Lusitania: II.

Chapter II.
A Fellow Passenger

Avis awoke sometime in the night with a pain in her stomach. She rolled over and over, trying to find a comfortable place, but it was no use. By the morning she was downright ill.
“Come along; time to get up,” called Hilda cheerfully. “It’s time to go to breakfast.”
“I’m not hungry,” said Avis. “I feel ill.”
“You do look rather peaky,” said Hilda looking at her white face. “I suppose you’re seasick.”
“I wasn’t seasick yesterday,” protested Avis.
“The sea wasn’t so high yesterday. Don’t worry; you’ll soon get over it. Why don’t you go up on deck? The breeze will freshen you up.”
“All right.”
Avis clambered slowly out of bed and made her way out of her cabin and up the three flights of stairs to the shelter deck. By the time she reached it she was so weak she could do no more than collapse into a deck chair. The fresh sea breeze heartened her up a good bit, but the swinging skyline made her fearfully dizzy.
Suddenly she had a queer feeling that someone was looking at her. She opened her eyes and saw a man standing opposite her, watching her in a thoughtful manner. Avis was generally frightened of strangers, but this man looked kind, and there was something about him that was different from ordinary people. Perhaps it was the contemplative expression in his eyes. Avis smiled shyly and sudden as the beam flashing from a lighthouse he smiled back and his eyes lost their faraway look. Avis thought he had a nice smile.
“Are you ill?” he asked politely in a slight Scot’s accent.
“Yes—seasick,” said Avis. “I’m afraid I’m not a very good sailor.”
“The best way to cure seasickness is to take your mind off of it. Why don’t you try walking up and down the deck a bit?”
“With you?” asked Avis as he stepped towards her.
“If you don’t mind my company.”
“Oh, no, of course not. I should like to very much.” Avis got unsteadily to her feet.
“Come along,” said the man kindly, offering her his hand, and although Avis thought she had outgrown such a babyish thing as holding grownups’ hands, she took it for her legs still felt dreadfully shaky.
“I’m afraid I haven’t introduced myself,” said the man. “My name is Professor Holbourn.”
“I’m Avis Dolphin.”
“How do you do?”
“Quite well, except I still feel rather funny,” said Avis.
“Do you like ships?” he asked next.
“Yes, only they make me seasick. Do you?”
“Yes I do, very much. I’ve a yacht of my own.”
“Do you? Like Mr. Vanderbilt, the millionaire?”
“Yes, only I’m not a millionaire. I live on an island, you see.”
“I should like to live on an island,” said Avis. “What is it like?”
“Well, it’s mostly all sea and sky, with a bit of sand and heather in between.”
“Did that come from a book?” asked Avis.
“Perhaps; I don’t remember.”
“Is it very pretty? The island, I mean.”
“Oh yes—the prettiest place in the world.”
“Where is it?”
“Up near the northern part of Scotland. My family has lived there for hundreds of years.”
“Is it a big island?”
“Oh no, not big at all. It’s quite small actually—only a few miles long and a little over a mile across.”
They had reached the front of the ship now. “Would you like to see the bow cutting through the water?” asked the professor. “But I daresay you’ve seen it before.”
“No I haven’t,” said Avis. “I haven’t seen very much of the ship at all yet. I wanted to, but it’s so big and there are so many people that I was afraid I should get lost.”
“I’ll show you over it, if you like,” said Professor Holbourn. “It’s a wonderful ship.”
“Oh, I should like that!” exclaimed Avis. “Do you know,” she said in surprise, “I don’t feel sick anymore!”
That was a wonderful day. Professor Holbourn and Avis rambled all over the ship, from the bow where the ship’s name might have been seen in gilt on the side, except that it had been painted over, to the stern where the great screws churned the water like antediluvian monsters, and from the bridge where the captain stood, resplendent in navy blue and brass buttons, to the engine room where the mechanics sweated away in grease and smoke. Avis saw the first class staterooms where the actresses and millionaires—like Alfred Vanderbilt—were quartered and the third class staterooms where the immigrants travelled.
