The Young Trawler. Robert Michael Ballantyne
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gently yet quickly shut the door in the captain’s face, and next moment appeared in the little parlour with a flushed face and widely open eyes.
The biggest man she had ever seen, or heard, she said, wanted to see Miss Seaward.
Why did he want to see her and what was his name?
She didn’t know, and had omitted to ask his name, having been so frightened that she had left him at the door, which she had shut against him.
“An’, please, Miss,” continued Liffie, in a tone of suppressed eagerness, “if I was you I’d lock the parlour door in case he bu’sts in the outer one. You might open the winder an’ screech for the pleece.”
“Oh! Liffie, what a frightened thing you are,” remonstrated Jessie, “go and show the man in at once.”
“Oh! no, Miss,” pleaded Liffie, “you’d better ’ave ’im took up at once. You’ve no notion what dreadful men that sort are. I know ’em well. We’ve got some of ’em where we live, and—and they’re awful!”
Another knock at this point cut the conversation short, and Kate herself went to open the door.
“May I have a word with Miss Seaward?” asked the captain respectfully.
“Ye’es, certainly,” answered Kate, with some hesitation, for, although reassured by the visitor’s manner, his appearance and voice alarmed her too. She ushered him into the parlour, however, which was suddenly reduced to a mere bandbox by contrast with him.
Being politely asked to take a chair, he bowed and took hold of one, but on regarding its very slender proportions—it was a cane chair—he smiled and shook his head. The smile did much for him.
“Pray take this one,” said Jessie, pointing to the old arm-chair, which was strong enough even for him, “our visitors are not usually such—such—”
“Thumping walruses! out with it, Miss Seaward,” said the captain, seating himself—gently, for he had suffered in this matter more than once during his life—“I’m used to being found fault with for my size.”
“Pray do not imagine,” said Jessie, hastening to exculpate herself, “that I could be so very impolite as—as to—”
“Yes, yes, I know that,” interrupted the captain, blowing his nose—and the familiar operation was in itself something awful in such a small room—“and I am too big, there’s no doubt about that however, it can’t be helped. I must just grin and bear it. But I came here on business, so we’ll have business first, and pleasure, if you like, afterwards.”
“You may go now,” said Kate at this point to Liffie Lee, who was still standing transfixed in open-mouthed amazement gazing at the visitor.
With native obedience and humility the child left the room, though anxious to see and hear more.
“You have a furnished room to let I believe, ladies,” said the captain, coming at once to the point.
Jessie and Kate glanced at each other. The latter felt a strong tendency to laugh, and the former replied:—
“We have, indeed, one small room—a very small room, in fact a mere closet with a window in the roof,—which we are very anxious to let if possible to a lady—a—female. It is very poorly furnished, but it is comfortable, and we would make it very cheap. Is it about the hiring of such a room that you come?”
“Yes, madam, it is,” said the captain, decisively.
“But is the lady for whom you act,” said Jessie, “prepared for a particularly small room, and very poorly furnished?”
“Yes, she is,” replied the captain with a loud guffaw that made the very windows vibrate; “in fact I am the lady who wants the room. It’s true I’m not very lady-like, but I can say for myself that I’ll give you less trouble than many a lady would, an’ I don’t mind the cost.”
“Impossible!” exclaimed Miss Seaward with a mingled look of amusement and perplexity which she did not attempt to conceal, while Kate laughed outright; “why, sir, the room is not much, if at all, longer than yourself.”
“No matter,” returned the captain, “I’m nowise particular, an’ I’ve been recommended to come to you; so here I am, ready to strike a bargain if you’re agreeable.”
“Pray, may I ask who recommended you?” said Jessie.
The seaman looked perplexed for a moment.
“Well, I didn’t observe his name over the door,” he said, “but the man in the shop below recommended me.”
“Oh? the green-grocer!” exclaimed both ladies together, but they did not add what they thought, namely, that the green-grocer was a very impertinent fellow to play off upon them what looked very much like a practical joke.
“Perhaps the best way to settle the matter,” said Kate, “will be to show the gentleman our room. He will then understand the impossibility.”
“That’s right,” exclaimed the captain; rising—and in doing so he seemed about to damage the ceiling—“let’s go below, by all means, and see the cabin.”
“It is not down-stairs,” remarked Jessie, leading the way; “we are at the top of the house here, and the room is on a level with this one.”
“So much the better. I like a deck-cabin. In fact I’ve bin used to it aboard my last ship.”
On being ushered into the room which he wished to hire, the sailor found himself in an apartment so very unsuited to his size and character that even he felt slightly troubled.
“It’s not so much the size that bothers me,” he said, stroking his chin gently, “as the fittings.”
There was some ground for the seaman’s perplexity, for the closet in which he stood, apart from the fact of its being only ten feet long by six broad, had been arranged by the tasteful sisters after the manner of a lady’s boudoir, with a view to captivate some poor sister of very limited means, or, perhaps, some humble-minded and possibly undersized young clerk from the country. The bed, besides being rather small, and covered with a snow-white counterpane, was canopied with white muslin curtains lined with pink calico. The wash-hand stand was low, fragile, and diminutive. The little deal table, which occupied an inconveniently large proportion of the space, was clothed in a garment similar to that of the bed. The one solitary chair was of that cheap construction which is meant to creak warningly when sat upon by light people, and to resolve itself into match-wood when the desecrator is heavy. Two pictures graced the walls—one the infant Samuel in a rosewood frame, the other an oil painting—of probably the first century, for its subject was quite undistinguishable—in a gold slip. The latter was a relic of better days—a spared relic, which the public had refused to buy at any price, though the auctioneer had described it as a rare specimen of one of the old—the very old—masters, with Rembrandtesque proclivities. No chest of drawers obtruded itself in that small chamber, but instead thereof the economical yet provident sisters, foreseeing the importance of a retreat for garments, had supplied a deal box, of which they stuffed the lid and then covered the whole with green baize, thus causing it to serve the double purpose of a wardrobe and a small sofa.
“However,” said Captain Bream, after a brief but careful look round, “it’ll do. With a little cuttin’ and carvin’ here an’ there, we’ll manage to squeeze in, for you must know, ladies, that we sea-farin’ men have a wonderful knack o’ stuffin’ a good deal into small space.”
The sisters made no reply. Indeed they were speechless, and horrified at the bare idea of the entrance of so huge a lodger into their quiet home.
“Look ye here, now,” he continued in a comfortable, self-satisfied tone, as he expanded his great arms along the length of the bed to measure it, “the bunk’s about five foot eight inches long. Well, I’m about six foot two in my socks—six inches short; that’s a difficulty no doubt, but it’s get-over-able this way, we’ll splice the green box to it.”
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