Nest Builder | Page 8

a grievance against himself
and fate, he at last fell asleep, clothed as he was, and forgot himself for
a time in such uneasy slumber as the storm allowed.

IV
The second-class deck was rapidly filling. Chairs, running in a double
row about the deck-house were receiving bundles of women, rugs, and
babies. Energetic youths, in surprising ulsters and sweaters, tramped in
broken file between these chairs and the bulwarks. Older men, in
woolen waistcoats and checked caps, or in the aging black of the small
clergy and professional class, obstructed, with a rooted constancy, the
few clear corners of the deck. Elderly women, with the parchment skin
and dun tailored suit of the "personally conducted" tourist, tied their
heads in veils and ventured into sheltered corners. On the boat-deck a
game of shuffleboard was in progress. Above the main companion-way
the ship's bands condescended to a little dance music on behalf of the
second class. The Scotchman, clad in inch-thick heather mixture, was
already discussing with all whom he could buttonhole the possibilities
of a ship's concert. In a word, it was the third day out, the storm was
over, and the passengers were cognizant of life, and of each other.
The Scot had gravitated to a group of men near the smoking-room door,
and having received from his turtle-jawed neighbor of the dinner table,
who was among them, the gift of a cigar, interrogated him as to musical
gifts. "I shall recite mesel'," he explained complacently, sucking in his
smoke. "Might we hope for a song, now, from you? I've asked yon
artist chap, but he says he doesna' sing."
His neighbor also disclaimed talents. "Sorry I can't oblige you. Who
wants to hear a man sing, anyway? Where are your girls?"
"There seems to be a singular absence of bonny girrls on board,"
replied the Scot, twisting his erect forelock reflectively.
"Have you asked the English girl?" suggested a tall, rawboned New
Englander.
"Which English girrl?" demanded the Scot.
"Listen to him--which! Why, that one over there, you owl."

The Scotchman's eyes followed the gesture toward a group of children
surrounding a tall girl who stood by the rail on the leeward side. She
was facing into the wind toward the smoking-room door.
"Eh, mon," said the Scot, "till now I'd only seen the back of yon young
woman," and he promptly strode down the deck to ask, and receive, the
promise of a song.
Stefan Byrd, after a silent breakfast eaten late to avoid his table
companions, had just come on deck. It had been misty earlier, but now
the sun was beginning to break through in sudden glints of brightness.
The deck was still damp, however, and the whole prospect seemed to
the emerging Stefan cheerless in the extreme. His eyes swept the gray,
huddled shapes upon the chairs, the knots of gossiping men, the clumsy,
tramping youths, with the same loathing that the whole voyage had
hitherto inspired in him. The forelocked Scot, tweed cap in hand, was
crossing the deck. "There goes the brute, busy with his infernal
concert," he thought, watching balefully. Then he actually seemed to
point, like a dog, limbs fixed, eyes set, his face, with its salient nose,
thrust forward.
The Scot was speaking to a tall, bareheaded girl, about whom half a
dozen nondescript children crowded. She was holding herself against
the wind, and from her long, clean limbs her woolen dress was whipped,
rippling. The sun had gleamed suddenly, and under the shaft of
brightness her hair shone back a golden answer. Her eyes, hardly raised
to those of the tall Scotchman, were wide, gray, and level--the eyes of
Pallas Athene; her features, too, were goddess-like. One hand upon the
bulwarks, she seemed, even as she listened, to be poised for flight,
balancing to the sway of the ship.
Stefan exhaled a great breath of joy. There was something beautiful
upon the ship, after all. He found and lit a cigarette, and squaring his
shoulders to the deckhouse wall, leaned back the more comfortably to
indulge what he took to be his chief mission--the art of perceiving
beauty.
The girl listened in silence till the Scotchman had finished speaking,
and replied briefly and quietly, inclining her head. The Scot, jotting
something in a pocket notebook, left her with an air of elation, and she
turned again to the children. One, a toddler, was picking at her skirt.
She bent toward him a smile which gave Stefan almost a stab of

satisfaction, it was so gravely sweet, so fitted to her person. She
stooped lower to speak to the baby, and the artist saw the free, rhythmic
motion which meant developed, and untrammeled muscles. Presently
the children, wriggling with joy, squatted in a circle, and the girl sank
to