The next council took place, not on the following day, but some days after. In the meantime there had been a tempest, with devils howling in the wind and waves going all ways at once and other discomforts. The Floating Leaf got out of control, and now, by what all but Terence called a stroke of luck, they were aground among the reeds in the mouth of a river, perhaps a mile up-stream. The river debouched between fantastic hills like green oyster-shells, and there were some queer sailing craft, with masts like bent fishing-rods, and other strange tackle, alongside. The sky was fantastic, like the hills, and there was in the air a liveliness and odour of spring. Here and there on a hill-top a plum-tree in blossom, and by a rock on the river bank a clump of narcissus on green, springing stems. Here and there a willow or grove of bamboo. “Much like Arundinaria Simoni, from here,” Lord Sombrewater remarked. “Those bamboos should do well in the sea air. Nothing like sea mists for bringing out their brilliance.”
Terence dominated the council. All of them were jubilant (except Blackwood), having been brought safe out of danger of their lives. Terence harped on the fulfilment of his vision.
“But what are we to do now?” asked George Sprot—“landed here like this?”
Sombrewater let his opinion be known at once. “Terence has convinced me,” he said. “Henceforward we cannot do better than trust ourselves entirely to his pink-footed fairies. Which direction is now indicated by the Peach-blossom People, Terence?”
A light was on the brow of the bard. “They drift up-stream, between the willows.”
“Well, now,” broke in Fulke Arnott, “it so happened that I was talking just now to that fierce-faced Chink. Strangely enough, he knows this country, and he says that the river is only navigable a few miles up, except for small craft.”
“Then,” replied Terence, “we are to proceed in small craft.”
“Or until we meet some Green Figs going the other way,” put in Quentin.
Terence did not hear. “This morning as I was walking on the deck,” he continued, “there passed by among the hills a man riding upon a goat. He had a face of supernatural majesty and his eyes were terrible, and he rode beside the river and on into the hills, driving his goat with a branch of Peach-blossom.”
“The indications are plain,” said Lord Sombrewater. “We leave the ship here in the care of Barnes and the officers. The crew, I am told, have already disappeared, except for Fulke’s friend. We ourselves make a journey inland with the portable wireless until the Peach-blossom cloud comes to rest and attaches itself to a tree. If necessary, we accompany the portent as far as Tibet, but personally I hope the destination of these ghosts is within reasonable distance. What do you say?”
“I have a feeling,” said Fulke, “that it won’t be very far. That same Chinaman spoke of a dragon that is famous in these parts. It lives, I believe, in the hills yonder.”
“We must see that bird,” said Lord Sombrewater.
To George Sprot it was criminal levity to propose exchanging the conveniences of their expensive machine for the discomforts and dangers of an excursion through an unknown country, and all because of the drivelling of a literary man.
“What will the ladies say!” he exclaimed.
“Naturally we shall consult everybody concerned. Shall we do so at once?”
Taking Ambrose with him, the owner of the vessel went forthwith to discuss matters with the captain. In twenty minutes the whole thing was arranged, and Barnes was in receipt of full instructions as to the course he was to pursue in case of trouble.
“I shall, of course, keep in close touch by wireless,” said Lord Sombrewater.
“That makes it all quite easy,” said Captain Barnes. “There’s one thing, though. We must have some sort of crew on board.”
“Oddly enough,” said the first officer, “that Chinaman butler and man-of-all-work mentioned to me this morning that he would have no difficulty in getting hold of a thoroughly reliable crew.”
“Did he indeed?” observed Lord Sombrewater. “Can you tell me whether the said Chinaman had anything to do with the steering of us the night before last in the storm?”
Captain Barnes laughed. “It’s a fact he was on the navigating bridge, lending a hand. But still—what could he do?”
“Seems to me he took the opportunity to bring us to his own door. Well, that’s that. I shall leave the maids behind. Our wives will need them in any case.”
They went on deck and found the rest of the company gathered there. The two mothers, with the advice of Mrs. Sprot, were quite definite; their daughters should not go on such an absurd expedition. “This is the maddest thing my husband has agreed to yet,” said Lady Sombrewater. “I protested from the beginning. I protested against the voyage. I pointed out that we were quite comfortable at home, but I was not listened to. I protested against this outlandish China, but I was laughed at. I protested during the storm. I had a feeling that we were being plotted against. But nobody seemed to be able to do anything or have any sense at all. And now look what a pickle we’re in, landed here like this, as Mr. Sprot so rightly says. I protest——” She looked round for something to protest against. “I protest against this kind of scenery. It’s most un-English. My daughter shall not go.”
“Of course not, mother,” said Lychnis. But she smiled at her father and pinched Ambrose’s arm.
Ruby saw it. “Oh, mother,” she pouted, interpreting the signs, “if Lychnis is going, why can’t I go, too?”
“But Lychnis is not going,” said Lady Sombrewater, with firm reproof; and Ruby, who was not so quick as she was red and white and lovely, looked terribly confused.
“Then,” put in Quentin, “the sensations that we experience on our journey will be very much abated in sharpness, because, for a man who is pure in heart, like myself, there is nothing gives so much point to the beauty of early morning, to the sudden revelation of a landscape, the contemplation of the purity of flowers, the noonday rest, and the bed among bracken under the winds of night, as the neighbourhood of a couple of maidens.”
The three ladies glanced at the girls and at one another, and their eyes were guardian angels. “I absolutely put my foot down,” said Lady Sombrewater.
“And I mine,” added Lady Frew-Gaff. “In any case, if one of the girls fell sick, who would look after her, I should like to know?”
“Oh, come now, my dear!” put in her husband. “I myself, though not an expert, know a good deal about the body——”
“Encyclopædic Richard,” observed Quentin. “And for the matter of that, I also know something of the body.”
“And Blackwood was actually a professional physiologist.”
“A physiologist is not a mother,” said Lady Sombrewater.
“The body,” observed Blackwood, “is but a collection of obscene guts and unpleasant juices. Beauty is therefore a superficial illusion and the reality is extremely revolting. The body——”
Lady Sombrewater waved the girls away. She was used to these uncompromising declarations of the Sages, but she had not got to like them, and she could still protect the girls.
“The body,” continued Blackwood, “is merely an involuted skin, highly specialized at various points, and capable of sensations, especially tactile sensations, which some—as, for instance, Quentin, who has not received enlightenment—consider desirable. Man, in brief, is nothing but a piece of skin capable, in contact with another skin, of a supreme sensation which results in the establishment of a third sensational skin. Of the behaviour of these skins and their obscene accompaniments, and of the cunning fluids by which, for their extraordinary object of perpetuation, the said skins are cleverly kept in what is curiously known as health, I have a considerable knowledge. The two maiden skins, therefore, would be in a position to receive expert assistance should they fall ill and inexplicably wish to recover.”
“Mr. Blackwood!” began the three ladies at once.
But Lord Sombrewater put an end to the discussion. “We’ll settle all that presently,” he said; and they heard in his voice their doom, and perhaps (though Ambrose was not able to find out whether their thoughts were precise) the doom of their daughters.
