The Lost Master - The Collected Works

by Stanley G. Weinbaum

  "Then I'll leave you," said Mark, "until this afternoon."

  He kissed her gently, and stepped quietly into the empty corridor; he tiptoed down the creaking stairs. Below, the bar-room was deserted; even Hong, who never seemed absent from his post, was invisible now. The sunlight slanted across the tables, bringing out in curious shades the dust that had settled on them since the visit of the men of the Caroline. The room, for all its open windows, had a musty, abandoned smell.

  Mark opened the chest behind the bar; nothing to eat was there save several clustered bunches of bananas. Lacking ice, of course, bread, fruit spoiled too quickly to warrant keeping, but he had hoped for a pineapple. He tore four of the brown bananas from their cluster, and slipped them into a paper bag from the bar; they'd do for breakfast and lunch, should his walk prove lengthy enough for two meals.

  He stepped from the door of the Diver's Helmet into the blinding sunlight of full tropical day. The gulls were gathering on the beach; their raucous squawks sounded familiarly pleasant to him—he had heard the sound on island after island for many months. The surface of the cove itself was almost glassy in its calm, but beyond the point, out in the open Pacific, small rollers flashed in the morning light. Behind him, the green hills of Tongatabu, with their mystery, glowed emerald; he turned and glanced up at them toward the village where he and Loring had watched the dance of the virgins. There was, of course, no visible sign of that settlement; nothing but lush jungle stretched from the edge of the clearing to the top of the highest visible hill.

  Loring was sprawled on his side beneath his tree, apparently asleep; save for his presence the clearing was as deserted as the bar-room Mark had just quitted, and nearly as quiet.

  He walked quietly across the clearing, past the unstirring beachcomber, and along the broad white sand that he and Vanya had followed before, on the walk they had taken together. He passed the great fallen tree they had clambered over, and he passed, far beyond, the coral outcropping on which they had rested, and where Vanya had confessed to Mark that she loved him. Where now was that love of hers, he wondered. Had he killed it? Small blame to Vanya if she had ceased to care, or if she had never really cared! He had been at fault, grievously at fault, throughout the whole miserable affair; yet, after all, could he have acted differently? Mark knew well enough that he couldn't have; he had done only what his training, his ideals, his morality, had made it inevitable for him to do. He couldn't have offered marriage to Vanya, not with the stern social code of half a dozen generations denying him the privilege. Not even loving her as he now realized he did.

  So he tramped on along the deserted beach, far beyond the place where he and Vanya had turned back. He passed a pineapple grower's establishment; natives were abroad in the fields, moving among the palm-like spikes of the plants. Each worker, as Mark passed, turned and stared silently at him for a long minute or more; strangers, he reflected were doubtless rare beings along that coast, especially strangers trudging alone along the beach. And the sun rose inexorably in the sky; when it was nearly at the zenith, he paused, threw himself on the sand, and consumed his warm and very soft bananas.

  He sat for a while thinking. He thought of Loring, mysterious, clever, ineffectual, and of Hong and Shene, whom Loring hated, but for the most part he thought of Vanya. He thought of her at first as she had looked in the crimson blouse and black velvet shorts in which she danced. A wave of longing swept over him at the picture he evoked of her slim, graceful body. He closed his eyes, and deliberately turned his mind from that image he found so dangerously alluring. He forced himself to consider Vanya's inexplicable revulsion and her refusal to uphold her end of the bargain. His mood of longing changed gradually to a slow feeling of indignation.

  "She wants marriage," he thought. "and that I can't in honor give. Black sheep or not, I'm still a Talbot!"

  He glanced at the sun; it was already, he thought, a bare hair's breadth past the zenith; he had to be leaving. He rose, crumpled the empty paper bag into a ball, and tossed it into the backwash of a Pacific comber. He watched it drift for a moment, and then set his face on the return route.

  Somehow the return seemed quicker; some excitement or expectation within him made his footsteps much hastier than on the first half of his long walk.

  "Vanya's to me like magnet to steel," he told himself. "I leave her slowly and with effort, but I bound back with such celerity that it surprises even myself."

