The Tenby Observer Weekly List of Visitors and Directory

THE IRIS. BARBY CARSTON and Jessie May were stan&5ag together, one fine evening in July, on the strand at the water's brink. The little seaport of L was looking its best, for the houses and the hill behind were rosy in the light of the setting sun, which shot a thrill of golden red over the bay, the rugged shore, and the figures of the two, who were talking with much earnestness. Henry Carston was a tall,1 handsome, sun-burnt young sailor; five-and- twenty years old he might be, less or more. Can you think of me, Jessie ?" he was] saying, ear- nestly. I suppose I must think of any one who is standing straight before my eyes," she said, laughingly. "Yon know, Jessie, I don't want a joke for an answer." Such as I have you must take, Harry." Ah, Jessie, answer. Can you love me ?" I love all my fellow-creatures, except such as are very old, or very ugly." Jessie, be serious for one moment. Can you love me enough to become my wife ?" I shall never marry. I am happy and free. Do not put yourself in my power, Harry, I advise you. If I were to say I liked you now, perhaps ten minutes after I should change my mind, and fancy I liked some one else better." Ab, Jessie, you jest. Tell me plainly, yes or no. I am a plain, honest sailor, and I want a simple answer. Say Yes,' and I will bless you for ever; if not, I must bear it, or try to bear it. Think I am going away for a long voyage. I shall be away a year, perhaps. Would you keep me in suspense all that time ? Indeed, I think It would kill me. One word of hope, Jessie, only one; Surely you will say it ?" Now, Harry, stop, or I shall begin to cry, and then you will not know what to do with me. Why can you not let me alone ? One kind word, Jessie ? I do not ask much, do I ?" But if I say it, you will think I love you." And you do not ? You cannot ?" u Harry, you are handsome, with your brown curls, and your blue eyes, and you know it. And you think we girls have nothing to do but fall in love with you. Now, you are quite mistaken." "Ah, Jessie, you mock me." "Come, Harry. Are you handsome or are you not?" Don't perplex me, Jessie." Are you handsome, Harry ? Speak this in- stant." I believe people say so, but I am sure I wish I were ugly if that would lead you to have any compassion." "I don't believe you, Harry." "Well, what shall I say to you? See! ah! see, my boat is coming; say something, one word that I may remember when I am far away, before she comes up." She paused- I think I am good enough already in coming 'down to see you off." Here the boat grated on the strand. "We're late, captain," said the man who steered. ,I You are, and the ship must be under weigh in half an hour." So she will, sir, and in less." Good-bye, then, Jessie," he said, half coldly; but he started, for there were tears in her eyes. He looked at her with an earnest question in his eyes. "I am thinking of your poor mother. She will be so lonely," she said, answering his appealing look. "It is kind of you to think of her," he said, bitterly, and without offering to take her hand he stepped on the gunwale, sat down in the boat, and took the helm. I will never set foot on this strand again," said the young man to himself in bitter anger. She stood and watched till she could distinguish the figures in the boat no longer, they all grew to one indistinct mass, and she turned to ascend the cliff by the winding path. "I wiii go and see his mother every day. She will miss him this time more than ever," she said, aloud. Mrs. Carston's cottage was a very neat, pretty one, with a little garden in front, in which the old lady spent most of the long summer evenings at her knitting. The front of the cottage was covered with climbing rose trees (now bright with flowers), which almost covered the little windows, and in the hottest summer noon made the little rooms within cool and shady. This evening Mrs Carston was sitting, as usual, on her little rustic seat by the door. It was the evening after that on which Harry Carston had sailed. I have come to try and cheer you up a little, Mrs. Carston," said Jessie, as the old woman took her hand kindly. Ah, dear, that's what you cannot do—at least, not yet awhile. My dear boy was everything to me." Don't say was, Mrs. Carston." H Well, dear, I have some strange, sad kind of feel- ing on my mind, that I cannot help. He trimmed the garden here for me only the day before he sailed, and I had a kind of choking at my heart while I watched iim, as if that were to be the last time I were to see him do it. But, indeed, I'm a nervous, foolish old woman, and I have felt just like this before, and yet nothing came of it." Everybody imagines things that never come to pass, sometimes, Mrs. Carston; and when we are sad we are more likely to do so than when well and cheerful." No wonder I eannot rest about him. My only child, aDd such a son! Such & son was never born, I'm sure. Harry is as tender-hearted as a girl. But I never could tell you all; nor how he comes and pours all the money he earns into my hands, that scarce can hold it. There was something on his mind, though, this time. He had not his own spirits. Did you notice anything strange about him, my dear ?" I did-that is, I didn't. I mean I have not been watching him very much," said Jessie, with a blush She did not want to betray the state of affairs, it seemed. Well, some of the neighbours did; and that set me more on to watch him." "I am sure people might mind their own business," said Jessie, sharply. What, my dear ?" "The neighbours have no business with whether your son is in good or bad spirits. People are so busy. I never knew such a talking place as this is ?" "They're all very kind, my dear. Why should I be angry with any one for taking an interest in Harry 2" Oh, they don't take it, they only pretend." Mrs. Carston looked mystified. Ie But why should they do so ? "she said. 4 Jessie did not answer. That evening, going home, Jessie was joined by Bessie Wilson, a young friend of hers, one who had been at school with her. I know how you're feeling, Jessie, just now," said Bessie, smiling. "Pray how, then, if you are so wise? I don't know anything I have to feel about, one way or the other." Ct How sly you are, and secret; and I am sure you might tell me Tell you what Nonsense! As if you did not know." If you want to ask me anything, ask it plainly." "Well, then, are not you and Harry Carston engaged ?" Nothing of the sort, and never will be." I don't believe you As you please." But I was told it for a certain fact." Then now you see you will be wise to doubt many certain facts for the future." Why are you so angry, Jessie 1" I