CHAPTER XXI
PAGANEL'S LAST ENTANGLEMENT
ON the 19th of March, eleven days after leaving the island, the
Duncan sighted the American coast, and next day
dropped anchor in the bay of Talcahuano. They had come
back again after a voyage of five months, during which,
and keeping strictly along the 37th parallel, they had gone
round the world. The passengers in this memorable expedition, unprecedented in
the annals of the Travelers'
Club, had visited Chili, the Pampas, the Argentine Republic,
the Atlantic, the island of Tristan d'Acunha, the Indian
Ocean, Amsterdam Island, Australia, New Zealand, Isle
Tabor, and the Pacific. Their search had not been fruitless, for they were
bringing back the survivors of the shipwrecked
Britannia.
Not one of the brave Scots who set out at the summons
of their chief, but could answer to their names; all were returning to their old
Scotia.
As soon as the Duncan had re-provisioned, she sailed
along the coast of Patagonia, doubled Cape Horn, and
made a swift run up the Atlantic Ocean. No voyage could
be more devoid of incident. The yacht was simply carrying home a cargo of
happiness. There was no secret now
on board, not even John Mangles's attachment to Mary
Grant.
Yes, there was one mystery still, which greatly excited
McNabbs's curiosity. Why was it that Paganel remained
always hermetically fastened up in his clothes, with a big
comforter round his throat and up to his very ears? The
Major was burning with desire to know the reason of this
singular fashion. But in spite of interrogations, allusions,
and suspicions on the part of McNabbs, Paganel would not
unbutton.
Not even when the Duncan crossed the line, and the
heat was so great that the seams of the deck were melting.
"He is so distrait that he thinks he is at St. Petersburg,"
said the Major, when he saw the geographer wrapped in
an immense great-coat, as if the mercury had been frozen
in the thermometer.
At last on the 9th of May, fifty-three days from the time
of leaving Talcahuano, John Mangles sighted the lights
of Cape Clear. The yacht entered St. George's Channel,
crossed the Irish Sea, and on the 10th of May reached the
Firth of Clyde. At 11 o'clock she dropped anchor off
Dunbarton, and at 2 P.M. the passengers arrived at Malcolm Castle amidst the
enthusiastic cheering of the Highlanders.
As fate would have it then, Harry Grant and his two
companions were saved. John Mangles wedded Mary
Grant in the old cathedral of St. Mungo, and Mr. Paxton,
the same clergyman who had prayed nine months before
for the deliverance of the father, now blessed the marriage
of his daughter and his deliverer. Robert was to become a
sailor like Harry Grant and John Mangles, and take part
with them in the captain's grand projects, under the auspices of Lord Glenarvan.
But fate also decreed that Paganel was not to die a
bachelor? Probably so.
The fact was, the learned geographer after his heroic
exploits, could not escape celebrity. His blunders made
quite a furore among the fashionables of Scotland, and he
was overwhelmed with courtesies.
It was then that an amiable lady, about thirty years of
age, in fact, a cousin of McNabbs, a little eccentric herself,
but good and still charming, fell in love with the geographer's oddities, and
offered him her hand. Forty thousand pounds went with it, but that was not
mentioned.
Paganel was far from being insensible to the sentiments
of Miss Arabella, but yet he did not dare to speak. It was
the Major who was the medium of communication between
these two souls, evidently made for each other. He even
told Paganel that his marriage was the last freak he would
be able to allow himself. Paganel was in a great state of
embarrassment, but strangely enough could not make up
his mind to speak the fatal word.
"Does not Miss Arabella please you then?" asked McNabbs.
"Oh, Major, she is charming," exclaimed Paganel, "a
thousand times too charming, and if I must tell you all,
she would please me better if she were less so. I wish she
had a defect!"
"Be easy on that score," replied the Major, "she has,
and more than one. The most perfect woman in the world
has always her quota. So, Paganel, it is settled then, I
suppose?"
"I dare not."
"Come, now, my learned friend, what makes you hesitate?"
"I am unworthy of Miss Arabella," was the invariable
reply of the geographer. And to this he would stick.
At last, one day being fairly driven in a corner by the
intractable Major, he ended by confiding to him, under the
seal of secrecy, a certain peculiarity which would facilitate
his apprehension should the police ever be on his track.
"Bah!" said the Major.
"It is really as I tell you," replied Paganel.
"What does it matter, my worthy friend?"
"Do you think so, Major?"
"On the contrary, it only makes you more uncommon.
It adds to your personal merits. It is the very thing to
make you the nonpareil husband that Arabella dreams
about."
And the Major with imperturbable gravity left Paganel
in a state of the utmost disquietude.
A short conversation ensued between McNabbs and Miss
Arabella. A fortnight afterwards, the marriage was celebrated in grand style in
the chapel of Malcolm Castle.
Paganel looked magnificent, but closely buttoned up, and
Miss Arabella was arrayed in splendor.
And this secret of the geographer would have been forever buried in
oblivion, if the Major had not mentioned it
to Glenarvan, and he could not hide it from Lady Helena,
who gave a hint to Mrs. Mangles. To make a long story
short, it got in the end to M. Olbinett's ears, and soon became noised abroad.
Jacques Paganel, during his three days' captivity among
the Maories, had been tattooed from the feet to the shoulders, and he bore on
his chest a heraldic kiwi with outspread wings, which was biting at his heart.
This was the only adventure of his grand voyage that
Paganel could never get over, and he always bore a grudge
to New Zealand on account of it. It was for this reason
too, that, notwithstanding solicitation and regrets, he never
would return to France. He dreaded lest he should expose the whole Geographical
Society in his person to the
jests of caricaturists and low newspapers, by their secretary coming back
tattooed.
The return of the captain to Scotland was a national
event, and Harry Grant was soon the most popular man
in old Caledonia. His son Robert became a sailor like
himself and Captain Mangles, and under the patronage of
Lord Glenarvan they resumed the project of founding a
Scotch colony in the Southern Seas.
THE END