<h2><SPAN name="page219"></SPAN><span class="pagenum"></span>XXVI.</h2>
<p><span class="smcap">That</span> they must come to Blackwall
Pier was assured. For there were no streets, no crowds, no
rumbling waggons; there were the wide sky and the unresting
river, the breeze, the ships, and the endless train of
brown-sailed barges. No unseamanlike garden-seats
dishonoured the quay then, and strolling lovers sat on bollards
or chains, or sat not at all.</p>
<p>Here came Johnny and Nora Sansom when the shrinking arc of
daylight was far and yellow in the west, and the Kentish hills
away to the left grew dusk and mysterious. The tide ran
high, and tugs were busy. A nest of them, with steam up,
lay under the wharf wall to the right of the pier-barge, waiting
for work; some were already lighted, and, on the rest, men were
trimming the lamps or running them up, while a cheerful glow came
from each tiny cabin and engine-room. Rascal boys flitted
about the quays and gangways—the boys that are always near
boats and water, ever failing to get drowned, and ever dodging
the pestered men who try to prevent it.</p>
<p>The first star of the evening steadied and brightened, <SPAN name="page220"></SPAN><span class="pagenum"></span>and soon
was lost amid other stars. Below, the river set its
constellations as silently, one after another, trembling and
blinking; and meteor tugs shot across its firmament, in white and
green and red. Along shore the old Artichoke Tavern, gables
and piles, darkened and melted away, and then lit into a little
Orion, a bright cluster in the bespangled riverside. Ever
some new sail came like a ghost up reach out of the gloom,
rounded the point, and faded away; and by times some distant
voice was heard in measured cry over water.</p>
<p>They said little; for what need to talk? They loitered
awhile near the locks, and saw the turning Trinity light with its
long, solemn wink, heard a great steamer hoot, far down Woolwich
reach. Now the yellow in the sky was far and dull indeed,
and a myriad of stars trembled over the brimming river. A
tug puffed and sobbed, and swung out from the group under the
wharf, beating a glistering tail of spray, and steaming off at
the head of a train of lighters. Out from the dark of
Woolwich Reach came a sailing-ship under bare spars, drawn by
another tug. In the middle of the river the ship dropped
anchor, and the tug fell back to wait, keeping its place under
gentle steam.</p>
<p>They walked on the wharf, by the iron cranes, and far to the
end, under the windows of the abandoned Brunswick Hotel.
Here they were quite alone, and <SPAN name="page221"></SPAN><span class="pagenum"></span>here they sat together on a broad
and flat-topped old bollard.</p>
<p>Presently said Johnny, “Are you sorry for the dance
now—Nora?” And lost his breath at the name.</p>
<p>Nora—he called her Nora; was she afraid or was she
glad? What was this before her? But with her eyes she
saw only the twinkling river, with the lights and the stars.</p>
<p>Presently she answered. “I was very sorry,”
she said slowly . . . “of course.”</p>
<p>“But now—Nora?”</p>
<p>Still she saw but the river and the lights; but she was glad;
timid, too, but very glad. Johnny’s hand stole to her
side, took hers, and kept it. . . . “No,” she
said, “not sorry—now.”</p>
<p>“Say Johnny.”</p>
<p>What was before her mattered nothing; he sat by her—held
her hand. . . . “Not sorry
now—Johnny!”</p>
<p>Why came tears so readily to her eyes? Truly they had
long worn their path. But this—this was joy. . .
. He bent his head, and kissed her. The wise old
Trinity light winked very slowly, and winked again.</p>
<p>So they sat and talked; sometimes whispered. Vows,
promises, nonsense all—what mattered the words to so
wonderful a tune? And the eternal stars, a million ages
away, were nearer, all nearer, than the world of common life
about them. What was for her she knew <SPAN name="page222"></SPAN><span class="pagenum"></span>now and
saw—she also: a new heaven and a new earth.</p>
<p>Over the water from the ship came, swinging and slow, a stave
of the chanty:—</p>
<blockquote><p>“I’m a flying-fish sailor straight
home from Hong-Kong—<br/>
Aye!
Aye! Blow the man down!<br/>
Blow the man down, bully, blow the man down—<br/>
O give us some time to blow the man down!</p>
<p>Ye’re a dirty Black-Baller just in from New
York—<br/>
Aye!
Aye! Blow the man down!<br/>
Blow the man down, bully, blow the man down—<br/>
O give us some time to blow the man down!”</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Time went, but time was not for them. Where the
tug-engineer, thrusting up his head for a little fresh air, saw
but a prentice-lad and his sweetheart on a bollard, there sat Man
and Woman, enthroned and exultant in face of the worlds.</p>
<p>The ship swung round on the tide, bringing her lights square
and her stem for the opening lock. The chanty went wailing
to its end:—</p>
<blockquote><p>“Blow the man down, bully, blow the man
down—<br/>
To my Aye!
Aye! Blow the man down!<br/>
Singapore Harbour to gay London town—<br/>
O give us some time to blow the man down!”</p>
</blockquote>
<p>The tug headed for the dock and the ship went in her wake with
slow state, a gallant shadow amid the blue.</p>
<p><SPAN name="page223"></SPAN><span class="pagenum"></span>Soon
the tide stood, and stood, and then began its ebb. For a
space there was a deeper stillness as the dim wharves hung in
mid-mist, and water and sky were one. Then the air stirred
and chilled, stars grew sharper, and the Thames turned its
traffic seaward.</p>
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