"FREEDOM FOR TWO"

Wairarapa Times-Age, 23 April 1940, Page 10

"FREEDOM FOR TWO"

PUBLISHED BY SPECIAL ARRANGEMENT. COPYRIGHT

By

MARGARET WATSON.

CHAPTER 11. (Continued). She said quite emphatically: "It’s extremely. good; but it’s moody." "You mean there are things 1 can’t play?" "1 mean mere are lots and lots of things you won’t put yourself out to play. But Debussy isn’t one of them." -You liked that?" he asked, with sudden eagerness. "1 shall always remember you by ’Minstrels.’ ” They had reached the rectory gate, and instinctly stopped, looking at each other in the glow of the light from the the study windows, two still figures in orange and black silouhette. "Should I be going out of character,’ he asked in a low voice, "if I told you that you’re quite the loveliest thing I've seen? ‘Minstrels' was for you, though I can't explain just how it applies. 1 think Melusine must have had eyes like yours—so brown they're almost red.”

She thought that her beauty hac. never been so dispassionately appraised, nor so comfortably summed up. She said with a little breathless laugn: "I think anyone but you would oe miles out of character, but somehow it doesn’t seem so surprising in you— —" “What doesn't? Appreciation 01 loveliness?"

"That you should look like a man of action, walk like an adventurer. play like a virtuoso, and know about Melusine."

"Would you rather I talked about adventure, then? I'm the original Ancient Mariner. I’ve been shipwrecked. I’ve combed beaches. I’ve narrowly escaped annihilation by bandits under the Great Wall of China. I've dropped cut of planes, I've begged in traditional rags—not to say fear and trembling —far from friendly Saharan cities —I've even seen—once —the Sargasso Sea." He was laughing like a romancer, like a new Baron Munchausen watching his dupes swallow the bait; but she knew, and was transported in knowing. that every word he spoke was true. She looked at him with parted lips and shining eyes, and then pushed the gate wide open and moved trancedly within it. "It isn't late. Will you come in and meet my people? And tell us all those stories? Please —I'd (ike you to."

The rector was busily writing in his study when she pushed open the door and looked in. "Hullo, Daddy! I've brought you a visitor.” "Bring him in, my dear, by all means,” said the rector, and went on writing. Mrs Manning came in through the further door and stood smiling at the half-seen arrival with an older and calmer version of Erica's smile. "I think 1 should warn you,” said Erica, "that he claims to be the original Ancient Mariner." "That’s all, right." said the rector, comfortably. "We've no wedding-guests here.” Mrs Manning, an unconscious prophet, thought of her husband's duties for a very full tomorrow and added innocently: "At any rate, not today.” CHAPTER HI. It was not at' all difficult to get Martin to talk about himself, Erica discovered. Things which were over and done were of little interest to him, and slight importance. The future and the present were the times for which he cared; but if she required that he should remember with detail and passion some of the incidents of the past —why, he would remember them. And if her curiosity was insatiable, his-pa-tience was inexhaustible. He sat there beside the study fire, on that first evening, with long hands clasped round his crossed knees, and talked vividly and merrily, while the light went in and out among the strong clean hollows of his face, and all three of his hearers hung breathlessly on his lips. "I’m the traditional bad boy,” said Martin, “the one who ran away to sea. I'm sorry to be so hackneyed, but I really did run away to sea—just like Amyas Leigh. Of course, I hadn't broken my schoolmaster's head, or anything like that. As a matter of fact, I'm afraid the dear man encouraged me. Whatever dreams he'd had as a boy had had to stay dreams; so he was anxious—almost desperately anxious—that ours should have a chance to come true. He told me a lot about places I'd never seen; I didn't realise then that he'd never seen them, either. So when 1 was eighteen. I ran away. "1 worked my way to Australia gradually during the first year—rounded the Cape on a four-masted barque, to my joy mid terror. Boys who run away won't be able to do that very much longer. And there's nothing, nothing on earth, quite so, beautiful as a sailing ship—all wings and air—so little of flesh, and so much of the spirit —ol>. 1 can't tell you! “Australia was fun, too. She showed off for me in the finest style, with a flood and a minor earthquake. My Uncle Jim. mother's brother, wrote and told me to look up an old partner ol his who was operating a shipping line from a rather unobtrusive harbour there. J did. It wasn’t much of a line, a Iwo-ship affair, but there seemed more money in it than I could afford to miss. lie tillered mo a home for the scrap of money I’d saved, and I jumped at it. It wasn’t until 1 wanted to skipper one trip that 1 found we had a double cargo. Yes. We were in the Chink-smuggling business, it seemed. When I tried to make trouble) —well, it turned out to be my trouble. I I was a partner, you see: and both his crews were ready to swear to anything ho told thorn. and altogether, 1 had to rimve out in rather a hurry, minus mv

savings. I've a notion I'm still wanted in Australia.

