Castle Nowhere | Page 6

the exception of two loopholes, and the
dug-out glided its quietest past these. But the west shone out radiant, a
rude little balcony overhanging the water, and in it a girl in a mahogany
chair, nibbling something and reading.
'My sugar and my sonnets, as I am alive!' ejaculated Waring to himself.
The girl took a fresh bite with her little white teeth, and went on
reading in the sunset light.
'Cool,' thought Waring.
And cool she looked truly to a man who had paddled two days in a hot
sticky fog, as, clad in white, she sat still and placid on her airy perch.
Her hair, of the very light fleecy gold seldom seen after babyhood,
hung over her shoulders unconfined by comb or ribbon, felling around
her like a veil and glittering in the horizontal sunbeams; her face, throat
and hands were white as the petals of a white camellia, her features
infantile, her cast-down eyes invisible under the full-orbed lids. Waring
gazed at her cynically, his boat motionless; it accorded with his theories
that the only woman he had seen for months should be calmly eating
and reading stolen sweets. The girl turned a page, glanced up, saw him,
and sprang forward smiling; as she stood at the balcony, her beautiful

hair fell below her knees.
'Jacob,' she cried gladly, 'is that you at last?'
'No,' replied Waring, 'it is not Jacob; rather Esau. Jacob was too tricky
for me. The damsel, Rachel, I presume!'
'My name is Silver,' said the girl, 'and I see you are not Jacob at all.
Who are you, then?'
'A hungry, tired man who would like to come aboard and rest awhile.'
'Aboard? This is not a boat.'
'What then?'
'A castle,--Castle Nowhere.'
'You reside here?'
'Of course; where else should I reside? Is it not a beautiful place?' said
the girl, looking around with a little air of pride.
'I could tell better if I was up there.'
'Come, then.'
'How?'
'Do you not see the ladder?'
'Ah, yes,--Jacob had a ladder, I remember; he comes up this way, I
suppose?'
'He does not; but I wish he would.'
'Undoubtedly. But you are not Leah all this time?'
'I am Silver, as I told you before; I know not--what you mean with your
Leah.'
'But, mademoiselle, your Bible--'
'What is Bible?'
'You have never read the Bible?'
'It is a book, then. I like books,' replied Silver, waving her hand
comprehensively; 'I have read five, and now I have a new one.'
'Do you like it, your new one?' asked Waring, glancing towards his
property.
'I do not understand it all; perhaps you can explain to me?'
'I think I can,' answered the young man, smiling in spite of himself;
'that is, if you wish to learn.'
'Is it hard?'
'That depends upon the scholar; now, some minds--' Here a hideous
face looked out through one of the little windows, and then vanished.
'Ah,' said Waring, pausing, 'one of the family?'

'That is Lorez, my dear old nurse.'
The face now came out on to the balcony and showed itself as part of
an old negress, bent and wrinkled with age.
'He came in a boat, Lorez,' said Silver, 'and yet you see he is not Jacob.
But he says he is tired and hungry, so we will have supper, now,
without waiting for father.'
The old woman smiled and nodded, stroking the girl's glittering hair
meanwhile with her black hand.
'As soon as the sun has gone it will be very damp,' said Silver, turning
to her guest; 'you will come within. But you have not told me-your
name.'
'Jarvis,' replied Waring promptly.
'Come, then, Jarvis.' And she led the way through a low door into a
long narrow room with a row of little square windows on each side all
covered with little square white curtains. The walls and ceiling were
planked and the workmanship of the whole rude and clumsy; but a gay
carpet covered the floor, a chandelier adorned with lustres, hung from a
hook in the ceiling, large gilded vases and a mirror in a tarnished gilt
frame adorned a shelf over the hearth, mahogany chairs stood in ranks
against the wall under the little windows and a long narrow table ran
down the centre of the apartment from end to end. It all seemed
strangely familiar; of what did it remind him? His eyes fell upon the
table-legs; they were riveted to the floor. Then it came to him at
once,--the long narrow cabin of a lake steamer.
'I wonder if it is not anchored after all,' he thought.
'Just a few shavings and one little stick, Lorez,' said Silver; 'enough to
give us light and drive away the damp.'
Up flared the blaze and spread