The Joss: a Reversion
Copyright© 2024 by Richard Marsh
Chapter 26: The Throne in the Centre.
Never shall I forget that row in the moonlight. It was one of those clear, soft, mysterious nights, which one sometimes gets in those latitudes, when the air seems alive with unseen things. One’s half shy of talking for fear of being overheard. I’m no hand at description, but those who have been in those parts know the sort of night I mean. I was not in a romantic mood, God knows. Nor, so far as I could see, was there much of romance about the expedition. But I had been brooding, brooding, brooding, till things had got into my blood. As I sat there in the boat I felt as if I were moving through a world of dream.
We had brought a funny crowd. At the back of my mind, and I felt sure at the back of Luke’s, was the feeling that if the thing had to be done at all then the quicker it was done the better. It was a case of taking time by the forelock. The Flying Scud had a ragged crew. The Lord alone could tell what was the nationality of most of them. Out of the bunch we had picked the best. There was the chief engineer, Isaac Rudd. He had shipped with me before. I knew him, and that he wouldn’t stick at a trifle. A man who had had to wrestle with such engines as ours wasn’t likely to. In a manner of speaking he was as deep in the ditch as I was; because if things had gone wrong his share of the blame was certainly equal to mine. If there was a chance of levelling up then we were both about as eager to snatch at it. Then there was Holley, Sam Holley, whom I had made second mate. Though he was a fat man, with a squeaky voice, I was hoping there were not too many soft streaks in him. There was his chum, Bill Cox, the very antipodes of himself. A shrivelled-up little fellow, with a voice like a big bassoon. Those two always went together.
Lord knows who the rest were. Though I had a kind of an inkling that Luke had done his best to see there were no shirkers, I had not breathed a syllable about the game we were after. But Luke might have dropped a hint. There was that about the fellows which to me smelt like business. And I felt sure that each man had about him somewhere something which would come in handy to fight with.
Still, I knew nothing about that. The impression I had wished to convey was that we were enjoying a little moonlight excursion, and that if anything was about, it was peace and mercy.
We reached shore. I spoke to them as Luke and I were getting out.
“You chaps will stay here. Mr. Holley, you’ll be in command and see that there’s no roving. Mr. Rudd, you will come with us to the top of the hill. Mr. Luke and I are going to see a friend on a little matter of business. If you hear a double catcall, or the sound of firearms, or anything that makes you think that we’re not altogether enjoying ourselves, you pass the word at once. Then you chaps will come on for all you’re worth. Leave one man in charge of the boat; that’s all.”
We then went up the slope. At the top we left Rudd, with a final tip from me to keep his eyes skinned, and his ears open. Luke and I plunged right away into what seemed to me to be a trackless forest. How he could find his way in it, considering he had only been there once in his life before, and then in broad daylight, was beyond my understanding. But there were one or two things about St. Luke which I couldn’t make out, either then or afterwards. Anyhow he forged his way ahead as if he had been used to the place from his cradle up. Never seemed puzzled for a moment.
Presently we reached an open space. The moon shone down so that it was as light as day. Only there was a fringe of outer darkness all around. Luke made a queer noise with his lips. I suppose it was some sort of bird he was imitating. He repeated it three times; with an interval between each. Then something came out of the darkness which took me all aback.
It was a woman.
When she first appeared she had something white over her, head and all. Coming close up to us, drawing the covering aside with a dexterous switch, she stood bareheaded. I stared in amazement. I had not known there were such women in the world. I stammered to Luke—
“Who’s this?”
To my astonishment she answered—in English a thousand times better than mine. It was a treat to listen to her.
“It is I.”
Off came my cap in a twinkling.
“I beg your pardon. I had no idea I was to meet a lady.”
“A lady? Am I a lady? Yes?” She laughed. She alone knew what at. Such laughter! “I am Susan.”
Susan! She was as much a Susan as I was a Jupiter. I said then, and I say now, and I shall keep on saying, she was the loveliest creature I had ever seen even in—I won’t say dreams, because I don’t dream—but in pictures. She was straight as a mast. Carried herself as if she were queen of the earth; which she was. Yet with a dainty grace which for bewitching charm was beyond anything I had ever imagined. And her eyes! They were like twin moons in a summer sky. As I looked at her every nerve in my body tingled.
She added, since she saw me speechless:
“I am the daughter of the gods.”
That was better. She was that. The daughter of the gods—as she put it herself. I could have dropped at her feet and worshipped. But she went on:
“You are from the ship? You are the captain?”
“I am Max Lander.”
“Max Lander?” She repeated my name in a sort of a kind of a way which made everything seem to swim before my eyes. “It is a good name. We shall be friends.”
“Friends!”
She held out her hands to me. As I took them into mine, Lord! how I shivered. I fancy she felt me shaking by the way she smiled. It made me worse, her smile did. She kept cool through it all.
“Shall we not be friends?”
“My dear lady, I—I hope we shall.”
Talk about being at a loss for words! I could have poured out thousands. Only just then my dictionary had all its pages torn out, and I didn’t know where to lay my hand upon one of them.
“It is my father you have come to see.”
“Your father?”
I had forgotten what had brought me. Everything but the fact that she was standing there, in the moonlight, within reach of me, had passed from my mind. Her words brought me back to earth with a bang. Her father? Was it possible that I had come to see her father? She, the daughter of the gods; what manner of man must be her sire? I stuttered and I stammered.
“I—I didn’t understand I’d come to see your father.”
“He is the Great Joss.”
“The Great Joss?”
What on earth did she mean? What was a Joss, anyhow, great or little? I had heard of joss-sticks, though I only had a hazy notion what they were. But a real live Joss, who could be the father of such a daughter, was a new kind of creature altogether. She offered no explanation.
“He waits for you. I am here to bring you to him. Come.”
She fluttered off among the trees.
“Luke,” I whispered as we followed, “this is not at all the sort of thing I was prepared for.”
“She’s a fine piece, ain’t she?”
A “fine piece!” To apply his coarse Whitechapel slang to such a being! It was unendurable. I could have knocked him down. Only I thought that, just then, I had better not. I preserved silence instead.
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