'Like hell it is!' broke in Lavina, 'and how does that affect...' but, having got into his stride, Sam cut her short and went on:
'What's going to become of us, God knows. But we've plenty °f stores so if we're not wrecked in a storm we ought to be able to hang out until we land up somewhere. Whether we do or don't, everything's going to be different from now on. You've got to forget this Princess stuff, become a real woman, and do your share of the work. As you can't cook, the sooner you learn the better. I think you should start in at once as scullery-maid to Margery and when you've got the hang of it a bit you can do the job turn and turn about.'
Lavina removed herself from Sam's lap, stood up, yawned, and stretched gracefully. For the thousandth time he admired the perfect lines of her slim little figure which showed to admirable advantage in the silk shirt and old bell-bottomed trousers she was wearing that day.
Still with her back to him she said quietly: 'You know, Sam, I've never found you a bore before but this afternoon I don't find you the least amusing. I'm going to read in my bunk,' and without a glance in his direction she left him sitting there.
That evening she provided them with a cold supper for which Derek and Hemmingway, both now more or less recovered, got up. When the meal was finished she said suddenly :
'I've been thinking that we ought to divide up the work of the ship. Gervaise, as Captain, issues the stores and is a father to us all; Oliver's our navigator and looks after the instruments and things; Derek's the engineer, so he'll see to the electric light, the heating plant, and the motors if we have any chance to use them; Margery, quite obviously, was cut out for cook. That leaves Sam, Hemmingway and myself, doesn't it?'
They nodded agreement and she went on:
'Well, I'm easy. Somebody will have to mother you and I'm not at all bad with my needle; so if you loose a button or anything you'll know where to come. Hemmingway can lay the table and do mess-waiter and, as Sam loves pottering about in kitchens, he'd better be scullery-man and help Margery with the washing-up. That's fair division of labour, isn't it?'
'Fine,' Derek and Hemmingway agreed simultaneously while Gervaise, Oliver and Margery smiled their assent. In the face of such a clear majority Sam could do nothing. His clever little devil of a wife had out-manoeuvred him completely. She would sew their buttons on. Yes, when they lost them—which would be about once a month—and in the meantime she would lie about smoking and reading while the rest of them did all the work.
He saw her smiling at him beneath lowered lids and twitched his own mouth humorously in reply. He knew that, even if she sat about doing nothing day after day, she would provide them with splendid entertainment and keep their spirits up with constant laughter. That was her natural contribution; to be sup' remely decorative and delightfully amusing. He readily gave her the trick she had played him, realising that he had been a fool ever to suggest that she should use those lovely hands of hers except to stroke his own face.
Again next day the low grey clouds covered the sky as far as they could see in every direction, bearing out any chance of taking the altitude of the sun. To everybody's surprise Lavina appeared shortly after breakfast in an extremely abbreviated swim-suit with the intention, now the waters were calm and only lapping gently round the Ark, of bathing from its circular platform.
The instant Derek saw her he exclaimed: 'By Jove! What a grand idea. I'll be with you in ten sees.'
But by that time Lavina was back again inside the centrally-heated sphere. She loathed the cold and one sniff through her delicately-arched nose at the chill air outside had been quite sufficient to make her abandon all idea of having a swim. Nevertheless she did not change into anything else but lay about all day displaying her admirable limbs.
Hemmingway could hardly keep his eyes off her although he did his level best to expunge from his agitated brain the memories which crowded into it; and Derek fidgeted nervously to such an extent that Gervaise inquired what was the matter with him. He then got down Mr. Sponge's Sporting Tour and, turning his back on Lavina, determinedly buried his nose in it.
After lunch there was trouble about the cigarettes. They had a fair supply on board but, with a view to making them last as long as possible, it had been agreed the previous night that they should each be issued with a packet of 20 Virginians per day, except Oliver who smoked only his own long cheroots. In addition, they were to allow themselves one Turkish cigarette each after lunch and dinner; for which purpose a box was to be kept in the drawer with the silver for passing round the table at the end of every meal.
As the first box of a hundred had been opened the previous night at dinner only five cigarettes should have been missing from it for Margery, being ill, had not had one; but a whole additional row was gone.
On opening the box Gervaise noticed the shortage at once and, looking round the table, said quietly:
'I'm afraid somebody's been cheating.'
'I have, darling,' Lavina confessed at once. 'Twenty cigarettes a day isn't half my usual ration. As I ran out last night, I raided the box before I went to bed.'
'Well, you mustn't do that sort of thing, dearest; it's not fair to the rest of us.'
'Now, don't get excited,' she said quickly. 'I only took a couple and I'm not having one after lunch or dinner today, to make things even.'
'But, my dear, there's a whole row missing,' he protested.
She shrugged. 'Well then, somebody else has been at the box besides myself. If I'd taken more than two I should say so.'
Gervaise knew that in many ways Lavina might be spoilt and selfish but quite definitely she was not a liar. She had never told him a deliberate untruth in her life and he would have staked his beloved home, had he still possessed it, on her veracity. He glanced round inquiringly at the others.
They sat there with blank faces and, after a moment, each in turn denied having had any hand in the matter, so the episode was closed. But it left an uncomfortable feeling and, as Lavina was such an inveterate smoker, those who did not know her as well as her father remained under the impression that she had taken a greater number of the cigarettes than she would admit.
She knew what they were thinking but nothing would have induced her to protest her innocence further; and she was extremely intrigued at the thought that the unusual conditions had already produced a sneak-thief and liar among them. Who it was she had no idea but, with the leagues of water on every side of them and no sign of land, she felt that time would show.
Adrift
The whole of that second day they spent nursing their hurts and recovering from their bouts of sickness. There were many things still to be done to put the Ark ship-shape but they felt too fagged out to give their attention to it and sat about dozing or speculating on what sort of fate the future might hold for them.
On the third morning after the flood it was still cloudy, but as the weather was calm all of them except Sam and Oliver put on their warmest clothes and went outside to get some exercise by walking round the platform. Although they had little hope of seeing a ship or raft with other survivors, they had kept a fruitless watch all through the previous days on the chance that they might sight a piece of high land which was still above the waters. Now as they made the first circuit of the sphere, they strained their eyes once again to peer into the distance by the pale, wintry, morning light, but in every direction the greenish-grey ocean stretched away unbroken to the horizon.
It was a depressing spectacle for, apart from their own Utter loneliness, they saw many evidences of the terrible fate which had stricken Britain. As the Ark drifted gently westward on the current the strangest collection of flotsam and jetsam bobbed along beside it, amongst which were great trees, chicken coops, odd pieces of furniture and dead cattle, poultry and human beings. Once they saw a structure which they thought might be another ark with living people in it, but as 't drifted closer it proved to be only a wooden barn. At another time they saw an overturned boat and a little later the wreck-age of an aeroplane.