AN EPISODE IN BALLANTYNE'S LIFE


The Reptons lived upon the Khamballa Hill and the bow-window of their
drawing-room looked down upon the Arabian Sea and southwards along the
coast towards Malabar Point. In this embrasure Mrs. Repton sat through
a morning, denying herself to her friends. A book lay open on her lap
but her eyes were upon the sea. A few minutes after the clock upon her
mantelpiece had struck twelve she saw that for which she watched: the
bowsprit and the black bows of a big ship pushing out from under the
hill and the water boiling under its stem. The whole ship came into
view with its awnings and its saffron funnels and headed to the
north-west for Aden.

Jane Repton rose up from her chair and watched it go. In the sunlight its
black hull was so sharply outlined on the sea, its lines and spars were
so trim that it looked a miniature ship which she could reach out her
hand and snatch. But her eyes grew dim as she watched, so that it became
shapeless and blurred, and long before the liner was out of sight it was
quite lost to her.

"I am foolish," she said as she turned away, and she bit her
handkerchief hard. This was midday of the Friday and ever since that
dinner-party at the Carruthers' on the Monday night she had been
alternating between wild hopes and arguments of prudence. But until this
moment of disappointment she had not realised how completely the hopes
had gained the upper hand with her and how extravagantly she had built
upon Thresk's urgent questioning of her at the dinner-table.