Page:Eekhoud - The New Carthage.djvu/96

68 which it was not his habit to lavish, could not but admit that the enterprising and courageous shipowner was being held responsible for a fault, or, rather, an accident, that had been expiated with enough pain by his father. Saint-Fardier evinced for this daring chap Béjard the admiration of a connoiseur. He was ambitious to serve him as a ferocious and faithful retriever, for he approved of the bloodhounds with which the planters tracked down their fugitive slaves. At bottom he chafed under the scruples of the correct Dobouziez; his proper partner would have been Béjard.

Laurent had never seen Béjard before, and he was ignorant of his reputation. And, nevertheless, an unspeakable uneasiness took possession of him in that man's presence. He had a sad presentiment, his heart contracted, and when he had turned away from the shipowner to resume his contemplation of the landscape, the banks of the river seemed to exhale a fatidical sadness.

Just as the Fulton dockyard was about to disappear behind a band in the Scheldt, the complicated framework surrounding the hull took on the appearance of an enormous skeleton to which clung, here and there, strips of flesh and burned clothing. But this sinister illusion lasted for but a moment, and the charm of other parts of the landscape reassured the momentarily troubled spirit of Paridael.

After the illusion had passed, he attached no importance to it, but later he was destined to recall it when, with a redoubled horror, it occurred again in the most tragic moment of his life.

They had spared themselves the trouble of presenting Laurent to the proprietor of the yacht. Several times Béjard threw a keen and distrustful glance