As they were walking along the boat deck that afternoon they saw some sailors ahead performing a lifeboat drill. At the boatswain’s whistle they would tumble into a lifeboat and take their positions at the oars. Then at a second whistle they would all tumble out again. Avis thought it looked rather silly.
“I don’t think they’ll be much use if we ever do sink,” she said.
Prof. Holbourn didn’t think so either.
“Wait here,” he said. “I’m going to speak to the captain.”
Avis sat down in a deck chair and looked around. She saw the young sailor she had seen the day before painting the bottom of a lifeboat with grey paint.
“Hello,” she said, for she had lost much of her shyness.
“Hullo, it’s you again,” said the sailor affably. “Did you hear about the stowaways?”
“No,” said Avis excitedly, “what stowaways?”
“Three German fellows they caught hidden in a closet. Spies, most likely.”
“What were they spying on?”
“The ammunition in the hold I’ll wager. Don’t speak a word of English either, so they can’t be questioned. Highly suspicious, if you ask me.”
“What are they going to do with them?”
“Locked ‘em up in the ship’s prison. We’ll hand them over to the law when we get to Liverpool.”
“Perhaps they were going to try to sink the ship,” suggested Avis.
“Well, I don’t know,” said the sailor. “It’d be some piece of work to sink this ship, I’d say, though I wouldn’t put it past them. You never can tell what those Germans will do.”
“What’s your name, please?” asked Avis. Besides Professor Holbourn, the sailor was the only person who had been kind to Avis and she liked to think of him as her friend.
“Morton. Leslie Morton. What’s yours?”
“Mine? Oh, it’s only Avis.”
As she watched him work two little girls ran up. In fact they were the same two girls who had been rude to Avis the day before.
“What are you doing?” the older girl asked.
“You’ve eyes,” the sailor replied. “I’m painting the bottom of this boat.”
“Can I help?”
“That’d be a sight, all right. I guess you can’t.”
But the little girl was not used to being told No. With a sudden movement she snatched the rag he was painting with and began daubing the side of the boat. By the time he’d gotten it away from her she was grey all down her front.
“Now see what you’ve done, you young mischief,” he said. “Look like a dead crab, you do. What’ll your mother say, do you think?”
Avis saw the children’s nurse come hurrying up and hoped they’d get a spanking.
“Oh! Naughty, naughty girl!” cried the nurse. “How could you do such a thing? Look at your beautiful dress! What will your mother say? Bad, bad sailor man to let you do it!”
But the one for whom this last reproach was intended had slipped under the rail and down onto the deck below. He knew when he wasn’t wanted.
Avis saw Professor Holbourn coming down the deck and hurried to tell him about the stowaways. He seemed preoccupied, however. The captain had not listened to him when he had asked to have a lifeboat drill and he was worried.
The days passed and the weather cleared up as Leslie Morton had predicted. Sarah and Hilda were having such a good time that Avis scarcely saw them at all. She spent most of her time with Professor Holbourn who was very good-humoured and never seemed to mind her tagging after him. Avis rather thought he liked it, for he seemed lonely sometimes.
He was a splendid storyteller and told Avis tales of faeries and bogles that inhabited his island. There are no faeries in the world so delightful as those found in the British Isles, and nobody understands faeries so well as the Gaels. Avis was delighted.
“I like your stories,” she said. “The stories people write for girls nowadays are so dull.”
“Perhaps someday I’ll write them out for you in a book,” said Prof. Holbourn.
“Oh, I should like that,” said Avis. “Then you’d be famous and rich and you wouldn’t have to go to America on lecture tours anymore.”
Professor Holbourn laughed, but then grew thoughtful.
“I suppose I shan’t recognise my little boys when I get back. It’s been over a year since I last saw them.”
“Do you miss your family a great deal when you’re away from them?” asked Avis.
“Yes, I do. A great deal,” said Professor Holbourn.
He looked suddenly at Avis.
“You’re travelling all by yourself, aren’t you?” he asked.
“Yes,” said Avis. “Mother couldn’t come. She’s too busy.”
“And your father?”
“My father is in heaven.”
Professor Holbourn said nothing and Avis glanced at him to see if he’d heard. He was looking at the deck and his brows were knit in deep thought.