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Her mouth, with its slightly full under lip, was elevated, and an outrageous desire possessed him. His countenance slowly turned hotly red, and slowly a faint tide of color stained Rosemary Roselle's cheeks. She looked away; Elim looked away. He proceeded aft and learned that Bramant's Wharf lay only a few miles ahead. The old man cursed the wind in his stringent tones.
He studied her for a moment and then answered: "Yes, Miss Rosemary." She swayed. Indy, at her side, enveloped her in a sustaining arm. "Indy," the girl said, her face on the woman's breast, "he, too!" "I'm sending a few bales of leaf down the river," Haxall continued to Elim; "the sloop'll pass Bramant's Wharf; but the crew will be just anybody. Miss Rosemary couldn't go with only her nigger "
"Don't you remember," Elim Meikeljohn spoke, "Haxall and the sloop; your relatives at Bramant's Wharf?" She returned to a full consciousness of her surroundings. "I was dreaming so differently," she told him. It seemed to Elim that the antagonism had departed from her voice; he even had a feeling that she was glad of his presence.
The sloop, Elim learned, was ready to start at once. The afternoon was declining; to reach Bramant's Wharf would take them through the night and into the meridian of tomorrow. They had made no preparations for the trip, there was neither bedding nor food; but Elim and Haxall agreed that it was best for Rosemary Roselle to leave the city at the price of any slight momentary discomfort.
"I'd forgotten that!" the other admitted. "McCall and John both gone, mother dead, and now by heaven!" he exclaimed, low and distressed, "she has just no one. I'm without a place. Her friends have left. There's a distant connection at Bramant's Wharf, but that's almost at the mouth of the James." Rosemary Roselle came up to them. "Mr. Jim Haxall," she asked, direct and white, "is father dead?"
His manner had a complete repose and absence of self-consciousness, which usually is only to be found in the people of race in any nation. "You were taken to the Sistine Chapel, of course," he went on, "and to the loggia and Bramant's staircase? You saw some statues, too, perhaps?"
He recounted the episode of the "Yankee army," delighted by her less formal tone, then the old man returned as enigmatically as he had disappeared. The ropes were cast off, the sloop swung out into the current, and their smooth progress was resumed. A few more hours and they would be at Bramant's Wharf. There, Elim knew, he would be expected to leave Rosemary.
Still, she would be cared for, supplied with every necessity, at Bramant's Wharf. There he would leave her ... his breathing stopped, for, incredibly, he saw that her hand was suspended over the piece of cake. She took it up and ate it slowly, absently. This, he felt, had created a bond between them; but it was a conviction in which, apparently, she had no share.
She rose, and stood with a hand on Indy's shoulder, murmuring affectionately in the colored woman's ear. The sloop once more headed at a long angle for the shore. Bramant's Wharf grew visible, projecting solidly from a verdant bank. They floated silently up to the dock, and the youth held the sloop steady while Rosemary Roselle and Indy mounted from its deck.
It's a nice quality now, but I don't think I would have noticed it even a month ago. You can see that I have grown frightfully old in the littlest while. Yes, you are comfortable to be with, and I suspect that counts for a great deal. It's quite sad, too, to grow old. Oh, look, we've changed! Where do you suppose he is going? This can't nearly be Bramant's."
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