SWNOVELS Chapter 26 (part 1)
First the good news. MY COMPUTER HAS BEEN FIXED!!!!!!! and guess what? I had it fixed for free :D My dad so kindly helped me out and did everything :D :D :D (yes, he really is so amazing!)
The not so good news is my teacher just LOADED me up with homework :/ So, I wasn't able to get the entire chapter complete thanks to that. But I did write a part of it, and I figured, why not post it, just so I wouldn't keep you waiting. And seeing my computer is back, I shouldn't have much trouble getting the other part finished.
So here you go, enjoy, enjoy and more is coming :D
************************************************************************************
Chapter 26 (part 1)
The Admiral had been sure that Wesley’s visit would go splendidly. He secretly hoped that Oceana might be able to convince Wesley to travel to Scotland and make peace with his father. It was about time the long lost father and the long lost son found each other. The hard part was getting that idea through Wesley’s thick head. Here was the living proof that his adopted son was really a highlander, even though he had long lost his accent, that obstinate Scottish skull remained unchanged. Admiral Chesterton hoped Oceana would be able to get through to him, love tends to change people, or so people said. Wesley’s behavior yesterday didn’t exactly help in proving that theory true.
Needless to say, Admiral Chesterton was very surprised when Wesley came back home long before expected.
“I’m guessing you meeting didn’t go very well,” he said.
“It didn’t happen at all. Oceana left for home last night.”
“Ah, you see, you should have gone yesterday. Learn this lesson, Wesley my boy, never put off things for tomorrow, because tomorrow may never come.”
The Admiral’s maximums only annoyed Wesley all the more. “Yes, thank you Admiral.”
“Now don’t be cross with me, my boy, better tell me what you plan to do now?”
“She left me a note,” Wesley pulled out the piece of paper.
“Oh? How romantic. Is it something very personal or are you willing to share it with your old Admiral?”
“Read it all you want, it is nothing more than Robin’s parting speech from a Mid Summer Night’s Dream.”
“Oooh, Shakespeare, very romantic indeed.”
“Romantic perhaps, but I can’t quite understand what she means by it. I know, I know, I’m supposed to read in between the lines, but I can’t understand her message.”
“That is because you know nothing of poetry,” Admiral Chesterton grumbled, “I’ve told you time and again that as an officer you must not only be educated in the world of war, but also the world of art and literature. You are a gentleman as much as you are a soldier.”
“I read plenty of literature,” Wesley argued.
“You read too much prose, but not hardly enough poetry. Poetry is the language of love, how can you expect to speak it if you cannot understand it? Your mermaid here seems to speak it fluently. Come, give me the poem. Lucky for you I am fluent in speaking and understanding poetry, even if I am an old, crusty bachelor.” Admiral Chesterton took the paper out of Wesley’s outstretched hand.
“If we the shadows have offended,” he read aloud, “think but this and all is mended. That you have but slumbered here, while these visions did appear. And this weak and idle theme no more yield but a dream…seriously, Wesley, what is there not to understand? You have to be a true simpleton to not get what she is trying to get across.”
“Oh, I understood that part,” Wesley defended himself, “She’s saying goodbye and for me to think of her as a dream. So if that is it then why doesn’t she just end the poem there?”
“Gentles do not reprehend, if you pardon, we will mend--Clear as day to me, don’t be mad at her, if you will forgive her, she will try to make amends.”
“If she is trying to make amends then why did she leave before I had a chance to apologize?”
“And as I am an honest Puck, if we have unearnèd luck, now to ’scape the serpent’s tongue, We will make amends ere long Else the Puck a liar call.—That is basically the same thing as what was written earlier. She is an honest girl and if she has truly offended you, to escape anger she will try to make it better, and if she doesn’t then you can call her a liar. So good night unto you all. Give me your hands if we be friends, and Robin shall restore amends. Ah Beautiful, just beautiful, so poetic and so creative.” Admiral Chesterton looked up from the note to find himself looking at Wesley’s annoyed face. He cleared his throat and returned to the matter at hand.“So to sum it all up, if you are angry beyond repair, just think of her as something you dreamed, if you are willing to forgive her, she will try her best to make it up to you.”
“But how can I tell her I’m not angry if she’s taken off ?”
“You’ve got to go after her, Wesley. It’s a test of honor we have here, I don’t know if she meant it as one, but that what is has turned out to be. If you really want that girl, Wesley, you’ve got to travel to Scotland and tell her so. It is a story as old as time, if you want the girl--fight for her. Don't expect her to just walk into your arms, you must prove her that you are worthy of her love and affections.”
“I don’t want to travel to Scotland,” Wesley stubbornly replied, “because that will mean facing my father, and I don’t want to do that. I may have found out from Mrs. Blackwood that he wasn’t as bad as I first made him out to be, but still, we have gone our separate ways; ways that lead in complete opposite directions. I am an officer in the King's Army, he’s a smuggler. For years he broke the law and for years I hunted men like him. I’m the predator, he’s the prey, and yes, I know he is retired, but still, his kind and my kind don’t mix. You see, we’ve reached the point of no return, and I can’t go back, even if I wanted to, which quite frankly, I don’t.”
“Wesley, I’m afraid if you want Oceana, you are going to have to accept your father as well. One won’t come without the other. It’s either both or none.”
“I am not ready to face my father after all these years.” Wesley’s voice was calm, but final.
Admiral Chesterton shrugged his shoulders. “Then I am afraid you have lost her for good. Oh well, I was of the opinion that you are not handsome enough for her anyway.”
Wesley frowned at this statement and cast a dark gaze at the Admiral. He really wasn’t helping him.
Admiral Chesterton understood the look and leaned forward a little. “Wesley, you are no longer a child, I don’t have to take you by the hand and try and help you find your way home. You are nearly twenty seven years of age, you have faced tempest at sea and come out the stronger for it. This is also a tempest, a tempest of the heart, and such tempests can only be faced alone. This time, if you want to find the way home, you must do it on your own. I believe this journey will truly help in making you a man.”
Wesley understood what the Admiral was trying to tell him, he just didn’t know if he was ready to accept it. He had understood from the moment he heard Oceana was gone that if he ever wanted to get her back, he would have to restore the bridge between him and his father, but he didn’t know if he could do that. It is not that he actually hated his father, it was just that he no longer cared what happened to him. Could he make himself care? Could he find the love a son is supposed to have for his father? Wesley was very torn, torn between his love for Oceana and the bitterness he felt towards his father. Admiral Chesterton was right, this was a tempest of the heart. Was the Admiral really speaking the truth when he said that such tempests had to be faced alone? And if he were to try and find help, to whom should he turn to get it? And honestly, why did this all have to be so complicated?
*********************************************************************
I just wanted to add a little note here and say that when Wesley says Callum's 'kind' and Wesley's 'kind' don't mix, what he means is that Wesley is now an officer, and that means he is a considerable step higher in society than Callum. Before, officers were of the high class, and your ordinary everyday soldiers couldn't get promoted to officer, it was a title you were generally born into. And though Wesley wasn't born into the upper class, because the Admiral was an officer, and Wesley became his adopted son, Admiral was able to pass on to him the title of officer and gentleman. Nobody else knows that Wesley if from low beginnings and that is why Wesley strives to cover it, or else he would be looked down on as someone who is not a 'gentleman'.