Most Beautiful

She was about to explore another life with Frank. Frank was very kind,

manly, open-hearted. She was to go away with him by the night-boat to

be his wife and to live with him in Buenos Ayres where he had a home

waiting for her. How well she remembered the first time she had seen

him; he was lodging in a house on the main road where she used to visit.

It seemed a few weeks ago. He was standing at the gate, his peaked cap

pushed back on his head and his hair tumbled forward over a face of

bronze. Then they had come to know each other. He used to meet her

outside the Stores every evening and see her home. He took her to see

The Bohemian Girl and she felt elated as she sat in an unaccustomed part

of the theatre with him. He was awfully fond of music and sang a little.

People knew that they were courting and, when he sang about the lass

that loves a sailor, she always felt pleasantly confused. He used to call

her Poppens out of fun. First of all it had been an excitement for her to

have a fellow and then she had begun to like him. He had tales of distant

countries. He had started as a deck boy at a pound a month on a ship of

the Allan Line going out to Canada. He told her the names of the ships he

had been on and the names of the different services. He had sailed

through the Straits of Magellan and he told her stories of the terrible

Patagonians. He had fallen on his feet in Buenos Ayres, he said, and had

come over to the old country just for a holiday. Of course, her father had

found out the affair and had forbidden her to have anything to say to him.

"I know these sailor chaps," he said.

One day he had quarrelled with Frank and after that she had to meet her

lover secretly.

The evening deepened in the avenue. The white of two letters in her lap

grew indistinct. One was to Harry; the other was to her father. Ernest had

been her favourite but she liked Harry too. Her father was becoming old

lately, she noticed; he would miss her. Sometimes he could be very nice.

Not long before, when she had been laid up for a day, he had read her

out a ghost story and made toast for her at the fire. Another day, when

their mother was alive, they had all gone for a picnic to the Hill of Howth.

She remembered her father putting on her mothers bonnet to make the

children laugh.

Her time was running out but she continued to sit by the window, leaning

her head against the window curtain, inhaling the odour of dusty

cretonne. Down far in the avenue she could hear a street organ playing.

She knew the air Strange that it should come that very night to remind

her of the promise to her mother, her promise to keep the home together

as long as she could. She remembered the last night of her mother's

illness; she was again in the close dark room at the other side of the hall

and outside she heard a melancholy air of Italy. The organ-player had

been ordered to go away and given sixpence. She remembered her father

strutting back into the sickroom saying:

"Damned Italians! coming over here!"

As she mused the pitiful vision of her mother's life laid its spell on the

very quick of her being--that life of commonplace sacrifices closing in final

craziness. She trembled as she heard again her mother's voice saying

constantly with foolish insistence:

"Derevaun Seraun! Derevaun Seraun!"

She stood up in a sudden impulse of terror. Escape! She must escape!

Frank would save her. He would give her life, perhaps love, too. But she

wanted to live. Why should she be unhappy? She had a right to

happiness. Frank would take her in his arms, fold her in his arms. He

would save her.

She stood among the swaying crowd in the station at the North Wall. He

held her hand and she knew that he was speaking to her, saying

something about the passage over and over again. The station was full of

soldiers with brown baggages. Through the wide doors of the sheds she

caught a glimpse of the black mass of the boat, lying in beside the quay

wall, with illumined portholes. She answered nothing. She felt her cheek

pale and cold and, out of a maze of distress, she prayed to God to direct

her, to show her what was her duty. The boat blew a long mournful

whistle into the mist. If she went, tomorrow she would be on the sea with

Frank, steaming towards Buenos Ayres. Their passage had been booked.

Could she still draw back after all he had done for her? Her distress awoke

a nausea in her body and she kept moving her lips in silent fervent

prayer.