The Last Hope | Page 8

once, but many times, Dormer Colville laughingly denied any
responsibility in the matter.
"I will not even tell the story as it was told to me," he said to the
Marquis de Gemosac, to the Abbe Touvent and to the Comtesse de
Chantonnay, whom he met frequently enough at the house of his cousin,
Mrs. St. Pierre Lawrence, in that which is now the Province of the
Charente Inferieure. "I will not even tell you the story as it was told to
me, until one of you has seen the man. And then, if you ask me, I will
tell you. It is nothing to me, you understand. I am no dreamer, but a
very material person, who lives in France because he loves the sunshine,
and the cuisine, and the good, kind hearts, which no government or
want of government can deteriorate."
And Madame de Chantonnay, who liked Dormer Colville--with whom
she admitted she always felt herself in sympathy--smiled graciously in
response to his gallant bow. For she, too, was a materialist who loved
the sunshine and the cuisine; more especially the cuisine.
Moreover, Colville never persuaded the Marquis de Gemosac to come
to England. He went so far as to represent, in a realistic light, the
discomforts of the journey, and only at the earnest desire of many
persons concerned did he at length enter into the matter and good-
naturedly undertake to accompany the aged traveller.
So far as his story was concerned, he kept his word, entertaining the
Marquis on the journey and during their two days' sojourn at the
humble inn at Farlingford with that flow of sympathetic and easy
conversation which always made Madame de Chantonnay protest that
he was no Englishman at all, but all that there was of the most French.
Has it not been seen that Colville refused to translate the dark sayings
of River Andrew by the side of the grass-grown grave, which seemed to
have been brought to the notice of the travellers by the merest accident?
"I promised you that I should tell you nothing until you had seen him,"
he repeated, as the Marquis followed with his eyes the movements of

the group of which the man they called Loo Barebone formed the
centre.
No one took much notice of the two strangers. It is not considered good
manners in a seafaring community to appear to notice a new- comer.
Captain Clubbe was naturally the object of universal attention. Was he
not bringing foreign money into Farlingford, where the local purses
needed replenishing now that trade had fallen away and agriculture was
so sorely hampered by the lack of roads across the marsh?
Clubbe pushed his way through the crowd to shake hands with the Rev.
Septimus Marvin, who seemed to emerge from a visionary world of his
own in order to perform that ceremony and to return thither on its
completion.
Then the majority of the onlookers straggled homeward, leaving a few
wives and sweethearts waiting by the steps, with patient eyes fixed on
the spidery figures in the rigging of "The Last Hope." Dormer Colville
and the Marquis de Gemosac were left alone, while the rector stood a
few yards away, glaring abstractedly at them through his gold-rimmed
spectacles as if they had been some strange flotsam cast up by the high
tide.
"I remember," said Colville to his companion, "that I have an
introduction to the pastor of the village, who, if I am not mistaken, is
even now contemplating opening a conversation. It was given to me by
my banker in Paris, who is a Suffolk man. You remember, Marquis,
John Turner, of the Rue Lafayette?"
"Yes--yes," answered the Marquis, absently. He was still watching the
retreating villagers, with eyes old and veiled by the trouble that they
had seen.
"I will take this opportunity of presenting myself," said Colville, who
was watching the little group from the rectory without appearing to do
so. He rose as he spoke and went toward the clergyman, who was
probably much younger than he looked. For he was ill-dressed and
ill-shorn, with straggling grey hair hanging to his collar. He had a

musty look, such as a book may have that is laid on a shelf in a
deserted room and never opened or read. Septimus Marvin, the world
would say, had been laid upon a shelf when he was inducted to the
spiritual cure of Farlingford. But no man is ever laid on a shelf by Fate.
He climbs up there of his own will, and lies down beneath the dust of
forgetfulness because he lacks the heart to arise and face the business
of life.
Seeing that Dormer Colville was approaching him, he came forward
with a certain scholarly ease of manner as if he had