"After that 1 was in Burma and India for quite a while, doing all sorts of odd jobs. I was there when Uncle Jim died; and I think his conscience must have been troubling him about the Australian business—though he'd always taken my part against a family who wanted me to be a lawyer. Can you imagine it? —because he 101 l me a very competent little fortune, with his blessing, and in the hope, I firmly believe, that I'd go on annoying my people by roaming around the world just as he'd roamed and annoyed them when when he was young. And 1 have. They don't write to me. They're still living up in Cumberland, and 1 write sometimes, but I never get any answer. They’ve washed their hands of me,"

Erica, looking at him with an envy he could not altogether understand, asked strangely: "How old' are, you?" “Twenty-eight. Why?” “Only twenty-eight, and you've lived two or three lives, and have goodness knows how many still to come. You lucky, lucky creature!" "Lucky? What’s so very lucky in that?”

“Just being born a man, I suppose. But when have you found time to become such a fine pianist?” "Oh, music!" he said, his face lighting. "You can always find time for something you love. I've,always cared for it. and had a bit of a flair. I suppose. So when I'm in England I get a few engagements, just to keep my hand in. 1 called myself Olaf Elson as a sop to the audiences; it would take a genius to get away with Martin Hirst, and I'm not a genius. Olaf Elson was the skipper of the Swedish barque on which I rounded the Cape. There were nearly seven feet of him, and a face like Eric Bright-eyes; he’s dead now. five years ago, lost overboard in the Pacific. There’s no one to mind my using his name, and I don't think he'd have been at all troubled, though the fiddle —by ear—was his only instrument." “And what else do you do?" shi’ l asked, smiling. "Oh, a little of everything, I think. I've mined here, and planted there, and done a bit of merchant-shipping on my own account. I was a one-ship line in Central America once, and it was the greatest lark, but no one could accuse me of making money out of it. There .were too many revolutions. I've had cargo after cargo confiscated by one side, or the other. Once or twice we fought for them, but we had to run for it, usually with half the scum of the Gulf on our tails. Then I've been | a professional parachute-jumper with an air-circus that toured Europe once. And I've been a lumber-jack, too, in between whiles. I'm keen on timber; it's individual and it's beautiful, and it grows i.n the open air. There's a job open to me in the timber business whenever I care to take, but so farwell, I don’t want to bo tied. I want to be the cat who walks by himself — all places alike to me. It’s a lot to want; and if ever I find myself unexpectedly growing old I shall take that job and settle down. But until then—well, there's such a lot to be done. I've never seen Japan yet; and there's plenty of unexplored territory on the Amazon; and some day there'll be another attempt on Everest, and maybe that time it won’t fail; anyhow. I want to be there.” He stopped, smiling at her. She sat motionless, with wide eyes fixed on his face, and said: — "Do you feel like Monte Cristo? You should. The world is yours.” It was late when he said goodnight, and the rector's mid-week address was still unfinished. "I hope you’ll never have to grow old and settle down,” said Erica at. I parting. "I should hate to think of you as changed.” She gave him her hand. She supposed it was really good-bye this time, for surely no power could hold him in Brandford for an hour longer than was necessary; and yet there was some inmost security in her which knew that he could not go away like that, without a word more. "Good-bye,” she said. "Until tomorrow? I'm going to stay for a week or two. I think we should find out more —much more—about the eyes of Melusine. After all, fate simply pitched us at each other, and I don't see why 1 should let her go back on the bargain now. Besides. I want to tell you about Lhasa, and a hundred and one other places." She said that she would like to hear though that was a poor expression for the eagerness she felt. So Martin stayed, and Christinas, once a mere variation of Brandford’s monotony, became an event of excitement and ardour. filled with a new passion | ()r life. Erica forgot to be discontented. Being in Martin's company, hearing the stories he would always willingly tell her, was like eating when she was hungry, like travelling the whole world whenever the dullness of her own corner of it became too great. "You like him, don’t you?" she said to her mother, over and over again during that fortnight. It would be a strange person who didn't like him." admitted Mrs Manning. an opinion in which her husbati'l joined her. There was no snow for Christmas but a dry white frost every morning and a sheen of stars every ni-ht. Erica and Martin walked, danced, shopped,, did a number of things together which I until then she had infinitely preferred to do alone. Sometimes he played fori her; sometimes she sang for him. They I showed off: neither of them had ever) felt any pleasure in the amusement before. I (To be Continued i.