecked, and that he had nothing to hope for save hollow worldly success. He knew that Ruth would return the ring. He could almost see the postman holding the little cardboard cube which would contain the rendered ring. He had loved, and loved tragically.

(That was how he put it-in his unspoken thoughts; but the truth was merely that he had loved something too expensive.) Now the dream was done. And a man of disillusion walked along the Parade towards St.

Asaph's Road among revellers, a man with a past, a man who had probed women, a man who had nothing to learn about s.e.x. And amid all the tragedy of his heart, and all his apprehensions concerning hollow worldly success, little thoughts of absurd unimportance kept running about like clockwork mice in his head. Such as that it would be a bit of a bore to have to tell people at Bursley that his engagement, which truly had thrilled the town, was broken off. Humiliating, that! And, after all, Ruth was a glittering gem among women. Was there another girl in Bursley so smart, so effective, so truly ornate?

Then he comforted himself with the reflection, "I 'm certainly the only man that ever put an end to an engagement by just saying 'Rothschild'."

This was probably true. But it did not help him to sleep.

II

The next morning at 5:20 the youthful sun was shining on the choppy water of the Irish Sea, just off the Little Orme, to the west of Llandudno Bay. Oscillating on the uneasy waves was Denry's lifeboat, manned by the nodding bearded head, three ordinary British longsh.o.r.emen, a Norwegian who could speak English of two syllables, and two other Norwegians who by a strange neglect of education could speak nothing but Norwegian.

Close under the headland, near a morsel of beach, lay the remains of the _Hjalmar_, in an att.i.tude of repose. It was as if the _Hjalmar_, after a long struggle, had lain down like a cab-horse and said to the tempest, "Do what you like, now!"

"Yes," the venerable head was piping, "Us can come out comfortable in twenty minutes, unless the tide be setting east strong. And as for getting back, it 'll be the same, other way round, if ye understand me."