From Fetter Lane to the flower-walk in Kensington Gardens, it is a far cry. Ah, you do not know what continents might lie between that wonderful flower-walk and Fetter Lane. Why, there are people in the darksome little alleys which lie off that neighbourhood of Fleet Street, who have never been further west than the Tottenham Court Road! Fetter Lane, the Tottenham Court Road, and the flower-walk in Kensington Gardens! It may be only three miles or so, but just as there is no such thing as time in the ratio of Eternity, so there is no such thing as distance in the ratio of Space. There is only contrast--and suffering.
They measure everything.
John made his way first to the flower-walk, just for the sight and the scent of those wonderful growing things that bring their treasures of inimitable colour up out of the secret breast of the dull brown earth.
Where, in that clod of earth, which does but soil the hands of him who touches it, does the tulip get its red? Has the Persian Poet guessed the secret? Is it the blood of a buried Caesar? Enhance it by calling it a mystery--all the great things of the world are that. Wherever the tulip does get its red, it is a brave thing to look at after the dull, smoky bricks of the houses in Fetter Lane.
John stood at the top of the walk and filled his eyes with the varied colours. There were tulips red, tulips yellow, tulips purple and scarlet and mauve. The little hunchback was already there painting them, hugging up close to his easel, taking much more into the heart of him than he probably ever puts down upon his canvas.
He comes every season of every year, that little hunchback, and Spring and Summer, and Autumn and Winter, he paints in Kensington Gardens; and Spring and Summer, and Autumn and Winter, I have no doubt he will continue to paint the Gardens that he loves. And then one day, the Gardens will miss him. He will come no more. The dull brown earth will have taken him as it takes the bulb of a tulip, and perhaps out of his eyes--those eyes which have been drinking in the colours of the flowers for so long, some tulip will one day get its red.
Surely there cannot be libel in such a statement as this? We must all die. The little hunchback, if he reads this, will not approach me for damages, unless he were of the order of Christian Scientists or some such sect, who defy the ravages of Time. And how could he be that? He must have seen the tulips wither.
From the flower-walk, John made his way to the round pond. The ships were sailing. Sturdy mariners with long, thin, bamboo poles were launching their craft in the teeth of the freshening breeze. Ah, those brave ships, and those sturdy men with their young blue eyes, searching across that vast expanse of water for the return of the _Daisy_ or the _Kittywake_ or some such vessel with some such fanciful name!
John took a chair to watch them. A couple of hoary sailors--men who had vast dealings with ships and traffic on deep waters--passed by him with their vessels tucked up under their arms.
"I sail for 'Frisco in five minutes," said one--"for 'Frisco with a cargo of iron."
"What do you use for iron?" asked the other, with the solemnity that such cargo deserved.
"My sister gave me some of her hairpins," was the stern reply.
This, if you like it, is romance! Bound for 'Frisco with a cargo of iron! Think of it! The risk, the peril, the enormous fortune at stake!
His sister's hairpins! What a world, what a City of Beautiful Nonsense, if one could only believe like this!
John spread out his short story on his knee, looked at the first lines of it, then closed it with disgust. What was the good of writing stories, when such adventures as these were afoot? Perhaps the little hunchback felt that too. What was the good of painting with red paint on a smooth canvas when God had painted those tulips on the rough brown earth? Why had not he got a sister who would hazard her hairpins in his keeping, so that he might join in the stern business of life and carry cargoes of iron to far-off parts?
He sat idly watching the good ship start for 'Frisco. One push of the thin bamboo pole and it was off--out upon the tossing of the waves. A breath of Spring air blew into its sails, filled them--with the scent of the tulips, perhaps--and bore it off upon its voyage, while the anxious master, with hands shading his eyes, watched it as it dipped over the horizon of all possible interference.
Where was it going to come to shore? The voyage lasted fully five minutes and, at the last moment, a trade wind seizing it--surely it must be a trade wind which seizes a vessel with a cargo such as this--it was born direct for the shore near where John was sitting.
The captain came hurrying along the beach to receive it and, from a seat under the elm trees, a girl came toward him.
"Do you think it's brought them safely?" she asked.
He looked up with a touch of manly pride.
"The _Albatross_ has never heaved her cargo overboard yet," he said with a ringing voice.
So this was the sister. From that wonderful head of hair of hers had come the cargo of the good ship _Albatross_. She turned that head away to hide a smile of amusement. She looked in John's direction. Their eyes met.
It was the lady of the heavy fur coat who had prayed to St. Joseph in the Sardinia Street chapel.
CHAPTER VII
THE VOYAGE OF THE GOOD SHIP ALBATROSS
This is where Destiny and the long arm of Coincidence play a part in the making of all Romance. One quality surely there must be in such matters, far more essential than that happiness ever after which the sentimentalist so clamours for. That quality, it is, of Destiny, which makes one know that, whatever renunciation and despair may follow, such things were meant to be. Coincidence combines to make them so, and, you may be sure, for a very good reason. And is it so long a stretch of the arm from Sardinia Street Chapel to Kensington Gardens? Hardly! In fiction, and along the high-road, perhaps it might be; but then this is not fiction. This is true.
Romance then--let us get an entirely new definition for it--is a chain of Circumstances which out of the infinite chaos links two living things together for a definite end--that end which is a pendant upon the chain itself and may be a heart with a lock of hair inside, or it may be a cross, or a dagger, or a crown--you never know till the last link is forged.
When he looked into the eyes of the lady of St. Joseph--so he had, since that incident, called her in his mind--John knew that Destiny had a hand in the matter.
He told me afterwards----
"You only meet the people in this world whom you are meant to meet.
Whether you want to meet them or not is another matter, and has no power to bribe the hand of Circumstance."
He was generalising certainly, but that is the cloak under which a man speaks of himself.
However that may be, and whether the law holds good or not, they met.
He saw the look of recognition that passed across her eyes; then he rose to his feet.
The knowledge that you are in the hands of Destiny gives you boldness.
John marched directly across to her and lifted his hat.
"My name is Grey," he said--"John Grey. I'm taking it for granted that St. Joseph has already introduced us and forgotten to tell you who I was. If I take too much for granted, say so, I shall perfectly understand."
Well, what could she say? You may tell a man that he's presumptuous; but hardly when he presumes like this. Besides, there was Destiny at the back of him, putting the words into his mouth.
She smiled. It was impossible to do otherwise.
"Do you think St. Joseph would be recognised in our society?" she asked.
"I have no doubt of it," said he. "St. Joseph was a very proper man."
They turned to a cry of the master mariner as the good ship _Albatross_ touched the beach. Immediately she was unloaded and her cargo brought triumphantly to the owner.
"This," said John, "is the cargo of iron. Then I presume we're in 'Frisco.
"How did you know?" she asked.
"I heard the sailing orders given in the Docks at London ten minutes ago."
She looked down, concealing a smile, at her brother, then at John, lastly at the good ship _Albatross_--beached until further orders. He watched her. She was making up her mind.
"Ronald," said she, when the wandering of her eyes had found decision, "this is a friend of mine, Mr. Grey."
Ronald held out a horny hand.
"How do you do, sir."
Surely that settled matters? St. Joseph was approved of. She had said--this is a friend of mine.
They shook hands then with a heavy grip. It is the recognised way with those who go down to the sea in ships.