  He passed the pineapple plantations, the coral outcropping, the mighty fallen tree, and the curve of the Cove lay before him. He rounded the bend of the shore; a vessel lay at anchor in the tiny harbor, a great schooner-rigged ship with men busy about the deck.

  Loring, peeling a bread-fruit, was watching idly; he looked up at Mark's approach.

  "There she lies!" he said. "The Kermadec, with her crew itching to enrich Pearly Shene."

  "Just in?" said Mark. "There's no one ashore, from the look of the tender."

  "She's been in an hour, at least. Horsten's not the man to give his crew shore leave until they've put in a full day's work. Not a man ashore until well after dark, unless he's changed his nature. He'll keep them swabbing decks and polishing brass, whether it's needed or not, until mess time. He's a hard man to sail under."

  "Shene must love him for that!"

  "Shene doesn't care. What money the crew has will be his anyway before they sail. But look—there's your transportation!"

  Mark turned. The native craft was just rounding the point toward the beach.

  CHAPTER XXXI

  STUBBORNNESS

  "You ready to go?" said Pearly Shene, as Mark and Loring leaned at the bar.

  "Just about," answered Mark.

  "Sort o' late to leave today," rumbled the giant. "Taulanga's good distance."

  "We'll take it by night," said Mark, wondering if Vanya would actually persist in her obstinacy. She wouldn't, he decided; she was bluffing beyond doubt. "It's cooler that way," he added, to Shene.

  "Sometimes not," said the other.

  "Can't help it. We'll have to do it; the packet leaves Taulanga early tomorrow."

  Shene gave only a hoarse rumbling by way of reply.

  "And while I think of it," said Mark, "I want you to credit my friend Loring with a quart bottle. I'll pay for it now."

  "Sure," said Shene. "He'll get it whenever he wants it."

  "I think I will!" said Loring, disregarding the glare of Shene's unfriendly eyes.

  "Want a receipt?" asked Mark.

  "What good is a receipt from him?" queried the beachcomber, utterly careless of the fact that Shene was glowering at him. "It would have about as much value as an indenture from Hong there, and that's worth, to be very exact, nothing!"

  Shene gave a faint but ominous rumble. He moved away down the length of the bar, and engaged Hong in a low-voiced discussion of some sort. Mark caught the murmured sound of a word or two; it sounded like "last chance."

  "You're simply laying the foundation for future trouble," he muttered to Loring. "Why don't you try being a little tactful?"

  "You can't use tact with pigs," said the beachcomber casually.

  Mark set his glass on the bar.

  "I've got a number of things to attend to," he said, moving away. "I'll see you before I leave."

  He ascended the stairway, Vanya's door was closed, but he heard her moving about within the chamber; he knocked gently on the panel.

  The door opened, and he stepped in. Vanya was wearing her flowered robe and tiny leather moccasins; she had apparently been combing her hair, for it cascaded in glistening ebony streams about her shoulders. She looked at Mark with that serious questioning glance he had come to know so well.

  "Has the grand jury reported?" he asked, smiling at her.

  "Yes, Mark," she said, still with the grave eyes fixed on him.

  "And did it reverse the decision?" he continued, covering his growing concern by the use of banter.

  "No. It confirmed it."

  "
Honey!" Mark exclaimed. "You can't be meaning to carry this farce any further!"

  "It isn't a farce, Mark. It's a comedy or a tragedy—but not a farce." She sank on the bed. "Which one it is depends on where you sit, I suppose."

  "I know which it is to me!"

  "And to me," added the girl. "But your friend Loring would laugh his shrivelled soul away at it!"

  "Vanya, you're being a stubborn fool!"

  "I don't know, Mark. Perhaps I am."

  "The prau's here. We ought to be leaving right now."

  "And yet we're not leaving. Not now nor ever, Mark."

  Mark paced back and forth in the limited space of the room. He was brought finally face to face with Vanya's decision, and he realized at last how desperately he wanted her to go with him. Yet it seemed incredible that she should refuse, should prefer this sordid sailor's hangout to the possibilities, the opportunities, that America could offer. He turned suddenly to her, resolved on a new method of attacking her opposition. He seated himself beside her, taking one tiny hand in his. He lifted it in his own great palm, and held it close as if studying it.

