Sometimes he put his hand on Jeremy's shoulder,and the heavy pressure of his great fingers made Jeremy tremble,partly with terror,partly with pleasure.His face,also,was scarcely so agreeable as it had seemed at first sight.His tremendous nose seemed to burn down upon Jeremy like a malignant fire.His eyes were so small that sometimes they disappeared under his fat cheeks altogether,or only gleamed like little sharp points of light from under his heavy,shaggy eyebrows.Then,although he tried to make his voice pleasant,Jeremy felt that that complaisant friendliness was not his natural tone.Sometimes there would be a sharp,barking note that made Jeremy jump and his cheek pale.The Captain told him no more fascinating stories,and when Jeremy wanted to know about the ship with the diamonds and rubies and the little sea village where she lay hid and the Caribbees natives,and the chances of becoming a cabin boy,and the further exploitation of the tatooes--all these things the Captain brushed aside as though they no longer interested him in the least.He,on the other hand,wanted now to know exactly where Jeremy lived,what the house was like,where the back doors were,how the windows opened,where Jeremy slept,and so on.Jeremy,pleased at this interest in his daily life,told him as many things as he could,hoping to pass on afterwards to more exciting topics;how,for instance,the kitchen windows were fastened always last thing at night,but you could undo them from the garden if you liked with your knife,and Jeremy knew this because Uncle Samuel had done it once on a Sunday afternoon when the maids were all out and he'd forgotten his door key.He would have told the Captain all about the schoolroom and the toy village and the Jampot and the fun they had had teasing Miss Jones had not,the Captain fiercely told him that these things did not interest him,and that he had better just answer the questions that were put to him.It was indeed strange to see how,with every interview,the Captain grew fiercer and fiercer and sharper and sharper.He made no allusions now to "'is little nipper,"said nothing about that holy soul his mother,and never mentioned his liking for Jeremy.There was evidently something on his mind,and if he had seemed mysterious at their first meeting it was nothing to the secrecy that he practised now.
And yet,in spite of all this,his hold over Jeremy grew and grew.
That dream of the bending white road was always with Jeremy.He could think of nothing but the Captain,and while he was certainly afraid and would jump at the slightest sound,he was also certainly excited beyond all earlier experience.He longed,as he lay awake at night,to see the Captain.He seemed to have always in front of his eyes the great wall of a chest with the blue ship on it,and the bolster legs,and the gigantic hands.Strangest of all was the sense of evil that came with the attraction.
He longed to be in the man's company as he longed to do something that he had been always told not to do,and when he caught sight of him a sudden,hot,choking hand was pressed upon his heart,and he was terrified,delighted,frightened,ashamed,all in one.The Captain always alluded to the things that he would tell him,would show him one day--"When you come to my little place I'll teach yer a thing or two"--and Jeremy would wonder for hours what this little place would be like and what the Captain would teach him.Meanwhile,he saw him everywhere,even when he was not there--behind lamp-posts,at street corners,behind the old woman's umbrella in the market-place,peering round the statues in the Cathedral,jerking up his head from behind chimney pots,looking through the nursery windows just when dusk was coming on,in the passages,under stairs,out in the dark garden--and always behind him that horrid dream of the dead-white road and the shingly Cove.Yes,poor Jeremy was truly haunted.
IV
That Miss Jones suspected nothing of these meetings must be attributed partly to that lady's habit of wrapping herself in her own thoughts on her walks abroad,and partly to her natural short-sightedness.Once Mary said that she had noticed "a horrid man with a red face"staring at them;but Miss Jones,although she was not a vain woman,thought it nevertheless quite natural that men should stare,and fancied more frequently that they did so than was strictly the truth.
Jeremy,meanwhile,was occupied now with the thought as to what he would do did the Captain really want him to go away with him.He discussed it with himself,but he did not doubt what he would do;he would go.And he would go,he knew,with fear and dread,and with a longing to stay,and be warm in the schoolroom,and have jam for tea,and half an hour before bedtime downstairs,and Yorkshire pudding on Sundays.But the Captain could make him do anything.
Yes,the Captain could make him do anything.
His afternoon walks now were prolonged agonies.He would turn his head at every moment,would stare into dark corners,would start at the sound of steps.His sleep now was broken with horrid dreams,and he would jump up and cry out;and one night he actually dreamt of his dead-white road and the sounds that came up from below the hill,the bell and the sea,and the distant rattle of the little carts.
Then the Captain drew near to the very house itself.He haunted Orange Street,could be seen lounging against a lamp-post opposite the High School,looked once into the very garden of the Coles,Jeremy watching him with beating heart from the schoolroom window.