am not angry with you, but with the people who go and tell such tales. I am never going to marry; nothing could be more stupid. I am sure, for my part, Harry is free to go and please himself in a wife all the world over, so long as he excuses me." Then I suppose I may contradict it 1 J" "Do though, really, it is not worth talking of." So they parted. One short week after Harry Carston sailed came disastrous news. The wind had been contrary from the south and west, so vessels coming in reported the iris therefore, could not have made much way. A ship leaking heavily came in, and reported that three nights before she had fseen a burning ship on the horizon, burning fiercely against the black night. They could not spare hands from the pumps to man the boats, and, even if they had been able, it would have been of no use the ship was many miles off, and, within half. an- hour of their first seeing her, she crumbled down sud- denly out of sight. Twelve hours after this report the crew of the late Iris came into port on board the little coaster Hannah, which had saved them. The news ran quickly about the town that the Iris was burnt, that the crew ware saved, but that Harry Carston had perished in the burning ship. We will not speak of Mrs. Carston, we know what she must have felt; about Jessie it is not so clear. Jessie May was standing with her friend Bessie Wil- son on the sea-shore, on the very spot where so lately she had parted with Harry Carston. It was the even- ing in which the last news came concerning the unfor- tunate Iris. Three sailors were coming towards them. Just by them the men stopped, and stood talking. "Indeed, 'twas a dreadful sight as ever you saw. The flimes got up through the hatchways in no time, and ran up the masts like wildfire. The deck was scorching the very soles of our feet." Jesaie began to listen. Of the ship's name she had as yet no idea. You must have given up all hope of your lives, Tom ?" "You may say so. There was only fire or water for us—a sore choice. We were as white as death one looking on the other. Not a word was said by one, or a breath drawn, it seemed. Then we saw the little boat coming, and we cheered for our lives." But about the captain, poor fellow! how [did that come about ?" Why, you see, the boat was but small. He made us go in one by one, as orderly as a marching company. When the last man of us was in (one on the top of the other we were), one cried out, We're sinking ?' Silence you are not,' said the captain, over the side. Push off, lads,' he said, then quite cool. Come along, sir, come along we shouted from the boat. We were half-scorched with the heat of the ship and burning splinters and showers of sparks were coming in our faces. Come aleng, sir I shouted again. Push off I' he said. Come, and don't keep us all in danger,' I cried. Push off, lads I'm going down with the ahip We told him we would bring him by force if he did not come. Just then the blazing foremast went over with a crash at the other side, and the rest cried out to pull for our lives, for the mainmast was coming, and away we pulled, and sore enough my heart was to leave him. The last I saw of him, he walked aft slowly, with his arms crossed on his chest, and he stood leaning over the bulwarks, looking after us. Once he waved his hand- a kind of good-bye, like. Some called to go back. The rest would not." "Poor Harry Carston!" said the second speaker he must have been mad." "Mad! he was cooler than you are now. Why, he put the dog into the boat." Poor Harry Carston! Whatever took him ?" This time the name, plainly spoken, struck Jessie's ear. Who ? Harry Carston 1 Captain Carston ?" she cried, convulsively. Who else, miss 1 Surely, the whole town knows it." She did not speak, but hurried from them up the strand, up the little winding path, through the street, through the little garden gate, into the cottage, into her own room. She locked the door, threw herself on her knees by the bedside-not to pray, scarce to think-- thought and suffering seeming for a while to be numbed by the weight of the great, sudden stroke which had fallen upon her. "Oh, Harry! Harry! These words, none others. came. il Ob, Harry! Harry!" They sounded so broken* heartedly. She shrank from the sound of her own changed voice. Bessie Wilson had missed her companion. She had not stayed on the shore to hear the sad story of the burning ship, but had walked on, thinking her com- panion was following. On the next day, when she heard that Jessie May was dangerously ill, she had no idea of the cause, and no one else was wiser. For weeks Jessie May lay between life and death. It was one of the last bright, warm evenings in September. Jessie May was sitting alone in a little shady arbour in the garden, always her favourite place. She looked, on the whole, calm, but tears were stealing swiftly and silently down her face. There was a rustle amongst the branches behind her. Easily frightened now, she started; a man's figure stood before her. She put her hands to her eyes with one low swift cry; then half-feeling, half-dreaming that the clasp of a strong arm was about her, she fainted. Oh, the fearfulness, the awe, the unutterable joy, when slowly waking from her unconscious state, she found herself, indeed, supported in the arms of her lover It is a dream she said, faintly. "No dream the fire and the sea have spared me. I have come to plead my cause with you once more, Jessie a word of yours now can send me away for ever. Will you speak it ? Am I to despair ?" Oh, no Forgive me, Harry, all my folly—all my pride, if you can." You will be my wife ? Oh I have not deserved this-I, who in my madness and sorrow, would have wildly rushed, uncalled, before my Maker's face Yet all things tarn to bless me. Oh, Jessie I have learned from sorrow xjie learning nas been worth it all." Your mother, has she seen you V Dear mother! No; you must break it to her." Can it be—is it really true—are you indeed alive, and speaking to me, Harry ? cried Jessie, with a burst of joyful tears. The strong arm drew her closer for answer, for the tears rolled fast down the sailor's cheek, and he could not speak. Is it needful to say that a few weeks saw Jessio and Harry Carston married ? Is it needful to speak of the mother's joy at receiving her only child, as it were, from the dead ? But how was Harry Carston saved ? Shortly after the crew had left the Iris, a steamer bound for the west coast of Africa had passed close by the blazing ship. By the glass an almost insensible figure had been seen leaning over the stern. The steamer altered her course; a boat put off, and Harry Carston was saved from the fate he had madly sought. »