  "Vanya, dear," he said. "Have you changed so much in your feelings toward me? Have I done or said anything so unforgivable that my offer, which once was acceptable to you, has suddenly become so distasteful that you can't even consider it?"

  The girl looked at him with something of the old sullen look returning to her face. A certain sweetness that had grown there of late was dying. She made no answer.

  "Dear," said Mark softly, "won't you answer me? At least I deserve to hear your reasons for this abrupt reversal."

  "I've given you my reason," said Vanya dully. "Don't make me repeat it. You can't give it, and I shan't demean myself to ask."

  "Vanya, dear,” he murmured, "did you mean what you said that day, the day we walked together?"

  "That I loved you? Mark, you know I meant it. I say it again, Mark—I love you! Of that at least I'm not ashamed."

  "Yet you won't go?"

  "And yet I wont go, dear." Mark sat silently thoughtful for a long moment. Vanya reached out her free hand, touching very lightly the unruly brown curls of his head. "Vanya," he said finally, "if I thought that any fear of me were moving you, if I believed that a repugnance to my caresses were the thing that troubled you, I'd promise gladly to bring you into America without a single advance on my part. I'd take you there without obligation, and ask absolutely nothing of you."

  "Mark! Oh, Mark!" she cried. "I know that. I never doubted that. If I'd wanted that, I'd have asked. But it doesn't solve the difficulty—not in the least. I couldn't accept charity—from you least of all people in the world."

  "Marriage again!" thought Mark ruefully. 'The one thing I'm forbidden to give by everything in which I believe." But aloud he said, "I knew you'd refuse. Yet the offer stands."

  "But it doesn't solve anything, dear."

  "No," said Mark slowly. "It doesn't."

  He pressed the girl closer to him, taking her lovely, troubled face between his hands. He leaned down and kissed her, gently at first, and then with increasing ardor as she closed her dark eyes and yielded in his arms. When finally he withdrew his lips, she lay quiescent against him for awhile, her breath sounding in little gasps.

  "Vanya," he breathed, "will you go to America with me?"

  "Mark, dear!" she whispered.

  "Will you go?"

  She sat suddenly erect, leaning away from him.

  "Mark! Even your kisses are lies, planned for effect. But they can't make me alter this decision. No matter how quickly I forget while I'm in your arms, I'll always remember the moment I'm free of you. I'll remember and repeat what I've said—Mark, I can't go!"

  Mark was nearing the point of exasperation. His quick temper rose in him; he fought it back with a surge of effort.

  "Vanya," he said, "if this is a trick of yours, an attempt to force my hand, or a method of getting a better bargain, don't drive me too far to recall."

  "A trick?" queried the girl. "Do you think I don't mean it?"

  "I don't know, but if you don't mean it, you'd better retract it now."

  "Well, I don't retract it. You'll see whether I mean it!"

  "Vanya," said Mark, "I'm going to my room before this—this insane defiance of yours drives my anger beyond control. I'm going to pack what's left of my things, and then I'm coming back here. And I want to see your belongings packed too."

  He turned abruptly and strode out of the door. A flicker of movement at the head of the stairs caught his attention, and he saw the massive face of Hong disappearing below the floor level.

  "Eavesdropping," he thought fiercely. "To the devil with him!" He strode angrily back to his own room, and thrust the door savagely open, kicking his littered bags aside.

  He sat angrily on the bed, wondering what was to be done now. What if Vanya remained firm in her decision? After all this long search, all his restlessness, his dreams of her.

  "I'll have to out-bluff her now," he thought. "Is this Talbot stubbornness or really the ideals and moralities of my people? Damned if I know!"

  He rose, and began flinging his possessions into his bags. The room looked odd and bare when he finished; it had been home for so long. Then he strode to Vanya's room, knocked and entered, to find her still seated on the bed as if she hadn't moved.

  "You're not packed!" he snapped. "Does this mean you're persisting in your obstinacy?"

  She nodded gravely, silently. "Very well! I'm leaving.' He paused for her reply; none came. "Listen, Vanya," he continued. "I'll give you one final chance. I'll wait just a half-hour on the beach. Understand? Half an hour!"

  He turned away, moving toward the door.

  "Mark," said Vanya. "Mark. your key. Take it."

  The key of the white house in Spring Brook.

  "Keep the damned thing!" grated Mark.

  "No." She sprang to the door, tore the key from the ancient lock, and thrust it into Mark's hand. He saw tears on her cheeks. "I don't want a key! I'll not need a key to lock my door here—not ever again!"

  HALF AN HOUR

  Vanya remained staring at the door as it closed behind Mark. She was scarcely aware that tears were on her cheeks, that her hands were clenched in determined little fists, that her mouth was set in a tight line of desperate intent. She was miserably distraught, despondent over Mark's apparently heartless treatment; he had so completely failed to comprehend her feelings.

  "He doesn't care for me," she told herself. "He's cold, hard, and without any understanding; all I mean to him is a pleasant plaything. I'm not even a human being to him—just a doll—or a pet. I'm an intractable dog that won't jump fast enough to his bidding!"

  She threw herself unhappily on her bed, and lay with tear-bright eyes staring at the moldy plaster of the ceiling. The pattern of its cracks and damp spots was graven on her mind from long familiarity. There was the odd blur that reminded her of a spouting whale, and there the one that resembled a horrible caricature of Hong's fleshy profile. Was she to see those unpleasant patterns year after year, in this room, or another like it?

  If only Mark had loved her! That and that alone, could have justified her yielding to him, could have made that bargain not only acceptable, but a splendid, joyous thing. She could have taken that at and much more from him—if he had loved her. But lacking his love, the bargain was a sordid business arrangement, insufferable, unbearable. Even Shene's Cove was preferable to that.

  For on this most vital point Vanya and Mark had completely misunderstood each other's meaning. Mark, bound by the rigorous ethics of his New England training, read only "marriage" in Vanya's demand. He never doubted but that that point alone was the basis of her refusal. And Vanya, loving Mark, and believing his interest in her to be but the merest physical infatuation, was demanding his love; for that only she needed to justify her acceptance of his offer. To Mark, the bargain lacking marriage, was unholy, and Vanya had condemned herself by her original complaisance. He thou
ght her present refusal the result of his own attitude, an attempt to force him into some more favorable agreement. But to Vanya, the bargain was insufferable only because it lacked Mark's love. They had quarreled over the situation without either comprehending the other!

  But the girl, lying on her bed and gazing despondently at the ceiling, knew nothing of Mark's own confusion, nothing of the struggle he was undergoing. She seemed lost, helpless, utterly hopeless. She glanced wearily at the cheap watch, standing upright in a case on the washstand beside her. Less than three minutes had passed.

  CHAPTER XXXII

  She rose restlessly and approached the window. There, pacing up and down the beach, was Mark. The prau was drawn up on the sand, its oarsmen lounging beside it, and in the bay lay the Kermadec, with seamen at work on its deck. Back and forth strode Mark, his eyes bent on the sand.

  He looked up, gazed directly at the window where she was standing. She saw him pause, draw his watch from his pocket, and regard it meaningly. Cruel gesture of warning! On an impulse she loosed the bow that bound her robe, spread it wide with both arms. Like a flame in the window, the scarlet blouse of her dancing costume flashed in the sun. Mark saw it; he turned his back and stared out over the blue waves of the Pacific.

  The room seemed suddenly stifling to Vanya. She kicked off the tan leather moccasins, and slipped on the crimson slippers that were a part of her costume. She moved into the hall, not knowing where she was going—anywhere, so that the horror of that drab, desolate room should cease to weigh upon her.

  Mark, pacing beside the prau, was in something of a frenzy. He couldn't believe Vanya would persist to the end in her refusal; that was incredible. Yet what was he to do? Carry through and leave, hoping she'd get in touch with him? He knew she wouldn't. Pretend to leave, and stay in Taulanga? He'd be back at the Cove in two days.

  "I'll bluff it through to the last minute," he decided grimly. "She'll weaken! When the half hour's up, I'll have the blacks paddle to the point, out of sight of the hotel. We'll see how she likes it!"